Mega 5: Murder Island

by Jake Bible

  “You are a sick bastard,” Kinsey said.

  “What would you propose, Ms. Thorne?” Ballantine asked. “We head to the nearest port and just wave goodbye?”

  “Yes,” Kinsey said. But her voice betrayed her doubt in her own response.

  “Yes, of course,” Ballantine said and nodded. “We expose ourselves to the world by just steaming our oh so unrecognizable ship into any old port with the hope that the place is not covered by surveillance.”

  “We find a small port,” Kinsey said. “One out of the way that won’t have modern security.”

  “Is this port on Mars?” Ballantine asked. “Because that is the only place where a port of that description exists. One does not exist on this planet.”

  “Satellites,” Darren said, bringing the boat around a curve in the island. They were getting close to their harbor and the B3. “Kinsey, every satellite Ballantine’s enemies have at their disposal will be watching the ports. Especially the ones that have low tech and little surveillance. We’ve probably ruined the trade for half of the world’s smugglers.”

  “I never thought of that,” Ballantine said. “How rude of me to do that to hard-working smugglers.”

  “We can’t kill her,” Kinsey said. “I won’t let that happen.”

  “Regardless of your convictions, Ms. Thorne, our new friend’s choices are very limited,” Ballantine replied. “Ours even more limited than hers. But we’re getting ahead of ourselves. This is not something we need to worry about until after we have left this island.”

  “After we get Shane back,” Kinsey said.

  “Precisely,” Ballantine replied. He pointed at the harbor as Darren brought the boat around one last curve. “Here we are. I advise you grab some food and get thoroughly hydrated while I bring up the limited schematics I have of this island.”

  “You do have schematics?” Kinsey asked. “Real ones this time?”

  “Of course,” Ballantine said. “They should be fairly accurate now that I know for certain which island we are on.”

  “Murder Island,” Kinsey said. “That’s what fucking island we’re on.”

  “Well put,” Ballantine chuckled. “Well put.”

  ***

  Shane stayed put. He didn’t dare move, didn’t dare breathe, didn’t even dare to twitch his taint. He stayed right where he was and played dead.

  It was easier than it sounded since he was covered in spider guts and pinned to the ground by the corpse of the spider that the guts had belonged to.

  Why stay put? Why play dead?

  Shane had erroneously assumed that the spider he had first met was the only spider in the area. Big mistake.

  As soon as he had pulled the trigger on his M4, which shot like a wild, bucking bronco, Shane had realized how big of a mistake he’d made. The spider in front of him had leapt and he was luckily a skilled enough shooter to rip the thing wide open, sending steaming, yellow-black guts exploding all over him, before it could reach him with its barbed front legs and very long, sharp mandibles. The moment his M4 stopped barking lead, he heard the hissing from above.

  It wasn’t hissing from the spider that was about to collide with him, obviously, which told Shane, in that split second before impact, that he had more company. It was a spider family affair and stood to reason the others, however many there were, weren’t going to be so happy that he’d just mutilated brother, or sister, with a dozen bullets.

  So, Shane stayed put.

  While the spider corpse was surprisingly light for its size, there was a smell that came from the oozing innards that threatened to give Shane away. It was a stench that he’d only experienced when coming across kill pits filled with rotting corpses. The spider had only been dead for a few minutes, yet it stank like it had been sitting in the hot sun for a week while stray dogs crapped all around it.

  Not pleasant. Made breathing difficult. Or at least made measured, stealthy breathing difficult. Which was the kind of breathing he needed to do if he was going to stay hidden from the Family Arachnid.

  There was a skittering close by and Shane held his breath. He tried to let his body go slack, but the spider corpse on him was balanced just right, and he was afraid if he didn’t keep his muscles tensed, then it would shift and that would draw unwanted attention.

  Something crawled by his head, a brief brush of hairy legs then gone. It took all of Shane’s willpower not to shudder at the thing’s touch, even with the helmet on. More skittering and several other somethings crawled past him.

  Then they were on him. A dozen or so. With the little light his goo-covered suit put out, Shane could see that the somethings were only as big as cats. But there were a lot of them.

  Babies.

  The damn spider had babies. Shane had killed a mother spider and her little spiderlings were crawling onto the corpse. He felt awful. He felt guilty. Yes, they were spiders. Huge spiders, sure. And he was defending himself. But he didn’t want to rob them of their mother. That was just unfortunate.

  The awful feeling went away when he quickly realized what the babies were doing. At first, he thought they were mourning, crawling across the mother spider corpse to comfort themselves. Nope. They were having a snack. It was a funeral and wake all in one. They’d skipped the casserole part of the wake, but kept the stuff your face full of food because of grief part.

  Lovely.

  A chunk of mama splattered onto Shane’s helmet and he winced. He didn’t want to, but it was spider guts and had surprised him. Another big mistake.

  The babies stopped feeding. They froze in place. Then as one they turned their many eyes onto Shane. They inched forward, still as one, paused, inched a little more, paused again.

  Shane’s hand, hidden under the mama corpse and a layer of gooey guts, still held the M4. The thing had zero accuracy, but Shane doubted he needed accuracy at close range. Maybe if he killed only a couple of them the rest would retreat and go hide their furry, eight-legged bodies in some other part of the underground hellscape Shane was trapped in. Wouldn’t that be nice.

  They inched closer, all perched on the corpse, eyes looking down at Shane’s helmeted head and shoulders which were all that were visible. Shane began to wonder if he could get the M4 free in time to defend himself. The mama corpse wasn’t heavy, but now it had several babies standing on it. He was fast, but probably not beat a brood of spiders fast. One of them was bound to get him before he could start firing. The beetles’ mandibles may not have been able to get through his suit, but he wasn’t so sure about huge spider fangs.

  He willed himself to be as still as the corpse he was covered by.

  After a couple minutes, the spiders went back to eating their mother, liquefying solid parts so they could suck them up with apparent, and quite noisy, relish.

  Shane stayed put.

  ***

  Gunnar came into the conference room with the good news. Everyone sighed with relief.

  “Thorne’s a badass,” Lake said. “I knew he’d pull through.”

  “From what I can tell, it was a minor heart attack,” Gunnar said. “It wouldn’t have been so severe and hard on him if there weren’t other circumstances.”

  “Like running from a giant swarm of blowflies,” Darren said.

  “Like Mike dying and then Shane being lost,” Gunnar said.

  “Right,” Darren said.

  “I know you are all compartmentalizing things, shoving grief and worry aside in order to stay in combat mode,” Gunnar said. “But don’t think that it all isn’t affecting you. It is.”

  “I know,” Darren replied. Gunnar gave him a look. “I do! Knock it off, Gun.”

  “We are all feeling it,” Kinsey said. “But we do still have a job to do.”

  “Yes, about that,” Ballantine said and swiped at the table so that the screen appeared. “This is our island. While Kinsey has so accurately called it Murder Island, it actually has a name.”

  “Don’t care,” Kinsey said. “It’s Murder Island, i
t will always be Murder Island, and anyone that doesn’t think it should be called Murder Island can go spend a day naked in the middle of it and see what they think then.”

  “I’m good with Murder Island,” Lucy said.

  “Regardless of what it is named,” Ballantine continued, “there are many things on the island that can, and will, try to kill all of us. The fact that we haven’t been attacked in this harbor tells me that things have fallen completely apart and what we are dealing with are the remnants.”

  “You call that crazy crap remnants?” Darren asked. “Jesus.”

  “What the hell is up with that computer voice?” Kinsey asked. “Is there someone else on the island or not?”

  “No,” Ballantine said. “Like I said before, there was an automated protocol in place. It has stayed in place, which is good since it helps prevent any of the altered species from being removed and spread out to the rest of the world.”

  “Removed? Who the hell would be stupid enough to do that?” Darren asked.

  “Most of humanity,” Lucy answered.

  “Very true,” Ballantine said. “But, ignoring humanity’s idiocy for a moment, let me explain briefly how the island is set up.”

  He swiped at the screen and the schematic of the island’s surface was replaced by the iconic image of the DVD of The Lion King.

  “I give you, the circle of life,” Ballantine said, smiling. The smile faltered. “What? No? Alright.”

  He swiped away the cover and brought up images of the various species that were on the island.

  “Each species has a mortal enemy to help keep them in check,” Ballantine said. “The beetles eat the blowflies, the beetles are then hunted and eaten by the birds. There are spiders to eat the birds—”

  “I’m sorry, did you say spiders to eat the birds?” Darren asked. “Those huge crows we met?”

  “Yes,” Ballantine said.

  “How fucking big are these spiders?” Darren asked.

  “Big enough to eat those birds,” Ballantine said. “I can’t say for sure how big the spiders are now, since I am positive these files are outdated and the creatures have certainly bred themselves larger over the years.”

  “You and your size,” Kinsey said. “Overcompensate much?”

  Ballantine ignored her.

  “Here is what we are dealing with in order to rescue Mr. Reynolds,” Ballantine said. He paused and looked at the faces in the conference room. “I assume that is still the plan, yes? To risk all of your lives in order to save one man? The odds of all of you coming back are very slim. As of this moment, there are only three of you.”

  “I’ll go,” Lake said.

  “I’ll go too,” Popeye added.

  “No, we need both of you here working on the ship,” Ballantine said. “That is non-negotiable.”

  “I bet I could negotiate it with my Desert Eagle,” Lake said.

  “It’s cool, Marty,” Darren said. “Ballantine is right. We need you here on the ship with Popeye and Cougher. If we don’t have a working ship to come back to, then there’s no reason for a rescue.”

  “I will go,” Ronald said from the doorway. “I apologize for eavesdropping, as I was not invited to this meeting, but I do believe I could be of service. I am not one for using weapons such as the firearms the team is used to wielding, but my superior strength, agility, and size should be of great help in this mission.”

  “Can’t argue with that,” Darren said. “But this is a combat mission, not just a rescue; we expect to have to engage some crazy creatures.”

  “Darren, I am considered by most of the world to be one of those crazy creatures,” Ronald said.

  “You could get hurt,” Kinsey said. “You aren’t trained like us.”

  “No, I am not formally trained the way you have been, but I do know how to fight,” Ronald said. “All gigantopithecuses know how to fight. It is part of our genetic makeup as well as our childhood upbringing. When you are a creature as hunted as we are, albeit by mostly morons and delusional individuals, you must learn to defend yourself.”

  “I am going to object,” Ballantine said. “But I won’t veto the idea.”

  “You could no more veto my personal choice as I could veto yours,” Ronald said as he stepped fully into the conference room to address everyone. “Or anyone else’s, for that matter. If I decide to go, then the decision is done. It is simply a matter of the team accepting my offer. I would never force myself on a team that has been working together for as long as Grendel has. Darren is the team leader, so it is up to him whether I go or not.”

  “As long as you understand the risks,” Darren reiterated. “There are going to be a lot.”

  “I understand,” Ronald nodded.

  “Then welcome to the mission,” Darren said. “I’m not going to say welcome to the team, since this is a one and done situation. Once back on the ship, you’re a scientist again, not muscle.”

  “Of course,” Ronald said. “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

  “I am still going to object,” Ballantine said. “Strictly because of that scientific brain of yours. I can’t risk losing that.”

  “Objection noted, rejected, and held highly suspect considering the selfish wording,” Ronald said. “Why is it only you that would be losing my brain? I would be losing it, as well as the rest of the crew.”

  “I believe you know what I mean, Ronald,” Ballantine said.

  “Perhaps,” Ronald said. “Perhaps not.”

  “Off topic,” Kinsey snapped. “Shane. He’s the topic. How do we get him?”

  “You will enter here,” Ballantine said, pointing at the spot on the schematic that everyone was very familiar with.

  “You’re joking,” Lucy said.

  “Come off it, Ballantine,” Darren said. “Now you’re just being a dick.”

  “Hardly,” Ballantine said. “I know no one wants to revisit where Mike perished, but it is the most expedient way to get to where I believe you will find Shane. If he is still alive.”

  “He’s still alive,” Max said as he joined the group.

  “How’s Darby?” Kinsey asked.

  Max shrugged. “Better? I don’t know.”

  “How do you know Shane is still alive?” Darren asked.

  “I just know,” Max replied, tapping at his head. “It’s a brother thing.”

  “You guys ain’t twins,” Popeye said. “Only twins have that.”

  “Bullshit,” Max replied. “Shane isn’t dead. He’s surviving. He’ll be there when we get there.”

  “We? Whoa, dude, you’re not coming,” Darren said. “Not with that leg.”

  Max flexed his leg and showed them his calf.

  “I got it braced up and Ingrid has some serious super glue stuff jammed in the wound,” Max said. “I won’t bleed out while we’re on the op. I’m not as fast as usual, but I can keep up and more than hold my own.”

  “Ingrid should have passed the super glue by me,” Gunnar said. “I’m the doctor on this ship, not her.”

  “You doctored me up fine,” Max said. “This was structural integrity. Engineering. I needed a quick fix and she gave it to me.”

  “Yes, but is the glue toxic?” Gunnar asked. “It could make you sick.”

  “Bad Chinese food can make me sick,” Max said. “Doesn’t mean I don’t love me some dim sum.”

  “That’s a shit argument,” Gunnar replied.

  “Makes me want Chinese food,” Lake said. “And a cold beer.”

  Everyone sighed. Cold beer was missed by all.

  “So we agree that I’m going?” Max asked. “I am still part of Grendel. I have more right than Ronald. No offense.”

  “None taken,” Ronald said.

  “Fine, dude, you can come,” Darren said. “But you keep your head on the op, not on what could be happening to your brother.”

  “Got it,” Max said. He scratched at the scarring across his neck. “Yeah, um, one other thing.”

  “What
would that be, Mr. Reynolds?” Ballantine asked.

  Max squinted at everyone then let out a long whistle of air.

  “Oh, for fuck’s sake, just say it!” Kinsey snapped.

  “Chill, Sis, chill,” Max replied, holding out his palms. “This isn’t easy. You all are gonna think I’m crazy, which I am for even asking this, but we need every hand on deck, right? We’re down Uncle Vinny and Shane on the team. And Mike. We need at least one more person to make this op work.”

  “One more would be ideal, I would venture,” Ballantine replied. “But all personnel are accounted for. Unless you plan to ask one of the elves or perhaps Boris, but I would consider that unwise.”

  “No, none of the nerds,” Max said then smiled at Ronald. “No offense.”

  “None taken,” Ronald said. “I do not believe anyone has called me a nerd before. I do not fit the stereotype.”

  “Right, yeah, so we need one more person and I know where we can find that person,” Max said. “But there’s a risk.”

  “Risk is what we do,” Darren said. “Who is it and what’s the risk?”

  Max gave everyone a sly smile.

  ***

  Darby was sitting cross-legged on top of the cage, a magazine in one hand and a sad-looking frozen waffle in the other. She glanced up as the hatch to the specimen bay opened. Four people walked in. She knew their faces, knew she should also have names to go with the faces, but the only name she knew among them was one.

  “Max,” she said and flapped the frozen waffle at him. “Do I have to get back in the cage?”

  “Do you want to get back in the cage?” Max asked.

  “No,” Darby replied. She set the magazine down and turned her body to face the others. “Who am I?”

  “Darby,” Ballantine said.

  “Wrong,” Darby said and looked at Kinsey. “Who am I?”

  “Fuck if I know, girl,” Kinsey said. “If Ballantine says you are Darby, then he’s probably lying. It’s Ballantine after all.”