by Almney King
“I don’t think I’ll risk it,” West commented.
“Me either,” Kitty agreed.
“Just cut the damn thing open already,” Raine ordered. We looked at him. It seemed he was as impatient as he was arrogant.
“Alright,” Urban said. He drew a knife, pressing the blade against the fruit. We waited. “Well,” he said, “here it goes.”
Just as he was about to start, I heard a noise. “Hold it,” I said. They looked up at me.
“What is it?” West asked.
I looked to the trees. There was a strange humming sound coming from the woods. “Something’s headed this way,” I said.
Raine and West picked up their weapons. “I hear it too,” Kitty said. “What is that?”
The hiss grew louder. “I don’t know, but let’s get a move on before we find out,” Raine ordered. I picked up my life pack and readied the mr2. “Let’s go,” Raine said.
From a distance, I saw someone break from the trees. He was running, shooting wildly into the wood line.
“Who the hell is that?” West asked.
As the figure neared, I recognized exactly who it was. “Is that...”
“Tank!” Kitty shouted. She tried running after him, but I held her back.
A red mist drifted over the beach, swallowing the four arsenals behind Tank. “Run!” he shouted. “Run!” Raine and I took the lead, racing through the sand. Screams filled the air. The dark cloud grew louder and louder, rising high above us.
Something hissed in my ear. I looked to the left. It was an insect, and there were thousands of them all around us. One of them landed on my shoulder and bit into my skin. I caught it in my hand and crushed it.
They came one after the other, latching onto my arms and legs. I tried fending them off, but there were too many. The swarm thickened. I saw only red, and the flutter of a million papery wings. Over the shrill buzzing, someone screamed my name.
Glancing back, I saw Kitty turn and race over to Tank. He was kneeling in the sand with his hands to his throat. I turned and chased after her.
“Tank, get up!” she cried.
There was no way he could. The bite wounds he suffered were a fleshy red, the skin bubbling all around his neck. “He can’t breathe,” I said.
“Do something!” Kitty screamed, shooting into the swarm. I moved behind him, searching his gear until I found his case of halos. “What are you doing?” Kitty shouted. “Those are...”
“I know what they are,” I said. I uncapped the vial and stuck him with it. He inhaled, choking on the blood in his throat.
“Tank,” Kitty shouted.
He waved his hand. “I’m good,” he said heavily.
“Let’s move,” I told him.
He nodded. I helped him up, and the three of us were running again. Tank couldn’t keep up. The longer we ran, the farther behind he became. Kitty looked back, ready to stop again.
“Go!” he snapped.
I held Kitty by the arm. “Come on!” I ordered.
“We can’t leave him!” she screamed.
I looked back. Tank was gone. He had been swallowed by the swarm. I felt another sting against my neck. “He’s gone,” I said. Kitty turned. I pulled at her again, forcing her to keep moving.
Suddenly, the world began to slow. I could hear my heart beating. I felt the earth turn. Then I saw Kitty. She was ahead of me. She was moving so fast—too fast. Then she was falling, sinking deep underground. It must have been an illusion, but when I heard her scream, everything became real.
I was quick, skidding in the sand to catch her. “Celeste!”
“I have you,” I said. Our fingers brushed and then she fell. The sand closed in around her and then she was gone. “Kitty!” I clawed at the ground. Where did she go? “Kitty!” I dug deep. “Kitty!” I dug deeper. There was only sand.
I tried to move, but my legs were caught. The ground was pulling at me. I was sinking. The sand sucked me in and I fell into the dark, tumbling through a tunnel of rock. My body beat hard against the walls, ripping and rolling until I hit the ground.
All was quiet. I sat up with a dull pain in my side. The air was thick and smelled of rot. Even the darkness was heavy, so physical I felt it creeping all around me. I lit my halo-com to brighten the way. The cave walls were long and narrow, branching into several different channels. They were smooth too, perfectly circular. These walls were not made by water.
I took the first tunnel on the right. My halo-com couldn’t catch a signal. I was blind. Eerie sounds came from the dark. These sounds, they were following me. There was something living down here, and as the sounds came closer, I finally realized it: I was being hunted.
I picked up my pace, reaching the end of the tunnel. The cave stood tall in the dark, but still there was light. I looked up, searching for that wink of sun. But it wasn’t the daylight. It was something else, and there were hundreds of them, thousands of bright cocoons clinging to the walls.
Then I heard it. It was behind me. I turned, aiming the mr2. The creature coiled out from the dark. It hissed, rising high into the air. I stood my ground and I fired. The creature retaliated. Six powerful limbs shot from its body. I dogged the first and ducked beneath the second arm of muscle. A smaller tentacle sprung from the left, crashing into my side. I flew and hit the wall. The pain was bearable, but I couldn’t move my arm. My shoulder was out of place.
Suddenly, I was being dragged. The creature caught me by the leg, and with a single pull, lifted me into the air. Everything was moving. I couldn’t get loose. The creature moaned. Its flesh was dilating, layers of slavering skin peeling back over a grisly pit of teeth. I screamed, and out of nowhere, my terror was heard. From down below, someone was shooting.
The worm shrieked and threw me to the side. I fell. And just as I neared the ground, someone caught me.
We hit the ground, sliding through a slush of mud. “On your feet, Red.” It was Tank. I was shocked. Back on the beach, I thought he’d been lost.
He pulled me up and snapped my shoulder into place. I stumbled, trying to collect myself through the pain. “Red!” Tank shouted.
“I hear you,” I said.
“I’ll distract it from the front. You attack from the rear.” He ripped a laser grenade from his life pack. “Get going!”
I did as I was told. The creature turned to me, lashing its limbs. I fired, barely escaping beneath the next twisty arm. A fourth tentacle swept low to the ground, speeding forward. It came too fast. I jumped, landing on top of the arm of muscle, then sprinted up the spine of the beast. It thrashed, arching his back to shake me.
Then I jumped, turning in the air with the mr2 at aim. I fired, sniping the beast in the eye. The creature howled. I flipped again and met the ground with a firm landing. “Let’s go!” Tank ordered.
I followed him back into the tunnels. The creature’s howls echoed deep in the caves. They faded slowly, and once they had gone, there was nothing but the silence again.
“You good, Red?” Tank asked.
“Could be better,” I murmured, messaging my shoulder.
“I see that. You seem a little off your game.”
“Don’t worry about it,” I assured. I wondered if he had noticed, somehow, that I was different.
“What happened to Kitty?”
“I don’t know. She fell just like we did,” I said.
Tank looked to the ceiling. “What the hell was that anyway? Everything started slowing down all of a sudden.”
“I have no idea. I felt the same thing.”
“This place is crazy as shit,” Tank uttered. He was right. Nothing made sense. This world, we weren’t ready for it. Regardless of all our training, nothing we learned had prepared us for this.
Tank whistled all of a sudden. “We’ve hit the end of the road, Red.” He shined his halo-com back and forth. It was true. We had come to a dead end. I pressed my hand against the wall. It was mud, unlike the rest of rocky tunnel.
“It’s wa
rm,” I whispered.
“Is it?”
I scratched at the soil, and tiny crumbs of rock fell to the ground. “We’re near the surface,” I said.
“Stand back,” Tank ordered. I moved aside. He gave his shoulders a roll then blasted his fist through the dirt wall. Light soared into the tunnel. Tank kicked down the remaining soil and stepped into the forest. “Red, check this out,” he called.
I stepped into the open, inhaling the fresh air. Tank was right. This sight was something to see. The forest was full of sand, large blue dunes of sand. “Where in the world are we?” Tank said. He brought up a map on his halo-com.
I sat in the sand. The woods were beautiful. The tall grasses budded with flowers and the trees were bright with color. “Here,” Tank offered. He handed me his canteen.
“I have my own,” I told him. He shrugged.
“Don’t worry about it. Just take it.” I relented and took a long drink of water. “It looks like we’re still in the charted area,” Tank said, sitting beside me.
“That’s good. Did you pick up where the others went?”
“I couldn’t get anything. It’s just you and me for now.” My stomach churned as he spoke. “Haven’t eaten?” Tank asked. He pulled his pack from over his shoulder. “I have some fruit. It’s damn good.”
“I would have, if those things hadn’t attacked.”
Tank fished the fruit from his pack and tossed it to me. It looked like gupa, the fruit Urban had found. The inside was like a pomegranate, but the beads of juice were blue and far larger. I took a bite. It was sweet and smooth as velvet. “You like it?” Tank asked.
I nodded. “I’ve never eaten anything this good before.”
Tank chuckled. “You’re telling me.”
“What happened with your team anyway?”
Tank leaned back against the sand, gazing toward the sky. “Ah, man. It was nuts. All five of us finally hooked up. We ended up losing a member. She never landed. Anyway, after we rested, we started east. We came across these flowers hanging down from the trees. They were massive. All of a sudden, the flowers opened up, thousands of them, and then those things started flying out. They were some mean sons of guns. We were running like mad men trying to get away. Then we came across you guys.”
I took a glance at his bite wounds. “You skin looks better.”
“Thanks to you. That shot of halos worked like magic. I didn’t think it could do that.”
“We’re not supposed to know,” I uttered.
Tank sat up. “What do you mean?”
I finished the fruit and tossed the rind into the sand. “Never mind.”
“Don’t keep things from me, Red. It doesn’t sit well with me.”
I looked at him. He was serious, his eyes stern and focused. I wondered for a moment if I could reveal my past to him. Tank trusted me to some degree, or rather, he trusted Celeste. Perhaps not with his life, but he did trust her with the truth. Celeste didn’t lie. She had no fear of telling the truth. But things were different. I was different.
“I need to find Elric.”
Tank gave me a confused look. “What do you mean?”
“You were thinking of reporting to New Eden,” I said. “Well don’t.”
Tank stood up. “Why the hell not? Our mission’s been delayed. We don’t have a choice.”
I got to my feet. “I have nothing to do with this mission,” I told him. “Not anymore.”
Tank froze. He stood there for a moment, unable to move. He looked shocked. He looked betrayed. He didn’t accept nor believe what I had just said. But I couldn’t run anymore, not from him, and not from the truth.
“So what are you saying? You’re abandoning everything? You’re going rogue?”
“Even if I explained it, you wouldn’t understand.”
“What does Elric have to do with it?” he snapped. His eyes narrowed. I could see his thoughts spinning in the hard of his glare. “You want him to follow you? Are you out of your mind?” he hissed.
Tank thought I wouldn’t notice, but I did. His right hand was steadily moving, reaching back for his mr2. I didn’t want to fight him. If I did, I would kill him. There was no way he could win against me. “We made a pact, Red. Tell me you’re not going back on your word.”
“Come with me,” I said.
Tank was silent for a moment. “You’ve really lost your shit haven’t you? I heard about what happens to those who go rogue. They don’t kill them, not at first. They take them back to humanization. They cut their brains open. Then they go in and get their hands all nice and dirty. And that’s just the beginning. Well I’ve been through that, Red. And I’m sure as hell am not going back. Not for anyone.”
I understood. There were things more frightening than this mission, more frightening than death. Tank feared ARTIKA. Nothing could make him betray them. They owned more than his body. They owned his mind. And with it, they could do anything. “You’ve changed, Celeste.” His hand was close now. He would draw the mr2 any second.
I stepped back. “I get it,” I said. “I’ll go.”
Tank shook his head. “I can’t let you do that.” He drew his weapon and fired.
I ducked behind the trees and dashed into the thicket. He followed me, shooting wildly. I leapt across the sand. The bullets came flying and there wasn’t much cover. I used the trees as best I could to dodge the whiz of fire.
I climbed the sand, skidding and sliding up and down the hills. Tank was relentless. He chased me over the dunes, shooting, the bullets cutting quick through the air. Some of the trees caught fire, caving in around me. I dodged the burning timbers, the sand slipping fast beneath my feet. There was nothing to grab, nothing to hold on to, and I slid, rolling into the underbrush.
Something caught my ankle on the way down and jerked me into the air. I found myself upside down, hanging back and forth above the ground. “You’ve got to be kidding me,” I growled. I heard Tank moving through the trees. He stood directly below me, scanning the area with his weapon. He couldn’t see me. I was too high up.
Moments later, he gave up and disappeared into the jungle. As soon as he left, I tried to free myself. I reached up, curling at the waist to grab my ankles, but the attempt was futile. I was moving too much.
I took another approach, swinging back and forth until I caught the trunk of the tree. I began to climb, all the way up to the sling of the trap. Once I reached it, I cut myself loose.
I rested.
I realized then how large the trees were. Most of them were so tall they disappeared into the heavens. I wished Mother could see this world, and Fern too. In Helio Tellus, there was nothing. There were no trees, no flowers, no wind, no sun. That empire I once thought as brilliant and mighty was dead. It wasn’t just a grave. It was a world of suffering. But even still, it was my world. It was home.
Tank would never understand. I wanted him to know the truth, to be free of ARTIKA. But I was alone. For some reason only my memories had returned. And it made me wonder about the others, their lives, their beliefs before they were taken. ARTIKA was too cruel. What they did to us, it wasn’t just our memories they took. They took our souls. That’s why Tank was afraid. A man without a soul had everything to fear.
I pulled my canteen from my pack and took a drink. The wind was picking up, stirring the wildlife of the forest. Everything was moving, and in between the sounds of nature, I heard a noise. It was a soft noise, like a tender knocking. I looked around, and then I saw it. An arrow had been fired, the tip of it blinking red.
I threw myself from the tree a second before the arrow exploded. I landed on the next branch, almost tumbling over the edge. Smoke clouded the forest. I drew my weapon. My enemies were close. There were several of them, and they had me surrounded.
As the dust cleared, I could see them leaping through the trees. They were fast, incredibly fast. One of them leapt from above me. The creature landed with power, a rush of energy rippling through the air. I wouldn’t fire just yet.
I was too outnumbered.
The creature sailed from the fog. Shape by shape, I watched it appear, and when I finally saw it, I lowered the mr2. I was lost, as if I had fallen out of myself. This creature was a native. It was a Meridian, and the beauty of him stunned me.
He looked like the lavender white of the moon. His skin was bright and smooth, marked with these elegant symbols. The markings were made of scales, and each small ribbon glistened down the length of his body. His hair was like lightning, running long over his shoulders. But it was his eyes that held me. I couldn’t look away. They were fierce and narrow like the eyes of a wolf. I saw a whole other world in those eyes, an ancient and secret world.
The native drew his sword. “Speak them now, hai’ek,” he demanded, “your final words before death.” His voice was like the wind, sharp and powerful. I couldn’t speak. I didn’t dare to. The presence of this creature overpowered me.
Rustling sounded in the trees. The natives were all around me, at least fifty of them. Some were male, others female. Their beauty amazed me. Everything about them came in color. They were even clothed in beauty; colorful sashes and bright beaded shawls. Their armor was light and delicately crafted. They were warriors. And just like the Meridian before me, their eyes were on fire. It was a tender light, but still seeable from the distance.
“Have you nothing to say?” The Meridian ordered.
“Who are you?” I asked.
Several other Meridians suddenly landed on the tree. “It seems to be alone,” one said. He had spoken in Hedai. “We should slay it now, Aieti.”
Aieti—I remembered it from one of Styler’s briefings. It was a powerful title, a name only a superior few could carry. Whoever this Meridian was, he was of great nobility. And when he spoke, he answered in Hedai. He looked at me a moment longer, like he was searching for something. “Patience, Zurel. There is something I must see first.”
“What is it, Aieti?”
“There is something about this one,” the Meridian answered. “I must see it.” He took a step forward, and I raised the mr2. The natives behind him stood still, but they were anxious I could tell. “You have no power, hai’ek.”