Nor was it all the Ursa’s fault. Food and water were becoming tougher and tougher to come by. The demand for a safe delivery method was growing. In fact, Vander Meer had prepared notes for a commentary on that very topic. He wanted to hold the government accountable for its failure to maintain some kind of infrastructure during the crisis.
Yes, the people needed him. And when it was all over, he would get credit for his heroism. He had no doubt of that. He would be remembered as the one who bolstered the colony’s morale in its darkest hour.
Of course, there hadn’t actually been any Ursa sightings in his neighborhood. Therefore, the odds were good—no, very good—that he would get to his studio and back without coming within three or four kilometers of the monsters. But that was a detail that could be left out of his autobiography.
“Trey,” said his wife, her face streaked with tears, “I wish you wouldn’t—”
He held up a hand to stop her. “My dear, we’ve already had this conversation. You agreed that I should go.”
“I gave in,” she said. “That’s not the same.”
It wasn’t easy to leave her like this. But he was sure that other great journalists had made sacrifices. He would have to do the same thing, tears or no tears.
Vander Meer took one last glance at his children, who were sitting together in the family room, watching the official Ranger feed because there was nothing else to watch. I’ll change that, he thought. And in the process, I’ll show Michael and Elena that their father isn’t the ghoul they thought he was.
Elena had been the most anxious of them, of course. She wanted to be with her boyfriend, but Trey and Natasha had refused to let her go. She was reduced to speaking with Derrick through the vid system despite the difficulty of finding a measure of privacy for their conversations.
“I’ll be back soon enough,” he assured Natasha. “See you then, my love.”
Then he unsealed the door and cracked it open, looking straight, then left, and finally right. The streets were quiet, not a bird or insect in evidence. If anything, the utter silence was a bit unnerving. Nova Prime City had a distinct sound, a sound filled with life, and it was absent now.
“Lock it,” he told his wife, feeling a sudden chill. Then he stepped outside and closed the door behind him.
He waited a moment for Natasha to do as he had asked. When he heard the last of the dead bolts they had added slip into place, he was satisfied. Taking a deep breath, he began his walk to work. It was a hot day. Before he had gone fifty meters, he was sweating. By the time he completed his journey, he would be a dishrag. Good thing he had a change of clothes waiting for him at the studio.
Vander Meer had barely reached the end of the block when he heard the growl. It wasn’t the kind a dog made. It was too deep, too prolonged. Ursa, he thought.
But there wasn’t an Ursa around, at least none that he could see. Then he realized that the growl was coming from behind his neighbor’s house. The house right next to his!
I’ve got to get back home, he thought.
But he couldn’t move. He was frozen in place, rendered unable to speak or even breathe by the terror that took crushing hold of him. As he stood there, helpless, he saw the Ursa after all.
It was slinking along the side of his neighbor’s house. Nor was he the only one who had spotted it. From behind not only his door but others as well, he heard the rising swell of panicked voices. He could imagine the debate—run or stay put—each answer bringing its own complications and dangers.
I have to find a place to hide, he thought. Otherwise, he would be the easiest prey the creature had ever had. But he couldn’t ask someone to open a door or a window for him to find safe haven in that person’s home. He could feel cold sweat run down his back like a river, and his heart was beating so hard that it hurt.
Before he could figure out what to do, he heard another sound—not a growl but a human scream. And it was outside, not muffled by protective walls. The scream of a little girl. And there was a word in the scream, a word he could make out all too well: “Dad!”
It took him only a fraction of a second to process that it was Elena’s voice, which made no sense since she had been inside the house when he’d left. He had hugged her good-bye after breakfast. She was safe.
Then it came to him: the boy! He lived a couple of blocks away. She had waited until Vander Meer was gone and then slipped out the back door.
Again the scream, this time louder and longer and higher in pitch: “Dad!”
It was mingled with the Ursa’s growl as it moved back along the side of Vander Meer’s neighbor’s house, retracing its steps, and vanished around the corner into his neighbor’s backyard.
Time slowed for Vander Meer. He imagined that he could see the Ursa catching sight of his daughter. There would be nowhere for her to hide back there. He had torn down the swing set months earlier, having seen that even Skipper was too big for it. Not even a shed, though he had planned to erect one after Michael’s birthday.
Elena! he thought, tears running down his cheeks. She was trapped outside the safety of the house. Although she might try to plead for her brother to let her in, Michael wouldn’t do so—not when he knew full well that it would expose him and Skipper and Natasha to the same danger.
Vander Meer heard screams of pain. His baby was being killed, torn apart, and he couldn’t move to help her. He couldn’t no matter how hard he tried. He was rooted to the ground.
But it was what he heard next that truly stunned him, that awakened depths of horror in him that he didn’t know he had. It was Michael’s voice, bellowing a challenge. Michael’s voice, cursing the monster in their backyard.
Oh, no, thought Vander Meer. No no no no no …
Michael had opened the door, perhaps to distract the Ursa in an attempt to save his sister. The monster roared even more loudly than before, and a male cry of pain was added to the hideous, discordant opera playing out behind Vander Meer’s house. A thud. A series of wet chomping sounds. In his mind’s eye, Vander Meer saw the Ursa feeding on the remains of his son.
Please, he thought, not sure whom he was pleading with. Please let me go back to them. Please let me get back inside without the monster catching sight of me.
Then he heard plaster and metal splinter. Glass broke. The creature was attacking the house itself or had crashed into it. Whatever was happening, Vander Meer knew the Ursa was after Natasha and Skipper.
His wife’s cry came as a grim confirmation. Run, thought Vander Meer. But no one ran out of the house, and the creature didn’t come out, either. At least not until sometime after someone had gotten hold of Vander Meer and dragged him away.
His family. His flesh and blood. No, he thought. It can’t be.
Trey Vander Meer wept, great sobs of pain erupting from his chest, and kept on weeping for a long time.
Bonita Raige’s squadron arrived too late to help the family whose home the Ursa had invaded. She could see that as they arrived in their vehicle. The creature was busily consuming the remains of its victims, half in and half out of the ruined house, seemingly oblivious to everything else.
However, they could help the man who was standing in the middle of the street, staring at the house, frozen by fear. It wasn’t until they had dragged him inside their vehicle and begun treating him for shock that Bonita realized who he was.
Trey Vander Meer. The guy who had started the movement to pare down the Rangers. And here the Rangers are, saving his skin. The irony didn’t escape Bonita.
Vander Meer moaned something she couldn’t make out, at least partly because she was keeping one eye on the Ursa. “What did he say?” she asked Yang, who was administering to Vander Meer.
Yang looked up at her. “My wife …”
Bonita glanced at the home the Ursa had broken into. Was it Vander Meer’s? She gritted her teeth. It looked like whoever was inside would be way past help—hers or anyone else’s. Nonetheless, she had to try.
“Danuta, you’
re with me,” she snapped to a woman with thick red hair twisted into a braid. “Yang, you’ll stay here with your patient. Bolt, Kromo, Carceras—evacuate the other houses.” There were six of them left in the development. “Get people to the shelter on Buckingham.”
Normally, she wouldn’t have risked prying people out of their homes. But if there was one thing they had discovered, it was that the Ursa were quick learners. Once this one realized there was food inside these structures, it wouldn’t leave the area until it had emptied every last one of them.
The Rangers acknowledged Bonita and spilled from the vehicle to follow her orders. As she swung around the house to get a better look at the Ursa, she wished she had a weapon in her hands that could put the thing down. After all, it would be an easy target as long as its attention was focused on its prey. But their pulsers weren’t going to kill it; squads of her fellow Rangers had learned that the hard way. The best they could do, even at a dozen feet, was keep the Ursa off balance.
Moving past the corner of the house, Bonita caught sight of the beast just as it shoveled a bloody limb into its fanged maw. It made some wet crunching sounds, and blood dripped carelessly down its chest.
Bonita could feel her gorge rising, and she swallowed it back. No time to puke. Not now.
Behind her, her team was banging on doors and shouting orders. She could hear the footfalls of people as they emerged from their homes and responded to the Rangers’ authority. They, at least, might be safe from the Ursa’s predation. Meanwhile, the thing wasn’t raising its head. It was as if it hadn’t noticed Bonita or Danuta. Bonita kept moving, her goal to take a position behind it. Then she could look into the house through the hole the Ursa had made and get an idea if there was anybody left inside to save.
With every step she took, she imagined the Ursa turning and charging at her. But it didn’t. It was too busy feeding. Finally, Bonita was directly behind the creature. Looking past it, she couldn’t see anyone who hadn’t already been ripped apart. But that didn’t mean there wasn’t someone hidden in there, someone praying that the monster would finally go away.
“Orders?” breathed Danuta.
Bonita cast a glance over her shoulder. As long as the thing didn’t delve any deeper into the house, it made sense to wait and give her Rangers time to get the neighbors as far away as possible. So she waited.
But all the while, she couldn’t help thinking she had a chance to take the thing out. After all, it hadn’t reacted to her presence behind it. What if she were to take the offensive and get as close as she could and hit it with everything she had? Would her pulser do any more damage at close range?
Even before the neighbors were gone, Bonita had made her decision and communicated it to Danuta via hand signals. When the last of them vanished from sight, escorted by Bolt, Kromo, and Carceras, she began counting to fifty. Fortunately, the Ursa went on feeding, undisturbed by her presence behind it.
And it kept on feeding after she reached fifty and began advancing on it, pulser in hand, covered by Danuta. Her heart was pounding so hard that she couldn’t believe the Ursa didn’t hear it, her breath quick and uneven in her throat. She forced herself to calm down, to concentrate on the task at hand.
Step by step, Bonita came up on the creature. And it didn’t move. It was as if she were in its blind spot, though it didn’t make sense that a beast without eyesight could have a blind spot—did it?
She would leave that question to the Savant’s people. Her job was to do as much damage as she could to the monster before it went after anyone else.
She was ten feet away. Eight. So close now that she could almost reach out and touch the Ursa’s hindquarters. Six. Four. As quietly as she could, she took aim at the back of the thing’s head …
And heard the scream.
She didn’t turn to see which neighbor it was whom her people had missed. It had to be a neighbor, she was certain, because none of her Rangers would scream that way. Therefore, she didn’t turn, because it wouldn’t tell her anything she didn’t already know.
But the Ursa did.
Bonita found herself looking directly into its maw, a dark hole full of pointed teeth from which bloody flesh and gristle hung in tatters. And in that moment she knew the monster was looking back at her, realizing—if it hadn’t already—that she was close enough to be a threat.
Fire!
Even as the command exploded in Bonita’s brain, she depressed the trigger mechanism on her pulser and a bolt of fusion force buried itself in the Ursa’s face—carving out a bloody gash every bit as deep as it was wide.
A moment later, Bonita realized she was lying on the ground, pinned under the creature’s weight. But she was alive.
She couldn’t breathe with the Ursa on top of her. It was suffocating her, crushing the life out of her. But at least for the moment she was alive.
As for the Ursa … she couldn’t tell. She felt something hit it from the side, then a second time, and a third. Finally the thing began to stir. It was alive. And the impacts Bonita had felt? They had to be Danuta burying burst after burst in the creature.
Bonita had only one chance—to slip out from under the thing as it went after Danuta. But as the Ursa rose, it planted one of its massive forepaws on her face. Then, as if it were no more than an afterthought, it used the other forepaw to gut her like a fish.
As Bonita lay dying, she tried to yell to Danuta to get away while she still could. But there was too much blood gurgling up into her mouth, choking her, making it impossible for her to utter a sound. So all she could do was think it: Danuta—run!
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Wilkins was reviewing telemetry in the command center when she overheard Hāturi speaking to someone over a voice line. He didn’t sound happy. In fact, he sounded positively grim.
Who? was the question that came to mind. Not What? Field casualties had become as common as sand fleas, as common as skipjacks on the western flats. These days, the only question was Who?
As she moved closer to Hāturi to find out more, he cast a glance in her direction. His eyes were red and wet. It shook Wilkins to see him that way, to see Hāturi, a rock of a man, caught in the grip of such emotion.
The Prime Commander waited until Hāturi had ended his conversation. Then she asked the question.
His voice was husky with mourning. “It’s Commander Raige, ma’am.”
It felt like a physical blow. Wilkins grabbed the back of her chair to steady herself. After all, she was the one who had sent Bonita into battle despite her injury. She was the one who had put her friend in harm’s way.
But she’d had no choice. Bonita was a good Ranger. She had been needed in the field. And she’d asked, for heaven’s sake. She’d asked.
Hāturi gave her the rest of the report. Danuta had died as well. But most of the people they were trying to save had reached a shelter. Their mission had been a success, as much as any mission could be a success these days.
The Ursa had claimed four civilian casualties. It was still alive, still seeking prey. Hardly a surprise.
Wilkins absorbed the news. As it spread from Ranger to Ranger, a hush descended over the command center.
“Get me Torrance Raige,” she told Hāturi. “I’ll be in my office.”
She knew Torrance was in an infirmary, recovering from the injuries he had sustained the other day. The damage wasn’t bad. He’d be sidelined for a week. But Wilkins had a feeling he’d want back into the field sooner than that when he heard what she had to tell him.
Conner was just getting ready to go out on another food-gathering detail when Wilkins appeared at the entrance to his barracks.
What’s she doing here? the cadet wondered. The Prime Commander didn’t just show up in the barracks unannounced. Something was up.
Wilkins didn’t say anything. She just scanned the barracks, obviously looking for something—or someone. As Conner watched, he wondered who it was. He was still wondering when the Prime Commander’s eyes found him
…
And stopped.
Conner felt his throat constrict. The look in Wilkins’s eyes … it was the same one she’d had when she’d told Chen about his mother the day before. Even before Wilkins crossed the room and took hold of his shoulder, he knew what she was going to tell him. He just didn’t know which member of his family she would name.
“Ma’am?” he said, trying hard not to let his voice crack.
“I have bad news, son. Your aunt Bonita …”
Wilkins didn’t have to say any more. “Yes, ma’am. I understand. Thank you, ma’am.”
Wilkins looked at him a moment longer, her brow creasing. She looked as if she wanted to say something else, but she didn’t. She just smiled sadly, turned, and left Conner standing there.
With his grief.
Lyla Kincaid considered the device she had made in her lab a month earlier. An eternity ago, or so it seemed. After all, that was before the Ursa had landed on Nova Prime. The device was tiny, half the size of her fingernail. She tossed it in the air and caught it. Light, too. It was also durable, made of materials that were built to last.
And it helped people hear when nothing else would.
The scientists of Nova Prime had made remarkable strides in medicine since the Arrival hundreds of years earlier. For instance, back on Earth, people had had to put up with hearing impairments, some of them congenital, some the result of injury, and some inflicted by disease.
Not anymore. In most cases, the causes of the impairments had been eliminated. In the rest, the Savant’s engineers had invented devices to address the problem. That was where Lyla’s work came in.
The device she held in her hand was designed to be surgically implanted in the inner ear, where it would effectively take the place of an eardrum. Without it, certain individuals would be unable to hear. With it, they could hear perfectly.
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