Cazak

by Elin Wyn

  “Humans are also resilient. They aren’t built to survive in a wide range of environments, but does that stop them? No, it doesn’t!” Dad was getting excited now. His eyes were wide and bright. He gestured wildly as he talked.

  “Once humans decide they want something, they’ll go to the ends of the earth to get it,” he went on. “Have you ever encountered another species like that? Humans were never meant to be on this planet, yet here they are!”

  “Our home planet died, what were we supposed to do?” I asked.

  “That right there is exactly what I’m talking about. Most species wouldn’t have thought to do anything. The humans sailed into the stars and made a new home for themselves. When they first arrived on this planet, it was the farthest thing from suitable. Sentient plants. Extreme heat. Extreme cold. The humans mastered everything here, or at least figured out how to survive around it. Some of them also managed to fight off the Xathi!”

  I shuddered at the name of those horrible aliens. Kaster was spared the brunt of the attack, but that didn’t mean it was a safe place during that turbulent time.

  “Those Xathi are a piece of work,” Dad laughed. “I’d argue that they’d make suitable hosts, as well.”

  “That doesn’t sound like a symbiotic relationship,” I pointed out. “The Ancient Enemies take over humans, but what do the humans get out of it?”

  “They get to expand their minds. The brightest of the humans seek knowledge with unrivaled hunger. They get a glimpse of all the secrets of the galaxy, every galaxy. They see things no one could ever dream up.”

  “That’s not what’s happening,” I said. “People are going mad. They’re sick. They’re in danger.”

  “Oh, that,” Dad waved me off. “The knowledge the humans are exposed to is powerful. Most can’t handle having a being such as an Ancient Enemy occupy their minds for longer than a few weeks.”

  “What happens after a few weeks?” I asked. My stomach churned, despite the fact that I’d skipped breakfast this morning.

  “Most humans expire.” Dad frowned. The idea of humans dying didn’t appear to upset him. He looked more disappointed than anything else. “Some of them are figuring out how to last longer while sharing a mind with an Ancient Enemy.”

  “How?”

  “I don’t know yet,” he said. “It’s no matter. The Ancient Enemies don’t get attached to individuals. It’s the species that matters. Luckily for them, humans are plentiful and replaceable.”

  “That’s terrible.”

  “It’s the circle of life, darling.”

  I frowned. Dad’s never called me darling, ever.

  “It would be against their own survival interest to get attached to one specific human,” Dad continued explaining.

  “What’s the point of this, Dad?” I asked, feeling more uncomfortable by the minute. I didn’t like how Dad kept referring to humans as if he was something separate.

  “You’re my daughter. I love you. I just want you to understand what’s happening in the world around you.”

  “Are you telling me that you know with one hundred percent certainty that the Ancient Enemies are causing the strange behavior of the people contained here?”

  “You know what else is remarkable about humans?” Dad breezed by my question.

  “What?” I knew I wouldn’t like the answer.

  “They breed at a remarkable rate. Even if one expires, there’s a host of infants.”

  “Please stop.” I closed my eyes and looked away.

  “Am I upsetting you?” Dad looked genuinely confused.

  “Yes.” I got to my feet. “I’m sorry. I have to go.”

  “I hope you’ll come back soon,” Dad called after me as I was escorted from the cell. I looked over my shoulder one last time. Dad smiled at me. There was something wrong with that smile. It was just a little too wide for his mouth. I knew at that moment that whatever I’d been talking to for the last hour was not my father.

  Pain bloomed in my chest. Would I ever talk to my real dad again? Was he even still in there? Or did an Ancient Enemy take him away from me forever?

  Cazak

  Sakev popped around the corner of the tree trunk and unleashed a long burst down range at the anti-alien terrorists. His lips peeled back in a savage snarl, and a scream of rage and determination escaped from behind his teeth.

  His aim was true, and one of the charging anti-alienists stopped in his tracks, jerking about as bullets riddled his body. He fell to the snow, bleeding wounds steaming in the cold air.

  The rest of the terrorists learned their lesson quickly, and all too well. They stopped trying to charge our position and sought out cover of their own. That was a real shame.

  Soon the tree we had sought shelter behind began taking rounds. The thick trunk provided enough mass to keep the bullets from penetrating to the other side, but the anti-alienists didn’t seem to be worried about conserving ammo. Their hail of bullets was so intense they sundered several limbs and caused them to crash to the ground.

  I knelt down in the snow and flattened myself against the trunk. Then I shimmied out just enough to get a shot, exposing the bare minimum of my scaled hide for them to target. I flipped the rifle to the semi-automatic setting and sent a controlled burst toward an anti-alienist who had chosen poor cover. He had posted himself up behind a fallen tree, but due to a slight dip in the terrain, his legs were exposed from the knees down.

  My burst caught him flush, two in the left knee and one in the right. He screamed, toppling over as his kneecaps became so much splintered bone and steaming, ground meat. Most likely he would bleed out quickly, and even if he didn’t, he wouldn’t be chasing us anytime soon.

  “Nice shot, Cazak.”

  “Thanks.”

  I pulled myself back behind the tree trunk when a round came awfully close to hitting me in the neck. Sakev leaned out and fired his own short burst, but he was unable to find a soft target. The barrage from the anti-alien terrorists slowed for a moment while he was firing, but then the return fire forced him to take cover as, well.

  For a time, we managed to hold them off by taking turns firing and hiding. We were much better shots, to be sure, but we had to conserve ammunition. By contrast, the terrorists were just firing willy-nilly, but by sheer determination, they had a good chance of hitting us.

  Then the bastards got smart, and started anticipating which one of us was going to be firing while the other hid. A barrage tore through the tree trunk, and sent a sharp shard of bark into my face. The gash it left behind wasn’t deep, but it did serve to remind us that our time was growing short.

  “They’re closing in on us. We have to abandon this position.”

  “You mean retreat?”

  “Your leg means that’s not an option, or I’d be assholes and elbows right now.”

  I jerked my head toward a rocky outcropping dusted with snow.

  “See that little ridge there?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Count to three, and then move as fast as you can toward it. I’ll cover you.”

  “Are you nuts?”

  “Oh, totally. But I’ve got you. You hear me? I’ve got you.”

  Sakev’s face fell, and he nodded grimly. We both knew there was a good chance I was about to sell myself to keep him safe, if only for the moment.

  But that didn’t mean I was about to go down without a fight. I counted to three, drawing my service pistol and wielding the assault rifle in one hand. It’s next to impossible to hold it steady enough for anything resembling accuracy with one hand, but I switched it to full auto and hoped for the best.

  Scales out, and a guttural growl escaping my lips, I popped out fully from behind the tree wielding both weapons. I didn’t even aim, I just sent as many bullets flying as quickly as I could.

  To my surprise, I actually took down a terrorist with the assault rifle. The ignorant fellow had been sprinting full tilt toward our position. His bravery cost him a red line of bullet wounds up h
is torso and across his throat. He fell to the snow, spilling out scarlet atop the blazing whiteness.

  The rest of his companions all scrambled to find new cover. A few of them fired back, but in their terror, their shots went wide and I wasn’t scratched. The service pistol claimed a victim as I took a man right in the heart. His hand clutched at the rapidly expanding dark spot on his coat before he pitched face first into the snow.

  Wisely, I scrambled back behind the tree and used it to block their view as I ran like hell for the ridge. Sakev, hindered by his injured leg, managed to fling himself over it just as I was a dozen paces from safety.

  Sakev braced his rifle on the rough stone and laid down some cover fire for me. A scream indicated that he hit someone, but I was in no position to look back and see if it was a killing or disabling shot.

  I scrambled over the ridge as bullets ricocheted all around us. When we both started firing, the terrorists dove back into cover, but they had already gained precious ground.

  Sakev slammed the spare clip into his rifle and grimaced.

  “How many you got left?”

  “Less than one fourth of my clip. The pistol’s completely out.”

  “Well, what did you expect, with that kind of gung ho shit?”

  “I expected you to die if I didn’t empty the clip.”

  Sakev’s eyes grew distant, and then he flipped his rifle into semi-auto mode.

  “You have a point. Start running, and I’ll keep them off your back long enough to make your escape. Just tell Evie that I—”

  “Shut the fuck up. I’m not leaving you.”

  “Come on, Cazak, I know you’re tough, but what’s the point of both of us being killed?”

  “We live together, or we die together. We can’t stay here, though.”

  With my back against the ridge, I scoped out a likely new source of cover for us. The only thing I could spot was a thick boled, squat tree. It was nearly fifty feet behind our current position, though.

  “You run straight for that twisted-looking tree. I’ll angle off to the left and draw their fire.”

  “That’s a skrell plan.”

  “Go. Get moving.”

  I shoved Sakev into a stumbling run and popped up from behind the ridge. I let loose a couple of shots to get their attention, and then ran like a madman through the underbrush. Bullets rained all about me, snapping tree limbs and splintering bark from trunks, but somehow, I managed to escape without further injury.

  In short order I joined Sakev at our new cover and crouched down in the snow next to him.

  “I’m almost out.”

  “I know. Hang on a minute and I’ll see if I can’t persuade them to leave us alone.”

  Sakev leaned out around the trunk, switching his rifle to single-shot mode. He took a terrorist right between the eyes, the man dead before he even toppled over. Taking careful aim, he sliced right through the exposed thigh of another human. He must have hit the femoral artery, because the man’s scream died seconds after he hit the ground as he bled out into the snow.

  My companion killed another terrorist, and another, but still they kept coming. Rather than being discouraged by the sight of their dead comrades, they seemed incensed into a frenzy. The fact of the matter was, once they decided to rush us, it would be all over.

  “Here.” I switched rifles with Sakev. “There’s a dense copse not far from us, do you see it?’

  “Yeah.” Sakev peered behind our position. “I can make it.”

  “Then go, and don’t stop running.”

  Screaming, I came out from behind the tree and planted my feet wide. At that point, I wanted to terrify the anti-alienists as much as possible. I switched to full auto and sent a deadly hail of bullets at their position.

  Men screamed, some even died, but most of my shots fell harmlessly onto tree limbs or jutting stones. A line of gouts in the snow indicated where I’d hit the ground.

  Then I was out of ammo, and running like hell for the copse of trees. But when I got there, Sakev just stood there, with his back exposed.

  “What the hell, man, keep going—”

  I screeched to a halt when I saw what was holding him up. We stood at the edge of a river, its steep rocky banks plunging forty feet before white rapids gushed through the ravine. There was no way to climb, and the water was clearly not deep enough for us to dive.

  We looked at each other, knowing we were both dead.

  The anti-alienists knew it, too. Sakev emptied the rest of his clip, killing one of their more overzealous members, but then he was empty. They realized we had stopped shooting, and one by one stepped out into the open, many of them grinning sadistically.

  I could tell by the hard fires in their eyes that there would be no prisoners taken today. My one regret was not being able to tell Sybil how I really felt…

  Then the forest simply came alive. One second, the anti-alien militia was stalking toward us, some already taking aim, and then the green growing things began assaulting them.

  Men screamed as vines slithered out and ensnared their limbs. A few fired off utterly ineffectual shots as they were taken captive. Soon, our attackers were splayed out spread eagle as the vines stretched them out like staked rabbit skins.

  “The Puppet Master just saved our asses.”

  “Yeah. We owe our lives to a plant.”

  We both stared at each other and erupted into laughter which was just one step removed from hysteria. Whether it was because we were glad to be alive, or the utter absurdity of the moment, I still cannot say.

  Sybil

  People came and went through the large double doors, but I didn’t bother to look up at them. I felt as if I were in a fugue, or a maddening kind of shock, where I couldn’t act but still felt each painful jab of my father’s words.

  The clinical way he’d described humanity still stung me to the core. Ambitious, overzealous. Fast breeders. The perfect hosts to use up and burn through.

  Did that mean they were going to ‘burn up’ my father? Was the alien presence inside his body already killing him? The medical team at the detention center claimed his vitals were all normal. The only signs of any issues were some anomalous readings on his brain scan and EKG.

  Others had been possessed by the Ancient Enemies and still managed to fight them off, and seemed perfectly normal afterward. Cazak had mentioned a friend of a friend, a human named Keith, who had attacked and tried to kill a member of Team Three. Apparently, Keith suffered no long-lasting effects, and was more concerned for the safety of the man he’d attacked than himself.

  Then why wouldn’t this thing let my father go? Surely it could see that he was no use anymore. He would be kept confined until everyone was absolutely certain the incorporeal possessing entity was gone. So why did it still have its mental meathooks in him?

  Those were my thoughts as I struggled to make sense of what my life had become. I felt utterly lost, more lost than if I’d sealed myself in a rocket and launched myself into space with no heading or directional navigation.

  Even as I sat there in the detention center lobby, and people flowed in and out, I felt removed from the world. The winter sun beaming cheerfully through the lobby windows did nothing to warm my soul, even though it did heat my skin. Time seemed to have lost its meaning, and the world didn’t make any sense.

  I had accepted the fact that being the child of a politician meant some hard truths. One of them was that my father was in a potentially hazardous profession. Political leaders are often targets, whether by oppositional groups or just a disgruntled electorate. I’d always held in the back of my mind the possibility that one day I would return home to find my father had met with foul play, or an accident, or just plain succumbed to the stress of his position.

  But the nightmare of possession was something I’d never considered, never could have prepared for. Somehow, it was worse than my father being dead. Then I wouldn’t have to look at his face, his body, hear his voice as his strings were pulled by
some otherworldly entity.

  I tried not to give in to despair. I tried to put my faith in the scientists, that they would find some way to free my father from his mental prison, but things seemed bleak. There was just only so much that could be done.

  The monster impersonating my father made a big deal of the fact that humans had survived their own extinction. I couldn’t help but wonder at the huge, cosmic joke being played on us if we managed to survive on this hostile alien world only to become living meat-suits for evil alien entities.

  The sun sank to the horizon, casting the last of its red-gold light over the city. I wondered if the sun would soon set upon my father, as well.

  At last, I could not stand it any longer. I felt as if I would be sucked down into the chasm of my own despair, if I hadn’t already. I longed for Cazak, to feel his touch again. As silly as it may seem, I just wanted someone to hold me and tell me everything would be all right, even if we had no way of truly knowing that.

  I rose suddenly, startling the clerks behind the desk. At that point, I believed I’d been sitting there so long they had begun to consider me part of the furniture. I swaddled myself in my long coat and headed out into the chill air.

  Where would Cazak be at that time of day? He was on duty, and I’d remembered seeing his cousin Jalok on guard duty at the airfield. I headed off that way at a brisk pace, hoping that soon I would feel his gentle touch on my skin.

  I don’t know why, but as soon as I rounded the corner and the airfield came into view, I felt a creeping sense of trepidation. With no evidence to support my prophecy, I believed something was amiss. The human guards at the gate acted stiff and formal, refusing me entrance until I mentioned that I was the mayor’s daughter. Then they grew most cooperative, falling all over each other in a sycophantic way to please me.

  I just wanted the gate opened. As soon as it had parted half a foot, I squeezed myself through and took off at a near run toward the tarmac.