by Tom Barber
There was no movement save for the door he’d smashed open to get in here from outside, blowing back and forth in the wind.
Arriving at the petrol tanks, he unscrewed the caps and tipped them to one side, running back as the gas seeped to the floor, widening out, spreading across the entire area.
Miller ran back to the stairs before the liquid could touch his boots, stopping halfway to grab a pack of smokes and a lighter from the inside of Haas’ BDUs, who was lying beside Rodriguez by the wall on the lower level.
Miller lit a cigarette, then took the utmost care to balance it alongside the lowest step, the end smouldering.
He looked down at Haas and Rodriguez’ bodies, lying there on the lower level with petrol seeping around them.
He gave them a silent nod of acknowledgement and farewell, then bent down and hoisted Bailey back over his shoulder, checking his watch.
2:01.
2:00.
1:59.
Miller made his way back into the stairwell and started to climb the stairs, even Bailey’s 120 pounds quickly becoming a dead weight and an increasing effort to carry.
He continued to check the shadows above and behind, sweeping everywhere he looked with the Delta Force assault rifle.
He made it to 1, then headed up towards 2.
He arrived at the door to the 2nd floor and hit the button.
It slid up.
The corridor was empty apart from the spitting flare he’d thrown down there earlier, the alarm lights still flashing, the sirens going off on the ground floor.
He stepped forward and heard the building start to rumble.
The transport was arriving.
He headed down the corridor and turned right for the door to the roof.
Something leapt at him out of the darkness.
He was ready and fired immediately, the blur of movement taking a burst of assault rifle fire which knocked it back.
Firing again, Miller hustled backwards down the corridor towards the control room as fast as he could, the nightmarish thing shrieking and thumping around the wall as it moved erratically and fast, like a bat trapped in a small room.
It had moved slower than the others, presumably because it was already injured.
But it was also blocking off the stairs to the roof.
Miller fired again as he arrived outside the control room, and hit the panel for the door which slid up immediately.
Stepping inside, he emptied the magazine down the corridor, clipping the creature as it screeched in pain.
He hit the button inside the room to close the door; as the panel slid down he saw whatever the hell it was down the corridor start to morph into Garcia and come towards him, shouting his name.
‘Miller! Miller!’
Feeling the building reverberate from the arrival of the transport, Miller hit the lock for the door then tossed away the empty assault rifle and carried Bailey to the ladder leading to the hatch above.
He climbed up and quickly unlocked it, pushing the hatch door open, the rumbling suddenly deafening as the vessel touched down on the roof.
The cigarette in the garage would burn out any minute and the whole station would go up.
They needed to get the hell out of here.
He manoeuvred Bailey through the gap, depositing her onto the roof none too gently.
As he went to follow, he suddenly heard a thumping at the control room door as Garcia tried to batter its way in.
And as Miller hauled himself onto the roof beside Bailey, he heard the door give way below.
He whipped his legs up off the last rung of the ladder just as he heard something rush into the room.
Rolling to his feet, he pulled his pistol and fired down into the space below, then kicked the hatch shut and secured it, sliding the exterior bolt across.
Behind him on the roof, the civilian transport was sitting on the concrete. A side door to the vessel opened and a man stepped out, walking towards Miller who turned to face him. The guy was blond, dressed in jeans, t-shirt and old sneakers, civilian gear, stubble framing the smile on his face which quickly disappeared when he saw Miller’s expression and the unconscious Bailey.
He ran forward as Miller bent down to pick her up again.
‘I’m Johnson!’ he shouted over the engines. ‘What’s wrong, Corporal?’
‘We need to leave now!’ Miller shouted back, hauling Bailey back over his shoulder whilst keeping his attention on the hatch.
Johnson stood where he was, looking at him uncertainly, confused.
Miller backed away from the hatch, keeping his pistol trained on it, then swung round on the man.
‘Let’s go!’
Hearing the urgency in Miller’s voice, Johnson didn’t need to be told a third time, running back to the ship with Miller right behind him.
He ran up the steps and ducked inside, then turned to help Miller with Bailey.
Miller staggered up the steps into the ship then dumped Bailey none too gently onto the deck.
Outside, the main door to the roof suddenly smashed open.
Garcia appeared, black blood staining its shirt, its face deranged, a distortion of the real Garcia’s.
Miller swung round and fired at it with the Beretta, the creature taking some of the rounds and screeching as he fell back through the door and disappeared.
‘What the hell are you doing?’ Johnson shouted beside him.
‘Go!’ Miller shouted back.
The co-pilot had seen enough and was already preparing to take off without waiting for instruction, Johnson rushing over to join him at the controls.
Miller watched from the open door as the transport lifted off and the station started to shrink beneath them.
Suddenly, the facility exploded.
The wave of heat made Miller recoil, throwing a forearm over his face as the dark landscape was suddenly lit up by the fire.
He watched the flames take hold, then turned away as the doors automatically shut and locked.
*
He fell back onto the deck of the transport, panting as the vessel moved further and further away from the station and headed rapidly for the sanctity of space.
He stayed where he was for a few seconds then staggered to his feet and watched through of one of the portholes as the colony disappeared from sight, looking down at the shrinking burning station, his knuckles white as he gripped a rail.
He stared at it for a moment longer, then turned and walked towards the two men sitting up front in the pilot seats.
Johnson had turned and was staring at him, looking shocked.
‘What on earth was that?’
‘I don’t know. Thank Christ you made it.’
‘What the hell was going on down there?’
‘Just get us out of here, man. Then I’ll fill you in.’
As the ship left Deimos’ atmosphere, Miller leant against the bulkhead, breathing hard, his adrenaline dumping, his body beginning to settle.
He looked over at Bailey; she was awake, looking up at him. It was the first time she’d been conscious since the crash.
He knelt down beside her, smiling.
‘Hey, Doc.’
‘Hey Miller.’
She blinked, confused.
‘What happened? Where are we?’
‘We crashed. Everyone else is dead. We’re on a rescue transport. We’re going back to MC1.’
‘Just us?’
He nodded. ‘Just us.’
She forced a brief smile, then closed her eyes again.
He looked down at her for a moment longer, then rose and walked into the cockpit.
They were up in space now, well out of #94’s atmosphere, surrounded by darkness and just distant silver stars. The journey to Mars from here would take days in normal flight time, the usual speed used for this kind of exploration vessel, but if they switched to warp speed they’d be there in a couple of hours. That was one of the advantages of space travel over travelling on Earth. The abili
ty to travel fast with hardly anything to get in your way.
‘Go get yourself cleaned up, Corporal,’ Johnson said, as his partner pushed some controls and flicked several switches. ‘And take a seat. We’re switching to auto-pilot and going into warp speed in three minutes. Then we want to know what the hell was happening down there.’
The co-pilot suspended the ship’s propulsion system and activated the auto-pilot.
‘Priming engines,’ the other man said, dialling in a code and pushing several buttons.
The ship slowed then stopped moving.
The countdown started on several screens around the cabin.
3:00.
2:59.
2:58.
Miller nodded.
Then he turned and headed for the lower level, weary, exhausted and nauseous with spent adrenaline.
TWENTY FOUR
A level below the main flight deck, Miller walked into a mess space.
His pulse had levelled off and now he was out of the colony, he was finally starting to relax.
He collapsed onto a seat and took steadying breaths, his body recovering from the extraordinary and totally unexpected terror of the last few hours.
He was mentally and physically exhausted and felt as if he’d been awake for days.
He sat still and momentarily closed his eyes.
Opening them again after a few seconds, his gaze settled on a computer terminal across the cabin.
He thought of his team.
All of them gone, save him and Bailey.
Rising, he walked over to the control pad and tapped in his login. The US Army 101st Page came up; he selected his Unit and Company, then squad. He wanted to check the pulse readers, more out of professional habit than anything else. No one gets left behind; he wanted to make absolutely sure no one had.
He typed in another secure code, and the page immediately flashed up.
He looked at the list, all of their names in red, a long list of the deceased.
But then he frowned and refreshed the page.
There should have been two names in green, but it was only his.
Lieutenant J Bailey was red.
He stared at the screen in disbelief.
Lieutenant J BAILEY.
He looked at the time of death.
Thirteen minutes ago.
He realised what had happened.
They must have killed her and hidden the body when he was trying to get to her inside the station.
Then they’d tricked him with the fake Bailey in the kitchen.
There must have been two of the beings in there as insurance, one sacrificing itself so Miller would kill it and take the other lying behind the table.
They’d imitated her twice, determined that one of them got on board the rescue craft.
And they’d fooled him.
He looked up. He was alone on this level.
She, or it, was still upstairs in the cabin with Johnson and his co-pilot.
He suddenly realised why they’d been studying him, learning about him, watching his every move all night. He remembered confronting them on the plain after the crash. Weathers glancing at Olson, and him nodding to her to comply with Miller’s orders. Garcia’s initial confusion when he’d first seen Miller standing over Keller’s dead body in the rec room. He’d obviously not been expecting to see him alive.
The thing imitating Olson was calling the shots. It wanted to understand Miller, get right inside his head, then kill and impersonate him so convincingly it’d get through quarantine and be able to fool anyone.
Because they wanted to get onto MC1 as him.
However, Miller had scuppered their plans. He’d unexpectedly fought them off inside the station, so impersonating Bailey was the alternative. They knew the transport was coming to pick him up, so if they couldn’t kill him in time then they’d imitate Bailey so he carried her onto the ship, completely unaware that it wasn’t Bailey at all.
Miller quickly grabbed a headset, the direct link to the two pilots upstairs.
‘Johnson, do you copy? Johnson?’
No response.
Miller moved over to the video comms and switched it on.
Both men were dead, slumped in their seats, bloodied and slashed.
Miller hadn’t even heard them die.
He stared at the screen, then checked the countdown before they went into warp speed.
2:04.
2:03.
‘Will?’ he heard a voice call.
He pulled his Beretta and checked the clip.
He had three bullets remaining, not enough to kill this thing.
Suddenly, it appeared at the bottom of the stairs.
‘There you are,’ it said.
He smiled, trying to empty his mind and not think about what he was looking at.
He glanced at the timer on the screen to his left.
2:00.
1:59.
‘You look better,’ he said. ‘Leg OK?’
‘I guess so.’
It started walking towards him.
Miller managed to keep a smile pinned to his own face, flicking off the safety for the Beretta.
As it approached, a smile appeared on its face.
‘You can’t hide your thoughts from me,’ it said. ‘You just figured things out.’
Miller whipped the pistol around and fired instantaneously.
Two of the bullets hit the being, the force knocking it back. As it staggered and shrieked, its hand hit the pressure door switch and dragged it down as it tried to regain its balance.
An alarm immediately sounded.
‘Warning. Pressure door will open in twenty seconds. All personnel ensure protective gear is in place. Nineteen. Eighteen.’
Realising what was about to happen, Miller sprinted across the cabin and started to pull on one of two white space suits standing ready in a pod.
As he did so, he watched in horror as the wounded creature morphed from Bailey into people he knew, constantly changing, the screeches distorting as its body did the same.
It suddenly lunged at him. He instinctively pulled his knife, burying it up to the hilt into the creature then kicking it back as hard as he could.
With the countdown approaching its end, knowing he just had seconds, Miller zipped up the white suit then stood still as the helmet and gloves were automatically sealed on his hands and head by the pod, all the while looking at the creature across the mess room as it screeched from the wounds and the knife in its body.
‘Five. Four.’
The suit gave a beep as it activated the oxygen supply.
‘Three. Two. One.’
The doors started to open.
He grabbed a safety rail, feeling the pull from the open hatch.
The creature lunged forward again and grabbed him with unexpected strength.
Miller lost his grip on the rail and realised he was going to get dragged out.
He desperately reached for an EMU rig and managed to grab it just as they were both sucked out of the ship through the hatch.
Into the black abyss of space.
TWENTY FIVE
Qualifying for the 101st’s Space Division meant passing a series of strenuous suit and space walk tests. Miller wasn’t afraid of most things, but even he had been slightly spooked by his first tethered space walk outside the ISS above Earth.
Being inside a ship, colony or transport was fine, but outside, in just a three-inch thick suit with nothing but never-ending space around you, he’d suddenly felt very alone and totally insignificant.
Protected by a double visor and a space suit, Miller had floated out there five times, doing the last two untethered. The furthest he’d ever gone out had been a hundred yards from the ship, floating above Earth in the darkness, using an Extravehicular Mobility Unit to push himself back.
It was a surreal moment, looking down at Earth below him, seeing the shape of North America under his white booted feet. On Earth with gravity, the suit weighed
two hundred pounds, the same as a fully grown man.
In space, it was weightless, like being in water without the water.
It had been an unforgettable moment.
As they were under training, they always had help on hand, but some guys had still completely freaked out and with good reason. Without one of the suits, a human being’s blood and bodily fluids would boil and then freeze because there is little to no air pressure. They’d pass out because there was no oxygen. Their tissues would expand because of the boiling fluids.
Miller knew a soldier whose oxygen supply had diminished during their training; he’d become euphoric and ripped off his helmet before their trainers could get to him. Miller would never forget watching what had happened to the man. It was etched onto his brain, a reminder of how dangerous it was out here.
Man could survive against seemingly insurmountable odds on Earth, but he’d last less than ten seconds in space without a protective suit.
As he was sucked out of the ship into black nothingness, Miller clung onto the EMU desperately, knowing it was his only chance of getting back to the ship, the thick gloves not helping his grip.
The thing now imitating Olson could obviously survive out here, continuing to thrash around and pull at him it gripped his foot, its hands turning into long, wickedly sharp talons.
If they pierced his suit, Miller knew what would happen.
Tumbling and struggling, he watched the ship shrink as they drifted further and further out.
Eighty yards.
A hundred.
A hundred and twenty.
A hundred and fifty.
He had to get this thing off him if he was going to have any chance of survival.
After four desperate attempts, he managed to kick the creature hard enough with his boot to finally dislodge it.
As it lost its grip and tried to swipe and claw its way back to him, it morphed from Olson into his mother, her face twisted with hate, then into something else, something unrecognisable, its mouth open but the screech lost in the vacuum of space.
It looked horrifying, but Miller dragged his eyes away and focused on the ship in the distance.