Arcane II

by Nathan Shumate (Editor)

  “They don’t find anything, we’ll pursue other options.” My gaze pans along the lonely moonscape. “We can’t assume the other Sectors made it. So far, we’ve got no proof we aren’t the only ones left.”

  Tucker sniffs. “I can wait for ’em, if you want. Go on below.”

  Will she be wearing her O2 mask? Probably not. And the others will follow her example, sucking down all that particulate matter in the air, letting the dust infest their lungs.

  I cross my arms, widen my stance, stretch my back a bit. “I’m as eager as you are to hear about what they’ve found. Must be something. She’s never cut it so close before.”

  I glance at the red rippling orb sinking into the west—an oddly comforting sight. No matter what else goes on, each day still has an end to it. I take a deep breath and feel the brief chill in my lungs. I hate wearing this mask. Give me a room full of filtered air instead. But anything’s better than the alternative. I can just imagine the dust particles finding their way into my respiratory system and taking root, changing my DNA, mutating me.

  Like she is. Like the others are.

  We’ll shut the bunker door and seal it, blow the tunnel, disable the elevator. There’s got to be another way out down below. The United World government would have planned for every contingency. We were their only hope for the future. We’re not rats in a maze with only one route to the cheese. And once we’ve found our alternate emergency exit, we’ll go as far away as it takes us—hundreds, thousands of kilometers underground—away from this alien world and its mutant sand. Hell, maybe even under the oceans to the other side of the planet!

  “They might have gotten caught in another sandstorm,” Tucker offers with a shrug.

  I force a smile, acknowledging his remark. A few months ago, she came back from scouting with three of the other women; they tend to stick together, the four of them. The jeep was caked in dust so thick the vehicle didn’t look like it could run. And they were covered in it too, every centimeter of their jumpsuits, their O2 masks, their gloves, their boots—the stuff clung to them like paste.

  She said a storm had come out of nowhere while they were returning to the bunker. The dust and grit engulfed them, and despite cowering into their seats and covering their heads, the stuff had managed to get through everything, even the impenetrable polymer of their masks.

  That’s when I knew something wasn’t right. It wasn’t natural. It was alive somehow—

  “There they are.” Tucker points and moves to step outside.

  “Wait.”

  He halts, glancing back at me with a frown behind his clear face shield. I ignore him and squint into the weak light. The jeep should be sending up a giant plume of dust, enough of the stuff to turn us all into mutants. But nothing’s stirring.

  “There.” He points again.

  I see them: four small shadowy figures heading toward us. On foot.

  “Where’s the jeep?” I curse. If she’s left it behind, there’ll be hell to pay.

  “Must’ve run out of juice.”

  I shake my head. “They had reserve power.”

  He turns, meaning to go to them. But he’ll stay put if he knows what’s good for him.

  “Something isn’t right,” I murmur.

  He steps outside then, the sole of his boot landing with a puff of dust.

  “Get back in here, Tucker.”

  He doesn’t move, just looks at me over his shoulder. “They might need help.”

  “Get in here,” I grate out, fury boiling in my belly.

  He hesitates, and for a moment it looks like he’s going to try his luck with me. But then he drops his head a little, and he steps back across the steel threshold. The dust clings to his boot like a fungus.

  “Clean that off.” Just the sight of it turns my stomach. What was he thinking? He knows better.

  But something’s gotten into him lately. Maybe he’s gotten into her. And she’s turning him into one of them. I’d better keep my eye on him, in case I need to put him down like a mad dog—for his own good, of course.

  The shadow-figures enlarge and take shape as they approach with locks of hair waving in the cool breeze, their O2 masks swinging at their sides with every sauntered step. She knows I’m watching. She’s rubbing my nose in it. How much of that air has she inhaled by now?

  “Get the hose,” I mutter. “Take care of your boot first.”

  Tucker nods and heads down the corridor to the elevator like a good lap dog. He sure as hell better stay that way.

  “Well looky here, ladies. Willard’s come up to welcome us home. How sweet!”

  She struts toward me like the leader of a wolf pack. The other three chuckle, their faces cracking with the dust caked on their skin. From the looks of them, they’ve been walking in it for kilometers.

  “Where’s the jeep?” My jaw muscle twitches.

  “What’s that?” She cups her ear. “I can’t quite hear you in that stupid mask. You know there’s plenty of O2 out here, right?” More cackling from the others as she inhales deeply, exaggerating for show.

  “The jeep. Where is it?”

  They approach within a few meters and stop. Only then do I notice the wet splatters across their jumpsuits.

  “Let’s see. How should I put this?” She bites her cheek, half-grinning with a hand on her shapely hip. “We ran into a little trouble, you might say.”

  “Not much,” adds one of the others. They laugh together, in on the joke.

  I don’t have time for this crap. “If you’ve damaged it, you’ll pay with your rations.”

  She feigns hurt for a moment. “You hear that, girls? Little Willard’s gonna put us all on a diet. He must think we’re fat.” She turns and pushes out her posterior, filling out the rear of her suit with ample curves. “You think I’m fat, Willard?”

  I grit my teeth and wait. After she’s had her fun, she’ll tell me. I have to be patient and not react, bite my tongue if need be.

  She approaches me, her hips exaggerated in their movement. “You never used to complain about my fat.” She gropes herself suggestively. “We always had a lot of fun, you and me. Isn’t that right? A lot of fun, from what I remember.” She winks.

  “Don’t come any closer.” I swallow. She’s covered in dust, and it doesn’t even seem to bother her. But what’s this other stuff, splattered all over? “Tucker’s bringing the hose.”

  I yell over my shoulder to hurry him up.

  She snickers, halting for the moment. “Paranoid as ever.”

  “What’s that on you?” If only there was more light. It looks like it could be blood.

  “Yeah. About that.” She pauses, sober now. “We’re not alone.”

  What the hell does that mean?

  Tucker comes up the corridor from the elevator. “Got it.”

  “Good.” I step back. “Let ’em have it.” I gesture toward the women, and they brace themselves.

  Tucker grimaces, twisting the valve at the end. The hose bucks in his hands and the pressurized air blasts outward. But he has it under control. With a short warning, he turns it on the women. Long strands of hair fly upward as the dust is blown away from their jumpsuits, hovering in a cloud that drifts off into the twilight. Water would be ideal, obviously, but this is the best we can do. They’ll need to scrub their skin down with a few hydropacks before we let them inside. And we’ll sanitize the suits good before anybody else puts them on again.

  Tucker’s done all he can with the hose. I send him below. “You know the drill,” I tell the women, and they begin to strip down.

  She winks at me. “Gonna watch?”

  My bowels recoil at the suggestion.

  “What’s come over you lately, Willard?” She frowns, eying me as she tugs the zipper down the front of her torso. “Used to be you couldn’t keep your hands off me.”

  “Is that blood?”

  She stops and looks at her suit. Then she nods. “We ran into some... creatures.” She gives me a direct look.
r />   “Animals?” But that couldn’t be. There aren’t any left out there.

  She shakes her head and shrugs out of the upper portion of the jumpsuit, her bare skin flecked with dust. The suits are a useless defense against it.

  I will never set foot outside.

  “Not animals.”

  “What then?” My mouth is dry. “Mutants?” Survivors from another sector? Infected by the dust as she is, but changed to a greater extent?

  “I wouldn’t know. But they came out of nowhere—a dozen or more of ’em.” She tugs her legs free from the suit around her ankles. “Armed to the teeth. Yeah, guns, believe it or not. They wanted the jeep, and they took it. Wasn’t much we could do.”

  I toss her a limp hydropack and lob three more at the others. They tear them open and begin to wash themselves, pouring the synthetic water across their bare bodies and rubbing the stuff around. I avert my gaze.

  “You just let them take it.” I can’t believe this. We’re down to one solar jeep now.

  “We were busy.” She closes her eyes as she cleans her face. “Managed to kill about half of them, but the other ones took off.”

  “Kill them? How?” We’ve never had any weapons. Did she manage to wrestle away their guns?

  “Funny thing, Willard. It didn’t really matter that we were unarmed. These freaks were too slow for us. I don’t know what it is, but this planet isn’t the same Earth we used to know. We feel different out here now. It’s weird, can’t really describe it.” She chuckles and cracks open an eye at me. “We killed them with our bare hands.”

  Wonderful. They’ve tasted blood. Now it’s only a matter of time before they turn on us.

  “But I almost forgot. We brought you back some souvenirs—just in case those creatures come this way and you need to defend the ol’ homestead.” She turns to the other three. “Ladies?”

  They reach into deep pockets of the jumpsuits crumpled at their feet and retrieve a small arsenal of hand guns and knives. I can feel my jaw drop.

  “Picked ’em off the ones we put down. Government—military-issue, from the looks of it.” She points out the U.W. insignia on the grip of one of the guns. “Genuine United World merchandise. Only the best for our dear Willard.”

  The others snicker. She moves to hand me the booty, and they follow her lead.

  “No.” They’re not clean. They’ll stay back if they know what’s good for them. “Just toss ’em.”

  She halts and shakes her head. “Whatever, Mr. O.C.D.” She lobs the gun at my feet and gestures for the others do the same. The weapons clatter, skittering across the concrete on my side of the steel threshold. “You’re really gonna have to get over yourself if you plan to go into town with us.”

  I shoot her a glance as I bend down to retrieve one of the four guns—a 9mm semi-automatic. I check the clip. Five rounds remain.

  “Town?” I murmur.

  She grins and nods, obviously pleased with herself. She pours some of the hydropack fluid across her chest and rubs in slow, circular motions. “We hit the jackpot, Willard. A Trade Sector city—what’s left of it, anyhow. Fifty kilometers southwest. It’s got everything we’ll need to start over, just sitting there. All we’ve got to do is go in and take it.”

  I turn the gun over and weigh it in my hand. It’s been a while since I’ve held one—more than two decades. It feels good, the weight, the power. Familiar. I squeeze the grip. The muscle in my forearm wriggles eagerly. “And the creatures? They won’t be a problem for us?” I don’t look up.

  “Not for us,” one of them remarks, and they all chuckle.

  “Of course. You kill them with your bare hands. How could I forget?”

  My tone isn’t lost on her. She stops scrubbing herself. “I thought you’d be happy, Willard. It’s what we’ve been searching for.”

  “Oh, I’m sure it is. What you’ve been searching for. You can make a wonderful life for yourselves and your mutant friends out there on the surface.” I load a round into the chamber and release the slide with a resounding clink.

  “We can’t live in the bunker indefinitely, Willard.” She raises her voice. “The O2 won’t last, no matter how much we fiddle with the air cycles. We’re just prolonging the inevitable.”

  She’s right. I am.

  I have been for far too long.

  I bring up the gun and pull the trigger in a single movement. The round burrows between her startled eyes with a wet crimson patch, and she tips over like a felled tree.

  I’ve forgotten how loud a gunshot can be. And the smell—absolutely intoxicating.

  The three other women don’t take long to get over the shock. Their movements are quick, catlike—literally. They spring at me, launching themselves through the air with fingernails extended like claws and with teeth like fangs, bared in their wild-eyed rage. Somehow, they have taken the form of savage, naked panther-women.

  Their bizarre display confirms what I’ve thought all along: they’re mutant freaks, abominations devoid of all humanity. And while I might have been expecting something like this from them eventually, nothing could ever have prepared me for this exact scenario.

  I freeze up, pulse throbbing in my ears, and stare, unable to fully grasp what I’m seeing. I’m rooted to the concrete floor and time’s passing, but I’m not moving with it, and I need to be. I really need to be. I’ve got to get the hell out of here if I plan on staying alive.

  My gasp is a sharp burst against the O2 mask, and I stumble backward, dropping one of them with two shots to the chest. That slows the others long enough for me to hit the airlock release. They clamber over her dead body as the steel blast door shuts too slowly—they’re going to make it inside. I backpedal, firing the last two rounds as they cross the threshold. The bullets hit their mark, downing the first one who falls into the path of the bone-crushing door. But the last one leaps over just as the airlock seals itself behind her.

  She stalks me on all-fours, grinning. She knows I’m empty. But I point the gun at her anyway and scream, “Stay back!”

  She laughs. “You should’ve taken one with more ammo.” The guns and knives lie where they were tossed, beside fresh blood and splintered remains at the blast door. “You want to come back and pick out another?”

  I keep the muzzle aimed at her head. I didn’t plan this very well. I didn’t plan it at all, I can admit that. It just happened. And now I’m stuck.

  I back down the corridor, toward the elevator. She matches me step for step, sauntering like an alley cat.

  “What’re you gonna do, Willard?”

  My mask is fogging up. I rip it off and throw it aside. “I told you to stay back!”

  “Or what? You’ll throw your gun at me?”

  Time for a new strategy.

  “Fine.” I drop the gun and raise both hands. “You’ve got me. Now what? You kill me in cold blood? Like those creatures that attacked you out there? Can you do that?” I’m panting. I’ve got to calm down. “I’m not like them. I’m a man—human. Unarmed, defenseless. Can you really kill me?”

  “We’ll see,” she snickers, fangs gleaming and slick in the fluorescent light flickering above the elevator doors.

  “Could you live with yourself? You’re an engineer, for crying out loud, not a killer! Think about this, just think! Is this who you are? Look at yourself! You’re crawling around like an animal with claws and fangs. Claws and fangs! What’s happened to you?”

  She slows half a step, confusion clouding her eyes. “You killed them.”

  “They weren’t right. There was something seriously wrong with them. But not you—you’re different. Why do you think I didn’t shoot you first? I could tell. And I can see it now. You don’t want to do this. You don’t want to kill me.”

  She scowls, dropping her gaze. “You killed them.”

  My backside bumps into the elevator doors and I hit the DOWN arrow pad, my hand fumbling spastically, my heart racing. I have to keep talking, keep her listening.

  “We
can help you. You don’t have to be like this. You didn’t ask to be this way, did you? Of course not, and you don’t have to be. For the others, those three back there, there was no hope, you see? But you—you’ll be fine. We can make you better. You’ll be yourself again.”

  I’m having some kind of effect on her, I can tell. She’s staring at the unnatural claws protruding razor-sharp from her fingers and toes.

  “You want that, don’t you? To be yourself again? Not like this. It’s not normal. The sand out there, the dust did this to you. The planet’s not how we left it. They did something to it—something bad, when they nuked the hell out of it—and it’s affecting you. But we can help you. We can make you the person you used to be!”

  She shakes her head from side to side, confused. Am I getting through to her? Is she faltering? Will she—

  Her head snaps up, eyes locked with mine. “I like myself this way.”

  With a growling shriek she lunges forward, unleashing her full vengeance in a frenzy. I cower, shielding myself with my arms—useless against her claws. I fall against the elevator doors, pounding my head as I fend off her blows. Her fangs flash, and I know it’s only a matter of time before she sinks them into my jugular. She’s too strong for me.

  What will happen to the others below? Dozens and dozens with no idea what’s going on up here. Will she kill them, too? One by one? Or will she change them into more mutant freaks—turning them like a vampire?

  Even worse: Will she turn me?

  The doors slide open without warning and I topple inside the elevator with her riding on top, jaws snapping at my face.

  “Willard? What the—!” It’s Tucker.

  “Guns! Get the guns!” I scream.

  “We don’t have—”

  “At the door! The blast door—GO!”

  She jerks her head up to hiss a warning, and he leaps backward, jittery and wide-eyed.

  “What the hell!” he yelps.

  I take a chance and throw my elbow into her face, up into her nose. It stuns her for a moment, long enough for me to wave Tucker in the right direction and for him to squeeze past. He takes off for the bunker door at a dead run, his boots pounding up the corridor.