by Chris Lowry
“Carver,” Dawes said as he held out his hands for the man to give him a foot.
He vaulted Carver into the duct with Rachel's help. Something slapped the panel outside the door. It didn't open.
The Licks banged against the door and began to pry it apart.
Dawes leaped for two outstretched hands and missed. He fell back to the ground and lost his footing as dizziness overtook him.
Rachel started to go down for him, but Carver grabbed her shoulder and pushed her back. He leaned his upper body out of the duct as the door pried open a few inches.
“Come on man,” Carver whispered.
Dawes got up, took a deep breath and jumped again. He grabbed Carver's arm and climbed while they pulled him into the duct.
The doors slid apart and the Lick's jumped in with rifles raised. They didn't notice the panel slide in place above their scaly heads.
CHAPTER THIRTY
Another grate in another room opened up and slid into the duct. Rachel rolled out of the open space and dropped to the floor with the grace of a ballerina. She glanced around the tiny common room with small cubes along each side. The living quarters of the crew. They're Spartan and utilitarian like the rest of the ship, but there are personal touches along the walls of each cube. Photographs. An artificial flower. A well-worn copy of EPOCH by a pillow.
Carver and Dawes dropped out of the duct next to her. Rachel moved to a cabinet and began to pull out foil packets of food and a water condenser.
Carver picked up a digital photo of her and another man.
“Who's this?” he asked. “Is this your boyfriend?”
The smiling man in the picture was wearing a black space suit that matched hers. She didn't look up from the beaker of water she was collecting.
“That's Gary,” she sniffed. “My husband.”
“Husband?” Carver snorted. “You're married? Where's he at? Come on now, tell the truth. He at home? Keeping the home fire burning while you're up in here in outer space?”
“Carver,” Dawes warned him off her look.
“He was on the ship,” she said in a grunt.
“Was? You mean he...” Carver trailed off as he realized what she meant. Her husband was probably one of the bodies he tripped over in the waste unit. He set the picture back on the shelf.
“Look, I'm sorry,” he said.
“I'm fine,” she grunted again. “I'll be fine.”
She tried to move the beaker to a small metal table bolted to the floor and missed the edge. It dropped on the metal panels and shattered, spreading a pool of water under their feet. Rachel collapsed into one of the chairs that was set in a track that skittered back. She didn't sob. She didn't cry. But her eyes welled up as she sniffled.
“They got him?” said Carver.
She nodded, but refused to look up. If she looked up, the tears would fall. If the tears fell, the dam holding back her feelings would burst. It would be too much. So long as she could keep the tears inside, keep them right on the edge, she could take those feelings and box them up, use them for fuel to stop the Licks. She would grieve when she stopped them. There would be time for that then. But not now. Not in front of these two idiots.
“We should get out of here,” said Dawes.
“We need to go back to the shuttle,” Carver argued. “We just start it up and get out of here.”
Rachel batted her eyes with the back of her hand and rubbed the end of her nose.
“We have to destroy the ship.”
Carver looked around at the thick metal walls and back at the woman with red eyes and a dead husband trying not to cry in front of them.
“It's a big ship,” he said.
Rachel shrugged.
“Do you know how?” Dawes asked.
She nodded in determination.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
The corridor was silent. Rachel slipped from one slender bulkhead to the other as she sneaked back to the corner near the engine room. Dawes tiptoed behind her as Carver dragged his feet and tried to look everywhere at once. He kept a good distance from Dawes as they moved closer to the edge.
“You ain't pushing me out again man,” he said in a harsh whisper.
“I wouldn't do that,” Dawes drawled.
“I ain't taking no chances.”
“Smart man.”
Carver drew up short.
“What you mean by that?”
Rachel waved them quiet with a glare. She peered around the low corner of the corridor to the engine room door.
“It's clear,” she whispered.
“So get in there and handle your business,” Carver whispered back.
“Someone has to stand guard in case the Licks come back.”
“Carver,” Dawes volunteered him.
Carver stepped around him and hooked his arm through Rachel's elbow. He led her toward the doorway. He reached back and took the plasma rifle from Dawes grip.
“Is happy to escort the lady to the room,” he shot back. “Keep a good eye out.”
Dawes frowned as he watched them leave him alone in the corridor.
“I guess I'll stay here.”
Rachel and Carver glide to the door on cat's feet. They step through the open doorway and pause as they let their eyes adjust to the dim light in the room. The LED's reveal six Lick's waiting inside on either side of them.
Carver shoved Rachel back toward the door but it's too late. The aliens grab them, lift them up off the floor. Carver squeezed out a shout as they wrested the gun from him.
“Run cowboy!”
Dawes hunched back into the shadows of the corridor, knees drawn to his chest as he tried to make himself as small as possible. He was hidden in the darkness and peeked as the Lick's carried Rachel and Carver from the engine room.
He watched them march past and turned toward the bridge. The aliens left a single guard to man the engine room door.
“Damn it,” he muttered.
He needed to rescue his friends and get Rachel back into the engine room so she could do her thing. But Carver took his rifle and he didn't have anything to fight the Lick with. He needed to get a weapon and go after them. But the only weapon he could see was on the guard at the engine room door.
Dawes jumped up and hopped around the corner. He whistled. The Lick popped its snout up and licked the air, hissed a growl and bolted toward him. The cowboy ducked back around the corner and sprawled in the shadows, stretching his leg out as far as he could.
The Lick slid around the corner. Its shin caught on his and Dawes yanked his foot back. The alien sprawled on the decking and slid a few feet.
Dawes pounced on its back and grabbed its head. The alligator skin was rough under his fingers, micro ridges ripping into his flesh as he pounded the snout into the unyielding metal deck plating. Black ichor leaked from the mouth as it bit through its tongue. The severed appendage slithered on the floor as Dawes kept pound the head into the metal until the body shivered under him and stopped breathing.
The cowboy stopped and tried to catch his own breath as it came in short heaving gasps. He didn't realize he was crying until he wiped away a tear, picked up the plasma gun and started running down the corridor after his friends.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
The Engine room guards step onto the bridge and sling Carver and Rachel down on the floor in front of Budge. He growled as he rose out of the Captain's chair and towered over them. The rumble of his hissing voice rolled over them in rancid breath. Rachel gagged and Carver tried to turn his face away.
“Might I suggest a mint?” he mumbled.
Budge hissed, grabbed him by the collar and tossed him across the room. The man flew into the far wall and collapsed in a heap. Carver pulled himself up the wall and found one of the hatchlings staring at him. It licked its snout with a long tongue.
“Was it something I said?” he groaned.
The hatchling advanced on him with bared teeth. Carver shoved back into the wall but there was nowhere to
escape.
“Hold on now,” he stuttered. “You got a whole garbage room full of people to eat down there. Don't eat me. I ain't no good. Stringy. Look at me. No meat.”
Carver held out his thin arm to demonstrate. The hatchling latched and swooped in for a bite.
Its head popped and showered Carver with slick wet goo. Budge roared.
“I didn't do it!” Carver screamed. “That son of a bitch popped all by itself.”
Budge turned to the doorway and hissed a roar again at Dawes who stood with a smoking plasma gun in his hands.
Dawes aimed at the chieftain, but he leaped across the room and hid behind the helm control. The cowboy shifted his aim to one of the engine room guards and sent a bolt through him. More goo and ichor spread across the bridge, splattered the view screen.
“You gotta be so messy?” Carver moaned as he crawled through alien guts toward the door.
“You want to move your ass?” Dawes shouted as he shot the second engine room guard that popped up from behind the helm.
Carver scrambled even faster but his knees and hands couldn't get a solid purchase between the slick floor and slippery blood. He tried harder but still didn't gain ground.
“Come on girl!” he encouraged Rachel.
She used her feet to push off in the opposite direction, shoving him toward the doorway while she ended up next to the control panel.
“Buy me a minute!” she shouted.
A guard leaped over the helm and made a grab for Carver. Dawes plasma bolted his head.
Budge and the other Licks recover and began firing back at Dawes. Carver grabbed the edge of the doorway and slid around to hide. Dawes ducked back but kept the gun aimed high as he pulled the trigger.
Rachel said she needed a minute and he was going to buy her one. He flinched as a plasma bolt scorched the metal next to his head and showered his cheeks with burning sparks. He took a second to wonder if it was smart to be shooting so much in a sealed bridge space, but another bolt dripped sizzling metal onto his arm and he quickly stopped worrying about it. If a hole opened up in the side of the ship, it would take the Licks first.
He fired back again and again, sending bolt after bolt in the direction of the aliens. Rachel finished at the panel and tried to crawl across the room. Her progress was about as well as Carver's. She pressed her feet against the helm and shoved, sliding across the floor under a rainbow of plasma blasts. Dawes kept firing until the whine on his rifle stopped. He was out of charge.
Rachel slid out into the corridor and came to an abrupt halt on the dry metal floor. Carver reached out and dragged her behind the protection of the wall with him. Dawes hurled his empty rifle into the bridge.
“Go!” he screamed and ran down the corridor.
Budge roared and hissed to get his guards to stop shooting. He stood up by the helm and glanced down at a monitor with a countdown that flipped from sixty to fifty-nine. He hissed and ran after Dawes, his remaining guards on his heels.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
Rachel ran as fast as she could on steady feet but a couple of days on reduced rations made her lightheaded. She shook the hair out of her face as Dawes caught up to her and Carver.
“Did you do it?” he screamed.
“I did it!” she screamed back.
“Did what,” Carver joined in.
“Keep moving,” Dawes yelled. “They're coming.”
They could hear the sucking sound of alien footsteps echoed in the corridor behind them.
“Somebody better tell me something or a lot of ass whipping is going down.”
“Where's your ship?” Rachel huffed.
“There's a big F on the wall,” Carver shouted.
“Follow me!”
She turned the corner and led them down another corridor.
“How long?” Dawes gasped.
“Sixty seconds.”
“Like ten seconds ago?”
“More like fifteen.”
“Faster,” he screamed.
Rachel led them past the F and into the corridor that led to the short passageway to the shuttle.
“I know this place!” Carver grinned as he surged ahead.
Budge launched out of an open side door and carried him into a room with the hit.
Dawes slid to a stop torn between the safety of the shuttle passage and the scream coming from the dark room.
“Get to the ship,” he said and turned toward the room.
“It's too late,” Rachel pulled up short beside him. She grabbed his arm and pulled. “You can't help him.”
“I'm gonna try.”
She leaned forward and pecked him on the lips.
“Good luck,” she said. “I'm not waiting.”
“When was the last time you brushed your teeth?” he called after her as she ran for the shuttle.
Dawes ran to the dark doorway and listened as Carver grunted in pain. He watched as the alien tossed him across the room. Carver slammed into the metal wall and slid to the bottom. He heaved up and staggered to his feet, blood leaking from his face and nose, battered and bruised.
“That all you got,” Carver slurred. “Come on mother fucker let's dance.”
He held up his fists.
Budge huffed as his snout pulled back in what could pass for an evil grin.
The alien surged forward and slammed into Carver. It lifted him off the floor, smearing blood on the wall. Thick claws dug into the man's neck, thin lines of red leaking out around the talons. Budge hissed and licked his snout.
A metal pipe bounced off the back of his skull and knocked him down. Budge dropped Carver and turned to face Dawes.
“Ever fight a redneck before?” Dawes circled as he waved the pipe back and forth in front of him.
“I thought you were a cowboy,” Carver gurgled from the floor.
The fight in him made Carver smile. The man had a loud mouth, he was a braggart and annoying as hell, but damn it, when the chips were on the line Carver was alright. Full of piss and vinegar and what looked like about three pints of blood if he were to judge by what was leaking out.
“Neither one fight fair,” Dawes took a swing at Budge.
The alien ducked away with a hiss. The two circled each other in the narrow room, the alien towering over Dawes by a good three feet.
“What are you waiting for?” Carver gasped. “Kill that alien mother fucker.”
“Get to the shuttle,” Dawes said out of the corner of his mouth. “Rachel's waiting and it's about to get really hot in here.”
“So take off all your clothes,” Carver mumbled as he pushed to his feet. He stumbled toward the doorway.
Budge leaped across the room and landed on Carver. He planted a foot on his back and pressed down. Blood squirted from underneath him. The alien hissed and opened up his arms, inviting Dawes to take a swing.
Dawes pulled the pipe back like a bat, danced forward on the tips of his toes and launched it like a spear at the last second.
Budge dodged his head back and batted the pipe away.
Dawes slammed into him, knocked him off Carver.
“Get out of here!” he screamed and kneed the alien in the snout.
It was the most sensitive part of the Lick anatomy. The snout was a nerve cluster that controlled balance and their highly-advanced sense of smell. Being hit there was like a knee to the groin. A giant concrete knee filled with dynamite.
Budge dropped on all fours and howled.
Carver stumbled to his feet and kicked him in the torso. The alien pitched over on it's side as Carver kicked it again and again.
“How do you like that”” he sputtered. “How does that feel”
The weak kicks threw him off balance and he stumbled. Dawes caught him as they held each other up.
“We have to move,” he groaned.
Carver nodded, slipped free and kicked the alien one more time.
“Piece of shit,” he spit on the Lick chieftain.
“Carver,” Dawes cal
led to him. “Come on.”
The hobbled down to the airlock and fell into the shuttle. Dawes reached up and swung the door closed. He spun the wheel to lock it.
“There's only room for two up here,” Rachel called back to them.
“You go,” said Carver. “I'm dying man.”
“Some king of the hill you are.”
Dawes lifted him up and helped him into the cushioned seat.
“Fuck you man,” he coughed.
“You let an alligator looking dude get the best of you.”
Dawes strapped him in.
“I beat him,” Carver argued. “Who's the last man standing?”
Dawes looked at Rachel in the cushioned pilot's seat and Carver belted in the co-pilot's seat.
“Looks like I am,” he grinned.
The view screen lit up with a series of quiet explosions that rippled the hull of the Lucas as it headed toward them.
Rachel punched the keys. The shuttle detached from the docking arm and pulled the engine's full power.
It flipped over and raced along the underbelly of the giant ship chased by explosions. The shuttle was caught in a fireball. Rachel poured on more power that sent Dawes flying across the narrow confines of the cockpit. They broke free of the detonation and raced away in one direction.
Behind them the alien ship detached from the rear of the Lucas and rocketed after them, the flames licking after them.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
Rachel's fingers danced on the keyboard as she rerouted the automated sequence. The shuttle was designed for two people to reach the Lucas and rescue the crew, but it wasn't designed to bring them home.
She had to alter life support functions and fuel consumption to compensate for the extra person on board. They were going to make it home, but just barely and it was going to be slow.
“You can fly this thing?” Carver mumbled from beside her.
“I wasn't always a mechanic,” she said. “I cross trained.”
“I did Crossfit a couple of times,” said Carver.