“Sorry, I thought I heard something. I swear we’re being watched.”
Kat lowered her pistol. “I’ve had the same feeling since we entered the forest. Almost like a shadow is going to reach out and grab me at any second.”
Ryan climbed up a fallen tree and slowly moved to its highest angled peak to get a better look.
“See anything up there?”
“There is another fallen tree in front of this one. Just past that seems to be a larger clearing, but it’s hard to tell.”
Ryan climbed down, and it took them a few tries to find a path around the gigantic fallen trees. They finally broke through some brush and into the clearing.
“My god,” said Kat.
The carnage was a frozen point in time. Bodies of fallen soldiers and military vehicles were strewn about the swampy area. Either the type of weapons used or the environmental conditions must have been perfect to mummify the remains and keep them preserved.
The low fog wisped through the vine-covered remains and, at times, seemed to emanate from the mouths of the corpses as if they were breathing out cold air.
Both of them jumped around as if people were whispering unknown words in their ears.
“Kat, what the hell is this?”
“I’m…I’m not sure yet.” Kat walked into the open swamp, her boots swishing through the low water.
Ryan followed her as she went from body to body to investigate. As they moved forward, they began tripping over remains in the shallow water. Ryan jumped a few times as he spotted a face looking back at him from behind hanging vines.
“These are Earth troops, and the other remains are Woland. Based on what is left of the uniforms and equipment, whatever happened here was a long time ago.”
“It looks like it was a bloodbath. Maybe a last charge by one side?” asked Ryan.
“Not sure. My scanner is still somewhat working. It’s picking up residual radioactive and bio-weaponry. It must have been a gruesome conflict.”
Ryan walked around the wreckage of a combat dropship. He wiped some of the grime from it to reveal a Caduceus symbol on a fiery background: the medical logo with the intertwined snakes and wings and words in another language written around it.
“Kat, come over here. I’m guessing this is a medical ship?”
Her mouth dropped as she rubbed her hand over the symbol. “This is the find of the century. Do you know what this is?”
“Not a clue.”
“It’s proof that the Order of Eir existed.”
“And they are?”
Kat rolled her eyes. “Eir is a Norse goddess associated with healing. It’s been rumored over the centuries that there was an order of battle-hardened women who would swoop into a battle if the cause was noble. They would set up a triage unit to tend to the injured warriors and traverse the battlefield for the wounded. Even fighting their way to get to them, bring them back for surgery, or painlessly end the suffering of those who were too far gone. They would leave the battle as quick as they entered it and, until today, there was no proof of their existence.”
Ryan rubbed more dirt off the ship to see the entire symbol. “Once we are done, we could always—”
They both jumped when reddish lightning immediately followed by a bang of thunder made their ears whistle.
“—come back another time to document this,” said Ryan, looking around. “We should keep moving. This place is creeping me out.”
“Yeah, probably a good idea. It’s getting dark…fast.”
They pushed forward through the ankle-deep swamp water. Ryan kept quickly turning to face a foe, but it was just more dead soldiers covered in the wet foliage, their sunken weathered faces twisted in the pain of death.
“Finally, higher ground,” he said, quickening his pace to get to a large field of white mushrooms.
“Stop!” yelled Kat.
Ryan froze and looked around. “What?”
“Those mushrooms ahead of you. What do they look like to you?”
“Skeletal hands?”
“That’s what I thought.” Kat walked past Ryan to the edge of the higher ground. The area was about twenty feet in diameter and covered with the white mushrooms.
Ryan moved next to her. “And what’s the problem with them?”
Kat pulled a knife from her belt and poked her finger with its point. She then smeared the blood on a rock and tossed it in the middle of the mushroom patch.
“OK. And…” said Ryan, shrugging his shoulders.
“Watch.”
The ends of the mushrooms started moving like fingers, reaching toward the bloody rock.
Ryan jumped back when long vines shot out of the ground and pulled the rock under. “Holy crap! What the hell was that?”
“It’s a blood fungus. I’ve only encountered it one other time. It grows in areas where large amounts of blood have been spilled. The actual mushroom itself lives dormant underground and has what looks like skeletal hands protruding from the ground. The hands seek blood, usually sucking in a wounded animal or humanoid, depending on its size.”
“And how big is this one?”
“From the number of hands, I would say it’s large. It would easily pull down something the size of an Earth cow.”
“Lovely, just lovely,” said Ryan, shaking his head. “This is turning into a planet of nightmares. I guess we’ll take the long way around.”
Kat put the knife away. “I highly recommend that.”
They carefully continued around the blood fungus. It was getting hard to hear with the driving rain slashing through the trees, and before they knew it, the late afternoon became evening, making it difficult to see anything until the alien world came alive.
The trees started to give off a greenish glow from what looked like flowing veins in the bark. Feeling the trees, they were cool to the touch and were an amazing sight, until Ryan realized it gave everything a haunting glow.
Thunder and lightning occurred more frequently, causing them to stay close to each other. The feeling of being watched weighed heavily on them, and they were glad they were not alone.
Ryan stopped after something reflected in the thick tree line ahead after a lightning bolt raced across the sky. “I think that’s metal in the trees up ahead,” he said, pointing.
Kat led the way forward at a quick pace, and the lightning illuminated the remains of a large ship. “It’s the front half of a large Earth battle cruiser. You can tell by the faded talon holding a lightning bolt symbol. It’s definitely an older class of cruiser. If we head along it, we should find an opening.”
They made their way along the ship and found a large hole where a missile probably impacted. Ryan stuck his head in and peered in both directions, but it was too dark to see anything. Kat entered, holstered her las-pistol, and lit up her hand with her innate energy ability.
The inside was overgrown with vines, and everything in this area was destroyed. Kat increased the illumination, and about thirty feet to their left was a large opening where this part of the ship had been ripped off from the main ship structure.
As they scanned the interior, Kat’s glowing hand faded, and swirls of energy started pulling away from her. Her knees buckled, causing her to end the energy burst and grab onto Ryan’s shoulder.
He slid his rifle to the side and put his arm around her. “You OK?”
Kat rubbed her head and shook it. “Yeah, I’m fine. It was the oddest thing. As I increased output, I could feel the energy being drawn from me. Almost like when I filled the energy orb that time. Only this was more intense.”
“Well, until we know what’s going on, you should hold off using your ability.”
Kat nodded and regained her composure. “I’ll only use it in an emergency.” She reached into her utility belt and pulled out two tennis ball-sized light sources. They act
ivated, began to hover, and then fell to the floor.
Ryan looked down. “Not as impressive as the last time.” He picked them up and handed the brightest one to Kat.
“At least they somewhat work,” said Kat.
“Since the back end seems to be torn off, I guess we go to the right,” said Ryan, pulling his Glock from its holster and holding the light with his left hand.
They moved deeper into the ship until they were forced to stop due to a shut blast door.
“If I had to guess, we made it to the command deck,” said Kat. “I have some small power cubes. They are low power, so whatever is draining things shouldn’t affect them.”
She angled the light on the floor as she pulled off a conduit door. The first power cube she pulled out was dead. “So much for that assumption.”
The second one had a bit of power left. She spliced in the power cube and activated it by tapping the top twice.
The door groaned and sprang open.
Ryan jumped back, his scream echoing through the ship, causing Kat to dive to the side and fumble to draw her las-pistol. A mummified body fell forward, landing in front of him.
Kat moved to a sitting position and put her head on her knees while Ryan leaned against the wall and took a deep breath.
“Sorry,” he said. “Wasn’t expecting that.”
“No worries. I like my heart beating outside my chest.”
Ryan put his hand out and helped Kat up.
They moved onto the command deck. Most of the equipment was piled to the left side. How the body got to the door was unknown to them, but others were crushed in the mess of debris. They moved the lights around and found the command chair still anchored in place. The mummified remains of the commander were still belted in. A large piece of metal was stuck in his chest.
“I hope the guy didn’t suffer,” said Ryan.
Kat pursed her lips, nodded, holstered her las-pistol, and pulled out another power cube that had barely any power left in it. “I’m going to hook this up to the console in front of the command chair. If the cracked screen still works, it should be enough to bring up some data.”
“How many of those things do you have?”
“Your next lesson in offworld archeology: always bring a bag full of power cubes.”
“That is good to know. I will add that to the adventurer backpack item list for next time.”
Kat rolled her eyes and shook her head, then attached the power cube to the console, and the screen flickered to life. She entered commands on the archaic keypad while Ryan focused his light at the open door and kept watch.
“There is a lot of data corruption. From what I can see, they engaged the Woland, and—”
The console flared, causing Kat to jump back and cover her face.
“Well, that sucks,” said Ryan, waving his hand at the smoke pouring from the console.
“Yes, it does. We’ll have to find the main part of the ship where those life forms are if we want to get any answers.”
“Probably best we set up camp here for tonight,” said Ryan, holstering his Glock.
“Makes sense. We—”
The loud bang and what sounded like a man screaming interrupted the conversation.
“That was a gunshot,” said Ryan, rushing toward the opening with Kat behind him.
Past the sound of the pounding rain they could barely make out a man screaming again. Looking at each other, they nodded and rushed out into the swampy forest.
The rain was coming down harder, and their light source barely showed a way through the darkness, forcing them to navigate by the continued shouting.
The cries for help were now mixed with odd growling and clicking noises. They slowed down to better evaluate the situation when the ground under them gave away. Ryan and Kat slid down a muddy hillside and splashed face-first into knee-deep water.
Ryan sat up and wiped the muddy water from his face and eyes. As his vision cleared, he found himself in a muddy pool surrounded by fluorescent green glowing trees.
“Behind you! Watch out!” yelled someone in front of him.
He turned to his right, and his eyes shot wide open. A humanoid with two heads and red eyes was coming at him. Its mouth chattered quickly, causing its teeth to make a clicking sound. It brought a makeshift club up, ready to strike him. Ryan fired a three-round burst into the humanoid’s chest. It spun backward and fell into the water. Ryan then moved to a kneeling position and swept the area.
Kat knelt behind him. “Over there, on the bank of the pool.”
Ryan looked over to see a man leaning against a tree, holding a makeshift rifle across his lap. Two other bodies lay next to him, as well as more deformed humanoids.
Ryan and Kat spun around to the sound of cracking branches, and more creatures poured from the tree line. They were all deformed in some way, with multiple arms, heads, clawed hands, or body parts in odd areas.
Ryan opened fire, dropping three of the creatures and causing others to fumble back. Kat fired her las-pistol, which blew a large, cauterized hole in one of the creatures, but her next shot fizzled.
“Not now! Not now!” yelled Kat, shaking the las-pistol.
“Grab the gun off my right leg,” said Ryan, firing at the attackers.
Kat pulled the Glock-17 out of his holster and began firing.
“Let’s get to the guy,” said Ryan, slamming a new magazine into his rifle.
They both moved over to the man. His face twisted when he tried to move his leg to stand. Ryan handed Kat the other two magazines for the Glock and then moved to help the man.
“Thank the gods. I’m not sure who you are, but the town is not too far past the trees,” said the man.
“Lean on me and let’s move!” Ryan yelled over the deafening sounds of Kat’s gunfire.
“What about my friends?” asked the man.
Ryan looked at the bodies lying around them and could see from the traumatic injuries to their heads and necks that they were dead.
“I’m sorry about your friends, but we need to get the hell out of here before any more—”
Everyone spun around as multiple growls emanated from behind them and creatures emerged from the brush.
“Ah, crap,” said Ryan. He recognized these creatures. They were hunched like gorillas, with bull-like faces, yellow eyes, claws, and radiated a black fire around them. The last time they had fought creatures like this, they had to self-destruct a Gravel spaceship to kill them.
The creatures slowly started spreading out. Heavy rain pinged on the muddy water’s surface. All three creatures squatted down, their hind legs trembling, and they growled again.
Ryan flicked the select lever to full-auto and unloaded on the creatures. Some of the rounds hit them, and they jumped back into the brush.
He ejected and slammed in the last magazine, lifted the man up and over his shoulder, and yelled, “Move!”
They ran in the direction the man pointed. The glow from the trees and lightning gave them enough light to make their way out of the forest and emerge onto an overgrown road.
“Which way?” yelled Kat.
“Left!” screamed the man.
The crashing in the tree line behind them confirmed their fears that the creatures were giving chase. They rounded a bend, where the outline of a large, crashed ship told them they were going in the correct direction. Nearing the ship, they could see torches lining the top of the wall and people shooting at the creatures chasing them.
A part of the ship opened and four humanoids stepped out. Two of them knelt and began firing, while two others moved to intercept them.
Kat reached the doorway first and someone waved her in as another took the wounded man from Ryan.
“Get back in,” he said, turning around and bringing his weapon up.
The two men ran in
side. Ryan continued firing as he backed up through the open door. One of the creatures howled in pain and limped away with the other creatures into the darkness.
The door was bolted shut, and Ryan turned around to face a bunch of people aiming weapons at him and Kat, who was now off to the side with her hands up.
A man in a long coat and hood stepped forward. “Take their weapons and isolate them until we can figure this out. Kill them if they try anything.”
Another man took Ryan’s gun and knife and shoved Kat next to him.
“Any ideas?” she whispered.
Ryan looked around and then up into the night sky. “Nope, but at least the rain stopped.”
Kat dropped her muddy head and sighed.
Chapter 14
Space Zealots
Ryan sat at a table in what looked like a storage room. His captors had come by to drop off clean clothes, fresh fruits, and some water. They did not talk, but at least they were treating him well. He assumed they were treating Kat the same way and just keeping them separated so they couldn’t plan an escape.
Figuring he would be here awhile, Ryan changed into the clothing, grabbed some food, and made himself comfortable against some large crates. About an hour passed when he heard the door being unlocked, and the bearded man who brought him the supplies earlier entered.
“Please come with me.”
Ryan quickly chugged some sweet juice and followed the man out. The air was muggy, and the rain was starting up again. Scattered around the area were large carved gourds lit up like jack-o’-lanterns, which made him smile.
The man led him into a large building that reminded him of a sports stadium or theater. There was seating on each side, a large open area in the center, and a line of chairs with a long table up front facing the audience. The place was filled with hundreds of people, and he was glad when he saw Kat was already here. She was standing in front of the long table and looked happier to be in dry clothes. If he had to guess, this was some sort of meeting hall, and the table upfront was for the leaders.
“Kat, you OK?” asked Ryan, moving to stand next to her.
“I’m fine.”
“This place is huge,” he said, looking around at the interior and all the people.
Second Life of Mr. Hunt: Book 3: Failover Page 12