Fluency

by Jennifer Foehner Wells

  Delay action momentarily, the symbol read.

  She wasn’t done with the filamentous medical devices after all. The suit utilized the same technology to make health assessments and deliver rudimentary care under combat conditions. Without the gel buffering the sensation, they pinched as they drove under her skin at strategic points all over her body.

  The suit triaged her. She realized with a start that it had threaded her brain and was delivering a digital assessment of her medical state in a real-time head-up display behind her eyes. The suit’s right leg adjusted its configuration slightly, to support the healing skeletal structure and minimize further damage.

  A shunt was established at the site of the nerve root of her right leg, which already felt blessedly numb. New pathways of control for the movement of that leg were routed. To ease the transition, the suit’s control matrix chose a software patch for itself so that it could coordinate more closely with the primary motor cortex on the left side of the prefrontal lobe of her brain.

  Behind her eyes, a dazzling symbol prompted, Practice?

  She unconsciously nodded her head, and felt the suit moving nearly effortlessly, in servomotor creaks and whirs. She let out a soft laugh. She felt like—which comic-book hero was it? She couldn’t remember the name. Alan would know.

  She had to find him—all of them. Ei’Brai claimed he didn’t know where they were, or what had happened to them. She didn’t know what she was going to find, but she had to go now.

  The suit wanted to optimize the customization of the suit for her personally. It was requesting that she perform a series of maneuvers, first simple, repetitive motions as in calisthenics, then increasingly more complex movements like the katas of a martial art.

  Her primary concern at that moment was simply to master walking in that getup. She turned carefully toward the door, intending to make headway as she worked it out.

  Her gait was clumsy at first. The right leg pounded into the floor, jarring her all the way up to her teeth. The suit’s adaptive software adjusted the code-patch with each step, until walking became less like drunken crashing and more like slightly disjointed stomping. Perhaps that was the best she could do.

  The suit prompted her again to continue the practical exercises so that the hardware/software integration could be perfected. She ignored the request. She didn’t need to move like a ninja. She just needed to get there. She set off for the deck-to-deck transport, picking up speed as she went.

  20

  So fucking tired.

  Bergen’s eyes drifted shut. He let them close, forcing his mind to stay active, alert, while he caught a little rest. Just a few minutes. As long as he was quiet, he’d be relatively safe. Just… no sleeping. If he slept, he might snore. Snoring was a bad idea.

  He was in the fucked up state he was in because he’d fallen asleep some time ago—no idea how long ago that had been now. He’d lost his watch—as if he could have kept track of anything like time in this nightmare, anyway. He hadn’t eaten in what felt like days. He wasn’t even hungry anymore.

  Waking up with a startled snort to find some creature feasting on his own leg? That had been fucked up. The fact that he hadn’t felt it or that he was still alive? More fucked up. He should be dead by now.

  He lifted one eyelid slightly to look down at his left leg. The flight suit was shredded from the knee down, exposing a calf that resembled chopped steak. He couldn’t even make out where the slash from the tail had been before; the smaller wound was lost in the new mess. It hadn’t even bled much, which was weird. Damn things must have a coagulant in their saliva. He coughed a little, then twitched and came to full alert, remembering he wasn’t supposed to make a sound.

  He’d been lucky that there’d been some kind of epic monster-on-monster battle going on in the corridor that had drowned out the sound of him killing that little son of a bitch. Sound drew them.

  Above all, he had to stay as quiet as possible. It was the only way. So, no sleeping, no groaning, no whining. No anything. Just hanging on.

  The urge to scream profanity was strong, but he held back, barely. Something inside him kinda wanted it all to just be over. If he couldn’t go out fighting, at least maybe he could go out raging like a lunatic.

  Goddamn motherfuckers. He was not an all-you-can-eat sushi bar.

  He felt kind of feverish and light-headed. There was no telling what kind of germs those bastards had left on him and no way to clean the wound. He had nothing left. He’d lost everything except his gun and even that had precious few bullets left.

  How many rounds? One? Two?

  He was too tired to check. He was loath to use it anyway. The noise created more problems than it solved.

  His head sunk to his chest. He jerked himself awake and blinked owlishly, trying to remember the last thread of thought he’d been meandering down before he’d drifted off.

  He’d given up hope that Walsh and the others would come back for him. They’d already pushed off from the Target. They’d be drifting toward Mars for months, and, if they weren’t all zombies by the time they got there, they’d touch down, connect the Providence to the return capsule, and hunker down to wait for the launch window to open to head for home. They’d have a year to explain to Houston via radio what had happened. Houston, without a doubt, was going to send Bravo to blow all this shit up. And good riddance.

  He was just hanging out in this tomb, waiting to kick it. The only thing keeping him from cracking up completely was the hope that maybe… maybe Jane was still alive.

  Walsh released the back of his flight suit and Bergen spun around angrily, getting in Walsh’s face. “We have to go after her.”

  Walsh eyed him steadily. “How do you propose we do that?”

  “We—we—fuck! What the fuck just happened?” Bergen swung around, hand raising to the back of his neck, gripping hard, thoughts racing through every possibility. “Fuck, fuck, fuck!”

  Gibbs and Varma approached them slowly. The animals were clawing and scrabbling and hissing on the other side of the door.

  Varma spoke up, “We should explore the room, see if there’s anything here we can use.”

  Walsh nodded solemnly. “Agreed. Spread out—but maintain visual contact.”

  Gibbs’s gaze darted from person to person. “We’re not going to talk about what just happened? That wasn’t Tom Compton…”

  Varma’s eyes were glassy. “Clearly not.”

  Gibbs went on, his expression stricken, “I mean, it was his body, I know… but…” He trailed off and turned a pleading gaze on Varma. “Do you have any theories as to what or how?”

  Varma looked pained. “I’ve no idea. This is so beyond the realm of human medical science, Ronald.”

  She wouldn’t say what they were all thinking—that the alien had wanted Jane for something from the start. Now it had her and Compton, both.

  Walsh ground out, “At this point, it doesn’t matter how, or even why. It’s getting its rocks off watching us spin our wheels. We just have to get the hell out of here.”

  The sounds from the hall amplified suddenly. There was a cacophony of thuds, unearthly screams, and strident hisses. They all turned toward the door. Bergen half expected it to open—or for something to break through it.

  Varma crossed quickly to put her hand over the door control, ready to shut it again if one of the animals got lucky and tapped the right spot outside.

  Something large slammed against the other side of the door, shaking it. Varma flinched. Walsh stepped between her and the door, pistol ready in one hand, air canister in the other. Alan and Gibbs joined him. They stood, shoulder to shoulder, waiting.

  The enraged and agonized shrieks from the other side of the door reached a deafening zenith. Alan glanced at the others, psyching himself up for the next onslaught that he knew was likely to be the end.

  Then, the sounds died off. It went silent.

  Minutes went by without a sound. No hissing, no screams, not even the scratch of c
laws against the door.

  Cold sweat ran down the side of Bergen’s face. He shrugged it away with his shoulder. He was intensely thirsty, chilled from the evaporation of sweat, and his muscles ached from the exertion and tension of the last hour. The fiery sensation in his left leg was waning, quickly replaced by an unnerving stiff, wooden feeling.

  They remained ready, but Bergen felt silly about it.

  “What just happened?” Gibbs asked nervously, adjusting his stance and aim.

  Bergen rolled his eyes. “Is that a rhetorical question? What makes you think we have more information than you do, Gibbs?”

  Walsh shot him a dirty look and lowered his 9mm. “Stand down.”

  They broke apart and stood motionless, listening. Varma went to the door and put her ear to it. Walsh sidled up to her and she moved out of his way, shaking her head. He listened for long minutes.

  Walsh stepped back and motioned Varma to the door control, then gestured for Bergen and Gibbs to flank him. “Cover me,” he said gruffly. Once they were in place, he nodded at Varma. She tapped the control and took up a defensive stance.

  The door slid up. A pile of the creatures that had been leaning against the door fell toward them. Walsh stepped back, cursing, but didn’t fire into the mass.

  Because they were all dead. For as far as Bergen could see, the floor of the corridor was littered with contorted corpses. Many had a painful, twisted look to them—eyes bulging, hinged-maw yawning, winged mouth-flaps extended, scaled-tongues stiffly erect. In death, they were even more grotesque than in life. No small feat, that.

  “What the hell?” Walsh muttered.

  Varma moved forward and stooped on the threshold, turning one of the specimens over with the business end of her Beretta.

  “Any theories, Varma?” Walsh grunted.

  She replied, “If I had to guess, I’d say asphyxiation.”

  Walsh huffed and poked one with the toe of his boot.

  Gibbs seemed to be looking anywhere but at the animals. “That’s insane. How could that happen?”

  No one knew. No one answered him.

  Walsh eased through the door past Varma, stepping over and around the corpses. He scanned up and down the corridor, looking unsettled.

  Bergen could see the wheels turning. Without conscious thought, he followed Walsh into the corridor, bellowing, “We’re going for Jane, you bastard!”

  Walsh inhaled slowly, raising his head a fraction. He turned, his eyes questioning Varma.

  Varma squared her shoulders and nodded. “We should, yes.” She turned to Gibbs.

  Gibbs couldn’t seem to find a comfortable place to rest his eyes; he closed them. “Johnson’s got no idea what’s going on here. We owe it to them—at the very least—to get a message back home. I think that should be our priority.”

  “Jane just saved our fucking lives, Gibbs!” Bergen blurted out in disbelief.

  Gibbs screwed up his mouth and leveled his gaze on Bergen. “Yeah. But how can we possibly find her in here? We have to be realistic, Berg.”

  Walsh said, “It’s split. Fifty-fifty.”

  Bergen’s hands clenched at his sides. “No, it’s not. Jane’s the deciding vote. She wants to be found, goddamn you.”

  Walsh cleared his throat. “How long can she survive with an injury like that?”

  Varma’s expression was thoughtful. “It was a compound fracture. That’s very serious. She’ll have lost a lot of blood. I can’t imagine her lasting more than three days. Even without taking blood loss into consideration, she wasn’t carrying water, and sepsis is inevitable with an injury such as that. It’s dire.”

  Walsh nodded slowly. “Can you treat that injury with the supplies in the Providence?”

  Varma’s chin came up. “Affirmative, Commander.”

  A bit of bravado, then, from Varma. If that worked on Walsh, it was all to the good.

  Bergen watched Walsh, willing him to make the right call. Regardless of Walsh’s decision, he’d already chosen for himself. He wasn’t leaving this ship without her. Whatever that meant—he’d do it.

  Walsh scratched absently at his beard, then jerked his head toward the deck-to-deck transport. “Let’s go, then.”

  But it wasn’t that simple.

  They threaded through the carnage, pistols at the ready. Bergen kept to the rear so the others wouldn’t feel compelled to comment on the growing difficulty he was having with his leg.

  When they picked their way over the spot where Jane had fallen, he swallowed hard. She’d lost a lot of blood. There was a large, dark pool, a smaller one nearby, with a long smear between them, from when she’d dragged herself, trying to save herself.

  He’d failed her. They all had.

  Varma stopped to survey the area before stepping around it. Her voice remained clinical. “It always looks worse than it is. Liquids… volume looks like more when it’s spread out, Alan.”

  He nodded and turned away. He couldn’t bear her sympathetic expression.

  The contrast, once they’d cleared that area, was sobering. The corridor near the deck-to-deck transport was virtually untouched, like a life or death struggle on a monstrous scale hadn’t just taken place a few meters away. If he didn’t turn around, he could almost believe it’d been a terrible dream.

  The slimy pupa on the floor in front of the deck-to-deck transport lay limp and broken open, its contents unleashed at some point since they’d last seen it. Inside the chamber were the remains of several creatures, smashed to shell and jelly by Compton, apparently.

  They stepped inside. Bergen leaned against the wall, grateful for a break from dragging a stiff, tingling foot at the end of a leg that was starting to resist moving at all.

  Walsh radiated disgruntlement. “Where do we start?”

  “Let’s assume a best-case scenario.” Varma reached out and touched the symbol for the level with the infirmary. Nothing happened. She pressed it again. The door didn’t close. They went nowhere.

  Bergen edged her out of the way, pressing the button himself, then trying various other keys. Pressing all the keys. Pounding the keys with his fists.

  They were locked out.

  The three of them silently watched him gimp-marching back and forth up and down the hall, swearing, until he finally fell on his ass. No one said a thing. They just sat down in a defensive cluster around him to share a meager meal and some water.

  Varma didn’t say a word, but efficiently slit his pant leg to the knee, examined the wound, smeared an ointment on it, and bandaged it. He knew he should thank her, but all he could manage was a nod. He immediately started theorizing about where the nearest deck-to-deck transport might be, from an engineering standpoint.

  Walsh kept his eyes on his food. His voice was flat. “It’s locked us out, Berg. I think you’d better come to terms with that. It doesn’t want us going after her.”

  “The deck transport could be malfunctioning,” Bergen said quietly, every muscle in his body tensing.

  “That would be some coincidence, don’t you think?”

  “Not if ballistics had been discharged inside.”

  “We saw no evidence of that.”

  Bergen stood, hopping on one foot, hands clenching at his sides. “She’s one of us.”

  Varma rose too and laid a hand on his arm, subtly supporting him. “We have to talk this through, Alan. You must remain calm.”

  Walsh stayed put. “This isn’t the movies, Berg. We lose people. It’s a fact of life. Every one of us knew that when we signed up. We all knew we probably wouldn’t be going home.”

  “You’re giving up on her too fast. There have to be service ladders in here somewhere. I’ll find them.”

  Walsh leaned back and grimaced. “That could take days to find. She hasn’t got long.”

  Varma’s hand tightened on his arm.

  Bergen’s voice came out as a low growl, “You don’t know that for sure. I could get lucky.”

  Walsh raised his eyebrows, gesturing li
mply. “We’re running out of ammo. What if there are more of those things?”

  “What if I kick the living shit out of you?” Never mind that he couldn’t actually manage that.

  Varma gripped his arm forcibly and led him some distance away. He leaned against the wall, chuffing like a locomotive through flaring nostrils, barely keeping from exploding.

  Varma waited patiently until he turned to her, throwing up a hand. “I’m not leaving unless I know she’s… You guys go, if you have to. I won’t leave her here to… I won’t leave her here alone.”

  Varma nodded slowly. “Do you trust me to fairly arbitrate this issue, Alan?”

  Varma? Fair?

  “Yes,” he said through clenched teeth.

  He had no idea how long ago that conversation had taken place. Time seemed interminable without any way to mark it. They’d agreed to wait for him for three days while he searched for a way off this deck. Those three days were long past being up.

  Once the paralytic in his leg had worn off, he’d found other deck-to-deck transports. None of them worked. He had never found a service ladder leading to another deck. He’d been trying to return to the capsule before it left, to ask the others for more time, to get more supplies and a cutting tool. He had hoped to cut into the wall around the deck-to-deck transport controls and manually trigger the mechanism. It had been a pretty desperate approach, but then, he had been feeling pretty desperate.

  That’s when it had become clear that a new brood of the creatures had hatched. Once they’d caught his trail, they had hunted him. He had been an easy target until he’d realized that all the noise he was making was the problem. He had never made it back to Providence.

  There’d been a few tight moments. He’d backed into a room and had barricaded himself into a small area by stacking man-high towers of the heavy storage crates around himself, like circling the wagons. They were already stacked up, and they slid over the deck pretty easily. It had required a bit of fancy dancing with a larger, slower-moving monster that had been stalking him for a while and had followed him in there. But he’d managed it without becoming monster chow.