The Grays stalk toward us, hunched forward, fingers curled. They’re intimidating as shit, not because their five-foot-tall, slender bodies are imposing, but because if we lose this fight, I think they might tear us apart.
I reach behind my back, dig beneath my body armor and remove the two handguns hidden there. Free of the Other’s direct influence, Aaron avoided the area when he patted me down. He didn’t know I had weapons hidden there, but he also didn’t want to know if I did, because then the Other would know.
He let me come here, and that was before he knew about Lindo’s death, which gives me a little hope regarding our odds of escape, which are probably still on the slim-to-none side of things.
I hand one of the weapons to Wini, who frowns at it. “Where’s Susie-Q?”
I smile, despite the circumstances. “Susie-Q holds six rounds.” I point to the CZ P-09 handgun in her hands. “Fernando holds twenty, which means if your aim isn’t shitty, we can take these assholes.”
We both take aim at the approaching Grays.
“You had me at Fernando,” Wini says, and squeezes the trigger.
A Gray’s head snaps back as the round slips through the front of its head and explodes from the back, spraying chunky purple goo.
“That’s my girl,” I say with a smile, before picking a target and opening fire.
After the sixth round is fired, and five Grays lie on the floor, the rest break into a desperate sprint. And they’re not alone. Godin and Young are back on their feet, thankfully at the back of the group. Isabella and Jacob stand behind the small army, frozen in place, both looking uncomfortable.
And then I see something amazing. Jacob is raising his hand, reaching out for Isabella.
Fight, Jacob! I will him, and pull the trigger again.
A charging Gray spills to the floor leaving a streak of purple gelatin behind it. While two of the little assholes round the fallen body, a third steps in a mound of brain jelly and slips, careening backward while sliding forward, its head slapping the solid stone floor, and cracking like an egg.
The Grays are conduits of the Other’s will, and horrifying, but they’re not built for battle.
Wini drops two Grays with marksmanship that puts my gunplay to shame. But she’s not quick enough to stop the third attacker diving toward her. Instead of shooting, she sidesteps and pistol-whips the thing’s head, driving the butt of her gun inside. The skull catches on the weapon, tugging it from her hand.
Four frantic shots drop the two Grays coming at me from the right and left. Worried about Wini, I adjust my aim to the creatures closing in on her, dropping three with five rounds and leaving myself exposed.
The next four shots that ring out are fired by Wini, who has recovered her weapon and returned the favor, dropping two more Grays headed for me.
“We can’t keep this up,” she says.
She’s right. While we’re doing a decent job of taking the Grays down in one or two shots, our accuracy and speed isn’t quite enough to drop all of them. At some point, this is going to become a fist fight. And while I would bet on me against a lone Gray any time, I’m not sure how Wini, or I, will fare against a group of them, especially when Young and Godin are in the mix.
With only a few rounds left, I consider putting a round into each man’s leg. If I can wound them, maybe they’ll be out of the fight? Then again, maybe the Other will simply block their pain? Or maybe they’ll bleed out before we can escape and get help—if that’s even possible.
I’m about to pull the trigger again when the orange crystal flickers and dulls, reminding me that while we’re fighting for survival, the Other is, too. We don’t need to kill all the Grays, we just need to outlast our true enemy.
I think.
Honestly, I’m not sure what will happen to the Grays when the Other is destroyed. Maybe they’ll faceplant, which would be welcome and funny, or maybe they’ll carry out the Other’s last orders, which could be anything from killing me to destroying the world.
“Behind you!” The voice is Jacob’s, so instead of looking for danger, I turn toward the boy, who’s holding Isabella’s hand. The girl appears to be in pain, but she’s free of the Other, thanks to Jacob’s support. That he’s free means the ancient being is losing its grasp. Godin and Young are still charging my position, but they lack Jacob’s strong will.
When Jacob points behind me and repeats his warning, I heed it and turn around.
What I find takes the fight out of me. The Grays’ reinforcements have arrived. An endless stream of the skinny bastards slips through the solid oval wall, charging toward the last defenders of mankind—myself and a stark naked senior who just ran out of ammunition.
49
Facing numbers that would make King Leonidas of the Spartans piss himself, I hold my fire and slip the gun into the holster on my hip. The two rounds it holds aren’t going to change the outcome of this fight. Fists clenched, I glance at Wini, who is now wielding her weapon like a very small club. She might get in a few good whacks, but it won’t take long for the Grays to overwhelm her. And I probably won’t fare much better.
Turning back to the smaller group setting upon us, I throw myself into the fight, delivering careful, but powerful punches. The Grays rush right into my fists, trying to overcome me with their numbers—which they’ll soon do—but for now, I drive my fists against, and sometimes through, every bulbous head I can.
Metallic whacks and a string of curses let me know that Wini is still putting up a fight without having to look.
I’m tackled from behind and driven to the floor. The lone Gray caught me off guard, but its follow-up attack is clumsy. Before it can stand, I grasp the back of its neck and drive its head into the floor three times. The third and final blow, delivered with an angry shout, splits the head.
I roll onto my knees, preparing to stand again, when I see Wini fall beneath three Grays. But they’re not from the original group. They’re the first arrivals of the new wave still pouring through the walls.
My muscles groan as I stand, pushing myself past limits set by a middle-aged body. Before I make it all the way up, I’m struck by a fist and sent sprawling back to the floor. I push myself onto my hands and knees, but don’t make it any further thanks to the stars in my vision. I look up at my attacker.
It’s Young, his twitching face framed by dancing lights.
“Fight it,” I tell him, hoping his twitching face is a sign of the Other’s faltering control.
Young steps closer, fists clenched.
“I’m sorry,” I tell him as he draws back to deliver a punch that will likely knock me unconscious. Then I deliver a swift backhand slap to his bare balls. Under control of the Other or not, the attack is enough to crumple Young in on himself. While he curls up into a fetal position, I push myself back up onto unsteady feet.
Jacob and Isabella stand back-to-back, surrounded by Grays.
The orange crystals’ luminosity continues to ebb and flow, but nothing else has changed. Hundreds of Grays scurry toward me. Wini is on the floor, held by a wiry-limbed gaggle of Grays, overseen by Godin, who is just starting to turn his attention to me.
Seeing Wini struggling for her life throws me into a rage. With a shriek that scares me a little, I run and dive, knowing full well that the attack will be the last thing I do.
I take two of the emotionless little pricks with me, crushing one beneath my weight and driving my forehead into the face of the second—three times. Warm purple chunks slip down my forehead and fall to the floor when I rise. I yank the third Gray off by grasping the back of its neck and tossing it into Godin, who’s closing in.
Wini, whose arms are now free, takes care of the fourth, pistol-whipping it in the head, over and over until it cracks and lies still. I kick the limp body off of her, and help her up.
“Look out!” Jacob shouts, even as he and Isabella are subdued by a Venus flytrap of Gray limbs closing in on them.
I find the impetus for his warning at the fa
r side of the room. A lone Gray wearing some kind of backpack aims a large glowing weapon in my direction. There’s a hum, and then a deep whump. A basketball-sized sphere of crackling energy launches from the muzzle. It’s not nearly as fast as a bullet, sailing through the air, rather than cutting through it. But the weapon’s effect is devastating to everything the sphere comes into even the slightest contact with.
A line of Grays are mowed down by the ball of energy, which slides through them, leaving empty space in its wake. Some lose arms, but most are cut in half by the waist-high projectile, which is headed straight toward me. Dodging the shot would have been easy if not for one large, naked problem—to reach me, the glowing sphere will first cut down Godin.
Not wanting to see the good sheriff fold in half after his spine and guts are removed, I dive toward the incoming projectile, tackling Godin by the waist. We topple into an onrushing Gray and fall in a heap. Hot crackling energy slides past, making my hair stand on end, but the rest of my body is intact.
“Thanks,” Godin says, his voice raspy and weak. I’m not sure if he’s regained full control, but at the very least, he’s still in there and fighting.
The hum of more energy weapons powering up shakes the air, but it’s unnecessary. The army of Grays is upon us.
I leap to my feet, ready to go down swinging. I bump into Wini’s naked back.
“Hey,” she says, with just seconds left. “Love you, babe.”
I take her hand in mine and lower my fists. “Love you, t—”
Orange light flickers and then cuts to solid black. The darkness lasts just a half second, but when the light returns, everything changes.
The horde of onrushing Grays topple forward, all control lost. Those in the front slap against the unforgiving floor with wet smacks. The thin bodies behind them fall atop each other like the grand finale in a long line of dominoes. A few balls of light launch toward the ceiling as the backpack-wielding Gray crumples to the floor, but they pose no threat.
A smile spreads onto my face when a nearby Gray faceplants into Young’s ass crack. “I was right.”
“About?” Wini asks.
“That was funny.” I take stock of our group.
Jacob and Isabella are shoving Gray bodies away. Jacob sees me watching and gives me a happy wave. “We’re okay.”
Godin pushes himself off the floor with a groan. “Thanks again.”
Young flinches back to himself as though violated, clenching his butt and launching away from the Gray burrowed between his cheeks. “Ugh! Shit!” He nearly makes it to his feet before the pain from being slapped in the nuts slows him down.
“What happened?” Godin asks. “I was a backseat driver in my own head. I could see and hear, but I couldn’t control myself. Then…” He looks at his hand, clenching and unclenching his fingers, back in control. He turns to the sea of still bodies. “Looks like the same thing happened to them.”
“But with no one in the backseat,” I say.
“How did you do it?” Young asks, straightening himself out.
“I didn’t,” I say. “It was Lindo.”
Godin’s face screws up.
“When he passed the nanites on to me, I think part of him came with them. I sent them into the Other’s computer system—” I point to the nearest orange crystal, its light now dull. “—with the order to kill it, but it wasn’t really my idea. And they were…eager to do it.”
“How could you kill the Other inside a computer?” Godin asks.
“Because it’s already dead,” I say. “In the traditional sense. The Others, as a species, are extinct. I think the last of them transferred its consciousness into this computer system, and has been utilizing the Grays and the UFOs to perform genetic experiments.”
“But to what end?” Young asks. “If they’re extinct, what could they want from us?”
I’m reading between the lines, but I think I’ve got a pretty good idea. “Host bodies. For its consciousness, to be transferred by the nanites into a body that shares enough cryptoterrestrial DNA to be compatible. I don’t think it was possible until Lindo and his nanites evolved together. Had it succeeded, I think the Other’s goal would have shifted from survival to repopulation.”
“So without a body, the nanites, and its computer system, it’s dead?” Wini asks. “For real dead?”
I’m about to answer in the affirmative when Jacob wraps his arms around me from the side. “I knew you’d come.”
“Couldn’t have done it without you,” I say. “Thanks for the confidence boost.” I give the two kids a quick once over. Aside from the scar on Isabella’s body, they appear unharmed.
Still in my arms, Jacob goes rigid.
“What is it?” I ask him.
When he doesn’t reply, I put a hand on his shoulder and a wave of fear swirls into me from the point of contact.
I turn inward, trying to spur the nanites still inside my head into action. I can feel them, but with their number significantly reduced, I’m unable to reach out beyond myself. Though my vision is still enhanced, I’m now only able to see what is right in front of me.
Jacob gasps out of his fright, sucking in deep breaths. “You’re wrong.”
“About what?” I ask him.
“The Other.” He looks up at me with his big blue eyes, terrified. He coils inward, wrapping his hands around his gut, experiencing intense emotions that the rest of us are oblivious to. When I reach out for him again, he shrugs away. “Don’t touch me!”
I raise my hands away from him. “What can I do?”
“Kill it,” he says, and when I react with confusion, he adds, “The Other. It’s alive. It’s…angry. Really angry. And it’s almost here.”
Somewhere far away, an explosion rocks the mesa, rumbling the solid stone beneath our feet. The smooth round tunnels surrounding us cough warm air and dust.
What the hell?
The billowing dust is followed by a dry, husky shriek that carries all the rage Jacob is sensing. And then it arrives, slipping through the wall as though it wasn’t there, solidifying before us like a nightmare made real.
The Other has arrived, and it is more hideous than anything I could have imagined if I’d been alive for the past ten thousand years.
50
I stagger away from the thing as its two large, fleshy feet pound against the floor, crushing a half dozen Grays beneath them, popping the bodies like stepped-on ketchup packets. Purple chunks spray away from the Other’s mass.
Jacob is right. The Other is not dead.
But I wouldn’t say it’s alive, either, not in the same way it once lived on this planet as part of the dominant species. While the nanites might have provided a way for the Other to live in a more human form, I now know that the cryptoterrestrial species—if the creature before us is an accurate representation of them—was nothing close to human.
The creature that’s just emerged through a solid wall is more tyrannosaurus than human.
Or is it? I wonder, noting the weird way its body looks almost fused together.
I use my enhanced eye to take a closer look. What I find stumbles me back even further. I trip on a Gray and fall back, sitting atop its oval head, but never taking my eyes off the Other.
It stands on two powerful legs that end with fleshy mounds, broad enough to support its weight, which must be tons, and wide enough to help maintain balance along with its fifteen-foot-long tail. All of that makes sense. Not much else does.
It takes a moment for me to tease out what I’m really seeing, but once I see it, the truth of what the Other has been doing fills me with nausea. It wasn’t just trying to become human, it was sustaining its true form using human—hybrid—bodies. I think back to all the frozen hybrids and now know where all their missing body parts went. Their altered genetics made them compatible with whatever the Other used to be. Had my genes been a bit more Other, I might be mounted in its collection, my arms, or legs, or eyes made part of the monster’s body. Harvested and
repurposed. While the rudimentary form might still be true to the Other’s origins, most of what I’m seeing was once human.
The epidermis is a patchwork of human skins, fused together and layered to create what looks like folds of rhino-like fleshy armor. The Other’s two long arms hang over the floor, but could easily be used to help it run. They are tipped not with two large hands, but with what looks like hundreds of human hands, all the fingers wriggling in time like some kind of sea plant warbling in an ocean current. The tail, sweeping back and forth with cat-like agitation is composed of human torsos, each one smaller than the last, from full grown adult tapering down to a newborn. A ridge of small bumps running along the creature’s spine from neck to tail tip is composed solely of human noses.
Despite the thing’s grotesque appearance, I come to the realization that the cryptoterrestrials weren’t a subterranean race. At some point in Earth’s history, they lived on the surface, and before becoming civilized and then technologically advanced beyond even present day humanity, they probably hunted and killed creatures far more intimidating than mankind.
It’s no wonder the Other has no moral qualms about using people for experimentation. Human scientists are creating their own chimeras out of unrelated animal species, and using pigs to grow human body parts, and basically doing anything we want with creatures of different species. We don’t like that the Other is using people for those things, but that’s because we’re people. While technologically advanced now, for the majority of humanity’s evolution, we’ve been primitive. Like animals. When swine flu, or some other super-virus wipes out the human race and the pigs evolve into the dominant species, perhaps the human race’s few survivors will find themselves in a similar position to the Other? How many people would find that outlandish? We already do with pigs as we please and would continue to do so, even after they evolved into a more intelligent, self-aware species.
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