The Complete Aliens Omnibus, Volume 3

by Sandy Schofield

“Hmm?” Church touched one bony finger to the imprint pad and then entered a brief clearance code. “Oh, there’s no hurry. We’ll see how things turn out.”

  Crespi grit his teeth to keep from screaming. The heavy door slid open and Church stepped into a short hall leading to what was presumably the lab entrance. Church waited until the door slid shut before he spoke.

  “Let me remind you, Church, that you are not my superior officer. All this lateral obstruction is going to serve you very poorly.” And it’s gonna frustrate me into a heart attack to boot.

  Church opened the second door and then smiled pleasantly over his shoulder. “Can you still get good chocolate on Earth? I heard they’d stopped making it.”

  Jesus, who did he have to kill to get a straight answer? What was this place? It couldn’t be a military station, there were rules and regs on those, and what was so goddamn secret that every sentence he spoke had to be rephrased for him, to insure that he wouldn’t presume to do his job?

  He scowled, but followed Church into the facility, his shoes squeaking faintly against the polished plasticrete. They stood on a small, raised platform in a huge room, perhaps two meters above the main floor. Four or five low-level techs were scattered about, a couple of them working at a computer console that took up an entire side of the vast chamber. The place stank of industrial-grade disinfectant.

  “You have one hell of a lot of nerve, Church—”

  “I accept the compliment, Crespi.” The old scientist walked to the end of the ramp and looked down over the rail into some kind of sunken enclosure.

  Crespi stared around, amazed. What was going on here, armed guards and secret access codes? There was no virus typing going on here; it looked more like a war zone.

  “How long did you think you could get away with this?” He motioned about, feeling more perplexed than he had so far all day.

  Church looked away from the rail, his expression almost apologetic. “Have you ever had to testify against a personal friend? I couldn’t make myself do it.”

  “What are you—”

  Church smiled amiably, then pointed down over the railing.

  “Look.”

  Crespi walked forward and looked into the enclosure—

  And felt his heart begin to hammer in his chest as a cold sweat broke out all over his body.

  “Shhh, don’t wake him,” whispered Church, but Crespi barely registered the words. Below them, crouched in one corner of the heated pen, was an adult drone. Its malignant dark sheen seemed to swallow up the dim light that bathed the chamber, and as Crespi leaned over, the creature’s long, black head shifted up to face them, its tail coiling loosely around the hard, metallic body.

  If Church said anything more, he missed it. Because even though his gaze never left the drone, Crespi was suddenly over a million miles away.

  5

  Sergeant Crespi yawned, careful to hide it from Captain Wilcox and the rest of the crew. He hadn’t slept much the night before and the rolling transport seemed to have a lulling effect in spite of the rough ground. He was second in com after Wilcox, at least on board the armored vehicle, and restless nights were no excuse for dragging ass—especially in front of the captain, a gung-ho type if ever there was.

  Restless, now there was an understatement. A conversation and a few drinks with Cady Trask had led to a longer discussion in her quarters—which had led to several very pleasant hours of no talking at all. He glanced around at some of the other noncoms, stifled another yawn. Corporal Trask caught his gaze and smiled before discreetly looking away, her dark red hair pulled loosely beneath her helmet. She didn’t look tired at all; amazing. And just the tiniest bit—disappointed?

  God, I wasn’t that bad, was I?

  Crespi wasn’t much of a player, never had been—he hadn’t spent his youth chasing after sexual gratification, which usually seemed to be more trouble than it was worth… but he liked to think that his prowess wasn’t horribly lacking. Adequate at the very least. It was just that his work always seemed to come first, always had—

  Trask, though. She was something. Bright, funny, attractive—and she was working toward a career in engineering, particularly biotech stuff. Maybe when this little stint was over he’d find out where she was going to station next…

  The transport lurched to a halt in the multileveled cave. Crespi blinked his eyes, sat up straighter. There were eleven others in the group, not including Wilcox and his two sweepers. The captain had apparently witnessed battle with this breed before, though none of the other grunts and noncoms had actually seen an alien drone, except in vids. Himself included. They had been brought together for the occasion, to get some experience in the field; most were working on some aspect of bioanalysis or other, and the Corps seemed to think it was important for them to be there, firsthand experience and all. Rumor had it that there would be some fast promotions for those choosing to specialize in drone research, although the higher-ups hadn’t seen fit to fill in the blanks. These creatures were supposed to be the newest up-and-coming threat to mom and apple pie… right. It was always something.

  Well, they can’t be that deadly, sending us in. Crespi rolled his head against his chest, uncomfortable in the light armor. Precautionary equipment, armed and ready, yadayadayada. Wilcox had spent a lot of time talking about how nasty these creatures were, but he seemed confident that they were just here to watch. Swell; months of work wasted to come to some no-name planetoid and witness the slaughter of a few big bugs.

  The captain stood and faced the crew. “All right, people. Regulations say you’re here as backup for the lead team and to provide a retreat escort if necessary.” He cleared his throat, smiled somewhat smugly. It looked strange on his thin, lined face.

  “What you’re really going to do is sit back, relax, and watch Rupp and Hollister liquify every alien in this cavern.”

  Wilcox motioned at his two sweepers, standing stiffly behind him. Now they looked like aliens—fully armored in what looked like silver-plated freeze units, their faces dim behind thick, tinted plexi. Each of them held two of the latest in military tech, particle-plasma projectors. The heavy weapons rode on the outsides of their arms, fully sheathed and mean-looking, basically handheld rocket launchers—only each one emitted a coherent beam of charged particles. Crespi had seen prototype tests; stand in the way and become soup du jour.

  The back of the transport slid up and out, letting the humid, foul-smelling air of the cavern breeze across their faces. Christ, that stank! The air had the thick, warm feel of rot, like badly decayed matter. Cloying.

  The vehicle’s outside lights cast a good ten meters of glow, exposing bare rocky walls that seemed too shiny, slick. Must be a leak from above ground, that’d explain the humidity—but that smell, that was unprecedented.

  Wilcox addressed the two men in the heavy suits. “Make it a clean sweep, men. I want this place sterilized.”

  “Aye-aye, sir,” said one of them, the crackle of his voice over the com sounding strangely muted, hollow. The two of them stepped out of the back and into the cavern’s gloom.

  Crespi leaned forward to see better. The men moved carefully, their thick boots thudding heavily against the cave floor. Each movement sent echoes through the still darkness, the only other sound that of their amplified breathing.

  When they were maybe five or six meters away, one of them (Hollister?) spoke quickly.

  “Over there!”

  A sudden clatter of sound, claws on stone. And what sounded like a low, guttural hiss—

  There were three of them, huge, black. They crouch-jumped into the circle of light cast by the transport, long, slick heads and chittering jaws, dripping—

  Twin beams of brilliant matter flooded the blackness, joined by the grinding thrum of the particle projectors. A third and fourth ray as Rupp fired. The creatures couldn’t have know what hit them as their dark limbs exploded backward in a hail of sizzling acid, their scaled bodies crumpling down.

  The rock beh
ind them burned, the smoke pungent, chemical.

  “Mother of God,” someone half whispered behind Crespi.

  “Offhand, I’d say this represents the end of the alien threat—”

  “No shit, Sherlock—”

  Crespi couldn’t take his eyes off of the smoldering rocks and the dismembered—things that lay in front of them. His body felt frozen, as if his blood had been replaced by liquid nitrogen. The soldiers behind him muttered and laughed in various states of awe, but Crespi felt something akin to terror. Monsters. They were scientists, what the fuck had they been sent into? Most of them hadn’t ever been in combat, hadn’t even used their boot-camp skills since before graduation, years past. Marines, yes, but trained fighters? Not them, not any of them, not anymore, without even thinking about it he reached for his weapon, rested one cold hand against the butt.

  Dazed, he glanced away for a second, saw Captain Wilcox staring out at the dead drones, a strange smile affixed to thin lips.

  “Kinda takes all the sport right out of it, don’t it?” Wilcox said, his eyes lit up from within.

  Oh, shit… Crespi felt it, deep in his gut. This was bad, code red time, these things were fucking lethal—

  Hollister and Rupp had moved out of the line of sight, off to one side of the ATV. All at once the hissing of the melting slag grew louder, more intense.

  That’s not slag—

  The sweepers’ voices blared out over the com, confident and excited. “Whoa, looks like the mother lode!”

  “Get ’em all before they scatter!”

  A flash and several low hums, and this time there were inhuman shrieks of something like rage, high and shrill, so loud that it would take dozens, maybe hundreds of the things to make that much noise—

  Hissing, acid on rocks now, the smoke pouring into the small transport at an incredible rate. Wilcox jumped forward, slammed his hand into the rear door control. Just before it came down, Crespi saw a flood of the viscous acid wash across the stone floor toward the transport.

  He snapped his head around, caught Cady’s horrified gaze, saw the sudden fear on the faces of the others. The projectors buzzed on, again and again, the smoke thickened—

  “Hollister!” Rupp, his voice panicked.

  “I can’t see! I can’t see!”

  The ATV suddenly crashed to one side. Several of the crew cried out in alarm as Rupp and Hollister began to shout.

  “The stuff’s getting in! The fumes are getting in, the concentration is too much, I can’t breathe—”

  “The transport! The wheels, they’re melting!”

  That much acid—Crespi jumped up, pushed his way to the front of the ATV. From outside came the horrible alien screams, so many now, the projectors almost silent in their wake.

  Wilcox shouted, “Crespi! Blow the bolts on the escape hatch!”

  “Yessir!”

  The hatch popped outward and a new flood of smoke pushed into Crespi’s face from above. He drew his weapon, a handheld automatic machine pistol, and crawled out into the swimming darkness.

  Behind him, Wilcox screamed, “Fight! Fight! Kill them, Marines!”

  Crespi spun, searched for the two sweepers beneath the fog of burning rock. There, three o’clock, one down—

  —and crouched over him was a nightmare vision, the blackness come to life. Easily three and a half meters tall, an impossible-looking thing made from ebony metal and stainless steel. A long, spined tail whip-cracked the air behind it, splashed through the ankle-deep pool of corrosive blood.

  Bodies of so many creatures all around, parts and pieces of shattered limbs and exploded skulls. And there were more, alive and drooling, creeping out of the smoky shadows—

  Shots fired all around Crespi as the others clambered onto the roof and found targets. Crespi sighted the monster on top of the fallen sweeper, squeezed the trigger again and again—

  The fumes were almost blinding, searing Crespi’s throat and nostrils. Hollister fired blindly into the oncoming creatures, spraying more acid across the cavern. Crespi heard human screams behind him as the blood flew, spattered onto unprotected flesh—

  Out of nowhere, one of the drones leapt forward, grabbing Hollister from behind, its long, chitinous arms wrapped around him—and then its metal jaws shot forward, ripping the man’s throat out through his spine in a gout of red.

  “They’ve got Hollister!”

  Wilcox screamed, barely audible in the din. “They’ve got all of us, you dumb sonuvabitch! Fight! Fight!”

  More drones leapt out, ran for the transport through the waves of gore. Their blood splashed up, more of it flying and spitting across human skin.

  Crespi was dizzy, ejected and jammed another mag into his weapon, turned in time to see one of the men fall off the roof and into the acid. The sounds of weaponfire were being drowned out by screams now, as a second, Corporal Chan, plummeted into the mire.

  “Mother, I need help—”

  Crespi fired again, turned and saw Tom Olsen, his hands clenched around his bleeding gut. Olsen staggered past and collapsed, the tips of his bloody ribs beginning to sizzle and melt. Private Olsen, his friend, dead—

  The drones were falling, dying, but even through the dark smoke Crespi could see more of them coming, climbing over black bodies to get at the transport.

  “Merciful Buddha, nooo—”

  “I’m dead! I’m dead!”

  Crespi spun, his bullets ripped into one of the things as it landed on the roof. He had time to see the man or woman whose face was melting, a pulpy bubbling mass of red. He saw Corporal Akely firing, suddenly falling, a long talon coming out of his gut, the monster clawing through his torso. Fourteen Marines, and now there were four, maybe five—

  The cries of the alien drones were louder than the gunfire now.

  Crespi screamed to no one as he jammed another magazine into his pistol. “Hopeless! This is hopeless!”

  “Keep firing!” Wilcox, somewhere behind him, though Crespi could no longer see where. Tears ran from his scalded eyes, almost impossible to see anything—

  “Tony—?”

  At the sound of his name he stopped, spun—

  And saw Cady Trask, crouched down, looking up at him almost calmly. Her red hair was down now, the helmet gone, her face pale and ethereal in the smoky gloom.

  Her right arm was gone, the stump of her shoulder hissing and bubbling red foam. Blood trickled down from her mouth where she had bitten through her lower lip in shock and pain.

  She stared at him for a scant second that seemed like an eternity—and then was jerked away by a long, spiny arm, pulled down into the mass of acid and limbs.

  “NO!” Crespi blasted the creature as it disappeared into the haze—hoping to God that his bullets got to her before its teeth did…

  There was a sudden, wrenching crack that assaulted all of his sense. The ATV lurched, slanted downward, sent another grunt to his acid death.

  “What’s happening?!” Crespi shouted.

  Wilcox sent a hail of fire into a leaping drone. “The ledge is going! It’s—”

  The rest was lost in another deafening crunch. Crespi’s thoughts raced, bleary and sick, multilevel caves—

  “Grab something, ride it down, stay on top!”

  Crespi fell, looped one arm through a metal strut, still clutching his gun—as the world spun away with a last rumbling crack, sending the tiny vehicle downward through space and into a void.

  6

  Crespi braced himself for the impact, eyes clenched shut, held on to the thick strut with all his strength. The weighted transport plummeted through the dark for a few impossibly long seconds, while all around he heard the screams of the creatures following them down.

  BAMM!

  The impact dislocated his shoulder and slammed his head into the metal paneling hard enough to blur his vision even further. There was no time to do it gently—he jerked his arm out and up, his teeth grit against the pain as the bone and muscle popped back into place.r />
  Rocks and debris rained down from above, clattered in echo across the cave floor, joined only by bursts of static from the ruined ATV. The air was clearer here; muffled shafts of light struggled through a crevice to his left.

  Something else struggled, too. A half-crushed drone, there in a pile of shattered rock.

  Crespi slid from the slanted roof of the battered ATV and aimed. Squeezed. And watched as the alien’s bizarre, twisted form exploded, bubbled into stillness.

  Another sound, behind him, soft in the ringing aftermath of the shots. Crespi spun, pointed—

  Sergeant Karl Gibbs crawled out from behind the transport, coughing, a gun in hand. He stood, stumbled over to Crespi. The look of fear seemed out of place on his strong features, the tension bunching his huge shoulders; Gibbs pumped iron, old style, had chatted with Crespi about it a few days before…

  Crespi shook his head of the random thoughts, unable to focus. This is impossible, didn’t happen couldn’t happen! They were Marines, for chrissake!

  For a moment they surveyed the wreckage all around them, the torn, hissing pieces of drone bodies—and the mostly unidentifiable remains of the Marines who had gone down with them. Crespi saw Wilcox, could only tell by the uniform; there was a thick slab of rock where his head should have been. He didn’t want to look, didn’t want to see Cady or Tom or any of them, not like this—

  From somewhere out of the darkness beyond them, he heard a sound that his mind rejected, that he wanted to be an illusion more than he’d ever wanted anything. He checked the counter on his piece. Three rounds. Three.

  Hissing. Talons on rocks.

  “Fuck!” Gibbs stumbled over to Wilcox’s corpse and snatched the captain’s gun out of his limp hand. Crespi looked around desperately, saw only rocks and death.

  From the useless transport came another buzz of static, the transmission lost through the layers of rock. “ATV103, come—What’s—in there—”

  Crespi ran to the crushed door of the vehicle, screamed toward the stuttering intercom. “Code Red, they’re coming! Get us out of here! Code Red!”