by Stuart Clark
He tasted iron on his lips and wiped away blood with blood-covered hands. The man who had done this to him, he reminded himself , as if he could forget, was the man who had hurt Kate too.
Her question rang in his ears. Why? Why was he bothering to give chase? Kit was nothing but trouble, had been nothing else but trouble. Why bother with him? Besides, what was he going to do once he’d caught him? Kill him?—Impossible. Wound him? Maybe put a round in his leg so he didn’t pull a stunt like this again. But that would make him a burden and slow them all down. Not an option.
Just let him run. But to where? The truth was, there was nowhere to run—except maybe the shuttle and a way home.
Wyatt ran. He couldn’t see Kit but he could hear him somewhere in the forest in front of him. His eyes verified the trail for him. Kit was easy to track. At the moment he was running. not hiding, and he was leaving a trail of snapped branches and trampled undergrowth—and the odd size eleven boot print in the mud.
Kit heading for the shuttle? It wouldn’t happen he told himself. Couldn’t happen. What were they going to do, both make it back independently and then pretend like nothing had happened? Now it was like Kit had said—every man for himself.
He was running now alright, but if he got away he’d be back to haunt them. He was a trapper too, and he could track them as easily as Wyatt tracked him now. And he would. Wyatt knew it, simply because now he couldn’t let them live. They couldn’t just turn back the clock and forget it all.
Not only that, but Wyatt possessed the single most important thing in the world to Kit right now—to them all. The hyperdrive unit. He would have to come back for that to stand any chance of getting home.
Kit would take them out, Wyatt decided. So he was one and they were three, he could pick them off one by one or he could take on all three of them at once with surprise as his ally. If he tried that then Wyatt knew he would be the primary target. Maybe he’d just snatch the hyperdrive unit and run, but Wyatt doubted it. He’d kill Wyatt quickly and then…do what to Kate? He shivered in spite of himself.
Gon-Thok might rush to her aid like it did for Par, but if it used that wicked looking spine on Kit and killed him then the hyperdrive unit wouldn’t be going back to the shuttle at all, and the alien, despite its good intentions, would have doomed them all.
And what if Kit succeeded? What if he made it back with the hyperdrive? He’d make up some cock-and-bull story about how he had been the lone survivor like Par before him. They wouldn’t believe him, of course, Bobby especially, but they wanted off this God-forsaken place as much as Wyatt did and Kit would have delivered them the means to do it. They’d run and worry about the details later, and Wyatt wouldn’t blame them for doing it.
He was digesting all this as he ran, deep in thought, when he burst through some brush and found Kit in front of him balancing on one leg, dead still.
“It knows I’m here,” he mouthed to Wyatt.
* * * * *
And so it went on, all through the day. After a few rounds of practice they had come to the conclusion that if they hadn’t seen it for half an hour they Chris had about five minutes of working time before it was attracted by the noise and showed its face again.
This had worked fine until the creature had come from their blindside, behind them. Bobby hadn’t seen it coming, hadn’t even felt the impact tremors until it was too late and the monster was on top of them, experimentally nudging and rocking the ship and nearly knocking her out of the door. They had fought their rising panic and had stayed silent and it had worked, but their timing was revised.
Five minutes was cut to three.
Five minutes wasn’t much. Three was next to nothing. Progress was slow.
* * * * *
Kit could have been on the cover of Sports Illustrated. He looked like a sprinter caught mid-stride in a photograph, arms akimbo, rear leg trailing a foot off the ground. Frozen in time. His pose was almost laughable.
Except Kit was a trapper, and he looked deadly serious. In fact, he looked shit-scared.
“What?” Wyatt asked.
Kit said nothing, just motioned to the ground. Wyatt surveyed the scene.
Kit was standing on what looked to be a very large leaf. Two feet wide and twenty feet long, perhaps even a thick drape of vine. It was one of many, all radiating out from a center which was occupied by what looked to be a circular plug of mud and grass maybe four feet across. From above it looked like the pressed and dried head of a massive sunflower plant, dropped right here in the forest. Judging from Kit’s reaction, it was nowhere near that benign.
“It’s underground,” he whispered, by way of qualification. “I heard it move.”
Now it all made sense. These “leaves,” if that’s what they were, were some kind of sensor mechanism for something that lived underground. No doubt they all funneled into the hole in the ground under the mud plug and then were channeled to some underground burrow where the creature sensed the vibrations from each and every one of them. That way it could monitor wherever the prey item on the surface was on its dais. Then it was just a matter of when to strike. Wyatt couldn’t help but admire its genius. The predator remained hidden. The prey didn’t suspect a thing until it was too late.
Kit was about a third of the way across, maybe twelve feet from the edge. There was no way that Wyatt could reach him. Wyatt even felt a twinge of pity for him. Kit’s situation was very bad. What’s more, he knew it, too.
“Well, can’t ya do somethin’?” Kit’s eyes mirrored his fear.
“Like what?” Wyatt’s answer sounded flippant but it wasn’t as throwaway as it had sounded. He was desperately racking his brain.
“I dunno. Think of something!” Kit hissed at him.
“Okay! Okay! Don’t move. I’ve got an idea. I’ll be right back.”
“Where are you going?”
“Don’t move! And not a sound!”
Wyatt backtracked a little until he found what he was looking for. A large stone, maybe a kilo in weight. It was crazy, he thought as he went about his task, two minutes ago he wanted to kill this guy. No, not kill, just seriously hurt. Now he was trying to save his life. But it wasn’t going to be easy. The animal knew Kit was there, had sensed his presence. This was Russian roulette on a grand scale. How many more steps did Kit have before the creature would strike? One? Five? A bullet and a gun looked a lot more preferable right now. While the plan formed in Wyatt’s mind he couldn’t help but think that it was simply an act of desperation—and utterly futile.
When he returned to the dais he had a dozen or so similarly sized rocks cradled in his arms. He crouched and carefully spilled them onto the floor.
Kit had not moved, had not even flinched and was fortunate to possess a decent sense of balance. He visibly relaxed on Wyatt’s return but frowned on sight of the stones. “You ain’t gonna be able ta stone this thing to death ya know,” he whispered. “It’s too bloody big for that.”
“I know,” Wyatt commented dryly. “That’s not what I had in mind.”
The frown never left Kit’s features.
“This thing has sensed your presence and is monitoring you from underground.”
Kit nodded. He’d figured that much out for himself.
“I’m hoping I can confuse it with these.” Wyatt gestured to the rocks. “I’m gonna throw them across to the other side of the dais and create false vibrations.”
“How does that help me?” Kit’s eyes searched for the answer to his own question.
“You have to time your steps to coincide with the impact of the rocks on the ground. Then there will be two vibrations. Two signals.”
“That’s it? That’s your plan?”
Wyatt had to admit that it was pretty ropey, but they were in the middle of the forest, for Christ’s sake. What was he supposed to do? He sighed heavily. “That’s it.”
Kit nodded, reluctantly accepting the fact.
“Okay. Trial run,” said Wyatt. “Don’t you move.�
� He took a stone in hand and hefted it underarm to the other side of the dais. It followed a graceful arc through the air and landed with a thud before rolling to rest. “Anything?”
“Yeah, it moved again,” Kit said nervously.
“Good. Well, at least it’s working. This time I want you to put your other foot down.” Wyatt picked up another rock. “Ready?”
Kit nodded, a look of absolute brick-shitting terror on his face.
Wyatt launched the rock and Kit traced it with his eyes. As it landed he planted the trailing foot in front of the other. He was half turned now, body twisted, facing Wyatt. Nothing happened. “So far, so good,” Wyatt said with an attempt at a smile, but he could not muster one. “Again,” he stated and Kit merely nodded.
They carried on like this for three or four minutes. Kit was now facing Wyatt and had his back to the central plug. He had covered maybe half of the distance back to the edge of the dais and was taking tiny steps to minimize his impact on the sensory vines. Apart from the occasional underground movement from the creature below, which would send a surge of fear through both men, everything appeared to be working fine.
Except everything was not fine.
Wyatt knew it. Kit knew it, but neither man voiced their concern over what was clearly visible to both of them. There weren’t enough stones to bring this half-hashed rescue plan to its conclusion.
Kit was six feet away. Wyatt had one more stone.
It was too far to make it in one stride from a standing start, even for a big man like Kit.
“I’m gonna have to go find more stones.” There, Wyatt had said the inevitable. He turned to leave.
“No, man,” Kit said behind him.
He turned back. “What do you mean?”
“Don’t leave now. We’re almost home and dry.”
“Almost,” Wyatt reiterated for him with emphasis, “But you can’t…”
“I can make it,” Kit said defiantly. “It’s two strides. One foot on the vines, one foot off. You have one rock. That’s all I need. You can’t leave me like this. I can make it,” he said again.
“Don’t be stupid, Kit. Why run the risk? Look, I’ll be gone a couple of minutes. That’s all.”
“I’m too close, Wyatt. Don’t leave me now. Just throw the stone.” Kit was genuinely afraid, and desperate. Safety was so close he could almost taste it. Delay for whatever reason would only prolong his agony. His nerve had been tested to the extreme for the last ten minutes. It was an agony he could no longer bear, whatever the risk.
“I’ll be a couple of minutes,” Wyatt said again. He sounded like he was going out for groceries.
“Throw the goddamn rock, Wyatt!” Kit shouted—and that was all it took.
The mud plug flew off the center of the dais like a hatch under pressure and two fleshy tentacles shot skyward, as fluid as jets of pink water.
In that horrible instant Wyatt knew that Kit’s luck had just run out.
The predator had been smart and had played a waiting game until one of the two signals gave itself away as genuine. Kit’s shout had done just that. Just the sound of his voice and the vibrations that accompanied it had been enough to give him away. He had effectively put the gun to his own head, pulled the trigger and found the loaded chamber.
He heard the commotion behind him and saw the look of horror on Wyatt’s face. By the time he turned around the slender limbs were already snaking their way towards him with frightening speed.
Two strides. That was all that lay between him and safety.
Total fear paralyzed him for a second and then that same fear galvanized him into action. He bolted.
He barreled into Wyatt, grabbing him firmly in a bear-hug tackle. One foot landed on solid ground off the dais, the other did not follow.
One tentacle wrapped around the ankle, just above the boot. The other grabbed his thigh.
It all happened so quickly and yet so slowly. Kit’s face was in his face for the second time in half an hour. He staggered backwards, Kit’s weight knocking him off balance. The big man’s features seemed bigger than normal, exaggerated by their proximity. His eyes were closed in relief and the shaggy black beard was breached by a show of teeth. A huge grin of satisfaction.
Instantaneously his face melted into a mask of horror. Wyatt hadn’t thought that Kit could make it. Now he knew he hadn’t.
The tentacles snapped taught like elastic. Immensely strong, they yanked Kit off his feet with ease. Wyatt was on the brink of falling over backwards, but Kit held him fast. Now he was hauled the other way and landed heavily on his front in the dirt.
Together the pair of them represented a considerable burden but the tentacles continued to retract, pulling them slowly, but surely, to the hole in the ground and whatever awaited them below.
“Help me, Wyatt!” Kit’s eyes were full of panic as he desperately tried to claw his way up Wyatt’s arm.
“Let go of me, you stupid son-of-a-bitch! You’ll kill us both!” Wyatt grappled with him, trying to pry open the fingers on the hands that held him, vise-like. Suddenly the grip tightened even more. Wyatt looked up to find Kit’s face and didn’t like what he saw there.
Kit’s features were grim. He realized the hopelessness of the situation and knew now that he was not going to walk away from it. Had he let Wyatt go earlier then maybe something could have been done, the tentacles attacked with a knife or a gun in an attempt to make them release their hold, but now they had all but gone, retreated back into their hole which Kit’s foot was now over. It would be a matter of seconds before he was following them down.
“Kit! What are you doing?” Now it was Wyatt’s turn to be afraid.
The familiar sneer crossed Kit’s features. His fear had been replaced by malicious intent. “I ain’t dying here alone, Wyatt. You’re coming with me.”
Wyatt fought the rising panic and Kit, but Kit was stronger than him. Desperately he tried to maneuver himself around.
“If I ain’t getting away from this place, then neither are you. None of you!”
Wyatt frowned and then it clicked. The hyperdrive unit. Shit! He had it and right now it was on his back. He’d been an idiot. He’d put himself in mortal danger while he carried, quite literally, the others’ hopes of escaping.
Kit was in the hole now, up to his waist with just his torso above ground. Wyatt had managed to scurry around so he was in a sitting position facing him. The big man’s hands were still locked onto his arm.
“We’ll die together, Wyatt. Like brothers. Criminals together. A fitting end.” The sneer never left his face. “We’re the same, you and I, just like I told your girlfriend back there.”
From underground there was a crack, the unmistakable sound of splintering bone, and Kit lifted his head and screamed. His grip released slightly and Wyatt used the advantage. “You know what? Maybe you’re right. Maybe we are the same,” and with that he lashed out with his foot and caught Kit across the face, snapping his head back viciously.
Kit let go and then instantly realized his mistake. He grabbed for Wyatt’s leg but found nothing but air. With alarming speed the rest of him was pulled into the hole. The frantically grasping hands raked through the dirt and then were gone. There was one awful scream and then silence.
Wyatt scampered to his feet and ran for the edge of the dais. His only chance of escape, he knew, was to get away now while the beast fed. Even so, he half expected to feel the tentacles reaching out for him, to prevent him from reaching the edge, and safety. They never came.
He stopped once he knew he was safe and leaned against a tree. His breathing was shallow and rapid and his heart pounded with exertion, adrenaline and fear. He retched until he had nothing more to bring up, and as he wiped away spittle and bile with the back of a hand he looked back toward the dais just in time to see one fleshy tentacle retrieve the mud plug and replace it in the center.
The tentacle disappeared but the mud plug continued to move, the creature rotating it from underground
until it was set in place. Then it lay still.
There was nothing to mark the drama that had unfolded here. Wyatt would be the only one to ever know. He turned on his heels and followed his tracks. He wanted off this place. Now, more than ever, he just wanted to get away.
CHAPTER
18
Kate felt betrayed. Hadn’t he said just yesterday that he wouldn’t leave her again? Then he’d just gone without a thought to chase Kit. How quick he had been to break his promise to her. The sentiment had just been empty words.
Why?
It seemed like a reasonable question. She too had entertained thoughts of just letting Kit run. He had nowhere to go. Just let him go. Maybe he’d come to a grisly end.
She brought herself up short. She had never thought ill of anyone before now, but then, before now she’d been a completely different person. That was the old Kate, and that young innocent girl had been left behind on the moon-base.
Why was Wyatt bothering to give chase? She couldn’t fathom it. Surely all that mattered now was getting the hyperdrive unit back to the others. Surely all that mattered now was the two of them.
She might have been cross with him, but she was also desperately worried. Over an hour had passed since the two men had bundled off into the bush and she had neither seen nor heard anything from either of them since. Her mind was playing tricks on her now. Every crack of twig was a footfall, every rustle the passing of a body through the trees, every muted call seemed to take on a voice-like quality which called her name. “Kate! Kate!” the creatures of the forest called her mockingly.
But something was coming. A noise in the distance, becoming louder. It wasn’t just her imagination. Gon-Thok heard it too. The alien was on its feet, both alert and wary.
Wyatt stumbled onto the trail behind them. He was disheveled, mud-streaked and still bloody.
“Oh, God, Wyatt! I was so worried about you.” She started down the track towards him but slowed on getting nearer. He looked different. Battle-weary, deflated, and wearing a look she had never seen on his features before—shock. He seemed to collect himself in her presence, pulling himself together before he walked slowly up the track to join her. He laid a hand on her arm.