by Gord Zajac
The puddle of light under their feet flowed forward, pulsing patiently just in front of them.
“I think it wants us to follow it again,” Sydney said.
“Yeah.” Karnage stared at the pulsing spot of light. It waited patiently as he tried to stop thinking about what loomed above him. He looked at Sydney.
“Well,” he said, “so long as they’re bein’ polite.”
CHAPTER FIVE
They followed the light across the floor for what felt like days. It stayed a half-step in front of them, rhythmically jumping ahead to prevent them from touching it with the tips of their feet. Karnage’s feet were starting to hurt and his neck ached from looking down at the light when it finally stopped moving.
Once they were standing on it, the glowing pool shot a coil of light forward that instantly sped straight up a wall directly in front of them. The lights flared out into tiny filaments and outlined a door the size of a hangar bay. The filaments broke apart, and rained down into a large glowing ring around the door. The door spiralled open with a loud aching groan. The lights flowed back into the lily pad under their feet. The lily pad drifted through the doorway, and pulsed patiently on the other side.
Karnage and Sydney followed it into the room. Once they were through, the lily pad shot strands of light in all directions. They travelled twice as far as the first room, literally disappearing over the invisible horizon. They were barely visible as thread-like strands as they snaked their way up distant walls the height of mountains. The lines eventually disappear behind an ever so slightly mottled ceiling in the distance. Pinpricks of light flickered and danced across the ceiling like stars. They grew larger in size as they slowly descended, finally revealing themselves to be glowing spheres.
The spheres were immense. Each one was many times larger than the biggest ones they had seen in the other room, each one practically a mountain floating unto itself. The dark masses moved down, revealing incredible shapes: great pyramids of crumbling stone; mammoth pointed steeples of a giant cathedral; winding twisting walls that looked like finely carved chunks from the Great Wall of China. Each monument ended in a perfectly smooth scoop of earth that encased its foundations. It was almost too much to take in.
Sydney craned her neck. “It’s like a giant museum.”
“Yeah,” Karnage scowled. “And we’re the exhibits.”
The spheres floated back up as the light drained from the walls. It shot back across the floor and coalesced into a tiny lily pad, bobbing and pulsing before their feet, urging them forward.
They followed into the darkness.
CHAPTER SIX
The light led them through another airplane-sized door into another room. This one wasn’t pitch black. There were faint flickerings of green in the distance that highlighted floating orbs. The toxic smell was more pungent in the air, and the white light didn’t launch boldly into the room. It cowered near their feet, before working up the courage to flicker and bob forward. It jumped erratically as it climbed the walls, as if trying to avoid the pulses of green light that occasionally ran through the room.
The light briefly flashed in one of the larger spheres, and the silhouette of the dark blob within was all too familiar to Karnage.
It was a giant horned worm.
“Jesus.”
As the light flitted about, it illuminated other alien objects including myriad squidbugs.
“They’re doing it to us, and they’re doing it to themselves,” Sydney gasped. “But why?”
Karnage twitched with energy. “Maybe this is it,” he said. “Maybe this is what Cookie meant.”
“What? What are you talking about?”
“Our chance,” he turned to Sydney. “It’s our chance to stop ’em. Look at ’em up there! All lyin’ in them spheres. Sittin’ ducks. Maybe this is where I can stop ’em. Before they wake up. Before they get out!”
“How?”
“I don’t know. I’ve just gotta . . . I’ve just gotta use my head. Goddammit! What did Cookie mean?”
“What are you talking about? Who’s Cookie?”
“We need a weapon,” Karnage said. “Something big. Something massive. Something that’ll nuke these squidbugs to kingdom come!”
“Maybe we can find something in one of these rooms,” Sydney suggested. “They seem to have everything down here. Maybe we can find something from The War.”
The War!
Karnage’s eyes bugged out of his head. Explosions, bullets, and screams filled his ears.
The War!
He jerked his arms and his handcuffs broke with a loud snap. His mind clouded over with smoke and flames and death.
The War!
Karnage’s fist shot out and grabbed Sydney by the throat. He lifted her off the ground, his fingers squeezing her neck as her gasping face disappeared behind the haze of battle.
“Don’t . . . talk to me . . . about THE WAR!”
CHAPTER SEVEN
Sydney strained for breath as Karnage’s tightening grip closed her windpipe. Stars danced before her eyes. “What are you . . . ?” she gasped, but Karnage choked her off. A voice in the back of his neck cheerfully informed her that he had hit Coral Essence.
“You want to talk to me about The War?!” Spittle flew from his mouth and his eyes blazed. “I’ll tell you about—”
Sydney thrust a pinky forward and danced it across Karnage’s arm. Joint by joint, she numbed Karnage into submission: a pinky jeté to his wrist, a thumb glissade to the elbow, followed by an index finger piqué into his neck. Karnage went down like a rag doll. He craned his head toward Sydney. His eyes blazed. Veins popped in his neck as he screamed at the top of his lungs.
“North Uzhorod! 8-8-4-2-1! Uncle Stanley had us on the run!”
The voice in the back of Karnage’s neck hit Frosty Pink as his voice echoed through the cavernous room. The green glow above them became brighter. The bits of white retreated from the spheres, and the green chased after them. The lines of white shot down the walls with torrents of green streaking after them. The white light retreated beneath their feet, as if trying to hide itself. The green streaks fired through on all sides and obliterated the white completely. The floor went black, and the only light was the agitated green among the spheres, flickering across them like lightning. The green lights pulsed brighter, and the spheres started to lower. The dark shapes within moved in time with Karnage’s cries.
“Blood and brains flew in all directions! Those monkeyfuckin’ skerks used our own people for cover! Those merciless bastards!”
The voice at his neck hit Strawberry Shortcake.
“Major!” Sydney shouted. “You have to shut up!”
“Snipers to the right of us! Snipers to the left of us! Snipers all around us! DIE DIE DIE!”
“THAT’S IT!” Sydney performed a grand jetée into Karnage’s ear lobe and he dropped unconscious, his head drooping against his chest. She heard something shatter above her and tiny bits of sphere showered the floor.
She swung Karnage’s body over her shoulder in a fireman’s carry. The broken handcuff bracelet around Karnage’s wrist glinted in a quick flash of green. She ground her teeth. Fucking E-nium.
She turned to run back through the door. A lightning bolt of green flashed down the wall and hit the door. It spiralled shut instantly.
“NO!”
Something clattered to the ground behind her. She turned around. A squidbug was charging towards her, its skin flashing deep crimson. She drew her goober pistol and fired. The shot hit the squidbug in the chest, knocking it onto its back. Its limbs flailed futilely as the goober swelled, sticking it fast to the floor. Sydney heard another smash above her. She turned back to the door. It glowed with green light that flickered like flames around its frame. She found a small nodule of bulbs flashing green by the door. She hit them frantically with her fist. They flashed green, almost defiantly. Hearing a squiggling screech, she turned around and took down another charging squidbug with a ball of goober. M
ore spheres burst above her. She turned back to the door nodules and gave them a hard kick.
“Goddammit! You picked a hell of a time to abandon us! You know that? You have to let me back through! You brought us all the way in here, now you’re just going to let us die? You can’t do this!”
A sliver of white light shot across the floor towards her. A flare of green shot out and shattered the white into nothing. Another squidbug dropped to the floor and charged, but was repelled by another ball of goober. Sydney checked her pistol. She only had five rounds left. She heard a giant crash, and a massive black shape crumpled to the floor.
It was a horned worm.
Sydney looked back up into the black.
“You have to get us out of here! Help us!”
An assault of tiny needle-like white lights rained down the walls on the glowing green door. The green lights lashed out in angry flaming tentacles, knocking away the light. The persistent rain of white whittled away at the green, knocking back its defences. The green and white roiled and boiled around the door until the white overtook the green just enough that the door slowly opened a few inches. As the glow slowly changed from dark green to paler and paler shades, the door spiralled open just enough for Sydney to push Karnage through the gap. She scrambled through after him before the door slammed shut behind her.
A tiny spot of white light appeared on the floor in front of her and lurched forward. She heaved Karnage back onto her shoulder and ran after it. A shot of green blasted across the floor and obliterated the white, leaving Sydney stranded in the darkness. Another sliver of white careened towards her from the distance. She started running toward it, but another blast of green obliterated it before she got there. Behind her, green lights were attacking the cracked door frame. The door’s spiral panels shook and shuddered as they tried to open. The worm on the other side was beating against the door, the cracks on its surface growing larger and larger.
White light coiled down the wall. Sydney followed it as fast as she could, Karnage’s limp bulk weighing her down. The light gathered around another door farther along, and it spiralled open. There was a loud crash behind her. Sydney turned around. Bits of door exploded into the room. An angry torrent of green light flowed up from the door and flared across the wall towards her.
She raced for the glowing white door ahead of her. She could practically feel the heat of the green light behind her as it collected and flared, making everything before her glow green. Her shadow on the floor grew longer and longer as the light flickered and flamed up. There was a loud smash and scattering of debris as a horned worm screeched behind her. Sydney didn’t look. She stayed focused on the door. Licks of green light shot ahead of her and attacked the white ring. The fingers of white slapped back at the green. The green lashes swooped down and seemed to devour the white. The light around the door grew dimmer. Sydney dove through the door just as the green light consumed it, and the door’s blades spiralled closed behind her.
Sydney dropped Karnage like a dead weight, panting. The room was dark. Angry tentacles of green light lashed at her feet. She desperately searched for any glimmer of white.
A dull grey sphere pulsed high above her in the middle of the room. As she ran towards it, the sphere slowly lowered down to the floor. It was larger than her, its innards oblong and mechanical. She saw a giant nozzle press against its side. She recognized it instantly, and grinned from ear to ear.
It was the barrel of a Sudsy tanker.
She pulled out her stun stick and smashed an opening in the sphere’s surface. She crawled through, coughing in the thick yellow haze as she pulled Karnage through after her. Mist poured out of the sphere, and she could see the Sudsy tanker in detail. Sydney opened the tanker’s hatch and dragged Karnage inside. She locked the hatch behind her.
“Lucky for you I got my start on the force in riot control.” She strapped the unconscious Karnage into the co-pilot seat. “Might not be quite as good as, say, a plasma cannon, but it’s a good start, right?” She lifted Karnage’s inert face and gently slapped his cheek. “Now you just sit back and enjoy the ride, okay, mate?”
She strapped herself into her seat and flicked on the console. It hummed to life, the controls vibrating under her fingers. She was thrilled to see the tanker’s Sudsy vats were full. She put the machine into gear and crashed it through the remnants of the sphere. She swung it around so it faced the glowing green door. The door spiralled open, revealing the angry sawtooth maw of the horned worm.
Sydney took a breath. “Right, here we go.”
The worm shot forward, and Sydney hit the guns. Sudsy sprayed across the floor. She backed the tanker up out of the path of the worm. The worm tried to bank, but its bulk hit the Sudsy and it slid across the floor, missing the tanker completely. It spun wildly as it disappeared into the black, screeching horribly. Its screeches faded to nothing.
A flash of white light appeared on the floor, and shot across the cavernous room into the darkness. Sydney steered the Sudsy tanker towards it and followed at full speed.
She checked her rear monitors. A pair of worms chased after her. Squidbugs rode atop each worm, their clawed hands holding the horns. They were catching up quickly. Sydney sprayed Sudsy behind her across the floor. The worms moved to twist out of the way. One of them made it, but the other caught the tail end of the Sudsy. The sudden loss of traction on its rear end caused the worm to flip violently. The squidbugs were thrown from its back and crushed as the worm rolled across the floor.
The streaking white light in front of the tanker was obliterated by a sudden ferocious flash of green. Sydney kept going, hoping she was still moving in the right direction. She pushed the engines as hard as she could, their gauges quivering at maximum.
A squidbug riding on the worm behind her levelled its staff. A ball of energy collected on its end, and buzzed towards the tanker. Sydney yanked on the controls, trying to dodge the blow. There was a loud sizzle, and she smelled burning plastic as she felt her hair stand on end. Warning lights on the console flashed. She wasn’t sure at first what had happened. The engines were still going strong. But then she noticed the Sudsy vats were emptying fast.
Oh no.
Sudsy was pouring out over the outside of the tanker. It coated the exterior monitors with a greasy smear. The tanker suddenly bucked and spun as the Sudsy hit one of the treads. It soon soaked the other and the tanker slid out of control. The monitors showed brief flashing blurs of the worm behind her also spinning wildly, squidbugs desperately clinging to its back. There was nothing left for Sydney to do but brace for impact.
The impact never came. She caught a white blur in her monitors and saw a grate on the floor open in front of the tanker. The tanker dropped through.
Sydney was jarred as the tanker collided with the wall of the chute. The tanker slid down the pipe toward a T-junction. White light collected in a ring around one of the openings and it slammed shut. The tanker bounced off its cover grate and slid down the other corridor.
Sydney shut her eyes. She felt like she was riding a tilt-a-whirl careening down a rocky mountainside. The tanker was being rocked and buffeted through the innards of the ship. She felt a huge lurch, and wasn’t sure whether it was the tanker or the ship that tilted down.
She opened her eyes again. Where she expected the salvific white light, instead, she saw flashes of blue at the end of the black tunnel. These turned to blue and beige as the tanker flew out of the belly of the ship and plummeted towards the desert floor.
CHAPTER EIGHT
When Karnage came to, he was hanging upside down in a mangled cockpit. Sydney stood beside him on the ceiling, right side up. “What happened?” Karnage asked.
“We escaped from the alien ship.”
“How?”
Sydney frowned. “It’s . . . kind of complicated.”
“Try me.”
“I think we had help.”
“Why can’t I move?” he asked, tentatively testing out his frozen muscles.
>
“That was me.” Sydney rubbed her throat. “You sorta . . . tried to kill me back there.”
“Oh.” The memories of what happened came flooding back to him: his fist squeezing her trachea. The shocked, terrified look in her eyes. The explosions, the smoke, and the flames, and then . . .
Karnage looked away, ashamed. “I lost it, didn’t I?”
“Yeah,” Sydney answered. “You did.”
“I’m . . . I’m not always right in the head.”
“Apparently,” she snorted. “So how are you feeling now?”
“A little better.”
“Only a little?”
“A lot.”
“Okay.” Sydney gave him a suspicious look. “But the next time you try something like that, I might not go so easy on you.” Sydney pressed a finger against Karnage’s earlobe. He felt the warmth flow back into his tingling limbs. She unstrapped him from his seat, and helped him drop down to the ceiling. His legs felt like rubber.
“Where are we?”
Sydney jerked a thumb to the mangled hatch that hung open in the wall. “I think you should see for yourself.”
They were resting in the bottom of a smooth crater. Just visible above the edges of the crater were the mile-high walls of the WTF.
“What the fuck?” Karnage said.
“My thoughts exactly,” Sydney replied with a smirk.
“How did we end up exactly where we started?”
“Like I said before. I think we had help.”
Karnage climbed out of the hatch and immediately set to work scaling the walls of the crater. “But who? Who would have helped us?” As he reached the top, he looked up into the sky, squinting into the blue. There was no sign of the aliens. It was as if they had never been there. Except for the smoking crater, and that lingering feeling. . . .