Hell Divers IV: Wolves

by Nicholas Sansbury Smith

  He was about ten feet from the nest when the other birds began returning to their roosts.

  The speakers in his helmet crackled. “X, do you copy?”

  He was breathing too hard to answer right away.

  “X, do you copy?”

  “I’m … busy,” he panted.

  “Are you okay?” A flurry of white noise took over the comm, then died away. “Is Miles okay?”

  Despite the static interference, X could still hear the apprehension in her voice. She thought this was her fault.

  “I’ve almost got him,” X replied.

  The branch cracked under his boot, and he jumped to another.

  Lightning flickered overhead, spreading its eerie flickering glow over the jungle floor. The headless vulture looked like a pile of feathers. He had been so revved with adrenaline, he hadn’t noticed the height until now.

  Miles barked, then yelped in pain, pulling X’s focus back to the nest above.

  “Hold on, boy,” he shouted. “I’m coming!”

  X used the knife to aid him up the rest of the way to the nest. He pulled himself up on another thick branch, stood, and was scrabbling for a foothold when a hooked beak with orange lesions peered over the side of the nest. Orange-feathered wings rose threateningly as two piercing black eyes glared at him.

  Magnolia relayed another message over the comm—something about a radio and the Hive—but X was too focused on the strip of white plastic, stained red and hanging from the bird’s beak, to respond. A full second passed before he realized what he was looking at.

  It was Miles’ hazard suit.

  X grabbed the end of the beak with one hand and stabbed the left wing with the other. The young vulture jerked back, and X, holding on to the knife, was hauled up into the nest. Rolling over the lip into the nest, he saw Miles hunched in the corner and snarling. The four nestlings surrounded him, pecking at his suit.

  Hell no!

  X let go of the knife hilt, leaving the blade lodged deep in the creature’s wing. It slammed him with the other wing, pinning him against the side of the nest, then moved closer and thrust its beak at his chest armor.

  He squirmed slightly to his left and grabbed the beak with both hands. Then, screaming in rage, he pushed the wing back, freeing himself. He came up on his knees, with the bird in a headlock.

  X twisted the baby monster’s head and beak until both crunched. He kept going, pushing harder and harder, his old muscles straining, until he ripped the beak completely off.

  Tendrils of muscle and gullet hung off the base. He rose to his feet, panting like a wild animal, with the beak in his grip. The three remaining nestlings had turned away from Miles to look at him.

  “Get away …” he panted, “from … my … dog!”

  Holding the beak in both hands, he plunged the sharp end into the birds one by one, until the nest was drenched in blood. He raised the last creature into the air for the other vultures in the jungle to see.

  “You’re done trying to kill us!” he shouted.

  Miles nudged up against his leg, and X slowly lowered the still-twitching baby bird and rolled it out of the nest. Lightning flashed over the bay in the distance, and in the glow, he saw something that froze him for a second.

  The incoming tide had dislodged the Sea Wolf from the beach. The damaged vessel was now in the surf, being pushed back into the bay.

  X cursed. This time, it wasn’t Magnolia who screwed up. It was on him. If he had kept an open line to Timothy, he would have known about this.

  But that still didn’t explain why the boat was drifting.

  Why the hell wasn’t the AI doing something to stop it?

  “Son-of-a-bitch robot is leaving without us,” X said over the comm.

  SEVEN

  The nightmare was just like the others. Michael was stumbling through the snowy wastelands in Hades. His lips and throat were dry from lack of water, but he couldn’t melt or drink the snow because of the radiation.

  He pushed on, continuing his search for X. Ice framed his visor, narrowing his view of the frozen terrain. A line of tracks led into the city once called Chicago, a place of many scrapers. The colossal architecture continued to withstand the test of time.

  Here, hell had literally frozen over.

  Trapped in the nightmare, Michael slogged through his own personalized hell. The high-pitched electronic-like wails of the Sirens became a satanic chorus that followed him down empty streets and over wind-carved snowdrifts.

  The tracks wound up and down the dunes, and the beacon on his HUD blinked with Xavier Rodriguez’s location, but every time he got close, the beacon would move.

  “X!” Michael shouted. “X, where are you?”

  In these dreams, the answer was always the same.

  Over the howling wind, X would shout, “Stay away, Tin! This is not the life your father wanted for you!”

  Michael would turn and turn, but the voice of X would echo off the frozen sides of buildings and fade away.

  “Please, X, where are you?” Michael yelled back. “Let me help you!”

  He continued his trek through the endless streets, his rifle at the ready, eyes sweeping constantly for hostiles.

  The city continued producing the music of hell: clawed feet skittering over icy metal, the wailing of the Sirens, and the crash and clatter of structures finally giving way to Mother Nature.

  Halfway through the dream, he would hear the worst of all the noises: a loud whap. Michael turned to see a Hell Diver lying in the middle of the street, its parachute luffing in the breeze. Jagged bones protruded from a semiliquid body held together only by armor and a hazard suit.

  “I told you to stay away, Tin! Don’t come after me or you’ll end up like him!”

  Michael looked skyward to see X ascending by helium balloon toward the storm clouds. He would scream and scream, and then Michael would realize it was he himself screaming and not X.

  His eyes flitted back to the dead diver, and his gun went up at the sight of a horde of Sirens bounding up the street to consume the corpse of the deceased diver—Michael’s father.

  Their leathery muscles stretched as the monsters pulled Aaron apart, limb by limb, their shrieks piercing the night.

  Michael aimed and pulled the trigger, but his rifle wouldn’t fire. When the Sirens were done with his dad, they would come for him, and every time they were just about to sink their claws into his flesh, he would jerk awake, covered in sweat and sucking in air for another scream.

  This time, though, he caught himself and didn’t wake Layla. She was apparently still exhausted from last night. Even the thought of their sweaty bodies and her moans of pleasure was not enough to dispel the horrid images in his mind.

  Michael pulled the covers off to cool his hot skin, exposing Layla’s naked body as he did so. He gently pulled the sheet back up over her breasts, and for a moment he just watched her sleep: studying her freckled face, full lips, and eyelids quivering in REM sleep.

  I hope you’re dreaming of something beautiful.

  He let out a low sigh, careful not to wake Layla. Weeks had passed since Michael slept through the night, and it wasn’t for lack of exhaustion. Three jobs and a rigorous schedule had him falling into bed at night and passing out almost at once. The problem was staying asleep. The nightmares were getting worse.

  And now the fatigue was starting to eat at him during the day, sparking the anger problem from his youth. He was always on edge and always a hair trigger away from anger.

  “That’s creepy, Tin,” Layla whispered, opening one eye and looking over at him. “You know I don’t like it when you watch me sleep.”

  “Sorry,” he said, turning onto his back. The alarm clock went off a moment later, and the wall-mounted screen warmed to life, projecting the image of the sun to represent a phenomenon that had once he
lped humans awaken in the morning. The mythical image did little to stir him awake at the early hour. He was wiped out.

  “What time is it?” Layla mumbled.

  “Six, and I’ve got to get up.”

  “What? Why?” She sat up and looked at the clock, then back to him. “I thought you weren’t going to the farm today.”

  “I’m not …”

  Layla rubbed her eyes. “So where are you going?”

  “To help train the new divers, remember?”

  “Oh, yeah …” She smiled seductively at him. “Was last night a dream, by the way?”

  Michael grinned back, his cheeks warming. “I’m pretty sure that was real.”

  “And it was ama-a-a-a-zing.”

  “Yeah.”

  “‘Yeah’?” Now both brows went up. “All I get is a ‘yeah’?”

  “I’m sorry, it’s just …”

  Layla snuggled closer and put a hand on his arm. “What, Michael? Tell me.”

  “It’s X. I just can’t stop thinking about him. I’ve been having bad dreams all night. Slept like crap.”

  “Again?”

  He nodded.

  She kissed him on the cheek and then nestled her head on his shoulder. “I’m sorry. I wish there was something I could do.”

  Feeling anxious, he pulled away and swung his legs out of bed, leaving her lying there half naked and staring at him in the dim lighting.

  “There is something I can do. Something we can do. We can start training the new divers so that when we do find X, we can help.”

  Layla patted the bed where he had just been lying beside her. He knew what was coming, and he didn’t want to hear it.

  “I really want to get going. Feel free to join me later.”

  She frowned, eyes flitting downward and then up again. “Michael, I love you, and that’s why you need to listen to me. Don’t you remember what X told you about coming after him?”

  “Of course I do,” he snapped. “But if he needs my help, I’m going after him.” He didn’t bother telling her about the nightmare that had startled him awake. Seeing his dead father and X in Hades had reminded him what was at stake and how precious life was.

  “I lost my dad a decade ago, and I also lost X for those ten years since then. Now I’m afraid I’m going to lose X again. But honestly, what hurts even more is that he had seemed okay with that when he left.”

  “Oh, Michael. He didn’t leave because of you. He left because this no longer felt like home to him. Deep down, I believe he was too selfless to ask you to go with. He wanted you to stay here and live out your life, with the hope that someday you two might be reunited.”

  “Maybe,” Michael replied. He thought back to their final moments in the launch bay of Deliverance, right before they dropped the Sea Wolf into the ocean.

  “You remind me of your dad,” X had said with a smile. “He’d be very proud of you. As I am.”

  Why didn’t you say something, then?

  Michael wagged his head. “I don’t know. I just don’t know what the right thing is anymore.”

  He threw on his uniform, the fog of sleep banished by the wave of anxiety born of regret.

  “Ugh, I wanted to sleep in for once, but you’re not giving me much choice, are you, Tin?”

  The wall monitor buzzed before he could respond, and a voice crackled from the speakers.

  “Commander Everhart, are you in your quarters?”

  Michael, his foot halfway into a pant leg, hopped over to the monitor and pushed the comm button. “Roger, I’m here.”

  “This is Ensign White. The captain is requesting your presence on the bridge of Deliverance as soon as possible.”

  “On my way,” Michael said.

  “Bring Layla,” Bronson White added. “She’s going to want to hear this.”

  * * * * *

  Katrina stroked her jaw, trying to listen to the scrambled transmission from Magnolia. Ensign Ada Winslow, seated in front of the radio equipment, was working to stabilize the signal.

  “Almost got it,” she said.

  The beeps and background noise of other conversations and automated messages filled the room while they waited. Among them came a transmission from the Hive.

  “Captain DaVita, this is Timothy Pepper. All systems operating at optimal levels. Next update in T minus two hours.”

  “Roger that,” Katrina said.

  “There … we … go,” Ada said.

  Katrina gestured for Ensigns Bronson White and Dave Connor to turn their monitors down so she could hear. White noise, followed by Magnolia’s voice, filled the bridge.

  “Miss Katib, this is Captain DaVita. Can you hear me?”

  More static, followed by “Yes, I can. Finally!”

  “Where are you?” Katrina asked.

  “I’m trapped in a facility on an island. X is on his way back right now with Miles, but we’re surrounded.” She was talking fast, and the static interference didn’t make her any easier to understand.

  An emergency siren wailed in the background. Katrina could hear that. And something else.

  “What is that sound?” she asked.

  “Hogs,” Magnolia replied.

  “Please repeat?”

  “Not like the kind we have on the Hive. Big pigs. With tusks.”

  The doors to the bridge whisked open, and Katrina turned as Layla and Michael hurried inside.

  “What’s going on?” Michael asked from across the space.

  Magnolia relayed another message, answering his question. “I’ve been holed up here for a few hours after we got attacked. One of the vultures snatched Miles, and X went after him. Captain, I found something in the database here—something that you have to hear. It may help humanity.”

  “Can you upload it and send it to us?” Katrina asked.

  Layla and Michael crowded around the station.

  “I’m working on sending this to you via satellite. I was able to hack into the computers here.”

  Layla maneuvered up to the radio. “Mags, where are you, and what in the wastes is going on!”

  “I’ve found something that explains what happened to the world. I haven’t been able to watch or listen to it all, but …” Magnolia’s voice crackled, masking the words with static.

  “Where is my counterpart?” said another voice.

  It was Timothy Pepper. His translucent hologram emerged next to the circular table in the center of the room.

  “Better question is, where is X?” Michael said. Katrina summoned her captain’s voice, which was firm and just shy of a shout so White would get it even with his bad hearing.

  “Everyone, calm down.”

  That did the trick for everyone except Magnolia. She continued speaking even faster than before. “I managed to get the satellite dish working here, but I’m not sure the radio I’m taking with me is going to work—assuming I get out of here alive, and assuming the Sea Wolf isn’t too far gone.”

  “Slow down, Mags,” Katrina said, lowering her voice. “One thing at a time. Tell me what happened to the Sea Wolf.”

  Michael stepped up next to Katrina. His hair was pulled back into a ponytail, with strands sticking out in various directions. Purple bags hung under his eyes. Typically, this would be a sign of drug or alcohol abuse, but she knew him better than that.

  He was just exhausted.

  “The Sea Wolf was damaged yesterday. We were attacked by a really big octopus—” Static again washed over the channel.

  Layla looked to Katrina and said, “Did she say what I thought she did?”

  Ada’s eyes widened. “What’s an octopus, and how big is a really big one?”

  Not knowing how to answer, Katrina just said, “Magnolia, you’re breaking up again.”

  “Our radio was destroyed, a
nd we left the Sea Wolf to find parts on this island. But the boat is drifting back into the bay.”

  Katrina wasn’t sure how much she had missed, but the last part gave her heart a stutter. “What do you mean, ‘drifting’?”

  White noise covered Magnolia’s voice.

  “Magnolia, do you copy?” Katrina asked.

  A fleeting moment of silence held the bridge, the tension palpable.

  “Hold on,” Magnolia suddenly said, her voice as clear as day.

  In the backdrop, Katrina heard the same animal grunt she had heard before, and something like an animal digging.

  “Shit … shit, shit,” Magnolia said quietly. “They’re almost inside.”

  “Sirens?” Layla asked.

  Michael’s face turned even paler. “This isn’t fucking happening. We have to do something.”

  Katrina could sense his anger, but she didn’t like cursing on her bridge. She shot him a glance.

  “The emergency sirens you’re hearing are from the facility, not the creatures,” Ada said.

  “Mags, tell us what happened to the Sea Wolf,” Katrina said.

  “I’m not sure. X just said it’s been swept back out into the bay. I’m not sure if Timothy is in control of the vessel.”

  “That’s not good,” Layla whispered. “Is there a way we can contact Timothy?”

  “My duplicate program would not abandon the divers,” the other Timothy said, his voice taking on a firm tone. “I am here to serve and help my human friends; so is my counterpart on the Sea Wolf.”

  Michael turned to Dave Connor. “Ensign, can you get a lock on their location?”

  “Already working on it, Commander,” Dave replied. He tabbed his navigation system on the screen, tapping his prosthetic leg on the deck as he worked.

  “What happened to X?” Michael asked Katrina.

  “I still don’t know, but we know he’s alive.”

  Michael ran a hand over the back of his neck.

  “Okay, done,” Magnolia said. “I’m uploading the data and sending it to you, Deliverance.”

  There was another pause, then a shout, gunfire, and an anguished wail.