by P. R. Adams
It only took a moment for him to realize what he was looking at: a human skull.
He edged back, and the sound—the skittering—came again. This time, it wasn’t his imagination.
41
30 October, 2167. Fourth planet of the COROT-7 system.
* * *
SKITTERING ECHOED in the domed chamber, quickly building until it was the sound of a thousand giant beetles rushing across the fungus-covered floor. In the near-absolute darkness, Rimes could only guess at the true origin of the sound. Sweat dripped into his eyes as he desperately jerked his head right and left, hoping his headlamp would catch movement in the haze.
Cursing quietly, Rimes brought his carbine up and backpedaled. His injured knee flared and nearly collapsed beneath him. Sweat—sweet in the sticky air—trickled into his mouth.
He needed one of the supporting columns at his back, but it couldn’t be one the…thing was close to.
Rimes tried to keep the sound in front of him while shuffling back toward one of the arches. He backed into a supporting column of stone at the same moment his helmet lamp caught a flash of movement.
The thing had finally revealed itself!
He sighted in on the form, but held fire until he had a better shot or at least a better sense of what he was shooting at.
Beads of sweat gathered on his forehead—the humidity was really getting to him. A jerk of the head tossed most of the sweat away, but some still trickled into his eyes. He blinked away the rest, ignoring the stinging.
The thing moved again and resolved more fully at the outer range of the headlamp. Its appearance was unquestionably insect-like but alien, something dredged up from the darkest realms of his worst nightmare. Although it was less than two meters tall, it was easily half again as long. It moved on four thick, jointed legs and waved two wickedly curved, thinner appendages menacingly in front of it. Black stripes ran across a blotchy, charcoal gray carapace. Its head was a shallow monstrosity more than a half-meter long, with terrifying, cilia-covered pincers and antennae. Where the head joined the body, it was thick and bony. Cords of sinew along the joint occasionally became visible as it rocked its head, searching. Whatever other segments it might have had were hidden by the carapace, which skimmed over the fungus with each step.
There were no visible openings in the carapace or other obvious vulnerabilities. The pincers and antennae offered some hope, but they were small targets.
Rimes continued backing up, trying to put some distance between him and the creature. He turned and hopped deeper into the chamber.
The skittering came again, faster, closer.
Rimes glanced back; the creature was accelerating toward the support he’d just abandoned. Rimes pushed himself, his desperate hopping almost a jog.
His headlamp lit a wall. He made for the wall, hissing despite his best effort. His eyes watered from the pain, but he stayed focused.
Shadows—darker than the wall and the rest of the chamber—drew his attention. He changed direction, slowing when he realized what he was seeing: a nook in the wall. It was almost oval, just over a meter high, a natural crack in an otherwise solid wall, and it was only a few meters away.
He stopped, unsure the nook would be deep enough.
Those pincers and hooked things on the front legs—so big. He pushed forward. Even partial protection was better than being completely out in the open.
Suddenly, the creature’s antennae twitched rapidly, and it seemed to sense him. It sidestepped around the column he had been leaning against and charged.
Rimes moved as fast as the bad leg could manage, then finally slid on his butt the last few meters.
The creature moved faster, quickly closing the distance.
Rimes tried to squeeze into the nook. The thing was behind him, closing fast. He could hear its pincers slashing through the air. Rimes pivoted on his butt and pulled his injured leg under him, gasping at the burst of pain. The carbine was caught beneath him, but he had no time to free it. He squeezed into the nook just as the creature arrived.
The creature ran its pincers over the stone surface, slowly at first, then frantically. Rimes pressed back in the nook as far as he could. Even if the carbine weren’t pinned beneath him, he was in no position to take a shot. Instead, he watched the creature as it inspected the nook.
It had no discernible eyes, at least not on its head. Rimes guessed the cilia were the sensory organs. Something about the strange blotches on the carapace—shifting now—made him wonder if there might be other sensory organs, possibly camouflaged, hidden there. Without eyes, the creature might be blind, meaning it might be forced to rely on something else to locate prey.
Scent? Sound? Taste? Don’t a lot of insects rely on scent?
The creature’s pincers scraped slowly along the nook, testing, searching. Something—possibly fluid released from the fungus, possibly venom—dripped from the pincer tips. It shuffled left and right, head rocking as it moved.
Rimes risked a quick glance out of the nook and nearly lost an eye for it. Whatever senses the thing was using, it was able to tell when he moved.
Stuck as he was, Rimes once again was drawn to the carapace. He noticed that, along the bottom, the patterns were different than elsewhere. There were strange, spiraling designs with something extremely dark at the spiral center.
Finally, the creature backed away but only six or seven long strides. It settled low, its head lying on the floor. Rimes shone the headlamp on it. After a moment, the creature was harder to make out, the strange patterns of its carapace shifting slightly to more closely match the appearance of the fungus.
Chameleon effect. Is that evolutionary or synthetic? Damn it, Sung, you’re missing your big moment!
Rimes’s thoughts turned to the severity of his situation. The Valdez had no idea where he and his team were, and even if they did, it would take a long time to find the structure and to possibly gain entry. Whatever had lured them in—it didn’t seem likely it was the bug—was playing the long game, separating them and picking them off one by one.
How long he could hold out suddenly became important. He had a week’s worth of water, a few energy bars, and a full stomach. Assuming the bug had killed the Tesla crew and the Commando team, it could probably go weeks, even months, just waiting for him to make a run for it.
This thing had to have been here before any of us came here. How old is it?
He risked a peek outside the nook, trying to get a better sense of his surroundings. He managed to get a feel for the size and shape, but not much more. The moment he stuck his head out, the creature’s camouflage patterns shifted again, and it rose and charged the nook, crashing against the stone with its carapace and sending a spray of fungus and rocks into Rimes’s face.
For a heartbeat, the nook seemed destined to fail, shattering beneath the alien’s frenzied assault. Then, as quickly as the attack had begun, it stopped. The creature retreated to its former position and faded from sight.
One second, maybe two. That’s all I’ll have if I try something.
Rimes played out in his head how long it would take him to shift around to where he could raise his carbine and get a shot off. Two seconds, he figured. The creature would cross the distance before he could draw a bead on it. Any shots would be wild, desperate. He thought back to the empty magazine he’d found in the carbine.
Pointless.
If he hoped for success, he needed to sight in on the antennae or one of the spiral centers, possibly at the unprotected neck cords. The odds of a round penetrating the carapace didn’t seem particularly high. The odds of a meaningful head or neck shot while the creature moved seemed even lower.
He needed a distraction, just enough for a few seconds to aim.
Rimes considered the creature’s behavior. Its attacks were physical, savage, and unsubtle. They reflected no sophistication or planning. It wasn’t the sort of thing he would have expected from the builder of the strange structure. Then he remembered th
e thin shell of an ant head he’d found. It had been much smaller and deeper than the creature’s head. A baby? A servant? A food source? The builders?
As much to preserve power as to test an idea about the creature’s reliance on visual stimuli, Rimes shut off his headlamp. He listened for any hint of movement.
Nothing.
He took slow, calming breaths, then he poked his head out and looked around exactly as he had before. He felt more than heard the sudden, thunderous clatter of the creature’s charge and settled back into the nook.
It didn’t rely on visible light.
The creature savagely tore at the nook. A pincer scraped along the outer wall and whipped not a centimeter past Rimes’s face. The pincer reeked of antiquity and death and of something sweet. A drop of fluid caught Rimes’s right cheek, and he gasped. Where the skin was raw from his earlier fall into the pit, the fluid burned, instantly numbing his face.
Rimes desperately wiped the fluid away and pushed deeper into the nook.
Once again, the creature eventually abandoned its attack and returned to the darkness.
Rimes catalogued the creature’s strengths: speed, size, power, venom, armor, camouflage, endurance, knowledge of the terrain.
What about weaknesses?
After a second, he decided size was a weakness. He added savagery, possibly indicating a less advanced mind. Finally, he added blindness to the list. From his limited testing, the creature had apparently evolved to not rely on sight. There weren’t likely easy ways to exploit that weakness, but he considered it something worth cataloguing.
He thought back to what he’d learned when training to operate in pitch-black environments. Over and again, the message was hammered home: pay more attention to your other senses. The creature would likely have a stronger sense of hearing, smell, maybe even taste or touch. It could also quite possibly see outside the visible light spectrum using something other than conventional expectations for eyes.
Smell seemed a strong possibility. Rimes sniffed the air and shook his head. The fungus coating every exposed surface gave off the distinctive, earthy, sweet smell. It trampled on everything else. The creature had a vaguely pungent, almost metallic odor that was barely perceptible over the fungus. Even outside of his relatively sealed suit, Rimes doubted he matched the fungus’s intensity. He certainly presented a distinct smell, but not enough so that it should be perceptible to anything but the most sensitive olfactory organs. Sealed, the only scent that should escape would be the suit itself, and it was already coated with the fungus.
Slowly, listening again for any sign of movement, Rimes reached up and sealed his helmet. With everything sealed, the sound amplifiers became more effective.
The creature hadn’t moved. He was sure of it.
Once again, Rimes leaned out of the nook and looked left and right. For a second, he thought the creature hadn’t moved, but the charge came again, and he fell back as fungus and specks of rock flew at him.
After a short, frenzied attack, the creature returned to its resting place and settled quietly to the ground.
Not sight or scent, I guess.
Taste seemed the least likely, unless it acted similar to scent, detecting flavors in air particles. It seemed impractical and unlikely, what with the suit sealed and fungus-coated as it was.
It’s got to be the sound, maybe even touch, or some sort of combination. Just general sensitivity to vibrations—the air, the ground. Even if it’s not the main sense, it seems to be a big component.
Rimes took a mental inventory: ammunition, energy bars, his water container, his knife—nothing stood out as particularly useful to test his theory. His best bet was the carbine wedged between his legs and the floor.
He would need to push himself out of the nook, pull the carbine out at the same time, then force himself back into the nook before the creature could reach him.
Or he could try and squeeze his wounded leg up while trying to drag the weapon free; it would be slower but safer.
He liked safer.
Moving the injured leg was agonizing and slow. Twice, he nearly blacked out, but each time he edged the weapon forward several centimeters. Gritting his teeth against the pain, he tugged at the carbine a final time, pulling it forward the rest of the way.
He brought it up into the nook and flipped on his headlamp, then he inspected the weapon. Other than being coated in fungus, the gun was fine.
So, I’ve got a gun. What next?
It came to him slowly. The wall he was inside ran a good distance to his left, curving at the edge of the range of his helmet lamp. To his right, the wall continued on a shorter distance before reaching an arch. From the nook to the creature was maybe six long strides. Maybe another four beyond the creature, the wall of arches gave access back into the dome-shaped pit he’d originally fallen into.
The pit held several unknown shapes. Most importantly, it held Kershaw’s helmet, and that meant it probably held Kershaw’s body. Kershaw had one of the grenades they’d taken from the Commando shuttle. Although the odds weren’t good the grenade’s shrapnel would penetrate the creature’s carapace, the explosion would almost certainly play havoc with its sensory system if it relied upon sound.
Big if.
Getting into the larger chamber would be the first problem. Finding Kershaw’s body would be the second. Getting the grenade out—assuming it hadn’t already been used—and throwing it before the creature could get to him was the third.
The fourth and biggest problem was what to do should the grenade not kill or seriously affect the creature.
Run? Where? To the opposite side of the pit, where it came from? What are the odds of finding another place to hide like this?
So the solution if the grenade failed would have to be a run back to the nook.
Everything came down to the grenade.
I need to get past the creature, though. How?
Rimes ran his headlamp over the creature’s still form. It hadn’t left its hiding spot. He could barely make out the edges of its carapace, and it took a moment to locate the tapering that led to its head, another to guess where the antennae should be.
The antennae. Noise. That’s my only chance.
Aiming, holding his breath, Rimes counted to three and exhaled, convincing himself the plan had a chance.
He squeezed the trigger.
The carbine’s roar was somehow quieter in the enclosed space, but the results were everything he had wanted. Instantly, the creature’s camouflage disappeared. It wildly thrashed around and staggered up off its belly. Rather than charging, it wobbled and crashed into the wall to Rimes’s right. Rimes squeezed out of the nook and did his best to run to the chamber beyond the arches.
Rimes glanced over his shoulder as he passed through the arch.
The creature seemed to be regaining its balance. Its pincers gripped at the wall for support, its antennae—still largely intact—waved in the air, possibly seeking orientation.
Too late, Rimes turned to get his bearings in the main chamber.
His right boot caught on something, and he lost his balance.
He fell forward and planted his face in a mound of fungus. His carbine skidded away.
Panic threatened to take control. Rimes pushed himself up and wiped as much of the fungus from his helmet’s visor as he could. That only made things worse, filming it a greasy black.
He flipped the visor open. He had to be able to see.
He looked around, desperate to retrieve his carbine. It was half a meter away, near Kershaw’s foot.
Rimes blinked.
Kershaw lay sprawled on the floor, staring at the ceiling, eyes open in horror, face contorted in agony. Swollen, bright red puncture wounds stood out on either side of his face.
The sound of skittering shook Rimes out of the moment. He dove forward, searching Kershaw’s body for the grenade.
He couldn’t find it.
The skittering became louder, grew closer. Rimes looked up,
saw the creature standing in the nearby archway, antennae waving.
For just a moment, Rimes considered reaching for his carbine. A lucky shot might give him the time to search for the grenade.
Neither carbine nor grenade would save him, though. He felt sure of that.
The creature slowly tilted its horrifying head toward him.
I can’t stop the inevitable, and it is inevitable.
The puncture wounds on Kershaw’s face filled Rimes’s thoughts. He’d felt the venom himself, burning when it came into contact with scraped skin.
Why give in? I’ve got to fight this. Is it influencing me, or is this shock?
The creature took a step forward and settled lower on its legs, its wicked pincers slowly snapping at the air before it. Rimes slowly reached for the carbine.
It happened so fast, Rimes almost didn’t catch it. One moment, the creature was crouching, readying, the next it was charging toward him. Its gait didn’t seem possible given its bulk.
Rimes dropped to his side, scooped up the carbine, and sighted on the creature’s head.
He checked fire.
As suddenly as it had gone from stillness to charge, the creature had once again stopped.
Rimes took the opportunity to aim at one of the antennae. The creature stood immobile, even its antennae no longer quivering.
Slowly, Rimes backed away, his sights still trained on the antennae. For the first time, he noticed what looked like a small, plastic panel on the carapace just behind the head.
Before he could give the panel any further thought, the creature started to convulse. It was subtle at first, but it quickly became powerful and obvious. Ichor leaked from the joints where antennae met the head. The creature staggered, then dropped to its side. More ichor leaked from its pincers.
“Finish it, Captain Rimes.”
Rimes fired, unconcerned who had spoken. Other guns fired.