“What’s that?”
“We have to find the queen first.”
CHAPTER 24
Finding their queen meant going back to the source.
We took one of the remaining carrier ships. I warned the others about the roach that had been hiding out on the carrier I had sent Lisa and the others back in. When we opened the tail, we were ready, but it was empty. None of us were pilots, but Jin had spent enough time standing watch in the cockpit of the Astraeus that he had seen how it was done. We had to hail Sturgeon over the com and get his authorization to override the remote pilot system so we could operate the carrier manually. I had expected an argument, but he didn’t give one. A red light that had been blinking on the control panel of the carrier shifted to green and Jin sat down behind the controls. Perkins took the co-pilot seat and the rest of us strapped ourselves in.
The carrier teetered and wobbled as it rose into the air, mostly due to Jin being unsure of himself. He had seen them operated remotely, and the controls on the Astraeus were basically a virtualized version of the ones on the carrier, but watching and doing were two different beasts. We hovered over the ground, the engines kicking up a spray of dirt and mud.
“If you crash this thing, it’s coming out of your paycheck,” Harper said, trying to lighten the mood.
The carrier climbed into the air. The thrusters rotated and locked into position and we blasted forward with sickening speed. It was the first time in a while that I was grateful that my stomach was empty.
“Sorry about that,” Jin said.
We circled high above the operation zone as we continued to climb and then Jin got us moving. The rain was coming down harder now and didn’t show any signs of letting up. Visibility was low.
It took less than a minute to reach the ridge and pass over it, and then we were hovering over the alien base as Jin searched for a good place to land.
“Put us down over there,” Perkins said.
We zipped over to the edge of the base, coming down slow as the engines tilted and coughed flame intermittently as we landed.
Once we had filed off the ship, we headed for the closest shaft.
Perkins said, “Once we’re down there, switch to night vision only. We don’t want to let them know we’re coming any sooner than we have to.”
“It’s really coming down hard,” Harper said, tilting his head up toward the rain.
“Is it supposed to do that here?”
“Beats me.”
Small coils of smoke twisted up from the ground as the rain hit it, cooling the surface. I wondered how it could rain at all; why it didn’t just evaporate in the upper atmosphere given the planet’s harsh temperature.
“Smoke?”
“Steam,” Harper said.
“I’m surprised it can rain here,” Gloria said. “With the heat, wouldn’t it just evaporate.”
“One would think so.”
The mud sucked at our boots, slowing us down. The rain was washing the graphite surface layer away. I watched the mud start to flow like thick lava, tipping over the edge of the pit mine and into the shafts.
“If it keeps going like this, it’ll flood the tunnels,” Harper said.
“We’ve got bigger problems,” Perkins said, motioning us toward the shaft.
We climbed downward. Perkins went down first, followed by Gloria, Jin, Harper, and then myself. It was rough going. The rain had turned the walls to sludge.
When we reached the bottom of the shaft, we switched to night vision.
“How do we find the queen?”
Attention was focused on Harper. He seemed to be the closest thing to an expert we had. “Really, you guys? Do I have to do all the work?”
“Get on with it.”
“The eggs,” he said. “We saw them when we escaped the first time.”
“But the queen wasn’t with them.”
“No, but she’s probably somewhere close by. So we threaten her babies.”
“And that’ll work?”
Harper shrugged. “I’m open to ideas.”
“Then let’s get moving,” Perkins said.
It wasn’t exactly scientific. We were fumbling around in the dark, almost literally. Because of the night vision, everything was monochromatic, a side effect of active infrared. I tried not to think of my aching hand.
“I don’t think it should be that hard,” Harper said. “When we located the room before, our sensors recorded a pretty decent temperature spike. That should make it easier to locate.”
“You heard him,” Perkins said.
I paid close attention to the temperature reading on my HUD as we moved along the tunnel. Our night vision gave us about thirty feet of visibility in any direction.
“What I don’t get is how the roaches could have made this place,” Harper said.
“Why’s that?”
“Roaches typically prefer urban environments. That’s why you always hear about them invading houses.”
“These aren’t Earth roaches,” I said. “Maybe they aren’t roaches at all. Maybe they’re closer to praying mantises. Or ants. Earth bugs don’t wear armor.”
“But they’re good at that. Earth roaches, I mean. They invade and it’s tougher than hell getting rid of them. My aunt had roaches. Tried everything. Somehow they kept coming back. At night, you could see the things behind the digital readout of the microwave even. They get into everything. Hard to eradicate, too. Did you know they can withstand ten times more radiation than a human?”
“I think we’ve established that they’re tough bastards.”
“Yeah, but I think this place was already here. Somebody else dug all the tunnels. The roaches could have come later and wiped the other race out and taken over. It’s a smart way to do business. Let someone else do the heavy lifting and then just swoop in. They wouldn’t even need to send a large crew. The suckers multiply fast.
“Doesn’t really matter if they did or they didn’t. If we get off this rock, I hope I never see one of the ugly fuckers again.”
“Ditto,” Gloria said.
The tunnel angled downward and to the right and then twisted back around again.
I checked my O2 and tried to ignore the level.
Another thing: I had discovered was that you had to ignore a lot in order to survive. If you fixated on any given obstacle there was a good chance that the stress of it would become overwhelming. In my case, the obstacles were building up. Low air supply, the burning sensation in my throat, dehyrdration, the stabbing pain in my hand, the exhaustion. It all added up. I couldn’t dwell on it though, otherwise any small amount of hope I did have would be swallowed up by despair.
From afar, I could hear the muffled sound of machinery; a low humming sound. I could feel the ground vibrating under my feet.
“Temperature’s up two degrees,” Perkins said.
We pushed forward. I expected the roaches to come at us at any moment. Even if we were evenly numbered, I thought it would be a slaughter. Humans were resilient and clever and could adapt, but the roaches were durable. They seemed bred for war.
“Up five degrees.”
“I think we’re getting closer.”
Harper said, “Most of these tunnels are probably interconnected. There would be several ways to reach any given destination. It’s more efficient. It wouldn’t make sense to only be able to access an area by a single route.”
“Makes sense I guess.”
“If you had it to do over again, would you come on the mission?” Harper asked. I think he abhorred silence.
“Is that a trick question?”
“Yeah, me either.”
“Ten degrees.”
We reached a fork in the tunnel. Without hesitation, Perkins led us down the straight path rather than taking the tunnel that angled off to the left
. A few minutes later, he said, “Twelve degrees.” He didn’t have to keep telling us. I could see the temperature increase on my HUD. We were getting close. I had a gut feeling. An unwelcome sense of foreboding that felt like a pair of strong hands twisting my stomach into a knot.
The tunnel widened gradually and then ended on a vast room.
“This is it,” Harper said.
The birthing chamber was filled with roach eggs. They lined the entire floor of the room save for a narrow path that allowed for passage from one end of the room to the other. There had to be hundreds of them, maybe more. They were roughly the size of soccer balls, made of a semi-transparent milky substance. Each egg housed a dark shape, and I could see something moving inside.
“They’re close to hatching I think,” Harper said.
A network of metal girders running the breadth of the ceiling housed heating coils that burned with an intense orange light.
“That would explain the temperature increase.”
“There are so many of them,” Jin said from behind us. He had remained at the chamber’s entrance, standing in close proximity to the tunnel.
The rumble of machinery that caused the ground to vibrate gently under our feet also caused the eggs to wobble slightly, giving the impression that we were standing amongst a slowly moving sea of slimy whiteness.
Perkins jabbed the alien forearm at one of the eggs. The egg burst open and clear fluid gushed out as it deflated. A small undeveloped roach rode the wave of fluid and lay twitching on the ground. Perkins stomped on it, crushing it under his boot.
“They leave this place unguarded?”
“Most species don’t care for their young. They hide them and leave.”
“How do we know if we destroy this place that they’ll come running?” I asked.
“Why wouldn’t they? Their life spans are short. Their young have to thrive in order for them to continue operations. Roaches rely on changes in scent. If one or two come running, the rest will follow.”
“Let’s not second guess ourselves,” Perkins aid. “Lansing?”
I removed my pack and handed it to Perkins. He opened it and removed a bundle of Tovex sticks that looked like sausages encased in light gray casings. EXPLOSIVE was written in bright red letters along the length of each stick.
He handed a couple of the Tovex sticks to each of us and had us plant them at various locations in the chamber. There was a blasting cap and wireless transmitter implanted in each stick of Tovex. Once we planted a stick, we pushed a small button and a green LED lit up to signify that it was armed.
Perkins held the wireless detonator. It was no bigger than a cell phone and had an LCD screen that displayed a tally of the active charges.
“It’s rigged to remotely detonate,” Perkins said, showing us the detonator.
In the right hand corner of the LCD screen, there was an icon that indicated signal strength. It monitored the detonator’s proximity to the Tovex, letting a person know if they were still within range to detonate the explosives.
“How do we know it won’t collapse the room?” Jin asked. “Or the tunnels?”
“We don’t. That’s why we’re going to be as far away as possible.”
“What’s the range?” I asked.
Perkins shrugged. “Don’t know. We’ve got optimum signal strength now, but we’re standing right next to the charges. All of them are online. Best we can do is head back and see how far we get.”
Click-click-clack-clack-click.
“Did you hear that?”
I nodded.
At the other end of the room, several roaches skittered out of the tunnel.
“Shit.”
“Go,” Perkins said. “Make a run for it.”
“What about you?”
“I’ll be right behind you.”
We hurriedly climbed back into the tunnel and ran. My legs were already tired, but somehow my body found the necessary energy to carry me forward. Jin, Harper, and Gloria were ahead of me. I could hear the sound of heavy breathing over the com. When I glanced over my shoulder, there was no sign of Perkins.
“Where’s Perkins?” Harper said, out of breath.
“Keep moving. He’ll catch up.”
But I wasn’t so sure, and by the time we reached the vertical shaft there was still no sign of him. We waited a beat and I tried to reach him on the com, but didn’t get a reply.
“Get started up,” I said. “Have the ship ready, Jin.”
“What about you?”
“I’m going to see about Perkins,” I said. And added: “He’d go back for us.”
Nobody argued. We all knew that there wasn’t time for a debate, and collectively we looked after our own. I waited until the others had started up the shaft toward the surface and then headed back down the tunnel.
I hadn’t gotten a hundred yards before I came around a corner and nearly bowled Perkins over.
He was standing in the tunnel like a guy taking a breather after a marathon.
“What are you doing?”
“You shouldn’t have come back,” Perkins said. His gaze was fixed on the detonator. The screen was lit up. He took a step closer to me and scowled. “This is the end of the line.”
“What?”
He held up the detonator so I could read the screen. The signal was weak, and when he stepped closer to me, a message flashed across the screen: OUT OF RANGE. SIGNAL LOST.
The insane chittering of the roaches was getting louder.
We both knew what it meant.
“I’ll stay,” I said and tried to snatch the detonator from Perkins’s hand, but he pulled back before I could snatch it away. “All right then, we don’t have any straws to draw, so why don’t we whip our dicks out and see whose is biggest? Loser stays behind.”
“I’ll save you the time,” Perkins said. “Mine’s bigger.”
He cracked a grin.
“I can’t let you do this.”
“I’m not giving you the choice.”
There wasn’t time to argue. The roaches were closer now, and it would be only a matter of seconds before we had a visual on them.
I raised the barbed alien appendage I was carrying and said, “Then we’ll fight.”
“Come off it, Lansing. This is only going down the one way. I’m an old man. If I’m going out, then I’m going out swinging. You get the others back to the ship and you get the hell off this rock. That’s your job. Now leave me to do mine.”
“But –”
Perkins shoved me back. Hard.
I stumbled back a few steps before I caught my balance, but by then it was too late. He charged down the tunnel toward the oncoming roaches. He disappeared around the curve in the tunnel, and a moment later there was a loud explosion and rock and dirt were raining down on me, a concussive blast of dust swept through the tunnel and slammed me on my ass.
I picked myself up and raced for the shaft. Dirt and mud toppled from above as the tunnel started to collapse.
I was furious. I felt the tears come, but continued to run. The man had been a stubborn old mule, too pigheaded for his own good.
And the rest of us owed him our lives.
I reached the shaft, dug my fingers into the wet dirt, and began to climb.
CHAPTER 25
I reached the surface. My hand was on fire as I dashed for the carrier ship. Jin had the engines idling, the ramp was down, and I could see Harper and Gloria already strapped into their seats.
“Let’s go!” I yelled as the ramp folded up. I slammed down into a seat and belted in.
“Where’s Perkins?” Gloria asked.
I looked at her solemnly and shook my head. “Damn old fool.”
I was still pissed at the old grunt. Pissed that he had sacrificed himself, pissed that I had to harbor the guilt of
that for the rest of my life, for however long that might be.
If I ever meet you in the afterlife I’m going to punch you in the face, I thought. After that, I’ll shake your hand.
Sometimes you cross paths with a hero without even knowing it.
Perkins hadn’t been that subtle though. He was all hero. He sweated the stuff. It was one of those things you knew and counted on the way you counted on the sun to rise each morning.
As the carrier rose into the sky, our silence said more than any words could have.
Let’s just not screw this up, I thought to myself.
We needed a leader now. Somehow I knew it was me.
CHAPTER 26
Jin made a rough landing, but it wasn’t bad for a beginner with zero experience. We piled out of the ship and headed for the shafts. The rain was coming down hard now, almost a torrent, and the ground was slick beneath my boots. The graphite surface was a thick sludge. It was starting to get dark again. I let Harper and the others lead the way since they knew where the others were being held captive. All we could do was hope that blowing up the birthing chamber had caused the distraction we needed. There was no sign of the roaches, which meant the distraction hadn’t worked or that the tunnels below connected with the tunnels on the other side of the ridge. I had my fingers crossed for the latter. Otherwise, we were walking into a shitstorm.
“It isn’t that far,” Harper said as we descended the rungs of the nearest shaft. “The miners were working in one area and Hayes, Flynn, and Yuri were in a pit not too far from there.”
I felt like sleep was something I had only read about in history books. My body was pumping out adrenaline, but even that was barely keeping me going. The roach appendage was heavy against my back and if my fear of combating the roaches unarmed hadn’t outweighed my exhaustion, I would have left it behind.
We hit the bottom of the shaft and Harper took the lead, navigating the tunnel. The network the miners had created in the last few days wasn’t nearly as vast as the those on the other side of the ridge.
I kept thinking about Harper’s theory: that the roaches hadn’t created the alien tunnels. That they were remnants of another race’s blood, sweat, and tears. How many different aliens had 55 Cancri e seen? Had it been some kind of alien outpost back in the day?
Project Diamond (Jacob Lansing Series Book 1) Page 19