by Scott Moon
She was about to start a war between Interstellar Enterprises and the Sagittarian Conglomerate. She needed people to do her dirty work.
Her security detail, with Carter out ahead as the point man, arrived at the build site. In true frontier style, the place was primed for an overnight transformation. It looked like a flat lot of mostly concrete and steel.
She pulled out her data tablet and waved her engineers closer. They went over the nondescript foundation point by point, ensuring that prefabricated structures could be placed down to erect a spaceport virtually overnight. It would take another week of testing and evaluation, but when complete, it would be far superior to the SagCon spaceport that was already several years out of date.
SagCon had moved forward with the minimum viable product needed to transport minerals and precious gases off the planet and bring in equipment and supplies to get the job done. Interstellar Enterprises didn't cut corners. Or more accurately, planned further ahead. The new facility would be bigger, more efficient, and capable of accepting military-class ships.
Private security was about to reach a whole new level on Darklanding.
“Carter, walk with me." She strode away from the rest of the group until they faced Transport Canyon from the edge of the mesa. She couldn't fail to notice how much it had changed. There was a huge river, almost a lake, stretching from one end of the canyon to the other. As far as she could tell, the water was still rising. If it damaged the monorails, IE would have to rebuild them, which would be annoying. And expensive. She would have to make SagCon pay if that happened.
She jotted a note on her data tablet: convince Shaunte to make arrangements for any and all repairs to the monorails to and from the mines needed as a result of flooding.
Carter arrived at her side and stood patiently.
Ortega spoke without looking up from her work. "I told you to take care of Dixie."
He took longer than most men would have to answer, seemingly considering his words and weighing the consequences before speaking—a rare quality in men. “She’s smarter than you think, and a better tactician than I assumed.”
“She led you into a trap,” Ortega said, her words dripping with disgust.
“Yes. I followed her half the night. Looking back, I realize she was wearing me down until Michael Hammer could get the jump on me. He put me in restraints and next thing you know, I was handcuffed to that psychopath’s bed.”
“At the Mother Lode? What was her name?”
“Doesn’t matter. Some prostitute with a bad attitude.”
“Did Dixie go anyplace else when you were following her?”
“No.”
Too quick, Ortega thought. She didn’t like the way he answered that question. “Find Dixie. Kill her. Is that clear enough? Do you need me to write the order down this time?”
“No. I know what I have to do,” he said.
Carter’s radio chirped a warning. He lifted it to listen. “Boss, this is Remi. We’ve got trouble.”
“Why is he calling you the boss? I said he was in charge?” Ortega asked, looking toward Remi and several security officers standing guard at the perimeter of the spaceport foundation.
“Probably just a habit,” Carter muttered. Keying the radio, he answered Remi. “Give me details.”
“Something attacked Peter and Suzan. No details, just screaming," Remi said. “Oh shit!”
Remi and the perimeter security team opened fire at a cluster of running shadows. The shape loped along the ground like a cross between dogs and many-legged insects.
Carter drew his new blaster. "Stay close to me. We’re going to have to move fast."
"What's happening?" Ortega asked.
"I'll write you up a full report later. Right now, we need to move." He grabbed her by the arm and dragged her away from the edge of the mesa. "We can't keep our backs to this cliff. If I go down, run to the apartments and don't look back."
“SagCon is going to pay for this," Ortega said.
"Come on! Move your ass!" Carter flinched mentally at the way he had yelled at his boss. He was already on bad terms with her and this was the type of disrespect that could send her into a violent rage. "This isn't a SagCon attack. This is something else. Probably a native species of Ungwilook.”
He knew that assumption was incorrect even as he rushed Ortega down one street and the next, seeking an escape path that led to the Interstellar Enterprises apartments. These monsters were aliens out of a nightmare, nothing like any survey of the planet’s inhabitants had ever reported.
“They waited until we were away from the rest of the team. These things look like mindless mutants, but they’re smart,” he panted as they ran. Watching where he was going while guarding Ortega took twice the energy of running alone.
“Or their leader is smart,” Ortega said.
Something clicked for Carter when she said this. He spoke without thinking, which, as was with all such utterances, a mistake. “Not a leader. These things have some kind of hive queen.”
Ortega stopped running, staggered a few steps, and vomited in fear. Seconds later, she vented her anger at being humiliated on Carter. “This is your fault! You think I’m like that hive queen monster? Is that what you’re saying? If you get me killed out here, you’re fired! You’ll never work in this town again!”
CHAPTER ELEVEN: When Shaunte Goes Missing
Thad felt his blood run cold as Dixie’s sweet, almost melodic voice answered his first question. “That’s what I said, Thad. She’s on the way.”
He made a fist with the hand that wasn’t holding the data phone. “Why aren’t you with her!”
“I’m trying to catch up,” Dixie said, her voice bouncing as she ran. “She’s on the way and I am trying to find her. Are we done playing twenty questions?”
Thad ended the call more abruptly than intended but didn’t have time to worry about it. “Sledge, I have to look for her."
"Then why are you still here?" Sledge asked. "We'll work on a plan to destroy these creatures. I still say nukes are our best option, but maybe I've watched too many action vids."
"There are several well-documented incidents during which nuclear weapons were effectively used to contain dangerous alien species," Proletan said. "Generally, they were on worlds or asteroid mines already hostile to human life.”
"Fascinating." Thad leaned close to Sledge. "Can you keep him from destroying the planet?"
"No promises. Go find Shaunte, and while you're at it, get Mast and Maximus back here. We’re going to need them."
Thaddeus nodded as he grabbed his coat and headed for the door. He tried to call Shaunte several times as he hurried through the streets of Darklanding. The place was a ghost town, doors and shutters closed as though a sandstorm was coming. He didn't like the eerie silence. Gone were the noises of human and Unglok children causing mischief. Loading cranes and transport freighters were silent. Not even wind dared the streets.
He wished the global positioning system had been properly set up in the early days of Darklanding. He also wished he hadn't talked himself out of getting it fixed so that he could keep track of Shaunte. At the time, it had felt like stalking or at least the actions of an insecure boyfriend with control issues. Now his lack of follow-through was going to get her killed.
He knew she had some kind of limited locator system, but he lacked access to it.
Maximus howled in the distance and was answered by whistling shrieks. Thad plotted a course to the Mother Lode and searched for Shaunte street by street. The Glakridozian killing spree came close several times, but he never saw the pig-dog or the creatures he was hunting. His gut told him there were too many monsters and not enough pig-dogs, but his four-legged friend seemed to know what he was doing.
The mutated arachnoids seemed terrified of Maximus. He saw a pack of them fleeing across an intersection up ahead. Maximus flashed after them.
“Holy smoke, dog, I didn’t realize you had those kind of wheels!” He tried to catch u
p but abandoned the pursuit. “I have to find Shaunte,” he said into the night.
The Mother Lode was crowded when he arrived. People from several neighborhoods were crowding around the imitation hearth fire or staring out windows.
Leslie Stargazer pushed through the crowd to accost him. “Thad, I tried to stop her. She ran out of here halfcocked. I tried to slow her down—and tell her I let the Carter dude go like we talked about—but she ignored me.”
Distracted, Thad looked her over, then studied the crowd. “Are you armed?”
“A little bit.” She patted her garter belt under her knee-length silk dress.
“Good. Does anyone else know how to use a blaster?”
“Pierre has that old shotgun thing behind the bar. I’ve been hearing a lot of strange talk about blood-sucking alien monsters,” Leslie said.
“I think they are more of the face-eating variety, but better to be safe than sorry. I won’t forget about Carter. If he was here, I was going to press him into fighting the mutant spider menace,” Thad said.
“I’m worried about him,” Leslie said.
Thad, already on his way outside to resume his search, stopped and stared. “Are you sweet on him?”
“Not like that. I just… I don’t know. I’m worried about him,” Leslie said. “He’s different.”
“Okay, fine. Um, good luck with that. Stay here in case Shaunte or Dixie come back,” Thad said.
“Okay, Sheriff. I’ll be holding down the fort.”
He took a different route back to the jail. Dixie should have arrived during the time he made the same trip she was making twice over.
The expression on Sledge’s face told him his assumption was wrong.
***
Mast regulated his breathing as the sheriff had taught him. The people of Ungwilook did not run without reason, nor did they exercise as Thaddeus had taught him. He was learning, but still a novice runner by any criteria that mattered.
"Suck the buttercup," Mast said. This was one of the many things Sheriff Fry said to encourage him. It made little sense, especially the way Thad muchly incorrectly said “Suck it up, Buttercup.” Mast Jotham was not a cup of butter and didn’t understand how sucking anything would make him run faster. And why suck it up? Why not suck it down, or sideways?
Mast decided humans were muchly confused about sucking.
"Maximus! Wait for me! We can fight these things together." He drew his blaster and fired at a large, slow-moving creature with hideous mandibles and hairy antennae twitching above its eyes. The shot would've been more impressive if the thing had not already been grievously injured.
Maximus had been here recently.
Something dashed across the street not far ahead. For the first time in hours, Mast recognized the shape. He called out to Maximus and sprinted forward.
Exhilaration raced through his veins as he closed the gap. He was getting closer, and closer, running for everything he was worth. He was going the distance, going for speed in the time of need. He wished Thaddeus was here to see this. Mast Jotham, the Deputy Sheriff of Darklanding, had finally found his stride.
His foot slipped in blood and gore, the guts of some creature Maximus had spread across the street. Mast wasn't sure how he knew this, because it happened so fast. One moment, he was charging gloriously forward, and the next, he was swinging his arms for balance and sliding on his backside.
Such was his momentum that he tumbled several times and twisted his left shoulder and right knee.
"Yuck! That is muchly horrible!" He wrinkled his nose and tried not to breathe in the horrid smell, certain that some of it had gone into his mouth.
He pushed himself to his feet and looked around. Dozens of medium-sized creatures circled him. He raised his blaster. “Do not swarm at me like ants, you foul monstrosities.”
The crawling things moved closer. A ripple surged through them like an electric shock and they charged in unison.
Mast flailed to his feet and fired on the move just as Sheriff Fry had taught him. He even found time to kick one of his attackers very muchly against the wall.
***
Dixie knew how to run down the stairs wearing high heels and a tight, short skirt. She was even faster barefoot, so that was what she did. Thad’s angry and near-panic voice reminded her that Shaunte wasn’t as smart or as tough as she thought she was. The young woman needed a momma bear to protect her. Since none of those were available, she was going to get the madam from the Mother Lode.
"Dixie, wait!" Leslie shouted from the bench she sat on near the music player. "I have something to tell you. That man Carter you had me watch…”
"Not now, Leslie. Shaunte's runoff to get herself killed." Dixie almost regretted being melodramatic. Her shouted comment sent ripples through the crowd at the Mother Lode. It was the first life she'd seen in the place for some time. This was how rumors started.
She loved rumors. And drama. And running barefoot, now that she thought about it.
Carrying her high heels in one hand, she raced into the night to find the Company Man. And thus began the worst night of her life.
Creatures with many legs ran along the building tops above her, their grotesque forms silhouetted by hazy moonlight. Some had eight or nine legs. Others had twenty or thirty. She noticed one that was very large that seemed to have one leg and two arms that were long enough to almost function as legs but not quite.
Dixie screamed. Unlike most of the girls she protected, she didn't stop running. Freezing in panic wasn't her style. Caterwauling like a prima donna opera star worked. Lights came on. Windows and doors opened. She wasn’t sure if anyone came out to help because she didn’t stop to find out.
“Shaunte! Where are you? I don’t like this at all!” She shouted again and again for the Company Man. “My hair is an absolute mess, and now that my skirt is riding up, I don’t think I did a great job shaving my legs this morning!”
Dying would be bad, but what would she look like when they found her?
A flood of head-sized spiders poured off a building in front of her. She backed up, hands held up defensively, the high heels dangling from her fingers almost forgotten now. The only way she could escape was by running through an alley, something she swore she’d never do again.
All of her worst memories had happened in such places.
CHAPTER TWELVE: A Call for Help
Thad stumbled through the door. Fatigue, blood loss, and worry had worn him down to a shadow of himself. Enemies who wouldn’t show themselves were the worst. It would save everyone a lot of time if this new alien menace would just show up in the street with Shaunte as a hostage, hit him with sinister but tediously overused monologue, then fight it out like man versus alien or whatever.
He checked to be sure all of his blaster charge packs were reloaded, repositioned on his belt so that the fullest would be the next he used, and swept his eyes over the room. Sledge and Proletan stared back at him. They were geared up for a fight.
“She never showed up, did she?” Thad asked.
Sledge shook his head.
Thad strode back and forth across the office, thinking, cursing under his breath, and disregarding one plan after another. “I left Ground Forces for this? War actually sounds pleasant by comparison. At least I would lead soldiers who followed orders.”
Sledge laughed. “Yeah, women. Always mucking things up for us men. Dixie’s gone AWOL too.”
“Sorry, Sledge. I’ve been focused on my own disasters,” Thad said. “Maybe they’re someplace safe together.”
“Maybe. Why don’t you call Shaunte again?”
“I’ve called her ten times,” Thad shot back in frustration.
“Call her again or go back out there. Your pacing back and forth is driving me crazy,” Sledge said.
“You should seek calmness within,” Proletan said. “Then you might find the answer you seek.”
“Stow that talk, you murdering freak,” Thad muttered. He dialed the phone and waited
for it to ring. Something was wrong with the button. He was about to curse all the ship travel into and out of the system for no reason when he realized he hadn’t pushed the button.
He was that tired. Recovering from the bite wound wasn’t exactly making him feel good. The moment Shaunte was accounted for, he was going to take a fifteen-hour nap. Pressing the button caused the call to go out, but he couldn’t get through. He sat at his desk and tried over and over again, all the while wishing he had the strength to go looking for her but knowing it was stupid to do anything without a plan or reasonable intelligence of the situation.
“The call cannot go through as dialed. Please try again later,” the phone said.
Thad wasn’t sure there was going to be a later.
“If you were thinking clearly, like the commander you are, you would know what to do,” Proletan said.
The man was right. Thad moved to the far corner of the room, wishing his office was private. Day to day, it was nice having his desk right in the middle of the bullpen. It wasn’t much for OpSec, however.
He called Tiberius Plastes and waited what seemed a hundred years.
“Thad, thank God you got through,” Tiberius said. The space line sounded worse than usual. Quantum physics hadn’t been able to beam people across the galaxy, but scientists had done an amazing job with communications. “I have been trying to get in touch with my daughter for days.”
“No time for chitchat, Tiberius. Shaunte and the rest of Darklanding are in trouble. I need you to send your TerroCom Soldiers,” Thad said.
“Listen, son. I’ve been doing this much longer than you have. Military force is not the way to handle Ortega,” Tiberius said, his voice fading away like he was a ghost just on the other side of life.
“Who the hell is Ortega? I’m talking about the creatures from the ship under Darklanding,” Thad said.
“Ship? I’m losing you. Cornelius Vandersun and his granddaughter took the ship. What are you talking about?”