His friends were stuck outside the compound, surrounded by the evil snake-things.
No one asked to go and help. Had they have asked, the commander would have denied the request. And rightly so.
The four of them were deep inside the colony. They would have to backtrack through the compound, go back out into the elements, and then search for Weber and Bell. Although, the faceshield would display a location, potentially…
Something moved. “Hold it,” Stanton said. He’d seen a shadow, or thought he had.
Ruiz spun around, dropped to one knee, and raised her blaster. She had one eye squeezed shut, the other wide open and staring through her scope. The green site laser from her weapon played on the floor, wall, ceiling. “I’m not seeing anything.”
“It was something. Just around the bend,” Stanton said. A part of him felt foolish. Maybe he had spoken too soon? Perhaps he should have waited until he was certain something was behind them.
No. No, it was better safe than sorry. Not the other way around. A distant early warning was better than an ambush. “Stay here,” Stanton said and took a step forward.
The commander reached out. Her hand locked on his arm. “You stay here. I’ll have a look.”
“With all due respect, Commander, no.”
“No?” Meyers said.
Stanton didn’t wait and hash out the issue. He continued on, backtracking the way they’d just walked. His respect for the commander continually grew. She didn’t send her people out to do things while she hung back as a spectator. She walked the line. Front line. She put herself, or tried, in the dangerous situations. She might not be as fearless as she pretended to be, but Meyers was brave. There was no denying that much.
Adam Stanton kept his knees bent. Arms high. The butt of the blaster crammed against into the crock of right shoulder. Left hand on the barrel. He didn’t have a scope on the weapon but used the sight on the nose of the barrel for lining up targets.
As he came upon the corner, Stanton slowed his steps even more. He listened intently for any sound out of the ordinary. Although, being new inside the compound, he had no clue what normal sounded like.
He pressed his back against the wall. The amber lights spun, made small shadows grow and dance. His hiding spot was cast onto the wall across from him. If one of the creatures was on the turn, and was smart enough to understand shadows, his element of surprise was shot.
Stanton almost laughed at the thought. He knew he was personifying some alien being, giving the thing far more credit than it deserved. The creatures were anything but intelligent. They were primitive, basic. He figured the things slept, hunted, and ate. Life didn’t get any more elementary.
Sucking in a deep breath and holding it, Stanton dropped to a knee as he pivoted his body around the corner. Weapon trained on whatever might be waiting directly in front of him.
As his knee hit the floor, he took a fraction of a moment and inventoried the situation.
He counted at least six of the creatures. They were slithering toward him. Some were on the walls. They definitely had small legs and webbed feet with taloned toes. The talons gripped the wall, digging into the metal. He also heard the clicking of those sharp toenails on the square floor tiles.
His mind reeled. The potential scenarios played out in his mind’s eye. He couldn’t differentiate a winning plan from the options. His was one blaster against a half dozen dangerous, violent aliens.
“What have you got?” Commander Meyers’ voice whispered in his ear. It was such a crisp transmission, for a moment he thought she might be standing directly behind him. He almost turned around to check but knew better. Might be better all-around if she were directly behind him. The two of them could deliver an unforgettable punishment on the creatures. On his own …
“Six unfriendlies making their way toward us,” Stanton whispered. He believed his sudden appearance went undetected. The creatures seemed preoccupied with each other. Their jaws opened and snapped closed, making back-throat gargles and tongue clicks. “Commander, if I didn’t know better, I’d say they were communicating with each other.”
So much for unintelligent alien lifeforms, Stanton thought. This changed things. Drastically.
“Can you get out of there?” Meyers asked.
Stanton knew he’d been lucky to drop in without alerting them to his position. He feared anymore movement might draw unwanted attention. He suspected their eyes worked in a fashion similar to other reptiles, picking up prey based on motion. “Not positive, Commander. I feel like if I stay still, they aren’t seeing me,” he said.
He saw two options, limited options at that. The creatures crept closer and closer. If Stanton waited too long to do anything, they would be on him in less than a minute. It would be far too late to kill all of them by then, maybe too late to kill even one. If he backed away, made it around the corner, they would most likely see him, and then they’d come at him fast. He would be leading them directly toward his commander.
“Permission to engage,” Stanton said.
“Permission granted,” Commander Meyers said.
Stanton looked to his right. Commander Meyers stood there. She held her blaster in her right hand, barrel aiming up. She gave him a nod, raised her left hand so he could see as she counted down, lowering a finger at a time. She mouthed the words, “Three. Two. One.”
Commander Meyers launched herself off the wall, slid to a knee beside Stanton, and the two of them immediately opened fire.
Chapter Forty-One
The creatures were all around Lieutenants Marshall Weber and Murray Bell. The rover was gone, sunk into Neptune’s ocean. The vehicle had been the only safety net available. The snake-like creatures were everywhere. They were surrounded.
Bell, with a missing leg and no weapon, was defenseless and panicking. “Web, man, shoot!”
“Web, man, what are you waiting for?”
The creatures came at them fast.
Weber sighed. “The charge is gone. I’m out. The blaster’s useless.”
The two of them locked eyes. They were going to die. The resolve washed over their expressions, the somber emotion of one matched the other as if looking into a mirror.
The biggest of the creatures came in close and coiled its body as the head rose in the air above them. The jaws opened wide. The rattling roar from the back of the creature’s throat nearly shook the ground. The sound hurt Weber’s ears. He couldn’t plug them with his hands, not with a helmet on, so instead was forced to just close his eyes and wait for the horrible cry to end.
Bell rolled onto his back. It was as if he didn’t want to die if he couldn’t see it coming.
Something whistled.
It came from above them. Weber looked up.
He saw a light spray from a cluster of clouds. His first thought was another freak storm. He hated this stupid planet; hated everything about it!
On the tail of the beam of light was a ship that cut a path through the sky.
It wasn’t the Eclipse or a shuttle. It was like nothing he had seen before. It flew like an inverted V with layered wings. The ship opened fire. Lasers blasted the snow and ice around them.
“Take cover!” Weber shouted. He dove forward, draping his body over Bell.
Weber heard more shots fired. The creatures chortled out throaty, gravelly cries. Weber watched as the ship made a second pass. Most of the creatures were down. Injured pools of blood around the long, round bodies. They weren’t dead. Dying, though. “Whoa-who!”
Bell pushed Weber off, tried sitting up.
As the large ship swooped in, weapons blazing, Weber knocked Bell back down. He covered Bell with his own body.
“What in the hell are you doing?” Bell screamed. “I can’t see what’s going on!”
“What if they miss?”
“Your body isn’t going to protect either of us from a blast out of a ship that size. Look at the size of their cannons.” Bell, once again, shoved Weber off and sat up.
> Bell had a point.
Weber held his useless blaster in his hands, wished his charger wasn’t dead. He wanted in on the action. He suddenly felt the flicker of hope stir inside his chest.
The ship spun around above them, hovered in place.
The underside cannon swiveled, bolts fired. A creature’s body exploded. Blood and innards sprayed. The cannon swiveled. Bolts fired. The blast hit a creature’s neck just below the croc-like head. The head fell away, severed from the rest of the body in a clean, sizzling, slice.
Weber had been certain they would never get out of this. Those creatures had them, dead to nuts, as his friends in military training had been known to say. Dead to nuts.
He had no idea who piloted the ship rescuing them, and at the moment, he didn’t care. They could be pirates for all he cared.
“Web!”
Marshall Weber looked at Bell and noticed Bell was looking behind Weber. His eyes were wide. Weber’s stomach dropped. He knew one of the creatures was closing in.
Without hesitating, Weber snatched his bowie knife from the sheath strapped to his thigh. He dropped onto his arm and rolled away. The ground crunched under his weight. His rapid breathing fogged the inside faceshield.
When Weber stopped rolling, he got up onto his knees, knife in a right-hand grip so that the blade ran along his forearm and he’d be ready to block and slash at the same time; in one fluid motion.
Except, the thing—the creature—wasn’t poised to strike … him.
Bell lay on his back on the ground with both arms crossed in a block above his chest. The creature had one of its feet on Bell’s legs. Pinning the man in place.
Weber jumped up onto his feet and sprinted forward. He rotated the Bowie handle. The blade arched forward as he leapt into the air. Before he realized what he was doing, Weber found himself straddling the back of the creature and driving the Bowie blade deep into the thing’s flesh, piercing between the scaly plates.
The creature bucked and shook, attempting to get him off of its back. It slithered away from Bell, which was a good sign. However, it was headed for a break in the ice, not far from where the rover had sunk.
Weber fought to free his blade from the creature’s neck.
They were close to the edge of the ice and Weber saw clearly the steady ripple of the ocean current.
Without overthinking it, Weber rolled off. He crashed hard on the ice. Had something in his shoulder popped? It was dislocated. Thankfully, it was his left arm. It didn’t matter. His blaster was empty and his Bowie was lodged in the creature’s neck.
At the last second, Weber jumped.
The back tail of the creature whipped back and forth, as the snake-thing serpentined toward freedom, headed for the ocean. He didn’t clear the jump. The toes of his boots kicked the monster. It sent Weber flailing. Again, he came down fast and hard on the ice. With his left arm dangling, Weber got to his feet and ran back toward where he’d left Bell.
“Weber!” Bell was pointing.
Weber chanced a look back. The creature realized he was no longer riding on its back, and perhaps understood that he was now injured. It had spun around. The ocean no longer seemed like its target.
The thing growled and roared as it tucked its head down and then using the ice to its advantage slid fast and furious toward him.
The V-shaped ship dropped out of the sky, rotated so the point of the V was aimed directly at Weber.
Weber looked back a second time. The serpent was nearly on him, its jaws were wide open. He could not believe the size of the curved teeth jutting from its mouth. The thought of those teeth biting through his flesh made him run faster, his legs pumping as hard as they could.
It seemed useless; he couldn’t run faster than it could slither.
He wondered what the ship was waiting for. Why weren’t they blasting the thing off the planet? And then he realized what the hold-up was: they didn’t have a clear shot. He was blocking the way.
Weber dove onto the ice.
It was a calculated risk, because if the ship didn’t fire immediately, then he’d just sacrificed himself for nothing.
How he managed to land on his left arm was beyond him. He screamed at the sharp pain coursing through his arm, back, and neck. It almost felt as if his skin were on fire.
The ship opened fire.
Weber didn’t stay put. Instead, he got onto all fours, well … all three working limbs, and kept his left arm cradled as close to his chest as he could, and then dog-crawled his way toward Bell.
The ship passed overhead, just as he reached Bell.
Bell was clapping him on the back. Pulled him in. “You’re okay!”
“Thought I was going to die,” Weber said.
“I thought you were, too.” Bell didn’t sugarcoat a thing. He said what he thought. Blunt was better than most, Weber thought.
Bell pointed. “Check that out.”
The ship was close to the surface. From the back of the V, a hatch opened, a mechanical ramp lowered, and standing on the edge of the ramp was a woman in a tight spacesuit, waving them over.
“What do we do?” Bell asked.
“We’ll never make the colony, not with so many of those creatures out. Not with you missing a leg,” Weber said.
“Ouch.”
“It’s the truth, Mur. It’s the truth, so I say we take our chance with these folks. They saved our lives just now.”
“They did at that. Help me up,” Bell said.
Weber lifted Bell onto his leg and got under the man’s arm. They ran with three legs for the back of the ship.
The woman waiting waved them on in a most frantic fashion.
Weber didn’t need to look behind them to understand her sudden panic.
“Faster, Bell!” Weber encouraged.
“Going as fast as a one-legged man can run,” he said.
Weber almost laughed. If he hadn’t been scared out of his mind, he might have. The situation needed some humor. There had to be a break in the terror that had gripped them the last several hours.
On the horizon, the sun was rising. The sun was just a small white orb. Even some three billion miles away, the sun managed to light the sky and chase away the night.
The woman raised a blaster, firing over their heads, let bolts fly.
Instinctively, Weber lowered his head, and tucked his chin closer to his chest.
Bell stumbled, as if the sudden blaster bolts flying overhead close enough to singe hair had they not been wearing helmets, and tripped him up.
Weber readjusted his hold. He grit his teeth since he had his left arm and shoulder pressed tight against Bell’s body. With his eyes cast down, he watched their feet. There was nothing graceful about their run. It was clumsy at best, pathetic otherwise. They didn’t stop, though. “Faster, Mur. We’ve got to reach the ship!”
“Ya think?” Bell did laugh, sort of. “I’m trying.”
The woman fired three quick blasts overhead.
“I know you are.”
Weber kept waiting for the sound of the creature chasing them to start screaming. He knew the things were hard to hit and even harder to kill. He figured, once again, he was in the line of fire, preventing the woman from striking and killing the creature with a bolt or two. There was no diving out of the way this time, not with his arm, and not with Bell in his condition.
The woman held her blaster with both hands now. She stood with feet shoulder-length apart and knees bent. She looked like she meant business. Weber was thankful she appeared to be on their side. He didn’t know a thing about the lady in front of them, other than she did not seem like someone to mess with.
Weber and Bell reached the lip of the ramp.
The woman’s right arm shot out. Her palm slapped a red button.
The ramp began rising.
Weber lost his balance. He pitched Bell forward. His friend tried staying up, hopping on one leg, but as the ship tipped lifting into the air, he stumbled, arms out, and fell.
>
Weber slid down the closing hatch. His legs dangled outside.
The woman punched the red button, halting the closing process. She dropped onto her belly and extended an arm.
Weber latched onto her hand. It felt like metal under her suit. Her grip was like a vice. He worried she might crush bones.
She tugged, pulling him into the ship.
Weber used his legs, his knee getting a hold on the lip of the ramp, and hoisted himself into the ship the rest of the way.
Rolling onto his back, an arm draped over his rising and falling chest, Weber finally allowed himself a moment to laugh.
The woman, also lying down and breathing heavy, said, “Did I miss something? What’s so funny?”
“Nothing,” he said. “Not a damn thing. I’m Weber. Lieutenant Marshall Weber. And that guy back there, he’s Lieutenant Murray Bell.”
“My names Cohn. Erinne Cohn.”
“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Cohn,” Webber said.
“A real pleasure, ma’am,” Bell added.
Chapter Forty-Three
Commander Meyers’ blaster fired bolt after bolt. The red laser bolts cut through the air and slammed into a creature. Only a few missed, scarring the walls and floor with black burn marks. Smoke rose from the scorched areas and from the armored scales protecting the creatures from the blasts. Stanton had been brave enough to back step from the way they’d come to search a corner corridor. They had all heard strange noises, and even if given only one guess, they each knew it had to be one of those creatures following them after they’d left the communications room.
When Stanton indicated there was more than one, Meyers ordered Ruiz through a hatch while she ran to help her captain.
Now the two knelt side-by-side, shoulder to shoulder, and fired on a hallway filled with those snake-ish creatures.
Stanton’s aim was equally on point. His bolts hit the targets he tried hitting. It looked as if only ricochets burned scars into the floor, walls, and ceiling. Otherwise, his aim was spot-on. The creatures just refused to die. They did, however, retreat some. That alone had to be considered some kind of small victory. Except, they would have to save any celebration for later.
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