“No time for romance, los amantes,” cried Nahuatl. “Back the way we came, quickly!”
That wasn’t an option. Travis had eschewed firing because high powered bullets would tear through the lizard men and kill Ressa. Plus, stealth was their best hope. As Travis turned to retreat, he saw that their way was blocked by snarling lizard men.
“Get ready to run. I’m gonna turn on the lights.”
Ressa was having problems. “I can’t feel my feet!” she cried.
“I’ve got you,” said the prince, throwing her over his shoulder. Travis adjusted his goggles and triggered his gun lamp. The switch from darkness to blinding white light caused the lizards to cry out in agony and cower back.
“Get some!” Travis shouted, and he triggered full automatic fire. As the prince fled up the passageway, Travis Buckley swept and cleared. Those lizard men not incinerated were blown straight over on their backs. Some even crawled across the ceiling to get at him. For every one he chopped to pieces, two more took its place. His clip was almost empty. Travis jammed another one into the breach and pounded back up the corridor to catch up with his friends.
By the time he reached them, Ressa was on her feet, limping as Nahuatl supported her under the arm. “We need to get a move on, folks,” said Travis. “I just rang the dinner bell. We’re about to have company.”
They moved on together in the darkness and tried to increase their speed. Ressa, who didn’t have night vision, clutched at her rescuers.
“Don’t let go of me! Please! I can’t see anything!”
“We won’t leave you,” said Travis. “I’ll try some infrared.” The gun lamp lit up the tunnel like the inside of a darkroom. It wasn’t great, but for now Ressa wasn’t totally blind. “Now what?”
“The river is north and west of here. You know which way that is?” asked the prince.
“Maybe!” said Travis. He made some quick adjustments to his goggles, turning on the heads-up display. In the upper corner of his right eye, a compass arrow indicator lit up. “We’re in business,” he told the prince. “Here,” he tapped the prince’s temple for a moment.
“Truly, I must have one of these for my own,” said the prince.
“I just want to see the sun again,” said Ressa. “Please! Come on! Don’t you hear them?” Sounds of pursuit began to reach their ears.
They ran for it, always travelling north and west, and descended steadily. Every so often Travis would have to use his rifle for cover, and once he used a grenade from the built-in launcher. He even gave Ressa one of his machetes so she’d have something to defend herself with. Gradually, though, he became aware of a new stench permeating the the tunnel ahead. A familiar stink, like…
“A sewer!” he yelled. “It smells like a sewer ahead!” And just like that, the tunnels opened up again. They could see without the night vision, because there was natural light coming into the bigger cavern.
They stood upon a new and bigger ledge. Below them was the roar of the underground river, which carried away the channels of sludge and foulness that flowed into it from the far end of the cavern. At the other end was a low hanging archway that led to the sunlit world beyond. Then Travis understood.
“This is their sewer outlet.”
“So?” said Ressa.
“So this whole place is full of methane gas! That’s what we’re smelling.”
“I still don’t understand,” said the prince.
“It means one good phosphorous grenade will bring this place down around their ears. Unfortunately, I’m down to illumination rounds. We can still mess them up, though. Come on!”
Even as he spoke, the cavern was beginning to swarm with lizards men. Hundreds flooded out of every passageway. They raced along the ledge and crawled along the walls, teeth flashing, eyes glinting with hunger.
“Swim!” cried the prince, and they leaped into the river channel. Weighed down the most, Travis had a huge problem struggling to the surface. He might not have made it without help from Ressa. He floated on his back, carried along by the current. Lizard men pursued them in the water, swimming with arms tucked in and tails whipping, like alligators. Nahuatl and Ressa were swimming strongly, but pursuit was closing. Travis dared not fire until they were almost out.
Suddenly he felt something clamping onto his leg. A lizard man pulled him into a death roll. He tried to stab at the thing with his bayonet, but could not get in a meaningful blow. He coughed and sputtered as his lungs began to fill. Then he felt another impact, and the brackish water turned red with blood. Nahuatl had swum to his rescue and bludgeoned his attacker to death with his macahuitl. Travis broke the surface and sucked in air. He could see the tunnel entrance ahead and hear the roar of the channel increase as it went over the falls. Nahuatl and Ressa were ahead of him, but another attack would finish him. Time to crash the party. Raising his rifle one last time, Travis triggered the illumination round.
The shot arced high and true, just missing the tunnel’s roof. Once the propellant was used up a small parachute would deploy. The igniting flare would drop slowly to the water. On the battlefield, these devices lit up the darkness for advancing soldiers. This particular round brought light to a place that had lain in darkness for millennia. There was an ear-cracking explosion and a blinding white light as the methane gas, which had soaked into the very rocks, ignited. Travis Buckley felt a huge wave of heat and pressure lift him and carry him along. Then all his senses were blotted out in an avalanche of roaring and force.
Chapter 13
Struts McCaskey did not like the jungle, and he never would. He was a wizard with all things mechanical. If it was made of metal and had wires, it held no mystery for him. In the jungle, he was surrounded by things that crawled and stung and bit, and this filled him with a sense of impending peril. Until he was on board a starship headed home, he was in agony.
He was the worst guy to put on night watch. He couldn’t see anything, and every tiny rustle and flutter of wing sounded like an approaching lizard man patrol. He wanted to be back in the motor pool, and he wanted it now. Of course, people in hell wanted ice water, as his pop used to say. That’s why he was shocked when a supposedly dead man gave the call sign and walked out of the jungle.
Prince Nahuatl looked liked he’s seen forty miles of rough road, but there was plenty of fight left in him. One of his obsidian clubs was still slung across his back, but his signature jaguar helm was gone. His mud-streaked body was covered in scrapes and bruises. There was a grisly pink burn mark on his left shoulder that was ringed by blackened, scorched flesh. He was weary, but he didn’t weave or stagger. “Take me to Bainbridge, and be quick about it.” was all he said.
The look on the captain’s face tightened when he saw Nahuatl was alone.
“We were separated. They were alive the last time I saw them.” While Hasinski tended the prince’s wounds, Nahuatl told the incredible story while he gulped electrolyte packs and chewed up an entire MRE. “Buckley and I are even now,” he said. “I saved him from that lagarto bastardo hombre. Then he fired into the cave, and there was huge gout of fire. If we had not all been in the water, we would have been asado. When I awoke, I had washed up on the shore.”
“What about Travis and the girl?”
“Buckley and Ressa were nowhere to be found. I looked and looked, but found no bodies. I think they were washed downstream. Capitán, I believe they still live.”
“Wherever they are, they’re beyond our help. You know that, don’t you?”
“Sí, señor. They are in Her hands now.”
Bainbridge put a hand on the prince’s uninjured shoulder. “Son, that was an incredible thing you did. I’ve never heard anything like it. I’m proud to have a man like you with us.”
“Damn straight,” said Derek Driveway.
“Fucking A,” said Struts. The other men murmured their assent. Nahuatl’s remaining scouts bowed.
“We’ll reach Pericu by sundown tomorrow. Get some rest, you mutts, and stay fro
sty.”
“Ooh rah!” said someone, and they all shuffled back to their fighting holes.
“Forget about your post, McCaskey?” asked the captain. Struts was walking in the wrong direction.
“Negative, sir!” said Struts, his voice glum.
As Prince Nahuatl left the fire and trudged to his waiting hammock, a large, sinewy hand came down gently on his shoulder. He turned to see Private Numbnuts smiling at him. His pale blue eyes radiated joy. “You’re right, prince. They are still alive.”
“I hope so,” replied Nahuatl. “I just wish I knew for sure.”
Chapter 14
The Prelate shook his cruel hand gingerly, clenching and unclenching the fingers to see if anything was broken. He had left the centurion crumpled senseless on the throne room floor. Now, as he headed to Dr. Arnac’s laboratory, his bodyguard made sure to stay out of arm’s reach. The Prelate never took bad news well.
He was getting soft, he thought. His own master had kept a blaster on hand for dealing with incompetence. Yet it was inefficient to kill a man simply because he bore bad news. The centurion in charge of the delta harvest station was another matter. He should be throttled with his own entrails. Or fed to a crocodile. No matter; it would be decided later.
The doctor’s lab was located underneath one of the larger buildings in the warehouse district, a short walk from his audience chamber. Here the accoutrements of modern technology dominated. A lizard man lay strapped to a table at one end of the room. His abdomen had been laid open and peeled back from chin to groin, exposing his inner workings. Tubes and long metal probes nested within, bubbling with strange fluids. Periodic charges caused the body to buck against the restraints in galvanic response. The lizard man, still conscious, hissed weakly.
At the other end, the room was dominated by a gleaming horizontal metal tank. Its clear canopy revealed a naked, well muscled male form floating within pale yellow fluid. An oxygen mask covered the face. Regarding the subject was a tall, sallow-faced man with thinning hair dressed in a white lab coat. He glanced up once, more irritated than concerned, to note the Prefect’s arrival. “I assume there is some reason for interrupting me?”
“I do nothing without reason,” came the dreadful voice. “I have received enough bad news this morning. I expect your report to be different.”
“Really? Does the bad news affect our project?”
“You may have to accelerate your experiments. Thanks to this cretin,” the Prelate indicated the man in the tank, “we can expect the Armada forces to arrive within forty-eight hours. Their numbers are insignificant, but they carry armaments that could breach the city walls. Though they will eventually be crushed, they could delay our departure long enough for more substantial reinforcements to arrive. How goes our test subject?”
“We’re preparing to introduce the mutagens into his system now. I believe they will bond much better with his mammalian DNA than they did with the reptilian. By morning Otto Speilman will be a changed man. He will be bigger, stronger, faster, smarter, than any human soldier. He will be,” Arnac chuckled, “the ultimate – how do they say it? Force multiplier?”
“Let us hope so. I would hate to think we made a mistake in recruiting you.” The Prelate peered at the form within the tank. “He seems rather too peaceful.”
“He’s unconscious. He won’t feel a thing.”
“But pain is the path to enlightenment, my good doctor! It’s the Machai way. We do not deny our enemies the opportunity to attain perfection through agony. In this way we serve the will of the Dark Master.”
“And all this time I thought you were just a bunch of sick bastards.”
“Of course,” laughed the Prelate, “of course. You understand! The Dark One will find his screams pleasing. As do I.”
Arnac shuddered despite himself. “You never told me what the bad news was.”
“There was a major methane explosion at the delta harvesting center. It collapsed a great portion of the catacombs on the eastern end of the hive. The reptiles,” sneered the Prelate, “claim humans were involved.”
“The queen?”
“Unharmed. The fires never reached the hatchery depths. Nonetheless, it is now unlikely we will reach our full quota. I really must do something with all my frustration.” The Prelate strolled over to the mutagenic chamber and used one claw-like fingernail to switch off the dampening field that kept the form within in a dreamless sleep. Within a minute, the figure began to thrash and twitch. The Prefect then twisted the dial that turned up the external speaker, amplifying the muffled cries that had begun as moans and were now rising to screams. From within his darkened hood, a smile stretched across his face.
Chapter 15
All Travis wanted to do was sleep, but someone kept trying to shake him awake. As he tried to shake out his still-ringing ears, words became intelligible out of the roaring din.
“Travis, wake up! Travis, they are coming!”
Ressa was pounding his back and shoulders in an effort to rouse him. His vision focused, and he saw where his was. He lay face down on a small sand bar in the middle of the muddy brown river. His legs still bobbed in the current. From his water-level eye’s view he could see scores of lizard men as they leapt into the water on the far bank. Though still dozens of yards away, they were making good time to his position.
“Damn!”
He rose to his feet. “You okay?” he asked Ressa. Dripping wet, she nodded her assent. He felt a sick lurch in his stomach as he realized his M1B was nowhere to be found. Hardesty could kill him later. He still had his combat knife, and a machete still remained bound to his back. A glance to his left told him the lizard men were gaining. A glance to his right gave him slim hope. The far shore was closer, and the current wasn’t bad.
“Swim for it!” he told Ressa, and they both leaped into the river. The machete was cumbersome, but it didn’t impede his stroke as he swam. Travis prayed it didn’t come loose. They might need it if the lizard men caught up. Though weighed down, he managed to keep Ressa in sight as they drifted toward the shore. A few moments later, they both scrambled up the bank.
He risked a glance back. The lizard men had gained the sand bar and were beginning the final crossing.
The two ran headlong into the underbrush in an attempt to put some distance between themselves and their pursuers. Travis’s mind raced as he tried to put together some kind of plan, but he was running out of ideas. They would run as far and as fast as they could. He would defend Ressa until the end.
Things only got worse. There was no causeway to follow, and though the undergrowth was not impenetrable, it was more and more difficult to maintain a sense of direction. For all he knew they were running in a circle. They couldn’t hear any signs of pursuit, and that was a good thing. Maybe lizard men could travel soundlessly in the jungle. They would soon find out.
Travis could see Ressa was tiring visibly. The few hours she had spent in a hammock had done little to rejuvenate her. He moved to catch up.
Just as he was within arm’s reach, Ressa vanished from sight. With a squeal, her feet slid out from under her and she appeared to drop through a covering of vines and undergrowth, like an animal falling into a trap. Travis made to grab at her, but then he felt his boots slide on what turned out to be slick stone. He too slid beneath the vines into the unknown darkness below.
Fifteen feet later his boots splashed into the bottom of an underground water-filled channel. He pitched forward, almost on top of Ressa. For a moment the only sounds were their exhausted pantings. Travis winced. Rocks are not a soft place to land. His elbows and knees screamed, but he had not struck his head on the way down. He didn’t think he had done any permanent damage. Unfortunately, he was back in total darkness again. No flashlight. No matches. He systematically groped in all his pockets looking for anything, and came up empty. Then, as his eyes adjusted, he could see that things weren’t quite so dark. The walls and ceiling of the underground were covered with strands of bio
luminescent algae that produced a ghostly glow to offset the blackness.
Travis could see Ressa sitting up, clutching her head and groaning. “Are you hurt?” he asked.
“Aiy! I hit my head, but I don’t think anything’s broken. You?”
“Fine. I’m just a little worried about our wounds turning septic. I – “ he was interrupted by a series of sharp cracks directly over his head. Travis jumped as massive boulders crashed down directly where he had been standing. When the dust cleared, the light from the well mouth had been cut off, but Travis and Ressa had avoided the cave-in by inches.
“Well,” he said at last, “at least the lizard men won’t be following us.”
“Our fall must have loosened the rock overhead,” said Ressa. “Now there’s only one way to go, eh?”
The two sat for a moment, resting. Ressa slid into Travis’s embrace. He held her close. “What is this place?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” he said. “My best guess is some sort of Spanish viper pit.”
“A what?”
“Natural pits and underground wells found in places like Central America. That’s back home on Earth. The Spanish were explorers in jungles very much like these. Their native guides were afraid of the pits because they were convinced the pits were full of snakes and evil spirits.”
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