by Chris Turner
“Up the ante,” commanded Dez. “Quit toying around, Vrand. Push these titanium hulks to their limits!”
“As you like.” Vrand’s grim smile did not escape Regers as the NOA man sent mechno #1 tumbling through the stream.
Vrand’s mechno boxed #1’s turret with its outstretched robot arms and sent it spinning back on land. The second hovered angrily to retaliate while its dripping peer jerked to its upright self again. Mechno #2 swept in to dive bomb the aggressive intruder.
Vrand’s bot forced mechno #2 on to open ground, firing hostile beams from its turret to land square on its central frame. Two hyenas got cornered by the shore. Running amok, they were pegged by fire and lay dead in the shallows. Both mechnos took the abuse, but riddled with stray blasts, mechno #2 was propelled backward. It swayed then toppled while mechno #1 smoked and sizzled.
The yellow flares penetrated mechno #1’s armor. Energy beams sizzled and sparked off its metal. Robot arms flailed wildly, heated to dangerous levels.
The mechno lay supine in the dirt, smoking, unmoving. But then an amazing thing happened. The metal started to melt in a rippling pool in the mechno’s center. A hole sprouted like a termite burrowing out from within.
“Shut the power down!” cried Dez.
“It’s useless. Look, they’re burrowing out, flying free,” cried one of the engineers.
A grey-winged thing burst out of the dissolving armature and shot high up into air. The other was also burrowing out of its metallic prison, then it came rocketing out to smack headlong into MXTR’s offending armor. The thing pierced through the titanium. Vrand’s bot spurted and sparked, then fell face first in the dirt.
Vrand sagged back, licking his lips. “Fucking hell. That’s not supposed to happen.”
Dez stared in dismay. Regers and Deakes laughed out loud and high fived each other. “Fucking A, Dez! You’re a real hero. Plus one for the moths.”
The moths flitted around each other in a strange flurry. Their habitat lay now in disarray with smoking metal and some of the animal bodies caught in the crossfire, floating in the creek. Other wildlife—wild foxes, hyenas and rats—ran amok, spooked by mechno blasts and deafening clamor with the sizzling mechno half in, half out of the clear stream.
One of the moths flew too close to the other in its wild frenzy and smacked it head on. The larger moth, under attack by its peer, feinted. It dodged a gnashing strike. While the other was caught off guard, the larger lashed out, teeth and claws catching the victim’s neck and ripping its head off. Strange, multicolored fluid ran out of the decapitated moth’s neck as it spun helplessly in midair then fell, flopping in circles in the dust. The thorax twitched. It was still alive for some moments, pumping out life fluids, then lay still. The surviving creature landed and rolled the carcass in the dust with its two front legs, spitting a gummy liquid on it from between mandibles and weaving some kind of fantastic thread from thorax. Round and round it wrapped the thread as would a spider, then clawed a hole in the soil not far from the shore where it shoved the head in and the dead, unmoving thorax. After covering up the hole with its black, fidgety digits, it patted the earth and proceeded to clean its mandibles, as if in a primitive burial ceremony.
The scientists gaped in incomprehension for this was something totally unprecedented. They were first time witnesses of the fact. The moth emitted a high-pitched sound, like a flute, or some sort of eerie banshee call—the first ever recorded of the alien species. In a burst of fantastic speed it hurtled up to the domed ceiling and smashed an area of metal. The blow took out the hidden camera with its bullet-shaped head.
The holoview flickered then went dead. The scientists stumbled about in pandemonium, gazing at one another. The creature had effectively nuked two impossible adversaries in a matter of minutes. Now it was champion of the arena.
Dez’s mouth sagged. “What the hell? How did the thing get out of its Imagron? You must have blasted it too heavily, Vrand.”
“No way,” the operator grumbled. “Those were only force 6 rays.”
“Then they must have secreted acid!” Dez cried. Red suffused his cheeks.
Mutters and grunts coursed through the scientists. The first hints of panic spread. No way of knowing whether the moth-alien predator was still contained in the war room or had somehow burrowed its way out of the containment sphere.
“Those are ten foot thick, solid titanium walls,” Dez mumbled to himself hoarsely.
“You going to take that chance?” asked Vrand.
“Surely, it could not get out?” He bit his lip. “Vrand, you take Biz and Mastri out to the beast access ramp and see that it’s secured. I’m alerting bio-hazard. Use the access tunnel on level D4 if you need to. Be careful!”
Vrand gave a low grunt and strode briskly off.
Dez’s mouth quivered. “They’ve never done that before—how can it be possible?—” he trailed off, his hand shaking.
Regers slapped him hard on the back. “Dez, you’re a wreck. Surprised you?—I told you not to fuck with those bugs and look what you did, you got a whole rodeo show going here that’s going tits up. I was lucky to get my money when I did—a million yols for getting that scrap metal to your yard. Now you’ve got a colossal mess on your hands.”
“They can’t do that,” babbled Dez.
One of the remaining engineers muttered, “They just did.”
“How can they be that intelligent? How’d it know the camera was there?”
The engineer shrugged. “Something alerted it to the camera.”
“Think! There’s no logical reason for it. Or reason for them to attack their brethren, actually, the opposite, there’s safety in numbers, Darwin’s survival of the species.”
Regers stared at him as if he were daft. “It’s a fucking alien. How do you expect to understand it? Your dimestore psychology models and R&D experiments mean jack shit to it.”
Regers could see that Dez was clearly out of sorts. “Loosed the beast from Pandora’s box? What’s to stop them from installing themselves in a FTL ship and blinking off between the worlds? How then’s your Bio-Imagron thingy gonna save you? They’ll bust through that like rats chew through cheese.”
Dez stared unblinking as if in a sleepwalk.
“Your problem, not mine.” Regers shrugged. “If you were trying to scare me with this moth freak show so I wouldn’t come after you sometime down the road, it didn’t work. That said, I don’t want to be a hundred light years within you or any piece of your operation.” He made for the exit. “Come on, Deakes. We’ve got our own battles to fight. I’ve had enough of this circus act.”
Chapter 22
The Zikri war Orbs circled in orbit above Xares, a rose-tinged planet, home to some 200 million people. The Mentera fleet drifted a score of miles away like wolves before a flock of fat sheep. Its thousands of mantises, aphids and destroyers gathered in no less menacing configuration. Now they drifted in a slow spiral ready to swarm down upon the planet.
Invasion of the hapless world was slated in minutes. A red light signaling a Code Critical flashed on Admiral Nrog’s communicator.
An armed detail of four massive Zikri entered the battle command bridge, tentacles glistening.
“Sir,” the lead security squid chittered, “a rogue ship has been captured and brought aboard Orb destroyer SP01 Uglik.”
“Who? One of ours?”
“One of the Mentera ships. We flagged it earlier. The ship we presumed malfunctioning that took out Mentera aphids and one of our rearguard Orbs. We tractored the ship into locking bay and managed to break through the hull, discovered it manned by three rebels, two human and one Mentera…the same ship set out to comb Kraetoria for intruders.”
Nrog’s motilators bristled in anger. “Those stupid Mentera and their non-existent security.” He twitched. “Transport the spies aboard via amalgamator”
“As you wish.”
“Anything else to report?”
The lead security squid’s train
of thought shifted with its parting polyp of a mouth. “Some peculiar Mentera recorder has been discovered aboard. The rebels claim ignorance of it.”
“Bring the unit for examination.”
“Right away, Admiral.”
Nrog whistled a fluting chirrup and patched through to First Officer Jring of the Mentera fleet.
Jring’s singsong voice sounded over the com. “A successful coup, Admiral. Both of us should be pleased with our achievement. One hundred thousand prime slaves have been shipped to Carcarus, a far world for factory tanking. For you, quite a score of factories and resources gained from one human planet.”
“Yes, quite, Princeps. Yet another matter concerns me. Some news of a security breach—in your ranks,” he added with a disturbing air of menace.
Jring clicked his mandibles.
“A rogue ship, two humans and a Mentera. I’ve detained the spies for questioning. Another special item has been retrieved.”
“Why don’t I come aboard and take a look?”
“I was expecting no less.”
Jring signed off.
Nrog paused in moody reflection. Zikri and Mentera, recent allies but age-old foes since time immemorial. Wary of each other’s propensity for violence and treachery. Could he trust Jring? Odd that Jring hadn’t captured and dealt with these spies earlier.
With haste, Nrog glided down the dim-lit hall to the interrogation chamber with his detail of security squids in tow.
* * *
Miko, crouching in painful posture, saw a flash of amber light as several forms emerged from the U-shaped amalgamator along the far wall of the interrogation chamber. Princeps Jring himself hunched forward, with gold bands on his pincer arms and hind legs. Four locust guards scuttled in tow, gripping lumo blasters. Nrog gave them a hasty greeting.
Miko’s spirits sank to new lows as the direness of his plight hit home. A humid, slightly rank odor permeated his nostrils in the maroon murk, courtesy of the mossy dark brown plant stuff caking the walls, somewhat bioluminescent. The Zikri went in for creepy. Star and Usk crouched at his side, damp, blooded, wild-eyed, but with no less fear and resignation. Five Mentera tanks loomed to the side…green-glowing aquariums filled with characteristic eerie green waters, three empty, one containing a husky, gape-eyed Daulk, and another with some horned, bat-like insect and three crab-like creatures with jellyfish streamers. The significance of three ‘empties’ was not lost on Miko.
On a signal from Nrog, guards from both races stepped forth to affix circuits, small coin-sized translator units, to the captives’ bodies: one on Usk’s antenna, one each behind Star’s and Miko’s ears.
“The invasion must proceed as planned,” Nrog told Jring. “These spies have somehow alerted NOA. I feel it in my motilators. We must not lose our advantage, Jring. If we wait too long, our window of surprise will be lost.”
“Agreed,” chirped Jring, “yet a small delay in conducting some security checks will not cost us, Nrog. I see no NOA on the horizon, or any visible threat.”
Nrog spurt out an angry chitter. “For now! Hostiles may light-drive in at any moment. There may be more of these spies about.” He turned to face the prisoners. “Who else is with you?” He shuttled closer. “Answer! What other ships are working in collusion?”
Miko maintained a grim, tight-lipped silence. While the blood pounded in his ears, Usk and Star stared at the luminous tanks, though Miko could see the shiver run through Star’s slender shoulders and almost palpably hear the beat of her heart.
Jring turned with brisk energy to his chitinous aide. “Kerut! Analyze all recordings between Mentera vessels prior to Quenrix. Start with the ships from Kraetoria.”
“Aye, Princeps.” The aide, a squat, heavy-plated locust in tight dark-green protective garb, moved aside to spew chitters into a coin-sized communicator pinned to his antenna.
Jring’s piercing red eyes bored into Usk. “It distresses me that one of my own kind is behind this fiasco, Nrog. Give the rebel to me. The culprit will be probed and sentenced to our tanks for intravenous feeding. Likely for workers on one of our space stations. Notice the rebel has the telltale red band on his head. A common mark of a deviant or convicted felon.”
“Interesting,” mused Nrog, grazing a tentacle tip across his prune-wrinkled mouth. He stared down at the traitorous crouching insect. “What have you to say for yourself?”
“I was wrongfully accused.” Defiance flashed across Usk’s eyes.
Jring scowled. “Your crimes of treason and murder trump any crimes here, real or feigned.”
Usk made no comment. He stared with a hollow expression.
“Give me five minutes with this traitor.” Jring clacked his pincers. “Our interrogators will make putty of him.”
Nrog flicked out a motilator. “No. He’s my captive, Jring, and on my ship. Your brutal means will have to wait—I’ll have Basilursk, my torturer, have a go at him.”
Nrog’s lead torturer gave a raspy acknowledgement. A ripple of excitement undulated through the squid’s upper body.
Jring seethed, but he held his pride in check and decided not to push the issue.
“Before you all die,” Nrog said to the prisoners, “tell me, what is this blue crate you carry with you? It glimmers with an unwholesome glow.” Nrog’s unsettling gaze drifted on to Miko.
Miko hesitated. His eyes flicked to the blue box. The device sat guarded by two of Nrog’s squids. Usk glanced about with nervous apprehension. Star whimpered in her space boots.
“Answer the question—or face my torturers!”
“I believe it is the vessel of the Masters,” Miko said.
“Ah, the Masters,” parroted Nrog with contempt. “I’ve heard of this creature. Some entity that haunts our ancient tunnels…what a lab assistant on Kraetoria was babbling about before he was murdered by some test subject.”
“Apparently a Zikri,” Jring interrupted. “The unusually large specimen who still prowls your lab tunnels, according to my intel.”
“Maybe.” Nrog glared in silent acknowledgement.
Miko licked his lips. Such a creature could only be Audra.
“Bring forth this ‘Master’, if you please,” instructed Nrog.
Jring scuttled forward. “Take care, Nrog. The box could be some bio-viral weapon or trap.”
“Relax. Our scanners have detected no explosives or organics. Lumo circuits of some sort, maybe some other material, yet wholly identifiable.”
Jring stirred in unease.
Nrog waved Miko on toward the crate. “The invasion will be delayed until we learn what this spy mission was…who sent them and what this device is.”
Jring chirruped. “That’s self-evident. They are spies of NOA. The device came from Kraetoria, our mother world. It is none other than some old lab equipment that my troops discovered and packed in a ship for further study under my lieutenant’s orders.”
Nrog rippled his upper motilators in doubt. “None of this makes any sense, Jring. What were the intruders doing on Kraetoria? Why would NOA send three amateur saboteurs, disparate picks in my opinion, into our remote base? This box is a weapon of some sort.” He rounded on Miko. “Speak up, human!”
Miko clenched his fists and shook his head. Even if he were to tell Nrog the truth, these creatures would kill him. Death was the only outcome and only moments away.
Nrog tipped his motilators forward and slapped Miko toward the box. “Move! Activate the device.”
“I know not—”
Nrog cast a suggestive leer at his torturer.
Miko swallowed. A stream of words gushed from his lips, “Only that at one time we activated such a box by pressing a panel, with a luminous knob, perhaps—”
Nrog flicked a motilator toward Usk. “What of you, insect? Do you know how to summon the Master? You crouch there like some deep sea turtle. Do you not know how to activate this box?”
Usk wavered a drooping antenna, an indication of the negative.
“Basilu
rsk, torture these hostiles. Start with the human girl.”
“Wait!” cried Miko, desperate and flush-faced. “I’ll see what I can do.”
He limped over and squatted before the pale-glowing box of mystery. The enemy guards glided forth, not trusting Miko or his moves. Mentera weapons lifted. Miko studied the device. The knee-high box was featureless but for a series of wide, grooved indentations on its right side. He passed his fingers lightly over them and the bare, smooth side and top. No effect. The box was unusually heavy for its compact size. When he tried to lift it, it took most of his strength. Easier to slide, he mused. But tilting it on its edge allowed him to scan the underside.
Nothing there. The other guards pressed closer, chitters in their mouths, curious as cats. Jring’s aides trained blasters on him. Miko tried various prods and knocks on the outer surface—to no avail. Only blue hard stuff, but it felt slightly warm to the touch. Just as he was about to accept defeat, an eerie peach glow lit on the box’s side and projected a conelike beam…a familiar form stood illuminated: the simulacrum.
An ugly figure, floating three feet off the ground.
The locusts recoiled and trained lumo weapons. Nrog’s squids flung tentacles at it. A humanoid creature of some sort: tall with yellow eyes and hairless hooded skull. The thing was neither male nor female—some androgynous creature, with short forelimbs and long bare feet graced with four hairy toes. Like some giant, humanoid, primitive ape.