by Mark Walden
‘Brand, you’re a genius!’ Shelby shouted happily as several other students who had seen what the two girls had done snatched their own extinguishers from the wall.
However, Laura knew that it was a temporary reprieve at best – there were only so many fire extinguishers on the top landing and they would not last for ever.
Otto snapped the casing back on to the final sleeper and shoved the weapons back into his pack.
‘OK, all done. Let’s go,’ Otto said as he jogged across the lab towards Raven. She turned towards him and the look on her face sent a chill through him.
‘I’m afraid it might be too late,’ she said quietly.
Otto looked into the corridor and saw that the only route back to the hydroponics cavern was blocked by a mass of the creature’s tendrils. They only had to get a few metres past the seething green barricade but it might as well have been miles away.
‘How fast can you run?’ Raven asked, never taking her eyes from the approaching vines.
‘Fast enough, especially when my life depends on it,’ Otto whispered.
‘Stay close to me. When I say run, you go and don’t look back. Understood?’
Otto nodded.
‘I think it’s time this thing got a pruning.’ Raven reached both hands over her shoulders and drew the twin gleaming swords from their sheaths on her back. She advanced towards the tendrils, her pace calm and measured, Otto just a metre or so behind her. The thorned vines seemed to sense her presence, rearing up from the floor as she approached. Raven kept moving forwards, both swords drawn, waiting for the first inevitable attack. She did not have to wait long – several of the tendrils suddenly whipped towards her and Otto, eager for fresh prey. Raven reacted instantly, both swords swinging in lightning arcs through the air, neatly severing all of the attacking vines, the dead ends dropping to the floor with a wet slapping sound. Raven continued to advance, repelling each strike as it came. The nearer they got to the passage leading to the hydroponics cavern the faster the vines whirled, Raven’s swords becoming little more than a silver blur as she hacked a way through. With only a couple of metres to go, one of the dozens of tendrils that were simultaneously attacking snuck past her guard, ripping a long gash into her thigh. Raven grunted in pain but never slowed, swinging the two blades even faster now as she carved a path through the spinning green blizzard for Otto and herself. They were now only a couple of metres from the adjoining corridor, which appeared to be mercifully free of the monstrous vines. Raven slashed to one side, finally clearing the path enough for them to get through.
‘Go!’ Raven shouted. ‘Run as fast as you can! I can’t hold them back for ever.’ Her face and uniform were streaked with the green juices that sprayed from the severed tendrils, her once gleaming blades dripping with the same foul slime. Otto knew there was no time to argue. He leapt through the gap that Raven had cut and sprinted down the corridor. Several tendrils snaked down the corridor after him.
‘You should be worried about me, not him!’ Raven yelled, hacking at the vines with even greater ferocity. The tendrils pursuing Otto seemed to hesitate for a moment before coiling back on themselves and joining the dozens of others slashing at Raven.
Despite Raven’s instructions to the contrary, Otto could not help but look back as he ran down the corridor. He could just make out the dark figure amidst the twisting coils of the vines, her blades still flashing, before the green wall thickened and she disappeared finally from view.
‘That’s it! I’m out,’ Shelby shouted as she threw the empty fire extinguisher at the approaching tendrils. She and Laura had fought desperately to hold the tendrils back as the last few students had locked themselves in their rooms but it had done little good.
‘Open up!’ Laura shouted, banging on the last door on the landing. The door slid open slightly and Nigel’s terrified face appeared in the gap.
‘Are they gone?’ He squeaked.
‘No, but we will be if you don’t let us in,’ Laura said angrily.
‘OK, OK,’ Nigel replied, opening the door fully.
‘Come on, Shelby, we’ve got to get inside!’ Laura shouted.
The two girls ran through the door as Nigel shut and locked it behind them.
‘Where’s Franz?’ Shelby asked, looking around the room.
‘He locked himself in the bathroom. He won’t come out,’ Nigel explained.
‘And I am being quite happy to stay here,’ Franz’s muffled voice added from behind the bathroom door.
‘We should be safe in here, shouldn’t we?’ Nigel asked, looking from one girl to the other.
There was an enormous bang from the room’s main door and the thick metal buckled inwards slightly.
‘Oh, sure, for about the next two minutes,’ Shelby replied.
Otto ran out on to the walkway to find a scene of utter chaos. The tendrils were attacking from all sides now as two guards wielding the last pair of functional flamethrowers fought to keep them at bay. Nero lay propped against the wall, his eyes closed and blood-soaked bandages wrapped around his chest, his face pale. Crouched next to Nero were Wing and the chief, who both looked up in surprise as Otto appeared.
‘Otto!’ Wing shouted, grinning at him. ‘Are you OK? Where’s Raven?’
‘She didn’t make it,’ Otto said quietly. ‘What happened to Nero?’
‘He was wounded when the creature attacked us. We have to get him to the infirmary but the way is blocked by that thing.’ Wing jerked his head in the direction of the hideous mutated plant in the middle of the cavern; it had grown noticeably in the time that Otto had been away. ‘It should be me lying there instead of him. He was hurt while trying to protect me.’ Wing looked distracted – the experience had clearly shaken him.
‘It’s time to end this,’ Otto said, pulling the pair of grapplers from his pack, ‘one way or the other.’ He snapped the grapplers to his wrists and moved quickly to the railing at the edge of the walkway. The scene that greeted him as he looked down into the base of the cavern was like a vision of hell. Boiling masses of vines surrounded the monstrous head of the creature which strained towards the walkway, desperate to reach the tantalising morsels that lay just beyond its reach. At the rate that it appeared to be growing they would not remain beyond its reach for long.
Otto forced himself to look away from the creature and picked out the points on the cavern ceiling that he needed to reach. The original idea had been for Raven to carry out this stage of the plan but that, sadly, was no longer going to be possible. He tried not to think about the way in which she had sacrificed herself to save him.
He had to stay focused on what he needed to do next. Not even Wing could help Otto now – with his injured wrist there was no way he could use a grappler. He was going to have to do this alone.
‘Otto, there’s something that I have to tell you about Nero,’ Wing said urgently.
‘You can tell me when I get back,’ Otto said, pointing the grappler on his right arm at the ceiling. Wing stared at him, desperate to tell him what he had seen, but there was no time.
‘Good luck,’ Wing said softly, placing his hand on Otto’s shoulder.
‘I don’t believe in luck,’ Otto said, forcing a smile. He squeezed the trigger, the thin wire shooting upwards and securing itself firmly to the rocky cavern ceiling. He took a long, deep breath and swung out into the cavern.
The creature seemed to sense the sudden movement, its head whipping around towards Otto as he swung through the air. Otto knew that he had to keep the line attaching him to the ceiling a certain length to keep up his momentum. He silently prayed that he would still be beyond the monster’s reach. As the creature’s head rushed towards him he tried to concentrate on the arcs that his brain was plotting in the air ahead of him. He fired the second grappler, releasing the first bolt as soon as he felt the second line go taut. The creature’s bloated head shot after him, only momentarily confused by the slight change in his original trajectory.
Concent
rate on where you’re going, Otto told himself, and whatever you do don’t look down. He maintained the rhythm of his swings, heading towards the centre of the cavern. He couldn’t see the creature’s head – he knew that it was somewhere behind him, but he had no idea how far away. He switched lines again, just as the slime-covered jaws of the creature slammed shut on the empty air where he had hung a split second before. He reeled the line in slightly, hoping that it would be enough to keep him beyond the reach of the snapping jaws. Just a couple more swings and he’d reach his target. The monster’s head raced at him again, moving impossibly fast. Otto twisted desperately, altering his course just enough that the gaping jaws snapped shut on empty air once more. The side of the creature’s head hit him hard, setting Otto spinning on the end of the line, momentarily disorienting him. Otto fired blindly towards the centre of the cavern, hoping that the grappler bolt would strike home. He felt the line go taut and swing again, his whole body aching from the glancing blow the monster had dealt him.
Otto fired again and the grappler bolt shot into the forest of hanging stalactites in the centre of the cavern’s roof. He reeled in the line, drawing himself up into the massive natural rock formation, beyond the reach of the creature’s hungry jaws. He twisted on the end of the line as he rose, taking in the shape of the jagged hanging rocks, looking for the best place to plant the surprise he had in store for the monster below. He spotted a small hollow in the rocks, near to what he calculated must be the most vulnerable point of the formation, and thumbed the controls on the grappler to reel him up towards it. As he rose towards the gap in the rock he caught a glimpse of the distant walkway and was horrified to see that the crawling vines had completely overrun the platform, forcing Wing and the guards to fall back through the doorway and along the corridor that Otto had run down just minutes before. Otto felt a chill run down his spine as he realised that there was no way back along that corridor. Wing was trapped between the vines advancing from the cavern and the ones flooding down the corridor. He pressed the button on the grappler harder, willing the line to reel in faster. He felt as if he was rising agonisingly slowly, but after only a couple of seconds he was level with the crack in the rock.
Dangling from the ceiling by one arm he struggled to pull the sleepers from the pack on his back. He placed the first weapon carefully in the hollow in the rock, praying that his alterations would work as planned. He worked fast, pulling the remaining three sleepers from his bag and placing them side by side in the small hole. He paused for a moment and looked at the four guns lying there. Would it be enough? He forced the question from his mind. If the modification he had made did not work as planned it was too late to do anything about it now. He reached out and pulled the trigger on the first sleeper. Nothing happened. He pulled the trigger again – still nothing. What had he missed? Just as Otto began to panic he heard a slight whining noise which began to gradually increase in volume. It was working! He quickly pulled the triggers on the other three sleepers and thumbed the switch on the grappler which would reel him down. He knew he only had a minute or so to get clear.
Otto caught a flicker of movement out of the corner of his eye and suddenly felt a blinding pain in his ankle. He looked down and saw a thin tendril wrapped around his left foot, its grip still tightening. He gasped in pain as the tendril pulled hard on his leg, dragging him down towards the creature’s gaping mouth, just twenty metres below. He locked the grappler holding him to the ceiling, trying to stop his descent towards certain death, the mechanism on the back of the device screeching in protest as the vine continued to pull him inexorably downwards. Otto yelled out in pain – it felt as if he was going to be torn in two. He gritted his teeth and pointed the grappler on his free hand downwards, aiming carefully. If he missed this shot he wouldn’t get another. He squeezed the trigger and the silver bolt shot from the grappler, straight at the slimy green tentacle attached to his leg. The bolt went straight through the tendril in an explosion of green slime and he instantly felt it release its grip on his ankle, recoiling back towards the cavern floor. Otto hit the bolt release, praying that the line would not get tangled in the flailing vines below. He watched helplessly as the line reeled in and felt a flood of relief as the bolt snapped back into place on his wrist, its silver tip covered in a thin layer of the creature’s emerald blood. Otto fired the grappler again at a distant point on the ceiling. The length of the line would send him swinging dangerously close to the cavern floor, but he knew he had to get as far away from the centre of the cavern as he could.
He released the other grappler and swung downwards at terrifying speed towards the tendril-covered floor below. As he swung low over the writhing green mass, tendrils snaked upwards, reaching for him. A couple got close but he was moving too fast now and they flailed uselessly at the empty air as he rocketed past, now swinging upwards again towards the platform crawling with tentacles.
THOOM!!
Behind Otto all four sleepers overloaded at once. The massive sonic shockwave tore through the hanging forest of stalactites, shattering their centuries-old grip on the cavern ceiling. The creature gave a final thunderous screeching roar as tens of thousands of tons of rock gave in to the pull of gravity and smashed into the floor below, crushing the bloated head and its vulnerable nerve sacs to pulp, burying the monster for ever.
The shockwave hit Otto in the back like a charging rhino, knocking the wind from him and snapping his grappler line. He seemed to fly through the air for a moment before he smashed into the suspended walkway with a bone-crunching impact. Stunned, Otto lay on the walkway, amidst the twitching tendrils, harmless now that the creature was dead. He rolled over and forced himself up into a sitting position, surveying the enormous mountain of rubble that filled the centre of the cavern, now partially obscured by the thick clouds of dust that hung in the air.
‘You’re compost, pal,’ he muttered to himself, chuckling despite the pain in his ribs. As he struggled to his feet his whole body protested. The adrenaline rush he had been feeling ebbed away to be replaced by fresh aches. His whole body felt like one big bruise.
Suddenly the platform lurched beneath his feet. The shockwave had not only loosened the huge stalactites’ grip on the ceiling, it had also loosened the fixings that secured the walkway to the wall. With a screech of tearing metal the walkway began to collapse. Otto ran for the doorway in the rock wall, every muscle protesting.
He was only a couple of metres from safety when the whole walkway collapsed, tearing away from the wall with a horrendous screeching noise.
Otto dived forwards as the floor fell away beneath his feet. He slammed into the edge of the corridor, dangling over the lethal drop to the cavern floor, his feet scrabbling for purchase on the rough rock wall. It was no good – he slipped and fell, just catching the edge of the walkway with his fingertips. He tried desperately to pull himself up, but the toll that the past few hours had taken on his body was too great – he felt his tenuous grip slipping. He closed his eyes. He wasn’t scared, just angry that he had made it this far only to fail at the end. Just as he felt that finally, inevitably, he was going to fall, a hand closed on his wrist, its grip like iron. He looked upwards.
‘You don’t get rid of me that easily, kid.’ Raven’s face, streaked with the creature’s green blood, smiled back down at him.
.
Chapter Sixteen
Laura slowly opened her eyes. The tendrils that had smashed through the door just seconds before lay convulsing harmlessly on the floor. She looked across the room at Nigel and Shelby, their own expressions of astonishment matching her own. Stepping cautiously over the fallen tendrils, she poked her head through the ruined doorway. All over the cavern the tendrils lay motionless, giving no hint of their previous murderous intent. Shelby and Nigel followed her out on to the balcony, gaping in disbelief at the piles of dead vines.
‘What happened?’ Shelby said quietly as more doors began to hiss open around the cavern.
‘Divine interven
tion?’ Laura replied.
‘They must have destroyed the nerve clusters,’ Nigel said quietly.
‘Oh, who cares,’ Shelby grinned, ‘as long as we don’t have to clear it up.’
They headed off down the balcony towards the stairs, picking their way through the dead vines.
Back in the room a small voice came from behind the bathroom door.
‘Hello? Hello? Is anybody being there?’
‘Max . . . Max, can you hear me?’ Raven gently stroked Nero’s cheek. He was still worryingly pale. His eyes flickered open.
‘Natalya,’ he whispered, his voice croaky. ‘The school?’
‘It’s over, Max. The creature is dead and the school is safe.’ She smiled. ‘I think we might need a new hydroponics facility, though.’
‘Well done. I knew you could do it,’ Nero replied with a smile.
‘Actually, it wasn’t me, I was . . . occupied elsewhere. It was Malpense. He carried out the plan himself. It worked, Max.’
‘Malpense?’ Nero’s surprise was obvious. ‘Where is he? I want to thank him.’
‘I’ll get him for you, he’s just over there . . .’ Raven’s voice trailed off.
‘What is it, Natalya?’ Nero asked urgently.
Otto and Wing were gone.
Otto and Wing ran across the gantry towards the helicopter sitting ready on the crater landing pad. Otto had heard Nero give the emergency evacuation orders and had hoped that it would mean that the way to the landing pad was clear. Just as he’d expected, there were no guards anywhere to be seen. They were too busy dealing with the chaos elsewhere in the school. He looked upwards. The crater was open and for the first time in months he saw clear blue sky. It was a strangely moving sight.