“And give Colonel Black an excuse to bury us in the Nevada desert?” Parker shook his head. “They’ll find out.”
“Not if you’re good.”
“But there aren’t any ports or disc drives,” he argued, rapidly formatting his connection to the network. “There’s no way to copy the information.”
April saw a dozen capybara-sized rodents with faces like koala bears scatter through the laboratory. “Pretty cute,” she observed.
Barnes nodded down the row of cages. “It must be dinner time.”
“Why would I risk my life to get you information?” Parker wondered.
“Because if what we find in their hybrid program is worth destroying, you already assume too much concerning the value of your life.”
“Civilians have no place in military concerns, and the army has no place in science except to protect it,” April stated. “We all search for verifiable truth, I say we should take it when it’s within reach.”
Parker imitated the same courage and initiated the uplink with the twin console operated by a programmer above ground. He typed in access codes for the mainframe of the Reptile Wing. “Give me a minute to hide our activities on the network, then we can explore Project Harvest.”
Dekker looked to April, who was peering into glass cages manufactured with fake greenery. On a partial tree, indistinguishable monsters coiled and undulated in a slithering mass.
“You have to see the philosophical underpinnings of your job,” she told him. “If you’re the only one fortunate enough to interact with animals like these.”
“And the only one who survives their rampage, usually. Species that transcend the physical world develop with little capacity to interact with lower life-forms without becoming just as myopically destructive. We’ve delivered ourselves up to a potential we assumed we could reach, and if all that has been sacrificed will come to bear in the upcoming technological revolution, it means that our growth was always a matter of free will.”
“A part of every civilization is ignoring what gets thrown away,” she said. “If we forget the sacrifice, how can we appreciate what we’ve created? At the heart of every mammal is the desire to re-experience the warmth of the womb, so if technology fails to offer such a thing, the deepest need within us will still cry out for resolution.”
“Unless robots become a replacement to human connection,” said Barnes. “People attach themselves to anything to fulfill the need you’re talking about.”
Hearn entered from the back as he gave a brief report to the Colonel through his comm-piece. “Has Parker started the data transfer?”
Dekker shrugged. “You’ll have to ask him.”
When the Lieutenant went to check, Barnes wrapped his arms around the Marine’s throat and locked him in a chokehold until his body went limp.
Parker leaned from data storage. “I’m in. We only have a few minutes of free roaming before the system recognizes the intrusion.”
“We need to know more about the alien they found alive, the one they used to splice the hybrids.” Dekker squinted as information washed over the screen. “Start at Phase Two of Project Harvest with the personnel lists evaluated for the volunteer program.”
“We should research more about Horatio Somers,” April suggested. “Maybe we can see why he went crazy and set all of this in motion.”
Parker rummaged through the digital files quickly. “Phase Two was divided into three stages. Only twelve volunteers were accepted into the third. They were all moved forward to be genetically manipulated until their psyches collapsed. Seven were cut after the first stage, but only one was ejected from the program after stage two.” He accessed the photos of the applicants. “It was Colonel Black.”
“That makes sense,” said April. “He already worked here.”
“But it doesn’t make sense that he was cut after initial tests proved that he was a viable candidate. See this evaluation?”
“So why was he dropped?” she asked.
“Maybe they used him without his knowledge,” Barnes surmised. “Pull up the hybrid program.”
“What part of it?”
“Find out everything about the genetic structures they used. One was from the alien, the other from –”
“Here it is,” Parker nervously checked his watch. “The system has finished uploading from this unit, now it’ll overlap nodes and transfer from the Insect Wing.”
“Hurry,” she reminded. “Unless you want a cot reserved at Guantanamo Bay.”
“Look at this.” Parker opened the hybrid files and was inundated by recorded entries. “They were all created from one person’s genes. It’s supposedly someone named Almodar Queseda, but –” He pulled up the lines of genetic code. When he reached the Colonel’s file, the same letters in the same order rolled across.
April paced outside the room. “Why would the scientists hide the fact that Colonel Black was the human addition to the hybrid program? What modifications did they make on the alien genetic structure?”
The server flashed data across the console until the programmer pulled the reigns of his investigation to a halt. “This is wrong. I thought I was looking at another stream showing the DNA of a second variation of hybrid. The structure is drastically different, but it doesn’t make sense. Only six hybrids were grown and their health statistics are recorded. This undesignated file here shows an alternate characteristic similarity to the human genome.”
“Why is that significant?” asked April. “It’s part human?”
Barnes leaned against the server. “Because it’s the DNA of the alien from the crash site. We know of a race called the Essassani, a future amalgam of the dying Zeta Reticuli greys and our species.”
“That still doesn’t explain the use of the Colonel’s genes without him knowing,” said Parker. “This was all planned extensively. Their facility only had space for twelve volunteers, they never needed a second stage to cut one last person.”
“Get out of the network,” Dekker told him. “Hide your tracks and monitor the upload from the Insect Wing.”
“This project was the scientists’ baby,” April concluded. “The creation of the animals serves a philanthropic end, and the volunteers were lab rats from the beginning.”
Parker shrugged. “What’s your point?”
“Everything was expendable, even the alien survivor,” she said. “But these hybrids were their creation. The scientists built them from a perfect specimen in this stage of our evolution and one from the future, making them a bridge between eons of development for our species.”
Parker searched the last folders, then severed his intrusion through digital barriers. “The General lied to us. He said that the alien survivor was damaged and kept alive, but it’s actually being held captive.”
“These scientists set up a second stage of testing to choose the real candidate for the hybrid program,” said April. “Because they knew that Colonel Black would be the one in charge if anything went wrong. They were trying to secure their project with foresight.”
“By using the Colonel as their failsafe?”
“To be certain that he would not liquidate partial clones of himself,” she replied. “It seems like an elaborate deception, but not when protecting your babies. In a way, they would be given a surrogate father to watch over them.”
* * * * *
Luma stood near a tank in the Aquatic Wing and watched everything sway with the false tide. As her sedative wore off, the anxiety returned and she couldn’t stop fidgeting. She decided to speak with Colonel Black.
“Is Zalas finished?” he called across the room, and Simms answered back that the programmer was still inebriated.
“I’m going to the central lab,” Luma declared. Out of boredom, Amanda and Larenz stood up to join her.
“Simms, keep them guarded,” said the Colonel. “Once the hacke
r is finished, we’ll continue to the Mammalian Wing. Report back if you find anything threatening.”
* * * * *
As Barnes and Parker were discussing the implications of Project Harvest, April stepped away and walked towards a faint sound in the distance. She moved closer to the pounding and saw a cage where a quadruped waited for dinner with her children, impatiently ramming the wall by the food dispenser with a furry ridge across her nose. The little pink bodies of the young seemed to be recently hatched, but April couldn’t tell if they were her newborns or an artificial clutch under her care. Their daily meal soon arrived from an automated compartment that delivered cold-stored greenery. As the tiny ones bumped into each other softly, they gave off squeaks and gnashed on the leaves.
She followed an echo of different noises, like horn beeps in a tunnel, and came to a glass partition that she assumed was another cage. As the slender heads and protruding teeth nipped at each other in tight social formation, April covered her mouth and dropped below the divider, realizing that she wasn’t staring into an enclosure. The predators were roaming freely through the hall.
* * * * *
Luma sat by the red-spotted carnivore trapped under a net in the central workstation. Simms rested on a desk to keep guard and ignored the puddles of blood near the elevator. While Larenz admired its gigantic claws, Amanda walked to the tranquilized herbivore sleeping nearby. She took a step back when the creature moaned.
Simms held up his hand to quiet them. “Did you hear that?”
When they heard something tapping across the floor, Luma hid beside the giant beast while Simms urged everyone behind the computer equipment. As he called the other soldiers over his comm-piece, two reptiles covered in spikes and vivid blue patterns stepped into the open and examined the room as if scavenging in a dangerous unknown territory.
* * * * *
Parker was unplugging his console when April came back and handed them her tablet. Pointing at the statistics of a pack-hunter with a caution label, she said, “These things are loose and searching for food. If they enter the central lab, they’ll find a free meal.”
As Dekker hurried down the corridor with her, Parker grabbed his portable console and followed. When they reached the end, they saw what looked like agile alligators sniffing around the tranquilized herbivore. The biggest one was letting out a continuous call.
“Is he doing what I think he’s doing?” April whispered.
Barnes nodded. “Calling the rest of the pack to supper...”
Parker looked behind them and saw a smaller reptile creeping up slowly to investigate their scent.
* * * * *
Luma held her breath while the hesitant hunters stepped carefully around the room. Larenz and Amanda stayed close to Simms and his net‑rifle. From their angle, they could see down the hall to the Aquatic Wing, where the Marines were responding to his warning with Colonel Black in the lead.
* * * * *
Parker was backing away from the carnivore when a flash-grenade exploded. He rubbed his eyes in total blindness and stumbled into the lab. With the reptiles in the central workstation tripping awkwardly around him, their frantic calls alerted the rest of the pack, forcing April and Dekker into the open as well. One of them caught the acrid stench and followed it directly to the Marines, rushing forward with fangs outstretched. As he yelled for the others to run, the Colonel grabbed the animal’s jaw and shoved a concussion grenade down its throat. The detonation ripped through the hallway, blowing pieces of the creature into the lab with a deafening blast.
When the mist of blood settled, Luma saw that O’Neal wasn’t breathing. Amanda found herself alone among the pack before they started digging into her with jagged claws. Larenz went to protect her, but they surrounded him quickly and attacked from all directions. Their hunting method was slash and dash like wolves, so April tried confusing them with an emergency flare from her pocket.
After Simms retreated into the nearest corridor, his screams were heard soon after. With elongated incisors that barely fit within its mouth, the male counterpart of the red-spotted carnivore lumbered to its mate trapped in the net and locked its teeth under the spiked bolts on the wire‑mesh. The vicious reptiles crowded the herbivore in a threatening display to mark it as their own against the newly arrived competition.
Colonel Black leveled his sub‑machine gun and fired. With his distraction, the other soldiers proceeded into the Mammalian Wing with the programmer Zalas, who was still hugging his portable console in the aftermath of the explosion. While the pack-hunters were preoccupied with the companion predators who were claiming the territory as their own, Barnes and April pulled Amanda from the chaos, leaving a trail of blood behind them.
When the survivors were safe, the Colonel ordered Zalas to upload from data storage. In the hallway, April was tending to Amanda, but she was bleeding too much to be moved again. Parker and Luma crouched nearby as Dekker walked through the facility, looking into the broken cages. After the red‑spotted apex monsters got free, they had apparently cracked open the other enclosures one by one to feed on the inhabitants.
The Colonel asked Barnes to check on the scientists when Luma started crying. He noticed Parker’s worried look and saw April cradling Amanda’s dead body with blood-streaked skin, making her appear like a tribal warrior.
Luma hesitated. “She’s gone...”
“Black is going to kill us all,” Dekker whispered. “We don’t know what his reaction will be to finding out that his genes were used to make the hybrids. Maybe he turns violent or maybe he starts sucking his thumb, either way I’m not going to let this end as his orders demand.”
“What do you suggest?” Parker asked.
“It’ll take some time for Black to realize that we’re gone,” he replied. “We’ll use the access corridor to enter the second sub‑level on our own.”
“What about her?” the programmer nodded to Amanda.
“Luma can stay here and pretend that she’s taking care of her. If anyone asks, she’s weak from blood loss and needs to rest. Tell them that our medkits were useless and we went to gather supplies. This ruse won’t last long, but it’s all we need.”
He removed his watch with the tracking device and the others did the same. Parker tightened the straps of the portable console on his back, then they left Luma to cradle Amanda’s corpse and hurried into the central lab. They stayed near the wall and tossed flares into the access corridor, trying to ignore the two ravenous beasts feasting on the herbivore after the reptiles scattered from their territorial dispute.
* * * * *
The Colonel urged Zalas to hurry as the programmer set up his console. “I want preliminary scans done on the second sub‑level to measure any threats before we get there.”
The Marines were smoking cigarettes and designing a strategy to keep everyone protected with the numbers they had left. Two linebacker-sized soldiers, Aros and Calvin, spoke about how they were going to finish the job or die trying in respect for those who had fallen. The bald man named Tacitus heard movement in the ventilation ducts above him. Before he could tell the others, something twisted the metal apart and pulled him into the shaft. A moment later, blood splashed across the sterile floor and the body of a dead volunteer followed shortly after. Tacitus landed safely while gripping his knife.
They investigated what was left of the highly trained soldier before the rigors of Project Harvest had contorted it with grey flesh and enlarged eyes. Under disproportionate features, a layer of pigment beneath the skin was shifting as its wounds healed. When the volunteer twitched, Colonel Black shot a hole through its neck and kicked the detached head across the room.
“Unless it can regenerate that, clean the blood off so the others won’t smell you.” He told Zalas to stop gawking and get back to work, then he tried to reach Dekker on his comm-piece to warn him of danger. After he failed to get
a response, he ordered Calvin to check on them in the hall.
Zalas finished connecting to the terminal’s mainframe and began loading the encryption programs, establishing a line to the second sub-level. “I’ll be ready to scan soon.”
Calvin returned to declare that he couldn’t find Barnes, and that Luma had offered an excuse that they went to find medical supplies for Amanda. The Colonel didn’t register the severity of the situation, but he felt sufficiently prodded into speaking with General Andronicus on the surface. He took a special earpiece from his pocket and his Marines stepped closer to find out what was going on.
“They already received a data upload from the Insect Wing.”
“Sir?” Zalas showed him thermal scans of the second sub‑level, where three dots were moving from the access corridor to the control station.
Black said to his Marines, “We might have a rogue agent working against us.”
* * * * *
Dekker looked through the computer workstation of the second sub‑level. With April and Parker behind him, he stayed low until they reached a door at the far side. At the server, he bypassed the digital lock and Parker started connecting his portable console to the internal network.
* * * * *
“It’s too late,” Zalas told the Colonel. “They’ve accessed the mainframe.”
Black took that as his conclusion about the inside threat, and without a word his soldiers followed him into the hall. As they walked by Luma, she looked up from Amanda’s body growing cold in her arms.
“What about us?” she asked.
“Finish the data transfer and lock yourselves in,” the Colonel responded, with no concern over what happened to them.
* * * * *
The Marines tossed concussion grenades into the central lab to drive away the predators, then Colonel Black walked straight to the elevator and told Aros to open it. Tacitus and Calvin took off their bomb-belts while the heavy doors were grinding open. As the horde of giant bugs scurried towards them, they sent in a storm of automatic fire and tossed in their grenades.
The Harvest of Area 51 Page 4