by Dan Oakley
Were there rodents on this planet? I’d seen some rodent-like animals running along the ground in one of the previous buildings, so that was the most likely explanation. Rats were survivors. They got everywhere.
I lowered my weapon and peered closer.
It couldn’t be a lizard up there. Those things were far too big to fit in between the piping. But I was sure I’d seen something.
The tint on the helmet’s visor made it hard to see so I adjusted it slightly to a blue hue rather than yellow and suddenly everything seemed brighter.
Between the tiny holes in the metalwork, I saw a pair of eyes watching me.
Chapter 22
I blinked staring upwards, transfixed.
“Er, guys… There’s something up there.” I pointed to the metal grid above my head.
Weapon raised, Draylan was first by my side.
He looked up after I stepped aside. “There’s nothing there, Tomas.”
I looked again and saw that he was right. The bright blue eyes had disappeared.
“There was something there just a moment ago. Two eyes, looking down at me.”
Draylan sighed and lowered his ElectroLaser. “We are all under a great deal of stress. Perhaps you just thought you saw something.”
His comment annoyed me. Mainly because he was the one who’d said there was a survivor here at the mines, and he hadn’t liked it when we doubted him. Now the shoe was on the other foot.
“There was someone there,” I insisted. “I saw eyes. Human eyes.”
Trella approached and looked at the spot we were staring at. “Maybe it was a trick of the light.”
“It wasn’t. I know what I saw.”
“You are wearing Bobby’s headset and the cooler isn’t working. High heat and dehydration are a bad combination, known to cause delusions.”
My eyes widened. Sure, I was hot, sweaty and fed up of being on this planet but I wasn’t delusional. “There’s someone up there.”
Draylan sighed. “Come on. Let’s search the rest of the building.”
He and Trella turned away, but I wasn’t about to let this go.
I grabbed on to the door frame and heaved myself up, bracing my legs on either side of the doorway. From there, I was able to get purchase and grab one of the metal panels. I gave it a hard yank, and the whole thing fell down with a clatter.
Bayliss and Cartwright turned on me, weapons raised. Making such a loud noise when everyone was on edge and feeling trigger happy probably hadn’t been a great idea. I dropped to the floor again and held up my hands.
“It’s fine,” I said. “I just want to check the hatch.”
Their facial features relaxed and they stopped aiming their laser weapons at my head, which was a relief. Instead, they kept the weapons trained on the metal grid work.
I put a foot on the wall trying to scramble and get some purchase but failed. Then I jumped, grabbing the edge of the metal grid and hoping it would hold my weight as I pulled myself up. Sticking my head into a narrow dark crawl space made me nervous. Especially with all the lizards running around. I tried to take comfort in the fact the space was too small to fit one of those monsters, but still, my mouth was dry as I peered into the darkness.
“See anything?” Cartwright asked.
"Not much," I replied honestly, wondering if Trella had been right, and I was seeing things.
A bead of sweat trickled down the back of my neck, and because of the headset, I couldn't wipe it away.
I turned, trying to get a good 360-degree view of the tunnel. It was small, but I could probably fit up there if I crawled along on my belly. But what would be the point? Nobody else had seen the eyes, and if there had been someone up here, they must have snuck away so quietly that we didn't hear them. Would that be possible? Surely we should have heard the rattle and clang against the metal as they crawled away.
I was about to lower myself back down to the ground when something caught my eye. It was a tiny scrap of fabric the color of peaches.
It was snagged on a jagged corner of the metalwork. I pulled it free and then dropped to the ground, holding it triumphantly.
“Look what I found.”
“What is it?” Bayliss asked as he and Cartwright drew closer to look at the fragment of cloth.
“I think it ripped off from somebody’s clothing. Someone was up there watching us.”
Bayliss and Cartwright’s eyes darted around nervously.
"Maybe Draylan was right. Perhaps there is a human here, but they don't want to be found." Bayliss turned a slow circle, his watchful eyes on the metal grid work.
“But why wouldn’t they want to be found? We’re the rescue party,” Cartwright said, creasing his prominent brow in a frown.
That was a good point.
But I didn’t know the answer.
The three of us hurried to catch up to Trella and Draylan. To my disappointment, they weren't very impressed with the fragment of fabric I'd found.
“That could have been up there for years, Tomas,” Trella said. “Maybe it got snagged when someone was up there doing maintenance back in the days of the colony.”
I had to admit that made sense. Reluctantly, I put the piece of cloth into the concealed pocket of my armor, and as we moved from room to room, I kept looking up, expecting to see those same eyes looking down at me.
As we trekked around the building, Bobby walked by my side. “Thanks again for the headset. Do you need to swap back yet?”
I shook my head. “I can manage a bit longer.”
“Can I see that bit of fabric you found?”
I tugged the piece of cloth from my pocket and handed it to him.
He turned it over in his fingers. “It doesn’t look old to me.”
I glanced at it again. He was right. It didn’t look as dusty as I’d have expected for a scrap of material that had been abandoned beside ducts and pipes for over ten years. Still, I wasn’t going to keep harping on about seeing mysterious eyes. I’d already been getting pointed looks from Draylan. He thought I’d lost it.
On cue, picking up on my paranoia, Zarak approached. “You’ve lost your marbles,” he said. “Full-on crazy town.”
I shook my head. I was determined to ignore Zarak from now on. He was trouble and only wanted to get a rise out of me. I had more important things to worry about–like getting off this planet alive–than arguing with Zarak.
“I think we’ve found the rest of the science expedition,” Draylan’s voice came over the comms system.
He and Trella had just entered a room off the right-hand side of the corridor. The door was hanging off its runners at an angle.
We followed them inside. It wasn't a pretty sight. Bodies were strewn everywhere. Most of them were missing limbs, and nearly all of them had missing midsections where the lizards had feasted upon the soft organs. The corpses were decomposing. The smell must have been horrendous, and I was glad that the air filtration system was still working on Bobby's headset even if the cooling wasn't.
“What the hell happened here?” Draylan whispered.
We all knew the answer to that. The mutated lizards had found the scientists.
“They must have barricaded themselves in here,” Trella said pointing at the collection of equipment and steel shelving close to the door. “The bolt is broken in two.”
She was right. It had been snapped. Breaking a solid steel bolt like that would take incredible strength. The scientists hadn’t stood a chance. They had come here with only minimal defense squad protection and had been armed with the same futile ElectroLaser weapons as us.
For a moment, no one said anything. We just stared at the devastation and destruction around us.
Eventually, Trella said, “Let’s check them for ID.”
It wasn’t a pleasant job. We rummaged through their torn and bloodstained uniforms and got most of their IDs from their wrist devices or headsets.
Trella leaned over a bloated, rotting body and identified the comma
nder’s sister.
After we were done identifying the rest, I leaned back against the wall and took a deep breath.
“Is that all the expedition members accounted for now?” Draylan asked.
“Yes,” Trella said. “I’d better let the commander know his sister perished with the others.”
I was surprised to see Trella remove a collection of long, thin shimmering crystals from a strap around her calf. The crystals were marked with runes.
“What are they for?” I asked.
“They’re used to amplify energy. Due to the Morellic being so far away, I can’t access the mainframe without an amplifier.”
“Are you telling us that’s the only way we can contact the Morellic?” Bobby asked.
Trella nodded. “Yes, until the ship moves back into jump range.”
"Why is the ship so far away? I've never been on a mission when the mothership was out of range before," Cartwright said, looking uneasy. "Hell, what if we needed to be evacuated urgently? You're telling me we are out of jump range?"
“I don’t know why this mission is different,” Trella said. “But it’s the way the commander wanted it.”
As Trella began to assemble the crystals, I saw the rune markings glow.
She muttered something inaudible, but before she could initiate contact with the ship, I heard the low hum of an old-fashioned plasma weapon being started up.
All of us turned.
In the doorway stood a slight figure, a young girl, holding a massive plasma weapon. She didn’t look older than fifteen or so. Her weapon was aimed at Trella’s head. No one moved.
The girl was painfully thin with dark, spiky, black hair and bright blue eyes. She wore baggy brown pants, cinched at the waist with white string, and a peach-colored tank top.
Her intent was clear. Her face screwed up in concentration as she kept the weapon pointed at Trella’s head.
Trella slowly removed her hands from the crystals, and they stopped glowing.
“We don’t mean you any harm,” Trella said gently. “We’re here on a rescue mission. We want to help.”
The spiky-haired girl didn’t reply.
My heart rate accelerated. Trella was the closest thing I had to a friend here, and I didn’t want to see her get hurt. Plus, there was the small matter of Trella being the only one who could transport us off this planet.
“There’s a good girl,” Cartwright said, taking a tentative step towards her with his hands raised. “There’s no need for us to wave weapons about. We’re all friends here, see?” He pointed at his own holstered weapon.
Her reply was to turn the charge switch, leveling up the old-fashioned weapon.
“Okay, don’t do anything rash,” Cartwright said, retracing his steps backward until he collided with the wall.
“You were the one watching me,” I said. Her peach tank top was the same color as the fragment of fabric I had in my pocket.
She didn’t move her head, but her bright blue eyes focused on me. She had a small and elfin-like face and the pointed tips of her ears poked out from beneath her spiky black hair.
I didn’t know why she wasn’t talking to us, and I had to admit her silence made me nervous. Was this girl part of the expedition? She didn’t look old enough, but maybe she looked young for her age. If she’d witnessed her colleagues torn to pieces by the lizards perhaps the horrific ordeal caused her to lose her grip on reality.
“I know you’ve been through a lot,” I said. “We just want to help you.”
“We’re calling Commander Taggert of the K.S. Morellic,” Zarak said. “If you put the weapon away maybe you can come back to the Morellic with us.”
She swiveled, turning the weapon on Zarak and snarling.
I guess he’d said the wrong thing.
I glanced at Trella, expecting her to send an energy bolt to dislodge the weapon from the girl’s hands, but she didn’t. Maybe it was too risky.
“Somebody shoot her. Do something! Get this crazy fool away from me,” Zarak shouted, as diplomatic as ever.
“You don’t want us to contact the ship,” Trella said thoughtfully, her forehead creased in a frown. “Why not?”
A flicker of indecision played across the girl's face and then she edged around the corner of the room. She didn't lower her weapon as she made her way to a central dashboard. She tapped a code into the keyboard.
“It doesn’t work,” Zarak said with undisguised impatience. “We’ve already tried it. The system is dead.”
She pressed another key and then raised a finger to her lips, looking pointedly at Zarak.
If the spiky-haired girl hadn't been pointing a laser gun at us, I would have kind of liked her.
She carried on pressing the keys but didn’t look frustrated with the system’s lack of response. She was typing with purpose.
Suddenly a floating image appeared in front of us. It was a vision of Commander Taggert in his quarters.
“Commander,” Zarak called out. “We need to initiate the jump back to the ship. Our mission is completed.”
The commander smiled, but I'd realized before Zarak had spoken that this was a recording. In a small, square section at the bottom of the shimmering image was a dark-haired woman. Her eyes were wide, and she looked distressed. She shared many features in common with the commander. A long, straight nose and dark, close-set brown eyes. I was reasonably confident this was a recording of Commander Taggert communicating with his sister. But why was the spiky-haired girl showing us this?
It soon became clear.
Chapter 23
“You must send help straightaway. Two of our team are already dead. Our weapons are useless against these beasts.” The commander’s sister wiped tears away from her cheeks.
“How unfortunate,” Commander Taggert said dryly. The smile didn’t leave his face.
“So you’ll come. You’ll send the ship now? Our mage says we aren’t in jump range.”
“All in good time,” Commander Taggert said.
“But time is the one thing we don’t have.” The commander’s sister’s voice shook with emotion.
We all stared at the shimmering screen in front of us, unable to tear our eyes away. It was hard to reconcile the attractive woman on the screen with the dead, bloated figure we’d just seen.
“So the ElectroLaser weapons are ineffective against the creatures?” the commander asked raising an eyebrow.
“Yes, we began the program as instructed, injecting the creatures with the hormone to induce mutations and make the subsequent generations infertile. The first few attempts worked well. We had hides set up and were able to target the lizards from a safe distance, but when one of the hides was uncovered, the lizards attacked. The defense squad tried to defend us, but their weapons were useless. Even when they were set to kill rather than stun, they did nothing.”
She held her head in her hands.
“But don’t you have a mage? Can’t he use defense magic?” Commander Taggert chuckled.
It was a strange reaction. I was starting to get a sense of what was going on here, but I hoped I was wrong.
“The mage isn’t much help. He says his magic isn’t working properly on Tor for some reason. I don’t understand it. There’s no scientific reason for his magic to malfunction here of all places.”
“No, you’re right. It’s almost as if he’s making it up, isn’t it?” A cool smile played on the commander’s lips.
The dark-haired woman blinked. “What do you mean?”
“My dear sister, have you not yet realized what’s going on? Even with all your specialist knowledge and after all those years of training, you really are quite stupid.”
She shook her head slowly. “No...No, not even you would stoop this low.”
“He isn’t a mage. He was paid handsomely to pretend he was. I will, of course, send a rescue squad, but not until I’m quite sure you and your entire team have been destroyed.”
“Do you hate me that much?” Her voic
e broke, and she pressed a hand to her chest.
“I don’t hate you. But I warned you. You’ve been squandering the family money for too long. If you carry on at this rate, there will be nothing left, and I have to protect my inheritance.”
“So you sent me on this mission on purpose...It’s a suicide mission?”
“I didn’t send you on the mission. I merely mentioned it, and you volunteered. That’s your problem. You can’t stop sticking your nose in, trying to be helpful.”
“But what about the rest of the scientists and the defense squad. They’re innocent.”
“They’re collateral damage. Unfortunate, but necessary.”
Tears freely ran down the woman’s cheeks. “Please, you can have everything. I’ll sign it all over to you… just please let us get off this planet!”
There was a noise on the recording, a crashing and banging sound, and the woman turned, screamed and then the recording stopped.
I could hear my harsh breaths echoing in my headset. No one else spoke, we were all trying to process what we’d just seen.
“Was that for real?” Draylan asked. “Is it just me or did that sound like Commander Taggert left his sister here to die?”
“He didn’t just leave her to die,” Trella said. “This was murder. And it wasn’t only his sister. The rest of the team could have been rescued if we’d gotten here in time.”
The spiky-haired girl nodded and looked satisfied.
I guessed this was why she wasn’t keen to meet the commander of the K.S. Morellic.
I turned to her. “Were you part of this mission?”
She shook her head.
“Did you see the scientists? Did you talk to them?”
Maybe that was a stupid question. She hadn’t exactly been keen to have a conversation with us.
But the girl surprised me by nodding.
“We can’t trust this,” Zarak said. “It could be a forgery. Maybe the recording has been edited. No matter what the commander has done, we still have to get back to the ship.”
Trella sent Zarak a sharp look, but Bayliss spoke up agreeing with him. “The rookie has a point. Even if the commander did this evil thing, we can’t change it now. We have to get back to the ship and from there we can see that justice is done.”