Archaea 3: Red (41 page)

“Good deal, it’s not too deep”, he replied, and stepped off with a mighty splash. A roaring rattle echoed through the gloom ahead of us, and I just about leaped back into the crab.

“Easy Jane… Janis says nothing lethal… that could be anything” he said reassuringly.

“Pfft… nothing down here more dangerous than me, Yak”, I replied. I set off into the gloomy muck confidently, despite not believing my own bravado for even a single moment.

We had to du
ck down and slither along the bases of some smaller tubes that had blocked our way, but we made it through. Coated in mud as we were, our mimetics were completely useless, though we were probably camouflaged well enough for what we needed to do.

The beacon was only a few hundred meters ahead of us, but it was the hardest terrain I’ve ever tried to navigate. We had to clamber up, over, around or through the most unimaginable tangle of rotting slimy… things.
I guess some of it could be ‘branches’ or ‘limbs’, but to be honest, none of it looked even remotely familiar.

There were definitely critters. The mud was full of worms of all sizes, some of which were as big around as my waist.
As we fought our way along, it seemed like half of the things I tried to grab for support moved when I touched them. Every time we stepped up out of the mud, the slime that ran down our suits crawled with black worms about as long as my fingers – maybe they were some sort of leech, or slug… I am not sure. They looked like worms to me.

Cruising along the surface from time to time were these enormous… millipede looking creatures, though with a sort of slug-like cilia instead of legs. Whatever they were, they were huge, easily 10 meters in length and at least 2 meters thick. Thankfully, they were either blind, or just didn’t care about us at all. Either way, Yak and I had to almost physically restrain each other from getting stabby every time one of them slithered
out of the gloom past us.

We hadn’t seen what was depositing the slime nets that were strung through and around everything, but I was convinced they were
a form of web or net. Yak thought they were probably more like a form of fungus, but their tenacious stickiness seemed more trap-like to me. We avoided them as best as we could.

“Hold”, Yak said, and crouched into the muck ahead of me, so I hunkered down and tried
not to think slimy thoughts.

“Ahead of us, Jane… it looks like a wall.”

He was right, though we almost walked right into it in this gloom. It was covered with the slime netting, and piled high with bracken and muck – but it was definitely a wall.

“Captain, be advised, we appear to have reached the colony”, I called on comms. “We’re at the perimeter wall now, looking for an entrance.”

“Copy”, he replied smoothly. “Keep me posted, Shorty.”

Yak waved me ahead to our left and I took point – or at least I tried. What I actually did was flounder and struggle through a mess of rotten slimy muck, grabbed a worm that pulled me chest deep into a pit of something horrible, then foundered for a bit kicking and sliding on my butt trying to keep my helmet up.

“Smooth, Jane.”

I looked back at him, nonchalantly standing knee deep.

“Captain, what’s our policy on murder?”

“You mean, in the line of duty, Jane?” he said seriously.

“No, I mean… if I were to just up and kill Yak out here and leave him for the critters… would that be okay?”

“Oh sure… that’d be just fine, Shorty. I’ll t
ake his coffee ration, and we’re good to go.”

Yak laughed, and reached out his damn hand, which I took
happily. He hauled me up, and we moved out a little more cautiously along the wall. There was a sort of foundation extending past the wall, which made it a little easier going – though we had to fight our way through the debris and netting piled up.

We didn’t have to go far. One of the larger tube structures had fallen through the corner of the colony and crushed the wall into the depths of the mud below. We were able to scramble and pull ourselves between the tube and the wall and dropped down inside.

“Hold up here for a moment, Jane”

“Holding”, I replied while he climbed up onto a pipe support. The interior of the colony was a refinery of some sort, emphasis on the ‘was’.
What it was now was furry green with corrosion, streaked with rust, covered with some sort of gelatinous vine growth – and everywhere covered with the sticky trap-like netting. A fine mist started to fall through the haze.

“Jane, I see movement, 20 meters low.”

I hunkered down and stared at the streaked pipe race above me, where Yak was perched. “What is it, Yak?” I hissed on comms.

“No idea, Jane… just a brief glimpse of motion around the side of
that tower.”

“Was it a critter?”

“Possibly… I couldn’t tell. It looked like something ducked for cover though.”

That got my hackles up.

“Call it in, Jane… I’m going to work my way along these pipes to get a better look around that tower.”

“Be careful, Yak”, I replied, never taking my eyes off the tower.

“Captain, be advised, we’re inside the colony.”

“How does it look?”

“It’s pretty overgrown, sir, and looks abandoned. Yak spotted something moving, so we’re going to check it out.”

“Survivors?” he replied, concern in his voice.

“Possibly, sir… we don’t know… might also be a critter.”

“
Well, use all caution, Shorty. I’ve seen a few slither past me here that I wouldn’t want to meet formally. Stay frosty, Shorty.”

“Will do, sir”, I replied with a grimace
, looking at netting strung from stem to stem as high as the eye could see.

Knives and knuckles
… what were we thinking?

“Jane,
covering, roll up”, Yak called on comms.

I grumbled something unladylike, and started moving forward toward the tower. The plasteel plating beneath my feet was a lot easier to walk on than the mud, but it was slimed with some sort of ooze that shuddered when I touched it. Nothing about this was fun.

The netting was everywhere, and tenacious. I avoided it as best as I could, but the closer I got to the tower, the harder it became. The ropy strands clung like mucilage from every surface, stretching to infinity. This was just awful. Being abducted from a colony like this would be like winning a prize.

“See anything, Jane?”

“Nothing, Yak… go ahead and come on down. I’ll cover you.”

“Roger that”, he replied, and climbed down the pipe support through a tangle of netting. Kicking and pulling, it tangled and snarled, and he just about went ballistic hurl
ing his arms around and through, trying to come down through it.

“Easy Yak”, I cautioned. The strands throughout the complex were thrumming like my nerves as he hacked and kicked his way through them.

“This stuff is impossible, Jane!”

I was just about to snap off a witty remark, when sudden motion caught my eye beneath and behind Yak.

“Yak – behind you!” I yelled and started moving closer. He spun around, wrapping himself in more strands of the netting and swinging his ka-bar wildly through the mess.

I couldn’t see what it was behind him, but it wasn’t a colonist. It was underneath the netting, and his frantic whirling blocked my view. The glimpse I had was of a wet-looking rubbery sort of creature moving low along the ground.

“What the—”, he dropped to a knee, slashing wildly. “Jane, it’s on me!”

He suddenly dropped to his back and started sliding back into the recess underneath the pipe race. I hurled myself forward and caught his outstretched hand, and just managed to wedge a boot along the
side of the support. He pulled his legs in close and hacked his knife into the netting below his leg, flinging a clear ichor from his blade with each swing.

“Pull!” he hissed, as he yanked against me and kicked his legs convulsively. I clenched my teeth and pulled as hard as I could, and suddenly he was
free and kicking hard, pushing us both across the slimed plating.

“
Are you okay?” I said, pulling his shoulders close and looking over towards his legs.

“Yeah…” he replied, peeling severed gelatinous appendages from his boot and lower leg with the blade of his knife. They were attached with nested rows of little hooks in a sort of slit opening, and still twitching and tugging as he pried them off.

Movement to our right caught my eye, and I slapped Yak on the shoulder and pointed. One of the critters was coming along the pipe race above us, exuding a ropy strand of netting behind it as it slithered along towards us. It didn’t appear to have bones, and looked somewhat like an octopus… but not really. It was just the closest thing I could come up with at the time. It was definitely a predator.

“Yeah, on the left too, Jane”, he replied, and I noticed another one coming down from the murky heights, limbs splayed out to either side as it slithered down on its strand.

“You know, I think I’ve seen enough here, Yak.” I hissed, and started sliding backwards.

“I hear that
, Jane”, he said softly.

We scrambled to our feet and slowly backed away towa
rds the corner of the compound as more of the things started moving around us from below the netting.

*****

“Warm it up, Captain, we’re inbound”, Shorty called on comms. The edge in her voice was more than enough motivation. I scanned the boards and warmed up the power plant.

“Copy that, Shorty. Is everything okay?” I called back.

“For now, sir”, she replied breathlessly. “The colony is overrun by the local wildlife and rotting into the mud.”

“
Did you get into the living spaces?”

A slight pause, then Yak replied “No sir, we couldn’t get in close enough. It’s pretty obvious though that this colony has collapsed, sir. It’s
rotted, corroded, rusted, burned, and almost completely overgrown. It’s barely recognizable as man-made at this point.”

I thought for a moment. “Did you see any evidence of violence, Yak?”

“No sir… one moment…” the comms went silent.

“Yak? Shorty?” I called on comms after more than a few extra-long moments.

“We’re here, sir”, Shorty called on comms, as they slithered out of the depths of the stalks in front of the crab, their slime-crusted suits glistening in the lights of the forward arcs. Shorty waved, and they stepped aft towards the ramp.

“Go ahead and
rack your suits and come forward. I’ll start walking us out of here.”

“Racking, aye”, she said as I started hauling us around.
We lurched a little bit from side to side as the legs struggled to maintain purchase in the mud, but it was amazingly smooth, considering.

Yak and Shorty came through the inner lock into the cockpit and pulled down jump seats, trailing a smell unlike anything I’ve ever experienced.

“Good grief, you two stink to high heaven!”

“Sorry sir”, Yak replied. “We may need to space those suits, I don’t know if they’re salvageable.”

“Pretty bad out there, eh?” I asked after a tense moment trying to navigate through a deep tangle of wrack.

“I’ve seen worse”, Yak replied.

“The hell you have”, Shorty quipped.

He laughed. “Okay, I haven’t seen much worse… but yeah, it was pretty grim out there.”

“So were there any obvious signs of a fight, or any other violence?” I asked again.

“Nothing we could really point at, sir”, Shorty replied. “It definitely looked like no one was home. The perimeter wall had been crushed by one of these tubes that had fallen, and the interior was full of the same netting we’re pushing through now.”

I raised an industrial strength eyebrow. “This stuff is netting… from a critter?”

A moment of silence filled the cabin with dread.

“Yeah… there’s a type of predator here that uses those slime nets a lot like a spider uses a web.”

“Spiders?” I asked from under the protective barrier of a set of industrial strength eyebrows.

“Well, they’re not really like spiders, sir. More like an octopus than a spider. They were thick throughout the colony complex, and clearly dangerous.”

I suppressed a shudder at the thought of what Yak and Shorty just did. Heading off into the dark with nothing but knives
… these kids were wired tight. To say I was impressed would have been an understatement.

T
he stench they endured was medal-worthy, all by itself.

The inertial tracker had us back to our point of entry, so I
de-weighted us with the lifters, pitched us up against the partially collapsed tubes we had skittered down, and started crawling back to the sky. It wasn’t the easiest climb, but the crab handled it nicely.

Once I had a hole shot
, I raised us on lifters and aimed for the sky.