Species II (33 page)

Press scrambled around on the floor for a precious two seconds trying to find the dart gun, then knew it was futile—the fucking thing had probably fallen through a crack somewhere in this pitted old floor. The only thing left was the machete and Press seized it, but how effective would it be against this thing that had withstood everything they could throw at it?

Fuck it, Press thought, and headed for Patrick. He wasn’t about to let Laura become this disgusting alien’s next piece of tail.

“Press—wait!”

He almost ignored Dennis, but something in the other man’s voice made him turn. One side of his ebony face was bruised and hugely swollen, but the astronaut had hauled himself into a sitting position where he’d landed. He gestured at Press to come back. “Use me,” he rasped. “Use my blood—it’s our only chance!”

Behind him, Laura screamed again. Press looked back and saw her bite viciously into the distorted arm around her neck, then gag and try to spit out the viscous green liquid that spilled from the injury. He knew he had to do it; by itself, the blade would be useless, but with Dennis’s help . . .

Press sprinted over to Dennis and raised the machete. Holding it aloft, he locked gazes with the astronaut and was unable to move.

Dennis punched him in the ankle to break the paralysis.
“Do it!”

He buried the edge of the machete in Dennis’s thigh.

Dennis’s scream mixed with another from Laura and below both was Press’s own cry of anguish. He pulled the blade free and whirled, saw that Patrick had dragged Laura within only a few feet of the pulsing, fleshy nest. The damned thing would cover them both in a protective sheath that for all Press knew would be impenetrable even to human disease, and he was never going to get over there in time to stop Patrick from pulling her inside.

Press brought the machete up, took one quick rehearsal swipe, then sent the machete hurling end over end through the air.

“Die, you son of a bitch!”

The point of the blade found its target and bit deep into the muscles running down the center of the Patrick-thing’s back.

The alien’s screech was like nothing they’d heard before. Infection spilled instantly across the surface of its back, bleeding white into the veins and rippling along the lines of bone and sinew. Still gripping Laura, Patrick collapsed and pinned her beneath his oversized frame, knocking the wind out of her. She quivered once, then was still.

Press dashed toward her, then saw with a jolt that he would never make it in time. Patrick’s body convulsed and tore down the middle as his head had done; from the resulting gore-filled cavity rose the same penile appendage that had retreated after destroying Eve—the core alien, the abominable thing that had manipulated both human and alien flesh in order to hide and safeguard itself. Now it was headed for Laura,
his
Laura, who lay unconscious, defenseless, and too fucking far away from Press for him to do anything to stop it.

He started to cry out, then choked it back. Eve, Press and Dennis saw in amazement, had
not
been annihilated. Injured and perhaps even dying, she had nevertheless crawled unnoticed across the floor, and now she flung herself the last few feet toward Patrick’s dead shell. As the two men stared helplessly, one of her knotted alien hands buried itself into the fish-white, diseased skin along Patrick’s spine. She shrieked as contamination exploded along her arm, finding an instant pathway inside her body amid a half dozen scrapes along her skin. It surged through her system with phenomenal speed, turning her shining, deep-gold complexion into that deathly virulent shade of ivory.

Then, with the last of her strength, Eve pulled herself over Patrick’s husk and sank the talon-tipped fingers of her other hand into the alien’s core tentacle as it was only inches away from Laura’s mouth.

The last of the terrible species turned white and writhed in her grip—

—then the ghastly duo imploded and was no more.

For a moment, Press was too shocked to move, then sensibility returned and he raced over to Laura. But when he got to her he couldn’t,
wouldn’t,
believe that she wasn’t moving.

Or breathing.

“Please,
Laura,” he begged. “Damn it, you come back to me.” Press slipped a hand beneath her neck and lifted her head, some long-ago CPR training kicking in when all he really wanted to do was scream. Bending over her, he closed her nostrils and covered her mouth with his, tasting the nauseating alien slime from her bite on Patrick’s arm, but feeling, underneath that, the soft lips that he’d kissed many times too long ago. He inhaled through his nose, then exhaled into her mouth, then did it again, watching her chest rise with the pressure of the air he was forcing into her lungs while his mind tried to remember the right ratio of breaths to chest compressions. Should he start chest compressions now, or breathe for her again? Everything was all muddled up and he couldn’t find the figures past a year and more worth of memories he’d forced to the background when they’d parted—

Laura and him laughing over dinner and wine in a hundred restaurants—

Laura smearing sunblock on her delicate, peach-colored skin during a trip to the Galapagos as Press admired her figure in a sleek, metallic-green bathing suit—

Laura at his townhouse with him, her body entwined with his and moving like silk beneath the comforter on his bed—

—then he felt the pressure of his lips being returned and realized she was kissing him as she swung her arms up and around his neck. She murmured something against his mouth, but Press wasn’t sure he heard it right. Surely she couldn’t have said . . .

“Magically delicious.”

“O
kay, Dennis,” Laura said. “That’ll hold you until we can get you to a hospital.” She pulled back and inspected the makeshift tourniquet she’d fastened around the astronaut’s thigh. “Does it feel okay?”

“Oh, sure,” Dennis answered through gritted teeth. “Just like a big slab of sliced steak.”

“Come on, buddy.” Press bent and hooked an arm under Dennis’s shoulder. “Up you go—get your weight on that other leg. That’s good, just like that.” He lifted the other man with a grunt and they both wobbled for a moment, then caught their balance; he was bone-weary and he ached in a dozen places he hadn’t known he had. He knew Laura did, too, and Dennis . . . well, he didn’t want to think about how Dennis’s leg must feel right now. “We’ve got all our stuff and we’re finally done here.”

“Let’s go,” Laura said, leading the way to the stairs and holding on to Dennis’s other side as they made their way down to the third floor. “Jesus, I’m so
tired.
I can’t wait to get out of here—”

“Hold it right there.”

Laura gasped and jerked too hard, making Dennis hiss with pain as the trio halted. Across the room and coming closer was Colonel Carter Burgess. Clutched in one of his hands was a pistol, complete with a deadly efficient laser scope. The laser’s red dot had already found and settled on Press.

Press let go of Dennis and steered the injured man’s arm to the railing so he could hold on, then stepped in from of his two companions. “Well, well,” he said sardonically. “Carter Burgess. They sent you for cleanup, huh?”

“Sorry, Press.”

Of course the older man didn’t look sorry at all as he moved closer. “Why, you rat-faced son of a bitch,” Dennis said in awe. “You—”

“Take it easy, Dennis. Our friend here is just following orders. After all, we’ve got a dead hero on our hands. They can cook up some kind of story to blame it on us and get everything tied up in a neat little bundle to hand to the upper muckity-mucks.” Press raised an eyebrow. “I’m assuming it’s not just me, unless you grew a sudden streak of compassion.”

Burgess shrugged. “I’ve made an executive decision. I’m afraid it would be unwise to let any of you leave this place.”

Laura’s mouth turned down. “What was it you said—
‘There are other staff members in the facility who have skills more or less equivalent to yours.’
I didn’t know how serious you were . . .
sir.”

“Nice little Nazi machine-pistol,” Press said cuttingly. “An antique, I presume? What an interesting choice for the all-American military man.”

Burgess shrugged again, impervious to both Laura and Press’s insults. His gaze on Press was sharp, missing nothing. “I know you’ve got your gun out, Lennox. Any good agent would have. You can just put it down—I’m wearing an armored jacket.”

“I suggest you eat shit,” Press said pleasantly. His hand was a blur of speed as he brought the Glock up and squeezed the trigger, aiming for Burgess’s head—

The Glock just clicked emptily.

Burgess smiled and took a step closer, the Mauser aimed at Press’s chest. “I suppose it’s safe to say you didn’t count your bullets up there, isn’t it? Tough luck—and yours just ran out.” His finger drew back on the trigger, but the burst went wild as Burgess was suddenly jerked off his feet. The colonel’s escalating scream was cut short by a long, powerful tentacle that had snaked out of the darkness above the stairwell and wrapped around his neck.

No matter what kind of man or monster Burgess was, instinct made both Laura and Press try to grab for him, but Burgess was pulled up and out of reach too quickly; all the three of them could do was stand below and watch in horror as he was lifted up and yanked inside a glowing alien chrysalis. The military man managed one muffled shriek, then the chrysalis heaved and a splash of red hit the inside of the membranous wall, turning the light it gave off a deep, uneven crimson.

“Damn,” Dennis said in a bland voice. “I guess we must’ve missed one.”

Overhead, the cocoon pulsed unexpectedly and they all flinched, waiting for tentacles to burst from its sides, or perhaps something much, much worse. Press’s hand slid to his waistband, but the only thing that happened was a final shiver as something small and hard dropped out of the pod and landed in front of Press’s feet.

“Oh, God,” Laura said as she gaped at it. “That’s
disgusting.”

Press stretched out one foot and pushed Burgess’s glass eyeball with his toe. “Here’s looking at you, kid,” he said in his best Bogart imitation.

Silence, then Dennis half coughed, half laughed while Laura covered her mouth with one hand to stifle a smirk. “Press, that is
so
bad!” he exclaimed.

But Press just grinned, stepped forward, and crushed the round piece of glass under his heel. Then he yanked the tranquilizer gun from his waistband and brought it up in one liquid motion. “Excuse the ingratitude,” he said flatly, and fired.

The final chrysalis gave a piercing wail of death, and this time the trio stayed to watch and make sure it was all over.

Then they descended the stairs and, finally, made their way outside.

21

E
ven when the quiet was disrupted by a stream of military vehicles and the churning of a Med Evac helicopter’s blades, dawn over the Virginia countryside was a beautiful thing to behold. The sun bled golden over the distant peaks of the mountains and lit up the hillsides slowly, as though it was a gigantic yellow floodlight brought up to full power by the world’s most powerful dimmer switch.

Press and Laura had had their bruises and bumps attended to while Dennis, with the six-inch gash in his thigh newly bandaged, sat in the passenger seat of the Med Evac. Laura and Press stood by the door to the chopper, and all three watched without speaking as the members of the clean-up team, a couple of dozen men encased in white protective suits, scurried around like albino ants and carried out the tagged and bagged remains of the chrysalises. On the other side of the field six military trucks idled, their back doors open and waiting to receive the cargo.

“What do they need those suits for?” Dennis asked. His handsome, dark face was creased with worry. “I mean, we were in there without anything—”

“Don’t get your bandage wrinkled,” Laura said. “They don’t need those suits at all—it’s just standard operating procedure.”

“That translates to a way to spend taxpayers’ money,” Press put in mildly. He watched a few more men go by carrying cargo, then said, “Gee, I wonder which one of those has Burgess in it?”

Dennis snickered as Laura shot Press a severe look. Press met her gaze without backing down and she had to turn away before he made her laugh—damn it, then she’d end up feeling guilty.

“You know,” Press said softly, “I think you were right about Eve.”

Laura turned back. “What?”

Press looked at the ground and poked at the flattened grass with his shoe. “About her being human, too—or least partially human. She had the chance to kill me in there, but she didn’t. And she didn’t let Patrick do it either.”

“And she gave her life to save yours,” Dennis said. “Whatever else was inside her, we . . .
you
were also a part of her. At the end, she remembered that.”

Laura opened her mouth to reply, then closed it as a couple of paramedics came around the corner of the barn and headed for the back of one of the transport vehicles. The gurney they were pushing held Eve, and Laura was thankful that the human part of Eve’s metabolism had triumphed in death and retaken her body. Underneath the grime from the barn, she was beautiful again, her skin pure and unbruised, that lovely young face now still and serene. A single tear slipped down Laura’s cheek as the medics lifted the gurney into the waiting vehicle, then shut the door with a clang.