Xenophobia (21 page)

The alien creature reared up before Bosco in the shadows. Bower couldn’t make out what he was seeing, but he was pointing the gun up at something several feet higher than himself. His feet stumbled on some loose wood as he backed up. Bosco was yelling something to her and Elvis, but she couldn’t hear what he was saying.

Bower saw the shot before she heard it.

The revolver lashed backwards as a flash appeared at the muzzle, then the crack of gunfire echoed throughout the empty factory.

As the gun recoiled, the creature struck.

Hundreds of tentacles lashed out at Bosco, engulfing him, slashing at his clothing and tearing him apart. His body was flung around like a rag-doll. Whips flayed his skin, breaking his bones and shredding his torso. His Kevlar vest was sliced in pieces, while his boots were torn in half, still holding the crushed remains of his feet. Within seconds, there was nothing but bloody gristle where once a man had stood. A dismembered hand lay to one side grasping the revolver.

Bower struggled not to vomit.

The rebel soldiers cheered.

“Two minutes ten,” someone yelled out, and another roar arose from the soldiers.

Bower found herself deeply moved by the sudden violence with which Bosco had died. Was that all life amounted to? She barely knew Bosco, but she knew there had to be so much more to his life. She couldn’t switch off. Although she’d been surrounded by an appalling, senseless loss of life since the attack on the Humvee, she couldn’t ignore what had happened to him. Bosco wasn’t a statistic. Just moments before, he’d been a living, breathing human being, and the stark finality of his sudden, violent death got to her.

Bosco had parents, everyone did, but she wondered how well he got on with them? He probably had brothers and sisters. Were they older or younger? Had they gone into the army as well? Or had they escaped this fate, becoming accountants or nurses, mechanics or shopkeepers. He’d grown up somewhere, bouncing on the knee of a proud grandparent. He’d attended school, probably fallen in love a couple of times, and one fateful day, Bosco had decided to join the army. What had that day been like? Had the sun shone, or was the day grey, with moody clouds passing overhead?

What had drawn Bosco to army life? Was it a sense of adventure, to escape the mundane routines of life? Had it been because his father or his mother, or perhaps an uncle had served with distinction? Had it been for patriotism or pay? And all those he’d met along the way, all those he’d befriended with his wit, what would they ever hear of this? Would they ever learn what happened? Or just that he was MIA: missing in action, presumed dead? Would they ever hear of his courage under fire? How much heartache would news of his death bring?

Bower felt an ache in her chest.

It wasn’t right that life could be snuffed out like a candle.

Tears ran down her cheeks.

“You are next,” Adan said, looking at Elvis.

“No,” Bower cried. “This is wrong. You can’t do this.”

Adan laughed. “Oh, but I can.”

He held two bullets in his hand, between his thumb and his forefinger, holding them up high so the soldiers could see what he was proposing.

Adan yelled, “What do I hear for a double? How long can two of them last? Do I hear four minutes? Is anyone going to take four minutes for the two of them? Do I hear four? Five?”

The rebels cheered and called out in response as the gambling began in earnest, with money rapidly changing hands.

“You sick bastard,” Elvis said, struggling to hold himself upright. Bower could feel him trembling. Even with his shattered arm, lost below the elbow, his bulk made him look formidable, especially as his bulletproof vest stuck out from his chest. His gruff voice sounded resolved, but Bower knew he was as afraid as she was, she could feel adrenalin betraying him. They were going to die.

Adan held out the bullets for Elvis to take, but with a tourniquet around his torn bicep and his other arm slung over Bower’s shoulder, he couldn’t hold them. Bower held out her hand, but Adan played up the incident.

“Arnold Schwarzenegger was so tough he didn’t need bullets to kill the predator. Are you our Arnold? Can you kill this monster with your bare hands?”

The soldiers laughed and jeered at them.

“Should you change your mind,” Adan continued, facing Elvis and Bower. “You will have to find your bullets.”

Adan tossed the two bullets carelessly out over the vast hole in the floor. Bower watched as the bullets sailed downward, bouncing on the mattresses, one falling to the left, the other bouncing further on and somewhere to the right.

“Fuck,” Elvis said under his breath.

Bower felt the butt of a rifle thrust hard into her back, forcing her to stumble forward toward the jagged hole in the floor. Below her, the alien monster seethed with anger, lashing out with its razor-sharp tentacles.

“No,” she screamed. “This is not fair.”

“Fair?” Adan cried in reply. “Fair? You bomb us with your Raptors, you occupy our country, you force your systems and beliefs upon us, you destroy our traditions, and you want to talk to me about fair? Ha. I say, you have as much chance down there as we do against your troops.”

Another shove in the back brought her to the edge of the abyss.

Concrete crumbled beneath her boots.

Elvis jumped out before her, clearing the torn strands of reinforced steel bars protruding from the shattered concrete. He landed on a mattress, rolling on his good shoulder as he fell forward.

Bower jumped. She had to. If she’d been shoved, she knew she would have fallen awkwardly and missed the mattresses. Breaking a leg on the concrete floor didn’t seem like such a smart idea, so she jumped. Jumping was her only option and yet it felt like suicide.

Bower didn’t make it as far as Elvis had, and she had no idea about rolling to soften the blow. She landed on a single mattress off to one side, and was shocked to feel the jarring impact resound up through her ankles, knees, hips and spine. She collapsed in a heap, pain tearing through her body.

Elvis staggered up against the crushed remains of a wooden crate, using it to help him stand. Bower got to her feet, but her ankles ached, the soles of her feet felt like someone had been pounding on them with a sledgehammer.

“Bullets,” Elvis cried. “Get the bullets.”

Bower looked around.

From the ground, the layout looked entirely different. She swung around, looking at the pile of mattresses, trying to get her bearings. Above her, the soldiers roared with excitement. She could see Adan standing there, laughing, gloating. From his position, she was able to orient herself. She had to be within a few feet of the bullet that fell to the left.

Elvis staggered over to where the revolver lay in a pool of fresh blood, crushed bone and shredded body tissue. She could see he was in excruciating pain. His movements were coarse. His shattered arm hung by his side, nothing more than a bloody mess.

Instinctively, Bower ran her hands through her short, dark hair. She wasn’t sure why, but it helped her think as her eyes scanned the ground, looking for the bullet. Small rocks and splinters of wood lay scattered on the floor. Patches of blood marred the ground.

Her eyes darted back and forth, manic in their desire to find the bullet. Long streaks of blood and splatter patterns stained the support pillars.

Something moved in the shadows. Thousands of blades seemed to slash at the air, cutting through the darkness.

Bower looked up. Her heart raced. She couldn’t help herself. Although she knew she should keep looking for the bullet she had to see it, she had to see this alien creature from another world. There, in the darkness, she saw the faint outline of the monster, just a glimpse of spikes and tentacles as the creature moved along the far wall. Above her, the rebels were chanting, willing the creature to attack.

Elvis was on his knees, using his one good hand to pull himself on. He grabbed the gun and leaned up against a concrete support pillar. The physical toll of his injuries had sapped his strength. She could see him struggling, fighting against fatigue and shock. His gloved fingers gripped the revolver. He wiped the gun against his clothing, trying to clean it.

“Doc, I need those bullets,” he yelled again.

Bower was down on her hands and knees. She was sure this was where she’d seen one of the bullets come to rest. Her hands pushed through the debris, her fingers desperately wanting to clutch at metal and not wood or stone.

The alien roared. Within the darkened floor, there was a sound like the rush of a storm in a forest. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see the monster closing in on Elvis.

“Where’s that goddamn bullet?” Elvis cried. He pointed the gun into the shadows, bluffing.

Bower moved to where she’d landed, searching frantically for the first bullet. The mattress she had fallen on had slipped off the pile and lay to one side. She was almost directly below Adan. She couldn’t see the general, but she could hear him gloating and calling out with delight.

“Get me that
FUCKING
bullet,” Elvis scream.

Elvis staggered. His legs could no longer carry him. He fell awkwardly, crying out in pain as he sprawled on the concrete.

Bower was manic, searching on her hands and knees for the bullet.

Above them, the rebel soldiers laughed.

Elvis rolled on his back, pushing frantically away from the alien creature as it slowly advanced on him. His boots slipped in the blood of his fallen comrade.

Adan and his troops cheered for the alien.

The creature reared up above Elvis, its tentacles slashing at the air. As the alien moved into the light, Bower got her first good look at the monster. Mentally, she struggled to process what she was seeing. Rather than a single creature, such as a lion or a tiger, the alien appeared to be a chimera, a hybrid, a combination of various creatures melded together.

What she’d thought of as tentacles were flexible blades. Bower was tempted to think of the alien as a giant sea urchin or a western tumbleweed, with an inner core like that of a basketball. Spikes protruded in all directions, but the heart of the creature was a seething mass, constantly moving, rippling and changing shape. She couldn’t articulate why, but the two concepts didn’t mesh, they seemed incongruous.

Rigid spikes rested on the ground like pikes or poles or crutches, while the upper spikes flexed like whips, giving the top half of the creature the appearance of an octopus thrashing around with its tentacles. As the alien moved, these soft, flexible fore-limbs became stiff, changing their function from what had presumably been like that of human arms to stiff legs. As the creature rocked forward, the dark, seething mass at the heart of the alien compensated for the motion, swarming and staying still relative to the rotation of the legs.

“BULLETS,” Elvis yelled again. “I need those bloody bullets now.”

Elvis struck out with his legs, trying to push himself along the ground away from the alien.

Bower couldn’t take her eyes off the creature. She was terrified. Her hands continued to run over the debris on the floor, but she never looked down. Then, under the fingers of her left hand, she felt the smooth cylindrical shape of a bullet casing. Her fingers picked up the shell and felt for the bullet at its tip to ensure this was not an empty brass case.

“I’ve got it,” she proclaimed, as though merely finding the bullet had solved their problems.

Elvis backed up next to her, sweat dripping from his brow.

The creature seemed weary of leaving the cover of darkness. Could it be that the alien was light-sensitive? Probably not, she figured. More than likely, its behavior was to avoid the rebel’s taking pot-shots.

With one hand, Elvis opened the revolver, pushing on the main cylinder so it swiveled out to one side of the Magnum. Elvis pushed the ejection rod against his knee, knocking the spent brass casing out of the gun.

His hand was shaking. He held the revolver so Bower could feed the lone bullet into one of the empty chambers within the cylinder block, but she struggled to get the bullet into the revolver. Although it only took fractions of a second, she felt like she was fumbling for upwards of a minute.

Elvis had his back up against one of the mattresses. His head rolled lazily to one side as he flicked the chamber back into the Magnum. He rested the gun on his chest and moved the cylinder so the bullet was in place, ready to fire. Bower hadn’t thought about it, but it was only then she realized she should have placed the bullet in the upper chamber. She was horrified to think she’d slowed the whole process.

While they were preoccupied, the monster retreated into the shadows, apparently sensing the gun was now loaded. Bower could see the alien understood the danger represented by this weapon, even with only a single bullet.

“Three minutes,” one of the rebels yelled out above her. Although to Bower it felt like three hours. Sweat dripped from her forehead, running down her neck. Her hands were shaking, but she knew what she had to do.

Bower scrambled up the pile of mattresses as Elvis called out, “Find the other bullet.”

She was already on it.

From the spongy mattress top, Bower could see the creature moving around behind Elvis, forcing him to turn. Elvis had no strength left; she could see that. He struggled to turn himself, putting the revolver down and pulling with his one good hand as his boots slipped on the bloodied concrete. He was exhausted. He couldn’t turn to face the alien.

Above them, General Adan laughed and cried out with glee, enjoying the spectacle. The creature was almost directly below the general, but he was safe, well back from the edge, with just his upper torso visible from the ground floor.

Bower pulled herself away from staring at the creature, her eyes scanned the floor for the second bullet. It was impossible. There was too much debris. She could see several spent shell casings, any one of them could have been the second bullet, but from where she was, she couldn’t tell for sure. She went to jump down the other side of the mattresses and start searching, but she was aware the creature was moving in to kill Elvis. She couldn’t leave him. She couldn’t abandon him when he was helpless.