Deep Space Dead (16 page)

The joy soon faded once the smoke had cleared. Revenants were walking around with arms hanging off or crawling around with no legs. There was a mass of blackened bodies around the centre of the explosion. Many of the revenants were on fire.
But they were still alive.
Slowly Arianna felt her joy turn to dread and then to sheer horror. She watched the revenants simply move into the circle vacated by their few vanquished comrades and in a moment there seemed to be as many of them as before. “According to the data we killed two hundred outright,” said Barra Herr, his voice shaking with despair as he starred into the holoscreens. “Two hundred out of the tens if not hundreds of thousands they have out there.”

“But thousands of them were caught in the blast,” said Sol numbly.

“And thousands survived,” declared Barra Herr. “My machine does not lie.”

“It would appear they are resistant to everything we throw at them,” said Dr Palk, trying to sound calm. “Their skin would appear to have a natural protection against burns; reinforced like the shell of a cockroach. Only direct hits to the brain, many times, with a powerful firearm seems to do the trick; that or decapitation. See how quickly their arteries heal. Why I’m looking revenants wandering around with massive burns and both arms blown off and yet they don’t seem to be suffering at all.”

“Listen,” said Arianna urgently. “If we’re going to stand the slightest chance of getting through this we need to learn the lessons of history. We need to convince everyone we’re involved in a constant war against these things; we need to get wise to propaganda, morale boosting. Okay, so we haven’t succeeded this time but we now need to go on to the next plan, and then the one after that. The last thing we need is for everyone to start tearing each other apart. We must tell people everything is going to be alright, even if we don’t believe it ourselves. We must tell people we’ve got plans; we’ve always got to have a plan, and a backup plan, and then another backup plan after that. Tell the people the operation went well. Tell them we killed thousands of revenants, and if it does not seem so it is because more came to take their place. But tell them we will not stop attacking until we have annihilated every last one of them.”

“Hope is one thing,” said Barra Herr doubtfully. “The fact is we need a successful end to this siege before we all starve. The people will not live forever on hope alone.”

“Nonetheless I believe Arianna is correct,” said Chairman Bol. “We do always need to be trying something. We must do whatever we can to prevent people from rioting and causing unrest on the ship.”

Each day for the next week the rangers fired off another plasma missile and each time it threw revenant bodies in the air and finished off a few hundred. But even using one missile per day the stocks would be depleted within a month and even then they would have made but a drop in the ocean in their bid to wipe the creatures out. Being under attack spurred the revenants to action and they attempted another determined assault upon the starship. It was a terrifying sight to pass by one of the windows only to see a revenant suddenly latch on to it and attempt to rip it from its frame, burning red eyes viewing you hungrily as a morsel of flesh.

After three days the colonists began to get wise to what was going on. They could see themselves there was no significant decrease in the revenant ranks. They started to petition the Council to do more. After this time the missiles were no longer fired.  They were fooling nobody anymore. The failure of the missile offensive made the Council despondent too. For the moment Magnuj Bol declared there was to be no decrease in the rations being handed out despite the urgings of some members of the Council. Many of the cannier colonists, Arianna included, had begun to horde food away. The crops in the arboretum began to spring up, albeit slowly. The agricultural committee racked their brains. Arianna dealt with a steady stream of farmers and consultants looking to research growing techniques within the Confederation archive.

“We need to send out a rover,” said Chairman Bol at another of the seemingly endless Council meetings. “We need to try and salvage what we can. There must be something left, buried beneath the revenant footprints.”

“This is the next plan is it?” Said Barra Herr doubtfully. “Another broken promise of salvation? People aren’t going to stand it forever. They’re barely standing for it now.”

“The rover can do other things aside from retrieving,” put in Jak. “It can go out foraging. It can also properly assess the revenant numbers.”

“We could close ourselves off in the arboretum and turn off the airlocks,” said the entertainment councillor Col Gayze suddenly. “Just us councillors I mean, and our families too of course.”

The others turned to look at him. Arianna and some others had horrified expressions on their faces. “What?” Said Col Gayze. “It would be a grim business, certainly, but in the long term there is little else we can do. Just imagine it. There is food inside that arboretum to sustain us for the rest of our lives.”

“You cannot be serious,” said Arianna.

“Soon there will be riots,” continued Gayze, ignoring her. “The people will blame us and it is us on whom they will turn. Already rumours are flying around like wildfire.”

“Out of the question,” said Chairman Bol sternly.

“You’ll come round to my way of thinking sooner or later,” said Col Gayze bitterly. He glared at Arianna. “One more week when you’re faced with the prospect of your daughter starving to death. The grand scope of the mission won’t seem so important to you then. There aren’t going to be any miracles, Arianna. You need to realise that.”

13

A new morale booster was needed and it was for that reason that a few days later the Council decreed another rover mission was to set off for the vast forests to the east to collect any foodstuffs they might find. This time the ranger Jan Lybne and those of his colleagues who had not yet been out were chosen for the mission. Jan Lybne and his small crew waved cheerfully as they prepared to set off. A large crowd of colonists was once more gathered at the viewing decks to see them off. Below the rover was a large, loose net which could be used to collect any foodstuff the rangers might recover.

The rover rose up slowly and hovered at the roof hatch. Jak gave the signal. Bacc Goor pressed the button to open the hatch. Now came the crucial moments. Jak, Sol and their troops fell back with guns blazing as the three revenants dropped down. They had been anticipating their arrival and thought they could finish them off in time. They were wrong. The revenant scythed through the air and decapitated the ranger in a single stroke. Bacc Goor pressed the button to close the hatch then hurtled back towards the door. He was not fast enough. The revenant tossed him in the air with such force his back broke with the momentum of the thrust but not before he was able to let out a final sickening cry. The revenant ripped his arm clean off then threw him the length of the room. Jak and his surviving men dived through the door which closed quickly behind them. A second later there came a dull thud as the revenants attempted to gain access.

“Close the airlocks,” ordered Jak. His hands were shaking uncontrollably and he was struggling to get his breath. His heart was thumping fast.

From the relative safety of the bridge Jak now looked out of the window towards the two rovers rising up. Four revenants latched on straight away but Jan Lybne was ready for them. He had come out of the hatch turning the rover fast in a corkscrew motion and tilting it from side to side. The revenants dropped off one by one. They leapt up in the air towards the rover but did not come close to latching on.

“There must be well over a million of them, Sir,” said Jan Lybne through his radio. “But the good news is I can see an end to them. At present however I can see no trace of any structures that might have survived from the city.”

“I can’t say I’m entirely surprised,” muttered Jak, although he was disappointed nonetheless. “Well you know what to do, Jan. Go forth and explore. Find what food you can then winch it back.”

The rover started to progress over the sea of undead. The rocks sailed upwards at an astonishing speed. Jak heard the sound of the glass shattering over the radio and he was astonished, for the rovers were built to withstand the pressure of space. Now the ranger looked up to see the rover shaking to and fro at the loss of air pressure. Suddenly a revenant flew into the air, borne forth from the shoulders of another, seizing hold of the net and climbing rapidly upwards. The revenant dragged the rover further still. “You need to stabilise the thing,” cried Jak to Jan Lybne, trying to remain calm. “Keep as high as you can.”

Jak saw there was no hope. They were as good as lost. There came the shattering of glass followed by the ear piercing screams of Jan Lybne and the rest of his rangers. Jak rushed to the window and saw the revenants had pulled the rover to the ground and were converged on top of it, bundling one on top of the other in a bid to get a taste of the human meat beneath. The colonists had been watching from the windows and had seen everything. It was another rover gone, another group of rangers lost. Despair was once more the order of the day.

“We’re trapped!” Exclaimed Col Gayze, hurrying the length of the bridge and seizing hold of Jak by the scruff of his collar. “Trapped I tell you! No way out. Why we’ve got to take off, don’t you see? We’ve got to take off now.”
“Now calm yourself!” Ordered Jak sternly, firmly detaching Col’s hook-like fingers from his shirt. “It does no good for the people to see members of the Council engaged in such a panic.” But as Jak looked up he saw the people did not need Col Gayze to show them how to panic. Out in the corridors people were running back and forth in such a panic that for a moment he imagined the revenants must have breached the ship. He readied his pistol and barged outside, forced his way against the throng of panicking people until he reached the Council chambers where Chairman Bol was standing alone, regarding similar scenes of unrest on the holoscreens.

“All is not lost,” said Jak, trying to sound more confident than he felt. “Jan Lybne was unlucky. Now we know what the creatures are going to do we can anticipate it. In future we just won’t pressurise the rovers until we’re well out of sight of those things. It means even if the windows get smashed we still won’t lose the stability. Why I could go up there myself right now with one of the nets. That’s an idea, isn’t it? I’ll go up myself.”

Chairman Bol turned around slowly. “Bacc Gor is dead,” he said grimly. “He was one of the few men on this ship who knew how it took off. I’m not sure if any others are still alive.”
“Chairman Bol,” persisted Jak, as Arianna and Sol came to join them in the Council chambers. “Let me go out. Let me win victory. I can do it.”
Bol shook his head and glanced over at Sol. “Can you guarantee success?” He asked him. “And even if you were lucky this time what about when we run low on food again, and the time after that? Why the colonists are not stupid. They know well enough the loss of the rovers and rangers is a slow death sentence for them.”
“All the same…”
“No,” said Bol firmly. He glanced over to Sol. “It looks like you have some work to do officer.”
“Yes,” replied Sol gravely. “Reports of violent unrest are coming in from all over the ship. I have ordered my men to contain it as best they can but all the same I thought I should ask you, Chairman… well, this is an unprecedented situation. The people are very upset and…”
“You are asking me if I will authorise you to use deadly force against the rioters,” said Bol perceptively.
Sol’s mouth opened and closed, then he looked down at his feet.
“The answer is yes, officer,” said Bol, his tone business-like. “I trust you will only use it reasonably and where absolutely necessary.”
“Of course Chairman,” said Sol grimly. He looked around awkwardly, nodded towards Jak and turned to go.

More despondent Councillors trickled in over the next hour. When they were all there with the exception of Sol, Bol called the meeting to order.

“It has been another awful day and I fear I have yet more bad news,” said the agricultural chief Gan Cuk. “This will be our final day of full rations. We were really relying on that rover mission being a success.”

“And afterwards?” Asked Marya Skiee.

“Another ten days on starvation rations,” said Gan Cuk. “After that…” He shrugged. “I suppose we have a lot of dead bodies in the hold that aren’t doing much except rotting,” said Coly Gayze quietly, his voice almost a whisper.”

Arianna looked up sharply, seemed about to protest. Bol held up his hand for silence. “They’ll only be used in the event of the direst emergency,” said Bol. “And the rest of the colonists won’t be told what they’re eating. Perhaps we could save back some of the real food for ourselves since we all feel so squeamish about it. But only because we already know. In the meantime we should get on with the business of announcing starvation rations. Might as well get the bad news out of the way at once.”

“Are you sure that’s wise?” Objected Jak. “People are already demoralised enough over the loss of the ranger mission.”

“I’m afraid we have little choice,” replied the Chairman sadly. “They will certainly notice the reduced meals tomorrow. We might as well give them fair warning.”