Orbs II: Stranded (8 page)

CHAPTER 11

S
OPHIE
looked out from the portal of Biome 1, staring into the endless black abyss of space. The smell of fresh oranges drifted through the filtered air. The smell reminded Sophie of her grandmother’s backyard in North Beach, Florida, before she had been forced to relocate due to the rising tides.

She continued to stare out into deep space, the view dusted with stars like tiny specs of sand. Somewhere out there, Mars awaited her.

“Doctor Winston,” said the man standing next to her. “May I speak with you a moment?”

Sophie knew that voice. She turned to find Dr. Hoffman smiling at her. His teeth were stained from years of drinking coffee, and when he noticed her staring at them, his smile faltered.

“We need to talk,” he said, clasping his hands behind his back and watching her with dark, calculating eyes. “We intercepted a transmission.”

Sophie cocked an eyebrow, but said nothing.

“I’d play it, but it would mean nothing to you. It’s a series of noises on a frequency that has left even our senior communications officer confused.” He paused and gazed out of the porthole. “Beautiful view, isn’t it?”

She nodded and stepped aside so he could get a better look.

“You should enjoy it while you can. I don’t imagine you have much more time,” Hoffman said, casually.

Sophie was getting impatient. Something was amiss. Her instincts
told her that this was all wrong, that it wasn’t real.

That it was a dream.

“We know that the Organics on the ground are not the intelligent ones,” he continued. “They aren’t the ones leading the invasion or the ones controlling the drones.”

Eve
, Sophie remembered. The thought made her angry. The alien drone Eve was found submerged in a lake in the remote wilderness of Alaska in 2055. Scientists had known long before the invasion that the aliens were coming.

She looked at Dr. Hoffman, wondering what he had done with Eve. The craft could have held the key to defeating the Organics and saved billions of lives. She fought to control her rage. There were simply too many things she didn’t understand.

Sophie was about to fire off all of her questions when she noticed that the orange tree behind Dr. Hoffman had shriveled and died. She looked to his right and noticed an entire path of dead crops lining the path he had walked earlier.

“Is something wrong, Doctor Winston?”

Sophie shook her head.

“As I was saying, we know the Organics you have seen on the surface aren’t at the top of their hierarchy. Their leaders have not yet revealed themselves. And I suspect they won’t until the human threat is gone.” He chuckled and added, “Not that they are much of a threat.”

Dr. Hoffman’s reasoning seemed logical, but one of his words caught Sophie by surprise.

They.

She stole a glance over his shoulder again; more plants had died in the few minutes he’d been speaking. An entire row of them. Brown vines curled around the back of his head.

When she turned back to Dr. Hoffman, his features had transformed. His eyes were darker, like space itself. His lips curled back, and he began to speak, but Sophie couldn’t make out the words. She tried to move, to back away from the man, but she was frozen. Behind him, the entire Biome was dying.

The sound of footfalls and a distant voice pulled Sophie from sleep. She reached for her sheets and noticed they were drenched in sweat.

“You were dreaming again,” Holly said, sitting down on the edge of Sophie’s bed.

The memory of Dr. Hoffman chilled her to the core, and Sophie shook her head frantically in an attempt to rid her mind of the terrifying dream. Wiping the sweat from her forehead, she focused on Holly’s face through the dim light. “What time is it?”

“Four in the morning. You should try and go back to sleep. You need your energy.” Holly reached for Sophie’s hand, but Sophie quickly pulled away.

Tossing the sheets aside, Sophie swung her feet over the side of the bed and stood, taking a deep breath before forcing herself across the cold floor of the bedroom to a small mirror. She hesitated before flipping the light switch, knowing she wouldn’t like what she saw in her reflection.

She was right.

When the white light washed over her, she saw a different woman staring back. Her face was flushed, and her cheeks were sunken around her jawbone. She shuddered at the view; it reminded her of the woman they had discovered in the orb back at the White Sands installation.

Splashing cool water on her face, she hunched farther over the sink, her head bowed in defeat. In a low voice, she said, “Alexia, have you heard anything from Emanuel yet?”

“I’m afraid not, Doctor Winston. I will inform you of any developments when they become available,” Alexia replied in her calm, unwavering voice.

“I need to get to the CIC and see if I can get a fix on their location.”

“No. No, you don’t, Sophie. You need to rest,” Holly said firmly. “Why don’t you tell me about your dream?”

Sophie reluctantly retreated to the bed and sat next to Holly.

“It’s okay,” Holly said, placing a hand on her friend’s. “Talking about your dreams is the only way you will understand them.”

“I don’t know if I want to understand this one. It doesn’t make any sense.”

“Try me.”

With a deep breath Sophie explained. “I was in Biome 1 of
Secundo Casu
with Doctor Hoffman. He said they had intercepted a transmission from the Organics, and he knew the source of their intelligence. But then everything got weird.”

“What do you mean weird?”

“I mean
weird
. The plants started dying and I couldn’t hear what he was saying. It was like he was killing them.”

Holly frowned. “You have a lot of resentment toward Doctor Hoffman for leaving us here, for lying to you.”

Sophie nodded and pulled a strand of blond hair behind her ear. “That’s an understatement.”

“Our dreams reflect what we experience in everyday life. Your hopes, your disappointments—they are all displayed in this dream.”

“Yeah. I suppose you’re right,” Sophie said, taking another long breath.

“You should try and go back to sleep now.”

Sophie managed a smile and patted Holly on the shoulder. “Yes, thank you. I’ll be fine.” She lay her head back down on the pillow and stared up at the ceiling, listening to the door shut behind Holly.

Long after Holly had left the room, Sophie was still staring at the ceiling, whispering to herself, over and over again, “I’ll be fine. I’ll be fine. I’ll be fine.”

I’ll be fine
.

“No! It will render the device inoperable!” Emanuel yelled, smacking the electromagnetic pulse grenade from Overton’s hand before he had a chance to activate it.

“Get down!” Bouma yelled.

Overton tackled Emanuel and Bouma opened fire with his pulse rifle. The rounds ricocheted off the shields of the two approaching Spiders.

“Go! Get out of here!” Bouma screamed over the sound of his rifle. “Get him to higher ground!”

Overton ducked, the electric blue traces from Bouma’s bullets tearing into the Spiders’ defenses behind him. They screeched, their shields rippling where the rounds connected.

“Move!” Overton yelled, scrambling to get away from the advancing aliens.

Emanuel dove for the RVM, grabbing the straps and throwing them over his shoulders before taking off running after Overton. Bouma provided another round of covering fire and glanced over his shoulder just in time to see his teammates disappear around the street corner.

“Come on!” he taunted, and then fired another round of bullets at the Spiders. One of them let out a deafening screech. The sound echoed in Bouma’s helmet. He tried to ignore the ringing pain, but it was so disorienting that he dropped to his knees.

The two aliens crept forward, their claws dragging across the pavement.

Scratch, scrape, scratch, scrape.

Bouma knew the sound better than anyone. It was the sound of death.

But he wasn’t going to end up like Saafi or Timothy or Finley. He wasn’t going to die, not without a fight. A brief memory of Holly touching his shoulder flared in his mind, and the adrenaline intensified. He still owed the lady a date, and he’d be damned if he missed it.

“Come on!” he yelled again, squeezing his rifle’s trigger. The weapon responded with the metallic click of an empty magazine.

He tossed the rifle on the ground and reached for his sidearm just as one of the Spiders jumped onto the roof of the car in front of him. The creature’s claws tore into the soft metal with ease. He fired a few rounds to scare it away, but the bullets didn’t faze the creature. It seemed to know the rounds couldn’t penetrate its defenses. The Organics were learning.

The observation shocked Bouma almost as much as the metal car he ran into as he turned to run. He fell on his back and watched the upside-down shape of the two blue monsters gallop toward him.

Scratch, scrape, scratch, scrape
.

The world slowed as he rolled to his stomach and steadied his pistol. He watched the Spiders’ claws swipe at him through the air—he saw their mandibles open and release deafening shrieks. He fired the last of his magazine, watching their shields ripple as they absorbed the impact of the bullets.

He closed his eyes in defeat, waiting for the claws to tear through his armor. But their claws never reached his flesh. His blood did not spill across the pavement. Instead, the Spiders erupted with shrieks of pain.

His eyes snapped open to see the two creatures convulsing on the ground, their legs flailing in the air, their eyes bulging from their tiny heads.

And then a brief burst of static sounded over the com. “Bouma, do you read? Over.”

Bouma tried to speak, but couldn’t catch his breath. He continued to watch the two Spiders struggle. Their legs twitched helplessly.

“Roger,” Bouma finally said, gasping for air.

“It freaking works!” Emanuel shouted over the com.

Bouma glanced one more time at the aliens as they stopped flailing and their black eyes shriveled inside their skulls. Emanuel was right. Without their shields, they were just fragile hunks of flesh.

“My God,” Bouma said. “It works better than we could’ve ever hoped.”

“Hell yeah, it does. Meet us at the lakebed, Bouma. We have some prisoners to rescue,” Overton replied.

Bouma smiled. The tide had suddenly shifted. As he walked past the dead Spiders, he considered spitting on them, but that would be a waste of water.

CHAPTER 12

A
CHORUS
of shrieks ripped through the night. Jeff paused at the familiar sound, but he kept his head low and continued following the marine.

The awful noises were coming from every direction. Even with his gaze fixed on the ground, he could see the bioluminescent blue glow. The color swam before his eyes like it was alive.

Another screech sounded. This one was different.

The alien sounded enraged.

Can they even feel rage?,
Jeff wondered. He guessed that they could. They were just like any other animal. He stole a glance at a pack of Spiders patrolling the bluff over the lakebed. The group seemed aggravated by something. Suddenly, they were running. Their bodies illuminated the dead trees’ branches like oversized Christmas lights as they moved across the ledge. They scampered across the dirt, their talons kicking up dust clouds behind them.

In the distance, there was another sound. It took Jeff a moment to realize what it was.

Gunfire.

The sporadic pops from what sounded like pulse rifles echoed through the night. Kiel heard them too, his head turning with every shot.

The prisoners slowed to a halt, some of them snapping from their trance and scanning the lakebed. The man nearest Jeff shouted, “Can you hear that? The army has come to rescue us!”

Kiel elbowed him. “Keep your trap shut.”

“Hey!” the man protested, gripping his injured ribs.

“Keep moving,” Kiel said, cocking his head slightly to make sure Jeff was still following him.

The sound of gunfire was music to Jeff’s ears. It meant there were people out there, people like him. And they were fighting. But the noise ended almost as soon as it began.

Worse, the refugees were almost to the poles. Jeff could see the people in front of him heading uphill.

Jeff jogged up next to Kiel and nudged him. “Why did the gunfire stop?”

“I don’t know, but look, when you see me run, you run, too. Got it?”

Jeff nodded. Overhead, the poles extended into the dark sky, lighting up the beach with an eerie blue glow, like a lighthouse warning boats away. With every step he could feel his heart beating faster in his chest. They were running out of time. If Kiel was going to do something, Jeff knew he needed to do it soon.

As soon as Jeff reached the embankment the shrieks got louder. The noise was overwhelming. It sounded like every single alien was screaming. The noises reminded Jeff of a suffering wild animal, like a deer being torn to shreds by a pack of hungry wolves.

Jeff clapped his hands over his ears. Around him, the other refugees were doing the same. Panic tore through the group, and several prisoners took off running.

An elderly woman dropped to the ground in front of Jeff, whimpering in pain. “Make it stop, make it stop,” she repeated.

Jeff thought about trying to help her, but Kiel grabbed his arm. “Look at that!” he yelled over the noise.

At the edge of the beach the Spider patrol was flopping around on the dirt. Their legs clawed at the air, like an invisible enemy was attacking them.

“Now’s our chance. Run!” Kiel screamed. He took off into the darkness, away from the poles and back into the empty lakebed.

Jeff watched him go. His head was pounding, his vision getting cloudy. Everywhere people were screaming and running, dispersing in
all directions. Those who weren’t fast enough fell to the ground and were trampled by the others.

A woman crashed into him, sending Jeff face-first into the dirt. Shoes raced past his head, kicking up clouds of dust. He closed his eyes and protected his head with his hands, waiting for the crush of desperate feet.

Instead, he felt a pair of strong hands grab him under the arms and yank him up.

“I told you to stick with me, kid! What do you have, a death wish?” Kiel yelled. “Now get moving!”

Jeff took off running. In the distance, he could see a pair of houses on the opposite side of the lakebed and made his way toward them. Kiel passed him a few seconds later.

“Good idea, we need to get out of the open,” the marine said.

“Wait up, Kiel!” someone screamed from behind him.

Jeff stopped, nearly stumbling over his own feet. Kiel turned to look over, his shoulder and yelled, “Thompson, where the fuck have you been?”

Behind them, a burly man with a large bald head stood hunched over, with his hands on his knees. He wore the same green fatigues as Kiel.

Gasping for breath, the man waved a hand in the air. “I’m . . . sorry,” he panted. “I got . . . separated.”

Jeff nudged Kiel’s arm. “We need to go,” he said. Everywhere he looked, the aliens’ bodies lay twisted and mangled. Were they dead? Even if they were, Jeff knew there would be more. There were always more.

“Kid’s right. We need to get out of here. Can you run?” Kiel asked.

Thompson took his hands off his knees, sucked in another deep breath, and nodded.

Kiel was running before the other marine had stood up straight. Jeff couldn’t believe how fast the guy was.

Jeff ran too, his legs kicking up a cloud of dust. It only took a few minutes for them to reach the shoreline on the opposite side of the lakebed. The trio climbed onto a small embankment, the dry weeds
crunching beneath their boots. An outcrop of boulders separated them from the houses. Jeff was too short to see much beyond them, but he could see several solar panels on the rooftops protruding over the boulders. They were close to safety.

“Stay here,” Kiel said. He took off in a sprint toward the houses.

Jeff watched him vanish into the darkness, wishing he had his rifle. He felt naked without it. Dragging his forearm across his forehead, he wiped a trail of sweat off his face. Then, he took off running, leaving Thompson resting against the boulders.

“Kid. Wait up!” the man protested.

Jeff ignored him and ran as fast as he could. It only took him a few seconds to find Kiel. He was standing in the shadows of the first house. The modern three-story building was covered in windows and overlooked the lakebed. Jeff watched Kiel move on.

The second house was an older brick structure, surrounded by a curtain of dense pine trees. Their green needles had long since browned and fallen to the cracked earth below.

Kiel turned when he heard Jeff’s footfalls crunching over the ground.

“I told you to stay put,” Kiel snarled.

“I’m not freaking waiting back there,” Jeff replied with a frown. “Besides, I can keep up.”

The marine regarded him with a cocked brow, his bulbous nose twitching. Jeff almost laughed, but thought better of it. After all, this man had helped him escape.

“Let’s move,” Kiel said with a snort.

Winded, Jeff pushed on, following Kiel to the west side of the house. Camouflaged by the darkness, Kiel peeked around the corner before balling his hand into a fist. Jeff couldn’t see the marine’s face, but the shaking of his hand was enough for the boy to know he had seen something.

Jeff hung back. Behind him, he heard the heavy breathing of Thompson, who had caught up with them and braced himself against the brick wall.

“Why . . . are . . . we stopped?” he asked between breaths.

Before Kiel could reply, Jeff heard the sound that frightened him
the most.

Scratch, scrape, scratch, scrape.

It was distant at first, but grew louder with every heartbeat.

“Move!” Overton yelled into his com. He could hear the scraping of the Spiders behind him but didn’t risk the second it would take to glance over his shoulder. Emanuel’s weapon had killed every Organic within a one-mile radius, but others had quickly shown up to avenge their friends.

Overton scanned the street desperately for an escape route. He wasn’t about to leave his men in the field, but he also wasn’t any good to them dead. His plan was to lose the aliens and circle around to find Thompson, Kiel, and Jeff.

There.

At the end of the street a school bus had fishtailed, blocking the route like a blood clot in an artery. That was where they would make their stand. Looking over his shoulder, he saw a large pack of Spiders had joined the chase. He’d faced worse odds before by himself; a dozen of the bastards weren’t going to stop him from rescuing his men.

“Get inside the bus. I’ll hold them off,” Overton shouted, dropping to his left knee. With a single motion he swung his rifle to his shoulder, aimed through the sight, and fired off a volley of shots toward the approaching monsters.

As the bullets ricocheted off the Spiders’ defenses, his stomach sank. Their shields were still active. Overton knew he wasn’t as smart as Sophie or Emanuel. This, he accepted. But he had something they didn’t: killer instinct. He dropped his rifle, reached for one of the electromagnetic grenades, and pushed the small red button on the side.

Click.

He tossed the device into the air, watching it through his HUD as it sailed toward the aliens. They scampered forward, unaware that they were about to receive a massive shock. Overton was running before the grenade hit the ground. A brief flash of light filled his HUD as he burst through the open bus door. Blinking, he stuffed his armored body into
one of the seats and jammed his rifle out the window just as one of the Spiders crashed into the side of the bus.

The impact jolted Overton backward into the aisle. He fumbled for his rifle as he landed on his back with a thud.

“Shoot them! Shoot them now!”

With their HUDs down and weapons low on ammo, Emanuel and Bouma fired off calculated shots, aiming strictly for the creatures’ heads. Within seconds the outside of the bus was covered in watery gore.

By the time Overton had regained his composure, the aliens were dead. And he hadn’t even fired a single shot. He turned from the window and surveyed his men. He couldn’t see their faces through the tinted visors, but he knew what lay behind the glass.

Fear.

If it weren’t for the adrenaline racing through his veins, he would be feeling the same thing. But he didn’t have time for that.

“We need to find the survivors before another patrol finds us. Take a minute to let your HUDs reboot. Grab some nutrition, and then we’re out of here,” Overton said.

Bouma reached for a new magazine and jammed it home into his rifle. “Last one.”

“How long until your device is recharged?” Overton asked.

Emanuel plopped the metal device onto the seat and examined its side. Glancing up, he said, “Something’s wrong. Only four of the nine bars are lit. It’s not recharging as fast as I thought it would.”

Overton felt his stomach sink. He knew how fucked they were if the weapon didn’t come back online. He tilted his helmet and scanned the street. A soft, cool blue beam of light pulsated at the end of the street as the aliens approached. He could hear their claws now—the gut-wrenching
scratch, scrape
of their impending doom. Overton clenched his teeth. He knew he was running out of time to save the others.