Shades of Earth (15 page)

“What kind of animal would make a tunnel that large?” I ask him. We haven't seen that many animals—mostly small forest creatures that scurried away before we could get a good look—and the pteros wouldn't make tunnels underground. Besides, the scale was nothing like their bumpy reptilian skin.

My mind flashes to the strange animal tracks we found near the shuttle after we first landed. There is much to this world we have yet to discover.

Colonel Martin keeps his eyes on the men descending down the hole.

“This tunnel is very close to the colony,” I continue. “Perhaps the ruins aren't safe. Maybe we should go somewhere else.”

Colonel Martin's mouth tightens. “It's a military matter, Elder,” he says finally. “We'll determine if there's a threat.”

“Really?” I ask. “That's all you're going to tell me?”

His eyes flick over to me, but he doesn't maintain eye contact. “I need you to focus on your people,” he tells me. “And I'll focus on the land.”

That's no answer, and we both know it.

 

With the latrine site closed, the only other thing I can do to help is work with the group laying water pipe. They've already set up a simple pump at the colony, and now it's just a matter of connecting pipe from it to the lake, our source of fresh water. It's much easier work, and there's something cathartic about the monotony of it. My body focuses on dragging the pipe and connecting the pieces while my mind races, trying to solve the mysteries of Centauri-Earth, Colonel Martin's strange silence among them.

Before I know it, we run out of pipe. “We'll go down and help the men laying pipe from the lake,” I tell the Earthborn engineer who's managing the project.

He frowns. “Colonel Martin said no one was allowed down there.”

I raise one eyebrow. “The military men are down there now.”

“He meant—”

He meant none of my people are allowed down there. Just like none of us were allowed in the tunnel.

“If we all work together, we'll be done by supper,” I say.

A soldier with the word
COLLINS
stitched on a patch on his shirt steps forward. “No one's permitted to go near the lake,” he says gruffly.

“Why not?” I demand.

“Not safe,” Collins says. He doesn't move from his spot blocking the path.

“But we'll be with you.”

“Not safe.”

I hold my hands out, asking him to stop repeating himself. “I understand that. But you have a great big gun right there, and when we reach the lakeside, we'll have at least half a dozen equally armed soldiers. We'll be as heavily protected as the shuttle.”

Collins shakes his head again. I notice the firm set of this mouth, the way he grips his gun. He will fight me over this. “It is forbidden,” he says.

“Forbidden?” I repeat, narrowing my eyes.

“Yes.” Collins actually looks a little nervous. Good.

I lower my voice. “Do you know who I am?”

“I do, sir. And if you have a problem, I suggest you take it up with Colonel Martin.”

“I'll do that,” I snap. Then I turn to my people and call out, “Early supper!”

They all cheer and begin to make their way back to the ruins. But I just stand there, at the edge of the meadow that has become an unspoken border, one thought occupying my mind.

What is Colonel Martin trying to hide?

25:
AMY

I'm still poring over
The Little Prince
when Mom bursts into the building I'd been hiding in. I quickly snap the book closed, but she doesn't even notice.

“It's time!” she announces with the same excitement little kids on TV back on Earth would announce that it was Christmas.

“For what?” I ask.

“Science!” she says in her best impersonation of a movie announcer. I laugh despite myself and slip
The Little Prince
under the sleeping bag Mom and I had taken from the shuttle. Maybe Elder's right—I can't spend all my time looking for clues that might not even be there, not now in the first early, crucial days of the colony.

Mom takes me straight to the shuttle to help with her research. Chris accompanies us for protection, but there are so many people now between the shuttle and the ruins that I can't help but think Chris's talents would be better used elsewhere. There are hardly any pteros in the sky, and while we've caught glimpses of other, smaller creatures—blurs of brown fur or dark feathers through the tree branches—the noise of workers and the sheer number of people here make them scarce.

Besides, I still have the .38 Dad gave me, the holster attached to the belt around my waist.

Mom chatters the whole time about the “plethora of specimens to examine on the new world.” The more Mom tells me about how she wishes she had a ptero specimen to dissect, the more I wish I was with Elder, talking about what Orion's clue might hold.

The cryo chamber area in the shuttle has already been converted to a scientific laboratory. The trays that once held frozen bodies now hold scientific supplies. Several metal panels are missing on the floor and walls, exposing storage areas that hid microscopes, burners, and other scientific instruments. Some of the biologists are already preparing a trek into the forest to make casts of animal tracks. I wonder if maybe they'll find more of the strange three-clawed prints Elder found on our first day, and I'm torn between curiosity over what the creature might be and fear that whatever it was, it was very close to the shuttle we're in now.

I open the door to the gen lab for my mom and Chris. The cryo chamber that held Orion is empty, drained. It looks ominous, as if waiting for another victim, and I turn my back to it. A few other scientists are already inside—either Kit or Elder let them in, or Elder's taken down the security on the biometric lock. Two of them—Dr. Engle and Dr. Adams, who've both worked with Mom for years—are standing in front of the huge cylinders that rise up from the ground near the now-broken Phydus machine.

Each of the cylinders holds fetuses of animals the FRX felt would be most helpful to us in the new world. Livestock animals, such as cows (normal ones, not the weird hybrids they had on
Godspeed
), goats, and pigs. Predators, including wild cats, birds of prey, and trays of smaller, egg-like pouches that I suspect are snakes or insects or something like that.

Dr. Adams uses a special scoop to remove a fetus from the tube. Dr. Engle takes it from him, putting the little bean that will one day become a horse into a specially designed tube.

“What's that?” I ask, pointing to a row of twenty tubes already inserted in an incubator.

“Dogs,” Dr. Adams says. “Large ones. We're aiming for a selection of animals that can be used for labor and, if worse comes to worst, food.”

I don't really want to consider eating a dog or a horse, but the little tubes of bean-shaped fetuses don't look much like either. My eyes slide to the other tube, the one with yellowish goo inside. The one with dozens of tiny clones of Elder.

“Amy?” Mom says, waking me from my reverie. She's been talking with Dr. Engle. “Can you help us?”

I cross the room to the last row of cylinders. Chris follows me silently. I don't think he's ever been in the gen lab before—he's wide-eyed, taking note of everything.

“Amy, you're friends with that ship leader. Do you have any idea what this is?” Mom asks. I think for a moment she's talking about the cylinder with Elder clones, but Dr. Engle points to the Phydus pump instead.

“Yeah,” I say darkly. “I know exactly what that is.”

“It looks like a water pump,” Dr. Engle says. “But inside are traces of a chemical we can't identify . . . ”

Phydus.

“It's nothing,” I say.

But of course, these are scientists. Tell them to leave something alone, and all they want to do is poke it with a stick.

“It was a water pump,” I continue, sighing. “One of the previous leaders used it to distribute drugs to the people on the ship. Elder broke the pump and quit distributing the drugs. It's pretty toxic stuff; you should just leave it alone.”

Dr. Engle looks even more curious than before. “What kind of drugs?” she asks. “Did they develop them themselves? What disease were they for—or were they intended for recreational purposes?”

Mom cuts Dr. Engle off. “We don't have time for that sort of thing, Maddie,” she says firmly. She is, after all, the lead scientist for the group. “We have other work that requires our attention.”

Dr. Engle nods reluctantly and goes to help Dr. Adams. Mom picks up a large canvas sack with special compartments for specimen jars and hands it to me. We're almost out of the lab before we notice that Chris isn't with us. I turn back to get him and see he's still standing in front of the Phydus pump, frowning, as if it's a puzzle he hasn't quite figured out.

“Come on!” I call, and he follows me outside. He grins at my excitement, and I can't help but notice that his nose crinkles when he smiles, illuminating his strangely blue eyes.

“What is it?” Chris asks, and it's not until then that I notice I've been staring at him.

“Nothing,” I say, blushing.

Mom stands on the bridge, shading her eyes from the suns, a small smile playing on her lips as she watches the two of us. “I want to gather as many specimens as possible,” she says. “I find it fascinating that so many plants seem similar to plants on Earth; I'd like to do some genetic sequencing and determine just how close they are. And of course, if there's any chance of catching any animal life, we
must
.” Her eyes are shining; I've never seen her so excited. “We've set snares in the surrounding area, and, as you know, some of the other scientists are out searching for prints, but it would be great to see something in its natural habitat!”

Chris and I follow Mom down the ramp and into the forest. She goes the opposite direction of the path to the ruins, hoping the less disturbed areas will yield more chance of wildlife. Chris holds a rifle with a high-powered scope in front of him, and I notice that he not only has two handguns (one in his belt, one in a shoulder holster) but also carries grenades, knives, and a machete—that I can see.

“Amy!” Mom calls. I dodge around the trees to reach her. She's pulling purple string moss from one of the trees, and I hand her one of the smaller specimen jars from the bag I'm carrying. “We've got several samples of these already—Dr. Card wants to see if he can replicate the neurotoxin—but I'd like to extract cells for a closer examination.”

“That,” I deadpan, “is so exciting.”

Mom hands me the jar. “Who knows what the DNA of this little guy can tell us!”

I squint at the plant. Although I know it unfurls to a flower nearly as big as my palm, right now it's nothing more than a bit of purple string.

Mom resumes her work, scraping off moss and lichen and bark into jars. “Just one small area, and imagine the diversity of life!” she trills.

I try to see the world through Mom's eyes, as if every
single
thing holds a new discovery, but then I stop in my tracks.

A terrible, wet, sucking sound creeps around the edges of the tree.

Immediately, Chris steps in front of me, slinging his rifle around in one fluid motion. Mom freezes, her eyes shooting first to me and then to Chris's gun.

A cracking sound. Scratching, like something hard across dry leaves.

My heart's beating so hard I can feel it banging against my rib cage. Something's out there, and it's
big
.

All I want to do is run away, but Chris creeps forward silently, his rifle raised and ready. I put the noisy specimen bag on the ground as quietly as possible. My sweaty hand pulls out the .38. I allow myself one moment to feel the gun, the heavy metal in the palm of my hand, the power behind it, and then I grip it properly, using both hands, one finger on the trigger.

Mom shakes her head at me but then stops, realizing the sense in having both me and Chris armed. She follows me as we move deeper into the forest and Chris glances back, signaling
forward
with his eyes.

A slurping, ripping sound leaks through the shadowy forest.

We're close.

Rustling. Definitely animal.

I step on a branch that cracks loudly, and an unnatural silence descends on us. The animal, whatever it is, has heard us.

Chris pushes aside a branch.

And then we see.

Dr. Gupta—what's left of Dr. Gupta—lies on the forest floor. A ptero, much smaller than the one that attacked Elder, cocks its head, looking at us as if we're a curiosity.

It bends its long neck down, using its saw-like teeth to rip away a chunk of Dr. Gupta's flesh. Blood and gore stick to the ptero's beak.

Dr. Gupta blinks.

Dr. Gupta blinks.

He's alive—he's alive, and he can feel—he can
feel
—as the ptero
eats
him.

He's alive.

The ptero bends its head down again to its meal. A horrific crunching sound echoes throughout the forest as the ptero shatters Dr. Gupta's femur. The ptero shakes its head, worrying it like a dog with a bone, until the leg snaps off.

A small sound, a moan, almost drowned out by the sound of crunching bones, escapes Dr. Gupta's cracked lips.

Chris and I both shoot at the same time.

My first bullet hits the ptero in the wing, ripping out a chunk of the thin membrane. The ptero drops Dr. Gupta's leg and faces us. It opens its beak, foam and blood dripping from its mouth, and
screams
.

I shoot again.

The ptero's chest bursts open. It crashes to the ground. Its leathery wings flop about, and it's dead—I know it's dead—but I shoot it again anyway, right in the skull.

I'm breathing heavily as I lower my gun, the smell of gunpowder mixing with the metallic tang of blood. I look at Chris and see that he's staring at Dr. Gupta.

I realize then that it wasn't the ptero he aimed for when he pulled his trigger.

A small round hole leaks blood down the side of Dr. Gupta's skull.