Wings of Retribution (15 page)

As soon as the shell folded open around him, Stuart’s nerve-endings suddenly came back to life in a blaze of tingly fire.  He cried out and fell to the floor, unable to move in the confusion.  So
this
was why the woman wasn’t worried about him getting away.  He should have remembered from the last time he was in one of these things.  Unfortunately, it meant he would have to do the transfer sooner than he had planned.

Stuart stretched out his hand to the soldier that had released him, ignoring the blinding pain.  “Give me a hand up?” he said, straining.

The soldier backed away, giving Stuart a suspicious look.  Stuart’s heart sank.  If Colonel Howlen came back before the transfer was complete, he was sure to know what was going on.  After over a decade of training on Millennium, S.O. developed a sixth sense about that sort of thing.

A squat, redheaded man stepped up, pushing the standoffish corporal out of the way.  Grinning, he caught Stuart’s hand in a firm grip that sent shockwaves of agony through his ultra-sensitive body.  Stuart forced himself to smile.

“Don’t mind ‘em,” the man said easily.  “They think colonists carry all sorts of viruses and parasites.”

In his stasis shell, Morgan laughed.

Stuart gave the shifter a cold glance before tightening his grip on the man’s hand.

“There you go,” the redhead encouraged, “now just push with your feet.  Good.  Now straighten up.”

Stuart carefully slid a node into place on his palm where it was clasped against the redhead’s.  Once it was ready, he gave a mental apology, then delivered a constant, mild shock that coursed through the redhead’s body, stunning him.  The redhead’s eyes went wide at the jolt, but he couldn’t yank his hand away.  With his other hand, Stuart swung his arm like he was trying to steady himself and smacked it palm-first into the other man’s head. 

Gods, he hated this part. 
They both tumbled to the floor, their hands still locked in a death-grip.  Before the other soldiers could pull him off of their comrade, Stuart shifted so that his ear was positioned over the redhead’s ear.  Then, gathering his strength, he slipped out of his old body and into a new one.

His surroundings changed with a sudden jolt.  Light, along with horrible dryness, assailed his body from all sides.  Since he had only the most basic sensory organs, Stuart could naturally only see fuzzy images, able to perceive nothing near as detailed and colorful as his previous host’s, and completely unable to hear.  Blind and deaf, perceiving the world through a disorienting haze of cold, dryness, and uncomfortable vibrations, that all-too-familiar fear of being without a host began to sink its talons into his soul. 

Had they seen him?  Did they recognize the muscle spasms of his old host, now that Stuart had disconnected?  Could they see the blood dribbling out of his last host’s ear?  What if the redhead started to scream before he installed himself?

Spurred by panic, Stuart burrowed deeper into the ear canal, knowing that the initial shock he’d delivered to the redhead would only last a few more seconds before his new host began to scream.  He couldn’t let that happen, not with a dozen soldiers watching.  This was his only chance.  If he mucked it up, he would be taken to some Utopian laboratory and left in a jar of formaldehyde.  Or worse.

Of all the creatures that had run afoul of the human race,
suzait
were loved the least.

As quickly as he could, Stuart opened a passage and slid into the redhead’s brain, easing himself between the tissues to minimize damage.  From there, he stretched his tentacles to envelop the sensory organs first.  

Have to take control,
he thought, his terror ratcheting up with every moment that passed. 
Have to hurry…
  The first images were fuzzy, but as he fine-tuned his connections, they became crisp with the wondrous clarity of human vision.  He saw a ring of humans, staring down at him with concern.

Hurry, hurry…
  That soul-deep panic was worming its way through his mind, and it was all Stuart could do not to dive through the tissues, instead of winding around them, careful to leave them intact.  He tried to go slowly, to spare them what he could.  Gods, he tried…

Then he felt his host take in a lungful of air to scream and instincts won out.  Shoving a tentacle the rest of the way through the brain, Stuart violently cut him off.  He winced, knowing he had caused damage, and knowing that his host might actually have trouble speaking, once Stuart left, but also knowing there was no avoiding it.  There could be no screaming.  Screaming would bring the men with lab coats and bone saws.

As he made contact with more areas of the redhead’s brain and it became evident that the transfer had been successful, Stuart slowly began to lose the horrible, innate fear of being rejected by his host.  Instead, the overwhelming guilt of taking yet another host against its will began to chip away at his soul in its place. 

Again,
Stuart’s conscience screamed. 
You did it again.

And with that, Stuart hated himself just a little more.  He had sworn he wouldn’t do it again.  Not until the last one grew too old to use.  Yet here he was, at the first sign of danger, ruining yet another life so that his could remain.  He felt so morally disgusting he wanted to die.

…But not bad enough to slip back out of his new host’s ear and onto the floor.  That terror was even stronger than his own self-loathing, and he remained firmly ensconced in his host’s brain, knowing that, if everything from this point onward didn’t go
exactly
right, it wouldn’t matter that he’d yet again stained his morality for his own survival.  One wrong move, one stray suspicion, and the temporary security he’d found in the redhead’s brain would be wrested from him by a sterilized titanium scalpel.  Stuart twisted in fear even as he forced more of his host to respond to his commands.

As the soldiers gathered around him, looking worried, he took over motor function.  He continued to stretch and reach, making connections, wresting away the last of the host’s autonomy.  He felt the host’s last vestiges of fear and panic, now all tightly enclosed within the container that became the host’s brain. 

Sorry,
Stuart whispered, in anguish.

In reply, he got a spasm of terror from his host, a being now locked within his own mind, an observer in his own body.  The host’s heart, already a jackhammer against his ribs, began to rip at the sides of his chest.  Stuart felt the beginnings of muscular tearing, and knew he was going to have to take over autonomic functions, too.

So sorry,
Stuart whimpered.  With a new wave of self-loathing, he wrapped a tentacle around the medulla oblongata to complete his hold over the host, blotting out the last of the host’s connection to the rest of the world.  Many centuries ago, Stuart had made the mistake of not taking this vital control center, and he had been stranded for days in a dead host once the host’s heart and lungs stopped from the shock he caused on entry.  Taking away that last bit of control, however, felt like a violation of the worst kind.

Stuart felt the host’s despair, and again wanted to die.

Again, he was too much of a coward.

Oh, stop wingeing,
Stuart’s logical side interjected. 
They would kill you on sight.  Stomp on you like a cockroach, spread your brains across the floor as they squished you in.  Besides, they killed the
harra
. They killed your family.  Hell, you might be the only one left, for all you know.  They deserve what they get.

Yet, deep down, he knew that the terrified redhead no more deserved him in his brain than Stuart deserved to be put in a jar of formaldehyde.

I’m sorry,
he thought again. 

In reply, his host mentally screamed himself hoarse. 

Reluctantly, guilt hammering at his consciousness as he listened to the host’s mental screams, Stuart unhappily returned his attention to surviving the next ten minutes.  With a tendril on the brainstem, Stuart forcibly calmed the redhead’s heart.  The body responded to him sluggishly, like most human hosts.  Unfortunately, without the
harra
, Stuart had no choice.  Humans had, with great efficiency and with brutal force, made themselves the only alternative.

He made his host sit up, keeping his head tilted entry-side slightly up, to keep the blood that was welling inside the canal from running out and betraying his presence.

 “You okay, Pete?”  The soldiers squatting beside him were looking at him anxiously, one steadying his host’s shoulder. 

Two other men were restraining Stuart’s old body, which was showing only the most rudimentary signs of struggle.  After being under Stuart’s control for almost forty years, his old host would probably take months to recover full use of his anatomy.

“Little blow to…head…” Stuart said, cringing at how slurred his words came out.  Usually when he switched hosts, he planned a few quiet weeks in a secluded hotel to re-learn to use the new size and shape of his host’s tongue.  Until he did, his words would sound as if he were perpetually drunk.

“He’s got a concussion.  Get him to medical.”

A new horror enveloped Stuart at the sergeant’s command.  If the medical technicians did a brain scan—which they would—the high metal concentrations of his natural body would stand out on their screens like a three-dimensional snowflake inside the man’s brain.  The mere thought of that left him sick with terror.

“No,” he managed.  “No, just need sleep.”

“Bullshit,” someone said.  “You’re talking like you forgot how to use your tongue.”

Oh gods…
Stuart thought, horrified by how close they had come.  Scrabbling to regain control of the situation, he babbled, “I’m fine.  Just a bump.  Need a nap.”  It came out sounding like, “Lyme thyne.  Lusp a bump.  Leed a thlap.” 

“Come on, you,” one of his host’s comrades said, hefting his arm over a shoulder.  Lifting Stuart’s host off the ground, he said, “Think of it this way…  You just got some free R&R.”

Stuart couldn’t let them take him to medical.  He knew this just as solidly as he knew he was rapidly running out of time.

“I said no,” Stuart growled, jerking his host out of the human’s grip.  As the man gave him a startled frown, Stuart punched him as hard as he could.

The blow wasn’t very hard, considering his lack of control, but it made his point.

Their hands up, the other soldiers backed away from him.  “Fine, man,” one of them said, shaking his head.  “But don’t say we didn’t warn you.”

“Warn him about what?”

Stuart stiffened at the sound of Colonel Howlen’s voice.

“Corporal Koff here fell and hit his head,” one of the soldiers said.  “We wanted ta get ‘im ta medical, but he gone and punched me.”

But Colonel Howlen wasn’t paying attention.  His eyes were fixed on Stuart’s old host, who was groaning and crawling ineffectually on the floor.  Stuart had the sudden spasm of panic, knowing that the S.O. operative was about to catch him. 

“Why is that man out of his stasis shell?” Howlen barked.

“Capt’in Burdough told us to—”

“Put him back,” the Colonel commanded.  “She was mistaken.”

“Aye, sir.”  Two men jumped to grab Stuart’s discarded host and shoved his limp body back into the stasis shell.

Howlen turned crisply to face the solders, looking all-business.  “I want four men posted here at all times to make sure none of these prisoners get out again. 
No one
opens those shells other than me or the Admiral, understand?  Soon as we dock, I want the watch upped to eight men.  No one enters this room without a voice scan.”  At that, Howlen gave Stuart a passing glare and left the room, the fidgeting Captain trailing in his wake.

“Ain’t that the way of it,” one of the men muttered.  “Officer screws up, we gotta take the extra shifts.”

“So who’s got first watch?” someone else demanded.  “I ain’t gonna get but four hours of sleep as it is.”

“I don’t know,” another man said as he looked at Stuart, “But he ain’t gonna last no shift in here.  He’s swayin’ around like he’s gonna fall over.  Sure you don’t wanna go visit the Doc, Koff?”

Still a little stunned he’d survived the Colonel, Stuart numbly shook his head.

“Well, at least let us get ye back ter yer room,” Sergeant Griffin said.  He grabbed Stuart by the shoulder and pushed him out the door.  “I ain’t gonna be blamed for leavin’ ye injured.  Bogg, Eldrich, grab two others from the barracks and take shift.  Deeds, help me get this fool ter bed.”

A soldier steadied each of Stuart’s arms and ushered him into the hallway.  Having no idea of the layout of the ship, Stuart anxiously let them lead him onward, praying they weren’t taking him to medical.  As he waited with increasing trepidation, they led him down the hall, up a flight of stairs, and, finally, into a room with two bunks.

“Hearst’ll be in ter check on ye in a few hours,” the sergeant said as they put him to bed.  “You start feelin’ dizzy or sick, ye tell him, right?  And I’m puttin’ in a word with the Doc anyway.  He’ll prolly be here ter take a look at ye sometime termorraw.”

Stuart glanced over at the empty second bunk and asked when his roommate would return.

The sergeant gave him a tiny frown.  “He’s still workin’ nights,” he said.  “He’ll prolly be in ‘round the same time as the Doc.  You
sure
you’re okay?”