Arrival, page 3
part #1 of Captured Earth Series
Because what’s inside her is like a death sentence.
It is a death sentence.
Mina’s belly is going to swell.
And then the machine will take her again.
Mina continues to clutch at her belly and a wail leaves her lips that shatters me at my core.
Hopeless.
Desperate.
Forlorn.
It will kill her like it’s killed the others.
And then…then it will be my turn…
Or Sam’s.
My chest heaves with huge breaths as I pull my gaze away from Mina to stare through the wall before me.
In the back of my mind are Mina’s cries.
We can’t help her. Even if we wanted to.
There is nothing we can do.
Sam and I made a pact.
If one of us gets taken…the other will have to do a horrible deed.
Asphyxiation is our only weapon.
But what would happen to the other once the deed is done?
We don’t know.
We don’t talk about it.
The last woman who came close to killing herself was crushed by the metal claw.
“There’s water ahead,” I whisper. The thought comes almost like an afterthought whispered in the back of my mind.
I can see it.
A great lake.
The machine will stop. Suck it up. And then it will move on.
Mina’s wailing slowly turns to low sobs as she settles back. Her chin is on her chest and through her ripped clothing, I see deep welts across her abdomen from where she’d clawed at herself.
I take her hand and settle back too.
Sam follows, sitting on Mina’s other side, and we rest in silence, lulling ourselves with the sway as the machine moves.
For the next few minutes, my gaze is focused on the lake as the machine heads toward it, and when it gets there, it steps into the water and pauses.
Mina’s sobs feel like my own.
No one is coming to save us.
No one is out there.
The thought registers like a hurricane and I gulp back a sob.
I’m not allowed to cry.
I feel guilty for wanting to do so when Mina is facing death much sooner than I am.
I can’t look over at the Feeders either—the men on the other side.
Thankfully, the vines cover most of what we can see.
I don’t know which side has it worse.
Them or us.
So I force my gaze ahead, my eyes glazing over with unshed tears.
I cannot do anything to help Mina, but I can be strong.
I can be strong for her.
Through my blurred vision, I think I see something, and I frown a little as I force the tears away.
With the back of my free hand, I wipe my eyes and squint for I…I think I see movement in the distance.
Something black, moving toward us through the sky.
It’s dusk and I haven’t seen any sort of bird in so long.
I blink again and my vision clears, but the bird is still there.
Bigger now.
For a moment, I don’t know what I’m seeing.
It seems to be getting bigger the closer it comes.
Out of nowhere, a bright light erupts in front of me. Far too bright. As bright as the sun.
The sudden brightness blinds me and I hiss as I shield my eyes.
Something moves over my skin like an invisible web. I feel it move all the way through me and it’s such a strange sensation that I let go of Mina’s hand to clutch at myself.
There’s nothing there.
As if whatever I feel is invisible.
Like…energy.
Pure. Raw. Energy.
And as the light dims and my eyes begin to adjust once more, there’s a loud boom.
The air vibrates.
It’s the same sound I’d heard on that first day and it sends a chill down my spine that has everything within me falling.
I know what that sound means now.
It means the orb is about to attack something.
“What’s happening?!” Sam’s voice is high, panicked, but I can’t even look her way because all I can see is that bird still approaching.
Something moves in my peripheral vision. It’s on the outside. One of the machine’s walking arms. But before it can do anything, the entire orb jerks.
We’ve been…hit.
The blast is so strong, it sends us hurtling to the side.
Sam screams. My eyes widen.
There is a pain in my shoulder from where I connect with the smooth interior, but my gaze somehow finds the bird again.
My heart skips a beat.
For the first time in weeks, hope flares within me.
For what I’m looking at isn’t a bird.
It’s a ship.
And it’s firing at the machine.
Chapter Five
ADIRA
There’s no time to prepare for what happens next.
We’re thrown upside down, gravity disturbed.
Like ping pong balls in a glass jar, our bodies slam against each other.
Screams pierce my ears. I do not know whether they are my own.
All I know is that chaos has suddenly erupted.
I try to grab and hold on to something.
Anything.
But nothing is there to hold on to in this smooth, featureless prison.
Something collides with the machine once more and it shudders hard, swaying wildly.
It feels like my bones crack each time my body slams against the inside of the orb and then, the swaying stops.
There is another jerk, as if something heavy lands on the orb and as I struggle to right myself, I see movement.
Something black.
A man.
A man on the orb?!
He’s so fast, I barely glimpse him and I wonder if I imagined it.
I try to rise but the machine is suddenly moving again.
Correction: we’re falling.
Fast.
Fast enough for me to feel the pull of gravity as my blood rushes into my head.
I clutch on to Sam and Mina both, gritting my teeth with the force of the pull.
And then it hits me.
Something is happening that I didn’t know was possible.
The machine is going down.
The calm water of the lake below is approaching fast and hope has my heart in my throat.
Help has finally come.
Somewhere, somehow, humans have found a way.
The fight isn’t over yet.
But beneath me, the surface of the water is approaching and a new terror fills my veins.
Two things become clear.
1. The indestructible machine isn’t indestructible after all. It is falling. It is being destroyed; and 2. It’s going down and we’re stuck inside of it.
A shout leaves my lips as determination I thought I’d lost flares.
Slamming my fists on the metal orb, I pray it breaks. But of course, nothing happens.
Sam and Mina are scrambling, trying to do the same, even though we know we can’t break it.
We’d tried many times before.
But right before the orb slams into the water, that man appears again.
I cannot see his face and it’s all happening so fast, I’m not sure I’m even seeing him for real at all.
His fist lights up and it smashes into our compartment. The glass-metal, the barrier to the outside world…cracks.
And then he’s gone. Thrown off the orb as it smashes into the lake.
“There!” Sam shouts, her gaze on the crack.
I wonder if she saw the brave man too but there’s no time to ask her. I’m already moving.
I slam my fist at the crack and pain tears through me. I’m pretty sure I just broke my wrist. But the crack splits and then…it gives!
Somehow, I’ve punched a hole in it.
“Adira!” Sam’s shout is almost drowned out by my own blood rushing into my ears.
I made a hole in it!
But my elation is short-lived. For as soon as the orb hits the water, it begins to sink and I am faced with a whole new terror.
Water rushes in through the hole I just made, desperate to fill the space.
It’s coming in so fast, it hits me hard and I’m thrown back.
Sam scrambles to take hold of Mina, who’s gone limp, and she screams. Or maybe I do.
Mina isn’t moving.
Unconscious.
I pray she isn’t dead.
I do not know.
I slip as I try to rise again.
The water is cold and the ripped dress I’d found in someone’s house is now soaked.
Still, I manage to push myself forward.
“Help Mina!” I shout back. “I’ll get us out!”
I hope I can.
Pressing forward against the sudden torrent feels like I’m fighting against every law of physics, but somehow, I reach the hole I made.
Maybe the weakened area will yield to my fist again. And so I try.
I punch it, fighting the pressure of the water as the orb fills up.
Pain explodes in my fist again and I inhale sharply.
The glass seemed to be even harder than before.
Each time I slam my fist against it, more pain ricochets up my arm, but the fear of what will happen if we don’t get out is worse.
So I keep going.
I don’t stop, even when the water reaches my knees…my waist…my shoulders.
It reaches my lips in no time and I take a deep breath, hoping it won’t be my last as I continue hitting my fist against the orb.
The water is murky, I can hardly see, but I don’t stop.
I can’t stop, even when the most likely scenario is staring me right in the face.
Is this how we die?
Behind me, Sam is trying to keep Mina’s head above the water. High above me, she swims, fighting her own waning energy to save the woman she’s pulling upward with her.
But the air pocket above me is barely big enough for them both.
Sam realizes this and places her body underneath Mina’s, supporting the woman’s head.
She’ll run out of air soon.
We don’t have much time.
So I pound on the barrier. I pound on it even as my skin breaks and my blood begins to fill the water around us.
I feel my eyes burning…my lungs…my entire body feels like it’s protesting.
I need air.
We need air.
But the barrier isn’t breaking.
No matter how hard I pound on it, I can’t get us out.
I do a mini somersault and aim my boot at the barrier instead.
Nothing.
My lungs feel like they are about to explode and there’s pressure in my head as if my veins are about to burst.
I raise my leg one more time, but my strength is gone…
I can’t even kick forward one more time.
We are about to die.
I stare outside the orb, outside the barrier at the water surrounding us.
Freedom…so close…
As the last of my strength leaves me, something large and dark moves in the water.
A fish, or reeds maybe…I’m not quite sure.
Vaguely, I realize my body is drifting away from the barrier, floating away and I have no strength to stop it.
And Sam…Mina…they’re drifting too.
The dark shape draws closer and somewhere in my mind a thought comes forward.
That’s not a fish.
Far too large to be one.
It feels like a dream. Like time has ceased to exist and I am simply just…floating.
A sort of peace settles over me as the dark form materializes into a man.
That man.
I hadn’t imagined him.
He comes close, his hands pressing against the outside of the orb, and his eyes lock with mine.
Liquid gold…like molten lava, they pierce mine, and I wonder if he’s real or a figment of my imagination.
His features are indiscernible.
He is faceless. He is all black.
All I can see are those eyes.
He raises a hand and I imagine his fist shining with the same sort of white energy that had crawled over my skin.
As my consciousness wanes, the barrier of the orb breaks apart and he is suddenly before me.
Eyes that aren’t human look down at me but I’m too far gone to react.
I think…
I think this is the end.
Chapter Six
FER’RO
There is movement within the Scrit.
It has passengers.
I climb down its outer shell just in time to see them inside.
It’s pilot is dead. I made sure of that.
Our missiles had aimed straight for the central core that held the Gryken.
It had been unaware of our arrival, walking with its shields down.
But even with its shields up, it stood no chance.
A whole world had been destroyed while we’d discovered how to kill the Gryken, and we aren’t afraid to use that knowledge now.
What we hadn’t known though, was that the Scrit had been carrying passengers…
I’m thrown off the vessel as it hits the water and I have to backtrack to find it again. I reach it just in time to see the creature, the passenger, inside.
Long brown filaments float above its head. It is floating backward, its limbs outstretched, but I note one thing.
The calmness in its eyes.
It sees me and for a moment…I pause.
My symbiotes, my ba’clan, writhe over my skin.
They can feel it too.
The being’s cry for help, though no sound comes from its mouth.
It is dying.
We have to save it.
My ba’clan charge as I aim my fist, slamming into the Scrit’s dome.
The vessel is no longer invulnerable, and it shatters before me.
As the being floats away, I reach for it.
The first thing I notice is how small it is. Frail.
The body is weak as I take it into my arms I realize it is also…limp.
And there are more of them.
Two others within.
Also unconscious.
I sense one of my brethren approaching and signal to him.
I cannot save the others, or this one will perish.
It is obvious this species cannot breathe under water. If I do not bring this being to the surface, it will die.
A simple mental command is all I need and my ba’clan activate, aiding me toward the surface.
A message thrums from my throat, the vibrations carrying through the water to my brethren.
“More below.”
I hear a response as more of my brethren dive.
If we’d known anything about this species, we would have been better able to strategize.
But they are unknown to us.
A distant species—one we have never seen nor made contact with before.
From a world, far, far away we came to save them.
To help.
The last set of Vullan warriors committed to one final task.
After travelling across the stars for so long, seeing the Scrit made us thrum with rage pent up for what felt like eons.
The scourge we had chased across the galaxy was here.
And…we were late.
The planet was already destroyed.
Even as I think about the Scrit sinking below me, my arms tighten around the being I’m holding as anger floods through me.
My ba’clan writhe, sensing the rising emotion but I cannot help it.
We left Edooria with a sole purpose.
To reach the next target before the Gryken did.
To warn them.
To save them.
To stop the same thing that happened to us…to Edooria…from happening to them.
But…we failed before we even had the chance to begin.
Neither had we known the Scrit had passengers on board. If we had known, would we still have attacked?
But what feels like eons in the cosmos, travelling across the stars to get here, had only created a burning need to destroy the Gryken…as they had destroyed us.
It is possible we acted too quickly. Frustration can do that to a Vullan.
But the satisfaction of seeing the Scrit fall was worth it.
I grip the being to me as I rise through the water.
I can feel the liquid even though not an inch of my skin is touching it. I can feel their reaction to it—my ba’clan. They are as happy to see it as I am and there is an urge to decompress and feel it against my bare skin.
When was the last time that I felt pure water like this?
The next thought slams into me hard.
Water.
There is still water here.
Maybe we are not too late after all.
My legs sink into soft earth as I bring the being to shore.
It’s still limp, its head hanging back to reveal the soft, pale skin of its neck.
I climb away from the water and set it down on the damp earth.
Behind me, I’m aware of my brethren moving toward the Scrit’s wreckage. Above us, our ship camouflages, blending into this planet’s strange blue sky.
The being is still limp as I set it down and for the first time, I get a good look at it.
Brown filaments cling to its head. Its face is smooth with a narrow nose perched above strangely plump lips.
Its lips are cracked and bruised and I can already see the beginnings of other dark bruises forming on the being’s face.
My gaze slips down and I pause.
It is so…small.
Frail.
Weak.
Its body is so thin that I cannot tell whether it is male or…
Its strange suit is ripped in several places revealing more soft skin underneath.
Round mounds settle on its chest, and one of the pert buds peek through its suit.
I am no fool…
It is obvious what I am looking at.
I have no doubt the being before me is female.
A female.
I kreen, the sound vibrating from my throat to culminate in a roar.
A female.
My brothers respond to my kreen; I hear their clicks when they hear my message.
We have found a female.
