Chapter 5
Rayne and I watched in horror as the first flap of skin slithered away from the Karaak soldier’s face. It opened wide and stretched out from its face, and then the second piece followed suit and unfurled like some kind of infernal ribbon. As soon as that was done, the two smaller pieces of skin that secured its mouth closed peeled themselves apart, revealing rows of razor-sharp teeth.
Saliva dripped from its mouth, and through the gaping hole on the side of its cheek, I was able to see the hydraulic mechanism that had been inserted into its skull start to move. The Karaak opened its mouth as the device sputtered to life, and then it let out a shrieking sound that pierced my eardrums.
But the real horror was that I could see almost everything as the mouth stretched wide, and that included the long, strong tongue that started to snake its way out from between the deadly rows of pointed teeth. Its jaw dislocated and opened so wide that it could have swallowed my whole head in one go. It shrieked again, and I stepped back out of pure disgust.
And then I saw its tongue jerk.
“Move!” I shouted as I shoved Rayne to one side and then dove out of the way to the other.
The tongue struck out between us, where we had just been standing moments ago. Rayne almost fell into one of the puddles of acid but managed to avoid it by the skin of her teeth. Bob stopped me from stepping in a puddle by placing his yellow body in between me and the dollop of it, but I had to fight to stay upright.
I turned back to see the Karaak’s tongue retract slightly, and then it whipped it around again. I ducked underneath it and fired my gun at the creature again, only this time I had it set to fire real bullets to see if those could make a dent. However, it had already moved out of the way, so the lead bullet just smashed into the side of the already dead ship.
The Karaak shrieked again, angered at the fact I had just shot at it for the second time. It rounded on me, but instead of lashing out with its tongue again, it opened its mouth as wide as it could while its fiery eyes locked on mine. For a moment, I wondered what it was doing.
And then I heard it.
At first, it just sounded like some tinnitus in my head. But then it got louder and louder, like a thousand people were screaming into my ears all at once. I clamped my hands over my ears and turned away from the beast, but its voice, or voices, penetrated my hands and the suit, and then bored its way into my brain. I groaned at the sensation of a million bees filling up my mind. and for a moment, I thought the top of my head might blow off, but then the sound suddenly stopped.
I looked around and saw Rayne holding her fire-launcher in her hands and a flaming ball heading right for the Karaak’s head. Everything slowed down as the blast of fire wrapped itself around the Karaak’s injury, and then the alien stumbled as it tried to turn away. The armor still protected the Karaak from any serious harm, but it was off balance and unable to defend itself.
So I fired the rifle again, only I used the laser mode on it. Nothing seemed to affect it no matter where I hit it, so I had to try everything I had at my disposal. This time, it cried out in pain and anger, and I watched its body stiffen for a second as the blast hit him.
But still, it didn’t go down. It shook it off like water off a duck’s back.
“What is with this thing!” I shouted.
“Will, the ship is ready to fire,” Francine said through Bob.
“No!” I said. “Don’t fire at the Karaak! You’ll destroy the ship in the process. Hold your fire! Shit--”
What I was saying was cut short when I felt something wrap around my ankle. I looked down to see the Karaak’s tongue coiled around my shin, and a moment later, I was on the ground. The tongue was insanely strong, so much so that, even through the suit, I thought it might crush the bones in my leg. It started to drag me across the ground, and I looked up to see the Karaak’s hungry eyes looking at me as it pulled me toward it. I reached out to try and grab something to hold onto, but there was nothing but rocks and acid.
“Will!” Rayne shouted as she started to run toward me and the creature.
The tongue suddenly let go of my leg, swiped Rayne out of the way, and then grabbed hold of both of my feet in the space of a second. Rayne flew through the air and slammed into the side of the ship. She crumpled onto the ground, and while she wasn’t unconscious, I could see her struggling to push herself back up.
I wrestled against the Karaak’s tongue, but there was no way that I was beating this thing in a strength test, even with the help of the nanobots coursing through my body.
And I was now almost close enough for it to reach out and gut me, so I needed to act fast. I took in its leathery skin and indestructible, mechanical parts, and then glanced back at its gaping mouth and wet tongue that seemed to almost have a mind of its own.
Then I got an idea. The Electro-Launch bullets didn’t have much of an effect on the exterior of the creature, but maybe it would work better from the inside.
The tongue dragged me along the hard ground and started to snake further up my body. I felt the pressure of it around my waist, and I knew that it was now or never. I raised my gun, swapped to Electro-Launch, aimed, and fired a single shot.
I watched the silver bullet soar through the dusty air and lodge itself right at the back of the Karaak soldier’s throat. The kinetic force of it knocked the creature’s head back, which momentarily tightened its tongue’s grip around my body. Then, I felt the tongue tense up, as though it had been turned to stone. I looked up and watched its whole body go stiff for a moment, and then it fell to the ground. The tongue finally relaxed, and I scraped it off me and scrambled to my feet.
I aimed my gun at the mouth and fired two more times. One could never be too careful when dealing with these things.
I heard footsteps beside me and saw Rayne trudging over to me. She massaged her head slightly, but she seemed to be alright.
“You okay?” I asked as she arrived next to me.
“Yeah,” she sighed as she looked down at the Karaak’s corpse. “I definitely prefer them dead.”
“I think everyone does,” I chuckled. “At least we know how to kill them now.”
“It still took two of us to take it down,” she said with a shudder. “These things are strong.”
“I wasn’t expecting it to be easy,” I replied.
“I suppose not,” she said as she kicked the tongue.
It squelched slightly, and some of the Karaak’s saliva dripped onto the ground. It was thick and slimy, and I grimaced as I realized that the lower half of my body was coated in the stuff.
“That was close,” I said. “I almost turned into that thing’s next meal.”
“And what a waste it would have been,” she said as she looked over at me.
We held one another’s gaze for a moment, and I felt my cheeks flush red. She chuckled at that, and then she turned to look at the Karaak ship. It hadn’t moved since we had arrived, but there was still something about walking into the literal belly of the beast that didn’t sit well with me. Still, we needed to go inside and find out if there was anything of use. We also needed to figure out if we could get it back to the colony so the Lilacrons could study it.
“Come on,” I said. “Let’s go inside.”
“Keep your gun ready,” she said as we walked over to the doorway that the Karaak had opened. “These things don’t seem to want to die.”
“Unfortunately,” I replied. “Come on, Bob.”
The robot beeped in agreement and then followed us as we stepped inside.
It was dark inside the ship. The lights had failed, most likely when I’d flung the ship into the side of a planet. Luckily, my headpiece had built-in night vision, and Rayne’s eyes were naturally adapted for exactly this type of scenario. So both of us were able to see almost perfectly in the blackness.
The doorway led through an airlock and into a hallway. There seemed to be only one floor on this ship, but the surface area was still about four or five times my ship. We had entered through the door at the halfway point on the creature, so the corridor split off to the right, toward the head, and the left, toward the tail.
“Heads or tails?” I asked.
“Head first,” Rayne said.
“Righty-ho,” I replied.
I turned right and started to walk down the corridor. I walked slowly so I could study our surroundings and scan for other survivors, and I made sure I kept my rifle at the ready. Although I had put on a calm front, I was secretly nervous to come up against one of the Karaak again, especially on its turf and in such an enclosed space. Still, we had figured out one way to kill the things, so as long as I could get a clean shot down its throat, we’d be alright.
Right. No big deal.
Honestly, it had disturbed me that the Karaak seemed immune to almost every weapon. The creature had shrugged off the first couple of Electro-Launch bullets as though they were flies on some fruit. It had hardly felt the usually deadly pulse of electricity that the shot had emitted. It had even held it between its fingers and felt nothing.
And what was that sound that it had emitted out of its mouth? It had been horrifying and painful, and the worst part was that as soon as it had its eyes and the direction of its voice locked on me, it felt inescapable. It was as though it had multiple voices inside it, and when they had burst out at me, it had been almost unbearable. It was obviously a way of incapacitating its prey, but it worried me that it was so effective. I made a mental note to talk to Francine about blocking the sound, but first, we had to finish searching the ship.
The corridor inside the Karaak ship was just wide enough for us to walk down. It went all the way to the head, and as I turned back, I could see that it ran all the way down to the back of the ship as well. There was a door at the head-end of it that I assumed led into the cockpit, and there were two doors on either side of the hall. There were also clear parts of the hallway that doors could slide across if they wanted to seal it off, but for now, they were open.
It was strange how normal the inside of the ship looked. I don’t know what I’d been expecting except maybe soft, flexible walls that could easily bend back and forth. But everything looked like the usual metal walls except for small sections every few feet that reminded me of a bus I’d once seen on a trip to Chicago. The bus was more like two smaller buses joined by what looked like a giant accordion, and that was what I was looking at again. But other than that, none of the creature’s insides were visible from where we stood.
Our footsteps sounded deafening in the silence. I could hear Rayne’s shallow breathing behind me and the rustle of our movements as we tiptoed down the hall.
When Rayne and I reached the first doorway, I turned back to look at her. She gave me a nod, and then I pressed the button beside the door.
It slid open, and I stayed to one side of the doorway with my gun raised, just in case one of the bastards came running out at us again.
I waited for a couple of moments for any sounds of movement, and then I poked my head around the doorway and peered inside.
“Whoa,” Rayne said as she walked straight into the room.
She couldn’t help herself. Her curiosity had been officially piqued. As had mine, so I followed her inside a second later.
We appeared to have walked into their intelligence room, meaning Rayne and I had hit the jackpot. There was a lot of tech inside that I didn’t recognize at all, but somehow, none of it had been damaged in the crash. Some of the screens and computers had been displaced on impact, but nothing looked broken or shattered. I would have fist-pumped the air if I wasn’t so paranoid that we weren’t alone inside the ship.
“We have to get this ship back to the colony,” I said. “Imagine what we could learn from all of this.”
“This could change everything,” Rayne said excitedly.
“Let’s have a look around the rest of the ship,” I replied. “There’s not much we can do with this stuff here at the moment, and I want to make sure there aren’t any more survivors.”
Rayne nodded, and then both of us stepped back out into the hall. I pressed the button and closed the door behind us, and then we moved on to the next door. It opened to reveal a storage area filled with boxes that had toppled to the floor. Each one was made of metal and tightly sealed, so it could have been ammo or food supplies. Either way, it seemed smarter to let Francine scan the things before we tried to open them, so once we were sure there weren’t any Karaak hiding in the room, we stepped back into the hallway.
That just left the cockpit at the front of the ship. I could feel my stomach start to tighten a little bit as we approached the door at the end of the hall because I knew that this was the place where most of the crew had probably been when the ship went down.
It turned out that my stomach tightening was justified, but not because of the Karaak.
The cockpit was the only part of the ship where it was obvious that we were inside an enormous creature, and it was a harrowing sight to behold.
When I first walked in, the room looked not too different from the cockpit in my ship, with the two seats at the helm and the control panel, and then a couple of chairs behind those at the sides. But then I looked up at the ceiling, and all of the breath rushed out of my lungs.
The creature’s brain was suspended above us, strung up by some strong metal poles. It was undamaged by the crash thanks to the hydraulics that kept it stable, but it was the thousands of wires leading to different parts of various control panels that was the most disgusting sight.
The wires were wedged into different parts of the creature’s brain, which had a violet tinge to its otherwise gray matter. There were also black marks where some of the wires had clearly shorted, and something I suspected was blood dripped from a gash near a pipe.
So this was how they controlled the creature. It looked painful and raw, and even imagining having that many wires and leads wedged into every inch of my brain was enough to give me a second-hand headache.
“How could they do something like this?” Rayne gasped. “It’s barbaric.”
“It is,” I agreed. “But it’s also genius. Think of the level of intelligence these things must have to be able to map out exactly what every inch of this eel’s brain does, and the intricacy of then working out where to put the wires so that they can control the creature entirely. It’s insane.”
“Insanely awful,” Rayne said. “You’re not seriously impressed with this?”
“I am,” I replied. “But that doesn’t mean I think it’s right for them to do something like this. There are better uses for this kind of knowledge.”
“Oh, really?” she said as she crossed her arms in front of her.
“I only meant that it’s fascinating how clever they are,” I replied.
“It’s not fascinating, it’s terrifying,” she snapped. “Don’t forget that these things are the enemy.”
“I’ve been fighting them longer than you,” I argued. “They’re coming after my people next, not yours. And right now, I’ll take every bit of information about these bastards that I can get my hands on, and if that means I have to admit that they’re smart, then fine, I’ll do that.”
I stormed out of the cockpit and marched down the hallway. I thought Rayne might call after me, but we were both equally stubborn, so instead, she waited until I was far enough ahead that she didn’t have to walk next to me. Bob remained between us, and he beeped in a way that reminded me of a child asking his parents not to argue so much.
I wasn’t proud of the way I had spoken to her, but I also didn’t entirely regret it. I knew she was freaked out about the brain, but all I had done was point out how advanced the Karaak were, and she had bitten my head off faster than the Karaak soldier we’d just killed tried to.
She was acting like I was suddenly their biggest fan, even though she knew that couldn’t be further from the truth. Those genocidal maniacs were after my planet, too, not hers, so what right did she have to tell me just how bad they were?
It was ludicrous. No, I told myself, I don’t regret one thing I just said. She could stew in our disagreement for a little while longer, but there was no way I was apologizing.
I didn’t stop until I was standing in front of one of the last two closed doors on the ship. I opened it without bothering to check for Rayne, and I found myself staring into a bunk room with four bunks.
Two of the bunks were occupied by some very dead Karaak, who had been crushed by the top bunks on impact. I shot them both just to make sure, and then moved on toward the last room.
The air between Rayne and I was heavy and awkward as she trailed behind me, and while I didn’t want it to distract me from the task at hand, it clearly had gotten to me, or else I wouldn’t have turned back to her when I was right beside the last doorway.
“And another thing--” I began.
Suddenly, the door opened and a piercing scream reverberated down the hall. I covered my ears, as did Rayne, and at the same time, something pushed past me. It slammed Rayne into the wall hard and darted toward the exit.
“No!” I shouted as I hurried over to her.
“I’m fine,” she slurred. “Go.”
“But--” I began.
“It’s getting away!” she said as she gave me a weak shove. “Go!”
I reluctantly left Rayne inside the ship and followed the final Karaak out of the doorway and into what passed for daylight on the planet. It was injured. I could tell by the way it was holding its left arm. It turned back and screamed at me again when it realized I was following it, and I stumbled and put my hands over my ears again.
Then, it turned tail and ran as fast as it could across the barren dwarf planet. It was headed toward a clump of high rocks just across the way, and I knew that I had to catch it before it found a good hiding spot and disappeared for good.
So, I took off after it and ran full tilt toward it.
It was incredibly quick, but thanks to the addition of my new nanobots, I was able to close some of the distance between us. I switched my gun to laser, since I now knew that the Electro-Launch would only work in the mouth, and I fired a few blasts just to slow it down.
Of course, shooting while in a full run isn’t very accurate and the Karaak dodged behind rocks, so the shots missed. But the space between us was growing shorter, and when the alien stumbled, it was time to push myself even harder.
But then its tongue lashed out and picked up a large rock.
“Shit!” I grunted just before the huge stone came flying toward my head.
I shot the rock out of the sky with my laser, but the smaller pieces rained down around me. Thanks to the suit, I hardly felt them land on me, but it had slowed me down.
The Karaak soldier had reached the rocky maze ahead and clambered up one of the huge stones with ease. The hydraulics and mechanisms inside this alien’s body were clearly still functional as it traversed the rocky field with ease.
By the time I had reached the first rock, it had almost disappeared from view. I took a run at the stone and leaped up on top of it. I landed in a crouched position, stood up, and took off running across the top of the rocks, jumping between each like stones across a river.
The Karaak had stopped long enough to watch me jump, and I could have sworn the thing looked surprised when I landed so easily. It started to run again, but at least it knew now that I wasn’t such an easy opponent.
It was harder to close the gap, though, and there were plenty of rocks up ahead where the thing could hide. The awe I’d first felt when I’d stared at the surface started to give way to fear as I realized that the giant rocks were now a labyrinth that I would have to navigate, and like the minotaur, the Karaak had the advantage.
I fired a few more shots at the Karaak when I could, but just as I had expected, it climbed up onto another boulder, jumped off the other side, and disappeared from view.
“Dang it,” I growled as I launched myself at the rock.
I made it to the top without any problems, but when I looked down, the creature was nowhere to be seen. Behind these rocks were a maze of passages, and for a second, I cursed the fact I wasn’t sure which way it had run. But then I noticed a small trail of dust that was just settling back on the ground. There was no breeze around here, so this had to have been the direction the Karaak had run in.
I grinned eagerly as I began to sprint after my target. Now that I was back on a flat surface, I could close the distance again. Sure enough, after a few minutes, I could hear it running up ahead of me, so I followed the sound of its footsteps until suddenly, they disappeared.
I came to a halt in the middle of a clump of sturdy rocks and listened. Every time the wind blew overhead, I spun around in case it was the Karaak.
For a moment, everything was still.
“Where the hell are you?” I whispered as I scanned the area for any signs of the alien’s passage.
But the tracks suddenly stopped, like the thing had simply vanished into thin air.
“Damn it,” I said. “God, please tell me these things don’t fly as well.”
I finally froze in place and forced myself to listen for any signs of movement. I knew the thing was smart, but I also knew that it had to be hiding somewhere nearby. I just had to find it before it found me.
So, I followed the tracks until I reached the final couple of footsteps that I could find. They were near the edge of the rocky circle, and they were deeper than the others, as though it had suddenly ground to a halt here and then…
“Jumped,” I muttered. “Oh, crap…”
I looked up just in time to see the creature leap off the rocks like a vulture above me, its weapons drawn, and its mouth open wide.