Drenched in his blood, a terrified Karine stumbled backward and slipped, falling to the floor. Scrambling on her backside, pushing with hands and feet, she retreated from the table until she found herself pressed up against one wall.
In front of her, the monstrous emergent dropped off the table and onto the deck. Though the sausage-like skull was devoid of visible eyes, it was clearly scanning its immediate surroundings, as if taking stock. Shaking with fear, Karine managed to get to her knees, but could hardly bring herself to look at the thing. A dark stain spread down her pants, adding the curdled stink of urine to that of death and the creature.
Abruptly she realized that it had grown. Now the size of a domestic canine, the thing stopped searching the room to focus on her. Already its arms and legs were longer, the mouth more prominent. Its actions seemed to reflect curiosity, more than malice. As she finally brought herself to regard the little monster, it remained where it was, staring back at her eyelessly.
A moment, she told herself. Just give me a moment. Stay there, stay there. Watch all you want. A moment.
Slowly, slowly, she reached toward Ledward’s utility belt. It lay on the floor nearby, along with the rest of his clothes. A standard Security expedition belt, its pouches held food packets, water purification tablets, medical ampoules, a serrated survival knife…
Moving quickly, she grabbed at the sheath holding the knife, ripped back the seal, and pulled the blade. Gripping it tightly, she was just turning back toward the creature as its tail whipped forward over its head to impale her.
Staring open-mouthed through the port, her hands on either side of the window, Faris whirled and ran. Ran without thinking, without looking back. Her mind was drowning in screams, both her own and Karine’s.
Stumbling wildly, she slammed into a bulkhead, staggered and fell. For a moment the screams went away. Dizzy and bleeding, she picked herself up. There was nowhere to run. There was only the lander. And that—thing. Some kind of faintly humanoid being that possessed not a trace of humanity.
The comm. Omni-pickup. She shouted at the top of her lungs.
“This is Lander One! We have an emergency! Please come in. Captain Oram, I need you! I need everyone! Now!”
Exhausted but driven to break into a run, both by the proximity of the ship’s lights and Faris’ frantic cry for help, the team willed themselves to accelerate toward the lakeshore. By this time Walter and Lopé were alternately carrying and dragging the unconscious Hallet.
Puffing hard as he ran, Oram yelled into his pickup.
“Faris, what’s going on? What kind of emergency? Christ, answer me, Faris!”
Her reply was uneven. If she was moving rapidly through the ship, her voice would have to be transferred from one pickup to the next. The electronic response was fast, but it wasn’t instantaneous, and would have to adjust clarity and volume for the fact that the speaker was not standing still.
“Something got on board. Some kind of… animal or parasite. Hostile. Vaguely humanoid, but morphed—neomorphic. Came out of Ledward… he’s dead. Oh god, oh god! Please hurry… I’m afraid it’s…”
Communication failed.
Oram cursed the loss of contact.
“What? Say again? Faris, repeat. Come in Lander One!” There was no response. “Fuck!”
Paced by Daniels, he started to sprint. As the pair broke out ahead of the others, Lopé and Walter were held back by the need to carry Hallet. In the absence of orders to do otherwise, Cole, Rosenthal, and Ankor stayed with the sergeant. Overcome by his partner’s breakdown, Lopé didn’t think to order the other members of the security detail to go with the captain and Daniels.
Inside the lander, at least a portion of Faris’ dread gave way to determination. Running to the weapons lockers, she wrenched open an orange door and fumbled inside for a weapon—any weapon. Settling on a military-grade shotgun with half a dozen heavy shells secured to its side, she whirled and raced back toward the medbay, loading the weapon as she ran.
Around her, Oram’s frantic words, broken and distorted, echoed through the corridors. Having no time to reply, she ignored them now.
Gripping the weapon tightly, she slowed as she neared the medbay. Pausing there, she took a moment to catch her breath, to try and collect herself, before pressing her back against the wall and edging sideways until she could once again turn to peer through the port.
The creature that had erupted out of Ledward—the neomorph—was on top of Karine. She was screaming and her heels, bloodied, were slamming spasmodically against the deck. The creature was also shrieking—wordlessly, horribly, machine-like in its incomprehensibility.
Readying herself, Faris deliberately hyperventilated a couple of times, then punched the door control. The barrier slid aside and she stepped into the medbay.
The white neomorph was standing on Karine’s chest, shredding her face and torso. It might have been eating, though in that brief soul-sucking moment Faris couldn’t tell for certain what it was doing. Responding to the sound of the door opening, it spun and looked up from its horrid, gory perch.
Taking a step forward as she tried to aim the weapon, Faris slipped in the spreading pool of blood and liquid and guts. She fired while going down, but the shot went predictably wild and slammed into the ceiling. Leaping off the mangled body of the scientist the neomorph attacked—only to find itself equally without traction as it slipped and scrabbled to get a purchase on the bloody, slick floor.
The precious few seconds allowed Faris just enough time to scramble back through the door and slam the “close” button. Having gone in with the intent of helping Karine, she had discovered that her friend was beyond help. Now she had to try and save herself.
The door began to slide shut—only to have the creature insert a portion of itself into the opening. Screaming, cursing, she jabbed the obstructing white limb as hard as she could with the butt end of the weapon. Every time she knocked it back it returned, fighting with crazed energy to get through the gap, to get at her. Each time, the door tried to close, found itself jammed, started to reopen, then reclose.
With reserves of strength she didn’t know she had, she finally succeeded in shoving the weapon hard enough against the protruding limb to force it far enough back into the room to enable the door to shut and lock. But in the process, the weapon ended up in the room with the monster.
Turning, she ran back up the corridor. Behind her, motivated by an incomprehensible inhuman energy, the frenzied neomorph slashed and battered at the door, leaping and kicking. A crack appeared in the port.
Racing away from the booming, pounding noise behind her, Faris staggered into the lander’s cargo bay and wrenched another shotgun from the still open locker. There was no shelter in the empty bay save for a webbed divider. Feeble though it was she took cover behind it, trying to steady her shaking hands and the weapon they held. Automatically she loaded it, and then flicked off the safety.
Moments later the neomorph appeared, already grown larger than it had been just moments ago. It took only a moment for it to see her hiding behind the webbing. Without sound or hesitation it leaped toward her, its movements a cross between those of a spider and a baboon. She screamed and fired, point-blank.
Missed.
Emitting a metallic screech, the creature threw itself sideways, away from her and toward the open hatch. Still screaming and cursing, Faris tried to track it with her weapon. Repeated bursts tore up the webbing and the interior of the bay as they struck just behind the fleeing, dodging creature, sending shards of metal flying, blowing out lights, conduits, intersecting the open weapons locker…