*****
They were led into a round room. The lights flickered as they activated, and Jennifer saw there were cables running a thick pedestal in the center. With a swelling in her chest she realized she had seen a room much like this before. Not in life, but in a memory belonging to someone else... Titania. Alvin Stag’s magnum opus. But to her horror she also saw that there was something missing – on top of the pedestal there should have been a large amber crystal. An egg; an artificial womb used to grow the engineered life forms like Titania and the creatures that had assaulted them here. Perhaps someone else had already been here. Already taken it… and who else would have known about this place?
“You okay?” She heard Kaya ask.
Jen shook her head. “Ten said she had a bad feeling before coming down here…” although Titania hadn’t been in control of Tenley, the Queen had some sort of telepathic connection to those changed by her, which in most case she’d used to subdue the victim’s personality, memories and will. And they could all share thoughts and memories and experiences. Perhaps Tenley’s feeling had been an echo of something that had happened to Titania in the past… but, there were other explanations. Alvin Stag might have removed the crystal egg a long time ago, or any number of things could have happened to it. Speculating now when there was no evidence either way, other than Ten’s vague feeling, which could have just been bought on by her heightened senses, was pointless. And too late to do anything about it anyway. Jen shook her head once more. “It doesn’t matter. There’s nothing we can do about it right now.”
“Tie the prisoners up over there,” Tom ordered, “and then you two watch them. Rest of us will look around and see what we can find.”
“What about Lionel?” A man asked.
“Oh, I don’t think he’ll give us any trouble, will you, Li?”
“Erm… n-no,” the gentleman adventurer stuttered. Tom roughly slapped his shoulder.
“Good. You stay here and wait until we’re all ready to go.”
As the mercenaries went about following their instructions, Lionel furtively twisted his hunting cap between his hands as the prisoners were being bound.
“I feel I must apologize, ladies,” he said, “for getting you involved in all this.”
“No kidding, Sherlock,” Kaya snorted just as one of the men pressed down on her shoulder, forcing her to sit.
“All my life I dreamed of mystery and adventure, but… I was still just a boy playing make believe. I’m afraid, when it came down to it, I’m just too much of a… a…” he faltered, the others all squinting at him as he put his cap back on. “Well, once again, I’m sorry.”
As he walked away, Kaya observed, “well, that was odd.”
“No doubt Tom plans on using us as a diversion while he and the rest of them make their escape,” Jennifer surmised. “It’s the only reason he would have to keep us alive at this point.”
“Oh,” the punk nodded. “I guess that makes sense,” she said, resting her head back against the cold wall. “I’ve been thinking though…”
Jen muttered to herself, “well that’s a first…”
“What?”
“Nothing. Go on,” the blonde said with a facetious smile.
“Well, the universe is really, really big, and so, so old, so if there are aliens, some of them must have been around for millions of years. Yet in all the time, there’s no sign of them ever visiting Earth. Why not?”
“I see,” Jennifer nodded, “I think what you’re talking about is the Fermi Paradox.”
“The for my what now?”
“Enrico Fermi was an Italian physicist who realized the same thing you just did. That there are billions of planets in the galaxy, billions of chances for intelligent life to evolve. Even using slow moving rockets of the kind we’re capable of building now, it would only take about a million years for that life to have spread throughout the whole galaxy which is, again, billions of years old. Yet, we’ve seen no proof of any other civilization. No definitive proof, anyway.”
Kay made a ‘v’ with her brow and lips. “Yeah, well, it’s obvious isn’t it? It must be, because I just said it, but no one’s gonna talk about the Cade para-thingy in the future, are they? But some Italian guy says something that anyone else could have thought of and you’re like ‘oh yes, that Fermi guy said that…’”
“Well, he did, and to be fair said it first…”
“So it hardly took a professor, did it? Bet he wrote books about it, didn’t he?”
“Er… I… I don’t know. He might have written a paper… and he showed all the math, so…”
“So what?” Kaya huffed. “Maybe Lionel’s right and aliens are around all the time and we just don’t notice. Maybe probes landed, like, fifty thousand years ago, decided there was nothing interesting and took off again, or maybe stayed and turned into rust and dust. Or maybe the probes are so tiny we can’t see them.”
Jen was very confused. She had thought that Kaya would be pleased to know that a distinguished and well educated person agreed with her, but instead she just seemed irritated by it. “Okay,” she meekly offered. “It’s not like that’s the only thing he did…”
“Should hope not.”
Maybe, Jen thought, Kay believed that because she had thought of it, it therefore wasn’t an intelligent observation and that’s why it annoyed her. All her life, Kaya had tended to under rate herself in regard to what smarts she had. “Maybe star ships all get eaten by the space lizards,” the fair haired stargazed smiled, attempting to lighten the mood. “Anything is possible,” she shrugged. “But in the absence of solid evidence it’s usually best to go with the simplest explanation… that is, the one that requires the fewest assumptions. In this case, that all this technology was developed somewhere here on Earth.”
“I guess,” Kay sighed. “Be cool if it was aliens though.”
“Coolness has got nothing to do with whether it’s true or not. Besides, isn’t it also amazing just to think of how ingenious people can be? Even if they don’t always put that ingenuity to very good use.”
“Yeah, I guess,” Kaya smiled. “Sergeant Pepper’s was pretty, and I don’t Lennon and McCartney were actual Aliens. They were just from Liverpool or something.”
Sayuri, who obviously hadn’t been listening to their conversation, suddenly groaned. “You know, I always thought certain death would be harder to cope with. But now, what does it matter? I mean I was never going to shift these damn calculators anyway.”
“You still fretting about that?” Kaya asked.
“What’s the point of me even making it out of here alive if I’m not going to have a living?”
“You could sell them to students. They need them for exams and stuff, right? They’re not allowed to take phones or tablets inside.”
Sayuri scrunched her eyes as she considered it. “I… suppose I could put together a package with some rulers and other stuff…” the drummer lit up, straightening herself against the wall suddenly attentive and full of energy. “Yeah. Okay, good… that might work. So I’ve decided to live. Do we have a plan to get out yet?”
Tenley whined, “I need to pee.” The girl squinted across the room. Tom and two of the others had left to explore the rest of the bunker, leaving the blue haired woman and a young man of barely twenty to watch over them. They had hooked a laptop up to a terminal, likely to download data from it in order to sell later. She was standing back by the door while he was sat checking his weapons and watching over the transfer. Tenley pushed herself up on her elbows, then addressed the man. “Hey you! Major Minor or whatever…”
The young man exasperatedly turned away from what he was doing and demanded, “what?”
“I need to pee.”
“Jesus…” the man stood, frowning and shaking his head. “Alright… fine,” he slammed his handgun down on a case as he marched forward, past Lionel, and yanked the girl to her feet. “Come o
n…” he prodded her to shakily walk herself across to the center of the room, where the woman had marched out to meet them.
“We should probably just put the little brat out her misery,” she suggested as they turned their backs on the others to follow Tenley. They were all quite firmly tied, after all.
In the relative quiet of their surroundings, they all heard the click. The mercenaries slowly turned around to find one of their own guns being waved at them by a very shaky and nervous gentleman.
“Please,” Lionel stammered, “I have no wish for further violence, so, both of you, drop your weapons.”
The mercenaries exchanged looks, each dropping their guns to the floor as then slowly raising their hands.
“What are you doing, Li?” The young man purred, taking a little step forward. “I thought we all had an understanding here. You really ought to give me that thing before you get yourself hurt…”
“St-stay back!” Lionel demanded, furiously shaking his hand to remind them it was holding a weapon.
“All right,” he backed off a bit. “So what’s next, hmm? You got a plan?”
“I… umm…” obviously he hadn’t, and the others being still tied weren’t able to help either.
Tenley, stood in the middle of the room with her hands bound behind her back, eventually just rolled her eyes. “You should shoot her,” she suggested, nodding to the silver eyed female mercenary.
“What?!” Lionel gasped.
“Obviously they’re both going to try and rush and disarm you, so since the glamazon here looks like a tougher opponent than pretty boy, you should shoot her. It’s just logic. Oh, and you will only be able to get one shot off.”
The mercenaries and Lionel all looked agape at the strange girl who smiled and shrugged helplessly. The mercenaries then turned their heads menacingly at the gentleman whose eyes widened fearfully as he realized the girl was absolutely bloody spot on. He pulled the trigger just as they started to run, the woman taking a hit to the shoulder and falling. Lionel had no time to turn his weapon on the other one, as he was tackled to floor and curled up helplessly as the mercenary rained down his fists.
Ten winced and grimaced as she started to pull her arms apart, straining until the ropes binding her wrists snapped. The glamazon was getting up to help her ally, only to be tapped on the shoulder, looked up, and then was sent spinning back down into the murky depths of unconsciousness by Ten’s fist.
Lionel kept letting out little welps and yelps in response to every punch he took, until suddenly it stopped. He opened his eyes to see that the young mercenary who had been beating him was still there with his arm raised, but some kind of vine or whip had coiled around it. He struggled against it, but then was suddenly yanked off Lionel and pulled back across the room to meet Tenley’s foot flying in the other direction. As the girl landed gracefully on both her feet, the young man fell in a heap, joining his comrade.
“So,” Kaya said, watching from the side with Jen and Sayuri. “You’re feeling better, then?”
“Yes,” Tenley beamed, stretching and cracking her knuckles, “much better.”
“The others will have heard all that,” Jen pointed out.
“Yeah,” Kay shrugged and wrinkled her nose in Ten’s general direction. “You wanna stop preening over there and get us all out of these? Thanks!”
It wasn’t long before a handset on one of the fallen mercenaries cackled, Tom’s voice coming out of it demanding to know what had happened. “Ben? Are you there or not?”
The now freed Kaya sauntered across and pressed the button to reply. “This is ground control to Major Tom. Ben hit his head… he might be dead.”
After a moment, the radio cracked back, “Guess I underestimated you girls. But it doesn’t matter. The plan stays the same.”
“That the plan for you to continue being a massive dick all your life until you eventually die alone and unloved, drowned in spaghetti hoops and your own vomit?”
“Heh… not quite…” the ominous note of that lasted less than a second, as it then became clear exactly what he meant. The doors Tom and the remaining mercenaries had left through slid shut, while in the opposite direction was a hiss, shortly followed by high pitched howling.
“He’s opening the doors! Letting them in,” Jen said, in perhaps not the most astute observation she had ever made, but it was accurate. “He must have found another way back out to the entrance.”
“Well, can’t you just close them again with your magic iPad thing?” Sayuri asked.
“I could,” Jen shrugged sheepishly, “but they confiscated it again.”
Kaya’s body tensed as a second howl chilled her bones, closer this time. “Guess he’s not at all concerned about his own guys… I only said the fella might be dead.”
Sayuri sighed, “Larger share for the rest of them, I guess.”
“It looks like information is the only valuable thing left down here,” said Jen. “ELF’s and the crystal eggs… that’s far too dangerous. He can’t be allowed to leave with any of it.”
“I think we’ve more urgent things to worry about,” Kay reminded her as there was a third howl. “Can’t you use the computer there?”
“No time… check on those two and get ready to run,” Jennifer said, pointing Kaya to the mercenaries. “Ten, do you think you could get this panel off the wall?”
Tenley casually strolled to the panel in question, next to the sealed door. It was screwed quite flush into the wall – there was no way she could grip the sides of it as it was. So, after a moment of consideration, she punched the center of the panel, the dent lifting the sides enough to allow her to tear the thing away. “Like that?”
“It’ll do,” Jen said, then got to some hasty rewiring.
Lionel watched on with his mouth hanging open. “H-how did she…”
“Milk bones,” Kaya offered as an explanation.
The rewiring worked, as the door hissed as it slid open. “Alright,” Jen panted, “everyone go left. We should be able to loop back through the rooms to the entrance.”
The adults carried the very dazed and groggy pretty boy and glamazon through the doors, with Ten following just behind and just ahead of all the howls and chattering coming scurrying after them.
Jen and Ten had to open a few more doors, but soon they were back in the corridor they had first entered into, the creatures presumably having all chased them through the side rooms being led around in circle, hopefully making a few of them dizzy. However, the corridor was not empty as Tom and his remaining soldiers were hacking the bunker entrance.
“How the bleeping hell are you still alive?” The leader growled, deciding quickly to fix the problem himself and open fire. Jen ducked back behind the door as the shot pockmarked the concrete.
“We’re kind of between a rock and a hard place here,” Kaya exclaimed as the creatures were surely now about to catch up.
Ten rolled her eyes as she sighed, “you’re all totally useless. Guess I’ll save the day. Again.”
The girl unclipped a pistol from the glamazon’s belt before rolling out into the corridor and spraying bullets. Tom dropped his gun as one sparked off it, shaking his hand vigorously as the mercenaries around him were taken out in quick succession, but not before the entrance began to slowly grind and Tom could see his way to freedom.
“Screw this!” He yelled, lobbing a small metal egg back down the corridor before he turned and ran.
Tenley spat in annoyance, dived and rolled back again through and around the door where the others were waiting, feeling the ground shake from the blast behind her. She had barely recovered when one of the tulip headed dog things appeared, it’s bulbous head peeling and body trembling as it screeched at the girl. Its tongue whipped out, but this time she was ready for it, catching the tip in her hand and squeezing the juice from it as the creature rocked and squealed. She tugged and launched herself toward at the beast. She hadn’t been just telling sto
ries about having a grenade in her pocket either, but in the next second it disappeared down the monster’s throat. It shortly after reappeared in pieces on the walls and ceiling along with the creature’s guts.
“There’re more coming!” Jen yelled. “We have to go now!”
Fortunately, the concrete walls had held up and the corridor was largely free of obstruction, so it was an almost straight run for the entrance, which Tom had been thoughtless enough to leave open. The only problem was the other creatures were close behind and picking up their pace. They didn’t know exactly how many beasts there were, but it was doubtful even Ten could fight all of them, although she probably would have been willing to try.
“Look out!” Someone cried. As they were nearing the entrance one of the creatures dramatically increased in speed, bounding rapidly along the corridor and almost ploughing through the entire group. They dived out of the way in time, the creature skidding to a halt and turning to face them. Raising its bulbous head, it yipped several times. But then, instead of attacking again, it seemed to sense its own freedom was near. Feeling the cool draft from outside, it turned to face the entrance and for the first time in its existence ran out into the world above.
“Shit,” Kaya spat. “That’s bad, isn’t it?”
Jen was slightly grinding her teeth as told the others to “come on.” She found her tablet on one of the fallen mercenaries as she left, so could use it to reseal the entrance. At least for now they didn’t have to worry about other creatures escaping, although a more permanent solution was certainly called for somewhere down the line.
For now, everyone needed a moment to catch their breath, but they couldn’t afford to rest for long. “We’ve got to stop that creature before it hurts people,” Jen panted, “and find Tom before he escapes.”
Sayuri panted back, “why worry about him? Just let him go.”
But Jen shook her head. “I don’t know exactly what information he got from down there. I doubt he really does either. But I know the kind of people who would pay him for it aren’t the kind of people who should have it.”
Ten was examining the ground, looking for prints and disturbances and other things that only she could see. “He went that way,” she said with a nod. “The flower dog thing went over there… toward the town.”
“We should really give them a proper name,” Kaya suggested. “’Flower Dog’ just doesn’t seem appropriate.”
“Don’t bother,” Tenley said, stepping to walk toward the town as well, “they’ll be extinct soon. It’s what they get for making me feel queasy.”
“Alright. Then I guess the rest of us will deal with Tom…”
Kaya was suddenly blinded by a bright light from above, the wind picking up and whipping at hair and clothing. “What the hell is that?” Kaya yelled over the noise of an engine. It wasn’t clear anyone heard, but the two mercenaries they had rescued used the moment of confusion to run away without so much as a thanks. No-one was a very concerned about that, as another motor began to grind and whir and everyone simultaneously agreed they had the right idea.
Jen, Kaya and Sayuri ran toward the trees in Tom’s direction, Ten running the other as had been previously agreed. No one saw where Lionel went, and again it wasn’t something anyone was too concerned about as higher on their list of priorities was the fact that the bark and trees around them were all now shattering, exploding and splintering all around them.
“Helicopters…” Jen panted, “w-we must have tripped some kind of alarm.”
“Right,” Kaya yelled. “You know, I think next time we go out somewhere, I should choose the activity. A nice biker bar or something… astronomy is just way too dangerous.”