She’d got this all wrong. This wasn’t about them, this was about the people outside. This was the group which contained one of the Marine guards who’d been shot when the raiders had made their move. The other guard having died in the first exchange. There were other invalids there as well and that included Clayton Barnes. She’d gone over to say goodbye when Markham’s group had been taken out. He’d been in a heavily medicated state and probably hadn’t even recognised her but he was still alive.

  The guy with the disruptor came forward and indicated for her to sit down but she ignored him. She had to see what was going on. Had to witness this atrocity.

  But, because of her position, she didn’t have a particularly clear view.

  Though her view was severely restricted, she could just make out the feet of the people stretched out on the floor and could clearly see the line of raiders behind them. They were checking and re-loading their weapons, comparing notes as though they’d just come off the shooting range. Everything seemed so blasé that she thought at first that she’d misunderstood. Surely, this couldn’t be happening?

  Then she saw Jeter, his white head of hair making him difficult to miss. He’d drawn a handgun and was striding over to the rear wall.

  There were three people on stretchers and one of them was sitting up.

  At this distance, it was impossible to tell but she thought that it must be Barnes.

  Whoever it was, Jeter didn’t wait to find out.

  He shot him once in the head before walking over and firing a second shot.

  He repeated this with the other two stretcher cases. One to the head followed by another to the chest.

  Jeter went back to his first victim, taking the time to check that they were dead before repeating the process with the other two.

  Someone moved over to talk with him while Jeter went through the rote action of checking and re-loading his pistol.

  At that moment, the main lights in the shuttle snapped off and LaCruz felt her ears pop as the cabin re-pressurised.

  Misdirection. Pure and simple.

  While LaCruz had been too busy contemplating her own fate, she hadn’t thought to consider the fate of the others.

  Which must have been their plan all along.

  If she didn’t know it then, she knew it as soon as she locked eyes with Deetz.

  That’s why the bitch was here. So she could watch LaCruz at just the exact moment her comrades were executed.

  Barnes, his feet destroyed by the cold, unable to even stand and face his demise like a man. Lying there like a wounded animal. Jeter must have thought he was doing him a favour.

  Which was fine. Because now LaCruz was going to be the one to return the favor.

  Deetz would just have to get in line.

  *

  They decided to stay on the hillside rather than return to the ship’s grim interior. Webster felt bad about it because he knew what their priority should be: to contact the other Confederation ships. But, since they’d had no luck so far tracking down anything that might be described as a comms system, he was loath to insist that they abandon their little haven in order to spend an uncomfortable night bedding down in one of the corridors.

  They both knew that this was an illusion they were dealing with here but, as illusions went, sleeping under the stars on a Tuscan hillside was a pretty good one. So, Webster had given in to Dalbiri’s insistent pleas. They could enjoy a break before they went back to searching the rest of the ship tomorrow. Though, Webster was privately concerned that when it came time to move on, Dalbiri would simply refuse.

  And there was little Webster could do to compel him. Despite his military background, Dalbiri was a civilian contractor when it came down to it. He might have been happy following Kekkonen’s instructions but there was no guaranteeing that he would recognise Webster’s seniority. Which was the main reason he didn’t want to push things with the big engineer. To get anything constructive done they would need to work together and he hoped that Dalbiri could see that. Having said that, he was rather pleased to be spending a second night out in the open.

  Besides, Dalbiri was the one carrying all the supplies. He’d brought a selection of MREs with him and Webster for one was glad that he had. Between them, they had managed to start a small fire and they sat opposite one another now holding their individual pouches over the flames, suspended on a twig. The trick was to gently warm the contents without singeing the bottom. If that happened, chances were that all you’d succeed in doing was to dump your food into the flames, possibly extinguishing them in the process. And Webster was hungry. Very hungry.

  “I’m going to say something in a second and I don’t want you to react,” he kept his eyes fixed on the MRE pack as he spoke.

  “What’s up?”

  “Don’t look, but over to your right, we’re being watched.”

  “You mean the wallflower thing?” Dalbiri said.

  “That’s what you call them?”

  “Makes sense, doesn’t it? They look like a big flower and they climb walls. What else you going to call ‘em?”

  “Good a name as any other, I suppose. Wallflowers it is then.”

  They didn’t speak much after that, just focussed on warming their pouches. Webster was too impatient though and used his teeth to bite through the top of the packet. Then he held it up so that he could suck out the contents. His was spaghetti bolognaise and it tasted pretty good, everything considered. It even had tiny lengths of pasta in it.

  Dalbiri cut the top of his pouch open with a knife and then produced a spoon with which he proceeded to eat.

  He was halfway through his dinner when he stopped and held up his spoon.

  “That’s five of them now.”

  Webster, who had been using his fingers to scrape the last bit of nourishment from his pouch, stopped what he was doing.

  “You sure about that?”

  “No. I think there’s more than that but I’m scared if I look I’ll frighten them away.”

  “What do you think they want? Could it be the food?”

  Dalbiri returned to his food. “I doubt that very much. More likely, they’re just intrigued. Trying to determine whether we pose a threat of any kind.”

  “That’s if they’re sentient. What if they’re just an extension of the main ship? Like servitors.”

  Dalbiri considered this. “Some kind of construct? That’d be interesting.”

  “It could give us some indication as to what we’re up against.”

  Dalbiri took another mouthful of food. Then he said, “You finished with that?”

  Webster considered his pouch. “Yeah, pretty much.”

  “Then, do me a favour. In a second, just drop it on the fire. Nice and casual, like.”

  Webster looked over at Dalbiri who raised his eyebrows as though daring him to do it.

  There was still some sauce left inside but Webster decided to indulge Dalbiri’s hunch and dropped the pack into the flames.

  The skin wrinkled instantly as the silver coating carbonised, the scrunching sound drawing the wallflowers’ attention. As they came forward, fixated on the flame, it was fairly easy for Dalbiri to roll over and grab one.

  He did it so effortlessly that he made it look like it was something he did every day but Webster’s admiration quickly turned to panic when the captured flower started bleating.

  There was no other word for it.

  Once it realised that it had been trapped, it threw its head forward and let off a long string of cries. All the time it was doing this, its body was rippling and pulsating, trying to tear itself from his grasp. Dalbiri, who was lying on his side, had to use both hands just to keep hold of it.

  “Use your jacket, man,” he shouted as he tried to find a stronger position.

  The creature’s bleating had become more insistent, more desperate even, but then it stopped and a long red proboscis snaked out as if searching for purchase. Webster leaned forward to get a better look at what was happening. The proboscis wasn’t smooth, as he’d originally thought, but covered with thousands of little, tiny hairs.

  “You’d better watch that,” Webster said as he shrugged off his jacket. “Looks nasty.”

  “Just grab the damn thing, will ya?”

  But before Webster could act, Dalbiri cried out and dropped the wallflower to the floor. Webster moved forward, holding his jacket out in front of him, but he was too slow and as he dived the wallflower bolted for it.

  By the time he’d gathered himself, he turned to see why Dalbiri was still making a noise and only to realise that he was close to being overwhelmed by three more of them. One of the flowers had its proboscis wrapped around Dalbiri’s forearm and, as it gripped tighter, he could see blood starting to well up. A second one had mounted Dalbiri’s stomach, its proboscis lashing at his face while a third had managed to wrap itself around his calf.

  “Get them off me!” Dalbiri’s voice was tight with pain.

  For a moment, Webster just stood there, not knowing what to do. It was a ridiculous situation for a grown man to be in but there was no denying Dalbiri’s obvious distress. The one which wrapped itself around his forearm seemed to be acting like a garotte, with blood dripping down his wound. And it wasn’t just how tight it was, either. It seemed to be capable of a subtle sawing motion which meant that if Webster didn’t do something it would soon be cutting through the flesh and into muscle.

  He made to grab the plant itself, using his jacket to protect his hands but before he could do so, he felt a sudden pain lancing up from his ankle. The pain was so intense, he could think of nothing else and when he turned around he saw that one of the wallflowers had lashed itself around his lower leg.

  In panic, he stamped down with his other foot, bringing his heel down onto the flower. But then he didn’t let up, grinding his foot down to prevent the thing from trying to escape. All the while, it was fighting against him, its barbed tongue tightening its grip on his other leg.

  The pain was indescribable but he kept on going, twisting his heel from side to side.

  Eventually, he was satisfied that the thing was dead. Still, he was taking no chances and kept it trapped under his foot while he carefully retracted his other leg. The fine hairs had managed to hook themselves under his flesh and as each one was pulled clear it was greeted with a sharp flash of pain. Still, compared to it literally cutting his leg in half, it felt incredible.

  Yet he still wasn’t in the clear. Four more flowers had moved up in an attempt to keep him away from Dalbiri who was now a good ten metres away.

  Dalbiri had been set upon by eight or nine of these things which had managed to snare him around the neck, arms and legs and were slowly dragging him across the grass. That was an impressive feat in itself but it wasn’t the most impressive thing.

  The most impressive thing was that they appeared to be working as a team trying to drag Dalbiri over to a large, looming pit which had appeared in the direction of the olive grove.

  Webster tried to push past the four wallflowers in front of him but every time he tried to do so, one or two of the plants would launch a stinging attack at his legs. One of them managed to slash him across the upper thigh, laying his flesh open as keenly as the sharpest blade. His attempts to lash out at them with his feet came to nothing. They had learnt from his attack on the other plant so that whenever he targeted one in particular, that one would pull back allowing the other three to surge forward, their proboscis’ tasting the air.

  By this point, it was clear that events had taken a darker turn with Dalbiri no longer calling out for help and Webster fast becoming desperate. The plants had succeeded in dragging Dalbiri to the edge of the pit and appeared to be readying themselves for the final push.

  Webster licked his lips, his heart hammering in his chest and realised that if he didn’t commit himself to do something soon it was going to be too late.

  Making a feint to the right, he took three long steps in that direction before shifting his weight completely to the other side in a body swerve his old football coach would have been proud of. He managed two more steps before hurling himself over the line of plants and landing heavily on his shoulder. The impact jarred his neck, but the trick worked, giving him the momentum to keep rolling until he regained his feet.

  Dalbiri was on the edge of the pit by now but must have still been conscious because Webster could see his fingers scrabbling in the grass, trying to gain purchase as the wallflowers strained to get him over the line.

  I just need to grab him , Webster thought, moving forward. Work out the details later.

  But even as he was thinking this, he realised that his foot was caught.

  Some kind of tripwire, maybe?

  Whatever it was, the result was the same and he hit the ground with enough ferocity to loosen some teeth.

  As he fought the urge to simply black out, his eyes strayed towards his friend who was teetering on the edge of the pit. Webster couldn’t see his face but he seemed to have at least some awareness of his predicament as he was working with his heels to try and drag himself clear of the brink.

  But then, at the last, as if by some pre-arranged signal, the plants which had hold of him all came upright in the same instant, flinging him over the edge.

  One of the flowers failed to get its proboscis clear in time and was snatched away as Dalbiri’s whole body disappeared into the abyss.

  In the silence that followed, the other wallflowers turned, one by one, in Webster’s direction.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Faulkner closed the channel and then sat back and wiped the sweat from his eyes. It was uncomfortably warm on deck and had been like that ever since they’d entered the debris field. He’d just finished going over the plan, looking for fresh ways that it could be improved on. It seemed fairly straightforward and while he was sure there was some way of tweaking it further, he just couldn’t think how.

  He took a quick look at the Renheim’s operational status, which didn’t make for reassuring viewing. With eight of the ship’s thirty-two compartments now glowing red, indicating a possible breach or a loss of environment in each, their systems were being heavily taxed. But that was the unavoidable price of forging ahead like this. There were going to be casualties. And, while they were going out of their way to avoid the larger sections of debris that didn’t mean that some smaller, undetected fragment might not find a way of inflicting a level of damage from which they wouldn’t be able to recover.

  The question was: did they carry on like this or did they take a risk? Because the longer this continued the fewer options they would have.

  “How are the fire teams coping?” he asked.

  “Not so good,” Schwartz admitted. “Of the six, only four of them are still responding.”

  “Might that be down to communication problems?”

  “That’s possible, but I’m pretty sure that we’ve lost at least one. Tony Adams’s team was clearing out the front basin when the compartment behind them was hit. The thing is that we assume that this debris is falling a straight line and that’s just not true. There must be thousands of cross collisions going on out there and we’ve got no way of tracking most of them.”

  An ensign came over carrying a pitcher of water and a tray of disposable cups.

  Faulkner took the pitcher and poured a cup for Schwartz and then one for himself. But before he’d taken a sip, Schwartz had drained her cup and was handing it back for a re-fill. Faulkner duly obliged.

  “Looks like you needed that,” Faulkner said.

  “I’m supposed to stay hydrated. I just keep forgetting.”

  “Must be difficult to keep on top of all this.”

  “You’re telling me.”

  She finished the second cup in three long gulps and placed it back on the tray. The ensign waited for Faulkner to finish before departing.

  Schwartz was poised to say something but hesitated, looking around her.

  “What’s that?” she said.

  Faulkner felt it too.

  Saw the evidence on his screens.

  A massive power surge.

  Then the rail gun fired. Once, twice, three times. The noise was enormous, force of it rippling through the whole length of the ship and, for a moment, Faulkner imagined what it was like to be inside the gun itself.

  It took a while for the tremors to cease.

  “Let’s hope that does the trick,” Faulkner said. “How are the lasers holding up?”

  “Poorly. They’re still operational but we’ve had to reduce their frequency of fire otherwise we’re in danger of burning them out.”

  “Okay,” Faulkner said, but he didn’t feel okay. With the shields failing they were relying on the point defence systems to vaporise anything that posed a threat.

  “What parameters have you been using?”

  “Nothing too sophisticated, I’m afraid. We’re currently only targeting fragments that are over a metre across.”

  Faulkner tried to envisage the damage a chunk less than half a metre wide could do.

  “And the rest?”

  “I don’t know what else to tell you, sir. We were always going to be close to the wire on this thing.”

  Faulkner’s ear-bead buzzed. It was McNeill.

  “Captain, I wonder if I might have a word?”

  The pair of them went over to join him. It was quicker that way and saved McNeill having to clamber on and off his chair.

  “What is it?”

  “I’m just looking at those last two impacts.”

  “And is there a problem?”

  “I think there might well be. They broke off rather more rock than we’d anticipated. My simulation suggests that if we continue on along on this particular vector there’s every chance we’ll be destroyed.”

  Faulkner looked over to Leyton for verification but the helmsman didn’t need to say anything. His eyes said it all.

  “Okay. Understood. So, what are we going to do about it?”

  “I believe there is a window of opportunity coming up between the second and third detonations.”

  Faulkner tried to remember the length of pause between the second and third rail gun blasts. No more than a couple of seconds at most.

 

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