Absolute Zero (The Shadow Wars Book 4) (9 page)

They remained still and silent, for several seconds. Trent was about to give the all-clear, then he heard it. It was a kind of rumble that, as they listened further, resolved into a series of rapid tapping sounds.

It was coming from behind them.

“Shit, where's the next exit?” Trent asked, as he shuffled forward and shoved at Drake's boots.

“Five meters,” Drake replied.

“Good. We're getting out there.”

They kept going. The sound got louder. And, what was worse, the vent started to vibrate. Something was coming. They reached the vent. Trent cursed his inability to look back over his shoulder. Drake fumbled with the grate.

“Any day now,” he muttered, his skin crawling.

The sounds and the vibration picked up.

“I'm going, I'm going...
shit
,” Drake shouted, suddenly bashing his fist into the grille. It exploded outward and he disappeared through the aperture it made.

Trent hurried after him, hearing him shout in surprise. No time to think, just to act. Trent kept going until he grabbed the edges of the vent and yanked himself through. For a second, there was the gut-wrenching feeling of free-fall, then he crashed into something very hard and unyielding. Just a foot away, he could see Drake.

“Damn,” he moaned.

Trent tried to push aside all the pain he felt along his left side; his arm, leg and chest now hurt and he was working on a headache. He brought his rifle to bear and rolled over on his back so he had a clear shot on anything that came out of the vent. The noise was louder now and as it seemed to reach an apex, it fell away.

There was a moment of silence, then a high-pitched whine, almost machine-like in quality, and yet just animal enough to convey disappointment and frustration. Then the sound started up again, going until it receded into nothing.

The vent opening remained vacant.

“Shit,” Trent said after a moment, allowing himself to relax.

Drake chuckled. “Good ten foot drop there, man. Thank God for these suits.”

“I'd rather thank the guys that built 'em,” Trent said.

They got up and looked around. The pair had fallen into a cavernous warehouse, behind a massive stack of crates. Trent glanced up at the vent once more to make double sure nothing sneaked through it after them, then made his way around the edge of the crate. Drake followed, watching his back.

He hit the edge of the crate and peered around the corner. Nothing but a narrow alcove created by two stacks of crates. He couldn't see anything in it or beyond it, but the view was pretty slim. He moved down the alcove, barrel-first. Something flashed by the edge, making him freeze. He cursed sharply, then laughed, a nervous edge to his voice.

“What is it?” Drake whispered.

“Something up ahead, might be one of those fucking lizard things,” Trent replied.

He kept going. When he reached the edge, Trent did a survey of the area. A broader version of the alcove he currently resided in awaited his inspection. Twin rows of stacked crates extended away to the left and right. He leaned out further and spied an exit a couple of dozen meters away to the right. It should take them back into a main corridor.

“Come on,” Trent said, more to say something than anything else.

There was no way they were doing this stealthily. He didn't think you could hide from lizard people. So there was no point in shutting up now. The pair hurried down the warehouse, eying the shadows that hung around the edges of the area. Something moved to Trent's right, then something else ahead of him, to the left.

“Shit,” Drake murmured. “There's a lot of them.”

“At least half a dozen,” Trent said.

They made it as far as an open staging area just in front of the exit before they struck. As soon as the half-dozen or so dark figures were leaping from the shadows, Trent and Drake turned away from each other and covered their half of the room.

Trent squeezed the trigger, glad he'd remembered to switch on the three-round burst function and put a trio of holes in the chest of the nearest lizard thing. The creature let out a shriek as it was forced flat on its back. Trent put another three rounds in its face, then turned the barrel on the next nearest monster, firing another three rounds into the thing's open, screaming maw, shattering a few of its teeth in the process.

He aimed, fired, aimed, fired. His finger smoothly squeezed the trigger as his left hand guided the barrel of the rifle with an almost peaceful grace. There were four of them on his side. He put them down quick with the proficiency of a two-decade veteran. The gunfire ceased almost simultaneously. Trent turned around and spied another five dead bodies.

“What the fuck
are
these things?” he asked, grimacing at the black bodies and silver pools of blood.

“Creepy. Come on,” Drake replied.

They moved through the exit and looked down the length of the corridor they'd stepped into. Trent frowned as he realized something and activated his radio.

“So, Sharpe, you forgot to tell us where the security center is.”

Sharpe sighed.
“Same as the other building. Same layout. I heard gunfire, what happened over there?”

“More lizard men. And there's something in the vents, too, but we didn't get a chance to really see it.”

“Fantastic. Hurry up, I'll walk you through the process of raising the lockout. It's simple.”

Trent thought that strange, considering she and the other corporate dogs wanted the mercs to have as little contact with any terminals as possible. Not that it mattered, he surmised, as they walked down the body-strewn corridor. Any meaningful data was probably locked behind firewalls and password encryptions and all sorts of bullshit. Trent knew that he wasn't technically-minded in the slightest.

They reached the security center.

Trent opened the door, took a step in, then stopped. Drake shifted in past him, then stopped as well. They both stared for a long moment.

Finally, Trent activated his radio. “Uh...we found Sergio.”

“What do you mean? What happened?”
Sharpe replied.

“He's...well, skinned,” Trent said.

There was a long pause.
“Are you sure it's him? Is he dead?”

“He'd better be,” Drake murmured.

“Yeah, he's dead. And his armor is here. What's left of it,” Trent replied.

“Fuck. Anyone else there?”

“No, there's no one else in the room.”

“All right. Head over to the main terminal.”

Trent did as he was told. He spent a few moments running through the procedure of unlocking the door to the tram area, then raised this portion of the overall lockdown.

“What about power?” he asked as they headed back out into the main corridor.

“What about it?”
Sharpe replied.

“Trevor said we only had about two hours before everything goes dead and we freeze.”

“We've only been in the facility about forty five minutes. We should be able to finish our job before then.”

“And the others?”

“They're expendable, now get back here.”

Trent opened his mouth to protest, then froze as he spied something up ahead, further on down the corridor, about halfway in between them and their destination. For a second, he thought it was another lizard man, but he quickly realized that the dimensions were all wrong. For starters, it was about a foot or so shorter.

It was dark in color...only it seemed to be lacking a head. It looked like it was roughly humanoid, and it was crouched on the ground.

“What...holy mother of fucking God, what the
fuck
is that?” Drake whispered.

“What's happening?”
Sharpe asked.

Trent couldn't answer. His eyes seemed to be sliding out of focus, as though they couldn't comfortably look at what was being presented to them.

Slowly, the thing stood up. Even in the dim lights, Trent had a good view of it. The thing stood maybe five and a half feet tall. Its skin was dark and strangely reflective. It was, in fact, humanoid, complete with two arms, two legs and a torso. No head though. He'd been right about that. But that wasn't even the strangest thing of all.

Where its chest should have been, there was a circular hole with what looked like giant follicles of black hair growing from the inside of the chest wall, all of them pointed inward to meet in the middle. Otherwise, there was nothing there.

Trent and Drake watched in horror as the creature picked up an arm and fed it through the hole, in between the hairs. There was a distinctive hissing sound. What came out the back of it was just the bones, bleached white, picked clean.

They fell into a pile on the ground.

“Holy
shit
,” Trent said.

The creature turned, seemed to take notice of them and started running for them.

“
Fuck
!” Drake cried.

They both raised their rifles and opened fire. Both men emptied their magazines, blowing the creature into several pieces, spraying the ground around it with thick black blood.

“What the hell is happening? More lizard men?”
Sharpe asked.

“No...” Trent managed, reloading with trembling hands. “Definitely not. Something wholly fucking different.”

Sharpe asked more questions, but Trent didn't feel like talking just then. He wanted out of this place. It wasn't meant to be inhabited.

He and Drake gave the new thing a wide berth as they passed its corpse.

Chapter 08

–
The Tension
–

“Are we really just going to leave them?” Trent heard himself ask as the tram left the station.

“Yes,” Sharpe replied simply, sitting in the little driver's area. “We are.”

“What about Trevor?” Drake asked.

“He knew the risks when he came out here.”

“You know, I actually don't think he did,” Tristan replied.

“Well, I really don't give a shit what you all think.”

“How would
you
like to be left out here? Gideon, Stephen and Trevor don't deserve that. Sergio might, because God and maybe your corporate exec board knows what he's done in his no doubt long, illustrious career as a corporate dog, but the others don't.”

Here, Sharpe turned around. Trent thought it interesting that she'd opted to keep the door between the cabin and the cockpit open this time.

“And I'm sure Gideon and Stephen are squeaky clean, right? Because mercenaries are known for being upstanding citizens.”

“We're
honest
about the shit we do.”

“Yeah, until the cops show up.”

“Corporate-funded cops.”

Sharpe stared at him for a moment longer, her mirrored black lenses as featureless and empty as insect eyes. After a long moment, she turned around. Trent afforded himself a small smile. He wondered if Sharpe had once been a mercenary. It seemed likely. What was her story? Why did she belong to a corporation now?

The tram trundled silently along.

“This doesn't make any sense,” Drake said after a moment's silence.

“What do you mean?” Trent replied.

“The creatures...there doesn't seem to be any rhyme or reason to them. I mean, let's consider what we have so far. The lizard guys that have a hard-on for brains. It would have been strange enough by itself, but now we've got those...whatever the fuck those other things are. With the holes in their chests. God, those things are creepy,” Drake replied.

“We've only seen just the one of that kind,” Tristan said. “It could be unique.”

“You really want to go into the next building assuming that?” Trent asked.

Tristan frowned, then shook her head reluctantly. “No, I guess not.”

“To make matters stranger,” Drake continued, “we've also got a flayed guy. The lizard guys didn't do that, I think, they only seem to give a shit about brains. And those chest-hole guys apparently strip whatever they get their hands onto down to the bone. So what the fuck skinned Sergio?”

“Insane survivor?” Trent asked.

“I don't think so...”

“I guess I just don't want to rule anything out. Remember that job we took at that research outpost? We thought we were going in there to rescue the researchers from slavers or mercs or something, and it turned out they just went nuts?”

“Yeah, I guess so,” Drake murmured.

“We should probably just keep our eyes open for anything, coming from anywhere,” Tristan surmised.

“Don't forget the vent,” Trent said, the memory suddenly coming back to him.

Tristan was looking at him curiously but Drake was nodding.

“When we were in the vent, there was something in there. Didn't get a good look at it, but it didn't feel like any of the things we've encountered so far. It might be the skinner.”