Everyone started to scramble, and Morag pulled out her flashlight and held it before her like a sword.
The insects moved fast in a flurry of legs and antenna. It didn’t matter to Morag whether they were hungry or just frightened, there was no way she was letting them anywhere near her. She didn’t want to get bitten, and certainly didn’t want any goddamn punctures in her suit.
Erikson was like a machine, aiming and firing, and never missing, as she exploded the things one after the other. Then as fast as they were vomited onto the ground, they were gone. The revolting bugs disappearing into the mist or burrowing back into the slime. The huge parent insect with its head obliterated had walked itself into a rock and continued to try to walk forward even with its path blocked.
“Okay everyone, fun’s over, get back in here,” Erikson demanded.
Morag turned to back up toward Erikson, waving the flashlight in front of her, but the baby monstrosities were gone. Behind her, Erikson sounded impatient.
“I said, everyone get bac… “
“…ack!”
“…aaaaack!”
“Huh?” Morag half turned, keeping an eye out for more of the bugs. “What?”
RG3 projectiles flew, splattering the mud, drilling into the weird tree stump things and blasting fragments from the rocks.
Morag dove out of the way then propped herself up. “Hey, watch ou—” She froze.
The female HAWC was hanging in the air, and something had hold of her. Morag’s mouth dropped open. The thing was huge; standing enormously tall on two legs. It’s elongated head grotesque and sunken into its shoulders, and centered with two large ink-black eyes that had smaller eyes dotted around them. The body was mottled, heavily muscled and its segments separated into distinct plating-like armor.
“Oh Jesus, no, no, no.” Morag scurried to her feet and backed away, feeling her stomach turn over from fear. She saw that the hand that held the woman by the throat was a match for the one that Alex Hunter had thrown before them. This was one of the things that had taken Steve Knight.
She continued to scuttle backwards until she bumped into Anne, who screamed, and then she and Russell ran in the direction of the HAWCs. But her knuckleheaded cameraman sprinted madly the other way into the mist.
“Calvin!” she yelled as she continued to retreat.
Erikson struggled vainly in the grip of something that out-muscled her by ten to one. Her rifle had been dropped or maybe pulled from her hands — did the creature also know to do that?
The thing then raked one hand down her body from her neck to her ribs, peeling back the heavily armored suit like it was nothing more than paper. Morag saw that the flesh was also rent and blood immediately welled up and ran down Erikson’s side. Erikson struggled, one hand on the iron-like grip at her throat and with the other arm, she used the point of her elbow to lash back against the pumpkin-sized head again and again.
Morag looked at the flashlight in her hands, wishing she had a shotgun. But the thought of getting closer petrified her, while the tough female HAWC never gave up fighting for a second. She wondered at the fortitude of these people, where she would have been screaming her lungs out or perhaps have fainted from fear, this woman fought on, with nothing but her body, curses, and gritted teeth.
Erikson reached down to pull a blade from her belt and then slashed and stabbed at the hand. But the knife didn’t penetrate a hide that seemed tougher than the hardest of leathers.
The thing dragged Erikson closer to itself and bent its monstrous head forward. The mouth opened, and telescoped out like the jaws of a fish from the sunless depths of the ocean.
“No…!” Morag knew what was coming and threw the flashlight with all her strength. But to her horror, she actually struck Erikson in the chest. It made no difference as the thing’s mouth fixed at the valley of her neck and shoulder and then wetly burrowed in.
It was only then that Erikson screamed, but only for a moment as her vocal chords were severed when the long teeth sawed through flesh, tendon, and cartilage, ripping away a double fist of meat. Her head flopped bonelessly to the side, and her eyelids fluttered like a pair of pinned moths.
Projectiles riveted up the creature’s hide. In a blink, it vanished, taking the female HAWC with it.
Alex Hunter sprinted in the open, and then looked about to go after it.
“No!” Morag screamed. “Don’t — she’s already dead.”
Alex turned to her.
“She’s gone. I think… I think, they want you to go after them.” Morag looked around. “They’re smart, picking us off one at a time.” She ran toward Alex, keeping one eye on the swirling mist. “I think it knew she was the one with the weapon — it disarmed her first.”
Alex’s head tilted back for a second, and she guessed he must have been cursing. She could see his eyes were screwed shut, but the more she stared, she realized it looked more like he was arguing, through gritted teeth.
“Alex…” She wanted to reach out to him, but hesitated. Then changed her mind and grabbed his arm.
After another few seconds, he lowered his head and she let go. He waved her closer.
“Come on.”
Alex backed up, keeping his weapon trained on the thick haze. “We’ve got Anne and Russell with us, but where are McIntyre and Renner?”
She pointed. “Out there. We need to go after them.”
Alex faced where she pointed and stared out into the fog for a few moments. “No, they’ve gone too far now.” He continued to let his eyes search the soupy air. “They’re on their own.” He turned away. “Let’s go.”
“But…” Morag paused to look back out at the curtains of mist, and then sighed. Hope you can find us, Cal. All the camera equipment and footage was also now gone. She dropped her head momentarily — it was all for nothing. She groaned and then spun back to keep up with the vanishing Alex.
Calvin Renner ran, fell to the slime, got up and ran some more before he even realized no one was running with him.
I’m panicking… stop!
He slowed, and bent over heaving in oxygen and resting his hands on his knees. He straightened, still wheezing into his mask.
Calm down. Just calm — the fuck — down.
He gulped more air, and then turned one way then the next. Already his footsteps had been filled in with the sucking slime, so there wasn’t even a way to retrace his path.
“Oh, you dumb shit,” he gasped, still breathing hard.
He turned again, and took a few steps. The mist seemed even heavier, and he couldn’t see more than a dozen feet in any direction. Shapes loomed huge, like stalagmites sprouting weird branches that held bulbous pods dripping with slime. He looked up; inside the pods things wriggled like the fruits were about to give birth.
Gross. He looked down at his feet and saw that pools of what might have been stagnant water, boiled with repulsive life. And that looks even fucking worse. He bent closer to stare into one. Tiny, glossy, black things roiled and climbed over one another. They could have been tadpoles or eels, but had tiny hands that gripped and clung on. He grimaced and slowly straightened.
A squelch of mud behind him.
“Hello?” he turned, hopeful.
“Morag? Captain Hunter?” He waited a few seconds. “Hellooo?”
Nothing.
Another splash from out behind the walls of mist. He spun, but then there came more from behind him.
Renner spun again. “Please stop that.” He spun back. “That better not be you, Morag. Not fucking funny.”