Kenopsia (Book 1 of Pandora's Wake: The Nomad Chronicles)

Terror gripped Ashley as she careened down the wooded hillside at breakneck speed. The flight, in the dark, on unsure footing, was almost as terrifying as whatever crashed through the trees above them. Her legs ached with the effort of running and trying to keep herself from falling head over heels – as Magda had done when struck by the spore-ball. Her mind was beset by visions of her tumbling down the hill, suffering one bone-shattering collision after another. Tears streaked her face, her heart was hammering in her chest and her lungs seemed fit to burst.

“I can’t go on!” she muttered to herself “I can’t!” Her feet slid from beneath her. For one heart-stopping second she thought she would fall, but by some stroke of luck she regained her balance and slowed to a safer speed.

Ahead of her, the form of Esther Yadin receded into the darkness. The small Israeli woman seemed as sure-footed as a mountain goat. Even in the dark, she seemed able to hurdle obstacles and maintain her balance as if born to it. Ashley wondered, and not for the first time, what secrets Esther kept from the other nomads. So much about her seemed – unnatural – well, if not unnatural then certainly unlikely. For an office administrator.

The sounds of pursuit seemed to have receded a little, and Ashley risked stopping to look back for the others. In the darkness, she couldn’t see them, but she could hear them, struggling down the hillside with Magda. Had they shaken their pursuer? Then she heard it, crashing through the forest above her. She had been wrong to think they were losing it, the sound was certainly closer now. Then it roared!

The sound chilled Ashley to the bone, she had never heard its like before, at least not in anything but old monster movies from before the Event. It echoed through the darkened forest and seemed to freeze her blood.

It was answered by another roar. Not as close as the first, but that was scarcely a comfort.

She could hear the frightened calls of Magda and one of the men, the policeman she thought, but couldn’t be sure.

“Oh god, ” she thought, “They aren’t going to make it!” She could feel herself shaking; she wanted to run, but she was so exhausted she wasn’t sure she could. Instead, she scrambled towards a small rocky outcrop, and hid behind it, trembling in fear.

Pulling her handgun she looked at the cold metal barrel before pressing it to her own head.

“It’s getting closer!” Mathias cursed as the forest echoed with the roars of the creatures, “We aren’t going to make it!”

“Damn you, don’t leave me!” Magda screamed. Fear gripped the injured civil engineer. Whatever was out there was close now, and she knew it would be on them in a matter of minutes.

“We won’t!” Mathias insisted although he was ashamed to admit that it had crossed his mind. Only for a second, but it had, and he hated himself for it. He had visions of having to explain to Knut what had happened. In the next instant, he made a promise to himself. He would die here with Magda if he had to, but he wouldn’t leave her behind. Even if she hated him, he couldn’t let her be taken by whatever horror of the Other-Verse thundered through the wooded slopes towards them.

“Take her.” Ronan barked, letting go of the Pole.

Magda screamed, but if from fear or the pain in her injured leg Mathias couldn’t be sure,

“What are you doing?” the former policeman asked,

“Just go, I’m going to ambush it!” Ronan slid to a stop and scrambled behind a tree.

Mathias wanted to argue the point, but he didn’t dare stop. Instead, he stumbled on, his arm wrapped about Magda and hers draped about his shoulder as she half limped and half hopped down the hillside. It was treacherous going, in the dark, downhill, with patches of snow on the ground.

Behind him, the thunderous sound of whatever was chasing them grew louder. It must be huge, easily the size of a bull, probably bigger, from the sound it made as its feet struck the ground.

It burst out of the darkness at the gallop, seemingly less hindered by the treacherous footing or the darkness then they were. Its body was immense, an oval-like shape, with a long, muscular tail. For a second Mathias thought it looked like some giant, nightmarish image of a sperm cell and almost chuckled...

… then he saw its face. If you could call the wide, toothy maw that split the front of the creature a face. It had no eyes that he could see, only the maw and two nostrils. It ran on two legs but had two smaller limbs near the front of its body, each ending in digits with wicked looking claws. Although smaller than the claws on its feet, they were still the size of combat knives and Mathias had no doubt they could eviscerate a man quite quickly. He wondered if the light police-issue armoured vest he wore would do him any good but if the thing was half as strong as it looked he doubted it very much. It was almost on them now, only meters away.

Then Ronan opened up from his hiding place. The shotgun pellets flattened themselves on the creature’s tough hide if they penetrated at all Mathias saw no sign of it, no splash of blood or chunks of muscle thrown into the air from the impact. It must have hurt though; the nightmarish thing bellowed, a low, bass, angry sound that shook loose snow from the trees and seemed to fill the night.

Twisting to face the direction of the attack the thing lost its footing and fell, its legs slid out from under it and it rolled down the hill.

“SHIT!” Mathias cried out as he threw himself to the left, dragging Magda with him. Her own pistol gripped awkwardly in one hand, spat two more rounds at the monster as it tumbled past them, barrelling through the space they had occupied only a fraction of a second before. Its legs were now kicking furiously in the air as it had somehow managed to roll onto its back.

Above them Ronan stood up and walked down the hillside, his weapon still trained on the flailing monster, spitting several more shells as it disappeared into the darkness beneath them. Whether or not he hit it was anyone’s guess.

From somewhere beneath them came the single, loud, report of an automatic pistol.

Ashley’s hands trembled as she pressed the gun to her temple. Surely a quick death from a bullet was better than whatever would happen when the things caught up to her. Tears ran down her face, a mixture of exhaustion, terror and frustration. She closed her eyes and began to count backwards from three.

Above her, the sound of gunfire brought her countdown to oblivion to a sudden halt. Ronan and officer Mathias were fighting the thing by the sound of it.

The night air was split by the bellowing sound of the creature, roaring in pain as it came tumbling down the hillside, the bass thud of Ronan’s shotgun still audible over the din of the tumbling, bellowing monster.

“It’s afraid!” Ashley thought to herself, “I... I think it’s afraid!”

It came into view all of a sudden, tumbling end over end and bouncing down the hillside, only yards from where she was. With a heavy thump, it slammed into a tree with incredible force, splitting the trunk and bringing the monster to a standstill. She could see the creature’s mottled flanks still heaving in the darkness, but the breaths were irregular.

It was hurt. Its two back legs kicked spasmodically in the air, and its smaller arms flailed about for purchase, eventually finding it in the lower branches of the oak tree. With a soft snarl, the massive creature tried to right itself, gripping the tree branch for purchase, its huge, muscular tail pushing against the ground to help as it worked to get itself upright once more.

Ashley stood up slowly, lowering the gun from where it had been pointed at her temple. She instead took aim at the creature, her fear somehow gone, replaced by a mix of curiosity and rage. She took several slow, cautious steps forward, toward the thing.

Hearing her approach the creature squirmed trying to face her, and as it did the branch it held gave way with a sudden and loud crack, sending the creature sprawling once again at the base of the tree.

Ashley circled the thing until she was looking directly into where its face should be. No eyes, just nostrils and a huge mouth filled with teeth as long as her forearm. Levelling her gun, she took one more step before the thing opened its maw to snarl a warning at her.

That was it. Her chance. She had seen how thick the thing’s hide looked if Ronan’s shotgun hadn’t finished the thing off, she doubted the pistol would fare much better against its armoured hide. Now, however, as the creature opened its mouth to snarl at her, it exposed its upper pallet. The thing was still prone, on it’s back, and she had a perfect shot into the roof of its mouth.

Trying not to focus on the thing’s massive teeth she squeezed her trigger.

The single shot punched through the creature’s upper pallet. Hot blood welled out of the wound in an instant, flooding the creature’s massive mouth and spilling out on to the snow-dusted slope. It twitched, spasmodically but could muster no more than a wretched gurgle as the bullet tore up its brain tissue.

Her eyes narrow and cold, Ashley looked down at the thing on the ground as it lay dying and she holstered her pistol, more calmly than she would have imagined possible. Circling widely to stay out of the dying monster’s reach, and not letting her eyes leave it until it was all but swallowed by the darkness, she walked briskly down the hill towards the road, her exhaustion all but forgotten.

Esther Yadin slid to a halt, the sound of gunfire above her and the roaring of the beast told her that her comrades were engaged in battle with whatever was chasing them – or at least one of the things that were chasing them. She took a step back up the slope, then stopped again. She was downrange now. If she headed back towards the fight, in the dark, there was a very real risk she would be hit by a stray bullet fired by one of her own people. She cursed under her breath, uncertain of what to do.

Glancing up the slope, then down, she made a snap decision. Down. Get to the cars and start the engine on her large four by four. There were more of these things out there, she felt certain, and she wanted to have the engine running so that when the others reached the road, they weren’t losing precious moments trying to start their vehicles.

“IS EVERYONE ALRIGHT?” she called into the night before setting out,

“I’m okay!” Ashley’s voice came back out of the darkness maybe twenty metres away. More faintly she heard a man’s voice,

“Ja, get to the cars! There are more of them!” It was the policeman, Mathias Forrell. He sounded faint, distant. Just how far behind her was he?

Nodding to herself Esther turned and dashed down the hillside.

“Keep moving!” Ronan said, unnecessarily. Mathias Forrell had no intention of stopping. In the distance, he could hear more of the things moving in their direction.

“What was that thing?” Magda asked, her face contorted in pain.

“I don’t know, would you like me to ask the next one we see?” Ronan asked in his annoying, monotone voice.

“Save your strength for getting down this hill, both of you.” Mathias barked. His muscles ached now with the effort and he desperately wanted to stop but didn’t dare. The pain in his side from the lactic acid build up was almost enough to bring tears to his eyes.

All of a sudden they caught sight of the creature that had tumbled down the hill. It lay in a heap against a tree that had been split in two by the impact. The alien thing was still alive, but only just. Its legs jerked irregularly and its flanks rose and fell in an erratic manner. Each breath seeming more shallow than the last as its blood welled up from a wound inside its terrifying maw, pooling on the ground around it where it drained from between the monster’s teeth or over it’s huge, bulbous and swollen tongue, which lolled out of its mouth.

As they drew nearer, they could hear a gurgling sound. Despite all the blood that was seeping out of the monster’s mouth it was clear that enough had pooled inside its throat that the thing was choking on it. It tried to rise, but couldn’t, instead, it began hissing pathetically at the three humans as they cautiously made their way past. The hiss became a choking cough as its blood misted in the air, spraying forward from its mouth. Then it fell silent.

“We need to go faster!” Ronan intoned in an emotionless voice that belied the very real danger he felt they were in. The sound of pursuit was drawing uncomfortably close again. Another of the things was almost upon them,

“I... can’t go... any... faster” Mathias panted. As a serving police officer before the event he had been fit, very fit, but months on the road with not enough sleep and too little to eat, not to mention not enough time to keep himself in trim, sat behind the wheel of a car in the convoy all day, had taken its toll. That and trying to struggle down the hillside with the wounded Polish woman.

“Here, give her to me, we’re not far from the road now, I think.” Ronan took Magda from Mathias, her face contorted in pain but little more than a faint grunt escaped her lips. She knew she was being a burden and hated it.

When she was a girl Magda had often watched war films with her father and older brothers. She remembered how there was always a wounded man who heroically gave his life for the others to get away, stoically commanding them to “Leave me, I will only slow you down!”. Sometimes the other characters would, reluctantly, of course, leave him with a gun and as much ammunition as they could spare, and sometimes an equally heroic character would deliver the “No, we won’t leave you “speech. Funny, Magda had always identified with the courage and heroism of that stoic, wounded soldier that refused to let his wound be the death of his comrades, but now, now she was that wounded soldier and she just couldn’t bring herself to say it. Part of her was afraid they would just leave her and go on without her. Now that she was faced with it, such heroism didn’t seem quite as appealing as it had in the safety of her father’s arms.

The three tired, bedraggled nomads made their way down the hillside as quickly as they dared, the sound of a second huge brute growing ever closer.

Esther Yadin leapt into the driving seat of her open-topped Jeep, sliding in past the roll cage and over the door without even opening it. Why she had picked an open topped Jeep model for use in central Europe, which was considerably colder than her native Israel, was one of the conundrums of her pre-event life that she was still unable to fathom. There was so much she still couldn’t remember from before she awoke in the hospital from what she was told was a short coma. Still, this was the vehicle that was waiting for her when she got home, and for all, she couldn’t fathom the choice it certainly felt familiar to drive.

The ignition engaged first time, much to her relief, and as the engine growled to life, she pulled her sidearm and checked the clip.

“You... aren’t leaving?” Ashley gasped between deep breaths as she stumbled out of the darkness.

“No!” Esther shook her head emphatically. “Not till everyone is clear. Get in.” she pointed at the front passenger seat. “You alright?” she asked as the English woman slumped into the seat beside her, her face drained of colour and streaked with tears.

“I’m...” Ashley broke off her answer and leant out of the four by four, vomiting onto the roadside, noisily.

“That’s okay!” Esther said, as soothingly as she could muster under the circumstances, “That is just the adrenaline and the stress, you will be alright.”

She was answered by a second round of vomiting from Ashley, although the young English woman raised one arm, her hand balled into a fist and her thumb raised.

Esther couldn’t help but chuckle.

“It’s right behind us!” Mathias bellowed as he clambered into the back seat of the Jeep, scrambling over the upholstery to make way for Ronan and Magda. There wasn’t going to be time to get the other vehicles going, and Mathias was relieved that Esther had had the presence of mind to get the engine started on her Jeep.

“GET IN!” Mathias bellowed at Ronan

Taking one brief, longing, look at his motorcycle Ronan threw Magda through the roll cage and onto the back seat. She gasped in pain as she landed heavily on her side.

Ronan scrambled into the back seat after Magda, his weight coming down on her legs.

“Arrrgh! Być ostrożnym!” Magda slipped back into her native Polish, but her admonishment was drowned out by the ear-splitting roar of the creature as it dashed from the tree line and raced for the car.

Slamming the Jeep into gear Esther floored the accelerator, and the Jeep rocketed off up the road as the creature lunged for Ronan. Even with Esther’s quick reactions, the creature’s monstrous head slammed into the rear bar of the roll cage with enough force to slough the Jeep around to the right. Cursing, Esther fought to regain control of the vehicle, fighting to get it back on the road as Ronan brought his shotgun up, firing at the monster.

Teeth and bits of its tongue flew into the night as one of his rounds caught it in the face, but the thing came rushing on. Scrambling to her knees despite the pain, Magda knelt on the back seat, facing outward, she squeezed off shots from her own automatic pistol as the creature thundered up the road, trying to catch the Jeep that was slowly widening the gap. The deep, resonant boom of Mathias’s shotgun joined the cacophony but still, the creature came rushing on, as a second emerged from the tree line nearby. Trying to change direction suddenly, to chase the Jeep, the second creature skidded and fell. Its limbs kicked and flailed as it roared in frustration, but eventually staggered back to its feet. Too late now though, it had lost too much ground as the Jeep roared off up the road.

“They are fast, but they do not turn corners very well at high speed” Mathias mused aloud, uncertain that anyone else had heard him. He filed that information away for later use. He had a feeling it would become important.

“Is everyone alright?” Esther called over her shoulder as she drove the Jeep into the night

“Fine” Ronan grunted, his eyes peering back longingly at where they had been forced to leave his bike.

“I am alive” Magda nodded, “That is better than I thought,” she looked sheepishly at Mathias,

“Thank you!” she said, “I... just thank you.”