Death Drop (75 page)

The object thrown into the cell hit the ground in front of her, and the growth screamed again as it glugged and spluttered out of the way. When the object reached out with two small hands to brace itself on the floor, Dezmara realized it was another prisoner!

“Are you all right?” she said as she knelt down in front of him. He propped himself up on his forearms and looked up at her. He had small, dark eyes, and it looked like he had brownish fur, but she couldn’t tell exactly—it was too dark to see if he had any off-color markings. “Are you okay?” she asked again. He was trembling wildly and rambling in sporadic outbursts, and Dezmara could see that he was clearly in shock.

“It’s done! IT’S DONE!” he screamed.

“Whoa, there!” Dezmara said in a firm but calm tone. “Just take it easy. I’m a friend. What is
it
? What’s done?”

“I didn’t want to! They made me do it! THEY MADE ME!” He was hysterical.

“Hey!” Dezmara yelled, snatching him up by the collar and shaking him. “What in the hell are you talking about, huh?! What the fuck is goin’ on in this place—WHAT’S DONE?!”

“The weapon!” he breathed in a strained whisper. “THE WEAPON!” He stared through Dezmara with empty eyes. She seriously considered slapping some sense into him or writing him off as completely insane, but before she could make up her mind, the most terrifying screech she had ever heard poured between the bars of throbbing feelers and stole her breath. It wasn’t a cry of pain, it was a wail of pure malice, and although it was deadened by distance, the fury left in the muffled voice was enough to quiver the tentacled bars and send the growth around the portal screeching in terror from the entrance. A moment later, another wail—lower in pitch, but of the same ilk—answered the horrible call.

“What the fuck was
that
?!” Dezmara said, looking through the bars into the emptiness.

“We’re going to die! We’re all going to die! It’s over! The weapon is done!”

Dezmara walked over to the wall and kicked at it until the growth cleared a bare space. Then she hauled her crazy cellmate over by the front of his tattered jacket and set him down. She stood over him and wondered what to do. “It’s done! No need for me now! They’re gonna kill me! There’s no need for me now!” He was still rambling on but in soft whispers that made it all the worse to Dezmara. His voice sliced into her mind as sharp as any blade, and she couldn’t help but wonder if this would be her fate too. She didn’t have to wait long for her answer. The gurgling sound of the bars releasing the rings in the floor and coiling up toward the ceiling drew her eyes back to a familiar figure.

The Durax that had thrown her cellmate in just a few minutes ago was back, and he was cackling in amusement again. He pointed a long, sinister finger at her and his purple, cracked lips curled around his teeth.

“Come!” he hissed. His other hand was holding a gun, and as she approached, he pointed the barrel at her chest. He stepped to the side and motioned for her walk ahead of him. “Hands where I can see them.” Dezmara raised her hands as she walked through the cell door and continued through the goop-lined tunnel on the other side.

They marched on, and he commanded her in his mawkish, choking voice through the labyrinth of foul-smelling darkness. “Left!” he ordered. “Right!” he barked. Dezmara’s mind was on fire thinking about what she could do and then wondering if he was reading her mind, which made her think even more. She was beginning to see how the guy back in the cell had gone crazy. But she knew if she didn’t try
something
, she was going to buy it in this disgusting place, and she was certain it would be a slow and painful death. “Right!” the Durax rattled. She tried not to think too much about it, but it was impossible; Dezmara figured that as soon as she made the turn, she would launch a back-kick at his head that would take it clean off if she connected. If he was reading her thoughts, he would either have to fight her to stop her or shoot her. Physically, he looked like a stiff breeze might break him in two, so she felt confident there; as far as being shot went, she preferred that to death by mind-rape any day. She rounded the corner, and as she shifted her weight forward to start her attack, the sight in front of her made her hesitate.

The dockyard of the Durax compound was as vile and nasty as the rest of the place. The rotting growth oozed down from the high dome above and plastered the gangways and railings. Several ships of various makes hovered alongside the docks. There weren’t any cleats or mooring lines to speak of; instead, the vessels were held in place by thick tentacles that reached out from the pulsating sludge on the deck and attached to each hull in a sticky, dripping splatter.

“’Ello, luv!” Simon’s voice said from behind her. She wheeled around and expected to see the form of the Durax guard ripple away and her mechanic standing there, but the evil creature was still perched on his spindly legs and pointing the gun at her.
“He’s playing with your mind!”
she thought but then she noticed something peculiar. There was nothing about his expression that was out of the ordinary. He was still staring at her with those empty, unblinking spheres; the gun was still clutched at his side and ready to fire, but he had one thin finger pressed vertically across his lips. He motioned to the gnarled stumps on the side of his head with the same digit and then made a circular motion, pointing to the walls, floor, and ceiling. Dezmara got the picture. The fibrous outgrowth around them was alive and probably spread through the whole ship: a gory, rotting sentinel the Durax could read with their powers.

“I just thought I’d show you the way you
won’t
be escaping!” he choked. “I bet you wish you had
this
to help you!” He pulled out Fellini’s access box from his gun belt and then hid it again.

“How’d you?” Dezmara started, forgetting about the growth.

“I took it from that brilliant Kaniderelle mechanic of yours!” He rasped out an evil laugh, and if she had any doubts before, Dezmara was now positive this was Simon in disguise, and she rolled her eyes.

“And what about the guy you threw in the slam with me?” she said in a pleading tone, hoping Simon would play along. He didn’t know exactly how to respond, so he kept quiet. “He knows what you twisted assholes are up to and you’re going to kill him for it!” She motioned back toward the cell with her head and Simon nodded reluctantly.

“Perhaps we should drag him here and show
him
how he’s not going to escape!”

“You wouldn’t dare!” Dezmara said, laying it on a little thick. Simon just shook his ghastly head and motioned for her to head back from where they came.

“Stop!” Simon commanded. “Step aside!” He waved his hand across his body and the tentacle bars rose once more. He ducked his head inside and Dezmara could see the sharp bones in his emaciated neck glide below the skin as he scanned the room. “My friends must be torturing him right now! Too bad it’s too late. Time for me to torment you some more by showing you how secure the dockyard is!” Dezmara stamped her foot down and glared at Simon.

“Please!” she cried in a double entendre. “I
must
see him!” Simon knew there was no arguing, and before he could hang his head in dismay, he snapped back into character.

“Very well, if you want to go to your death—and the deaths of others—that much sooner, so be it! I believe my fellow Durax are this way.” He jabbed the barrel of his gun in the opposite direction from which they came, and she turned down the passage, walking slowly, but deliberately into the heart of danger.

***

Simon led them to Dezmara’s intended destination—and the last place he wanted to go in all the universe—without a single wrong turn, and she made a mental note to ask him how the hell he knew where he was going. The tunnel opened into a tiered command room, and they stopped in the shadows just before entering. Most of the bridge, except for the banks of controls flickering at the back of the top level, was covered in the sentient meat-fungus—even the viewing panes were masked. Four figures on the second tier were surrounding a helpless form writhing on the ground at their feet: it was Dezmara’s cellmate, and he was twitching in spasms of pain as two of the Durax flanking him clicked and choked in ecstasy. The other two were surprisingly silent, and when she looked harder, Dezmara understood why.

Dezmara had heard stories about the Durax’s sick devotion to their powers. Pubs were rife with tales about The Butchers: a group of Durax whose sole purpose was to operate on an individual when his powers advanced beyond certain physical capabilities. But these demons weren’t skilled surgeons or healers; their work was horrifying and brutal. The removal of body parts was performed in a twisted ritual with no anesthetic, and the subject was expected to rely on his powers to endure the pain. Haphazard cuts were made with ragged blades and the Durax wore the resulting disfigurement with twisted pride; a symbol of devotion to The Order and their rank in Duraxian society.

The quiet ones were seated in devilish-looking chairs. Their legs were shriveled to the point where Dezmara was uncertain if either one could support the paltry weight of their deathly thin torsos. Both had thick, jagged scars—slick and purple—that crept up their necks, and Dezmara guessed that neither creature possessed vocal chords any longer. They had mouths with meshes of spiny, translucent teeth that separated slightly and then clamped shut over and over again. Fleshy, ringed craters directly above their fang-lined cavities pulsed open and closed in time with their breaths. They didn’t gaze through pitch black spheres like the other two but rather stared at the hell they helped create through unblinking, cloud-white eyes that looked ready to spill from their shallow sockets and roll away at any moment.

“Your turn!” one of the standing Durax said to the other as he pointed at the defenseless body on the floor. They all fell silent, and it looked like the one who had been razzed by his companion was concentrating hard. Dezmara was relieved when nothing happened. She continued to watch for a few moments; then the man on the floor shook wildly and cried out. The two talking devils cackled again. She noticed the vile mouth on one of the seated creatures was flexing open and shut more rapidly than the other, and his chest was pumping with effort. He was torturing the broken little man with his mind to show them how it was done. The two standing, talking Durax were less advanced than their more grotesquely deformed commanders, and this was a cruel training session.

“Where is Gundu with the Kaniderelle?!” one of them screeched.

“You’ll never advance to the level of general,” the other said as he motioned to their superiors with a bony claw, “if you can’t fight your compulsion to speak, Runca. But if it’s beyond your abilities to use your mind for such a simple task, I’ll help you stay a soldier!”

“Screw you, Creteo!” Runca spat. “We didn’t get to kill Fellini, and I want the pleasure of seeing the brain of the one who came in his place bubble from his pointed ears!”

“It doesn’t matter if Fellini showed or not. We have the supposed Human and not that pirate scum, Feleon Gulkar—just as the Turillian promised. Now
we
can deliver her to Lord Helekoth and reap the rewards!”

“Yes, yes. But what of the Kaniderelle, huh? When does he die?” Runca moistened his lips with his tongue like a ravenous animal. Suddenly, Dezmara saw movement from the man in the center of the floor, and her heart swelled with hope and fear for what they would do to him for showing such amazing courage; then hope turned to utter horror. The man got to his feet, but his movements were unnatural, as if invisible hands were dragging his limp body upright. His head and shoulders were slumped and his clawed toes barely skimmed the glop-ridden surface of the deck. The man’s chin lifted from his chest, and his hand stretched to single out Runca with a scolding finger.

“He’ll die when we say so!” the man said in a haunting moan. His own voice was present, but it was overlaid with another, demonic reverberation that turned Dezmara’s blood so cold, she could have gone into cryo all on her own.

“What the shit?” she whispered as she turned to Simon. She had forgotten he was still in character and jumped a little bit at the sight of him, but she knew underneath the ghastly costume his yellow eyes were filled with terror just like hers.

“But first,” the possessed prisoner said, “we will try to make the simulmorph shift at our will. Something even Lord Helekoth has been unable to accomplish with their kind!”

“Yes, yes—forgive me, my lords,” Runca sniveled. “Experiment! Experiment!”

“Experiment! Experiment!” Creteo joined the ominous chant.

“But where
is
Gundu with the Kaniderelle?” Runca pressed.

Dezmara’s gut was telling her there was nothing they could do to save her cellmate from the Durax and she and Simon should get the hell out of there now. She grabbed him by the bony shoulder and wheeled him around to sprint back to the dockyard when the growth let out a piercing scream. The alarm had been raised; the prisoners were escaping.

Tentacles sprang from the ceiling and snatched them both off the ground, ensnaring them around their arms and smashing down with near bone-crunching force. They both gasped for breath and cried out, but to Dezmara’s surprise, Simon stayed in the hideous guise of a Durax soldier. The fleshy columns elongated from their perches in the ceiling above the passage and shot into the bridge with wet, sloshing burbles. They stopped only inches from the cretinous faces of the Durax generals and then snapped back several feet to hover them in front of the little prisoner-turned-puppet.

“Kaniderelle!” the prisoner said and pointed his finger at Simon. The tentacle mashed tighter around his torso, and Simon grunted in pain and then rippled into his own form again. The gun he was clutching by his wounded thigh fell to the deck with a splat! A gaunt hand reached between their dangling feet and scooped up the pistol.