Extinction (61 page)

“Copy that, Bloom. Give him a quick sit-rep
and tell him we'll give the base CO a full debrief at the base. Jockey, head
back to the hangar so we can pick up Doc and her team. I need to go check on
the lieutenant. Davies, meet me in the med bay.”

A new mission started as everyone began
to carry out their instructions. Daria and her team were picked up; the lieutenant
was unconscious but doing well. Jeeves was talking with Bloom and Patz about
the ship's condition and giving a detailed plan for the best use of their time
for repairs.

As they were landing at their primary
base, Wilks saw the Detrill captain being introduced to the base commander. As
they shook hands, the warrior prisoner was being led into the base. He was
shackled but Wilks knew what the base security didn't: if the warrior didn't
want to be shackled, those restraints wouldn't hold him. Wilks sent Snake to
catch up with the security officers to debrief them on their prisoner and his
abilities.

Everything seemed calm and exceptionally
slow at the moment and Wilks took a small moment to enjoy the feeling. He knew
it wouldn't last for long. It never did.

The litter had been laid in the
traditional way, as it had always been done and always would be done. The
mother left without sadness, regret, or remorse. When she returned to the
nesting place in four months’ time, she expected no more than five out of
fifteen of her litter would be alive to meet her. Looking at two of the smaller
sacks she reconsidered; probably only four. She had carried them within her
body for almost a year now. It was time for them to decide who was strong
enough to live and who wasn't.

The litter sacks were lumped together in
a teardrop formation and held together with a thick membrane that would keep
them that way until the firstborn chewed his way out, thereby releasing the
rest of his litter-mates.

A cloudy liquid filled the sacks and
provided nutrients for the small dark masses that occupied the center of each
one. Bound together by a communal umbilical cord of sorts, each individual teardrop
would try to siphon nutrients from the others. In a litter this size, it was
likely that at least four of the litter would be completely used to feed the
others. Two would be so nutrient-starved they wouldn't survive the final stages
of birth. Two or three more would be the runts of the litter and of those, one
would be lucky to live long enough to be reclaimed when their mother came back.
The rest would fight among themselves or band together as a pack in order to
survive.

The Shirka had been a spacefaring species
for almost three hundred years. Their written history dated back almost ten
thousand years. And with all of their technological advances, they easily could
have made it so every fetus in every litter survived, but that wasn't their
way.

The Shirka were a strong species and had
quickly tamed their planet once they became sentient. Each female was capable
of bearing ten or more cubs per litter every two years of their adult life, if
they wanted to. They realized early on that if they abandoned their natural
ancestral birthing practices, they would quickly overpopulate their planet.

They were also a species that was very
in tune with nature, and that harmonic relationship called for sacrifice. Every
species on the planet had to be sacrificed to another species at some point.
Without this sacrifice, nature would not survive. Every plant and every
creature fed the environment somehow, even the cubs of a Shirka litter.

This process of weeding out the weak had
kept their species strong and the planet in balance since time immemorial. The
ones who survived were strong physically or mentally and sometimes both. This
is the way it always had been and always would be.

The litter had been left in the forest four
months ago to finish its incubation period. Three would definitely be in
competition for the alpha role. Five of the fifteen sacs were completely used
for nutrients and a sixth was used just enough to kill its embryo. There were
four runts, one particularly smaller than the rest.

The would-be alpha that was closest to
the outer membrane started to feel something that he hadn't felt before. This
sensation, though new, was immediately recognized as hunger. The sacs had
stopped feeding them almost three days ago in order to prepare their hunger to
be strong enough to make them chew through their protective and potentially
deadly outer sack layer.

His lips curled back and he bared his
teeth for the first time in his predatory life.
He
had exceptional long fangs for a cub, which worked to his advantage. Even so, i
t
was difficult to get a good bite on the sack as its natural shape curved away
from his mouth. In the end, he settled on chewing through his umbilical cord
and eating it so that as he chewed and swallowed, it brought the sac closer and
closer to his mouth until it was chewed instead of the cord.

He finally breached the outer layer and
felt the cool morning air on his muzzle. He was cute by any species' definition
of the word. Cute and absolutely deadly.

At this point, he was less than a half
meter tall, lanky, covered in matted fur and exhibiting a temporary tail.
Shirkas were a little oddly balanced as younglings and the tails helped
stabilize them. As they grew older, the tails became part of their lower spine
and essentially absorbed into their adult form. Some female Shirkas didn't lose
all of their tail after puberty and this was commonly thought of as a sexy
trait.

Shirkas had a rounded head, much like a
Grizzly bear from Earth, and a muzzle that resembled a wolf's. If a human had
ever seen a Shirka before they knew about alien life, the human would have
probably thought they were looking at a real life werewolf.

They usually reached just short of three
meters in height and looked thin for their size. They had no body fat for
insulation; instead, they relied on a very adaptable system of fur that was
self-regulating depending on the environment. It could thicken the undercoat in
a matter of hours or shed top layers in minutes if necessary.

Each hand had five fingers with
retractable claws. An opposable thumb came from the center of their wrist near
the palm of their hand, a dew claw that evolved into that position and allowed
them to become more than forest-dwelling predators. Their feet were naturally
padded and had stubby claws that weren't retractable.

Overall, they were a formidable enemy
and they enjoyed battle. The Shirka almost never ran from a fight but they
almost never started one, either. As they expanded through their small portion
of the galaxy, they never fought other species for resources or planets.
Shirkas were firm believers in a code of honor that forbade them from taking
what wasn't rightfully theirs. Some species had mistaken this code of honor for
weakness and tried to take resources from the Shirkas. Although the Shirkas
were no stranger to defeat, they never lost a single planet, asteroid or solar
system they had claimed for themselves. This was a lesson the humans would
eventually learn the hard way.

And now the cubs were fighting their
first battle, escaping the membranes that kept them safe and fed them for over
a year now. Once the first cub breached the membrane, the remaining fluid in
the sacks would start to drain and the self-contained ecosystem would stop
supporting them. They had a little over an hour to get out before they would
start the slow metabolic suffocation that would kill them.

Once the first cub was out, he looked
around. Shirka cubs emerged from the sacks as fully functional predators. It
took only a few steps before he understood what his body could do and how to
make it move. A shriek in the distance caused him to crouch and growl in the
direction he heard the sound. Another predator, he was sure of it.

It was time for a decision. He had
several options to choose from, as his ancestors always had. He could eat the
pups that weren't out yet, use them for his very important first meal. He could
leave the litter and strike out on his own; they were taking so long to emerge
and every minute he stayed here was another minute that a predator had to find
him. He could help his siblings escape their sacks but that may save the weak
ones who weren't supposed to survive. Or he could stay with his litter, watch
over them, wait for them, and protect them as best he could if danger found
them.

No Shirka was ever judged on the
decision he or she made after they emerged. If their mother returned to find
one cub left and he had eaten the rest of his siblings, it was what he felt was
necessary to survive and she would not hold it against him. Shirkas never
discussed their birth decision with anyone outside of their family, ever.

This cub decided to stay and protect his
family. He wasn't going to help them emerge, but he would give his life to
defend them if needed. He was hoping to get a kill before they emerged so he
could present it to them and secure his position as alpha. Emerging first
didn't automatically make you the alpha, but it helped.

No sooner had that impulse crossed his
mind than he heard an excited yelp behind him. His first sister had mostly
emerged, with one leg still left in the sack. She yelped to get his attention
and he came over. The look on her face was fairly obvious.
Help me, brother
.

The first cub growled a negative and
gave her a few short barks of encouragement.

Even though they were fully formed and
aware, they still hadn't been taught advanced language and verbal skills from
their parents. All they had at this point was their instinctual communication
that was based on body language and basic primitive sounds. But she got the
point.
Do it yourself. I know you can!

She was going to bite him at some point
for that but she had to get out first. The umbilical cord was wrapped around
her ankle and she eventually chewed herself free, just seconds before her
second brother freed himself.

Three down, six to go. Over the next
twenty minutes, three more emerged, including two of the runts. Of the three who
remained, there was one any betting Shirka would've called an alpha. The other
two were the last runts, with one of them being the smallest from the litter.

The bigger runt was having problems
breathing and losing strength as he struggled. His brothers and sisters were
barking encouragement but he just didn't have it in him to continue. He gave
up. His body went still and he slowly faded away into unconsciousness and
eventually death. His brothers and sisters didn't mourn him: he was a quitter—he
still had life in him and he gave up. They turned their attention to the two
remaining litter-mates.

The once would-be alpha was near the
center of the sacks and that's what had been hampering his progress. He was
fighting his way through the sacks but he was losing steam; he wasn't sure whether
he was going to make it. He wasn't going to give up, though. He would die
trying; he knew that unequivocally.

He finally broke the surface with his
nose. Fresh air, the first his lungs had ever felt. The internal metabolism
that had kept him alive without actually breathing had already come to an end
so this breath of air was the sweetest thing he had ever or would ever smell.

His head was almost out but his right
leg couldn't move. As the sack dried and hardened, it had started to twist
around his leg. He pulled and clawed but couldn't get free. He was so tired
now, so lacking in energy. At least he was breathing but that was a small
comfort if he couldn't fully escape the sack.

He suddenly felt a nibble at his trapped
foot and he strained to see what was going on. The little runt was trying to
chew his trapped foot. He couldn't believe it; the little guy was trying to
make sure that neither of them got out alive! He growled and barked angrily at
the runt but there was nothing else he could do.

~

The runt looked around and saw how much farther
he needed to go before he could escape. So much chewing left; he didn't think
he would make it. He watched his stronger brother give up and die right next to
him. If his brother gave up, what chance did he have?

He decided that being the runt didn't
mean he had to die like a runt. He was going to fight, until the end, no matter
what. He resumed chewing and looking for paths that had already been
established by his litter-mates. The problem was as the sack dried it
constricted, hardened and became much more difficult to chew through.

He felt a strong vibration off to his
right and was able to turn enough to see one of his brothers struggling to get
free. Part of the sack was quickly drying and constricting around his brother's
ankle. He wasn't going to make it.

The runt looked around and saw a
possible pathway for him to get out. The sack was still moist in that direction
and there were obvious gnashed areas in it where a few others had already
chewed through. He might be able to make it that way.