‘One metre portal’s threaded,’ Gwendoline said. ‘How much longer?’
Maria was fumbling with the door lock.
‘Almost with you.’ He stood square in the corridor, an immovable barrier between the stairs and his flat. Behind him, Maria finally got the door open. A wan emerald glow oozed out into the corridor.
‘Who the hell are they?’ Gwendoline demanded.
The tips of three capturesnakes rose up above the top stair. Horatio struck a pose, holding the voltstick ready to thrust and parry as if he were channelling some buccaneer ancestor. They launched themselves at him – two writhing across the floor, one somehow scooting along the wall. The tactical routine gave him the best attack strategy, the angles to thrust and stab, optimum time between the strokes. Perfect, had he still owned those glorious long-ago adolescent football field reflexes.
He hit the one on the wall easily. The tarsus lens dimmed automatically to protect his optical nerve from the flash, but he saw the capturesnake drop and shudder in eerie death throes. He missed the next, but the swipe carried on in a powerful arc and caught the third straight on. Vision dimmed again for the flash, at the same time something hit his left knee with bewildering force. He crashed to the ground, the air knocked from his lungs.
‘Horatio?’ Maria cried.
‘Fucking go!’ he yelled back at her. ‘Gwendoline, they’re my friends.’ Even he could hear the raw pleading in his voice.
‘I can’t,’ Gwendoline said.
‘They’ve got a baby!’
‘Oh, motherfucker.’
Horatio didn’t hear anything else; her voice vanished behind a wave of pain from his leg. Adrenalin coupled with raw panic overrode his body’s muscle lock, and he stared down his trembling torso. The capturesnake had wound around both knees like a sinuous manacle, its tip puncturing the skin, allowing it to tunnel up through the quadricep muscle. He could see it pushing its way deeper into him and screamed in shock. Once again he brought the voltstick down, thrashing at the obscene alien device in frenzied horror. The pain of the discharge was excruciating, forcing him to stop in tears after the third or fourth strike. Panting on the ground, he saw the capturesnake was dead, or at least inert. His leg was numb, which he knew wouldn’t last. He reached down and gripped the awful thing, pulling . . . It took an age to yank it free amid unbelievable pain. A frightening amount of blood gushed out of the wound. But far worse than that was the sensation of something moving inside him, pushing along his femur towards his groin. The capturesnake had performed its function, injecting him with a blob of Kcells, the start of cocooning. His stomach heaved, and he grew faint.
Hands gripped his shoulders and started to drag him back, out of the corridor and into the flat. When he looked up, he saw Maria’s manic grin as she tugged him along. Beyond her, at the far end of his lounge, an innocuous circular portal was standing vertically on spindly mechanical legs, showing a bright green room on the other side. He gazed numbly at the apparition from a lost past.
Jaz was on all fours before it, passing her baby through the circular portal.
‘I’m coming,’ Horatio told Gwendoline.
‘We’ve got the baby,’ she replied.
Niastus pushed Jaz, and she started to crawl through the portal. Horatio clenched his teeth at another wave of pain firing up from his leg. The clump of Kcells the capturesnake had violated him with was moving again. ‘I’m going to need a medical team,’ he said.
‘On their way.’
Niastus started to clamber through the portal. A capturesnake dropped onto Maria’s head. She screamed, shuddering about as if she’d been electrocuted. It fell off her, and Horatio swatted it with the voltstick. Four more were rushing into the flat. The corridor floor outside was swarming with a whole pack of them, dark shells glistening in the jade light.
‘Horatio!’ Gwendoline called.
‘Go,’ he begged Maria. The lead capturesnake leapt forwards. He struck it perfectly with the voltstick, surprised and disappointed at how weak he seemed to have become. Something bit his foot. He saw a capturesnake had penetrated his boot leather to jab into his ankle. More capturesnakes were slinking forwards quickly, as if they could sense his growing vulnerability. He slashed about wildly with the voltstick. ‘Go. Please.’
She stared at the approaching pack of capturesnakes in horror. ‘No.’
‘Live for me.’
‘Horatio!’
A capturesnake speared his abdomen. He brought the voltstick down on it in a classic hara-kiri stab. His back arched up, muscles rigid as he received the full blast of the voltstick. The universe was growing fainter, somehow receding in every direction. ‘Go.’
‘I love you,’ Gwendoline said.
‘Every day forever.’ His final smile was ruptured by the tip of a capturesnake forcing its way into his mouth; it started to worm its way down his oesophagus. Biting it was useless; the flexing skin was hard as rock. He started to choke as the green light dimmed. Maria’s body was filling the portal. A final swipe at two capturesnakes surging after her, the satisfying flash of incandescence as their alien guts fried. The green light grew brighter as Maria’s legs quickly slid across the rim, then vanished completely.
I’ll be waiting there for you after the end of time.
The
Avenging Heretic
Year Two
It was Callum’s second extended period out of the tank’s oblivion, and he was surprised at how quickly it had gone. The crew’s schedule was simple enough: Two people were on duty for three months, then everyone would be brought out of suspension for a month together, and after that a different pair would begin their duty watch.
He’d though his first watch would be difficult; he’d shared it with
