Part 8
Carson inched blindly through the inky darkness, hoping for a glint of light. He saw only vague shapes and kept stumbling over random items lying across the floor he could not see. This was a mistake, he thought. His emotions pulled towards fear, the determination he felt earlier draining from him. He was about to turn back when he caught the sight of a thin beam of light. It flashed intermittently with a red glow. He suppressed his feelings, and continued to push his way through the darkened room, hoping to find some form of light he could actually use. The glow brightened as he closed, he was glad to find, and soon he saw the faint outline of a doorframe, to which Carson slowly walked in its general direction.
He cracked his knee off what felt like a desk, and cried out in pain and surprise. He grabbed his knee and admonished himself for making noise – if there were any flesh-eaters close by, they would surely be heading this way any moment. With his knee throbbing, he continued onwards, the injury just adding to his earlier cuts and scrapes, and he strained to hear any unusual sounds.
Finally he made it to just outside the room with the red light, and a rotting smell hit his senses. He stopped short and tried to look all around, willing the darkness to evaporate into light. It didn't, instead it was merely casting phantom shapes everywhere. He held his breath, realising that he could not trust his eyes, and so turned to his other senses.
Dire seconds past, and he heard nothing – no blundering sounds, or scraping, or any noise at all for that matter. And nothing had grabbed or bitten him. So, where was the smell coming from? Was there a zombie stuck somewhere where it merely lay in wait for an unsuspecting victim?
He decided that standing still would do him no good (he had done enough of that in the hab-flat, and it had gotten him only into more trouble), so he pushed onwards into the dimly lit, blood red radiance of the other room. The smell worsened as he entered, and he immediately saw the reason why:
A decomposing servitor lay upon the floor, curled up in what looked to be a foetal position. The light came from the lobotomised servant's augmented eye, around which a metal-looking skullcap formed over its head. Both its arms and most of its body were covered in metal, or had been replaced as such – indeed, one arm ended in a pincer claw, which lay awkwardly by the servitors side. The light blinked a few times, on off, on off, then stayed on, staring blindly at the ferrocete wall before it. In the odd gloom, Carson could see that the room was small – maybe a storeroom of some kind – and was filled only with a chair, a desk and an array of wall-cabinets. And, of course, the motionless form of the rotting servitor.
The fact it wasn't moving was a good sign. Maybe its undead brain had been killed, but the mechanical parts still had power? How else could it not be attacking him while it was still operational and decaying?
Then he saw the hand light. A small blister-light with a fist-sized handgrip. It lay in an open locker close to the body, the locker's contents being dimly illuminated by the servitors' eye. To get to the light, Carson would have to lean over the body and even though the dead servitor looked lifeless, he hesitated. The light was still on. What if it was merely lying in wait – a raw form of intelligence from its augmentations controlling it? Visions of the putrid thing taking hold of him as he closed shot into his mind.
Get over it Leto, he thought. You've gone through worse these last few weeks. Grow a pair and move it!
Using the faint light he leaned over the servitor, the stench of it filling his nostrils and making him baulk slightly. He didn't stop to think this time and reached out, finally grasping the hand-orb. He used the table for support and pulled himself up and away from the dead servitor, grateful to be putting distance between himself and it.
As he backed out of the room, he checked the light was working, thumbing the activation switch he felt on its side. After a brief flicker, it was alight. Relief washed through him, finally some light!
Before continuing onwards, he cast his hand-orb over the area he was in, realising it was some kind of office. Cognitors, logic engines and other contraptions sat on desks, while paper, rubbish and other office equipment littered the floor. Dried blood clung to most surfaces also. It was just like most of the other places he'd hid in since the outbreak and violence.
He absentmindedly closed the storeroom door, shutting off the red glow, and decided to push on deeper into the tech-factory. He remembered that the vehicle works used to be on the lower ground level. He had never been through this way before, however – mainly entering from the front when he had visited; even so, he had a decent idea of where to go.
He walked through the office, zigzagging between the desks towards a door on the far side. The fact he had some light now brightened his spirits slightly: he was finally making some progress. He breathed a sigh of relief, the tension ebbing away.
Then the wall in front of him burst open, a keening wail sounding as it did so. Instinctively Carson backed away, turning the light off accidentally as he retreated and scrambled behind a cognitor station. The world had blackened again, as if a switch had been flicked from light to dark.
Something large and heavy sounding crashed into the office and a throaty, rasping sound could be heard – like wind being tore through tight, rusting grates. Carson heard the violent clang of metal splintering wood and plastek, and the sounds grew closer. The pitch of the breathing changed suddenly, into short, swift inhales, like something was sniffing the air.
Carson's blood turned to ice and lightning fear gripped him – by the glorious Emperor, was some new monstrosity hunting him? Was it trying to find his scent to chase him out of hiding, only to catch him and eat him? This just could not be happening! It just wasn't fair, after everything, after…
There was a high-pitched, rusty growl, and the hunter charged towards Carson…
*
Eli Cain rolled his Thunderbolt to port, enjoying the G's and the freedom of the open sky. His wooden, hand-carved effigy of Saint Saricine jangled in the cockpit as he righted the fighter-plane, his control firm and true. He smiled as the Carla sailed through wispy clouds. Eli knew, each time he took to the sky, that he was born to fly, just like his father and his Grandfather. He always felt on edge on the ground, or more like out of tune. But up here, with the thrumming engines of a Thunderbolt under you, well… it was perfection.
He eased the stick, pushing the throttle further, and heard the growl of the engines as they fired up, driving the sleek, grey-painted frame of the plane onwards through the clouds. Carla, from what he knew, was the last Thunderbolt active on the planet, and a certain amount of pride slithered through him. I knew I was the best, I knew I'd survive.
The mission the old man had sent him on seemed interesting – finally he might get a chance for some action. For too long, Carla had been grounded. There just had not been any reason to use her guns – it was a waste of ammo ripping apart the plague-ridden. There was just too many of them to make it count.
But now it seemed as if there was another flyer around, possibly hostile, and so old Dassion needed the firepower and backup while he tried to take his hunk of junk over to the spaceport to see what was going on. It surprised Eli every time old Hermia was able to fly – she should have been junked long ago. He checked the auspex, double-checking his location. The Tharius Spaceport was almost underneath, if anything happened, he and Carla would be moments away.
Eli reigned in his flight, turning to starboard, and prepared to circle the spaceport high above the clouds, when bright tracer fire light up the clouds and sky around him. He reacted quickly, breaking from his stable flight-pattern, instinctively he rolled to starboard, and dived away from his linear tract.
Two bats suddenly appeared on his auspex, chasing his tail.
What in the warp? He thought, struggling to remain calm. What was going on?
In answer, his pursuers opened fire once again.
He banked Carla sharply to port, cutting through the sky at speed and dodging the enemy fire. He heard the engines howl in annoyance as he suddenly pushed them fiercely, looking for some way to find a shot on his attackers.
Somehow they evaded him, and still the auspex pinged in alarm, warning him of yet more shots fired. Eli looked up at his small statue of Saint Saracine, and whispered, 'If I ever needed you, it's now.'
As more enemy fire burst around him, he just hoped she was listening for once.