Operation: Mongolia

- 15 -

Banks and Hynd’s luck held for another hour of running; they managed to stay on rocky ground and well away from any encroaching worms, although they had seen several more ‘forests’ of raised trunks sucking down the rain to either side of their track. The rain continued to pour down, slowing them more than Banks would have liked and forcing them to find routes around the larger puddles that had formed on the rock. Still, Banks was cheered by their progress and already looking ahead to reaching their goal and returning to the others with aid.

Their luck ran out when they reached a dip in the ground and arrived at a rocky ledge some ten feet above the level of the sand below them. Blue flashes of electrical charge provided all the illumination they needed to see that they weren’t going to get any farther while it continued to rain. The ledge looked down over a channel, an old riverbed was Banks’ guess, filled with a seething, rolling mass of worms. All of them, from some a mere two feet in length to monsters ten feet long and more, traveled from west to east across Banks’ view, a new river to replace the old one, the worms heading with a single purpose.

“What the fuck is this now?” Hynd said in little more than a whisper.

“Migration? Or some kind of feeding behavior maybe? Maybe one of the boffins would ken but I’m buggered if I do,” Banks replied. “All I know is that they’re in our way.”

“So now what, Cap?”

Banks raised his head, checking the weather. It might look a bit brighter away to the north.

Might. Then again, that might just be wishful thinking.

“I’m not going back,” he finally replied, keeping his voice low although the worms below them seemed fully intent on their eastward movement and were paying no heed to the men above. “We’ll wait here for a bit, see if the rain stops and these beasties settle down. We’ve come too far to turn back.”

Hynd didn’t reply, merely lit a smoke for himself and passed another over to Banks, who took it gratefully. They smoked in silence, cupping the cigarettes from long habit inside fingers closed against the rain and wind. The procession of worms continued below their feet, flowing away east, the blue static brilliant enough to leave yellowish clouds swimming in Banks’ eyes after the flashes.

“So how come nobody kens these buggers are here?” Hynd asked after a while.

“The monks certainly knew all about them. I’m guessing they come and go with the rain—it disnae rain all that often and when it does, folks aren’t out and about to notice what the local wildlife are doing.”

“They’re terrifying me, that’s what they’re fucking doing.”

By the time they’d finished their smokes, it was obvious that the rain was slowing, first to a drizzle then to a few droplets and finally as quickly as it had come, it was gone. The sky cleared fast from the north, stars winking into existence behind high wispy clouds. As the dampness in the air disappeared, so too did the worms, sinking down into the sand, the larger ones first, the blue aurora fading and dissipating until there was only still, disturbed sand in the old river bed below. Banks began looking for a way down from the ledge.

“I don’t like it, Cap,” Hynd said, watching Banks clamber down onto the sand.

“What’s not to like,” Banks replied. “We’re in the middle of the desert, with no comms, surrounded by big fuck-off electric worms and with two injured men depending on us for a rescue. It’s a piece of piss.”

Hynd laughed.

“Aye, and at least we’ve got smokes this time around.”

“And I’ve got all my clothes on.”

Hynd laughed, then Banks hushed him as he took his first step on the sand.

“Quietly now. We take this slow, keep our wits about us, and shoot the fuck out of anything that gets in our way. Follow in my footsteps.”

He headed out slowly onto the old riverbed.

They moved carefully, every nerve tingling, their gun lights washing the ground immediately ahead and ready to shoot at the first sign of an attack. A blue crack of static slashed ten feet to their left, then another to their right. Banks resisted a sudden urge to turn and flee for the safety of the high ledge and forced himself to take another step.

The sand was still slightly damp, firm underfoot. He wondered whether the mass of worms had moved on or whether they were still there, just below his feet. His mind gave him pictures of a great mouth opening below him, sucking him down like rainwater before he had time to do anything about it. He had to force the thought away, concentrating only on the next step then the one after that.

Another crack and blue flash came from his right, further off this time and eastward, giving him hope that the mass of worms had already moved away in that direction. To the north, he saw a deeper, blacker shadow loom and risking the chance, shone his light in that direction, letting out a sigh of relief when it showed another ledge to match the one to the south. If their luck held, it would signal another patch of harder ground leading north. They still had a chance of reaching their target.

He had another dozen steps to negotiate before the safety of the rocks and he forced himself to take each one as carefully as the previous. He was getting ready to congratulate them for getting to safety when a blue crackle of electricity ran across the sand, sending a tingle through him as if he stood too close to a generator. The sand shifted and raised in a mound three feet to his left. He didn’t wait to see if it was going to break the surface—he fired, three shots into the highest part of the mound, then turned and leapt for the rocks.

He knew Hynd would be right behind him. As soon as Banks stepped up onto harder ground, he put his back to the rocks and turned, weapon raised. Hynd was indeed only a step behind him but wasn’t going to make it—a blood-red torso came up out of the sand like a missile, three feet and more wide with a mouth that was already opening enough that it might swallow the sergeant whole when it closed.

“Down,” Banks shouted, already raising his weapon and once more Hynd didn’t hesitate. The sergeant threw himself down and forward to Banks’ feet at the same moment that Banks fired, three shots into the worm’s great mouth, splintering a handful of the white teeth and sending shards of sharp slivers flying across the sand. Even with half of its mouth blown away, the thing kept coming, but Hynd had already rolled onto his back and put three shots of his own into the thick red torso, which popped as if a balloon had burst, showering the immediate area in pink pulp and gore.

Banks helped Hynd up and dragged them both up atop the shelf before turning back to look down at the fallen creature. The sand beneath it shifted and roiled and five smaller mouths appeared above the surface. Banks raised his weapon again but these had no interest in the men, intent only on feeding on the dead. Within seconds, the carcass was reduced to scraps of skin, then even that was gone and the sand was still once more.

“Voracious wee buggers, aren’t they?” Hynd said, lighting a smoke with a hand that trembled slightly with tension.

All that remained of the beast they’d shot was the pulpy tissue that had spattered their clothes. When Banks brushed the worst of it off, it felt cold and waxy under his fingers, slightly slimy like the river eels he’d sometimes caught as a lad when trout fishing. The stink caught in his throat and he was grateful when Hynd handed him another cigarette to mask the smell.

He turned his back on the riverbed, looking north. They once again had a carpet of stars overhead and he saw a long stretch of rocky ground laid out ahead of them.

“Finish the smoke fast, Sarge,” he said. “Looks like we’re in for some decent running.”