Overlord

47

Aston was shivering so much, his teeth rattled together. At least, he thought, that means I’m still alive. Unless it finally is a cold day in Hell.

“Sam!” Someone was calling him from very far away, their voice muffled by distance. And another sound insisted on his hearing, a repetitive thump-thump.

He sucked in a deep breath, wincing at the pain it caused in his chest.

“Oh, Sam! You’re alive!” The voice wasn’t nearly as distant this time, much closer in fact. Somewhere right nearby. And the thumping sound was his own heart, his pulse a rapid pressure in his ears. Memories came flooding back, the giant cephalopod, the crazed attacks on shore, the dark flash of the bloodstone dagger hitting that terrible mouth, Slater’s spear shattering the idol. His mind stuttered and, though his eyes were still closed, he saw a glimpse of a body lying on the shore, two people crouched over it. The clothing was familiar. One crouching person had long dark hair, hanging in wet ropes about her face. Slater! She was alive. But his eyes weren’t open. He sensed the chittering mind of a mantic and his awareness flipped back to his own eyes as they opened and he saw Slater leaning over him, her face split in a smile. The mantic that had been watching him lying on the rock squatted nearby, lost and directionless. On his other side was Jen Galicia, also alive, though battered looking. Her eyes had dark rings around them, the skin of her face drawn tight.

Then Jen’s face was obscured as Slater leaned in and planted a hot kiss on him. Her lips against his was the best sensation he could ever remember feeling and he reached up to her cheek. She sat back and scowled. “You’re such an idiot, Sam Aston!”

He managed a laugh. “What?”

“What were you thinking, eating that stuff? Are you okay? Is the… whatever it is dead?”

Aston pulled himself up to a sitting position, his heavy wet clothes squelching around him. “I think I’m mostly fine. And no, it’s not dead, but it has retreated. The idol Digby had seems to summon it somehow.”

“How?” Jen asked.

He looked over at her, shrugged. “I don’t know.”

“Well, it’s destroyed now,” Slater said. “So I guess the creature won’t be coming back again.”

A wave of sadness passed through Aston as he considered that again. It was possible that it would remember to come this way without being called, but seemed unlikely, given what little he had discerned about it. It could no doubt feed elsewhere, might live on in its ravenous loneliness. How far did this vast underground sea extend anyway? Maybe, if they could escape, he might be able to find out, to send a survey team. But all that depended on them getting out and that had to be his only concern now. With a start, he realized that his connection to the hive mind, amplified as it had been before, had now weakened to almost nothing. He couldn’t see nearly so many points of view. He couldn’t remember the way out.

He sensed movement and Slater scrambled to her feet, looking around for a weapon. “No more, please!” she said.

Aston staggered to his feet next to her, one last chance presenting itself. “It’s okay. I’ve got this,” he said. Though the connection was weak, he still sensed this one mantic nearby, still saw faint images of it looking back at them. If he was quick, maybe he could still trigger one last action in the creature.

The mantic moved cautiously towards them and Aston reached out for it with his mind. The link was weak, muted, but he held onto it like a lifeline. He thought of the green cavern, knowing they could easily find their way back from there. “Take us there,” he said aloud even as he thought the same words and pictured every detail of the cavern he could remember. The shape of it, the pool, their halogen lights. “Take us there,” he said again.

Slater and Jen watched closely, desperation in their eyes, not daring to interrupt.

The mantic turned and moved away along the shore, scurrying in the direction of a tunnel mouth some hundred yards away. As their connection faded even further, Aston sensed its intent. Felt its acquiescence to the request.

He let out a held breath. “He’ll lead us back,” Aston said.

“Seriously? And there won’t be more to attack us?”

“Not now. At least, not for the moment.” Aston hoped he wouldn’t have to consume more of the glowing green substance to ensure that remained true. Whatever it was, it facilitated a connection to the hive mind, but it was not good for him, that much was certain. No way could anything so potent be anything but damaging to a biological system not designed for it, or evolved for it. A biological system like Sam Aston.

Exhausted as they all were, the trek was slow going, but the mantic seemed to know a shortcut. It made confident turns, always finding a passage that seemed to slope upwards. At one point it stepped into a narrow fissure in the rock and Aston, Slater, and Jen cautiously followed, anticipating a trap. But inside were roughly carved steps, almost an uneven, undulating ladder that went up and up, and opened eventually into a small cavern. They continued on.

It took a few hours, but finally Aston saw something familiar, and before long they saw a glow up ahead. The mantic paused, moving more slowly than ever, tipping its head aside.

“It’s hurt by the brightness,” Aston said. “Give it time.”

The creature went forward a few paces and stopped again.

“We could just go on,” Jen said.

“We don’t know if that’s where we want to be though,” Aston said.

“You can’t ask it?”

“No,” he had to admit. “My connection with it has faded. I can’t be certain of its intent anymore, but I’m pretty sure it’s still doing the last thing I asked of it. Let’s be patient.”

Step by tentative step they kept moving, the mantic clearly reluctant, but doing as it was bid nonetheless. Eventually they emerged into the huge, glittering cavern where the vast majority of the greenium was deposited. The lake with the strange door at the bottom reflected the light, made patterns dance across the ceiling. Their halogens still lit, though fading. The mantic hung back in the remaining darkness of the passage.

“Well, I don’t think we’d ever have found the way here on our own,” Aston said. “But I’ve never been more pleased to see a place.”

Slater had a wide smile on her face. Even Jen seemed illuminated somehow from her previously withered state, far beyond what the light should have shown.

“Let’s get the hell out of here,” Slater said.

Aston turned to the mantic, gave a nod of thanks. He was about to suggest it go on about its way when a dark shadow loomed up behind it. He opened his mouth to shout a warning, one hand flying out uselessly, but Anders Larsen, from directly behind the creature, slammed a bloodstone knife down into its skull. Darkness and green blood spattered up as the mantic shrieked in agony. Aston winced, went down involuntarily to one knee as a sharp bolt of pain punched through his brain, his connection apparently not entirely worn off yet, then the mantic died and the connection was severed.

Larsen stood there, grinning, the mantic’s blood dripping from the knife. “I don’t need that thing or you lot any longer,” he said. “I can find my own way back from here.”

“You followed us all this way?”

“I woke up after being washed onto that stone ledge back there and saw you three being led away by the bug. I guessed it was my best chance to get out, but thought I’d better keep my presence to myself.”

“Just who the hell are you, mate?” Aston said. “What are you doing?”

“Right now? I’m tying up loose ends. Then I’ll head back up and be the hero.” He raised the knife in front of his face and dropped into a fighting stance.

Aston glanced back at Slater and Jen. “Go! No questions! Get out of here and I’ll follow.”

He saw doubt sweep across Slater’s face, but didn’t have time to convince her as Larsen closed the distance. The last thing he saw was Jen drag at Slater’s sleeve and he could only hope they had both run for their lives.

He sucked in a breath and tried to steady himself. He was too tired for this, too over it all. Now this big, muscular, so-called geologist wanted to stick him with a blade right as they had finally found their way out. The thought infuriated him. Well, he thought, I guess I’ll use that anger as fuel. He ducked forward and rushed Larsen, the man’s eyes widening in surprise.

Aston timed his move just right, slapped the knife aside and drove a punch up into Larsen’s jaw. The man tried to dodge, made it halfway, and the blow glanced along his cheek. The impact was satisfying nonetheless and Larsen staggered backward. Aston jumped aside as the geologist brought the dagger sweeping across the gap between them, parting the front of Aston’s jacket.

That was too close. He needed to finish this. Unarmed against a knife was never good odds. As Larsen swept the dagger back again, trying to gut him like a fish, Aston grabbed the man’s thick wrist and whipped his other elbow into the side of Larsen’s head. Larsen grunted in pain, staggered, but somehow kept his feet. The guy was one tough son of a bitch, Aston realized, and his own strength was failing. Then something else moved in the periphery of his vision and Aston instinctively ducked aside.

Slater brought a large chunk of rock swinging overhead like she was pitching a baseball, and cracked it into the top of Larsen’s skull. The man staggered and went down.

“I told you to run!” Aston said.

“Yeah, well it’s just as well I didn’t. Looks like you needed the help.”

Larsen groaned on the rocky floor of the cavern, a rivulet of blood running from his head down over one cheek and ear. Then a grin spread across his face. He pulled open his jacket to reveal a thick belt of explosives strapped around his middle.

“If I can’t have this place,” he said, his voice slurred by Slater’s blow to the head. “Then no one will.”

“Oh shit,” Aston said, and he and Slater both turned and ran.

They pounded across the cavern. He saw Jen Galicia waiting wide-eyed in the mouth of the tunnel leading out, then everything vanished in a cacophony of noise and light and he felt his feet leave the ground before everything went dark.