Writing in Public: Story 4, Chapter 26

[image error]Note: I’m having to skip over the scene I wanted to do and will have to come back to it.  It looks like it might need some scenes written after it to figure out what I should do with it.

CHAPTER 26

The silence outside stretched so long that Hope’s teeth ached with it.

No one came to check on them.

No one came to take them prisoner.

“We have to look,” she said.  Not too loudly.

“Yes, we have to look,” Zuver said.

Neither moved.  They’d been crouching in the alcove for so long that Hope’s knees cramped fiercely.

Hope shifted the wrench to her left hand.  Gave her right hand a good shake.  It ached from clutching the wrench for so long.  She peered around the doorframe.

Expected to something to leap out at her.

Started when the shuttle was empty.

“Clear,” she said.

She uncurled slowly, shaking her knees out.  On her elbows and thighs, she dragged herself out into the main cabin.

Listening.

The silence itched.

Zuver leaned out of the alcove, his hammer ready.  His eyes were too wide.

Hope levered herself up into the nearest seat on the port side.  Eased up to the bottom of the window.

Zuver crawled clumsily out of the alcove, keeping low to the deck.  “What do you see?”

“Nothing.  No movement, no people.”

She had to go outside.

She didn’t want to go outside.

She didn’t want to see what was outside.

#

The air stank with decay.

Bodies.

Everywhere.

Hope’s legs folded up under her.  She sat heavily.  Started to cry.

Everyone dead.  Because she couldn’t do what they wanted.

She felt a warm hand on her shoulder.  Zuver.

“Do you see any ghosts of your friends?” he asked.

Hope blinked.  Wiped away the tears. Startled that she hadn’t noticed.

“No,” she said.

Her brain now registered that the bodies were all alien.  Not a single human.

“I would think,” Zuver said, “that if any of your friends had died, they would be here to see you.”

Two 49er ghosts wandered around, confused at what had happened to them.  One came over to Hope, offering a tentacle.  When she didn’t response, he tried touching her.  The tentacle went right through her.

“Sorry,” she said.  “I don’t know what you’re trying to say.  One of the alien ghosts,” she added for Zuver.

Hope stood, though her legs were shaking.  The other 49er came over and tried the tasting thing with his buddy.  While they could touch each other, it looked like that sense had been lost with death.  They touched each other frantically, discovering they were both mute.

The air rippled.

Hope shivered.  Even Zuver felt it.  The temperature dropped twenty degrees in seconds.

Five new ghosts appeared.  They surrounded the two 49ers.  Their eyes gleamed with menace.

The 49ers scrambled, trying to get away.

The other ghosts pounced.  Like a football pile up.

Ripping. Clawing.  Scratching.

Light sparked.  A ghostly tentacle flew out of the pile and vanished.

Ghostly terror clogged the air.

“No!” Hope screamed.  “Stop!  Stop it!  What are you doing?”

Her words fell on ears that ignored her.

She ran at the ghost pileup.  Her hands scrabbled at empty air, going right through the ghosts.

She couldn’t help the 49ers.

She sank to her knees and couldn’t watch.  She listened as the air sparked.  Again and again.

Until silence.

The 49ers were gone.  Had their souls been destroyed?

One of the new ghosts turned to her, that sick grin on his face.  “You kill.  So we can kill.”

The ghosts where there, then they weren’t.

Hope threw up until her throat was raw.

To his credit, Zuver didn’t do anything but stand there and wait until she was done.  He handed her a bottle of water to rinse her mouth.

Hope swished a mouthful of water around in her mouth, then it out.  She dumped the rest over her head.

Didn’t help.

She lurched to her feet, dripping, and felt like she was filled with lead.

“Is there anything I can do?” Zuver asked.

Startled, she realized he’d stood there the entire time while she’d talked to empty air.

“You probably thought I was ten kinds of crazy,” she mumbled.

“I felt the temperature drop.  It’s almost back to normal now.  I could come up with scientific explanations…” Zuver pushed up his glasses.  “But they would be trying to explain something I can’t explain to myself.  Can you contact your ship?”

Of course.  Hope had blanked on that.  She’d have thought of it eventually she told herself.

Stump-legged, she made her way back to the shuttle.  It felt safer in there, even though it wasn’t.  She contacted Kangjun on her comm band and then collapsed into the seat.  Zuver came in and sat down across from her, pale and pinched, as Graul’s image sprang up between them.

Hope found herself comforted by his solidity.

He was behind the plot table.  “I’m sorry.  Our orbit put us out of range.  We couldn’t do anything.  We’ve got help coming for you, but—”

“It’s my fault,” Hope said.  “I should have been able to do something more—”

Graul was already shaking his head, his voice firm.  “No.  It’s not your fault.  Talk to me.”

Hope and Zuver went over what had happened.  Hope finished with telling Graul what the ghosts had done.  The words sounded insane in her ears.

“Ghosts aren’t supposed to be like that!” she blurted.

Graul leaned forward, resting his arms on the plot table.  “We thought it was just because the 49ers killed everyone.  I think there was something else going on between both of them, long before the final battle.”

“Like a feud?” Zuver guessed.

“Maybe,” Graul said.  “Humans can get so angry that they lose sight of what caused the disagreement.  Then it becomes about being right, and they use it to justify the anger.”

“And anger hides fear that maybe they aren’t right,” Hope said.

Too many people feared her because of the ghosts.  She could feel her spirits lifting.  She knew this fear.  She knew this anger.

Graul nodded.  “I doubt if we can talk to either the living or the dead.  All we can do is get our people out.”

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