The Siberian Incident

by Greig Beck

On the ground tucked in beside the stone where both men had sat to enjoy the view, sat Marcus’ black Swiss army knife. Now, another lost relic in a place lost in time.

“We still know next to nothing at this time. But my guess is there’s more than one.” He turned to Red. “You followed the tracks?”

Mikhail turned to look over his shoulder. “What if these things need suits to get around on dry land? They can tolerate it for a while, but to really move about for extended periods, they need something else.”

Because if they are, then they do not regard us as something to be valued, acknowledged, or even something on an equal footing with them.”

“Suit.” Carter snorted. “I’m starting to hate that expression, and I’m sorry I ever mentioned it. Yeah, we can try and capture it while it’s still driving around in its mobile corpse. But that thing looks at any one of us sideways and we send it straight back to hell.”

Carter turned to look back down on the compound. Lights had come on and the roofs were coated in white. It was almost like a picture from a postcard or the cover of a fairytale book. Except it was a dark fairytale where something weird and deadly was stalking them, and as night took hold it was inflicting unspeakable brutality on them.

Bait. He chuckled softly. That’s what I’ve made of myself; no wonder Sara was pissed at him. They broke up before because he always took the hard missions in the most violent places on Earth and was always one of the guys that took too many risks on behalf of other people. She said that, and she was right.

Carter stared straight ahead, feeling the blood pound in his ears. He’d kick Mitch’s ass for letting Mikhail take over the comms now. A scientist didn’t appreciate the time it took for reactions or have the anticipatory skills that a soldier had when facing an adversary.

“What do they want?” Mikhail’s eyes were half-lidded. Anna’s face crumpled for a moment, and her eyes flooded. “The wolves, the bears, the fish… us. They use biological entities like we use machines. We are their raw materials; their building blocks, their glue, their fuel.”