Hive Invasion (11 page)

Chapter Fifteen

Ryan stood again and looked at the people seated around the tables, every last one of them staring at him with hope shining on their faces. He glanced over at his companions, all of whom would follow whatever course of action he set in his next few words.

“Elder Bough, Elder Teale, members of the collective. You’ve shown us hospitality, and for that we’re grateful. It seems like our paths have crossed for a purpose, and we’ll do what we can to help you fight your enemy.”

There was a sudden knocking on wood, and Ryan looked over to see Tully rapping on the tabletop in front of her. It quickly spread, until all of the seated men and women were tapping their knuckles on their tabletops, including the elders.

“Then it is settled,” Elder Bough said with a nod. “And all of us thank you, travelers. As stated when you first came to our ville, what is ours is yours. Food, drink, shelter, all of it is at your disposal. You merely have to ask.”

“Much obliged,” Ryan replied. “But since we’re all getting down to brass tacks here, mebbe you should tell us more about the situation, so we can all figure out the best course of action.”

“You speak with wisdom, Brother Ryan,” Bough said.

“Well, let’s just say I’ve had enough people trying to put me in the dirt over the years that I believe in getting as much information about my enemy as I can,” Ryan replied. “We got some of the story from Latham, but why don’t you tell us what happened the first time these raiders hit you?”

Bough nodded slowly, as if weighing his words before starting. “Whoever they are, they’re cunning. It began about three days ago, with what seemed like a minor incident. We lost one of our scouts, a good man named Belthus. He just disappeared like he never existed. We searched for him the rest of the day and into the night, but found no trace, no sign of his passing. We had searched this place while looking for him, and, finding it suitable, made camp, intending to continue looking for him the next day.

“He returned that same night—leading a group looking to claim more of our collective. Belthus was able to get close to a family, and he and the others nabbed Japeth, his wife and their son. The younger daughter was left alone, for what reason we cannot fathom.

“All of them returned the next night, but this time we were ready. However, they were well armed, and killed two of ours, and wounded several while taking four more of our people away. If not for the bravery of a few—” he nodded at Tully, who sat stone-faced on her bench at the far part of the U “—who, despite breaking one of our most sacred laws, took up arms to drive off the attackers. However, it is the general consensus that these people will return again and again, until they have gathered us all under their insidious will.”

“Right,” Ryan said. “From what Latham said, these people don’t seem...normal?”

“That is correct,” Bough replied. “They move and react as one group, as if they are all connected in some unknown way. One of them is a match for two of our strongest men, and they absorb punishment that should kill a normal person, but remain standing.”

“I can shed some light on that,” Mildred said as she pushed her bench back and rose to her feet. “I’m a healer, and I know a great deal about the human body. I don’t know what, if anything, Latham or Tully told you, but we encountered two of those people, a man and a woman, when we found your two scouts. The woman was very sick, and she died shortly after we got there. The man was heartbroken, practically hysterical, and had to be sedated. We all rested, but when the man woke up, he was...different. He attacked my friends, and they subdued him. I then decided to examine the woman’s body further, as I had seen what looked like evidence of a parasite living inside her. Further examination revealed that I was right, but that the parasite had left her body and traveled to the man. We found out the man was also dying, and when he was gone, the parasite had left his body, and was then killed by one of us.”

Mildred looked around at the shocked looks and gasps from her audience. “The point of my long-winded explanation is that these parasites seem to be able to control their human hosts to the tiniest degree. They seem able to block pain, and most likely regulate bodily functions to make those hosts stronger and faster than they were before.”

“What about...what about their minds?” a woman asked in a quavering voice. “Are they still themselves?”

“That, I don’t know,” Mildred said. “I would need to observe a living subject with one of these things inside him to be able to tell. But if you’re really asking if those that were taken might be saved...” The woman nodded emphatically, and Mildred hid her quick grimace. “Unfortunately, my answer is the same—I don’t know.”

The collective members muttered to one another until Bough rapped his water cup on the table. “It would seem that two choices lie before us. We can attempt to locate our brethren and save them from this pernicious evil that has not only befallen them but seeks to ensnare the rest of us as well, or we accept that some of our own have fallen to the dangers that stalk these lands and press on in the hope of saving the rest of us from a similar fate.”

“You would leave my Joseph in the hands of these—these monsters!” the woman who had spoken before now said, her voice rising. “How could you—”

“Calm yourself, Sister Saea,” Bough replied without rancor. “It’s not my will that we will follow, it’s the will of the collective.”

“The will of the collective,”
every other person—including the woman who had just spoken—said in unison. Ryan exchanged a wary look with Krysty and J.B. They hadn’t seemed like cultists, at least not until the past few seconds.

“Sister Saea, although it would seem that you have made your view on this matter very plain, is there anything else you wish to say on the matter?”

She looked around at everyone with wide, frightened eyes. “You all know what happened to my family. Baron killed my husband, Reth, when he wouldn’t turn over his land. They burned the house with my little girl still inside....” She took a deep breath and wiped her eyes. “When we all voted to leave, I was with you all, because with Joseph by my side, I could face anything. But now, thinking of him in the hands of those monsters...” She buried her face in her hands. “I—I dream of him...calling for me...from somewhere cold, and white...and I can’t go to him....” She collapsed back on her bench, sobbing.

“Thank you for your words, Sister Saea, and the collective grieves with you,” Bough said. “Does anyone else have anything to say on the matter?”

Other members rose to tell their stories, either of loved ones lost to the invaders, or how the other missing members shouldn’t be forgotten. There was almost no mention of pushing on without their people.

Finally, Bough turned to Ryan and the rest of the companions. “Is there anything else any of you would like to say?”

“Yeah.” Ryan rose from his bench again. “We’re not going say what we think you should do. This is your decision about your people, and it wouldn’t be right to try to influence you all one way or another. But I want to say that if you decide to go ahead and try to rescue your people, you should be aware that there’s a good chance it’ll cost you other folks in the end. You’ve already paid the price with some, and I’m just saying that you all should weigh the risk carefully before charging into something that might cost a whole lot more before it’s finished.”

“Thank you, Brother Ryan.” Bough turned to the rest of the assembly. “People of the collective, you have heard our situation, and of the two paths open to us. Who among us believes that we should stay and try to find our missing brethren?”

All the members raised their hands, including the other elders at the table. Bough looked around with quiet satisfaction before raising his own. “The vote is unanimous, and with the count from those on guard duty, not a single person of the collective opposes trying to find our missing members. Truly, you are all a kind and benevolent people.”

“That’s ’cause everyone here knows we’d do the same for them,” Tully remarked in the silence afterward.

Bough nodded. “Quite true.”

He turned to Ryan. “We place ourselves in your hands now. What would you have us do?”

Ryan had already given that some thought. “The most important thing right now is to keep everyone together so the group is harder to attack. If you haven’t already done that, people need to leave any outlying buildings and all plan on sleeping in one place—probably the building with the bathrooms—which can be guarded more easily. Also, we’ll need to change up the guard positions and rotation, since any males who were taken probably know the schedule, and therefore when to strike. From this point on, no one is to go anywhere by themselves. I’m sure these people will be just as happy picking off a lone man or woman if they can’t get to the main group.” He looked over at Tully. “We’d also like to get a look at those weapons that were taken, and get an idea of what we might be going up against when they come here again.”

“So we’re staying put for now?” one of the other elders, an even thinner man with gray-white hair, asked.

Ryan shook his head. “Only for tonight. Right now it’s far too easy for a small group to slip into the ville and be among us before we know it. Pass the word, pack up whatever you can tonight and prep the water machine and whatever else you’ve got so we can move out early tomorrow. They’ve had the advantage when they came at you before, so we’re going to try to remove that and face them on more even terms.”

“What about finding our own?” Saea asked. “How are you going to do that?”

“One step at a time,” Ryan replied, not wanting to reveal his plan for finding the redoubt yet if he could avoid it. That was going to be trickier, and he needed them on his side as much as possible before that could happen. “We need to make sure everyone left is secure, then we go about looking for the lost.”

Ryan turned to the group’s leader. “Elder Bough, am I right that the bath building should be able to hold everyone?” At the other man’s nod, he continued, “Then I suggest you all pack up your things and move into that building. It may be a bit cramped, but it’s only for one night, and besides, it’s better than the alternative.”

Talking among themselves, the collective members rose and began heading back to their various shelters. Ryan’s companions clustered around him, with Doc clapping him on the shoulder.

“My, my, dear Ryan, it seems to me that you missed your calling. Perhaps a career in what they called ‘crisis management’ would have suited you in another time.”

“Sure, Doc, as long as the job allowed me to chill anyone who got in my way,” Ryan replied. “Just telling these people what’s going to happen, that’s all. Too much rests on their shoulders at the moment, and that’s what worries me.”

“Still, we’re giving them something that’s been in short supply recently—hope,” Krysty said.

“Yeah, but that only goes so far,” Ryan replied. “If people keep getting snatched and we can’t stop that, or we can’t find the redoubt, that well’s going to dry up pretty quick.”

“Locating the redoubt shouldn’t be hard, if I know what you’re thinking,” J.B. said, then looked around Ryan’s shoulder. “Head man’s eyeing us. We’ll talk about it later.”

Ryan turned to see Bough leave the other elders and walk toward them. “Brother Ryan, I just wanted to thank you again for agreeing to help us during these most dire times. I know my words are paltry recompense for what you and yours are undertaking, but the feeling behind them is true.”

“Understood and appreciated,” Ryan said as he reached down to retrieve his longblaster. “But we’ve all got a long way to go before we can put this behind us, Elder, and if you don’t mind, I’d like to get started by taking a look at those recovered weapons tonight.”

“Absolutely.” He glanced at Tully, who had been standing a few feet away, hands clasped behind her back. “Sister Tully and I will take you to where they’re being stored. If you’ll follow me.”

They all followed the older man and young woman to a small cinder-block building that was probably more than a century old, although it looked as if it had been built a few years ago, and would still be standing a century after everyone here was dead and buried. The door was made of faded tin, with a hand-machined hasp and a gleaming, mass-produced, predark padlock on it.

“Water-pump room,” Mildred said.

“Whatever was inside, any machines there were stolen or destroyed long ago,” Bough said, pulling a silver key on a chain from under his shirt. “However, the building itself is strong enough to be sure that no one—from our group or otherwise—would be able to get their hands on these instruments of destruction.”

Unlocking the padlock, he slipped it off and flipped the hasp open, then opened the door. “No light inside, I’m afraid.”

“No worries, we’ve got our own.” Ryan took out his small pocket light and turned it on as he entered the room.

The inside was as plain and bare as the outside, and consisted of a packed-dirt floor with a hole in the corner. Two short-barreled automatic longblasters and two handblasters had been set in the corner, with the longblasters leaning up against the wall. Web belts holding several magazines sat on the floor next to them. Ryan noticed one of the longblasters had what looked like blood and maybe a bit of hair on its buttstock.

“M4 carbines.” J.B. shouldered past Ryan and headed straight for them. “It has a 14.5-inch barrel, collapsible shoulder stock, 5.56 mm with thirty-round magazines—” picking one up, he pulled the cocking handle back and took a look at the chamber, then eased it back into position “—and both are practically brand-new.” He glanced down at the other weapons. “Handblasters are 9 mm Berettas, also just out of the box.” He looked up at Ryan, the question—and excitement—on his face unmistakable.

“Well, this is a big help,” Ryan said. “The more weapons we can field against your enemies, the better we can stop them. We’d like to break these out, if you don’t mind.”

Bough nodded. “As you wish.”

“What of training?” Tully asked with a glance at the elder. “Since I’ve already broken our laws, and there’s no telling how many of them might come this time. We’ll need all of the longblasters working that we can get.”