Hive Invasion (15 page)

“Yeah, so much so that I asked Ricky on the way back,” Ryan said. “He told me the good people of Silvertide are making moonshine to trade along the way, and that the girls—plural—they snuck out to meet last night brought along a jarful.”

“Well, if that don’t beat all,” J.B. said. “Truth be told, I was wondering how these people were going to survive on what we’ve seen of their stuff so far. Good for them. You know, people used to make a decent shine with corn liquor and fermented apples back in Cripple Creek. Wonder if theirs even comes close.”

“Let’s finish this little talk before you go swapping recipes,” Ryan said. “I was about to say, ‘any plan that works even halfway is a good plan.’”

“You seriously quoting Trader at me?” J.B. asked.

Ryan grinned. “Yeah. Since it’s still the plan I aim to use, you best let me know if you have a problem with it. I already know it’s going to require some sacrifice—you heard what I told ’em at the vote—but we’ll try to make sure none of the collective gets hurt or killed. But look out there.” He waved his arm at the endless yellow-and-brown land on all sides. “We’re surrounded by who knows how many square miles of land with no chance of searching even a fraction of it in the time we have. The best bet is to make them come to us, and then follow them home.”

“No argument there,” J.B. said. “But if it comes down to a choice between saving some and saving all, we’re still going try to save all if we can, right?”

Ryan nodded. “Right.”

“Figured as much.” With that, the Armorer and Ryan both returned to watching the landscape for any sign of trouble. After a few moments, J.B. broke the silence again. “I just hope we aren’t biting off more than we can chew.”

Ryan grunted. “Hey, they bleed and they die. There’s nothing else we have to know about them.”

“Yeah, except that we’re not trying to kill
all
of them, remember?” J.B. asked.

“Yeah, I know—fireblast, you’re getting to be more and more like an old woman every day, J.B.”

“Just trying to make sure we all come through this in one piece, that’s all,” J.B. grumped as he looked back out the window. “I said this could be dangerous, that I didn’t want to get mixed up in anything like Heaven Falls again, yet here we are.”

“I know. Look, that wasn’t right for me to say, okay?” Ryan answered. “But like we all agreed, we’re helping these people, and once we get a handle on where the redoubt is, we’ll clean it up, and that’ll be that.”

“If you say so, Ryan,” J.B. replied in a tone that made it clear he didn’t agree with the other man’s simple assessment at all.

“Of course it will be,” Ryan said. “You’ll see.” Just then his bruised cheekbone flared with pain, and he opened and closed his jaw, trying not to wince. “It’ll be fine.”

Chapter Twenty-One

Just before the hottest part of the day, one of the windriders came back to the lead wagon. Ryan spotted the sail as they came up on the right side of the train while finishing their latest pass.

He pulled up alongside the lead wagon as Elder Bough reined his team to a stop. One of his family members stood on the back of his wagon and waved a red flag, signaling that the entire train was to halt. The land sailer swerved to a stop in front of both of them, and Ricky got out and ran over.

“Got a strange pit ahead, thought you might want to check it out.”

“Strange how?” J.B. asked.

“It’s not naturally made and looks like something dug it,” Ricky replied.

Ryan and J.B. exchanged a glance. “Let’s go take a look.”

They followed Latham’s sailer out about a half mile away from the main convoy, braking to a stop when the sailer did again. At first glance, Ryan couldn’t see anything different about the landscape. “So where is it?”

“Go out about ten more steps and you’ll be standing over the middle of it,” Latham said as he pulled a fire-hardened spear from his vehicle. “Hang on.” He walked over to a small hole in the ground. “Here’s how we found it. Stopped for a piss break, and the wheel broke through the crust. Lucky we weren’t over the middle of it, or we would have been screwed.” He thrust the pole into the ground, sinking it up to his hand, and leaving only two or three feet above the surface. “It’s big, like a sinkhole.”

“What makes you two think it isn’t a sinkhole?” Ryan asked.

“Too round and regular, for one thing,” Latham replied. “It covers about a thirty-foot diameter and is almost a perfect circle. Nature’s good, but not that good. Something dug this out.”

“Think it’s still there?” J.B. asked while casually slipping his shotgun off his shoulder.

“Can’t tell, but I’m not going down there to find out either,” Latham said. “Would’ve figured those herds of antelope runnin’ all over woulda tripped this one already, but if they haven’t yet, whatever’s down there might have starved to death.”

“Or it’s hibernating,” J.B. said. “Heard of some frogs down in Mex way that can live for more than a year without eating or some shit.”

“Well, mark it with some stakes, and we’ll go back and tell the others to go around it,” Ryan said. “Good eyes.”

Latham shrugged. “More like dumb luck. If the wheel hadn’t gone down, we never woulda known it was there. But thanks anyway.”

“Stay here until the train passes, and then you can catch up with us after it goes by,” Ryan said.

They headed back to the caravan and explained the situation to Elder Bough. “The important thing will be for everyone else to follow the lead wagon as carefully as possible,” Ryan said.

Bough then dispatched two of his teenage children with a precise message for the rest of the train to follow their lead exactly. When the children returned, Bough gave the signal to move out, and they resumed their trek.

Within ten minutes, they came on Latham’s windrider marking the edge of the pit. Giving it a wide berth, Bough’s wagon headed past the covered hole on its right. They had gone about a hundred yards past it when Ryan and J.B., who were heading around the back of the train, heard a terrible scream, followed by panicked shouts and more screams. Punching the gas, they sped up to see a new horror show unfolding.

Bough’s wagon had disappeared, vanishing into another large hole in the ground. The other wagons had stopped, and several people were cautiously approaching the edge of the pit.

Krysty was Ryan’s first thought, and it had him jumping out of the truck and running over almost before he’d braked to a full stop.

“Watch the edge! Stay back!” he shouted as he ran over. “Anyone with rope, get it out now!” An awful screaming was coming from the pit, and Ryan looked over to see one of the oxen team dead and pinned underneath the wagon, which had also broken an axle. The other ox was bellowing as it was tangled up in the traces and thrashing around half-buried in the dirt.

“Everyone okay down there?” Ryan called out.

“Yeah, some bumps and bruises, but nothing major,” Krysty shouted back. “Lucky no one was pinned under the wagon—”

She stopped talking as the trapped ox’s bellows changed pitch, turning to high-pitched screams of pain. It whipped its head back and forth in a futile effort to escape, then gave one last, despairing shriek and collapsed, its head flopping onto the dirt. The silence that followed was profound.

“What happened to him?” Bough’s wife, a sinewy woman about forty years old, asked.

“I don’t know, but I think the body’s sinking into the dirt,” Bough said.

He was right—the body was slowly sliding under the fine dirt. One of the Bough children, maybe about ten years old, pointed to the ground near the body. “Something’s moving down there!”

Ryan squinted to look, but didn’t have the right angle from where he was. “What do you see?” Someone came up and pressed a coil of thick, nylon rope into his hand, and he nodded thanks.

“The sand is churning or rippling underneath the ox,” Krysty said, just as the entire wagon lurched over. “It’s affecting the dead ox, as well.”

“Okay, let’s get everyone out of there, and we’ll figure out how to salvage the wagon afterward.” Ryan uncoiled the rope and tossed an end down to the wagon. “Grab on and we’ll haul you up.”

“You’d better hurry, Ryan!” Krysty shouted. “Something’s coming up toward us!”

“What in the Lord’s name?” Bough shouted.

“Dark night!” J.B. said.

Ryan didn’t have any words to say as a group of dirt-covered tentacles, smooth, purplish-red and as large around as a person’s waist, burst out of the ground at the bottom of the pit. Instead, he handed the rope to the nearest person and shrugged off his Scout longblaster to start picking off the ropy, waving limbs.

“What are these— Oh, my God!” Bough’s wife screamed.

As they came closer, homing in on their prey, the end of each tentacle split apart to reveal a tooth-lined maw!

“Children up first!” Bough shouted. “Climb onto the back of the wagon!” His four kids quickly scurried up to the top of the slowly sinking vehicle.

“I got the right, J.B.” Ryan said.

“Hang on! I might be able to nip this all at once,” J.B. said, aiming his M-4000 shotgun at where the four tentacles had come up from the sand. “Here goes—look away!”

He unloaded a full magazine into the area, churning up a geyser of dirt and dust and completely severing three of the tentacles. The fourth one whipped back and forth before withdrawing back under the ground.

Cheers greeted the Armorer’s shooting, but Ryan waved his arms for everyone to be quiet. “Settle down, and let’s get them all out of there now!”

A rope-pulling detail was quickly formed, and in less than a minute, the first two children were back on the surface. The third one had just been hauled off the broken wagon when it heaved again, and this time began being drawn below the bottom of the pit, with cracking noises testifying to the strength of whatever was down there.

“Hurry, Ryan!” Krysty shouted, blaster in hand. “It’s getting closer!”

They pulled the last one up, and Krysty told Bough’s wife to go next. She did, fairly flying up the side of the pit. By now the wheels had disappeared, and the wagon was tilting at a steep angle, with the front end completely buried under the dirt. Someone had brought another rope and tossed it down, and Krysty and Bough each grabbed one, holding on as they started to be hauled out.

They were almost at the lip when the last tentacle erupted back out of the dirt. Its toothy maw snapped at the air for a moment, then it dived down, heading straight for Krysty.

J.B. was raising his shotgun again, and Ryan was doing the same with his longblaster, but it was going to be close.

However, before either of them could fire, Elder Bough shoved off the side of the pit and planted himself between her and the beelining tentacle.

The mouth slammed into his back and bit hard, making him shout with pain. “Go!” he said to her right before the limb’s hungry maw yanked him back off the rope and retracted, dragging him down into the dirt. It all happened so fast that neither Ryan nor J.B. could try to shoot the thing before it was gone. There was a brief thrashing around, and then he disappeared under the remains of the wagon.

“Mattias!” Bough’s wife screamed. “Mattias!” She lunged back toward the edge of the pit, but was caught by her eldest son, who held her as she sobbed.

Ricky lowered his carbine. “Do we try to go after him?”

Ryan shook his head, but it was Krysty who answered, “Not unless you want to end up like him. Whatever was down there was very large and very hungry. We need to move on through this area quickly. I don’t think it’s the only one around here.”

Ryan looked at the others, most staring in shock at the pit or the rest of the Bough family. “All right, people, we should keep moving so we can get out of this area.”

“Brother Ryan?” one of the other elders, a white-haired man named Chreis, asked. “Before we go, we need to pray over Elder Bough’s...final resting place.”

Ryan couldn’t help but glance back at the pit where the Silvertide leader had vanished. “Do what you have to.” He gathered his people around him. “Spread out and keep an eye on the bottom of that hole. Anything moves while they’re praying, and I mean
anything,
don’t wait, just blast it.”

All of the members of the collective assembled to stand at the edge of the pit and joined hands. Over the now-muffled sobs of Bough’s widow, Elder Chreis began to speak.

“O Lord, we commend our brother and leader, Mattias Bough, into your waiting arms. Mattias was a true blessing to our community, leading with grace and equality, and always willing to work with opposing parties to achieve a compromise that was fair for both. It was his words and vision that first led us out from our homes to seek our freedom, and it is in his spirit that we will continue this journey to found a home for ourselves and our descendants where we can all strive to live up to Mattias’s ideals, which he lived every single day. He leaves behind his wife, Leah, and four children, Aquila, Ethias, Hushai and Jairus. Let us all come together to comfort and help them in this time of trouble, and reassure them that they are not alone in their journey, that the collective watches over its members, always, and will watch over them, as well. Amen.”

The rest of the congregation muttered, “Amen,” and began dispersing back along the convoy. Elder Chreis and his family went to the Boughs and gently began herding them toward their wagon. Once they were situated, the elder came back to Ryan.

“I think we should leave this area as soon as possible, agreed?”

“Absolutely,” Ryan replied. “It’s going to be slow going, though. There’s no telling how many more of those things are out there.”

J.B. mopped his brow and replaced his fedora before turning to Ryan. “We’re going to need a ground tester to keep moving.”

“Yeah, someone light. Ricky?” Ryan waved the teen over. “Got a job for you that isn’t going to be a lot of fun....”

* * *

F
OUR
HOURS
LATER
, Ryan signaled for the wagon train to come to a halt. Water and feed was distributed for the hungry, thirsty oxen teams, and the families took a moment to grab a cold bite in the meager shade cast by their wagons under the pitiless sun.

Ricky trudged back in from his scouting duty and untied the rope from around his waist. “
Santa Maria,
we must be clear of those—things by now, yes?”

He’d been walking about forty feet ahead of the truck, testing the ground with a spear. Ryan and J.B. had followed behind him: one driving, the other holding the other end of the rope around his waist.

Ricky had found several more holes in the first mile, each necessitating the train to stop so they could ensure there was a clear path around it. The first hole had another one within thirty yards of it, leading Mildred to theorize that two of these creatures may have created lairs near each other in order to drive food toward each other’s pit. The others were more isolated.

But there had been no sign of a pit in the past two miles, so Ryan was reasonably comfortable they were clear of the threat. “Yeah, I think we’ve left that behind now.” He scanned the horizon, spotting a line of hills about two miles to the west. “Let’s rest here for an hour, then make for those hills before camping for the night.”

“Don’t want to spend the night on the plains?” J.B. asked.

“Do you?”

The Armorer shook his head.

“Once we get moving again, we’ll send Tully and Jak out that way to make sure there’s no surprises. I might even have us go out there and keep Latham back as the intermediate scout for the train.”

Ryan liked his plan so much that once the scouts had gotten their meal, he filled in Latham and Ricky on what he wanted to do and had them hang back around the wagons. Then he and J.B. drove out to the hills to check them out. Twenty minutes later, they had their answer.

“Damn, this doesn’t get much better,” J.B. said after taking a cursory look around. “I can’t believe we actually found a clear spring here.”

Ryan nodded while staring down at the small trickle of water that had carved its way from the hills in the distance to here. It had created a small oasis amid the dry, dusty plains that was hidden in a cluster of foothills from the rest of the landscape.

A distant rumble of thunder made him look off to the west, where billowing cumulonimbus green clouds several thousand feet high filled the sky. As he watched, he saw streaks of lighting arc in the clouds, making them light up like glowing billows of smoke.

“Better get them here pretty quick. Looks like a storm’s rolling in—a big one.”