When True Night Falls (2 page)

Lise Perez, M.D. Thank God for her. She had saved his life a few nights back, under circumstances he shuddered to recall. She had almost saved Tom Bennet when that
thing
got past the eastern fence and launched itself into the mess cabin, and in any case she had prevented it from grabbing anyone else, until a cook finally brought it down by severing head from body with a meat cleaver. She was a competent officer, always collected, she had a nose for trouble—and she had been keeping tabs on Ian Casca for nearly a month now. God bless her for it.

“How long?” he whispered.

She looked at her watch. “Half an hour.” And glanced up at him. “He’ll be here before that,” she assured him.

If anyone else had brought him out here—if anyone else had even
suggested
that he should come out here, making himself the perfect target for every nightmare beast in this planet’s ghastly repertoire—laughter would have been the kindest of his responses. But Lise had suggested it and he trusted her judgment, sometimes more than his own. And Ian had to be dealt with. There was no way around that. Case should have jailed the man when this all started, but he had chosen to assign him to therapy instead, and now he was paying the price for that decision.

“Listen,” she whispered. “Here he comes.”

He nodded, noting that though her jacket and pants were dark enough for cover her pale skin glowed like a beacon in the moonlight. They should have thought of that. Rubbed her down with charcoal, or lampblack, or ... something. Made her dark, like him, so that they could creep through the night unseen.
Too late for that now,
he thought. He cursed himself for carelessness and motioned for her to keep low, so that the weeds might obscure her face.

True night was about to fall. Less than half an hour now. Case told himself that the term was a mere technicality, that even on Earth heavy cloudcover might obscure the stars and moon, leaving a man in total darkness—but he knew that there was more to it than that. He had tasted its true power once in the field, by turning off his lantern so that the darkness was free to envelop him—a darkness so absolute, so utterly boundless, that all the shadows of Earth paled by comparison. The mere memory of it made his skin crawl. By now the whole camp would be alight with beacons, bright floods fighting to drive back the shadows of the triple night. As if mere light would help. As if mere walls could keep the serpent out of Eden, or prevent it from reading their secret thoughts, from turning their fears and even their desires against them.

As he listened for the sound of Ian’s approach, he remembered the night it had come for him, the serpent incarnate in an angel’s form. Remembered how all his fear and his skepticism and even his innate caution were banished from his soul in an instant, as though they had never existed. Because what had stepped out from the shadows was his son—his
son
!—as young and as healthy as he had been ten years ago, before the accident that took him from Case’s life. And in that moment there was no fear in the Commander’s heart, no suspicion, not even a moment’s doubt. Love filled him with such force that he trembled, and tears poured down his cheeks. He whispered his son’s name, and the figure moved toward him. He reached out his hand, and the creature touched him—it touched him!—and it was warm, and alive, and he knew it by touch and scent and a thousand other signs. Christ in heaven, his son was alive again! He opened his arms wide and gathered the boy up, buried his face in his hair (and the smell was familiar, even that was right) and cried, let all the pain pour out in a tsunami of raw emotion, an endless tide of grief and love and loss....

And she had saved him. Lise. She had come, and she had seen, and she had understood at once. And acted. Somehow she’d killed the unnatural thing, or driven it off, and she’d dragged Case to MedOps. Barely in time. Later, when he had regained the wherewithal to communicate, he asked her what she had seen. And she answered, steadily,
It was devouring you. From the inside out. That’s what all these creatures do, one way or another. They feed on us.

In the distance now he could hear the low rumble of a tram approaching, its solar collectors vibrating as it bumped over the uneven turf. Ian. It had to be him. The trams had proven to be dangerously unreliable—two had exploded while being started up, and three more simply would not work—but Ian was one of the few who seemed capable of making them run, and they gave him no surprises. Likewise the man’s weapons functioned perfectly, while others jammed and backfired, and as for his lab equipment ... the botanist lived a charmed life, without question. But at what price?

In his mind’s eye Case could see the grisly stockpile that Lise had discovered one night, after following Ian from camp. Small mammals, a few birds, a single lizard ... all beheaded or dismembered or both, and hidden beneath a thornbush at edge of the forest. When Case had confronted Ian about them the botanist had made no attempt to dissemble or even defend himself, but had said simply,
There’s power in the blood. Power in sacrifice. Don’t you see? That’s how this planet works. Sacrifice is power, Leo.

Sacrifice is power.

The tram was coming into sight now, and it was possible to make out the form of a man behind its controls. Lamplight glinted on red hair, wind-tossed: Ian Casca’s trademark. In the back of the tram was something bundled in a blanket, that might or might not be alive. Case felt a chill course through him as he gauged the size of the trapped animal, and he thought,
Might be human. Might be
. He couldn’t see Lise’s expression, but it was a good bet she was thinking the same thing.

The blood is the life
, the Old Testament proclaimed. Lise had shown him that passage in Casca’s own Bible, underscored by two red lines on a dog-eared page. He wondered if Ian had made those marks before or after this horror began.

The tram had entered the clearing now, and after a few seconds of idling Ian braked and shut it down. The harsh purr of the motor died out into the night, leaving a silence so absolute that Case’s breathing seemed a roar by contrast. Even the insects were still, as if they, too, feared the darkness that was about to fall.

Case tightened his hand about his gun. Waiting.

The old formulas will work
, Ian had claimed. He was lifting a bag from the cargo section, a specimen case whose soft sides bulged when he set it down. From it he removed a long strip of red cloth and a canvas sack.
All we have to do is learn to apply them
. He hung the cloth about his neck so that its ends fell forward, brushing against his calves as he worked. Painted sigils glittered on its surface: geometrics bordered with Hebrew figures, ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs, something that might have been an astrological symbol ... Case shook his head in amazement as the man reached into his sack and drew out a handful of white powder. The trappings of his madness were so precise, so deliberate, so painstakingly detailed ... which made him all the more dangerous, Case reflected. A careless madman would have gotten himself locked up long ago.

Lise touched him on the arm. He turned back to look at her, saw the question in her eyes. But he shook his head.
Not yet
. He turned back to watch the botanist, who was now tracing a circle on the ground, dribbling powder through his fingers to mark its circumference. When he was done with that he began to sketch out more complex figures, his fingers trembling with fear—or excitement—as he worked. On the bed of the tram one of the bundles had begun to move, and Case heard a soft moan issue from it.
Human,
he thought.
No doubt about it
. His jaw tightened, but he forced himself not to move forward. Not yet. Erna had no jailhouse, and at the rate things were going wrong they might never get the time to build one. If Ian’s madness had turned murderous, then for the sake of the colony he would have to be disposed of. Excised, the way one excised a cancerous tumor to save the flesh beneath. And as judge, jury, and executioner, Case had better be damned sure that what he was doing was justified.

The circle was finished now, and all the designs that the botanist had chosen to add to it. He poured the last handful of powder back into the bag, tied it shut again, and set it aside. Case tensed, ready to interfere the minute Ian went for his captives. But the man simply stepped back, so that he stood in the exact center of the circle he had marked, and shut his eyes. For a moment he was silent, as if readying himself.
For what?
Case wondered. What arcane operation did the man imagine would give him control over this violent, unpredictable world?

If only it were that easy, he thought bitterly. Draw a few signs on the ground, recite an ancient incantation or two, and behold, all problems disappear ...
for a brief moment he wished that he shared the botanist’s delusion. He wondered if he, too, might not be willing to spill a little blood, if he truly believed it would help the colony survive. Human blood? It was a disturbing question, and not one he wished to investigate further. God save him from ever discovering that the shell of his morality was as thin and as fragile as that of Ian Casca’s sanity....

The botanist stirred. Slowly, breathing deeply, he raised his hands up by his sides, and opened his eyes at last. The lamplight barely picked out his features, but even so Case could see the concentration that burned in his eyes, the sweat of tension that gleamed on his brow. He began to chant, in a manner that was half speech, half song. Case caught a few words of something that sounded like Latin, intermingled with bits that might be Greek, then Hebrew, then Aramaic. It was as though Ian had taken all the ancient tongues of Earth and sifted through them for words he needed, then mixed them indescriminately to create this custom-made ritual.
Words of power
, Case thought. For one sickening moment he wondered if Ian might not be right, if Earth’s magical traditions might not wield some true power in this extraterrestrial forum ... but a moan from beneath the blankets brought him back to his senses, and his hand tightened about his gun.
Even if it did work
, he thought grimly,
it’s not worth the price.

Then Ian stopped. Stared into the night. His whole body was taut, rigid with tension. “Erna, hear me,” he intoned. “I offer you this sacrifice. I offer you the most precious thing we possess: the lifeblood of Terra. In return I ask this: Take us in. Make us part of you. We tried to be aliens on your soil, and your creatures defeated us. Now make us part of this world, as those creatures are part of it. And in return ... I offer you the heartsblood of Earth. The souls of this colony, now and forever.” He shut his eyes; Case thought that he trembled. “May it please you,” he whispered. “May you find it acceptable.”

His hands dropped down to his sides once more. For a moment he was silent; perhaps waiting for an answer? Case saw one of the bundles on the trams begin to stir, as if trying to free itself. Apparently so did Ian. The movement awakened him from his seeming trance, and he began to move toward the tram and its contents. Stepping over the line he had drawn, across the sigil-girded circle he had so carefully created. Drawing a slender knife from his belt as he moved.

That was enough for Case. He was on his feet in an instant, and Lise was right behind him. While she moved to intercept the man, to keep him from reaching the tram, he took up a solid position at the edge of the clearing and leveled his gun at the man’s heart. “That’s enough,” he announced. “Party’s over, Casca. Stay right where you are.”

The botanist reeled visibly, as though Case’s words had not only stopped him in his tracks but had awakened him from some kind of trance. He turned toward the commander and gaped at him, as if trying to absorb the fact of his presence.

“Leo,” he said at last. Starting to move toward him. “How did you—”

“Stay where you are!” Case ordered. “And keep your hands where I can see them.” He glanced toward Lise and nodded; she was kneeling on the tram’s bed, inspecting its contents. “No fast movements, you hear me? Just stay where you are and keep quiet.”

Lise had cut the tie on one of the bundles and was freeing its occupant. “Well?” Case demanded.

“It’s Erik Fielder.” She reached a hand in to take his pulse, and added, “He’s alive.” Quickly she moved to the other bundle and unwrapped its upper end. “Liz Breslav. Out cold. I see bruises, some sort of impact damage to the side of the head ... can’t say how bad it is without MedOps. We need to get her back to the ship.”

It took him a minute to put the names in context; when he did, he darkened. Ian’s choice of victims was all too practical. With true night coming, the colony’s other members would have been huddled together in their makeshift cabins, seeking the dubious safety that could be found in numbers. It would have been hard for Ian to single out one or two of them, much less knock them out and drag their bodies from the camp without being seen. But Fielder and Breslav had drawn special guard duty for the night, which meant that they were already outside the camp, standing watch over the ship and its contents a good mile away. They would have been especially vulnerable, Case thought, if their enemy was not a creature of Erna, like they expected, but one of their own kind. A glib man who might talk his way into their company, and then strike at them from behind when they least expected it.

His mouth tightened into a hard line as he raised the gun. “That’s proof enough for me.”

Sudden understanding gleamed in Ian’s eyes. Understanding ... and fear. “Leo, listen to me—”

“The charge is endangering the welfare of the colony,” Case said steadily. “The verdict is guilty.” Something tightened inside him, something cold and sharp. Something that hated killing, even in the name of justice. It took effort to get the words out. “The sentence is death.”

It’s not a killing
, he told himself.
It’s an excision. A cleansing
. Ian had to die so that the rest of them could live. Was that murder?