Chapter 583

The Prison Planet

... They were barely a hundred yards from the cave, the girls starting to become accustomed to pulling the light cases while wearing the cumbersome snowshoes, when Jasmine screamed, “Down!” as Morales grunted and went to his knees.

Even as that was happening, Jasmine’s rifle fired as she also went to a knee, jacked another round into the chamber and fired a second time, the sound of the rounds unbelievably close together for a bolt-action rifle.

“Morales!”

In a big tree not thirty yards from them, and twenty feet up, a man dressed in furs slowly toppled from a blind he had made there. With a cascade of snow and a tremendous “thud,” he landed on his back at the base of the tree, his crossbow landing beside him.

“See to Morales,” Jasmine screamed to her sister-wives as she came to her feet, untangled her snowshoes and trudged as fast as she could toward the figure half-buried in the snow.

But she needn’t have bothered because the wolves beat her to him by a significant margin with Lobo only a heartbeat in front of Lila. The big wolf closed his mouth around the man’s throat and tore it away, a gush of blood splattering the snow as he did so. A second later, Lila finished ripping the man’s head from his body with an ease that would have been scary under different circumstances. Jasmine, frustrated because she had wanted to blow his head off, stumbled into a turn with her snowshoes momentarily tangling, and thrashed her way to Morales.

The big man, with the help of his new wives, had managed to prop himself into a sitting position against a tree with six inches of a crossbow bolt protruding from his coats, the bolt obviously buried in his chest.

Morales turned his head to spit blood, before wheezing, “Who the fuck was he?”

“I don’t know, but the bastard will never shoot anybody again,” Jasmine absently returned as she tried to determine exactly where the bolt had struck her husband. With all the clothing he had on, and not wanting to move any of it which would have jarred the bolt, it was hard to tell, but she thought it had hit somewhere on his left chest.

No, no, she kept screaming in her mind, He can’t die. He just can’t.

The wolves, their muzzles bloody, came dashing over to push Ashley and Christine aside so they could lie against Morales sides, whining so loudly that it was distracting. “Hush,” Jasmine told them. “He’s going to be all right. We just need to get him out of the cold.”

Jasmine grabbed a stunned Ashley, “Go to the front of the cave and write the word ‘HELP’ on the whiteboard in big, bold letters,” she ordered, “then wave your arms, do a fucking rain dance if you have to, but attract the attention of the AI that supposed to be watching us.”

Morales grabbed Jasmine’s arm, only to grimace from his having moved. “With your help, I think I can walk. Just get me back inside the cave. We both know that I’m going to bleed out, and I don’t want to die out here in the cold.”

“You’re not bleeding out here or anywhere else,” she snarled back even as she could feel the tears freezing on her face.

“Get me up,” he demanded. “You know that bolt is in my lungs,” he wheezed.

“The pain keeps me from taking more than tiny sips of air. I’m going to bleed out in a few minutes, and I’m not going to die sitting out here leaning against a tree.

“No. No. No, Baby. You don’t need to exert yourself. The AI at the General’s headquarters is supposed to be polling the cameras’ AI here every few minutes. They’ll notice and send help. Now give me time to rig a travois, and we’ll get you inside.”

“Bullshit. Do you actually think that the General will pay any attention to a prisoner...”

They heard Ashley screaming, “This way. This way,” as the portal opened and troops boiled out.

The Retreat

Jeff, Dave, Evie, Tosha and most of the family were sitting in the living room talking, when Jeff motioned for them to wait. Unconsciously, he sat up straighter, his body going tense as he listened to someone on his radio. There was a long pause before, “No. Don’t bother trying to move him,” the Prime ordered the trooper who had stepped back through the portal to call his Colonel. “That bolt will only do more damage as you put him on a stretcher and get him through the portal to bring him back to the base. The medics should be able to keep him alive until I get there with Ship and her healing chamber.”

Hearing Jeff’s side of the conversation, Arlene, Selina and Diana were already sprinting down the hall toward the inside garage as Jeff finished giving his orders.

“What’s happening?” Tosha asked, worriedly.

“Come on,” he said, grabbing Tosha’s hand as he started behind the others with Kayla right behind Jeff. Surprising them all, Selina kept up with Diana and Arlene. Tosha, with all her training, also matched Jeff step for step.

By the time Jeff, Kayla and Tosha were to the inside garage, Diana had an Escalade running with Arlene and Selina inside, everyone, other than Jeff, breathing hard. The Clan Queen had already hit the remote to open the bay doors, and as soon as Jeff, Tosha and Kayla were aboard, she roared out of the garage, jammed the selector into Drive and slammed the accelerator pedal to the floor.

In seconds, they were at the fake building. As they boiled out of the vehicle, Jeff picked Selina up and sprinted, the others in his wake.

On the way from the Retreat to Ship, Jeff had briefed her mentally, and she had the course to 2214 laid in and was waiting. As soon as the hatch closed, she translated to orbit, the ground and the Retreat shaking from the blast of sound. A heartbeat after clearing atmosphere, she warped to the prison planet.

Seconds after reaching 2214, the great ship was hovering over the entrance to the cave, only to quickly move a few hundred feet until she had a direct line of sight to the group hovering around Morales who was still sitting propped against the tree.

“Bring him up,” Jeff told Ship mentally.

Ship, not taking time to sort everything out, went the quickest way and just moved everyone and everything in the group around Morales, which included the patient, snowshoes, two medics, two wolves, three wives, miscellaneous medical equipment and three rifles and two cases with skis and some snow. A millisecond later, she transferred Morales into one of her chambers that she had just moved near the group. Everyone who had been hovering over Morales was now hovering over nothing. Even the snow was gone without a trace.

The wolves, their master suddenly missing, immediately went on battle alert, which greatly impressed the medics who jumped away from bared fangs and rumbling growls. The wolves were normally very imposing beasts, but add upset, their hackles raised and their teeth bared, not to mention the blood on their muzzles, and they were far beyond merely imposing.

Jeff knelt in front of the animals. “Easy guys. Your master is going to be fine. Ship is healing him,” he said while trying to project a mental picture of Morales lying in the healing chamber.

It must have worked, at least to some extent, because Lobo and Lila dashed the few feet to the chamber and looked inside just as the mists finished obscuring the view of Morales lying there.

Three crying and trembling women hugged each other and hovered over the chamber while a shaken medic stood holding an IV with its severed hose that continued to drip fluid toward the floor, although a puddle never seemed to form. The second medic had been kneeling, and after inserting the IV catheter in a vein in Morales’ arm, was in the process of taping the catheter in place when Ship transported the patient to the healing chamber, which left the medic kneeling over nothing. The medic came to his feet, both men staring around them. After all, it wasn’t as if they were warned about what Ship was going to do. They both knew about Ship, of course, about the healing chamber and about their Colonel, but one minute they were treating the patient and the next they were aboard what they soon realized was Ship.

Upon arriving at the scene, the troops on the ground had immediately set up a perimeter a few meters from the medics they were guarding, but gradually realized that the medics and everyone else were gone without a trace – well if you discounted the monster ship that hovered above and practically blotted out the sky.

Diana and Arlene were trying to console the women, telling them that Ship had previously told them that anyone entering Ship’s healing chamber with a heartbeat would live.

“He’s alive,” Christine sobbed out. “He was talking to us, but the whole front of his coat was soaked with blood.”

“Can any of you tell me what happened?” Jeff tried to ask over the sound of the near-hysterical sobbing women.

“Some bastard was in a tree and shot Morales with a crossbow. I put two rounds into him, but they were snapshots. I have no idea where he was hit, but the wolves tore his throat out almost as soon as he hit the ground, so it didn’t really matter, anyway,” Jasmine finished as she turned to hug both of the trembling animals.

Jeff stepped to the hatch and touched the area behind his ear to communicate with the troops.

A Sergeant stood to look upward. “There’s a headless guy dressed in furs under the tree there,” he said, pointing. “And there’s a crossbow beside him that he apparently used to shoot the prisoner. Colonel, do you want me to call in more troops to search farther out in case there are others?”

“No. Not just yet. Just widen your secured area out to a hundred meters or so if you haven’t done that already. I’ll get back to you when I can talk to the patient and have more information.”

“Yes, Sir. Nelson out.”

Diana had managed to get Morales’ wives to sit on some padded, high-backed stools that Ship had grown near the healing chamber. A table had appeared a few feet away with carafes of coffee, cups and condiments. “Make yourselves comfortable, Gentlemen,” Jeff told the medics. You’re involved in this and deserve to be here for the outcome.”

“Respectfully, Sir,” the Corporal said, “in case someone gets hurt, we need to be with our team out there.”

“Then take them some coffee and let me know when the General arrives.”

“Yes, Sir,” they chorused as big thermoses of coffee appeared on the table.

“Just walk over near the hatch when you’re ready,” Jeff told them. “When the coffee runs out, let me know and I’ll send more. As you’re already well aware, it’s cold down there.”

“We came prepared, but we thank you for the coffee, Sir,” the Corporal said as he and the other medic donned their backpacks, picked up their cases and the coffee, walked over to the hatch and were gone.

“The General told me that this couldn’t happen,” Jasmine snarled out in a shaky voice as she paced back and forth, the tears still flowing. “He said that all the prisoners were tracked, and none were near here. And if one began wandering this way, he would be moved back to his area. That asshole out there,” she said as she waved toward the hatch, “was dressed in some weird outfit made from furs that came from animals he had killed here. He had to have been a prisoner.”

Jeff’s face blanked as he listened to his radio for a second before he replied, “I’ll have her bring you up, Sir.”

Before Jeff could give Ship any instructions, the General was standing just inside the hatch.

“This way, Sir,” Jeff said aloud, then mentally, Thank you, Ship.

Jasmine came to her feet, her hands on her hips as she snarled out. “I thought you said that the prisoners were all tracked, their positions always known and there was no way any of them could reach us. Well, it certainly looks as if one did, and probably because he was downwind, Lobo and Lila didn’t scent him in time. He was almost impossible to see because he had made himself a blind in one of the monster trees. He was waiting for one of us, probably my husband, to come near.

“That damn bolt,” she continued as her voice broke, causing her to hesitate until she could choke out, “hit my husband in his chest. I couldn’t tell exactly where it hit because of the coats, but it had to be very close to his heart. It obviously hit his lung because he was coughing up blood. I can’t lose him. I just can’t,” she said before collapsing into her sister-wives arms, each of the other two now glaring at the General as if he were something she had found on the bottom of her shoe, all three with tears pouring down their cheeks again.

Diana eased into the huddle of weeping women. “He will live,” she said as she caught her husband’s eye, who nodded affirmatively as he stepped into the group hug.

“Ship just reported that she is slowly removing the bolt and closing the wound as she works the blades of the broadhead out of his body. She says that she is closing off and regrowing bleeders while maintaining his vital functions.” At least I think that’s what she means from the deluge of information she sent, Jeff said to himself.

The General still had not said anything, but passed a glance with Jeff before stepping back to the hatch. A second later, he disappeared.

Time drifted on as Morales’ wives continued to huddle together while staying as close to the healing chamber as they could, sometimes, one or more of them would put a hand on the chamber or lean over to stare down into the mists that covered their husband. Eventually, Arlene managed to get each of them to drink some coffee and take a few bites of a sweet roll. Their sobs had mostly stopped, but they continued to discuss the incident quietly with each other. Ashley caught Jeff’s eye and asked how it could have happened.

“I don’t know yet, but rest assured that I will.” Eventually, Jeff squeezed Diana’s hand before walking to the hatch, where Ship put him on the ground. As he went over to the group huddled under the tree, the General, who had been kneeling in the snow by the bloody remains of the prisoner, and the scientist who was examining the person, both came to their feet as Jeff neared.

“I watched the cameras’ recordings when I first arrived on planet. That woman would make one hell of a soldier. She put two rounds center chest and, well, you have to watch those videos. Those wolves are killing machines. I would love to have a whole fucking squad of them. It’s amazing how fast they can move even in the snow. They were just fucking blurs as they charged headless here,” he said while motioning to the person on the ground. “Of course, the snow isn’t as deep as it is out in the open, but there are still a couple of feet even here. I swear that they were on this guy three seconds after he hit the ground. And a couple of seconds after that, his throat and head were ... gone. No growling – nothing. Perfect teamwork – just killing machines. Of course, he was only a gasp or two away from death anyway, but still...”

“How in the hell did he get here without us knowing?” Jeff asked.

“Yeah, well, we just found that out. Show the Colonel,” the General ordered.

“Yes, Sir. Uh, Colonel, if you would look here, Sir,” the technician said as he pushed the dead man’s right sleeve up. “He has a scar from a mostly-healed wound here,” he continued while motioning to a long set of crude, but healed stitch marks on the outer side of the prisoner’s forearm. “It appears that something tore a gouge down his arm which, probably inadvertently, removed the locator, or at least opened the skin so that the prisoner noticed and removed it himself.”

“But I was told that there was a backup to the primary in the arm,” Jeff insisted.

The scientist offered Jeff a small instrument. “As you can see, Sir. The locator is still in his upper back – incidentally, placed there because it is almost impossible for a person to reach that part of his own back effectively – anyway, it is still there, but it isn’t transmitting. However, the one that used to be in his arm is still transmitting and is roughly forty clicks in that direction, he said as he pointed another instrument until it showed the strongest reading. I would wager that a fall destroyed the one in his back, and he inadvertently discovered the other one after he was injured and was tending to the wound in his own arm.”

“Damn,” Jeff muttered as he motioned to the dead man’s clothing. “That’s effectively a Ghillie suit and I’ll wager that part of those skins came from a snow leopard. The outfit is crude but not bad for what he had to work with. No wonder Morales didn’t see him. Makes me wonder how Jasmine did. From what she and Morales’ other wives are saying, she fired at almost the same instant this guy did.”