The trio had entered the ship through the lower cargo hatch. After which, Lockspur had resealed the bay doors beneath them while Carolyn and Binky moved into the aft loading bay and lowered the rear tailgate. Later, Lockspur accessed the ship's computer, checking for damage. Luckily, he found none. They had either beaten the Necros to the ship or their chasers had gone elsewhere. Lockspur joined Carolyn outside the open tailgate, where they disagreed about what their next course of action should be.
During the journey there, Carolyn mind-wiped a slew of raptors that she wanted to leave aboard the ship while they went back to find the others. When Lockspur protested, Carolyn tried to convince him to go along with her plan by assuring him they needed to find Dahl and Moss before the Necros did. She didn't tell him about Lilith or who else she suspected might be there. He wasn't ready for the whole truth. Hell, she was privy to the plan before arrival and still wasn't sure she knew the entire story.
Lockspur continued his protests, arguing that if one of his teammates found the ship and went inside, the raptors would attack them. Carolyn assured him the raptors would only attack the Necromongers. And he countered that if Dahl or Moss encountered raptors on board, it would be they who attacked the raptors, not the other way around. At which point, the raptors would have no choice but to defend themselves, and everyone would get hurt. So, there would be no raptors left aboard his ship.
Carolyn turned away, and he assumed she was going to get the raptors. Instead, she headed towards the exit tunnel, leaving him and the raptors where they were.
"Hold it," he called after her. She kept walking, ignoring his protests. Without thinking, he lunged forward, grabbed her above the right elbow, and spun her around. She almost fell. "I mean it," he warned. "You can't leave those things in there and just walk away. They'll tear the damn ship apart."
Carolyn squinted down at the hand clamped around her arm, and a look that Lockspur just made an awful choice consumed her face. "Let go," she warned, yanking her arm away with enough force to jerk him off balance. He faltered, catching himself before toppling over.
He stepped back, staring into an expression that spoke volumes of what she would do to him if he ever touched her like that again. But foolishness and ego were about to rear their ugly heads. He lifted a hand, preparing to poke a finger in her direction.
"Enough," a garbled voice said. It sounded choked off, as if someone was trying to talk with a mouth full of hard candy. "My kin care not for your sky machine of metal and plastic. Or those who came here with you. They will not attack your friends, no matter what they do."
Lockspur glared at Carolyn, then turned to Binky, the not-raptor anymore, and said, "When the shit hits the fan, everyone fights to stay alive. How are they any different?"
"Agreed," the raptor said, holding up a hand. "But we are no longer mindless prisoners of instinct. My kin will not harm your people. I'll give you my word."
"I'm sure you believe that," Lockspur replied. "But I doubt your..." he paused, unable to find the right word to describe the changing raptors. "I doubt they can differentiate one human from another."
"That is a very human thing to say."
"Perhaps," he admitted. "But I think it's fair to say they have never turned down a convenient meal when it presented itself. And it wasn't that long ago that they knew only hunger."
"Yes," the raptor admitted. "Always hungry; always searching.; it was our curse. But mind mother took that curse away. We understand now. Know better. Be better. Do better. Not monsters like before. Something else now." The raptor's disturbing smile faded, but it left behind an eerie memory of a woman he had met long ago.
"How are you talking right now?" Lockspur asked. "Raptors don't have vocal cords?"
"Not a raptor. Not anymore." The creature said, raising its chin high in the air. It touched its changing throat, exposing its soft neck. "Different now. Becoming like old mother. Difficult to make throat sounds. Becoming easier as time unfolds."
"Old mother? Who's that?" Lockspur asked. He turned to Carolyn and saw that she did not know.
"Old Mother looks like the ancient keepers. The ones left to protect the time stream continuity. Three souls, two flesh; one machine. Past, present and future made manifest." The misshapen raptor replied, "Left to keep the machine running."
Lockspur reeled on Carolyn. "You said you only altered her mind."
"I did."
"Not Carolyn," the raptor interrupted, "Not the first to come here. Not the first outsiders on this day."
"Who did you meet?"
"Not meet." The raptor said. "Eat. Who did I eat?"
"You ate someone, and this happened?"
"Many go to challenge. Many eat. All died. All... except this one. I ran away. Fell down. Got sick. Went to sleep and when... and when I woke up.... I knew where you were. Saw you in my mind. Knew mind mother... Carolyn... would come. Knew she would save you. Change me. Make me more. Make me better. Set my people free. A time of transcendence is at hand. Time to take our rightful place in the universe. All our places. Yours and ours. Time to become one people. Born of many. But one."
The raptor touched its growing belly. "Everything is changing now." It glanced at Carolyn as if asking permission to elaborate.
Lockspur saw a dark secret pass between them. He didn't like it. They knew who she was, or at least, suspected who the old mother was. He suspected he did, too. Lilith had sent him there; used him to set all this lunacy in motion. "Why are you changing?"
"Is it not enough to know that I am changing?" it added, not looking Lockspur in the eyes. "Whole life engineered by others. Twisted. Used. Experimented on. But now, free. Free to create my own path." She looked at Lockspur and added, "Our path. First path. All paths. No more questions. You follow. I lead. Destiny changed. Set free."
What's it talking about? He thought, and Carolyn shrugged. She did not know what was happening. Lockspur had almost died half a dozen times, and now he understood that everything that had led him to this point was a lie. The mysterious crash, the happenstance encounters, the missing son. It was all a ruse to get them there, so Lilith could spin another plan, and now it seemed like Carolyn and Binky, the ever-changing raptor, might be in on it.
His eyes lasered through his new comrades as a wave of heat rose through his feet and exited through the top of his head. In a short time, the raptor had picked up a few of humanity's least noble traits. The art of half/truths and deception. "Bullshit," he blared, unimpressed with the power of a large, unpredictable raptor, or a sketchy telepath. "If either of you wants anymore of my fucking help, you'd better spit the goddamn truth out right now. If not, you and Binky here can fuck off out of here, and I'll stay aboard while you and your pet science project run off to play heroes in the dark. I'm done with this shit. Got it." Neither of them offered anything close to the whole truth.
As he stood there, wanting to deny them access to his ship, he noticed the creature's slump had straightened over the last few minutes. Binky stood upright, mimicking Carolyn. Lockspur gestured at the raptor's wobbling, off-kilter stance and said, "And I suggest you stop that."
"Can't stand; can't sit. Stuck in between. Not pleasant," the raptor said.
"Not standing. Lying." Lockspur spat the word at their feet. "Lying pisses people off." He sounded angrier than he had a right to be. Hadn't he played a part in this? How could he bitch about Carolyn not asking him if he wanted her to link his mind to a raptor, when he helped Lilith alter the raptor first?
Lockspur could see the changes taking hold of the creature's body, and hear it in its voice. "Did you even consider what was best for her or the effect it might have on her unborn children?"
"I didn't do this," Carolyn said. "I admit I had no right to use you. But whatever this is, it's beyond my abilities."
"Mind-mother..." the raptor said, and paused, messaging its throat. Changing or not, it was in a great deal of pain. "Carolyn does not lie." The raptor lowered itself to the ground, struggling to sit like a raptor. It looked even more pitiful than it had been when it was trying to stand upright. Its days of sitting like a quadruped were ending.
Binky lowered her head, unwilling to look him in the eyes, and Lockspur saw guilt and shame consume her mind. The raptor, far from a creature anymore, possessed two things it hadn't a few hours ago. Human eyes- not in the right position- and human emotions- not understood yet. While the newly formed eyes were terrifying, it was the sudden burst of emotions that was downright dangerous. The gigantic infant could neither understand nor control its new emotions.
"Christ, Carolyn, what have you people done here?"
"My father's voice is fading, replaced by terrible images. Past. Present. Future. All mixed. Difficult to know which way is the right way. Which choices are good? Which is bad. Either way, bad things are coming."
"What's she talking about?" Lockspur demanded. "You said my memories would be permanent. But she's not talking about my memories. Whose memories is she seeing?"
"I don't know," Carolyn admitted. "This isn't why I came. This wasn't the plan."
"Unless it was," Lockspur replied, studying the raptor.
The creature gasped in shock and said, "Mind father calls. Sees this one as more than... an animal. More than... monster. My babies will not be monsters. Kings and queens."
"I'm sorry. I did not know the link would affect your children."
"And yet, you did it anyhow." Lockspur said, staring into the creature's oversized eyes. The ones on the sides of its shrinking head. A myriad of troublesome questions exploded in his mind. He frowned at Carolyn; face blazing hot. "It wasn't bad enough you did this to her. But you did it to her children, too," he snapped, gesturing to her belly.
"It was not my lady's fault," the raptor cut in. "I told her I could make my brothers and sisters understand, make them follow. But I was mistaken. They no longer understand my voice." She touched her lips. "I cannot speak their words. Or perhaps... they choose not to hear. I am outside now. Meat to feed the hunger. Nothing else."
"That's all fine and good." Lockspur snapped, words coming out like a slap to Carolyn's face. "But you didn't tell her anything until after she had already transformed your mind. So, no. You didn't get to choose. It doesn't matter whether she did it on purpose or they tricked her into doing it; that's irrelevant. She did it. She used you the same way she used me." Lockspur raged, and the raptor looked away.
"I didn't do anything to her body." Carolyn pleaded.
"I wasn't just talking about you. You're not the architect of this fuckery. You're just a puppet." Lockspur said. "Like me. Like her." He threw an angry gesture at the raptor. "The one who sent you is responsible. And I'd venture a guess, she's the same person who sent me here. Isn't she?"
Carolyn nodded and said, "The same person who's pulling all our strings."
"Lilith," Lockspur said. "Who else?"
"Would it surprise you to learn there are others involved?"
He laughed in Carolyn's face. "No more than it surprises you to learn your leaders lied about their true purpose for you coming here."
"My leaders would never lie to me," Carolyn protested.
He winked and said, "Well, good for you. They didn't lie. They just left out all the bad stuff." When she said nothing, he asked, "How many raptors have you altered since you arrived?"
"The raptors we left on the ship and a few more," she answered, not looking him in the eyes.
"What's a few? 10, 20, more?" Lockspur demanded.
Carolyn looked at the raptor and said, "A few hundred... or so." Lockspur's mouth fell open, and she added, "Every raptor that came into my sphere of influence during the trip here. And any that threaten us in the future."
"That could be thousands."
"Once they become a threat. I have no choice. It's us or them."
"How convenient."
"There is no other choice. The hunger is too great," the raptor explained. "That is all my people know. Hunger and service. Eternal, undying service. For that alone is what they created us for. To stand guard; to kill all who dare come here."
Lockspur's voice remained calm. "It was one thing to take a single raptor with us when we leave, but how the hell do we get hundreds, or hundreds of thousands of them off-world? Even if we could, it would irreparably change galactic stability forever."
Binky stood up even straighter than she had 15 minutes earlier. Her physical changes were happening at an alarming rate. Her head had narrowed by 50 percent, and now her eyes were facing forward. In a few hours, she might look human.
"The maker will provide," the raptor said in a pitch-perfect tone. Her descending rows of teeth were gone. Either down her throat, into the sand, or vanished. Lockspur couldn't tell. But he could see her teeth looked human. An orthodontist's dream of perfection.
"Listen," Lockspur replied, remembering his little girl's braces. "I've traveled all over this galaxy, and if there's one thing I've learned, it is that God doesn't give a shit about our problems. If you need something fixed, do it yourself."
"And yet, here I stand in the light of day, a bloodthirsty raptor speaking in your tongue. And let us not forget who it was who taught me your language," Binky said. A loud rumble burst up through the tunnel opening, and Binky jumped in the hole beneath the lower cargo doors and ran into the tunnels far below.
Lockspur crouched at the edge of the hole, peering into the darkness below. I can't help you if you won't tell me what's happening, he thought. He shook his head in disgust, realizing he had been lying to his teammates, to himself, to everyone. "You should have let me die. It would have been a kindness."
"To her, or to you?" Carolyn asked.
"Both."
"Do you think that's what your family wants for you? To die in the dark, unmourned and forgotten to time." Sorrow contorted his face. It made her heart skip a beat. He was a man broken by loss.
"My family hasn't wanted anything in a long time," he said, staring through her.
"I'm sorry, Carlos," Carolyn replied. "I had no right to say that."
"No, you didn't," he agreed, furthering her growing sense of regret. He looked away, staring into the hole, and time stretched into an uncomfortable pause. "But that doesn't make it untrue," he admitted. He turned back to Carolyn with red eyes wet with years of bitter longing. She wanted to say something, but she knew she'd already said too much. "Let's go," he said, and hopped into the darkness, not thinking about the dangers lurking below, only feeling the dull ache of the broken heart he had long since hidden away.
Carolyn didn't have to go far to find him waiting in the tunnel. He was 20 yards in, crouched at an intersection watching a group of raptors. "What are you doing?" she asked, not bothering to hide from the animals.
"Deciding if it's safe."
"They're with us," she replied, patting him on the shoulder and gesturing for him to follow her.
"If you say so. But without your gifts, shoot first, ask for forgiveness later. Unless you have some nifty way of helping me tell them apart."
She nodded and said, "If it weren't safe, you'd already be dead. I'm certain they smelled you as soon as you dropped into the tunnel. Hiding from them down here is not an option. This is their domain."
Lockspur stood up, but refused to follow Carolyn when she headed off towards the raptors in the near distance. When Carolyn realized Lockspur wasn't beside her, she stopped and asked, "What's the problem?"
"If we're going to survive down here, we need some way to camouflage ourselves."
Carolyn gestured to the group of raptors and said. "I can't conjure invisibility camo. But maybe our new allies have a suggestion. "
One raptor in the group came to her, stopped a few feet away, and stood in silence. Lockspur realized they were talking telepathically. A few moments later, it nodded and walked away.
"Private conversation." Lockspur said.
"More like pictures. They can't communicate like us. At least not yet."
"Not yet."
Carolyn shook her head and said, "I doubt they'll ever be able to speak as well as she does. But they are becoming intelligent. And I have noticed a few physical changes taking place. Although I do not know how or why they're changing."
"Did it have any ideas about how we could survive down here?"
"It did, but you won't like it."
"Why?"
"Because it's shit."
"So, raptors have bad ideas, too."
"No," Carolyn replied. "It's shit. The only way to cloak ourselves from the others is to rub the shit from the huge ones on our clothes. That way, the smaller ones will smell it and move away."
Lockspur let out a guttural scoff. "Yeah. And I bet it went back to its buddies and had a real good laugh about that."
"Maybe. But we don't have any other options."
"Great. Our only options are to wear shit or become shit. Lockspur said, shaking his head. "I hate this place."
Lockspur walked over to an enormous pile of crap, jammed his hands inside, and came out with two piles. The vacant expression on his indifferent face cloaked the rolling stomach in his belly. He walked over to Carolyn, held out a handful of stinking excrement and said, "If you're so keen to trust our new friends. You first."
Carolyn frowned at the raptors looking at them from the intersection. The raptor had returned to the group, who had now all turned to watch it. She frowned, and Lockspur imagined he heard a snickering laugh. Carolyn gagged at the smell and wiped the fresh dung on her pants and shirt. Then she took the remaining handful and wiped down Lockspur.
"Doesn't this bother you?" she asked.
"You get used to it."
"Having shit on you."
He offered a weak smile and said, "It's been a rough couple of days."
After three hours of making their way deeper into the tunnels, the soiled duo finally came to a tall figure standing in the shadows. The shadow sniffed the rank air as they approached and let out a half-cough/ half-sneeze. "What are you wearing?" it asked, stepping away from them. "You smell like..."
"Camouflage," Lockspur said, finishing her thought.
The raptor exhaled a choked-off sniffle. "Is that what camouflage smells like?"
Neither of them said anything.
"Who told you to cover yourselves in... camouflage?"
Lockspur thumbed a gesture back towards the raptors behind them and mouthed the words, fuckers. The group following at a safe distance cackled like giddy hyenas. "Perhaps in the future you can carry your camouflage in a separate bag. That should suffice rather than rubbing all over yourselves." She turned to look at them and added, "Humans, so smart, but so gullible."
Lockspur leaned in close to Carolyn and whispered, "Told you. Just a matter of time."
The creature returned to peering around the corner. She gestured for them to come look at the massive horde of ravenous raptors filling an enormous cavern ahead. As they studied her, Carolyn let out a gasp of shock. Binky the raptor had a much more homo-sapiens face. She stood upright, suspended by a frame that looked more Xenomorph than raptor. Her transformation had changed every part of her body.
Hundreds of screeching creatures milled around the corner, forming a chorus of commotion that reminded Lockspur of a concert he had gone to with his wife decades ago. "What now?" he asked no one in particular. "Why are they here?"
The female raptor turned to him, sniffed the air and replied, "They smell enemies in the upper tunnels."
"Is it us?" Lockspur asked.
She looked him up and down, expression unreadable, and said, "Your camouflage keeps you safe for the time being. They smell the death bringers in another tunnel." She pointed at a second opening. "There. They will emerge from there."
"Can't you talk to them?" he asked. "Tell them what's going on."
She gestured at her new form and said, "I am an outsider here. Food for the feast."
"I'm sorry," Carolyn said with a guilty grimace. "If there had been any other way."
"No need," she replied with a faint smile. "You have given far more than you have taken." She touched her belly. "Unlike them, my babies will grow to be special." She sneered over her shoulder at the snapping herd. "And for that alone, I cannot give enough thanks."
"I hope they become kings and queens."
"As do I," she agreed. "But there is something you should know."
"What?"
"My physical changes result from an energy pulse emanating from the core of this moon. It activated long-dormant strands of DNA woven into my genome."
"Lilith didn't do this to you?"
"That is a long story, and time is running short."
Before Carolyn could respond, Binky pointed at the raptors. The horde had all turned towards the tunnel opening and gone still. The changing raptor made a shushing gesture and said, "Time to go."
"Go where?" Lockspur asked. "They're right there. We can't just walk through them."
"No. But we can run," she said, pointing to a tunnel opening on the other side of the group. "When I go, you follow. Keep up, or they will see you."
"Wait," Lockspur said. "What are you talking about? There's no way we can't get by them."
The raptor raised her chin, sniffed at the air and said, "Prepare to move out. They're almost here. It won't be long."
"Who's almost here?"
"Use your senses. The outsiders are coming."
Lockspur sniffed the air and almost puked. The stench of feces made his empty, aching stomach do cartwheels."All I can smell is..."
"Camouflage," she said, laughing to herself. "And that is why even simple-minded raptors know not to roll in shit. It may blind your enemies to your scent, but it also blinds you to theirs."
He stared at her, searching for a witty comeback, but nothing came to mind. Instead, he turned to Carolyn and said, "Did she just school me on tactics?"
"I believe she did."
Weapon's fire erupted from the tunnel leading up into the wreckage, and the unsettled horde rushed towards the tunnel opening. A path opened between the trio and an exit a hundred yards away.
"Now," Binky screamed, and Carolyn and Lockspur took off running behind her. With every stride of her long legs, they fell behind 4 paces. Her speed was frightening. The distance seemed to vanish in front of her, and after only a few seconds, she had vanished through the opening, leaving them running through the center of the pack alone.
As Carolyn and Lockspur approached the opening, a massive raptor unfolded itself from the floor, barring their way. It roared and hissed, alerting a large group of raptors on the other side of the cavern. They rushed back to investigate the commotion, trapping the two outsiders on all sides. None of the snapping, snarling raptors seemed to notice or mind their unique smell.
The horde circled like vultures waiting for just the right moment to feed on their helpless prey. Every so often, a raptor would dart in close, try to take a bite, catch a furious blow from a razor-sharp knife, and then retreat to a safe distance to lick its wound. "This won't work for long." Lockspur shouted, swinging at another incoming raptor.
A tremendous scream emanated from the tunnel opening, and a giant black figure leapt from the darkness. The creature flailed through the air — 20 feet, 50 feet and then 100 feet — landing just behind Carolyn and Lockspur. It stood up, grabbed Lockspur by the back of the pants and shirt, and tossed him through the air like a discarded potato sack. He flew, cartwheeling, and then crashed down far from harm's way as Carolyn landed on top of him. Both lay battered, bruised, with the wind knocked out of them, but they were alive and no longer the centers of attention.
Half a dozen raptors turned to follow, but the she-raptor screamed a challenge to all. They turned back to her, and the circling began again. Raptor after raptor answered her challenge. Running at her, snarling and biting, some came away bruised, others came away with bloody teeth, some never came away at all. She bludgeoned them all with enormous blood-drenched fists.
As two raptors ran at her from the sides, a third monster raced up from behind and slammed her in the back. It threw her through the air as if hit by a locomotive, crashed to the ground and slid to a stop face down, ten feet in front of her new friends.
Lockspur and Carolyn cowered against the tunnel wall, trying not to draw unwanted attention. He mouthed, we have to do something, and she shook her head no. There was something wrong with these raptors. She could not reach their minds. She was helpless.
Binky's eyes flickered open; she saw her new comrades crouching just inside the tunnel opening and pulled herself to her feet, swaying from side to side. They knew she could run past them. And she knew it too. But if that was the case, the horde would follow her and find her friends.
"Next time, run faster."
Guilt twisted at their guts as they watched her turn back to the horde, stagger a few yards, and then fall face down in a heap as the creatures descended upon her.
They ran covered in shit and smelling like mountains of guilt and shame. They had left her to endure the fate that should have been theirs. Twenty minutes later, Lockspur came to a gasping stop and fell to his knees, crying in shame. "We just left her there to be torn to pieces." He couldn't stop looking into his little girl's eyes. What had he done? He heaved himself up, rubber band legs barely supporting him, and began staggering back, mumbling how they needed to go back. To make it right.
"Wait," Carolyn said. "She's still alive."
"How do you know? Can you read her?"
"Sorta," she replied, feeling herself all over.
"Yes or no, dammit."
"She's projecting."
Lockspur put his back against the tunnel wall, slid onto his backside, and let out an exasperated sigh. "She's alive."
"She is."
He felt like he hadn't slept in ten years. Every muscle in his body ached, and his mouth felt as rough as sandpaper. "I knew this job would be dangerous. But it is bigger than anything I imagined."
Carolyn said nothing.
"Fine," Lockspur said. "Have it your way. Just answer one thing? How did a dead Hunter Gratzner crew member show up out of nowhere to save my ass like you knew exactly where and when I would need help?"
"What makes you think I died?"
"Company report lists acting Captain Carolyn Fry as killed in the incident. Hell, I saw the emergency footage myself. You were there, and now you're here. That's a lot of time to go walking around this barren shithole with no food or water and everything trying to eat you. And how is it- after all these years- you look younger?"
"Thanks for noticing," she replied with a smirk and Lockspur fixed to the spot with a dark stare.
"I get you deserve answers," Carolyn said. "So, let's start with I didn't come to save you. I came to save her."
"Who? Binky!"
"Stop calling her that. She sacrificed herself for us. She is their queen."
Lockspur's mouth fell open, and he said, "Are you saying you would have let the queen kill me?"
"I'm saying you're an idiot," she snapped. "Lilith lied to you. You're here to meet an earlier version of herself. It was the keeper who reached you first. And your Lilith, who sent you with two shards. "One for the earlier keeper Lilith; the other for the emerging raptor Queen."
"That's nuts." Lockspur replied. "You're the only one I've met since I arrived."
"If I am wrong, you still have the crystals, right?"
"Of course I do. They're right …" he paused, touching the spot where the festering boil was. "Gone," he said to himself, pressing the skin and feeling nothing below the surface. "The incision had vanished." Carolyn smiled at him, reading his confusion.
"You cannot remember because Lilith gave you blood to heal you," Carolyn explained. "As a result, the memory of that meeting — you giving her the shards and her ingesting one — was suppressed. The other shard she gave to the raptor before I found you, thereby tricking us both."
"This isn't over, is it?"
"Apparently, no one tells me anything. But if I had to guess, I'd say this is just the beginning."