Chapter 12: Escape (Part 3)

As Vessa stared, wide-eyed with fear, Hinelin strode to a moss-slicked log and sat, resting his elbows on his knees. “I’m with the military,” he admitted, his voice cutting through the tension with a flat, weary honesty. “Giddeon’s right. I was sent here to investigate Vibane.”

He adjusted his rifle, setting it crosswise on his thighs. “Ereos spent years telling the Triumvirate that landing here was impossible. Then our intelligence flagged recruitment logs for a mission that didn’t officially exist—proof he’s a lying bastard.” Hinelin shook his head, a ghost of some private grudge flickering in his eyes. “I was sent to find out what he was hiding.”

He glanced at Vessa, his expression unreadable. “Your turn.”

Vessa licked her dry lips, gulping, her throat pressing visibly against the cold bite of Uzari’s blade. “I—”

“I want to play a game,” a voice called out from the dark of the forest.

The words sent a shockwave through the huddled crew members. Kilner and Orion scrambled backward, weapons drawn, while Oomah screeched and latched onto Eddington’s lethargic frame. Hinelin exploded off his log, his rifle leveled at the thick underbrush at the exact same instant as Giddeon. Uzari reluctantly yanked her axe away from Vessa’s throat, instantly pivoting into a guarded stance.

Next to a towering, vine-choked tree stood a man in rugged black pants and a dirt-stained brown shirt. His hair was a matted nest of the same dull earth-tone, framing a face dotted with open scabs. His mouth hung slack, a thread of drool lengthening until it broke, splashing onto the damp forest floor.

“I want—” The man’s form suddenly fractured, a brief burst of static rippling through his silhouette before he popped back into focus. “—to play a game.”

He stepped toward them, his hand reaching out.

Boom!

Hinelin’s rifle barked, the sharp recoil snapping his shoulder back. The high-caliber round caught the stranger center-mass, slamming him hard against the tree trunk. He crumpled instantly, collapsing into a limp heap amidst the tiny, neon-colored ferns and ancient moss.

Vessa flinched, her hand clamping over her mouth.

“Why’d you do that?” Oomah cried out. “What if he’s from another team?”

“None of us look like that, or talk like that,” Hinelin said calmly, the metallic clink of a fresh brass casing hitting the dirt as he chambered another round. “…Or shimmer like that.”

“Is…is he dead?” Vessa asked, taking a tentative step toward the heap of dirty clothes and matted hair.

Orion matched her step for step, his Vibane axe gripped tight. “Stay behind me,” he muttered to her out of the side of his mouth.

“Be careful,” Hinelin warned, keeping his rifle locked on the downed heap.

Closing the distance, Orion knelt and nudged the stranger’s shoulder with the head of his weapon. No response. He hooked the blade under the collar and flipped the corpse over.

A sharp hiss sliced through the clearing. Vessa and Orion scrambled backward as the flesh rapidly dissolved into a black, quivering sludge. It let out a final, wet gasp, then went rigid, calcifying into a dull, matte substance like volcanic glass.

“It—it decayed a century in seconds,” Vessa whispered in awe, staring in sick fascination.

Orion leaned in, tapping the hard surface with his axe. A sharp clack echoed through the trees—the hollow sound of metal on cold stone. “It’s solid rock,” he murmured, frowning. “What is this?”

“I want to play a game,” twin voices spoke in perfect, haunting unison.

Identical figures—exact copies of the man Hinelin had just killed—stepped out of the forest’s shadows from opposite directions. They advanced with a synchronized, fluid grace.

Kilner cursed, backing into the huddle. “Two of them!”

The group split in a chaotic panic, backing away in different directions. Vessa scrambled to the center of the clearing, while Oomah pulled the still-numb Eddington left, their eyes locked on the encroaching figure to the north. Giddeon stood still; his own barrel was glued to the replicant on their left while Hinelin’s rifle tracked the one to the north.

What are they? Giddeon queried his AI, his finger resting lightly on the trigger.

“Most likely part of the faction that hit your camp,” Johnny guessed. “I took the liberty of analyzing them. They’re perfectly identical, right down to the scabs. Or were—until Hinelin turned the first one into a pile of stone. If killing one triggers a split, you and macho man over there will just be burning ammo.”

“Don’t attack!” Giddeon shouted to the scattered team. “We don’t know if killing them will multiply the threat!”

“Multiply how?” Orion demanded, his eyes darting frantically between the identical figures as his grip tightened on his axe. “They’re closing in. You want us to wait until one of them guts us?”

“They might be splitting,” Uzari answered, wiping cold sweat from her brow. “Kill one, get two more—that theory.”

“Mitosis?” Kilner cursed several times in a row, the words tripping over each other. “What do we do then?”

“Do you want to play a game with me?” The creature closest to Oomah tilted its head, its neck clicking as it twisted to an impossible angle.

“No! Get away!” Oomah shrieked, her voice cracking as she stumbled backward.

“They’re right,” Vessa spat. “We don’t know their abilities. Hinelin killed one, now we have a pair.”

“Make a decision!” Orion roared, lifting his axe threateningly as the twins advanced in perfect unison—one drifting toward Oomah while the other closed on him.

“Capture them!” Hinelin thundered, keeping his sights locked on his mark. “Blunt force only!”

Orion didn’t hesitate. He choked up on his grip and lunged, driving the haft of his weapon into the figure’s jaw with a loud crack. Its silhouette shimmered, then reformed, collapsing into the dirt like a sack of bricks.

“I got him!” Orion shouted, sounding half-surprised as he threw his full weight onto the fallen twin. Pinning its chest with the axe’s handle, he slammed his knee down on its midsection.

The second twin didn’t even glance at its double. Its unblinking gaze remained locked on Oomah as it fractured, its shape blinking across the open clearing in a shimmering, high-speed distortion.

Oomah’s breath caught in her throat, a sharp gasp rattling in her chest. Beside her, Eddington scrambled feebly back, but his heel caught a slick root, sending him crashing to the ground. Oomah was left alone, paralyzed in place, with the horror reaching out for her.

Giddeon abandoned his position, sprinting so fast it was almost as if he materialized in their midst. Skidding to a joint-sheering halt, he planted his leg firmly in the creature’s path. It tripped over Giddeon’s boot, sprawling flat to the earth. Before it could recover, Uzari dropped onto its spine, viciously wrenching its wrists behind the small of its back as her knee pinned it in place.

“Rope!” Hinelin shouted, his eyes darting from one to the next. “We need a bind! Fast!”

“No one has anything!” Kilner yelled back. The skinny man rushed over and threw his weight onto the twin’s legs, helping Uzari anchor the thrashing target to the ground. Its body vibrated randomly, letting out a low, crackling hum. “Just knock ‘em out!”

“We need to question them!” Hinelin barked, his eyes scanning the glade’s perimeter, watching for other movement. “Don’t let them go.”

Suddenly, the twin pinned beneath Orion snatched his wrist. “Play with me!” its voice fragmented into a corrupted, high-speed loop as it laughed manically.

A sharp hiss sliced through the air as the creature’s flesh bubbled and sloughed away. The black mass expanded with a sickening surge, swallowing Orion’s hand and forearm before he could break away. In a single heartbeat, the liquid goo solidified into cold, obsidian stone, cementing his arm in place.

“I can’t get it off!” Orion’s voice rose to a terrified panic. He frantically clawed at the heavy substance with his free hand, but his arm was fused in place as if cast in solid iron.

Uzari’s eyes widened as she watched Orion’s plight. Her own captive began to laugh, that same corrupted, high-pitched sound filling the clearing. “What the—” she exclaimed as the body beneath her hissed, instantly turning to gel.

Giddeon moved like the wind, wrenching Uzari clear just as her knee began to sink into the bubbling sludge. He skidded to a halt thirty feet away, his heels tearing up a massive track of moss. He set her down, his chest heaving and his ankles feeling as if they now had several hairline cracks running through them.

“You need more Endurance to keep up with those sudden bursts,” Johnny informed him. “And your feet are about to fall off.”

Yeah…I noticed, he quipped back, his heart hammering violently against his ribs as agony flared in his lower limbs. Shift fifty to Endurance.

Uzari stared at him, breathless. “How—“

“How the hell are you so fast?” Vessa blurted, staring open-mouthed at him.

“Do you want to play a game?”

“No way,” Kilner whispered. Every trace of color drained from his face as a fourth twin emerged from the dense foliage.

Hinelin rushed up to Orion’s side, his boot slamming into the hard substance pinning the younger man in place. Cursing openly, the team leader delivered a series of punishing kicks, the impact vibrating up his leg with each blow. Finally, the substance spider-webbed, then cracked. With one last powerful strike, it shattered into a dozen pieces.

“Run!” Hinelin bellowed, pointing due east.

Numbly, Orion stumbled away, pale with shock and clutching his bruised wrist as he chased after the group. They plunged blindly into the choking foliage. Behind them, dark silhouettes flooded into the clearing, their forms flickering erratically in and out as they moved in perfect, haunting unison.

A single question rose in a chilling, overlapping chant—perfectly synchronized and devoid of human warmth.

“Do you want to play a game?”

Laughter erupted from the canopy and the deep undergrowth all around them, a suffocating wall of sound that transformed the eerie forest into a living cage.