Doom pursed his lips with obvious displeasure. Like me—or rather even more than me—he wanted to know what we’d find below. Our scans didn’t detect any life inside, but we suspected scramblers or disruptors were interfering with our equipment—a standard tactic of the Kryptids.
“Let’s get busy,” he said, whipping out the remote to the excavation bot.
The hovering device, equipped with four mechanical arms with high precision lasers at their tips, glided over the surface before stopping in front of the door. It immediately went to work, its arms moving in every direction as it began carving the large boulders blocking our path into smaller, more manageable chunks that we hauled out of the way. Twenty minutes into the task, after further scans confirmed it was safe for the others to come out, the rest of the crew came to help us clear the debris.
The door’s locking mechanism had long ceased to function, whether from explosion damage or disuse. But even if it had, the battered door wouldn’t have smoothly opened. Despite being reinforced, the concentrated power of all four beams cutting through the same spot carved a large opening in no time. Using magnetic handles on it to prevent the carved-out section from falling in, we pulled it out only to be confronted with more debris blocking the way in.
My curses echoed those of Doom. With an angry growl, Stran suddenly rolled up into a ball and, spinning forward, he threw himself against the boulders blocking our access.
“Stran, no!” Doom shouted.
But it was too late. The Creckel slammed into the rocks with a thundering sound. It wasn’t fear for his long-time companion that had prompted Doom to try and stop him, but what followed instead. Some of the rocks shattered under the force of the impact. Small pieces fell first, making the stack shift enough that a much bigger boulder fell down. It took a few seconds before a loud crash rose from the within when the boulder finally reached the bottom. We could only hope it hadn’t harmed anyone down there—assuming there were any survivors.
The rest of the stack of rocks shifted again but finally settled, leaving a large enough opening for one of us to squeeze through. At first glance, it looked like the base’s doors had opened directly into a lift that had been destroyed. A very weak light could be seen at the very bottom of the shaft, indicating some power still remained inside the base.
But that didn’t mean life.
The stale and rotten smell that wafted to us through the opening boded ill. I recognized all too well the scent of death and decay. Doom and I exchanged a glance. My hearts tightened at the sight of his shoulders imperceptibly drooping. He had so desperately wanted to give his friend some good news—as had the rest of us.
Stran unfolded himself to peer into the hole. He stared for a few seconds before emitting a small keening sound I had never heard from him before. It tore at my hearts. Like the rest of us, he had known the chances had been slim. But, until now, I hadn’t realized just how deeply he had held on to hope. He curled into a ball and rolled a short distance from us, leaning against the rubble of stones we had moved from the entrance. His dark scales changed color, taking on the washed-out sandy hue the rocks in the area. Had I not seen him go there, I wouldn’t have known Stran was there at all, so effective was his camouflage while he mourned.
But I refused to totally give up hope.
“I can fit through the hole,” I said pensively while giving it an assessing glance. “I can fly down and see what’s going on.”
I didn’t need to go into specifics for Doom to understand I meant to evaluate if there was any point for us to continue clearing the debris. Our team leader gave me a stiff nod before his eyes flicked towards the Creckel, his jaw clenched with sadness for his friend. I squeezed his shoulder encouragingly then, making sure the debris surrounding the opening was steady enough, I lowered myself in.
3
Janelle
A sizzling sound in the distance penetrated my foggy mind. I dismissed it, presuming it to be one of the many auditory and visual hallucinations I’d been experiencing over the past few days. There was no more food. We should have had more larvae, but over the past week, every morning when I went to prepare the rations, one or two more had gone missing. It wasn’t just the mature ones either, but many of the young and then the eggs.
At first, I had struggled with accepting that one or more of the Creckels could be betraying us like this. They were almost always with me anyway. Since that only left the membrane as a potential suspect, five days ago, I’d moved the remaining larvae to one of the farther tanks, out of its reach. The next morning, the membrane had shifted on the wall, and the tank had sat empty.
I had wept loud, ugly sobs while Brees attempted to console me. I didn’t even shed tears: my body was too dehydrated to produce any. She’d carried me on her back to the great hall. Along with the other Creckels, they had moved the beyond used mattress that served as my bed to the center of the room, well out of reach of the membrane. I no longer doubted that it would kill us in our sleep to feed itself.
In desperation, I’d tried to eat some of the vegetables. It made me horribly sick for three days straight. Everything hurt, even my skin. With my severe dehydration, my muscles cramped almost non-stop.
The Creckels had gone into hibernation, every single one rolling up into a ball around me. They would die in that position in a few weeks for the youngest ones and maybe in a few months for the adults. I wished they would keep me company instead of spending my last few hours alone. But they were doing it to reduce their oxygen consumption in order to leave what little there was for me. Either way, I’d finally made my peace with the fact that my time was up.
My efforts to create a newer membrane had failed. I was too blind to see what I was doing and too weak to think straight. I couldn’t bear wearing my optical aid for more than a few seconds before feeling like my brain was getting fried, or bleeding from my nose or my ears. I’d just wanted to feel the sun on my skin, to have soothed the dry pain in my throat with fresh, clean water, and to have gone to sleep on a full belly one last time.
The sizzling sound persisted. My hallucinations usually only lasted a couple of minutes before shifting to something else. This sound had been steady for a good fifteen minutes if not more. And now, a burnt smell was seeping into the room through the closed door—or was that another delusion?
No, this smell truly stings my nose.
As that thought crossed my mind, Brees stirred against me. She unfolded and looked at me questioningly before turning her dragon head towards the door. Her eyes were dull, almost haggard. Her scales, once shiny and colorful, looked ashen.
I projected to her an image of sparkles. She nodded and approached the door with heavy steps. Rising on shaky legs, I had to kneel back down for a moment to fight the dizzy spell that washed over me. Getting back up, I half-walked, half-stumbled to the door. Just as I was reaching for it, a loud bang on the other side scared the living daylights out of me. I pressed myself against the door, as if to keep it shut, my heart pounding into my throat. Straining my ears, I listened for any other sound that might reveal what was happening on the other side while the other Creckels stirred.
Brees bumped her snout on my thigh, telepathically projecting the image of the corridor. A million thoughts exploded in my mind, but I couldn’t latch onto a single one or make sense of anything in my weakened and terrified state. Pushing the door with shaky hands, Brees helping me with her forehead, I opened it onto the long hallway of the base. Normally, I shouldn’t have been able to see anything at the end in the semi-darkness that now permanently reigned below. But light trickled in from the elevator shaft. It was nowhere near enough to fully light the area, but it allowed me to see the outline of a large boulder-like object.