Swarm

Chapter 11 - Act I - INGRESSION

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Chapter 11 - Swarm

Paysha

A screen pulses red, accompanied by high-pitched beeps. Hicks moves fast, throwing the coil of rope to Bosun and pushing Lewey aside to view the bank of screens arrayed on the desk. He stabs a button to silence the alarm as his eyes dart across the displays. His forehead furrows.

“What is it?” demands Lewey.

“Something coming towards us, boss. Fast like. From the west.”

“What do you mean, something? Is it inside or outside the Wall?”

“It’s…they’re…above it.”

“What?” Ignoring the screens, Lewey darts to his telescope and grabs the eyepiece. Tense seconds pass as he matches the virtual warning to external reality. He looks up, his cheeks concave, the vapestick’s tip an expectant glow. “We’re leaving. Now.”

I can’t see anything in the small patch of blue sky visible to me.

“What is it, boss?” asks Hicks.

“Nowww!” bellows Lewey, enveloping himself in a final sulphurous exhalation before hurling the stick to the floor. Like a badger bolting from its set, he grabs my bag and runs towards the elevator with Hicks close behind. Bosun remains rooted to the spot, eyes swivelling between his accomplices and me, indecisive gears grinding.

Ignoring them, I claw back a vestige of self-control and stagger towards Markus, pain lancing through my knees. As I yank at his bindings, a numbness envelops my body and my vision narrows to a tunnel.

“I am not worth it, Paysha,” Markus groans. “Save yourself, before it is too late. I wanted only to tell him his son might be alive. But he…he…” Sobs rack his body as he forces the words out: “He wanted more. I could not stop him. He had this…this…” I don’t have time to understand. Wiping away my tears, I look around in vain for something to cut his ties. Bosun is fumbling inside his skins for the elevator keys as Lewey yells at him. Obsessive security is now hindering any escape.

Then I see it: a grey murmuration, its airborne waves flowing towards the Spire. From this height, it already sits below the horizon, its approach masked by the sea. But this aberrant aurora warps and weaves unlike any flock of birds. It has more direction, more purpose; like angry, disturbed insects vectoring onto an intruder. The lagoon’s sparkling waters dim with its passing shadow as it emits a sequence of white trails which disperse in the slack breeze. A chill races up my spine as, not for the first time, my father’s voice says: ‘Whenever you’re unsure what to do, choose an action which creates change’. Post-Flood I’ve applied a more direct interpretation: ‘To stay alive, you must decide. Take any path. But don’t just stand there doing fuck all’. It’s worked for me so far.

I don’t know why – perhaps a lingering shred of redundant guilt – but I bend to kiss Markus’s forehead. He looks up at me. Somehow he knows what’s coming. His bruised, bloodshot eyes close in resignation at his likely demise. A hand clutches my arm. “Go,” he urges. “Save yourself, Paysha.” My tears well up, my throat tight as his grip slackens.

When I push on the chair’s arms to stand, I spy through an upper window something strange, far above the swarm. Two glints of light are closing on each other; a pair of detached sequins high in the cerulean sky. Suddenly, one blooms orange in a soundless spitting of fiery parts. It’s another unpredictable clash of unknown elements in our warring world.

I turn to limp as fast as I can towards the still open elevator doors. Lewey is jabbing random buttons as Hicks snatches the key from a dazed Bosun. He’s looking past me, through the windows. The drones must be almost upon us. I can see his life-clock unwinding, his cocksure bluster giving way to uncertainty.

The doors are closing when I reach them, but no-one stops me forcing my way inside. Through the gap I see Markus turning his chair to face the initial onslaught. It saves me from a last tormented glimpse of his face. A series of thumps announces the first wave latching onto the Spire’s walls and windows. As the doors clunk shut, I can see their explosive payloads extending on scorpion-like pincers.

We descend to the collective sound of heavy breathing. Vapestick residue and the taint of Stink-soaked skins invade my nostrils. I try to focus on the message above the elevator panel: ‘In Case Of Fire Use Stairs’. But the compulsion to face my tormentor is too much. Lewey’s crow-black eyes are already fixed on me. He raises his arm, kisses a pink palm and extends it towards me. A puff of his cheeks blows his psychotic affection into my face as a vape-laden breath of unfathomable confidence.

As I shut my eyes to avoid his predictable smile and fight down another wave of nausea, a concussive boom pounds my eardrums, forcing our metal box to judder against its guide rails. Bosun swears and grabs at the handrail. Lewey clutches my bag tighter. Hicks remains impassive, betrayed only by a tic in a clenched jaw. We continue to descend. A second barrage rattles our cage as the drones’ placed charges detonate, the explosions resonating through the shaft’s creaking structure. Dust sifts down from the ceiling grate. Further waves of seeker drones might already be breaching the Spire, seeking out pre-assigned targets. I try not to think about Markus’s fate.

A third explosion buffets the building, jolting the elevator to a halt with a tortured shriek. I cry out as a cascade of unknown objects strikes the elevator’s ceiling, denting its tarnished chrome. The lights flicker and there’s an acrid smell of concrete dust. We freeze as one until Lewey thumps Hicks on the arm. “What the fuck are you waiting for, Hicks? Get me out of here!”

Photo by Judith Chambers on Unsplash

Hicks shoves Bosun onto his knees and, ignoring his protests, jumps onto his bent back to punch the ceiling grate. The flimsy panel gives way, clanging onto the roof. He leaps up and grabs the exposed opening with both hands to haul himself into the noise-filled darkness.

His face reappears, accompanied by more blackened dust falling onto our upturned faces. “They’re not this far down yet,” he shouts. “C’mon, move it!” Lewey reaches up to grip his wrist. “You and the bag won’t fit,” protests Hicks, his voice almost drowned out by screeches of torn metal from higher up the shaft. Then an ominous buzz emerges from the reverberations. Hicks jerks his head upwards and his expression can’t be doubted. They’re almost on us.

Lewey’s panic redoubles as he shoves the bag up to the opening with both hands. Before taking it, Hicks looks at Bosun, who is now stood. The subtlest of signals passes between them, unseen by Lewey. As Hicks grabs the bag and hauls it up, Bosun turns with the deftness of a street-fighter and conjures a blade into his hand. He sinks it into the right side of Lewey’s chest, twisting his hand as he snarls into wide, uncomprehending eyes.

I shriek and stumble into a corner. Lewey’s face is a stunned mask at the inconceivable assault. His left hand clutches at the narrow slit in his grey shirt, failing to stem a blossoming stain. He drops to his knees, his other hand flailing at Bosun’s waist. The adrenaline from this new mortal threat smothers my pain but triggers something else into life. I can feel her ascending out of my subconscious. My banshee is back – and she’s not happy.

Bosun steps away from Lewey’s ineffectual grasp and turns to me, still wielding his bloody knife, his expression a rictus of savagery. The drones’ buzzing intensifies, their rising pitch invading our claustrophobic space. At least this ending will be swift, the violence merely bloody. I only need a few more seconds. I split the air with my cries, hands raised in pointless deflection. “No, Bosun!” I plead. “I’m not like him. Don’t do it!” Faster than thought, she is dampening my fear, turning my body into a tool she exists to wield.

Hicks shouts down, “Leave her! The drones will rip us apart if you don’t hurry the—” The buzzing turns into a tortured din as a thud rocks the elevator, followed by shouts and curses. But Bosun’s focus remains on avenging his demeaned masculinity. “I’m gonna stick you with somethin’, you cock-sucking bitch,” he snarls, jabbing his blade towards me, the mocking bully in the playground.

Lewey slides down the wall, hands slick with the blood pooling around him. He reaches out in silent plea, but my banshee couldn’t care less. A familiar, all-encompassing presence, she flows through my body, capturing my reflex arcs, seeking maximum autonomy. Her invasion fills me with both hope and fresh fear. Her interventions are invariably successful, but often messy. Containing her in these circumstances will be impossible.

This unpleasant drama shouldn’t go to waste, my dear, my own voice utters inside my head. Not while your cocky captain is being pulverised upstairs.

She tugs on my leash, testing me within this cramped space. I sidestep to evade Bosun’s first lethal thrust. His eyebrows rise at my agility and he jabs again. Another nimble evasion and she tugs harder. She can smell Lewey’s blood, still alive, slumped in a corner. But it’s not his she’s interested in.

Hicks’s head bobs into view again, his face etched with pain. There’s a wide gash on his forehead and his hand drips blood from several shredded fingers. “Last chance, Bosun. Get the hell out or die with these losers!”

Don’t worry, I’ll take over from here, she reassures me, straining against the remaining threads of my frayed self-control. I look down at Lewey. His chest is rising in brief gasps, head lolling and eyelids drooped. He’s a dying man. I refocus on Bosun – as does she. Time slows, each heartbeat a second. A flicker of doubt dilutes his contemptuous stare. Is it just Hicks’s urging or can he sense her command of me, how she will prioritise my survival above all else?

Grunting in regret at an opportunity lost, he sheaths the knife back under his skins. Hicks extends his uninjured hand as Bosun tenses in readiness to jump and grab the roof’s opening. She’s now a cat eyeing a rat. A tidal wave of neuronal transmission engulfs me as my muscles attune to inhuman frequencies. My brazen banshee knows me too well and persists in ensuring I can only observe her prescient power. All agency departs me, subsumed into a shared, expanded consciousness. Some people deserve all of my attention, she hisses from deep inside, converting prior fear into a frenzy of hate; feeding my latent desire for her to decide all our fates.

Hicks cries out a warning as he guesses zealous intent from my shifting posture. He’s too late. I release her leash and the last of my volition evaporates as she extinguishes my urge to cower. The lights fail, plunging us into darkness, within both this cage and my head. She promises to be quick, but that doesn’t mean she has to be clean. After all, it’s not her knife. Or her teeth.

Feel free to look away.

It’s pitch black, but I can’t shut my eyes – and she knows it. We still need to see to survive, and she can somehow detect her warm prey. The loud humming in my ears drowns out the mass of drones inside the elevator shaft. She cackles with delight at her release, revelling that, once again, I am her and she is me; unlimited in her freedom to commit any atrocity. Falling to my knees, she diverts my tedious pains elsewhere. Ripped skins and torn nails signal a bully’s turn to scream. Prompted by his earlier carnality, it takes only a few gristle and shriek filled seconds before we spit out an unzipped horror. The floor grows slicker as we stand and raise his ceramic knife to head height, her grip now around his stretched throat as his legs dangle. “Now, where should his brains be?” she asks out loud, emboldened by revenge. She wipes my blood-wet lips and spits again. “Ah, I remember…”

Bosun’s raw bubbles of pleading descend into animal howling as my rhetorical oracle slices into vertebral bone with razor-sharp stone.

Through the brain-hacked darkness, I tell her she shouldn’t enjoy her job so much.

You know the rules, dear. No interruptions while I’m working.

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