Dark Rising

FIFTY-ONE

Warmth, strange scents, the hum of life. Alex opened his eyes and had to blink as brilliant sunshine flooded his senses. He was lying on soft, sandy soil, partially shaded by the branches of a large tree. Small yellow bees buzzed around sticky-looking fruit nestled in amongst the leaves. He quickly looked at his hands and feet and felt his face. No elongation; and other than some tightness across his chest where the lacerations were healing, he felt fine.

Beside him lay Adira, her chest rising and falling as if she were deep in sleep. Except for a black eye and bruising on her top lip, she was perfect. Sam, too, was laid out on the sand, groaning now as he came around.

Alex moved across and helped Sam sit up. He pulled his drink flask from his waist and lifted it to Sam’s lips. The HAWC coughed, opened one eye and drank. He looked like he’d fallen in front of a cattle stampede and managed to get caught by every horn and hoof. He had open gashes on his cheeks and chin, and both of his eye sockets were purple. A huge knife wound ran from his collarbone to navel. Alex could see it had separated the skin and some of the deeper fatty tissue – horribly painful, but his innards wouldn’t come tumbling out.

Sam raised a blood-crusted eyebrow at Alex and smiled. One of his front teeth was missing. ‘You should see the other guy,’ he said, and coughed some more.

Alex laughed, and quickly checked the HAWC’s shoulders, arms and ribcage for breaks. Sam groaned as Alex extended one of his arms and then pressed his side.

‘Broken ribs as well, big guy,’ Alex said.

Sam coughed again, spat red onto the sand, and winced. He noticed the damage to Alex and got serious. ‘Sorry, boss, I tried to hold them. I saw Rocky go down, then that big bastard caught me a good one and everything went black.’

‘Take it easy, Uncle. I think he caught you with about fifty good ones. We’re all lucky to be alive. Those guys were bloody tough, like no one I’ve ever encountered.’

He paused for a second and sat back on his haunches. ‘Sam, Rocky didn’t make it. Irish neither.’ He pushed one hand up through his sweat-soaked hair and looked down into the sand.

Sam’s brow creased. ‘Rocky and Irish? I never even saw Irish come back.’

‘No, he didn’t. He took on that thing from hell. Stopped it from ambushing us outside the laboratory and gave us the time we needed to engage. I couldn’t get to him in time.’ An image of Hex Winter burning in a chair pushed into his mind. ‘I never get to them in time, Sam.’

Sam groaned again as he sat forward. He saw Adira lying on the sand, then quickly looked left and right. ‘Where’s the kid?’

Alex just shook his head.

‘Ah, shit. They killed him too?’

‘No. No, he stayed. Look around – nothing eating the planet, no incinerated landscape. He shut it down. He knew it would kill him, but he did it anyway. We’re alive because of him. He saved us all.’

Alex got to his feet and brushed the sand from his hands. ‘Anyway, soldier, patch those wounds. We’re not home yet.’

‘You got it, boss. Hey, by the way, where are we?’

‘I’ve no idea. Can you take some scans? I seem to have lost some of my kit.’

Sam laughed. Alex looked as though he had been shot out of a cannon and landed in some thorn bushes. His super-toughened suit with the ceramic armour plating was just a tattered rag circling his waist, and the pants were punctured and red with blood.

Adira groaned, and Alex went over to her and lifted her head. ‘Slowly, slowly, we’re safe now. I think it’s all over.’

Adira sat forward and put her elbows on her knees and drew in some deep breaths. ‘It’s over? Where’s Zach?’

Alex exhaled slowly through his nose and wiped sand from her cheek before responding. ‘I’m sorry. He didn’t make it.’

Adira’s eyes went a little dead for a moment, then she looked up at the sky. ‘No one weeps for heroes in Israel anymore, Alex. The tears would drown us all.’

Alex allowed the silence to stretch, giving her time to recover. He looked around at the horizon and then back down to her. ‘I think we’re lost.’ He raised his brows at Sam.

Sam shook his head. ‘It’s all fused, nothing works.’ He dropped the useless scanners and communication devices to the sand. ‘But it still looks like Iran to me.’

Adira looked up at the branches above them. ‘That’s a wild desert fig tree – they only grow to this size near Kashan. I have people there – we’ll be safe.’

‘Safe.’ Alex tested the word in his mouth. It felt strange, unnatural, and no longer relevant. He now knew there was another world hidden behind the one most people knew. A world where monsters existed, where horrific things crept in the dark, dropped from the sky or slithered up from the depths.

He lay back and closed his eyes against the sun and thought about a beach somewhere on the east coast of Australia. He inhaled salt and heard waves crashing on the sand. ‘Yes, safe now.’ Soon, he thought, very soon.