Chapter Thirteen

Reunion

The columns of water burst, and rose several meters high with each onslaught of the animals, and Mai had to avoid being buried by the tons of water at every second.

It was a terrifying spectacle, but at the same time of a surreal and spectral beauty, beyond the mundane reality. The rules, the intrigues, the dualities, none of that mattered. It was simply nature in its pure state, indifferent to the presence of sentient beings several kilometers away, with their cities of bright lights and sophistication.

Each attack inflamed more the beasts, that seemed to want to prolong the combat until the day that absolute zero reigned over the universe. Neither side was falling. And the speed with which they moved meant that several times they simply melted into an undefined mass of flesh, antlers and water. Mai saw here and there wounds on the bodies of the stags, that to the common eye would have been as if wounds were opened in the fabric of reality and blood flowed from them like a stigma of existence itself.

She dodged new attacks from the visceral filaments, that now seemed to be less angry with her and more interested in helping the monstrous beast. It was making the earth tremble with its screams and would have made anyone who heard it turn their hair white.

Mai wondered if the soldier stationed at the entrance was listening to the sounds. Although it was quite far away, the shape of the wide valley was perhaps more than enough for the sounds of the scuffle to reach there.

She had tried several times to connect with him, but for some reason the communication was failing again. There was something blocking the incoming and outgoing signals and she was more than sure it wasn't a problem with her Neurowire, which seemed to have all its functions working, although not the ones she needed at the moment. Contact with Shin, who could receive calls through the translator, was also cut off.

It is not possible for him to disappear again, is it? Mai wondered.

In the relative time they had been together, she and Lizbeth knew him well enough to know that he wouldn't disappear without a good explanation. She remembered seeing him at the log dam when she was attacked. But the dam had disappeared and so had he.

The snow and mist continued to swirl in the vortex towards the center of the lake with increasing speed, and the fungus networks emitted the ghostly pulsating flash in waves that came and went, as if they were communicating a message not meant for the eyes of this world. Mai felt more and more worried by the crescendo of the lights in the place, which seemed almost as if they were the veins of a living being, even the huge monster showed the same flashes here and there on its body.

In one of the lunges, against the monster, one of the stags, which seemed to be the smallest of the three, crashed in a bad angle into one of the portentous antlers of the beast. There was a sound of something breaking and a horrible groan and one of the stag's antlers flew off and was lost in the darkness. The monster spared no time and, in one detailed stroke, reached the neck of the poor unfortunate animal who emitted a scream of pain that froze Mai's blood.

The other two flinched for a few seconds, but rushed to the rescue of their friend, and the monster used the body in its mouth, waving it in the air to keep them at bay, while lacerating the flesh of its prey, that was struggling and kicking incessantly.

Mai went back into the waters, switching to incendiary ammunition once more, and took the opportunity to shoot the beast in its rear again. It let out a thunderous shriek and threw the body several meters away.

Mai was not sure if she had hit the target of what looked like an umbilical cord, but the creature had its eyes on her again, looking at her with an unspeakable fury. But, to Mai's luck, before the beast could launch itself in pursuit of her, it was lifted into the air again by the giant stag, which again knocked it down and it attacked the monster, stepping on it several times.

Then Mai looked at the wounded animal, which had been freed from the creature's fatal bite.

The wounded stag let out pitiful groans and Mai could see how the rotting fungus' nets had already covered it and dragged it under the water. She moved closer, until the water reached her waist, but she did not have a suitable angle of shot without hurting the animal even more. She would have liked to help him, but he was too far away from her. She saw the unfortunate animal's wild eye begging for help above the water, which the wounds had turned a glowing crimson. It was already too late for the animal.

Quickly she changed her handgun and taking up her pistol again, she pointed it at the animal's heart and fired, putting an end to its suffering. Then the sound of bubbles and stillness. She put the gun away again, tasting something bitter on her lips and stepped back, to get back in position to shoot.

She would try to fire again to the beast's rear as soon as she had a chance, when large arms embraced her from behind.

"You're doing good," said a voice in her ear.

Mai pulled her arms free with the help of the shotgun and turned around. There stood Shin wearing only his pants. Mai punched him in the arm angrily.

"You scared me! Where have you been?"

But as she punched him in the arm she couldn't dislodge her fist. The figure in front of her warped for an instant and, although it retained its anthropoid form, she recognized that the body was a gelatinous fungus web that had taken Shin's form again. She shot at it and the goo splashed her face. The smell was so repulsive that she had to suppress retching to keep from vomiting.

"Why are you shooting at me?"

"...!"

"Don't you want to be a part of this?"

"Don't you love me?"

Several of those throbbing, semi-human-shaped disgusting creatures were approaching her, on the water carried by the filaments, exchanging bodies, shapes and faces into a hideous, fleshy, throbbing mass. Mai clicked her tongue in disgust and simply fired with the shotgun in her left hand at the nearest one, that had taken the form of Komarov at that moment and then, drawing the pistol again, fired at the one that had taken a mixed form of Ivraeva and Shin. Several more approached and Mai saw how they started with small hyphae that grew, branched and intertwined crossing each other at a biologically impossible speed, forming throbbing bulbs where the head should be.

She shook them off, before the heads began to take shape, and backed towards the shore again, trying not to turn her back on the giants, as they continued the battle in the water.

She felt incredibly disgusted with herself, she could not understand how that thing managed to fool her senses, when she could see everything else in the environment in perfect order. Everything was coming from that glow.

The creature was far more intelligent than she had thought. Its ability to create information networks, to copy its victims and make them appear to be real versions was terrifying. The versions that attacked her took shapes that formed quickly, but who knew how far they could go if she gave them enough time.

Not to mention its ability to create the illusion of an entire base among the trees. The fungus and the creature probably secreted some hallucinogenic substance, and used the memories, at the same time, to create an illusion in the mind of its victim.

"Who is Rei?"

Hearing that, Mai turned around quickly. She had no idea how much that thing had seen in her mind, but it was more than obvious that it also fed on the memories of what it touched. She had been unconscious for hours and the hallucination of the base seemed to make more sense now. The fungus created a web of memories of everything it touched. The vehicles she didn't recognize, or the base itself, were made up of her memories and those of the victims.

"Who is Rei?"

From her left a new figure, this time with the face of Shin again, approached completely naked, as he smiled and red tears came down from his empty eye sockets. She sent the filth to the other side with her shotgun, but behind her approached another figure that had sprouted in the darkness.

Another shot from the shotgun and she hit it squarely in the chest.

But the thing didn't go away this time. It lunged at her and threw her aside, at the same time as a huge antler from one of the stags flew inches over their heads. They both rolled in the snow and mud.

"You shot me!"

Mai looked up at him. It seemed so real. The shotgun was between them so she pulled the trigger one more time. The thing was thrown backwards and rolled a couple of meters away from her, but got up almost instantly.

"You shot me again!" the thing said, visibly angry.

But the shot had no effect on the dark metal that covered its body.

For a second they were both distracted, they were sure they had heard some distant detonations in the north, above the roars of the animals. But Mai refocused on the figure in front of her. She frowned in confusion and noticed that the being was wearing black armor and carrying a ball under his arm with a smiley sticker on the side.

She felt her voice crack and a stabbing pain in her chest was making her lose consciousness. Her heart was pounding like she had been running a marathon all day.

"Prove me it's you,” she said, standing up.

"What is it?! It's me, look! I'm not one of those things."

Shin stood up and looked at her confused, he had no idea what had happened, but Mai was visibly disturbed. The armor retracted from his body to the back, revealing Shin's naked torso.

A nauseating wave hit Shin's nose. The smell of the place was unbearable, so much so that he wondered how she was still standing and he could already imagine what had happened by looking at her antennae.

Hallucinations, like the ones Zejho, Ivraeva and Komarov had suffered. He cursed himself for not having arrived before everything started to get out of hand.

"Tell me something that only the three of us know. I don't know if you're a hallucination of that thing, one of those creepy things or who knows what this time. Tell me something that only the three of us know!"

"..."

Shin looked into Mai's green eyes, they were glazed over, perhaps in an attempt at tears or restrained joy. Whatever the emotion was, he felt it was his fault. He should have been there for her and his heart shrank from imagining something worse happening to her while he wasn't there.

They were beings whose character had been shaped by the cruelty of an unknowable universe and, as if it were a joke, without that cruelty, in a world which seemed to revolve senselessly around madness, they wouldn't have met either.

Back to back, taking care of each other.

He, an alien with so many years on his back, walking through lands and planes of a world similar to the one he was walking in, but of infinite strangeness, looking for something that would give meaning to his wandering existence.

She, a fey who had decided to seek her happiness in her work and in a way had found it. Still, the emptiness that had filled her heart in recent years had made her wonder, more than once, if it was worth so much suffering for a world that, at least in some part, seemed to hate those who were like her.

And Lizbeth, what about her? Although at that moment she was hundreds of miles away, the three of them shared the same desire.

A fey girl who was once the plaything of fate. But whose smile could light up the darkest of days and whose bravery had never made her turn back before the horrors she encountered on her way.

Now the three of them were together. Just a few more days and finally the three of them could be happier than they had been in centuries.

Shin approached Mai slowly, as if he didn't care about the disaster caused by the animals behind him.

He put on a serious expression and uttered a few words that only Mai could hear. Then muffled by the sound of the battle and carried by the wind, they fled away like the mist coming out of the mouth.

They were simple words that to anyone else might have meant something else. But to both of them, and Lizbeth included, they were important.

She loosened her trigger finger, and a tentacular filament lunged at Shin. He tackled it by dragging it away, which gave Mai time to wipe her wet eyes and shoot at another who had tried to grab her by the ankle. It was no time for kisses or hugs, they had work to do, although they were both relieved to have each other again. They both backed several meters away from the shore and hid behind a fallen log free of filaments. Shin set the drone down on the ground and tried to comfort his partner in crime.

"The important thing is that you're okay. Do you have a gas mask in your backpack?" Shin said, as he destroyed a shapeless mass that was trying to take his form again.

Mai's antennae moved in a smooth motion and hid in her hair again. She had already abused her ability enough, and the truth was that she was starting to feel dizzy. Shin tore off a new one of the pestilences and looked at Mai, who moved several meters away while shooting and activated the gas mask with visor. Mai felt a little embarrassed that she hadn't thought of it sooner, but the truth is that either she had become accustomed to the smell or the hallucinations produced by the fungus in her system had prevented her from taking the precaution of wearing a mask. Everything would have been easier if she had worn it from the beginning.

"Th-that's Piper?" she asked, regaining her composure, but still with her voice slightly cracking.

"Yeah I don't know what happened to him. When we were on our way over here, it suddenly shut down."

"I lost the other two at some point. That thing made me hallucinate it was you, and I followed it from the other side."

Shin looked at the figure of his partner, she must have gone through hell while he was gone.

"Sorry for the delay, when you fell and that thing destroyed the dam, the current swept me away."

“I figured something had happened.”

Shin looked at the mess of the place and the fight in the water. Another of the stags had lost one of its antlers, but Shin could only see the ever-increasing trails of blood floating in the air. Mai turned and looked to see the one that had passed over them, when Shin had pounced on her, and discovered that the huge antler was now visible, as if it lost its properties once it was far enough away from the main body.

The rotting filaments of the fungus had again begun their attacks against both, but this time without taking any form. They simply attacked with the needles.

“Were those the ones that destroyed the dam?” he asked, peering through the fog that had already thinned sufficiently.

"Can you see them?"

"No, but they're elks…. Or stags, aren't they? I mean for the sound they make. Although I didn't know they could grow so big… or that they could become invisible."

"If it wasn't for them, I think that thing would have eaten me by now," Mai said as she shot at a bulb, that had begun to form a humanoid facial feature, as if it were screaming.

"They're not going to last long. That thing is beating them. And that's making me more worried," he said pointing in the direction of the huge glow. "On my way over here I was able to guide myself by the lights but they're not nearly as powerful as the one in the reports."

"...!"

"That thing isn't the one producing the lights, it's what's underwater."

"That's what I figured. Do you think it's another creature?"

"I don't know. But I think the key to all of this is the earthquakes."

"The fungus or something else? What I've been seeing is because of that?"

"Yeah… in some way. That rotten smell is hydrogen sulfide, and remember this is a volcanic area. The last earthquake may have produced some methane pocket that is releasing gases into the air. Earlier it didn't stink so much, but now it does. Even though we can't feel it, maybe the whole area is still having aftershocks from the earthquake."

"Shin... that thing has three pairs of arms. The ones on the sculpture we've been looking at only have two."

“Do you think that thing is the number of victims the creature has assimilated?”

"What do you think?"

"I don't know, three victims seems to me to be too few for that size, although it may just be its growth and that it has absorbed characteristics of other animals."

In their minds several pieces had begun to fit together. The creature, the arms, the sculpture-like umbilical cord and the period when the lights appeared. But there was no time for further explanation.

"What?" Mai asked as Shin turned to look at her.

He didn't like the idea he had in mind at all, but it was the best he could come up with at the moment. He reached behind his back and unzipped his backpack from the tactical holster.

"ZiTF09, CB02," Shin said, looking at the backpack.

Instantly there appeared, on the chest buckle of the holster, three grenades and on both sides of his belt a black tactical sword and a small one put in their respective sheaths, and he tossed the backpack to Mai.

"Use my rifle if you need it. Do you think you can stall him a little in case the stags die?"

"What are you going to do?"

"Whatever happens in the bottom is the source. I think that if I can cut the umbilical cord on that thing it can't live without being connected. If it could have been done, it would have been done a long time ago. The filaments of the fungus I sampled changed their shape to adapt, remember? Well that creature I'm sure is the amalgam that artist was talking about. But what is important is in the center."

"You're going in there? Have you lost your mind?" Shin simply shrugged and looked at her with a face of circumstance. "But what if you're wrong?"

"Run to the car and keep your distance until reinforcements arrive," he said, drawing the short sword and ripping one of the fungus nets that was thrown straight at his face.

"About that... I called for reinforcements but I forgot to ask through Arsen first."

"You didn't call Carissia, did you?"

"…"

"I hope she didn't land in the middle of the city at full speed or we're going to get hung up on." Shin pursed his lips and furrowed his brow.

"Carissia is my personal pilot… I can always tell I was under the hallucinogenic effects..."

"Yeah… I'm not sure if you say that it's going to be much better." Shin sighed and turned to look at the battle. "That monster is too dangerous to let loose. If we don't stop it now who knows when it will reappear and maybe by tomorrow it will disappear deep into the lake."

Mai looked at him worriedly. She didn't like the idea, but they had no other at that moment. Arsen should have already set some operation in motion, after she called one of the robots, but it would still take time to get to the place.

Shin jumped over the tree, where they had been hiding, and headed for the lake re-sheathing the short sword.

"If those two fall and that thing goes after me, don't even think about doing something stupid."

Mai ran after him, as if she wanted to tell him something else, but stopped just before she reached him. She would be lying if she said she wasn't worried, but she also knew that Shin was the only chance to get close to whatever was in that glow.

"Good luck." She told him and she put out her antennae again.

 

He gave her the closest thing he had to a smile, trying to ward off Mai's fears, as the armor began to cover his body again, and ran in the direction of the lake. The black silhouette was the last she saw of him before he plunged into the gelid waters.

Shin knew how stubborn she was about her work and she would not run away until she knew that whatever was going on in the lake was not under control.

Shin's reasons were different now that he knew she was okay. And Mai knew he wouldn't stop until he found out what was in the middle of the lake either.