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The first one to open was in front of Salvaje. He stood with his arms wide, as did the others,
but his eyes were open. He leaned down over the egg. The flaps glistened with strands of shining
slime. Fingerbonelike legs emerged and caught the edges of the opened egg, hauling the
primary-embryo stage of the alien s crablike body onto the lip. It leapt at Salvaje, wrapped a
muscular tail around his neck, jammed its ovipositor into his startled mouth, and clutched his face
with the legs, pressing itself flat against his face.
Orona could see the terror grip the man, and he realized that in this final moment of truth, the
reality was more than he had bargained for, for Salvaje tried to scream.
The sound was choked off by the tube rammed down his throat.
The scientist in Orona was intrigued, but the human part of him recoiled.
Other eggs splayed wide their fleshy openings, other primary-embryos leapt upon waiting
faces.
The queen watched it all impassively.
Then, when all of the naked humans had been infected, the outermost eggs hatched and
depleted of their inhabitants, the remaining robed people darted in and dragged their comrades
away, adroitly avoiding, save for one, being attacked by the remaining eggs.
The queen did not approve of this, but she was anchored to her huge egg sac and could not
move quickly enough to catch the scurrying humans.
 Normally there would be drones to hold them, Orona said.
 What?
 Nevermind.
The door shut. The queen raged.
As the attackers hauled away their fellows, one of them spotted the watching camera. He
pulled a handgun and fired at it. He missed three times, but the fourth shot wiped the screen.
 What happened?
The agent shrugged.  The security system was overridden at this time. We have no more
images of the fanatics.
 Overridden?
 One of Bionational s chief security people sent a coded squirt to the system. Self-destruct
code.
 What?
 Ninety seconds later the security system destroyed itself along with the entire complex. Blew
it to bits.
 No! What about the alien? The eggs?
 Scattered about the countryside in pieces the size of your little fingernail, Doctor.
 Oh, no!
Orona was stunned by the news. What a waste! He d sent a ship halfway across the galaxy to
obtain such specimens and if they d been a few hours quicker, they could have had one right here on
Earth! That explained the dreams people had been having! Damn! Damn!
Wait. Ninety seconds. Could that mean ?
 What about the fanatics? Did any of them get away? There were at least a dozen of them
infected!
The agent sighed.  We don t know. Our people have been combing the country looking for
them, but there s no sign of them. The explosion was in the half-megaton range. There s no way to
tell from the wreckage how many people died in it, whether anybody got away.
For a moment hope flared in Orona. There might be a chance.
 We hope none of them did, the agent said.
 What? Are you crazy? These life forms are priceless!
 Think about it, Doctor.
Orona was a brilliant man; he had always been at the top of any class he was in. It hit him,
what the agent was trying to say. Yes, the aliens were priceless. But under controlled circumstances.
Bionational knew that. That s why the complex was rigged to blow up if there came a breach in
security. If the alien somehow escaped, got free of captivity, that could be disastrous. Even a single
egg was potentially dangerous. Given how quickly they could breed and come to maturity, given how
they could change into queens if the need was there&
Orona nodded. Yes. He saw it.
A dozen queen aliens, hiding out, laying eggs, that could be a problem.
That could be a major problem.
17
Billie stood in front of one of the  viewing ports, watching the streams of light strung like thin,
crooked tubes of bright neon across the dark background. She hadn t spent much time in space, not
since she had been a child, and this kind of travel was new to her. She stared, trying to remember
her parents during happy times, but their bloody end kept jamming itself into her thoughts. Since
Wilks had come to see her that first time, the reality the doctors had tried to wipe kept bobbing to
the surface like floats on a pond. The truth was rising and would not be denied. All the dreams that
had been real&
 That s an illusion, you know, came a voice from behind her.
Billie turned and saw one of the marines, Bueller, standing there.
 The improved gravity drive means we can spend less time in hypersleep, but the
multidimensional matrices of the butterfly field turn dots into lines. Something to do with some
esoteric particle, chronons, or impiotic zuons or some such.
 I wonder what Easley saw in his last seconds? she said.
It was a rhetorical question, but Bueller shook his head.  I don t know. I can t imagine why he
would have gone EVA and taken a grenade with him. "
 Some kind of depression, the colonel says. Maybe Easley was running from monsters.
Again Bueller shook his head.  I don t think so. We were pretty close. It doesn t make any
sense that he would suicide. Besides, there are a lot easier ways.
Billie nodded. Blowing yourself to bits in deep space was not her choice of an entry to the final
chill.
 I don t trust Stephens, Bueller said.  He doesn t have any command experience in the field
and I think he wanted to hush the whole thing up. If we re successful in our mission whatever it is
exactly then up-levels will overlook a few bodies. But if we fail, then the little things will count.
 I hate to disillusion you, Bueller, but if this mission doesn t succeed, we ll get eaten by things
with big teeth, or else turned into puppy chow for the baby things with little teeth. We ll all end up on
the cold ground as lumps of alien dung for the bugs to fight over.
 How colorful, Bueller said.
 Telling it like it is. I ve seen these things work.
 You sound like Wilks. He stood there for a second and she could see he was uncomfortable.
 Come on, Billie said.  I ll buy you a cup of what passes for coffee.
 Okay. Yeah.
In the mess hall, Ramirez was waiting for a self-heating meal packet to cook. He grinned at
Billie and Bueller when they came in.
The two of them sat at an expanded plastic table with their paper cups of the vile ship s brew.
 Wilks must really think a lot of you to bring you along. You know Stephens will hang him out [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]