Grueberfest 06 R3: Deadlier Than the Male (773 hits)
Category: NoneLabels: Grueberfest sci-fi
Rating: 1.89 on 31 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by Jack McCallum (View user info) at 2006-10-18 18:36:25 EDT
Brocha was sitting on a stool, bent over a microscope.
She was comparing two slides.
To the naked eye the samples looked completely different.
Under the microscope, they were almost identical.
Wall-mounted displays carried bobbing pictures from helmet cameras and emitted bursts of static, grunts, farts, and the occasional profanity.
She looked up, not seeing the plastic walls that made up the airtight chamber, not seeing anything at all. Her ears were still ringing. All she could hear were derisive comments and laughter that had filled her small prefab lab mere minutes before.
Chavas, Brule and Lanner.
Tough guys. Loud mouths. Soldier-builders. Hired muscle.
Brule was the first to be attacked.
Lanner was the first to start screaming.
Lanner's display rolled and blurred as he whipped his head back and forth, but Brocha saw blood, and splintered bone protruding from a jagged stump.
*
The expedition to Hambardzumyan II had started off with a bang, and if things didn't improve it would end with a whimper.
With the invention of the Cross Drive, Earth had reached out. The Cross Drive had been installed on twenty ships. The drive took tremendous amounts of power and magnetically twisted space into a funnel shape. With the drive a pilot could point that funnel in any direction, and the ship would ride down the funnel, emerging in a distant part of space.
Eleven ships had disintegrated when Cross Drives had become unstable. Six ships had disappeared, perhaps emerging into a point so far away in space that it could take many years for a message from them to reach Earth. One ship had emerged at the target point near Omega Centauri, transmitted a few words of a distress message, and gone dark. One ship had reached a habitable planet near Kappa Cruces. The crew of the Vanguard were heroes on Earth. They had arrived safely, and were establishing a base camp for settlers and explorers.
Brocha had entertained similar high hopes for the Spearhead. Her ship had made the journey to a habitable world near the multiple star system of Mizar in Ursa Major. They had shut down the Cross Drive and approached the planet on nuclear fusion drive. They had entered the atmosphere of the second planet from the sun, cheering when they saw blue skies under the light of the bright yellow sun, a star christened Hambardzumyan by astronomers back on Earth.
When they were eight hundred feet above the surface and about to land on wings and jets, wind shear flipped the Spearhead onto her side and she careened off course to a crash landing.
Wind and gravity stressed the restraints on dozens of containers that had been strapped to the body of the Spearhead in zero g weeks before.
The seed bins and hydroponics chambers struck the ground and had been blown to pieces. The food storage modules and many others, textiles, heavy machinery, had spun away from the body of the spacecraft and probably landed miles away. A massive module called the Ark had come apart, scattering cages and animal carcasses. It was impossible to know what animals had survived, but Brocha had seen cats and rabbits and honeybees pass by the habitat, and she hoped the cats didn't screw up the local ecosystem, since they were pets and were not intended for release.
There were five survivors of a crew of twenty.
Three soldier-builders had made it, those hardy former military personnel who made up half of every ship's crew. They were the ones who did the heavy lifting and digging and building while the scientists studied a new world and the pilot and co-pilot maintained the ships.
Seven soldier-builders had died. The pilot and co-pilot were dead. The two structural engineers, the life sciences specialist, the doctor, the geologist and the biologist had died.
The only person Brocha had been close to on the journey, the zoologist, was badly injured. Brocha wasn't sure if Patterson would survive, and she missed talking to him.
The surviving S-Bs were sure they could finish building all the necessary prefab habitats so all of them could survive until a rescue mission came.
Brocha had tried to explain that was unlikely, at least not for a long time. The crash had happened so fast no mayday had been sent back to Earth.
The S-Bs found it darkly amusing that of all the scientists, only the botanist was unscathed.
A simple six-room inflatable-prefab combo unit had been set up first.
The S-Bs had set up a barracks for themselves, and Brocha's botany lab. She slept on a cot in a storage space in the lab, and they shared a shower, toilet, and kitchen between the two rooms. Patterson slept in a drug-induced haze in a bed in the ruins of the ship. The bed was in a sealed chamber in the medcenter. Brocha checked on him every few hours, hoping that the concussion and broken bones she had detected and tended were all that was wrong with the man.
Atmospheric data analyzed on the Spearhead before the crash gave a preliminary indication that their air was safe to breathe, but the S-Bs still insisted on wearing their suits until they were familiar with the terrain.
"We may not have a doctor to take care of a broken leg," Chavas had bellowed a short time ago as the S-Bs headed for the airlock, "But at least we are guaranteed some fresh salads with our rabbit stew."
Brule and Lanner had laughed as they followed Chavas through the airlock and out onto the surface of the scond planet from Hambardzumyan.
The planet had not yet been named. Since it was the prerogative of the landing party to name a habitable new world, quite a few names had been suggested during the journey, with no decision being reached. Once down on the surface, the three S-Bs had their own suggestions.
"Cockworld," Brule had said, as they had been suiting up for their first exploration of the area days earlier.
A thousand miles to the west, away from the lush vegetation of the mountain-rimmed equatorial jungle they had landed in was a great desert of stone and sand littered with tumbled spires of rock. One spire still stood erect, one thousand feet high, and when they had passed over it the S-Bs had whooped it up.
*
Brule had been collecting wide leaves and red fruit from a plant that had caught Brocha's eye when he let out a grunt and the view from his helmet camera became a blur.
There was a wall of beautiful vegetation on the edge of the riotous growth of the jungle not far from the habitat and the ruined ship.
The plants were of two types in that particular cluster, short and wide leafy plants weighed down with small red fruit or berries, and tall thorny tendril clusters. Every few feet along the height of the tendril clusters was a small yellow football shape almost hidden behind a basket weave of slender vines.
*
After setting up the first habitats and doing a little exploring, Chavas had relented and collected some samples from both plants. Brocha had asked the S-Bs to do this every time they had gone out and they usually ignored her.
"Just collect some fallen leaves and old fruit," she had asked.
Chavas had gathered a few pieces of rotting fruit and some wilted fallen leaves from the first plants, and a three foot length of dying thorny tendril from the others.
Brocha had been studying these samples for two days. She had run a toxin scan on the red fruit and the leafy greens the moment she received them, and the night before she had tasted a piece of the fruit while the S-Bs watched and cursed and sputtered.
"Mmmm," she had said. "The fruit tastes like raspberries and tomatoes. It's quite pleasant." Nibbling a bit of dried leaf she had told them it was more like spinach than any kind of lettuce, and they could make a decent salad from the two.
The men had scoffed at the suggestion, but she was sure they were as sick of dehydrated emergency rations as she was.
*
Brule had gone quiet. Brocha could only see him through the helmet cameras of the others, Chavas turning away from the horizon and Lanner interrupting his investigation of the small yellow footballs wrapped in a mesh of vines. He seemed uninjured, but he was raising both hands, and seemed to be trying to reach behind himself.
*
"Ha! Yeah, planet Cumshot!"
That had been Lanner's suggestion.
From orbit they had seen that there was a single continent on one hemisphere of this world, a crescent over seventeen thousand miles long and three thousand miles across at its widest point, with an archipelago on each end that reached the polar icecaps. The ship had passed over the crescent and the crew had pointed out mountain ranges and rivers and lakes, and empty deserts and deep jungles and forests that covered thousands of square miles. The Spearhead had crashed on that crescent just north of the equator.
On the other side of Hambardzumyan II was an ocean that could cover the Earth's moon three times over. Over that ocean had been a churning white storm ten thousand miles across. The storm had been emitting long white streamers of cloud that could be seen as projectiles of ejaculate, depending on your point of view.
"How about Foursome," Chavas had said, eyeing Brocha.
"How about you boys go on your way," Brocha had replied.
*
Now, on their seventh trip outside, the S-B's had been collecting fruits and leaves and when they were attacked.
"Chavas," I can't see anything. Hold your cam steady on Brule and Lanner!"
"You can wait, bitch!"
Brocha saw blurs.
Chavas began roaring and swearing and all three cameras transmitted swooping, spinning images.
After only a minute or two, there was silence.
Brocha studied the displays.
Brule's camera was at ground level, sending an image of a blood-spattered suit. Either Lanner of Chavas was lying on his back.
It was Lanner. His camera showed blue sky.
The camera in Chavas's helmet showed both Brule and Lanner. Chavas seemed to be on his knees. He wasn't moving, he wasn't breathing.
Brocha went to the airlock, stepped in, and opened the outer hatch.
A breeze stirred her lab coat and cooled the patch of exposed skin beneath her throat and above the zipper of her nylon jumpsuit.
She stepped outside, inhaled, exhaled, and waited.
After a moment she decided the air was safe to breathe, and she went to the wall of vegetation and the three dead men.
From a distance Brocha studied the S-Bs, and the vegetation, both the fruit-bearing plants and the thorny tendrils.
Chavas was on his knees. Slender green vines had wrapped around his neck again and again, squeezing so hard that the high-impact plastic of his suit was crushed where the helmet locked down. His faceplate was fractured.
Lanner was lying on his back. He had bled out after losing his right hand.
Brule was lying on his side. The back of his suit was studded with punctures.
Brocha studied the scene. The plants had killed these men.
The evidence of the attack was clear, and the reason for the attack had been revealed to her under the microscope.
She kept her distance from the tall thorny tendrils. This was a plant that had evolved to go on the offensive when threatened. The slender vines had choked the life out of Chavas as he had tried to help Lanner. Lanner had been investigating the small yellow football, which was actually a seed pod that had evolved into something else, a Venus flytrap from hell. The yellow football had opened to reveal thorns like teeth and powerful bands of cellulose fibers as strong as muscle. The pod had chewed off Lanner's hand.
Everything had started with Brule, when he had picked a few living fruit from the low, leafy plant.
Brocha returned to the lab. Leaving the airlock door propped open, she wheeled a metal cart out of the lab and across the uneven ground until she was within ten meters of the plants. She eased the cart over and let it lie on its side.
Brocha stepped forward and plucked one of the ripe fruit from the low plant.
She pulled and one of the plump berries snapped free of the plant. She watched closely, and saw a plume of powder as fine as pollen drift into the air from the leaves and branches. The plant was dusted with the pollen, and any sharp motion released the powder into the air. Brocha turned and ran. She ducked behind the overturned metal cart and heard a series of sharp thuds as is stones were striking the flat metal barrier between her and the plants.
She got up and returned to the plants.
"Brule picked the fruit," she said aloud, "And released the pollen, which might have been part of the fertilization process a long time ago, but now it is just... an alarm."
She stepped close to the tall tendrils, studded with thorns. On the rough skin of the tendrils and slimmer vines were traces of the powder.
"The pollen message is received. The fruit is under attack. The tendrils release these thorns, firing them like shot from a gas-powered gun."
She leaned close and saw gaps in the skin of the tendrils where thorns had been only a shot while ago. She looked over her shoulder and saw thorns scattered on the ground before the overturned cart. The sheet metal of the cart was dented from a dozen impacts.
Each of the thorns had a drop of moisture at its tip. Too late in the day for dew, Brocha thought. Poison? She kicked at the dirt and uncovered small bones, some shaped like fine grids. The rib cages of alien animals.
She picked up a dry thorn lying at her feet, and split it open.
"Aha."
She looked around and saw tiny growths sprouting from the ground. Budding green stems and thin streaks of green reaching away from the body of the new plant. These would grow up to be both of the plants before her.
She parted the soil with her fingers and saw more tiny bones. The carcasses played an important role as well, the dead animals returning essential nutrients to the soil.
"The fruit is plucked," she said, thinking aloud. "The pollen is released. The thorns are shot at whatever threatens the fruit bearing plant. Thorns also enter fruit still on the vine, so to speak. The thorns are seeds. The fruit nurtures the seeds."
She turned to the fruit-bearing plant. In some of the small red fruits she saw the wide bases of thorns embedded in the pulp.
"Eventually, the fruit falls away, rolls across the ground carrying a fertilized seed away from the parent plant, and creates a new plant. Once they were one plant, as shown by microscopic analysis. Now they are two. The little ones begin to grow apart from each other the moment they begin to sprout."
Brocha backed away from the plants which had separated into two sexes, the male, which shot thorn seeds, and the female, which nurtured them.
The plants were fertilized and protected at the same time. The male half had obvious thorns and defense mechanisms, and the female half had only ripe, beguiling fruit.
She walked back to the ruins of the ship to check on Patterson, realizing that there was a whole world of new things to be studied.
She would have to take care.
(I blew through this pretty fast today, so there are probably typos and goofs galore. Forgive me.)
User Reviews
Submitted by Sacrilicious (user info) at 2006-10-19 21:47:20 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I tried to read this last night and couldn't get into it at the time. I agree with Anansie's comment that it's sci-fish, which is probably why. I'm glad I came back to it, though. Those plants were badass.
Submitted by Orgasmatron (user info) at 2006-10-19 17:35:43 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I think we should compile a list of all of your characters' names. For kicks. You've come up with some interesting ones.
Me? Hell, I love it when you go all sci-fi for a change. This reminds me of last year's "Bone Dry," not because of the plot or the characters, but because you decided to create a little world in space again.
This kind of thing is also a botanist's wet dream, I imagine.
Submitted by Anansie (user info) at 2006-10-19 17:32:37 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Then again this title was probably really hard to write for.
Submitted by Anansie (user info) at 2006-10-19 17:27:23 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
This was good, but seemed more like sci-fi than horror. It was interesting though. You did a good job with the descriptions of the plants.
Submitted by Anansie (user info) at 2006-10-19 17:26:35 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
No Comment
Submitted by JoeyG (user info) at 2006-10-19 09:14:12 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Another excellent job well done.
Submitted by CaptainThorns (user info) at 2006-10-19 08:51:50 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Thorns auto+2!!!
Oh, the story was ace, too.
Submitted by Ducky (user info) at 2006-10-19 00:53:47 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No... I've seen them around. Isn't that like, 5 guys writing under one name or some bizarre shit like that?
------------------
It was the pen name for two Vancouver-based criminal laywers. As of late, any Slade books published are written by one of them and his daughter. The earlier ones are better. If you like crime novels, I think you might enjoy it. Some of it can be quite graphic, but the writing is excellent.
Submitted by consuelo212 (user info) at 2006-10-19 00:53:16 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Bigmike (user info) at 2006-10-19 00:27:34 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
not quite a 1, not quite a 2.
At least from my perspective.
Submitted by Bigmike (user info) at 2006-10-19 00:27:04 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
Quickly put together and not your best effort it seems.
Enjoyable nonetheless.
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2006-10-18 22:06:29 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by Ducky (user info) at 2006-10-18 20:59:32 (#)
Ranking: 2
And he knows because she's told him, and her instincts never fail, that the female of the species is more deadly than the male. Thankyou Kipling.
Have you ever read Michael Slade (pen name)?
--
No... I've seen them around. Isn't that like, 5 guys writing under one name or some bizarre shit like that?
Submitted by Ducky (user info) at 2006-10-18 20:59:32 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
And he knows because she's told him, and her instincts never fail, that the female of the species is more deadly than the male. Thankyou Kipling.
Have you ever read Michael Slade (pen name)?
Submitted by Stagger_Lee (user info) at 2006-10-18 20:33:02 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
+1 bonus point for dodgy title.
Submitted by icarus1987 (user info) at 2006-10-18 20:22:23 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
You brilliant son of a bitch.
Submitted by Bubba2341 (user info) at 2006-10-18 20:16:30 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Jack McCallum is teh Devil???
Yes, that is a fact, but he is a good-writing Devil........
Submitted by JonnyX (user info) at 2006-10-18 19:53:33 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
cool.
Reminded me of that sci-fi story '____World', where plants are dangerous and evolved, and humans live like little bugs amongst their tree-homes.
Submitted by kaos-king (user info) at 2006-10-18 19:44:34 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Not your best work and kind of a weak ending, but still better than 80% of the garbage on this site.
This only further proves that Jack McCallum is teh Devil.
Submitted by forensicgirl3 (user info) at 2006-10-18 19:22:31 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
vagina vagina vagina
This was a very good story. Methinks the vagina left your brain alone.
:)
vagina
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2006-10-18 19:19:17 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by forensicgirl3 (user info) at 2006-10-18 19:17:22 (#)
Ranking: 2
Huh! I would have thought you would LIKE to have a vagina on your face.
Well, you learn something new everyday.
--
Well, not one that sucks my brain dry.
Metaphorically, fine. Literally? No.
Submitted by forensicgirl3 (user info) at 2006-10-18 19:17:52 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Ooooooooo SNAP!
hehehehehe
Submitted by forensicgirl3 (user info) at 2006-10-18 19:17:22 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Huh! I would have thought you would LIKE to have a vagina on your face.
Well, you learn something new everyday.
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2006-10-18 19:09:16 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by forensicgirl3 (user info) at 2006-10-18 19:01:55 (#)
Ranking: 2
Now was that so painful?
--
Actually... YES.
I feel like my brain has been sucked dry by one of those multi-eyed goo-dribbling vagina-faced brain-sucking-tube bugs from Starship Troopers.
Submitted by GodChicken (user info) at 2006-10-18 19:08:04 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I'm a dude and you've been living in San Fran too long.
*scared now*
Submitted by forensicgirl3 (user info) at 2006-10-18 19:01:55 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Now was that so painful?
Submitted by Amontillado (user info) at 2006-10-18 18:53:56 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Not the vine from hell!
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2006-10-18 18:53:00 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by GodChicken (user info) at 2006-10-18 18:51:11 (#)
Ranking: 2
I don't know why but I read the title as "GruesomeFuck"
--
And that is exactly the word that pops into the minds of most Uberettes whenever they see my name.
COINCIDENCE?
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2006-10-18 18:51:55 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
You know what I hate?
When think you have a light sneeze coming on and you actually do sneeze and feel something huge and moist evacuate your skull at about 90 miles an hour, but since you didn't have a tissue ready to trap it you have to carefully trace a presumed trajectory, looking for a displaced wad of phlegm.
Damn it.
Submitted by GodChicken (user info) at 2006-10-18 18:51:11 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I don't know why but I read the title as "GruesomeFuck"
Submitted by Yes (user info) at 2006-10-18 18:49:40 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Thats some good stuff. Nothing wrong that a couple readthroughs couldn't fix.
Submitted by HotWillie (user info) at 2006-10-18 18:46:00 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
You shouldn't apologize for writing quickly on your lunch hour. I saw no glaring mistakes in spelling or grammar.
Good story.