It was big and it was fast, and it was mean.

The blasts caught it full in the chest, and it kept on coming for what seemed like a full second before it was lifted up and slammed against the wall. It tried to scrabble back up and tackle them again, before a final plasma stream knocked its head apart.

"There's more," yelled the point man. "There's—"

The next one was even bigger, and even faster. Before they could swing their weapons away from the first and onto the new arrival, it was on the first soldier.

Horrible claws tore the man's chest apart.

"Jesus!" cried Private Mahone as she was sprayed with blood. She swung her gun around and let off a spurt of plasma, but missed. The beast was incredibly fast. It finished one more ripping shake of the point man and then leapt toward the rest.

Lesser soldiers might have lost it right then, so horrific was the sight. But they kept their cool, aimed their weapons, and let the thing have it.

Two more "guards" attacked.

Another soldier was torn apart before the guards were subdued, blasted to pieces.

In all her time fighting inside hives, Kozlowski had never seen such an intense battle conflagration. The queen's guards were incredibly quick and agile, almost imbued, it seemed, with superpowers. Fortunately, this crew was also the best she'd worked with, and they'd half expected something like this.

Within violent minutes, four aliens and two humans lay smoking and quite dead upon the ground.

"God," was all that Private Mahone could say, lying slumped against the wall, gasping for air and still grasping her weapon, ready if another bug should care to call.

"No, I don't think God's around here," said Henrikson. "This is more like the Other Place."

For her own part, Kozlowski was just numb.

"Okay, we'll pick the bodies up on the way back. Take a quick moment for a breather, because that's all the time we've got if any of us wants to get out of here."

Two more dead. She couldn't believe it, even when she looked down at their twisted and torn remains. This wasn't worth it. But she had her orders, and she had her duty, and she knew nothing more than that she had to complete this mission, or their lives and the lives lost earlier and the months spent on this project would have been for naught.

A suited figure peeked around the corner of the cargo drone. "Is ... is everyone all right?"

Dr. Begalli. Apparently, his head had been well stuffed in the sand.

Daniel Grant, who had been leaning on the side wall, exhausted, pushed himself off and walked over to the man. "No. Two more dead. You couldn't have warned us this would happen?"

"We knew about the guards. What we didn't know was that they'd come charging up at us like that," said Kozlowski. She got her second wind, went over to have a look at the only xeno head that had survived the mauling. "Ever see anything quite like this, Doctor?"

Begalli gave the angry and suspicious Grant a wide berth in coming around to look. "Oh, heaven, what a mess—No, Colonel, I had no idea ... Loathsome beasts. I don't recall the report from the last visit here giving them full justice. We knew they were bigger, but not this nasty. This is fascinating." He looked up from the dead beast. He took a small piece of blasted "skin" in a bottle. "I'll have to do a genetic workup when I get back. The queen mother may equip her guards to continue to evolve." He shook his head, mystified. "Or could the things havedevolved rather than evolved. What a fascinating mystery! So much is down here!"

"Let's get a roll on."

"Yeah, Begalli. And you go first," said Grant. "Let's see a little courage for a change."

Begalli nodded, picked up his pheromone meter, and they were off again toward the depths of the alien hive.

 

"The queen's chambers should be down there," said Begalli.

The electric torches stabbed down into the darkness—but beyond their reach, Kozlowski saw the beginnings of what appeared to be some kind of bioluminescence.

"Okay," she said. "This place has had a few surprises that we weren't prepared for. There still might be more. Dr. Begalli, Corporal Henrikson, Daniel Grant, and myself will head on down to the chamber. Dicer, Clapton, and Mahone, stay here and guard our backs. I don't expect the radios to work, so let's just say if we're not back in an hour, get back to the lander and get out of here."

Private Dicer was a skinny guy with big eyes that seemed about to pop out of his head. He'd put on an excellent display of bug killing, but clearly the pressure was getting to him. Sweat pasted his long stringy hair down over his forehead. Private Clapton was a little more poised. He was a thickset easy-come, easy-go sort with a ready humor that he'd somehow lost now. Private Mahone looked as though she simply could not even believe she was here. But they were all good soldiers. They'd been good soldiers up above and they'd be good soldiers down here.

"Yes, sir," they chorused.

Kozlowski took the controls of the drone from a trooper and motioned the party onward.

It took another ten minutes to get down to a place where the lamps were necessary to see. Still, Kozlowski kept the side lights of her suit on, just in case things suddenly went dark.

The tunnel went around a bend.

Suddenly opened up.

It was the biggest chamber that Kozlowski had ever seen.

Eerily lit by the bioluminescence was the scene that the scientists had more or less predicted.

The four huge pods, radiating around a larger pod, above which the queen towered, a true giant, like a devil tilted atop her evil throne.

Only the sketchy holograms could never have hinted at the textures or the colors, the bizarre organic geometry here that threatened to drive a mind mad if concentrated on too closely.

The queen's pod glistened and oozed with what Kozlowski knew to be royal jelly.

The stuff that would make Grant an incredibly rich man, that would give the armed forces what they wanted, that would spell a success to this bloody campaign.

"Incredible," said Grant.

However, his eyes did not glow with avarice.

"Amazing," said Kozlowski. "We've hit the motherlode of royal jelly here." She looked at Grant. "You're going to get your tank filled, I think."

She patted the metal, and it echoed hollowly.

"Little problem," said Grant. "What about queeny?"

The gigantic creature perched atop the center mound did not even seem to notice they were even there. Its attention seemed focused off into space, as though it were meditating.

"I'm sure it's psychically directing the rout of the reds," said Begalli. "Must be. It's so absorbed, it didn't even notice the death of its guards." He quickly scanned the room again. "Four pods. Four guards. Excellent correspondence. Looks like we've got this place all to ourselves. All we have to do is to deal with the queenie, and she's just a sitting duck!" He smiled broadly, skipping a little closer to the gleaming, gooey treasure hoard. "Looks delicious, doesn't it? Ah, what wonders that stuff must hold. I can't wait ..." He cut himself off suddenly and looked furtive.

"Can't wait?" said Grant. "This ismy expedition. Whatexactly can't you wait for?"

"Uhhmmm. Nothing. Nothing, sir ..." He drifted closer to the pod. "Look at it all. I never thought I'd see this much up close. God, it's beautiful."

The queen mother was as still as a statue. As still as death.

Beautiful? Was fear beautiful? Dread? Terror? All the primitive juices battled now at Alex Kozlowski's barrier.

Michaels's beautiful head boiling apart with acid.

His scream.

Her guilt.

She wanted to turn and run from this place. It was worse than she had ever imagined it. The dead body of her lover seemed superimposed over everything.

She calmed herself. She'd known that she would never get the trauma of that dreadful Hollywood day off her mind, that she'd have to live it all over again in her head.

She just never realized she'd have to live it over again in reality.

And this time it could beher skin bubbling off, to expose the grinning skull beneath.

"Beautiful?" said Grant. "I'm not so sure anymore. People havedied for this stuff. I feel ... responsible."

"No time for self-remonstration," said Kozlowski. "Glad to hear you've got a conscience, but we really should finish this mission up. Begalli, get away from there. We can't take any chances. I want that thing up there dead, and I'm going to do it myself, right—"

Grant, though, was on a jag. Apparently the deaths of the other three soldiers, so close, had really shaken him up.

"I don't know," said Grant. "I just don't know."

"Mr. Grant! You started this whole thing rolling."

"Yeah, and I'm going to have to live with it for the rest of my life, too. I'm paying for my ignorance. But you, Begalli—" He brought his gun up. "You've been sabotaging this mission from day one, haven't you?"

"What?" said Begalli, turning back to him.

"Come off it! I've been watching you, Begalli, and I know damn well you're up to something," said Grant. "You're still working for MedTech, aren't you?"

"Okay, sure ... I have been up to something." He took a breath. "I'm doing research, independent of Neo-Pharm. I'd planned to publish articles on my findings."

"Articles?"

"A new kind of alien. I'd go down in history. I'd be famous ... forever!"

"Articles?" repeated Grant.

"I've got more than enough money, Grant. And I always hated MedTech—what I want is to be acknowledged for my scientific efforts.That's why I wanted to come down here. Maybe I'll even write a book ... Yes, a bestseller!"

"You heard it, Grant," said Kozlowski. "The only thing he's guilty of is scientific greed. Now back off ..."

"So how do you know he isn't lying... ?" Grant started to say, before a sudden hissing shriek froze his sentence.

Without warning, the queen mother jumped.