Chapter 9.3: The Gullet

  [The Slot Canyon — 1300 Hours]

  The entrance to the canyon wasn't so much a geological feature as it was an open wound in the earth. The red sandstone walls rose three hundred feet on either side, narrowing until the strip of sky above was nothing more than a jagged blue scar.

  The heat of the desert vanished the moment they crossed the threshold, replaced by a damp, stagnant chill. The ground wasn't dry rock; it was coated in a layer of black, viscous sludge that sucked at their boots with every step.

  "Watch your footing," Hawk ordered, his voice echoing too loudly in the confined space. "It’s slick."

  "It’s not mud," Nova whispered, her scanner illuminating the ground with a harsh red light. "It’s secretion. Mucus. We aren't walking in a canyon, Captain. We're walking down a throat."

  Orion looked at the walls. They were coated in patches of grey lichen that pulsed slowly, like diseased lungs inhaling the stale air. The smell was overpowering—a mix of ammonia, copper, and something sweet, like rotting fruit.

  "Keep it tight," Hawk signaled. "Quartz, Rook, eyes up. Vertical ambush is the primary threat here."

  "Way ahead of you, Cap," Quartz murmured, his plasma rifle pointed at the sliver of sky. "Though if anything jumps us from up there, we're basically fish in a barrel."

  Blade took the lead. He moved with a mechanical, relentless pace. He didn't pause to check the dark recesses. He didn't scan the ledges. He simply walked, his boots splashing through the black slime.

  Orion watched him from three paces back. The unease in Orion’s gut was twisting into a knot. Blade was a scout; scouts stopped. Scouts checked. Blade was walking like he was on a conveyor belt.

  He knows where he is going, Orion realized. Or he’s completely zoned out.

  The canyon narrowed again. They were forced into single file. The walls were so close Orion could feel the cold radiation of the stone through his shoulder plates.

  "Blade," Orion hissed. "Slow down."

  Blade didn't slow down.

  Almost there, Xaloth whispered in Blade’s mind, overlaying the dark canyon with a map of golden light. The choke point. The Killing Floor.

  "Blade!" Orion reached out, grabbing the back of Blade’s tactical harness and yanking him to a halt.

  Blade stopped. He didn't spin around defensively. He just stood there, staring into the darkness ahead where the canyon opened up into a small, circular cul-de-sac.

  "Why are we stopping?" Hawk whispered, moving up behind Orion.

  "He's not checking his corners," Orion said, keeping his voice low. "He's walking us blind."

  Blade turned around slowly. His face was pale, sweat beading on his forehead despite the chill. He looked confused, his eyes darting around the canyon walls as if seeing them for the first time.

  "I... I thought this was the pass," Blade stammered, his voice trembling. "It looked different on the map. I think... I think I took a wrong turn."

  "A wrong turn?" Rook snapped from the rear. "You said you knew this place!"

  "It’s the corruption," Blade said, backing away slightly, creating distance between himself and the group. "It changed the landmarks. I... I need a second."

  Orion looked past Blade, into the circular clearing ahead. The ground there was different. The sludge was deeper. And the walls...

  Orion squinted. The texture of the canyon walls in the clearing wasn't stone. It was bumpy. Irregular. Thousands of melon-sized protrusions clustered together, blending perfectly with the grey lichen.

  He tapped into the Light, just a flicker. The headache spiked, but his vision sharpened.

  The bumps on the wall had heat signatures. Faint. Cold-blooded. But alive.

  "Hawk," Orion whispered, the blood draining from his face. "Those aren't rocks."

  Hawk looked up. "What?"

  "The walls," Orion stepped back, raising his rifle. "They're covered in them. Hundreds of them."

  Blade looked up at the infest walls. To the crew, he looked horrified. Inside, Xaloth was smiling.

  "Oh god," Blade whispered, playing the part of the terrified scout perfectly. "I didn't see them. I swear I didn't see them."

  Orion looked at the motionless, camouflaged shapes. Web-Spitters. Ambush predators.

  "Why aren't they attacking?" Quartz whispered, the barrel of his rifle shaking slightly.

  "Because we aren't all in the kill zone yet," Orion realized. He looked at Blade, who was standing on the far edge of the group, closest to the exit of the cul-de-sac.

  The air in the cul-de-sac hung heavy and stagnant, reeking of sulfur and rotting organic matter. High above, jagged stalactites dripped a viscous, glowing green ooze into a massive, dark pool taking up the center of the cavern floor. The silence was absolute, pressing in on the crew from all sides. It didn't feel like an empty cavern. It felt like a held breath.

  Now, Xaloth commanded.

  Blade tripped. It looked perfectly accidental. His boot caught on a thick, dark root, and he fell backward with a loud, metallic clatter, his heavy rifle striking the solid stone wall.

  CLANG.

  The sound cracked like a gunshot through the silence, echoing into the dark recesses of the cave.

  Slowly, the shadows along the cavern walls began to shift. The stone itself seemed to peel back. Translucent, multi-jointed legs uncurled from hidden crevices. Dozens of bulbous, glowing eyes snapped open, illuminating the dark in a sickly pale light. The entire cul-de-sac was lined with them.

  "CONTACT!" Hawk roared, raising his rifle.

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  It wasn't just a cavern. It was a nest.

  Web-Spitters hissed from the ceiling and walls, launching thick, acidic strands of webbing down at the crew. The ground beneath their boots—which they had assumed was solid rock—suddenly gave a wet, sickening groan.

  "The floor is unstable!" Nova shouted over the screeching of the Drones, her scanner blinking wildly. "It's a crust! We’re standing on a hollowed-out crust over the pool!"

  Before Hawk could issue an order to retreat, the stone beneath the center of the formation shattered.

  With a deafening roar, the cavern floor collapsed into the subterranean lake of glowing, toxic bile. The stagnant pool instantly came alive, churning violently. A massive whirlpool formed in the center of the dark liquid, spinning with hurricane force, pulling the shattered rock—and the struggling crew—toward its crushing center.

  "Grip something!" Hawk ordered, his boots sliding through the slick mud toward the edge of the vortex.

  The suction was immense. The thick, glowing sludge pulled at their armor like liquid gravity. Quartz screamed as the heavy weight of his plasma rig dragged him closer to the spinning maw of the whirlpool, his hands desperately clawing at the crumbling shale.

  "Fascinating," ARK-9 announced, his heavy metallic boots clamped firmly onto a stable ledge of bedrock. He watched the crew flail against the suction, his optical sensors whirring. "The human buoyancy in highly acidic, bio-organic sludge is remarkably poor. Your survival odds are dropping at an exponential rate."

  "Less analyzing, more shooting, you walking toaster!" Quartz shrieked, spitting a mouthful of toxic water.

  "Understood," ARK-9 replied casually. He didn't aim at the swirling pool. Instead, he raised his heavy cannon toward the ceiling, directly at the massive, unstable stalactites hanging over the water.

  He fired.

  The explosive payload shattered the cavern roof. Tons of jagged rock, petrified roots, and crushed Web-Spitters plummeted down, crashing directly into the center of the whirlpool.

  RUMBLE.

  The cascade of stone slammed into the vortex, temporarily plugging the massive sinkhole. The violent suction choked and stopped. The displaced water surged outward in a massive tidal wave of sludge, pushing the gasping crew up onto a slanted bank of loose scree at the edge of the cavern.

  They lay there in the mud, coughing up foul water, their armor caked in glowing slime.

  "Good... good shot, ARK," Hawk wheezed, pushing himself up to his knees.

  "Seismic warning," ARK-9 interrupted, ignoring the praise. The massive droid stopped halfway up the newly formed slope of debris, digging his metal fingers deep into the stone. He stared down at the plugged whirlpool. "The obstruction did not neutralize the suction. It angered the source."

  The pile of rocks in the center of the pool shifted violently.

  The debris heaved. A massive, wet shape burst through the tons of rock like a surfacing submarine, sending boulders flying like pebbles.

  It wasn't just a whirlpool. It was a mouth.

  A thirty-foot tube of grey, glistening muscle thrashed free of the stone. It had no eyes, no face—only a terrible, spinning maw of concentric, jagged teeth at the front. Along its flanks, rows of translucent, pulsating sacs glowed with a sickly, radioactive green light, pumping fluid through its massive body in a rhythmic, churning motion.

  "Oh god," Nova gasped, aiming her scanner at the creature's side, her hands trembling. "Look at the thermal output! Those sacs aren't organs; they're biological refineries. It’s filtering the toxins from the water and turning them into hyper-fuel."

  The creature didn't slither. It reared back, contracting its massive, segmented body, and then threw itself forward in a violent, heaving motion.

  THUMP.

  The ground shook as it slammed down, closing the distance to the slope in a single, terrifying surge.

  "Locomotion analysis complete," ARK-9 boomed, racking his cannon with a heavy, metallic clack. "It moves via explosive peristaltic contractions. A giant, lurching parasite."

  "It’s a Leechlord!" Quartz yelled, his voice cracking with pure terror as he fired a plasma bolt. The blue energy sizzled uselessly against the creature's thick, wet hide, leaving nothing but a scorch mark. "And it’s hungry!"

  "Target Designation: Lurching Leechlord," ARK-9 confirmed. He looked back at the terrified humans. "Recommendation: Run."

  Chapter 9.4: Dead Weight

  The Leechlord shrieked—a sound of wet, grinding gears that vibrated directly in their bones. It ignored the droid. It ignored the plasma fire. It sensed the heat and the frantic, elevated heartbeats of the lagging crew members.

  It wanted Quartz.

  "Go! Go! Go!" Hawk screamed, hauling Nova up the shifting scree.

  They scrambled up the loose rock, desperate to escape the pit. The Leechlord surged from the pool, shaking off the debris. It roared again and slammed its massive bulk against the base of the cliff.

  RUMBLE.

  The impact shook the entire slope. The makeshift ramp of rubble began to slide. A curtain of dust and gravel cascaded down, turning the air into a choking, brown fog that blinded them all.

  "Hold on!" ARK-9 bellowed. The massive droid dug his metallic fingers deeper into the bedrock, anchoring himself while grabbing Orion by the tactical vest to keep him from sliding back down into the waiting jaws.

  "I can't see the rear guard!" Hawk shouted, coughing violently into his comms. "Sound off! Rook? Quartz?"

  "I'm clear!" Rook’s voice cracked over the channel. He was clinging to a jagged outcropping ten feet below the rim, breathless, his armor covered in dust. "I'm flanking right!"

  "Quartz is lagging!" Blade’s voice cut through the static. It was calm. Too calm. "I'm going back for him."

  "Blade, don't be a hero!" Hawk ordered, but he couldn't see them through the thick dust cloud. The Leechlord was thrashing below, snapping its massive jaws just inches from the sliding rocks.

  At the rear, Quartz was struggling. His heavy plasma rig—the weapon that had just failed to dent the monster—was now a lead anchor dragging him down. He slipped, his boots scrabbling uselessly against the sliding shale. He was sliding backward into the dark.

  "Help!" Quartz gasped, his lungs burning with dust.

  A hand shot out of the gloom.

  "Gotcha," Blade said.

  Blade was braced on a solid ledge of rock, looking down into the blinding dust. He grabbed Quartz’s wrist with a grip like iron.

  Quartz looked up, tears of relief cutting tracks through the mud on his face. "Thanks, brother. That thing... it's right behind me."

  Below them, the Leechlord snapped its jaws. The wet rush of air from the bite ruffled the cuffs of Quartz’s boots.

  Blade pulled Quartz up until he was pinned safely against the ledge. For a second, they were eye-to-eye. The rest of the team was gone—up over the ridge, completely blind to what was happening below.

  Only Rook, clinging to his perch on the flank, had a line of sight through a sudden break in the swirling dust.

  Rook wiped his visor. He saw Blade pull Quartz up. He let out a heavy sigh of relief.

  Then, he saw the faint green pulse in Blade's eyes.

  Blade didn't pull Quartz the rest of the way up. He held him there, pinned precariously against the slick rock. Blade looked down at the struggling, exhausted tech.

  He is heavy, Xaloth whispered in Blade’s mind, a cold, alien presence. He slows the pack. Blade’s expression went entirely blank. He reached for his tactical belt.

  "Blade?" Quartz wheezed, his relief morphing into sudden, stark confusion. "What are you...?"

  Blade didn't speak. He drew his combat knife. With a precise, surgical motion, he reached behind Quartz and slashed the primary retention strap of the heavy plasma rig.

  SNAP.

  The heavy weapon swung loose, violently throwing Quartz off balance. He teetered on the razor's edge of the drop.

  "NO!" Rook screamed, but his voice was swallowed by the deafening roar of the beast below.

  Blade didn't hesitate. He planted his heavy boot directly in the center of Quartz’s chest and shoved.

  It wasn't a slip. It was a cold, calculated execution.

  Quartz’s eyes went wide with a betrayal he didn't have time to understand. He fell backward into the dust, his arms flailing wildly, tumbling straight into the open, spinning maw of the Leechlord.

  CRUNCH.

  The creature snapped its massive jaws shut. The sound was horribly wet, and terribly final.

  A second later, the damaged plasma rig still strapped to Quartz’s back critically failed under the crushing pressure.

  BOOM.

  A blinding blue supernova exploded from inside the beast’s throat. The Leechlord shrieked—a sound of absolute agony that cracked the canyon walls, thick black smoke and green gore billowing from its mouth.

  Blade stood calmly on the ledge, watching the fire below. He smoothly holstered his knife. He looked up, scanning the rim, but he didn't see Rook hiding in the shadows.

  "Quartz is down!" Blade yelled into the comms, his voice instantly laced with perfect, manufactured panic. "He slipped! The rig dragged him down! I couldn't hold him!"

  "Damn it!" Hawk cursed from the top of the ridge. "Move, Blade! Move!"

  Blade turned and sprinted for the rim, leaving the fire and the lie behind him in the dark.

  On the flank, Rook hung there, completely frozen. The breath was trapped in his throat. He had seen the knife. He had seen the kick.

  "He didn't slip," Rook whispered to the uncaring stone.

  Below, the Leechlord, wounded but furious, began to blindly claw its way up the slope again. Rook shook his head, the terror of the monster suddenly replaced by a cold, hard knot in his stomach. He scrambled up the rock, not just to save himself, but because he was the only one in the universe who knew the truth.

  And he had to survive to tell it.

  RIP Quartz. He went out with a literal bang, but that cold-blooded betrayal from Blade changes absolutely everything. The Drones and the Leechlord are terrifying, but Xaloth might be the deadliest thing in that canyon.

  If you're enjoying the rewrite of Conflict Space: Swarm of the Hive, please consider leaving a rating, adding it to your favorites, or just dropping a comment. It helps the story grow and fuels the next chapters!

  What is Rook's best move to survive now that he knows Blade's secret?