Lion Man's Captive, Kaitlyn O'Connor [top fiction books of all time .txt] 📗

by comparison to ejection andfreefall, he unfastened his harness and looked around for the hatchrelease. The pod was tilted crazily and rocked unnervingly as hestruggled out the hatch once he’d opened it. When he emerged andlooked around, he saw why. The pod was perched precariously on arather steep drop off.

No doubt the trees between his positionand the bottom would halt its progress even if the pod did begin toroll, but that thought didn’t particularly comfort him and Aidaneased the remainder of the way out of the pod with great care. Hisknees were a little wobbly, he discovered, once he was on solidground and he sat down to allow the weakness to pass, studying theterrain around him with a good bit of dismay.

He hadn’t expected to find himself inthe middle of a jungle, on the dark side of the planet, and he hadthe uneasy feeling that it was going to take him a lot longer tofind what was left of the satellite than he’danticipated.

* * * *

Physical distress superseded fear aftera time. Anya stopped to catch her breath when she realized she wasin danger of passing out and turned to look back at the threateningobelisk, mildly heartened that it hadn’t blown up … yet. As shestared at it in the gathering gloom, however, she thought shedetected a dark plume of smoke rising out of it and forming ashifting cloud. She stared hard at that shifting cloud, huffing forbreath and trying to figure out what seemed strange aboutit.

There was no wind to account for theshifting, she realized after a moment, instinctively looking up atthe tops of the trees to see if there was wind higher up that mightexplain the phenomenon. There seemed to be a slight wind rufflingthe tops of the trees, but it didn’t seem to be enough to explainso much movement.

Transferring her gaze back to theobelisk, she realized the movement seemed more purposeful thanrandom—like a swarm of insects.

Bees.

She didn’t stop to consider theunlikelihood that it would be bees swarming from something thatseemed so alien—or in fact a missile or rocket of earthly origins.Swarm connected in her mind with danger and she whipped a franticlook around for cover.

There was a virtual sea of smashed andcrumpled cars on the highway. Not only did they look to offerlittle in the way of shelter in their current condition, however,the thought instantly leapt into her mind that there could be abody or bodies in any of them.

All of them weren’t wrecked, she sawnow that she was close enough for a better view. Quite a number ofthem appeared intact or relatively intact, as if the drivers hadskidded to a halt and merely leapt out and abandoned them but thepossibility of finding a body was enough to instantly redirect hermind to some other shelter.

That stretch of highway seemed bereftof human habitation, though. Nothing but woods and more woodsbordered the highway without a sign of a friendly light to indicatethe presence of people. There was an overpass behind her andanother that looked like it might be a mile or two away.

A culvert caught her eye and she rushedtoward it before she had time to consider what might beinside—besides water. She’d had time before she reached it toconsider slithering things, though. Bending down, she grabbed ahandful of dirt, grass, and rocks and pitched them inside. Whenthere was no telltale rattling, she crawled just inside and curledinto a ball.

It was uncomfortable but at least dryand she felt safer as soon as she thought about the fact that itwas made of reinforced concrete and buried under asphalt and dirt.Surely, even if the thing blew up, she was far enough away by nowand had enough protection to be relatively safe?

She was still working on convincingherself when she heard a sound similar to the sound she’d heardbefore the obelisk landed. The world outside her cramped hidingplace brightened. A fireball shot through the trees within view andthen disappeared.

Anya tensed. Another one of thosethings? Or something else?

She heard an impact, like distantthunder. Faint vibrations traveled through the culvert.

A shiver ran along Anya’sspine.

What was going on?

Were they at war, shewondered?

If they were, she realized in a fewmoments, it wasn’t with some other country.

They were being invaded byaliens!

As soon as the thought occurred to hershe tried to dismiss it. The conference had gone to her head! She’dspent days watching people stroll around the hotels and Atlantastreets dressed as aliens and galactic warriors and ‘acclimated’ tothe idea of intergalactic travel and aliencivilizations.

There was no such thing, though!

There had to be anotherexplanation!

She couldn’t think of one. That thing,unless it was just some kind of advertising gimmick she hadn’tnoticed before—like a billboard built to look like a spaceship—couldn’t be something from earth. She knew she hadn’t justmissed it, been too preoccupied with getting gas, finding a snack,and bathroom to notice it.

But what kind of invasion could it bewhen the thing hadn’t blown up?

But she thought she’d seen smoke comingfrom it.

Maybe it was a dud?

It wasn’t the lightening of the worldoutside that presaged morning that woke Anya some time later. Itwas the clods of dirt sifting down on her and the sense that shewas sitting in an ant bed. Waking with a start, Anya brushedfrantically at herself, trying to beat the stinging insects off andthen abruptly pitched herself out of the culvert and into theditch. It was as well she did because even as she rolled over tolook for the ant bed she’d apparently fallen to sleep on top of,chunks of the culvert began to fall.

Her eyes, burning as if she had dirt inthem, Anya blinked several times and rubbed them, trying tocomprehend what she was seeing, trying to convince herself that itwas nothing but her imagination.

The culvert collapsed. Atabout that same moment, Anya’s brain assimilated the fact that shestill felt like something was crawling all over her. Looking downto find the culprits, she discovered to her absolute horror thather clothing seemed to be disintegrating. She could see … somethingcrawling over her. If not for the movement, she didn’t think shewould’ve been able to discern even that much, though. Whatever itwas