Read Online Predator - Incursion by Tim Lebbon - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Tim Lebbon
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the base. It had been closed down several years ago after a particularly ferocious storm ripped out one wall and collapsed part of the flat roof, and the Love Grove Base management had decided that the remaining, solid areas of the sprawling building were plenty big enough for its current use. The atmosphere processors virtually ran themselves now, and these dozens of rooms built to house builders, engineers, and technicians were now redundant.
They had left so much behind.
“Home,” Svenlap muttered again. She frowned, a little confused.
In one room, swirls of trimmed light-wire caught the glare of her flashlight and stored the light deep. She curled it around her hand, then tucked the ball into her bag. Across the room, on a dusty table, she found some semi-spherical objects, metallic containers the size of her hands which might once have been used to house laser charge pods. She pocketed two of these, as well as a scattering of bolts used to connect them tightly together.
Wind howled through the corridor as she moved toward the fallen eastern end of the wing. The walls ran with rivulets of moisture, and sand and grit had drifted, providing a strange internal landscape. Her flashlight cast shifting shadows across the ceiling.
The Founders have not forgotten you.
Alone in this deserted part of the base, breathing in an atmosphere heavy with dust and moisture and still not rich enough in oxygen to sustain her for more than a couple of hours, she felt watched and wanted, trusted and needed. Hers was a lofty mission.
There was only one instant when the old Svenlap peeked through. She staggered to a halt and thought through what she was doing. Her hands were scratched and cut from digging through old tools and hardware. The ghost of what she intended to build haunted her.
“Let light blossom,” she said.
Shoving aside panels that had warped and fallen from the ceiling, she barged her way into one of the remotest rooms of the base. As far as she was aware, no one had been here for years, and the interior looked like part of the outside landscape. Open to the elements along one side, it had filled with sand, walls were down, furniture rusted and rotting over time in the acidic atmosphere.
In the far corner was the heavy door that led into a storage room. It was locked tight, but the hinges were decayed. Even using a steel bar, though, it took her half an hour of grunting and straining to prize the top hinge apart, then another twenty minutes to break open the bottom hinge. She paused for a rest and a drink, the water tasting rank as it swilled out her mouth and she swallowed dust she’d been breathing in. She feared what it might be doing to her insides, but at the same time, she knew that she didn’t have long left to worry.
Groaning, sweating, her bleeding hands slipping again and again on the slick metal, Svenlap tugged the door far enough open to squeeze inside.
She used her flashlight again to find what she needed.
There was plenty there.
* * *
She had never been technically minded. She’d dabbled in engineering when she was younger, but drifted away when other interests took hold. Passions, like her obsession with Yautja history.
So now they had two dead Yautja on the base.
Scattered around the edges of her desk and discarded on the floor were the paraphernalia from her current work. Photographs, paper copies of scanned books, tactile objects that she found so much more beneficial than their electronic or holo equivalents.
Deep inside, Angela Svenlap knew that she should be beyond excited. She’d known about the bodies since before Palant returned from her off-base jaunt, and had barely been able to control her excitement. Later that day, she had intended to return to Palant’s labs to see the bodies, perhaps have a really good look at them. They might be carrying trophies that could pin them down to a specific point in history. Imagine being able to locate some concrete piece of Yautja evidence
They had left so much behind.
“Home,” Svenlap muttered again. She frowned, a little confused.
In one room, swirls of trimmed light-wire caught the glare of her flashlight and stored the light deep. She curled it around her hand, then tucked the ball into her bag. Across the room, on a dusty table, she found some semi-spherical objects, metallic containers the size of her hands which might once have been used to house laser charge pods. She pocketed two of these, as well as a scattering of bolts used to connect them tightly together.
Wind howled through the corridor as she moved toward the fallen eastern end of the wing. The walls ran with rivulets of moisture, and sand and grit had drifted, providing a strange internal landscape. Her flashlight cast shifting shadows across the ceiling.
The Founders have not forgotten you.
Alone in this deserted part of the base, breathing in an atmosphere heavy with dust and moisture and still not rich enough in oxygen to sustain her for more than a couple of hours, she felt watched and wanted, trusted and needed. Hers was a lofty mission.
There was only one instant when the old Svenlap peeked through. She staggered to a halt and thought through what she was doing. Her hands were scratched and cut from digging through old tools and hardware. The ghost of what she intended to build haunted her.
“Let light blossom,” she said.
Shoving aside panels that had warped and fallen from the ceiling, she barged her way into one of the remotest rooms of the base. As far as she was aware, no one had been here for years, and the interior looked like part of the outside landscape. Open to the elements along one side, it had filled with sand, walls were down, furniture rusted and rotting over time in the acidic atmosphere.
In the far corner was the heavy door that led into a storage room. It was locked tight, but the hinges were decayed. Even using a steel bar, though, it took her half an hour of grunting and straining to prize the top hinge apart, then another twenty minutes to break open the bottom hinge. She paused for a rest and a drink, the water tasting rank as it swilled out her mouth and she swallowed dust she’d been breathing in. She feared what it might be doing to her insides, but at the same time, she knew that she didn’t have long left to worry.
Groaning, sweating, her bleeding hands slipping again and again on the slick metal, Svenlap tugged the door far enough open to squeeze inside.
She used her flashlight again to find what she needed.
There was plenty there.
* * *
She had never been technically minded. She’d dabbled in engineering when she was younger, but drifted away when other interests took hold. Passions, like her obsession with Yautja history.
So now they had two dead Yautja on the base.
Scattered around the edges of her desk and discarded on the floor were the paraphernalia from her current work. Photographs, paper copies of scanned books, tactile objects that she found so much more beneficial than their electronic or holo equivalents.
Deep inside, Angela Svenlap knew that she should be beyond excited. She’d known about the bodies since before Palant returned from her off-base jaunt, and had barely been able to control her excitement. Later that day, she had intended to return to Palant’s labs to see the bodies, perhaps have a really good look at them. They might be carrying trophies that could pin them down to a specific point in history. Imagine being able to locate some concrete piece of Yautja evidence
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