Scott Sigler - Ancestor

Magnus would kill her, bleed her out slow, burn her…

No, she couldn’t let the terror take her now. She’d fight that fucker, fight him till she had nothing left.

“Tim, get your ass up. We have to get downstairs.”

Tim crawled for the trapdoor. He descended gingerly, still troubled by his ruined knee. Sara followed him down, wondering how long it would be before Magnus came after them again.

THE ARCTIC CAT rode heavy under the weight of three men, but it reached the Sikorski. Had the monsters heard the snowmobile’s whine? Were they coming?

Colding brought the sled to a stop. Rhumkorrf scrambled off and climbed into the helicopter, mittened hands shutting the door behind him. Clayton stayed on the back of the snowmobile, his good arm wrapped loosely around Colding’s waist.

Colding revved the engine, making it as loud as possible. He had to draw them in so he’d know where they were, know they were behind him. If he drove right to the old town, the creatures could attack at any point along the way. They might even be in the old town already. And if they were, how could he save Sara?

He scanned the tree line but saw no movement.

Colding revved the sled’s engine again. The motor’s whine filled the clearing, bounced off the hangar, so loud it hurt his ears. The smell of exhaust filled his nose.

Colding felt Clayton’s grip around his waist change from a manly barely-holding-on-to-you to a clutching, desperate grip of fear.

“Sweet Jesus,” Clayton said.

A quarter mile away, the creatures broke from the trees and poured onto the landing strip. At least thirty of them, huge and strong and savage, a phalanx of muscle and teeth.

“Clayton, hold tight.” Colding gunned the throttle.

The Arctic Cat still felt a bit sluggish, but free of Rhumkorrf’s extra 150 pounds the machine raced back up the one-lane road toward the mansion. Colding turned right at the main road, following the same path Magnus had taken. He’d outdistance the creatures and have maybe ten minutes to gather up Sara and Tim, if they were still alive. Then, if they could either kill or avoid Magnus, they could wait for Rhumkorrf to come with the helicopter and they’d be off this godforsaken island.

Overall? Shit odds. But it was all they had.

Running wide open, the Arctic Cat pulled away. The monsters gave chase.

MAGNUS SAT IN the Bv’s front seat, a first-aid kit open next to him. His right hand held his Ka-Bar knife, his left pressed a bloody ball of gauze against his thigh. Had to stop the bleeding. Blood had already soaked his sock, his shoe, and his pants leg from the knee down. He wondered if the ancestors could track a blood trail.

He’d underestimated her. He’d deserved to get shot for being so fucking stupid, walking out in the open like an idiot. First Clayton, now Sara—Magnus had lost his edge.

He’d used the knife to cut open his pant leg. Funny to have his own blood on his knife, but it wasn’t the first time. He pulled the gauze back for a look. The torn flesh instantly filled with thick red.

Fuck. She’d hit an artery. He jammed the gauze back in, pushing until the pain radiated through his entire leg. He’d been to this dance before. Pressure alone probably wouldn’t do the trick, and he didn’t have time to wait.

The wound sat on the outside of his thigh, close to the knee, so he knew it wasn’t the femoral artery. Maybe it was the… what was it called… the lateral circumflex? Didn’t matter, he had to stop the bleeding and go kill that murdering cunt.

He pinched the Ka-Bar between his knees, point up. With his right hand he reached into the back of the Bv, digging around in his canvas bag until he found what he needed—the propane torch.

How ironic.

How many people had he burned with a torch just like this one? How many lives had he taken with it? And now that same device might save his own.

He used his left elbow to keep the gauze jammed into his wound, then opened the valve on the propane tank. He fished the lighter out of his pocket and lit the torch. Magnus pointed the blue flame at the tip of the knife and waited for the blade to heat up.

He’d have to cauterize the wound. Pull off the gauze, stick the knife in and sear the artery. Then a pressure bandage, and he’d be good to go. No telling if the wound would open up on him again, but it would buy him time, let him move.

The blade started to glow red.

“You’re going to pay for this, Sara. I’ll find a way to make you pay over and over again.”

He wondered if this knife would make it back to Manitoba, if it would join the others on his office wall.

He shut off the valve and dropped the propane canister. He held the knife handle with his right hand. The glowing tip hovered just a half inch from the gauze.

“And where the offense is, let the great axe fall.”

His left hand pulled the bloody gauze clear, his right stuck the hot knife point into the bullet hole. Blood bubbled and muscle sizzled, filling the Bv’s cab with the stench of burning flesh.

CLAUS RHUMKORRF SAT slouched down in the pilot seat. Only his eyes moved as he watched the last of the ancestors filter past the Sikorski and up the road leading to the mansion. They were the last stragglers from the pack that chased after Colding and Clayton.

He was on the helicopter’s right side, looking out the plexiglass pilot’s door window. And if he could see out , they could see in , so he had to stay very still… hard to do when his body shook from both the cold and piercing terror.

How could he have been so damn blind? From the first moment the embryos started to take shape, he’d known—somewhere deep inside—that they meant death , not life . It all lined up now, all made a twisted kind of sense. He had shorted Jian’s meds to bring out her staggering genius. But doing that also brought back her manic-depressive symptoms, her suicidal urges, and she’d manifested those urges by creating these things .

The last of the ancestors turned down the main road toward the old town. He would wait just a few more minutes, make sure he had time to lift off in case the Sikorski’s engine noise drew them back.

Only now, with death all around him, did Claus realize what kind of a man he was. The ancestor project wasn’t about saving lives. Not really. It was about creating a living creature. From scratch . Not some bacterium or a virus, not a simple thing with only a few thousand genes, but a large, advanced mammal.

Creating life was the sole domain of God.

God, and now, Claus Rhumkorrf.

He’d conveniently deluded himself until it was too late. And when there could be no more delusion, when he’d watched his creation almost kill Cappy, he’d had yet another chance to stop everything. When the plane crashed, he should have let the cows die, but his overwhelming hubris controlled his actions.

Claus’s breath caught in his throat. Back up the trail, a lone ancestor trotted back out from the main road. It stood at the intersection a hundred yards away from the helicopter.

It seemed to be looking right at him.

“No,” Claus whispered. “Please, no.”

The ancestor’s sail suddenly stood straight up, the translucent yellow membrane catching the morning sun. Its toothy maw opened wide. Claus couldn’t hear it inside the cockpit, but he knew the creature was roaring a hideous roar, calling its brethren back.

He sat up straight in the seat, reached over his head and pushed the start button for engine one. His frostbitten finger howled in protest, but he easily ignored the pain. The blades started spinning up.