Дэниел Смит - Below Zero

Right now, ED was in its ‘down’ position, body resting on the ground, jointed legs in an upside down ‘V’, arms retracted.

Everyone in the ‘robotic world’ knew about Drs Evelyn and Adam Reeves because they had designed robots for researching the Mariana Trench, deep under the Pacific Ocean. So when the Exodus Project asked them to design something for them , Zak’s mum and dad created some of the most sophisticated robots the world had ever seen.

Transfixed by the Spider, Zak could hardly believe three others like it were already on the surface of Mars, preparing Outpost One. Zak imagined them moving through the orange dust like aliens, conjuring new components from their 3D printers as if by magic, and putting them together to build a new base.

‘We’ve got another problem,’ Dad said.

‘Hmm?’ Zak was so busy staring at the metallic monster, he hadn’t noticed he was already halfway across the room. A few more seconds and he would have been face to face with the Spider. He blinked hard, not quite sure how he had got there.

Behind him, Dad had the walkie-talkie to his mouth, his thumb pressing the ‘talk’ button. In fact, he was pressing it so hard the pad of his thumb had gone white.

‘What is it?’ Mum’s distorted voice came through the walkie-talkie. ‘Did you find Dima?’

‘No. And there’s something else. Hal and Roy are missing.’

‘Say again. It sounded like you said “Hal and Roy are missing”.’

‘That’s exactly what I said. Ed’s here, but the other two are gone.’

‘Nothing on the system?’

‘No response at all.’ He tapped at the tablet computer in his hands. ‘Everything’s dead.’

There was a pause, then Mum said, ‘We’re on our way.’

‘So, this is bad?’ Zak couldn’t take his eyes off the Spider. ‘They should all be here?’

‘Seems like everything’s disappearing.’

‘Maybe that’s where everyone is? They’re out practicing with the drones?’ Zak watched the Spider resting in its bay like a monster sitting in its lair. There was something ugly about the way it sat there. Like when you find the crusty remains of a spider in the corner of the shed.

The door swished open and Mum came in with May right behind her. ‘Anything?’

‘Nothing,’ Dad said. ‘Ed’s powering-up but all the controls are dead.’

‘He’s powering-up on his own ?’

‘Someone else must be controlling him.’ Dad’s fingers tapped icons on the touchscreen. ‘I have no idea where the other two are. All the cameras are off-line, all the read-outs are flatlining… I can’t get any response.’

Mum watched the Spider. ‘Where are your brothers?’

He? Him? Brothers? Zak shivered. Yuck . As if they weren’t creepy enough already, without Mum and Dad treating them like they were alive .

Ed sat there while Mum and Dad started with their foreign-sounding technical speak. It was all ‘normalize’ this, ‘autonomous’ that or ‘kinematic’ the other.

‘It’s freaky, isn’t it?’ May came over and whispered in Zak’s ear.

‘It’s not the only thing.’

‘Hey, you.’ She slapped his arm.

‘I didn’t mean you ; I meant everything that’s happening here. The lights, the people, the plane, those bugs in the lab…’

‘We should’ve stayed in St Lucia.’

‘Yeah, you’re not wrong about that.’ Zak’s gaze was drawn to the Spider once more.

There was something glistening within the complicated joints and limbs. Zak frowned and put his hands on his knees, leaning down to see the Spider’s underside where sinewy grey strands threaded backwards and forwards among the movable parts. Each strand disappeared into the oval casing that contained what Mum and Dad called its ‘brain’, but the strands weren’t mechanical – and they definitely weren’t wires. They looked more like something biological . Like something fleshy was growing on the Spider’s brain. Or growing out of it.

Was that supposed to be there? He didn’t think so. It looked like—

All at once, and with more speed than he could have imagined, the Spider came to life. With a quiet mechanical whir of parts, its legs extended, raising the body off the ground, the arms lifted as if they were ready to attack, and it came forward.

Tick-tack-tick-tack , its metal feet sounded on the floor. Tick-tack-tick-tack, as it came right at him.

Startled, Zak tried to get away but fell backwards, sprawling on to the circular platform. The Spider kept coming, huge and horrific, stopping only when its whole body was standing over him. It tilted forward so the dark lenses of its cameras were staring into Zak’s eyes. Metallic arms reached out towards him, the nimble pincers coming straight for his face. Glistening, fleshy sinews twisted around the rods and wires of its joints, tightening and relaxing with the Spider’s movements.

Behind him, May screamed.

‘Stop him!’ Mum shouted. ‘Turn him off!’

Instinctively, Zak threw his arms up to his face for protection. Cold pincers touched his hands, and in that instant he knew why they couldn’t find anyone at Outpost Zero. He knew what had happened to Dima. This Spider had killed them all. It had torn them apart.

And now it was going to do the same to him.

The Sikorsky MH-60S Seahawk helicopter came in low across the foam-crested waves. Reaching the coastline of November Island, it thundered over the narrow stretch of white sandy beach, and skimmed the jungle canopy as it headed inland.

To anybody who noticed it, November Island was unremarkable. It was charted only on the most detailed maps, and any keen-eyed kid with a love of scrutinizing Google Earth images wouldn’t bother to take more than a second glance at it. Even to the most experienced analyst, it was nothing more than one of the many beautiful spots of sand and jungle that lay in the warm waters of the Indian Ocean.

The unassuming spit of teardrop-shaped land was only one and a half kilometres long from end to end, and one kilometre across its widest point. It would take the average person no more than an hour to stroll around it. However, very few ‘average’ people visited the island, because if they did, there was a strong chance they would be dead in less time than it would take for them to walk those beautiful beaches.

November Island could only be reached by boat or helicopter, but both were restricted. Every centimetre of the emerald jungle, and the idyllic beach surrounding it, was monitored for intruders. Any boat that approached, perhaps carrying adventurous tourists hoping to discover a deserted island, would be met by a security patrol and turned away with a polite word. Those who ignored the polite word would either disappear without trace, or would be found far out at sea, victim to an unfortunate boating accident.

Inside the Seahawk helicopter, Larisa Lazarovich sat with her carefully selected team of operatives. She flicked through images and files on a tablet computer, double-checking the details Phoenix had sent her several hours ago. Lazarovich was a highly-skilled soldier, and her mission success rate was one hundred per cent. Only one of The Broker’s operatives – a man named Thorn – could beat her record of twenty-eight successful missions. This was to be Lazarovich’s twenty-ninth mission, and she did not intend to fail. The Broker did not like failure, and nor did Lazarovich.

During her first mission for The Broker, when she was twenty-one years old, Lazarovich had led a team into the Amazon jungle to recover valuable documents from a crashed plane. Only one of the team had objected to having a young woman as his leader, so Lazarovich made an example of him. She challenged him to a knife fight, during which she cut him badly, then left him to die. Now his bones were picked clean and scattered across the jungle.