THE DOWN LOW (REVISED 11/27/23)

"Explain it." Lockspur said, as Dahl walked into the cockpit, drying her damp hair with a hand towel. Mercifully, in the confines of the small compartment, she smelled and looked much cleaner. Better yet, she seemed more herself and less a product of the long trip or the effects of the region.

"You look better." Moss said, picking up a pack of Lockspur's sour candies and tossing them to her. Lockspur frowned at him and mouthed the words thanks a lot.

"Thanks." Dahl said, taking them with a kind smile. She hated sour candy. "Explain what?" she asked, leaving the damp towel on a nearby console and moving closer to the monitor beside Lockspur. Neither of her teammates noticed the small bag of candies covertly nestled into the towel. She would place them on Lockspur's console later, hoping he would think he had dropped them. Dahl stood in front of a wide monitor, scrutinizing the image of the area between the wreckage and the cave where she first spotted the creatures. She savagely raked a comb through her short blonde hair with enough force to make her teammates cringe.

"Christ, doesn't that hurt?" Moss asked, offering a wince every time she dragged the comb through a fresh line of tangles.

She shrugged and kept going.

"If those things..." Lockspur paused, gesturing up at the tangerine sky outside. "fry in the daylight, how'd it get locked in that compartment? It's unlikely it was still there from when the eclipse occurred years ago. If it had been, the investigators would have seen it, and if it was still in there, why wasn't it dead from starvation?"

"I have an idea about that." Moss replied, teetering his head as he surveyed the monitor showing the terrain outside. Even the glaring video feed bursting out of the monitor made him squint.

Shit, Dahl thought, it's like looking into a welding arc. No wonder everything here is blind. The Goddamn light from two suns burns the eyes right out of their sockets.

None of them knew how the creature came to be in the closed compartment. Logic suggested, it must have gained access to the ship after the investigators left. But that didn't make any sense either. "The light isn't the only problem." Moss said, tapping the closed hatch on the screen with a chime of contemplation. "That means, it would have had to close the latch behind itself." He turned to his teammates and said, "These creatures are cunning, but that level of problem solving suggests an intelligence far beyond that of any normal type 2 Bio-raptor."

"We'd better hope they're not that smart." Lockspur said to himself. "Because if they are, we're screwed."

"And that's not the worst thing," Moss said. "If they don't actually have heightened intelligence, then their actions suggest there is an outside force controlling them." Moss' brows furrowed at the idea that something or someone was influencing them. "And if that's the case, we have a much bigger problem. Someone or something knows were here and doesnt want us here."

"Let's hope not." Dahl replied, imagining how their mission would suddenly become much more dangerous if the beasts had focused and organized thoughts. She shuddered at the idea the creatures may not be simple eating machines, but more like well-organized ants. Each having its own role to play; each having an individual mission supporting a far greater and much more connected purpose. But what purpose? Whose purpose? Surely, I'm giving these creatures more credit than they deserve. Such human machinations would be beyond these primitive creatures. They have brains the size of walnuts.

"As it is," Moss continued, "I dont believe we have to worry about the raptors being to smart. I think the simplest explanation will suffice here."

"And that is?" Lockspur replied. 

Moss nodded towards a second image on the large monitor off to one side of the cramped compartment. "It's 350 meters from the tunnel exit - where you spotted movement - to the hatch where the creature emerged."

"That's a lot of open terrain to cross." Lockspur replied, his eyes making their way through the detailed video footage on the monitor from the cavern's opening to the aft side of the compartment. "The creature would have to navigate the open terrain while being burned alive. Not a likely scenario for an animal who prefers the cool comforts of darkness."

"It's doubtful any of them could survive that trek or would even try." Dahl said. "Unless..." she paused, thinking aloud. A landslide of puzzle pieces fell into place in her mind's eye. "They are like ants, afterall."

"Makes sense." Moss replied, offering an agreeable nod. "We all agree they didn't get there above ground. "He paused, staring through Dahl and said, "The lower hull was scrapped off on impact. They could come up from underneath."

Dahl adjusted the outside sensor array to show an image of the substrate beneath the Hunter Gratzner and laughed darkly.

"Shit," Lockspur said, the idea they may be diggers never occurred to me. "That's just fantastic. Even after seeing the mounds, I never thought they could come out anywhere.

"Apparently, the raptors aren't the only ones with brains the size of walnuts."

"Kid, I was killing people before you were in diapers."

"And now, grandpa. Your killing them while you're in diapers."

"That's how," Dahl said, turning to a monitor whild shaking her head. She traced a network of underground tunnels up into the bowels of the wreckage with her fingertip. "Crafty little bastards burrowed straight up through the bottom of the ship. That means they have access to the bridge."

"Good, Christ. They are diggers." Lockspur said, sneering in disgust. "If it turns out they're smart, too. They could tunnel up beneath us and just sit down there waiting for us to walk off the end of the ramp."

"Unlikely," Moss said.

"What if one of them gets the bright idea to dig a cavern just big enough to drop one of the landing struts? If they take out the struts, we're stuck here until we can dig ourselves out. And we cant dig ourselves out, if they're down there waiting for us." Lockspur said.

Dahl turned to Moss with a grim expression. "And what if they start digging traps. One second your walking along and the next, whoosh, the ground beneath you collapses and they've got you."

"Two days later, you're a pile of steaming shit in a pitch black tunnel to hell."

"That would suggest an above average level of intellect and an ulterior motivation."

Lockspur grimaced at the monitor and said, "Our job just got a thousand times harder. The wreckage is most likely infested."

"I think it's fair to say, the ship is definitely infested. We have to go in through the windscreen. Fighting our way in from the back is not an option. "

"How do we get it off?" Dahl asked' shaking her head doubtfully. "We can't just pull it off. It weighs too much."

"I could rig a couple of shape charges on the frame rails and blow it off." Lockspur replied. "But that means everything in the ship would know we were on the bridge."

"And potentially destroy what we came for in the process." Moss warned. "Even if you could blow it off without damaging the mainframe, there's no way of knowing which way the glass might fall. If it falls out, great; if it falls in, game over. We'll never get to that computer with 3+ tons of bulletproof polycarbonate laying on it. And once we blow the poly, theres no telling how many of those things will be on the otherside of the hatch."

"Or... if the hatch is even closed, or locked." Dahl said.

Lockspur's mind ran through the darkened derelict, pursued along endless corridors of blood sprayed safety zone yellow as a frenetic chorus of blaring sirens and red spiralling warning lights lit his way. A nightmare gauntlet of terror flashing in an endless wash of red-yellow, red-yellow, red-yellow. There would being no going in through the rear, either. "Then we'll have to go out there and access the situation first hand. Figure it out on site."

"Situation normal," Dahl said, sitting down next to Moss, who was already planning a mission strategy. The three of them knew this mission would no longer be a simple you're in/you're out run. It had just become painfully apparent, an entrenched enemy controlled the area as well as had both a home ground and numbers advantage.

"We're screwed." Lockspur added, staring from Dahl to Moss. "Mission over. All this way for nada. If we go in there bombs blasting and guns blazing everything within 10 klicks will come running to see what's going on."

"And if we don't go in there, we don't get paid." Moss said.

"And... we have to face Lilith. She won't like wasting a quarter of a million credits getting us here for nothing." Lockspur added.

"Well then," Dahl said, "Looks like we're going out one more time.

Lockspur shook his head and Moss jabbed his shoulder, and said, "We're not done yet, amigo. I intend on getting paid for having to come all the way out to the asshole of nowhere."

"So, its settled then. we'll need to figure out how to get in through the windscreen." Dahl said.

"And if there's a raptor in there?" Lockspur said unexpectedly.

"So what if it is? You're forgetting the one thing we have going for us. Light." Dahl said. "The entire compartment will be flooded with light. Nothing will be in there. Nothing can be in there. But none of this matters. If you can't get us in through the windscreen,."

"Me," Lockspur blurted. 

"Hey,, Amigo. You're the engineer. So, start engineering. If not, we go home with our tails between our legs." Moss said.

"You explain to Lilith what went wrong." Dahl added.

Moss smiled at her and said, "You know, I like her more every day. What about you, compadre?"

Lockspur turned to Moss with a frown. "Me too."

"Nice," Dahl said, and they all laughed.

"Not to be a buzzkill," Lockspur added, "What about the black box?" He pointed at the cabinet marked Emergency Telemetry Recorder beside a large monitor. "That ship's ETR is in the midsection and that's..." His words failed him, chased off by earlier visions of dread. "In enemy territory."

"It doesn't matter." Moss replied, thinking about the first thing every investigator wanted to find. "It's already gone. Company investigators removed it during their investigation."

"Then how do we determine what caused the crash?" Dahl asked, scowling as if they had wasted a trip.

"That's not the mission," he said. "We're here for the backup drives."

"And that brings me to another point of contention I'd like to discuss." Lockspur said, contemplating the absurdity of traveling months in hyper-sleep just to locate something as trivial as a backup drive. "Doesn't it seem odd to go to these extremes just to retrieve something that may have disintegrated in the crash?"

"Chill, amigo." Moss said. "Lilith assured us they would be there."

"Chill my ass." Lockspur snapped. He had legitimate concerns. There was a simple question he had asked Lilith before they left. Why are we really going? The answer was simple. To make a delivery. But she would not tell him who was going to be here when they arrived.

And now they had arrived. It appeared someone was indeed here, and maybe controlling the creatures. But he couldn't tell that to Dahl or Moss, because Lilith swote him to secrecy. So, he took a different tact and asked, "Have you ever seen Lady Hemmingford sink this many credits into a mission that has no financial return? She knew something was wrong here, that's why she sent us. So, what's wrong?"

"The return... is Johns' son." Dahl replied. "And what could she know? She's on the other side of the galaxy."

"Bullshit!" Lockspur countered. The heat of his word slammed into Dahl like a runaway freight train. He waved off her incoming rebuff and added, "They haven't spoken since Will was a boy. And even then, Will hated him. He was a shit husband and an even shittier father."

"That was Helen's fault." Dahl cut in.

"Sure. Sure." Lockspur blurted, unintentionally pissing her off when he laughed as if she were a naïve child. "Because she got him a headlock every night and forced him to drink a fifth of whiskey." He knew the full story of how Johns came to be single again, and it was not an impressive tale. Johns was no saint. In fact, in his youth, he had been quite the sinner. "I'm certain it had nothing to do with the fact he was a fall down drunk, an abusive husband and even worse father."

"Says you."

"Ask him yourself, chica." Lockspur said, quite tired of her constant need to defend a life she knew little to nothing about. "He was at his best when he passed out. That was the only descent thing he ever did for his family."

Dahl jumped from her seat, jammed a long, slender finger in Lockspur's face. She hated being talked down too, or made to feel somehow inferior because of her age or gender. And he had just done all three in 30 seconds. "Don't call me, chica." she snapped, readying herself to do battle. A battle she would not win. Lockspur was old, but a formidable opponent on a bad day.

"Then stop acting like one." Lockspur replied, dismissively swatting Dahl's hand away from his wrinkled, olive face. "And, for the record, your uncle made peace with those demons long ago."

"Fine. If we're not here to find Will," she snapped sarcastically. "Tell me why we are here?"

"Not a clue." he lied with a weak shrug. "But I'm telling you, this trip has nothing to do with finding a son he never really knew."

"Guilt." Moss said, teetering his head as if that might be a good enough reason to shut them both up. He didn't really give a shit why they were there. He was interested in how they could complete the mission and get out of there still very much alive and intact. "It can make people do crazy shit."

"Seriously." Lockspur said, reeling around to meet his eyes. "You're talking about Johns. If you haven't noticed in the last dozen or so years, Johns doesn't do guilt. And most importantly, Lilith doesn't pay for guilt." Moss nodded. "This mission is cold, calculating and methodical. Amd even if Johns doesn't know what's going on, you can bet your asses, Lilith does."

"Conspiracy theories and monster stories aside, this poimtless debate isn't helping. We need that drive." Dahl said, shaking her head at both of them as if they should let it go.

"Can't you see." Lockspur continued, gesturing at the ship in the distance. "A ship that size should have detonated in the upper atmosphere long before it had a chance to land. Whatever happened here isn't just wrong; it's impossible. That ship should have detonated on re-entry."

Dahl pointed in the same direction and said, "And yet, there it is. Broken up, but for the most part, still intact."

"Before I joined Lilith's organization, I crewed long range haulers as chief engineer aboard the C.H.S. Bowmen for 10 years. It was the twin sister to Hunter Gratzner."

"So." Dahl replied, as the what's that got to do with anything tone in her voice spurred him on.

"So... I'm the one guy in a 1,000 light year circle you should listen to when he says something is wrong with this picture." The stress in his voice giving credence to his belief. "I'm telling you. What happened out there is beyond impossible. A ship that size cannot withstand the gravitational forces exerted on its hull during re-entry. They're not designed to withstand a landing."

"Regardless," Moss interjected, walking over beside Dahl and leaning in towards the screen. "Our priority is finishing the mission and we're never gonna do that if we stay here arguing physics. We have no choice. We need to get out there."

"Wrong." Lockspur fired back. "Our priority is staying alive. And going out there reduces our odds of doing that dramatically. I say it's too risky."

"Are you suggesting we turn around and go home without the drive?"

"Hell no. I'm suggesting we are smart about it." he replied, remembering his agreement with Lilith. And the fact that in all the years he had worked with her, he had never failed to complete a mission or follow her orders to the letter. Like it or not, he had to make his delivery. Even if he didn't know where that delivery would take place or who he was meeting. The rest of their mission was just a ruse to get the thing in his arm here. But why couldn't the others see the mission was shit? He looked away, fearing the lie on his lips would show on his face.

"And what about you?" Moss asked, turning to Dahl. "What do you think? Do we cut and run or do we run and gun?"

"Simple. We go get what we came for and get out. But Carlos is right. We can't just run out there. We need to be careful. Something is off here." Dahl said, swiping a finger across the touchscreen. The quick gesture brought up an image of the entire crash site taken from high overhead. "Look here," Dahl said, pointing at the monitor. "The aft section broke off and came to a stop 2 kilometers back there. After we're done on the bridge, we can fly back and assess the damage."

"No confrontations." Moss replied, looking at the back of Lockspur's head. "We're in and out, before the raptors can catch our scent." But even as the words came out of his mouth, he had his own doubts.

"And if they do catch our scent?" Lockspur asked Moss' reflection in his monitor.

"We'll take a larger loadout and a few extra frag-grenades." Dahl said, looking at Lockspur. "Hopefully it won't come to a confrontation like that, but we need to defend ourselves if it does."

Lockspur swiveled around, looked from Dahl to Moss thinking about the gutted behemoth they'd left lying in its own entrails. "It's still risky. But I don't think, at this point, we have any other options."

"Then, let's get geared up and go get it done so we can finish this and get the fuck off this rock." Dahl said, handing him the rifle leaning against the console beside her.