Orion Colony Complete Series Boxed Set J.N. Chaney (books for new readers .txt) 📖

I reached into my pack and handed her a water. She took it tentatively and half fell, half sat down on the ground. She lifted the bottle with a shaky hand.

Whether it was the water or my words, when she removed the bottle from her lips, she looked a little better. This close to her, I got a better look at the wound on her head. It was a shallow cut that would probably be fine with a few stitches. Head wounds always looked worse than they were. I knew better than most. I’d had a few dozen of them in my day.

“Th-thank you,” Doctor Allbright managed to say. She handed the water back to me. “I-I’m sorry. I don’t know what came over me.”

“What did you see?” Ricky asked, coming up with the mutt.

The dog went to Doctor Allbright, sniffing at her legs and feet, then let off a low growl.

“Easy, hey, easy,” I told the dog, patting him on the head.

“It’s okay; he probably smells whatever is on me,” Doctor Allbright said, shaking her head from side-to-side, as if to clear the images from her mind. She took a deep breath. “I don’t know how to explain what I saw.”

“Well, figure it out and don’t take too long,” Ricky told her, then looked in the direction she had come from. “Mist can travel quickly, and I don’t want to get stuck in it.”

“We should get moving soon,” I said, slinging my pack from behind my back and opening it up to retrieve the med kit. “Can you tell us what happened to you?”

Doctor Allbright nodded. “I was in one of the larger ships when we disengaged from the Orion,” she said, looking past my shoulder, as if she were seeing the events as she spoke them out loud. “There had to be hundreds of us crammed inside the spacecraft, far too many if you go off the safety regulations. In the panic to get aboard, people were cramming themselves into whatever ships were closer, rather than follow proper procedure.”

She shuddered, imagining the chaos of the evacuation.

“There were so many people inside the craft as we took off. There simply weren’t enough seats or harnesses for everyone. I couldn’t even hear myself think. People were shouting and crying hysterically. It was horrifying.” The doctor winced as I cleaned her cut, using a spray I’d found in the pack.

“Sorry,” I said.

“It’s okay,” she answered. “The automated pilot controls took us to the surface of the planet. We watched the Orion break apart in a dozen or more pieces. There were escape pods everywhere in the sky, both the smaller spheres and larger crafts. We landed on the planet maybe a few kilometers south of here. We couldn’t see anything through the windows, there was so much fog. Someone impatiently opened the main doors before we could receive the all-clear that the air out here was breathable. The mist rushed into our craft at an unnatural speed, faster than I have ever seen before.”

Doctor Allbright paused. I did a decent job of cleaning out her cut, then placed a wrap of gauze around her head. Stitches would have to wait.

I looked over at Ricky. His mouth was hanging open. He was staring at Doctor Allbright as if mentally willing her to continue the story.

“I-I don’t know what happened from there.” Doctor Allbright swallowed hard. She ran her tongue around her lips. “People started—they started screaming and disappearing in the mist. The mist was so thick, I could only see a few meters in every direction. A panicked herd mentality overcame us like when a wolf is in a sheep pen. We just started running. We ran out of the craft. There were hundreds of us, maybe more.”

“Did you see what was taking the survivors?” I asked, unable to keep my own curiosity at bay. “What was it?”

“I don’t know, I really don’t know, and that’s the most disturbing part,” Doctor Allbright said, pointing to the wound on her head. “I tripped at some point and hit something on the ground. When I looked up, I saw a dark shape moving through the mist away from me. Whatever it was, it moved slowly, but I can’t recall the size or any discernable details. It could have been anything.”

“I’m never walking into mist again,” Ricky said out loud. “Never again.”

“I don’t know if I’m the only one that got away,” Doctor Allbright said. “I just kept moving. I ran until you stopped me.”

The suns shifted in the time since we found the mutt and Doctor Allbright. I guessed it would probably grow dark soon, but I couldn’t say for certain.

“You think you can walk?” I asked Doctor Allbright, replacing the medical kit and water containers in my pack. “After what you said, I think we should put some distance between us and whatever is in that mist.”

“I can walk,” Doctor Allbright said, rising to her feet. She stumbled for a moment, then regained her balance. “Let’s go.”

I took the lead with Allbright behind and Ricky bringing up the rear. The mutt galloped beside me, sniffing everything in and around our path.

The forest ahead remained the same. There was no noise, foreign or familiar. The suns descended overhead in unison. We marched on.

After an hour of quiet walking, trying to find our way, Ricky decided to share what was on his mind. “I’ve been doing a lot of thinking,” he started.

“That’s never good,” I said.

“I’m being serious here,” Ricky said. “What if that mist travels and spreads overnight? What if it works on a cycle?”

“You’re thinking about this too hard,” I said. “If that’s the case, we can’t do anything else besides what we’re doing right now anyway. We head to the Orion and look for survivors. Iris or the Eternals will have a plan. Focus on the mission and put everything else out of your head.”

“I hope so,” Ricky said, looking back at Doctor Allbright and lowering his voice. “Did you see how