Hellworld (Deathstalker Prelude) by Simon R. Green Read Free Book Online Page A

first aid kit. That rag you’ve got there is filthy, and I don’t want your cuts getting infected.
    Corbie sniffed and looked put upon, but accepted Lindholm’s offer of a clean bandage and wrapped it carefully round his cuts. Lindholm knelt down and cut away a few spikes of grass with his dagger. Williams slipped them into a self-sealing bag and tucked it carefully into his backpack. Hunter checked that everyone was ready, and then led his Squad on towards the waiting forest. He wasn’t too unhappy about the incident. Corbie hadn’t been badly hurt, and it was a lesson his people needed to learn. Apart from the Investigator, they hadn’t been showing nearly enough respect for their new environment. Even now, it might take a serious accident before they did, and he couldn’t afford to lose anybody.
    The forest spread out across the horizon as they approached its boundary. It was bigger than Hunter had expected, and looked to be several miles wide. He activated his comm implant and patched into the pinnace’s computers. Three point seven miles at its widest, to be exact. Hunter frowned suddenly as he shut down his implant. He shouldn’t really be using the implant for this sort of thing. Once the energy crystals in his body were depleted, all his high-tech implants would be useless. Better to save his tech for when it was needed. As he made a mental note to mention it to the others, the Investigator came to a sudden halt beside him. He turned to her enquiringly while the rest of the Squad pulled up around them. Krystel was looking intently at the ground just ahead.
    “Everyone stay where they are,” she said softly. “Captain, I suggest we all draw our guns.”
    “Do it,” said Hunter. There was a brief whisper of sound as the Squad’s disrupters left their holsters. Hunter glanced unobtrusively about him, but couldn’t see anything threatening. “What is it, Investigator?”
    “Straight ahead, Captain; two o’clock. I don’t know what it is, but it’s moving.”
    Hunter looked where she’d indicated, and a chill went through him that had nothing to do with the morning cold. Something long and spiny was oozing up out of one of the cracks in the ground. It was flat and thin, and the same dirty yellow as the foliage on the trees. At first, Hunter thought it was some kind of jointed worm or centipede, but the more he looked at it, the more it resembled a long strand of creeper or ivy. It had no visible eyes or mouth, but the raised end swayed back and forth as though testing the air. It was as wide as a man’s hand, and already several feet long, though more of it was still emerging from the crack.
    Dozens of hair-fine legs suddenly appeared at its sides and flexed impatiently as the rest of the long body snapped up out of the crevice. The creature scuttled across the open ground with horrible speed and then froze in place, the front end slightly lifted, as though listening.
    “Ugly-looking thing,” said Corbie, trying to keep his voice light, and failing. “Look at the size of it. Is it a plant or an animal?”
    “Could be both, or neither,” said the Investigator. Her gun was trained on the creature and had been since it appeared. “Would you like it as a specimen, Dr. Williams?”
    “Don’t think I’ve got a bag big enough to carry it in, thank you,” said Williams.
    “Kill it,” said Corbie. “I’m not sharing the pinnace with that horrible thing.”
    “Take it easy,” said Hunter. “We don’t know that it’s dangerous, and it is the first living creature we’ve come across. It could tell us a lot about this world.”
    “I don’t think it’s got anything to say that I’d want to hear,” Corbie replied.
    “There are more of them,” said DeChance suddenly. The esper had one hand pressed to her forehead, and her eyes were closed. “They’re right here with us, just under the surface. They’re moving back and forth in the earth. I think they were attracted by the sound of our