Astronomicon: Behemoth

Chapter 33- Demons

"We've found a corpse," came Commander Gordon's voice over the radio. "No E.V.A. suit this time, but it's been shot in the head."

"Man are they ugly!" added L.E.O. Cohen's voice.

Aron reasoned that if the cat people were able to walk around in their hangar without breathing assistance, the gas mix must have been tuned to them. In turn, that pretty much guaranteed that it was not going to be breathable by humans.

Still led by L.E.O. Obi, he had got his breathing back under enough control for the warning icon in his helmet visor display to switch off. They were getting close enough that the cat vessel lights were giving some idea of the vessel's structure.

A vertical stack of four globes, each approaching ten metres in diameter, formed the main body. The bottom three were uniform in size but the topmost one looked about a third smaller. He could only guess as whether that was to do with stability, aerodynamics, both or something unrelated to either.

The globes were joined together by a short section of three-metre-wide tube between each and stabilised with flimsily-thin vertical struts another metre or so from the tubes.

The whole assembly stood on a squat, polo-shaped cylinder about the same ten metres across but only a couple tall. There were no landing feet, engine nozzles or apparently anything else protruding from the bottom of the vessel. Instead, it seemed the base cylinder rested directly on the black floor of the hanger.

Aron's engineering-sense had already decided that this vessel was designed for functionality with little if any consideration given to appearance, at least not in human terms.

There was no obvious way to enter the vessel and still no signs of life. With the extremely low light level, it was difficult to make out any detail. There was something large and irregular lying on the ground a short distance to the left of the vessel but Aron got no sense of shape from it. It was little more than a dark shadow on a darker surface.

Once they reached within a few paces of the vessel, Mr Obi sprinted heavily to the side of the base cylinder and turned his back to it. Shuffling cautiously sideways around the left side of the vessel, he held his sidearm ready to fire.

Aron gripped his own rifle more firmly but had no intention of running anywhere if he could avoid it. His glued and bandaged leg was still too sore for any sort of extra strain. Compounding the injury with vigorous physical activity would not help him or the others.

"We've got another body on this side," came Commander Gordon's voice again. "This time in a suit. Looks like two bullet wounds in the chest."

Suddenly a gunshot rang out, audible without the radio but painfully saturating the speakers in Aron's helmet.

"What going on?" came L.E.O. Obi's voice, sounding rattled.

"Just making sure it was dead!" growled L.E.O. Cohen defensively.

"Well, if they didn't know we were coming, they do now!" shouted Commander Gordon. "Have you found anything your side, Mr Obi?"

"No, sir. No activity here."

Aron walked steadily after the L.E.O. but his attention was mostly on the irregular mass that was positioned just outside the weak light cone shining from a spotlight on the cat vessel somewhere above them. He desperately wanted to switch on his suit lights to get a better look at it but that was not an option in their current situation.

By this time, L.E.O. Obi was mostly out of sight around the curvature of the spacecraft. Having no desire to be left alone in the dark, Aron hastened his pace. Up close, he could see that the cat vessel was devoid of any paint or any other decoration. As far as he could tell in the low light, it was simply bare metal.