Samoylova worked at a steady pace, not rushing herself for fear she would make a mistake. She had positioned four of their devices and resecured their access panels but then was certain that she had heard something distinct from the normal hum of the Gate. It sounded like a thud such as when an animal jumps down from someplace high. She listened carefully for a while but heard nothing. And then she leaned into the next access, focusing more on the sounds around her.

She installed the explosive device and definitely heard a distant “mrrp.” She turned in the general direction, not bothering to put the access plate back. “Ghost,” she whispered. “Here, boy.” There was no answer.

She checked the camera’s feed on her tablet while carefully listening for another sound. Ghost had to be nearby; nothing else sounded like that. The motion detection setting should have alarmed on any movement in the accessway, but there was nothing. And TURING had not informed them of an opening.

A soft meow came from the distance, like he was on the other side of the Gate. She set her tools down and walked a short way across the catwalk to Moussa.

“Chief, I think Ghost is here.”

He had his head inside a power panel but pulled out and faced her after hearing her report. “You think you’ve heard him too?”

She felt relief at his reply. She hadn’t imagined it. “I heard him meow. If it’s not him then it can only be…”

“Yeah, the Creature can probably sound like him. I think it would’ve jumped us though.” He set his tools in the pouch by his feet.

“Should we split up to find him?”

He shook his head. “We’ll stay together just in case.” He turned away from her and whispered, “Ghost, come here, kitty.”

She strapped on her pistol belt, grabbed a flamethrower, and followed him. They crept through the tight walkways, peering into the clusters of machinery. “Ghost,” they softly called. “Here kitty.” But he didn’t answer.

Samoylova grunted in frustration. “I know I heard him.”

“I did too,” Moussa said. He stepped up on a higher point on the catwalk and looked all around with his hands in his pockets.

She checked her tablet again. The turret cameras still showed the accessway to Command was sealed on both ends. Holly’s team was far away – if they were still alive. She hoped they were, but she also wanted to find their cat and finish their job before Holly and James returned. “Here Ghost!” she said louder.

“I’m not liking his independent nature right now,” Moussa said.

“He could be sleeping.”

“Well, we got to find him. We can’t leave him in here when the bombs go off.”

“Should we get food and then call him?”

“I think he’s too smart for that. He knows we don’t eat in this Gate. And we would waste time going for food.”

She was forced to agree with that reasoning. He knew them too well and would suspect a ruse. “Come, kitty-kitty. We need to get you out.”

“Come out, Ghost.”

“Meow.”

Moussa turned to Samoylova, “He’s not sleeping.”

“Good boy. Come here, Ghost. Here, kitty!”

They both called him for another minute without success, and then they heard another Meow.

“He’s up ahead.”

“Damn,” he said, “I think he’s in the outboard there.”

They reached the access to the bilges and outboards – a narrow trench leading under the machinery. They set their weapons down; one of them would have to crawl down in the access to the bilges. She would fit better. “I’ll get him.”

“I’ll do it,” he said, taking off his jacket. “I got longer arms.”

He pulled off the screen and lay down on his back. “You watch out for both of us.”

She nodded.

Meow.

“Yeah, I’m going to get you,” he said as he pressed himself against the piping in the duct. He began to pull himself in.

She watched him go in to where only his legs were sticking out, and then she heard an angry yowl.

“Be quiet,” Moussa said. “Come out where I can see you.”

“Ghost, here kitty.”

Another yowl answered them, and then a vicious snarl. And then Moussa screamed.

“Ow! Stop, no! Pull me out!”

She stared at his legs kicking in the trench. And she knew from his desperation that something horrible had happened. The angry growls were not from Ghost. “What? Chief?”

He screamed again more desperately as he inched himself back out of the access. “Pull me out! It’s not Ghost!” He pounded at something out of sight. The low thuds from the desperate blows reverberated through the metal plating within the Gate.

She stepped down in the trench and pulled him out in frantic steps, straining the muscles in her body. He weighed a lot more than she did, and it was hard to get a good hold of him with his thrashing. Each tug was more desperate than the one before. She could not shut his screams out of her mind. And then she saw blood on his shirt.

She turned to the side to climb out of the trench and help him up. A wild thrust from his knees smashed into her face, inflicting sharp pain. She ignored it as much as she could and helped him get out of the trench. But she felt the warmth of her own blood running over her mouth and the warmth of his blood on her arms and hands.

The right side of his head and right arm were lacerated as if he had been attacked by a wild beast. He clenched the worst wounds and blood oozed between his fingers. “That’s not Ghost,” he cried. She quickly surmised that his cuts went down to the deep fascia. Maybe even into the muscle tissue.

She turned back to the service trench, hearing the beast’s growl. It was much bigger than Ghost (she guessed double his weight), and its eyes gleamed with malice amplified by its blood-covered face. Patches of its pale skin had been stripped of hair and marked with inflamed sores, and its body was hugely muscular. Its mouth was filled with sharp teeth. She drew her revolver on instinct and emptied the cylinder; her thumb working the single action revolver’s hammer with an expertly memorized technique. And then she tossed the pistol down to retrieve her flamethrower, and she filled the trench with fire.

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She was sure she hit the beast, but also certain that it was still dangerous. Her fear subsided and gave way to a twisted mix of remorse and rage. That was Ghost. She knew it from the dark-skinned nose; shimmering, blue-tinted gray coat; and blue-green eyes. Pazuzu had changed him into something perverse. She heard a thud several meters away where she thought it had jumped out of the outboards.

“Did you get it?” Moussa asked, grimacing in pain while he applied pressure to his worst injuries.

She shook her head. She never had been a good rapid shot – such things were only possible in Western stories. His bleeding filled her with a new sense of fear. “I’ll get the first aid kit.”

“No!” he said. “Kill it first.”

“But it will only take…”

“Kill it.” He pulled a laser pistol out of his jacket’s pocket and set it in his lap. “I’ll do it if it comes this way. Go hunt. And may the Lord be with you.”

She looked in his eyes and saw that he too was aware of the danger. She lifted her pack, much lighter since she had used most of the explosives, and weapons and jogged to the noise she heard before. There was another access trench, and blood was on the pipes. A droplet trail, not just the large, bloody paw prints. Time would be on her side under different circumstances. But Moussa was losing blood too.

She heard an angry yowl from a mezzanine catwalk up above. She cocked the cylinder of her pistol forward and reloaded with memorized technique, keeping her eyes fixed on the danger. She wished she had more than six shots available, but at least she didn’t have to worry as much about holing vital equipment with the old revolver. She thought about her adventures with her recon fireteam, skirmishing in the grey zones of the Sol system. Her drones had captured many faces at the very time of their death.

Her tablet showed that both accessways were still sealed. She now didn’t have a fireteam, and she didn’t have drone support. She only had her own skill. But her enemy was also alone. And it was wounded. It wouldn’t gain a memory of her face as she died. She kept a finger on her pistol’s trigger as she climbed the ladder to catwalk one handed.

She swept the platform with her pistol and then climbed fully onto the mezzanine. The Ghost-creature had already vanished. More blood though, and a creature of its size couldn’t afford to lose that much. The Creature wouldn’t be able to dart and hide for long.

She saw bloody paw prints leading below a catwalk on the bottom floor. It was going back into the bilges. It was trying to hide and heal. She would sandwich it between herself and Moussa and kill it once trapped. I’ll drive you with fire.

“TURING, delay fire protection system activation.”

“I’m inhibiting activation. Please do not remain in the vicinity of flame.”

She went back down and pumped a jet of flame into the bilges. An angry hiss answered the fire’s low roar. It was close. She pumped flame into another set of bilges and saw the cat-monster race out of another hole. She turned with equally impressive quickness and chased the monster with a jet of flame, singeing its fur.

The cat-monster was as big as a lynx. It flung itself on the decking and extinguished the flames with a long roll. She aimed her pistol one handed and got off a trio of shots. The beast moved too quickly to aim for vitals (and it may not even have them anymore) but she certainly scored at least one hit. The unnatural thrash from the beast gave testament to it.

It regained its footing and ran with an obvious limp to the accessway door to Aux One, ducking low to try to crawl under as it rose. She perceived its intention as it drew near.

“TURING, keep the access door to Aux One shut.”

“Acknowledged,” TURING said.

The monster fled in panic under the door. It was now trapped. That brought her further apprehension rather than relief. The most dangerous beast was a cornered beast. Further, this was something beyond a beast. It, like everything else Pazuzu made, was a crafted weapon.

No nation within the Sol system had recruited normal humans into their special forces groups in two hundred years. The weapons – replicants, top contender splicers, and combat droids outcompeted them, and replaced them. Normal humans were only recruited for support roles. At one time she had thought this was bigotry. Then she narrowly avoided getting killed on Ganymede by the weapons. Her mind wasn’t downplaying the danger this time.

Her hands shook as she followed it into the accessway. She watched it press its head against the door on the other end and scratch with its paws. And then it seemed to know, and it turned back toward her, yowling. Its mouth – unnaturally full of long teeth captured her focus.

Just stay there. It’ll all be over soon. If there’s any part of Ghost still in you, stay calm and it’ll be over soon.

It lowered itself as if as if about to pounce and its claws extended from its bloody paws, but it’s increasingly pathetic yowls revealed its fear. She approached it cautiously, but without incident. Just another second, God. And then she aimed the flamethrower at the hideous monstrosity, and forced herself to pull the trigger.

She felt both relief and sadness as she sprayed the cornered beast with flame. It turned away from the flame and yowled, looking around for a chance to escape and scratching the door. Its fur and skin flaked off as glowing embers and then she released the trigger and set the flamethrower down. She drew her pistol with a careful aim and fired one shot. Ghost fell on the deck and lay still.

“Warning,” TURING said, “Fire protection system activation is imminent.”

“I know, that will do.” Her fear subsided and the sharp pain in her nose came back to the forefront of her mind.

She solemnly watched its body burn for a few seconds and then turned away after the CO2 sprayed. She crossed through the catwalks and then turned back one last time to view her charred companion. You were a good cat, I know that it’s not your fault. She wiped away a couple of tears and went back to Moussa, grabbing an emergency aid kit along the way. He had fastened his belt into a tourniquet on his right arm. He had bled a lot and was still bleeding, although the rate seemed to have decreased.

“You got it then?” Moussa asked.

She nodded while wiping blood off her mouth. “He’s at peace now.” She knelt beside him and opened the kit. “I’ll get you fixed up, buddy.”

“Sam, listen…”

“Don’t talk now,” she said while sterilizing gauze with alcohol.

He grabbed her arm to stop her. “I appreciate it, but not this time.”

She looked in his eyes and instantly understood him. But she didn’t want to be alone out in this system that bordered on hell. Don’t quit on me. “There’s still some chance we can make it.” They had antibiotics stored in Command. They could try.

He shook his head. “I’ve lost too much blood to be useful at anything. And we both know about the infections. Nobody on the Nineveh has survived those, and I’m pretty sure nobody on that derelict did either. I’m not coming after you as some alien zombie.”

“We don’t know that…”

He looked sternly in her eyes, silencing her. “I can do my best work here. The surest way to see that these go off without a problem is to have someone manually initiate the detonations. I’ll be right here with the last one. I won’t suffer.”

Alone. Even if anyone returned from Propulsion Two, she couldn’t be sure they had not been altered by Pazuzu. She would be alone against monsters. Weapons – that might look like friends. One of which had so easily killed De Silva. And Patterson.

She pushed the memory of De Silva screaming out of her mind. It would only feed her fear, and she was barely keeping it under control. And maybe she didn’t have it under control at all.

But she would be alone. Guilty and alone. Guilty of abandonment. Guilty of not assessing the danger of the derelict, and what was on it. And she feared that guilt too – maybe as much as she feared Pazuzu. She looked in his eyes and shook her head. “I can’t just give up on you.”

“I know,” he said, grabbing her shoulder. “But do this instead.” He pulled her close, looking straight in her eyes with a fiery intensity. “You survive. Tell my wife and daughters that we did what we had to do.”

She nodded, tears running down. “I…I’ll try to give them your message.”

He slapped her shoulder in encouragement. “We did what we had to do… You tell them.” He lowered his head and closed his eyes, appearing almost dead, and then breathed in again. He then fumbled within his pack and got his tablet. He struggled to sign in with one hand and then opened a copy of the Psalms. “Get out of here and get some pain killers for your nose.”

She mumbled in response. “I don’t want to leave…”

He grinned at her even as his eyes watered. “I have everything I need. Now get out of here!”

She stood but didn’t leave. She looked in horror on how he sat there reading with blood all over. She felt like she was shaking all over.

“Go,” he said. “I’m going to start setting these off in a few minutes.”

Fighting back tears, she picked up her weapons and began to back away. He appeared increasingly lethargic, and was still bleeding. She gave him a small nod when he next looked at her and then she turned toward the exit making a fast trot. She was fighting for both their families now. Alone.