Mimic Goes to War (Space Shifter Chronicles Book 5) Read online

  “Ow!” I hissed, yanking my hand back as I was pricked by the sharp needle in my other hand for possibly the tenth time since I had started.

  “Need help?” a small, reedy voice asked from beside me. I looked over to see one of the mimics beside me rapidly putting together several cages with their four arms. They were kinda human looking, but also kinda not, and I couldn’t tell whether the deviations in their design were intentional or just happy errors.

  “No, I got it,” I said, returning my attention to my project. It was strange to just be sitting down, making traps and cages, but that was my part in the war so I was going to do my best at it.

  Sure, it stung my pride a wee bit that I wasn’t on one of the more important projects, but hey, it wasn’t that bad being the one in charge of securing hope for the future. I just needed to look at it the right way and not let my pride get in the way.

  Hah, pride. Who would have thought? It was strange to think that a little over a year ago, I had been an insecure, quiet, and lonely person who thought the hull of a ship was all there was for me. I couldn’t afford a concept like pride, and I let my boss bully me this way and that like I deserved it.

  So much had changed. I had grown, and learned, and found out more of who I really was than I had during all the rest of my life. Who would have ever thought that I would be participating in a war such as this, let alone as one of five sub-leaders?

  “Sure no help?”

  I looked back to the mini-mimic beside me to see they had already finished their previous cage and was working on yet another one.

  “You know what, I guess I do.” It stung a bit to be outclassed by a literal child, but at least it gave me a chance to finish packing up all the supplies we would need.

  Heading over to our makeshift warehouse, I grabbed rope, bait, torches, flint, and some fruits and other edibles. Since the mimics didn’t eat anything remotely digestible by us, there wasn’t exactly a wide breadth of food, but there was still our fabricator on the ship to make sure we got the proper amount of nutrients. We just had to make sure we returned there every few days.

  Once I was properly loaded up, I headed back to the edge of the woods to see the five mimics assigned to my little mission finishing up the last of the cages and traps. We only had about a day and a half to complete our job, and while I didn’t know how many animals we would be able to round up in such a short time, I was going to try my hardest.

  “Alright, so are all of you clear on the plan?” I asked, walking to the center of the little group.

  “I carry,” one said, its voice low and sounding more like rocks scraping against each other than the vibrations from actual vocal cords. Which, for all I knew, was exactly the case.

  “And I track. Sister gave scents to follow. You have list, and lead.”

  A deafening bleat came from one of the two non-humanoid helpers, its strange jaw seeming to practically unhinge. I was getting used to the sheer body-horror of hanging out with a bunch of juvenile mimics, but I still often had to avoid staring directly at some of their more mangled forms.

  “They say they help catch.”

  “Sounds like we’re all on the same page. Um, Vik, was it? Would you like to…uh, grow for me?”

  The rock-voiced mimic nodded, and its form began to ripple upwards like it was clay, and someone had inverted the world’s gravity. I tried not to let my stomach flip as I watched its features sink back into its flesh like pudding until finally a large, wide creature not too different from a hippo appeared.

  If a hippo had dark, almost indigo skin and a tail as long as its body. Oh, and giant tusks about a foot longer than my arm.

  “Alright, friends, let’s load up.”

  There was a general chittering of agreement, and then we were loading up our cages, traps, and other accoutrements.

  “Higgens, wait!”

  I looked up from the pack I was about to throw on Vik’s back, surprised to see Eske running toward us.

  “Hey, did you need something?”

  “Uh, yeah. I’m coming with you.”

  I gave her an odd look. “But aren’t you needed on the training grounds?”

  “Actually, Gonzales is really focusing on weapons training and the twinsies are going to pick their pilots and help train them. We figured you could use a little extra muscle on this in case things get, ya know, dicey.”

  “Huh. And here I thought I had the easiest job out of all of you.”

  “Are you kidding me?” she said, snorting loudly. “You have to go out into the wild and capture creatures that very much don’t want to come with you and could even possibly kill you. Well, kill us now, but you get the point.”

  “Huh, I guess I didn’t think of it that way.”

  “Yeah, because you always downplay everything you do. I could tell from the moment I saw your first interview. Now there’s a humble guy. But we don’t much have time for that particular virtue, so why don’t we just cut to the part where we get up and go?”

  “Fair enough. You bring a weapon and supplies?”

  She nodded and pointed to the pack on her back. “Right here.”

  “Alright then.” I turned and looked to the other six juvie mimics that were building some of the bigger pens and corrals. I guessed it gave them something to do while the more developed mimics prepared themselves for the fighting part of war. Survival really was a group effort. “Let’s finish packing up and we’ll be on our way.”

  She nodded and eagerly helped us with the rest of what we needed to do to get started. Unlike me, she didn’t seem to have any sort of existential crisis about whether it was important or not. Maybe there was a lot besides physical combat I could learn from her.

  After all, for needing to rely on goggles to see with any sort of clarity, and being ripped from her life without so much as a notice only to be involved in a war with an invasive species, she was pretty chill about everything. I didn’t think I had ever heard her complain beyond her surprise at the insane things that we did.

  “So, which one of you was the tracker again?”

  “Me! Niely!” The four-armed one skittered up, its form melting into another as soon as the words were out of its mouth. This time, I had the good sense to look away as it went through its transformation, giving me a new appreciation for the artful way Mimic often changed her body.

  Then, finally, we were on our way.

  I looked to the list on the datalog that Mimic had given me. “How about we try the…the…Glyrkk?” I said, stumbling over the sounds.

  Niely nodded its new, round head at me emphatically, and I reached for the corresponding sample in the bag Mimic had provided. I handed it over, then watched as the little mimic went crazy—waffling, sniffling, and rubbing its nose all over the little capsule.

  After a solid minute of gross sinus noises, it finally jumped up and rushed off in a direction through the thick, brilliantly-colored woods.

  “I guess that’s our cue,” I said, following.

  I heard everyone fall in line behind me and we set off on the most thrown together, least prepared zoological expedition I had ever heard of.

  But hey, what could go wrong?

  3

  Conservation is Hard

  “So, when did you know that you had fallen in love with an alien?”

  I nearly choked on my water as I helped myself to my thermos. Once recovered, I gave Eske an incredulous look. “Um, what?”

  “I said, when did you know you had fallen in love with an alien?”

  “I, uh, I…” I didn’t know how to answer that. I was still figuring it out, but I figured that saying as much would make my kiss, and my feelings, sound insincere. I didn’t want to sound insincere. “We should probably stay quiet, so we don’t disturb the creatures we’re trying to find.”

  “Oh, you’re right, you’re right.”

  She managed to be quiet for maybe five minutes as we cut through the thick, vibrant foliage before I heard her speak again.
r />   “I thought I could see it on one of your interviews. They were asking so many questions about Mimic, but they kept referring to her as ‘the lifeform.’ You would correct them every time. There was this fierce, I dunno, I’m not the best with defining these things, but I would say…protection in your eyes. And once that section ended, you seemed so sad. Like you wanted to talk about her forever.

  “I figured you guys either had the best, deepest friendship a person could ever ask for, or you were in love. Not that one is more important than the other, because they’re both pretty rad, but…there’s a difference, ya know?”

  “Yeah, I’m beginning to find that out.”

  “Just beginning to…?” I heard her shake her head but did my best not to make eye contact. I didn’t want to see what was across her face, which would undoubtedly make me think that much more about the situation when I was just trying to concentrate on my one job of saving some alien animals. “Man, I know I’m not always the best with a lot of concepts, or people in general, but you really take the cake. You ever get diagnosed with anything?”

  I shrugged. “It didn’t really matter on colony life, so I never went to see any sort of specialist. I always was just me. Higgens. The weird boy who didn’t talk a lot, or ever let his parents cut his hair, and just kinda stared a lot.”

  “Huh. I got ya. I had all sorts of problems when I was younger. My mom finally got me to one of them universal doctors and they said I had some anxiety and social stuff all goin’ on. Got me some medicine, and a few visits with a counselor to teach me some coping skills, and the next thing you know, I was getting along much better.”

  “Hmm,” I said, listening with only about half my brain.

  It was interesting to listen to Eske about a part of her life that I had never heard before, but my mind was stuck on Mimic and my feelings for her again.

  I felt like a broken audio-file, just going over and over and over the same thoughts without any resolution or rest. It was starting to get on my nerves, which was less than conducive to everything I was trying to get done.

  A squeal sounded from up ahead, and if that wasn’t an affirmative on a sighting, I didn’t know what was. I rushed forward just in time to see Niely disappear through a log, in hot pursuit of something I couldn’t spot.

  But I followed along, my heart in my throat. I had thought that maybe we would just find the creature’s nesting area and then set some traps, but it appeared that we were going for a more aggressive approach. I had never wrangled an animal before, but I guessed there was a first time for everything.

  The rest of the party cut through the foliage, trying to keep up with the two of us as best they could. Of course, Eske caught up with me relatively quickly, her long legs pushing her past me like it was a pleasant stroll.

  Soon, she too disappeared ahead of me, leaving me to only follow blindly. Less than a minute later, I heard something that sounded like a large body diving through the bracken and then a shout of triumph.

  “I need a cage!”

  I skidded to a stop and signaled for Vik to do so as well, yanking one of the smaller cages from its side and rushing in the direction I’d heard Eske’s voice.

  Rushing through the plants, I heard a high-pitched keening echoing through the trees followed by frantic coos from Eske that everything was going to be alright and she was just trying to protect it.

  After what seemed like forever of me trying to find them in the forest, I finally spotted a flash of wild color. Sprinting toward it, I found Eske on her back, her muscled arms wrapped around the colorful, flailing body of an avian-looking creature while Neily ran in circles around them, chirping and kicking his chubby hind legs.

  “I got the cage!” I called, popping open the door.

  “Well, then come over here and use it, geez!”

  Oh, right. I should probably do that.

  I rushed to her side, trying to angle it so the opening would come down right on top of the kicking bird-like creature. But every time I thought I had it, Eske would roll out of the way and I would have to readjust.

  “Could you stay still?”

  “Nah, I thought I would just roll around by my own health. I’m trying to keep still, but this chickee is a strong little bugger.”

  “You’ve been hanging around Ciangi too much,” I shot back. But I lifted the cage above my head nevertheless, and once I saw an opening, I slammed it down with all the speed I could muster.

  I felt the cage connect with Eske and she let out an oomph, but managed to retract her hands in time for me to slap the lid of the cage shut. Standing up, I held the still-shaking, cawing Glyrikk in its new, but temporary, home.

  “There!” I said, with no undue amount of triumph. “Now how about we get you on Vik’s back?”

  I held down a hand for Eske to help her up, but kept my eyes on the frantic creature I was helping.

  It was indeed very bird-like, but instead of a beak, it had a mouth not too different from a serpent, lined with rows and rows of needle teeth. It had brilliant feathers of blue, orange, and yellow, but very soft fur at the base of all of the plumes.

  “Hey there,” I murmured, whistling low and soft. The tune seemed to catch the creature’s attention, and it cocked its head to the side to observe me with its four, slit-pupiled eyes. “There ya go. We’re not bad people. We’re not trying to hurt you.” I looked to Eske. “Do you mind doing a scan?”

  “Oh, sure.”

  She quickly lifted her wrist and after a few seconds of whirring, the machine beeped.

  “Looks like this is a fertile breeder. We just need either the fertile male or fertile… I don’t know what this word is, but it’s the other type of thingie that can make the breeder pregnant.”

  “Gotcha. One of the three-sexed ones. Those are complicated.”

  “Not compared to the five-sexed one I saw on the list that apparently also has dominant and submissive social structures thrown in.”

  “You saw that, huh?”

  “I—”

  The maintenance woman stopped short as we heard something crashing through the trees. Eyes going wide, I put the first of our findings on Vik’s back and reached for the weapons we had brought along.

  “Anyone know what—”

  I never quite got my words out. Suddenly, a form crashed through the trees into our little gathering, all fur and slashing claws.

  Something tackled me, and I realized it was Eske pushing the both of us out of the way of the snarling beast.

  “Bylpar!” one of the mimics shrieked.

  “Bylpar?” I gasped as we crashed into the ground and ate dirt. “That’s one on our list?”

  “Wait, what?” Eske shouted. “We’re supposed to bring back that?!”

  We fought to our feet just in time to dodge out of the way yet again as the large creature whirled on us.

  It was like someone had crossed a lion and a bear, but dyed it black and orange. Its teeth were easily the length of my arm and its head nearly the size of my upper body, while its tail looked like it could wrap around even Vik once or twice.

  It turned again, roaring a sound that felt like it could make my eardrums pop, and I was absolutely sure that would be the end of us.

  But the rest of the mimics were suddenly rushing forward, all of their forms shifting as they carried ropes to completely encircle the thrashing beast.

  I grabbed Eske’s arm and pulled her toward the edge of the melee, searching through our supplies for the tranq-injector. I had known the journey could be dangerous, so of course I had brought it, but I suddenly found myself wishing I had been a bit more prepared to use it.

  I finally found the thing and raced back to the fight. My little mimic friends were flying this way and that, but never let go of the tethers they were trying to get around the Bylpar. Although I was by no means a marksman, I took the best aim I could with my tranq-injector, then pushed my finger against the sensor.

  Only for the bolt to go wide and lodge itself int
o a tree. Oh well. At least it didn’t hit one of the mimics.

  Not allowing time to doubt myself, I aimed again and fired.

  I didn’t know if it was the sound of my breathing, or if the creature just felt my eyes on it, but it whipped back to me, sending the smaller mimics scrambling again. It lunged toward me, murder clear in its eyes, and I rolled backward, sure that it was going to reach out and slice me into tiny Higgens pieces.

  But instead, it seemed to stumble at the last moment and hit the ground hard, sliding to a stop just before a particularly thick tree.

  None of us moved for a second, sure that it would rear up and be twice as angry. But instead, a low, rumbling sound issued from its chest, followed by something akin to a whistle.

  “Is…is it snoring?” I asked a bit incredulously.

  Eske laughed. “Well, there ya go. It seems those sleeper darts work pretty well.”

  “Thank goodness. Otherwise, that might not have worked out half as well.”

  I felt a slight pressure on my leg and looked down to see the mimics pushing past me, binding the creature in a way where it would be safe. It was fascinating to watch them go, and I took a step back to give them room.

  “So, what’s that?” Eske asked. “Two down?”

  “Eight to go,” I answered with a long breath.

  “I hope all of them aren’t this exciting.”

  I laughed lightly, and clipped my tranq-gun to my thigh. “Knowing our luck, each one will be more thrilling than the last.”

  4

  New Plans, New Prep

  Thankfully, while none of it was easy, none of the rest of our expedition quite compared to the beginning. We couldn’t get all of the creatures listed before our day and a half passed, but we managed a good third of it, with a majority of the breeding pairs in our possession.

  By the time we returned to the edge of the capital where Mimic had been constructing pens, Vik was loaded down with all sorts of creatures, some docile and some not, and all of them very much eager to stretch their various limbs.