Mission: Planet Biter (Veslor Mates #4)(2)

“Is Dr. Hazel sleeping?” Heavy breathing continued behind her but Vera ignored it, silently chanting just my imagination in her head. It was tempting to ask Nancy if she saw a terrifying bigfoot, too, but she figured the nurse would already be screaming out a warning if it were real. “Any news?”

Nancy lifted her hands and lowered her face into them, soft sobs coming through the microphone. “Dr. Hazel died. Josie is gone.”

That shocked Vera. “What? No!”

“She’d been testing drugs on herself, trying to counteract what we were exposed to. She’s dead. I think it’s just me and you now.”

Vera started to rock in her chair again. Now she knew why most crazy people did it. There was some comfort to be found in the motion of moving back and forth. “What about our employers? The fleet? Hell, has anyone responded to our distress signal?”

“I don’t know.” Nancy shrugged.

“I’ll call Dena. She’s supposed to be monitoring long-distance communications.”

Nancy yanked her head up, raw pain showing in her eyes. “Dena is probably dead too. She was ranting about how no one would take her alive and swearing we were under attack from rebels the last time Josie spoke to her. That was this morning. Josie tried to call her back but she wouldn’t answer.”

“No.” Vera tapped the desk, bringing up Dena’s sleeping room on the security monitors. The small place was trashed, the bedding on the floor, and clothes pulled out of the dresser.

Then she saw legs peeking out from the other side of the bed.

“Oh no…”

“Can you see her?” Nancy leaned closer until her face took up most of the screen.

“Part of her,” Vera admitted. “She’s not moving.”

“Whoever did this needs to roast in hell!” Nancy sobbed, leaning back in her chair.

Vera agreed with the nurse. Some asshole had sabotaged the pods in which they lived and worked, exposing them to an experimental drug from Earth. By the time they’d realized it, some of the forty-three people living on the research pods had already gone crazy.

They were trapped inside the pods. They had no shuttles at their disposal to leave the planet, and to exit the pods would be a death sentence. There was breathable air on the planet, the temperatures were even survivable, but the aggressive alien wildlife would quickly kill them.

The first sign of trouble was when Joe, one of the cooks, had stabbed someone to death for complaining that they hadn’t liked their dinner. He was usually the most mellow, nonaggressive guy ever. Security had tried to take the knife away from him, but he’d tried to stab them, too. They’d had to shoot Joe. He died during surgery.

Next it had been Chuck, their head of security. He’d started introducing his wife to everyone. The only problem was, she’d died ten years before. He freaked out when no one else could see her, pulled his weapon, and took his own life.

The third incident had been Crystal, a botanist with a specialty in alien vegetation. She’d activated the alarms by overriding the safety protocols and going outside without an armored vehicle. They’d found her nearly a mile away, under attack by a pack of small alien creatures. Her last words before dying from the trauma she’d sustained were mutterings about how her plant samples had begun talking to her, swearing they’d protect her from harm if she sought them out.

Dr. Hazel and Dr. Jeth had ordered everyone to line up at medical, taking blood and tissue samples. They’d also run full body scans. Everyone came back positive for a registered experimental drug that had failed during human trials on Earth.

They’d tested the water tanks, the food, and even the air pumps to see where the exposure had come from. But it was already too late. People were losing their minds, hallucinating and experiencing emotions ranging from violent outbreaks to severe depression.

No investigation work had gotten finished. Instead, everyone turned on each other, accusing fellow employees of exposing them to the drug. The two doctors had ordered everyone to stay inside their sleeping rooms and to remain there. But they hadn’t. Fights had broken out and several died from their injuries. Including Dr. Jeth. One of his patients had snapped his neck.

Once all six of their security personnel were dead, Dr. Hazel had asked Vera to take over monitoring everyone inside the pods. She’d been one of the three employees with the lowest dosages of the drugs found in their bodies. Her, Dr. Hazel, and nurse Nancy had that in common. Therefore, the three of them had experienced the least amount of side effects. Vera had been ordered to activate a total lockdown. The previous security guards had refused to do so. Now, every door was sealed and couldn’t open unless Vera herself did it, from the very desk where she currently sat.

“I’m a drone operator. Not head of security.”

“Vera,” Nancy said sharply. “I know that.”

It pulled Vera from her thoughts. She hadn’t realized she’d spoken aloud. Focusing on the still-active video call with the blonde nurse, she said, “I fly drones over the surface and log information. I shouldn’t be locked inside the security office doing this. I just want to go home.”

“We all do. Snap out of it, Vera. We’re depending on you. You the one who talks to us, keeps us calm. You make sure we’re locked in so none of us go outside like Crystal did… She was my friend. Those animals were eating her.”