Chapter 2 | Dead Freeze 3

He was glad Petra could fly, but Max was very grateful to be back at the wheel of something that actually flew.

He felt in control in a way he couldn’t anywhere else. It caused him to relax some muscle, perhaps only imagined, that had been tense since the moment he’d awoken in his escape pod. He set his sights on their destination and then got to it.

Bringing them out slowly at first, Max gradually increased the speed, trying to get a feel for the shuttle. It was their only one, let alone the fact that it had their only rover on it. He almost regretted bringing it, he found himself adjusting awkwardly to that added weight, almost like the controls were subtly fighting him.

But he wanted to be oh so careful with this thing.

For a bit there, Max lost himself in the bumps and jolts and subtle vibrations of turbulence as it shuddered through the old ship’s frame. He listened to it creak and groan and make other sounds. Listened to the beeping and blipping from the control consoles around him in the cockpit. Bathed in their pale blue light.

There was a lot left to do, but now more than ever he felt capable of doing it. After being comatose for three days and then in recovery for four more, he was desperate for activity. And finally, he was ready to actually get out there and do it.

“I see it,” he called back into the passenger section.

A moment later, Sierra appeared beside him, grasping a handle and leaning forward, staring out the windows. “Yep, looks like a gray brick. Well, half of a brick, since I guess this is an outpost.”

“A very nicely intact outpost, from the looks of it,” he replied.

“Can you run a scan for life?”

“No, we ended up not being able to repair that one. So we’re going in blind. But I’ll admit, as paranoid as I am, I do wonder if we’re the only living humans left on this rock. It’s been known to happen. Some places are genuinely dead. Or undead.”

“Yeah. But you never know.”

“You do never know,” he agreed. “Sit down, I’m bringing us in for a landing on the pad.”

She nodded and disappeared. Max brought them slowly down and less than a minute later, metal kissed frozen metal and he had landed them in the center of the icy landing pad. He waited to see if anyone or anything would reach out to him, perhaps over the radio, but there was nothing. He turned the engines off and then keyed a special code and his thumbprint to lock down the vessel.

Just in case.

Standing, he hurried back to join the others.

“What are we doing?” Sierra said, staring intently down the barrel of her gun, then nodding to herself and slipping it back into its holster.

“You and I are going to hit the Outpost, clear it out, and then Petra and Lexi will join us. We do our search,” he replied.

“Sounds good. We’ll be ready,” Lexi said, and Petra nodded.

Something had changed, Max realized as he nodded back and then led Sierra to the airlock. Something had definitely changed between them over the past week, and it was not just a good change, but a fantastic one.

They were closer now. They all trusted each other in some way they had not quite before. It made them run smoother, get along better. It made the whole experience more pleasant. And Max could feel anticipation and joy welling in his chest as he realized, for the first time, that he might actually have a shot at making a life with these three women work.

This could really work.

Of course, they still had to get off the planet.

Max walked off the ramp with his rifle in hand, checking the area for movement, signs of life, footprints in the snow, a shadow in the dirty windows of the Outpost.

Anything.

But he saw nothing.

And yet…

His instincts were not just awake, but alert. They had noticed something. But what? Max remained still, frowning deeply as he stared at the structure. Sierra remained still beside him, knowing that he had noticed something, or perhaps having noticed something herself.

The windows, he decided. He’d seen something in one of the windows.

“You see anything?” he murmured quietly.

“I thought I did, maybe. You?” she replied softly.

“Same.”

“What do we do?”

“Keep going.” He pulled out his radio as they began walking forward. “Ladies, we might have movement out here. Nothing definitive, but we both noticed something inside. Be alert.”

“Check,” Lexi replied.

God did he love efficient, professional women.

Max and Sierra walked up to the front door and checked it over. He saw signs that someone had tried to get in at one point, but that could have been three hours ago or eight years ago. Nothing definitive.

They needed more answers. He had Sierra follow him as they did a sweep of the exterior perimeter, but after fifteen minutes, they ended up right back where they started, colder and none the wiser.

“Watch my back,” he muttered as he started trying to get into the locking mechanism.

Sierra grunted a reply and he got to it. The mechanism had held up pretty well and was a model he was familiar with. Consequently, he managed to pop it in about thirty seconds. He pried the door open as Sierra covered the ever-widening crack with her pistol.

“Clear,” she said.

“I’m going in.”

“Got your six.”

Max freed his pistol once more and stepped up to the threshold. Nothing inside by a cold, dusty lobby, starkly furnished and fashioned. He didn’t see anything, although he was less sure now than before, though he couldn’t tell why.

He took a step forward and that was when his instincts flared.

Something came at him from the right, but the way it moved was all wrong. He twisted, raising his pistol, found himself staring into maddened eyes.

Maddened human eyes.

A woman was holding a pistol and a knife and let out an inarticulate scream of rage as she came for him.

“Let me handle this!” Max snapped.

And then she was upon him.

She was strong, and fast. Max dropped his pistol and then grabbed both of her wrists. He twisted them painfully and she let out a scream of rage as she tried to kick him while simultaneously going for his throat with her teeth.

Her pistol was dislodged from her grasp, but the knife wasn’t. Max didn’t really bother trying to reason with her because he had seen this look before and he knew what to do. She was feral. It happened sometimes to people and it was almost always temporary, like a state of shock or psychosis. It just had to be waited out.

Which meant that he had to do this.

Max maneuvered, whipping her around so that he was behind her and so was the arm holding the knife. He hit a pressure point in her wrist and forced her hand open. Once the knife clattered to the floor, he kicked it away and then wrapped one big arm around her throat and put her in a chokehold. He had out her out in about thirty seconds, probably because she was already hyperventilating.

Panting a little, he carefully let her down to the floor. Once she was there, he reached into an inner pocket and extracted a coil of thick wiring.

“You just had that ready to go?” Sierra asked as he tied her hands behind her back.

“I figured something like this might happen,” he replied.

“Good fucking God, you plan for everything.”

“Are you seriously complaining?”

“No, but...goddamnit, Max, sometimes you make it hard to feel competent.”

“I actually actually understand how you feel,” he replied.

She sighed. “Whatever. What are we going to do with her? How long has she been here? Who the fuck even is she?”

“No idea,” Max muttered as he began patting her down.

He found another three pistols concealed on her body, two grenades and an explosive she’d clearly cobbled together herself. Two combat knifes and what appeared to be three throwing knives. A very nice, very tightly packed medical kit. A silver medallion with a curious symbol on it. A piece of cartography tech. A tablet. Some handrolled cigarettes. And about a dozen other little pieces of nifty survival tech.

“Uh-uh,” Max said when Sierra reached for the smokes.

“Oh come on, she tried to kill you,” Sierra replied, but withdrew her hand.

“She’s feral and I think she’s alone. Stay here. Update the others on what happened. Watch her. I’ll do a sweep of this place.”

“On it.”

Max looked at the woman for just a moment longer. She looked like a very hard person, a grim survivalist type...what was she doing here?

Probably what they were.

There were a million questions, but he snubbed them out and got to his feet. Marching on, Max began his search of the Outpost. Two things quickly became obvious. The first was that this place had been picked over very thoroughly. The second was that their mystery guest had already done the exact same thing.

He moved through derelict offices and an empty barracks and a desolate mess hall. There were just a handful of infected corpses spread around, all of which had been stripped. There was a rover that had clearly been modified in the garage. He was tempted to investigate, but given her temperament, he imagined she had it rigged with a trap or seven.

By the time he returned, he saw that she still hadn’t awoken.

“Has she moved at all?” he asked.

“No, not beyond breathing,” Sierra replied. “I bet she’s a real hardass.”

“She’d have to be. She looks like she’s been here a while. There’s a souped up rover in the garage that’s gotta be hers. I think she’s in our situation, just for longer.”

“Think she’s alone?”

“Too hard to tell. She’s alone here almost for sure, unless they’re hiding in the rover. The windows were tinted. But I don’t know, maybe. I guess we’ll find out.” He pulled out his radio. “Okay, ladies, the base seems safe. Need you two in here.”

“I’m ready with the kit,” Lexi replied. “We’re coming now.”

Two minutes later, the rest of their little survival team had gathered in the lobby. Petra paced anxiously while Sierra and Max stood guard and Lexi checked the woman over. Among the new medical gear they had managed to salvage was a portable scanner.

“She’s in quite good health,” she murmured. “I see no signs of illness or serious injury. She’s a little malnourished. Otherwise, she’s physically healthy.”

“That’s good at least,” Max muttered.

“What’s going to happen to her?” Petra asked.

“Well, that depends entirely on how she reacts when she wakes up. At the very least I want to have a conversation with her because clearly she knows more about this planet than we do,” Max replied. “So we’re just going to wait here until she wakes up.”

“Let me give her a stimulant,” Lexi murmured.

“Is that the best idea?” Max asked.

“I would advise only a very mild one in a low dose, but it shouldn’t harm her,” Lexi replied.

Max began to respond and that’s when the woman snapped her eyes open. She happened to be facing him and so they locked eyes immediately. She grit her teeth and tried to move, then jerked when she realized her hands were bound.

When she began getting a bit more violent, Max shifted aim with his rifle. Just a little, not a lot, enough to get her attention.

And it did.

“Who the fuck are you?” she asked finally.