Minutes to Burn

"What the fuck do you mean we don't know what's going on?" Savage yelled. "I just told you there's a mammoth fucking creature on the loose. Nine feet tall and just as long. We have to kill that motherfucker."

He stripped off his shirt and flung it to the side. His body gleamed with sweat. "We gotta kill the larvae. They're its offspring. We got one in the tent and four more in the forest." Savage held up three fingers at first but got the fourth one up quickly. "We gotta get to them before they transform."

"I am not standing by while you attempt to exterminate a species," Diego said. "So don't even think about it."

"Nothing's transforming," Derek said wearily. "And we don't know that these larvae or the egg sac have anything to do with what you saw. We don't even know what you saw. The worst thing we can do is jump to conclusions."

"We don't have time not to jump to conclusions."

Cameron spoke in an uncharacteristically low voice. "He may be right, Derek."

Derek shot her a glare reserved for liars and traitors. She recoiled from it.

Savage threw his arms out to his sides in frustration. "They teach you this in leadership school, champ? You've been a whole lot of indecision since we landed here."

For a moment, Cameron thought Derek might charge Savage. He was clenching his jaw, the corners of his cheeks flexed out in points. His voice was calm, but there was an element of lunacy hidden in it. "You weren't getting along so good with Tucker, were you, Savage?" Derek asked.

Savage froze. He glowered across the fire at Derek, his beard bristling as his mouth worked noiselessly on words. When he finally spoke, his voice was so close to a growl the words all rushed together. "I would love nothing more than to slit your throat and paint my face with your blood."

"Having some problems with him, you're a little loose around the pegs to begin with, maybe you slipped and your knife got stuck in him. Seems a bit more likely than a nine-foot mantis, doesn't it?" Derek jabbed a finger in Savage's direction, his upper lip curled into a snarl. "You'd better fucking pray you didn't touch him."

Szabla still had not spoken. A spot on her right cheek was quivering like crazy even though she wasn't close to crying. She was never close to crying. Tank sat quietly, digging a stick in the dirt.

"Let's go," Cameron said. "Let's run a recon, see if we can find Tucker." She caught Savage's eye. "Or recover his body."

"Nobody is going anywhere unless I tell them to," Derek snapped. "What, are we gonna search in the dark with flares and elbow lights? We don't have any tactical lights. We'll wait till morning."

Savage backed up on his heels, laughing. He raised a finger and pointed at each of them in turn. "You're a bunch of fucking cowards. Tucker's been your comrade for years. Let me tell you something." His eyes gathered emotion. "Whether I liked him or not, I just saw a man go down before my eyes and I'm gonna do something about it."

He stormed over to Szabla and she flinched away, but he was just retrieving his knife. Resting a boot on the log next to his Death Wind, he yanked it out, running it back and forth across his thigh. It sliced the fab-ric of his pants, opening a slit as thin as a paper cut. He pointed the tip of the blade at Derek. "You want proof?! I'll bring you proof."

Cameron ran after him a few steps as he headed for the forest, but Derek yelled at her, "Cameron, get back here. Let him go."

Cameron halted and Savage disappeared, fading into the blackness between the trees.

Derek issued combat orders, taking the first patrol. Marching along like a dazed distance runner, he circled the fire, then headed all the way out around the perimeter of the open field, keeping a safe distance from the forest on the north side.

Diego removed the larva from the cruise box and placed it outside. He tested its responses to a number of stimuli-different touches, movements, and sounds-until the larva inched away, curled up and ceased responding at all. Tank was reclining on the grass, a safe distance from where the larva lay. Cameron stared at the larva blankly, trying to quell the storm rising inside her.

His boots shushing through the grass, Derek walked past them. The fire flickered over his face. He'd completed the route five times, passing right in front of them, and not once had he spoken. Aside from the large black crescents under his eyes, his face was pale. His lips, moving as he mumbled to himself, looked blue.

Savage had left his shirt on the ground, and Szabla leaned over and picked it up. Removing her ripped undershirt, she slid his shirt over her bare skin.

Derek moved past them and around the fire like a ghost, and Szabla raised her head to watch him walking away. She tried to laugh, but it came out angry. She lowered her voice so that Diego and Rex, sitting on the far log across the fire, couldn't hear her. "He's not being level and he's not making good assessments."