The Martian soil beneath my feet shook with a violent rage as we raced through the tunnels. The Queen may have ran off toward Hotah, but the sound of our footsteps had attracted her spawn. Alaki hisses filled my ears as we dashed around corners and darted down straightaways.

At every intersection we crossed, one lunged at us. For some, Erotan managed to deal a painful blow to the sides that allowed us to maintain our sprint. For others… well, they simply whipped their wormy bodies around and joined the crowd in chasing us.

“What happens when they catch up?” I asked Erotan.

“They’re not going to catch up,” he answered. “Just don’t stop running, Mia.”

That was way easier said than done.

“Incoming,” he shouted.

An Alaki dropped down from the ceiling. Its pincers snapped at us, but it was unable to crane a prize as we darted around its shiny black head.

I glanced over my shoulder, expecting to see its disgusting body slide to the floor, but instead, the other Alaki following us rammed into it, knocking it down. They were too consumed by the chase to slow down and swerve around it. The monster ended up being battered and trampled to death beneath its brothers’ and sisters’ thousands of needly legs.

Mars was a fucking gruesome place.

They were closing in on us quick and apparently I wasn’t moving fast enough, because Erotan plucked me up with his big hands and threw me over his shoulder. Without me slowing him down, we were able to put some much-needed distance between us and the horrible creatures.

I placed a hand on his muscular back and arched up, looking where he was running.

“It should be just up there,” I said as the entrance to the tunnels came into view.

It felt like it had been forever since I last saw the red surface. A part of me was excited to see a glimpse of sunlight, but why did it have to be while I was in the middle of running for my life?

“Are you sure?” Erotan asked as he sprinted past a spacesuit that had been ripped to shreds.

“Absolutely,” I answered, hoping I was right.

The tunnel’s ceiling grew taller and taller the closer we got. It stretched nearly several stories high. I glanced up. The sight of it brought back so many unwanted feelings: dread, anxiety, terror. Not that I wasn’t already feeling them now in some way, but the fear of the unknown when I had first entered the caves flooded my body. I remembered the chills I got when we stumbled across the broken glasses and damaged suit.

“Do you see it yet?” Erotan asked, yanking me away from my thoughts.

“It’s not just laying out in the middle of the caves,” I told him. “It was somewhere near the wall last time.”

“You mean we’re going to have to search for it?” He roared.

I couldn’t blame him for being upset. With the Alaki on our tails, stopping to find this weapon seemed undoable. But that’s exactly what we were about to do.

“Just fend them for five seconds,” I told him as he put me down.

“There’s like seven of them. I think I’ll last three seconds.”

“Three seconds then.” I tried to sound confident. “Turn and face them on my mark.”

“On your mark,” he repeated as we ran closer to the entrance.

I sucked down one last deep breath, calling my memory forth. And then, when I knew we were at the right spot, I said the words, “Alright, now.”

Erotan immediately stopped and swung around with his sword at the ready. “Three seconds, Mia.”

As if I needed a reminder. I ran to the rock wall as I frantically searched for the gun that I knew was shoved somewhere between two boulders. There was no glowing moss up here and I only had the dim light of the sun to use, and it was far from enough.

“They’re here,” he shouted.

A shiny glint caught my eye. “I have it,” I yelled at him. I dashed over and snatched the weapon from the rocks. It was a lot heavier than I expected and it almost slipped from my hands.

I whipped it around, saddled the butt against my shoulder, and pulled the trigger. Nothing happened. Or at least I thought nothing happened since I didn’t feel anything.

Still, the Alaki scrambled away from Erotan despite being moments away from consuming him whole.

“What happened?” I asked.

“Did it work?” he answered with his own question.

I pulled the trigger again, but nothing happened. “I don’t know how to use it.”

“What?!? You don’t know how to use it?!?” Erotan shouted in disbelief as the wiggling black sea of Alaki began to part.

Like Moses himself, the Queen strut through the center. Her spawn didn’t dare touch her and crawled over each other instead of risking her wrath.

“Okay, I’m going to need five seconds after all,” I told him as I glanced down at the gun.

I didn’t understand why it wasn’t firing. The gauges showed that it still had nearly full power. The switch was on, and the dial cranked to max force. What the fuck was going on?

“Anytime now, Mia,” Erotan said with a gulp.

I glanced up. The Queen stood before Erotan with her front half raised. The rest of her body arched upward, standing tall on her little legs. Her massive form eclipsed Erotan. He looked like a tiny toy soldier compared to her.

“Mia!” he cried.

Fuck. I dropped my eyes back to the gun, and that’s when a bright orange switch caught my eye. It was covered in a thick layer of red sand. “Oh, fuck me. The safety was on.” I flicked the switch upward, and I squeezed the trigger.

And nothing. No feeling. No sound.

But when I looked up in panic, I saw mayhem. The Queen and all of her minions were writhing violently, releasing ear-piecing hisses. Then, like firecrackers on Chinese New Years, their heads exploded one after another at a rapid pace. Buckets of slimy green blood rained down on us. The revolting goop was filled with guts, bones, and bits of brain matter.

Soon, the only sound in the caves was that of their dead bodies slapping against the floor. The Queen was the last to fall. I gasped at her size. She could’ve been a segment of the London Underground. Her headless wormy body rose in one final death spasm and then collapsed, falling directly on top of Erotan and spilling more thick green blood across the floor.

“Fuck!” I screeched as I sprinted over to him. “Erotan! Can you hear me?”

I pushed on the carcass with all my might.

“Please be okay. Please be okay,” I muttered over and over again in a panic as I pushed.

The legs wiggled from my touch, and I nearly pissed myself. Apparently, not all of the nerve endings had completely died quite yet.

“Erotan!” I screamed as I rushed the Queen’s body once more, digging my shoulder into the hard carcass in hopes of rolling it off of the love of my life. I grunted and pushed with all of my might. My legs shook beneath the strain, and my teeth and my eyes clenched shut. It didn’t give at first, but after a few seconds, I felt the body begin to roll.

I couldn’t believe I was fucking moving this train, but love was a powerful thing. I had heard many times before that love could move mountains, but today it was moving an Alaki Queen.

I opened my eyes as relief overcame me. I didn’t see an inch of Erotan’s body until she had rolled a full 180 degrees.

“Is he still alive?” Hotah asked as he came around from the other side of the corpse.

“You’re still alive?” I had to pick my jaw up off the ground.

His brow creased as he stared at me like I was an idiot. “Who do you think just moved the dead Queen’s carcass?”

ME. That’s fucking who. With my god damn love.

I swallowed hard. “I thought I… ” I shook my head. “It doesn’t matter. Check his vitals.” I would’ve done it myself, but I didn’t know how. While humans and Subcotan looked similar, I had already discovered that our organs weren’t positioned in the exact same spots. Erotan had touched my sternum once, believing it to be my heart.

Hotah pressed two fingers in the center of Erotan’s neck. “I feel something, but it’s faint. We need to get him back to the village immediately. Do you think you can carry him?”

“Me?” I spat. The boosting power of love only worked in small bursts. It wouldn’t last the entire walk back. “You can’t be serious?”

“Just kidding,” he said, rising to his feet. “Help me fling the flower bud across my back.”