Plague

too big even for Jack’s strength.
    He scrabbled and found a head-sized rock. He threw it hard and missed the floating bug.
    “The others are getting away!” Sam yelled.
    “What’s that noise?” Dekka cried, and made a shushing gesture.
    The three of them froze and listened. A sound like a mountain stream rushing over stones.
    No, a beating of wings.
    “Greenies!”
    The flying snakes came in a cloud, rushing up from their lair below like swarming bats emerging from a cave at sundown.
    Like tiny dragons, most just a few inches long, some as much as a foot long. They had leathery wings and whipped their tails back and forth to sustain a very shaky aerodynamic ability.
    Sam yelled a curse and fired. Too late to catch them by surprise. A mistake that might prove fatal.
    Bright beams of light sliced through the attacking cloud. Greenies burned and fell flaming.
    Not enough. Not nearly enough and the greenies were not backing off.
    Dekka canceled gravity beneath the leading edge of the swarm, but it only had the effect of disorienting some of the snakes, who responded by flying upside down or in wild circles.
    They began to squirt greenish-black fluid.
    Sam remembered Hunter telling him about being hit by some secretion from a greenie.
    “Don’t let them hit you!” Sam yelled. “Run!”
    Running uphill would be too slow on the steep slope. They ran at right angles to the swarm, ran all-out, panic speed, tripping and jumping back up, oblivious to bruises and scrapes.
    The swarm was slow to react, but react they did, and wheeled after them.
    Sam hit the road, staggered, caught himself, and spun around. The swarm was still emerging from its lair in the rock face above. Sam aimed hastily and fired.
    Brush on the hillside instantly caught fire. Rocks heated and cracked. He played his light on the cave itself, lighting it up, making it a bright, blazing green mouth.
    The swarm was lost now, unsure. It swirled in the air, dropping green-black droplets like an evil rain, but not over Sam and the others, not yet.
    Confident he had burned out the cave, Sam swept his light upward into the swarm itself.
    A mistake. Attacking their lair confused the greenies, but a direct attack on the swarm gave them a target.
    Sam aimed again at the rock wall, hoping to distract them. Too late: the swarm was coming.
    “Run! Run!”
    Dekka ran backward, canceling gravity behind her. A cloud of gravel and dirt rose into the swarm. This slowed them.
    Dekka turned and ran full speed after Sam and Jack.
    The swarm seemed to be losing interest in following them. But a few of the more persistent greenies were still after them as they ran.
    Dekka fell hard. Sam could see she was winded. He ran back to her but the greenies were faster than he was.
    Dekka rolled over and looked up just as one of the greenies fired its fluid. The dark drop hit her bare shoulder. A second drop hit her jeans. Other drops fell around her.
    Sam fired. The hovering greenies flamed.
    Dekka jumped to her feet. “It got me, it got me!”
    “Get your jeans off,” Sam ordered.
    She complied. Jack grabbed the garment and carefully inspected the fabric. “It didn’t get through.”
    “My shoulder,” Dekka moaned. “Oh, my God, it got me. It got me. Oh, God.”
    “Hold out your arm, Dekka,” Sam ordered. “This is going to hurt.”
    “Do it,” Dekka agreed. “Do it, do it!”
    Sam formed a narrow beam of light. Carefully, carefully he moved it closer and closer to the dark splotch on Dekka’s shoulder.
    Dekka gritted her teeth.
    The beam of light burned and she cried out in pain but then yelled, “Don’t stop, don’t stop!”
    But Sam did stop. He quickly grabbed Dekka as she came close to fainting. “Let me see the arm,” he said.
    There was a burned scoop mark in Dekka’s skin. Maybe half an inch deep. Twice as wide. The flesh was cauterized, so there was no blood.
    “Got it,” Sam said.
    “You don’t know that,” Dekka said through gritted teeth.
    “I got it. It didn’t get anywhere else. I burned it off.”
    Dekka grabbed the neck of Sam’s shirt. “Don’t let it happen, Sam.”
    “It’s not going to, Dekka.”
    “Listen to me: don’t let it happen. You understand? You see it happen, you take care of me. Like Hunter.”
    “Dekka . . .”
    “Swear to me, Sam. Swear it to me by God or by your own soul or whatever you believe, swear to me, Sam.”
    Sam gently pried her fingers loose.
    “I won’t let it happen, Dekka. I swear