[ WP ] Jurassic Pork , a subpar sci-fi novel

Racklin Murray was praying, eyes shut, when the pilot suddenly announced, `` ETA five minutes. Get ready, team.'' 
 
 Slowly, he looked around at the rest of his silent team. Chris Teak was bobbing his head, gaze fixed on the ceiling of the shuttle, earphones jammed tightly over his ear. Barbie Summers was triple-checking her Exosuit and all its accoutrements. Racklin thought he should do the same, but he held faith that his weapon systems would function perfectly. 
 
 Jason Rind was the only one who looked nervous. He kept looking at that photo of his kids he kept in his wallet. Beads of sweat shone on his bald, ebony head. 
 
 `` Two minutes!'' the pilot said. 
 
 `` You guys ready?'' Racklin asked. Despite the steadiness of his voice, he wished he was anywhere but here. 
 
 `` Never been readier,'' Barbie said. 
 
 `` One minute!'' 
 
 The team stood as one and made their way to the rear of the shuttle, where a door was sliding open. It was night outside, and they were flying over a dark carpet of treetops. Barks and whistles of unseen nocturnal beasts rang out. 
 
 A hologram flickered into life before them. `` Remember your mission,'' the old, white-haired man said. `` You have six hours to locate the target and secure it before the cargo ship arrives. The hope of mankind rests with you—only you can prevent our extinction. We've given you the best we have. Spare no expense, but be careful; there's no telling what now resides on Earth since the incident three years ago.'' 
 
 `` Will do, sir,'' Racklin said. 
 
 `` Good luck.'' 
 
 `` Go, go go!'' the pilot yelled. Without further ado, the team leaped from the shuttle and hurtled into the forest. 
 
 *** 
 
 `` It's a lot denser than I expected,'' Barbie said, slicing the thick jungle growth with a plasma wristblade. 
 
 Chris snorted. `` What did you expect? A tropical paradise?'' 
 
 While the two bickered, Racklin looked up, through a gap in the canopy, at the multitude of stars in the heavens. One of them was particularly bright; its red glow fierce in a field of black and silver. Homebase, where the remaining five million members of humanity lived. 
 
 Anger flashed through him, hot and sudden, when he remembered the man responsible. The same old man who had now sent them on a perilous mission. 
 
 `` They were supposed to end world hunger. All the meat we would ever need,'' he said, and the others stopped talking. `` And yet, they're starving up there now, while we're down here looking for something that should never have existed.'' 
 
 `` Hold up, guys,'' Jason called. His voice was faint. Turning, Racklin saw him standing a distance away. If not for the lights on his Exosuit, he would be entirely hidden by the shrubs and ferns. He looked positively tiny, dwarfed by the monstrous tree trunks around him. 
 
 `` Hurry up and stop dicking around,'' Racklin shouted. He was holding that stupid photo again. 
 
 `` There's something wrong with my suit,'' Jason said. `` Gim me a—'' 
 
 The tree trunks bent without warning, and Jason was screaming as something clamped its jaws over him and lifted him into the air. 
 
 `` Holy mother of—'' Chris yelled, and then the trio began firing their wrist cannons at it. In the barrage of light that followed, Racklin saw that it was a gigantic hog, albeit one with tusks the length of the shuttle they had flown in. There was a sickening crunch in its mouth, and Jason's voice vanished. 
 
 The creature roared at them, so loudly Racklin felt the earth shake. Rather than charging at them, however, it fled into the forest, causing Barbie's missiles to miss and destroy harmless trees. 
 
 `` Shit,'' she said. `` Was that—'' 
 
 `` It had to be one of the original clones, judging by its size,'' Racklin said grimly. `` Come on, we need to keep up.'' 
 
 Fortunately, the beast had been hurt. They had little difficulty following it, due to the copious amount of blood it had left behind. 
 
 `` Six months,'' Chris said. `` Six months was all it took for the world to go to shit? What the hell did OutGen do to screw up so badly? Why've we become food for bacon?'' 
 
 `` Shut up,'' Racklin said, holding up his fist. `` You hear that?'' 
 
 As one, they faced a rustling bush, weapons aimed at it. `` On the count of three,'' Barbie said. `` One... two...'' 
 
 A squealing piglet tore out of it, one the size of an elephant. Barbie howled as she let loose with her flamethrower, lighting the creature on fire, while the other two settled for peppering it with bullets. However, it survived the onslaught and vanished into the brush. 
 
 `` Good job, guys,'' Racklin said, watching it go. When he faced the other two once more, he froze. Just behind them, a large shape was slowly rising from another section of foliage. 
 
 `` What?'' Chris said. `` You look like you've seen a pot roast magically appear.'' 
 
 `` Clever girl,'' Racklin said, and the hog speared his friends, one with each tusk. 
 
 `` No!'' he screamed, firing everything he had at the beast. Thick blood splashed everywhere from the attack, and from the bodies of his friends. The hog rushed at him, but he engaged his jetpack and flew aside, dodging it at the last second. 
 
 `` You're not kosher for me anyway!'' he yelled. Firing the mini-nuke from his left arm, he hurled himself behind a rock and curled up, just before an explosion consumed the world. 
 
 *** 
 
 `` You know, Racklin, when I asked you to bring back enough meat to feed the colony, I did n't expect you to blow it up with a missile and leave barely enough scraps for one of those Chinese bone soups.'' 
 
 The cargo ship's captain was glaring at him, but he ignored the fellow as he watched the crew try to shovel the bloody chunks into the aircraft. It was all he could do to keep the pieces he'd hidden inside his Exosuit from falling out. 
 
 `` Did you hear what I said? We still have a food shortage problem! What're we going to do?'' 
 
 Racklin shrugged. `` Life, uh, finds a way.''
