“Good,” she croaks, when she recognizes Odisseus. “You’re awake.”
Moira has become pretty good at distinguishing the ones that shoot darts from the ones that don't shoot darts and this one definitely shoots darts.
The flower is displaying all the telltale signs. Like a miscreant about to hawk a loogie, the plant arches its stem backward ever so slightly. It even appears to purse its petals into a pout before it lunges forward, launching a featureless black dart to impale its prey. Its prey, Moira Quicksilver, isn’t about to stand idly by and get impaled by some garden variety poison-dart-shooting death plant.
Instead, she spins easily aside, extrapolating the flower’s angle and trajectory. At the exact right moment, she swats downward with her glassrock blade. The tiny javelin falls neatly into two pieces at her feet.
The flower does not appear disappointed or embarrassed by its failure. Instead, it falls eerily still, fading in amongst the rest of its inanimate brethren. An instant later, it’s perfectly concealed among its fellows, looking completely harmless to the untrained eye.
A painful fate averted, Moira swings the torch back and forth along the cavern’s wall, searching for any more surprises. Recognizable only by the indigo – not blue – spots spread on its petals, Moira quickly learned the knack for distinguishing between them, after the first few darts fired her way came a little too close for comfort.
Uncommonly clever for a plant, this particular species was fond of smuggling itself among a patch of its harmless, non-artillery-firing cousins. From this disguised perch, it could easily catch its prey unawares and stick them with a thorny projectile as they passed. To what end, Moira has no idea but she’s certain, from the smell of the ill-aimed barbs, she’s better off avoiding their nasty toxin.
As far as ambush predators go, this one earned Moira’s grudging respect. She called them blue devils; as their unofficial discoverer, Moira reckons that’s their name now.
Moira Quicksilver is surprised to discover she’s actually kinda enjoying Fernhollow.
The Skyscratch thought this a fate worse than death, banishment to a den of monsters. Something instinctual inside Moira Quicksilver, however, rose eagerly to this impossible challenge. This was undeniably a garden of death, a dozen painful ends around every corner. To Moira’s hardwired survival instincts, that’s kinda what made the whole ordeal so exhilarating. Here, Moira is reduced to her simplest weapons – her wit, her instincts and her physique.
There’s no sense in denying the inevitable. These are unquestionably the last hours and days of their three miserable lives. Those lives, Moira knows, will end with their corpses thrown as fertilizer to some abominable man-eating plant.
That taken for granted, then, Moira Quicksilver is determined to put all her survival skills and physical conditioning to the ultimate test. She will stave off that gruesome fate as long as she possibly can, with bonus points for each member of her crew she also keeps alive.
They’d assumed they were being tossed into the gullet of some unfathomable god-monster. This was true in a certain sense and too imaginative in another. In accordance with their quite literal naming convention, Fernhollow turned out to be just that – an underground hollow, filled with ferns. When she and her unfortunate Gitter falling partner hit the ground, they landed atop a soft bed of vegetation, courteous enough to break what otherwise would have been a lethal fall.
This came as a quite a relief to Moira but the Skyscratch soldier was of an entirely different mind. Overcome with quivering religious terror of the place, it was a simple matter for Moira to swipe one of its weapons – a dirk in its hands that becomes a saber in Moira’s – and slice her former executioner to pieces.
Her weapons were few but vital. She was armed with the Skyscratch sword, really a knife that she could wield like a scimitar. She constructed a torch from piece of broken poleaxe haft and a few sparks off the glassrock blade. Most important, Moira came equipped with decades of mental and physical preparation for exactly this type of nightmare scenario.
So armed, Moira Quicksilver, the one woman in the galaxy most likely to survive this deathtrap, set about exploring this outlandish underworld she’d been dropped into. It wasn’t long before she discovered it was chock full of monsters.
The cavern’s exact dimensions are still a mystery. From her rangings, Moira could extrapolate that it was much larger than the opening they were tossed down would suggest. She’d estimate several mottibles in diameter, at its widest points. The cavern’s ceiling varies drastically in height. In some places, it soars far above the reach of her torch’s feeble light. In others, it stoops so low that Moira must crouch and wriggle to pass beneath.
It’s also unbearably stuffy, devoid of breeze or passing drafts. Add to that the unbearable humidity, the air so thick with moisture missing from the surface, and Moira occasionally feels like she’s swimming rather than walking. There’s also the unbearable smell, the rancid stench of rotting vegetation that oozes from every nook and cranny.
Plants carpet the cavern’s floors, walls and ceilings. Ten jungle's worth of slippery black shrugs, ferns, fronds and other undergrowth rises to Moira’s waist. Curtains of ivy plaster the walls, hanging down in strips so thick that Moira could disappear completely into their tapestries of colorless leaves. Vines swing down from the lower patches of ceiling like strands of terrestrial seaweed, these sections resembling a forest inverted, its canopy scratching the ground.
The vast majority of the vegetation appears completely benign, no different from the harmless flora of a million other habitable planets. The occasional exceptions, however, are deadly enough to make Moira fondly recall the bloodthirsty jungles of Baz.
Blue devils are hidden snipers, requiring Moira’s constant vigilance wherever she ranges. Individually, these’re best dispatched with a sword strike to the stem. In large groves, they’re best avoided altogether.
Vinemaws send seeking tentatcles through the underbrush in search of unconscious Ortoks to feed on. Most vulnerable at their epicenter, the fight is best taken straight to the flower’s monstrous maw, as insane as that sounds, since the tentacles range far across the cavern and are exceptionally well-camouflaged. Three such vinemaws has Moira slain so far, slowly perfecting her technique for the inevitable fourth.
Thornclouds were another matter entirely. In broad daylight and against ditrogen weapons, the thorncloud proved a near invincible foe. Down here, by guttering torchlight and against glassrock blades, it became a carnivorous god, more akin to a hurricane or a black hole than a viable combatant. Only once had she encountered the creature down here, little more than a passing shudder through the underbrush, and she gave it the widest berth possible.
All these and more does Moira encounter on her perimeter of the cavern. She’d briefly entertained the thought of inviting her two companions to accompany her on this scouting mission. Then Nemo opened his mouth and complained about leaves in his ass and Moira instantly knew she’d be better off on her own.
They’d only slow her down anyway.
Nemo, screaming obscenities all the way to the bottom, was the easiest to locate among Fernhollow’s wilderness. It was Odisseus, thrown down first and knocked over the head, that Moira nearly didn’t find before it was too late. Only when an nearby vinemaw took an interest in something that wasn’t her did Moira get a bead on the Ortok’s position
She’d left them both huddled around the campfire at her temporary bivouac. As far as Moira would range, she’s careful to always keep the distant glow of that fire on the edge of her awareness, lest her torch unexpectedly die and she be plunged into impenetrable blackness.
Once she’s shirked the blue devil, Moira sweeps the torch back and forth along the cavern wall. With each swing, the grasping shapes of leaves cast queer shadows on the surround. Her sword she points outward, toward the greater jungle, ready for a vinemaw’s lurking tentacle or, moons forbid, a thorncloud to come calling.
Nothing hungry and bo
tanical does comes calling, much to Moira’s relief. What does come, however, something quite unexpected, is a draft.
A breeze brushes the flames of her torch ever so slightly from Moira’s left. She almost doesn’t notice, too busy scanning the greenery for danger, when something caresses the hanging vines on the cavern’s western wall.
Moira stands there a moment, squinting at the vines as they sway almost imperceptibly back and forth in the flickering torchlight. It’s not imaginary, she decides, after a long moment. There is a gentle current of air, jangling the vines against one another and batting playfully at her torchlight.
What would otherwise be an utterly banal observation is transformed, under these dire straits, into a blessing on high, a godsend that pessimistic Moira wouldn’t possibly have prayed for.
She inches towards the swaying vines, a little unwilling to investigate and disprove this faint ray of hope. The tip of her sword parts the leafy curtain and reveals an even stronger breeze, whistling past Moira and into the main cavern.
Her suspicions confirmed, Moira flicks her wrist and the glassrock blade slices clean, spongy black vines falling to a wet heap at her feet.
Moira stands before the entrance to a small tunnel – narrow, utterly dark but with a current of fresh air wafting through – and her best chance of escape from Fernhollow.
Odisseus sits up suddenly straight. “Moons.”
“Hm?” grunts Nemo, his attention far, far away.
“Gimme a second,” the Ortok implores, shutting his eyes and attempting to summon that spectral set of the Lover’s blueprints he’d memorized. Both paws held in midair, Odisseus scans through his memory, attempting to recall or imagine a particular patch of the Briza Light Freighter’s outer hull, a landscape he knows better than the capes and coastlines of his birth.
“The crawlspace,” he mutters tentatively, testing the sound of the words together before he makes any promises.
“Whazzat?” Nemo grunts again, his speech mangled by the heel of his hand, pressed into his right cheek.
“The crawlspace,” Odisseus repeats with a fresh burst of confidence. “It’s accessible from the lower ventilation duct.”
Across the flickering fire, Nemo's expression betrays neither understanding nor interest. “Come again?” he requests, devoid of enthusiasm.
The Ortok is far too invested in his revelation to give a toss about Nemo’s lack of enthusiasm. “I may be overestimating the size of the openings,” he stipulates, more to further his own calculations than to explain anything to his saltbrother, “and we’d need to remove about half a dozen stoppage grates but–”
Here, he pauses – not for effect, but rather to run one last diagnostic on his theory – before he dares give voice to his sudden epiphany. “I think,” he announces slowly, “I know a way back onto the ship.”
“Okay.” Nemo accepts the news with surprising solemnity. He cranes his head upward, to consider Fernhollow’s distant and invisible ceiling. “The ship’s up there. We’re,” he drops his gaze back down, to consider the fire, his smoldering Gitterpeach and the sinister shrubbery that encircles them, “down here. Forever.”
He gives that final word – “forever” – ample to time to marinate in Odisseus’ mind. The longer it does, the more the Ortok’s heart sinks, falling from the euphoric heights of potential to wallow back in hopelessness. “Yeah, right,” he mutters, his words slurred together into one noncommittal sound. “I forgot.”
There’s nowhere else for Odisseus to look but back into the orange coals of the bonfire. Like shipwrecked survivors, Nemo and Odisseus squat around the fire, the dark jungle looming ominously around them.
They’d scavenged their seats – a rare stone for Nemo, a mildewed log for Odisseus – from the surrounding area, never daring to go more than an arm or tail’s length from the fire’s radius. The Skyscratch warrior provided the only viable firewood, everything else down here so sodden with moisture and mildew. Odisseus pretends the thought of burning a sentient’s corpse for kindling didn’t make him feel queasy.
Their remaining supplies consisted of what little fruit they could scavenge from the cactoid’s body, what wasn’t pulped in the precipitous fall – four whole peaches in total. One of those four Nemo halfheartedly attempts to cook at the end of a length of stick.
This is the state Moira left them, an unknown number of hours ago, when she’d stalked off into the surrounding wilderness. For all they knew, she could be hours dead, throttled or devoured or eviscerated by one of the numerous killer plants that made Fernhollow its home.
Now and again, something will move somewhere in that morbid black jungle. Odisseus will hear the rustle of leaves, the snap of fragile stems, the shuffling of enormous somethings through the undergrowth. It takes every ounce of his willpower not to imagine what mindless monstrosity is lurking beyond the fire’s meager light.
Their inevitable death so close at hand, it’s impossible for Odisseus not to fantasize about escape – from this hollow, from this planet, from this deranged way of life.
Through the wavering flames, Odisseus notices a new scowl on Nemo’s face. A spark of interest, perhaps aroused by the Ortok’s aborted attempt at conversation, appears to have awoken something, a question, in Nemo. “What were you saying before?”
Now it’s the Ortok’s turn to feign misunderstanding. “When?”
“Before. Right before they pitched you in.”
Before he answers, Odisseus takes a moment to study his saltbrother’s face, his posture, his tone of voice. He’s fully aware, Odisseus decides, what he’s asking, the nest of agwaifapedes he’s about to kick. Nemo is picking at another argument, the way one might pick at a scab.
“That you’re a selfish little pissant,” Odisseus confirms, rising to the challenge, “throwing a twenty-eight year tantrum.”
“Oh.” This statement stews in the deafening silence, broken by the crackling fire, the sizzling Gitterpeach and the odd jungle noise from somewhere far and away. “A tantrum?”
“Yeah.” The Ortok is suddenly weary, forced to explain the punchline of a joke he wasn’t that particularly proud of anyway. “All you wanna do is make people notice you. You’ve convinced yourself that if you do enough terrible things, the galaxy’s gonna hafta stop and notice you.”
“I mean,” Nemo recoils, shrugging with self-evidence, “they did, though. The galaxy noticed me.”
“Oh, they most certainly did,” Odisseus agrees readily enough. “Everyone agrees you’re very good at being terrible. Far as I can tell, though, there’s no real reason behind it.” He starts to wave his paws around, getting a little caught up in the rant, despite himself. “You make all this noise, you cause all this damage, you burn half the galaxy to the ground. Why?” Both paws slap down against his blubbery thighs. “To say you did. To see the look on people’s faces.” The Ortok stares into the fire, his point made, his hand played. “To get attention.”
To his credit, Nemo takes longer to digest this information than Odisseus assumed he would, the defensive bastard that he is. “I think that’s unfair.”
“I’m shocked and astounded.”
“Not really sure,” Nemo ventures, “where you, of all people, get off saying that.”
“You may not realize or acknowledge this,” Odisseus leans forward to inform him, “but I’m the universe’s foremost authority on you and why you do the insane things you do. I feel like, out of anyon–”
“That’s not what I mean.”
There’s a rare edge to Nemo’s voice – not the flinty note that comes into his speech when he’s threatening someone, not the half-suppressed snort when he’s mocking someone. This is something brittle, something vulnerable, that Odisseus has not heard in a long, long time.
“It kinda amazes me,” the Captain admits, “that you can’t read between the lines. That you don’t see what all this,” he gestures at the surrounding vegetation, apparently meant to represent his career of murder and mayhem, “has
actually been about.”
“And what’s that?” Odisseus begs the question, keeping his tone neutral.
Nemo allows a pregnant pause. “You have to ask?”
This perks Odisseus up, his dreams of tranquil waters and picturesque coastlines undimmed in his memory. “You’re kidding,” he blurts. “Now, you wanna talk about this?”
Nemo shrugs. “Sounds like you could use a reminder.”
“A reminder?” Odisseus discovers himself snarling through gritted teeth. “You think I don’t remember? Where we came from, what’s behind us?” He stares daggers through the licking flames at his saltbrother.
“What was taken from us,” Nemo asserts, as patronizingly as possible. “By them.”
“They didn’t take buhoxshit from you,” counters Odisseus, claws dug into his knees, his whole body and posture committed to finally, finally airing this grievance. “They didn’t burn down your village, they didn’t slaughter your family while you–”
“They did burn my village!” explodes Nemo, that fragility shattered. An anger that might quail the hearts of the civilized galaxy, the righteous rage of a homicidal Galactic Menace, sounds petty and childish in this uncaring cave, to ears well-worn to his petulant fits. “That’s exactly what they did!”
“It was my village too,” Odisseus mutters, through teeth still gritted.
“Then why the fuck,” Nemo snaps, his hair flapping from the sheer force of his frustration, “are you taking blooming exception with me? How do you sit there and grumble about engine parts and fuel intake when the people who destroyed our home are out there fine and dandy?” He stares, wild-eyed and panting from his tirade. “I’m everyday boiling with anger – still. Still.”
Unconstant Love Page 24
