Tracked on Predator Planet (Predator Planet Series)

by Vicky L. Holt.

  “Tarry no longer,” Naraxthel said from behind. “We go to fetch the human.”

  Raxkarax stepped forward. “I stay at Moon Shield,” he said. “There are more preparations to make for the quest.”

  Naraxthel tipped his head a moment. “Very well. We will see you in some zatiks.”

  They ended with the traditional greeting, and the rest of us boarded BoKama’s ship.

  “Pattee Crow Flies gave me the coordinates of the human’s last known location,” BoKama said. “Strap yourselves in.”

  The ship lifted with a gut-churning heave and roll, and we flew.

  52

  My heart thudded. My breaths came in shallow gasps. Giant indigenous persons, alien technology, and knowing one of my fellow classmates might lie dead or dying, possibly from an EEP malfunction, had me breathing in through my nose and out through my mouth in an attempt to stop hyperventilating.

  Esra Weaver didn’t know it, but her hand clenching mine kept me grounded as my gaze darted from one alien to another.

  I also held Hivelt’s hand, but we hadn’t yet molded the comfortable clefts in one another’s palms; it was too new. I loved that he stood by my side. I loved that he was ready to run all night to reach the miner. I snuck a glance at his massive form, but he wore his helmet. I wished I could see his face again.

  As if sensing my scrutiny, he turned to see me. He cocked his head, then used his free hand to unlatch his helmet and remove it.

  “I know your fellow lives,” he said. “The Goddesses assure me.”

  “How do you know?” I asked, my brows meeting, and a tear balanced at the corner of my eye.

  He pounded his armor over his heart … in the new place. “I feel it here.” He leaned close enough I could see the swirling red in his black eyes. “And my heart is never wrong.”

  Great Spirit, I thought on a sigh. You have forgiven me.

  I couldn’t speak. I nodded and turned to look out the viewing window of BoKama’s ship. All was darkness. At least there wasn’t a glowing mushroom cloud. If the fractionated quark bomb went off … I shuddered to think.

  My gaze drifted to the massive males across from me. Naraxthel, and then, if memory served, the other two were Natheka and Raxthezana. Natheka’s wolf-like helmet was off. He held it in a casual manner and smiled at something Naraxthel said. He had a narrow face and leaner build than the others, and he struck me as a runner, though it must be genetically ingrained in each of them. Hivelt was built like a linebacker but could run cross-country like an Olympian.

  Raxthezana scowled a lot, but when he wasn’t scowling, he looked serious and bored. He put me on edge, though he had nodded a polite greeting when he’d first entered the ship.

  “Circling the region,” BoKama announced. “I am not detecting any signatures.”

  I cocked my head.

  “VELMA, scan the area with the transospheric nanosatellite array. Look for anomalies,” I said.

  “Scanning,” she said. “Unfortunately, I am only picking up anomalies.”

  “What?” I shared a concerned look with Esra, who listened in.

  “Pings are bouncing back erratically,” VELMA said. “I am discussing this phenomenon with BoKama now.”

  I peered over at BoKama, who nodded.

  Hivelt leaned near me again. “It seems we hover over the Magnetic Burst Field,” he said. “The comms will not function, nor will scans.”

  I swallowed and looked out the viewing window as if I could see it.

  “Just put us down,” Esra said. “We’ll find them.”

  I nodded. “Yes,” I said. “We’ll canvass the area.”

  “Shouldn’t there at least be smoke?” Esra asked. “Or burning debris?” She cringed after she said it.

  I did too.

  “It’s too dark to see smoke,” BoKama said. “A dense cloud cover has rolled in and sleeps at the base of the mountain.”

  “Hivelt?” I looked at him.

  He nodded. “BoKama, alight. Those who wish to join us will form a search party.” He replaced his helmet. Mishibizhiw never looked so handsome.

  Rumbling vibrated my bones, and we landed.

  Naraxthel, Esra, Natheka, Hivelt, and I all stood.

  BoKama left her chair to join us. “The Ikma Scabmal Kama stalks the Royal Fortress halls daily.” Her sweeping brows carved a line in the center of her smooth forehead. “When Naraxthel sends a sight-capture, she devours it, licking her lips and caressing the screen.”

  Naraxthel shifted from one boot to another. I glanced at Esra to see her face redden and jaw clench.

  “But that is not the most troubling issue,” BoKama said. “She begs I will sleep in her room of a night. She wakens in fits of terrors, screaming about fire and exploding planets.”

  I bit my lip and frowned.

  “She dreams of destruction,” Hivelt said, no question in his voice. “The Goddesses warn her.”

  Raxthezana scoffed from his place near the hatch.

  “Does she dream of her own destruction or the destruction of her people?” Natheka asked, eyes unfocused. He didn’t look like he expected an answer.

  “Her dreams scare her,” BoKama said. “And she grows more unhinged by the day.”

  Naraxthel studied the floor at his boots.

  “I could sever the truth,” he said, glancing at Hivelt. “Sight-capture a battle, spill blood upon my helmet, and end the transmission. Fake my death.”

  “I thought of that,” BoKama said. “But I believe she would demand a blood sacrifice,” she said. “I cannot predict her madness.”

  My gaze traveled from one person to another, but my heart ached to disembark and start searching.

  “It is troubling, indeed,” Hivelt said. “But I am more troubled we stand here when a human may be bleeding out into the ground. Pattee and I leave. We will help you when we can, but we search for Pattee’s companion now.”

  The tension inside me snapped, and I walked to the hatch.

  “Of course,” BoKama said after us. “I am sorry. Many important things demand attention at once. Take provisions, if you wish.” She indicated a panel that Hivelt then pressed.

  He pulled out several packets and stuffed them into the pack he carried.

  “I cannot return to aid you,” BoKama said. “The Ikma demands my constant presence. My lies will only hold her for so long.”

  Hivelt saluted BoKama, who bowed her head.

  I followed him down the ramp into the darkness. “Thank you, Hivelt,” I said, my voice catching.

  “You are welcome. Let us find your fellow being now.”

  Boot steps on the ramp behind us showed the rest of the party except BoKama joining us. Her ship lifted off and cloaked while we attempted to find our bearings.

  “VELMA, can you patch a map overlay into my helmet?”

  “Unable to comply,” VELMA said. “Unable to access the nanosatellite array via your helmet. Unable to access my neural network in SLO.”

  “Schist,” Esra’s voice said in my helmet. “We’re going to have to spread out.”

  “Agreed,” I said. “Hivelt and I will go west. You and Naraxthel go north. Uh, Natheka and Raxthezana can head south.”

  The east was at our backs, a ridgeback mountain range over which BoKama’s ship had flown. I had hoped BoKama’s ship would have been able to detect the crash if it had been there.

  Hivelt strode ahead. “Come, Pattee,” he said. “The Magnetic Burst Field is large. Few creatures live within its borders and there is less plant life. The six of us will be able to cover its width in a zatik.”

  “Bolt a strike with your flare when you find the wreckage,” Raxthezana said in our helmets.

  It sounded staticky.

  “The farther we are from each other, the less effective our comm devices will be,” Hivelt explained.

  “We have flares as well.” I switched to night vision. “Esra, what do you think about using the UV vision?”

  “I tried it,” her static
voice rang in my ear. “It’s patchy. This magnetic thing is messing with the technology.”

  “The night vision is fine then,” I said. “It’s low-tech, but it works.”

  “Yep,” she said.

  I knew we were going to lose radio contact soon.

  “Thanks for holding my hand back there, Esra,” I said. “It meant a lot.”

  Fuzz in my ear.

  “… in this together. Stay strong and …”

  I lost her.

  The greenish cast to the ground as well as the gravel, stumps, and bushes made for a dull walk. Nothing stood out as having been disturbed. It was a barren wasteland.

  I looked far out over the field, trying to see anything out of place, but saw nothing. Hivelt and I walked several feet apart. I scanned the ground for a gash or loose metal parts as the sick feeling in my gut fermented. I wanted to find the person alive. “Look for metal pieces,” I told Hivelt. “Anything that looks like it might have come off my pod. You know what it looks like.”

  “Ik, Pattee.” He stopped walking, so I followed suit.

  I watched his armor as the black transformed to bright green with the night vision. He stood stock still.

  “Do you see something?”

  He held his hand up to me.

  A long minute later, he turned his helmet to face me. “You brought to my memory something from the powerful mudslide that sent me over the edge of the ravine,” he said. “When I was puzzling how to reach your ship after the landshake. I saw a twisted band of metal in the flotsam of the stream’s flood.”

  I tilted my head and frowned. “I’m confused. That was days ago.”

  “Ik,” he said. “Many days ago. It must have been from another ship.”

  I bent over, my hands on my knees. I took deep breaths.

  “There’s another human on Ikthe besides the one we search for,” I said. “Maybe alive, maybe not.”

  “They are alive,” he said without hesitation.

  “How are you so sure?” I asked in disbelief.

  His broad shoulders lifted in a pronounced shrug. He tapped his armor over his heart.

  We began walking again, a slow pace to try to cover a lot of ground, but my mind raced. How many pods had landed? Had there been a malfunction? Had I engineered a design flaw? Nausea boiled in my gut. I grimaced when I tasted bile and bent over again, trying to quell the sensation, resting on my knees.

  “Pattee?”

  “I’m okay,” I said through gritted teeth. “Worried.”

  A second later, Hivelt was at my side, brushing his big hand down my back. “We will find them.”

  “I hope so.” I closed my eyes and breathed through my nose. I needed to keep it together. For Esra. For Hivelt. For the others. I took a final, deep breath and eased into a stand. “Okay. Thank you for that.”

  “Without hope, we are all dead in this place, Pattee.”

  “Duly noted,” I said, mind focused on the future.

  ***

  We walked for two hours.

  The tedium of the landscape and the absence of even an animal to fight against drilled fatigue into my head. My eyes stung. The bland, green and gray field of vision blurred in my tired gaze. There was nothing. No sign of anything. Not a ship. No debris. No footprints. And, thank the Great Spirit, no body or parts of a body.

  At the edge of the Magnetic Burst Field, our comms started to work again.

  “Anything?” I asked.

  “Not a single shaving of metal,” Esra answered. “Not a fingernail, thank God.”

  “Maybe Natheka and Raxthezana found something?” I asked.

  “No,” Raxthezana said. “We’ve scoured the land. There is no sign of a crash or a landing.”

  “We will fan out and retrace our steps,” Natheka said. “But I think the Burst Field must have altered the coordinates VELMA detected. This is not the site of the crash.”

  I clenched my fists and squeezed my eyes shut.

  “Dammit,” I whispered. “We’ve wasted so much time.”

  “Pattee.” Esra’s voice was quiet but firm in my ear. “You survived,” she said. “And so did I. This person, whoever they are, has survived too. They’re going to be okay.”

  I sucked in another breath.

  “Esra, Hivelt told me he saw metal wreckage in a flood near where I landed. It’s from another pod.”

  Silence.

  “Five stars,” Esra said.

  “What?”

  “Five stars,” she repeated. “BoKama told me she had a dream she saw five stars fall from the sky.”

  I must have been sleepwalking because Esra made no sense.

  “Have you had dreams?” she asked. “Special dreams that were unlike the usual where you’re looking for the bathroom in high school, or you can’t remember your locker combination?”

  “I never had dreams like that,” I said. “But yes. I’ve dreamed of the Goddesses of their culture.”

  “Okay. BoKama told me about her dream, and I think maybe … maybe we’re the stars that fell from the sky. The humans. So, not only are there two more…” “There are three more,” I finished.

  “Yes.”

  I bit my lip. “I don’t know.”

  “But you’ve had dreams,” she said. “They meant something to you.”

  I tried to remember any of them, but they were hazy. “I’m not saying you’re wrong.” Sweat pricked under my arms and in my palms. “I’m afraid they didn’t make it.”

  “I was afraid you weren’t going to make it either,” Esra said. “And look at you. Strong and brave. A hero. And a heart mate. Maybe these other humans are as well,” she said and paused. “Well, anyway. Let’s hope. God knows, this planet needs more of that.”

  I considered her words. “You’re right,” I said. “But I’m not giving up trying to find them.”

  “Of course not,” she said. “They’re just not here.”

  I kicked a green rock with my boot, and searing pain shot up my leg. “Gah!” I sank to my butt and cradled my boot. “What is that thing made of?”

  “What happened?” Esra asked in a panic.

  “I kicked a stupid rock, and it hurt like hell,” I said through clenched teeth.

  “Was it black?”

  “No, it’s green,” I said.

  “With the night vision?”

  “Ungh.” My lower leg throbbed.

  “This place is covered in obsidian and another black rock I can’t identify. It’s a geologist’s dream out here. What with the magnetic activity and the ancient geological formations? If I had a core barrel, I could—” she said but stopped. “Sorry, I get a little excited. Is your foot okay?”

  “It’s fine.” Something she said had flipped a switch. “What did you say again? About magnets?”

  Magnetic Burst Field. Magnets.

  “The magnetic activity?” she asked.

  “Yeah. Magnetic activity,” I said. “Hivelt, didn’t you say something about the animal migrations?” I rubbed my shin where the pain had radiated up from my foot.

  “Many of the animals travel out of season,” he said. “It is troubling.”

  “It is unprecedented,” Raxthezana said. “But let us meet back where we started. The dawn approaches. I’d rather not be here when the suns come up.”

  “Ik,” Hivelt said. He helped me up. “Let’s go.”

  As we traveled back, fanning out from our original paths, my thoughts turned over and over. Pieces of a huge puzzle were coming together in my mind. If I could steal five minutes to myself with a little bit more information in addition to the download from VELMA on my CMM, I could figure out what was going on with Hivelt’s planet.

  Our radio comms lost contact again, the landscape was as dull as ever, and there was still no sign of a crashed pod.

  In a way, it made me feel better. Or maybe it was talking to Esra. Ever since I had lost my father, I’d lost hope. Funny how a planet full of death and blood was the place I felt it again for the first time
. I found myself drifting back toward Hivelt, and when we were close enough, I held his hand. And it felt comfortable, like we’d been holding hands for fifty years.

  53

  Our group met just as the first sun crested the mountains’ jagged teeth. We were all of us exhausted.

  “Let us make a camp,” I said. “A zatik’s sleep, and then we will climb the face of Black Heart.” I gestured to the jagged mountainscape. “From here, I do not see any sign of a crash,” I said. “But it stretches far into the north.”

  Everyone nodded, and the Theraxl pulled out their sleeping pallets.

  “Why do the humans not carry pallets?” I asked Pattee as I unrolled my bed.

  “Maybe because we usually plan on finishing our tasks before nightfall,” she said with a tired smile.

  I studied her face, noting the dark shadows under her eyes. “Are you yet worried about your human fellows?”

  “I can’t believe it, but no.” She glanced over to Esra and Naraxthel, who crouched together and ate favelt-rax. “After talking to Esra, I think maybe … maybe it’s all going to work out.”

  My heart swelled. “I also feel it is going to work out,” I said. “Rest with me. When we awaken, we will determine our next course.”

  She did not argue but lay beside me where I could enfold her body with mine. As Ikthekal, we would sleep lightly, but the Magnetic Burst Field was free of predators.

  ***

  A short zatik later, we woke and assembled a small meal.

  “BoKama left us to our own devices on the western slope of Black Heart Mountain,” Raxthezana said. “After we find the other human, we shall take the Agothe-fax Tunnel to return to Moon Shield.” He eyed both Esra and Pattee with suspicion. “The humans may walk in the center.”

  I laughed.

  “Raxthezana has not witnessed my Pattee in battle,” I said. “She slew a rokhura in a single throw of her spear.” I gestured to her handmade javelin. “Pattee fights beside me.”

  Naraxthel grunted. “Esra has slain three Agothe-faxl and a rokhura. With her simple naxl.” He pulled her to his side while she shook her head with a red face. “She fights by my side as well.”