by Peter Telep
“Here!” she cries. “Here’s why I stay!”
Lying before us are dozens of moss-covered stones about the size of volleyballs. They’ve been arranged in rectangles barely visible beneath all the weeds. The stones rise in the shadow of two larger rocks serving as—
Grave markers.
My wreath translates the symbols scratched on the rocks to Mum… and… Dad.
Between the rocks stands a small British flag that’s been attached to a branch jutting from the ground. The flag’s sun-bleached, tattered, and flapping in the breeze.
I glance to Cypress, who’s already breaking down. “Doke, I come every morning to visit them. If I leave, no one will do that. No one.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Before I can respond, Cypress dropkicks me out of her mind, and my head slams against the elevator door.
I swear and moan.
She trembles hard before tucking herself deeper into the doors and ignoring me.
I wait for her breathing to grow steady. “Hey…”
“Shut up, Doke.”
“I’m sorry. I get it now.”
“You get nothing. I told your grandmother this wouldn’t work. Now it’s impossible.”
“No, it isn’t.” I shift a little closer. “I know it’s been hard, but I can promise you something—”
“No promises, Doke. They never work for anything. Mum and Dad promised they would never leave.”
“Yeah, but I’ll help you get back to them.”
“Maybe you won’t,” she says.
“Maybe I’ll die trying—because if you don’t come, you know what’s going to happen.”
“You want me to feel bad.”
“You already feel bad. I want you to feel good.”
She finally looks at me and frowns.
“Yeah,” I continue. “You’ll feel good knowing you helped us and saved a lot of people.”
“No, Doke, you don’t know what I feel.”
“I think you’re just like your Mum and Dad. They were sent here to help people.”
She smirks. “You didn’t know them.”
“I know they saved you.”
Her expression softens, if only a little.
I get closer and lower my voice. “So let me tell you about my friend Hedera. She leads all these kids… it’s sad, their wreathes are broken or messed up. But she’s always talking about being grateful. She says we’re taking our world from ashes to bloom. She gets it. She knows it’s our turn to help. That’s what I’m trying to tell you. It’s our turn.”
“Words won’t change my mind.”
“But something will.”
Her brown eye widens and goes distant. “Yes, something.”
I raise my brows. “Tell me what I have to do.”
“Tell her we’re friends.”
“Tell who?”
A grren shoves her face through the vines and roars. Her fangs come to within an inch of my nose as her eyes rotate like gem-filled stars. Now her hot breath is all over me.
I can’t help but notice the black patterns on her forehead, like licks of fire with dots forming a hexagon at the center.
I shiver and press myself against the elevator door—
As Cypress says, “Tell her, Doke.”
I’m panting as the grren’s tongue flashes, and that pointy tooth growing from the tip waves in front of my nose. “You knew she was coming! You didn’t say anything!”
Cypress snaps back, “Because you talk too much and brought her here.”
I shiver, focus on the grren, and raise my palms. “Okay, okay, please don’t bite me.” Since she’s not in her persona, I jump a foot to her right and seize one of her floppy ears before she knows what’s happening.
Whoa, she makes the connection, mainly because she’s curious. She expects us to run for our lives.
Her shoulders come together as I dive into my memories of Brave, Mama Grren, and Grandpa, showing her my first encounters with Brave. I ride his persona through the trees, and then we go into battle against the nomads.
Next I show her Grandpa and his pack and how Hedera helped us connect with him. I follow this with how we saved all those grren from the Galleons’ ship.
I’m ready to go on, but I’m already drained, and maybe it’s the mirage or something else, but my memory short-circuits, flipping though countless films and TV shows, and for some odd reason, the grren locks on to images from one of my Dad’s old favorites, The X-Files. She takes a liking to the characters of Mulder and Scully and keeps pulling me back to them, wanting to know more.
I might as well call her Scully.
Finally, I regain control of my memories and lead her to more images of Brave and Mama Grren. I emphasize that we’re friends and that we fully respect the grren. We even love them.
However, Scully still has a huge problem with how we’ve treated our grren. She focuses now on the image of me riding Grandpa, suggesting that this is degrading. I keep thinking I’m sorry, but our grren don’t see it that way. We work as a team, and we’re honored to get their help.
She’s not convinced. She shows me the image and shakes her head.
In a panic, I offer memories of everything that’s happened to me here. I show her Flora… and Earth… and the billions of people who’ll be lost to the Galleons if we don’t stop them.
But she doesn’t react. Her mind goes blank—
And suddenly, she rips away, vanishes through the vines, and is gone.
“What the hell?” I mutter.
“Rude to me. Rude to the grren,” Cypress says. “But at least she didn’t eat us.”
“Better than nothing, I guess.” I lean forward and stretch my arms. “So you’re all rested and ready to move.”
Her snort becomes a hiss. “No.”
I toss my head back on the doors, pull my knees into my chest, and close my eyes. “Oh, man, I don’t want to die.”
“I know, Doke.”
“Then we need to leave.”
“It’s okay. They’re coming.”
The clicking of teeth sounds from somewhere beyond the thicket.
Cypress nods, rises, and pushes through the vines. I slip in behind her—
And we lock gazes with a pack of five grren standing on the shoreline. Scully stands much taller than the others. She trots up and lowers her ear toward Cypress, who looks at me, amazed.
After connecting, Cypress clears her throat. “She says we can ride their backs, and they’ll take us to Grrethos. They can get us there before sundown.”
“Hell, yeah,” I say.
“But she wants something, Doke.”
“Tell her we’ve got food, whatever they need.”
“No, Doke. She wants Mum.”
“She wants Mum,” I repeat. “Wait. No! Tell her she can’t have her.”
Cypress takes a long, calming breath, and there’s a pause before Scully backs away. “She says they won’t take us unless she gets Mum.”
“Why the hell do they want her?”
Cypress bares her teeth at the question.
I swear over the mistake and say, “Look, maybe we can let her borrow Mum for a little while, just like I need to.”
Cypress shakes her head. “Once she gets Mum, she won’t give her back.”
“Because…”
“Because she’s valuable.”
“Well, tell her she can’t have Mum,” I say.
“I already did.”
“There must be something else we can give them.”
“I don’t know, Doke.”
Growling myself, I march up to Scully and touch her ear. I show her how important Mum is, that we need her to open the labs on Flora. We can’t give her up.
Scully considers that.
And while she does, I wonder if these grren would enjoy a little off world vacation on Flora.
As though humming to herself, Scully reconnects and shows me an image of Mum.
She wants the immortal. Period.
She draws back her head like I’m insane.
I curse again. Okay, okay. I show Grandpa coming up on his hind legs and mimicking a mask. Once again, I show her Brave and Mama Grren trapped in the Galleons’ ship. I point up to the sky, where the mask is still up there in orbit over Halsparr, its right cheek darkened by shadows.
Maybe this’ll make it real for them. We’re trying to help their cousins on another world.
Now she takes me into her mind, into the trees, and we climb to the highest branch and gaze across a valley where Halsparrans dressed like the assassins lie dead.
Hundreds of them, as though they were hiking somewhere and just collapsed.
She takes me in close, where she rolls over one of the bodies. He’s just a boy, pale and gaunt, consumed by disease.
Grren emerge from the trees, gather around the bodies, and begin to howl and weep.
Suddenly, the image flashes to white and then fades in on the same valley. The bodies are gone.
With another flash, we fly away and zoom in toward a primitive village constructed in the jungle. It’s a ghost town. But then grren appear from between the trees and come forward with their heads hanging.
Scully breaks the connection.
I glance to Cypress. “You’re right. They’re sad because the Halsparrans are dying.”
“Yes,” Cypress says. “And it’s getting worse. And right now the grren think Mum is special. She has magic and doesn’t need technology. She’ll find a cure that doesn’t break their laws.”
I reconnect with Scully. I show her our arrival here in Grrethos, then opening the labs with Mum’s help, and then returning here, where Cypress gives her the immortal.
I’m trying to tell her that if they help us now, we’ll come back and help them later.
I show her the sequence once, twice, a third time, and then I break the connection and beg her with my eyes.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Scully turns me down and trots away with her pack.
I stand there. Shocked.
“Stubborn grren,” Cypress says under her breath.
“Seriously?” I ask, rubbing my eyes and hunkering down to stare blankly across the water. “You know for a little while, I thought I heard her voice.”
“Sometimes they allow that.”
“Punk and Mr. Gurdy talk to you.”
“Almost like talking.”
I sigh deeply in disgust. “So now we’re screwed.”
“Yes, this totally sucks,” she adds.
I look at her. “Is that from your homework?”
She nods. “Your grandmother wanted us to be friends. At first, I thought you were stupid because of all the movies and toys.”
“Yeah, I’m a geek—which is totally cool. I’ll be turning you into one after we kick some Galleon ass. But right now, we have to talk.”
“You Terrans,” she says with a sigh. “Always talk.”
“Look, I’m serious. I won’t make it back. My body’s getting weaker. They keep giving me mirage, but it won’t last.”
“Don’t say that, Doke.”
“Look, pretty soon my body will shut down. So you’ll jump back to Flora, to the same location where you intercepted my jump. I’ll make sure they find you, and you take Mum to the labs. That’s all we need.”
“I can’t fail again,” she says.
“No, you won’t.”
She points at me. “Because now I remind myself that your family saved me.”
“We did? I mean, yeah we did.”
“Your father sent Mum and Dad. Without him doing that, I would be dead.”
“Uh, yeah, exactly, so you owe me big time. You need to go to Flora.”
She comes around me and slaps her shoulder, gesturing for me to climb on her back. “You save energy this way.”
I raise my hand. “No way. I’m not doing the Yoda thing.”
“The Yoda thing,” she repeats, thinking about it. “Oh, yes. The little green one. I like him.”
“Yeah. That’s right. Come on.” I break into a jog and take off, ducking beneath the limbs.
“Doke!”
I freeze and turn around. “You want something.”
She hikes up an eyebrow. “Wrong way.”
I roll my eyes and swear as she waves me in the opposite direction. I drop in behind her, and we’re off on foot—until we come up with a better plan.
She sprints along the riverbank, kicking up mud with her leathery boots. I can barely hold her pace.
I won’t tell Cypress about the chills rushing through me or the terrible ache in my chest. I just ball my hands into fists and keep moving.
* * *
Back at the safe house, Tommy thinks he’s worked out all the kinks with the engine. He says she’s purring like a cat.
“Don’t talk to me about cats,” I say.
He just frowns.
He’s drawn Val’s immortal back into his body and taken more Wrrambien, but we’re worried about him, along with everyone else back at the Monkshood temple.
My grandmother’s immortal has the coordinates of the labs at Larkspur and Faldareach, and I’m tempted to save time and tell everyone to jump directly there and wait for us, but we still need to contact Grace, Joshua’s caravan, and the rest of Hedera’s ivies to see if they’re okay.
I suggest to Tommy that we should jump to that shelter he found across the street from the temple, this way if the despers do control the area, we’re not jumping into a trap.
He calls me a “sharp operator” and approves the plan.
I add that if the area’s secure when we arrive, we can use the repaired engine to jump to the farthest lab in Faldareach, and then work our way back to Larkspur.
“But how’s it going otherwise?” he asks. “I mean back on Halsparr?”
I frown and close my eyes. “Not so good.”
* * *
The river narrows into a creak as we ascend a long rise, and then jog down, out of the denser jungle and into a valley of black grass rising to our waists.
As we plow into the field, a rumble, like distant thunder, has me slowing to glance over my shoulder.
And then I stop.
About a quarter mile away, out near the edge of the field, a powdery white cloud lifts a few feet above the grass.
“Cypress!”
She’s still running, glances back, and then turns around.
Her mouth falls open. She looks to her left and right, as though judging the distances to the jungle on either side of us. She waves and starts drifting toward the jagged line of trees about two hundred yards to our right.
I chance another look over my shoulder.
The cloud swells toward us, gaining speed.
Is the sun already setting? It must be since it’s getting a lot darker around us… or is that just me? I start running, but my knees give out, and I slam onto my stomach, my face slashed by the grass. The ground shakes and sends loose sand into my eyes.
It sounds like a stampede.
Damn, I hope it’s not the grren. I get onto my hands and knees, but I’m knocked back down by Cypress. “Stay low,” she orders.
She tucks in beside me, lying on her back, and then her eyelo flashes, producing a stream of hexagons that morphs translucent while forming a dome that completely covers us.
And not a second too soon.
We’re trampled by hordes of creatures about the size of pit bulls with long, ribbed tails, snouts like alligators, and bodies covered in scales shaped like more hexagons. Stripes in various colors ranging from deep blues to intense yellows fluctuate across their bodies as they gallop like horses on three pairs of muscular legs.
But their legs are not flesh and blood. They’re personas glowing with blue-green light.
In fact, these things are more like worms or snakes, but when
they want, they project legs and run. Weird.
And there must be thousands of them.
They keep coming, leaping over or thumping on hooves across our dome. They smell like spoiled milk.
Cypress has one eye closed and the fingers of both hands extended so hard that they’re turning white. She’s panting, and I’m too weak and too afraid to say anything—
But then… the rumbling vanishes.
With a deep sigh, Cypress sits up as the dome evaporates around us. She shoves her hands beneath my arms and drags me to my feet—
Just in time to watch the show.
Hundreds of grren charge from the jungle on both sides of the field. They leap into personas that mimic themselves, with a plan to cut off the creatures before they can reach the jungle about a half mile ahead.
“The hunt,” Cypress says.
“Those things are called…”
“Lunch,” she finishes, without missing a beat.
It’s hard to smile. “Okay, but the name.”
“Just rrinx. Not very smart.”
“Their legs… they use their wreaths to—”
“Watch,” she insists.
As the grren draw within fifty feet, the enormous herd of rrinx wails in fear like a million out-of-tune guitars all being strummed at the same time.
Suddenly, their legs shape shift into wings, and they leap into the air.
But they’re too slow.
The grren launch themselves into arcs much higher than any grren on Flora—
And now the hunt has taken to the skies as the rrinx flap around on their three pairs of wings and try to smack away attackers with their long, whip-like tails.
Still, many grren manage to intercept the creatures and clamp down with powerful jaws.
“Very hard for the rrinx to fly,” Cypress tells me. “Takes lots of energy.”
Which is why many of them come hurtling back toward the ground with grren or the personas of grren attached to their torsos.
The hunt reaches a horrific climax as fountains of blood erupt in all directions. The roaring and clicking and hissing are all too familiar, but the cries and shrieks of all those dying rrinx sends chills down my spine.
Cypress gestures for us to leave—
Just as shadows darken the grass ahead. We turn to find Scully and her pack standing behind, watching us.
