Alone in Paradise (The Chronicles of Anna Foster Book 2)

by Patrick Stutzman

Several seconds passed, which felt like an eternity to Anna. She had never faced down a wild animal before, let alone one that considered her its next meal. She knew it held the same desire to survive as her, and it would use every scrap of strength at its disposal to make it happen. Remnants of her fear re-emerged, reminding her of the peril she had put herself in. She wanted to run. She wanted to run and hide far away, from this place, this animal, and any others like it.

  With a slight hunch down, it charged her. Anna’s fear surged. She channeled it into her hand and fired at the approaching predator, but the shot flew past into the forest beyond. She fired again with the same result. The sound of its approach, its solid footfalls against the metal hull, filled her ears. Her fear rose, and she screamed as she shifted her hand and fired a third shot, just as the creature leaped.

  Anna raised her arms in front of her as it hit her. The force of the impact shoved Anna to the hull, pinning her underneath the animal. She slammed her forearms into the beast’s jaw and neck to keep its sharp fangs from her throat, shrieking with each blow. Several seconds passed before she realized the creature no longer moved. She stopped thrashing and looked at the body on top of her, dumbfounded. Its weight pressed against her, making breathing that much harder.

  Anna pushed against its head and one of its lower legs. With some effort, she rolled the beast off her. It tumbled for about a meter, and came to a stop on its side. Still, it did not move. She jumped to her feet, pulled the flashlight from her belt, and aimed it at the animal while keeping her sidearm trained on it. Despite her best efforts to keep her hand steady and slow her breathing, the beam of light danced over the body.

  The large canine was a hexapod, but very unlike hexapods she had seen depicted in various fictional programs. While those of fiction showed them having three legs on each side of their bodies, this one had two sets of legs at its front and rear ends. The two lower legs at each end appeared to be normal, but the third, on top of its body, extended from where shoulder blades and a tailbone usually were. The animal relaxed as the last of its life force dissipated. Its lower legs shifted to an angle pointing away from a central axis.

  Anna stepped around to stand in front of the creature and examined it. Her third shot had burned through its head just above its left eye, the light fading while she watched.

  She shoved her pistol back into her pouch. As she did, tears flowed down her cheeks, punctuating her feelings of guilt and shame. Her knees buckled, and she collapsed to kneel in front of the alien maw that now hung open. The sound of her tears patting on the hull accompanied the breeze across her ears. “I’m sorry.”

  The guilt pervading her mind peaked. She reared her head and screamed at the sky. “I’m sorry.”

  Off in the distance, scattered howls erupted from the forest in all directions. Anna sobered, becoming alert. Despite her desire to study the dead body, it would attract other predators. At the same time, its estimated weight made it difficult to carry away and avoid any unwanted attention.

  Anna toggled her wristcomp. “Kate, how close is the closest life form?”

  “The closest signal is about six hundred meters due south and moving southeast. Is everything okay up there?”

  “I’m fine. Thanks. I’ll come back inside in a minute.”

  Maneuvering next to the animal, she pushed it over the side of the ship, and winced as it hit the ground with a dull thud. She made her way to the ground, where she grabbed two of the beast’s legs and dragged it toward the woods. Several minutes later, Anna reached the tree line and stopped to catch her breath. As she did, she received a call on her wristcomp. “Anna, I am receiving multiple signals closing on our location from the east, about forty degrees above the horizon.”

  Her eyes darted skyward, but she could not locate the incoming anomalies. Thinking the eclipse played a big part in obstructing her view, she stepped back into the forest for cover. “How many signals?”

  “Thirteen.”

  Anna furrowed her brow for a second, trying to contemplate what they could possibly be. Then, it dawned on her. “The drones. Great! Send…” She paused to calculate. “…four of them to my current location.”

  “Are you certain?”

  “Yes, I have a job for them. While you’re at it, how far away is the nearest life form?”

  “The closest life form is about seven hundred meters to the southeast and moving in that direction.”

  “Okay. Thanks!”

  The drones descended from the sky a few minutes later, four breaking away to move straight to where Anna was. She rose to her feet and stood next to her kill, a huge grin on her face.

  As they landed a few meters in front of her, she called back to the ship through her wristcomp, “Kate, tell them to pick up the creature in front of me, drop it off in the river nearby, and return back to the ship.”

  “Understood, Anna.” The drones extended their grasper arms and lifted the body from the ground by four of its legs.

  “While they do that, I am coming back to work on a program that will allow me to talk to the drones directly through my wristcomp.”

  Chapter 8

  Anna stirred in her cot. Opening her eyes, she looked at the ceiling of her tiny room. She stretched under her covers, her hands bumping the walls on either side of her. After running her fingers through her hair and brushing back the stray locks clinging to her face, she pulled the covers off her naked body and opened the door, leaving her clothes behind.

  Before going to sleep several hours before, she’d decided that wearing her clothes to bed would only serve to increase the frequency of her laundry. Since she only had one set of clothing, fewer washes would help them last longer, and not wearing them while she slept would mean longer spans of time between washes. Although she hated the idea of wearing dirty clothes for an extended period of time, she really had no choice – at least until she found a way to return to civilization.

  As she stepped into the hall, she caught sight of Kate rounding the corner toward her.

  “Good morning, Anna.” Kate stopped in her tracks and looked over Anna from head to toe. “Is there a reason why you are naked?”

  Anna rubbed some of the sleep from her eyes. “I just woke up, and I’m going to take a shower. No point in putting anything on just to walk three meters.”

  Kate nodded with a look of humored disbelief and walked past her toward the bridge, while Anna finished her stroll to the head.

  After her shower, Anna returned to the curved corridor, feeling refreshed and ready for the day, though her hair was still a little damp. She stopped outside the door to the head and looked at the door across the way where Ryan’s unused clothes lay in a heap on the other side. She entertained the idea of rummaging through the articles to see if she could salvage anything to wear in addition to her scant wardrobe, but a loud rumble from her stomach broke her train of thought. With a slight shrug, she changed her plans and walked to the kitchen to make her breakfast.

  Fifteen minutes later Anna strode onto the bridge, eating turkey mixed with corn and rice off a plate and still not wearing a stitch of clothing. She looked up after stuffing a forkful of food into her mouth, and saw that it was dark outside. She swallowed her food and pointed her fork toward the window. “Still dark outside?”

  Kate, standing by the pilot’s chair, looked over her shoulder. “Still naked?”

  Anna shrugged. “You got a problem with it?”

  “I am just curious. I am not bothered by nudity. I am a computer, after all.”

  Anna ate another bite of her breakfast. “I’m glad to hear that. If something should happen to my clothing for whatever reason, I may have to walk around like this for a short time while I make replacements. “Besides, it’s not as if you couldn’t do the same thing.”

  “Actually…” Kate’s short statement prompted Anna to look up from her plate just in time to see the hologram’s image shed all of her clothing.

  Kate planted her hands on her hips and shifted her
weight onto one leg. “Is this better?”

  Anna stretched one corner of her mouth toward her ear. “Not really.”

  Kate’s clothes digitized back into place. “I can change my clothing to suit your tastes at will. I have over five hundred different outfits on file that I can choose to wear at any given time.”

  Anna’s fork hit the floor with a clang. “Five hundred? That’s quite an impressive wardrobe. Too bad I can’t borrow some of those.”

  “Perhaps you can.”

  Anna raised an eyebrow while retrieving her fork. “Come again?”

  “I have information about a device that was recently released to the general public: a belt that generates holographic clothing.”

  “Holographic…clothing?”

  “Yes. Originally marketed as a novelty item, a large number of celebrities and wealthy people began wearing them to make a statement against the continual harvesting of cotton, wool, and other plant fibers for making clothing. The movement increased in popularity, eventually lowering the price to where the middle class could afford to purchase hologarments of their own.”

  “So, do you have one of these belts here that I can look at?”

  “Inventory does not have one listed, but I do have schematics for one.”

  Anna ate another bite of food. “Why do you have that on file?”

  “I am not sure why, but I suspect that Ryan accidentally downloaded it while he was on a previous assignment.”

  “Maybe he had something else in mind.” Anna rolled her eyes as she mumbled.

  Kate leaned closer and cupped her hand to her ear. “What was that?”

  “Never mind. Let’s take a look at this schematic.”

  A split second later, the technical readout of the belt appeared in the air between the two women. Anna furrowed her brow as she read it, pointed to a few spots, and mouthed several terms as she lingered on certain areas. “This is an interesting concept. Do you know if any issues have been reported about the hologram getting around body parts?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I’m referring to the physics of beaming the light from the hologram to areas of the body that do not have line-of-sight with the projectors on the belt. I’m surprised that they would be able to get to areas like the tops of shoulders and outer sides of arms.”

  Kate looked at the floor for a second before returning her gaze to Anna. “I have no such issues listed on record. Then again, I am not connected with any customer service databases that would deal with such issues.”

  With a nod, Anna conceded the point and looked back at the schematic, finishing her breakfast while she studied it. “If I am to build something like this, I am going to need two lenses shaped for holographic projection. I count a total of five in the ship.”

  “That is right, Anna.”

  “The three that are currently in use for the control panels at the front would be too bulky for the belt. The other two are being used by you. Although the idea of not having to worry about clothing is appealing, I don’t want to lose my only friend over this. So, I’m going to rely on the clothes I have for the time being.”

  “I understand.”

  Anna pointed over her shoulder as the schematic dissipated. “I’m going to take care of these dishes, then dig through Ryan’s clothes. Wish me luck.”

  “Good luck.”

  Anna returned about twenty minutes later wearing dark gray sweat pants and a wrinkled white T-shirt cinched around her waist by her tool belt. She modeled the outfit with a flourish of her arms and a quick spin around. “It’s not the most fashionable outfit, but it covers the important parts.”

  With silence being her only response from Kate, Anna clapped her hands and swayed her arms by her sides. “Okay, so how much longer until the eclipse ends?”

  Kate glanced out the window. “About ten hours, and then we will have sun again for the next twenty-nine days.”

  Anna slumped her shoulders. “Yeah. Maybe that’s why I haven’t been sleeping very well.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Anna pointed outside with a lazy arm. “Whenever I tried to go to sleep before the eclipse, I’d go back to my bunk and lay down. But I’d have a hard time going to sleep. Perhaps my mind knows that it’s still daylight outside and is playing with my sleep schedule. But, I fell asleep a lot easier a few hours ago, and I took a nap while I was lying on top of the ship stargazing.”

  Kate nodded while Anna spoke, appearing to think over her statements. “You may be right about that. Perhaps I can find something to help you with that.”

  “That would be great. Thank you.”

  Anna stepped past Kate and sat down in the pilot’s seat. “Now, have any of the local wildlife come any closer to us over the last several hours?”

  “A couple of creatures came to the tree line ahead of us about three hours ago, but they stayed only for a few minutes before retreating back into the forest.”

  Anna watched the sensor display. “How are the drones doing?”

  “While you slept, the other four that Seventeen sent out to locate you found us and joined with the rest.”

  “So, now we have seventeen drones altogether?”

  “Yes.”

  Anna cast her eyes toward Kate. “Good. They could really help us out around here. I have some ideas on what they can do.”

  “Like what?”

  “First, the drones will need fuel to stay running. They run on hydrogen, just like the engines of this ship. I could recalibrate some of them to seek out hydrogen instead of what they have been mining. The only problem is that the tanks they have now are filled with the gas they collected about three weeks ago, and we have nowhere to store the hydrogen they would collect.”

  Anna’s thoughts drifted for a moment. “Looks like I’ll need to patch up the fuel tank. But before I can do that, I will need to find a way to get underneath it to seal it all the way. I don’t want to get trapped in there. So, I can either dig a trench underneath it, or somehow get the ship off the ground.”

  Anna disappeared in her thoughts again, leaving Kate to stand idle behind her. Hardly half a minute had passed when the hologram interrupted her thoughts. “Anna, why did you have the drones carry the creature you killed to the river?”

  “Hmm?” Kate’s question took a few seconds to sink into her consciousness. “Oh, the one that attacked me? I had to do something with it, and I didn’t want it attracting any others over here.”

  “If anything, I would think that your shooting at it would attract more attention.”

  Anna shrugged. “You’re probably right.”

  “Was it bleeding when it died?”

  “No! Of course not.”

  “Why do you think it would have attracted other predators?”

  Anna turned in her seat. “The body would surely attract other predators after it begins decomposing.”

  “True, but the body is not going to do that for a while.”

  Anna leaned back and crossed her arms. “What should I have done?”

  Kate held her hands behind her back. “You have been concerned about food and clothing lately. Have you not?”

  “Well, yeah.”

  “It would seem to me that the animal you had recently slain would help you solve those problems for the immediate future. Although I can not be sure without scanning it, I would think that the meat it would provide, along with some local vegetation, would help supplement your diet. And, the animal’s skin could be used for clothing after your current garments are no longer wearable.”

  Anna considered the suggestion. “That’s certainly a good idea about the food. I’m sure that I could forage for plants after the eclipse has passed and check the meat to see if it is edible. But, I see a couple of problems.”

  Placing her hands on her hips, Kate regarded her with a curious look. “And, what would those be?”

  Anna held a finger aloft. “One, I don’t know how to skin an animal, let alone create leather from its
carcass. And two, the river would have surely taken the body further downstream by now.”

  “I have basic leatherworking knowledge in my database, so I can help you with the skinning.”

  “You have leatherworking information? Why on earth would you have that on file?”

  “It is a survival skill. One never knows when it will be useful. As for your second point, why don’t…”

  “I could send a couple of drones out to search the river and retrieve the remains.” Anna snapped her fingers and raised her wristcomp to her face. “Drones Four and Six, fly to the point where the body was dropped earlier and search for it along the river downstream. Return it here, once it is found.”

  Anna sat back and smiled to herself, relieved that she didn’t have to hunt down the dead predator on her own. She glanced at the sensor display and watched the drones fly away.

  After a few seconds, she returned her attention to Kate. “So, what other survival skills do you have on file?”

  Kate crossed her arms “Well, I have basic knowledge in firecraft, first aid, fishing, foraging, hunting, leatherworking, navigation, ropes and knots, shelter building, swimming, tool making, and tracking.”

  “Really?” Impressed, Anna grinned.

  “Yes. The files are rarely accessed, since most humans tend to stay in or near urban environs.”

  “I’ll be honest, Kate. I don’t think I will need some of those, such as tool making. But, some of the others will come in pretty handy here, especially foraging and hunting.”

  “Let me know when you want to learn, and I will be happy to help you.”

  “Okay.” Anna stood and rubbed her hands together. “Does now work for you?”

  “I suppose. Where would you like to start?”

  “Well…” Anna held her chin and looked at the ceiling. “Since I’ll be needing it really soon, how about leatherworking?”

  A little over an hour later, Anna’s lesson was underway.

  “What? What do you mean I have to pee on it?”

  Kate looked up from where she knelt next to a holographic skin projected on the floor of the bridge. “Since you lack the modern curing chemicals that were formulated centuries ago, you will need to cure the hide the old-fashioned way by applying urine to the skin.”