Primal Dawn

by Ryan Kirk

  It was the first time Kindra felt real fear while in Fleet. Their messages would only travel at light speed, which meant they were on their own. Kindra wondered if they had bitten off more than they could chew.

  Despite the loss of the probe, their team went about their work with practiced efficiency. They had explored dozens of new worlds, and despite the promise of this one, in every other way it was just another planet. Kenan would be the first one to place his foot on the world, as he always was. Kindra understood the protocol, but it didn’t stop her from feeling a pang of jealousy every time she watched Kenan make first contact with a new world. She should have felt gratitude. Kenan went first because in many ways, Fleet considered him to be the most expendable. But just once, Kindra wanted to be first onto a new land.

  The loss of the probe slowed them down. Derreck didn’t want to let anybody out onto the surface until he was certain it was safe. They delayed a day, waiting for anything to happen, but nothing did. The forest was alive, but nothing came to bother them or the Vigilance. Every hour that passed was excruciating. Kindra wanted to send Kenan out to get samples, and she finally got Derreck to agree there didn’t seem to be any danger.

  Kindra helped Kenan into his exosuit, even though there wasn’t much to do. Kenan could get into and out of his exosuit on his own, they were designed that way. But regs were regs, and Kindra had to check to ensure the suit was sealed properly. Even Kenan wasn’t enough of an idiot to screw it up, though.

  Their scans said the atmosphere was safe to breathe, but they wouldn’t take any chances. All it would take was one curious microbe and they could all be in jeopardy.

  Kenan gave Kindra one final, obnoxious smile, and put on the helmet to his exosuit. The visor dimmed as Kenan pulled up the displays feeding him whatever information he thought was important.

  Kindra stepped away and Kenan powered up the rest of the suit, taking his first steps towards the airlock. As she watched him move, she couldn’t help but be impressed. The exosuits were a new invention from Fleet headquarters. Humans had been armoring themselves for as long as historical records went back, but they had never created anything like this. The neural interface technology had only recently been developed.

  The suits were heavy, ranging from fifty to well over a hundred kilos. Kenan’s was on the heavy side, suitable for combat operations. But when you slipped into the suit, you didn’t feel different at all. The key was a combination of two technologies. The first was the helmet. Sensors running from the base of the neck and all around the skull were able to read the electrical impulses in your mind. Once the suit was sufficiently calibrated, you could, at least in theory, do anything just by thinking about it. Everything from movement to environmental reports to combat was a simple thought away. In practice, the technology was still new, and many pilots struggled with neural control of the suits. But, it still helped the second technology.

  Inside the suit was a system of responsive sensors. They amplified your natural motions by detecting them and feeding them to the suit. If you wanted to raise your arm, you simply began the motion. The suit would notice the change in body position and duplicate the motion. It was the primary driver for most pilots.

  Kindra had logged over a hundred hours in the suits, and she was still amazed by their abilities. They amplified your strength and senses, and a skillful pilot could pick a flower or lift a girder with equal ease. Unlike Kenan, she didn’t have her own dedicated suit. She and the other four shared the other suit, a basic multipurpose model, just over half the weight and size of Kenan’s. It was still an impressive piece of technology, but it didn’t match the capabilities of Kenan’s suit.

  Kenan stepped into the airlock and waited for the decontamination process to cycle. They were concerned not just about bringing microbes onto the ship, but also about delivering their microbes to the planet’s surface. No system was perfect, but they did the best they could, and Kenan would be decontaminated both going and returning.

  After she was certain Kenan was set and she had gone through the last parts of her checklist, Kindra returned to her station to get back to work. She had been upset to be pulled away from all the information coming across her screens. Even without the probe she was collecting a lifetime’s worth of information.

  Kindra pulled up three monitors when she got back to Biology. Two of them were dedicated to the information coming in from the ship’s sensors, but the third was the feed from Kenan’s suit. As much as she didn’t care about Kenan, he was the first to step onto the planet, and he would collect a few samples for her. It was worth giving him at least a bit of attention.

  Kindra went about her work, only half paying attention to Kenan’s screen. The first part of the expedition was just getting Kenan away from the ship to prevent contamination of samples. When he started gathering her samples he would let her know. Until then she could focus on other data.

  A flash in the monitor caught her eye. She looked up and saw a blip fading on Kenan’s motion detector. Kindra shot to attention. She pulled up a wrap-around view so she could see even more than he could. She tapped into the audio between the dropship and Kenan. There was silence, so she clicked in. “Kenan, did you see the motion sensors?”

  “Yeah, but it was a faint reading. Could have been anything.”

  Something twisted in Kindra’s gut. After the probe, who knew what was out there? “Keep your eyes open. Everything coming across my screens indicates this planet is almost certain to support lifeforms we aren’t familiar with. Who knows how they’ll show up on motion sensors?”

  She heard Kenan curse. “I suppose you’re right. Oh well, at least it makes collecting samples more exciting.”

  Kindra kept her eyes glued to the screens, but nothing came up, and she wondered if she was worried about a danger that didn’t exist. Despite the loss of the probe, they hadn’t discovered any signs of intelligent life. They had to remain rational. She tuned in to Kenan’s audio feed to hear what he was hearing. Mostly it was silence, the silence of a planet undeveloped by human hands. Kindra drank it in. Every once in a while a breeze would come through and rustle the leaves of nearby trees. Kindra reveled in the sound, something she hadn’t heard in months.

  Another blip came across the sensors, and this time there was no doubt. Something else was out there with Kenan. Kindra was just about notify Derreck, but there was no need. His voice was already on the comms. “You’ve got company out there, Kenan. I’m aborting the mission. Come back in.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The motion was behind Kenan, still faint. Kindra isolated the information from Kenan’s suit and ran a basic analysis. The sensors were indicating a large object, so the faint readings meant it was moving slowly. It could only be intelligent life. A primal part of Kindra’s mind went off, and she grew certain Kenan was being hunted. He was already on his way back in, and his exosuit was one of the most advanced around, so he shouldn’t be in any danger, but she could still help him.

  Kindra grabbed the video from Kenan’s rear-mounted cameras. He couldn’t use them while walking because of the disorientation, but she could. She started the computer on pattern recognition while she kept her eyes peeled on the screen. There didn’t seem to be anything there. She blinked and switched the feed to infrared. There was a lot of heat, but in the distance, she could see something move, so carefully it didn’t even trip Kenan’s motion sensor. Kindra commandeered some of Kenan’s sensors and focused on what was behind him.

  She caught the movement again and pulled up the recordings. Her mind rebelled against what she was seeing. As a scientist, she was well aware of her own cognitive biases, but she couldn’t help herself. Whatever was out there was bipedal. The odds of it were beyond astronomical.

  “Derreck, check this out.”

  “That looks like a human.”

  Kindra sighed in relief. “I thought I might be going crazy for a moment.”

  There was a moment of silence as Derreck considered the new in
formation. Kindra had no answers for him. But he decided quickly.

  “Kenan, you’ve got at least one bipedal creature thirty meters behind you. We’ll watch your six for you, just get back to the ship, double-time.”

  Kenan didn’t acknowledge, but his speed picked up. Worried, Kindra pulled up Kenan’s vitals. His breath was steady, but his pulse was high, and his adrenaline was through the roof. It was far outside of non-combat parameters. She opened a private channel to Derreck.

  “Derreck, his vitals are through the roof.”

  Derreck’s answer was cryptic. “Memories. He’ll be fine. We just need to get him back here.”

  Kindra watched the monitors, her worry mounting. She felt helpless, but she knew she was doing all she could.

  Without warning, there was a large blip on the motion sensor. Kindra was still listening, and she didn’t hear anything, but there were multiple creatures out there, and this one was less than ten meters behind Kenan. Time seemed to slow down and everything happened at once.

  Kenan wasn’t watching his six, but the motion was enough to draw all his attention. Like the well-trained combat veteran he was, he turned around and snapped his arm up and towards the target behind him.

  Derreck saw it too and shouted through the comms. “Kenan, hold your fire!”

  On the minimized monitor that showed Kenan’s front view, Kindra saw the targeting reticule move away from the creature that had triggered the motion sensor. Kindra couldn’t believe what she was looking at. It couldn’t be, but she was looking at a human, clad in nothing but a loincloth and armed with a bow and arrow.

  The creature, the human, drew his bow in one smooth motion and launched an arrow straight at Derreck. Kindra flinched involuntarily, but the arrow bounced harmlessly off Kenan’s armor. His exosuit could take most high-velocity projectiles without a problem. The arrow was less than a joke.

  For a moment, it seemed like everything would still be fine. But then the woods around Kenan came alive. At least a half-dozen creatures emerged from behind trees, and Kindra lost her power of speech. How had they avoided detection? Two spears arced towards Kenan, and Kindra could see more were soon coming.

  In theory, Kenan wasn’t in any danger, but Derreck’s voice over the channel was worried, more than Kindra thought he should be. “Shit. Kenan, retreat, now!”

  But Derreck was still keyed into the private channel with Kindra, and it took him a few seconds to realize his mistake.

  Kenan reacted. She heard the whine of the rifle attached to his arm, and the tree next to the first creature exploded. None of the other creatures even hesitated. Every one turned and sprinted away from Kenan. He aimed near one of them and pulled the trigger again, cutting down another two trees with a sustained burst.

  Kindra couldn’t believe what was happening in front of her eyes. How had this happened?

  Derreck’s voice penetrated through the fog of her mind.

  “Kenan! GODDAMNIT, CEASE FIRE!”

  Kindra had never heard Derreck shout before, and it startled her back into action. It also caused Kenan to stop firing. She heard him mutter under his breath. “Only warning shots, sir.”

  He sounded like a child angry he had been scolded for doing something he had thought was okay.

  Derreck’s voice was lower, but his tone left no room for argument.

  “Get back to the ship, immediately.”

  Kenan knew better than to say anything.

  “Yes, sir.”

  Kindra released the breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding. Had they just opened fire on the first aliens humans had ever encountered?

  The next day Tev and a group of his fellow hunters joined the messenger on the journey back to his home. Ever since Tev had heard the story, his mind had been racing with new thoughts. He thought about the odd star he had seen after the hunt. He tried to imagine what it would be like to see a ball of fire fly across the sky, and he wondered for the thousandth time if the two were somehow connected.

  Tev shared his thoughts with Neera, but the best she could do was shrug. She did not dismiss his ideas, but there was also no evidence for them. Unlike him, Neera was comfortable with not knowing. She allowed herself to be uncertain until she learned the truth. It was a skill that Tev sometimes envied.

  Fortunately, the journey itself distracted him. They were entering land he had never traveled before. Although he had roamed far and wide in his hunts, there were places the clan didn't go, and this far to the north had always been one of those places.

  When he was younger, he had asked the elders why travel to the north was forbidden, and they had given him a variety of answers. Some spoke about the inappropriateness of trespassing on the lands of another clan, others said it was a different type of land with dangers they didn’t understand. Although the reasons differed, the rule always remained the same. There was a firm boundary to the north no one crossed. When they finally crossed the river that marked the northern boundary of his clan lands, Tev wondered what he would discover in this land, at once so new and so similar.

  As they hiked, the land around them changed. The terrain they covered was still forested, but the trees thinned out as the land became steeper. Their progress slowed as they continued through unfamiliar territory.

  As the two days passed, a friendly competition developed between the messenger and the hunters of Tev’s clan. Tev prided himself on being the best hunter he knew, and it was soon obvious the messenger felt strongly about his own skills. The messenger shot a bow better than any Tev had ever seen, but Tev’s familiarity with spear and blade couldn’t be matched. Likewise, in the trees Tev had no equal. He could scamper from branch to branch and climb with the same ease as walking across flat ground. But as they left the dense forest and entered more mountainous terrain, the messenger was now the one at home, climbing from jagged stone to jagged stone as though he were walking up a set of steps.

  As intense as the competition was, it remained friendly. Tev showed the messenger a stronger tree climbing technique, and in return Tev learned how to make more effective use of his legs while climbing rock walls. Together, their skills increased in tandem.

  The final leg of the journey was a harrowing hike up the sides of cliffs. The path was narrow, barely wide enough for one person to walk straight ahead, and at its narrowest, even that was untrue. At times Tev had to flatten himself against the rock wall and shuffle sideways until the path widened once again. There were times Tev doubted the messenger was actually leading them towards his home. Perhaps it was all an elaborate trap. There seemed to be no way a clan could make their home in such an inhospitable place.

  But then they were there, among a series of caves that sheltered and protected the clan. A quick glance told Tev this was one of the safest locations a clan could make their home, and awe quickly replaced his doubt.

  When they arrived, they found Xan and his hunting party recently returned. A small crowd had gathered around them, and Tev’s group didn’t receive much of a welcome. Tev and his fellow hunters joined the small crowd and listened as Xan spoke.

  Tev’s first impression of Xan filled him with respect. Xan was a tall man, lean and muscular. Scars were visible all across his body, and Tev noticed that a few of them were fresh. At the center of the circle, he stood up straight and spoke clearly, and Tev found it easy to listen to him.

  The story he told was difficult to believe. Part of it was obvious. Xan spoke about how he and his fellow hunters had tracked the falling ball of fire. The beginning of the hunt was an important part of a hunt story, and Xan told it well, but Tev was far more interested in what happened after. His mind had been consumed by possibilities since he had left his home. He wanted answers.

  As Xan continued, his story became more and more unusual. Xan spoke about hearing sounds he had never heard before, sounds he lacked the language to describe. He tried mimicking them, but to no avail. Then he told them all of a creature, a creature who seemed impossible.

&nbs
p; “Like us, it seems to move on two legs. It has two arms and a place where the head is. But that is where it ends. It does not have skin like you or I have. It has skin made of some sort of rock, but rock made of bright colors. We struck it with arrows and with spears, but it did not bleed, and our weapons bounced off.”

  Tev kept his expression neutral, but he was having a hard time believing Xan’s story. There were animals that had hides that were difficult to pierce, but everything living could be cut. Tev only knew Xan by reputation, and although he didn’t seem like a hunter who would lie, he had to be mistaken.

  “I do not know what power this creature has, but when it raised its arm, it made a shrill shriek, and a tree next to our hunter shattered as though it had been felled with one axe swing. We realized then that this was a hunt we were not prepared for. We returned to wait for our brothers and sisters, so we may once again pursue this most fearsome foe.”

  Tev ignored Xan’s dramatics. While traditional, it was something Tev had little patience for. The legendary hunter’s story had been full of exaggeration, but far too short on the details that Tev would have liked. But Xan was mobbed by the crowd, and Tev would have no chance of speaking to him for a while. He noticed, with a pang of jealousy, that Neera was among those who pressed to be closer to Xan.

  What did strike Tev as interesting was the basic description Xan had given. He had said the creature looked much as they did, and Shet’s words about people from the sky echoed in Tev’s mind. Perhaps there was another connection here he didn’t yet realize. He wandered the caves as his mind wandered over the possibilities.

  After Xan’s story was complete, the clan seemed to remember their manners. They had been obsessed with their greatest hunter’s story, but they didn’t forget their hospitality.

  Tev and his fellow hunters were welcomed warmly by the clan. They received places to sleep and introduced themselves to hunters from other clans as well. Tev was surprised by how many clans had heeded the call. It was unlike so many to come to the aid of another.