Into the Forest Shadows

by J. A. Marlow

  She took an even stronger hold of him, pointing up at the trees when he stopped to scowl at her. "Don't scowl at me. Do you know you almost got hit? Being close to you isn't enough anymore!"

  Ayden looked up. He gulped when he saw so many limbs just above them. "Now we know why there is no operator around here. The trees would have killed them."

  "We hold hands the rest of the way. Just to be safe," Kate insisted.

  "But someone must be controlling the robot. It isn't capable of independent programming," Ayden continued.

  Ayden accepted her hand, but he kept up his fast pace through the forest. Which made keeping up more interesting, as the forest paths weren't made for two people walking side by side.

  The diffused light of the forest was a welcome relief from the bright sun of the clearing, even with the trees tense all around them, ready to attack Ayden if the opportunity presented itself.

  Considering what happened in the clearing, Kate was surprised they didn't do it anyway, despite her red cape.

  Pain intermingled with the anger. It grew as they walked, to the point that her body hurt in sympathy. The trees stopped moving, the limbs hung wearily. A stillness pervaded the trees, and yet the pain grew.

  A wide and gnarled tree with a glass window in the middle of a knot marked the edge of the Gatherer camp.

  "What is it about this forest and having tree houses? I mean, they are cute, but it's a little too much like living underground," Kate said.

  "With the fogs and other problems, they are the safest places to live. Besides, why not live in a living tree? On most other worlds you live in dead trees," Ayden said.

  "I hadn't thought of it that way."

  Ayden walked up to the window and inspected the inside. He circled the trunk, dragging Kate along behind him. Small scrub grew up close to the trunk, making it more difficult for them to find their way around.

  The front door stood wide open. Ayden let go of her hand and stepped inside first. Kate looked around. Still no movements in the trees, and no animals at all. None of it felt right. She hurried after Ayden.

  Directly inside sat a table and chairs, with the chairs knocked over and dirt covering the top of the table. The kitchen showed the same level of dirt and disarray.

  Kate wandered over to a broken window. A window that looked like it had been broken from the inside to judge by the fallen glass.

  Ayden came back from the back of the house. "This doesn't make sense. I can tell the bedrooms have been used recently, but look at the rest of the house. It's a disaster!"

  "And needs repair," Kate said gesturing towards the window.

  "A tree house is a place of safety from the dangers of the forest. Why would anyone be this careless? And where is everyone?" Ayden shook his head in confusion. He grabbed her arm, "We'll check the other houses. Someone must be about."

  The other houses didn't shed more light on the situation. The bedrooms showed use, specifically the beds, but the rest of the rooms were a filthy disaster.

  And the longer they went without seeing anyone the more uncomfortable Kate felt. The feeling something had happened continued to build. She jumped at every noise and shadow.

  Where were the birds and insects? Where were the bunts? They'd loved getting into Grandma's house. She missed their twitchy little noses.

  Kate's eyes narrowed. In fact, BunBun had taken residence at the bottom of Ayden's coat despite being very active before arriving in the clearing.

  "Find the robot?" She suggested after the fourth empty tree house.

  Ayden set his jaw and nodded. They worked their way deeper into the camp. Equipment sat on the ground as if dropped. A small hovering scooter lay against a tree, a scattering of leaves on the top of it indicating it hadn't moved in some time.

  A thud echoed through the trees, followed by the loud noise of breaking wood. Ayden tugged at her hand, breaking into a run.

  In the middle of a small clearing they found one of the large tree refineries. A tree slowly fed into the open maw at one end. The other end was covered with canisters to capture the refined byproducts.

  In front of the refinery stood a tall brown-haired man with wide shoulders with his back to them. Ayden let go of her hand and rushed up to him. "Hey! What are you doing? That tree is taboo!"

  Kate followed and then stopped. A chill went through her. She recognized the tree getting fed into the refinery. One of the taboo trees.

  Why didn't the trees in the camp react? Why did they broadcast so much pain?

  The man didn't turn around even when Ayden grabbed him and shook him. Ayden looked up in his face, and immediately let him go and stepped back. Kate reached out and pulled him back from the disturbing expression.

  No, that wasn't right. The lack of expression.

  A woman stepped around the processor carrying a canister over her shoulder. The blank look on her face, completely devoid of any emotion or animation had Kate rubbing her arms.

  Silence reigned over the camp. Even the people weren't talking to each other.

  Ayden made to go around the processor. She ran forward and grabbed him. She pulled him back despite him fighting her. She didn't say anything. Somehow she was loathe to break the oppressive silence of the camp. The only thing she wanted to do was get away from this place.

  Then she saw the tree. To the side of the processor. She pointed it out to him.

  Ayden looked over and swallowed deeply, stepping backwards along with her, no longer resisting her pulls.

  White and gray tendrils curled up through the bark. The limbs drooped, the leaves almost gone from the tree canopy. The tree looked like it was well on the way to dying. The more she looked around, the more signs she found similar to the tree that had saved them from the prescription bottle contents.

  The pain around her took on a whole new meaning.

  "We need to contact the city and get out of here," Kate said in as soft of a whisper as she could manage.

  Ayden nodded, searching the area. Kate looked around, as well. Where would their communication device be? She hoped it wasn't in as bad repair as the houses.

  Ayden turned and dragged Kate behind him. He rounded the refinery, working his way through a field of canisters towards another tree house.

  A deep thrumming emerged from Ayden's coat. The forest around her started whispering on their own, but Kate couldn't figure out what it might be saying. But, she could feel the hatred amidst the painful haze. Emotions not aimed at them, but towards someone else. Someone near.

  Ayden froze, causing Kate to bump into him. From around the tree house stepped a small creature. It was far shorter than her, with a plump middle, moving cautiously on two stumpy feet. It reached down once in a while with one hand to help its progress, moving in a three legged walk. Gray-green skin covered with patches of rough hair covered the parts of the body not covered in a suit of connected pieces of matte-black armor.

  Three small eyes looked up from a wide forehead, blinking two of them.

  The hatred in the air around her focused on the small creature.

  Kate blinked. This small creature was what the trees had been trying to warn her about?

  In a high reedy voice it said, "Good. More workers to toil in this filthy forest."

  Blank-faced Gatherers surrounded them. Did the blank expressions mean slow thinking, as well? If they made a run for it, would the Gatherers react or be able to keep up?

  Then she spotted a shape slinking behind the creature. A razor wolf, his eyes narrowed in the daylight. The wolves didn't look any better in full day. The light only emphasized the claws and razor points down the back.

  It stepped closer, sniffing the air. Kate took a step backwards, right into the wide chest of a Gatherer. "They have the taint of a Watcher on them."

  The creature shook its shoulders, standing up straighter. All three eyes blinked rapidly as if trying to bring them into focus, "Both of them?"

  "Don't accuse us of killing the Watcher." Kate glared at the
wolf, using anger to keep the fear away. "Your kind murdered him, not us."

  The razor wolf chuckled, coming to stop in one of the darker shadows along a tree. "Did I say you killed him? If you have the smell upon you, it means you came from somewhere near the invasive human home."

  Rage surged through her. They had to be talking about Grandma, and she was not invasive. The trees themselves trusted her.

  Ayden pulled at Kate's sleeve, shaking his head. Kate fell silent, watching the two. Shadows moved and darted around them, but not taking shape. More Shadow Creatures, she was sure of it.

  "If they were near the human home they might be of use to our leaders, if only for a meal," the wolf said.

  "I want workers. We need more product," the little creature insisted.

  The wolf snapped its jaws at the three-eyed creature, making it jump. "You do not command us, Newcomer!"

  "No. They stay here. They will be put to the spores," the creature insisted, a hand going to a pouch on its uniform.

  Kate watched them bicker back and forth. The memories from Grandma finally clicked and she blurted out towards the little creature, "You're a Newcomer!"

  "My kind are more ancient than your kind!" The creature bristled. He opened a pouch on his belt. "They know of our arrival. We shall soon know how."

  Fear, anger and the impression of danger flooded out from the trees, overwhelming Kate. The pouch. Danger lurked in that pouch.

  A low creak went through the trees. The Newcomer paused while pulling a packet out of the pouch. The razor wolf jumped to its feet, looking up with long ears swiveling around.

  The pain and moans of the trees filled the camp as the limbs lowered. The razor wolf easily jumped out of the way of the slow moving limbs, but the Newcomer didn't. The Newcomer screamed as a limb caught him in the middle and knocked him away.

  "The cape!" The razor wolf shouted. "They are protected."

  "Get them out!" The Newcomer squealed. "To my Captain! Into the cargo pod!"

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Kate pivoted, pushing through the Gatherers. If they could get into the regular forest they might have a chance.

  But the Gatherers were much faster than their blank expressions indicated. She found her arms caught and held tight, her feet kicked out from under her.

  The trees continued their attacks, but as fast as the branches knocked the Gatherers away others replaced them. The attacks didn't slow them from dragging Kate and Ayden away from the center of the camp.

  She caught a glimpse of several small dark pods near a large shuttle that looked like it was made of the same black armor of the Newcomer's uniform. She struggled even more, yelling out at the trees to help.

  A door on the side of one of the pods opened. Metal cylinders knocked the breath out of her when she was thrown inside. Ayden tumbled over her legs. The door slid shut behind them.

  Kate scrambled to the door, trying to find a way to open it. She heard a limb strike the top of the pod, the echo hurting her ears.

  The pod shifted, throwing her backwards. Ayden grabbed her before she hit a wall.

  "Careful," he said in her ear with a strong arm wrapped around her middle.

  An arm she very much liked.

  She felt Bunbun at the side of his shirt. "I hope I didn't squish Bunbun."

  "He's fine."

  She pushed herself back to the small window in the door. The pod rose up through the canopy while the trees took swipes at it.

  Ayden grabbed at a strap holding the canisters tightly to the wall as the pod was buffeted by the attacks. "I lost my axe and backpack. See a control pad anywhere?"

  She shook her head. "Not a thing."

  He started searching the walls. Kate searched around the door again, still not finding anything. Not even a small control pad or a computer cabinet.

  The peaks of the mountain brought her attention back to the window. "We're heading out of the human zone. I needed to go there, but not like this."

  Ayden rushed to the window. "This isn't good. No one goes off the peninsula."

  "I'm guessing the Newcomers have." Kate leaned against the door, her head against the window, watching the deep passes and hidden valleys pass by. "The Ancients are going to be livid."

  "If anything will get them to show their faces, this should." Ayden frowned, "I guess we try to make a run for it when we land and hope we can find our way back. But I don't know this area, or some of the trees I'm seeing."

  Kate slipped out her phone. She shook her head at the readings. "Nothing. And I thought we'd made it when we found the camp."

  The peaks flew by, the land gradually leveling out. The nose of the pod dipped down, sending the canisters clanking against each other. They moved through cloud wisps, revealing the dense green of a new forest.

  Trees that might help them.

  Kate chewed on her lower lip. "We need to go the other way."

  "What?"

  She pointed at the sharp hills and slopes they could see out the small window. "Those aren't right. That's not where we need to go, even though I can tell we're closer. So, it must be the other direction."

  "And I didn't think you could get any more strange," Ayden said with a shake of his head.

  Kate shrugged and smiled, "I've been called worse. Going to argue with me?"

  Ayden leaned against the wall, letting his head rest against the edge of the window. "No. For some reason... just no."

  She didn't like the doubt in his voice.

  Out of the sea of green a clearing appeared. In the middle of it sat a large oval object half buried in the ground. The matte-black pieces of curved hull told her the ship belonged to the Newcomers. At the very top near a rounded protrusion a small part of the ship lay exposed, small spots moving around it.

  Regularly-spaced small buildings surrounded the ship on all sides. Ayden was right. Houses like that didn't fit on this world. They didn't feel right. They sat on top of the ground apart from the landscape instead of a part of it.

  "Not a Gatherer Camp," Ayden commented. "I don't like this. No one should be out here."

  "No trees to help," Kate added as the pod settled down in the middle of the clearing. The trees might be too far to help, but their long shadows overlaid the entire camp.

  Two large Gatherers appeared on the other side of the door, their blank stares echoing those of the camp they'd just left.

  "Get ready," Ayden whispered. "I'll tackle one of them, you run for it."

  She shook her head. "We need to both run for it. I can't survive out there by myself, and you know it."

  A glimmer of Ayden's cocky grin reappeared. "Good point."

  From behind the two Gatherers a door to one of the wood buildings opened. A Newcomer with a familiar uniform stepped out. At his shoulders glittered draped golden cords. He stopped in the sunlight, adjusting a prim black hat with a narrow brim and gold ornamentation along the edges. He stepped to the side of the door, looking back inside the building.

  Then emerged the one person she so desperately wanted to see.

  Grandma.

  And all the run left her. No way was Kate going to leave Grandma.

  Ayden grabbed her arm and whispered, "She's alive."

  The door of the pod moved outwards, letting in the smell of dust and dirt. The Gatherers stood on each side of the opening, their eyes hardly blinking.

  Grandma beckoned to her, moving forward slowly as if in pain. A breeze rustled through the fringes of her dirty apron. "Come out, dear. The pod needs to be unloaded."

  Kate cast a nervous eye at the Gatherers and the fancily dressed Newcomer. With a hand on the edge of the door frame she pulled herself out of the small pod.

  "What is happening?" Kate demanded as she straightened up.

  Out of the corner of her eye she guessed the distance to the nearest trees. Much too far for her liking. Yet, she could feel them. A haze of discomfort and pain lingered in the air, blowing along with the breeze. It was too far to see the coloring of the
bark and trunks, but she guessed they would show gray and white marks.

  "I'm sorry I had to leave so quickly. I was called out to help," Grandma said. Kate noticed her droopy eyes and pale skin. "This is Captain Straos, of the Myropties. It seems there has been a misunderstanding."

  "A misunderstanding?" Kate repeated. She rubbed the back of her neck, the building whispers from the trees going straight through her head. How could they affect her so badly with the trees so far away? "Oh, about what? The Gatherers? Your kidnapping?"

  Captain Straos stood up straight, motioning the two Gatherers forward. He spoke in a child-like voice, "We came at the suggestion of the ones you refer to as the Ancients. It seems we both have a similar problem to deal with, although my people's is of high priority."

  "Even the Gatherers are catching it now," Grandma said sadly.

  "What?" Kate moved away from the Gatherers to stay out of arms-reach.

  "My research, dear, with the sick trees. I solved the riddle." She nodded to Captain Straos. "It is an illness among their people as well as our Gatherers. It's spreading. Were you successful in saving my research?"

  Kate kept her face as steady as she could, facing them fully while her mind raced to make sense of the conversation. Of all the things to ask, Grandma was asking about her research? Not about the Watcher? Not about how Kate came to be here?

  Grandma faltered, leaning back against the building. "Oh dear. The sun. Much too hot."

  "Your Grandmother asked you a question, child," Captain Straos said sharply. "Answer your elder as honor demands."

  Kate glared at him, warring between anger at his tone and laughter because he sounded like a petulant child. "Which project are you talking about?"

  "Immune systems! Age length and strength." He waved at her grandma, "She is growing ill."

  "She may not have it. I did hide it," Grandma said. She retreated to the shadows of the building, fanning her face with a hand, "Too hot today."