She moved back toward the front of the craft. Ron and Ajaya were finishing up the cleaning and Alan was lying there with his eyes closed. She felt foolish. Ron gestured for her to join him as he took a seat on the gangway, arms and legs sprawling out. “If you’re feeling bad about what happened, don’t,” he said.
She eased down next to him, trying not to bounce as she settled onto the deck. “Why? Is that something pilots do after a rough landing?”
He glanced her way, eyebrows raised, a hint of a smile twitching on his lips. “No. Not really.”
“We’re alive,” she said and held out her hands in a helpless shrug. “At least we’re alive.”
“Word,” Ron said. “You did the best you could under terrible conditions. None of us could have done any better. Just keep that detail in mind. Don’t be too hard on yourself.”
“I’ll try.” They were in a bad way now. Without engines they couldn’t move the shuttle to their destination or back to the Speroancora. They’d have to cross to the nearest settlement on foot and ask for help. It wasn’t an ideal first-contact scenario. And she couldn’t forget what she knew of Atielle—that the nepatrox that had plagued them aboard ship dominated this world, allowing the sectilians to carve out a survival existence in small colonies. Traveling out in the open overland, not knowing the terrain, would be very dangerous.
She looked out at the landscape. It was a new world, never before seen by human eyes. She was ready to see something beautiful, astonishing—she was ready to be rewarded for the harrowing ordeal behind them and the one that was likely to come.
She saw…stagnant muck, choked with straggly water plants. She smelled decay and foul odors tinged with sulfur and metal. The acrid tang of bile still lingered on the back of her tongue. She wanted some water but was afraid to put anything in her stomach just yet.
It was hot—at least ninety-five degrees Fahrenheit and very humid—the air felt thick and heavy, which seemed odd juxtaposed against the light gravity. The sky was dark and overcast. The rain they’d just been outrunning was on its way. Below her right knee, she heard a deep, sucking burble and a muffled splash as the marsh belched up some kind of gas.
A deep sigh filled her lungs with that funk, and she let it out with a trace of a bewildered laugh. She leaned against the side of the hatch and chuckled. She tried to contain herself. She pressed her lips together in a line but the mirth exploded from her suddenly. She laughed so hard she started to feel weak. Tears traced down her cheeks. She doubled over and just let it out. It didn’t make sense, but it didn’t have to. It was a release.
Behind her, Ajaya hovered over Alan, taking his blood pressure, ignoring her laughter.
Alan grumbled, “What’s so funny?”
Jane pulled the sleeves of her suit over her hands and wiped her face. “We’re alive.”
Alan grunted.
Ron patted her arm like he wasn’t sure what else to do. “What’s next, QD?”
8
Bergen frowned and watched Ajaya tidying up inside the shuttle. She was taking her time and being methodical about it and he knew why. It was more than just keeping things orderly. It kept her mind off of Ron and Jane traipsing through the swamp by themselves, where they would face God only knew what—not to mention the mind-numbing boredom he and Ajaya were about to endure until the two returned, hopefully with help and at least one of the engines for him to repair. That was assuming that the airbags that protected the engines after release had inflated properly, that their location beacons were functional, that they’d be repairable, and that he’d be in any kind of condition to execute those repairs.
As it was, the cybernetic limb was releasing a freaking lot of happy juice into his leg while it regrew and repaired the connections between its components and the synapses and sinews of what was left of his leg. Some of that joy juice was getting into his bloodstream. He was feeling a bit weird. He didn’t like it. Slowly turning into Darth Vader was not all it was cracked up to be.
“How long do you think we’ll last before we go fucking nuts?” he asked Ajaya, and threw his arm over his face to block out most of the pale light streaming in through the windscreen and side windows. He wasn’t tired, but he was thinking about sleeping anyway. The drugs would make it easy. It would pass the time.
Ajaya sidled up to him. “We,” she announced, “are not going to go ‘fucking nuts.’ We are going to stay busy.”
“Speak for yourself, sister,” he grumbled. “I didn’t bring my needlepoint. In case you forgot, you yourself ordered me to stay flat on my back until my leg is healed.”
“You’re very funny,” she quipped, but there wasn’t any humor in her statement. “There’s plenty we can do to keep our minds occupied at the very least. Why are you so morose?”
“Really? You’re really asking me that?” He peeked out at her from under his arm.
“I am,” she said archly and leaned against the back of the bucket seat next to his.
He didn’t reply.
“You know,” she said, “you should have more faith.”
He snorted.
She looked very prim. “Six of us left Earth. We went farther than any human had ever gone before. We explored a vessel from another part of the galaxy, and despite the hostile environment, all six of us survived.”
“Oh, am I getting a lecture now?” he asked.
“Indeed you are,” she replied.
He huffed. “Great.”
She went on, “Jane was chosen to lead us across the galaxy and though it was difficult for her, she was able to make that journey happen seemingly through sheer force of will. Then she piloted a shuttle through reentry onto an alien world under brutal conditions—something she had no experience doing—and yet everyone on board survived again.” Ajaya paused. “Alan, Jane is resourceful, capable, and extremely intelligent. I have every faith that she’ll be back in no time with a solution to this problem.”
“Are you done?”
“Yes, I believe I am,” she said pertly then busied herself with something.
Ajaya’s words rang in his ears. They were all true. But he couldn’t voice his actual thoughts and fears: that eventually Jane’s luck would run out and they’d either die with her or be stranded and at the mercy of either the Sectilius or the Squid. He didn’t know which would be worse. He was glad his arm still partially covered his face so Ajaya couldn’t see the emotions warring for control of it.
“I’m going to take a nap,” he said, his voice thick and pinched.
Ajaya squeezed his shoulder and returned to work. “Okay,” she said softly. “And when you wake up, you will connect with Ei’Brai and begin to study everything you need to know about the engines to be able to repair them.”
He’d already studied those engines extensively, but it was a good idea. He was bound to learn all kinds of things. And if he connected with the Squid, he’d be connected to Jane too. He’d know in real time how things were going with her. Except he wasn’t sure if he wanted that. What if something happened to her while he was forced to sit and watch, powerless to help? Again? The whole thing was fucking nuts.
He felt like Rapunzel, stuck up in her tower waiting for her stupid macho knight to ride up on his stupid horse and rescue her. Her and her ridiculous long-ass hair. Fucking Rapunzel. She’d probably had a bum leg too. That chick needed to get a buzz cut, grow a pair, and start taking care of business.
“Did you hear me, Alan?”
Alan shut his eyes and ground his arm over them to blot out more light. “Oh, I will, will I?” he challenged, just because.
“Yes. Jane left me in charge.”
He sighed.
9
“Do you think they’ll send anyone to investigate the crash site? If anyone was awake when we landed, they would have seen a bright orange streak in the sky, right?” Jane asked Ron and passed him the pouch of water they’d been sharing.
Ron squinted at the horizon between the two low mountain peaks ahead of the
m before squirting a swallow into his open mouth. “Sure hope so.” He scratched his head. “Of course, they might have just thought it was space junk burning up in the atmosphere. They probably get a lot of that.”
“True.” Her boot stuck momentarily, held down by suction. She jerked it loose and bounded forward with a splash, nearly toppling face first into the muck before she caught her balance. She was still adjusting to moving in the lower gravity.
Her boots were laced tightly to her ankles and legs, but seconds into their trek, her socks had been soaked, and her toes felt wrinkly. Silty sludge had seeped in through the tops of the boots and lacings. Her toes squelched with every step. She was hot and sweaty already.
There were wide swathes of dense, tall grasses, very green, throughout the marsh. They seemed almost like archipelagos in a shallow sea. But trying to walk over or through them was more difficult than sticking to the watery areas, dotted with scummy-looking algae and leafy plants resting on the surface.
Despite the fact that they could cover more ground with each step due to the lower gravity, fatigue was building up. There was nowhere to rest out here. They had to make it to higher ground before they could stop. The sun was hidden behind the clouds and it had been raining lightly for a while, but it was still uncomfortably hot. “Any idea how much farther to the settlement?”
He glanced at a sectilian instrument in his hand. “In sectilian or human measurement?”
“Human,” she replied.
He looked like he was converting in his head. “Just over four hours at this rate.” He stopped suddenly and pointed. “Hey, I think I just saw a fish!”
Jane looked where he was pointing but saw nothing. “Could something actually live in this environment?”
“Stranger things have happened,” he said and resumed his springy forward motion.
She silently agreed.
For the millionth time she wondered why no one had answered their hails. Could an entire civilization collapse in such a short time? Someone had survived the genocide, but would it be primitives that greeted them? Could all remnants of their advanced civilization have been lost in the last seventy years? And what would she do if that was what she found?
Ei’Brai was with her, but quiet. He didn’t have any answers. I continue to hail, he said, in hopes that they do monitor intermittently.
“Mud skippers,” Ron said.
Jane peered at him quizzically.
“Mud skippers could live in this kind of environment, I think. They’re some kind of fish-reptile-like animal. I think they have both crude lungs and gills.”
“Ah,” Jane said.
She’d seen a few different kinds of insects. There were midges that hovered just above the watery mud. She’d also seen a bright-blue insect that resembled a hybrid between a praying mantis and a dragonfly skimming the surface of the marsh and clinging to reedy plant stalks. These blue bugs looked curious as they watched her and Ron trudge by.
Jane had also seen some furry animals flying overhead that made bleating sounds, possibly something similar to bats or maybe flying squirrels. She didn’t think they had feathers, but it was hard to tell for sure.
Evolution had taken similar but clearly different paths here. It was a very strange sensation to see species that could have evolved on Earth, but hadn’t. The evolutionary tree on this planet terminated in different branches.
“I wonder if they ever had anything like dinosaurs here,” Jane mused aloud.
Ron didn’t answer because at that moment the sky opened up and dumped on them. The rain was cold and quickly chilled the air. They had on protective gear—clothing that repelled water which included a hood. But unless she kept her head bowed, water ran down the sides of her face in rivulets. She could feel it drip from the loose tendrils of her hair down onto her collarbone, running under her shirt—and sometimes it just pelted them sideways. So, while the clothing itself stayed dry and relatively warm, there was cold water constantly chilling her skin, though her feet were still immersed in warm, muddy water.
Her hands and the tip of her nose quickly grew cold. She wished she’d eaten something before the deluge began. She was expending a lot of energy, slogging through the muck, and hadn’t ingested any food in some time. She could use some calories to warm up.
Ron suddenly stumbled and sidestepped into her. She reached out to grab him as an animal thrashed and splashed in the water underfoot. She caught a glimpse of something large and silvery with a purple sheen as its long body broke the surface for a second and then trailed away, water rippling just underneath. Ron looked at her for a moment. “Well, that answers that,” he said and shook his head and then trudged on. Jane was more tentative with each step after that, and kept her eyes on the water looking for evidence of other creatures that might be…hungrier.
Finally, the sludgy water turned to mud, and the mud progressively grew more solid until it gave way to wet, rocky soil. They started to feel the ache in their calves to indicate they were climbing a gentle incline.
They ate some food squares as they walked. The rain hadn’t let up. They crossed many rivulets running past them downhill, and there was evidence of erosion all along the hillside. There were also many gaping holes that seemed to go deep underground. She assumed they were animal burrows. Visibility was poor and that was troubling. Jane hadn’t forgotten about the nepatrox.
Ron held a device that contained all the information they needed about the terrain and the route to the nearest settlement. It also had a heat-detection scanner, but that was only useful if an object was considerably warmer than its surroundings, so insects and other cold-blooded animals were virtually invisible unless very close and very large.
They’d seen many small animals on the device since the rain started—animals they couldn’t see with their eyes. They seemed to be good at hiding, which made sense because large packs of the voracious nepatrox were always a threat. Jane assumed they were just under the surface in the tunnels they kept seeing. So far, there’d been nothing big enough to be worrisome.
They’d seen no evidence of accommodations for people of any kind. But it was unusual for atellans to live outside of a dense grouping of residences, most of which were large multifamily dwellings or at the very least connected to other homes. So unless they found some kind of cave, they were in for a long trek in the open. There were very few trees. Those that were present were fairly small and grew in contorted shapes with sparse branches. There was no shelter to be found beneath one.
As they hiked along the low slope between two foothills, Jane kept scanning for some kind of shelter where they might try to dry out and eat something more substantial, but she hadn’t yet seen anything that would work.
Ron stopped walking and grew very still, staring at the scanner. Jane was a few paces behind him. She didn’t speak aloud, but connected to him through Ei’Brai.
What Jane saw in Ron’s mind made her carefully slip her hands into one of the many pockets on her clothing and pull out a palm blaster. It was a sectilian weapon. Not gun shaped in the slightest, it was a convex disk with loops around one side for slipping over fingers and a small digital sight that she placed between her index and middle finger. She threaded it carefully over one hand and gripped it in her palm. One full rotation of its dial with a fingertip of the opposite hand would energize it, and squeezing it at two specific pressure points with her fingers would trigger a concussive blast. Ron already had one in each palm.
Jane eased her second one out and primed them both. There were similar weapons built into sectilian battle armor. She had used them before on the Speroancora. They were a devastating weapon when used against anything that was low density—like organic matter—but did very little to anything dense and solid—like the walls and hull of a ship, which made them the preferred type of weapon aboard starships. She remembered how the concussive force had penetrated the cracks in the nepatrox’s shells and made them explode into goo and shell fragments.
Ron
held out the scanner so she could see that around the two fuchsia dots that represented the two of them, there were green dots of various sizes encroaching from every direction. Some were very small, some of them were similar in size to Jane and Ron, and some were slightly bigger. Jane glanced up at Ron and sent him a thought. “Do you think those green dots are atellans?”
He replied, mind to mind, relayed instantaneously through Ei’Brai. “Sentients are supposed to show up as pink. But it might not be accurate, since it’s only referencing heat.”
Jane nodded. “Let’s keep walking as if we don’t know they’re there. They could be simply observing. If they get too close, then we go back-to-back in a defensive formation. Be certain they’re hostile before firing. Does that sound reasonable?”
“Affirmative.” He slowed his gait and they walked on, side by side.
They hadn’t gone far when they heard a shrieking cry, only slightly muffled by the steadily pouring rain. The cry echoed over the rocky terrain, and soon it seemed to be coming from every direction at once and growing louder.
Jane shuddered. She knew that cry. She’d heard it aboard the Speroancora just before the nepatrox attacked. The scanner showed the green dots closing in on the pink ones. Though they couldn’t see them yet, there was little doubt now as to the identity of these creatures.
Jane looked wildly in every direction for a place to shelter and hide. All she saw was a twisted tree, growing at a crooked angle from the slope at least thirty feet away. Ron looked at her, looked at the tree, and mentally agreed it was their best option at the moment. It was the only available way of putting some distance between them and the predators, of getting any kind of tactical vantage point.
Confluence 2: Remanence Page 6
