by Marcus Sloss
∞∞∞
I awoke on Griffin with a massive headache. Blue lines blurred in front of me. I staggered and wobbled to a sidewall. With an effort, I got myself stabilized.
“Mack! Mack! Please respond.” Mila’s voice echoed from a hidden speaker. Ouch, my headache worsened.
“Mack you took brain damage from excessive acceleration. The shuttle pilot did not realize what you humans are incapable of. I need you to run the blue lines. You have ten minutes before your event starts. We have your other clone in transport waiting for you. Mack!”
“Here, running now… No more talk.” I managed to get a reply out.
“I jogged unable to keep my legs on a straight path, luckily the hallway kept me from wandering too far. A minute later a room I had never entered before welcomed me. There were rows upon rows of cryo chambers that resembled a sleeping pod. They were longer though for the back end of a lancer. Only one was open and stumbled my way into it. I triple confirmed my desire to relocate my mind.
The door hissed as the chamber shrank to conform to my body. I was shaking off the cobwebs when a needle jammed into my neck. My ability to control my limbs instantly vanished. Odd. I watched in fright as a tube snaked from the ceiling down my face. It wormed its way into my mouth with force. When it found my throat it shot down into my stomach. This was not fun. I wanted to protest when an intense squeezing pressure was applied to my brain that overrode all thought. I quickly blacked out.
∞∞∞
A tube shot out of my mouth and my two lovely girlfriends rushed to support me as I stumbled out of a container. That was horrid and would definitely take some getting used to. Granted, I had achieved a human dream and transferred into a newer body. If only it wasn’t so expensive.
“Hurry we must run.” Mila plied the girls off me and sprinted.
I had never seen her run before, jog sure, but the cat with her humanoid top was a bullet right now. She used her elite status to bowl people over to clear a path for me. I hounded her wake and stayed on her trail. My headache was gone and this body felt lighter and more agile. I wanted to take it to the gym and bulk it up when I remember I was about to die in it.
We raced to a section of a station for competitors. Mila handled my details and a luni scanned me to confirm my identity. The yellow color indicated I was approved and the luni rushed me to a pod on the exterior wall. The alien muttered some loosely translated words. I caught stupid, monkey, and enjoy your death. I tried to get situated when the luni slapped my hands and triggered an automation that sealed me in.
I tinkered with the inner pod display when I lurched from a drop. I immediately spun the dampeners to max and exhaled in relief. Everything was happening so rapidly. I still did not understand what occurred earlier but I knew I had to focus now. I scoured the tiny pod and found a metal rod with a sharp end. At least the asshole luni didn’t leave me weaponless.
An alert blared. Damn it I was going to land in the drink if I didn’t correct. Actually, that would work if it was near the shoreline. There seemed to be more animals in the water. As long as I stayed shallow I could adjust to the situation.
I steered the pod to crash right outside a protected lagoon. I adjust the controls for a max deceleration burn at the last fifty meters and came to a hover half a meter over the water. I grabbed my weapon and punched the eject button, but did not get out in time.
The pod ran out of accelerant and sank into the water gently. I was free though and swam toward the lagoon. I did a quick scan of my surroundings. The sinking pod had frightened off most prey. I did see a collection of lazy largemouth fish at the bottom of the rocks that formed the lagoon. Inside the protected inlet there was a swimming predator. It reminded me of a plesiosaur from ancient Earth. Four flippers allowed the beast to swim with grace and ease. It glared at me but decided I was too big to make a meal of. Thankfully this looked to be a baby or its full size was smaller than the monsters from Earth’s past. It was only two meters long and while it was not scared of me, I was not frightened by it.
I surfaced to gulp a breath of air and dove down to the depths. I decided to kill a lazy fish first if I could. I reached the where the fish meandered when the meter long fatty slowly swam away. My ability to swim on this tiny planet was faster than I anticipated. The fish rotated an eye onto me and panicked seeing how fast I closed the distance. It hesitated while it tried to figure out the best direction to retreat.
I thrust my sharp spear into its eye, the body thrashed even though the creature died. Blood spilled into the water as I retracted my weapon from its skull. My breath was reaching a critical point so I swam for a new intake of oxygen. While I may have been new to combat I was experienced in keeping aware of my surroundings. It was what made me a great ZBall player. I kept my head on a swivel.
With my lungs refilled I dove back down to find the plesio eating the dead grouper. I hustled down to the bottom letting air escape my lungs. Before the predator ever noticed me I slid the point down into the top of its skull and brained it. It refused to accept death as it thrashed. Without delay, I hastily vacated the area for fresh air.
I repeated the process and wounded another grouper. This attracted what I assumed was a mamma plesio. That evil leviathan was fast, fluid, and could swallow me in one bite. I retreated to the shallow lagoon as she ate the wounded grouper and dead fish. I saw her eye me down… daring me to return to the depths.
As I exited the water and crept up the beach I wondered if wounding was worth anything. I tried to check my points and found all connections were disabled. Back on the Griffin, I had read that, funny how when you are fighting for your life these things are forgotten.
The hot sand irritated my feet. I hated that I was naked again, but understood how outfits could give undue advantages. Probably the first, and what I hope was last time I wished I could tuck my penis in. I cautiously stepped into the light underbrush and tall leafy trees. I let my eyes adjust to the dimmer setting before proceeding deeper.
Commotion caught my attention. A battle cry rang through the air. I followed the noise that was further down the beach. I stayed slighty inside the tree line to hide my silhouette. There. Not a hundred meters away two luni were awkwardly fighting a turtle in the sand. I kept going and assessed the situation.
The turtle was moving toward the trees and based on the blood trail it had fled from the water. I did not realize teaming was allowed but these two were clearly working together. My internal mathematics crunched away. I needed to figure out if the turtle would make it to the tree line before he died or was stopped. It would be damn close.
I Inhaled, exhaled, and controlled my breathing. The key to silence was patience and caution. With that in mind, I tediously crept the rest of the way until I was lined up behind a tree the turtle should cross. I waited in ambush exposing only one eye to watch the combat.
Less than five seconds later the fish creature that was balancing awkwardly on its tail in the sand turned its back on me. My guess it was an attempting to prevent the turtle from reaching the trees. I salivated at the opportunity. I had no idea where the vital organ on the luni was so I aggressively jabbed my pike into the back of its skull.
I stabbed too hard and it erupted out the front of the luni. It died silently and crumbled to the ground. Its friend hollered for help while I struggled to remove my weapon. After what seemed like an hour I pulled the weapon out the front of its face. A shriek split the air when my ambush was discovered. The turtle pleaded for help and turned to get into the woods past the dead body and me. I let it go and faced my opponent. The luni was at a disadvantage, a literal fish out of water. I chucked my spear at him and he screamed in an awful sound. The metal cylinder embedded a dozen centimeters deep, the majority of the weapon of wobbled out of him while he rotated in pain. It had decided to retreat to the water. I grabbed the spear off the dead luni and charged.
At moments like these, realizations hit. For this luni it was – ‘we chased that stupid turtle to
o far out of the water and now I have a spear hanging from my gut’. For me it was ‘the luni was brain dead for trying to escape the situation by hobbling on its tail towards the water while giving me a free shot at its back’. It ended its life quickly and efficiently with a stab to the back of his skull.
I calmed my breathing and retrieved my weapon. I then scooped up his weapon for a total of three spears and trailed the turtle. It was breathing heavily collapsed on the ground in between the trees. I got that pleading look, similar to the one Mila gave me before I saved her. I did not hesitate. The pike went into the three skulls, and the turtle breathed its last.
It was obvious a battle occurred here, the multiple bodies, the screaming luni, and the trailing blood. Every sense I had screamed at me to retreat and I listened. I raced through the trees and the underbrush until I found the lagoon again. I washed the blood off and saw the red liquid trail out of the lagoon. The massive plesio eyed me hungrily from an ambush spot. That thing was incredibly scary and intelligent. Thank the maker it was not here when I landed.
I felt clean of the gore and headed into the wood in the opposite direction of my previous battle. I found a fruit tree that resembled a mango. When I tried to scan it nothing returned. Well, how the hell was I supposed to know what was poisonous? Then I rationalized that some scanners and data analyzers would be more powerful than others and give advantages. While I was hungry I decided not to risk it and set the fruit down.
That little action, the slight movement of bending over to deposit the ripe fruit saved my life. A snake had chosen its ambush moment and I had lucked out of being smacked by its massive fangs. It slammed its head into the tree as it missed. I was irate, my inner demon burst forth while my anger berated the snake for its attempt. I shift all three spears into a two handed grasp and plunged them into the snakes head while it tried to recover.
I then pissed on the dead creature as its body twirled in postmortem. Snakes were the worst, and I could only imagine how bad it would have felt to die by poison. This island planet was awful, and I knew it would only get worse.
“Asfa?” I spun to see a gorgeous dragon humanoid that had both hands up in a sign of no aggression. She had black scales that contoured over her curvy figure which supported ripe full breasts and mesmerizing pink eyes. I started to sway on my feet from her gaze. Realizing something was wrong I snapped my head to break the contact. I yanked my spears from the snakes head with a sucking sound.
This black beauty braced for battle and anchored her clawed feet into the ground. Wings unfurled as she charged. The advantage in close would go to her, she was a monster of legend compared to me. My only hope was utilizing the two extra spears I had.
I launched them in rapid succession and I did so as if I was playing ZBall. The first was aimed where her head was, the second I dialed into where her head would go when she dodged. The initial javelin soared by empty air while the next sunk into her forehead. She crumpled to the ground and shit herself in death. The amount of sulfur that escaped made me vomit but my stomach was empty so I wretched bile.
I collected myself and then four spears. I felt I was doing really well at this point. Three competitor kills and three creature kills. I hoped it was worth it. I studied the dead dragon lady briefly as I had to vacate the smell of her expulsion.
Deep down I had hoped going inland would be safer but I was coming around to the fact I was up a creek without a paddle. My safety was my ability to kill before being killed, or in the case of the snake. Pure luck. I decided to go to a wide expansive area on the beach.
A few glances and rough measurements and I found the approximate middle. With a light toss, I inserted three of the four pikes pointy end first into the sand. I did a full rotation and felt comfortable that unless there was an airborne predator I would be able to identify and engage my target before they got to me.
An hour passed quietly and I decided I could sit. Three hours later and I realized the sun was not moving. Probably should have studied that aspect more, might have been why that minotaur from the video slept in the cave. I shrugged it off and realized I could sleep when I was dead. I was overly exposed in a wide open area. It was only a matter of time before something stumbled upon me.
Another hour passed when a luni rose from the beach. She sneakily hurled a spear my way. It missed horribly, probably because she had to stand on that tail to leverage the throw. I saw her yell at me with her remaining spear in a challenge. My guess was she wanted me to charge her and enter the water. Fuck that. Instead, I collected the fifth projectile and added it to the others.
For the next ten minutes, she kept breaching the water and screaming at me. I knew she was stupid for doing this. The splashing and noise would attract something. I was not disappointed. A massive croc creature with twelve legs burst from behind her and bit her in half. I felt I should have earned points for that one. Without hesitation, I jumped to my feet, tucked my spears that were in the sand under my arm and bolted into the trees. No way in all the hells was I fighting an armored amphibian that big and scary. I didn’t need to keep retreating though, it scooped up the other half of the luni and left a wake as it headed for deeper waters.
I refused to drop my guard and kept scanning for new threats. Right when I could barely see the trail of the croc a mega shark erupted out of the water. The body breached and in its teeth were around the croc that was digesting the luni. When they splashed in a large eruption of water I saw a big wave become small and hit the beach. The ocean ran red with blood. I hesitantly stepped back to my isolated central location and reset my perimeter.
More time faded ever so slowly until I saw the first set of increased monster drops. Out in the oceans, all ranges of toothy savage predators were deposited. I watched to see if anything was placed on the land near me but saw no drops.
It was quiet for the next few hours. I pondered during this time on why I could relate to so many creatures thus far. Was it because all DNA shared a basic code from the creator? Were there no monsters that had tail eyes and brains in their toes? There had to be some prevalent connection that my intellect of two was missing. I grew bored until the next drops were inserted.
This second wave included far more activity. I knew this wave was the most expensive by the host as it swarmed the environment with half starved predators. If I remembered right the minotaur survived this incoming violence by hiding. Which was the opposite of my situation? I went to pee and saw my urine had gone from a bright yellow to an ugly shade of orange. I was on the fast track to dehydration sitting out in the sun like this without water.
Every instinct told me to retreat into the cool shade and hunt for something to drink but I ignored it. My defense here was solid, my time probably limited. Few things could escape the onslaught of wave two and I would rather meet my death here than by being ambushed.
Ten minutes passed when a cackling from the tree line caught my attention. I ensured my back was clear and faced the threat. One of the five spears was firmly in my grasp. The creature slowly revealed itself. Instantly I became worried, it was a mix of hyena with the body and a head of a dinosaur. The one all those movies were made about. Raptoria one through fourteen. It snarled to reveal a mouth of razor sharp teeth.
Off to the right thirty meters away a cackling erupted as three more stepped into the sand. I immediately realized I was being surrounded. Sure enough, three more poked into the open from my left. I snatched my spears and sprinted with everything I had toward the deadly waters. The rapyenas did not hesitate. They knew I could escape into the water. The sand was my saving grace as I had less of it to transition trough until the waves.
Waist deep in water I spun and kicked myself off the sands and now had to swim to stay afloat. The central rapyena was eyed by his pack mates. They looked for guidance to see if they should chase their prey into the waters. A cackle call was made and as one they splashed the shallows to try to reach me.
I pinged off the bottom of the sand and shot mysel
f into a breach. When I crested I had a top down view of the exposed heads of my opponents. My first spear sunk into the alpha in a kill shot. I went back down and leaped back out of the water. I hurled my next projectile into the face of the closest rapyena.
I was out of room to keep doing this and dove deep to swim away. Below my opponents, I saw them struggle to dive into the water to get to me. I snagged a lungful of air further away drawing them into deeper water. I saw two spin and start to struggle to swim to shore. Their focus no longer on me. I dove under their friends and jetted for the two leaving. I gutted each from below with a single mighty swipe. It was enough to spill guts that tangled their peddling paws.
There were three of my attackers left. I utilized this maneuver and gutted two more. It was awesome and gruesome. I was literally swimming in blood and guts. The last rapyena had decided to swim out to sea instead of to the beach. The moment I gutted that one and ended its life when I felt a pull of rapidly moving water below me. I kicked myself for chasing this dumb animal out into the depths.
My head swiveled and I realized that my dead foes from earlier were gone. Something had consumed them. I panicked and looked all around me. When I looked down I stared into the eyes of a very pleased, very proud momma plesio. Her patience had finally been rewarded. I refused to go quietly into death and swam with my spear extended heroically at the massive creature.
Large serrated teeth tore me in half. The last thing I saw was my lower half being swallowed as my killer turned for the rest of her meal. The mouth opened around me and… Blackness.
CHAPTER 13
The tube in my throat cleared my drifting nothingness. I choked on the intrusion until it retracted. A minor headache told me I was alive. I opened my eyes to a blur that faded. I let the past catch up to me. The pod hissed and ejected my augmented body.
