by Calista Skye
The dactyl ignores me, and I take a relieved breath, very, very quietly. I can’t really move until it flies away.
But it keeps circling. It’s definitely interested in something here.
Okay. I can stay here for a few more minutes. Those thorns in my ass are getting a little too familiar, and if I didn’t know better, I’d think they were working themselves further in. It’s starting to sting something fierce.
The dactyl keeps circling, but now it’s lower, almost stroking the treetops with its huge wings.
Then it suddenly dives, and I have to hold back a squeal. But it’s not coming for me.
Something else comes crashing through the undergrowth, and the dactyl screeches once more in triumph of having scared its prey up from its hiding place.
I stay still, but all I want is to jump up from this insanely painful bed of thorns.
The dactyl’s prey is coming this way, and all I can hope is that it passes by me without seeing me or getting me involved in this.
Then I see what it is.
It’s a caveman.
He’s huge and stringy, with gigantic muscles that flex wildly as he runs hard through the vegetation. In a split second, I notice that his stripes are pitch black.
And then the dactyl comes diving again, crashing through the leafy canopy above us, oblivious to the trees, ripping the branches and leaves off them and snapping their trunks like toothpicks.
The huge gape opens, showing endless rows of razor-sharp teeth and the cold, dead eyes on either side of the head.
The caveman veers wildly from side to side, but the trees are pretty dense here and there aren’t that many places for him to run.
The dactyl is going to get him.
And I can’t take the thorns piercing my butt anymore. I sit up at the worst possible time, right in front of an attacking dactyl.
For a split second, the caveman and I lock eyes, and I notice that his have a yellow sheen to them.
And then I have no choice. The dactyl is just feet behind him, and it’s holding its talons ahead of it, ready to rip into the caveman’s shoulders.
On pure instinct, I throw the crossbow up to my shoulder, take a half second to aim and pull the tight trigger.
The weapon punches my shoulder, and I just see the bolt hitting the dactyl’s leathery belly.
Then I throw myself down again and roll into the bush once more to avoid the talons.
The caveman hits the ground right beside me, and for a moment everything is quiet. Then both the dactyl and I scream in pain.
My back and butt and calves feel like they’re burning, and I just can’t stay down. I scramble to get out of the terrible bush, feeling like I have hundreds of needle-sharp thorns stuck to my backside.
I take a moment to check on the dactyl. It’s soaring up through the treetops again, still screeching in pain and fury.
I give a good screech of pain, myself.
There’s movement from behind me, and I quickly ready another bolt in the crossbow before I spin around and point it at the caveman’s face from five yards away.
“Stay where you are,” I hiss, angry and scared and in worse pain than I’ve experienced since I came to this forsaken planet.
The caveman freezes, halfway to his feet.
Fuck. If it hadn’t been for him, I would have probably got away from that fucking dactyl.
“Don’t move,” I say again and give the caveman a glare that I hope he interprets correctly.
I look up again. The dactyl is circling up there, still screeching.
That’s going to attract more of the same kind.
The back of my body is burning so bad I want to cry. And now I’m holding this damn caveman at arrow-point.
What the hell do I do now?
3
- Brax’tan -
I can hardly believe my eyes.
That is a woman. The soft face, the round body, the sensationally voluminous hips and chest — there can be no doubt.
And what a woman she is! Her hair is the darkest black imaginable, seeming to soak up light, but still reflecting it in a bluish sheen as it cascades in strange, tight curls down the sides of her face. Her skin is darker than mine, but lighter than my black stripes.
She’s small, but still plainly an adult.
Her whole being calls to me, and there’s a hard swelling in my groin, something that’s entirely out of place for a man being hunted by an irox.
Her eyes are shining pools of darkness, but it is as if they can shoot white lightning.
She’s otherworldly and so luxuriously proportioned that she has to be an alien. Xren could never create that. Her weapon is also not something I’ve seen before. But it looks dangerous, and it made the irox give up its attack. That’s not something one commonly sees.
She’s pointing it at me, and she looks and sounds like she’s in pain. Screaming like she just did isn’t advisable in the jungle, although the screeching from the irox will scare most other beings away.
Except other irox. They will come flying here very soon, and I really don’t want to be here when that happens.
“We have to leave,” I say, slowly getting to my feet so she can see I’m not going to harm her. “Many irox will come.”
She glances up at the sky, and I think she knows I’m right. There’s a lot of pain in her eyes, but that can’t be helped right now.
The irox’s intense screeching is answered by other calls, further away. We really can’t stay here any longer. But the woman seems frozen in place.
“We must find a place to hide,” I try again, as if to a child. “They will try to kill us.”
Still she keeps that weapon trained on me, and she stares at me over it.
I clap my hand to my sword to check that it’s still there.
The woman gasps and raises her weapon another finger width at my movement, but if I don’t leave now, I’m as dead as if she shoots me with that alien arrow.
I hold my hand out. “Come with me.”
She adjusts her weapon to keep it aimed at me.
I quickly dodge around her and grab her wrist. She yelps and furiously tries to get loose, but I unceremoniously drag her with me.
“If we don’t go, we’re dead.”
Another screech tears through the air, and I start running, painfully slowly. But the woman can’t run as fast as me, so this is as good as it will get.
And, I realize as I hear the flapping of irox wings behind us, it’s not good enough.
I throw the woman over my shoulders so that I can run faster.
She screams and kicks and bangs my side with her weapon.
“You’re too slow,” I state as I start to run down the hill from Bune. “You can shoot me later.”
As I run, I wonder at my own actions. I would only do something like this for a member of my tribe, and she’s most certainly not that. But she is a woman, and the implications of that are just starting to seep through my mind.
I crash through the bushes and the grass. I’ve never been to this part of Bune before. The peak is forbidden to step on. I can only hope that there will be a place to hide somewhere here.
The woman is lying still across my shoulders now, not trying to get down. She’s keeping quiet, too. She probably realizes that we’ll be lucky to survive this. Despite it all, her scent fills my nose with its sweetness, I can feel her heat on my back, and I can hear her quick breathing. It feels like I’m carrying something of immense value, something that makes my own survival less important.
More wings are flapping above and behind us, and I veer to the right to not be predictable prey. I want treetops above us. They may not slow down a determined irox that much, but they make it harder to spot us from above.
Then I see exactly what I’d been hoping for. A large, flat rock sticking out of the rubble, with just enough room under it for someone to hide. Emphasis on one.
I scramble to a stop, the woman on my back yelps, and I throw her off and make sure s
he lands on her feet. “Crawl under there.”
She looks up at me with those huge eye. “There’s only room for one.”
I draw my sword, looking back to face the irox. “And it’s you. Go!”
They say I can be imposing when I give orders, and I put all my authority into the command. The woman jerks at the tone of my voice and immediately drops down and crawls under the rock, dislodging gravel and small stones. Soon the only part of her that can be seen is her alien weapon, and it’s still aimed at me.
I want to laugh at that, but the irox have some idea of where we are and are swooping down for a closer look, now from this side of the mountain.
I draw my sword, for a moment not sure about what to do. Things have happened so fast, my head is spinning. I can have no hope of fighting off these four irox with a blade. A lucky hit might discourage one of them, but not all four. Fighting several irox at a time is something that should be avoided at all cost—
“Get down here!”
The woman is looking out from under the rock.
“What?”
“There’s more room under here. You’ll fit!”
I drop down and look inside. Indeed, there’s more space under there than I thought.
I look behind me and up. The irox are circling close to the treetops, but they don’t have a clear location for me.
The woman gets out of the way, and I crawl in under the rock while an irox screeches in disappointment when I’m suddenly gone.
It’s a very tight fit, but I curl up as best I can and scoop some loose gravel away so I can kick my legs further in under the rock.
The woman still has her weapon pointed firmly at my nose. It’s a short arrow with a gleaming tip, clearly iron. It looks pointy.
I’ve never seen a more serious face. “You just stay still.”
She speaks like anyone from my village. I would have expected an alien woman to sound, well, alien. How alien is she, really? But her voice is bright and clear like that of a young boy, except with more depth and more maturity to it. And more melody. Even now, the sound stirs my soul. There’s such depth!
Our legs are close together, but there’s a little bit of air between us, taken up by her weapon. I can feel her rapid heartbeat in my legs, like that of a small animal. Her scent fills the small enclosure and adds to my dizziness.
The irox are screeching in unison outside, annoyed that their prey is gone. They will get bored of looking for us soon enough, and in most other places I wouldn’t worry about them. But Bune is a special place. The irox like to come here and can often be seen swarming around the mountain.
The woman is staring at me, as if worried I’ll attack her. She’s very tense.
“I am Brax’tan,” I say softly so the irox can’t hear. “From the Verensi tribe.”
She looks at me for so long that I think she’s not going to answer.
“Delyah,” she says softly. “From Earth.”
I frown. I’ve never heard of that tribe. “Ah. Are you an alien?”
She keeps staring, but she doesn’t reply.
“Are you The Woman?” I strongly doubt she is, but the question had to be asked.
“No.”
If the incessant pressure in my groin is any indication, The Woman couldn’t be much more enticing than this. It just wouldn’t be possible.
In my mind I see flashes of me ripping her alien garments off her and seeing what she looks like under them. That roundness of her hips and her chest, that smooth skin and the downright scandalous hair… she’s spectacular, a true wonder. I had no idea women would be like this.
The angry screeches from outside are growing distant, but I want to stay here until I can be sure the irox have gone.
I snake an arm underneath her weapon and knock on her strange apparel with my knuckle. It rings like iron.
“Alien clothes,” I conclude. “For protection.”
She just shifts her position and keeps her weapon aimed at me. She’s difficult to engage in conversation.
Well, we’ll still be here for a while. I take the water pouch out of my sack and drain half of it. I’ve walked far this morning. I offer it to Delyah, but she doesn’t even move when I hold it out to her.
I don’t blame her for her silence. She can’t know who I am. And if she did know, she might have shot that short arrow into my heart the moment she saw me. She’s being very prudent, staying in control of the situation. Despite her roundness, I’m probably three times her weight. Or more. Holy Ancestors, to reach out and cup those hips…
“How long do you intend to keep me here?”
She can’t get out from under this rock before I move.
I look out again. There’s no sign of the irox. “A little while yet. They can be sneaky and pretend to leave, while still keeping close.”
“Where do you come from?”
“The Verensi tribe,” I repeat.
“Why are you here?”
“Bune sent out mysterious lights last night. I wanted to investigate. Why are you here, alien woman?”
Nothing.
Again I can’t blame her. She’s being prudent for a woman in her situation. And I do have some idea about who she is and where she comes from. There have been rumors among the tribes that there’s a new tribe living a day’s march from Bune. A tribe with women. Some tribes have been talking about going on expeditions to check, and to forcibly bring any women to their villages if it proved to be true. I usually don’t pay attention to rumor, but I had my own reasons for being interested in that one.
And here she is. A woman. A legendary being. With skin in the same warm tone as the copper mirror in the shaman’s cave. It’s as if she’s had a Stripening of her own, except the stripes cover her whole body. I itch to reach out and touch her face.
So I do.
She gasps and her weapon shudders when I let my fingers touch her hair, feeling the alien smoothness and the elasticity of her curls. The heat from her skin is like fire on my fingertips. It’s so smooth and fine that it reminds me of the babies when taken out of the Lifegivers. No, those aren’t stripes that grew too wide. That’s her skin. All over.
Even under her garment, perhaps. My crotch twitches at the thought.
I withdraw my hand, knowing that my intrusion was probably not welcome.
“We don’t have women here,” I say as an explanation.
“I know,” she replies.
And then we lie in silence, just waiting for the irox to give up their hunt for good. I’m fully aware that this might be my only experience being this close to a woman, so I try to enjoy it fully. Her attention is focused on me, tense and ready, while I let my gaze casually wander all over her.
4
- Delyah -
He looks me up and down, and it’s an invasive look. And still it feels good. There’s only admiration in it. It’s been a long time since I’ve been appreciated as a woman.
Back on Earth, this would make me feel extremely self-conscious. But this man has never seen a woman before. There’s no judgement in his eyes, just wonder and appreciation and an innocent curiosity.
Well, maybe not all that innocent. His gaze does tend to rest at my hips and chest.
His fresh, alien scent fills the little cave we’re in, and I see now that his eyes are in fact golden and that his stripes are completely black. I’d like to touch them, and I would be entitled to. After all, he had no trouble reaching out to touch me. I let him do it, because the only alternative would be to shoot him, and that seemed a little excessive.
He’s wearing a kilt-like thing that reaches to his knees, and that’s it. His upper body is scarred and so muscular he could work as an anatomical poster in a doctor’s office. A thin sword is hanging from his belt. The kilt is pretty loose, but I can’t ignore the bulge at the front of it, and my eyes dart down there and up again without me meaning to do it.
His face has those alien features that all the cavemen have, and to my Earthling eyes the proportions a
ren’t exactly handsome. But he’s striking as fuck, and not just because of the fangs. His unruly hair is a natural mix of gold and coal. He has pretty thick stubble on his chin, and I wonder if he’s been away from his tribe for days or weeks.
I’m still pointing the crossbow at his face, but I don’t have my finger on the trigger. He seems like a pretty decent guy by the standards of this planet. If he hadn’t dragged me with him, I might have been taken by those dactyls.
No, scratch ‘might’. I definitely would have been taken. I was dancing around and screaming in pain, out in the open. My back is still hurting, but it’s starting to feel numb. Those thorns weren’t just sharp. They had some kind of venom in them, and most of them are still stuck to me.
Fuck. What do I do? I can’t trust this guy. He’s a complete stranger, and not all the cavemen on this planet are as good as the ones the other girls have met. I have to stay in control.
He totally ignores the crossbow aimed at his face, and I can’t help admiring that. He’s either brave or stupid.
Brax’tan. That name has to be rooted in brak, the caveman name for one of the creepiest monsters here on Xren. Tan can mean many things, but is usually associated with action of some sort. ‘Killer of braks’, perhaps?
“Are you an outcast?” Oh fuck. I gasp when I hear myself ask that question. Sometimes my mouth will say things without checking with my common sense first. It’s like I don’t have that filter that normal people have, where they don’t immediately say everything they’re thinking.
Being cast out from their tribe is the ultimate disgrace to the cavemen, and this could easily be taken as an insult.
But he doesn’t even raise an eyebrow. “No. I think the irox have gone.”
