The Shattered Sky

by Paul Lucas

  I spent the next week on the raft tending to Cloud’s many cuts and gashes. Dark spirits torment him if he didn’t seem to enjoy the extra attention from me, despite the fact all the cuts made it difficult for him to move much in the first few days.

  Still, the incident drove home to all of us just how dangerous the Outlands could be. Even a seeming innocuous creature such as the small and vulnerable Wolfling female could hold the possibility of a sudden and very painful death.

  Another week on the river and we began coming across farmed land and permanent villages. These villages were composed mostly of buildings made of various combinations straw, wood, and patches of mud, and the people did not look much better. Proper hygiene seemed to be a hit or miss proposition among the cultures in the Outlands, with most of them straying as far as possible from the target.

  We made contact with several of these villages, all of whom were mistrustful at first but willing to trade information and supplies for several hours with skilled healers. We were thankful that they were of the same H’rai culture that dominated this river valley, and that they served a central city-state further down the river, where it flowed into an even larger waterway.

  Inevitably some of the villages’ elders began offering trade goods in return for our males spending a night with one of their women. The nomad H’rai, as mobile and as numerous as they were, probably had no trouble keeping their gene pools fresh. But here in these villages, where their agricultural lifestyle demanded that they stay in one area most of their lives, inbreeding became a serious concern. Exotic strangers weren’t seen just as a source of stories and trade items, but as a valuable resource for instilling new blood into the community. At many villages, this took the form of the inhabitants making individual advances toward what they saw as exotically attractive strangers. At others, however, the practice had become institutionalized to the point where the village leaders bargained away nights of sex with their fertile village females. Even some Mated couples took part, especially if having children of their own proved difficult for them.

  Cloud refused without exception, but Louis agreed more than once, especially if the village offered him a particularly attractive female or two. Amethyst seethed at this, but said nothing. She would spend hours upon end furiously cleaning and sharpening her weapons whenever Louis was off in one of the huts with a native partner.

  Amethyst and I were occasionally included in the discussions when one village big-shot or another tried to buy us away from “our” males. The first time that happened, Louis went along, trying to see how big a price he could get for us. I was worth exactly five goats, two pigs, and a bow, according to the village chieftain. Amethyst turned out be worth three pigs and a hand-axe more, because our potential buyer thought he would be able to get more work out of her.

  After we near-strangled Louis, however, he got the idea that we were not for sale, even for fun.

  During this time we also began running across local watercraft. Some were flat rafts similar to ours the native poled from village to village, trading goods. Some were honest boats, with small curved hulls and a single-masted triangular sail used to tack upstream against the current. Most ignored us, but a few pulled up along side to either trade or inspect us in the name of the H’rai nation. The latter we could usually bribe into leaving us alone with minimal trouble.

  We arrived at the main H’rai city-state itself, Amiriq. It was large with a high wooden palisade surrounding the original inner city. However, it was obvious that in some ways the city was too successful for its own good. Much of the recent construction spilled over into the cleared land surrounding the city outside of its walls. When I was in the KN, the humans had a name for such a phenomenon: urban sprawl.

  As we entered the city, the first impression I got was the overwhelming stench. Feces, puddles of urine, rotting hay, rat carcasses and more all lined the streets, making any stay there almost unbearable for Cloud and me. He and I stayed with the raft after that first foray while Louis and Amethyst sought an audience with H’rai’s rulers, a council of merchant families.

  The rulers turned out to be surprisingly ignorant of the lands outside their own territory, except to say that a clan of Otterkin lived down river beyond their established satellite villages and beyond them lay a number of hostile tribes of unknown character.

  Several days later on the river we met the Otterkin, every bit as pleasant and friendly as the H'Rai told us they'd be. Fortunately most of them could speak the H'rai dialect, so our computer translators had no trouble keeping up with them. After we made contact with them, they would hop up onto the raft by twos and threes while the rest would swim by, some of the more daring and playful youngsters getting enough speed to vault over our craft entirely. For several nights they would visit our campsite on the shore, trading fish and shell creatures for interesting stories and dirty jokes.

  Otterkin were as tall as a typical human, but far lankier with slightly shorter limbs. They all possessed an agility and flexibility that would put even the Fae to shame. Like we Myotans, they were transhumans who retained a great many human features. They had very expressive eyes, small muzzles, agile lips that always seems most natural when curved up in a mischievous smile, and rounded ears on the top of their very otter-like heads. They had human-like head hair, which most of them kept cropped short. They also possessed a layer of full-body fur, which was slightly longer and slicker than what we Myotans possessed.

  They did not believe in clothing. Spending so much time in water, who could blame them? Their very casual nudity did cause us some consternation. Surprisingly, it was not Louis and Cloud who proved to be the most flustered by so much female flesh on display. Amethyst and I practically choked on our words of greeting when the first male Otterkin climbed up onto our raft and we saw what was between his legs. We first thought he was deformed, but he turned out to be common-sized among his species.

  My husband, in a playful mood after a session of love-making, once explained to me about the relationship between penis size and infidelity in primates. The more promiscuous the species proved to be, the longer the penis would evolve. Gorillas, who had near zero promiscuity, had members barely five centimeters long despite their enormous physical size. Humans, however, the most promiscuous of all primates, had the largest penises, extending fifteen centimeters or more.

  At least that was the theory. He also said the Builders stuck with it when creating sentients that possessed primate-like sexuality. No sense messing with a proven survival mechanism if they did not have to.

  Judging from the--evidence--before us, the Otterkin were a very promiscuous species. Indeed, not one of them seemed to have a fixed female partner for even the few nights they visited us, and the males did not seem to feel the need to compete with each other, even on a friendly level, as human or Myotan males often do. I realized with a start that all their competition to pass on their genes was done on a much more intimate level. Sperm versus sperm from one sex act to the next, penis versus penis, dueling.

  I laughed out loud at the images that conjured up. Everyone on the raft, human, Myotan and Otterkin alike, gave me a very odd look. I tried so hard to stop laughing that I started to hiccup and could not stop for a half-hour.

  The Node river eventually emptied into a much larger waterway the H’rai called the Nalum River. As the H’rai warned, we began running into hostile tribes, either baseline humans or close variants, who would hurl atlatl-assisted spears at us from the shore. They did no real damage and a few well-placed and very loud bursts from Amethyst’s rifle quickly put an end to that. Still, we thought it best not to put to shore for several days until we cleared their territory, so we all slept on the raft (not a very comfortable experience) and lived off of our rations during that time.

  We met our first major obstacle several weeks of uneventful travel later, as we came across an enormous waterfall. The plunge from top to bottom was almost two hundred meters. Our raft, not to mention us, would have no hop
e of surviving such a fall.

  After some debate we decided we would have to abandon our raft and carry our equipment down to the river’s new level, where we would have to build a new craft. This decision turned out to be tougher than we thought it would be; we had all grown somewhat attached to the little vessel that had seen us through so much.

  We had to make several trips up and down the adjacent slopes to transport all our equipment and supplies. Louis would not abandon even a single box. In some ways, I could understand; who knows what we might need later in our journey? But in other ways his near-obsessive attitude about the KN equipment became very annoying. Did we really need to save every MRE wrapper and bullet casing, as he insisted? It was almost as if he was so insecure about being cut off from home that he had to hug closely to him every single scrap of it we had with us.

  It took us two days to haul all the equipment down the waterfall edge. On the second night it worked out that Cloud and Amethyst were caught by nightfall on top of the waterfall while Louis and I were at the bottom. Via radio we agreed for them not to risk descent during darkness and for them to make camp up there as best they could. For the first time since we came through the Node our little party was separated.

  While Louis and I sat around our campfire that night, he surprised me by pulling out several small animal-hide canteens he had traded the H’rai for weeks ago. They were full of fermented berry juice. He explained that both Amethyst and Cloud were too “starch-assed,” as he put it, to enjoy a good drink in our situation. He was saving it for when he could let loose a little when they weren’t around. He offered me some.

  I was exhausted, stiff from two days of hauling bulky supplies, and had started to become very bored the last several weeks of our journey, so I readily agreed. Soon we had finished one canteen and started on a second, laughing and snorting at the stupidest things.

  Then Louis surprised me again by saying he could really understand why Lerner had fallen for me. He even called me pretty, in a furry-Pocahontas kind of way. Whatever that meant.

  I knew even then it was the fermented juice in him, but it did not seem to matter. Like I said, I was bored and drunk myself. And, Spirits help me, I felt an incredible surge of loneliness. I had spent most of the last few years waking up with someone warm and loving by my side. I missed that terribly in the last few months.

  So it was my turn to surprise him by inviting him over to sit beside me. His moves were hesitant at first, but I was used to knowing what human males wanted and took the lead. Soon our clothes were in a pile as our hands frantically explored our most intimate places. Spirits, I never realized how much I missed that kind of touching.

  But after only a few minutes tears began flowing from my eyes. I could not help it. The feelings were too familiar. Louis’ awkwardness reminded me too much of my first few times with Lerner. All the grief and anguish of my husband’s passing that I thought I had begun putting behind me came crashing back out in great sobbing waves.

  To his credit, Louis backed off instantly at the sight of my convulsive tears. When I haltingly explained what was going on, he tried to put his arm around me to comfort me. I screamed at him to leave me alone.

  Spirits, I could not believe what I had been about to do! Was that how I honored Lerner’s memory, by cheating on him with his best friend?

  Louis retreated sheepishly and we both got dressed. We barely exchanged two words the rest of the night.

  The next morning I woke with needles in my skull from a bad hangover. Simply listening to birds chirp was enough to drive spikes behind my eyes. To say that Louis and I felt awkward around each other would be like saying the Tower was kind of tall. We did not even know if we should look at each other, much less what to say.

  When Cloud and Amethyst returned later that morning with the last of our supplies, they knew instantly something had happened between Louis and I. You cannot spend so much time in such a small group and not notice such things. But neither of them said a thing to us, and we did not feel like discussing it. The tension level in our group rose steadily in the days afterward. Amethyst became very cold toward me, and Cloud and Louis almost came to blows a dozen times while we worked to build another raft.

  Our situation might have completely deteriorated if something altogether unexpected had not distracted us.

  The Spider Swarm began to talk.

  Up until this point we had gotten used to treating the tarantulas like pets. They mostly foraged for themselves and did not bother us much except when they wanted to play certain games, like chase-the-string, which we often gladly obliged to relieve the overwhelming tedium that often overtook us on the journey.

  But then one night, with the new raft half-finished and us four humanoids eating and glaring wordlessly at each other around the campfire, the Swarm spoke into the heavy silence.

  “Duuummasssss,” they hissed in near-unison.

  I was so startled that I nearly dropped my tureen of soup. Louis and Amethyst swore aloud.

  After a heartbeat, the Spider Swarm repeated itself. “Dumas.” Then again, in rapid succession, as if immensely pleased with itselves: “Dumasdumasdumasdumas.”

  Louis suggested that the Swarm’s communal mind must have finally congealed enough for it to start communicating verbally again. And, not surprisingly, the first thing it spoke was its own name.

  We were all delighted to hear the new Dumas speak, even if its vocabulary were distinctly limited. We spent most of the rest of the night trying to coax the swarm to speak some more, and thanks to enticements of food and play, after a few hours it could say half a dozen more words, including our names.

  The tension level between us deflated somewhat after that, but it never quite returned to the easy-going camaraderie we had when we had first started this venture. That was unfortunate, as we could have truly used that trust in the tumultuous months to come.

  FIFTY-THREE

  After another year and a half lost in the Outlands, travelling, living amongst, and sometimes fighting many strange peoples, I had thought myself jaded against surprises. After all I had been through, what was left to truly astonish me?

  The wrecked KN helistat that met our quartet as we crested the hilltop was made all the more shocking by its familiarity. One thing we had had to come to grips with fairly quickly since coming through the Teleport Node was that we could never expect to see our respective homes again.

  It had taken us twenty months to just put four thousand kilometers behind us, mostly by water, and given all the obstacles we had encountered it was a miracle we had made even that good a time.

  Which was part of the reason that the sight of the helistat wreck was so disconcerting. Even though technically we knew we could still possibly be within range of the KN’s helistats, their current zone of exploration covered an area of something like six trillion square kilometers. Our chances of ever meeting up with potential rescue were even more remote than the prospect of walking home.

  So seeing the helistat lying prone, its composite carbon-nanotube spine broken and its gas bladders impaled in dozens of places by rocks and tree limbs, made it seem more akin to a ghost. The spirit of our past lives come back to haunt us.

  We had been hearing rumors of the wreck for months now, picked up from a few nomad bands, and had done what we could to track it down. As well as chase down rumors of the mysterious city beyond with its sky-stretching towers.

  The wreck had once been an Explorer-class helistat, like the Sword of Thorena that had first made contact with my people over six years ago. Three hundred meters from bow to stern, thirty meters wide, its flattened-teardrop shape now all but unrecognizable from the carnage. It lay crumpled on a rough slope punctuated by boulders and scraggly trees. Debris lay scattered in all directions.

  “Spirits,” Cloud swore. “What happened to it?”

  That self-same question was on all of our minds. And, almost as one, we lifted our heads toward the tall spires in the distance, almost lost in the
horizon haze. We were still roughly a hundred or so kilometers from the ruined Builder city. Even at this distance, its collection of six two-thousand meter tall Tower-like spires were easily visible across the flat expanse of the Shard.

  We came seeking an answer to the mystery at this ruined city, only to be confronted with another. I think we all knew, deep inside, that the two were connected.

  We slowly began making our way down the hill to investigate the wreck.

  * * *

  “I still do not understand,” I said, looking up at the deflated canopy overhead. We stood in the corridor just outside the wrecked vehicle’s bridge. “What could possibly shoot down a helistat?”

  Amethyst set her jaw in a grim line as she scanned the treeline from the large blast hole in the vehicle’s side, where we had entered. “A Boiler Lord crawler can do the trick,” she answered.

  "Its possible we could have ended up near their territory," Louis said. "After all, no one's ever really figured out just how far Boiler Lord lands extend. And of course it would fit our crappy luck just right, to run into those sons of a bitches."

  The Boiler Lords were one of only two civilizations the KN had encountered on the MegaShard with technology approaching its own. Technically the Lords had technology equivalent to Victorian-era Earth. While true that they never developed the internal combustion engine nor rudimentary electronics, the major technologies they did have access to--steam engines, hydraulic engineering, and clockwork mechanisms--they had developed in directions never seen on old Earth or in the Known Nations.

  The Boiler Lords were nomadic raiders and conquerors, using vast, multi-ton steam-powered land crawlers to rape, pillage and enslave any lesser peoples in their way. These crawlers, known as Boilers in their own language, were the land-going equivalent of the KN’s oceanic warships, thickly armored and bristling with artillery. Thought to be the last remnants of a sprawling civilization they themselves helped to destroy five hundred years before, the Boiler Lords loosely dominated an area over three earthspans across.