Event Horizon Threshold

by Kaitlyn O’Connor

  He flicked a glance at Aurek, but he turned with her readily enough and walked her to an area that offered some privacy. She shrugged and focused on business when he turned his back since it could be hours before they stopped again.

  “I wanted to talk to you,” she said as soon as she’d adjusted her clothing.

  He frowned. “You are tired?”

  “Uh … oh … not that. Have you noticed Marvin? I mean, he just doesn’t look well, if you know what I mean?”

  He stared at her blankly. “Subject Marvin is on medication for his heart.”

  Subject Marvin? What an odd way to refer to him! “Oh. You think he’s ok, then?” she asked, disconcerted.

  He seemed to mull over that. “I will observe him and then, mayhap, if it seems warranted, examine him when we make camp.”

  Relief flickered through Roslyn and she smiled at Tor. “Thank you! I’ll feel better if you have a look at him.”

  They ran into Aurek, almost literally, when they headed back. Aurek caught her arm when she would have brushed past him and she gaped at him in outrage. “What? I wasn’t alone!” Shrugging his hand off, she stalked back to the group.

  Gretchen sent her a smug look, but she resolutely ignored it.

  God only knew what they’d do if she lost her mind and tried to beat the snot out of the bitch!

  It took an hour to walk the ‘mad’ off, but she’d taken care of her most pressing needs and felt more capable of handling the hike.

  She was going to be in great shape, she thought, when they were done.

  And would probably lose weight, too!

  “I wonder what was in the other food containers?” she wondered aloud, thinking she was getting less interested in meal time every time she opened an MRE and found stew.

  “Probably stew,” Paul said and then snorted at his humor.

  “Don’t!” Gretchen said warningly. “I might puke.”

  “At least it’s good,” Marvin put in.

  “Was. I thought so at first, anyway,” Gretchen retorted.

  It made Roslyn feel better that Marvin at least seemed to be in good spirits. He paused to take samples here and there and she followed suit, offering what she found. Some he took, others he declined, telling her he’d already gotten a sample of it.

  The ‘garden’ gave way to untamed forest as they descended the hill they’d camped on the previous night and they could no long see a sign of the city they hoped they were approaching, but the soldiers sent up their drone again and Roslyn took comfort in it, certain they were checking to keep everyone on track.

  She really, really hated getting into the same tent with Gretchen, but she wasn’t about to hang around outside either. Instead, as soon as she’d finished her evening meal, she climbed into the tent and settled in her sleeping bag with her back to Gretchen’s sleeping bag.

  She was so exhausted she didn’t even hear her come in.

  She couldn’t say she was exactly bright eyed and bushy tailed when she got up the following morning, but then again, that wasn’t typical for her under the best of circumstances. She always felt sluggish when she first woke up.

  She needed a shot of caffeine!

  Alas, there was none.

  One of the most important substances known to man, or woman, and they didn’t have it!

  They had stew, though, by god!

  The inevitable stew with water woke her right up, energized her …. Not!

  She was at least more awake and rested enough that it didn’t take long to get her heart pumping to produce the energy she’d lacked waking up.

  The scenery was different.

  Within a few hours of their trek, the forest gave way to a rocky sort of landscape with scraggly brush and malnourished trees. Roslyn collected a few samples but Marvin seemed … actually a little out of it, not especially interested.

  After waiting fruitlessly for a chance to get Tor alone, she finally just gathered her strength to her weak spine and moved up the column until she was beside him. “Did you check Marvin last night?” she asked in a voice only slightly louder than a whisper.

  “Yes.”

  She waited, but he didn’t elaborate. “I just imagined he was sick?” she prompted, torn between relief that that seemed to be the case and irritation that he hadn’t volunteered anything.

  “No.”

  My god! It was like pulling teeth. “Well?”

  Before he could respond, if indeed he’d intended to, she was wrenched aside and Aurek planted his fist in Tor’s face hard enough to lay him flat.

  Roslyn was too shocked even to react.

  The sudden, seemingly unprovoked, violence threw her into a state of suspended animation. Even her brain shut down.

  She looked down at Tor and back at Aurek and then down at Tor again as he struggled to his feet and Aurek marched her to the front of the line, dragging her by one arm as if she was a child that had misbehaved.

  The bizarre feeling that she’d hallucinated the entire incident, swept over her.

  She glanced at Aurek a couple of times, but she couldn’t see anything about his profile that said ‘angry’.

  There was that little twitch in his jaw that looked kind of like grinding his teeth, but she’d never seen him do that before and wasn’t certain it was what she thought it was.

  For that matter, she couldn’t think of any reason he might be angry, let alone furious enough to deck Tor.

  Maybe she’d missed something the night before when she’d gone to sleep so early?

  She glanced back at Tor and stumbled, bumping into Aurek.

  The look he gave her was indecipherable.

  It made the hair on the back of her neck stand on end, though.

  She really, really wanted to drop back to the end of the line again, but she was uneasy about trying it at the moment.

  Deciding she’d take up the rear when they stopped for lunch, she just focused on keeping up.

  Aurek decided to walk her to her potty break.

  She thought to her god that she wasn’t going to be able to let go with him standing over her, even with his back to her.

  Thankfully, he had a lot more patience that she did. He didn’t prod her to get done and she finally managed to unclench long enough, she thought, to empty her bladder.

  He decided to talk. “I have offended you in some way?”

  Roslyn snapped a stunned look toward him. Thankfully, he hadn’t turned around. “Uh … no,” she responded before it occurred to her that she’d been mightily offended when she’d realized he wasn’t interested her—at least not the way she was interested in him.

  But that was hardly his fault.

  She wasn’t mad. She just wanted to distance herself from her embarrassment.

  She was sorry he’d taken it that way.

  “Why did you go to Tor, then?” he asked just about the time she managed to coax her bladder into letting go. “I am alpha leader.”

  Thankfully, she couldn’t retract permission once given. She decided to talk fast to try to drown out the tinkling noise she couldn’t stop. “Yes, I know. Uh … you aren’t a medic, though.”

  He glanced back at her at that.

  “Don’t look!”

  “You need a medic?”

  “I don’t. I was worried about Marvin.”

  He took the rear with her.

  She gazed longingly at Dylan, who’d taken point, and Tor, who was probably glad he was behind Dylan now instead of Aurek.

  Aurek, she decided, was actually kind of scary when he wasn’t in a good mood.

  He must be terrifying on the battlefield.

  He looked like the thunder god at the moment and there was only a slight frown on his face, that, really, she thought she might be able to put down to the glare.

  Except when he did glance at her it was that same enigmatic look that made her uneasy directly after he’d punched Tor in the face, jacked his jaw sideways, and flattened him on the ground.

  And Tor was dam
ned near as big as Aurek.

  Maybe heavier. Hard to say when he wasn’t quite as tall ….

  She was diverted finally by the landscape, which gave way from rocky with scraggly brush to what looked like a pure desert.

  Aurek called a halt and they sent the drone up for a look.

  He did some calculations when they got the data and decided they had time to get to a small waterfall and pool on the other side before they needed to make camp.

  Roslyn wasn’t convinced but, naturally enough, nobody wanted to argue with Aurek—not even Paul.

  Not that they’d really challenged him at any point, but they’d at least felt perfectly comfortable making their doubts and opinions known.

  They were maybe halfway across when the nightmare hit them.

  One moment they were trudging along and concerned with nothing but getting across the sand, which was like walking through mud or knee high snow. It shifted with each step and threw them off balance and they had to focus completely on just walking.

  Then Roslyn noticed the sand … draining. It looked like an hourglass where you could see the sand draining away into the bottom half—except they couldn’t see where it was going.

  “Look at that …!” Roslyn gasped since it seemed nobody else had noticed. She didn’t get the chance to say what or where. She’d hardly gotten that much out when some giant, alien thing shot out of the sand pit, jaws wide like an alligator, and clamped down … on somebody.

  Gretchen screamed.

  When she did, Roslyn screamed.

  Or maybe she screamed first?

  She had no idea, later.

  Aurek snatched her off her feet and literally threw her over the heads of the others. Dylan caught her and set her behind him, bringing his gun up at almost the same moment.

  The noise level was nearly deafening.

  Aurek, Dylan, and Tor all drew down and fired a hail of bullets at the thing. Whether by design or from death throes, it slammed its head into Dylan, pitching him sideways. Roslyn made a grab for him when he started to slide toward the pit. She thought for a moment he was going to take her with him, but she planted her ass on the ground and dug her heels in, bracing enough to stop his slide.

  The creature was dead before it disappeared back into its pit, but so was Gretchen.

  Roslyn saw the piece left on the sand and nearly puked.

  She didn’t realize she was crying and screaming hysterically until Aurek grabbed her and coiled his arms around her.

  “Dylan? Did he get out?”

  “Hush. Yes. He is safe. You are safe.”

  She started crying again. “Not Gretchen.”

  Aurek grasped her arm and held it. Drawn by that, she glanced around and discovered Tor had a needle. “No! Don’t! I don’t need it!”

  “It will calm you,” Aurek pointed out.

  “To sleep, damn it! I’m afraid to close my eyes! That thing was horrible! There’s no telling how many more are here!”

  He tipped her face up to make her look at him instead of Tor and nodded at Tor. “I will keep you safe.” He glanced at Tor and Dylan. “We will.”

  She felt the sting of the needle going into her arm, but since Aurek chose that moment to lean down and press his lips to hers she was completely diverted. For a handful of heartbeats, he increased the pressure, sending warming currents through her and then he lifted his head and stared down at her.

  Under the circumstances, and despite her reaction, it felt … more like a promise than anything else.

  He stroked his fingertips lightly along her cheek and then looked away as he got up, carrying her with him. Instead of setting her away when they were on their feet, he swept her up into his arms. “How is the old man?”

  “Not well,” Tor responded.

  “Then he must be helped or carried. We cannot stay here.”

  “I wouldn’t mind being carried,” Paul complained. “I don’t want to step into one of those pits.”

  Aurek turned to look at him. “Step where I step—exactly where I step. Do not decide to dance beside me.”

  Paul glared at him, but he kept his rancor to himself and got behind Aurek.

  Contrary to what Roslyn had feared, whatever it was Tor had given her hadn’t knocked her out, but she felt as if she was floating—almost completely divorced from the world around her and the fears that had chased her down the rabbit hole.

  Something was bothering her, though, and eventually she recalled. “It Dylan ok?”

  “Yes. His nanos will repair the damage.”

  “That was so weird,” she murmured, smiling a little drunkenly. “I thought you said nanos.”

  She discovered he was looking at her when she pried her eyelids up.

  “Sleep. It will help.”

  Roslyn felt her chin wobble at the reminder. “It bit her in half. I’m going to have nightmares forever. I can’t put that image out of my mind.”

  It transpired, though, that Aurek knew exactly how to lull her and divert her from that nightmare.

  Chapter Six

  “It could’ve been any of us. I was right behind her when it got her. Marvin was just in front of her. I’ve never seen anything like it. I’ve never seen any land animal that could move that fast.”

  Roslyn roused at the sound of Paul’s voice and pried her eyelids up. They’d left the sandy area/desert and reached a landscape that seemed like a cross between the rocky area of before and the forest.

  Sensing she’d awakened, Aurek found a spot to settle her, a relatively flat rock—thankfully not on the ground. “Stay put.”

  She wasn’t about to argue with him, especially after what had happened to Gretchen. She was still woozy and sluggish from whatever Tor had given her anyway and doubtful she could stay on her feet.

  After struggling to stay awake for a few minutes, she finally curled up on the rock and dozed off again.

  Aurek roused her later by slipping a hand under her head and lifting it. She saw then that they’d made camp, built a fire and set up the tents.

  Only two.

  What was wrong with that picture?

  “You must eat.”

  That brought her attention back to Aurek. “I’m not hungry.”

  “Eat anyway.” He helped her to her feet and, when she stumbled, swept her up and carried her to a spot between the campfire and a tent—the soldiers’ tent.

  She didn’t ask where the women’s tent was. She didn’t want to think about it.

  The food didn’t really wake her up.

  She didn’t actually want to wake up.

  She wanted to crawl in her sleeping bag and zip it all the way up.

  Aurek finished her food when she handed the container to him. She was surprised and then dismayed, wondering if they’d been rationing themselves to make sure everyone else ate.

  Then again, he’d carried her and that must have used up a lot of calories.

  At least she thought he had.

  Truthfully, she thought he could have passed her off or passed her around and she would’ve been too out of it to know or remember.

  She was glad Tor had given her whatever it was even though she’d been afraid to take it, felt like she had to stay alert if she was going to survive.

  “Where am I going to sleep now?”

  Aurek unzipped the tent and showed her her sleeping bag.

  It had been lain out roughly in the center, she saw, but the tent was going to be seriously crowded with her and the three guys.

  Not that she felt like complaining.

  They could sleep on top of her for all she cared—as long as they were close. “How much ammunition do y’all still have?”

  Aurek stared at her for a long moment as if mentally conducting inventory. “Enough.”

  Enough for what? An army of those fucking things?

  “It lives in the pit,” Dylan said quietly.

  “Not anymore,” Paul retorted, giggling as if he was drunk.

  Terrified, more likely, skat
ing the verge of hysteria. Roslyn felt like she was one shot away from being in the same state.

  And it was starting to wear off.

  “They are pit animals,” Dylan corrected himself, giving Paul a cold look. “It will not … harm anyone here. You are safe here, Roslyn.”

  It actually made sense, now that she thought about it, but did it really? Or was it because she was drugged?

  It still comforted her and she was able to leave the campfire and crawl into her sleeping bag. She really wanted to stay with the guys until they decided to sleep, but she was more worried about giving them the impression that she was a burden and pretty useless to them.

  And she was having trouble keeping her eyes open.

  In spite of that, she was still aware of her surroundings enough to know when two of the men joined her in the tent.

  The third, she supposed, was on guard.

  Aurek settled on his back beside her, folding his arms behind his head. He lay that way for some time and finally rolled onto his side, facing her, and she found herself almost nose to nose with him. Settling one hand along the side of her neck, he dragged her closer and molded his lips to hers, then lifted his mouth and brushed his lips lightly along hers. It made her lips tingle and she licked them. The next time he molded his lips to hers his lips were slightly parted and she felt and tasted him, opening her own lips to nibble at his in tentative response.

  A quaking started in him that grew more pronounced the longer he matched his lips to hers, nibbling, sucking lightly, shallowly exploring the tender recesses of her mouth so that breaths and tongues met and they shared one another’s essence.

  It lit a fire in her in response, but he seemed to have no intention of taking it further, despite the quaking she thought must be from desire.

  She was disappointed when he broke the kiss, but he dragged her closer and wrapped her snuggly against his length and that was almost heaven by itself. She felt sheltered, protected—miserably uncomfortable because he was rock hard all over, but safe.

  And when she finally drifted to sleep, she didn’t dream at all.

  She felt like she’d been drugged when she woke up. She’d had hangovers that were no worse, but she dug in her backpack for her trusty bottle of asprin and crawled out of the tent to look for water.