by Peter Telep
Feels like I’m trapped inside the cement mixer now. No one knows I’m here. I’ll suffocate.
I need… to breathe...
Getting dizzier.
Harder to form a complete thought. Spitting out mud and groping for air… and now I’m rolling over and over and over, the world spinning until—
I slam onto my back, light flashing behind my closed eyes.
I cough out mud and blast it from my nostrils…
And finally, finally… I take a breath.
Another one.
A faint squishing sound grows louder, and I have a look, but it’s not easy with all the mud in my eyelashes. A clay-colored figure recognizes me.
It’s Meeka, who pulled herself out of the mudslide. Her mouth moves. I can’t hear the words. I’m just lying there, sore and stunned and deaf.
She yanks me up, and I have this urge to hop on one leg and tilt my head. My ear pops as the mud slips out. I do the other side, and now I can hear the rumbling river of sludge.
“Doc, I’m asking are you okay?” Meeka hollers.
I look at her. “This sucks.”
“Uh, yeah?”
“I mean… I was supposed to save you.”
“Ha. Like that’s ever gonna happen.”
A faint cry comes from about thirty feet below us, where Steffanie’s struggling in the mud.
“I’m coming, Steff!” Meeka skids her way down the slope, raising her arms for balance.
I glance up into the rain to clear my face.
SITREP: our packs are gone. So are the bikes.
I reach for my holster. Deep sigh. The pistol’s still there.
After a long breath, I get to my feet, slip, and land flat on my butt. Damn, that hurt.
I’m back up again, slithering and skating my way down to the girls, where Steffanie’s wincing as she rubs her shoulder.
“Lost my rifle,” she tells me. “The sling slipped right off my shoulder.”
“Maybe we can find it.”
I turn around, and another twenty feet below lay all three bikes. They got washed up behind a small outcropping that held them there.
Our backpacks, however, are gone, probably swept down the slope or sunken beneath the mud.
I point out the bikes, and then add, “So do we look for the gear or just go?”
Meeka takes a long moment to survey the broad river of mud. She takes a second look, and then says, “Damn, I don’t see the packs. They’re probably buried. And I don’t know about you guys, but I still can’t jump.”
I try. Nothing.
Steffanie shakes her head. She can’t, either.
I frown at Meeka, who’s now making a face. “You okay?”
“I’m spectacular,” she replies, then turns away and blows mud out of her nose.
“Sorry I asked.” And ugh, mud grinds between my teeth. “Everything hurts right now.”
She slaps a palm on my shoulder. “Well, start thinking about something else—like your plan for when we find the grren.”
“Roger that.”
We head down the slope and dig our bikes from the mud. It takes a few minutes to fix our bent handlebars and seats and free our chains and wheels enough to move.
We take one more look for our lost packs, and then walk our bikes up the hillside, barely able to keep our balance across all the slick mud.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Now that I can add “alien planet mudslide survivor” to my resume, I’m feeling pretty good.
Mentally.
Physically, I’m a wreck. We all are. Tomorrow we’ll have aches and pains and bruises in weird places.
Despite that, we kill it up the foothills, our legs straining with every pedal stroke, the bikes grinding louder because of the mud still stuck in them.
To keep my mind off the effort, I’m doing what Meeka said and working on my plan.
Fact: the grren are highly intelligent creatures. The have marriages, funerals, and many other rituals as sophisticated as Florans. Still, they think with their stomachs, and the trick is to distract them long enough to communicate.
I learned that before the withering, large portions of the Highlands were protected territory, and killing a grren was a crime. Now it’s a free for all, and the grren’s numbers have dwindled, even as their hatred for Florans (and nomads in particular) grows stronger. When I was connected to Brave, he showed me bursts of memories of his packmates being slaughtered by thugs. I wanted to roar myself with anger.
So how do I show them who we are without connecting in our personas? I can’t assume that the second we get up there Mama Grren and Brave will rush out to greet us.
The question haunts me even more as we reach the first cluster of trees, and Meeka raises her hand. We slow to a stop so she can look around.
I lean on my handlebars and fight for breath.
Steffanie’s hanging her head.
“We’re getting closer,” Meeka tells us.
“Can you be more vague?” Steffanie asks. “How long?”
“Maybe another hour.”
“Are you serious?”
“You bailing on me? Even Doc’s still here.”
“Hey…” I begin.
“I’m kidding,” she says.
“No, you’re not.”
She winks. “I’m not.” And then she pedals off.
Steffanie groans, curses, and then comes out of the saddle, her bike creaking as she speeds up behind her friend.
Once she catches up, she rides with one hand, using the other to rub her shoulder. She’s hurt worse than she’s saying.
I want to say something to let her know I’m concerned, but I think she’ll blow me off. Maybe I’ll do it anyway if we get a chance.
Because I like her. She’s my friend. And we’ve come a long way since that day inside the mountain bike park when she picked up that rock and was ready to bash my head in—
Because she thought I killed her parents.
Technically, my father killed them, or rather, his partner Solomon, or more precisely the insane Monkshood terrorists who detonated the bombs all over Flora.
But I’ll take the blame for all of it now.
Seeing that crater reminded me of how all the moms and dads and kids living here have experienced more pain than I’ll ever know—and all because my dad played with fire…
To say I have huge respect is only the beginning. There are no words. And speaking of respect, Meeka’s earned mine for her ridiculous riding skills. She’s pulling us like a beast through the outskirts of the forest. Steffanie and I struggle and fall behind.
Once the ground levels off, and I catch my breath, I pedal up beside her and ask, “Your shoulder still hurt?”
“Nope.”
“Liar.”
“Pain is pain.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means if there’s nothing you can do about it, then you ignore it.”
“Until you pass out and die?”
She looks at me like it’s obvious. “Yeah.”
“Uh, yeah, so please don’t do that?”
She chuckles under her breath. “I’ll try not to.”
We pedal a moment more, and then she asks, “I’m glad you never tried hitting on me.”
“Me, too. Not that I don’t think your—
“What? Hot? Especially now, all smelly and full of mud?”
“I was gonna say I, um, I respect you.”
That makes her laugh even harder. “What a line.”
“Seriously!”
She rolls her eyes but then they crease in pain.
“You’re not okay,” I tell her.
“Pain is pain.”
“I get that. And you know, I’m sorry.”
“For what? You didn’t bang up my shoulder.”
“I mean for all this.” I eye the forest.
“This is fun.” She flashes me a crazy smile.
“If you say so.”
“I came to help. And because t
his is my home, as horrible as you think it is.”
“I was born here, too.”
“But it’s different for you.”
“I guess.”
“My only regret is that I didn’t pack more pretzels. I love those damned things,” she says.
“Me too. So hopefully we’ll find Pace.”
“If she wasn’t taken.”
“But we won’t go there yet, right?” I ask.
“Right.”
“So why does Meeka hate her so much?”
“It has nothing to do with Pace. It’s all about Meeka.”
“What do you mean?”
“She thinks every relationship has to be so perfect, but nothing ever lives up to her expectations. She couldn’t save her boyfriend, so now she’s trying to fix everyone else. It’s like she’s obsessed.”
“But the guy got sick and died. What was she supposed to do? None of that was her fault.”
“Yeah, but you know what she said? She wishes she could be like Solomon—because he saved himself.”
“Yeah, but what is he now?”
Her eyes widen. “He’s immortal.”
“We don’t know that for sure. I think he’s extremely evil.”
“I don’t think Meeka cares.”
“Are you serious?”
“She said if her boyfriend had that power, he’d still be here. Anyway, she won’t go through that again. She can’t lose any more friends. She can’t take it anymore.”
“I get it. Everyone gets sick here and dies.”
Steffanie nods. “Back at the safe house? She couldn’t even look at Rose. It was just too much.”
“So the problem is death, and Meeka wants to fix it.”
“Yeah, but she can’t. And she needs to realize that the masks aren’t the solution, either.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
The cars or “buckets” sit beneath a cluster of trees, exactly where the rumms left them.
If I didn’t know better, I’d assume all four rolled off the assembly line of a redneck junkyard after being taped, wired, and hammered together by mechanics drinking Tommy’s father’s moonshine.
Nothing matches. No glass. Weird solar panels. Rust. Dirt. Dents. Cannibalized parts at their finest.
“I just thought of something really obvious,” Meeka says.
“Can you stop doing that?” I ask.
She hops off her bike and climbs in the first bucket. She taps a code into a keypad. Nothing. “Steff? Try the others.”
“What’s wrong?” I ask.
“Our batteries are old. They don’t hold a charge very well. And we’ve had them parked under these trees. No sun. No power. No ride back.”
“Oh, no.”
Meeka glares at the gray sky. “Not enough sun to charge them.”
Steffanie reports that two more buckets are dead. Meeka tries the last one. The engine grinds for a second… our eyes light up… and then cough, cough… silence.
Meeka gets out, mutters something to herself, and then bangs on the hood—
Just as a gunshot punches the hood barely an inch from her hand.
All three of us curse and hit the ground.
“Hello, hello, hello,” comes a female voice singing each word from behind the trees (if you could call that screechy tone singing).
We turn, and the trees seem to come alive—
With despers slipping out from behind them, maybe twelve in all.
They fan out in front of us with guns, guns, guns.
Did I mention guns? I’m afraid to even blink.
That shirtless guy I spotted with the tattoo comes forward. One of his arms has been horribly burned, his skin like pink cellophane wrap with blisters. His lips split into a crooked grin as he steps closer. He’s mulling this over, can’t figure us out, what’re these kids doing here?
Beside him limps this bald skeleton, our singing old hag of the apocalypse. She’s either thirty or sixty. It’s hard to tell with all the scars on her face and her necklace of tumors as big as golf balls. A scruffy brown dress hangs limply from her shoulders, but the military style boots fit well and definitely belong to a nomad. She leans heavily on a wooden cane with a hilt wrapped in leather cord.
Everything about her seems worn and diseased—
Except her lips. She’s painted them a bizarre red. I’m not sure that’s lipstick, though, because the stuff looks thick and sticky, like honey.
And as I notice those grotesque lips, she grins at me, a black-toothed smile that cannot be unseen. I’m either going to throw up or turn to stone.
Meanwhile, Meeka’s reaching back for her rifle—
But the bald guy points at her. “Unh, unh, unh…”
“And you, boy with the nice helmet,” she calls to me. “You put your hands up high toward the healing wreath.”
Instinctively, I tighten my chest to jump into my persona.
Uh, yeah, thanks Dad…
I raise my hands. So does Steffanie.
“Look, before you rob us, can we talk?” Meeka asks.
The woman glances back at her group and cackles so loudly she breaks into a cough.
“What’s so funny?” I ask.
“You,” she says. “All of you. The doubters, the accusers, the prisoners who’ve never recognized the jail. And you want to talk? My dear boy, our day has come. Yours is gone!”
Steffanie takes a step toward the woman. “Uh, yeah, hello lady, we don’t know what you’re talking about—so if you could be more specific, yeah, that’d really help.”
“You smell that?” asks the bald guy. “That smells like sarcasm!”
The despers hoot and howl like a studio audience being paid to laugh at bad jokes.
“What happened at the Palladium?” Meeka asks. “Did the nomads hire you? Or are they gone?”
“Young lady, thousands of years ago, there was a day just like this, a day of uprooting for ancient Florans, a day that reminds us that we must raise our fists and fight back. And today, everything we’ve been taught has come to pass.”
“That’s awesome,” Meeka says. “But can you tell us what’s going on. Did someone take the nomads?”
The woman hums to herself as she hobbles up to Meeka. “Your accent. Where do you come from? Somewhere down on Larkspur?”
“I was born in Lily,” Meeka answers. “Meaning I was born with my accent.”
“The mutation. Did you just come up from there?”
“Why do you ask?”
The woman huffs and regards the others. “They kept this new generation away from us. Never taught them anything about the Monkshood. Hid the truth. Lied to them. And now these poor souls are lost.”
“Yeah, but I bet they taste good!” shouts the bald guy.
The despers go wild.
“Their appointed day has come!” he adds. “The First Ones will never control us. The withering is our salvation. And the uprooting is finally here!”
The despers rage aloud like an army ready for war.
Okay, so I’ve heard this crazy talk before, back in the City of Violet’s art museum, where the despers had converted the basement into a steakhouse, I mean a temple (basically the place where they prayed and ate their victims, gross).
But if these despers took over the Palladium, there should be food there, right? Why’re they resorting to this? Or do they plan to eat us as part of some ritual? Maybe they’re just trying to scare us.
“All right, now, my children,” the old woman says. “Let’s come have a look…” She takes another step toward Meeka.
And in the next second—
She’s dead.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
According to the Chinese astrology books that Grace has read, there are five kinds of children: fire, water, metal, wood, and Earth.
I’m an Earth child (ironic to say the least). I always have trouble working on things alone, which is why I don’t do well on math quizzes but rock star the hell out of group work.
; In that way, I’m just like the grren. I’m a social creature who likes running with the pack. Hunting with the pack.
Feeding with the pack.
That’s probably a bad comparison because I’d never leap from a tree and tear a woman’s head off the way this grren just did.
She topples to the dirt—
And standing behind her is the monster himself. He hisses and growls with the woman’s head still clenched between his teeth, her weird lipstick still flashing.
Blood spatters across Meeka’s face before she dives back toward the buckets.
Behind me, Steffanie screams my name.
But I’m just standing there, caught in the headlights of all this violence with my brain playing catch up.
Okay, the grren never travel alone, and they’re not here to save us out of the blue like that lame dos-x-macarena plot device my boring English teacher’s always talking about.
That gunshot drew them, along with our shouting… and our scent. As usual, they arrived without us knowing.
The despers scream and scatter like rodents.
At least six grren soar down on us. The second they hit the mud, they jump into their personas. Each grren produces six more shimmering beasts, and their numbers no longer matter. Everyone will die.
I can’t move and can’t breathe as the grren bound off after their prey.
Back at the Palladium, I described Mama Grren as the Incredible Hulk version of a saber-toothed tiger, and I’ll stand by that, only the grren’s ears are longer and floppier, and their foreheads have individual markings like tribal tattoos.
And they’re big—bigger than the tigers we have on Earth. No fur though, just mounds of muscle beneath wrinkled green skin and eyes spinning like kaleidoscopes to focus.
Sometimes as they near their prey, they click their double rows of teeth, preparing to chomp. When they sweat it smells like wet clothes you left in the washing machine for a week.
Few Florans have connected with them, and Julie’s part of that very special group. Her father saved Brave when he was just a cub, and Julie managed to reconnect with him many years later. Were she here now and able to jump into her persona, this would already be over.
Wait a minute. She can jump into her persona. She’s just not here. Not yet, anyway.
