by Letts,Jason
Gallow led them around the edge of a shaded pool. Thin tree roots snaked above the slimy surface of the water—some of them appeared to be moving.
“The principal sin of humanity is hubris,” he said. “We think we can control our environments, transform everything around us without any unintended consequences. This hubris makes us think that we’re different from our surroundings, but on Nova that couldn’t be further from the truth. Before joining us, you must wash away your self-righteousness.”
Iotache again led the way, trudging into the water and wading out before dunking his head. He emerged covered in a green film. Loris and the others followed silently. He pondered how their precarious situation left no room for his free will. The thought crossed his mind that he’d prefer a life in the stars rather than one on a planet even as bountiful as this.
But he swum out and treaded water with the others anyway, gradually letting his head sink into the thick, almost viscous liquid.
There was so much movement around, but he felt something particularly strong off to his left. He came up and saw thrashing and an outstretched hand getting pulled under. Gasps and yells erupted all around. Loris fought to get closer, but someone else grabbed the hand first before it went under. The second person began dipping under the surface too, and then everyone around dove after them.
It was difficult to see through the shaded water with so many others around, but Loris thought he saw a vine pulling his companions toward the bottom. They all grabbed onto the victim and kicked up, but even that wasn’t enough. Someone swam underneath them all and soon everyone returned to the surface.
Stayed’s head broke the water’s plane last. He had a knife between his teeth. They all piled on the shore while the main victim sputtered and gulped breaths.
“This doesn’t count as technology, right?” Stayed said, stowing the knife back in a sheath along his waist.
“I’m afraid any alloy does. We have many sharp stones that would work just as well. You’ll all be handing over any items like that just over the hill,” Gallow said.
Stayed pursed his lips but continued on with the rest of them. They climbed the hill and then continued along the forested plateau until they came to a short but steep cliff. In the valley beyond was the encampment Gallow had mentioned, but their new leader had said nothing of its size. Campfires speckled their view in each direction as far as they could see.
“There must be ten thousand people here,” Loris said to Stayed, who was standing behind him.
“How could they all have up and left Earth without everybody knowing about it?” Stayed wondered, sounding equally awestruck.
One of Gallow’s women, Kid, appeared before them with a basket of thatched leaves. Smiling, she reached for Stayed’s waist, plucked his knife away, and dropped it in the basket. Each of them was thoroughly searched, their bags turned inside out, and each forbidden item confiscated. By the time they were done there was a pile of belongings heaped higher than a man. Loris was allowed to keep some packs of food, the bag itself, and his pet turtle, Survivor, who was sure to find a good home around here.
“We call our village the Crossroads. Go ahead over the edge and then to an area marked off for you to the right on the far side where you can build your camps. Plans are in place to bring the rest of you down in due time,” Gallow said.
Laughing, he grabbed the closest person to him and pushed her over the edge before she even had time to react. She slid for a ways and then dropped to the ground where the slope became steeper. Once she dusted herself off and cleared out of the way, the others descended in bunches.
Distrusting eyes followed them as they navigated the camp in a single-file line. Loris tried to listen to their whispers and get a good look at their faces in an attempt to discern where they were from on Earth, but nothing gave them away. Many of the people amused themselves by pouring powders on their campfires to change the color of the flames.
Loris was given a plot about ten feet wide marked with stakes. He didn’t know his neighbors, but that changed when Stayed talked one of them into changing.
“I don’t know if you’re into bunking, but we could double our square footage,” he suggested.
Loris grasped an opportunity to switch Stayed out later for Brina and accepted. Soon they were sitting on logs and using stones to shave bark from tree branches in what seemed to be a surreal exercise.
“Did you ever think you’d be doing this?” Loris asked. Stayed chuckled and stuck his cutting stone in the ground.
“I always knew I’d die up there,” he said, gesturing toward the stars emerging through the dimming sky. “We’re space men. That call won’t go away no matter how many times they try to tell us humanity has its limitations.”
“I know what you mean,” Loris said. “We could get a few of us, Panic and Lopez, hop into the Balboa and go anywhere. We could be kings of our own world.”
“That’d be fun for ten or twenty years until my back gave out or I couldn’t walk. Even with some great people, it’d get lonely. No, I don’t see any realistic way of getting out of here if most everyone else is content to stay. Maybe I’d just decide to stay on the Magellan when they were about to light it up. Some might consider it foolish to give up your life for a station or a ship, but there’s not much left of me without it.”
Hearing Stayed talk about the Magellan brought something else to Loris’s mind.
“You know, Iotache told me that my name wasn’t safe here and that I needed to come up with a new one. I guess packed into their anti-technology beliefs is a hatred for my mother.”
Stayed’s eyebrows raised in surprise. He peered around and looked like he was going to spit on the ground.
“That’s bullshit,” he said and then lowered his voice. “How could the son of Corinna Roderick, the most ingenious mind of a generation, be forced to treat his name like a shameful secret? That’s madness.”
Loris was glad for the empathy.
“Even if they had something against her, why should I have to change my name? It’s not like I’ve done anything great. I’m thinking about just rearranging the letters.”
“You’ve got time. Corinna was older than you are when she found her path. There are a lot of people who can dream big, but she was the best in our lifetime at building bridges to her dreams, actually getting to them. Most people know about the speed of light and all that, but she had the realization that light was a road that could be ridden. She transformed our understanding of the galaxy from a big empty pool to a complex system of highways.”
Stayed seemed wistful talking about it.
“You really appreciated her,” Loris said, regretting his earlier assessment. “Did you ever meet my father? He was a lab tech and chemical engineer, but he parted ways with my mother when I was very young.”
“I never met him. I was a test pilot back then, risking my life every time someone tinkered with the space ships. If you’re wondering, I was terrified of blowing up most every time I had to hit the ignition, except when it was your mother’s handiwork. It was impossible for anyone not to appreciate her exhaustive attention to detail. That’s why I think the people here eschewing technology are full of shit.”
Loris stripped another long piece of bark from a limb and looked up.
“You don’t think they’re serious about giving up technology? It looks to me like they’ve been sleeping on the ground for five years.”
“I just don’t believe they could turn their backs on the capabilities we’ve achieved. It’s just a feeling.”
Stayed looked like he wanted to go on, but he suddenly arched his back and shifted his attention behind Loris, who looked over his shoulder. Gallow came wandering up the path, exchanging a few words with the passengers of the Magellan and helping them tie knots or hack branches. When he came to Loris and Stayed, he greeted them with a big smile. Loris got a closer look at his walking stick, which was covered in intricate engravings.
“Hello, friends,” he sa
id. “I’m going around meeting all the new folk. You settling in all right?”
“We’re getting the hang of it,” Loris said.
“That’s great. And what are your names?”
“William Stayed,” he said, turning his attention to Loris, who hesitated. All that talk about his mother made him loathe to give up his name, but Iotache’s warning was in his head too. There was something in Gallow’s eyes hinting that there might just be something crazy behind that jubilance.
“I’m Eric Lorado.”
“Well, it’s nice to meet you fellas. Let me tell you, we’ve got a well over there, you can borrow nets for fishing or to keep the bugs away in that direction, and my own bit of advice is to give us locals some time to adjust to you. Don’t take anything personally. It’s been a long time since we’ve seen anyone new.”
Loris and Stayed nodded and smiled their thanks. Gallow began to move on but only took one step when the ground shook under their feet. In Loris’s mind, he was suddenly back on Earth about to take off for the Magellan when they felt the first precursors to the explosion that tore the planet apart. The memory brought all of the terror and agony flooding into his mind.
“What was that?” he asked.
The tremors continued and shouts echoed around the camp. A smile crept onto Gallow’s bearded face, the only hint that the planet wasn’t about to be destroyed. He pointed off into the woods where trees and brush thrashed around somewhere deep within.
“That means you need to get off your ass and grab a weapon. The hunt is on.”
CHAPTER 10
Loris and Stayed trotted off after Gallow down the dirt path and toward a large, sturdy shed in the distance. About twenty of the Novans were already there, dashing in and out before running for the woods. Once Loris made it to the shed, he saw that the aforementioned weapons consisted of spears, bolas, and a few bows.
He grabbed a hefty spear and ran his finger across the triangular stone lodged into its end. Even testing its sharpness against his thumb the long way was enough to cut him and draw blood. It sure wasn’t a guided hand cannon, but this thing could do some damage.
Gallow took a pair of spears for himself and busted open a trunk full of knife-sized stone blades for one of those. This was more Stayed’s preference, and he took one in each hand.
“What’s out there?” Loris asked, wondering if a spear was indeed the right choice.
“You won’t believe me until you see it for yourself,” Gallow said. Loris took a stone knife just to be on the safe side.
Soon they were racing through the village for the thick woods in the distance, where the Novans were hooting and hollering as they fanned out. Stayed immediately started lagging behind, but to Loris’s surprise Gallow’s sizable midsection didn’t hold him back from running at all. The longer the chase went on, the more Loris realized that he might be the one to have trouble keeping up.
They left the village far behind them, waded through a stream, and passed several caves before seeing any evidence of their prey. Loris and Gallow slowed to take a breath near an overturned tree that had a huge dent along its trunk. Next to it, it looked like a tunnel had been drilled through the woods with brush, dirt, and stone, clearing a path large enough for the Hudson to fly through.
“We’d only been here two months when these things barged in on us for the first time. They wiped out everything we’d built and killed fifteen. Some were afraid we wouldn’t make it, that the planet was too hostile, but we got smart and started being proactive about protecting ourselves. These things are just too big and tough to let live,” Gallow said.
He’d already caught his breath and took off again. Loris remained right behind as they filed through a dense thicket. Loris tripped on a root and almost stabbed Gallow in the back with his spear before catching his footing.
“Watch it!” Gallow shouted.
They continued on and started catching up with the rest of the hunting party. These men were sweating in the heat and had the frantic look of killers in their eyes. They crept slowly, silently through a dark stretch of forest. The sounds of thrashing plants echoed ahead, as did some strange clicking that Loris couldn’t sort out.
Suddenly the brush split apart before them and something big and black burst forth at them. The shape was difficult to discern in the darkness, but it had a number of legs, a hard shell, and a large protrusion sticking out of its head. The creature was as big as an elephant.
“Look out!” someone yelled.
“It’s an insect,” Loris realized.
“The natural order here is completely out of whack. Most mammals and animals are extremely small. It’s the insects that are few and bulky,” Gallow said.
The giant horned beetle charged at the hunters just off to Loris’s left. Some readied their spears and took aim. Loris cocked his arm back and threw as the creature careened by. The spear wobbled in the air and hit their prey long-side, bouncing off and dropping to the ground.
Gallow started laughing so hard he doubled over and grabbed his knees to support himself.
“Did I forget to give you instructions with that? Try to hit it with the tip!”
Loris stewed, but the other hunters’ attempts didn’t work out any better. The beetle’s shell was enough to repel well-thrown spears, and it was moving fast enough to make hitting it between the plates a difficult task.
It spun around and charged at one of the Novans, who attempted to leap out of the way a little too slowly. His legs glanced off the side of the horn, sending him flying fifteen meters into the trunk of a tree. He didn’t get up right away and everyone else was too occupied to go over to him.
“Here, why don’t you try again?” Gallow said to Loris, handing over one of his two spears.
Not one to back down from a challenge, Loris took it and led the way into better position. The giant beetle continued to thrash and chase down others in the area. Loris sensed its next target and ran to intercept. Sliding over a large boulder, Loris stepped into the open as the black mass homed in on another Novan. He took better care to keep the tip down, and the spear struck close to its eye. No damage was done, but it was enough to make the lumbering insect turn its sights on Loris.
“One shot with a hand cannon and this thing would be toast,” Loris said, looking about wildly for something to hide behind.
The horned beetle charged toward him as he hopped over a log and dashed for a tree. He barely slipped behind it before a loud thud hit his ears and the huge protrusion was right in front of him. The creature ground its horn against the trunk in an attempt to get to him.
“Hold it still!” Gallow called.
“Are you crazy?” Loris called.
He saw the others were closing in, and some more of the men from the Magellan were filtering into the fray through the woods. The beetle clicked and squealed as it strained. Bracing one foot against the trunk, he reached out for the jostling horn before him. As soon as he got a good hold, the creature swung away, instantly overcoming Loris’s resistance and pulling him into the air.
His heart pounding and everything around him a blur, he grappled against the creature’s horn, which was at once hard and sticky. When he finally got his bearings, he saw a spear sail through the air just a few centimeters from his head.
“Watch it!” he shouted.
The others were throwing anything they could get their hands on from every direction. The beetle charged at another one of its attackers and forced him to dive out of the way. Gradually, Loris got a better handle on his mount, setting a foot on the base of the horn and opening up the possibility that he could use his knife to gut the creature’s eye.
Peeling one arm off the horn, he reached for the stone knife dangling from his side. He put more pressure on his supported leg and attempted to lean closer to the monster’s head. When he squeezed his hand tight around the handle and drew it back for the strike, the beetle lurched off of a mound and sent Loris sprawling against the ground.
He
rolled over to make sure he wasn’t in imminent danger of getting trampled only to see that the beetle had gotten stuck in an uneven position and took two spears to its underbelly. Black blood oozed from its side as it continued to row its legs in an attempt to get off the mound.
Loris staggered to his feet and took a moment to catch his breath and revel in a hard-fought victory. Their adversary was doomed; it continued to lose the energy to struggle. But the clicking continued, increasing even. Feeling banged up, Loris started walking back toward the others when he realized that the latest flurry of clicking wasn’t coming from their vanquished foe.
An instant later a flurry of black shapes erupted from thick brush into the grove. A new round of hollering came from the Novans, who braced themselves for more fighting. These creatures were identical in shape but were about half as large and seemed to be funneling out of a nest.
Most of them went for the large group of Novans and Magellaners, but one of them veered toward Loris, who was closer to the giant carcass. Empty-handed and fearing that this more modest sized insect could still crush him, Loris turned and ran for a copse of trees. The creature wasn’t fooled by the impediment, however, and raced around to cut Loris off at the other side.
Having no choice but to continue his flight, Loris continued running even though it was taking him farther away from Gallow and the others. He headed down a hill with the clicking creature closing in on him. Looking frantically for something that could help, he veered for the only noticeable feature of the environment, a wide-mouthed cave with a shallow stream running through it. Loris nearly tripped, but the sound of scuttling close behind pushed him on.
He approached the cave and the rabble of rocks around the entrance. Farther on, Loris noticed a clearing where there was more light and green grass. He wouldn’t be able to make it there before the creature reached him, but some stringy trees above the entrance of the cave looked like a better solution anyway.
