by Louise Wise
At the back of his throat was a small sac, which contained a poison that continuously replenished itself. A sinew carried the venom along to be ejected at will from a tiny duct under his tongue. Death was painless in its speed.
He had spoken matter-of-factly, and why shouldn’t he? His being venomous was as natural to him as breathing was to her.
“Isn’t having such a poisonous toxin in your system dangerous to your kind?”
“We have natural antibodies to counter-attack the toxin. The meat is done,” he said.
She hurriedly flattened the covers over the boulders to dry. Without soap, the wash wasn’t as effective as it might have been, but at least it washed out the lingering smell of ashes.
She crossed towards Fly, watching as he bent over the meat and cut it thickly onto plates. Gratitude overwhelmed her, and breath fled her body in its intensity: here was a member of an unknown species, who had saved her life more than once; giving her food, and was now offering her shelter and all the protection he could provide.
It humbled her. And she knew she couldn’t board Taurus XI and leave him behind. Bodie had to listen to reason. Even if it meant they convey the craft to a remote part of Mars, and make their way to the Solar Station and wait rescue while Fly was secretly using Taurus to take himself home.
She sat beside him and was offered a plate piled high with roasted meat and vegetables. They drank melon juice leaning against boulders, and nibbled on the crispy vegetables that had fallen in the fire.
“Where’d you find the vegetables?” asked Jenny, inspecting one between finger and thumb. She popped it in her mouth and began to chew. It tasted sweet and juicy.
“They are fungi. Lethal if eaten raw.”
Jenny stopped chewing. She felt his gaze on her and knew he was mocking her fear, even though his facial expressions and body language were nonexistent.
Pretending to cough, she spat the chewed vegetable out into her hand, and tossed it into the bush under the pretense of stretching.
“Have you explored the planet any further?” she asked, stretching one more time for authenticity.
“Many parts is marsh-land inhabited by animals more ferocious than the natives, although they lack any sort of intelligence and are guided only by instinct.”
Jenny peered behind at the trees, which seemed to take daylight into their claw-like branches and swallow it up. She couldn’t believe there was anything more horrendous than the native-wolves.
“Follow the black river downstream and it will turn into white rapids, which flow into several gorges before emptying into the ocean. There are many rivers, and of course the ocean, which is vast. You must know more about this planet than me.”
“We’re on the outer edge of its pole,” she offered. “The two stars together shine less brightly than our sun, but night time is eternally twilight because of the many moons. And it’s mainly water as you’ve already figured, water and forest.”
“You find this planet.” he consulted his computer, “dark?” “Yes, it isn’t as bright as home and, believe me, it can be unbelievably dim there in the winter!” She smiled, thinking of England. Her smile slipped, and a long silence lapsed between them. Fly closed his eyes.
Jenny chewed on her lip, and tried to turn her thoughts into words. “Bodie, the commander, was concerned you’d force control of the shuttle if he came to collect me. Y-you’ve helped me, and we’d like to help you return home. I’m not stupid,” she said in a rush. “I know I’m a hostage while I remain with you, but all the same, I’m still grateful to you for helping me.”
“Is that why you think I am helping you?” he asked, without opening his eyes.
Jenny looked at him aghast. “Oh no! I - I mean -” She lowered her head. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to throw all your good intentions back in your face.”
Fly said nothing. He opened his eyes, and stared ahead across the rapid flow of the river. “I take care of you because you are female. Had you been male I would have killed you. “
Jenny dragged her shocked eyes away from his face.
His crooked mouth twisted into a smile. “Sexual craving is the one emotion we have not lost.”
Her face, already pale, became even more so. She touched her temples with an unsteady hand.
“Your ship will not come for you,” he continued in the same flat voice. “They believe you are dead, and I doubt any civilization will return for a body. “
Jenny felt her life drain away. She hadn’t thought of that, and as she stared ahead, she saw a door close and bolt on the light at the end of her dark tunnel.
“No, I can’t believe that. Bodie’s my uncle - family - he’ll come for me.”
Fly shifted forward and threw a stone at the fire. “Your life on Earth has ended, and new one with me has just began.”
Jenny said nothing, but held her head in her hands. Her fingers tightened in her hair as she battled with this extra trauma. Finally, she raised her head. “It’ll be stupid of him to come, but I have to believe he will. The new life you speak of will destroy me.”
Fly made no comment, and whether he understood or not he made no move to reach for the computer, but stared straight ahead with great intensity, as if he were mulling something over in his mind.
It was getting colder and Jenny huddled closer to the fire. Even wearing the top half of an alien spacesuit over her own, the cold seemed penetrating. One of the binary stars had set hours ago, and the other was just slipping below the horizon.
A distant howl of the native-wolves caused her to swivel around from the waist towards the noise, her hands flat on the ground to steady her upper body. Her heart gathered speed, and the tiny hairs that covered her flesh became erect with fear. It took long a moment to realize she wasn’t alone any more. There was Fly. But what was that going to cost her?
She looked over.
He was leaning against the broken boulder; his eyes fixed steadily on her face.
Feeling foolish that her fear was so apparent, she climbed to her feet and crossed towards him, trying to act as if this had been her intention before the wolf-beast howled. As she neared, he held out his hand to her.
She stopped, mortified.
You’re not going to survive on your own, Jennifer Daykin; you’ve become a pathetic excuse for a human.
With the truth of her thoughts buzzing in her ears she allowed herself to be pulled down next to him, and was held so close that she could hear the beat of his heart. She sat tense, aware and afraid. His arm was firm around her middle. His hand, the fingers bunched into a loose fist, rested lightly on her upper thigh.
She could feel the hardness of his body against hers, and she held herself as rigidly as she could. Heat poured off him, warming her and worrying her at the same time.
The light gave way to the dimness of night, and the howling became louder and more frequent. The fire had faded into bright embers, and hardly any warmth came from it. Jenny peered up at Fly, his eyes were closed, but she had never been more awake in her life.
Oh, Bodie, where are you? I always thought I could cope with any situation but I fear I’m cracking up. The longer I stay with Fly the bigger the threat of my falling so passive I shan’t be able to pull out again. Don’t give up on me, please, please come. “
She had closed her eyes on her private thoughts, and when she opened them again, she stared hard at the sky and wished her words kilometers into space. She hoped Bodie was bearing up. He was more than an uncle. He had become her best friend.
She had been following in her father’s footsteps, and he’d been so proud of her when she decided to try and “make it” without the famous Bodie name, and use, instead, her mother’s maiden name. It made her efforts of achievement doubly sweet when she met them.
She may have refused her father’s help, but she had been fiercely proud of him, and loved him dearly. She had just needed to prove to herself she was just as worthy, and as clever as he. It had been arrogance, on her part she supp
osed, but it worked, even though it meant hurting the feelings of friends when they found out.
She thought briefly of Matt; he’d taken her real identity badly. Like she had deliberately set out to make a fool of him.
She blinked back a tear as she recalled her father warning her that some people might see it as deception - oh, how right he had been.
She had been devastated when he died on that infamous spacewalk. Bodie had been present when he died, and had blamed himself, and would probably blame himself for the predicament she was in now.
Another sound reached her, and her body reacted fearfully, pulling her sharply to the present. It sounded like braying, and thundering hooves vibrated in the ground where she sat.
“They will not come anywhere near us.”
His voice came low in her ear. She looked up, his eyes were still closed, but she could tell he was no longer asleep, maybe he’d never been.
She glanced down at the hand that lay on her thigh. It was large, the nails soiled. She peered closer and noticed the tiny slits on the tip of each finger - this must be where the claws emerge and retract. He came from such an ugly and violent race; she was extremely lucky she was female and able to provide him with light entertainment, otherwise, as he had already said, she’d be dead.
No! I won’t become entertainment for anyone. I’ll die first!
And you will, Jen, you will.
The knowledge was like a presentiment, and she mentally recoiled at the thought of clawed, soiled hands on her body, and of the emotionless eyes that would see her at her most vulnerable. She thought for a moment of his hard, lean body against hers and a shiver, different to her repulsed thoughts, swept her body.
She stared into the fire. After a few minutes gathering courage, she began to move away. The hand on her stomach abruptly splayed out and stopped all movement.
“Where are you going?”
“Nowhere. I th-thought you were asleep.”
“Do not try to leave, the natives have surrounded us.”
Jenny physically cringed. She peered out into the dusk and her eyes saw shapes she hadn’t noticed before.
“W-won’t they attack us?”
“They are curious of you, but afraid of me. If they believe you are my mate they will leave you unharmed, pretend otherwise and they will kill you.”
Jenny swallowed. She was a woman from the 23rd century, and had made mincemeat out of men as big as Fly, yet she was unable to defend herself or seemingly survive without him.
She stared ahead at the shadowy shapes in the distance, and blinked at the rapid tears that had formed in her eyes. She was a hard woman, so why was she reduced to being at the mercy of a man? An alien man?
She pushed his hand off her, and made space between them, but her voice let her down. “It isn’t going to happen, Fly. I w-won’t let you rape me.”
“There will be no need for rape.”
Jenny said nothing, but her stomach somersaulted.
The natives continued to howl like they came from a direct line of wolf descendants, but an unwilling picture popped up in her head of the humanoid creatures, and she knew she could never think of them as merely wolves again.
She closed her eyes, and struggled to regain normality - but there was nothing except a black-eyed alien, vicious animals and deadly flowers in her mind to remind her that nothing would be
ELEVEN
Spinning the wheel to the right, Bodie pulled the heavy door open and allowed Matt entry. Matt pulled off his space helmet, and shook damp hair out of his eyes. Then Bodie helped him off with his breathing apparatus.
“Done it,” he said, his breath labored, as if he had been in a particular hard race, which he’d won.
Bodie slapped him on the back. “Thank God,” he said. “That leaves one more correction then we can go and get Jen.”
He swiveled round to notify Kate of their intention, and didn’t see the flash of rebellion in Matt’s eyes.
Jenny woke with a start. The voice of the natives had faded, and high in the sky were seven luminous moons.
It was a stark reminder of her predicament. She felt cold and isolated, and without glancing around she knew the space beside her was empty. Panic seized her.
“Fly?” She rose unsteadily, her eyes searching the immediate area. A noise from behind made her spin around, and she saw Fly emerge from the dense bush. Her relief was apparent, even to her. Already she had fallen, willingly or not, dependent on him.
His smile was a mere movement of lips. It was as if he had read her dilemma, and was amused.
“I will take you back to the ship. “
She nodded. She was glad of the safe, if dilapidated, walls of the cabin. She couldn’t trust Fly to protect her from the natives. She was going to have to make herself a weapon, something better than a mere sharpened stick and pocket knife.
How to make a machine gun out of wood? Jenny, in her bewildered state, couldn’t remember the simple crude weapons of old.
Fly taught her how to use the canteen, and allowed her to use the cupboard that held some of the beverages. It was then, she realized, that he intended to leave her completely alone in the cabin. Surprise, gratitude and then relief overwhelmed her. Disappointment showed itself later when he had gone, in a spurt of bewilderment and loneliness.
He had taken nothing with him, and left her everything.
The following day passed smoothly. He brought his kill back to the ship and cooked it outside. When they had eaten, he had risen and left without a word.
This continued the following day, and soon as much as a week had gone by without either of them exchanging a word. And when he did speak to her, the small translator was being used less often. She was surprised by his quick ability to grasp her language, and felt obliged to honor him with the same respect and teach herself some of his by using one of the other translators left laying around the spaceship. He had told her they had been taken onboard the space vessel because of the many different races of the Itor man.
She rarely ventured far from the spaceship, and with the buggy out of action she felt too vulnerable to wander alone. She was as helpless, and as defenseless, as a newborn. She didn’t like it, but didn’t know how to change it.
It didn’t help that Fly made no demands on her. He seemed to expect little, and it was almost as if he enjoyed her needing him.
Jenny undressed to her “whites”: long-johns and vest. Her spacesuit was becoming too hot for daytime wear now. She wondered if summer was approaching, or if she was simply becoming used to the climate.
She had cleared the cockpit of debris and could now walk freely without tripping over plant or tree roots, alien space litter and dirt. She worked to keep her mind off the loneliness and abandonment. It was three weeks since Taurus had taken off without her (she had been marking off the days, like a prisoner, on her cabin wall).
Jenny’s self-portrayal of her own vulnerabilities continued to grow. She was a woman of her time; the touch of a button at her fingertips. Here everything had slowed to a virtual stop. The days dragged endlessly, and the twilight nights were immeasurable.
Fly continued to keep his distance, and she felt he was retreating from her. Although he returned to the spaceship more often, he left in silence and with various items in his arms: tubular metal, sheets of hardened plastic, electric cable and so on. In one day he had made his appearance over ten times only to disappear without acknowledging her.
She propped the handmade brush against the wall and, flexing her stiffened hands, went outside. The air smelled and tasted wonderfully clean after the gloomy vessel. She breathed deep into her lungs, and looked up at the hill. It was covered with coarse foliage, whereas before it had been soft mud. It was strange, if circumstances were different, she knew she could be happy here. It wasn’t the first time she appreciated her surroundings. This world could be beautiful. If only…
She looked into the sky; the twin suns no longer surprising her. Neither did the presence of
the large moon that seemed too impossibly close for comfort. Everything was so normal in its alien frame.
She took a sip of melon juice from her hip flask and wondered where Fly was, and what he was doing. She knew he’d made a fishing rod, for he’d cut and shaped the wood while they ate the other day, so maybe he’d gone fishing. It was strange how she’d enjoyed that extra time with him. It made her realize she’d come to look forward to the times they spent together. His distorted face and black stare didn’t hold as many fears as it once used to.
But he was emptying the vessel of an assortment of objects alarmingly fast. Not for the first time, Jenny wondered how she would cope without him once his new shelter was built. She knew she shouldn’t worry about his desertion, but she did. She was becoming increasingly passive and knew, only too well, if he left her, chances of survival until rescue, if any, would be small.
She screwed the lid back on the flask and a sparkle of determination lit her eyes. It was time she stopped acting like “Jane” in a Tarzan film. So what if he left? That would solve her problem, wouldn’t it?
Matt flicked up the switch. Bodie looked at him, puzzled. The headset on his head had been switched off.
“Why’d you do that?”
“We aren’t going down.”
“The hell we are!” Bodie reached for the switch but Matt’s hand closed over the older man’s.
“There’s no point,” Matt said. “She’s dead.”
“I shan’t believe that until I see for myself. There still might be a chance -”
“You heard the creatures! D’you want to join her? She’s dead, Bo, and if we don’t head back while we’ve enough fuel, our graves will be here inside Taurus.” He leaned forward and spoke harshly in Bodie’s face. “Is that what you want?”
Bodie wiped Matt’s spittle from his cheek. “I failed her father, and I’ll be damned if I fail her too!”
“This is all about the golden boy, isn’t it? Sir Zack bloody Bodie, her dad and your brother,” he said with a sneer. “Talk about keeping it in the family. “ His laugh was without humor. “Funny that he died on the same spacewalk you were on. You kill your brother, then your niece
