As she hiked through the underbrush toward the great city of Er Khosh, she severed her gloves from the suit, pitching them into bushes without a backward glance. She unzipped the top of her survival suit down to the waist, leaving only her halter bra above the waist. Cool air grazed her bare midriff, shoulders, and arms.
Set to autoglide, her optics transitioned through spectrums. Foliage shifted from white to orange, from purple to black, red-outlined, translucent, entirely invisible. Still strolling at a leisurely pace, she flipped back to biotherm, having caught sight of a distance lifeform. 10 o’clock, 33m ahead… a false alarm. A large carnivorous plant. Her pace quickened.
Mapping guided her along a route she’d planned weeks ago, circumnavigating the bone-laden shrine of Hwahxo, two kilometers along the sundrenched crest of a hidden pass, and then a half-K down to an unobstructed overlook of Er Khosh.
As she sauntered to the overlook’s tip, a growing panorama broadened before her. Hundreds of strident Greaters and timid Lessers hustled about the barren field, unaware of her presence. At the cliff’s edge, she slid her palms up her sweat-glazed forehead into her frizzed hair, filled her lungs as she hurled her arms out before her, and called to them.
“Greaters!”
Those nearest halted first, scanning about for the strange voice’s source. Just as their gazes found her, the next farthest cluster froze, and then the next, until time had appeared to stop across the entire expanse. She looked out at the hushed masses, hearing only the sigh of a gentle breeze.
“Know all! Fear all! Here Shroosh!”
The congregation dropped to their backsides in succession, like dominoes. Muted chatter bustled through the electrified horde.
“All change! Er Khosh change!”
Submissive heads sneaked upward glances at the Goddess of Floods incarnate, no doubt pondering whether the deity they so feared would choose to bless them, or choose to damn.
Shroosh lowered her arms to her sides and stepped back from the precipice. With regal strides she returned to the slope, descending the foothill’s gravelly base, boots sinking in the scree as she slid. On firm soil, she continued on toward her docile subjects. With heads still hung close to the ground, their uneasy eyes glinted from the shadows while tracking her progress.
She paused a stone’s throw from the first line, sizing up the nearest Greaters. A young adult male caught her eye. Unlike the others, he wouldn’t dare behold the visage before him. His focus gripped the ground as Shroosh sauntered his way. Without hesitation, she stepped right up to him, wiry shoulder hairs prickling her bare abdomen. The young Greater flinched as Shroosh laid a hand on his back. She inhaled a deep, intoxicating breath, caressing her subject’s skin, his hairs gathering between her fingers and brushing beneath her palm like sapling pine needles. Her eyes wandered down his back to the intact cloacal pouch.
“Move no,” she commanded as she leaned forward, her hand sliding toward the virginal slit.
“Shroosh you?” the male quietly asked as Shroosh’s fingers explored the pouch’s shallow crevice, in search of a weak spot to breach.
“Yes.”
The sky streaked forward and she was on her back, biostats alerts flashing and buzzing. Her boot had been crushed into her foot and ankle, and each second—as fast as it could update—new damage sites appended the list.
ALERTS: BIOSTAT – Tibial shaft fracture
ALERTS: BIOSTAT – Multiple fractures
ALERTS: BIOSTAT – Severe musculoskeletal trauma
ALERTS: BIOSTAT – Circulatory
ALERTS: BIOSTAT – Circulatory Critical
ALERTS: BIOSTAT – Pulmonary contusion
ALERTS: BIOSTAT – Critical
ALERTS: BIOSTAT – Cardiopulmonary Arrest
Ish’s body rolled, flipped, twisted, and crushed—her face, for an instant, pressed into the small of her own back. Greaters’ faces and bodies flashed by in a never-ending blur until one hand pulled her from the frenzied swarm, lifted her high overhead, twirling the mangled body in the air as it was sprinted from the scene.
3.3
Wiping her sweaty face on a dusty sleeve, Minerva burst into the cave. “We have to leave. Now.”
Startled, John sat up too fast. Ribs, neck, shoulder. He gasped and cringed. “What’s happened?”
Minerva unclipped the string of bunnies dangling from her waist and tossed them in a supply bin. “Ran into some roving hunters…” She scuttled about, grabbing strewn gear and throwing it into bins. “Spread out over a few kilometers. Thought there were only three. Kept an eye out, making sure I wouldn’t be corralled in. But there was a fourth. The instant it came into optic range, they started closing—all four. Like they knew where I was. Like they were in communication—coordinated!” She began stuffing her sleeping bag into its sack.
John began easing out of his bag, eyes trained on the cave opening. “Are they… are they coming? Were you followed?”
“Coming, yes. Followed, no. I killed three of them. Tried to get the last one, but it fled. Couldn’t catch up enough for a shot. Not even close. I fully expect he’s fetching some friends at this very second. I also suspect they can smell us from a long way out.” Minerva hefted a bin and turned to go load it on the skimmer. “Ugh, always paid attention to wind before!”
John began stuffing his bag, catching a potent whiff as she breezed by, like ammonia and fresh cat urine. “I can smell you from here, actually.” She paused at the entrance, peering back—only a silhouette, but he could imagine her expression. “No really, it’s sharp… biting. Have you had any attacks? Presymptoms? Your profile indicated that hormonal—”
“Not now.” She resumed to the skimmer, murmuring. “‘Presymptoms hormonal bleh bleh’… damned things practically on our doorstep…”
John sighed. Never now. She refused to discuss it. Better to pretend it didn’t exist! And it’d remain her biggest liability, worse even than his burdensome, ruined body. He’d wanted to make her leave without him, had rehearsed the words and bolstered his resolve, no matter what she argued (if she argued—he was fairly certain she would) or bargained. She’d believed his story about a return vehicle, but now he wasn’t so sure it’d make a difference, even if she didn’t have him slowing her down and exhausting resources.
She dashed back in, grabbed the comms unit, and filled her other hand with gear. John threw his packed bag on a pile.
Before he could utter another syllable, Minerva cut him off. “I’m serious. Not now. Just sit tight for a few minutes and keep watch.”
John bit his tongue but his mind raced on. She’d already slammed shut the medkit full of his pills. He could see exactly how this played out if he told her to leave him behind. She’d stay and argue, even as an army of Hynka stampeded up the hillside. It’d turn into a gory last stand, both of them torn to bits.
And then there was Ish and her flops of Hynka data, language, vids, and maps, as yet untransferred to the EV or Minerva’s fone. She needed every possible resource to boost her chances of surviving a trek across this continent.
Only garbage and a few empty cartons remained when Minerva stooped down on his better side. She looked in his eyes. “You ready?”
John hung his left arm over her neck and pulled his feet in close. She gathered and clutched the material in the small of his back. A count of three, nodded in sync. White and red painted the insides of his eyelids as they rose. He wanted to pause there a moment, let the burning subside, but it wouldn’t make the march to the skimmer any easier, and Minerva wasn’t wasting a second. His feet skipped and shuffled as they went, contributing but a few pitiful steps along the way, Minerva’s little body bearing the bulk of his weight.