Chapter Five: Dead Reckoning — Part 1
“Isn’t she going die?” A man’s voice asked, somehow familiar.
She couldn’t tell if he wanted her to die or not, and his was but a distracted, momentary observation. It could have happened hours ago, or seconds. Laura looked up through swollen eyes. Her vision distorted, the people around her were blurry, hazy. She could barely force her lids far enough open to see. Her body ached, her mind felt broken, racing in a thousand directions at once, her once keen focus now completely shattered. She had a suspicion, nagging at her fretfully, that they were talking about her. Her life, she sensed, seemed to hang in the balance of the reason of but a handful of people. Another voice, also familiar, answered the question.
“She’s lived this long, we can hope she adapts successfully. Everybody else is dead or fully recovered, so she should live. She’s a fighter, and she’s got something about her worth redemption.” This was the voice of the woman who had pulled Laura’s hair with her toes.
“That’s the problem.” Another voice said, sounding a little concerned, a little dark.
“I don’t see a problem. She’ll live, that’s a blessing.” Susan’s voice was firm.
“It is truly a pity that she should survive the symbiont only to die because she is such a threat to you.” The third voice hardly sounded familiar, hardly even sounded human, and something about it made Laura shiver. Perhaps it was the fever. Perhaps it was the delirium that gave her visions of a giant spider dancing in the space around her.
Then a fourth voice bellowed out in her defense. “You won’t kill her without getting through me. She saved me, so there must be something good, something wonderful. Deep down, somewhere.”
Laura’s mind tried desperately to grasp at the words as they blurred and distorted in her mind. She couldn’t talk.
The fourth voice continued talking. “I’ll fight anybody for her, any living thing on this planet. I’ll even fight Susan, and especially you, Robert. You weren’t there; you didn’t see what she did for me.”
“You didn’t either, blind as you were.” The male voice must be the boy who left her to drown.
“I could still hear her words, and I won’t let her be harmed.”
The seriousness of that fourth voice, bent suddenly toward desperate viciousness, made Laura both fearful and comfortable at the same time. The voice sounded desperate, as if her determination alone were keeping Laura alive. Too weak to hear more, Laura closed her eyes for several days. Then they snapped open, and she looked around anxiously, full consciousness returning to her. The world around her had two new tints to it, overlapping the dim gray was a hazy purple and a dull red. She looked up, and a small, dark skinned mutant stared back at her, smiling impishly.
“It’s about time you woke up.” Susan said, offering her some water.
Laura sat straight up, her head missing a branch by just inches. “What the hell happened?”
“You’ve survived symbiosis. Do you remember why you came here?”
“To determine a biological threat and destroy all carriers. How many of my people survived with me?”
“A little over a thousand. You’ll find them long integrated into the local human population. You fought the symbiont for two months, and won. Or lost, depending on how you look at things.” Susan’s smile was hard to interpret.
Laura was disgusted by what she saw. The woman was obviously damaged. “Your genetics are flawed, you must be cleansed.”
Susan frowned ever so slightly. “Cleanse yourself then, Laura.”
“You’ll call me by title.” Laura said, sounding disciplinary.
“You have no title here.” Susan snapped, her eyes warning.
Susan was dressed in a fine silken wrap that concealed nothing of her delicate, beautiful form. As she drew closer, Laura felt herself flush red with desire, but it gave her a chance to study the flimsy material and realize its true nature. It blocked out the blue and red light – acting as camouflage. Susan put a mirror in front of Laura’s face. Laura studied the reflection with both horror and awe. Her body had changed. Her eyes had gone from icy blue to marble gray, and her body, young and supple to begin with, felt light and strong. She felt like she could be blown around in the wind. She felt like spring steel, coiled and deadly. She felt younger, and older, than any person she had ever met. She had a sneaking suspicion that Susan felt everything she felt, only more so. She opened her mouth, exposing the teeth of a child – functional and yet refined. Her small face had retained its high, almost gaunt cheekbones. Her ears had changed the most, and yet she found them attractive. Her blonde hair reflected the purple light, giving her face a strange aura.
“What have you done to me?” Laura asked.
“I didn’t do anything. The symbiont found you acceptable, or too stubborn to kill, I haven’t figured out which. As for your mission: It was accomplished, at least in part. We put a quarantine beacon at the edge of the solar system. As far as the Cynosure is concerned, this planet is unlivable, and nobody survived initial contact with the environment.”
“This sucks.” Laura’s words were laced with disgust. “I remember an argument.” She said, trying to figure things out.
“Some people wanted to kill you. It took me and Loka to talk some sense into them.”
“Loka?”
“One of the girls you saved from the Banks.”
“I can’t believe you let a Red Zero come to my defense.”
“Your class standards don’t exist on this world. Loka, by the way, is now our sister, as you’re part of my family. Take some time to thank Loka. As you are the only Class One female to have survived the transition excepting myself, both the human and the Antansi tribes wanted you exterminated. They felt you might pose a threat to me, the leader of the Human Tribe, should your memories remain intact. I disagreed. Try not to prove either Loka or me wrong, as there are many bitter souls out there who would not hesitate to end your life, rather than earn your loyalty.”
Laura bit her lip. “I’m scared.” She said. “Why did I tell you that?”
“Because you trust me. Everybody trusts me. They have to, it’s one of the perks of being me.”
“I’ve been taught to trust nobody.” Laura felt confused.
“I spent weeks trying to get my life together when I first came here. I had friends to help me, and duties to fulfill. Go out, learn about yourself and others, and find your friends, seek out your duty. I’ve got more pressing matters than to worry over you all day. Two months of caring for a sick and wasted person is taxing on even the most steadfast physician.”
Laura was taken aback. “You mean I’m not a prisoner?”
“Where would you go? What crime could you possibly commit? You’re probably hungry, so go hunting. We don’t keep food in the houses; it tends to grow too fast for that.”
Laura was confused, but she left the small house, dropping to the base of the tree. She ran quickly into the fog. She was furious, jumping from rock to rock, branch to branch, and through the water. Her hand grabbed a bunch of blue moss in passing, and she ate it as she scrambled over a muddy embankment. It tasted good, though slightly tart. She found herself downing a gulp of cold, purple tinted swamp water to clear the taste from her mouth. The water tasted sweet, and her senses told her it also had some nourishment to it. Some part of Laura told her where the rest of the ‘tribe’ was, but she wanted to be as far from them as possible. She wanted to escape the impure race she had become a part of. She ran until her legs ached, working her way deep into the marshy wastelands. The smell was overwhelming, nothing looked remotely edible, and some of the smells were starting to make her worried. Everything felt dark to her, and instincts warned her to turn back. Even as she was overwhelmed by an urge to retreat back to the tribe, Laura felt it might be too late.
Laura turned to flee the wasteland, sensing the eyes of a predator on her skin. The creature hunting her proved cunning and stealthy, catching her from just behind her blind spot. It caught her totally without hope, at an angle that kept her from seeing it. The massive beast, armored by a black exoskeleton, whipped out a webbed paw, and knocked her into the muck. Laura gasped, trying to get upright. The beast stood on four legs, looming over her. Its sidelong jaws leaked a viscous fluid. Three lidless eyes swiveled on stalks, all focused on Laura. Its antenna darted whip-like over its head, anticipating a quick kill. This one, it was sure, was too young to defend itself effectively.
Laura, however, was a fighter at heart. She kicked out instinctively, but the creature had anticipated her defense. It caught her foot in its claws, and tossed her into a tree trunk, where her bones cracked under the pressure. The force of the blow should have killed her, but Laura was only slightly dazed, and her bones were beginning to heal even as the creature moved in to finish her. She might lose, but she figured she might find a way to outthink the monster. The beast had jaws with sharp edges for tearing flesh, and blunt appendages for fighting and killing its prey. Laura stumbled away from it, too stunned to run. She felt stronger than she had ever felt before, but not strong enough to fend off this beast. She’d have to rely on luck and speed. She was too proud to call for help.
One of the other humans moved out of the reeds, a flying reptile trailing him. The boy, no older than fourteen, trailed by a lizard no longer than Laura’s arm, rushed headlong to her defense. The embarrassment worsened as the boy, who was nearly a head shorter than her, proved more effective against the monster than she had. The boy tossed a clod of mud into the monster’s stalk eyes. Blinded, the beast fell back, its guard up. The boy followed his strike with a kick that snapped one of the beast’s antennas from its socket. The lizard landed short and hissed defensively, the beast’s attention drawn to the sound. The boy jumped onto the monster’s back, pounding it with both his fists and yelling profanity at it. The monster, now disoriented, blinded, and off balance, swung around and ran headlong into a tree, taking a pounding and not knowing how to deal with it.
The beast collapsed onto the ground, hissing in pain. It began to sink into the mud even as the boy jumped to Laura’s side.
“Ma’am.” He saluted playfully, “It is I, the mighty Drake, at your service. If you would but allow me and my humble squire, Grumpy, to escort you from this swampy deathtrap and back to your family group, I could get back to my otherwise uneventful day.”
“What are you doing here?” Laura wondered.
“Do you really think Susan, as wise and passionate as she is, would let a newbie like you go it totally alone? She likes you too much to let you kill yourself. You’ve got to be hungry, so come home with me and I’ll make you supper.
“Didn’t you just offer to take me back to my home?” Laura asked.
“Yes, but upon looking at you, I changed my mind. Either way, we’d best leave. The kuru’s only startled, and it’ll be real mad when it realizes just how tiny I am, and how big it is.”
Drake snapped his fingers, and the lizard crawled onto his shoulder. It looked humorous, a cross between a shaved poodle and an iguana. Only this iguana had turquoise eyes, and teeth like a cow. Its forepaws were dexterous, almost human in appearance. Its tongue caught her face in passing. It hacked, apparently in disgust, and turned the other way, wiping its tongue with both of its highly dexterous paws.
“I told you she wouldn’t taste good Grumpy. Of course Grumpy has no sophistication. I would find you delicious.” Drake took her hand, smiling playfully.
“You’re the strangest person I’ve ever met.” Laura said, letting him guide her out of the swamp.
“Then you’ll really love the rest of us.” Drake chuckled to himself.
Before Laura knew what she was doing, she was following Drake, letting her cheek rest against his shoulder. He put his hand around her waist, holding her close. The village came into sight, its small buildings high in the treetops. Suddenly, and rather unexpectedly, a strange, almost alien emotion crept over Laura. It was warm, like lust, but less sullen. She decided, after taking the time to feel the sense of things, to call it happiness. Having been without it so long, part to of her never wanted to lose it again. As it turns out the happiness, or at least the dept of it, would prove to be short-lived.
