Trapped on Predator Planet, page 3
“Affirmative, Raxkarax,” the female voice sounded in my language. “Joan’s communication array is compromised in her ship; however, I can patch her helmet’s comms to your helmet’s frequency, at least whenever one of my nosecones is within range.”
Startled at VELMA’s news, I paused in my hike. “I may communicate with … Joan?” I tasted her name on my tongue; it was smooth like honey. Inobtrusive and soft. My heart cramped a jotik.
“Yes, for a few brief periods each day,” she said. “SLO number four approaches now with number two following close behind. Would you like me to introduce you?”
Voice caught in my throat, I coughed and looked around at the scant black trees for a jotik, as if they could witness my shock and inadequacies. “Please,” I choked out.
“Very well,” VELMA said. A rotik later, she spoke again.
“Raxkarax, I have Joan Wu on the line.”
I heard nothing and realized the human must be waiting for me to speak first.
“Greetings, kind human,” I said and then winced. I sounded the fool!
“Hi,” Joan said, her voice as soothing to me as a winter brewed pepper tea.
I hadn’t time to collect my thoughts or craft a clever salutation.
“I bid you stay within your pod,” I said, after a moment. “The dangers of the bog are not to be trifled with.”
“I figured that out on my own,” she said. “You shouldn’t trouble yourself about me. I’ll figure something out.”
Aghast she would suggest such a thing, I stumbled over my next words.
“The … you must not … only wait for me,” I said.
I heard her humorless laugh.
“Well, I’m not going anywhere,” she said. She cleared her throat. “Anyway, um, it’s nice to meet you, Raxkarax. I’ve gotta go.”
Silence indicated she signed off.
Heat flooded my neck and face. Our first conversation was nothing like I had imagined, but then, what had I imagined?
Memories of my brethren’s hands caressing their human mates passed my mind’s eye: stolen moments when they thought no one would notice as they petted their human’s cheek or grasped an elbow and pulled them in for a swift kiss.
The aching behind my chest panels confirmed what I’d suspected all along. And yet, just because my own heart may choose to leave its cage and reside in the new place, it did not force my heart mate to choose likewise.
My steps quiet as I approached the wooded swamp, I pondered how I might beseech the Goddesses about this quandary. Was there a series of actions or perhaps, the right words I might say to entice the human Joan to agree with my heart’s desire?
And what of events I had already witnessed or heard about from my brethren? Perhaps therein lay the clues to the convincing of my heart mate.
Lost in thought, I missed the warning stream of acid from the acid-spitter to my right. Low to the ground and obscured by dried brush, I would have passed her by had she not shot at me. Sizzling from the leg panel signaled where she hit my armor. With a quick slash of my weapon, I killed her, letting her blood quench the cracked soil. With furtive glances at my perimeter, I dressed the spitter and collected the glands I needed.
Bloody hands today; full bellies tomorrow, that old proverb echoed in my head as I worked.
Gesturing to the north with a humble salute, I buried the offal and carcass and resumed my hike into the darkening wood.
Lady trees cast their deep shadows all around, and the wind whispered of promises in the night. But only a fool or a novice dropped his guard in this wood where hungry killers waited on all sides. Pulse quickening with every step, I dialed my sensors up with an eye-blink, my hands gripped around their weapons.
Even as I kept my wits about me, the sound of Joan’s voice replayed in my mind. She sounded cautious. Wary. Humorless. Brow furrowed, I considered her circumstance, of which I knew little. Trapped in the Agothe-Fatheza, awaiting a stranger’s help. From what I knew of the human women, they seemed reluctant to accept help or admit weakness. Much like Theraxl.
It made sense she would be wary and humorless. She knew nothing of our race, our intentions or culture. Anything she learned of Ikthe fell solidly in the category of swift and certain death.
Sobered by my musings, I trekked through the wood. The hunters seldom spoke of it, but Ikthe’s beauty defied understanding. We supplied lifeblood to the sisters on Ikshe, the violence of the hunt satisfying a dual appetite: both the literal hunger for meat and the thirst for battle. But out of these daily wars bloomed a feral and wild beauty known only to the hunter brothers who spent most of their lives here.
Even now, crouching between the black trunks of two lady trees, I spied the dance of a lonely awaafa as it fluttered among branches in search of the brine flower. Its iridescent blue wings captured hints of green, bringing life to the arid black and orange forest springing from the Barrens.
The mottled coat of a jokapazathel gleamed in the solitary ray of light streaming through a break in the dark canopy; its fur was soft, and I remembered Pattee’s belt swinging with numerous of their pelts.
Wind creating a chime from the hollow stalks of woodbane’s tangle, a peace descended over my heart home.
I knew what I must do to win Joan’s friendship and respect.
The drone of a swarm of fireflies alerted me to the horde, and I spun to protect myself. Always, death’s attention came first on Ikthe.
Chapter 6
Joan
Unaccountable jitters struck my hands, and I sat on them inside my pod, staring up at the monitors.
I had long abandoned attraction to men.
But Raxkarax’s voice …
Its raspy baritone stirred a place inside me long forgotten, the graveyard where I’d laid past dreams to rest. Shaking myself, I tucked my hands under each arm now, trying to warm the chill spreading throughout my body. The temperature-controlled pod was a comfortable 72° Fahrenheit, but I felt cold. Anxious. Uncertain.
“VELMA, how long before Raxkarax gets here?” I asked, not liking the uncharacteristic wavering in my voice.
“I estimate five to seven days,” VELMA said. “Depending on how many hostile engagements he entertains.”
“Is there anything I can do to help?” I said, already knowing the answer.
“Considering your limited perimeter, I’m afraid not,” she said. “However, you may speak to him intermittently when my SLO satellites are within range.”
Raising a brow, the chill in my bones receded. VELMA sounded almost—chipper.
When Raxkarax called, I was settled in a cocoon of despondency. I’d been establishing a safe base from which to forage food and water for two weeks, but the realization that the air itself was laced with measurable toxins had thrust me into a mental tailspin. The EEP’s filters wouldn’t last indefinitely. Nor would my rations. I could live on the reeds until I’d decimated the local population that ringed my island, but I’d certainly be malnourished by then.
Any hope of rescue relied on the impossible. Judging by Natheka’s description and VELMA’s own findings, a person would have to be unforgivably foolish to venture into this place.
Or suicidally desperate—to leave.
VELMA and I had discussed the possibility of me wading through the bog to shore, but initial samples of the bog water indicated incredible acidity. My suit was rated for many things, even some acids. But Ikthe’s alien vegetation created an unusual blend of hydrochloric and nitric acids in the bog water. Recently discovered Galvanite was prized for its indestructability, but it was a metal. IGMC flight suits were a high-tech blend of polycarbons laced with Galvanite. And as amazing as Galvanite was, it could only withstand nitric acid for a few minutes before it began to corrode.
Couple the bog’s acidity with its unknown depth, and the AI and I had both decided against it several days ago.
Hearing my erstwhile rescuer’s voice was a shock. Not only because it was rich and masculine, but also because it was another person. I wasn’t alone with a computer for company. But I was terrified. Terrified to feel hope only to have it obliterated before my eyes, much like had occurred over twenty years ago before my career as an exobotanist for IGMC had gotten off the ground.
Rubbing my arms vigorously, I checked the temperature, but it remained steady in spite of the chill I felt. “I’m going to harvest more reeds.”
Replacing my helmet and gloves, I exited the pod to the swish of the hatch and worked up a sweat yanking more reeds out by their roots. Eunice the rokhura was nowhere to be seen, and a strange green haze permeated the air. Just like the eerie fogs on Earth and Exterra, this bog nursed a thick miasma that floated above the swamp from time to time. The difference being that Ikthe’s airborne algae coated everything in a fine layer of chartreuse slime.
The patch of land I stood on was spared some of the pea soup, but not enough. Looking up at the pod’s metal surface, I saw it appeared even greener today. No amount of wiping could keep it at bay, and I turned away, peering across the bog instead. I wondered from which direction Raxkarax would come.
I realized I should warn him about Eunice.
But we’d spoken only minutes ago. Checking my IntraVisor, I saw it had been more like two hours, but still. And he had a few days before he would even be in the vicinity. It could wait.
Bundling the reeds, I reentered the pod and activated the decontamination shower and vented the air once more.
Spending the better part of the afternoon cleaning and cutting the thick reed roots, I watched the highlights reel VELMA compiled for me from scavenged footage.
She’d recorded hours and hours of activity and whatever she lacked in video she made up for in audio. It was a riveting podcast.
“Pause playback,” I said. VELMA had just explained bioacoustics transduction to Amity after the forest teeth tree nearly ate her. “VELMA, what else have you learned about this planet’s flora relative to bioacoustics?”
“I thought you’d never ask, Joan,” VELMA said. “As you doubtless already know, every living thing bears an acoustic signature. Just as I surmised about the forest teeth tree, the flora on this planet and others, responds to limited use of acoustic wavelengths. However, there is a missing piece to my growing understanding of plant communication. I was hoping you could fill me in.”
The black cloud over my head thinned, and I looked up from my pile of diced reed. “I’ve got nothing but time, VELMA,” I said. “Hit me.”
Silence as the AI digested my phrase. “Lacking a physical vessel, I am unable to comply with your request. Furthermore, it seems a violent engagement.”
Stifling a groan, I waited.
“I see. It is another of your ironic phrases that is not meant to be understood literally. Ha. Ha.”
Narrowing my eyes, I could almost envision CeCe typing in code that would give VELMA the illusion of a sense of humor. I couldn’t decide if my friend was brilliant or a possible sadist. All the power of language modeling software at her fingertips, and she programs it to make dad jokes?
“Sorry, VELMA,” I said, ignoring her terrible attempt at lightening the mood. “Let me rephrase. What questions do you have?”
“I have an encyclopedic knowledge of the mechanisms of the mycorrhizal layer and its functions on planets with significant soil, moisture and fungal growth, but I lack experiential knowledge.”
Knife poised above the last of my reeds, I spoke. “What are you asking?”
“I wondered if you might help me devise probes you could bury in assorted habitats on the planet, that I might study the communication systems more thoroughly,” she said. “Starting here, of course.”
I would protest the pointless nature of the experiment considering we had no way to get off the island, but my thoughts buzzed in spite of my dour mood. Mind seizing on the possibilities, I felt my pulse increase. “Let’s see,” I said, absently placing the tray with chopped reed on the extendible counter. “If we use the soil samplers, we could modify the shafts with speaker wire and hack the digital readout display to transmit frequencies. Would that work for you?”
“Admirably, Joan Wu,” VELMA said.
Stinky vegetables forgotten, I found myself on hands and knees pulling out cubby drawers in search of speaker wire and the T-shaped soil samplers. With complex speaker systems in the EEPs, I was confident I’d find a spool of the cable somewhere. If not, I could cannibalize wiring to a couple of the interior lights in a pinch.
Two hours later in the waning light of late afternoon, I worked the soil sampler’s shaft into the ground near the thick bushes the pod had crunched when it landed. Branches still snaked out sporting greenish yellow leaves, so it had survived, if barely. Its root system would be fine, however. At least for a month or so. I’d either be dead or gone by then.
Ignoring the morbid thought, I pushed the metal rod until only a few centimeters remained visible as well as the handle. Pushing the button on the readout, I activated VELMA’s mycorrhizal probe.
The hair on the back of my neck stood on end, and I turned to look across the bog. The fog had dissipated an hour ago, and Eunice stood fierce and tall, eyeballing me with a decidedly hungry bent. Where I normally would shout some playful banter, I stayed silent and watched the deadly predator.
Was I imagining the flare of her nostrils?
She pawed the ground and then bowed low, digging her snout into the dirt at the base of a tree.
I wasn’t waiting to see what she would do next; a sixth sense warned me something was up.
Taking the three strides to the hatch, I entered without preamble and initiated the vent flush while I looked out the view portal. Eunice appeared to be burrowing into the muddy shore as if looking for clams. Snapping her jaws on thick wads of shiny brown mud, she smeared the mess all over herself, including her clawed feet and legs.
“VELMA, are you recording this?”
“Recording.”
Watching in horror, I gasped when Eunice dipped a toe in the acidic bog and then took a confident step into it. With hohijopa expanding, she called to comrades I had yet to meet, and continued her slow progress into the bog. Every step brought her another meter deeper into the swamp until only her neck and head remained above.
“Now we know how deep it is,” I muttered, my breath fogging the glass. Wiping it, I felt my entire body tense as Eunice approached my island. When more of her body showed, I realized she found where my island began underneath the water. Eunice was close enough for me to make out the details of her dark green scales and penetrating eyes. All at once, she rolled her neck and yawned in a silent roar, a thick pale green tendril snaking around her throat and tightening.
Gasping, I watched with horror when Eunice tried to scratch at the bog creature without effect and another arm coiled itself around her front legs and then jerked her entire enormous body under the surface. She sunk before she’d taken another step.
The bog swallowed up the elephant-sized monstrosity without so much as a hiccup. The thick layer of green foam gathered around the place where she’d disappeared.
Holding my breath, I waited. Maybe she dove below on purpose to fight the bog creature? Maybe she would come careening onshore to attack my EEP?
A huge bubble rose and popped on the bog’s surface. And that was it.
Stepping away from the porthole, I felt the blood drain from my face. A glance toward the McGuyvered soil samplers that rested beside the hatch gave me a thought.
“VELMA?” I said.
“Yes, Joan.”
“Did you really need soil probes or were you trying to distract me from myself?”
“The two questions are not mutually exclusive rendering the word ‘or’ inappropriate in this context,” VELMA said.
I sighed and collapsed into the chair, pulling the lever that reclined it.
“Yes, to both, then,” I said. “No need to wake me in the morning. I’m sleeping in.”
“Very well, Joan,” VELMA said, and once again I couldn’t help but attribute human emotion to the AI’s intonation. VELMA sounded chagrined. I conceded another point to CeCe’s brilliance. It was my only comfort.
Chapter 7
Raxkarax
Heart thudding in my chest, I asked VELMA to connect me to Joan as the nearing satellites gave us an opening. In the space before I heard Joan’s honeyed voice, I beseeched my Goddesses for Their blessing.
“Hello?” Joan said, her voice rough from sleep I surmised. Kathe.
“Ah. I am sorry to wake you,” I said. “The next time I will task VELMA to wait.”
She cleared her throat. “No, it’s fine. What’s up?”
Taken aback by her subdued but approachable demeanor, I paused to gather my thoughts.
“If you have not yet witnessed it, you should observe the rising of the second sun,” I said.
“Um, that sounds—interesting—but the marsh has a thick layer of green fog that hardly ever lifts,” she said. The words not spoken were doubtless less kind.
“Hold, woman,” I said in haste before she could disconnect. “Of a morning, the second sun’s rays cut through many layers of the fog and sets the horizon alight with a green flash. I have seen this myself from the very bog in which you reside.”
“Hang on,” she said with a disgruntled sigh, and I heard fumbling items, rustling fabric, and the snick of a latch. “Going outside. Just a sec.”
Waiting, I closed my eyes and tried to imagine the scene. I did not yet know what this human looked like, so instead I imagined facing the east when the second sun breached the horizon line from the bog. My place in the thick wood prevented me from observing the same phenomenon.
A gasp filled my ears.
“Oh my God,” she said, a quiet reverence in her voice. “It happened so fast; I wasn’t expecting that.”
Warmth flooded my chest and fangs clipped my lips when I smiled.
“I am pleased you saw it,” I said. “I will let you return to your—slumber.” The image of a faceless woman with soft skin and enticing curves lying in repose entered my mind unbidden.
