Chapter 1: Goodbye
Lance knelt next to a creek he’d redirected. Washing mud off his hands, he
checked his calloused hands for any new cuts or scrapes. A few graced his palms. He cleaned the
dirt out before double- and- triple checking each cut for signs of infection. There was none.
Pulling his long, matted hair out of his face, he picked up the bow he’d made.
Grabbing his quiver of arrows, he inspected the feathers on each one. Coming across a few that
loosened, he quickly re-fastened them to the shaft.
Inspecting the arrow heads, he ran his finger across the reforged pieces of metal
from the destroyed Veles base, giving each one a wiggle. The sharpened ends held fast. Placing
them back in the quiver, he tied it to his waist.
Leaving the cleaning and water gathering area of their camp, Lance made his way
through the thick forest, downhill a few dozen yards. Standing in a small clearing he’d made
were three wooden crosses, carved from the hard-wood trees that towered over him. Kneeling,
Lance rested his bow on his knee as he looked at the markers.
“Thank you,” he whispered. “Thank you for your sacrifices, your willingness to
give up your own lives to save ours. We wouldn’t have made it this far without any of you. I
only wish I could have honored you better.”
“Two of the three at least,” Chadavia said, emerging from the tree line.
The former SOAT’s skin was pale, his shoulders slumped and his voice weak as
he looked at the crosses. He pointed at the last one to the right.
“Devon can burn in whatever underworld you believe in,” the Jarog added.
Lance rose to his feet, slinging his bow over his shoulder.
“He may have been a Veles, but he saved us from that giant lizard,” Lance
replied, touching the sharp tooth the size of a man’s hand that dangled around his neck.
“I don’t think it counts if you’re just slower than everyone else,” Chadavia
replied.
“It stopped chasing us, didn’t it?” Lance asked, turning to his friend. “What are
you doing up? Your fever clearly hasn’t broken.”
“This infection hasn’t broken,” Chadavia countered, showing a small cut on his
leg surrounded by swollen, pussy flesh. “You’ll need me.”
“I can’t use you in this state,” Lance countered. “And we both know what
happens when an infection sets in. We don’t have the antibiotics to get you better.”
“How do you know the scavengers are back?”
“There are re-entry trails on the horizon. They should be at the destroyed base any
minute, and when they land, I’m sticking to the plan and getting you out of here.”
“You can’t do it by yourself.”
“We both know I’m not alone.”
“You really think the Spirit of the Forest is going to aid you?” Chadavia asked. “It
may have saved you with the superstitious locals who are still tribal. It’s not going to do anything
to a bunch of space-faring scavengers who are little better than pirates!”
“The Spirit of the Forest is with me. If things start to go badly, I have no doubt it
will come to my aid.”
“Your faith in that thing is unfounded.”
Lance looked at the crosses. Shaking his head, he thumbed at the bow string that
sat across his bare chest.
“I’ve lost two and a quarter friends to this planet. I’m not going to lose another.”
“How do you come to that math?”
“Devon may have been a Veles, but he was at least half a friend by the end,”
Lance explained. “Then there was the whole bitten in half thing, leaving only a quarter left.”
The low roar of ship engines tore through the jungle. Lance drew an arrow from
his quiver, knocking it before giving the string a few test pulls. It was as tight and springy as the
day he’d made it.
Standing up, he walked over to Chadavia and looked the Jarog up and down. He
looked at his clothes, grimacing at the muddied, blood and sweat-stained uniforms they’d
managed to scrounge.
“When we get off this rock, the first thing I’m doing is taking a shower,”
Chadavia muttered.
“First, you’re getting antibiotics, then you can take a shower,” Lance countered.
“Let’s get going. Stay low, close and try not to give our position away.”
“If there’s not a human or a Jarog among their group, how do you plan on
communicating?” Chadavia asked.
“It’s a good thing Dasha’Ful taught me how to speak Galeese, then,” Lance
replied.
“I didn’t think human tongues could make those noises.”
“You didn’t think human tongues could speak Jarogeese either,” Lance replied,
opening his arms and holding the bow and arrow with one hand. “And yet here we are, talking up
a storm when we could be getting a ship and getting out of here.”
Chadavia looked up the hillside. Thick undergrowth accompanied by thicker trees
made seeing more than fifteen feet in front of them impossible. With a frustrated sigh, he reached
under his waistband and drew a knife he spent over a year forging into the perfect weapon.
Spinning the blade, he let out a frustrated huff.
“The beacon was never going to work, and you know it,” Lance said as he started
up a small path they’d made.
“We fixed the capacitor problem,” Chadavia replied, his voice weak.
Lance glanced back to see the Jarog wipe a sleeve full of sweat from his brow.
His eyes narrowed, never having seen his friend sweat so much.
“It was a power issue, even before we started to lose our brain power survivor by
survivor. We weren’t going to be able to generate enough juice to get to human, or alliance
space. Best case scenario, we let the pirates know exactly where we are instead of being able to
attack them by surprise.”
As they wound their way through the thick forest, the sounds of a rushing
waterfall cut through the songs and screeches of the wildlife. The air was thick and heavy,
pressing down on him as he moved. His clothes were constantly damp even though he wasn’t
sweating.
A rustle in the trees brought both men to a stop. Lance grabbed the string of his
bow. Standing straight, his eyes darted in all directions. Focusing his hearing, he heard the rustle
a few more times.
“You think it’s the Spirit of the Forest?” Chadavia teased before holding back a
series of coughs.
Sniffing the air, he picked up the familiar damp stench that permeated the forest.
Lance nodded before crouching and continuing to move forward silently.
“She’s watching us,” Lance replied. “Curious what we’re doing.”
Lance moved slowly through the trees, letting Chadavia move at his own labored
pace. Reaching the top of the waterfall, he moved toward the river’s edge. Ducking behind a tree
trunk, Lance poked his head out.
“Eh, those aren’t terrible odds,” he muttered to himself.
Two Galio transport ships were set down on the outer edge of the massive crater
of the self-destructed base. A strange craft unlike anything Lance had seen before hovered over
the hole, weapons at the ready as it slowly scanned the surrounding woods.
Several Galio, a Jarog, a handful of what looked like humans in full armor and a
Tardig walked over the rubble with scanners. As they inspected it for loot, Lance could hear
them griping about how humid the planet was.
As the engine of the flying ship roared, a flock of birds flew out of the trees. They
spun and swarmed, some flapping toward the monitoring vessel. A flare of light knocked down
the faster birds several yards away from the craft’s hull. A few of the slower birds managed to
skim the bottom of the ship.
Stepping back into the forest, Lance returned to Chadavia, who was sitting on a
rotted-out stump. His breathing was heavy as he rubbed his infected leg. His large eyes were
dilated to the point they looked black. The fronds around the outer side of his skull drooped
limply around his shoulders.
“What’s it looking like?” Chadavia asked.
“There’s a ship with a kinetic barrier and intakes the size of Texas,” Lance
replied.
“We have been over this; I do not understand your human state references and
insults. I am still trying to grasp what you meant when you called me Florida man.”
“You were drunk, you were naked, and you said you were going to wrestle what
I’m assuming is this planet’s version of an alligator,” Lance mused. “If that’s not Florida man, I
don’t know what is.”
Untying his quiver, Lance pulled off one of the exterior leather flaps. Behind it
was a short sword he’d hobbled together with a multi-tool he’d found. Grabbing the vine
wrapped handle, he tied the quiver back around his waist.
“Didn’t you say that was a dishonorable weapon?” Chadavia asked.
“Only for the natives,” Lance replied. “I’m not about to fight the natives. And
why are you giving me a hard time about it? You have a knife.”
“A work tool. It’s not dishonorable to use a tool of work to defend oneself,”
Chadavia replied.
“Talk about a loophole.” Lance chuckled. “I’m going to try and negotiate a ride
off anyway. I need you to stay hidden where no one can see you.”
“I can help!”
“They see an injured man, they’ll kill us both for sure.”
“And if you go out there, they’ll shoot you.”
“One, it’s not a guarantee that they’ll shoot me—we could resolve this
peacefully—and B, they wouldn’t be able to hit me. Whatever mad science Irene did to me made
my CRISPR enhancements seem like the Great-Value version of whatever this is. I’ll be fine.”
“But...”
“No buts,” Lance cut him off. “You stay here. If I have to call for the Spirit of the
Forest and still need your help, I’ll let you know.”
Chadavia pursed his lips. Letting out a frustrated sigh, he folded his arms, shaking
his head.
“I don’t like this.”
“And I’m sure you’d like it less when you can’t move quickly enough, and they
put a bullet in you.”
“That was insensitive!”
Lance smirked, winked at his friend and turned back toward the river. Sneaking
out of the forest, he watched the sentry ship. As it turned away, he slipped into the warm water,
keeping a hand on his arrows, he slid beneath the surface and swam to the far bank.
Poking his head out of the water, he watched the ship overhead carefully once
more. As it turned away again, he scampered up the outer edge of the crater. Reaching the top, he
stuck the short sword into the ground, grabbed the bow string but held the weapon down.
“Good afternoon!” Lance shouted in English, Jarogeese and Galeese.
The ship overhead turned toward him, aiming its weapons at the warrior. The
other pirates raised their rifles, pointing them at him as well.
“There’s no need for weapons at the ready,” Lance said in all three languages.
“I’m just looking for a ride off this rock.”
“We have translators,” the Tardig snarled. “Stop repeating yourself.”
Lance’s brow furrowed as he looked at the giant. He understood the enormous
alien clear as day.
“Do you speak English?” Lance asked.
“Only Tardegeese,” the large man replied, pointing the cannon of a pistol at
Lance. “What do you want?”
“Stick a pin in that for later,” he muttered to himself before flashing a bright
smile. “Like I mentioned earlier, I’m just looking for a way off this rock. I was a prisoner at this
installation. I managed to blow it up but didn’t quite get on an escape shuttle in time.”
“What was this installation?” one of the humans asked.
Lance motioned to one of the shards of twisted metal. It had the Veles symbol on
it. Immediately, the humans tightened the grips on their weapons before taking several steps
back.
“He’s Veles!” one shouted.
“No, I’m not,” Lance replied. “I kill Veles.”
“I thought the Veles were wiped out?” the Galio asked.
Lance felt the probe of a Jarog at the base of his skull. He looked at the
salamander and shook his head.
“I’d appreciate it if you stayed out of there,” Lance said, resisting the read.
“Kill him,” the Tardig ordered.
“So, it’s going to be one of those days,” Lance sighed as the weapons on the ship
started to whir to life. “Real bad move.” ...
We hope you are enjoying the book so far. To continue reading...
Copyright © 2024 All Rights Reserved
Please log in to recommend or discuss...
