I reach out to touch it, awed by the resourceful little plant, capable of thriving in the strangest places.
Distracted, I only notice the sound of the spaceship passing overhead when it gets so loud it blocks out everything else. Glaring up at the sky through the crack, I cover my ears and furrow my brows against it.
Something shoots past my vision.
Startling, I jerk, dropping my flashlight to unsheathe my daggers.
Something else flashes to my left and, right as the spaceship flies out of earshot, I hear a loud hissing sound. Brandishing my blades, I back up into the lichen-covered wall. “Who’s there?”
There’s another flash to my right, deeper in the tunnel.
I twist in that direction. “Who are you?” I shout. “Answer me!”
The hissing grows louder, and thankful for the patch of sunlight, I snap my eyes back and forth, scanning the gloom all around. “Come out and face me!” I goad, swaying my knives in the air in preparation.
Suddenly there’s a whizzing noise directly beneath me, and I dart my eyes down to see what it is, only for another flicker of movement to catch my eye, this one to my left again. Something comes streaking toward me out of the darkness—I spin and drop to the floor, but my dodge is a little too late and I take a shocking blow to the back of my skull. Lurching, pain erupts through me as my head is forced forward. Without another thought, I crash face first into the ground, and everything goes black.
FOUR
CREATURE, BEING, HUMAN, FEMALE
Darolus
I gently placethe human down on the floor at the edge of the pool. Small and fragile, the creature’s limp body settles easily on the hide I’ve placed there: the rugged coat of an animal I killed long ago. The human is smaller than that creature, by a considerable amount. Its fur will offer her body some cushion against the hard ground.
I tilt my head to the side, assessing. I have never seen a real human before, but I have seen pictures of them all over the city. Shaped like me, except much smaller and with two legs instead of a tail, I can only surmise I am looking down at a female, as she is delicate in appearance and has pronounced mounds on her chest, long black hair, and a vividly colored mouth.
Shifting to her legs, I take hold of one with each hand and spread them apart. They are covered in a kind of fabric, perhaps armor. When I notice they bend in the middle and at the bottom, I test those joints as well, being gentle as Iexplore her strange mobility. I do not want to hurt her before I know why she is here, but if I have a chance to know my enemy while they are unaware, I will take that chance.
Whether she is an enemy or not, I will find out once she wakes up.
After testing her arms, and taking a moment to pet her silky hair, I turn away from her and go above, where the orb rests in one of the cracks where sunlight shines through. Awakening it, I take it back down below with me, hoping it will be able to tell me more of the creature in my nest.
The orb launches into the air and floats above her, scanning her over with a red beam. “Homo sapiensfemale, fully grown, Caucasian mixed.”
“How do I wake her?” I ask after staring down at the human female for several long, contemplative minutes. She is smaller than I expected a human to be. I thought the creatures were closer in size to my kind—though, after seeing fake humans around the city, I knew the largest pictures of them could not be true. But she is not large at all.
I am not good with small things. I tend to break them when I am not paying attention.
The orb scans her again. “She is breathing. Her heart rate and temperature are within average range. If she is sleeping, a nudge will wake her, otherwise she will rouse eventually on her own. If she is unconscious, or has been put under, she may wake anytime between two hours and twenty years.”
“Twenty years? How many seasons is that?”
“Forty seasons.”
I look down at the small human and worry that she may be more than sleeping, since she did not rouse earlier whenI carried her down here. “Put under?” I ask next, confused by the orb’s wording.
“Put under means to be rendered unconscious by drugs, either those of legal or illegal categorization. Without updating my systems to Pro, I cannot scan her further for a more accurate diagnosis. Upgrade today for six hundred and eighty-nine dollars and ninety-nine cents?—”
I snatch the orb out of the air and swipe it off, tossing it over my shoulder in irritation. I lost my original orb long ago, and the orbs I have found since have never been the same.
Lowering over my captive, I take another close look, making sure she is not a robot herself. I distrust the metal constructs outright. Despite being warm to the touch, her skin is marred and smudged with dirt. I flare my nostrils, inhaling; she smells of smoke and, faintly, of blood. And there is another smell to her, an earthy one I recognize from the places deep beneath the ground, but I ignore it. She was nowhere near the secret tunnels when I found her.
Flipping her over, I search for the source of the blood I scent, discovering only a couple of drops on the back of her black shirt. Running my hands over her body, I test and probe for additional wounds, thankfully finding none. The only wound she seems to have is the one to the back of her head. I test her scalp with my fingers.
A pained groan leaves her lips.
Pulling my hands away, I frown.
