“Good mornings my very good friends!” Bob's voice startled them, and they instantly stepped away from each other, the moment lost. “I did catching some very tasty lizards for breakingfasts.”
They looked on in morbid fascination as Bob held up two of the biggest iguanas Evelyn had ever seen – not that she had ever seen one in real life, and they were nothing compared to the salamanders of the day before. Still, each one was well over a meter long. “I did catching them while they were making the sexing,” Bob grinned widely. “Is that what you two peoples were going to doing now?”
“No!” Matthew blurted out, looking at Evelyn with wide eyes. “I mean … I don't think so.”
“Definitely not,” she said, frowning at him in amusement.
“Oh. Well then you can helping me to taking the skins off these lizards, because the skins they do not tasting very nice. Chewy,” he added, pulling a face.
“Um ...” Matthew said, but before he could make an excuse Bob had tossed him one of the iguanas, which he fumbled trying to catch and eventually held at arm's length as though it might try to bite him.
“Relax,” Evelyn laughed. “It's dead.”
“Yeah. Yeah, it's dead,” Matthew said, nodding his head vigorously, and Evelyn got the impression he was trying to convince himself. “So how do we ...” He glanced over to Bob, who had raised his iguana to his mouth and was busy stripping away the skin with his teeth. “Oh.”
Evelyn laughed. “I'm pretty sure you could do it with your knife. I mean, unless you want to gnaw on a dead iguana.”
“No, no, the knife is a good idea.” He draped his iguana over a rock and drew his knife.
“I'm going to go wake the others,” Evelyn said, catching his eyes.
As he nodded, Evelyn could swear she saw Matthew blush.
When she got back into the cave Clove was just stirring.
“Oh, hi Evelyn,” she said.
“Hey. How did you sleep?”
Clove scowled at Kenji's prone figure, which emitted a steady nasal drone. “Aside from that constant racket, not bad thanks.” She glanced around. “Where are the others?”
“Outside,” Evelyn tried to hide her smile, “Preparing breakfast.”
“Did someone say breakfast?”
They turned to Kenji, who had snapped upright like a jack-in-the-box. Evidently he was hardwired with a waking mechanism that recognized food terms.
“God, you're like a bottomless pit,” Clove laughed. “My grandma would have loved you.”
“Was she a good cook, your grandma?”
“The best,” Clove smiled sadly, and Evelyn guessed she had been dreaming about her family back on Earth. Clove rubbed the dreams from her eyes. “So, what's for breakfast?”
“Yeah,” Kenji added excitedly, “what's for breakfast?”
This time Evelyn didn't bother trying to hide her smile. “Come and see for yourselves.”
About an hour later their breakfast was ready.
The iguanas tasted less bad than Evelyn had expected after being grilled over a fire Bob had lit near the river by transferring some coals from the one he kept forever smoldering in his cave, and in fact as she looked over the carcasses there was barely a scrap of meat remaining. She had to admit, taking in the contented expressions of her companions and the beautiful valley in which they sat, that the idea of simply living out their lives hidden here was somewhat appealing. But she knew it was only a romantic thought – and Brenner was still out there.
The words the Mind had spoken through Brenner in her dream had stayed with her all morning. What if it had been real? What if the Mind really did have Brenner? She didn't know when she had decided this, but she suddenly knew she had to go to the Colony. She had to see for herself. The only question was: how would she explain her decision to the others?
Suddenly Clove gave voice to her thoughts of their missing companion. “I wonder how Brenner's doing,” she said, looking down at the iguana leg in her hand. “She must be so hungry, and afraid.”
“Yeah, we should get back to the shuttle today. Maybe she's seen our message,” Matthew said hopefully.
“I dunno guys...” Kenji scratched his chin nervously. “What about those freakin' wolves? You remember; the ones that tried to eat us?”
“We'll just have to be careful,” Matthew answered. “We can't just forget about Brenner, pretend like she doesn't exist.”
“Look, all I'm saying is it doesn't help anyone if we get ourselves killed.”
“What if it was you all alone out there? We'd come back for you, you know.”
Kenji met Matthew’s stare evenly. “I know. And I appreciate that. But we can't just go traipsing through the woods and hope those things don't find us again. We need a plan.”
“We could create some kind of a diversion ...” Clove suggested.
“Yeah, exactly. A diversion could work.”
Evelyn had been listening to their conversation in silence. She didn't know how to tell them about her dream, didn't know how to explain the strange link she seemed to have with the Mind, how it spoke to her. Following some deep intuition, she had never told them about the voices in her head when they first arrived, voices which she now knew belonged to the Mind, or the fact that both Seren and Holly had been trying to take her somewhere. Now she finally had an idea where.
The Tall Hut. She was certain that was where the Mind was located, and from where it controlled the black mist. Would she find Brenner there? She didn't know, but she knew it was time for her to come clean.
“I think I know where Brenner is,” she said. They all turned to look at her, and she told them everything: about the voices she'd heard, about Seren and Holly trying to lead her somewhere, about her dream. It felt good, to share her burden with them. She hadn't realized just how much of a strain it had been to keep it to herself.
When she had finished, a strange silence hung over the group.
Kenji broke it. “So, you're like, the chosen one?”
“I don't know why the Mind decided to speak to me, but yeah, I guess.”
“Why didn't you tell us before?” Matthew demanded. She could see that he was angry.
“I … I don't know. I didn't know what was going on, Matthew. I thought maybe I was imagining it, maybe I was going crazy.” This was a lie. The truth was she didn't know why she hadn't told them. Something inside her had just warned her against it.
“Is this something that happens, Bob?” Matthew turned to their shaggy host, who had been watching them in silence. “Does the Mind speak to people … telepathically?”
“I did never hearing the Mind speaking to me. I do not knowing 'telepafiklee'.”
“Look,” Evelyn said, “whatever the reason, it's decided that it wants me for … something. And it has Brenner. So I don't see any other choice but for me to go there.”
“Are you serious?” Matthew's snapped. “Evelyn, even if that thing really does have Brenner, do you really think it'll just let her go when you turn yourself in? You just told us about how it was saying we all had to die.”
“Yeah,” Clove added, “I think we can all agree that whatever the Mind is, it's not to be trusted.”
“But it's going to kill her. I can't let that happen.”
“I'm not saying we should just leave her there, but you can't keep this kind of stuff to yourself. We need to stick together, always.”
“Oh, that's a bit rich coming from you, don't you think?”
Matthew faltered under her glare, and turned away, looking contrite.
“Look,” she went on, feeling slightly remorseful, “I don't want you guys to put yourselves in danger if you don't have to.”
To her surprise, Matthew stood up and came over to her. He took her by the shoulders. “Evelyn, we're all in this together. We're not letting you go alone. Okay?”
She looked into his eyes, saw the hurt there, and realized he wasn't angry at her for keeping secrets; he was angry at her for thinking she didn't need thei
r help.
“Okay. But what are we going to do?”
He released her and leaned back. “I don't know, but I'm sure between us we can think of something that doesn't involve you walking into a trap.”
“I might have an idea,” Clove said. “But it's a long shot. And you're not going to like it.”
When she had finished explaining her plan, Matthew shook his head. “No way. It's too risky. We don't even know if it'll work!”
“I like it,” Evelyn said. “And I think it's worth a shot. Kenji?”
“What, are we a democracy now?” Kenji scowled.
“We're a team,” she glanced at Matthew, “and we need to decide together.”
Kenji looked from Evelyn to Matthew to Clove. He turned and looked at the river, gurgling peacefully through the creek. “I really like this place,” he said. “I wanna stay here.”
“Kenji ...” Evelyn started.
“So,” he continued, “Let's do this. Can't have no weird mind-controlling mind-controller running around on the loose. It'll totally ruin my vibe.”
Evelyn turned to Matthew. “So? What do you say?”
He looked at her sadly. “I hate this, and I wish you wouldn't do this, but if you're going to do it anyway – and I can see that you are – then I'm with you.”
“Thank you, Matthew.”
“But ...”
She raised an eyebrow.
“I'm coming with you into the Tall Hut.”
“I don't think you–”
“I'm sorry Evelyn, there's just no way I'm letting you walk in there alone.”
“We don't know what's going to happen in there.”
“Exactly, which is why it'll be good to have backup.”
Seeing that he wasn't going to budge on this, Evelyn decided to drop the matter for the time being. “Okay.” She gave him a nod before turning to Bob. “Bob, can you try to describe the layout of the Colony? And do you remember how to find the place you went to when you were Taken?”
Bob leaped up excitedly. “You are going to helping me freeing the People?”
“Well, we're going to try.”
Bob threw his hands up in the air. “I did knowing you would helping me, you and your clever friends who did coming from the stars!” He snatched up a thin stick and began drawing lines in the dirt. “This is being the Colony,” he explained, as his lines took on the form of a series of concentric circles with lanes spreading out from the center.
“What's that in the middle?” Kenji asked.
“That is being the Tall Hut, where the Mind does living. No people who do going in there ever do coming out again.”
Matthew looked at Evelyn imploringly, but her mind was made up. “They must go somewhere. People don't just disappear,” she said. “And besides, we have a plan.”
“A plan we don't know will work,” Matthew pointed out again. “And we still haven't figured out how to get through the forest without being set upon by wolves.”
“You're starting to sound like Kenji,” Evelyn snapped.
“Gee, thanks,” Kenji said.
“I do knowing how to getting through the forest without the hunters seeing us,” Bob said. “It is very scaring, but the hunters never do going down there.”
“Down where?” Kenji raised an eyebrow.
“Into the hole where I did dying, the place where there is being no day times, only dark times.”
Kenji scowled. “Wonderful.”
18
It was dark, it was damp, and unseen creatures scuttled loudly in the shadows.
The hole Bob had spoken of turned out to be a tunnel at the bottom of a crevasse in the forest floor a short walk from his cave. It had been easy enough to climb down, as the crevasse seemed to be a result of the tunnel's roof caving in, and the fallen earth from above had left a kind of ramp. But once they had walked several paces into the tunnel, leaving the daylight behind them, the going became tougher. For starters, it was pitch dark. Bob had made each of them a makeshift flashlight by catching glow-worms from his cave and placing them inside cones rolled from the broad leaves of an old tree by the river. These provided just enough luminescence that, by squinting her eyes, Evelyn could discern the ground in front of her and the walls on either side. It was certainly better than nothing, though she and the others did have to stop every few yards to re-position the worms, who kept trying to escape.
“These poor little things,” Clove said, carefully picking up a worm that had fallen to the muddy floor. “They're just like us, being taken from their home and forced to explore some faraway place.”
“Clove,” Kenji said, “you're adorable.”
“Um … thanks?”
“This tunnel...” Evelyn said, looking around them. “Don't you guys think it looks man-made?” Even with the poor light, she could make out that the tunnel cut through the ground at an unnaturally straight angle, and its dimensions appeared uniform. The floor was a layer of soft mud that stuck to their feet, sapping their energy as they trudged through the darkness. The walls looked to be made of some kind of stone, cracked with age and green with lichen and moss.
“Kinda, yeah,” Kenji said.
“Do you know how this tunnel was made, Bob?” Matthew asked.
“I do not knowing. I only did finding it. Up ahead you will seeing the place I did falling down when I did dying.”
“Bob, you said you couldn't climb out of the place where you fell, so how are we going to get out of here?”
“Oh, this hole goes on and on beyond that place, and there are many places to coming out. I do coming this way sometimes, to looking for mushrooms.”
“Mushrooms?”
“Yes. Looking!”
By now Evelyn's eyes had adjusted to the dimness enough that she was able to follow Bob's finger to where a clump of pale mushrooms sprouted from a crack in the wall of the tunnel. Bob stopped to pluck some of them. He popped one into his mouth whole and chewed happily.
“Trying one,” he said, holding out one of the white fungi. “Very tasty, you will seeing!”
“I'll have one!” Kenji jumped forward and took the offered mushroom, removing his helmet to pop it into his mouth. He chewed it eagerly before swallowing it down. “Not bad,” he said, as the others waited expectantly for his review. “I've never had a mushroom before. It's kind of earthy; fresh, with a hint of cave. You guys should try one.”
One by one they all tried the mushrooms until there were none left, and Evelyn had to admit they did have a pleasantly clean, mildly savory taste.
“Maybe we will finding more,” Bob said, starting off down the tunnel again once they had all rounded up their escaping glow worms.
After walking for what Evelyn guessed was about a mile, the tunnel began to curve gently, and soon after that they came to a place where the walls suddenly fell away, opening up into some kind of antechamber. It was hard to tell how big it was by the dim light of her living flashlight. She moved a few steps towards where the wall had been and found that there was a ledge, like a platform, at about waist height.
“What is this place, Bob?” Evelyn asked.
“This is where I did falling into the hole. You cannot seeing it anymore, trees and leaves did falling to block the hole, but right up there was being a hole to the sky.” He pointed at the roof, invisible in the darkness. “Ah, here is the very exactly place!”
She stooped to examine a patch in the ground where Bob had stopped. Apparently water still dripped through the hole in the roof, for a small crater had formed in the mud floor, and at the bottom of the crater a piece of dull metal caught her eye. Squatting, she scraped aside more of the mud, trying to expose the object.
By now the others had all gathered around, and it was Matthew who first made the observation. “That looks like a train track.”
He bent to help her, and within a few seconds it became clear that there was indeed a train track running along the bottom of the tunnel.
“Okay, now I'm really confused
,” Kenji said.
“Yeah,” Clove agreed. “Somehow I can't imagine that OrbiCor had a subway on Janus. I mean, look at this place. It's been abandoned for ages.”
“Let's not forget we were asleep for ten thousand years,” Evelyn reminded them. “Back on Earth we went from the invention of the wheel to space travel in only five thousand.”
“You make a good point. Still. It's weird.” Kenji looked at her strangely. “Hey, quit doing that.”
“Doing what?”
He giggled. “Moving your nose like that. It's making me … it's making me dizzy!”
“What the Bloom are you talking about?”
Kenji began wiggling his head bizarrely, skewing his eyes.
“Kenji are you okay?”
“Hmm?”
“Guys!” Clove suddenly said, reaching out to grab Evelyn and Matthew, who were on either side of her. “Do you guys see that? Look at that! What is that?”
Evelyn turned to where she was staring but saw nothing but darkness. To her surprise, Matthew nodded.
“Wow … it's beautiful. It's like a … like a … like a million enormous flowers that have been shrunk. And … they're dancing!”
“Yeah!” Clove laughed in amazement.
Evelyn frowned, befuddled. “What the hell's going on guys? This isn't funny.”
Bob began giggling hysterically then, clutching his belly and pointing at the ceiling. “Wheeeeh! Down I did falling, down down down thump!” He slapped his hands together.
“What the ...”
“Look!” Kenji, having stopped his head-wiggling, scampered down the tunnel a short way. “More mushrooms!”
It was then that Evelyn clicked. She had heard about the psychedelic effects of some mushrooms. Apparently they had been quite popular with certain crowds back on Earth before the Bloom. “Kenji, no!” She rushed forward, pulling him away from the mushroom patch.
“But I'm hungry. Hunger-bungers.” He chuckled as he tried to shake her off. “Hunger-runger-bunger-rungery!”
“All of you, listen! It's the mushrooms. They're making you … they're making you imagine things. Oh Bloom, I can't believe this is happening.” Looking around at them, Evelyn could tell that her words weren't sinking in, Bob was watching her in fascination. Clove, apparently thinking it was some game, was trying to help her restrain Kenji, laughing all the while. Then she looked at Matthew, who was watching her hungrily, the way one might watch someone scooping up chocolate ice cream on a hot day.
The Cloud Page 15