Southern Stars

by Melissa Good

  Kerry merely straightened and leaned toward her, resting her cheek against Dar’s shoulder. “Glad we’re at least up here, not down at the bottom of the path.”

  “Mm.” Dar pulled the sleeping bag around their shoulders, and glanced at her watch.

  Only two a.m.. She rested her head against the wall and diverted her attention, trying to ignore the discomfort long enough to get some rest.

  Dar picked up the cup she’d filled with rainwater and sipped from it, her mouth a little pinched and dried on the inside from the saltiness of the fish they’d had. She offered the cup to Kerry, who accepted it and then set it down between them.

  “Too wet for cards, huh?” Kerry remarked wryly.

  “Wish I had a Rubik’s cube,” Dar said.

  Kerry regarded her. “I’ve seen you solve that underwater, Dar. What challenge would this be?”

  “Dark.”

  “Mm.”

  The lightning flashed again, and suddenly Rich let out a yell and pointed below them. “What was that?”

  Dar’s hand fitted itself around a rock and leaned forward to look out, waiting for the next flash. It came, and she took in the whole area, seeing nothing but rock. “What?”

  Rich was half standing, hand on the curve of the arch over his head, blinking. “I swear I saw something.”

  Everyone got up on their knees and stared.

  There was only the sound of the rain, and the swish of the water passing through the center of the path, and the thunder rumbling overhead. But even repeated flashes showed nothing downhill from them. Dar got to her feet and looked intently at the path.

  Had she heard something? Her ears twitched, as she was half convinced she’d detected the scrape of something against stone, a scratching sound. Then she saw a few rocks tumble off the top of the arch and fall to the ground right in front of her.

  She went still, and in reflex, looked up at the underside of the arch as her heart started to pound. She felt all the chill of the rain vanish as blood flushed through her muscles.

  “What?” Rich said, staring at her.

  “I think I heard something up there.” Dar pointed at the arch. “On top.”

  “Fuck.” Dave pulled his hood up and ran to the upper side of the arch, and into the rain, shading his eyes from it and whirling to look up. “Nothing from this side!”

  Thunder rumbled, and then they all heard it, a rasp and rattle of something big on the ledge overhead. Everyone was awake and got up in alarm.

  Dar dropped the rock in her hand and took her pocketknife out of her pocket and opened it, feeling the blade lock as she tightened her fingers around the hilt. She felt Kerry take a firm hold of her belt. She looked around, to see her partner braced. “What?”

  “What what?” Kerry hissed back. “Just what do you think you’re doing?”

  Dar half turned and almost laughed, when she heard more sounds overhead and quickly turned back to see something fall through the air to the ground. Lightning lit up again and she saw a large animal getting its balance back and turn toward her.

  “Oh crap.” Dar exhaled realizing how large the cat was. She spread her boots out at shoulder width as her body recognized the threat. She let out a booming yell in the animals’ direction, waving her arms in a motion that did nothing to deter the cat.

  Someone screamed behind her and she heard Kerry yell a warning. A stone came flying past her to miss the cat and go bouncing down the slope into the darkness.

  It rushed at her, and for a second she froze, then instinct took over and she lashed out with a kick aimed at its head and felt it connect, sending the cat skidding to one side as its claws scrabbled in the wet gravel at the unexpected attack.

  Then it lunged forward again and she leaped at it, reaching for the teeth coming at her knees in a perfect moment of unreal insanity. Its eyes met hers in a flash of silver light and two feral souls met with no time to do anything but act according to their natures.

  She wasn’t cognizant of the knife in her hand, but the blade tip hit something hard, and with her momentum penetrated. Her other hand grabbed at the cat’s neck and shoved its head away from her, teeth missing her wrist as it twisted to meet her, claws extended.

  She landed on top of it with all her weight and shoved it to the ground. She heard it yowl in pain and surprise and her knees came down on top of the cat’s hind legs. Her forearm pinned its neck to the ground, her thinking mind suddenly wondering what the hell she was supposed to do next.

  Then without warning, Tracey landed next to her with a thump and a splash, a long blade grasped in both hands. She stabbed the animal repeatedly with a screaming of her own, nearly slicing Dar’s hand as she struggled to get the hell out of the way.

  Dar had to get off the cat’s body, or risk being impaled. She jerked back hastily. “Hey! Look out! Stop!” She yelled in alarm. “Hey!”

  The cat twisted and scrambled free as Dar’s weight came off it. The cat ran off limping. It shook its head and disappeared into the rain.

  “Fuck!” Tracey panted. “I wanted to get it for Josh.” She stared at the knife in her hands. “Little bastard!” She watched the dark stain of blood rinse past with the driving rain and put one hand down into it.

  “You damn near stabbed me!” Dar said, in an exasperated tone.

  A rush of people was now at their back, and Dar felt hands lifting her to her feet as she stood there shivering in reaction, with Kerry’s arms wrapping around her.

  “That was insane,” Rich said. “That was freaking insane.”

  “Nuts,” Janet said. “Are you guys okay?”

  Dar was silent for a moment, feeling the beat of the rain on her skin and the afterimages of the cat and its vivid eyes, and its yowl fading. “Yeah,” she finally said, motioning them all back under the arch. “I’m fine. Just wet and freaked out.”

  They all clustered back under the arch, and then Todd pushed through them. “What in the hell just happened?” He asked, getting to Dar’s side.“What was that?”

  “That was the mountain lion,” Kerry responded. “Or a mountain lion.”

  “Yeah,” Rich said. “So, Dar kicked it in the head and then she and Tracey jumped on it and started stabbing it. Pretty rad.” He eyed the two women with bemused respect. “It went up onto the arch. Was stalking us.”

  Todd’s eyebrows hiked up, as Amy peered from around his broad shoulder. “Oh shit.” He looked out. “It got away?”

  “It’s got holes in it,” Don said. “Better it than us.” He pointed down the path. “Went that way.”

  Todd grabbed one of the walking sticks and ran in that direction. “I’ll make sure.”

  “Todd wa— Amy flinched as a flash of lightning cracked overhead and they all ducked backwards, and when the afterimages faded.

  Don grabbed her arm and held her back. “No sense in both you out there,” he said, in a practical tone. “That thing’s gonna die soon. He’ll be back.”

  Dar felt her heart settle, and she pretended everyone wasn’t furtively staring at her. She turned and regarded Kerry, who, after a brief pause grimly smiled. “That sucked.” She edged back under the arch and out of the rain, now soaked to the skin and shivering.

  Kerry took the knife out of her hand and unlocked the blade to fold it closed. Then she put her arms around Dar and exhaled. “Jesus.” She could feel the vibrations running through Dar’s tall frame and she closed her eyes, giving her a gentle scratch on the back.

  Courage was such a funny thing. You couldn’t buy it, couldn’t even develop it inside yourself. It was just something you had. Or not. She felt Dar’s body slowly relax, and she guided them both back to the spot they’d picked and sat down, listening to the rain coming down all around them. Listening to all the people talking around them. Hearing again the angry howl of the cat.

  Hearing again Dar’s answering yell, bold and fierce and without fear echoing in her memory. Kerry looked aside, watching Dar’s profile in the faint light. She reflected on the
realization that most people, especially most people who had lives like theirs, never got to test where they fell on the flight or fight scale.

  Strange. She watched the rain fall. Strange, and often on the edge of heartbreak.

  Dar sighed. “I shouldn’t do shit like that.” She shook her head a little. “Idiotic.”

  Kerry tasted the truth of that. “You can’t help doing shit like that, Dar,” she replied, understanding the truth of that, as well. “We joke about you being a crusader, but you know...”

  “I know,” Dar answered. “But is that fair? I seem to remember promising you to think about us first.”

  There was something so woebegonly charming about that it made Kerry smile. “You did.” She took Dar’s hand in hers. “But that was only for the stuff you could think about.”

  Dar grunted a little. “Yeah, I guess this is different. No time.”

  Odd moment of epiphany. Kerry clasped her fingers with Dar’s. “Let me tell you something about you and me, Paladar Katherine.”

  “Uh oh.” Dar eyed her.

  “If there’s a fucking mountain lion coming at us, we jump on it,” Kerry said. “We don’t let it eat us.”

  Dar regarded her in silence for a moment. Then grinned, just a little.

  “Besides.” Kerry consciously lightened the tone. “Can you imagine me telling the gang at the office about this? You’ll end up having ridden a Tyrannosaurus Rex while singing God Bless America.”

  Dar chuckled silently, clasping her hands over Kerry’s, with a light shrug of acceptance. Then she leaned back against the rock and extended her boots out a little, as the rain started coming down harder.

  MORNING WAS DISMAL. Literally, because it was still raining, and figuratively since there was only leathery dried fish cooked the night before. Everyone was tired and had little sleep.

  They had an uphill climb to face on top of it, and the only positive note was they’d gone through all the supplies so there was little left for the crew to carry. Everyone had a pack on their back, and that was it.

  “Let’s get this over with,” Dar finally said, taking the lead out into the rain.

  “Fuck yeah,” Todd said. “Too bad I didn’t find that cat. I wanted a souvenir.” He dug his walking stick into the gravel and walked steadily upward. “So, what are you really?” He asked Dar as they trudged along.

  “What I am really what?” Dar replied shortly.

  “You a circus performer? Some reality thing for Animal Planet?” Todd asked. “You aren’t no computer geek.”

  “I’m a computer geek.”

  “Nah.”

  Dar just shook her head.

  The center of the path was a continuous stream of water, so they walked on the edges, the party split into two groups one on either side.

  Dar and Kerry were on the left hand side, with Todd, Amy and most of the crew. The rest of the passengers were on the other side, with Rich and Dave in the lead. Everyone walked carefully, and slowly enough that the three injured were able to keep up.

  They reached the plateau that they’d gotten the dried grasses from, finding it soggy and barren. “Should we pick up some of this stuff for later?” Rich asked, pointing at the remaining grasses, beaten down and ragged.

  “No, we’ll be at the ranger station before mid-day even at this pace,” Janet said. “No sense carrying wet grass.”

  Kerry dug her stick in as they reached a slightly steeper part of the path, leading up to a turn that bore to her left, and would then pitch downward to the station.

  She hoped.

  The canyon walls curved on either side of them, providing no shelter and just a funnel for the rain pouring down, the sky overhead solid, uncompromising dark gray.

  But, she thought, they’d left the lion behind them, and they only had a short distance to go, then it would be over.

  She could almost taste the hot cup of bad coffee she knew would be there, at the end of the trail.

  Chapter Ten

  DON LEANED AGAINST the rock wall with his arm lifted to block the rain. “Can’t believe this weather.” He was breathing hard, and next to him Marcia looked patient but miserable.

  But of course everyone was, in this march up a steep, sometimes slippery path into the rain.

  They were taking a brief rest, both to catch their breaths and to allow the deluge to lessen a little. Dar was braced against a large boulder, providing a rain break for Kerry, as well as Tracey and Pete, huddled behind her. The water down the path was now a solid rush. It came up over their boots as they stood in a tiny facsimile of the river they’d left far behind.

  “We’d be hip deep if we were back where we’d stopped last night,” Janet said. She was seated on a bit of rock out thrust, her cut leg stretched out, her face white with exhaustion. “But hey, at least no one’s dehydrated.”

  Tracey chuckled shortly. “True.”

  “That’s the usual problem out here,” Rich said. “Man I’m looking forward to a hot shower and dry clothes.”

  Todd shook his head. “What a bunch of pussies,” he said. “You think this is bad? We did a hike in the Yucatan where we didn’t have nothing for a week.”

  Kerry tipped her head back and allowed the rain to fill her mouth, swallowing it and licking her lips. It tasted of nothing and everything, sky and cloud and fog and as pure as water was going to be.

  Ahead of them, maybe a ten minute walk, was another large arch. Just past that they could see the path cresting. Water was running off the arch, making a curtain across the path. She could already feel the pounding on her head and imagined what that would be like.

  “Only morons pay money to be miserable,” Dar said. “I’d rather spend the week on my boat.”

  “With fresh caught lobster and a nicely chilled white wine,” Kerry said.

  “Please shut up,” Tracey said. “Most of us can’t afford lobster.”

  Kerry eyed her. “Sorry. We can, but we never buy it. We catch it in the ocean.” She paused. “Besides, we earned what we have. I’m not ashamed of it.”

  “No, sorry. I didn’t mean...” Tracey held up a hand. “Didn’t mean to diss you. Just jelly.”

  Janet stood. “We should get moving.”

  They all picked up their bags and shouldered them, starting up the path toward the arch in a straggled line as thunder rumbled over head again.

  Dar leaned forward and focused on the top of the path, looking forward to achieving it and the downhill stretch beyond it. “I think—

  “Always and constantly,” Kerry said. “Regular as lizards on our porch.”

  Dar chuckled. “I think I appreciate Miami’s flatness for the first time. Now I know why I steered clear of the stair climber in the gym.”

  Caught thinking that very same thing, Kerry just chuckled in response.

  They’d gotten perhaps twenty feet up the path when a huge crack sounded overhead that made them all duck. Lightning hit the top of the arch they were climbing toward and lit the area with such pungent white light they all turned to the side and closed their eyes.

  “Shit,” Janet yelped. “Oh shit!”

  Thunder boomed. Then as Dar blinked the after image out of her eyes, Tracey let out a bloodcurdling scream. Suddenly Rich pushed her to the side toward the wall. “What the hell...”

  “Avalanche!” Dave yelled. He grabbed Kerry and they all pressed against the wall amidst a rapidly escalating sound of crashing stone.

  “Get out of the way!” Pete bawled. The crew started running down the path, back the way they came, unable to find shelter against the walls as thick pieces of rock thumped and tumbled down after them, gaining momentum.

  Dar felt the sting of debris against her skin and she pressed her body against the rock and closed her eyes, feeling a thick rumble so deep it vibrated the bones inside her. She heard things smashing against the wall and opened one eye to see Kerry looking back at her, scared.

  Instinctively, she put her hand over Kerry’s as she felt a rock hit her
shoulder. Dave yelped in pain and she turned slightly, to put the pack on her back between her and the moving debris.

  Rich looked down the path and hesitated, but then pressed himself more tightly against the wall on the other side of Kerry.

  “Stay here! Don’t move!”

  Dar grimaced, as another piece of rock slammed into her. “What the hell.”

  “Arch collapsed,” Dave said, his eyes closed. “Jesus Christ this trip is haunted.”

  They had gotten lucky, tucked behind a slight bend in the wall. After a minute or two the noise abated, and then there was only rain, and the faint sound of stones bounding and skipping down the path behind them.

  Dar pushed back and looked over at the arch, stunned into speechlessness when she saw the upper trek they were heading for. “Oh crap.”

  “Jesus!” Both Rich and Dave spoke at once.

  “Oh my goodness,” Marsha gasped.

  The top of the path was completely blocked with stone rubble and huge chunks of the arch that had collapsed completely, closing in the slot canyon.

  Everyone was briefly silent, stunned and wide-eyed.

  Todd came up to stand next to Dar, and they stood shoulder to shoulder regarding this new impediment to the end of their journey. “We’re fucked,” He said, after a few moments. “Seriously.”

  Dar tried to consider a rebuttal, but failed. “Yeah,” she said, putting her hands on her hips. “This is terminal suckitude.”

  No supplies, no food, no way around the rubble. Dar turned and looked down the path, where the crew was now climbing back up to rejoin them, having evaded the falling rocks.

  She looked at Kerry, who looked back at her, the same knowledge in her pale green eyes.

  No way to let people back home know what was going on.

  Kerry came up next to her and put her arm around Dar’s waist. “This just got very complicated.”

  Dar responded. “Yeah.”

  “Fucked,” Todd concluded succinctly.

  “Cursed,” Rich added. “Seriously.”

  “Shit.” Tracey said.