Opalescence

by Ron Rayborne

  “Hello, Desi,” she said softly.

  The Desmostylus moved their bulk from one foot to the other, eyes anxious, not knowing what to do. Should they flee or should they stay? Their genetic memories contained no hint of her species.

  So comfortable was Julie that she hesitated to get up, and yet she did not want to upset these great creatures who likely had called this very spot home for who knew how long.

  “Okay, I’ll go,” she said at long last, and in regret. “Nice to meet you.” Slowly, she stood, then walked over to her clothes. The beasts began to make loud barking noises and she nearly had to cover her ears.

  When she was dressed, she turned to say goodbye, but something caught her eye. Movement. Different. She looked, looked again, focused. Then froze. On the ridge above was a figure. Upright. Quickly going to her pack she dug out the binocs, then crouched behind the boulder, carefully pointing them at the figure and focused. He stood there with his own binoculars looking down, down in her direction. Jaqzen. A big bulk of a man. He’d seen her, surely. Julie’s heart began to beat hard in her chest. She’d forgotten he was an expert tracker. Then an arm went up ... a wave? No, it was a rifle, pointing at the sky. How? A shot in the air, barely audible. A way of saying, I see you. Julie swallowed. Crouching back behind the boulder, she looked again in the direction of the hidden canyon. If she ran that way he would undoubtedly note it. There was in fact, she surmised, nowhere she could go and not be seen. Still, she had to try.

  God, why hadn’t she done him in when she had the chance? Instead, like a trusting schoolgirl, she’d walked along the ridge, an obvious route, probably leaving a path anyone could follow. She glanced around the corner of the rock again. Gone. Not there — then — Yes, there he is! Running downhill! Hastily, Julie hoisted the pack onto her back and ran toward the canyon.

  Chapter 17

  For two days Tom slept in a temperature-driven stupor, unaware that several interesting things were occurring. One, was the fact that Little had assumed the position of sentry. For such a small aelurodon, she had a very loud bark, which sent most of the large beasts packing. Fortunately, those that didn’t were harmless herbivores, which would dully eye the yapper and continue chewing, seemingly in a stupor of their own. If Tom had been aware and well, he’d have found Little’s frustrated attempts to scare these huge sluggards away hilarious.

  Another interesting thing had to do with Tom himself. Though in an unconscious, muttering, oneiric state, he had gotten up several times to find water, chew bitter willow bark and relieve himself, each time returning to sleep on his bed of grass under the trees. He would remember none of it.

  After the two days were up, strength returned, and with it, cognizance. Opening his eyes, he gazed up at the light filtering through the leaves above. A glorious sunrise. Turning his head, Tom briefly wondered about that, then remembered. He’d been sick. Now, though, he felt better. Much better. Instantly, there was Little by his face, grinning, if ever a dog could be said to grin, her entire body wagging in tune with her tail. Then, strangely, she decided to climb over and stand with her feet on either side of his head, warm, fluffy belly covering his eyes and tickling his nose. He laughed.

  Lifting her, Tom sat up and rested her in his lap. My, she is getting bigger, he thought. Then he looked around himself, amazed. The carcasses of a dozen ground squirrels were scattered about him. Perhaps she’d left them in hopes that he’d eat and get better. And indeed, he was hungry, mighty hungry. Then an odd thought, a wisp of memory. In his previous ailing condition he’d eaten them too. Surprise and revulsion followed. Then practicality: they’d likely aided his recovery. He just hoped he’d cooked them first.

  Okay, I can eat ground squirrels. He looked around at those lying on the ground. How long had they been there? He did not want to get sick again.

  Setting Little down, he stood and looked at the bounty. While some had flies or wasps on them, others did not. Fresh kills? Tom reached down and felt one. Still warm and soft. Then another. The same. Then another. And another. In all, he found seven good, obviously recent kills, and so, after building a fire, he set to skinning them one by one with his knife, then skewering, roasting and eating them. They were good, there was no denying it. Though there were some initial dull pangs of conscience, they were outweighed by the sharp pangs of hunger that gnawed at his stomach. Still, Tom was glad that he wasn’t the one doing the actual killing.

  Physically, he looked a wreck. His clothes were dirty and he stunk, a combination of body odor and sulfur from the hot spring. The rash was still there, but not nearly as itchy as it had been. Apparently, his insistent, though unconscious, scratching had actually sped up the healing process. Rather than the sensitive light pink swellings of two days prior, now it was a deeper and slightly hardened, rufous color. He wondered and worried what it was. Then he had an idea. Finding the P.I., he aimed it at his left thigh where a large patch was and snapped.

  Accessing Database

  Then came back the diagnosis and description:

  Poison Oak

  Toxicodendron diversilobum

  *Contact Hazard*

  A small to medium-sized shrub generally 2 to 6 feet high.

  Identified by its characteristic “leaves of three.”

  Capable of causing a miserable, itchy rash

  which can last days or weeks.

  Not to be confused with non-toxic lookalikes

  Blackberry (Rubus ursinus) or “Squaw Bush” (Rhus trilobata).

  After exposure, wipe affected area with alcohol

  within 3 to 4 hours to remove or lessen effect.

  Tom clicked on the icon indicating that there were photos available. These he studied. Now he remembered having pushed his way through the stuff back in the forest when he was coming down the hill from the Strong Box. He’d thought it was quite lovely then, and certainly it was, but it was one plant he would not make the mistake of touching again.

  Sitting down, he glanced at his feet. Ah yes, another of his recent misfortunes. Pulling a bare foot up to his lap, he studied it. Gone were the puffy swellings. They were replaced by flattened, hardened skin. Good, he thought. It was the same with his other maladies. The jock rash had passed, likely also helped by the sulfur. The tick bites had receded to tiny pinpricks of red. The sunburn had darkened his shoulders. There the skin was just beginning to peel. All in all, things were improving. And they would improve, of that Tom was determined — determined, that is, where he could help it, not to make the same mistakes again.

  Suddenly he thought of Julie. Getting up, he ran to his pack, still lying by the hot spring. Tom flushed with gratitude when he saw it. Unmolested. It could easily have been ripped and pilfered or snatched and carried off by some curious creature attracted by the lingering smell of food. And it did smell, bits of the entelodont he’d collected for Little still within. Brushing all of that aside, though, he found the PinPointer and hurriedly switched it on, eager to see where his wife was now. In the time he’d been out, she could be even farther away then she was before. He held his breath. There was a pause, then a beep. A beep. One beep. One light, the red one. The green was not there. Slowly his mouth opened in fear. No. Please no. Almost in answer the green beacon abruptly popped on and began to beep too. Tom let out his breath and said another thank you, a lopsided smile cutting raggedly across his face. Thank God.

  Happily, rather than farther away this time, Julie had actually closed the distance between them. At twelve miles, however, it wasn’t much. The red light representing Jaqzen had closed as well. He was now nineteen miles from Julie. Alarming.

  Then the green light went out. What the...? It stayed out. Tom suddenly worried that something was wrong with his PinPointer. He gave it a shake, tapped on the crystal. It made no difference. The green light was gone. Tom gulped and tried to figure out what it might mean. Had he just witnessed Julie’s death? Had she perhaps fallen over a cliff or been attacked by a wild beast? Or maybe, maybe it was something more ben
ign, but just as worrying: maybe her PinPointer was malfunctioning, caused possibly by an inadvertent bump on a hard surface? Or could it be losing power, the solar cell batteries that fueled the device finally past their normal life? To be sure, her trip was only supposed to last thirty days.

  The chance that any of these scenarios might be true sent icy cold shafts of fear through his psyche. He tried to think of other possibilities. Could there be another reason why was the green light was out, then on, then out again, while the other remained on the whole time? Why, in fact, had the two lights been separated by so much distance? He knew why that was, but had not wanted to acknowledge it to himself before: Julie was on the run. She was being chased. It was the only logical explanation.

  Then... Tom thought, maybe what was happening with the green light was something else. Maybe she was intentionally switching it off so as not to give her position away to Jaqzen, only turning it on when she noticed the blue light, his own light, blinking at the top of her screen. That would mean that she knew someone else was here, likely to try to rescue her. Of course, it would mean that Jaqzen was also aware that somebody else had arrived. He’d probably been watching his own screen, not only to seek and find Julie, but also to monitor this newcomer, this threat to his plans, whoever he might be. Tom switched his beacon off.

  He wondered if Julie had been on the run from the start, thinking it only about five weeks since her launch. Had he known that, in actuality, it was more like four months since she’d arrived, he would have been horrified. Yet, somehow she had managed to elude Jaqzen, a trained tracker, all that time.

  Tom’s breathing was rapid and again he felt the need for speed. But now he knew that would be foolhardy. If he was going to reach her at all he had to be smart about it. Running wasn’t an option; not only would he exhaust himself again, he could attract the attention of a pursuit predator. No, he’d go as fast as he could and still get there in one piece. In the meantime, Julie would have to take care of herself. There was no other way. But he had confidence in her: she had an uncommon intelligence and strength of character. She could do it. And he hoped the discovery that someone else was here and headed toward her would give her courage.

  Something puzzled him, though. How did she know that my beacon was on and was then able to respond to it if hers was turned off so as not to give away her position? Tom scratched his head, then, frowning, he looked at his PinPointer, turning it over in his hands. He’d been given only a brief orientation to the technical equipment before he left. There was only one switch on the device that he could see: On / Off. He turned it over again; that’s when he saw the seam, an almost invisible line around the two-inch screen. Hmm.

  He picked at it, careful not to use too much force. Snap! The screen lifted on an internal hinge revealing other controls beneath. Ah! Tom nodded. There was a focusing dial, a brightness display, along with a “Filter” button, which was a mystery. At the bottom were “Tone On / Off” and “Beacon On / Off” switches. He smiled. So she wasn’t turning it completely off then, only the beacon part, the tone she kept on. When she heard that second beep and knew someone else was “online”, she’d switch her beacon on briefly to alert him to her presence, then would switch it off again. Clever.

  He wanted to test it out. She might not respond this time seeing as she’d just done so moments before. On the other hand, she could realize that it was a test, an attempt at communication. Tom turned his own beacon and tone off, clicked the screen shut, then switched PinPointer back on. Instantly came Jaqzen’s beep and his red light. He waited for several minutes. No green. Then he reopened the lid and turned his beacon and tone on and waited again. Ten seconds later, he heard it, “Beep!” and there was her green light. It stayed on momentarily, then was off again. That confirmed it; she did know someone else was here, and they had just communicated. This pittance of contact was almost as good as a telephone call. His heart soared!

  Now if only they could think of a way to make these communications exclusive to themselves. The Focus button? He switched on again. There was Jaqzen, and then, seconds later, Julie. He adjusted the dial. It brought the area where the red and green dots were closer to the center of the screen, making them appear larger. This was accompanied by a long string of rapidly changing digits that increased or decreased as the resolution did. Green switched off again and so did he. Okay, give it a rest, she was probably getting antsy about this.

  So Focus was not going to work as he’d hoped. Again he studied the device, but could find no way to limit it to one person. Crud. Tom sighed. He hoped for Julie’s sake that Jaqzen hadn’t been paying attention, that he hadn’t caught on to their little breakthrough.

  Tom wanted to set out immediately, but he needed to wash himself and get the filth out of his clothing. Not only would dirt and grime weaken the fibers and thus the lifespan of his garments, it would be an irritant and possible health issue for him. He did have another scrubbed pair in the pack, but wanted a clean backup. Roughly cramming his gear, they headed over to a clean water pool. A few Dromomeryx that had been standing nearby sauntered off. It wasn’t fast enough for Little’s liking, though, and she set to barking and chasing. They hightailed it, and the little rabble-rouser trotted back triumphantly.

  Stripping again and getting the soap bar, Tom waded into the pool. It was shallow and warm. He remained standing and set to washing, the soap and water that splashed off clothes and him turning the water opaque. The mud he kicked up quickly enveloped that bit of pollution.

  “Sorry guys,” Tom apologized to the blithely watching Cranioceras. When he was clean, he walked out, got the towel from his pack, dried and dressed. Indeed, he felt great. Strangely better than he had in a long time. Now he reloaded everything with care.

  “Well, Little, are you about ready?” The scruffy aelurodon looked up at her human expectantly. “Let’s try to do it better this time, shall we?” Staring at him now with closed mouth, she turned her head this way and that. Tom paused, then corrected himself, “Okay, I’ll try to do it better this time!” He reached down to pet his growing companion. “You could use a bath, too, you know,” he snorted. She stood, grinning again, ready to be underway. Tom gazed at his decided upon route, off toward the hills to the South. They would be heading in that direction, up a low, grassy rise dotted with a few trees and scattered with small herds of grazing animals. He knew from his previous observations that eventually they would come to an inland part of the sea that was surrounded by gentle hills, and to the far west of it, what looked like a large island.

  “Well then, my friend, let’s be going!” Tom said. Pointing a finger stiffly toward the horizon, he shouted, “Ho!”

  Along the way, Tom often veered from the path to inspect the glossy fruit growing from a particular tree or shrub. If it looked appealing, and if the wildlife seemed to favor it, he would pick and taste it, testing for edibility. Anything bitter was spit out. Everything else he consumed. After thinking about this strategy further, he decided to use the added precaution of prior identification with the P.I. No sense poisoning himself on a lark.

  As now usual, Little would run off whenever she heard the shrill calls of ground squirrels. The sound seemed to excite her at an instinctual level, and occasionally one would be caught off guard. Then, rather than retreat into the hole where she stood guard, it would take off at a run, and the chase would be on. Little was quick in the short-term, but if the pursuit was long, her growing weight began to slow her down. Some day, he surmised, she might not be able to rely on speed. He wondered what she’d do then.

  A couple of hours later, the land began to get softer and slightly mushy, interspersed with a more normal, solid feel. He trudged on without giving it much thought. When it became mushy again, his feet sinking slightly, he looked down wonderingly. The ground was wet. His shoes were wet. He glanced around for Little and discovered her keeping pace off to his left on higher terrain about fifty yards away. He headed that way.

  After a few min
utes, climbing to another rise, Tom looked back toward the lowland and now noticed that it was scattered with lots of pools of water, but few animals. Of course, he’d seen these pools pretty much the whole way so far, but now there were more of them. They were also larger, and farther down the hill, some had coalesced into small lakes. Indeed the whole area had a saturated feel about it. Better stick to higher ground.

  Up ahead, half a mile or so, he noticed that a large river cut across their path. He watched it as they closed in. At two hundred yards, the sound of its rushing became noticeable, seeming to increase with every few steps. Little eyed it too, looking unsure, perhaps afraid. She began to slow, then trail Tom, getting farther and farther behind. He turned and called, but she held back, still following, but cautious and uncertain, taking tentative steps now.

  At twenty yards, the sound of surging waters loud, Tom stopped and examined the situation. Where the water ran downhill, it seemed gradually to spread out, cascading over small boulders and toppled trees, falling over itself in a mad rush to oblivion far off. Uphill, the scene was more serene. The river there, though swift, was much reduced in width, probably because, he assumed, time and flow had carved a deep gorge. Still, it looked to be no less than maybe fifteen feet wide at its narrowest. He decided that if they were going to get across, that way was the way to go. Tom turned to find Little again by his side. While he stood, she’d crept up. She was looking at him and glancing around as if trying to find another way altogether. Tom bent down and smiled, stroking her head.

  “Don’t worry, Little,” he said, raising his voice to be heard above the tumult, “It’ll be okay. But we do have to get across.” He looked uphill again. It was fairly steep, but open country. With his eyes, he followed the course of the river distantly to where it seemed to originate in the space between two high hilly ranges. On either side was thick vegetal growth, short trees and shrubs, growing in the perpetual moisture.