Paw-Prints Of The Gods

by Steph Bennion

  “I see it,” came the crackling response, after a pause. “Very odd.”

  The approaching stain resolved into a ragged dark green oval, several metres wide. The shadowy slick oozed across the rippling surface and slowly spread around Kedesh’s legs. Ravana watched as the woman bent low to take a closer look.

  “It’s some sort of weird slime,” said Kedesh. “I wonder...”

  Her words broke off into a piercing scream. Ravana stared in horror as Kedesh leapt towards the shore in a flurry of limbs, her boots and survival suit ankle coverings masked by a billowing green mist. Ravana leapt to the ladder, dropped to the ground and rushed to meet her, deafened and terrified by the agonising cries flooding from her suit speaker. Kedesh staggered clear of the water and fell thankfully into the girl’s arms.

  Within moments they were back in the airlock. Kedesh’s screams became fitful and choked as her suit filled with vapours from the slime bubbling at the smouldering ankle seals. When the inner hatch finally opened, Kedesh fell through into the passenger cabin beyond. Ravana unlocked the woman’s helmet, removed her own and quickly got to work helping her out of the ruined suit. The released vapour smelt vile.

  “What the hell is that stuff?” Ravana cried. “It’s eating through everything!”

  Her face fell as she pulled the woman’s suit clear. Kedesh’s ankles and feet were badly inflamed and breaking out in huge blisters. Artorius and the greys, wearing startled expressions, watched from across the cabin.

  “I think ‘eating’ is right,” groaned Kedesh, with a cough that made her wince. “That green stuff is alive. I’m guessing it’s some primitive organism that attacks with acid.”

  “Wonderful,” muttered Ravana. “Artorius, fetch the first aid box, would you?”

  * * *

  Kedesh refused to remove her underclothes but allowed Ravana to help her into the transport’s shower cubicle, where what remained of the acidic slime was quickly washed away. Ravana’s hands were shaking as she attended to the injuries but soon had the wounds clean and secure beneath a layer of fresh bandages.

  The woman looked pale and woozy from painkillers when some time later they returned to the cockpit to consider their options. Nana came with Ravana, leaving Artorius and Stripy huddled in the back. Other than a small patch of green slime at the water’s edge, the windswept lake once again looked deceptively serene.

  “I vote we make a dash across the water to the ridge I saw,” Ravana began. “I reckon we could do it in under a minute at full speed.”

  “Unless we hit deep water or submerged rocks,” said Kedesh. “Or worse, a patch of slimy acid waiting to dissolve us for lunch. It’s too risky to go for a boundary shot.”

  “Then I’ll lead the way,” Ravana said hesitantly. “You’re not too wounded to drive. I’ll walk in front to make sure it’s safe and use your cannon to scatter any slime.”

  “Thraak thraak!”

  “You heard Nana,” said Kedesh. “That’s crazy talk.”

  “Not as insane as I will be if I spend any longer cooped up in this transport.”

  Kedesh sighed. “We’ll need someone on the roof,” she said, though looked far from convinced it was a good idea. “You saw the green nasty before I did when you were up there. The scanner can spot large rocks but won’t pick up biological weirdness.”

  Ravana frowned. “I can’t ask Artorius.”

  “Thraak thraak!”

  “It seems you have a volunteer,” mused Kedesh. “But that makes it no less mad.”

  * * *

  Ravana paused by the water’s edge and glanced back at the transport trundling in her wake. The squat figure upon the roof was barely recognisable; the greys’ tolerance to the poisonous atmosphere was unclear, so as a precaution Nana was wrapped in one of the spare survival suits. Ravana returned her gaze to the lake, hefted the cannon to her shoulder and placed a finger on the trigger. Her left hand held Kedesh’s acid-damaged cricket stump.

  “Hey Nana,” she called. “Everything okay up there?”

  “Thraak!”

  The suit’s inbuilt communicator made the grey’s screech sound more like white noise than ever. Reassured, Ravana stepped forward into the lake. Her helmet speaker relayed a muffled splash as the wheels of the transport entered the water behind her.

  “I can’t see the ridge from here,” she said. “Am I walking towards it?”

  “Thraak,” came the reply. “Thraak thraak.”

  Ravana nodded and turned slightly to the right. After every second step she paused and prodded the lake bed with the stump, her eyes scanning the surface for any signs of movement. She could not help feeling a little awestruck by her situation; with the transport temporarily out of her eye line, it brought back to her just how far from the rest of humanity they were. Yet the vastness of the bleak unspoilt vista left Ravana feeling not lonely but exhilarated. She walked upon the raw bones of the universe, unseen by any human eyes before hers. It was a daunting thought.

  “Thraak! Thraak thraak!”

  Ravana spun to the left, her finger instinctively closing on the trigger before her mind had even registered the approaching wash of green slime. A spear of lightning erupted from the cannon and the water at the edge of the shadow promptly exploded in a cloud of steam. Ravana quickly backed towards the transport, but paused when she saw her shot had done the trick. The bits of membrane left bobbing upon the water were a reassuring roasted shade of brown and soon drifted away on the wind.

  “Thanks for the warning,” she said, relieved. “Has it gone?”

  “Thraak,” confirmed Nana.

  “Well done!” added Kedesh, watching and listening from the cockpit.

  Ravana grinned and stepped forward once more. Nana sounded another alarm several metres later. This time, Ravana barely paused as she blasted the incoming slime, after which she gave the lake bed a nonchalant prod with the stump and continued to wade onwards. The lake became deeper and soon she was submerged to her thighs. When Nana sounded the third warning, Ravana found it harder to turn in the water and gave a squeak of fear when she saw how near the slime was. A quick blast dispatched it as before.

  “That was close,” she murmured. “How much further?”

  “Thraak thraak.”

  “We’re not even halfway?”

  Ravana frowned. She reached to give the lake bed another prod, then screamed as the stump was promptly snatched from her hand, sucked away into the murky shadow that had appeared from nowhere to surround her. The green slime, oozing thickly across the surface of the water and rolling like treacle, bubbled and then broke into a myriad of tiny vortices that moved like gasping mouths. Ravana’s eyes went wide with fear.

  “Thraak!” cried Nana. “Thraak thraak!”

  Gripped by panic, Ravana blasted recklessly into the lake. She did not stop even when the heat of boiling water came through the fabric of her suit and continued to fire long after the eerie shadow had been reduced to charred fragments. Wreathed in steam, it was not until her linked implant display flashed overheating warnings, the cannon glowing warm against her cheek, that she relaxed her grip upon the trigger and slackened her shaking hands. Her heart raced and inside her suit she was drenched in sweat.

  “You were right,” she muttered to Kedesh. “This is madness!”

  “I don’t know,” purred a reply. “You’ve done well to get this far.”

  Ravana froze. The woman’s voice that seeped into her helmet was not that of Kedesh. She turned slowly and twitched in alarm.

  To her right, reclined upon a rock that had also manifested out of thin air, was the dark-haired watcher from Falsafah Alpha, wearing the same fur coat and mischievous smile. Ravana gave a strangled cry, glanced back at the transport and gasped. Everything around her, from the vehicle to the rippling waters of the lake, had stopped dead as if frozen in time. She returned her wary stare to the apparition and gulped. The woman, who lay on her side with her head resting upon a slender bare hand, regarded Ravana cur
iously.

  “You again!” cried Ravana. “Where the hell did you come from? How can you just appear out of nowhere? Not to mention breathe!”

  The woman winked. “I play by different rules when it comes to reality.”

  “This is not real?”

  “Let’s not get into technicalities,” she said irritably. “From your bemused air of bafflement, I take it that your travelling companion has been her usual inscrutable self. There was me thinking you’d be fully briefed by now.”

  “She said you are a watcher,” said Ravana, eyeing her carefully. She had quizzed Kedesh further about the mysterious stranger during the long drive into the mountains, but received nothing but vague replies. “Are you an alien?”

  “No more than you are,” the woman replied frostily. “The only true citizen here is the green slime you seem happy to obliterate, but that’s imperialism for you. How’s the little star man? The boy being led like a lamb to the slaughter to fulfil his destiny, I trust?”

  “What?”

  “The infamous Falsafah prophecy?”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “I’m talking to an idiot!” she growled. Her youthful facade, much to Ravana’s horror, abruptly slipped and twisted into that of a wizened old crone with blackened razor teeth. “You showed real promise against mad Missi. Do your homework before we meet again!”

  “But...” stammered Ravana.

  The watcher and her rocky pedestal were gone. What looked like a silver owl fluttered skywards, then vanished to leave nothing but the blank rippling waters of the lake.

  Ravana gulped. Gripped with terror, she lunged forward through the water, away from the transport towards the distant sand bank. Her half-wading, half-leaping progress became rapid once she reached the shallows and soon she was sprinting through ankle-deep water, conscious but uncaring of the slimy dark shadows darting away on all sides.

  “Ravana!” Kedesh’s voice sounded loud in her helmet. “Slow down!”

  “Thraak thraak!”

  Ravana reached the dry ground of the ridge and fell to her knees. She was scared, angry, confused and seriously fearing for her sanity. Behind, the transport climbed from the lake onto the sand bank and pulled to a halt, pouring water from various nooks and crannies beneath the chassis. Nana took the opportunity to shuffle along the roof towards the ladder, but it was Ravana who reached the airlock hatch first.

  Kedesh rose from her seat as the girl burst back into the cabin, Nana close behind.

  “What happened out there?” she cried. “Spooked by the slime?”

  Ravana threw her helmet to the floor. “Didn’t you see her?” she retorted angrily.

  “See who?” asked Kedesh.

  “A big scary slime monster?” sneered Artorius.

  “That damn watcher from the dome!”

  “Fwack!”

  Kedesh frowned. “There was no one out there but you.”

  “Thraak thraak,” added Nana, as Artorius helped the grey from the suit.

  “And Nana on the roof,” the woman corrected. “You saw Athene?”

  “Athene?” Ravana stomped to a bunk, sat down and threw an angry glare at Kedesh. Nana and Stripy slunk to sit with a startled Artorius. “You can’t see her but somehow know her name? Who is she? Tell me now!”

  “One who walks amongst us,” Kedesh said slowly.

  “Stop being so frigging mysterious!” snapped Ravana, frustrated. “What the hell is a watcher? And why is she also a cat? Or even an owl?”

  “She can be whatever she wants,” the woman remarked gaily.

  “Answer my damn question!”

  Kedesh sighed. “Watchers are hard to explain,” she admitted. “Some believe them to be alien beings of pure energy, evolved far beyond the need for flesh and bones, each with a consciousness mapped into the quantum fluctuations of space-time. Less charitable people dismiss them as delusions of the insane, of course. In the past they may have been looked upon as gods. The cat thing goes back a long way amongst watchers who toy with humans.”

  “Evil space ghosts!” Artorius remarked gleefully. “Cool!”

  Ravana forced herself to be calm. “An alien cat woman?”

  “Thraak,” replied Nana. “Thraak thraak.”

  “Our grey friend has a point,” said Kedesh. “It is said they’re as old as the stars, which makes us the invading aliens, not them. The watcher who calls herself Athene is one I have crossed paths with before. She likes to meddle more than watch.”

  “I don’t like the sound of that,” Ravana said dubiously. “Tell me more.”

  “Athene is a bit of a maverick all-rounder,” Kedesh said thoughtfully. “The fact she’s hanging around Falsafah worries the hell out of me.”

  * * *

  A short while later they were on the move. The ridge ran high and dry for most of the way, but solid ground remained at least an hour’s drive away. Ravana was keen to hear more about the mysterious watchers but Kedesh, ever eager to change the subject, convinced her that their immediate concern was keeping the acid slime away from the transport. Ravana soon found herself back on the roof, plasma cannon at the ready.

  She gazed across the congregating flotillas of slime, astounded by how the lake had changed in such a short space of time. The shore either side of the sand bank bubbled like hot volcanic mud and a green mist swirled uneasily above the wallowing sickly surface. The knowledge they were running low on spare cartridges for the cannon did not help Ravana’s nerves and she jumped when Kedesh’s voice suddenly interrupted her thoughts. The woman had suggested they use their headcoms to keep in contact; Ravana did not like to be reminded of her cranium implant but had reluctantly agreed.

  “Everything okay up there?” asked Kedesh.

  “I’m fine. Is Artorius with you?”

  “He’s taking another nap.”

  Ravana paused to fire another volley, the third so far, at the encroaching slime.

  “Athene, your watcher, spoke about the Falsafah prophecy,” she told Kedesh. “She called Artorius a star man and said something about him fulfilling his destiny.”

  “A star man?

  “Also, at Missi’s dome, when he was safe she said there was no paradox.”

  “Interesting.”

  “Is that all you can say?”

  For a while Kedesh did not reply. “It’s nice the way you’re looking out for him,” she said eventually. “I’m not sure I would have the patience with such a rude little boy.”

  Ravana was shocked. “Kedesh!”

  “Sorry. Obviously, I’m also grateful you’ve stepped up to the crease on my behalf more than once. When Missi tried to suffocate us, why didn’t you collapse when I did?”

  “I grew up on a world with a thin atmosphere. If you remember, the greys were affected even less. I owed you that one. You rescued us after we crashed.”

  There was another brief silence. Ahead, a short stretch of ridge dipped below slime-infested water and Ravana released a couple of plasma bolts to clear the way.

  “I have a confession to make,” said Kedesh. “I was going to leave you there.”

  “But you didn’t. That’s all that matters.”

  “The greys threw a curved ball. I was about to drive away when they hammered on the hatch. They had dragged you from your transport and somehow kept you alive long enough to get you into my airlock. Nana and Stripy saved your lives, not me.”

  Ravana’s blood ran cold. “You were going to let us die?”

  “You don’t understand.”

  “Damn right I don’t! We crashed trying to avoid running into you!”

  “I was scared of creating another paradox,” protested Kedesh. She uttered a shriek of alarm as Ravana released a volley of plasma bolts into the sand bank ahead, more out of anger than necessity. “I am not allowed to meddle!”

  “Really?” retorted Ravana and scowled. The transport swerved around the miniature impact craters she had just created. “So you’re a watcher, too?”


  “I am Commander Marion Kedesh,” snapped the terse reply. “Field agent for the Grand Priory, the Most Venerable Order of the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem.”

  Ravana blinked. “You’re what?”

  “It is a bit of a mouthful,” admitted Kedesh.

  “A field agent for Saint John?”

  “Sent here to report on the Dhusarian Church, but with no authority to intervene.”

  “I don’t believe you.”

  “Suit yourself.”

  Ravana silenced her headcom with a vicious mental stab. The transport rolled on and soon there were fresh patches of slime to divert her attention. Eventually even these became fewer and far between, then the ridge widened into an expanse of smooth sand and suddenly the strange lake was behind them. Ravana was tired and hungry, her legs ached from her earlier frantic run, her shoulder throbbed from the weight of the cannon and her mind felt heavier still with the day’s revelations. When it was finally time to climb from the roof and go back inside, Ravana ignored Kedesh’s request to talk and went straight to her bunk, kicked off her suit, buried herself under a blanket and tried to get some sleep.

  * * *

  Ravana awoke to find the transport had once again fallen still. She brushed her matted hair aside and saw several hours had passed; dusk was upon them and through the windscreen Tau Ceti was setting below a sky awash with brilliant pinks and purples. They were no longer in the caldera and instead were high upon a hillside of windswept rolling dunes.

  The interior lamps were on their lowest setting, save for a single bright light above where Kedesh sat at the table. Ravana watched curiously as the woman slotted a glass vial into a portable medical analysis unit and scrutinised the machine’s display. Ravana wriggled free of the blanket, stretched wearily, then frowned when Kedesh reacted to her awakening by trying to hide what she was doing. A trio of gentle snores from the heaving shapes on the opposite bunk was enough to locate Artorius and the greys.