by A. G. Wilde
He was there.
Awake.
And as she stared at him, she realized she’d been holding her breath the entire time since she’d reached the edge of the clearing.
He was still frickin’ there.
And drinking her water.
The alien was crouched near the rock pool, droplets of water running down his face and dampening his shirt.
A few feet behind him, against the wall, rested his bag with things. She could see a few items, gadgets she didn’t know the purpose of, brimming from the top.
It probably had tools too and other useful items.
Things like a firelighter, maybe a knife…a gun possibly?
Even his little light gadget was enviable.
She bet he had things in that bag that she could use. Things that would make living in the wilderness so much easier—that is, if she somehow managed to survive this.
Over the past few months, she’d used all the knowledge her father had passed down to her to craft as many items as she had the skill to craft.
She still had the piece of metal, which served as her trusty blade now. She could make a fire using a board, some kindling, and a swindle. She’d used vines and some of the large leaves to fashion things she needed to live like her mattress and pillow. There were even some husks from some huge nuts that fell within the jungle that she used for bowls too, whenever she managed to find them.
If he had a knife though, a real one, it would make life so much easier for her. And a lighter? What she wouldn’t do for something that could make a fire easily and on the go.
Cleo bit her bottom lip, her gaze shifting back to the alien. He hadn’t moved.
Looking right at his back, it took her a few moments to realize that something was off.
He…he wasn’t moving.
He was frozen in a sort of non-movement you’d see an animal do when it was hyperaware.
Every nerve ending in her body sent an alarm straight to her brain.
Shit.
Like before, she had the feeling he knew she was there.
Swallowing hard, she watched as the alien’s back moved as he inhaled deeply, his shoulders rising and falling before he went completely rigid.
The air suddenly felt chilly as she froze in the cover of the bushes, not daring to even breathe.
Ever so slightly, she watched as the alien turned his head, right in her direction.
Fight or flight.
It was a command in her brain, as if her body could tell just what was about to happen next.
The alien was going to pounce.
Immediately, adrenaline pounded in her veins, making her heart press against her chest in thunderous beats she was sure the alien could hear because it was deafening in her ears.
Without waiting another second, she clambered through the bushes, wincing inwardly as a twig snapped underneath her feet.
Run, Cleo.
Fucking run!
Instead of heading towards her den, she went in the opposite direction.
Curse the darkness, for it was not her ally.
She stubbed her toe and almost fell over the many obstacles on the ground but she kept running, not daring to even pause for a second.
Her breath came hot and hard through her nose, making the sensitive skin inside her nostrils burn but she didn’t dare to even stop.
And then she heard it.
The unmistakable sound of bushes rustling behind her.
He was coming for her…
…and she had a sinking feeling she was going to get caught.
The animal turned and darted away, rushing through the undergrowth and something clicked inside Sohut immediately, fueling his Merssi instinct of old.
Hunt.
It was instinctive from the days his ancestors used to hunt to survive.
Forgetting his initial plan, Sohut raced forward, cutting through the undergrowth with ease.
He could hear the bushes rustling far ahead of him as the creature tried to put distance between them but he didn’t need to hear the she-animal to be able to track her.
He’d caught on to her scent now, locked on to it, and following her across the jungle would be easy.
Hopping easily over fallen trees and huge roots, he gave chase and it brought back a memory.
One of him and his brother running after they’d escaped the mines. The wind had been in their faces, freedom in front of them…and terror behind them.
Only this time, he was the terror and the creature running in front of him was the one dashing away to freedom.
Deep within him, adrenaline pumped in his veins, pushing him forward and it didn’t take him long to notice the animal wasn’t running in a straight line.
Instead of darting straight forward through the undergrowth, the creature shifted direction every now and then as if trying to lose or confuse him.
He’d been right about it being intelligent.
Eyes ahead of him, he entered a particularly sparse section of the undergrowth and that’s when he caught sight of the creature for the first time.
His vision wasn’t the best in the dark, but still he could see better than most and what he saw almost made him stumble.
The creature looked nothing like he thought it would and, for a second, he contemplated whether he was tracking the wrong thing.
He’d have thought so if the creature running in front of him wasn’t obviously a non-native species to this jungle.
It was obviously the alien creature he’d been sent to find—only, it wasn’t at the same time.
The animal in front of him was…bipedal.
Confusion mixed in with the thrill of the chase as he surged forward.
Ducking under hanging branches and thick vines, Sohut closed the distance between him and the creature, reaching out as soon as he was within arm’s reach to grab hold of the animal.
For a moment, he didn’t know what part of the creature he’d caught hold of but his confusion was only compounded when the creature let out the most feminine of sounds as they both went tumbling into the bushes.
It was a high-pitched shriek that had his ears ringing and the animals around them running back to their dens.
He didn’t know what he’d expected when they tumbled into the bushes, but the first kick caught him right in the midsection.
The animal was screeching and bucking, trying to wring itself from his grasp and the second kick landed squarely in his gonads.
Phekking draxx…
He released the thing momentarily as pain surged in his groin and the creature tried to scramble away.
Grabbing what he supposed was one of the creature’s legs, he pulled the animal back toward him.
More struggling ensued as the other leg kicked back, trying to find a mark.
It was like trying to keep a chid in a tantrum steady.
As he launched himself on top of the bucking creature, just so he could hold it steady, he felt another pain, this time in his arm. But that sharp pain was quickly dismissed as more prominent thoughts forced forward in his mind.
Holding the creature steady enough so he could look at it, shock rendered him motionless.
This was no animal.
Despite the darkness that surrounded them, he could see enough to tell that this…this creature wasn’t what he’d thought it was at all.
9
The creature was a bipedal female.
Not Merssi for she had no horns…unless the Gori had dehorned her—the mere thought of which sent a surge of anger through him.
If she wasn’t struggling so much, he’d take the time to feel for frilli running down her septum and chin.
But she couldn’t be Merssi.
The Gori would have been mad to send him after a Merssi female and expect him to capture and take her to them.
Confused, he stared down at the alien beneath him.
All this time…he’d been tracking a bipedal female.
The female grunted and struggle
d against him again, bringing him out of his thoughts.
She was feral, he was sure.
He’d probably have to restrain her and bring her back to the water hole where he could think clearly without fear of her running away.
Realizing he must be crushing her small frame with his weight, Sohut eased up a little but that only renewed the female’s efforts to kick him in the gonads and he wasn’t ready to relive that pain.
“Stop. Don’t fight,” he growled, his voice a little more hostile than he’d intended as he pressed down against her again.
Could she understand him?
He didn’t know.
“Leht mee goh!” she screamed, struggling against him still.
He had no idea what she just said but it sounded like a language he’d heard before.
Where? He couldn’t be quite sure.
Her struggling continued as she let out a pained sound—one of mental anguish.
She wasn’t going to calm down. She was too frightened. Panicky.
She was livid and out of her mind.
He didn’t want to restrain her but did he have a choice? He doubted she’d listen to him if he tried to calm her down.
Adrenaline was pumping within her, coursing through her veins, telling her to do whatever she could to survive.
He knew this too well— the feeling of complete madness that can overwhelm the body when it felt like all was lost.
He’d experienced it before.
Sighing, he reached for the roll of cord in his pocket.
He had to restrain her and he had to be quick about it.
He’d heard noises in the jungle over the past few days and he didn’t want to be caught without his blade in the middle of the undergrowth.
Stupidly, he’d run after her without retrieving it from his satchel.
Pinning the female’s arms above her head with one hand caused her efforts to double.
She had skinny arms and even though she was putting up a fight, it wasn’t nearly enough to cause him to release her.
That fact was evident. Still, she struggled.
There was something sharp in her hand too, and he couldn’t wrestle it away from her, so he wrapped both of her hands entirely, rendering her weapon useless.
Even as he held her legs down so he could tie her ankles together, she grunted and resisted.
It took a few minutes but, finally succeeding, he eased up from over the female, taking a deep breath as he did.
Her eyes were not luminescent in the dark but he could feel that she was glaring at him, and she had a right to be upset.
This whole situation just got a lot more complicated than he’d expected.
Crouching, he swooped the female’s body into his arms and threw her over his shoulder with ease.
A series of sharp words left her mouth as she yelped and proceeded to hammer his back with her bound wrists.
This continued for most of the trek back to the water hole, till she hung limp against him. Only her chest moving against his shoulder and back told him she was still alive.
Light from his light-disk greeted him as he neared the water hole.
Stepping into the small clearing, he set the female down into a nest of vines.
Livid pale eyes stared up into his and Sohut froze in shock, his gaze running over the female’s face.
With the light now illuminating her features, he could see her clearly.
The Goris had said the creature had long red fur on its head and down its back.
The female in front of him had no red hair whatsoever; there was a dark, stiff-looking crown on her head instead.
The Goris had also said the creature was pale all over but the female in front of him had a dark coat.
They’d also said it had long spindly legs, translucent eyes, and a flat face.
The female had a delicate nose set in the middle of a face with soft angles.
The more he stared, the more speechless he became.
This was definitely no animal.
And that dark coat…it wasn’t a coat at all.
It was mud.
Realization dawned.
He’d been right about hearing her language before, because he had!
Back at the Sanctuary, before he left, there’d been a female there called Larn. She’d been a refugee of sorts who’d been cast in the care of his brother.
He wasn’t positive, but the female in front of him looked a helluva lot like she was the same species.
The more he stared at her, the more he was convinced.
This female in front of him a dirty—no, a filthy—Larn!
As he eased up from over the female to stand, Sohut took a step back.
There was that sharp pain in his arm again and it took a few moments before his gaze moved to the area.
Deep in his flesh was a gash and Sohut blinked as he watched his blood spill and run down his arm.
He didn’t remember getting injured by anything sharp as he ran.
When he glanced back at the female, she was staring at his arm too and memory of the weapon she was clutching in her hand came back to him.
She’d…she’d wounded him.
“You stabbed me.” Even to himself, his voice sounded disbelieving.
There was a pause and he was surprised when she answered.
“Phuk wit mee anhd ai-will doo iht ah-gen.” Her voice was strong, not betraying the fear in her eyes.
It sounded like she’d understood what he’d said.
Larn back at the Sanctuary had been able to understand him too, though he hadn’t been able to understand her.
Whoever had taken Larn from her home planet had also installed a language chip in her brain. That’s why, before coming on this mission, he’d gone to the exchange to get the language files for Larn’s planet—just in case Riv didn’t get rid of her before he returned.
Always interested in new worlds, he’d wanted to learn more about where she came from and the best bet had been to ask her the questions directly.
Staring at the female in front of him, he was nonplussed.
How did she survive out here all alone?
The female bared her teeth again, snarling at him, and he didn’t spot any fangs.
Maybe she was feral.
That partly explained why she’d managed to survive so long on her own.
It also explained why she looked like she hadn’t taken a bath the entire time she’d been in the jungle.
“Leht. Mee. Goh.” She was speaking through her flat, clenched teeth and it definitely sounded like the same language as Larn’s. The more he heard it, the surer he became. “Waht arr yoo go-win too doo too mee?”
Her gaze flicked from him to the jungle as if she was considering wriggling away in her restrained state.
“Don’t bother. Even if you did get away, you’d still need me to remove those restraints,” he noted.
Cold, gray eyes met his and the look she gave him could kill a family of mogs with one glance.
She hated him.
Even restrained, she was defiant.
He knew it wasn’t the smoothest of introductions.
It probably looked like he was capturing her to keep her prisoner but he’d had no choice but to tie her arms and legs as he led her to a safer location.
They’d been in the open and, granted that he hadn’t met any spined creatures since passing that invisible scent barrier, he still needed to focus on his surroundings without worrying about her trying to escape.
There was also still the scent of slizz. It was even mixed into her scent, and that was confusing.
Larn hadn’t smelled like slizz at all, so he was sure it wasn’t a similar scent gland her species used.
Unless the female before him was a variation of the same species.
That was something to consider.
Phek.
He suddenly had a lot of things to consider and phek him but he didn’t nearly have enough time.
The Gori wo
uld be expecting his return soon.
They’d trusted that he would catch their creature and that he did.
The more he thought about it, the more pissed he became.
10
She’d fucked up.
Royally.
Cleo couldn’t even face herself or the situation she’d fallen into.
It wasn't lost on her that she'd been trained for this moment from her very early years.
In primary school, her teachers had been horrified when she'd mentioned the week she'd spent in the wilderness alone.
Which parent would have been mad enough to leave their eight-year-old all alone in the wild?
Thomas Barlow. That's who.
Staring into the dark sky, her brows hurt from the severe frown on her face.
Each morning she woke had been another day added to her freedom and she’d relished it.
This new life had taken some getting used to but she was darned proud of herself.
To let it slip away so easily…
She had to find a way out of this.
She wasn’t dead yet.
In front of her, the blue alien was standing a few meters away.
Right now, he stood scowling at her, unblinking.
And the more time passed, the angrier he seemed to get.
Fuck.
Was he disappointed in his catch or something?
She was pretty sure he was going to walk over and snap her neck at any moment. For that reason, she tried to make herself look as nonthreatening as possible.
It felt like an hour passed and he was still studying her.
What’s worse, Wawa was nowhere to be seen.
He still hadn’t returned.
She could only hope that he wasn’t dead.
Movement in her peripheral vision had her snapping her head toward the alien.
Fear spiked within her immediately.
“Please…” She tried to shuffle backward but that was difficult seeing as he’d put her down on a section of uneven vines. “Whatever you’re going to do, don’t do it.”
The alien paused in front of her.
He was huge; his mere presence was overpowering.
She could still remember the feel of him pressed against her too. Her fucking confused mind didn’t know if it should be enraged or happy that someone had been touching her.