by Adam Carter
“When I met Winter before she wasn’t happy, started shouting at me as though I was some form of traitor. That was when she told me she’d destroyed your ship. Whatever she wants here, she needs to be here.”
I shake my head at the bleeding obvious. “So you’re a front. The government wanted to send Winter here for a reason but they couldn’t violate the law, couldn’t just send her in. Unless it was as a part of an extraction team.”
“I figured that much. I’m nothing to these people, which is why I don’t know anything.”
“I take it that midnight quake was a lie as well then?”
Harper nods, not looking at me now. “I guess Winter needed a little extra time to do whatever it was she needed to do.”
“And you have no idea what she’s doing here?”
She shakes her head.
I wish I could say I had a better idea, but where the government’s concerned none of us has a clue. That Harper’s telling me the truth I don’t doubt, but it calls into question everything my team’s doing. I’ve worked with these people for three years now, Spring for only a year. Soppy as it sounds, they’re like my family. We watch out for each other and never leave a woman behind. Now the lieutenant’s been lying to me this whole time? I shouldn’t believe Harper, shouldn’t take the word of a woman I don’t even like. But it sounds plausible, and more than that it answers a few questions.
The plane is the key. Then I remember the lieutenant took something from the wreck. “The black box.”
“You think that’s what she was sent here to retrieve?”
“It’d make sense. But why? It was just a commercial plane. It didn’t have any military potential.”
“I’m not the right person to ask.”
She’s not wrong there. Whatever the truth, no matter how infuriating, I won’t find any answers without consulting with the lieutenant. The only thing we can really do then is continue our journey towards the shuttle and hope Winter doesn’t leave without us.
“You fit to travel?” I ask.
“You’re still taking me with you?”
I frown. “You thought I was just going to leave you here?”
“I’ve been playing you, Corporal.”
“The lieutenant’s been playing me, girl. Anyway, whatever you’d done I’m not going to just leave you for the dinosaurs to eat. Did you actually think I would?”
“I ... wasn’t sure.”
“You really don’t think much of me do you?”
“I’m trying not to.”
I can tell there’s something else and debate whether to press my luck. But I don’t want her clamming up, especially since she might well reveal a few more tidy facts along the way. Whatever it is she knows and hasn’t yet said, it can keep a little while longer.
“I’m not the monster you think I am,” I say, mounting Onyx and holding out my hand for the professor to take. “Now come on. We have a lot of ground to cover.”
She hesitates only a moment before accepting the gesture and hauls herself onto the back of the beast behind me. Her arms encircle me once more and this time I find it almost pleasant to have another human being depending on me so much for her safety. It makes me feel necessary, makes me feel that I’m not going to be able to die on this stupid world because someone here needs me. Just as Davey needs me to come back home.
We start trotting without another word. There’s been far enough spoken just now for me to have enough to think about. Far, far more than I ever wanted to learn.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
We reach the continuation of the forest just as night falls. It took a lot longer to descend the cliffs than I would have liked, especially with the draconyx. We’ve already had proven to us why we shouldn’t travel the forest during the night so decide to make camp. I select a large tree and clamber into its branches. The formation of the leaves provides a natural bedding and the branches themselves are thankfully almost horizontal so I figure it would make a good place to sleep. Using Onyx as a stepping stool, Harper is able to reach the lowest branch as well and I help her to a more comfortable position. Onyx himself can make do on the forest floor: he’s used to sleeping here so knows what he needs to do to make sure he survives. We could I suppose have remained with him, for if he started it would mean trouble was approaching; but I have a horrible feeling I’m going to need all the strength and wits I can muster tomorrow, so wouldn’t mind an uninterrupted sleep beforehand.
Harper doesn’t complain about the makeshift bedding, and I’m once again not so sure I like the change which has come over her. It’s true I prefer not to have some antagonistic rich-girl continuously carping on at me, but this new persona is unsettling. I know there’s something she hasn’t told me, but the more she stays withdrawn the less I’m liking it.
“Do you want me to tie you down?” I ask.
“This is only our second night sleeping together, fall-girl. You could at least wait ‘til we’re engaged.”
It’s a half-hearted attempt at humour, and there’s none of the previous insult lacing her words. She’s trying at least, and I have to give her points for that.
“I meant to stop you falling out of the tree in your sleep. Or I could just hold you all night if you’d prefer?”
“Your unit must be a very happy place to work. I’ll be fine. I haven’t studied trees for all these years just to die by falling out of one.”
So we settle down for the night on the same two branches where they meet the tree itself. Beneath us Onyx settles down himself and I just hope the lieutenant doesn’t decide to march through the night. I get the impression a part of Harper is hoping for just such an occurrence.
*
I awaken immediately alert. That’s not natural for me, but has taken a great deal of training. In fact it’s one of the things I’ve put the most effort into, since it’s just so difficult for me. But sometimes waking up instantly knowing where you are and what you were doing the night before can save your life, and as such it was the one thing the lieutenant always insisted I perfect. Thinking of how the lieutenant always looks after her unit makes it so difficult to accept everything Harper was telling me last night. That Winter could be lying to us all is ridiculous, and yet I believe it entirely. It makes me wonder what else she’s been lying to us about over the years.
Harper isn’t beside me, which is the first thing I notice when I open my eyes. Frantically I check the base of the tree, but she hasn’t fallen to her doom, and for that I’m grateful. The next jump for my heart is that she may have taken Onyx and departed silently in the night, stranding me here in a tree. But Onyx is still there, dozing by the looks of him. I look about for signs of Harper, and see her on the ground a few trees away, standing at a position where I can barely see her arm but none of the rest of her.
She’s probably gone over there to relieve herself, I decide. But she’s standing up, and the more I stare, the less certain I am of anything. Since I can’t think of anything else she might have gone over there to do, my suspicions begin to churn my insides with doubts. She also seems to be leaning her back against the tree, if the angle of the visible arm is anything to go by. So she’s not relieving herself.
So what’s she doing then?
Without a sound I drop from the tree and stalk through the forest floor. The closer I get to her the more I’m certain I can hear her talking, and it’s as I reach the tree and pause upon the opposite side that I recognise the words she’s hastily mumbling.
“... just asking you to wait. Please! I’m a couple of hours behind you at most. You won’t have to wait long.” She pauses as if listening. “I know all that,” she says now. “But come on, it’s not going to do you any harm. And what’s it going to look like if you return without the person you were supposed to extract? Come on, all I’m asking is for you to fulfil your mission.” Another pause. “All right, I’ll try. But if I’m not there just remember how rich I can make you for just waiting an extra hour.”
She swears an
grily and storms straight past me, heading back to where we were nestled for the night.
“No joy?” I ask.
Harper freezes, her entire body going rigid. I reckon she probably doesn’t need to relieve herself any more after that fright.
She turns to me slowly, her eyes afraid, an excuse already bubbling from her lips.
“Not interested,” I tell her. “Strange the lieutenant gave you her frequency.”
“It just suddenly occurred to me she might answer if we called her.”
I never thought of that, stupidly enough. Still, after everything I’m learning I’m starting to think maybe it’s for the best I haven’t tried to contact anyone. “So you’re arranging our trip back? What makes you think the lieutenant would leave us behind?”
“I swear I didn’t mention your name.”
“You didn’t mention my name? What does that matter? Hold on, you’re telling me you didn’t even tell her I’m still alive?”
“I told her you got eaten by that brachauchenius.”
“By a what?”
“That thing in the water.”
So that was its name. “Why would you want her to think I was dead? Are you planning on leaving me here, is that it? You trying to get me back for calling you Goldie all this time? You think it’s funny to tell my friends I’m dead so they’ll leave me behind on some dinosaur world? Eh?”
She’s backing away, but that’s likely because I’m stalking towards her. Anger boils within me and I’m desperately trying to control it, but I don’t think I even want to. Ever since coming to this place I’ve been running for my life, saving Harper or finding out a whole heap of things I really don’t want to know. Anger is not a word which even adequately describes what I’m feeling.
“You don’t understand,” Harper says. “I was trying to help.”
“Help?” I’m close enough to push her so that’s precisely what I do. She stumbles but doesn’t fall, so I shove her again and this time she goes down. I watch her scrabbling back uselessly and I feel a fire burning within me at last. “Help? You think we’re pals, don’t you? You think you’ve wheedled your way sufficiently into my good books that I’m about ready to turn on my friends. Is that it? You want to make me think the lieutenant’s ready to abandon me to get me riled up?” I kick dirt in her face. “You think I’m going to believe Winter’s going to abandon me?”
“You don’t know everything,” Harper says, more fearful now than I’ve ever seen her before. Whatever she has to say is something I don’t want to hear, and I grab her by the shirt, tossing her through the air without letting go, slamming her back into a tree. Her breath explodes from her body as she attempts to gasp words, but they don’t come.
“I know everything I need to know,” I say through gritted teeth, trying my level best not to punch her head in. “I know that everything was going fine before I met you. Now suddenly I don’t trust what the lieutenant says, and I don’t know who to turn to. And the only person I have is you. Do you understand that, Goldie? The only person I have is you, and you’re nothing.”
“Her orders ...”
“I don’t care what you think of her orders,” I snap, pulling her back and slamming her against the tree once more. “Tell me what’s happening, Goldie. Tell me what the lieutenant told you, what you’re not telling me.”
“We have to get to the shuttle first. They don’t know we have Onyx. If we ...”
“I’m through with your manipulating!” I strike her then, my fist backhanding her across the face. Blood spills from her split lip, spattering the fallen leaves. Her glasses fly from her face. It shuts her up instantly, and as she turns terrified eyes upon me something within me bursts. The frustration of this mission, the stupidity of being here at all, being chased by beasts which died out millions of years ago ... None of this makes any sense. Adrenalin rushes might be my life’s blood, but this entire situation isn’t even real.
I draw my fist back to punch her full in the face, not even realising what I’m doing, and Harper bursts into tears before I can even land the blow. Suddenly I feel rotten that I’ve snapped, that I’m taking things out on this girl, the one person who’s still stood by me through everything.
I lower my fist, loosen my hold upon her shirt. “I’m sorry, Mary. I ... I don’t know anything any more.”
“You’re going to die.”
For a moment I don’t think I’ve heard her right. My eyes narrow just as hers begin to tear once more, and in a trembling voice she repeats those words, damning to someone though I’m not sure who.
“What?” I ask.
“Orders. Winter didn’t like them: she was giving me a rough time over them when we met. That’s what she was having a go at me about: as though it was somehow my fault.”
I blink, none of this making any sense at all. “What?” I repeat.
“They need a patsy. Someone to take the blame. The lieutenant retrieves whatever it was she needed to retrieve and goes home a success. The blame’s laid on me because you had to come retrieve me. But they needed someone else, someone within the team. Someone to be lost, killed by the dinosaurs so there would be a sad story to the tale if it ever got out to the media. And because ... because the government knows my father would protect me, so a cover story had to be made.”
“That’s absurd.”
“They’re going to pin the blame on you. Someone who won’t be able to refute whatever crimes they heap on you.”
“No. No, that’s ... this is ridiculous. I ... you’re telling me I’m nothing but a fall girl?” And then the nickname suddenly makes sense. I figured Harper called me that because of my codename – Autumn. But maybe she’s been trying in her own way to warn me of this the whole time.
“I’m sorry,” she says, trying not to cry but not entirely succeeding. “I told the lieutenant I was an hour or two behind her, but I figured with Onyx we could make it there before her. I thought ... I thought if you could stow away on the shuttle, they’d never know.”
“Winter wants to kill me?”
“No. No, Winter doesn’t want to kill you. But they’re her orders.”
I shake my head, releasing her at last. The orders stink, and I can’t believe the lieutenant would go through with them. Actually scratch that, yes she would. Over the years the lieutenant’s done a whole lot of bad things just because she’s been ordered to do them. Losing me would be something she could live with compared with some of the others. It’s no wonder she’s always drinking.
“Do Summer and Spring know about these orders?” I ask.
“I don’t know.”
They can’t. There’s no way either of them would have gone for it. Which means all I have to do is turn up to the shuttle alive, surprise them all, and unless Winter’s prepared to shoot me dead in front of everyone they’re going to have to take me back. But would she do that? Alienate her entire team just to see the mission through?
Possibly. You never can tell with the lieutenant.
“I’m sorry,” Harper sobs from where she’s fallen.
I crouch beside her and hold her tight, clutching her to me like a lost sister. “I’m the one who’s sorry,” I say in a gentle voice. “You’re a screwed up kid, aren’t you? You don’t deserve to have all this responsibility shoved down your throat.”
She sniffs. “Thanks.”
I help her to her feet, whether she wants the assistance or not, and place her glasses back on her face. “We should get back to Onyx and start moving if we’re going to stand any chance at all of making that shuttle before Winter gets there.”
“I don’t want you to die, Autumn. I ...”
“Claire.” It’s almost comical the size her eyes become as I say that single word. “My name’s Claire,” I say. “If we’re two women alone against this crazy world we might as well know each other’s names.”
She doesn’t understand just how important this is, me telling her my real name, but she seems to grasp that it’s something big. It
could be accused that I’ve only decided to be open with her because I want her support. That would be true, I don’t refute it. But Harper and I have spent a lot of time together and I think I’m actually starting to like her. Against all my better judgements certainly, but as stubborn and antagonistic as she is, she’s just a kid. And she’s tried to do the right thing. I can respect that.
“Your son,” Harper says. “I ... I didn’t want him to grow up without his mother.”
“You’re a better girl than you were a couple of days ago, Mary. Just remember there are people in this life worth trusting. Now let’s get a move on. We have a shuttle to catch.”
She tries to smile, tries to maintain a sense of optimism, but the truth of the matter is that neither of us knows what to expect when we finally meet up with the lieutenant. We don’t know whether she’ll carry through her orders or whether she’ll have the balls to throw her orders out the window and carry on protecting her soldiers.
If she turns on me, I honestly don’t know what I’ll do. Or what I’d prefer to do. It’s something I’ll have to decide when I reach it. Be prepared, those annoying scouts would have said, but I’ve never met a scout who’s had his scoutmaster planning to kill him.
With any luck Harper and I may yet be killed by a dinosaur before we ever make it back to that damn shuttle.
CHAPTER TWELVE
With Harper having lied to the lieutenant about her speed of travel I have it figured there’s an even chance we will be able to make it to the shuttle first. I still have no idea what I’m going to do once we arrive, and riding on the back of Onyx at his fastest gallop, the wind kicking my hair and blasting cold sense into my face, I realise that on this primitive world the only survivors are those willing to do whatever it takes to stay alive. That does not for one moment mean I am in any way willing to kill the lieutenant, but at the very least I have to disarm and try to reason with her. I won’t even attempt to talk to her, however, without first making sure she’s powerless to kill me.