by Archer Swift
***
I was unbelievably on-form during the hunt. Three shots, three large males. Each arrow striking just behind the shoulder, through the heart. An instant kill. Dixan allowed me to take lead in the hunt. Although my junior in some ways, it was his designated bow—and his call to make. He watched my back, keeping an eye on any possible dangers, so I could give my full attention to catching enough food for at least three days.
The incident with Gellica and Nadalie did not shake my newfound resolve. Dixan and I bounced around the jungle like young boys on their first adventure. I could see my upbeat mood rubbed off on Dixan quickly. We joked and laughed easily, so much so he couldn’t resist asking me how I was coping so well. When I threw caution to the wind and chose to confide in him, confessing to my early-morning stunt, he didn’t believe me.
“No way, bro,” whistled Dixan through a grin that was all teeth, looking at me as though I’d stuck my underwear on my head. “I reckon you hit your head falling into that hole harder than you think!”
“You think?”
“Or being falsely accused. I reckon that could send someone off to loony-land!”
“Yep, that must be it,” I played along.
You’re not far wrong, Dix!
Dix. Dixan Mantle. A plucky little bloke with a heart of gold. He never met his father, a military man, killed in the final year of World War III—the Oil War that ravaged the planet. Dixan was born a month after his funeral, on a military base somewhere.
His mother, a brilliant meteorologist also employed by the military, was killed by a Serpent in year four on this planet. Another tragic, heartrending tale. We were all defined by our parents’ demise to some degree. All orphaned, scarred. Forever marked by their deaths. That we probably wouldn’t have the chance to scar the lives of children of our own was some consolation. At least, I viewed it that way.
Before we headed back to camp, we reset the three traps that we’d closed before our trip to the Gathering. They consisted of three-by-three stride holes dug into the ground, nearly one-and-a-half strides deep. At the bottom of each, we secured four sharp spikes to impale a Hog that might tumble into the pit. Foliage disguised the opening. Two days before the Gathering, we had closed the traps. What we didn’t need or couldn’t use, we didn’t kill.
On the way back, we had a brush with Death, a rendezvous with one of Dixan’s worst nightmares. And mine. I heard it before I saw it. Actually, I smelt it before I heard it. The reek of Death. Then the rustle of bush flattened by enormous, sliding weight. The distinct raspy buzz of the tail rattle. Followed by the soul-searing hiss.
Distracted and less observant, Dixan would have walked straight into its path. With a girth four times thicker than a man’s waist, the fifteen- to twenty-stride-long gargantuan viper would kill on sight. Even with a full belly, it killed simply because it could.
It was difficult to call it a snake being so much bigger than an Earth-snake. My Dad once described it as a hybrid between an anaconda and a rattlesnake. I couldn’t argue. I’d never seen either of those Earth-creatures. All I knew, the Serpent was my least favourite beast on Eden. Yes, I loathed the Sabre. But the Serpent was something from my most feverish nightmares.
I once saw a Serpent in action, its rattlesnake-like tail mesmerising an entire herd of Hogs like a magic wand in the hand of a conjurer, emitting red and green flickers with each rattle. Swallowing eight hypnotised adults one by one, it didn’t even need to use its venomous fangs.
Twenty centimetre fangs. Daggers that could penetrate the underbelly of a Sabre. In fact, on my ventures into the deep jungle, I’d witnessed two brutal battles between these monsters of Eden. The score? One apiece. On each occasion, the victor killed quickly, but then took its time defiling the body of its enemy. Ripping its rival apart, defecating on the carcass, leaving it for the scavengers to feast on. In both cases, the victor did not eat its opponent. The pleasure was purely in the kill. Eternal enemies. A feud spawned in the bowels of Eden.
The Serpent’s lethal venom would drop an adult Sabre dead inside three minutes. Dixan’s mother died in fifteen seconds. She was gone in thirty. Swallowed whole. And Dix nearly followed in his mother’s footsteps.
I pulled him down and hushed his startled gasp. I kept my eyes locked on Dixan’s—my own mesmerising act, to keep him from bolting. If he ran, he was dead.
The ruthless serpent-beast slid past us, dank with puke-green slime; its tail rattle abuzz, toying with a petrified jungle as it asserted its bewitching supremacy over all lesser creatures. We kept out of sight, just. I kept Dixan still, somehow. For some reason, favour smiled on us. Full-bellied, and moving somewhere with purpose, the hell-born creature didn’t notice us.
Even though these sorts of near-death experiences happened often, I think I only breathed again when we got back to camp. The death-smell of the viper, however, remained trapped in my nose. It would be days before I could smell without feeling bilious.
The rest of the day was filled with gutting and skinning the Hogs. Because of the excess meat, Dixan and I spent the afternoon salting much of it to make meat-jerky. It would probably keep our bellies full for a week.
But food would be the least of our worries in the days ahead.