Was I lying down?
Someone shook my shoulders. A deep, resonant voice echoed within my head. “Dammit, Jess. Breathe!”
I gagged as something slithered into my throat.
“Happy birthday, Jess.” Grandma handed me a brightly colored package.
Dad’s grin slithered away. “That’s a pretty big box for a gift card, Mom.”
Grams lifted a shoulder. “I couldn’t resist.”
I tore through the paper and gasped as I uncovered the Panasonic logo.
Holy-lee-crap.
I ran my fingers across the box, part of me not believing it was actually in my hands.
Dad rubbed his temples. “You bought her a camera?”
My father faded into the distance, replaced by layers of clear webbing and a blurry figure leaning over me.
Can’t. Breathe.
I scratched and clawed at my mouth, desperately trying to pull out whatever obstructed my airway. Weight bore down on my chest and shoulders, pressing me deep into the ground.
“Breathe, Jess. Try to breathe!” the voice shouted.
But I couldn’t. Whatever was inside me suctioned everything out. My vision started to fade.
We’d come so far, but now I’d die here. And no one would even know.
Something snapped, and frigid air entered my lungs. I sucked deeply, choking on whatever was in my throat.
“That’s it!” the voice cried. “Just keep breathing!”
I spluttered as whatever was in my mouth pulled free. A hazy image of a huge tube passed over my eyes.
“Take a slow breath. You’re okay.”
I closed my mouth and breathed through my nose. The air was sweet, reminiscent of lying beneath a lilac bush. I let my lids fall shut, enjoying the resonance humming through the air around me. Safe. Warm. Nothing could ever hurt me.
Wait. What?
I bolted upright. The haze cleared, and I focused on the most beautiful turquoise eyes I’d ever seen. Stunned beyond belief to be breathing, let alone staring at a dead guy, I froze.
David gaped. “Are you okay?”
No. I wasn’t okay. I was dead. We were both dead. Maybe he didn’t know that?
Deep, dark shades of olive surrounded us. Shouldn’t it be bright? Pearly gates and all?
David tilted his head. “Jess, please say something.”
I blinked twice, trembling among the tall trees and green-tinted darkness. I was still on the planet. But if I was still on the planet, that would mean …
“David!” I flung my arms around him. “Oh my God!” I thrust him away and stared at him before pulling him back to my chest. “Oh my God! Oh my God! Oh my God!”
His arms encircled me. Warmth, serenity, and love flowed between us, infusing me with everything that was David. He was alive. We were both alive.
Nothing else mattered but that moment. We sat in silence. His movement, the slow, calculated rhythm of his hands on my back, told me he was drinking me in as much as I was bathing in him. I didn’t care if I never let go. Everything was okay again.
David held my face, searching my eyes. “I thought I lost you.”
He lost me? “I saw your ship explode.”
He nodded. “That’s two for two crash landings for me. Maybe I should retire from piloting.”
I laughed. “Yeah, maybe that would be a good idea.”
David eased my head to his shoulder. His sigh told stories I wasn’t sure I wanted to hear.
“The ship is gone,” he said. The nerve center is intact, but the hull is scattered. We’re—”
I shushed him with a finger over his lips. A few hours ago, I was stranded on an alien world, terrified and alone. Now I was back in David’s arms. We were alive, and we were together. For now, that was enough.
I reached up to wipe a tear from my cheek and jumped when my fingers grazed my naked skin. “Where’s my mask?”
“You ripped it. You scared the life out of me. If I hadn’t been here … ”
“But how are we breathing?”
He waved his hand. The air around us shimmered. “This is a hostile surface bubble. It cleanses toxins from the air.”
I flapped my hands, but the air didn’t react. “Where does it come from?”
David held out his arm and fingered a shiny, black oval banded to his wrist. “The dome forms in a thirty-six span radius of this ovoid. We need to stay close together, but it should be able to filter enough air for both of us.”
The tall trees and haunting green air didn’t seem so frightening anymore. The cold did, though.
I rubbed my shoulders. “Why aren’t you freezing?”
“I am.” He stood and grabbed my backpack and ration case. “Come on, we need to go.”
He led me through the trees to a mound of branches. He pulled one up.
“Crawl in there.”
Okaaay … I slid beneath the pile into a cozy, hollow nook: a covered divot in the ground not much larger than a two man tent, like a warm-weather igloo. I plopped down into the thick, cuddly grass and crossed my legs. The ceiling lay only a few inches above my head.
David glided beside me and pulled down the branches like a door.
“Not too shabby,” I said.
Inclining, he laughed. “Yeah, I improvised pretty quickly last night. It gets cold here, fast.” He checked a few of the branches above us. “I had to protect myself, too. There’s a grassen out there. Not sure where it came from. It nearly took my head off last night, and almost bit me twice today.”
“Edgar?”
He raised an eyebrow.
“He was in my escape pod. He’s been following me, just like in the ship.”
“You gave it a name? Keep away from that thing, Jess. It’s unstable.”
“No, he’s sweet. You just need to give him a chance.”
He settled deeper into the leaves. “I think those fumes got to you.”
“Maybe, or maybe I’ve always been crazy. I have a habit of picking up aliens in the woods and taking care of them.” A grin spread across my lips, despite trying to hold it back as I cuddled beside him.
“If you gave that thing anywhere near the attention you gave me, he’s a lucky little bug.”
“He’s not a bug. I thought he was an important part of the ship’s biological something-or-other.”
“They are, as a whole.” He rubbed his hand. “Apparently alone they’re little pieces of …”
“Be nice.”
He ran his fingers down my temple and along my jawline. “I was worried about you.”
I gave him a quick kiss. “And I’m so glad you’re not dead.”
David pulled me to his chest. “This is nice. It reminds me of the woods on Earth. Do you remember holding each other at night in the forest?”
I smiled. “I’ll never forget.”
His breathing steadied and his grip on me relaxed, as if he’d fallen asleep. I took his hand and pulled his arms tighter around me.
Alone, again, in the woods. But this time no one knew where we were. David took a deep breath, and I relished the sensation of his chest pressed against mine. Perfect.
It was this sense of contact that I needed. The connection. How could I ever find this with anyone else?
I could feel him, and not just physically. He was inside me. Part of me. The lost piece of my puzzle was back, and he fit seamlessly. We were one. Right. Back where we belonged. Even if we were stranded in the middle of God knows where.
My eyes grew heavy, and I gave in, allowing them to close. We could worry about cohesion and parts of the spaceship later. Now, everything was right where it needed to be.
“Goodnight, David.”
He whispered in Erescopian, tightening his grip on me. I had no idea what he’d said, but it sounded tender, loving.
I let my lashes flutter closed and cuddled deeper into the crook of his arm, more at ease than I’d ever been.
24
Crack.
My eyes bolted open.
Crack.
I blinked the sting from my eyes. How long had I been asleep?
Crack.
I rolled toward David, and a pang jettisoned through my chest.
The leaves beside me lay empty.
Crack.
And something was outside.
I grabbed the branches over my head and lifted. But what if those twigs were all that was protecting me from the toxins outside? I released the leaves and set my palm where David had been. No warmth remained in the soil. How long had he been gone?
Crack.
“David?”
Something shuffled outside. I trembled and scuttled to the rear of our hideaway. The branches shifted overhead before opening. I cringed, until David’s smile stole my fear away. The planet’s odd green atmosphere lit him up like an Irish God.
“Good morning.”
I grabbed my chest and released the breath lodged there. “What are you doing?”
He pulled me from our safe haven and handed me a strip of something that looked like a Clark Bar without the chocolate coating.
I flipped the hard, brownish block over. “What is this?”
“Breakfast.”
Yum. I guess the bacon I’d been fantasizing about was too much to ask for.
I took a bite. The dry, crackery substance tasted a lot like a rice cake. Or cardboard. Same difference. I tried to withhold my grimace as I swallowed.
He squatted and handed me a canister. “Here. Drink. It helps to moisten the food supplements.”
I sat, sipped from the container, and handed the water back to him.
Interacting like this seemed so natural. It was almost hard to believe that only yesterday I was fumbling through these woods alone.
“How did you find me?”
His eyes deepened, the color swirling. “I could find you anywhere. But you knew that, didn’t you?”
Maybe I did. When we were on the ship, and I’d closed my eyes, I had to concentrate to not sense David. His feeling, his resonance, screamed over everything else.
And last night, something drew me further into the trees. Always in one direction. Deep down, I think I knew he was alive, searching for me. “You can sense where I am, can’t you?”
He nodded, dragging his hand down the side of my face.
I grabbed his wrist, holding him there. “I thought I was going to die.”
David raised his free hand to my other cheek, cradling my face. “I wouldn’t let that happen.”
Our foreheads touched, and a jolt of energy swirled across my skin before shooting through me, cascading through every inch of my being. My head eased back, and a sigh escaped my lips as the sensation settled in my chest, building in pressure.
I leaned into him, frightened, but driven to reach for more. I whimpered, straining, needing to burst what built inside me. Something cracked, and a wave of bounding energy shuddered through my veins. I gasped, releasing a moan with each subsequent tumble of energy. My body trembled until the sensations slowly ebbed away.
Breathing through the last of the tremors, I opened my eyes. David released me and sat back, looking at his hands.
It seemed an eternity before he returned his gaze to mine. “I’ve never done that before. It was supposed to feel good.” His shoulders leveled. “Did it?”
I blinked as the last of the sensations drifted away. “Are you kidding? That was amazing.”
He lowered his eyes. “Oh.”
“David, what’s wrong? I loved it. I’ve never experienced anything like it.”
A sadness coated his eyes. I reached for him, wanting to blot that expression off his face forever.
He stood, moving away. “If we can figure out a way to attract that grassen back to the nerve center, we might be able to get part of the ship back together.” He brushed his fingers through his hair. “Every time I get near him, though, he attacks me.”
His stark change in subject cut a hole in my heart. What had I done to disappoint him?
David kept his gaze from me. “Do you really think it’s following you?”
“Well, he drank water out of my hand.”
David turned, raising his brow. “Be serious.”
“I swear. He even tried to give me something to eat—a dead animal.”
“I think you were hallucinating when you ran out of air.”
I folded my arms. “I’m telling you, he’s friendly. He may not like you, but he certainly likes me.”
“I’ll believe it when I see it.”
I let my arms fall to my sides. What was wrong with him? Maybe I shouldn’t push. “How would Edgar be able to help rebuild the ship?”
“Grassen herd the particles of the ship together, keeping them close enough to the nerve center so the ship acts like one solid entity, instead of millions of pieces moving independently. It’s a symbiotic relationship. The grassen feed off the expended energy of the ship’s molten components, while they keep the microbiotic elements from drifting off in space to die alone.”
“So, your ships, they’re actually alive?”
“They were.” He picked up a dull, black blob not much bigger than a grape. “The components won’t survive long scattered like this. They need to be together, like a family. Apart, they’re weak.” He picked up another bead and placed them together. When they tapped, the balls disintegrated and wafted through his fingers as dust.
“That can’t be good.”
“It’s not.”
I set my water canister down, but it slid off the rock. Two glugs of water trickled into the grass before David grabbed and handed the container back to me.
“Huh.” He poked a ball within the miniature puddle. The orb’s dull tone brightened.
“Huh, what?”
He picked up another dull, oblong bead from the ship and swirled it in the spilled water. The opalescence returned, and the slightly flattened oval sprang back into a ball. “Maybe the smaller parts are dehydrating?” He glanced at the cloudless, green sky. “I guess rain would be too much to ask for.”
I dribbled some water over the particles that had turned to dust. A soupy dust-mud puddle formed at my feet.
Oh well, it was worth a try. I guess dead was dead, even for alien metal.
“What happens if too many particles die like these?” I asked.
He looked down. “We don’t go home. The nerve center needs enough particles to form a ship around it.”
I rubbed my face. “So we need Edgar to get us out of here, huh?”
He nodded.
“Then I think you better let me do the talking.”
25
The sun had moved to the opposite side of the sky. Probably about four o’clock by Earth standards. After biting David three times, Edgar lay hidden under a pile of leaves.
David massaged the fang marks on his hands. “If you have any ideas, I’m up for them.”
I tried to hide the smirk from my face. “I told you to let me do the talking.”
He sighed. “I’m trying to be a gentleman. I didn’t want you to get hurt. I have a fake epidermis he has to bite through before he draws blood. You don’t.”
I picked up a few glistening orbs. From the number in this area, it seemed Edgar had already started herding them. With a gentle flick, I rolled the orbs toward the grassen’s den. Edgar snatched the bait, pulling the orbs beneath the leaves.
Well, that’s a good start.
I poured some water into my hand and held the drink close to the hole.
“What are you doing? That thing will bite your thumb off.”
I reached closer. “I don’t think so.”
“Jess, don’t.”
Edgar edged out. His fangs hung close to my fingers, but I didn’t budge. I crouched down to his level as he slipped his fangs into the water. Good boy.
“The ship we all came on kinda blew up
,” I said, keeping my voice low and steady. “David might be able to fix it, if we get all the pieces back together. Do you think you can help?”
“That thing is not listening to you,” David said. “They’re not intelligent like that.” He stood, and the spider whisked back into the burrow.
“You scared him.”
David slumped to the ground and threw a rock into the trees. I sat beside him.
“You didn’t seem so negative about the grassen back on the ship. You called Edgar out of the wall like it was nothing.”
“Because before then I’d never been bitten by one.” He glanced back at the burrow. “I honestly don’t know all that much about them. We kind of take them for granted. In a pack, they’re predictable. They always do what we prompt them to do. I never had to deal with one with a bad attitude.”
I wove my fingers into his. “Maybe you two just need to get to know each other?”
Something shifted beside my thigh. I froze as a silvery leg maneuvered a small black glob beside my hip. “David,” I whispered.
His eyes widened. “Don’t make any sudden movements.”
Edgar scurried into the trees and nudged three more orbs toward us. The four balls flew together like magnets, becoming one larger, shiny mass.
I smiled. “Still think he didn’t understand?”
“I don’t believe it.”
Edgar reared back on his hind legs, chittered, and ran into the bushes. He returned and looked at us. My reflection sparkled in his center eye, David’s likeness in his left.
I stood and approached the huge spider.
“What are you doing?” David eased up from the ground.
“He wants us to follow him.”
David tilted his head. “How do you know?”
“Haven’t you ever had a dog?”
“No.”
I reached out my hand to David, pulling him the rest of the way up. “Trust me on this one.”
We wove through the trees. I crinkled my nose over the thick smell of scorched earth. Can you call it earth when you’re not actually on Earth? I shook my head. Who cared?
Edgar stopped before a thick outcropping of trees and tapped his two rear feet together. David stepped back.
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