by Pj Belanger
shaman, who seemed pleased as he shook his beads in her face. The Chief, however put his hands together and bent his entire body to her talking as he did so.
Although she knew what the big man had said through her amulet, Polk signed anyways, “He says that the gods have sent a beautiful messenger. He finds you quite attractive and would be honored if you would share his bed tonight. All visitors are expected to share his bed.”
Her mind reeled. Oh for god’s sake, her thoughts puked. Yoria started to sign a negative reply but there was yelling from the area around the pen. She looked over and to her horror the shaman had entered into the enclosure and was approaching the beasts. The stupid insane man was waving his beads and chanting. She started to run toward the opened gate with Sergeant Polk matching her stride for stride. He was yelling at the top of his voice. Her translator rang loudly in her ear. “Stop, you fool. Get out of there!”
Time seemed frozen. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw her riders rushing toward the pen, horror written on their faces. She saw the Browns lift their heads, showing their sharp teeth and pounding their immense tails. It was the Red, however, that moved the fastest. In seconds, with his thumping legs and swishing tail, the beast had reached the shaman. Two beady curious eyes watched the witchdoctor, who was chanting loudly and swinging his beads at the Red’s snout. The giant lizard opened its mouth and in two bites ate the soothsayer. It happened so fast that it took Yoria’s brain a few moments to actually realize what had happened.
“Oh shit!” came from Polk’s mouth. Everyone stood gaping at the spot where the crazy shaman had been standing. “Damn, this is going to cause a lot of problems.”
Yoria had too much experience, too many deployments to break the silence. Fed rules had been ingrained in her. She motioned with her hands for Polk to shut up and he did. Her other riders were also causing a ruckus. Covering her mouth carefully with her hand, she quietly spoke into her amulet, “Protocol people! Calm down or the beasts will react badly.”
The Browns were already agitated by the commotion. They started bumping into each other, roaring and snapping. The Red was pounding the ground and rearing up on his haunches, as if to challenge the smaller lizards. The riders fanned out around the pen. Every one of them raised and lowered their arms in union, then began loudly chanting.
Unfortunately the Chief, who was rooted in his original spot, was hollering and yelling. The Chieftain wailed loudly. Yoria turned to run back to the ranting man. He was going to cause the beasts to break out of their pen in panic. She didn’t get far, however, as the chief proceeded to throw up his innards and then collapse. Polk raced over to the now unconscious man, shaking his head.
The beasts, thank goodness, were responding to the riders, most just stood quietly watching their masters chanting motion. Eventually, all the lizards, including the Red, lay down quietly. Yoria motioned to Mitch and Moria to help Polk move the Chief.
“Let’s get them saddled. We need to get out of here,” she instructed her team. Then she returned to Polk who with Mitch’s help was throwing buckets of precious water at the chief, cleaning him up. The village leader seemed in a daze.
Polk got the man to stand up. The Chief smelled as bad as the beasts for god’s sake. Yoria’s translator caught the sergeant’s words, “Your highness, the gods have seen fit to send your witchdoctor back to them. He is with the gods.”
The Chief just stared at Polk, Yoria wasn’t sure if the village leader understood or was still in shock. Polk, however, brought out a bag full of gold nuggets. The chief’s eyes opened wide, his hand grasped the precious bag of wealth. The village leader then nodded, “Yes, it is so.”
Yoria watched as Polk accompanied the Chief back toward the village, talking animatedly to the leader, handing him even more gold as they went. The riders all finished loading the beasts. It took two riders to place and tighten the saddle and attach the saddlebags but they hurried as much as was possible given the task. The beasts, to their relief, gave no further problems.
The sun was not yet mid morning when the riders led the huge reptiles out into the Hellgate Plains. Mitch’s Brown, Calypso, came along side Lily. “That’s going to cause a lot of trouble when we get back to base camp,” he shook his head.
She just nodded. Despite the killings that the Fed army would do to prevent any world tampering, they were very strict when it came to any other unnecessary local deaths. “We will need to watch the Red carefully,” Yoria told her second in command. “You know what they say about once they taste human flesh.”
Mitch shuddered then nodded. Her second in command looked pale. She wondered if the horror of what had just happened also showed on her own face. It was Moira who came up, relieving the tension. “Well, that was a first for me. Not something to write home about!”
The lands beyond Ponstria actually had grass. Unlike the desert, there was a slight breeze filtering down from the surrounding mountain ridges. The land seemed less dry and the grass in places was quite tall. She wondered at the lack of inhabitants. Not much had been said about the land preceding Hellgate. The General’s comment had been, “Just get through it to the cliffs as quickly as possible. Stay on your beasts.”
Moria came next to her, “Maybe we could take a small break, we left rather quickly and we should double check our equipment.” Yoria was about to agree when something moving caught the corner of her eye. She tried to focus more on the surrounding area. Funny, she thought, why aren’t there more small animals. Not a squirrel, rabbit or even birds seemed to be anywhere around.
Then she actually saw the grass move. To her horror, an enormous snake slithered along side of their convoy. “Oh, my god, did you see that?” Moira gasped breaking her silence.
“Everyone keep on your mounts!” she quietly spoke into her medallion as another snake slithered on the other side of her. Now she knew why nothing dwelled in this land. If her estimate was correct, the snakes were fifteen or twenty feet long and as wide as a small barrel. There was comfort in the fact that the snakes would not bother with the massive lizards but the sooner they got out of here the better.
Suddenly, one of the snakes slithered between her and Moira’s beast, Lucky. Her lieutenant’s lizard roared rearing high on its back legs. The lizard immediately took after the snake. Crap, Yoria thought and waved to Mitch as both Lily and her second in command’s beast turned and followed Moria. “Keep Calypso on the right of her, I’ll take the left,” she ordered Mitch.
Mitch and Yoria’s Browns were the fastest of the twelve. Both got along side of Lucky, using the big Browns to try and slow down the smaller animal. Lucky swung its massive head at both mounts, snapping. The snake was slithering right in front of them. It suddenly turned to hiss at the three massive lizards, coiling upwards. Lucky’s huge foot came pounding down on it.
The snake was cut in half and collapsed to the ground. Yoria got Lily to turn right into the path of Moria’s mount. Both lizards collided then stopped, the dead snake right under them.
“Don’t let her eat any of it!” Yoria loudly yelled, “We have no idea if it’s poisonous.”
Moria pulled hard on Lucky’s harness but the beast was giving her a difficult time. Yoria jumped down. She quickly stared into Lily’s eye, “Stay,” Yoria whispered and her lizard actually sat. Then she went over to Moria’s beast. Mitch was on the other side trying to use Calypso to block the other lizard’s head from going down to the snake while keeping his own beast under control.
Yoria stood in front of Lucky, she made eye contact, staring intently at the big black eyes. Slowly, Moira’s beast quieted to the point where she could be turned around. Yoria remounted, but not before passing over the immense snake. The head was as large as a horse’s head, not to mention the matching long body. She shivered and quickly got onto her saddle.
When she’d rejoined the group, she reached for her amulet telling her troops, “Keep to the road and be alert for another snake incident. Keep these animals on short leashes!”
The day seemed to drift away as noon came and went. Her stomach was rumbling but she dared not stop to get something out of her saddlebag. They had been seeing snakes on and off all morning and she did not want to tempt fate and become snake food. Once again she thanked the heavens for the massive size of the beasts. Yoria wondered if she should warn the General then decided he probably already knew given the warning he’d provided. Still, the following caravan would have to be careful.
Around mid afternoon, the huge plateau-topped cliff, Hellgate came into view. It was one of two high plateaus that seemed to guard the entrance to the populated lands beyond. From her report she knew that several large settlements lay just past the gap. It was the more populated part of the planet. Its gateway was why the criminals had chosen this place. It was easily defended and also easy to reach the villages from there and to spread the new technology before the Galactic Congress became aware of it. She just hoped the Rolles hadn’t gotten to the large villages yet.
With any luck, they were in time. It was on the top of the plateau that the Rolles had reportedly set up camp. Hopefully with this side being unpopulated and the cliff’s supposedly being un-climbable, then the Beast Squad would have the element of surprise