Quiggs sobbed, pounding the door. “What are you waiting for? Help him!”
The grandmother sliced a sliver of flesh from his flank and dangled it over Beau’s agonized face before she smacked her lips around it.
Max tried to pull Quiggs away. “Don’t watch.”
A blue bolt shot through the air and punched through the grandmother’s chest. The hole widened, flesh and bone melting into globs of gray paste. Her shocked expression was the last glob dropping into the vapor.
“Fuck me,” Max breathed.
Bolts sprayed the room. The searing light forced Quiggs to bury his face in Max’s chest. “Please, please, please. Don’t hit my Beau. Please, please, please. Don’t hit my Beau.”
“The bolts have stopped.”
Quiggs opened his eyes. They had stopped because there was nothing left standing to kill. Where the stairs had stood were scorched, rippled walls and no trace of the females. “Where’s Beau?” He stared down, realizing the lift had taken them halfway up.
Coughing, Beau staggered to his feet. He wiped his eyes and gazed about, bewildered by what had happened. He jerked his head toward the metal wall, and a lit door opened. As if beckoned by a friend, his face split into a happy grin, and he loped toward the door. The doorway vanished after he passed through.
As it neared the roof, the lift strained, and the gentle hum roughened to a death screech. A greasy smoke filtered in. The vines, left alone for centuries, formed a heavy network of roots on the surface, preventing the lift’s hatch from opening.
Max gripped the handrail, his face grim. “Brace yourself. This thing either breaks through or it breaks apart.”
Smoke—real smoke—poured through the cracks, zigzagging down the sides and across the floor. Quiggs wrapped his arms around Max’s waist, holding tight as they waited to suffocate or plummet through the floor. He felt Max’s heart thudding evenly, fearless to the end. His own heart seemed to have stopped pumping.
Roots snapped, dirt clods flew, and vines spurted sap as the lift ripped through. The back wall slid open to let them out. Quiggs stumbled outside into a patch of sunlight where the lift had toppled a small section of the canopy. He fell to his knees, gasping for clean air.
Max knelt beside him, chest heaving, his sensory hairs standing on end, overloaded with input.
For a minute, the vines stilled. Quiggs never saw the vines rest. Then the canopy rustled. Silvery threads spun from the damaged stalks. Mists shot from the leaves to feed the new growth. Gnarled roots thrust from the ground to absorb the damp sap dripping from broken stalks. Roots nudged his feet, and Quiggs shivered. These were the untouched ancient vines with stalks thick as wrists, towering to form a dense canopy.
Like the vines, Quiggs needed a minute to recover from the carnage. He had no explanation for what had occurred. He fixated on how precise that first bolt was. Something cognizant lived behind that wall. In seconds, it killed the ferals, then deliberately lured Beau through a door in the wall while it took his friends to the surface.
“Slow, even breaths.” Max spoke softly, a reminder there was a chance a few females had escaped the den, though Quiggs doubted it after seeing the annihilated stairs. Max loosened the bulky backpack and slid it down his shaking arms. He massaged Quiggs’s shoulders until his breathing steadied.
The lift belched smoke, then fell, the impact a faint thunderclap. There was no way in or out to search for Beau. Was his friend a welcomed guest or a trapped specimen? Quiggs had watched him sprint to the door in the wall, looking enthralled at what beckoned from the other side.
Quiggs admitted to envying him—unless the watchers intended to experiment on him. He squared his shoulders. “Max, what do we do about Beau?”
Max rummaged through the backpack for a vine cutter and gloves. “Beau’s safe. Worry about us. We have two days to find the canal before our water runs out and we go vine daft. On my honor, we’ll put together an expedition with equipment and supplies and return for him.”
Max’s words triggered the vivid image of Beau standing before the drying vent.
Please save my Quiggs. On my honor, I will do anything if you help us.
How had the watchers understood what he said? Had they deciphered a sensory interpretation of an obvious plea? Perhaps a lost patrol in the past had discovered the bunker, and the watchers had learned their language. His parents had vanished without a trace. Had they—
Max snapped his fingers in front of Quiggs’s face. “I know that expression. Stay away from the fog. We’re wasting daylight.”
Quiggs blinked at him. “The watchers didn’t kidnap Beau. He promised them anything on his honor for their help and they collected.”
“I heard what he said in the bathroom, but how did the watchers understand his language?”
“Assume they understood and enslaved him as payment for saving us.” Quiggs swallowed a sob. “They could run experiments on him.”
“I doubt the watchers intend to harm him. The blue bugs seemed fascinated with him. Maybe they’re part goat.”
Quiggs let out a watery laugh.
Max strapped the backpack on Quiggs. He pulled Quiggs to his feet and cupped his face. “All I know for sure is Beau loves his good friend Quiggs, and we made a pact that whoever survived would see you reach the canal.”
“What if we can’t find our way back here? What if they won’t release him when we come back for him?”
“First of all, assume we will find our way back here with everyone in the Triangle fanning out to locate what is undoubtedly a gateway to the lost shelter of our ancestors. Secondly, if Beau is unhappy, his yowling will have the watchers kicking him out within a month.”
Quiggs cheered. “True.”
Max tugged a red herder’s hat low over Quiggs’s ears. “I cut. You navigate.”
Quiggs put his two years of flight training to work, checked the angle of the sun, and pointed westward to the canal.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Max estimated two to four miles of tough striated purple stalks to cut before reaching the thinner, bendable purple stalks found closer to the canal. The older stalks in the deep outland resembled thick leafy poles, spaced less than two inches apart and rising taller than Max before branching into a dense canopy of soft broad-leafed vines. To squeeze through, Max cut three or four stalks, gaining him a half-step forward. Cut another three or four stalks, move forward, and repeat hundreds of times. He could rip vines apart with his bare hands, but he would exhaust himself sooner without extra food and water.
The leafy canopy housed a variety of vermin. Leeches slept inside cocoons until ground movement disturbed the supporting stalk. When vibrations awakened them, they cracked their cocoons and fell like wet leaves. The purple leeches moved sluggishly and quickly shriveled and died if they didn’t land directly on exposed skin. A toothless mouth attached with a sealing, numbing mucous, and their proboscis drilled a hole. After the leeches sucked enough, they regurgitated nourished eggs into the hole and fell off, the process completed in a few hours. Unless the clot of eggs was excised before hatching, the victim faced an agonizing death. If detected, a fingernail or a knife easily scraped the creatures off the skin before they gifted a host with eggs.
Soldiers on border patrol performed frequent body checks on each other, usually ending in perfunctory sex. Max remembered how frequently he’d checked his comrades during his first year of patrols. As for himself, his sensory hairs signaled if a leech landed on his skin.
Instead of covering up as Max advised him, Quiggs rubbed the cheap lube herders carried in their backpacks to his exposed skin.
When Max looked surprised, Quiggs explained, “Beau told me it prevents a leech from forming a seal.”
Max stopped after a few hours and opened the backpack for a canteen. “We’ll rest for ten minutes. Sit back to back. Keep your limbs tucked in and your mind alert.”
Quiggs examined his floppy herder’s hat for leeches, then slumped wearily against Max�
��s back. He sipped sparingly and handed the canteen back to Max. “Drink my share. You’re sweating buckets.”
Max accepted without a token protest. He feared by tomorrow night he’d show signs of going vine daft.
“Meh-eh-eh. Meh-eh-eh.”
The weak cry came from ahead to their left.
“Meh-eh-eh. Meh-eh-eh.”
Quiggs rolled to his feet. “It’s a goat in distress.” He sang out to it, “Where are you, sweetheart?”
The sweetheart meant extra fluids, regardless of Quiggs’s objections. Blood would hydrate them, though the hot coppery taste would test his baby cadet’s stomach.
Max cut vines, following the plaintive bleats to a large tri-color doe in a flattened circle of stalks. Black eyes with slit-pupils in a brown-and-tan face gazed at them when they approached. She showed her horns when Max moved toward her. The tri-colors were ornery and bit and kicked when herded from a comfortable grazing site. If scared, they gored. Max would kill her with a quick snap of the neck.
“Careful, Quiggs. Stay back. Don’t watch.”
“Pfft. Step aside. She’s harmless.” Quiggs shed his backpack and patted the sides of his thighs. “Come here, you gorgeous sweetheart,” he cooed to her. “What’s wrong? Did those nasty ferals hurt you?” She trotted over, letting him wrap his arms around her long white neck. He ran a hand over her sides and flanks, then examined beneath. “Oh, I see. Your teats are leaking. Max, she’s desperate for milking.”
Max’s gaze strayed to her dead baby, its wizened size telling him it was premature, probably from the trauma of a raid. He’d rather drink milk than blood, but he’d never milked a goat in his life, and his sheltered concubine wouldn’t have a clue either. Fuck it all. Their lives depended on drinking extra fluids. He’d have to kill her, slice open her throat, and force Quiggs to drink.
He braced himself for hysterical sobbing. “Step aside.”
Quiggs knelt on her right side. “Don’t you worry, sweetheart. I won’t let the evil commander snap your neck and drink your blood because I know that’s what he’s thinking.” He reached his right hand under her belly. “Beau taught me how to milk his dairy goats. I need to gently massage her teats and udder to accustom her to my hand in case she’s a first freshener.”
Max’s jaw dropped at his competence. Was there anything Quiggs didn’t know? “How do we catch the milk if we don’t have a pail? Do we lie beneath her belly and take turns squirting it into our mouths? Do I need to tie her hind legs?” All the questions made him sound like Quiggs.
Quiggs rolled his eyes and handed him his herder’s hat. “It’s waterproofed. Kneel by me and hold it under her belly.”
Max knelt with the hat in place. “Your sweetheart is glaring at me. What the—ouch! She bit my ear.”
“She gave you a sharp nibble telling us to quit stalling. If she meant to bite, you’d be missing your ear.”
“Should I pat her flank or something to calm her?”
“Nope. She’s fine. Her milk’s let down. Now pay close attention.” Quiggs enclosed a long plump teat with his thumb and forefinger and set up a squeezing rhythm with three fingers. Soon, he used both hands, squeezing one teat while the other teat refilled. He leaned into her as he milked into the hat, all the while praising her in the happy nonsensical way he’d learned from Beau.
After Quiggs finished, Max stuck a finger into the hat and sampled the milk. He spat it out. “The milk’s bad. Is she sick?”
Quiggs tasted and did the same. “Yuck. She’s been grazing the older vines. Something in them is contaminating her milk.”
“Can we still drink it to keep hydrated?”
“If it causes gripe, we’ll dehydrate faster from diarrhea.”
The doe stretched her long neck around and licked Quiggs’s face with gratitude. She nuzzled her dead baby, then selected a stalk near it. Using her front hooves, she trampled the stalk to get at the upper leaves, then ate her way down, stopping at the woody base.
The doe’s red collar identified her as the property of the Port Paducah Guild. Quiggs examined the tags. “The last grazing marker on her collar was Milepost Sixteen. She escaped the first raid. Gave birth soon after. Stayed near her stillborn…” His voice trailed, then brightened. “She didn’t wander deep if she gave birth. We’re less than a mile from the canal. We can reach it tomorrow, barring detours or dark skies.”
“We have enough water through tomorrow.” Max narrowed his eyes on the doe. “Will she follow us?”
“She’ll graze and catch up.”
“Good.” The doe would provide tomorrow’s supper if they didn’t reach the canal. With extra food and liquids, he could afford a longer rest. “Wake me in fifteen minutes.” Max used the backpack as a pillow and closed his eyes, instantly asleep.
Max woke to the day fading out. Why had Quiggs let him sleep? He leaped up, frantic that Quiggs had gone into a fog and predators had seized an easy meal.
A quick sweep showed Quiggs missing, as was the doe. The vines looked like a herd had stampeded through the rest area, smashing down a wide avenue of stalks and churning the undergrowth. The vines hadn’t begun repairing the damage. The bordering stalks looked yellow and exhausted. He’d never seen so much sky exposed. What the fuck had happened? He’d slept through the stampede without his sensory hairs triggering him awake.
Fear rushed through his veins. He gave two sharp whistles. “Quiggs, dammit, if you’re dead—”
“Over here!” Quiggs emerged from one side of the sickly fringe. “Watch this!” His voice vibrated with a new discovery. He broke off a piece of fallen stalk, then crumbled it in his palms. “It was so fast I wasn’t sure what had happened. The canopy whipped as if caught in a strong wind. The leaves curled and dropped. Then I saw the mother roots breaking through the ground cover, as if a new species of underground insects was attacking them.”
Looking down Max saw an exposed black root covered with a yellow exudate. The root crumbled when he kicked it. He squatted and sifted his hands through the brownish clumps. They felt slightly sticky, like tilled earth in the early morning, and smelled faintly sulfurous when rubbed between his palms. He wasn’t a genius like Quiggs, but he realized he’d just created a handful of fertilized dirt for the exhausted farms of the Triangle.
Max fell back on his ass, trying to deal with the knowledge.
Vines crackled, and another section of the canopy toppled beyond Quiggs. The doe bleated, bounding out from beneath the falling vines. Quiggs stroked her neck until she quieted.
Whatever parasite was attacking the vines had frightened the doe. He and Quiggs needed to get away before it attacked them also.
Max picked up the backpack. “Why didn’t you wake me?”
Quiggs blinked at the obvious. “Because I needed to observe what was causing the damage.”
“Put on your backpack. We’re leaving before it infects us.”
“Exactly why I didn’t wake you. I knew you’d drag me away without giving me a chance to prove my theory.”
The doe glared at Max and showed her horns. Quiggs tickled her ear, cooing. “Play nice to Max, my sweetheart. He’s our friend.” The doe backed down, gave Quiggs a drippy lick on the hand, and then searched out a friendlier section of vines to graze.
The infected doe was off the menu for supper.
“Put your backpack on. Explain your theory while I clear a path out of here.”
“We can’t leave yet.” Quiggs knelt and dragged his hand through the dirt. “While you napped, I walked to the edge of the vines to pee. I watched tendrils shoot out to absorb it seconds after it splattered the stalks. As I tapped off, I heard a rustling from where I’d poured out the bad goat milk. I turned around, expecting to find the tendrils drinking up and spreading over the area the doe had grazed. Instead, I watched the roots—I’m speaking of those deep woody hearts buried ten feet under—buck through the surface. They blackened and swelled until they cracked. The sap leaking out was a putrid yellow instead of a
normal purple, but sap is never wasted, so other tendrils shot out to collect it. The contagion spread in a vicious cycle, the vines absorbing bad sap to repair themselves and causing more damage, generating more bad sap.”
Quiggs scrunched up his face. “I guess the simplest way to describe the process is the milk poisoned the sap, causing it to clot as it sped through the venous system from the roots to the canopy.”
Max feared Quiggs had gone vine daft. Yes, the vines were dead, but the explanation was insects or blight, likely transported by the ferals from their isolated valley. If Quiggs and he lingered, those parasites might discover red-blooded humans were tastier than sap. He pulled a canteen from the backpack, his face neutral. “Clots, huh?”
“Coagulation confirmed with a crude dissection of random slices of stalks and branches before they crumbled, of course.”
Max nodded amiably, unscrewing the canteen. “Of course.”
“The vines can’t regenerate in an area where their mother roots are poisoned.” Quiggs beamed as if waiting for applause. None coming, he frowned. “I just told you how we can kill the vines. You’re looking at me as if I’ve gone vine daft.”
Max pressed the canteen to Quiggs’s lips. “Stop talking. Take a deep drink.”
Quiggs took a small sip, puzzled by Max’s calm reaction.
“Keep drinking. You need to hydrate.”
Quiggs snickered and danced away. “You do think I’m vine daft.”
His tone soothing, Max said, “A new species of blight or insect is affecting the roots, and when we’re a safe distance away, you can ponder where the parasite originated and how to use it our advantage. The rest is a grand delusion.”
“Men don’t go vine daft after a few hours.”
“Proof the more ingenious a mind, the sooner it goes vine daft. Until you recover, you’ll wear a leash so you won’t wander off.”
Ingenious Page 27