Hiss returned Leon’s axe, and Leon slipped it into the loop on his belt.
They all gathered around the fire, enjoying the light and the warmth it provided, as well as the small morale boost it gave them. It was surprising, thought Leon, how much comfort a simple fire could offer in the worst of circumstances.
Annie sat back with her feet extended toward the flames. She turned to face Hiss who was feeding more wood into the growing blaze. “Hiss, when we first turned up in the grasslands, Kack thought he might be home. You knew right away that you weren’t. How did you know?”
“We, together still, were. When we, to home the Apex send, then we, separate will be.”
“How will they separate us?” Leon asked. “What was your final challenge last time and how did you get home?”
Hiss paused, seeming reluctant to discuss his previous trials at the hands of the Apex. After a long moment of silence, he expelled a breath of air in a very human sounding sigh. Still focusing on the flames in front of him, he answered Leon’s question.
Hiss had been one of four to make it to the final challenge. He had started with a group of nine, but five had been killed or lost during the previous tests. The four survivors exited the final hallway and found themselves in an open field with a selection of nine holes in the ground. Because the Many lived underground it was obvious to them that each hole was an entry burrow leading into a nest. Each of the remaining four abductees could select one hole to enter, but first they needed to determine which hole would return them to their own home nest.
The selection process was not random, either. Each of them was permitted to select one opening and, if they were wrong, there was no opportunity to try again. The first of the four placed his head into one of the burrows to examine the entrance more closely and try to determine if it would lead him home. The opening in the ground closed, taking the unfortunate creature’s head with it. The others learned from their companion’s mistake and kept their distance as they tried to decide what to do next.
Hiss was the first to notice that there were specific varieties of plants growing around each entrance, and no two openings hosted the same flora. One of the eight remaining holes had a slender tree and two varieties of flowers growing along its edge. The tree was a variety of fruit tree that grew close to Hiss’ home nest. It was his responsibility to tend these trees and harvest the fruit each year. In addition, the flowers were the same type that were cultivated in nearby fields to attract the right type of pollinating creatures necessary for proper cross fertilization of the trees.
Neither of his remaining two companions recognized the plants in front of this burrow. Hiss came to the conclusion that this path was meant for him alone so, he climbed in and hoped he wasn’t about to lose his head in the process. He was sucked into complete darkness as soon as he entered the tunnel and was trapped for what felt like an eternity before he was finally spit back out into the light. He landed in the same burrow of his home nest from which he had been abducted.
The moment he returned, Hiss had gone to the Mother’s burrow and notified her of what had happened. She thanked him, and he returned to his duties. The two he left behind were not members of his nest, so he never found out if they had selected the correct tunnels to take them home. As they were both also males, attempting to discover their fate never crossed his mind. Their survival was not of any import.
Annie shivered. Whether from the cold or Hiss’ story, Leon wasn’t certain. He untied his jacket from around his waist and draped it over her shoulders.
“I don’t need your coat, Galahad,” she snapped irritably, and began to pull it off to hand it back.
“Just because you accept someone’s help doesn’t make you helpless,” he shot back. “I’ll try to respond better to compliments if you stop being such a self-reliant bitch.”
Annie’s eyebrows lifted in mild surprise. “Well, look who thinks he’s a shrink now,” she told him, although Leon noticed she pulled the jacket back around her shoulders.
“I, question, have,” said Kack, to everybody’s surprise. The tall alien had spoken sparingly, if at all, during the entire ordeal, so his question had the entire group’s attention.
“I, fascinating your false skin, find. Humans, often this skin, remove and replace?”
“Skin? You mean our clothing?” asked Annie, holding out the sleeves of Leon’s coat. “It’s just like your vests. What’s so fascinating?”
“Vest, for tools and equipment, are holding. For your artificial coverings, also are?”
“Some clothing has pockets that you can put things in,” she agreed. “But mostly, clothes are to protect our real skin. We scratch and cut easily, so it protects us. It also keeps us warm in cold weather.”
Kack was not yet satisfied. “You, why so often, change?” He pointed at Leon. “Your covering, to Annie, you give. Michael, false skin, remove and replace.” Kack gestured at Malcolm next. “You, false skin, remove and replace. You, color, is it, not like? First yellow and green, remove. You, then blue, replace.”
“Wait,” interrupted Michael. “Kack, when did Malcolm change his clothes?”
Kack cocked his head to focus two rainbow, compound eyes on Michael. “In room, same. You change. He change.”
“And he was wearing yellow and green?”
“Yes,” Kack agreed.
Michael turned to look at Malcolm. Malcolm, in turn, was eyeing Michael carefully.
“Was that yellow and green boiler suit on the floor yours?” Michael asked. “And don’t give me any duff. Just answer the question.”
“It’s not a big deal, mate,” Malcolm said, smiling pleasantly. “You changed your clothes. I changed mine. Let’s not get all gutted about it.”
Michael turned to Leon. “I knew he was a bit dodgy when I met him. That yellow and green jumpsuit on the floor was a prison outfit.”
Leon took a moment to digest this new information, then asked, “Malcolm, did the Apex grab you out of prison?”
“And if they did? What does that mean, eh? I’m stuck here like the rest of you wankers, and all I want is to find a way back home. Maybe not exactly back to the same place, but I still want to get back to Earth.”
“What did you do?”
“I nicked some stuff that maybe didn’t belong to me. It isn’t such a…”
“He’s lying,” interrupted Michael. “That suit is a high security or flight risk jumpsuit. You don’t get one of those for nicking a bloke’s watch.”
“Fuck every one of you arseholes. Think what you like,” Malcolm spat. He sprawled out on the path, flat on his back, crossed his ankles and draped one arm over his eyes to block what little light filtered through the trees. “Just make sure one of you wakes me up when you start movin’ again.”
“We can’t trust him,” Michael insisted.
“I already didn’t trust him,” Leon said. “And that was before I found out he was an escaped prisoner. But it doesn’t really change anything. We can’t leave him behind.”
“Why not?” asked Annie. “What possible benefit is there to keeping him around.”
“If we leave him, he’ll die. If you think he deserves to die, then go put a knife in his neck right now. It’s the exact same outcome if we leave him by himself. Besides, we don’t know what we’re going to run into after we get out of this forest. What if he’s the key to beating the next challenge?”
“What if he turns on us?” Annie challenged. “What if he’s the reason the rest of us don’t make it back home?”
Leon removed the axe from his belt and held it out to Annie. “If you feel that strongly about it, then do what you have to. I won’t try to stop you.”
Annie stared at the axe, her eyes flicking back and forth between the weapon and Malcolm still lying motionless and feigning sleep. She growled, then pushed it away. “When did you grow a pair, Idaho? I still don’t like having him around.”
“None of us do,” Michael assured her.
“Probl
em with false coverings, is?” asked Kack, into the conversational lull. “I, poor question, asked?”
“No, Kack,” Leon reassured him. “Your question was too good.”
***
Leon hugged the back of the rockadillo, his body draped across the hard shell. The armored hide bucked and rolled under him and he was forced to scrabble with his fingers and toes to find purchase and hang on. The massive creature undulated beneath him and slammed into a wall, almost knocking Leon from his desperate perch.
“You let me die,” cried a gasping voice directly in front of him. He looked up to see Vinod pinned between the edge of the rockadillo’s bony shell and the wall. Vinod stared at him with shiny black eyes, tears of pain escaping at the corners. The man coughed. Blood fountained bright red from his mouth, sheeting down his chin and darkening his already maroon shirt. “I was inches away from you and you couldn’t be bothered to try to help me.”
“That’s not true,” Leon pleaded. “I did try to help. I couldn’t reach you.”
The rockadillo lurched forward, raising itself and ramming again into the wall, cutting Vinod in half. The man’s torso dropped onto the creature’s back, but instead of lying still, his head craned upward to lock eyes with Leon once more.
“You let this happen,” Vinod told him. “You may as well have murdered me yourself.”
Leon needed to run. Turning around on the monster’s wide back, he braced a foot under himself and leapt, trying to push hard enough to clear the beast beneath him and reach the stony floor beyond. He launched himself into the air but did not fall. Instead, he floated, drifting helplessly in slow motion over the rockadillo. Tumbling in place, arms and legs flailing without purchase, he spun like an untethered astronaut through space.
All at once, gravity resumed its pull on his body, and he crashed headfirst to the cobbled stones. It should have hurt, but there was no pain from the impact. There was only the continued and growing urgency to flee from the dead man and his angry recriminations. Leon climbed to his feet, turning his head left to right, desperately searching for Vinod. He found nothing. He was alone. The rockadillo and what was left of Vinod had vanished.
Tears welled in Leon’s eyes and he chocked back a sob. Fear, guilt, and grief combined with the simple relief that Vinod no longer pursued overwhelmed his ability to contain his emotions. Leon was lost and afraid, and he had no idea how to find his way home. Misery filled his body and soul, drowning him in its aching, suffocating grasp.
He felt a tug at the cuff of his pants and looked down. Vinod’s torso lay at his feet, his neck twisted grotesquely to stare up at Leon while one hand pulled at his pants leg. A smear of blood and gore showed where the mutilated torso had dragged itself along the paved street to reach him.
“You let me die, Leon.”
“No!” Leon sat up, flailing at the empty air in front of him, trying to push something away. He opened his eyes and saw trees, backlit by the dim glow of a never changing twilight. The Many were gathered around the brightly burning fire, talking among themselves quietly while the humans rested, sprawled out in various positions along the dirt path.
With his heart racing and his head pounding, Leon checked his feet and the surrounding area. Vinod was gone. It had all been a dream. Somehow, Leon had managed to fall asleep in this waking nightmare long enough to sink into a real one.
“You okay,” Sofia asked drowsily. She lay curled beside him and had been awakened by his panicked thrashing.
“Um, yeah. I’m fine. I think I’m done sleeping, though. Sorry I woke you.” Leon touched his fingertips to his cheek. They came away wet. He tried to wipe the moisture away before Sofia could see it.
“That’s okay,” she said, pushing into a seated position. She stretched, then rubbed a hand across her face. “How long were we out?”
Leon pulled his phone from his pocket. “I have a little past four. We were asleep about an hour. An hour and fifteen, maybe.”
“We should probably all start moving again. Sleep felt good, but we can’t stay here forever.”
“Ah!” exclaimed Hiss, pointing at Leon and Sofia. “The humans, not dead, are.”
Leon smiled at the reaction. “No, Hiss. Not dead.”
Sofia gave Michael and Annie a nudge to get them moving, then stepped over to where Malcolm was still fast asleep, snoring softly with his mouth open. She tapped the bottom of his shoe with her foot until he snorted and his eyes popped open.
“Have you figured out anything new?” Leon asked Shoo. “Or are we staying with the plan we had before?”
“I, nothing new, have. I, no changes, suggest.”
“We’ve already gone to the left. Now, we go straight. Then right, if we end up here again. Does that sound okay?”
Shoo waved a small hand in assent to the statement. Reaching into the recesses of her multi-pocketed, black vest, she removed a wooden box similar to the ones with which Hiss had started the fire. She placed the box in the flames. The wood blackened and charred, splitting at the seams as it burned. As the box broke apart, a bubbling and hissing noise emanated from it and a white foam burst out from the exposed interior. The foam spread outward, engulfing the entire campfire and smothering it in a matter of seconds. As soon as the fire was extinguished, the foam stopped expanding and crystalized into an amorphous white blob.
“That’s incredible,” Leon commented, impressed. “I wish we had something like that back home.”
Shoo reached into another pocket and removed a second box. She handed it to Leon and indicated he should put it into his backpack. “We, if needed, shall use,” she told him. “You, if not, keep. Home, may take.”
In the time it took to put the fire out, the rest of the group regained their feet and began milling about, ready to begin the next leg of their forced march. Sofia’s and Annie’s directional arrows were still intact on the ground, and now the crystallized foam would serve as a third marker should they return to this spot in the next half hour or so.
They set off with Hiss and his nestmates in the lead. Malcolm walked close behind the Many and the rest of the group lagged behind where they could keep an eye on the big man. Twice, Malcolm tried to drop back to join the other humans, but each time Michael cut him off and returned him to his place in line with a gesture and a curt comment.
Leon, walking next to Sofia, watched the trees on the right side of the path. He did not recognize anything in these woods and that bothered him on a subconscious level. They were obviously trees and bushes. They didn’t look menacing or have bizarre color patterns. They didn’t move when they weren’t supposed to. They appeared completely normal, except … except they didn’t. Everything was just different enough to be a constant reminder he was not on Earth.
In addition to feeling out of place, his legs were sore and his feet were tired. The brief nap had been helpful, but the muscles in his thighs and calves had tightened while he rested and were only slowly uncramping as they warmed up again. His tennis shoes, which he had felt were perfectly adequate when he put them on this morning, now chaffed his heels and the sides of his feet unpleasantly. The stupid things had no arch support either, so the bottoms of his feet were beginning to complain from the punishing treatment. Leon knew the others must be suffering through the same hardships; none of them had woken up today and decided to throw on the appropriate clothing and footwear for a twenty-mile hike. So, tired and in pain, he kept his complaints to himself.
“How are you holding up?” he asked Sofia, focusing his concern on her rather than on his own problems.
“I’ve been better,” she admitted.
“Tired?”
“My feet are a little sore, and my legs are getting tired. Fortunately, being a waitress, I’m used to being on my feet all day so it’s not too bad.”
“Hostess,” he corrected.
“What?”
“Hostess. Not waitress. You were very clear on that point, earlier. Remember?”
She gave him a wan smile. It
wasn’t much, but under the circumstances he would take it. There hadn’t been much to smile about, lately. He checked his phone for the fourth time in five minutes and they both lapsed back into silence, losing themselves in their own private thoughts.
Several minutes later, they returned to the crossroads and the site of their recent campfire. The crystalline foam over the firewood had decomposed and collapsed during their trek. It looked like nothing more than a pile of ash coated over the top of the cold, blackened wood. There were no burning coals remaining in the fire. There wasn’t even any smoke. Leon might have found the sight fascinating if he wasn’t so disappointed at finding himself back at their starting point.
He took a deep breath and released it slowly. He knew the odds were slight that going straight would get them out of the forest, but still he had privately hoped that they might get lucky. Maybe the next turn would do it, he told himself, trying to remain positive.
Hiss did not pause at the intersection. As they had discussed earlier, he made a right turn at the junction of the two pathways and continued walking. It took only a few minutes before Leon realized this direction was another failure. When they turned right, the long shadows cast by the trees on either side of them stretched out in straight lines parallel to their path. The sun hanging low on the horizon was somewhere directly in front of the travelers. As they walked, those same shadows shifted gradually to their left until they eventually swallowed up the pathway.
Leon shivered involuntarily. The creeping darkness was like a malevolent presence reaching out toward them. He knew the shadows would not harm him, but he nonetheless let them herd him toward the left edge of the path until there was nowhere left to go to avoid them.
Shoo had also noticed the change and pointed it out to Kack and Hiss.
Despite the fact they were again going the wrong direction, and despite the darkening of everyone’s mood, they slogged forward. There was nothing to do but continue to the next intersection and try again.
Testing Grounds (On Dangerous Grounds Book 1) Page 13