They arrived in under an hour. Ett landed as close to the site as the tree line allowed, but they still had to hike a quarter mile to reach the first debris.
The devastation was immense. Pieces of the ship were strewn over a swath of forest at least a half mile long. The fires were already dead or dying in the dank woodland, but the area radiated an uncomfortable heat. Along the path of the crash, giant conifer trees lay broken and bent, decorated in black burns and smoldering cinders. The underwood was littered charcoal.
Smoke and ash hazed the air and combined with the pervasive odors of incinerated pine, fresh ploughed earth, and space-age chemicals. The smell was noxious, and they were compelled to hunch their necks and pull their shirts up over their noses.
Casting a calculating gave over the near devastation, Ett said, “Let’s split up and look for the burrillion box first. It’s worth more than both of you and the farm put together, so be thorough. Lily, you take closest to where it hit. I’ll take the middle. Delya you search the last bit. It’ll be a metal square or rectangle about this big,” Ett swirled his hands two feet apart, “with three or four vat tap outputs on one side. Should be near the engine, wherever that is, so if you find that, call me.”
The women nodded, making to head out, but Ett thought of one more thing. “They’re built to hold up, so let’s hope it’s intact. But if the box is open or even cracked, don’t touch it and get away fast. Search your area. Get as close as you can and keep an eye out for other good stuff, too.”
Time passed into early evening and the burrilion crystal had not been found. Ett cursed thinking it was probably tied up in one of the big, twisted sections of broiling wreckage and would have to be cut free. They couldn’t waste any more time on it. Bagging something was better than nothing, and nothing is what they would have when people more ruthless than Ett found the crash site. And they would. F-moon was made of cutthroat people.
Running a hand across his sweating brow then cupping his mouth like a bullhorn, he yelled at the top of his lungs, his voice carrying in the too-quiet clearing cut by the impact. “Lily. Delya. Can you hear me?”
He paused, ears pitched. Lily’s response was clear, Delya’s faint.
“Forget the crystal. Start taking stuff back to the hauler.”
“What should I take?” the uncertain waiver in Delya’s word lost over the distance. All she saw was ruin, too hot and looking too heavy to cart away.
Ett felt the ever-simmering disdain for his dullard daughter rise to shutter his heart’s usual temperance. So much was at stake. In his minds-eye sat the home on Erdos he would buy where his pretty young wife would meet him at the portal every day when he returned home from work at his very own shop, his clean son, fat and ruddy with good health, balanced between her dirt-free arms, nestled against her freshly laundered dress and baby-swollen belly. The images were vague, and that very vagueness worked to sharpen his anger. Chances to change the course of your life didn’t come around often and were rarely for the better. Yet here they were awash in a sea of loose credits and that useless girl couldn’t figure how to scoop any of them up.
“Lily,” he bellowed. “Work with Delya.”
*****
Despite the horror scene, once they began, they were like kids in a candy store, picking up tools and mechanical parts and other items they hoped would be worth something to the right people. Most of the big treasures were caught up in bulk still too hot to handle, even with their thick work gloves on, and so they spent precious daylight and energy ferrying smaller, less impressive finds back to the hauler. All the while, both Ett and Lily listened for sounds of new arrivals, nervous the most valuable plunder could slip through their grasp. Delya’s mind was absorbed in placing careful steps along the treacherous forest floor.
Much too soon, shadows grew long over the wreckage, the remaining tall trees eating much of the setting sunlight. The route through the forest grew dark and even more treacherous. Unwilling to wait any longer, Ett powered on the electron cutter and directed his women to work in the areas still too hot to venture unscathed. Dangers be damned. There was no time to worry about safety. Their whole existence wasn’t safe, and for once the benefits far outweighed the risks. What were a few burns and boils compared to shrugging off the crippling homestead yoke?
The family threaded their way through the ovened maze of fractured metalik hull, trying to avoid contact, eyes still alert for the valuable crystal. All shock had long worn off and they were unmoved by the scattered lumps of pulverized flesh and charred limbs amongst the rubble.
Ett pointed to a hull slab the size of a barndoor. “You two take that, then come back and get more,” he said, not stopping to watch as they struggled to obey, cursing his lack of sons who would have made this job so much easier.
The broken section was unwieldy, the women’s task made more arduous by the searing heat permeating their gloves and scorching their hands. Progress was slow, weaving around shadowed tree trunks and stabbing branches, their feet and legs tripping in the underbrush. They had to stop constantly and drop the blistering scrap to cool the fever in their hands.
“Pick it up. Pick it up,” urged Lily when Delya delayed lifting her end. “We don’t have time.”
“I can’t do any more right now. My hands,” she cried, holding her hands forward, forlorn eyes staring down at her gloved palms. “We should wait till the stuff cools down first.” Delya slumped against a tree, moving to strip off a glove.
The burns on Lily’s hands pulsed fire, her back throbbed, and the blisters on her legs chafed against her pants. But the agonies barely registered, her mind drugged with golden possibilities. After a lifetime of pain, hope was proving the very best analgesic.
“What are you doing? Don’t take those off!” Delya couldn’t quit. Lily needed her.
“We have to get as much as we can before others come.” She felt frustrated and frantic. Delya’s whining had brought her own suffering creeping back to the forefront.
Exhaling an impatient breath, Lily stopped to think. Pain numbing hope was the only fix. What would motivate Delya? What did she want?
Then Lily remembered the blue dress Delya had lusted over. “Everything we get will make your life better. We’ll be able to buy you that blue dress we saw last year. You’ll look so pretty in those ruffles and lace. With a pair of heels. We’ll be able to eat at fancy restaurants.”
“The dress?” Delya whispered, teeth raking her bottom lip, wide brown eyes gazing inward. For months after seeing the figure-skimming, sky-blue sheath in the window display of the expensive store her family was too wretched to even enter, Delya had dreamed of a life where she wore that dress. Dreamed while she toiled in the barn, and when her hands were buried knuckle deep in field dirt or rubbed raw swinging the ax. Dreamed when wringing gorc necks and plucking their puny carcasses. Dreamed while waiting for sleep to take her and during sleep, too.
The dress held all her hopes. All her princess fantasies featured her wearing it. Now, pressed against the tree, knobby bark biting through the course fabric of her stained tunic, she imagined herself in the feminine creation and saw how good she would look. Sexy. Sophisticated. Beautiful. She imagined the parties she could attend. Imagined the handsome man with the good city job she would marry.
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Everything she wanted in exchange for just a few hours of a larger-than-normal level of suffering. She could tough it. This was her chance.
Delya straightened, myopic determination in her eyes. “Let’s go,” she said, stooping for her side and hefting it with barely a whimper.
Laborious struggle delivered them to the hauler where they heaved the metalik onto the extended bed. Without a word they headed back, each woman lost in her own thoughts. Delya still felt her burned hands, her pinched back, and her peppered legs, but her mind was firmly anchored on her fashionable future.
They worked into the night using head lamps and proline torches for light. They ignored the oozing lumps of pulverized flesh and bone amongst the rubble. Ett cut deep into the wreckage searching for the burrilion fusion crystal, loosing treasures along the way for the women to carry. If the crystal was intact, they would be bonified rich, and could jettison the other items scavenged.
The women battled the dark forest and their physical limitations, tenaciously piling loads on the flatbed. Navigating was hard and more than once they veered off and went the wrong way. They kept an eye out for dangerous creatures, but the crash must have scared them all away. On their tenth trip, while obscured in the forest’s moonlit embrace, they heard the dreaded drone of arriving ships. Lights swept the treetops growing nearer.
“No. No, no, no,” Lily moaned. There were three searchlights which meant at least three flyer ships. No one she knew had that much tech. Their family had the only hauler in 100 miles which made their’s the richest farm around even though they half-starved every winter. Everyone else was hoofing it, either by horse, ragwal, or foot, and that was the reason they were still the only ones at the crash site. So, who were these newcomers?
“What should we do?” Delya asked, her fear pinched face made eerie by her head lamp.
The women were beyond fatigued, only sheer will had been propelling them on. Their legs were depleted of strength as though strapped with drenched sandbags, their strides reduced to ponderous shuffles. Even if they tried to reach Ett to participate in one last frantic, uncontested search for the burrilion crystal, the fresh arrivals would beat them to the crash site. The flyers were able to rise above the trees and find landing inaccessible to the family’s hover hauler, eliminating any distance advantage.
Delya moved to set down her end of the load.
“Don’t. Let’s get this to the hauler,” Lily said.
“No, we should hide. Who knows who they are?”
“Does it matter? Won’t change that we’re here, and our stuff is there.”
It did matter, actually. Greatly.
F-moon was a developing rock at the beginning of a long curve towards civility. It had laws. Murder was illegal, of course, as were certain types of rape. Stealing, too. In the capital city of Feris, folks could walk down many of the streets during daylight without much fear.
Civilization had made less of a mark in the outback where life was measured in mouthfuls and death in seconds. Out here, there were no safe introductions other than the happenstance of encountering a man of good morals who wasn’t too desperate. Throw in found treasure? In a civilized society, avarice can infect good morals with terminal flexibility. In the night forest with a crashed space jumper laying for the taking, even the holiest of men would turn barbarous.
So, who they were mattered as much as the difference between life and death mattered, and these newcomers were no one Lily knew. The Law? Maybe, but not the local law. They only had one flyer. Feris patrols would wait for daylight if they even bothered to come. The outback forest scared city folk. Scared Lily, too.
Far more likely they were a posse of alphas or high testosterone betas from one of the acreage farms built on prime river land. A shiver of dread fought for release along her nerves, but exhausted muscles didn’t shudder. The family was likely in trouble no matter who the arrivals were. If it was the law, the family could be treated as thieves. If it was a posse, the family could be murdered. There was the slim chance of either sharing the salvage or successfully hiding, but even hiding their presence was unlikely with the hauler in plain sight outside the tree line and Ett working the site. Maybe Ett had been wise enough to flee in time?
Brightness was no longer streaming from above as the ships found landing, one not more than 100 yards away, between the women and their hauler. Lights shone hazy white through the tangle of trees but did not reach to where the women stood clutching the bridge chair in indecision.
“This is it, Delya. This is it. We’ll never get an opportunity like this again. We have to try, see if they’ll share. Even if we just get scraps, it’s better than nothing.” Lily spoke fast, trying to convince herself and Delya before her bravery ran out.
“Have you lost your mind? Let’s leave this here and go hide by the hauler and wait for Dad.”
The first sounds of boisterous men thrashing through the forest could be heard coming their way, a dozen head lamps swinging wildly as the men fought through the foliage on their mad dash. Despite Lily’s declaration, courage failed her. She dropped her end before crouching low.
The load jerked from Delya’s grasp and nearly smashed her foot. “Ow.”
“Shh, get down. Turn off your lamp.”
Lily pulled Delya by the sleeve toward a thicket of scraggy bushes.
“Inside,” Lily panted, pushing her daughter shoulder first into the morass. She launched herself at a neighboring bush, head lowered, eyes screwed shut, ignoring the scraps and stabs of bracken as she scrambled in.
The men were on top of them. Ten alphas. Lily could smell their scent strong in the air, a dominating mix of sweat and testosterone. She hoped they couldn’t smell their fear. As they passed, one tripped over a root and landed on the bush where Delya hid, his lamp light filtering through the scant leaves and reflecting incandescent off her eyes.
“What?” A giant hand reached in and grabbed a fistful of sweat damped brown hair, hauling a screaming Delya up until her flailing feet kicked the branches. The other alphas, only interested in treasure, looked but didn’t pause and within seconds just the women and the lone alpha remained.
“Mm, nice. Homestead cunt.” His brawny hand mauled her chest. “I’ll save you for later.” Drawing his arm back, he punched her full force in the temple. Delya’s screaming stopped and she dangled limp in his hold. He punched her two more times, not chancing escape, before dropping her slack body back into the bush.
“Stay wet for me,” he laughed. Whooping, he ran after his associates.
When the forest was silent around them, Lily disentangled herself and rushed to the bush that swallowed Delya’s unconscious form. She ripped at the plant, digging out her daughter, cutting herself on the shoulders and face.
Finding an arm, Lily pulled with all her might, senseless of additional damage to the snarled girl. The bush fought back, then gave the girl up with a loud crack of its main stem. Delya’s torso emerged, her mouth slacked open, her forehead bleeding from a large gash that sat astride two gorc-egg sized lumps.
A shuddering cry escaped her. “Oh, baby. Delya. Fates, wake up little girl.” She shook her inert child, the only one of seven who survived into adolescence. “Darling girl, wake up.” She choked back sobs. There will be plenty of time for crying later. She had to get herself and Delya away before the alphas came back through.
Some part of her brain heard them coming, heard the menacing plod of heavy men carrying heavy treasure over rough terrain, the snapping of branches as they passed. Overwhelmed with distress, Lily was slow to react and was unprepared when a team of alphas trudged past arms laden. She curved her body over Delya’s offering the only protection she had.
Nary a glance was sent in their direction.
Lily waited for the sounds to fade then sprang into action. Looking around to make sure the brutes were gone and no more were coming, she pulled Delya by the arms, loosing her legs from the bush and dragging her across the studded ground and away from the alphas’ path.
Otherworldly energy roused Lily’s spent body, granting her power to drag her limp daughter across the forest floor. Lily hauled Delya behind her, a leather shod foot gripped under each arm. She marched through the woods, between the two greatest points of interest, the crash site and the family hauler, unknowing if she was escaping harm or going towards more. Where had the other flyers set down?
She bent to her task, moving as swiftly as the jumbled terrain allowed, heedless of damage to Delya’s seesawing head, convinced whatever the alphas would do to her daughter was far worse. When Delya couldn’t be drug over an obstacle, Lily rolled her dead weight around it, grunting from effort, sweat making her hands slippery.
Nearly blind in the low light, Lily tripped often, landing on bruise raising roots and in scything bushes. Yanking and pulling, ceaseless, she was possessed by maternal love in a manner that far surpassed the now fading hope that had driven her salvage fantasies. Even so, her worn body hit reality’s wall and slowed, painful steps taking more than she had left to give.
Chest rocking in staccato pants, she finally crumpled to the ground, releasing her daughter and herself to fate. She lay beyond caring they were on open floor, unsure if even a pack of snarling F-wolves could get her to move an inch further.
The dark forest carried sounds of rampaging alphas, but far enough away to raise a feeling of safety. The lights by which they worked a faint halo in the distance. Only an idiot would concern himself with hunting outback pussy when real treasure lay on the ground for the picking. It was one thing to have an unconscious belly warmer waiting in a bush and quite another to search bush by bush for it, especially since the same could be bought at any of the small backwater towns dotting the foreboding landscape for less than half the cost of a mystery-meat sausage dinner