Chapter Forty Three

Everything had happened faster than she wanted. Faster than it ought to. There was meant to be build up, even that damn mutant in the forest had some kind of foreshadowing to its existence. There had been signs, sightings... the Sleepless had left trophies to signal their territory... nothing emerged spontaneously, there were always rumblings of it, the pulsing water before something surfaced from the deep, the shadow of a creature falling over her before she saw it. And she wanted to say that she hadn't expected it. But the truth was... she had. Just hadn't expected this. Them. But she'd smelled the beautiful perfume anointing the peaks, and then she'd noted how the statue didn't hold that scent - implying it was left, not simply a natural growth. Then Hull had told her about animals marking their territory. Then Anthan had talked about the caves in the mountains. Then the Yasa had talked about these gods before. The single link that had failed to emerge was connecting all of those facts to living creatures. Not mutants. But intelligent things living in the caves. Marking their territory. Watching for intruders. Attacking when they had a chance. She couldn't help but imagine the snowmelt next year... would it wash away bones? Had these creatures killed the people in that village? Were they somehow responsible for that well which stank of contamination?

...no answers.

They weren't interested in giving any. The steps were there, the steps for anticipating them, maybe even predicting them, and she hadn't... hadn't made that final connection. That final leap from logic into fantasy. Failure of imagination, failure to be enough of a lunatic. The fire warmed her back - and she relished the heat, let it wash through her coat. Terror heated her from the inside, the fire took care of the outside, and she could almost feel herself steaming in the cold. Her eyes were wide with fright, and she was clutching Hull's hand so tightly that her knuckles turned as white as the snow. Anthan had his rifle out, and yelled violently at any of the creatures which came close enough to see their glittering skin, their gleaming tusks, their many eyes twinkling with ravenous enjoyment. She could hear them talking, out there in the dark. Their speech was barking and snarling, punctuated with guttural clicks and snaps. No syntax she recognised - she was so unfamiliar with this language that she couldn't even pick words apart from one another. Just a single jumble of sounds, incomprehensible, nonsensical. And sometimes... a bark or two of laughter. Cruel. Laughing at the idiots who'd strayed into their territory, had ignored every warning sign, passed every boundary, and now had the gall to act surprised when they were attacked.

Ignorance of the law was no excuse.

Hull sniffed loudly - the cold weather was making everyone's noses run. From what she could see of the glass-skinned men, they were wearing... not a huge amount. Some furs, but it didn't even cover their bodies fully. Resistant to the cold. Maybe immune. Just another natural advantage. She almost jumped out of her skin when Hull spoke.

"...not a bad way to go."

Carza gulped.

"Being killed by something in the mountains?"

"Being killed by the things that some people believe to be gods. I mean, we're surrounded by myths."

"Myths that are going to kill us."

"...and no-one would believe us anyway. Even if we escaped."

Carza grimaced.

"...yes, I... suppose so. Probably will assume we were just killed by an avalanche."

"Disappointing, really."

"A bit."

"I mean, this is a... discovery. This could make our careers."

He was babbling. Barely suppressing his panic. Carza shot him a quick sympathetic glance, one he gladly returned with a reassuring squeeze of her shaking hand.

"It really could. We could spend years writing about this. We'd be famous. Rich, too."

"Imagine all the brandy we could afford."

"Barrels."

"Imagine the cigarillos."

"Crates."

"Imagine the barmaids."

"My mother was a barmaid, don't go where I think you're going."

"...can I be vulgar if I'm about to die?"

"I'll bother you in the afterlife if you spoil our deaths by being rude."

Hull snorted a quick laugh.

"Alright. I'll try to be polite when I'm getting-"

She squeezed his hand. Hard. She didn't want to hear about that, she just... just wanted him to be here. Alive. Healthy. With her. Having conversations about nothing at all, rambling together, enjoying scholarship and brandy... Anthan didn't interrupt them at any stage. Too busy training his eyes forwards... and maybe he understood that they needed this. Needed to talk. Needed to find some closure, just by... almost pretending things were normal. They'd said their funeral prayers quickly, made their peace. No time for a biography to be written... and that was honestly what Carza felt most guilty about. The idea that Lirana's biography would rot here, unread by anyone but herself. It was a good biography, too... she'd had adventures. Proper adventures. And died with some dignity left. Carza hoped she'd die with equal dignity - no crying, no screaming, just... dying with nobility. She doubted it'd happen, but a girl could dream. And more than that, she hoped she died before Hull. Didn't want to listen to him perishing while she endured.

One of the creatures began to move forward, crunching loudly over the snow - deliberately. They knew that Carza's group was trapped, surrounded, doomed in every way. All they wanted now was the opportunity to attack in a way that didn't leave a few of them perforated with bullet holes. Were they... wait, why weren't they just attacking? Hold on, furs, attacking with their tusks... maybe they hadn't heard gunfire before, maybe they just weren't used to it. But they were adapting. Learning the weaknesses - the need for reloading, the limits in accuracy, the terror which made her hands shake too much to even aim, let alone fire. The limited ammunition that their disposal. And the creatures were testing, probing, seeing how far they could go before the group lashed back. Carza pointed her pistol in the direction of the sounds, huddling closer to the fire, keenly aware of just how much dimmer it was compared to a minute ago. How long before it went dark? How long before they were surrounded, outnumbered, out of ammunition, and they couldn't even see an inch in front of their faces... the moon was dark. Hiding itself from them. Didn't want to watch what came next.

The creature stepped into the light, and stared at them. Almost looked like it was enjoying itself.

The three of them stared right back, unsure whether or not to fire on sight. Carza was just... studying it, really. Wanted to know what her killers looked like, before the fire went out. Huge. Muscled. And powerful. There were some comparisons to a human - two legs, a head, but the rest... it wasn't a mutant, that much was obvious. Too cohesive. Mutants had a kind of randomness to them - constantly integrating new elements, new ideas, new fragments of other organisms. The oldest mutant she'd seen, that thing in the forest, had been... shapeless, really. Losing any sense of cohesion and becoming something squirming and dark, lurking in the depths of its chosen suit of armour. This, though... it looked complete. No more alterations to be made - something mutation never achieved. There was never a point where a mutant was done mutating, but this thing was sure as hell done growing. Four arms, an upper set that rippled with muscle and was split by a few silvery scars, and a lower set which was thinner, had longer fingers, remained a little curled into the torso. One set for brutality. One set for subtlety. Maybe. It stood on two legs, but a moment later it leant forwards, resting on its heavy knuckles - like a diagram of a gorilla she'd once seen, some awful creature from the far south of the continent. Four eyes, dark as beetle shells. The tusks protruded from just below its lips, each one longer than Carza's forearms, and viciously sharp. Carved, too - more indication of them being intelligent, and not just dumb mutants. Carved elaborately - symbols, scenes, whole friezes picked out in miniature, like a piece of scrimshaw she'd once seen in a junk shop. But the tips were bare.

They had a use for those, after all. And had no interest in dirtying their nice little carvings with the blood of their enemies.

How considerate of them.

It rested on its knuckles, staring with its black eyes, skin shining like a perfectly cut gem. She tried to imagine what advantage that might have - it couldn't be good for concealment, but... but it was beautiful, she had to admit that. Beautiful, in a savage sort of way. Maybe it could reflect light, but... what would be the point of that? Maybe it could dazzle their enemies, or help them blend into the glittering snow on the peaks of the mountains... she honestly couldn't say, and she wasn't sure if she even wanted to know. It would kill her, that was all that mattered. And yet she couldn't help but stare, and wonder what it was, where it had come from, why it looked like that, acted like this... why it wanted her dead. She did see something interesting, though... the lower arms. The palms were perforated with a small, dark hole... almost like a gland or something. And the most wonderful scent washed over her as it remained where it was, the wind shifting to pass over it and towards the group. Perfume, the most perfect perfume - every spice she could imagine, all amplified and cascading one after the other, variation upon variation. A deep scent, almost primal - it lingered in her nose, clung to her skin. Potent. And she realised that... yes. Yes, the scent in the mountains was them, produced by those holes in their palms. A way of marking territory, maybe attracting a mate...

It watched them in silence, examining them like creatures under a microscope. No, no, too clinical. They were more interested than that - more eager. This wasn't just a matter of cold murder, this had passion to it.

And with a snort, it reared off its knuckles and stalked back into the darkness, silent as the slowly drifting snowflakes.

Testing them. Seeing if they would shoot at anything that came into sight. Of course they hadn't shot, they couldn't waste their bullets on such obvious bait. While Carza had been watching it, the others had been scanning the darkness, making sure nothing was taking advantage of the distraction. The snow was falling thicker now, and the snapping language of these things had ceased. Silence. Not a single footstep... and she knew that that didn't mean they were being still. They could move without her hearing a damn thing if they so chose, she knew they could. Seeing them, hearing them... only when permitted. Being allowed to see their killers was a gift, not a right. And it was a gift they could withdraw at any time. The fire dimmed... and they huddled closer around it. Carza had an image of one of them throwing a mound of snow over the thing, extinguishing it completely, then moving in to rip them apart limb from limb. They could. None of them held weapons as far as she could see... but they didn't really need to.

"Anthan?"

Anthan grunted in response, eyes unblinking and cold, staring into the dark. He looked resigned... but he wasn't going down without a fight.

"...should we try and make more explosives? We have bullets, so..."

He glanced sharply over for a moment - just a moment, before snapping his eyes back to the gloom where those things were. No idea how many - the thumps of them bounding through the snow was the same as them landing. Could be three, five, ten, a dozen, many dozens, a hundred... more could be waiting in the tunnels, watching while grinning around their tusks, happy to sit back and watch from their warm homes. Watching the spectacle with eyes that apparently saw through the dark as easily as Carza could see on a bright day. This wasn't her world. THis was theirs, and she... she couldn't

"If your hands stop shaking, yes."

Crud. Fear was... no, she had to restrain it, had to stop bloody shaking. So what if she was about to die, so what if she could barely hold her gun, so what if she couldn't aim, so what if she was going to die here alone and no-one would know what happened to her. Melqua wouldn't be expecting a communication until the expedition ended, so... so she might sit around for years waiting for Carza to resurface, worried but also content with the idea that Carza had reached the steppe. She imagined several years trundling by while her dismembered corpse turned black and shrivelled as coal, buried under layers and layers of snow, maybe washed away by the spring thaw... she imagined years passing, and Melqua gradually becoming more and more worried. Why wasn't she writing? Why wasn't she coming back? Slowly and steadily realising that Carza might've died. Realising that it could've happened at any point. No idea how Carza went. No idea if it was quick, slow... murder, disease, accident, starvation... no idea. Carza knew how ambiguity could be a wolf that devoured thought, and she imagined that wolf gnawing at the base of Melqua's skull, eating away at the woman that Carza was proud to call her aunt.

Her hands tightened.

She couldn't let that happen. The gnawing in her stomach was screaming for her to try anything, no matter how suicidal or stupid. As long as it got her out of this, it was worth it. As long as it hinted at survival, it was worth it. She glanced at Hull, and a felt a small stab of guilt. For a second she... she thought that if him dying would help her live, she'd let it happen. No, no, that was a monstrous thought. But she couldn't let Melqua grieve, couldn't let herself die... but then it passed. The cowardice faded, only a faint sense of guilt lingering behind it. Both of them were getting out of this. All three of them, ideally. She holstered her pistol, removed some bullets from her belt, and started to work - unscrew the bottom, just like Anthan had done. If she focused, she was able to stop shaking... well, to reduce the shaking to the point of functionality. Remove the black powder, tip into a small glass bottle, fill it, fill it... then grab a cloth. Soak it in a little lighter fluid from the firestarters... and she had another explosive. Ready to go, just needed...

A rock crashed into the fire. Large enough to crush her skull.

Sparks flew everywhere, burning twigs extinguished by the layers of snow, nothing but wisps of smoke remaining...

And rough laughter echoed in the night.

Oh. Oh no.

Their patience had ended.

Anthan swore, and fired, before digging into his belt for the other explosive. Flaming branches had scattered, providing dim but widespread illumination... rapidly fading. Stars winking out, one by one by one, leaving them with darkness. She saw eyes out there. Too many. Anthan hurled the first explosive, the rag burning - one of the twigs was still nearby, and still hot enough to ignite something. It slammed into the snow, and Anthan roared.

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

"Run!"

The three took off through the snow, struggling to get through the ever-deepening layers. The creatures were silent as they moved. Only their low breathing was audible, and the occasional low laugh as they pursued something so very small, so very weak. They could soak up the gunshots, and Carza struggled to pull out her pistol even as dread settled in her stomach like a lead weight. Anthan fired as he ran, the muzzle flare lighting up the world around them for a moment, showing huge silhouettes chasing them lazily, loping and easily keeping pace... they weren't even exerting themselves. One of the creatures jerked slightly as a bullet entered its shoulder, and then... it just kept going. They could soak up the bullets. Only a direct hit to the head would kill them... that or the groin, maybe. Or the knees. A small list of small targets, constantly moving, hard to hit... lost cause. Carza's hands were shaking so badly that she didn't hit once with all six of her shots, and the laughter of the creatures escalated for a moment. This was a joyous hunt for them, it was like squashing a trio of irritable ants - easy, and thoroughly enjoyable.

They were all going to die here.

The explosive went off.

Light. Fire. Sound. A pulsing wave that made her ears pop. Snow flying in all directions. Laughter ceasing, replaced by startled yelps...

A tiny flare of hope.

The explosions frightened them. They weren't used to guns, they couldn't be used to explosives... maybe, maybe...

A creature threw itself out of the darkness, and Carza saw gleaming tusks slicing the air beside her...

A tugging feeling in her cheek.

Torn open, and the creature was slashing with claw-tipped hands, ready to finish the job...

Hull's gun flashed.

The creature jerked backwards, blood spilling from its chest...

Vanished into the dark. Carza ignored the pain in her cheek. Too much adrenaline to feel pain, all that she could feel was cold air on exposed flesh, and blood staining her collar. Her lungs were burning, tears were running down her face, her legs were struggling just to get through the snow...

They were all going to die. The explosion had distracted a few, but... but...

Something echoed in the night.

Another gunshot.

Not close to them.

Carza glanced... and she saw something. Illuminated only by muzzle flare, appearing and vanishing just as quickly. Some distance behind them, a dark shape... long coat... a long trunk-like thing growing from...

Lirana?

She'd followed them. Keeping her distance so as not to attract attention.

And now she was yelling at the top of her lungs. A voice which didn't even sound remotely human at this point. Too coarse. Too... guttural. And she looked larger, from what Carza could glimpse. She was glad she couldn't see much, just a monstrously tall shape, with long, powerful limbs... claws tipping her fingers, and a hunched stance, like she wanted to drop to all fours. No words in her scream. Maybe she couldn't speak anymore, her throat twisting into a new and exotic shape, ready to snarl and snap and growl. Speech was pointless for something which would spend the rest of its existence alone and absolutely unique. Why communicate at all? The scream pierced the darkness, and more gunshots, the clack of a bolt being drawn back... the creatures were turning, confronting this thing interrupting the hunt. Carza had to focus on the snow in front of her, but she felt a rush of gratitude. Lirana had followed them. Lirana had wanted to keep an eye on them, had been responsible enough to keep her distance, but had been loyal enough to stick around. Even as her mind left her, even as she mutated beyond recognition... she'd remained.

Carza promised herself to add this to Lirana's biography.

The creatures were turning, some of them running to attack Lirana. Carza didn't watch to see how it ended. She didn't want to know. All she heard was gunfire receding into the distance, Lirana running as she led them off... maybe she'd live. Escape. Maybe she'd be ripped apart. But in any case...

They might, might have a chance.

The pass descended sharply, adn their feet skidded over ice-slicked scree. The ice made them want to fall, the scree made them want to sink, and the snow made them want to stay very, very still and conserve their warmth as best they could. And terror... terror made them move. Four warring impulses, combining to create a chaotic tumble. Carza wasn't in control, and she felt her legs shaking as she took to the air a few times, landing with staggering motions, struggling just to stay upright. The creatures were more careful, and that slowed them. They had a life after this, after all. This wasn't a life-or-death struggle, this was a hunt. Lirana's gunshots were out of her range of hearing now... and the chaos of the world was too much for Carza to stop and listen. To confirm if Lirana was dead or alive.

The ground was becoming boggier. The snow from yesterday had melted, and the water had flowed downhill - into a muddy brown landscape of bogs and deceptively deep pools. Flies rose up, disturbed from their sleep - great buzzing black clouds that Carza couldn't even bring herself to worry about, no matter how they started to gnaw at her exposed hands and neck. Anthan turned, filthy water splashing around his legs as he did so, firing blindly into the dark... it hit something, but once more, it just kept moving. A few second's delay. Lirana had taken part of the chase onto herself, but... even one of these creatures could kill them if it came close enough. They were still toying, and... and...

The pass was narrowing.

They were passing through a place where landslides had piled up, year after year after year, combining to form a significantly narrower passage. Her voice rose to a panicked scream.

"Bomb!"

Anthan blinked. But he got the message. The pass was narrowing, and the rocks were unstable. A single explosive... and they might be able to seal it off, create enough dust and noise and chaos for them to escape. If they kept running, they might... might get out of the territory of these creatures. Maybe. Carza had the one remaining explosive, and she dragged it out of her pocket, hands shaking wildly. Light, light... her matches, her matches... gun in one hand, bomb in the other, crud, needed a third arm, needed to spontaneously mutate a third arm, no time to holster... Hull saw her predicament, and matched her pace, shoving a hand inside her coat pocket, fishing for the matches. Did he... know where she stored them? How did he... well, if that wasn't friendship, she didn't know what was. Knowing where someone kept their matches and cigarillos. He dug around, and a second later... fire flared.

The bomb was lit.

The creatures were close.

Anthan raised his gun...

And then one attacked, lunging from the dark, a savage smile on its pseudo-crystalline face.

Anthan fired...

Miss.

Too close. Too fast.

The creature lunged...

And Carza screamed.

The tusks pierced, the claws swiped, and with incredible strength... the creature tore Anthan in half. His face was locked in a rictus of... sheer surprise. Too fast for pain, too much damage - lost too much blood, he could barely even process what was happening. Carza felt warm blood splash over her face, and... and the bomb dropped from her limp fingers. She felt Hull's hand, still in her pocket, now dragging her onwards. Into the narrowness between the looming boulders. Into the dark, the only illumination from the bomb twinkling merrily behind them. Anthan was dead. He'd died in less than ten seconds. Ripped apart, ripped in half by something that was meant to be a myth. He had no chance for a biography, or a proper mourning ritual, or a burial... just... one second he was there, the next second, gone. Like Egg. Like Cam. Gone before she could even process what was happening. Warm blood, sticky on her face, thick as molasses and thin as water, trickling down to mix with the wound on her cheek, staining her collar a thick red... her eyes were wide, and stung whenever a droplet hit them. She could barely think. Barely comprehend what was happening. Her legs, at least, kept working - kept splashing through the frigid, boggy water... her breathing was deafeningly loud in her ears, she couldn't even...

He was dead.

Anthan had died in front of her, and she'd barely recognised it happening.

Silence all around, silence but for her own breathing. Lirana's gunshots... out of audible range, maybe, or just... stopped. Maybe she was dead too. Anthan, ripped in half. Lirana, mutated until she ceased to even recognise the name. Egg, killed by a mutant and added to its bloated mass. Cam, stabbed by a drunk in a bar-room brawl. Six had begun. Two remained. Herself and Hull. Her pack was heavy on her back, heavy as a rock, and she wondered if one of the creatures had clutched it, was riding on her... no, she'd have been crushed by that weight, but the image lingered of something grinning and glass-skinned digging its tusks into her neck, piercing the skin, dragging sharp claws around her until it couldn't be removed... Six. Now two. 33% of the expedition remained. She'd gotten four people killed by taking them out here, all of them preventable deaths. She didn't even... couldn't even remember if Anthan wanted her to do something with his salary. Did he have family? A friend he wanted to give the money to? Did he simply not care?

He'd been so resigned, so tough, so... him.

Had he regretted anything?

How long did it take for him to die?

Instantly? Or was there a second where he felt nothing below the waist, where his torso lay cooling in the mud, digestive system still pulsing with life, unaware that it was meant to be dead. She'd barely seen what he looked like when he was ripped open, the terror had been too much to concentrate... dead instantly, or still alive somehow, feeling nothing... did he regret anything?

Did he wish he'd made different choices?

Did he blame her?

With Lirana, she'd had a chance for closure. Nothing like that with Anthan.

Hull suddenly pulled her off to the side. Between a few rocks. And then he hugged her, clutched her tight despite the blood marking her face... she buried her head in his shoulder, clutched his back, and waited.

A second.

Two.

Three.

Fou-

And then the world exploded.

The first explosive had been in the distance, in a blizzard, and they were running. Now she was still. Now it was close. And now there was nothing to muffle it but stone which was being rapidly destabilised. The explosion rippled through her, and she felt everything shifting out of position, her body struggling to adjust to the waves of undulating pressure. Sound ceased. All that remained was a dull whine in her ears, a throbbing ache in her skull... and a dim awareness of things crumbling. Anthan had been right. Yelling wouldn't create a landslide... but in the right place, at the right time, with the right materials, an explosion very well might. Rocks shifted, and other rocks shifted in turn... a cascading catastrophe rippling through the unstable segment of the pass. If they hadn't found this place... she might well be decorating the ground next to Anthan. She curled into Hull, and he curled around her, sheltering her from the rumbling, churning earth that vibrated upwards from the soles of her feet to the top of her skull.

No light.

No sound.

Nothing but the vibrations. Couldn't even tell if she was crying or not. The blood on her face felt scalding. She wondered if Anthan had been contaminated during his long service as a soldier... if she was about to mutate like Lirana did. Hull was shaking, but... he was larger than her, and she could at least find comfort in the fact that he was alive, he was around her, sheltering her... the rocks began to crack as boulders further up the slope tumbled down at the slightest provocation. The muddy water beneath their feet foamed up, churned into a frenzy by the chaos. She heard nothing. But she felt things begin to split, and saw flecks of stone flying free, spinning through the air, sharp as knives and fast as bullets. The back of her hand received a long, shallow cut, a livid red smile that leered at her from the darkness. Hull winced as something thumped into his back, and Carza clutched him tighter, afraid to let him go, not losing him to a bomb she'd damn well set off... for a second, the two of them ceased. All that remained as a single, shivering mass.

Less than an hour.

It'd been less than an hour since the attack had started.

Reminded her of the Sleepless... but more inhuman. The Sleepless had still been defined by human urges - greed, fury, revenge, ambition, ideology. These creatures... she had nothing. No idea how complex their thoughts were. And even now the stink of their perfume filled her nose, choked her sinuses, made her eyes water with the sheer intensity of it. Marking their territory. Their kill. Scenting them so they could pursue at their leisure. With the wind against them, they could be tracked for miles. The rumbling continued, and it sounded like the world beyond their cocoon was coming to an end. All of it tumbling down, the mountains folding up... or the mountain underneath them growing, the hill sprouting stones and vaulting up to seal the pass. The corners of the world rolling up the edges of a map. It was hard to imagine stars, sun, or moon from here. From the dusty, damp dark where black flies clustered on their flesh and gnawed hungrily. Short-lived. Desperate. No thoughts for the future, just... hunger. In a way, she felt some form of kinship. The gnawing in her stomach was constant and sharp, and she no longer wished for anything more than another breath. There was no responsibility left but to endure, but to keep on living at all costs. And as she clutched Hull tighter against herself, she added Hull to that category of things which must continue.

The dust began to settle, drifting into the muddy water and becoming opaque light brown clouds, floating aimlessly in the chaotic pools. A sky under their feet. The world turning upside down - darkness above, and clouds below. Her hands were curled into arthritic claws, clutching desperately at the one remaining member of the expedition. Two of them, two out of six... Anthan, Egg, Cam, Lirana, all dead or no longer human. And... and she needed to move, if she wanted to live. Hull agreed... said something, but her tinnitus was too bad, she couldn't hear a word. Just a muted rumble at the edge of her hearing which sounded nervous. Panicked. Her heart was pounding out of her chest, making her ribs ache... and she slowly started unpeeling herself from Hull. He did the same from her, and for a second, the two simply... adjusted. Processed. Dust still settling... she dragged another match out of her pocket, lit it up, then grabbed something from her pack. Just needed to... to... her hands were clutching for something, but what she found was right at the bottom. And she froze. It was... just paper. Just a piece of brown paper. But she recognised it. Had stuffed it deep into her pack, intending to throw it away, just... never got round to it. With shaking fingers, she drew it out.

It was the brown paper that Melqua had used to wrap up her farewell fruitcake.

Carza pressed it to her face, sniffing deeply. A few stale crumbs still sticking to the paper... a beautiful scent of fruits and sugar, all pressed together into a loaf she'd gladly shared with the expedition. On the train, in her new suit, nervous at the world beyond but... hopeful for the future. Missing Melqua already. She sniffed again, and felt tears pricking at the corner of her eyes. Memories of home. Warm food. Warm beds. Safety. Security. The golden void of the Court of Ivory, the feeling that she was part of a long tradition which would endure long after her death, that could sweep her up and nurse her through the rest of her life. Rocking her like a baby until she fell deep, deep asleep. Melqua holding her tight in the early years, when she was still adjusting. Giving her a doll to clutch like a life raft. Blackmailing her father, and then being kept in Melqua's room with its tree-root chandelier... slowly becoming human, and not just some street-rat with stick-thin limbs and a gnawing in her gut. The gnawing had endured. Kept her alive.

It took a conscious effort to shove the wrapping paper away again. Right, she... she had something else. Plan. Right. Yes. Could do that. She reached again. Flask, empty. She had some paper in her bag, a hell of a lot of paper and she grabbed a few of the cheaper pages, rolling them into a tight tube. Stuffed them in the neck of the flask, and lit them up with the match, letting the orange light wash over her like an old friend.

A small torch.

But enough to gauge the damage.

No idea what she looked like, but Hull looked like a dead man walking. Hollow eyes, coated head to foot in dust, hair stained with blood... hands shaking. Limping a little from a rock that had struck him in the lower back. And... right, they were in a tiny alcove between boulders. Beyond it was a churned-up mound of mud that had once been a stream, the bog becoming a sodden mass of unrecognisable dirt. But there was a path. The world above was dark... and she heard nothing. She wanted to move slowly, to take her time... but the gnawing in her gut told her that she needed to run. To remain low, and to sprint. Exhaust all her reserves, because exhausted and alive was better than rested and dead. Hull stumbled beside her, the two bumping into one another continuously. Incapable of going in a straight line, just too... too wobbly. Slowly, her voice came back, and her pace increased alongside her certainty. She was alive. Hull was alive. The explosive had caused a landslide, they should have some room to move... scent was cloying, yes, but it felt... weaker, somehow. With each step, a little weaker.

Less than an hour of contact, and Anthan was dead, they were both wounded, and stumbling through the site of a terrific landslide.

Less than a bloody hour. Weren't... weren't things like this meant to take time? Long, drawn-out confrontations, where they were stalked gradually by something monstrous... or maybe they could have conversations with a madman, building to a final engagement. But... the world was like this. Chaos was quick. If it had been drawn out, there'd have been order, and that was never going to happen. Not here. The snow was falling all around them, barely interrupted by the churning of earth and the sliding of a mountainside. Fat flakes tickling her sliced cheeks. Blood staining her face so deeply it became war-paint. Eyes wide with fear - she had to force herself to blink, and was terrified each time she let darkness consume her vision, even for a split second. The two staggered on, two lonely soldiers, guns dangling loosely from limp wrists, eyes staring like burned-out lights... barely aware of the world around them.

They had nothing else they could do.

And then... then something moved.

In the dark.

A huge shape, jumping down from a rock. Carza froze, a terrified squeak leaving her mouth... and Hull struggled to get his gun up, terror helping him move despite the fatigue slowly overpowering both of them. Weights hauling them down to the ground, heavy as millstones. No mistaking it - this was one of the mountain-dwellers. The glass-skinned gods of the Yasa. The ones who inspired them to mutate until they ascended to godhood themselves... but this was no mutant, couldn't be. Too cohesive. Too clever. And too... sadistic, she supposed. No mutant hunted for sport. Only something natural could. The figure stepped closer, into the dim light of her makeshift torch. One of the creatures. The same glass skin, the same wiry black hair, the same strength... but a little different. Wider hips. Thinner arms, very slightly. A slightly finer cast to its features. A... right. Female. Barely any dimorphism between the two, still absurdly well-muscled, powerful, deadly. And she was close. The Female stepped closer, claws trailing along the boulders. Hunching to avoid flying shrapnel. Tusks gleaming like butcher knives. Hull lifted his gun...

The creature lashed quickly, smacking it from his hands. Carza struggled to lift her own, just as a final act of defiance... but the creature was close.

And a second later, she felt one of the smaller hands pressing against her face, just as another pressed on Hull. Vicious strength, even in the smaller limbs... pushing them against a rock, while the pulsing gland in the palm marked them. Perfume, stinking and pungent, overwhelming her senses, making her cough and gag. The Female grinned wickedly, teeth white as bone... and before either of them could react, her limbs had wrapped around them. Carza screamed, and struggled, trying to get free... but the grip was iron, and a deadly squeeze reminded her of how easily she could be crushed to a pulp. It wouldn't take much to split her ribs and turn her organs to paste. Wouldn't take much to rip her in half like Anthan. Why wasn't... why wasn't she doing that? Why wasn't the Female tearing them apart, biting out their neck-veins, goring them over and over while howling to the moon in savage happiness?

Why were they still alive?

...and then the Female began to move.

And Carza saw nothing. The darkness was total. The Female could move faster than them, much faster, and she needed no light to see. All Carza knew was the rushing cold, the brush of snowflakes, and the intakes of slow, steady breath from a torso larger than her entire body. Eager pants. Carza struggled... and couldn't move more than an inch. Too powerful. Much too powerful. And Hull gasped out two words.

"Hold... on..."

Her hearing had returned. And she could've sobbed. Hull was still alive.

If they were going to die, at least they'd die together.

The darkness swallowed them up... and the last thing Carza felt before confusion overtook everything and senses faded... was the change in air. From the biting cold of the mountain pass, the howling wind which sliced across her bruised and battered face...

To the stagnant, damp air of a cave.

A cave into which they descended, deeper, deeper, and deeper still...

Into the heart of the mountain.