Saedah would say later that it all seemed to happen in slow motion. But at the same time, it happened all too quickly. He could see the red earth rising faster and faster. Details were clear, like the leafless shrubs growing larger until he could see sun-scorched bark flaking along stunted branches. Like the streaks in the red earth from the flooding of past rainfall. The stark terror in Nyx's face.
The ship seemed to fall in silence.
He couldn't remember any sound after their pursuers stopped firing. The sight of the world rising up to capture them was all consuming.
Then they hit. The sound of bending and tearing metal rang through the ship. Nyx and Saedah were tethered to their seats by their harnesses, what little good those did. Every loose particle in the ship was flung at them. Some of the larger pieces were ripped from their bolts to be hurled about as well, until the ship finally rolled to a stop.
Their metal casket thudded to a halt amidst the screech of metal and clang of debris, belly up. By some miracle, Saedah was still conscious. Looking to his right, it appeared Nyx was not so lucky. Her arms hung limply toward the roof below them. Knowing he had little time, he unclipped his harness, falling the considerable distance to the unforgiving, hard metal. His knee protested the landing, but he couldn't take the time to slow.
The ship still groaned around him, an ominous, deep sound.
Getting Nyx down was a test. The woman had poison barbs for hair, after all, and that shit was everywhere. Manically, he wondered if Pteroisians could cut their fronds. He squelched the hysteria as it threatened to bubble up, searching for the Calm. The harness finally issued a 'Click!' and Nyx dropped like a boulder.
The female may have actually weighed as much as a boulder. He grunted as her weight hit him and he tried to not drop her. He failed, for the most part. He caught her chest, barely, and just managed to keep her head from smacking the uneven roof. Her feet, however, came down hard on a section that had been part of the ventilation system.
Her heels left dents in the stiff metal. He winced imagining how that would feel when she woke up. But before he could think too much on her comfort, he tossed her over one shoulder and fought his way to an escape hatch. She might be tiny, but she was dense. Darkspinner take him if he ever said it out loud, but the female was set to fight the cruiserweight, if not the heavyweight division. He had to prop the woman against the hull to shove the hatch door outward, cutting his palm on a jagged section of hull in the process.
The cats were gone, as though they had never been on the ship. They were either buried in the debris, or were out through one of the gaping, ragged holes in the hull. While he desperately wanted to search for them, he had more pressing matters. His own life ranked above the lives of his cats, even if it settled sourly in his stomach. He would have time to miss them later. More importantly, Kitty was silent. That was never a good thing.
Without Kitty, he was blind and deaf. He wanted out of that ship, into a particular underground hideout, and on the com with one of the others. He smothered curses and dug around for the packs the two had thrown in, a mental clock counting time since the wreck, already climbing upwards of three minutes.
He wished he had thought to be updated on Conclave workings before that shitstorm.
Yeah, well… Wish in one hand, he thought bitterly, finally catching sight of the three bags. He made quick work of gathering them up and pulling Nyx out. Ungracefully, he might add. She wound up in a heap after tumbling down the earth mound that swelled around the ship.
Once Nyx was out, Saedah turned to the hatch to manually set the trap. The ship would blow when someone tried to open it without Kitty's permission. Since Kitty was AWOL, it would blow for anyone. Friend or foe, and like it or not, he was included. It was best to leave quickly, in that case. The way his luck was running lately, it would blow before he got his clear. As he spun to run back down the curved side of the ship to the excavated earth where he had dropped Nyx, he slipped.
He ate dirt. He ate a lot of red, dry dirt as he fell face-first into the churned earth. He narrowly missed landing on Nyx. That would have been an awful cherry to top her suck-ass sundae.
Saedah tried, but he could not carry all of the packs and Nyx. She was beginning to stir, but too slow for his taste. In a firm grip, he shook her shoulders. Thanking the suns, Saedah exhaled a relieved breath as she finally opened her eyes. She woke loudly, though, launching into a hysterical scream the moment her brain began firing back to life. The strangled cry that left her throat pierced his ears and threatened to burst his drums.
He pounced on her, covering her mouth with his hand. It was a testament to her intellect that she caught on quickly, shutting off the infernal scream.
"Gotta go, and we gotta be fast. Can you run?" He prayed the answer was yes, even as he whispered the question. The answer had to be yes. It wasn't in him to leave her. Not anymore. Four days ago, definitely. Without hesitation.
Damn her for being an ally.
She had to have seen the desperation in his eyes, as she nodded fiercely. When he removed his hand, she shot to her feet, wincing and limping on one foot.
His mental count had reached five minutes.
Red dirt still drifted in the air, concealing their exact movements, but it was a fine signal for their location. Like they hadn't already been marked on enemy radars. Dazed, they ran through the red dust cloud. It certainly looked like something from a B-rated movie. The sun above hardly pierced the thick veil, while pockets of fire shown through like lamplight in the dense, red cloud. He knew the city was North. They needed to run South. Between the rolling of the ship and the haze, he could have been running in any direction though. He'd been granted no time to orient himself.
Running in any direction was surely better than sitting in wait for the shit-storm about to plow them over, though. He was positive the Triad ships that shot them down had marked the Pegasus. It was hard to miss the paint job.
They ran. From behind and to their left, the roar of fossil-fuel engines chased.
"Rangers." Saedah growled in a low, ominous tone. He paused only long enough to look over a shoulder and pinpoint the direction of the oncoming enemy vessels. He couldn't see them, but there were only a handful of people in the whole of the four systems who still used fossil-fuel vessels. Of them, the Rangers weren't the worst, but they were far from peaceful. Kill counts in the Rangers were a large factor in determining rank. Now, apparently, they'd teamed up with the Triad. Having just assaulted Triad military personnel, he could guarantee that the meeting would be doubly disagreeable.
With his heart pounding, Saedah pulled Nyx to the right, urging her to run faster. She was running with a limp on her right leg. Her face was pinched in pain, and he sympathised with her. Every part of him, every single nerve ending, was screaming at him with every breath and step he took.
Nearly half a mile out, with both gasping for breath, they broke through the haze. Behind them, the engines were still running, but they must have stopped at the ship. Any minute now, and- the ship finally blew.
The shockwave that hit them rolled over the land in a physical and visible wave before knocking them to the earth. Nyx was the first to recover, coughing from the fresh haze of quickly dissipating dust. With grumbles from the male, she fought with his weight, trying to get him off her and vertical.
"You are a heavy bastard. Damn!" She grunted, hobbling a few steps with his arm draped over her shoulder and all of his weight on her back. Her injured foot caused sparks to dance in her eyes every time she was forced to place weight on it.
There was nothing but scarce trees and low rolling hills for cover. If the blast hadn't taken out all of their pursuers, little time would be needed to track the two of them down.
"Come on, man!" She hissed, patting his face. He shook his head and took more of his weight on his own. He looked over his shoulder.
"You aren't built of clouds, either, you know." He mumbled groggily.
Behind, pockets of footprints dotted the landscape where they had ran across soft soil. The haze was nearly dissipated. Where the Pegasus had crashed, fiery debris rained. Looking up, following the trail of debris, there was more on its way back down. And it wasn't concentrated around the blast site anymore. That brought Saedah to full lucidity.
"Run!" His dry throat protested the word, but they ran. Chunks of metal fell around them, but they ran.
When their legs had turned to jelly, their sheer momentum was the only thing keeping them on the move. The sun sat low on the horizon, rapidly nearing the mountains in the distance. Saedah stumbled to a stop and raised a hand to Nyx. She was looking at the world with distant, unfocused eyes. Her lips were cracked and scabbed. She did not run past him, but shambled in a mechanical way for another few steps before stumbling to a stop. Her legs shook visibly, with tremors running violently though each muscle of her body. Each step she took was shaky as she returned to him.
"What?" Even her voice was cracked and seemed painful.
"The sun." His voice sounded just as dry, and it was painful. He pointed to the sun, not yet touching the mountains in the distance. "It'll be dark soon. Dark means cold here." He didn't want to explain it. She didn't want to stand and listen to it. He pointed to a knot of trees following a dry creek bed. The roots of those trees formed caves, usually. Judging by a section that was exposed, an animal had already made the one viable resting spot a home.
Perhaps it wasn't one of the more dangerous animals in this gods-forsaken desert. Perhaps there would be a spring and four-course meal inside, too.
The two fell more than climbed down into the creek bed, praying for relief.
By some miracle, whatever animal had called it home was either part of the debris choking the entry, or had abandoned the den. Not looking too closely at what he shoved between the roots, he prayed it had just abandoned the den. He didn't dare dump the gross mess outside, as it would be a glaring sign of their presence.
Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
Nyx retched at the base of the neighboring tree and Saedah groaned internally. And there was another track for his pursuers to find. He couldn't fault her, though. They had run hard, under duress, in scorching heat.
"Get in." He ordered, pushing the packs inside the hollow. It was going to be a tight fit, but it would protect them, somewhat, from what was coming. One large section along the creek bed was exposed, and wouldn't provide much relief from the cold he expected. The sun was already falling behind the mountains, and he could feel the stirring of a faint breeze. It was a hot breeze, like sucking on a hairdryer, but in an hour or two he fully expected to fight hypothermia.
Once Nyx had climbed in, he followed. There was no way to avoid touching one another. There simply was no room for personal space. As it was, he had to bend in an extremely uncomfortable way to keep his feet out of the entry. Nyx, trying to make herself as small as she could, was shoving as much dirt, leaves, and fur as she could manage into holes and crevices between the roots. She lifted one particular clump of fur, attached to a sliver of jerky-dried meat and wrinkled her nose.They worked together, scooping dirt and debris to the outer edge of their temporary home.
Saedah finally had a moment to unclip his com from his ear and examine it. His com was broken. It was a wonder the thing had even remained on his ear. Nyx's, no surprise, had no signal. Saedah wondered why Nyx would not have been patched with a bridge to Kitty, if the others spoke so highly of her. Kitty would have been able to hijack the signals on the planet to reach the Conclave. But Kitty was gone. It was just the two of them.
The temperature was already dropping. Their sun-baked skin, even through their clothing, was painful. The cold did nothing to make it feel better. Their hot skin just made the cold seem that much more intense. When Nyx started shivering, He decided it would be worth risking discovery, especially knowing that the wind would be picking up soon. He dug the foil blankets from their packs and twined them through the roots to form a meager barrier. Next he dumped the contents of one bag and took inventory, using Nyx's com as a sparse source of light. Three heat packs, three cold packs, flint and striker, a flare, one change of clothes, fire starter, two bottles of water, a bag of jerky, and a first aid kit. And the best part, bless the female's heart, was a small handgun with a full magazine.
"The same in the other?" He whispered, watching the blanket start to whip in the rising wind.
"Yes." She replied simply. He had to admit, this was far better than he had expected her to pack. But they only had four bottles of water between them. He broke one of the heat packs and passed it to her. She curled around it, cradling it to her chest as Saedah moved to give them more room. He then loaded the handgun and placed it near her head, within easy reach of both parties. He began breaking up more dirt to pack between the roots to keep the blanket from snapping in the wind. After a few minutes, Nyx uncurled and passed the heat pack to him, taking his place in firming up their pitiful tent. That was their routine; passing the heat pack back and forth, keeping their windbreaker from ripping free, until late into the night.
The wind rose, the temperature fell, and they used the extra clothing as blankets. There was too little room to actually don the articles. They huddled close to one another, both shivering, both in pain from muscle cramps and sunburns. Nyx smelled like the bitterly fragrant ointment he had helped spread on her skin. They sipped at the water, knowing it would have to last through the next day, and knowing they wouldn't be able to stay there.
Saedah woke with a start, not realizing he had fallen asleep. Nyx was pulling dirt into the den to get at the blankets. The heat was rising rapidly, causing their den to become stuffy and uncomfortable. Panicked, he tucked the handgun into his belt and hurriedly helped, praying he would not find sunlight on the other side. Thanking every god he knew, only the dim light of pre-dawn bathed the world. Saedah tied his extra shirt around his head and helped Nyx do the same. Her skin was both blistered and cracked, and he thought about the med kit again.
"No, we don't have time." She said, stalling his hand on the white box. She was obviously in pain, but she was right. They were still too close to the crash site, and the Rangers would be out again to look for their bodies. Few off-worlders could survive a night, unprotected, is the Finis Steppe of Phaenna. They hurried through packing the remainder of their belongings and left the den as the first rays of sun broke over the horizon. Trying to absorb as much of the sparse shadow as they could, they followed the creek bed.
Not even an hour later, the heat forced them to stop. They were both parched, and the thought of the water bottles on his back had their stomachs clenched in knots. Pulling Nyx into a crouch below a fallen tree, he passed her the water bottle first.
"Not too much. It's a long way from water, yet." He looked to the horizon, noting the barren flatland. There was a single rock formation jutting skyward in the distance. They may not even reach that by tomorrow's nightfall in their condition. They were moving too slow. He removed a jerky stick for both of them, wishing it had been nearly any other non-perishable. Sucking on the dry meat, causing the meager moisture in his mouth to vanish, he pulled out the first aid kit and set about medicating the visible cracks in Nyx's skin.
They had to stop every hour, or their best estimation of an hour, until nightfall. The medicines in the kit helped with their burns, but the pack was running low on ointment already. Nyx's striped, ridged skin was, apparently, very sensitive to arid environments and heat.
Lucky her to have been on his ship, then.
They had the second pack, but both agreed that slowing the consumption of the medicine would be better in the long run, at least until they were able to get somewhere out of the elements for an extended period of time. As though the universe were laughing at them, they had been unable to find another den that night. They were left to bundle in the extra clothes, wrap the thin blankets around themselves, and cling to one another. It was a miserable existence. From the creekbed, they were sheltered only minimally from the terrible wind, but it was something.
Saedah found himself telling Nyx the story of his last visit to the planet, where he had secured Conclave roots along the thulium trail. The planet was known for three things: thulium , oil, and coal. Since oil and coal were only used by the people on the planet and precious few others, it was near worthless. The thulium , however, was a high commodity in the galaxy. Very few places had thulium mines that could support their own population, let alone be shipped out for trade. It was Phaenna's one cash crop. The planet as a whole was governed by no law, except that the strong live, and the weak die. It was a harsh planet, with harsher people. They just wanted to live, but were mostly stuck on this barren wasteland. The more fertile lands to the north and south were mostly divided amongst wealthy summer vacationers. The few who managed to leave were either hired out on less-than-legal ships, or managed to win the education lottery.
The roots he'd sewn with Conclave had been hard-pressed to take. He had fought tooth and nail to build a reputation as the baddest of the bad in three of Phaenna's largest cities. He'd earned plenty of busted lips and bruises along the way, but violence was the only thing those people knew. So he amassed a following. More of a gang, really, but it worked. He didn't outright tell them that they were working for the Conclave. Most thought it was a drug cartel. For the purpose the Conclave was using the planet and her people, it actually was. The Conclave was the primary manufacturer of antibiotics and cell stimulants this side of the galaxy. Their medicines were the purest and the cheapest in the whole of the galaxy. That was something both Mac and Vorn vehemently agreed on; the medicines they produced would not be the cash flow the Conclave needed or depended upon. Yet, as the medicines dominated the market, the corporations governing the Superior and Minor systems outlawed the use and possession of the drugs. That was when the Conclave began using the thulium trade to hide their shipments.
Nyx snored. He looked down at her, shocked that she had fallen asleep so quickly. Honestly, he could see little of the warrior his friends swore her to be. She screamed a lot. She had near zero apparent survival instincts, emphasized by how she had gone toe-to-toe with Citram. She fell asleep in strange places, like in his arms. He refused to think of how he had fallen asleep the night before, instead of keeping watch.
That night was long. He refused to fall asleep with them both in the open. He held the handgun in his right hand as he maneuvered Nyx to allow him full use of the arm. It wasn't his dominant hand, but with the months of depending on it alone, he was as close to ambidextrous as anyone could be. His left arm was holding Nyx tight to him as they leaned against the wall of the creek. Hours ticked by in the span of years. Roughly two hours before daylight, Nyx jolted awake. Her eyes darted the ridge and the length of the creek before falling on Saedah.
"How long before dawn?" She whispered.
"A couple hours, maybe." Her eyes widened.
"Get some sleep. I'll watch." She took the gun and Saedah put his back against hers, pillowing his head on the cold earth of the creek. Where the waking hours had dragged on and on, it seemed he had only slept for minutes before Nyx woke him with an oily, medicated smear across his cheek. The sun was peeking over the horizon.
That day was much the same. Bake in the sun. Take a break, drink, and address the worst of their skin problems. Near mid-afternoon, the creek bed melted into the flat expanse of dried lake bottom. The stone formation wasn't too far off now. A mountain range rose in the distance, but they would never be able to walk that distance and survive. Not across the Flatness, and not with the inevitability of night between them and the jagged ridges. The two looked on from crouches beside a lone, stunted tree. Its branches were all bent to the west. As they neared the Flatness, the few trees they had seen had taken on that appearance, growing with the wind. The strong nightly winds had sculpted trees as well as rock.
"That is where we need to be." He said, pointing to the stone formation. From this close, it looked like twin barrels of a shotgun pointing straight at the heavens. There would be some safety there. He hoped. If there was any safety for them on Phaenna, it was in the stone. "Before nightfall." Nyx only nodded. Her large brown eyes scanning the expanse of open, flat sand and hard, cracked earth. He didn't need to tell her the likeliness of surviving the night if they failed.
With tight eyes and stomachs fit to press diamonds, they made their way across the flatness.
Nearly three hours later, Saedah was ducking behind a rock at the base of the stone, trying to get a clear shot at the assholes that had invaded his dugout. Nyx had dove closer to the stone as the shots fired. He had only been able to dive behind a single pillar.
Nyx was pinned in her present location, with bullets whizzing just over her to imbed in the rock blocking his body. Her gun was loaded and ready, but she was in a terrible position. If she moved from her cover, the men above would make quick work of neutralizing her. With the gun in one hand, she covered her ears and drew her knees to her chin.
Seriously, where was the kick-ass Citram bragged about? She looked like a helpless child, the way she was sitting there.
Movement caught his eye and he reflexively fired two shots toward a figure running from behind the Stone toward a set of bikes. The second could only be called a lucky shot. It caught the figure in the leg, but didn't keep the shit-stain down. Saedah had neither the bullets to fire at that distance, nor another opportunity to take the potential threat down. As soon as he fired on the fleeing figure, the two men in the stone shown themselves, attempting to take Saedah out quickly.
He caught one in the shoulder and the other had the misfortune to take the bullet in the stomach. Saedah ducked back behind the stone, keeping an ear out for signs of movement, in case more lay in wait. The runner got one of the bikes started and sprayed dirt in their hurry to get to town.
Which was absolutely perfect.
Having decided he'd waited long enough, he darted up the well-hidden path to the mouth of the dug-out cave, Nyx on his heels. They froze when they found the 'men'. They were hardly old enough to be considered such. They may have been Vector's age, but he would bet a fortune they were even younger.
"Damnit," Saedah snarled, hauling the one terrified boy with the shoulder wound into the cave. Using the kids grimy shirt, he showed the youth how to keep pressure on the wound. That done, he sat Nyx to watch the boy while he went to fetch the other child. He found the youth curled on his side, whimpering. Saedah lifted him as gently as he could, trying to tell the kid it was ok. He wasn't sure if he was trying to convince the kid or himself, at that point. With everything else, he wasn't sure his mind could handle killing a child. Once inside, Saedah made his way through the smaller opening into a well-protected cave and to the farthest wall. Balancing his burden, he reached his hand into a shallow crevice to trigger the ancient biometric scanner, opening a secret door.
Through the door was a dark and winding, uneven staircase that led down, and down, and down, into the depths of the stone spire. Wires ran along the ceiling with faint bulbs flickering to life to light the way as they passed under. About the time the kid's head started to loll, they levelled out into a natural cave formation. Well, natural enough, aside from the three manufactured enclosures along one side and the lights reflecting off glistening white stalactites and stalagmites. He took the kid into one of the rooms. Bright lights winked on at their entry. Saedah laid him on a dusty bed, similar to the one in his house, with a surgical arm hanging from the ceiling.
Upending the third bag on the equally dusty table, Saedah grabbed a wrapped syringe and vial. With a tight chest, he began field triage. Stomach wounds were bad. They caused death more often than not.