Project U.L.F. (45 page)

“What are you suggesting?” Wyatt turned to face him squarely, his voice flat.

“That Par did away with him, and that he’s sending us away on some wild goose chase too!”

Knowing what he knew now about Par, Wyatt was reluctant to answer, but he didn’t need to. Kate leapt to Par’s defense. “That’s a preposterous idea!”

“Is it? Why’s that?”

“Well…because…” she was floundering. Faltering in her argument. So quick to challenge but not quick enough to reason. The imperfection of youth. “Because,” she said defiantly, latching on to an idea, “You saw the way the alien reacted when Par mimicked the thing that attacked them.”

“That was natural,” Kit defied her, “He threw his arms out wide and intimidated it. Most creatures would back away from you if you did that. It looks like threat posture.”

“Well then, if not that, then because you’re a team.”

Kit laughed. “There’s nuthin’ ‘team’ about it, girlie-girl. The sooner you learn that the better. It’s every man for himself.”

“That’s not true!” Wyatt stopped him.

Regardless, there was something in the way Kit had said it, the emphasis on the words, that sent a shiver down Kate’s spine. She shot him a look of disgust and knew that he caught it before she turned away.

They sat in silence then, until Gon-Thok returned, and now the alien’s sun-baked, clay-red skin was once again chocolate brown and the texture of clammy leather.

They trudged on through most of the afternoon without a word said between them. Kate and Kit, it seemed, were no longer on speaking terms, and Wyatt was lost in his own thoughts, mulling over what Kit had suggested. Countless times he tried to cast the thought out of his mind, tried to tell himself that this was Par’s way of trying to right the wrong he’d done to all of them. But Par had betrayed them once already and, try as he might to convince himself otherwise, that thought played on Wyatt’s mind. Maybe Kit was right. Maybe this was all still part of an elaborate plot against him that Par had only alluded to.

It was nearing dusk when they stopped again. The alien needed to find water again. Its usually moist leathery skin was showing the effects of the heat and the sun. Gon-Thok was the color of parchment and its skin was now cracked and flaking. In places it looked to Wyatt as though the alien were bleeding and he guessed it must be in some discomfort. Whatever toll this climate was taking on them, it was affecting the alien much worse. So when Gon-Thok turned to communicate to him that it was about to leave them briefly, he nodded instantly to show that he understood and shooed it away with his hand to go and locate the water that it so desperately needed.

With the alien gone, the others dumped their packs with groans of gratitude and sat themselves on nearby logs and branches. After twenty minutes the alien had still not returned and Kit was growing restless, suggesting the alien might have left them there.

“Give it a rest, Kit,” Wyatt said. “You saw the state it was in, it’s having just as hard a time of it as we are. Besides, it’s always come back before.”

“Maybe.” Kit got up and strode away.

“Where are you going?” Wyatt called after him.

“Anywhere. I just can’t sit here and do nuthin’.” and with that he was gone and the rustle of bushes became quieter as he disappeared into the forest away from them. Wyatt let him go. He was not in the mood for an argument.

When the creature had still not come back some time later, Kate stood and put her hands on her waist, pushing her hips forward and curving her back with a groan. “I’m stiff, do you mind if I go for a wander to blow away the cobwebs too?”

Wyatt pondered the request, clearly not happy about it, but relented. “Okay, but don’t go far. When Gon-Thok returns we’ll be moving on immediately. We have to make it to the mining ship tonight.”

She nodded her understanding.

“And be careful. We’re by no means safe here.”

“I will be,” she smiled. It was funny, days ago she would have resented him saying that, thinking that he thought that she was incapable of looking after herself. Now she knew better. He just cared. She looked at him for longer than the exchange warranted but he had already turned away and was oblivious to her. She looked at him in a different way now. She didn’t see his tanned skin or the creases round his mouth when he smiled or laughed. She didn’t notice the scars on his forearms or the dark patches of sweat on his fatigues. Now when she looked at him, all of his physical being seemed to dissipate into an ethereal peripheralness, and she looked at the soul directly behind the eyes.
Who are you, Wyatt Dorren?
she asked herself before she turned away, and she realized that she really wanted to know.

Initially Kate had done as she had been told, not straying too far, always keeping Wyatt in sight, albeit through the trees. Now as she crouched to examine the bright yellow trumpet of a flowering plant, a reasonably large insect came humming through the air to settle on the sleeve of her jacket. She looked at it in wonder as it sat there, cleaning its mandibles with forelimbs, occasionally unrolling its proboscis only to roll it away again. It was unlike anything she had ever seen and she took a moment to examine it more closely.

Its head seemed to swivel around a tiny neck every time one of the forelimbs swept over and cleaned one of the two round green eyes, each pin-pricked with a single black pupil. The thorax seemed non-existent, simply incorporated into an enlarged abdomen supported by four legs while the other two adapted limbs went about their task of cleaning. With both mandibles and a proboscis, she could only guess that it fed on other insects and plant matter as well as utilizing pollen for energy. It would need a good and readily available energy source since it had only a single wing with which to lift its relatively large frame. The wing, its most attractive feature, was opaque and shaped like a single teardrop, falling down from the back of the bug’s neck. It shone with a myriad of colors like mother-of-pearl, and if this alone wasn’t enough, the cytoskeletal protein that framed the wing looked like silver thread. It was beautiful and as she looked at it she couldn’t help but remember Bobby’s words to her. “
The thrill of seeing something for the first time and knowing that you are the first person to ever see it.
”

Without warning, the wing spun into motion, describing a complete circle like a rotor as far as she could tell and lifting the insect, with some considerable effort, off her arm. “That can’t be,” she said to herself. She had never known a muscle or protein-engineered system that could sustain three hundred and sixty degree motion continuously in one direction. The wing must have been completing a near circle before going back the other way, but doing it at such speed that she could not perceive the change in direction. Still, it was remarkable, and with her curiosity getting the better of her, she followed it through the trees.

When the bug landed again, it was a considerable distance from where she had first encountered it. She had followed it clumsily through the brush, wading through waist high ferns and grass and trampling the fungi and juvenile plants that thrived in the damp and detritus beneath. She had not kept an eye out for landmarks or significant or peculiar plants that would mark her way back, her eyes had been completely focused on the object of her attention. Thus, after an all-too-brief rendezvous with the insect, it took to the wing again and Kate realized as she contemplated a second pursuit, that she had strayed further than she ought to and was now completely lost.

“Wyatt,” she called, but her voice sounded pitiful in the expanse and died quickly. She brought a hand up to her face, fingering her bottom lip uneasily while she wondered what she might do. Suddenly something came round the side of her head, clamped over her mouth and pulled her backwards through the trees. She tumbled over and fell onto whatever was behind her. She heard it grunt and it released its grip on her. She picked herself up quickly and turned to find Kit. She frowned. “Kit, what are you doing?” Then she caught the look in his eye. “No.” She shook her head. “Please, no.”

She turned to run but he pounced on her and tackled her to the ground. He grabbed her by her hair and forced her face into the leaves and the dirt. She twisted her head to the side and tried to grab a breath of air.

“Not a sound!” he ordered her with a hiss.

“Please,” she whispered, “Don’t hurt me.”

“I’m not gonna hurt you,” he said wickedly, bringing his head down close to hers but all the time holding her hair so she could not pull away.

“What…Uh…What are you going to do?” she struggled through the pain.

He pulled her up until she was on her knees, then, putting one hand on her shoulder, his fingers inside the collar, he came up close behind her. “No, I’m not gonna hurt you,” he whispered again into her ear. “I’m gonna make a woman of you!”

Quickly, his other hand grabbed the other side of her collar and pulled them down and apart. The first few buttons popped off her shirt and her T-shirt ripped to her mid-riff. Kit pulled them halfway down, exposing her breasts and locking her arms behind her at the same time. With her effectively immobilized, he let her go. With nothing to break her fall she fell heavily to the ground.

“I’ve waited so long for this,” he chuckled behind her. “You don’t know how long I’ve waited for this.”

Kate struggled to get to her feet, but only pitched headlong into the dirt again. Behind her, she could hear Kit fumbling with his belt, laughing. Her mind struggled to comprehend the situation. She simply couldn’t believe this was happening. Not to her. Not here. Like this.

Where was Wyatt, she wondered. Why wasn’t he here? Her eyes filled with tears. “No,” she sobbed. She wished now that she hadn’t gone wandering alone.

But she was not alone. Through the trees, eyes watched.

*
  
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*

Wyatt went to check his watch and remembered that he’d lost it. Beneath the trees it was gloomy at the best of times, but it was getting darker. Dusk was giving way to twilight and soon night would fall. He checked his watch again and tutted himself for finding the back of a naked wrist again.

Suddenly there was a commotion from behind him and Wyatt spun, gun ready, to see Gon-Thok crashing through the scrub, clearly agitated about something. He had never seen it like this.

“Hey, hey, what’s the rush? Are you better now? Find water? Yes?” He looked at it. It had clearly had a long soak and looked much better.

Gon-Thok shook its head.

“No?” Wyatt frowned. “What do you mean no? I can see you’ve had a bath.”

Gon-Thok threw its arms up in mock surrender, a sign Wyatt recognized. “Stop?” he asked it. “We are stopped. What? You want us to stop here for the night? We can’t. It gets too cold for us, we have to press on.”

Gon-Thok was still shaking its head, bug eyes waggling.

“No. No you don’t want to stop? Is that it?” Wyatt was exasperated. “Look, I don’t know what you mean and I don’t have time to find out. We’ve got to find the others and get moving.”

“Chee-men-wi,” it said, recognizing the word.

“Others. Yes. We have to find them.” Kate and…Kit. Wyatt froze in fear, thinking now he understood what the alien was trying to tell him.
No
,
stop
,
no
, he thought to himself. Kate and Kit. “Shit,” he said under his breath. He looked at the alien, determined. “Where?”

*
  
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*

He was on top of her now and she was powerless to stop him. He was trying to pull her panties down over her hips and grunting and cursing with the effort. It all seemed so unreal. Like a nightmare happening to someone else. She sobbed silently into the dirt.

From above her there was a click and she looked up to see the toes of two muddy boots.