Yuen-Mong's Revenge (5 page)

     
"It lasted for a long time and was very painful to endure. That is why
I came looking for you."

 
     
"You actually came searching for me? It wasn’t just a coincidence?"

 
     
"No, I came to take you to safety."

 
     
"But why did you steal my pack, rather than speak to me?"

 
     
"Because you would not have believed me. You still do not believe
me." She sensed his discomfort.
He does not like to be confronted.

     
"Believe what?"

 
     
"Believe the night dangers, but I will show you."

 
     
"What is it?"

 
     
"Seeing is better than hearing. We will go soon."

 
     
She got up and went back to the cooking place, where she speared the
remaining meat strips on a blade of grass and hung them over the fire for
drying. Then she held the end of a half-yard tree branch into the coals.
When it had caught fire, she blew out the flame such that only glowing
embers remained.

     
"Come, it is dark now," she said and went out onto the balcony to the
rope. Only the western section of the ring was still lit and gave off
enough light to discern the outlines of things. She dropped the rope fully
and let herself down, holding the stick in her mouth.

* * *

Atun hesitated. He did not see why he needed to observe the night
danger, whatever it was, right then. It could not be that deadly if one
could actually go and see it. He felt it was far more dangerous to go down
that rope in the darkness, and he also dreaded the pain of having to haul
himself back up again. It was enough of a challenge in daylight. But
neither was he willing to let her see his reluctance, nor to be bested by a
woman. By the time he reached the bottom and let go of the rope to drop
the last few feet, she had the stick burning brightly.

     
"Follow," she said and took the path they had come in earlier that day.
About a hundred yards on, they got to a little creek where she stopped.
"Stay on this side." She again blew out the flame and they were in
complete darkness. He heard something drop to the ground in front of
them. Two seconds later she had the torch burning brightly again. What
he saw made him shudder. On the other side of the creek, the entire
ground seemed to have become alive with ant-like insects, about as big
as two links of his small finger, all streaming toward a piece of meat and
a twig of foliage. Within seconds both were covered by these creatures
which continued piling up on top of each other. She threw the stick into
the throng, and he heard a sizzling sound, as some burned, devoured
immediately by the others. And then they vanished as they had come —
all simply disappearing in the soil. Not a speck of the meat or leaf or any
of the burned insects was left.
So that explains why the ground is raked
clean.

     
"Wow… Do they eat everything?"

 
     
"Most everything, except the bark of all trees and some grasses. Any
plants that have not adapted by developing poisons or moving into water
have disappeared from this planet. That is why Aros has such minimal
diversity. This is evolution in action."

 
     
"Are you an expert in biology too?"

 
     
He was disappointed that she simply ignored his sarcasm.

     
"The night scavengers are one of a few insects left and the only other
animals are a several species of birds and sea creatures."

 
     
"Why don’t they attack us? Is it the water?"

 
     
"They avoid water." As she said that, she quickly stepped across the
creek to pick up the torch and instantly the ground became alive again.
She has guts.
He doubted that he would have dared retrieving that stick,
but was glad she did.

     
"Why don’t they strip the leaves off the trees?"

 
     
"They cannot climb up smooth bark."

 
     
"So, they couldn’t scale a smooth rock wall, like at your cave, nor up
metal. I would have been safe in the shuttle then."

 
     
"They can climb up grass blades. So only if all openings are completely sealed would they not get inside, but then you would suffocate for
lack of oxygen."

 
     
"Not if the inside air is renewed by the recycling unit."

 
     
"But the unit does not work, right?"

 
     
"How do you know all that?" He was getting annoyed by her.

     
"Because my father told me. Let’s go back up again."

 
     
He was glad to reach the top of the rope and did not even mind his
sore arms. It felt safe up there. When he entered the cave, she offered him
another drink. Then she said: "I now show you where you can relieve
yourself."

 
     
This had been on his mind since the night danger demonstration. How
had she guessed? She took him to the right side of the ledge and led him
down a narrow path that had a rope strung along the rock. About ten
yards on, right at the edge of the ledge, was a seat, which he recognized
as a hand-crafted wooden toilet seat, with a covered bucket underneath.
There was a slit cut into the bucket wall at the far side. From beyond the
ledge came the sound of trickling water.

     
 She removed the cover. "The liquid runs down into the gully and is
carried away by the water. I empty the solids about once a week for the
night scavengers to clean up."

 
     
She pointed to a neat stack of broad leaves and said: "You rub those
between your hands and then they are like soft paper. You need to go
now?"

 
     
He nodded. She inserted the end of the torch into a crack in the rock
wall and quickly disappeared up the path. When he returned, she was
spreading out a padded roll on the second alcove from the entrance. She
briefly glanced up and said: "You can wash your hands back there where
the water trickles from the ceiling. There is a hole on the right side for
the torch and soap is on the shelf next to it."
She treats me like a little
child.
But he was interested in the soap. He had never seen any, just
heard that it had been used centuries ago on Old Earth as the preferred
cleaning solvent.

     
He picked up the brown bar. It had a pleasant smell. "How do I use
it?"

 
     
"Wet your hands and turn it between your palms a few times. Use the
lather to rub your hands. There is a towel there too… You sleep here. I
sleep there. Tea is in the pan if you are thirsty." With that she walked out
onto the balcony.

     
After drying his hand on the surprisingly soft woven towel, he
followed her, but she had disappeared. Maybe she went to the toilet too.
He waited, studying the night sky. The eastern edge of the ring was
beginning to catch light too, leaving the middle of the ring dark, blocking
out stars.

     
When she did not return, he decided to test his sleeping pad. He took
off his protective outer clothing and stretched out. The padding only
offered minimal support, not like the body molding foam he was used to.

     
What a strange woman! Such contradictions. Such aristocratic
features, but limping. Living in the stone age, but claiming to know about
electronics. And how she had bent those savages to her will. He replayed
again the way she foiled that vulture. That took courage. If he had had the
gun, it would have been so simple to incapacitate it. And what did she
mean she felt his terror? Was she an empath? Could she read his state of
mind? Was that the reason she knew his intention to snatch back the gun
and wacked him? Seemed to anticipate him? He suddenly felt uncomfortable, like having his thoughts stolen, his privacy invaded. What was he
going to do with her? Did she expect him to take her along when he left
this primitive planet?
No, she doesn’t even believe that I’ll get off.
And
that nonsense about electronics not working on this world. She seemed
to be very certain about that. But why did his watch not work anymore?
Did it get knocked? There were so many questions, but he did not really
want to get burdened with their answers. His only goal was to fix his
shuttle and rejoin his mother ship as quickly as possible. He made up his
mind to return to it the next day.

     
Shifting around uncomfortable on the hard sleeping pad, his thoughts
drifted back to her. Why did her father get stranded here? Who was he?
Her accent sounded familiar. Then he remembered. "Andromatis," he
murmured, "that’s it. Her parents must have come from Andromatis." It
was very likely that one of the huge Andromatian conglomerates, run by
the most powerful families in the Galactic Federation would have tried
to assess the commercial potential of the titanium-rich ring, like his own
mission.

* * *

Yuen-mong had a compelling urge to be alone, to get away from this
strange man who did not believe her, who stank of sweat, not the healthy
sweat of exertion, but the sour smell of fear. The chaotic presence of his
mind had already become an intrusion into her ordered life. Her cave was
not hers anymore; she had lost her precious sanctuary — precious
because of its beauty, precious because it meant safety, precious because
here she had loved her parents, because here she had grown up with
them, because it kept their memory alive.

     
So she almost fled from the cave and scaled to her refuge on top of the
rock. She stretched out her arms and took deep breaths, letting her gaze
lose itself in the vastness of stars, letting her mind roam in the multitude
of murmurs, more subdued than during the daytime. She sensed the
chatter of a school of mermaids, as her parents had named the dolphin-like hunters in the sea. A sharp rise signaled that one of them was in
trouble, probably fallen victim to a sea hexapuss, a slimy pod with six
tentacles that each could reach up to ten meters in length. It momentarily
distracted her from her own distress.

     
Do I really want to share my cave with this stranger? Share my life
with him? Have him as my mate?
She felt a tremor of panic just thinking
of this. After her parents had been killed by the savages, she had always
wondered whether she would ever have a mate. She could not see herself
joining the savages, although their males had tried for years to capture
her until they came to fear her.
But he is the only male of my class… I
may never encounter another. If I am ever going to have a child, I need
him.
She had never really thought beyond that, at its implications for her.
It had always remained a vague idea. Her mother had her, so she should
have a child too. Suddenly, this idea had become a possibility and its
stark reality looked frightening. Who would keep her safe when she was
carrying the child? Who would protect them both when the child was still
helpless, like her father had protected her and later taught her how to
survive? Somehow, she could not see this self-possessed man to live up
to these tasks, as her father must have done for her mother.

     
Maybe she should only leave him to his own devices, but she was sure
that he would not live long unless she helped him, taught him at least the
basic skills of surviving on her world. She could not kick him out before
then. Her parents would never have done that even to somebody they
disliked or disapproved of, and she owed him at least that much in their
memory.

     
And then there was the remote possibility to get off-planet, to return
to the home of her parents, claim her spiritual and physical inheritance.
Her mother had told her that she was very rich. This was not really a
concept that made much sense to her. Rich, her mother had said, meant
that she could get or do almost anything she wanted, but didn’t she do all
she wanted on Aros? There was nobody here to deny it to her, except if
she got a mate who would try to impose his will on her.
I would not let
him!

     
Did she really want to leave Aros, never to see it again? She loved her
unforgiving world, its savage beauty, its majestic ring that she never tired
of studying in all its variety. She even loved its daily challenge of survival, but then she also longed to be able to share all this with a soul
mate, like her mother had always been. She longed for the challenge of
discussing things, reasoning through complex mathematical problems,
as she had so often done with her father.
Why did they have to die?