Aftermath - Ann Aguirre [10]
On the Triumph, just before I left, he was red-eyed, eyes burning with pain. Doc’s raw grief when he lost Rose, the woman who had loved him all their lives, threatened to make him do something stupid. I had feared enough for his life that I put the AI on watch. My only consolation in this fragged-up mess is that Evelyn loved Saul, no matter the ambivalence of his own heart, so at least they were together at the end, and he did not die alone.
Despite my sad spirit, I try to get some rest, and as we sit in silence, rain drums on the roof. By nightfall, I’m ready to move, but it’s going to be a miserable march. At least I studied maps of the immediate area, the last time we were here; before coming up with the plan to steal the shuttle, we debated hiking out on foot, despite the dangerous fauna.
“There’s a city fifty-five kilometers northeast of here.”
My mother never traveled there, of course. Not when she had a villa with her own private hangar. There was no reason. Remembering Ramona gives me a little pang, as I must count her among the heroic dead. She surprised me at the end. Surprised the whole galaxy, I guess. She would be so furious right now to see what the Morgut have done to the place. I can almost hear her saying, And that’s the trouble with foreigners, Sirantha.
“By the time we get there, the Morgut may have reduced it to rubble.”
Yeah, I’m aware. But I don’t know what else to do. Our personal comms don’t have the range to signal far enough to do us any good. I’m not even sure if Tarn got my message or if the whole fleet has been lost. Mary, I hope not. In that scenario, killing would be too good for me.
“But there’s a better chance of us finding functioning equipment there.”
Hit consults her handheld and gets us started in the right direction. With nothing more to say, we stick to the cover of the jungle. Animals snarl in the darkness, calls and cries that raise gooseflesh on my arms. At least the rain has put out the fires, though damaged branches come crashing down with the weight of the water. I learn to stay light on my feet, avoiding the deadfall as it drops from the canopy. The downpour doesn’t let up, so before long, we’re both soaked to the skin.
“In this weather,” Hit said, “we could be walking most of the night.”
“No shortage of water, at least.”
She flashes me a fleeting, rueful smile. The night passes in a tangle of dark leaves, near misses with the native fauna, and sheer exhaustion. It’s not cold, but the wet sinks into my bones, making me feel as though I’ll never remember what it’s like to be comfortable again. Still we keep moving, and at daybreak, the rain stops.
Hit shoots a furred thing with too many eyes and teeth as it leaps toward us from the branches above. The animal falls with a thud, revealing green-spotted fur. I’ve never seen anything like it, but she kneels, slices it open, and checks the meat.
“We can eat it,” she says. “If we must.”
Dear Mary. I’ve never eaten fresh flesh.
“Wouldn’t we need to cook it? That would slow us down.”
She nods. “Point.”
I’m just as glad it worked out this way. I don’t want to see how things get turned into food, even if this beast tried to eat us first. We walk on and leave it behind for some other creature to feast on.
Eventually, we come to a point where we can’t continue, and we rest, rolled up in giant leaves. Insects bite me as I try to sleep, tortured by images of Doc and Evelyn. Worry over March haunts me, but I force myself to relax, one muscle at a time. Hit takes the first watch.
Creatures prowl around our campsite, some smaller than the one we killed. Others sound bigger, but they won’t close as long as we can find dry wood for a fire. I don’t rest well, even when I’m not on guard duty. The need to locate freshwater and forage slows our travel; but as we can, Hit and I keep moving toward Castello, the capital of Venice Minor.
She falls sick on the third day. I don’t even know she’s feeling poorly until her knees buckle. Whether it’s something she