Volume 1, Chapter 6: Running Was Going So Well (Patreon)

“I don’t understand!” Brigid cried.

That was when I realized, first, that she had no legs with which to run; second, that she might not understand the word; third, that she might not possess much in the way of reflexes; fourth, that she had already fallen behind; and fifth, that I really did list things far too often.

Fucking hell!

The air split with a strange sound that was partly animalistic, yet also resembled a ship’s horn muffled beneath shifting sand. Hearing it, I gritted my teeth and twisted my head around, unable to believe what my body had apparently decided to do. I slowed sharply and turned back toward the place I had just begun fleeing.

Bent low over the sand, I lost my balance from the sudden shift in momentum and planted one hand against the ground. It sank deeper than I would have liked, kicking up a small cloud of grit, but I used the support to push myself forward again, heading toward the light flickering between the trees and fronds—the glow of my little flame, growing dimmer by the second.

A few long strides and another leap over the fallen trunk brought me back to the place where we had been ambushed.

My senses managed only to register a gray-and-black shape in front of me, with a bulge at the top thrashing wildly from side to side. Light shone through narrow gaps in the darkness, and flames burst from within, as though Brigid had been trapped inside a black cage.

The air reeked of scorched flesh, wet soil and salt.

Clutching the crowbar, I charged past the shape. I instinctively ducked beneath a limb or tail that lashed toward me—I could not tell which, given how quickly everything was happening—sidestepped, and swung with all my strength at a point just below where I believed Bri was being held.

My momentum carried me farther, and I took cover behind a tree for a brief moment as the creature attacking us groaned and opened what I could now—after circling the trunk and preparing for another strike—identify with certainty as its mouth.

A chill raced down my spine, freezing me in place for a moment as I finally understood what I was facing.

It looked like an enormous mole, with massive front paws resting against the ground, each ending in three claws as long as my forearm. I could not see its hind legs, because the entire rear half of its body, whatever shape it possessed, remained buried beneath sand that constantly poured away from it.

Its head resembled a mammalian version of a crocodile’s snout, covered in short gray fur and packed with rows of sharp, numerous, elongated teeth.

And Bri was trapped inside that mouth. Flames burst through the gaps between its teeth as she threw herself from side to side, struggling to escape.

Stunned by my blow, the creature remained relatively still, but aside from the narrow stream of blood running down its side, it was difficult to judge its condition. It had no eyes from which I could determine whether it was dazed—or whether my attack had accomplished anything at all.

Ignoring the lack of results or my inability to understand them, I rushed closer to the creature’s maw, though not close enough—or so I thought—for its claws to reach me.

Unfortunately, I misjudged the length of its swipe. One claw caught me across the stomach and ribs despite my instinctive attempt to pull my torso back. Even so, as I recoiled, I managed to thrust my arm forward and strike the creature’s skull with the crowbar once again.

The blow forced its jaws open.

“Help!” Bri screamed, still trapped between the creature’s teeth as I began circling it.

Once I reached its back, I leaped onto it and struck its skull again. Abandoning all restraint and common sense, I grabbed the edge of its upper jaw with one hand and wrenched it upward toward me. Leaning out to the side, I wedged my crowbar between the upper and lower jaws, preventing them from closing.

Even those few brief moments were enough for the flames bursting from my fireball to scorch the skin of my hands, which burned mercilessly.

“Get out!”

“I can’t move!” she shouted back in response to my plea. “I just can’t! Something is holding me here!”

“Fuck this!” I yelled.

Through sheer force of will, I tensed my Psyche enough for the skin of my right hand to become covered in armor made of lava. I felt the Soma seethe inside me for barely half a heartbeat before surging like a wave through my body and into my fingertips. There, it rose outward in a brief flare the color of flame and answered my need, coating my skin in the necessary protection. Interestingly, it covered the ring I wore on my finger without any trouble as well.

I focused intensely on not overdoing it, drawing upon only as much of my Psyche’s strength as was truly necessary.

The moment I felt safe enough, I reached deep into the creature’s mouth. My fingers closed around something like a lump of coal heated red-hot, and I pulled it free.

Flames and smoke burst and raged between my fingers as I leaned backward on the creature’s spine, kicked off with both feet, released Bri, and flipped through the air before landing.

My shirt had caught fire, so I used Cinderhide once again, directing it to cover my forearm as well. At the same time, I tore my shirt open across the chest, sending buttons flying until I could rip the garment off and throw it onto the creature in front of me.

Brigid, now much smaller than before, finally shook herself out of her shock and turned her face toward me.

“Get closer to me!” I shouted to her, feeling the effects of overstraining my soul.

My head felt light, as though I were drunk, and everything around me had begun to spin. My other senses were behaving strangely as well. I thought I could hear my own heartbeat turning into a howl, while the stench of burned flesh was repeatedly overwhelmed by something that smelled like hot chocolate. My mouth tasted first of blood, then toothpaste.

I could not allow the dizziness to overcome me, however, because the creature in front of me almost certainly roared like a ship’s horn again as it managed to twist the crowbar loose with its tongue and spit it out.

It turned its entire bulk toward me. Meanwhile, I opened my bag, pulled out the broken broom handle, and wrapped one of the ties from my pocket around its end just as Bri moved closer.

“Sorry,” I said, then thrust the stick into her dimmed, hairlike flames until the fabric tied around its tip caught fire.

As the beast slowly turned toward me, dragging one massive paw after another across the sand, I waved my hastily assembled torch in front of its face. I did my best to avoid its claws as it responded by swiping its forelimbs, trying to knock the weapon from my hand.

“Raaaagh!” I roared, bristling and trying to make myself appear larger, even though I had seen no indication that it possessed eyes.

Either my shout, the torch, or perhaps everything at once stopped it from coming any closer.

So I did it again, screaming with all the strength in my lungs and throat. I even heard the rustling of leaves and the beating of wings as birds, only now alerted by my voice, took flight and fled.

Fortunately, the monster standing before me hurriedly began scrambling backward, digging itself into the sand as it went. Leaving a sizable mound behind, it disappeared beneath the ground.

I waited a few more moments, but when the monster failed to resurface, I drove the still-burning stick into the sand, smothering the flame, then dropped to my knees and clutched the gash across my stomach.

The muscles over my ribs had been sliced open, and fresh streams of blood escaped through the wound with every passing second, the flow worsening whenever I moved.

“I can help!” Bri cried, flying closer.

I stretched one hand toward her with my fingers spread, gesturing for her to stop, and only then did my eyes remind me that it was still covered in armor. In response to my will, the shell cracked apart at once and drifted away on the wind like glowing ash from burned paper.

Unfortunately, the skin beneath was still pink from the earlier burn. Only the blisters that had formed before seemed to have subsided, as I could no longer see them.

I allowed my body and soul a moment of weakness and collapsed onto my back, sending another cloud of dust into the air.

I welcomed the fact that I could hear birds and other animals again, including the sounds I associated with insects. It undoubtedly meant I had driven the creature away far enough to grant me at least the illusion of safety.

At that moment, with my right hand completely stained by my own blood as it poured from my left side while I pressed down desperately to slow the bleeding, that illusion was more than enough.

“I can help, Lex…” I heard my companion’s girlish voice again and felt the warmth radiating from her as she drew closer.

Everything around me was spinning so quickly that only sheer force of will kept me from slipping into unconsciousness.

“Do it,” I replied, moving my hand aside to expose the wound.

When I opened my eyes, I suddenly felt better—less exhausted and no longer dizzy. Light filtering through the leaves above fell across my face, stomach, and feet. The forest rustled around me beneath gusts of wind, while scattered raindrops landed on my skin after rolling from the leaves.

Brigid hovered directly above me, slowly turning in the air like a guard stationed atop a tower.

I moved my hand toward my ribs and gently traced the area with my fingertips, finding the wound—or rather, what remained of it. The cut had been seared by fire, the skin melted together across the surface to seal the tissue beneath.

“Did I fall asleep?” I asked as I remembered what had happened after the fight.

The little flame reacted by spinning sharply toward me. Her face lit up with a smile.

“Lex! You’re alive!”

“Of course. A little burned, but otherwise in good shape.”

My answer wiped the smile from her face.

“I’m sorry. I, um… tried as hard as I could, but without hands… I couldn’t do anything. But when I flew closer, your, you know, body started melting, and the wound closed.”

“Don’t worry about it,” I replied. I cleared the dried blood and saliva from my throat, turned my head, and spat to the side. “You’re doing fine, girl. You’re already finding ways around your limitations.”

“You really think so?” She bit one fiery lip with the other.

“Of course,” I said, only partly lying. “You kept watch over me too, didn’t you? You didn’t let anything come along and eat me. Thank you.”

A spark formed in the corner of her dark eye, then drifted away on the wind.

“Mhm! You saved me too, even though you could have, um, run away,” she finished in a whisper.

“I could have, but I decided things would be more interesting with you.” I had also been thinking about the safety provided by an extra pair of eyes, a source of warmth, and enough light to travel by. Without those things, I might have died after stumbling into the first available hole the moment my torch—or, eventually, my lighter—went out.

That was a perfectly reasonable explanation. It was also bullshit, at least partially, and I knew it. Bri really was useful. The problem was that I hadn’t thought about any of her qualities when I turned around.

I’d run. I’d realized she wasn’t behind me. Then, before the supposedly rational part of my brain had managed to submit its opinion on the matter, I’d gone back. Only afterward had the explanations arrived.

I frowned at the sand between my legs. I spent an unreasonable amount of time figuring out why other people did the things they did. But apparently, when it came to myself, I had developed the considerably less impressive talent of pulling the strings first and explaining afterward why that had obviously been the plan all along.

“Was I asleep for long?” I finally asked, trying to pull myself away from those unpleasant thoughts.

“No. I don’t know how to, um, measure the passage of time yet, but the light from above only just appeared. Maybe that’s what woke you up, right?”

“Maybe. Who knows?” I replied.

Planting my hands in the sand, I pushed myself into a sitting position, brushed the grit from my skin, then crossed my legs and rested my elbows on my knees before letting out a yawn. My stomach answered with a long, drawn-out growl.

“You still haven’t eaten anything.”

“There hasn’t exactly been time.” I smiled at her. “Basically, ever since I got up yesterday—or, fine, ever since I was forced out of bed yesterday and had to jump through a window—I’ve been moving almost constantly. Except, of course, for that delightful conversation and soul remodeling session at old man Gray’s estate,” I replied, turning a stolen ring on my pinky finger with the other hand.

“Do it now.”

“Do what? Bri, what am I supposed to do?”

“Use me for… what did you call it? Roasting?” she replied, lowering herself until she hovered just above the sand. “Make yourself something to eat.”

“Seriously?”

“Yes.”

I had no intention of arguing with such generosity, especially when doing so might provoke a rebellion from my own insides.

So I rolled—because I could not be bothered to stand—toward the crowbar first and then to the broken broom handle stuck in the sand. Then I rolled back with both toward my bag. I set the stick aside, pulled out a screwdriver, and began gutting the first lizard, discarding everything that looked like an internal organ.

“Disgusting,” Bri commented.

She quickly replaced her expression of revulsion with a smile, though this one was more timid and decidedly one-sided. The wrinkle of her nose betrayed how she really felt.

Once I finished preparing the lizard, I skewered what I assumed was nothing but muscle onto the remains of the broom handle. Setting the bloody screwdriver aside, I extended the makeshift spit in front of me and positioned it above my partner’s head.

“I saw your back… when you, um, took off your shirt. Do you want to talk about it?” she asked after a few moments, once fat from the lizard began dripping onto her fiery hair.

“Not really. It’s the result of something that happened a long, long time ago, so even if you wanted to, I doubt you could heal it.”

I slowly turned the stick in my hands to begin roasting the other side of my breakfast. At the same time, I glanced behind me again to make sure nothing was about to leap at the part of my body my fireball had found so interesting. Then I surveyed the surrounding sand once more.

“As soon as I finish eating, we’ll find some wood for you to burn.” I deliberately changed the subject. “And after that, we’ll test my remaining abilities. Maybe yours too.”

“Mine!? How? I don’t have hands, and I don’t know how to control Soma…” she replied, flowing seamlessly from obvious excitement into complete disappointment. Her expressions and mannerisms were those of a small child.

“I think whatever selected the abilities I received—and the ones you were given—took into account the possibility that we would work together. We need to test that,” I added, rolling the stick between my palms.

“Yes! I can't wait.” Her grin widened, and her eyes narrowed into slits.

“There’s something else I’ve been wondering about. Even though you haven’t been alive for a full day, you speak remarkably well and know and understand things you’ve never seen before.”

“Like what?” She raised her eyebrows, briefly transforming them into two tongues of flame belching black smoke.

“Clothing. Was Molbob wearing any? If he’s the same alien as my old man, then definitely not. You’re not exactly dressed either, yet you know what clothes are. When you looked at my back, you understood that you were seeing old scars, even though the alien certainly didn’t have any, and once again, neither do you. Where did that knowledge come from?”

“Well… I don’t know, you know?”

“We have a lot of questions, very few answers, and no idea how much time we have. But we’ll manage,” I said, driving the end of the stick into the sand and dragging a nearby stone closer to support it from the front. “Let’s make that our next challenge: figuring out what you are and why.”

I stood and walked toward the bag I had left nearby. Bending down, I unwrapped the next lizard’s carcass from my shirt and placed it on a flat stone, then shook out the shirt—which was two sizes too large—trying to dislodge the scraps of flesh and fat clinging to it.

“Thank you. What are you… doing?”

“Getting dressed.”

I slipped one arm through a sleeve, then the other, and pushed my head through the opening, pulling the already foul-smelling fabric over myself. I wrinkled my nose when the stench reached it, but I knew I would get used to it sooner or later. Besides, it was starting to get hot, and wearing something was still better than wearing nothing.

“We also need to find a source of water,” I added, watching the scattered raindrops fall—the most pathetic excuse for rain I had ever seen. “Unfortunately, dehydration will kill me much faster than starvation ever could, and those dozen or so droplets coming from above definitely won’t be enough.”

“Humans are very demanding.”

“You have no idea.”

I walked over to a tree, turned my back to her, and lowered my pants.

“What are you doing!?” she shouted in alarm. “Water is leaking out of you! Stop it!”

“Oh, girl. That’s called taking a piss.” I hoped that the aliens would take that one personally.