Regi's Goddess, chapter 11 (Patreon)

Dante let out a string of profanity that would've sent his grandmother searching for a bar of soap. He stood and brushed his pants off as he eyed the steep slope that he had failed—once again—to ascend. He’d clambered up steeper ground in his youth, but either the rocks here were looser or Dante was getting old. Every time he thought he had found a handhold, he would slide to the bottom again. His hands were scraped raw and his hip ached from the earlier fall.

Dante glared at the slope before turning his attention to the rest of his surroundings. He possessed a good sense of direction, and this cut in the ground was between him and that town. So he needed to find a way around it. He looked towards the sky. “Lady Divashi, if this is you that keeps flinging me back to the bottom of this hill, I don't mind telling you that I am getting a little aggravated with your high handedness.”

Dante wondered whether his grandmother would've considered his words a prayer. Probably. But then she would've been so scandalized by his recent spate of cursing that she wouldn't have had any more room for additional horror.

Muttering about interfering women, Dante studied the relatively flat ground to the left and right. Since he had no idea where he was going and had never seen an aerial picture that would have at least given him a general sense of geography, Dante chose right at random. “I assume if you disapprove, you will do something,” Dante said as he started down the sandy path. The trail had clearly been formed by running water because broken tree limbs and debris gathered at each bend in the path, but the same water had carved a relatively flat trail for him to follow. Of course, he still had to navigate the unevenness of the ground and the rocks that littered the way. After months of walking only the smooth corridors of the ship, his ankles protested the workout.

“You know, I've no intention of worshiping you. At best, you’re an annoying busybody who is always trying to tell other people how to live their life. When I lived in Houston, I had a neighbor just like you,” Dante told the sky. He didn't expect anyone was listening, but wildlife didn’t like to be startled. Making noise was the best way to ensure that he didn't interrupt some wildcat’s dinner or startle baby wild pigs so that their screams called the adults to attack. The rule on a trail was that if you wanted to see wildlife, you kept quiet, and if you wanted to avoid wildlife, you acted like some city tourists who talked at a volume that would only be appropriate when trying to have a conversation with someone on the opposite side of a crowded subway.

So Dante did his best to imitate that tourist.

“I bet Regi thinks that you made sure I was out alone on the ranch that night, and that you picked me because your hedgehogs needed someone to love them. Well I don't mind loving your hedgehogs because they are sweet creatures, but if I ever get evidence that you conspired with those assholes to take me off Earth, I'm going to figure out a way to ascend to whatever dimension you live in, and I am going to kick your ass so hard that you aren’t going to be able to sit in the saddle for a month.” That threat was more effective when the person he was threatening actually had a butt. “You know what I mean,” he added. “Screwing with people's lives is not acceptable behavior.” That had always been his grandmother’s most condemning phrase. If you insulted guest or kissed a boy in front of others, she pulled out the “not acceptable behavior” line. Dante knew she had been trying to protect him, but it still rankled.

“At least ask if people want your help. The Kowri appreciate your help, and you have guided them do some pretty amazing stuff. I wish humans had been able to reach space without having to rape every corner of the planet to get there.” In his lifetime, Dante had seen the ranch halve and halve again because the value of land and the taxes attached to it had risen so much. As more land became unusable from overmining and rising water, it seemed like there was very little space for the life Dante had grown up loving. Of course, the ranch pulled in more money every year because rich people valued rare experiences, and riding on an open range was becoming an exotic adventure.

Right after high school, Dante had moved to Montana to study Equine Science. That was the last part of the country that had huge tracks of untouched land. He’d wanted open spaces without the shadows of civilization creeping in with every distant blast of a semi horn. But the minute the first winter storm had hit the dorm rooms with such fury that the walls shook, he had called his father. He might hate his dad, but the man had the connections and the money to get Dante out of a bad situation of his own making.

“Why couldn't you just break the pirate’s ship so they had to land?” Dante asked the sky as he trudged down the dry creek bed. “Earth could have reverse engineered their engines and gotten a jumpstart on technology we needed to get out of the solar system. At the same time, your dops could have found a new home. Yeah, my people probably would've put them in a zoo, but they would put them in a nice zoo. My people are better to animals than they are to each other. Usually.” Dante grimaced and he thought about the work he had done with the horse rescue. People who didn’t have space for horses often insisted on keeping them because the animals were a huge part of Texas culture. And in Texas, culture mattered more than the law. “My people are good with exotic animals they see as having value. Any zoo with an alien animal exhibit would've made some damn good money.”

“Maybe you didn't think about that. Maybe you're just as fallible as the people down here—you just have a different perspective on things.” Or maybe Divashi didn't trust humans. Dante could hardly blame her. Then again, Kowri weren’t significantly better. Between the politics at the temple and Siger’s backstabbing, Dante was pretty damn disappointed in them. They weren’t the monsters the Coalition made them out to be, but they were disappointingly ordinary on the moral front. Dante had nursed some childish hope that when he met aliens, they would be better.

Dante heard some large creature crashing through the brush on the high ground above the creek bed. He looked around for a sturdy branch that he could use as a weapon, and cursed himself for not doing that earlier. There was a lack of downed branches in the immediate area. He considered turning and running back to the nearest bend in the creek bed where there had been a pile up of tree litter, but he didn't want to turn his back on a potential predator, and he definitely didn't want to run on rocky ground. The first was an invitation to get chased and the second was a near guarantee that he would twist an ankle if not break one.

So instead he ripped a whippy little branch off an overhanging limb and prayed that he could bluff whatever monster was about to accost him.

“Dammit! Stop, you gods’ cursed beast.”

Dante let his hand fall to his side and he called out, “Hello? Hello! I need some help down here.”

“Dante?” Incredulity came through the translator just fine.

A great crashing through the brush presaged Regi tumbling to the bottom of the slope. He sat in the rocky creek bed with a dazed look and his fur so poofed that he looked like a fuzzy teddy bear. Given the unhappy look on Regi's face, Dante decided to not share that observation.

With relief so great that it made his knees weak running through him, Dante closed the distance between them. “Thank God. I didn't think anyone was going to find me before one of these cold-weather predators you keep talking about ate me.”

Regi rubbed his hand over his face and his fur settled; however, he didn’t respond.

Dante crouched down next to him. “Are you okay?”

“What are the parameters of ‘okay’?” Regi asked, which was not a reassuring question.

“If you need a doctor, you’re not.”

Regi nodded with deliberate, slow movements. “Using the definition of okay, I am okay in that I do not need a doctor for any effects of that fall. I am not okay in my frustration towards certain individuals. I may need a doctor of Ean’s ilk in order to release negative emotions that are leading me toward antisocial behaviors.”

Dante silently translated that to Regi being pissed at Divashi. Regi's goddess did provide more than her share of bad luck. But, since Regi's bad luck had led him to find Dante in the middle of the wilderness, Dante was Team Divashi this time. Given his earlier rant, that was hypocritical, but Dante was fine with embracing his own selfish needs.

“I’m shocked you found me. I thought Siger’s murder plot was going to work.” Dante stood and offered Regi his hand.

Halfway through reaching for it, Regi froze. “What do you say Siger possessed?”

“He didn’t possess anything, but he did orchestrate a murder plot. That's what we call it when someone intentionally organizes events to try to kill someone else.”

“Kowri are not above corporeal greed or sin. I understand the concept of murder plot and that is one of the crimes that followers of Gavd are charged with investigating. However, why do you believe Siger attempted to murder you?”

“He attacked me and the pebafri I was riding while shouting things about how Gavd was the true God and Divashi was evil and a whole bunch of other bullshit I didn’t catch since I was trying to avoid death.” Regi silently mouthed the word bullshit as if he couldn't quite understand it. That was fair, he probably couldn't. Dante had no doubt Kowri and every other species cursed in their own language, but the translator skipped those words.

“At the stables, Siger is coordinating the search for you. He said your pebafri stepped badly.” Regi put his hand in Dante’s but he hauled most of his own weight up, not relying on Dante to provide a counterbalance.

“My pebafri stepped badly after he struck both us with a whip. I don't know whether it was my years in the saddle or the Lady Divashi who keep me from bashing my brains out on the way down the slope.” Dante grimaced. “Maybe both.” He had seen less serious falls result in broken necks or cracked skulls. Siger had not offered a helmet, and Dante hadn't asked for one because he had trusted his own ability to stay in the saddle. Even without the murder plot, that had been reckless given that he didn't have experience with pebafri.

“That complicates matters. I had no idea he was a Gavd monotheist. That belief doesn't even make sense to me. If Gavd is the only god or the only god that matters, then why do the other gods have power?” Regi's eyes widened. “Not that I am casting aspersions on your people's religious beliefs.”

“Don't worry about that. If we ever get back to Earth, my people will be casting lots of aspersions. They will probably tell you that your gods are just another alien species, and one that is been created by their God since their God is above all.” Dante checked Regi’s walk, searching for any sign he was injured. The fall down that slope was not a pleasant one. However, he seemed fine, although his fur was so full of dust that his stripes were half-hidden by a layer of gray.

“That would be a fascinating theological discussion,” Regi said.

“I believe the translator has miss-translated ‘horrific shit storm,’” Dante corrected him.

Regi flashed him a grin. “Let's call for assistance, and then we can discuss the vagaries of theology.” He pulled out his communicator and asked for any follower of Gavd who could provide rescue. The communicator produced static and pops, but no voice came through. Regi looked up at Dante, alarm in his gaze as he repeated the request.

“Did you break it on the way down?”

Regi grimaced. “Perhaps, which is a striking piece of irony.”

That comment made very little sense to Dante, but since Regi was busy pulling the cover off the communicator, Dante found the nearest non-jagged boulder and perched on it. It gave him a chance to stretch his ankles.

“I don't see any physical damage, but I don't have equipment to examine the smaller details,” Regi said as he snapped the back on. “Instead of providing rescue, unfortunately I may have simply provided a traveling companion as we will both need to walk back to town.”

“I don't mind a traveling companion at all, especially if you're armed. I don't suppose you have a weapon you could loan me.”

For long seconds, Regi studied him, as though trying to parse some poorly translated message, his eyes wide and the hair at the edges of his eyes standing on end in a way that made him look alarmed. “Why would you need a weapon? Why would I need a weapon?”

Now Dante fell silent as shock stalled his brain. He had never thought of Regi as stupid, but that statement came near it. “Siger tried to kill me.” That was more than enough reason to desire a weapon.

Regi's features smoothed as his worry drained away. “He has taken riders miles off course to search for you.”

“He could double back to finish killing me.”

Regi began studying the path where the Lady Divashi had dumped them. Either that or Siger had dumped Dante her and she had sent Regi along after him. “If Siger were to leave the rescue, many would ask why. Since he carries a new communicator, many would follow if he attempted to leave.”

“Communicators can be used as trackers? Why didn't they just track the riding path he took us on?” Dante did not understand how these people could have phenomenal technological advances and still have these huge blind spots.

“Such surveillance of every Kowri would require obscene amounts of storage. The temple only tracks an individual if something remarkable is going on. Siger losing an outsider who is central to a temple debate is remarkable enough that others will watch him. The local predators are far more significant a danger.” Regi slapped his hands together, dislodging a significant amount of dust from the fur of his arms.

Dante might have continued to delineate the scope and breadth of Regi's naïveté when it came to his people, but a faint chittering derailed his thoughts. “Is that a dop?” Dante had no doubt that wild dops were just as dangerous as the Kowri maintained. They would have all the poison of the dops on the ship without being used to handling.

“Peaches!” Regi called.

“Peaches? You dropped my Peaches down a slope?” Horror washed through Dante, and he started scrambling up the loose bank toward the unhappy chittering. As he climbed, Dante crooned, “Chee chee chee chee chee. Come on Peaches. Chee chee chee.”

“She chose to come with me,” Regi said from the bottom of the slope. He wasn’t trying to climb up after Dante, but then for all his vigorous efforts, Dante was only five or six feet above the creek bed. This soil was far too loose for climbing. However, Dante wasn’t going to abandon his favorite dop—the one who had chosen to stay with him when the others had all run for freedom.

“You dropped her somewhere up here.”

“I was dropped off the back of a rearing pebafri. She suffered no more than I have. In addition, she is god-touched. One does not tell a god-touched creature where to go.”

Dante spared one cranky look over his shoulder before he focused on the slope in front of him. He called out again, and this time the chittering was much louder. A small pink nose appeared through a tangle of brittle branches. “Peaches!” Dante held out his hand, and she quickly waddled into it so he could pull her close. He stroked her quills to make sure they were all laying flat before he flipped her over onto her belly to check for injuries. Four tiny paws kicked the air and the prehensile tail she normally kept rolled up under her belly stretched up towards Dante. Dante righted her and held her close enough for her to climb up his shirt.

“I won’t trust you with my dops again,” Dante said as he slid back down the slope.

“They are the Lady Divashi’s dops. And apparently she trusts both of us with them because Peaches insisted on coming.”

Dante studied Regi. For all his dismissive words, his ears were lowered. “I will forgive you because you believed you were searching for a missing person, not investigating a murder plot, but next time, I do not want my critters in the middle of a murder plot.” Dante was serious about that. Peaches was the queen of the ship, and her company had saved him from insanity more than once. After David had punched one of the slavers in search of a quick death—one he’d found at the Styl’s hands—Dante had considered doing the same. Sitting in the dop room with Peaches playing on his lap was the only thread of sanity that had kept him from suicide.

“I am rather more concerned that you are in the middle of a murder plot,” Regi countered.

“I’m not the one to worry about.”

Regi cocked his head. “I do not understand the implications of that statement. Who else would I worry about?”

“Siger,” Dante said, his voice flat. “I have plans for that bastard, plans that involve his eternal humiliation if not his death. I wouldn’t mind his death.”

“Dante.” Regi rested his hand on Dante’s arm. “I regret this, but few Kowri would take the word of an outsider against someone as established as Siger.”

Dante grinned. “Then we convince them. After all, the guy is a Gavd monotheist. If he is willing to be this crazy in support of his beliefs, don't you think he's done other crazy shit? He's done something we can use to make him eternally regret trying to kill me. And Peaches.” Dante stroked her quills and she shivered them until they made a rattling noise.

“I begin to doubt your sanity,” Regi said with a weary sigh.

“My sanity has been in doubt for a long time. But then, I followed you into a radioactive engine, and it worked out. I’m willing to bet that if we put our minds to making Siger miserable, we can find a way. After all, this feels a lot like a god’s first blessing,” Dante pointed out. Not one of them but both of them had been thrown off pebafri in the middle of nowhere. Based on the stories Regi had told, that did feel like something the gods would do.

“Are you saying you trust the gods to show you a path, one you plan to follow?” Regi’s eyes grew wide with shock.

“I’m saying I know how to take advantage of any opportunity that appears, god-given or not.” And if necessary, Dante had a little friend with very poisonous quills. Dante remembered how Carlos had died. He’d intentionally aggravated one of the smaller dops, poking it until the docile creature had finally shot a half dozen quills into Carlos’s hand. Within an hour, his hand was swollen, and red tracks marked the inside of his arm like some sort of zombie make up. An hour after that, he started throwing up blood, and then he’d died screaming in pain. Carlos been a good man who hadn’t been able to face one more day as a slave, and he’d chosen the only escape he could see. He deserved better. Siger didn’t.