Seeds - Three

Part 1.3

Reince woke with a start, a blinding pain exploded in his skull. His joints burned and he felt like a battered hunk of meat. He blinked but could not clear the blurring in his eyes. Like dancing eggs, two ovals took turns jumping and falling, shaking the world about them as they alternated up and down. He squinted at the things but they only became less distinct the harder he tried to discern their nature. Groggily, he wished they would stop, his hips burned and something sharply uncomfortable pressed into his stomach and ribs with each quaking motion. 'Stop.', he mumbled. His nerves came alive, reporting back to his battered brain, the damage. Groaning, he was unable to curl himself into an embryonic ball. Then the stench hit him, sweat, blood, bile and rot. He cried out then passed out.

The sun squinted into the fog from her left. Gradually, she became aware of the blood, she saw her arms as if through a tunnel; the needles, the trees, the red stained hands pistoning in and out of her vision. Her fatigue burned from far away, Please, please, please, she mouthed hoping desperately for another shot from Bannon to point the way. She heard only the squelching in her boots, fluids congealed between her toes.

Her legs were weak and her burning lungs seemed to kindle the nausea in her stomach. She stumbled to a tree, resting her shoulder against it and bent over, heaving. But her stomach wouldn't just let it out, her finger came up to her throat and then she heard feet and the clicking words. She cursed, swallowing hard and breathing deep. She pulled her cloak over herself and forced herself to listen. Impatient, she peaked. Three hunched figures jogged into sight from the west. They would pass her and cross the trade road in ten minutes. She had avoided two such groups in the dark. Now she would have to hide or run, but her urgency drove against her better judgement.

Luri unfastened her belt, a length of slender leather with a thick steel cinch inlaid with lead. Folding the length into her fist, she gripped it, debating a head on assault. No, she shook her head, no, focus, Luri.

They passed. The closest was a woman whose skin slithered over her skeleton with her movements like water in a shallow pan. Rags and patches of uneven hair hung loose about her thighs, covering an impossibly wide, sagging waistline. She carried a black metal rod filed down at the edges to sharp spear tips. The thinning mist obscured the others.

Then it happened, Bannon's rifle exploded. It was close enough for the reverberations to rattle into the Needle-trees. As one, the three stopped and turned south. Luri crawled around the tree trunk. She heard the woman shriek. Luri took off across the needles.

It was not long before she heard the thudding of feet behind her. Her nausea disappeared as adrenaline flooded her blood, she gasped and pumped her legs. She thought she heard voices ahead, adjusting her course she tried to focus her entire being on working her legs. There came an aggressive snarl at her back. Luri dove sideways, landing hard and rolling. She stumbled up and fell forward as the black spear impacted the needles between her legs. Pushing herself up, she faced the woman. The strange skin wobbled on her face as she snarled at the girl. Fucked proportions, was all the thought Luri could muster before the rod whistled up diagonally. Luri ducked and jumped forward, whipping the belt around the woman's ankle, she threw all her weight against it, yanking the adversary off her feet. The spear fell and Luri scrabbled for it. The thing was rebar, she realized struggling with the dead weight. Her tired arms lifted it onto her shoulder as the woman lurched upright, clicking furiously to her companions. Luri lurched forward, driving the long tip into the eye socket with all her might. The head snapped back as the rod penetrated the soft brain and lodged in into the skull. Luri gasped for air, staring in horror at the drooping jaw and the abominable contortions of a face that should be still.

Another figure sprinted down the slope towards her. A gasping sob of frustration forced itself between her lips. She ran. 'Help!', but her cracked voice came out as a whimper. 'Help!'. Panicked, she looked over her shoulder to see the man with his ambling gait lurching with unnatural speed after her. She gasped, 'Help!'.

She swerved around a tree; her foot sank into a rotted patch of needles, her leg gave way and the tree leaped at her, hitting her like a hammer. Her body twisted and rolled in the needles. Blind instinct drove her on, slithering across the carpet like a drowning fish.

'Gruahw!', the roar made her turn, shielding her face. He rose above her with a hatchet aimed at her chest. BOOM, his shoulder exploded into haze of vaporized flesh and hunks of charnel. He flew from sight.

'Ho! Another one's coming, boys! Get'im!'

Feet ran past her head. The purple orange heavens were pierced by the thick bough tapering into its shaking dress of green. Fingers of startled needles leapt into the twilight sky, turning gracefully as they descended in a slow dark twirl. Nothing else existed and a strange calm settled over her burning body like a cold. It was so beautiful, she thought, reaching into the air with her blood-stained arm as if she caught fish in a pond. A curious needle swam down the exact line of her eye, it settled softly into her palm.

A meaty hand slapped hers, the startled needle gushed off to the left. A large, brown bush bearded face slid into her vision from the top, the scars across his bloodshot eyes and ruddy cheeks pulled menacingly, 'The fuck are you!?', boomed Ranger Bannon.