Chapter Seven of my current wip. All and any comments very much appreciated

The five dragons tore at their fallen fellow. Ranging from small to as big as the giant Jess had stunned, they ripped great chunks from the still-living carcass. Sprays of blood and gore tainted the air with a heavy salty-sweetness. His every sense told him he ought to run while they were distracted.

He stayed, unable to look away from the Itamakku. A delicate fragrance whispered to his senses. Scarcely a hint, yet it veiled the raw gut-turning stench of the feeding frenzy behind him.

The series of images shown at the Briefing, of the host species as it was slowly modified, hadn’t prepared him for this. Neither the glimpses from the flier – the angles were different. He hadn’t expected them to look so much like the Monzas. But of course, how else were they to breed? Slighter of build than the male, most noticeable was her hair. A night vision of his: His long, straight and golden-hued, hers long, straight and black. And so glossy surely a hundred hands had polished it.

So, a female. Yet this wasn’t how his sister looked. And neither his milk-mother, his father’s sister, though that was so long ago he could scarcely remember. Maybe before the Amzal War the fertile female Monzas – those who could give live-birth and ensure the continuation of species – had looked similar? But a virus had wiped them out leaving only the immature workers and the juveniles in their nurseries, the trigger to mature now missing. The GM Programme was a desperate attempt to genetically alter another species to the stage where Monza and breed-pool could meet and meld.

And now she wasn’t looking at the dragons, but at him.

He recalled his shudder and queasiness at the thought of breeding with such a creature. To do that and die, as he’d been told back in the days when he worked in the Dreek mines of Kreegirn, the grey planet that swirled at the very edge of the Monza’s home galaxy. He’d been glad that the Techs would handle that, ex utero. But now, seeing the truth of her, so close… he wasn’t sure exactly what was threading his thoughts, but it wasn’t revulsion.

An Obs, it was his duty to observe. But if the Techs had given the Itamakku that name of Sanki for their skin colour, then it was misapplied. Perhaps when seen at a distance. Or in the images taken from the fliers as the Techs had shown at the Briefing. Even then, not an iron-rich sand. More pale ochre – though not as pale as the Monzas’ pink. And texturally, even from a distance, it was unlike any conceivable sand. Rather, he’d say her skin had the translucence and texture of a dew-fresh blossom, though of none seen on this planet. And now he was being like Joel, lyrical.

Next noticed were her extraordinary hips, visible despite their covering of… was that woven fabric? Too delicate to be animal hide. Two-hand spans wide, they flared from her one hand-span waist. He longed to touch, ached in his every part to stroke and caress her blossom-fresh flesh.

A visual montage of red ripened fruits filled his thoughts, though it was her lips, far developed from their original form, that he watched. As if in anticipation his own lips twitched, tasting that fruit. Her eyes drew his gaze back. Dark and wide, and between them a small snub of a nose.

He was ballooning, he’d swear it. Which explained his repeated deep sighs. Maybe if he stopped describing her to himself, that might relieve the uncomfortable sensation. Instead, a smile slipped his control to morph into an unexpected laugh. He noticed she responded with the same.

At the Briefing the Techs had shown the Zems images of the breeding pools. They had not shown him anything approaching this. He licked his lips, aware now of their dryness. He wanted to go to her.

He sighed, another great breath constricting his throat and his chest. He took a step, hesitant, not wanting to scare her.

And she fled.

He raced to that dune – but too late. Though he scanned the shore he could see no sign of her.

That’s when reality slapped him.

NO CONTACT.

No contact was a condition, a rule, put in place to protect whichever the species they were observing. Jess hadn’t given it thought before, except to assume the rule was to ensure the Monza stayed hidden from the breed-pools, so as not to frighten them. Or maybe it was so they’d not influence the breed-pool’s behaviour, and also to protect the observed species from any infection the observers might carry – especially a certain virus. Is that what happened to the breed pools on Urgula Teth? Horror coiled in his belly, weakened his limbs. What if he should cause that to happen here, with his breaking of rules? And look at how far he’d strayed into the breed-pool’s range. He hastened back to where he should be.

But what if there was another reason for the restriction?

*

First to be picked up, as the flier lifted above the trees and the hills, guilt gnawed deeply into Jess.

“You’re quiet,” Kookka observed. “Find any defunct holos?”

“Four.” Though he had hardly noticed what was around him as he made his way along the perimeter. To walk mindlessly through this terrain was to invite death. But maybe he wanted that? He snorted. No way.

“What? What’s up?” Kookka asked him.

“Eh? No. I was just thinking.”

“What, you were replaying what happened down there? So, what did happen? Something important to play on your mind,” said Kookka. “Come on, share with a friend.”

Jess forced his attention back to the present. “Dragons.” But he was already into another thought.

What if she hadn’t been Itamakku? She didn’t look that much like the images the Techs had shown him. Seeing her, he’d never have named the breed-pool Sankis the way the Techs had. Blossoms, unfurling. Fresh fragrant flowers. He smiled as she appeared again in his memory.

“Well, if you don’t want to share it….”

Jess was barely aware of what Kookka was saying.

But really, what if she wasn’t Itamakku? What if perhaps she was from the Pendolsphere? Yet the Pendolsphere was no place for her, brimming as it was with dark and evil forces. She couldn’t be evil, not and be like an unfurling flower. At the renewed memory he inhaled most deeply, drawing a curious look from Kookka.

Yet… Jess frowned, yet by appearing when and where she did… perhaps she’d intended to lure him there as food for the dragons? But, no, that was crazy thinking.

And it wasn’t crazy to wonder if the Pendols had created her and projected her to be a false holo?

But why would they do that? To distract him, of course. And he couldn’t deny the distraction. And why would they want to distract him? To take possession of him. He remembered the stories when he was still bound to the schools. He shuddered, for that did make some sense. The thoughts he had had, wanting to go to her, wanting… he didn’t know what, just wanting. Wanting them to hold close together. Even now, at the thought of it, he felt some decidedly unfamiliar sensations around his body. He found himself rocking, his hands drifting down, to squeeze them between his thighs. It had to be the Pendols, nothing else would explain it. He sighed. And that was another thing: What were these disobliging swellings of air that periodically filled him so he must forcibly expel them? He found a name in an upswelling of memories, snatches of songs and stories from his nursery days. Affections – affections for his playmates and his milk-mother; likes and fondness and bindings and bondings. Perhaps they were similar, he’d not deny, but they weren’t the same. And nor were they akin to the way he felt for his dear friend and life-saviour, Kookka.

Affections. He silently scoffed at the word. Affections belonged in the nursery. The Techs would never allow affections for a grown Monza.

“Well, if you’re not going to tell me,” Kookka was saying, “I don’t want to know of your dragons.”

“Dragons?” Jess dragged his thoughts back to the present. “Oh, the dragons, yea. Six of them. Thought that my last, that I was a dead one.”

“Dragons?” Kookka repeated with a querying eye.

“Reptiles, sort of. Like crocs but bigger.” With an effort he turned his focus to them. “That last holo – the only one working, wouldn’t you know it – was slap up against their burrows.”

Kookka shook his head. “Hey, they must really have done for you. I’ve never known you to be like this, like a mindless Monza all this time. And all that sighing. Are you sure you’re not sickening?”

“I…,” Jess started to say but Kookka was already bringing the flier down to pick up Saker, and this wasn’t a thing he could discuss with the others.

They waited while Saker heaved himself into the flier. Saker had scarce gained his seat when he rushed his report. “All holos working. But hey, is that Sanki speech ‘cause if it is how the Pendoling did the Techs come by it, and if it isn’t then what’s the point?”

“They probably had it through the psi-sphere,” Jess said, glad of the moment’s distraction.

“Sure,” Kookka said. “If they can jump us across the galaxies by psi-thought, why not learn the Sanki’s speech by psi-thought too? Besides, they must have had some contact. How else the GM procedures?”

“By psi-thought?” Saker suggested, though it was humorously said.

Jess’s thoughts were wandering again, down labyrinthine paths he didn’t want to follow. He heaved them back. Perhaps if he told Kookka about the encounter… they could discuss it. Maybe Kookka would agree, he was right to worry. Worry? No, it was worse than worry. Fear. But memories of his time with the Fire-keepers of Colabri, he knew it was best to share.

Yet if he was to say anything at all to Kookka about encountering that female it would have to be far away from any Tech’s hearing. Even to think of it in their presence would be tantamount to an invitation for the Techs to come skin him. He had to focus on those dragons instead. At least there he had a story, guaranteed to hold attention.

to be continued

Comments of any kind most welcomed

Which graphic do you prefer: The ‘all blue’ or the ‘full colour’?