C.L. Scholey - Zuri's Zargonnii Warrior (Unearthly World # 2) (2 page)

“So?”

“They’d make good spies.”

“Spies?” Citun started laughing. “Who the hell are they going to spy for? They stand out like a cyron at a bangor party.”

Kobe scowled. Cyron beasts were massive creatures, whereas the bangor were smaller and covered in red fur. A party of bangor would be a funny sight; Kobe could squash them. Cyrons were another matter entirely. Female Zargonnii stood between the males and cyrons on their planet. Even if their species didn’t cohabitate, their females protected them from the massive beasts. Rarely did a cyron beast get past the females’ area, except during the Holiday. All male children were kept inside for their own safety during that time.

The trek from the female area to the males’ was dangerous. Kobe’s mother had come across a cyron beast while taking him to his father. Her long white hair wrapped around him, cocooning him, leaving her hands free. His mother had kicked the beast’s ass. Cyron beasts were stupid creatures. Too dumb to realize you never messed with a female Zargonnii, especially when she’s protecting her young. Still, the emotional impact was profound. Kobe hated the beasts.

“Look at this one’s hair,” Kobe said, changing the subject. “It’s all red, like a fire. Human females must be color-coded for a reason.”

Citun became thoughtful. “They do appear to be color-coded. All of our people are born the same time every other year; we all have white hair and red eyes. Maybe earthlings judge age by hair color. Maybe all brown-haired earthlings are born in a different season as, say, the red-haired ones.”

“That’s a good theory.”

“Maybe the eye color has something to do with it as well. All Zargonnii have red eyes for a protective reason, but look at this one with brown eyes. She is pouting, whereas the other with blue eyes is smiling. Perhaps the eyes of humans turn color to match emotions.”

Kobe became excited. “Yes you’re right. Look at this one with green eyes, she appears to be watching someone over in a corner and she looks angry. None of them have the same facial expression.”

“True.”

“What about their males?” Kobe asked.

“I was told by the Tonan to watch out for them. They are dangerous and many are larger and stronger than human females.”

“What an odd, turned around culture. I feel bad for their offspring.”

“Perhaps these earthlings aren’t really that complicated. After all, we’re worlds away so you would expect some differences. We just need to be smarter than they are. Our females may be stronger and larger, but the male of our species is smarter. We will just need to watch out for their male species. They could be a threat.”

Kobe stood staring at the three Earth females. His eyebrow dipped into a frown. He wasn’t so sure about that. There was something about these females, something about their vulnerable looks. Their multi-colored eyes might be a great advantage; they would always know an Earth female’s mood.

“I wonder where the Tonan got these images,” Kobe said.

“The Tonan have been to Earth. They are actively searching for these creatures. Apparently, the females make a good bargaining tool when dealing with Castian warriors. There isn’t much of the planet Earth left, unfortunately. The Tonan said he didn’t think any more humans were alive. The entire planet is either frozen, barren, or under water.

“A shame really. I wouldn’t mind taking my own look if this mission proves to be a success. If we don’t want the human females, we can trade them to the Castians. Or our counterparts on our planet; Titus is interested in these creatures.”

“What about the Tonans?” Kobe asked. Titus might be Zargonnii, but he and his men were on the opposite side of the planet. Titus and his warriors were South Zargonnii, and the different sides didn’t always get along.

“I’m told the Tonans aren’t very careful with human females, I wouldn’t want any to be harmed unnecessarily. I’m also told they kill the males regardless.”

“Tonans aren’t my favorite species, but they must kill the human males for a reason.”

“Tonans like to kill. First it was Castian females, now its male humans. Tonan creatures leave a bad taste in my mouth.” Citun made a face as though he had tasted something foul. “The Tonan I spoke with had a tail almost as tall as he was, you know what that means. A filthy liar, so we have to decide what parts of the conversation are true. Regardless, we’ll keep an eye on any males. And hope these images of human females are real.”

Kobe had never dealt directly with a Tonan. The Castians and Tonans had been warring since he could remember. He knew very little of either species. Castians were immortal and mated for life. To Kobe, it was an oddity; if a Castian was killed, so was its mate. Their ways were strange. Kobe didn’t understand why a Castian wanted a female mate. The Zargonnii way was better. The females lived in one area, the males in another. They came together for the Holiday and parted.

When a Zargonnii male was born, he was left near his father’s domicile at the age of one month. His mother would watch from a short distance until the babe was discovered, she would then move off. Kobe had never seen a female Zargonnii infant. The mothers kept any female offspring. The situation seemed perfect. Integrating male and female issues together was redundant. Males had their own troubles, females theirs. Why should they take on each other’s problems?

It was on the tip of Kobe’s tongue to ask Citun why they should bother, but he was curious. A small female was interesting. The beings in the pictures were cute, if strange. Besides, it wasn’t his place to ask; he had a duty to perform.

“What strength level do we assume with Earth females?” Kobe asked.

“That’s something we need to discuss as a team,” Citun replied, now all business. “We should be arriving at the planet soon. It’s time to gather for a briefing.”

Kobe took one last look at the images and shook his head. He followed Citun out, smiling. Kobe enjoyed being a mercenary; he enjoyed when he needed to be a warrior. This mission was more of an extraction, a mere game of hide and seek. It had been a while since Kobe had played; he was looking forward to engaging his prey.

Chapter 2

The night was black as pitch and seemed to hang in the air just as heavily as the thick substance. Zuri could feel her heart hammering in her ears, her breath dragged from her lungs. She could hear the other human survivors using the strange, practiced calls and whistles to alert one another of their general presence and direction. Until noise became too dangerous. Zuri was alone with her thoughts, her fears. The human survivors had to split up; there were too many warrior-creatures. When the aliens had attacked, stormed the broken shuttle, the human refugees had scattered into the wind from small escape holes in the twisted metal. Zuri remained in hiding, a fist pressed to her mouth to stifle noise.

The ground beneath her feet was cool; rich black dirt settled between her toes, separating each individually. Zuri felt like that—separated, an individual, alone, cutoff from the others. She was crouched low to the ground; the smells of the planet’s strange jungle foliage seemed intensified. But like Zuri and her friends, all animal life was eerily silent. The deep guttural voices of the beings were sporadic as they hunted their prey.

Cold breezy air gave the wispy tendrils of Zuri’s hair flight around her face and tickled her neck. Her bare calves became cramped from immobility and her lungs burned while trying to stifle her need to gasp in air. Zuri’d had only enough time to race from their shelter in her sleeping garments—panties and t-shirt; the nights were hot. A fire inside would roast them if one was lit. The metal shuttle retained the day’s heat, as a closed oven would, cooling off only during the early morning hours. There was barely any light inside the crude battered shelter.

When the first noises of attack had filled her ears, it was the God-awful bellowing of massive creatures to send them scurrying in fear. Or to corral her and her ship mates. Her first sight had been glowing red eyes in the dead of night. They bobbed eerily up and down against the inky black setting of darkness as the creatures moved. A pair of those eyes had settled onto her as she had looked way up at the enormous figure. Goose bumps dotted her slender arms and she shivered with terror. Her sweat turned cold, as the fine hairs on the nape of her neck stood tall.

Zuri and her co-inhabitants had spent a year on this planet, in relative harmony with the strange aliens who occupied the world. The creatures knew humans had crash-landed in a large shuttle some time ago, but for the most part kept their distance. The beings offered neither aid nor signs of annoyance or hostility with the new presence, in the early months. They appeared to understand the humans’ appearance wasn’t an invasion but an accident. The one time, early in the beginning, Zuri had run across one of the weird-looking beings, they had studied one another until the being slipped back into the jungle.

The beings were human-sized, not all the same height or weight, with flat, perfectly symmetrical faces and bald, grey-white bulbous craniums. She could detect no ears on the hooded beings. The creatures’ protective covering was a dark, eerie black cape which fluttered around without the aid of wind. Their unshod feet were flat, oval shaped with four perfectly rectangular toes on each. Zuri couldn’t distinguish individual sexes, even though it was easy to see they wore nothing under the cape.

Each alien had two, perfectly-round holes for nostrils and unclosing, sphere-shaped mouths. The large almond eyes consisted of a rolling, smoky dark fog, and when Zuri looked into their depths, she swore there were black numbers floating within. At least, that was what the symbols seemed to be; she had stared hard trying to grasp any meaning. When the being spoke, its tone was even and not unpleasant; Zuri didn’t understand its words, but the dark fog within the being’s eyes formed a string of strange shapes, including a few numbers and letters she could comprehend. Zuri was certain it asked questions needing enumerative denominators. Zuri’s calculus was pathetic, there was no way she could decipher the complex numerals to understand the sentences. She was no Einstein.

Zuri’s hesitant, muttered, “Two plus two?” response was met with a vacant stare and a shake of a head; she was no doubt dismissed as being simple-minded and no threat. The being had floated a few inches above the land, moving at a good pace and was soon far from view, leaving her openmouthed and scratching her head.

The planet’s inhabitants seemed content to wander the deeper, darker foliage where other strange creatures lurked. Zuri hated that part of the planet, so did the other humans. At one time, they had ventured deeper and come across the strange structures Zuri found astounding. The beings’ domiciles were shaped like two-story isosceles or scalene triangles, geometrically-symmetric quadrilateral and orthotope designs. Fascinating was such a boring word when trying to wrap her head around the designs. The layout was meticulous, put together; the tiny congregation formed a perfect octagon, housing approximately fifty beings. Their arrangement was ingenious, perfect harmony, indicating a closely knit community of family. A protective family.

Terrifying would describe the other beings wandering around the aliens’ homes. Sphere-shaped creatures with rolling balls for feet thrust forward in an effort to spear you with unicorn points. A massive circular creature shaped like a silo rolled with a vengeance. They were guard animals of sorts meant to keep intruders out. The animal—geometric—beings avoided direct confrontation, but it was more than apparent that though the native beings would allow the humans to remain on the planet, their home was off-limits.

Zuri and her sixteen shuttle mates who had grown close on the cramped space flight and then crash had bonded the past year. The first little while was tricky, as they had to work together and make a decent shelter from the vessel’s remains and find food. Zuri was neither a follower nor a leader; as it turned out, not many others were either. The humans made functioning smaller groups which helped in their survival, each appointing a mediator.

They managed to search out water, or the equivalent. The only fluid substance available was a little heavier, thick, a deep blue but tasteless and cool—refreshing, akin to a watered down shake or slushy. It took Zuri some time to get used to almost needing to chew her liquids. Bathing was difficult. The substance dried like normal water, but the texture took some getting used to.

In the beginning, food was a chore to identify. Everything they encountered had perfect shapes of different colors. Some things grew on the strange rectangle trees that boasted odd rectangular branches and circular leaves with green rectangular fruit. Other food items were root-based and pulled from the ground. Nothing tasted familiar, or looked remotely familiar. For the first few weeks, they had all lost weight with the assault to their taste buds.

The human survivors bonded over time, watched out for one another, cared for one another and protected one another…until there were only three of them left. Their foliage-shuttle structure kept out wind and the thick rain which splatted against the roof and sides. Zuri hated the noise of the ‘rain,’ it sounded as though huge bugs smacked against the metal. There was no thunder on those nights; the wind made an eerie moaning that kept them awake and watchful as the seasons changed from rainy and cold over the course of two months, to hot and dry. There was never a happy medium. With each change of the ‘season’ came the change of different foods. They were forced to learn to survive by identifying new edibles. Another hardship that led to sickness, which they tried to muddle through.