The Virtual Man [The Virtual Reality 1] (Siren Publishing Classic) (21 page)

“There’s no need. It’s fine,” she replied trying to desperately hold on to her independence.

“Tiana, if you don’t show it to me right now I’ll just wait until you’re sleeping, and then I’ll look my fill. And not just at the wound, either. Let’s please do this the easy way. We have to work together to survive.”

She knew there was no way to get him off the subject now. She slowly hiked up what had served as her wedding dress and removed the bandage, exposing the angry red wound. Derek touched it. It was hot.

“It’s infected. Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I didn’t know,” she lied.

“Yes, you did, the pain told you so.”

Wanting to maintain control, Tiana replied, “Don’t get pushy on me. It’s not like we have a real marriage!”

She regretted the words the minute they came out, but she couldn’t take them back now.

Derek maintained his composure. What did that mean? Was he in agreement?

“Tiana, I am very grateful for your sacrifice on my behalf and you’ll have your freedom soon enough. We’re on Arcadia 10 and the Alliance has no extradition treaty with the planet. As long as I remain here there is no need to serve out the two-year requirement. As soon as we are rescued and taken to a more civilized part of the planet we’ll divorce and go our separate ways.”

“Suits me just fine,” she prevaricated, her pride stinging at his use of the word ‘serve’ as if marriage to her was a jail sentence.

Okay, that’s two bold-faced lies in the span of two minutes. Way to go, Tiana. Why can’t I control my stupid tongue?

Using his clever rigging system, Derek descended the giant tree and was gone for the remainder of the day. Tiana didn’t know whether he was upset at her or whether he’d been killed in the forest. Why did she have to be so stubborn and arrogant? Why couldn’t she have apologized when she had the chance?

* * * *

By the time Derek returned, the sun was already setting. He came back loaded down with a not insignificant number of fruits and plants that took him several trips up the tree to deliver. Derek couldn’t tell if she had even noticed. She was hot to the touch and appeared to be too weak to sit up.

“Tiana, you’re burning up with fever. Here, drink some water.”

Derek sat next to her and held her up with one arm, supporting her back with his thigh, and placed a cup of water next to her lips. He allowed her to sip at her own pace. She had probably been too weak to drink on her own for most of the day. He cursed himself for having left her, but he knew that if he had stayed, he would probably be cursing himself now for not having gone looking for what he’d brought back.

After she drank her fill, Derek gently set her back down and stroked her face in despair. Tiana felt Derek hiking her skirt up, allowing it to bunch around her waist.

“Derek, I’m not in the mood,” she groaned.

“Neither am I, sweetheart, neither am I,” he whispered softly.

He pulled back the bandage exposing the angry looking wound, and pulled out some prickly stalks from the pile of plant life he had brought back with him. He broke off bits and pieces of the stalk, milking it for the liquid inside, and applied it first to his fingers and then, generously, to her wound.

Flinching, she whined, “Ouch. What are you doing to me?”

“I’m applying some medicine to your badly infected wound.” He smiled.

“What medicine? Where did you get that? That’s not Galactic Alliance regulation medical salve!”

“Well, I’m not totally sure what it’s called, since we are on a planet whose vegetation I’m not familiar with, but it is a succulent, and I think it is close enough to the aloe family to do the trick.”

After the pain from his initial touch wore off, she felt a slight soothing sensation. Whatever he’d put there was doing its job. She heard him scraping something and then watched as he dropped some blue-green powder over the wound. The powder stuck to the sticky plant juice.

“Now what are you doing?”

“More medicine.”

“Think you can be more specific?”

“Mold. It’s nature’s own antibiotic.”

“Sorry I asked,” she groaned. “Derek, I’m cold. May I put my skirt back down?”

“Sure, let me finish wrapping this up.”

After returning her skirt to its rightful place, Derek took off his shirt and wrapped it around her. He then draped himself over the upper part of her body, making sure not to put too much weight on her, to keep her warm.

Tiana felt his strong muscles encircling her. She felt his warm breath sweep across her face. How she’d missed him today. Little by little the shakes she suffered from being so cold dissipated and, feeling totally secure, protected and cared for, she fell asleep.

The sound of birds chirping woke Tiana up. It was morning. She’d slept through the night. Derek was now next to her, but still trying to keep her warm. She wasn’t feeling that much better, but she wasn’t dead yet. The proverbial glass of water was half full.

“Would you like some breakfast?” she heard him ask.

“You can slice it, dice it, smash it or fix it up any way you want, but if I have to have breakfast at the Banana-rama Café this morning I’ll puke.”

“I found some nuts and some roots you can eat,” he said, handing her part of the treasure he had brought back with him the day before.

“Well, the nuts aren’t bad,” she admitted after tasting them. “They could use a little more flavor, but it’s better than having another banana. Derek, you’re my new best friend.”

“I have another treat for you. You’ll like these roots. They taste a little like a potato.”

She seemed to be getting stronger as she ate. “My hero!” she murmured. “Derek, where did you learn so much about edible and medicinal plants?”

“Don’t forget, I was a Galactic Scout. My dad was the troop leader and made sure we learned all about first aid and survival tactics. He was so proud of us. Twenty-two out of twenty-five of us kids made it all the way through to Interstellar Scout. I must admit, I never thought I would ever put any of it to use until now. Let me show you something else.”

Derek picked up a long stick that blended perfectly with all the others on the platform except for a piece of rock at the end.

“This is my new pride and joy.”

He had taken a relatively straight stick and with his knife had whittled away all the bumps and knots so that it was relatively smooth to the touch. On one end he had split the stick in half and stuck a sharp rock in the middle. String made from vines wrapped around both the stick and rock, holding the two together.

“What is it?” she asked, wondering what he was up to.

“It’s another of the things I learned to make when I was a scout. It’s a spear for hunting. You need to eat some protein if you’re going to get better.”

“Okay, my little cave man. I suppose if you kill a
reasonably clean animal
, the least I can do is eat it. Just don’t complain if I retch.”

He smiled. “It’s a deal! Will you be okay if I leave you for a little while? Animals aren’t exactly going to jump up here and impale themselves on my spear, you know.”

“Sure. I’ll be fine.”

“Remember to drink this water at intervals and feed yourself,” he said stroking her cheek, and looking at her beautiful, pain-filled eyes. “Your body, incredible as it is,” he teased, “needs sustenance to heal.”

Derek started climbing down as she, in a voice loud enough to mean it but tentative enough to not guarantee being heard, said, “I’ll miss you.”

* * * *

If he wasn’t motivated to hunt before, he was now. Tiana needed something decent to eat or her body would not be able to repair itself.

Remembering his last attempt at hunting, Derek decided to stalk his prey from the branches of a nice safe tree and hurl his spear from there. He had to succeed. Tiana’s life depended on it.

His heart felt like it had a huge hole in it. His hopes of wooing Tiana had been dashed by the stark reality that she didn’t consider their marriage a real one and clearly didn’t want more than they had agreed to. She obviously wasn’t romantically attracted to him and didn’t see any possibilities along those lines. Carnal lust was one thing, committed love another. Her statement had been very clear. He replayed it in his head.

It’s not like we have a real marriage!

In her defense, what had he expected? She had been kinder than he had a right to expect. She had done him a favor, one that he was starting to feel guilty for. He needed to be an adult about this and stop making her rejection such a big deal. But how could he not? Every breath he took was for Tiana. Every thought he had seemed to revolve around his new bride. He needed to let go of her but he didn’t know how. Obsessions were not healthy! In the meantime he would do his duty and protect and care for her. He owed her that much.

Well, at least he would repay her kindness by making sure she lived through this ordeal.

* * * *

While Derek stalked his prey, Tiana sat up on their platform, wishing she could have gone with him.

Oh, Lord, please don’t let anything happen to him. Please keep him safe.

While she regretted the words she had leveled at Derek less than a day ago, they had drawn out his true feelings.

“I am very grateful for your sacrifice on my behalf,” she mimicked the logical, proud expression with which he had delivered his response to her and simultaneously mocked it with the back and forth shuffling of her shoulders and head. “There is no longer any need for us to remain married. As soon as we are rescued and taken to a more civilized part of the planet we’ll divorce and go our separate ways. Blah blah blah. Let me go swinging through the trees naked, find an animal and see if it can scare me and chase me all the way to my little treehouse before I pee in my pants. Oops, I forgot, I’m jungle boy, I don’t wear pants.”

As much as she tried to poke fun at Derek, the part about there no longer being a need for them to remain married really hurt. She had given herself to him. Did he think she gave herself to just anybody? The fact that he was her husband and she was his wife was an integral part of why she had shared her body with him; that and wanting him more than any man she had ever known. Part of Tiana hoped they would never be rescued. The other part wished the infection would just go ahead and put an end to the pain in her heart. Of course, the possibility remained that both her wishes would come true.

* * * *

The morning was gone and half the afternoon with it, and he still didn’t have anything to take back for Tiana to eat. He was, however, getting quite an education on the wildlife indigenous to Arcadia 10. For the most part, the animals he had thus far seen resembled those found on Earth in some way, but there were always some differences.

A six-legged wild boar had gone past his perch early that morning. Derek had carefully aimed his spear, heaved it and … missed. Shortly after that, a family of the species of giant deer he had first tried to hunt had walked by. Figuring that if he killed either the female or one of the offspring the buck wouldn’t rest until he had his revenge, Derek decided to aim for the big buck. He had carefully taken his aim, and heaved the spear with enough force to drive it deep into the big buck and … missed. The animals didn’t even notice Derek or his spear. This time it had taken him a while to find his spear in the undergrowth, but find it he did, and resumed his post.

The third animal to come by was a … who knows what it was. It had six legs, a row of shell-like scales down the middle of its back, thorns along both sides and a head the shape of a half-circle with eyes on the two far sides of the arc. Derek decided to let the creature walk by undisturbed. He knew Tiana’s limits, and there was no way she would have eaten that thing.

Last, a cute, cuddly rabbity-looking brown animal with spots as big as an Earth dog came by. Putting the animal’s sweet looks aside, Derek once more aimed and heaved his spear, only to have the creature hear him and jump away before the spear hit. Once the cute cuddly bunny realized it was being hunted, it turned on Derek, baring sharp teeth with long fangs. Flying into a rage, it repeatedly smashed its head into the tree Derek was hiding in, in an effort to dislodge him from it.

Looking closely at its fur, Derek determined that the rabbit had to be a closet redhead.

Once the rabbit had given up its quest for vengeance and moved on down the trail, Derek, as he was now quite adept at doing, retrieved his spear and resumed his vigilance.

He didn’t have to wait long. Soon, another doe came by. Derek slowly stood up on his branch and went to grab the spear, which he had placed between two branches and … watched it as it dropped to the ground right near the doe. She looked up at Derek and, not sensing any danger from the stupid man-thing, bent down to sniff the spear and check it out.

* * * *

Tiana was aching, her skin hurt, her tongue felt swollen. She felt chills and knew that her fever was getting worse. Her wounded leg felt like somebody was sticking a knife into it. Where was Derek? What was taking him so long? The sun was starting to set and if he didn’t make it back before darkness, he probably would not make it back at all. Best-case scenario, he wouldn’t be able to see in the pitch darkness of Arcadia 10’s night and would have to wait until morning before attempting to find his way back. Worst-case, he could be … she didn’t even want to think about it. Regardless, the way she was feeling she wasn’t sure she would survive the night.

At first, she thought she heard the padded paws of some animal walking by, but then realized that it sounded more like a man’s stride. Derek! He was back! Thank God! Looking over the side of the platform, the platform she hadn’t left in days now, she saw that it was just a deer.

“Tiana, are you up there?”

Why is that deer talking to me? How does it know my name? Maybe I am already dead.

She took another look and saw that it was, in fact, Derek, with the carcass of the local species of deer across his rugged shoulders. He was a sight for sore eyes. Naked from the waist up, the muscle-bound alpha-male hunter, with his prize across his shoulders, was returning to his lair where his mate eagerly awaited him.
She could think of a better prize for him than some stupid deer!