“If we step past the warning, it will discharge.”
“Aus, decipher any symbol?”
JC peers across the scorched field.
“You know there’s only one way to make it drop down. Age may have slowed it, but there’s no way to make it target you first.”
“Somehow I knew.” She unzips her knee-high boots and curls her bare toes in the grass. “I run first. Just don’t miss.” JC crouches into a stance ready to sprint.
Reynard racks the slide. He catches the ejecting cartridges. He pockets the unspent shell, knowing the weapon’s ready to fire.
A lavender blur whirls across the carved warning from behind them.
The king shouts angry protests.
The parrot-sized pet dragon hovers before Reynard.
“You free me. I owe you a debt.”
“Not at the cost of your own life.” Not sure how he freed the creature, Reynard notes the flapping leash has been singed.
“Did you see where the blast came from?” JC asks, still in her sprinter’s stance.
“From under the left side a cannon dropped, fired, and retreated.”
“Observant ball of fur.”
Reynard, unlike his normal quick-draw tactic, laces his left hand over his right, securing the weapon as he aims at the cannon’s future location. He locks his elbows, inhaling as much air as possible. His left eye shut, he breathes, “GO.”
JC darts left, right, left giving a wide berth for the lavender dragon, who barrels straight for the cave.
Zigzag pattern. JC sends out a thought. The child’s pet ignores her if she even reached his mind.
The cannon lowers.
Booming thunder disturbs the tigers.
The tiny dragon zips straight up. The cannon targets him.
Durasteel shells riddle the cannon as it tracks the creature.
The beam blast burns the cave ceiling as the weapon was never designed to track a flying target. Chunks of stone smolder on the cave floor as pieces of the device rain down.
With the device’s destruction the tiger riders’ protests subside.
He kicks the smashed cannon to ensure it’s dead.
Reynard runs his fingers along grooves in the wall. The recent disturbance of the door having opened shook loose impacted grime around the frame. As ground dirt crumbles to the ground, the shapes of unknown symbols are apparent.
“How long do you think it would take to translate, Aus?” he asks into the headset.
“The stone advancements used to construct this bunker could stretch back tens of millennia.” JC inspects the broken cannon. She has to step with care to avoid the rock fragments with her bare feet.
“A dead language,” Australia whispers over the comm.
“How do you figure?”
“Some catastrophe sent this planet back to the Stone Age. They haven’t progressed much beyond tribal society. Anthropology dictates certain progressions happen in most cultures. Hunters/gatherers happen before farming. Farming progresses into more stable settlements.”
“I get it, Spock,” Reynard quips.
“Many cited examples from those societies also skipped the basic progression.”
“The need for a Prime Directive.”
“What?”
“A visionary futurist from my culture felt a policy of noninterference with worlds who had not reached a certain level of technology advancement.”
“He would not approve of giving Halcary pain sticks to tribal huntsman.”
“Basically.” Reynard pushes on each symbol hoping one might move. One does to reveal a small, pinky-finger-sized hole. “Keyhole?”
“We need our scanner.”
Reynard spins around, pointing at Australia. “We have to have her.”
Reluctant, the king waves his soldier to escort Australia across the field.
The warrior hesitates.
The king twists his pain stick.
The soldier marches across the scorched fields with Australia in tow. He remains with her as she slips the scanner from her pocket. Unable to fit in the cave even if he kneels, he stands vigilant at the edge.
“I do not know any of these symbols.” It takes the scanner seconds to examine inside the hole. “It is a maze of small conduits. Logically, the only way to the tumblers is fill up with a liquid and then somehow harden it to create pressure unlocking the door.”
The device beeps.
The tiger rider grips the pommel of his edged weapon.
“Inside a DNA reader resides.”
“Would these people be Ki-Ton’s descendants?”
Australia waves the scanner close enough to scan the tiger rider without him knowing. “Evolve from transmogrification to telepathic. No known evolutionary path would travel in such a direction.” The scanner confirms part of her hypothesis—the fledgling telepath lacks DNA to be a shapeshifter.
“The planetwide catastrophe could have caused it,” JC speculates.
“This device needs DNA and someone to metamorphosis into the shape of the key to unlock this door. It takes one of Ki-Ton’s people to proceed further.”
They will kill us, Commander. JC’s thoughts float into his mind. He crouches to peer into the hole.
“My death is assured if we don’t retrieve the princess.”
Before the pain stick stings Reynard, the tiger rider spins to address whooping howls. Crashing through the trees, more nine-foot humanoids barrel into the tiger riders, only these men ride bear creatures. The tiger rider ignores his captives and races back to his mount.
For whatever reason, Reynard’s mind catches that the brown fur hides of the bears match the skins decorating many of the tiger riders where the bear riders sport cloaks for the greenish tiger skin. Blood enemies. They slaughter each other.
Trapped between the carnage, Reynard fumbles with the lock hole. “I’m open for suggestions for the winner of this fray won’t have a use for us.”
Joe, restrained over the back saddle of a tiger, slips from his bonds.
“Ki-Ton’s the only person meant to saunter through.” JC reaches out with her mind. Her thoughts drift inside the mountain.
She flies back as if struck by an invisible club in the gut. Reynard catches her before her head impacts the ground.
He slaps her cheek, attempting to revive her. “What happened?”
Her eyes flutter uncontrollably. “Darkness,” she moans. She digs her fingernails into his arm. Even with his leather jacket the sting of claws on Reynard’s bicep hurts from her grip. JC’s eyes open covered by black cataracts, if something beyond reality consumes her. “Let the princess go. What’s beyond…don’t release it.”
She slumps lifeless in his arms.
Reynard sucks in a breath—calm. He glances to his sword brother for support in reminding him of his training.
Joe uses the attack
