He shuddered. What might dwell in those nests—more eel spawn? Before he could react, something small and fast slithered out of the water and clamped onto his leg where the blood ran in rivulets. Voicing a cry, he shimmied back in fear, stamping at the attacker, uttering another howl when the eel-snake tried to leech back onto him. He stamped it with his webbed foot, cursing himself for his inattentiveness. His lengthy dependency on the ship was responsible for his misfortune. The faint sulphurous reek clung in his nostrils, doubtless from the fumes of the murky water. Humid and sticky air filled his lungs, just remotely breathable. He panted with shock and the effort of scrambling and hopping about in this alien environment. The sky was rife with clouds of thick yellow vapours. He still clutched his weapon and used it to quell the hungers of other aquatic predators that came seeking his hide.
Miko pulled himself up a thick vine that hung low from a tall, malformed tree. There he hung in dazed limbo from a branch. Slowly he began inching a path across the branch that traversed the treacherous mire to the pool’s edge.
It was a long way away.
He was amazed that he could manage the use of his limbs after so long cooped in Sitty. It was adrenaline, he figured, and the fact that the VR designers had installed mechanisms of fluid injection to keep his muscles elastic and from atrophying over the long voyages. The flesh throbbed where he had cut himself free from Audra, but he welcomed that pain over the obscene alternative.
A tiny flapping of wings caught his ears. He looked over his shoulder—There, a glimpse of a small flying squirrel creature with pterodactyl wings flapping its way across the misty water. One of the eel fish jumped six feet out of the water and hooked it, dragging it under in a flurry of bubbles.
The blood in Miko’s ears pounded.
He proceeded with infinite caution, crawling his way upside down and on all fours.
A sudden glooping ripple in the nearby water had him freezing in mid-crawl. His breath caught in his throat.
Peering down across the pool, he saw a mottled, greyish figure emerge sixty paces away along the pool’s shore.
Could it be . . ? Miko squinted with disbelief.
No! It was impossible!
The thing was real; it held up two pieces of mangled eel in its cilia-wisped tentacles. Purple ichor dripped from its jowl. Swaying in casual fashion, it chittered in its familiar way, a satisfied gurgle, as it dragged its grey bulk and the rest of the eel toward the shore.
Audra? Miko swallowed the clot of bile rising in his throat. Insane horror almost had him losing his grip on the moss-covered branch and plummeting into the water. How could she have survived? The eel thing was three times her size!
Audra gave another exultant chitter. Her pale grey eyes blinked back at him, from a muddy face as it trained itself up—on him.
Miko shrank back in dismay. The guilty traitor in him flared.
In a flurry of panic, he wormed his way across the branch and down the rough-barked trunk. Bloody fingernails scratched at the pulpy wood, but he took no heed. His last act of reason, severing her flesh and cutting ties with her glutinous body was an act of war and Miko was in no condition to discover what reward was coming his way.
He leaped the last fifteen feet onto the spongy turf and nearly tumbled back into the water. Half clambering, half hobbling away from the shore, he pushed his legs to the limit of exertion.
They were like rubber, these alien limbs of his, yet he drove on.
Somewhere across that pool, a strange mournful hooting came wafting across the sylvan gloom. Sinister sounds disturbed the very sanctitude of this perilous world, drifting to Miko’s ears like the cries of chained devils.
If not for his gruelling military training on Mission Base I, he would not have been able to keep out of Audra’s grip. The splicing with the alien had given his limbs uncanny strength, while the gravity of Rogos was one third less than what he was accustomed to, which made his panicked haste and hops and springy stumbles serve to advance him all the farther.
Peering back through the trees, he saw Audra brushing herself off, swaying in characteristic, confident rhythm, pitching pieces of chopped eel into the water as she fed and then came lumbering after him.
Miko blundered off as best he could, staving off his living nightmare to be fused again with creature.
Audra thought differently. That he would be an easy catch. When she caught up with him...Her expression was one of outrage at his last exploit of treachery and abandonment.
Even as he hobbled, Miko could feel that the effects of the retrociniation were lessening. He attributed it to his time out of the VR and away from Audra. There may still exist hope.
He reached out a webbed hand and stroked his fishy gills, dubious of the usefulness of his webbed feet and fin-like arms. There were traces of cilia that exuded from the pores of his skin. He shuddered at the thought of what
