Reaching down, almost in a trance, he wrenched a chunk of root from the twisted cluster nearby. He tossed the root in the vicinity of the violent shadow. Almost as if drawn by a magical force, the thing paused. Miko drew himself up to his full height, gripped with a peculiar determination and will to survive and he waved his deformed limbs, calling out throaty challenges...his intent was to stir the creature’s wrath...
What an act of utter madness!
But maybe not. An arm of the shadow shifted, bent in an unnatural way in three directions.
While the thing was occupied, Audra took the opportunity to unroot herself and crawl away in whimpering dismay to the nearby pool’s shore.
Miko caught a glimpse of her grey hide oozing purple ichor before it disappeared into the dark water with a soft splash. Miko felt strangely relieved. But why?
He staggered off, fighting for his reason. He tripped over the roots, cursing. He picked himself up, scrambled on again, but hardly had he crafted a dozen steps before he too felt pinioned to the ground and drawn to a halt. He could move his tentacled arms, but not his legs.
The shadow grew taller, almost a menacing cloud, irked at the loss of its prize in the form of Audra.
With strange stealth, the thing advanced, a gigantic umbrella of cold blue shadow, taller than life itself.
Miko wrenched himself from his stiff crouch, struggling to free his feet, but without luck.
The moving billow froze his blood. Was this the terror that Audra felt? Surely! It was a thing that possessed the power to rob a man of his will and freeze his limbs. His heart pounded in his chest.
Suddenly a crash rent the air.
Shredding branches appeared from on high.
Miko looked up. A sulphurous rain of debris came thundering with it. One of the winged horrors had broken through the treetops. How? Why? Down the creature careened on a destructive path, taking with it dozens of trees and tree-dwellers that clung to branches above.
Miko stifled a cry. Did the thing despise the shadow so much to swoop so direly. Or was it drawn to the shadow? He knew not. He shivered in terror at either condition.
A tree suddenly capsized in front of him, almost taking off his head. He tried to stagger away in an opposite direction, but could take not a single step.
The strange forlorn horn call came drifting again, a hounding menace—a lunatic presence, closer than ever. Was the thing from the sky the source of the chilling sound? No. Miko thought it was something far more insidious, far more ancient.
Bedlam, chaos, horror. There came a gigantic struggle of alien forces that defied the imagination as the winged thing fell. Chittering screams, rends, moans, and tearing flesh filled the air. Of the primitive flying thing, Miko caught only a glimmer of its majestic scale-crusted hide as it pounded upon the ground, or fell into the shadow. The goliath of a bird had two horned heads and an armadillo’s body and a dozen stringed appendages that may have served as legs.
With eyes bulging from their sockets, Miko twisted about in horror, struggling to get away from that mad carnage. There came sounds of ingestion, horrible crunching sounds that followed with much gurgling and mastication.
Of the shadow Miko saw naught. The presence seemed to have no tangible form or substance, outside of a cold damp presence—something like a damp wind from the sea. But how could something like that eat something that large?
The winged thing’s calls faded to nothing. Then came thick silence.
A silence was so deep that Miko felt the very planet had halted.
A brooding pall followed. Miko could feel it, palpable as a panther’s stealthy pursuit, terrible under the dim shadow of the penumbra-born twilight.
The presence seemed to retreat, as if satisfied. The pall suddenly lifted. The dim amber twilight light shone over the hollow again. To where the creature went Miko knew not, but the horn-like sound faded to dim echoes. And then nothing...
Momentarily Miko blinked back his confusion. He seemed free of the spell, but he refused to believe his motor functions would function for any time too long.
As quick as a serpent, he dashed on, racing in stumbles and starts through the sylvan gloom. He felt a pounding in his ears, a deep, hollow despair. Would he ever see the end of this nightmarish journey? The thought of the time cone and his impossible marooning flashed through his mind. Was there any rescue? He could be years, decades in this place, stuck in some future, or past. The perplexing acts exhibited toward Audra gave him no solace. They frightened and disquieted him.
Gritting his teeth, Miko knew he must put as much distance between himself and the Zikri and this shadow thing. Though he barely understood what motives drove it, or had driven him to act as he did back there when it had entrapped poor Audra. Where was she now? He stopped as he registered what he had just said. Poor Audra? He shook his head in sad bafflement. He could not get his mind off her.
Nevertheless, under no circumstance must he sleep.
* * *
Miles later, the beleaguered pilot came to a cleared area at whose dank outer end he stumbled across a pathway. Or was it a roadway? Yes, he detected the faint footprints of some bipeds or other etched in the thick reddish-coloured mud.
No sign of Audra. Miko followed the trail with mixed emotions. He seemed to have lost Audra and was intent on keeping it that way. But again, misgiving hit him; the sad hollow feeling of loss. He urged his feet onto greater speed, even though they were numb with fatigue and his heart beat with a terrible ache for the alien.
Miko
