They positively glow glow, huh (oh)
Chilly down with the fire gang
Chilly Down - David Bowie
-THE WARRIOR -
Warrior pushed up to his feet, swaying slightly as he rose.
"Whoa!" Amanda called jumping up beside him. She wrapped an arm around him as if to steady him. "Careful, don't fall again."
The energy crackling through his limbs demanded movement but he paused and wrapped his arm around Amanda's shoulders drawing her closer. She clearly needed reassurance.
"I am well," he boomed. Amanda winced. He lowered his volume to a dull roar. "I merely used up my energy reserves but they are now sufficiently restored. We must get underway. Even at the border, we could be detected if we linger in place too long."
Healer stood from his stooped position over Logic. "Amanda and I have discussed the matter and we do not think it would be wise to take Logic deeper into the subconscious."
"Agreed, the three of us should make the journey." Warrior had not even considered bringing Logic. Carrying him would slow them down without providing any benefit. Not that he would say that in Amanda's hearing.
"The two of you will go," Healer corrected. "I will stay behind and monitor Logic."
"You should come with us," Warrior insisted. "You are occasionally useful after a fight."
"Warrior," Amanda admonished, "I asked him to remain here. Not only does Logic need care but risking Healer further is not an option. Sarek's recovery will depend on him."
"Sarek's survival depends on getting you to the bonding nexus," Warrior countered.
"Are you not capable of doing that without assistance?"
Warrior looked down at the woman he held. She looked up at him adoringly. He held back a sigh. "I am capable."
"Good, then it's settled," Amanda smiled, pulling away from him. She gestured towards Logic, "Oh, and we need to move Logic into the shade before we leave."
"Close to the jungle of life he may gain some benefit from the energy there without being overwhelmed by the chaos within," Healer explained, his fingers steepled in front of his face as if to hide some expression.
Warrior looked down at the stricken form and grimaced. Logic had continued to deteriorate in the time he had laid on the stone. He had seen mummified husks in the desert with more semblance of life. But it was the emptiness, the complete lack of psyche, that was worse to his senses. Moving Logic was unlikely to help him now, there was nothing left inside. He did not want to touch that wrongness.
"If you are not feeling strong enough to move him on your own will you at least help us carry him?" Amanda asked.
If HE was STRONG enough!
He huffed out his chest. He walked over to Logic, crouched and pulled him over his shoulder by his robes to avoid touching the putrid-looking skin. He stood, balancing the dead weight on his good shoulder.
When he turned he saw Amanda's poorly suppressed smile.
That woman
He'd do anything for her.
Amanda reached for his dropped lirpa. "You can't leave this behind."
"You will not be able to -" he began.
She picked it up with a grunt and settled it across her own shoulder.
"How did you -?" he got out before words failed him.
"What are you two staring at?" Amanda demanded. "Come on let's get moving." She led the way down the stairs.
Warrior snapped his jaw shut and looked at Healer in complete bewilderment.
"She shouldn't be able to do that," Healer confirmed, one eyebrow raised so high in incredulity it was in danger of leaving his face. "Amanda has no training at wielding psychic weapons. I am also surprised you would allow it. It was difficult enough for me to move it. You were unconscious and even then it resisted being moved far from you."
In Amanda's hands, his normal need to possess his lirpa did not press upon Warrior. "She is exceptional."
"You trust her."
"Yes," he grunted. More so than the other parts of himself.
Amanda turned around and began walking backwards. "Are you coming Warrior or do I have to cross the jungle by myself?" she yelled before turning back around.
With a grunt Warrior jumped down to the ground not bothering with the stairs. Sunburnt lichens crunched under his feet. With his long stride, he swiftly caught up with her. He walked her by a few strides and then slowed so he did not out-pace her. Any creature coming out of the jungle would never get to her.
Healer walked behind them at a more moderate pace. He caught up with them as they entered the shade of the trees. "Put him down here Warrior," Healer ordered, pointing to a spot on the shaded ground.
As he crouched, Logic's dead weight slipped off his shoulder. Warrior half-heartedly tried to grab him, before recalling that hand that was no longer attached anyway. Logic landed on the ground with a satisfying thump in a twisted mess of limbs.
"Warrior." Amanda hissed, "he is injured enough."
Her fury was a true thing of beauty even when directed at him.
Especially when it was directed at him.
He shrugged and held up his stump. "He slid off faster than expected, I could not grab him on this side."
Amanda narrowed her eyes, her gaze berating his carelessness without needing to say a word. She pushed the lirpa into his chest with significant force. Beautiful, forget that she was he was magnificent. He wrapped his hand just above hers on the lirpa allowing their fingers to brush. Amanda blushed at the contact, and unfortunately, she let go, relinquishing his weapon back to him.
The lirpa gave a slight tug in his hand as if it wanted to return to her. He understood the impulse but he attached the lirpa to the back of his armour, so it hang crosswise across his back, the club above his left shoulder, the fanned blade at his right hip. Then it vanished, its weight lifting from his back. A part of him, it would reappear again when he needed it.
Amanda had kneeled beside Logic. She helped Healer straighten out Logic's limbs with a care that bordered on reverence. Warrior's teeth ground together. Why did she persist in caring for him? That emotionless wretch had never helped her when she needed it.
A dark fluid seeped out of Logic's side where one of the cuts had split open. Was that blood? If so, the colour made it look like it had already congealed. A rancid smell hit him a moment later and he stepped several places back. Decay. Warrior checked what parts of himself he could. If any of that fluid had ended up on him he'd never get the smell out.
A drop of the black ooze rolled down Logic's side and hit the white lichens below. The lichen withered.
He lunged forward grabbed Amanda and yanked her back away. "What?" Amanda shrieked in shock. At the same time, Warrior roared, "Get back from Logic now."
Healer obeyed instantly, launching back several steps.
"Did any of the black fluid from Logic touch you?" Warrior demanded, lifting her hands to inspect them for himself. If she had come to harm…
"No, I don't think so. Why?"
She seemed clean. It had not touched her. The tightness that clenched his belly relaxed a fraction.
"Healer scan the lichen by Logic's head, whatever is leaking out of Logic is killing it."
Healer outstretched his hand and his scanner whirled, even as he did some more lichen died. He turned to face them looking pale. "You are correct. This is a creeping death and we have brought it to the jungle of life, it could kill everything here."
"We have brought it to the border. It may not be able to cross. But if it can, that much destruction would release Storm. In our state, there will be no surviving that.
"What about Logic," Amanda demanded fearfully.
"This is far beyond my skill to heal. This contagion must be why Logic isn't improving and I could not even detect it."
"The psychic energy you used earlier, can you give him more," Amanda suggested desperately.
Healer pulled the small bottle from his robe and considered it. "When I administered it, he initially stabilized but that was followed by a rapid decline after we came here. It is probable that this contagion is able to feed off the extra energy. It may hasten his end."
"It is spreading," Warrior warned, noting the expanding pool of dead lichen. He carried Amanda back several metres. Healer stepped back with them.
"I am concerned about the spread. Fire is the only one that might be able to contain it."
"I thought we needed to avoid him," Amanda questioned, a worried frown etching her face.
"You must not come in contact with Fire," Warrior agreed, "but this situation can not be left unchecked either. Still, I do not like drawing Fire's attention if it's not needed. Healer, If we end Logic's life, would that stop the contagion?"
"No, I won't allow it," Amanda screamed, fighting Warrior's hold on her hands and pulling towards Logic.
He tightened his hand around one of her wrists and tugged her back against his body so he could wrap his arm around her.
"Let me go," she demanded, striking her other fist against his chest in fury. Should tell her how adorable her ineffectual strikes were…probably not. If she kept struggling she may injure herself.
"Amanda, I will not release you till you have calmed yourself and promise to keep your distance from him."
"I won't let you kill him," she snarled. If that statement had not been in defence of Logic, he would have been tempted to kiss her. He was tempted to do so anyway. Shaking his head cleared it a little. Keep Amanda safe now, kiss her later.
"The spread must be stopped or it will end everything, do you understand?" Amanda still struggled in his grip. He tried a different tract. "If he was able, Logic would tell you the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. He would not want to be the cause of your death, Amanda."
And that was certainly true. Logic used T'Pau's threat to Amanda's life to get Warrior to stop fighting and leave Earth. It was one of the few times they had ever agreed on what was needed.
Amanda let out a small wail of despair, but she stopped fighting his grasp and sank against him, her fury spent.
"I do not think killing Logic would stop the spread of this," Healer stated thoughtfully. "In fact, it is likely to make it worse. Storm is the embodiment of the death drive and this is its work. The life force left in Logic's body would slow the infection. The dead lichen is now spreading the contagion to its surroundings as well. We can not deal with this ourselves Warrior. I must call Fire here. The embodiment of Life is the only thing that might eradicate this."
"Very well, I accept your expertise on this. I will leave him alive and you will seek aid." Amanda took great gulps of air at his words and he relaxed his hold to supporting rather than confining. "However, Amanda and I need to leave before you contact him, Fire must not know she is here."
"Let me check that you do not bear the contagion first." Healer passed the whirring scanner over the two of them and then himself. "I can detect no contagion upon us like I can with the lichen but I did not detect it in Logic till it left his body either. It could be that we are all infected and our life force masks the symptoms."
"We can not afford to wait any longer. If there are no signs of contagion then we must proceed now."
"But is she is infected, and she joins with the nexus…"
"Everything is a risk now Healer. We have to choose which ones to take. I will watch her for any changes and I will not allow her to join if she is showing signs. My priority will always be her safety."
Healer inclined his head. He touched Amanda's cheek and she opened her eyes. He pushed the bottle he held into Amanda's hand. "Use this sparingly if you need it." He turned to Warrior. "I can not wait long, the contagion is spreading exponentially."
Warrior glanced down, the blackness had spread and now surrounded Logic's body in an irregular circle of close to a half meter.
"There is no more time to waste, Amanda, get on my back and I will run."
Amanda looked towards Logic clearly torn.
"The sooner you go, the sooner I can call for aid," Healer prompted.
Neither of them would tell her that it was more likely that the Fireys would come. Unlike Fire, they could not heal with their flame. But either way, the contagion would be stopped here.
Amanda pinched her lips together and gave a sharp nod. Warrior crouched and she climbed onto his back, arms around his neck and legs around his waist. He stood, balancing her weight.
"Give me ninety seconds from the time we enter the jungle then call him."
"Understood."
Warrior snapped a mental shield around himself and Amanda. It was a risk to walk from the established paths in the Jungle but it would be a greater one to use them now. Too easy to locate them. Amanda gave a shocked cry as he ran full speed at the tree line. She buried her head in the back of his neck. The branches parted before him allowing him entry into the jungle.
Warrior began a mental count. The trees shuddered as he ran into the midst of them. Branches whipped aside as he willed a path to form, snapping back to their previous potions once they passed.
The count reached thirty in his head, and he was not nearly far enough away. Despite channelling all the energy flooding through his system into running, he must find a way to go faster. He pushed his will outward, and so great was the force against the trees that they dug themselves from the ground and skittered aside on tentacle-like roots to allow them to pass.
Faster. He had to go faster.
His feet flew over roots and rocks. The ground rumbled, and he missed a step, catching his balance before he fell. As he straightened, he saw through the tops of the trees a great plume of glowing smoke rising from the Volcano.
- THE HEALER -
Putrid blood oozed out of Logic. It wept from each cut and burn. The lichen underneath him was dead in an expanding black pool that now extended several meters away from the source.
Bell caps resembling fungi fruited in an outbreak, a deathly approximation of life. Once they released their spores the contagion would spread by the air too. The edge of the darkness crossed the border into the Life territory and touched one of the trees. The tree shuddered. Black veins began to wind up the trunk, far faster than he would have expected.
Healer took another step back powerless to do anything but call upon a dangerous force. But it had not been ninety seconds.
With a crunch, the infected tree collapsed, eaten away from the insides. Its neighbours began to turn black.
Healer called to Life.
- FIRE: THE LIFE DRIVE -
Fire stood up in the pool of lava and yawned. The call of a little spark had startled him from a dreamless sleep. It was not time for him to wake.
Danger, there was some danger to his lands.
Fire concentrated, and the lava heated further under him and bubbled viscously. Smoke thickened in the chamber and vented out from the crater above. There was not enough pressure in the magma vault to properly rouse the Volcano. Pity. Could have wiped out the threat with the lava and then finished his 7-year aestivation. Very inconsiderate to disturb him partway through. He slipped deeper into the lava, the heat soothing him. Perhaps he would send one of the Fireys to investigate and sleep a little longer. How important could it really be?
/Danger, a threat to all life,/ the warning came again along with an image of a creeping death that drove away the last vestiges of sleep. /This is Storm's work./
"STORM!," Fire hissed out a cloud of brimstone. He would have to deal with this problem himself. /I COME/ he warned the little spark that had long ago been part of himself. He felt its mental touch flinch away from his heat.
"Go ahead of me, prepare the way," he commanded the nearest Firey, the heat expelled by his voice caused the air in front of him to burst into flame.
The Fireys answered in the hisses and snaps of a crackling fire as the message spread through the collective. In their hundreds, their glowing bodies rose from the lava pools or left their stations in the jungle and ran in the direction of the Healer's call.
Fire swam down through a lava channel that emerged in a pool at the base of the Volcano. He shivered as he raised himself up into the cooler air of the Jungle. His magma torso began to harden. He allowed his shoulders to sink back beneath the molten rock. He would go, but he would wait for the ambient temperature to warm to something more comfortable. It would not take long.
At his command, the Fireys set the trees to flame.
- THE WARRIOR -
Had his count been that far off? it could not have been 90 seconds already. No matter. With the Volcano rousing that could only mean that Fire had awoken. Fireys could come from any direction now. He should be able to navigate around them; their bright flames were easy to spot in the dim jungle.
Under the jungle's thick canopy it had grown increasingly dark as ran. The sunlight was now an occasional twinkle through burgundy leaves. He lept over a rock sunk deep into the ground that was too stubborn to move for him. It was fortunate he saw well in the dark.
His nose twitched. Was that smoke? Had a Firey drawn close? He could not sense one, but there, on the ridge above, trees had caught fire.
They needed shelter fast.
No large life forms had crossed his senses yet. While he did not have time to fight a hostile lifeform, a cave or a burrow would offer protection. All he could sense were small birds and insects. That was no help.
Amanda had tightened her grip around his neck. It would have been enjoyed her presence if his need to protect her had not been so overwhelming. He widened the range of his psychic senses risking detection by more sensitive creatures but also gained an early warning of them.
There, at the edge of his range, a lifeform. Definitely not a Fiery, most likely an emotional entity. That could be dangerous if it was the embodiment of an aggressive emotion. But the big creatures often created homes for themselves to protect themselves from the fires that occurred when the volcano erupted.
From the thickening smoke, they would need that protection soon.
No other option presented itself. He headed towards the creature ready to react to whatever he found. A short distance away he located the entrance to an underground warren. It was hidden from view behind bushes and shielded so that only an expert that was actively looking for it could find it. A complex creature indeed to create that, something close to an aspect. No matter though, he could best whatever it was.
Ahead of him, a tree did not move from his path and he was forced to dodge around it. Flying lifeforms took to air in their thousands as the trees swayed in increasing agitation. A branch slapped him in the face as the tree writhed in distress.
Warrior found the mouth of the warren and dived in. Amanda cried out at the unexpected motion but the sound was fortunately muffled into his neck. He crawled forward on knees and a single hand, Amanda clutching desperately to his back.
The tunnel branched and he chose the one with the steepest incline leading them further down from the surface. As the tunnel branched again, he thought he sensed a lifeform down one passage so he took the other. This tunnel was narrower and he was forced to duck down lower till he was nearly sliding on his belly so Amanda was not pressed against the tunnel roof.
The tunnel ended in a large space. Phosphorescent lichen lined the walls of a den. The lichen emitted a faint green glow enough to see the den and additionally made a soft cushion on the ground. He lowered Amanda down at the back of the den and positioned himself near the entrance. Unfortunately, he could not stand, there was just enough height for him to kneel here. Nothing could pass into the room without dealing with him. Once he tightened his shields around them, he allowed himself a moment to breathe and ready himself.
"Where are we?" Amanda asked glancing around in the dim green light.
"We are in the den of one of the jungle's creatures. We will remain here until the Fireys have passed and then continue our journey."
"I thought the plan was to evade them?"
"I could evade the Fireys however their passage has ignited some of the trees. I am uncertain that I can evade a jungle fire."
"Oh, I thought I smelled smoke." Amanda sat with her arms wrapped around her knees and wrapped her arms around them. "We just can't catch a break." She pressed her forehead into her knees.
A muffled scrabbling echoed down the tunnel. Warrior expanded his senses. Not just the one large creature that he had sensed before, but several lesser ones were entering the den with it. He could not be sure how many. Perhaps they would take the other branch.
Amanda bolted upright. "And what about the animals who live here?" Amanda whispered, finally hearing the noise of the creatures as they approached the mouth of the den.
"I will deal with them," Warrior promised, his lirpa appearing in his hand. "They will not get past me."
Authors Note: I know it's been a long time since I updated. You have no idea how hard I have been trying to write this chapter. Writing became a chore rather than something I enjoyed about 2 years ago. I had to put it aside for a time. I came back to it multiple times, writing a bit, and then deciding everything I wrote was bad and not something I could post. When I decided to try again recently, I found one version of this chapter that actually had some promise. I've edited it and decided to post it now before I change my mind. There may still be some errors that I will catch after this is posted, but so be it. I do hope that you will enjoy it.
I still want to finish this story. I finally feel like the story is moving again and I know where I want it to go. Should have some time in late December during my Christmas break to get some serious writing down and in the meantime, I will peck away at it when I have a chance.