Part 2
The pain was intense, fogging his senses and stealing away all clarity. Starbuck tried to open his eyes as his training kicked in; he had to assess the situation, make a plan for action but the haze was too close to his consciousness. Iced fingers stretched into his mind to steal his awareness, plunging him back into oblivion.
He took a deep breath ignoring the flash of pain in his chest, forcing himself to see. His surroundings floated in front of watery eyes, indistinct, smudged, and indecipherable. "Gotta get out, Bucko," he murmured weakly. But he could not find the strength to move. Instead his eyes closed, his head lolled back and his senses shut down completely. He did not know how long he was out but the comforting, pain free blackness did not last long. He tried again, forcing his eyes open, pursing his lips as he concentrated on forming the blurred image in front of him into a semblance of normality.
His viper had cut a swathe through the dense forest. Small fires struggled to burn at the edges of the gorge he had gouged out of the earth but from his position, still strapped into the cockpit, he could not see this. All Starbuck saw was the grey stone monolith which he had finally crashed into and had brought his craft to a complete, crumpled stop. The monument had been knocked over and lay on its side on the mossy earth, the viper's nose had embedded itself into the stone like a treacherous knife in an unsuspecting victim's back.
Starbuck moaned as the mental shock hit him almost as hard as the physical one had earlier. His luck it appeared had not deserted him, if he had been going any faster on impact he had no doubt that his body would have ended up as the filling in a sandwich of metal and stone. He gulped as a wave of nausea washed through him. Again his fragile grip on consciousness seemed to slip and he closed his eyes, trying only to survive the pain.
As it settled to a dull ache he forced himself to think. He had to get out of the craft regardless of the damage his landing had done to his body. The longer he remained in it the more vulnerable he was; who knew what had tracked his flaming path across the sky? There could be any manner of enemy on this planet, rushing to investigate his spectacular descent to earth. Gingerly he tried to move his legs but stopped, biting back the groan as flames of agony burnt through him. He had to do this, he knew, but he doubted whether his courage would guide him through the pain.
Slowly, very slowly he used his arms to pop his cockpit canopy open and lifted it, up and away. He bit his lip, tasted blood, as holding on to the side, his arms straining arms lifted his body out of the viper. Eventually he levered himself to a sitting position, then he balanced precariously on the lip on the cockpit, closing his eyes as more waves of pain bombarded him. He tottered on the edge, clutching desperately with both his hands and his mind to keep hold but the pull of oblivion was too strong and as it rushed up to take him, he fell backwards to the ground with a dull thud.
Starbuck lay still, his mouth slightly open as he groaned softly. The small grub-like entity crawled from the base of the monolith towards him, its pace slow but purposeful. It never deviated, never hesitated as it made its way to the unconscious pilot's mouth and entered. Starbuck choked weakly, his body spasming but he did not wake as the entity disappeared down his throat.
It was a miracle! Magawincha had never dreamed she would see anything like it in her lifetime, but it had happened! The writings had proved to be true. The prophecy fulfilled. And though she had never doubted their validity, it made her feel so warm inside that her beliefs had been justified.
She stopped now, her senses bombarding her with vibrations as she hesitated. She examined them all – the stringent scent of fire and something else floating on the breeze causing her nostrils to flex, the complete lack of noise, the touch of the soft mossy covering of the clearing and the change as it became warm, and blackened from the happening as she moved forwards. But the thing she concentrated on was the information her eyes gave her. She had seen the monolith broken and torn asunder, the strange white craft embedded into it, the vicious scar it had cut through the forest and such damage would normally have caused her to stop, to fear, for naturally cautious she hated change, but her eyes had run across the things quickly, as if they were not important, coming to rest and remain on the vision in front of her.
She felt suddenly inadequate, unclean, to be in the presence of such godliness. Her paw, unbidden, itched to reach out and touch the beauty that entranced her but she stopped herself. Instead she quivered as her eyes drank in the physical perfection of the golden being who lay before her.
"Don't touch!" Beagragon's order was harsh. "You are not worthy!"
Magawincha looked away and dropped her head in deference, feeling her eyes were suddenly bereft. Beagragon was the leader, he knew so much more than her; he was learned in the gospels and the teachings. He was Keeper of the Monolith, Protector of the People. It was only correct that he should take precedence, take over now he had arrived. But Magawincha allowed her snout to curl into a slight smile; he could not take away the fact that she had arrived first to the clearing, that she had seen it first, that she had found the Chosen One!
It had all happened so quickly. The bright star blazing across the darkening evening sky and then the noise as it seemed to scream to them. They had stood, eyes wide and hearts thumping furiously with awe as they dared to hope. And then they were running, falling over themselves through the forest, running for the monolith, the place where the star was falling. It was the prophecy – it had to be!
And Magawincha with her smaller, younger frame had ducked around the trees lithely to arrive in the sacred clearing first. It had all exploded into her vision and she had stood on her hind legs frozen with amazement and wonder and fear.
"He is well featured." Magawincha heard Eveenator whisper behind her. "And so different from what I imagined. His face has only short, spiky hair."
"Beautiful," Magawincha breathed. "He is pale and golden!"
Beagragon let out a snort. "Typical!" he scoffed. "Of course he is…. Is he not the Chosen One? Now we must get him ready, we must prepare." He wrinkled his nose. "There is danger coming, I sense it."
"But how?" Slynavo asked from his position between them. "He is too big for us."
Magawincha let her eyes run along the body before them once more. She could see the height of his frame, his muscles were neat and yet she sensed the strength in them. His physical perfection was so unlike her own short, worthless form.
"Nonsense!" Beagragon sniffed. "We must work together as the prophecy says. 'Though there be few of us, still will it be enough!' Slynavo go and fetch the sling, we will pull him back together. Eveenator go with him."
"But…."
"Do not question me!"
"May I stay please, Beagragon?" Magawincha asked meekly, not daring to hope.
Beagragon's features twisted into a smile. "You may," he said.
Magawincha ignored the growl of disappointment from Eveenator as she and Slynavo moved away. "Beagragon always lets her do things!" she moaned.
Magawincha turned her attention back to the Chosen One. Again the desire to reach out and stroke the smooth, almost hairless skin burned in her but she remembered Beagragon's words, so she satisfied herself by simply running her eyes over him. She took in every detail, every feature from the smooth slightly sweaty golden hair on his head, over the pale skin punctuated with stark red cuts and darker bruises, down across the brown uniform stained and ripped to the big boots on his feet. He was indeed a thing of legends!
Beagragon had moved away and she could hear him sniffing expectantly around the monolith. Magawincha sat back on her haunches to wait. Her heart jumped feverishly in her chest as she looked down on to the face once more, for beautiful blue eyes had opened to look at her. They sparkled in the moonlight. She did not see the pain that veiled them, all she saw was their intense warmth and comfort. From that moment she was lost in a sea of shimmering love that she would have been unable to swim against, even if she had the will to do so.
TBC
