Hello all, for those that aren't following The Unforgotten, I'm not dead, and this chapter of Soft Heart has actually been 'done' since last December. With the holiday season combined then with tax season, I didn't have very much time to work on it, though I did. The issue I had with this chapter was that it was originally written from Kaylin's perspective, but once it was finished I thought that it would possibly be better to be written from Jitar's. Unfortunately with each version I lost symbolism that I very much wanted to include, and so had a dilemma of which version to post up. I fought with this for the past five months until this month when I decided to put it to the side and write for Unforgotten, which turned out to be for the best because it helped me think of a solution for this chapter. It's the first time I've done a hybrid perspective chapter and I hope I managed to pull it off without the two perspectives being too jarring.
So here it is, I'm so sorry that it took this long to complete and I hope it was worth the wait. I've made my new year's resolution to put up at least one chapter per month so there will not be the same long gap of silence from this end of things. I hope you enjoy.
Also for anyone interested the website I'm co-authoring and world-building for is near complete and in its beta opening stage. It's called Anterone . com for any of you who want to come and look at what some of my original work looks like and to roleplay if you're into that sort of thing. Many thanks!
She stood and turned away from the woman, walking back to Jitar, who watched and rattled. Together they made it back to the ship. It seemed to come to life under the alien's fingers, and the side of it opened, lowering a ramp that he walked up.
Kaylin looked at the ramp and then after Jitar, unable to see him out of the mist pouring out of it.
Last time, she had remained behind and watched him fly away. While it felt appropriate to let history repeat itself, and leave her to die there, it wasn't an option this time. Jitar needed her.
Uncertain steps began leading her up into the ship, where white light was replaced with red. The air felt heavy, and burned slightly in her lungs. The walls of the ship were carved with pictographs and sigils. It all looked very ancient, primitive, like what she would have expected to have found in ancient Mayan pyramids.
She followed the sound of beeping, finding the alien seated at some kind of cockpit, working a computer designed in a way she couldn't comprehend, but she could see the red glowing images being summoned. It looked like a thermal map of the mountain, and Kaylin shuddered at the hive-like structure.
The red color changed to a green one, and she could see the xenomorphs on all the levels. They were everywhere now, even the first floor where the marines and inmates had just fled. They looked to be searching for a way out. Kaylin feared it wouldn't take them long to get through if they really wanted.
"What do we do?" she asked and Jitar looked at her with a staccato movement.
"Death to everybody!" he chirped.
Kaylin frowned.
A scream echoed into the room, and Kaylin looked around.
"Oh no," she whispered and ran back to the ramp. She looked across the room, and through the door, down the hallway, where the pristine solid white was being swallowed by writhing, squirming blackness.
"Jitar!"
Kaylin fell to her knees and grabbed a hold of the side of the opening as the ship lifted off the ground, rocking back and forth. The xenomorphs poured into the room, overtaking everything. Kaylin's eyes went to the sergeant's body as it was swiftly covered in the wave of black chitin. The bugs leapt for the ship but it was out of reach, and it kept swinging erratically. Something was wrong with it. The ramp she was at attempted to retract, only to make a screeching noise as the ship veered.
The xenomorphs responded and began clambering over each other to reach it. There was a sudden flash of light, then another. Debris began to fall on top of the hoard, raining down on them, until bright sunlight fountained in.
The ship began to ascend, and Kaylin leaned to look up at the hole Jitar had made. An escape, but an escape for them was also one for the xenomorphs.
Her heart stopped at this realization and she ran back to Jitar, crashing into the walls to get there. He was fervently working on the console. Kaylin grabbed onto Jitar, staring out ahead at the windshield.
There she was.
The mother burst through in a rain of concrete, screeching her terrible battle cry. Her long arm swiped at the craft, which began to spin in the air. Jitar fought to steady it, and Kaylin stumbled back to the ramp, looking out.
The xenomorphs moved for their hive queen as she stepped into them, roaring and trying to catch the ship. Kaylin held on, getting flashes of the crest, the head, the claws, then the ship stopped spinning, the mother had them, Kaylin was looking down at her.
The eyeless face seemed to turn up to the small human, her maw opening, screeching. Kaylin stared at it.
"You want your baby."
The mother answered by jerking the ship closer, tightening her hold and screaming, smaller arms tried to reach for Kaylin, no doubt deeming her a threat to the unborn nymph inside of Jitar. Kaylin backed away from the arms, pressing against the wall where she could feel it shudder as it tried to escape. She heard Jitar roar down the hall, and knew that if the queen didn't let go, he was going to deal with her personally.
Kaylin moved away from the wall, towards the queen. The mother's jaw opened and the inner jaw flexing. Kaylin moved in close enough that it would be easy to kill her, a split second was all it would take. The queen's inner mouth shot out straight at Kailin, and the doctor stepped back out of reach and stabbed the dagger into the fleshy unprotected appendage.
The queen screamed. The mother's smaller arms assaulted her own mouth, trying to get the dagger out where it had gotten stuck, spitting out acid. Only one of the larger arms let go to do the task the smaller ones could not, and the ship turned.
Kailyn cried out as she felt the acid burn into her arm, frantically trying to wipe it away on the ground, writhing in pain. The ship buckled and her body began to slid to the opening, but she caught herself with her good hand, holding the still melting one away from her. She heard a snarl and looked down at the end of the ramp, where the queen screamed at her, blood pouring out of her mouth.
His ship kept bucking back and forth, swaying from side to side, commands entered into it were delayed. The humans had tampered with it, and the craft was all but worthless now. Roaring in frustration, he tried to get the flying machine to do what he wanted, as the hoard of kainde amedha poured in. He finally got the ship to respond well enough that he could fire up, cracking through the ceiling of the human-made hive to allow for a way out.
When the scanners on his computer informed him that outside air was filtering in and portrayed a picture of the hole via a heat signature, he knew that they were almost out. He felt the human sainja touch him and only glanced down at her. A glance was all that he got, for shortly after, as the hoard was clambering over itself to reach them, the baiun appeared.
Jitar felt his heart pounding at the chest as the monstrous kainde amedha rushed in and swiped at the ship. He snarled and fought the controls to aim in the opposite direction of the spin, to get the ship to stop so that they could keep ascending. He felt the human's touch leave him, and by the time that the ship had ceased to spin, she was gone.
Jitar focused on angling the ship, trying to wrench free of the baiun's grasp as the huge female screamed and fought him. His instincts pulled him into two directions, one to keep wrestling the shop away to ake their escape, the other, the correct one, to abandon the ship and escape and fight the baiun like a true warrior of honor. The choice should be obvious, the Path laid bare before him, but his judgement was clouded, fogged by emotions he had long been taught to be wrong, shameful, sinful.
If he abandoned now, and fought the baiun to the death, there would be no hope for the human sainja, even if he were to die here as he should, that was not her way, it should not be her destiny.
These, he knew, were the testing thoughts of Ciujim, to tempt him to stray from the Path, to falter on his honor.
That was when he heard the baiun scream, and the ship swung suddenly as it was released, swiveling, still grasped in the queen's single hand. Underneath her scream, Jitar could hear the human's scream, and for a split moment, they sounded the same.
The sainja had wounded the baiun, he could see the blood pouring out of her mouth like a fountain, melting into the floor at her feet. The queen was now positioned in front of him, but her attention was to the side of the ship, where the ramp was jammed in it's extended position. A quick comand brought to light the layout of the ship, where he could see the human's body, kneeling on the ramp, staring down the queen.
Sound faded as he saw her small heated body stand, cradling a wounded arm. As he saw the baiun's wounded maw open in a scream. The human didn't flinch, didn't run, simply stood there in defiance. Jitar could hear his heart beating in his chest, could see the path before him, could see the two goddesses waiting to judge: the black warrior, and the trickster.
Let the Path freeze over.
Jitar's eyes burned wildly as he gripped the control of the ship and pressed his fingers into the triggers. Acid burst from the queen's head as a ball of fire tore into it. The brood simultaneously cried out, a terrible dirge, and collapsed from the shock of losing their mother. It was the sound of the death of his honor as a sainja.
He roared with undridled emotion as he swung the ship, sending a spray of fire into the helpless kainde amedha who could not fight back. He could feel the heat, like poison, filling his body with glee at the release of everything that had ever tied him to the Path, and simply relished in the killing. He only stopped when he felt the hand of the human on his arm, and snapped his gaze at her. The human woman with the Baiun's scream, the trickster, the sainja and the healer.
Her face was twisted and wet, and she touched his chest, then looked up.
Jitar, grabbed her and pulled her to his chair, sitting her in front of him as he angled the unsteady ship upwards and ascended out of the hive and to the surface of the planet.
They were out, but not yet free.
Jitar turned and ran, keeping his balance easy with the swaying ship, Kaylin held easily in his grasp. Jitar set her down only to grab a pack and hand it to her, which she seemed to grab with some confusion, looking down the ramp at where the hole still was. He grabbed her and leapt out of the ship, avoiding the melting edges of the ramp from the baiun's blood.
They landed in the grass, where Jitar dropped the human sainja. On her hands and knees, she turned, looking at her and he stared at her for a moment, before turning his attention as he fastened a new kh'r-khit to his wrist, then tapped it. His mask tilted to the ship, as did the human's face, as the craft shut down, and fell out of the sky, back down the hole it had created.
Jitar snorted at the trickster, then turned and began running, the human girl scrambling after him, favoring her injured arm still. Despite everything, despite knowing what was about to happen, Jitar ran at her pace.
They had barely made it to the tree line when there was an earth quake. The human fell and scrambled to a tree for support, turning to watch the hill collapse, then expand suddenly, before erupting like a volcano. The force hit them both, a concussive blast that could be felt throughout both their bodies. Jitar crouched beside her, shielding her. He could see could see beams of electricity run up the trees as bright beams of heat, then the wind tore past. One of the trees fell over, then another. Crashing down around them.
Then it fell silent.
Jitar looked down at the human sainja, who opened her eyes and looked past Jitar. Where the hill had been, there was now a crater of collapsed earth, miles deep. All of the kainde amedha were dead.
She looked from the hole over to Jitar, who stared at the destruction, then stood. Finally, he looked down at her, then grunted. All it had taken was one human, this soft-hearted sainja, to convince him to throw everything away, and become an ic'jit.
Bad blood.
The woman shifted, standing to her feet unaided, looking again at the crater, then down at her arm. There where bright spots of heat where she was injured, and the arm, now with only a single finger and a thumb, was shaking.
Jitar did not give her time to dwell on her wound, turning and jogging into the forest. He didn't know where to, but they needed to keep moving. For once in his life, he had no path to walk, no destination, not to glory or to death. All he knew was to keep moving, running with the human sainja.
Daund-Pyode.