IN NATURA: a science fiction novel (ARZAT SERIES Book 2) (5 page)

CHAPTER 6

SUPPLY AND DEMAND

Tom, Alex, Mot, and Ara carefully picked their way back to the main supply area under the low light of their makeshift Arzat torches. All of them were barefoot, which posed no problem for the Arzats, who were naturally born with feet as tough as nails, but Tom and Alex had to be extremely diligent. There were no doctors and likely very limited medical supplies were they to injure themselves.

  “Be careful where you step, Alex,” Tom had already told her a million times. Alex was not always as graceful as she looked. Worried that she might trip and fall, Tom stayed close to her.

  “Now, why didn’t we wear shoes in the cryos again?” he asked rhetorically.

  Alex ignored Tom’s question and racked her brain, trying to mentally inventory the kinds of provisions and the kinds of clothing and blankets they had stashed in the hermetic safes prior to cryo. She crossed her fingers and prayed that the safes had held after all of the years. If no air had reached the contents, there was a good chance that at least some of their supplies might have survived. Like Mot, Alex was also getting hungry, but what she needed now—even more than food—was some heavy clothing and a good pair of shoes. She was shivering and her toes were freezing.

  “Ouch!” she cried, kicking something on the ground. “God damn it that hurt.”

  Tom reached out and took Alex’s arm. Along the way, he periodically looked up into the dark, trying to imagine the status of the carbon fiber beams that kept the giant underground space from collapsing. It was hard to fathom the idea that eight thousand years had passed since he had installed them.

  At the time of its construction, the Utah ARC was thought to have been one of the most complex and monumental projects in all of human history. One half of a sphere, over a quarter mile across, four hundred feet high at its center, and almost a half mile underground, it was to have been a disaster refuge that resembled a small city. It was by far the most sophisticated of the four that had been built in the United States and would have been populated with over two thousand individuals had it been completed in time. Designed solely for humans and built underground, it was otherwise simply a very modern Noah’s Ark.

  When Tom had been approached to oversee its construction, the job carried a strict stipulation that he could tell absolutely
no one
—including Alex—what he was doing. In fact, this had been a criterion for everyone who had worked on the ARC, from the foremen to the lowliest laborer.

  Tom had been torn. He knew that he could not stay married to Alex and accept the position—but he desperately wanted the job. The prospect of being in charge of constructing one of the most difficult projects ever conceived was almost impossible to pass up, not to mention the fact that he had been kind of sold on the idea that taking the position was the patriotic thing to do. A secret meeting with several high-ranking government officials, including the president himself, had sealed the deal.

  But Alex was a problem. She was too smart and he was too transparent when it came to her. Tom knew that if he took the job, Alex would eventually figure out what he was up to. So, he had invented a story, based on his governmental boss’s suggestion, which had effectively ended their marriage.

  It had seemed to be a bad decision almost immediately, and Tom regretted it the moment he’d made it, but he had been so consumed by getting the ARC built that he hadn’t looked up long enough to realize the magnitude of his mistake until Alex had inadvertently shown up literally on the doorstep of the project.
Thank god,
he thought to himself, as she plodded along side of him, still wondering how he could ever have made such a poor decision. Now, in retrospect, he realized ironically that it was only his direct connection to the ARC project that had ultimately saved them.

* * *

Eventually they reached the supply area and the safes where the first trouble they encountered was that the levers to unlock them were stuck tight. It wasn’t until Tom finally employed the Arzats’ help that the problem was solved. Mot and Ara each stepped up and popped the two safes open, wrenching on the five-spoke handles like there was nothing difficult about it at all. A wisp of dank air escaped as each of the doors cracked open.

  Mot flicked his tongue, not liking the smell coming from the safe they had primarily stocked with food. “Something is not right, Alex,” he said to her after a moment.

  Alex could feel Ara in her head agreeing, though the female Arzat had really said nothing. In the torchlight, she could see both of the Arzats occasionally flicking their tongues.

  “It might be okay, Mot. Give it a minute to air out.”

  Alex remembered flooding the safes with argon
gas right after they had filled them with provisions. The safes were like large storage sheds, designed to hold multiple supplies for long periods of time. The inert gas was supposed to help eliminate decomposition. Argon itself had no odor—at least not to humans—but Alex suspected that Mot and Ara’s sensitive noses might have been able to detect its presence anyway.

  So far, so good,
she thought,
the seals must have held.
She blocked the thought from the Arzats, not wishing to be cross-examined by them regarding the nature of argon
gas.

  They waited a moment and then walked into and rummaged through the safe they had used for food storage. Even with only the dim light of the torches, Alex was disheartened almost immediately. Everything looked like it had turned to a fine powder. Even the beef jerky Mot and Ara had so proudly stashed earlier had turned to dust. She could see that the plastic containers they had been stored in were half disintegrated.

  Most of the water they had stashed had also been in plastic and the bottles had mostly disintegrated as well. Only a few bottles of sparkling water that had been in glass with aluminum lids had fared well and had apparently survived. Mot screwed the seal off of one of them and smelled it, flicking his tongue over the top to get the full sense of its contents. He then dumped some into a cupped hand and sipped.

  “This water is unusual, Alex,” the big Arzat told her, handing her the bottle. “It has strange bubbles in it. Other than that, it tastes pure.”

  Alex laughed. “It’s okay, Mot. That’s just carbonation. Although how in the hell it’s stayed carbonated after all these years . . .” She shrugged and took a good long pull from the bottle.

  “What is . . . carbonation, Alex?”

  “Can I explain that later, Mot?” Alex asked, realizing that even she didn’t remember the principals of carbonation at the moment. “How is the food, Ara?” she inquired, trying to change the subject. “Is there anything left of it?”

  The female Arzat had been squatting while closely examining the provisions and fingering what was left of their packaging and sniffing the contents.

  “I’m sorry to say, Alex, that nothing seems to have survived.”

* * *

Tom, in the meantime, wandered into the other safe where he located several gear bags he had previously stowed and began doing his own inventory. Much to his delight, the weapons seemed intact and looked as good as the day he had bagged them. The ammunition, of course, was highly in doubt.
But really,
he thought,
the rounds are fired by a pretty basic combination of chemicals. If necessary, I could probably—with Mot and Ara’s keen sense of smell—eventually find the basic ingredients for gunpowder somewhere.
In addition, a large stash of clothing appeared to be intact as well.
Thank god for synthetics,
he thought.

  “Alex, Mot, Ara, come over here.”

  The three of them joined Tom and he began passing out heavy jackets. He had been fortunate to find XXXLs in the ARC’s supply center just before going into cryo and had stashed them for the Arzats just in case. Mot and Ara struggled to put them on, but they fit—barely. Having been raised in a tropical climate and fully acclimated to cave temperatures, the Arzats were not used to wearing any sort of heavy clothing.

  “That’s the magic of
polyester
right there,” Alex said, reaching up and adjusting the collar of the coat Ara was awkwardly wearing. “Better than nothing, right?” she asked, sensing Ara’s distaste for the garments.

  Alex had found a new shirt and put that on before she gratefully zipped up her own jacket. To her delight, she had also found some military grade boots and socks and immediately slipped them on. When she was dressed, she handed Tom a bottle of water that she had retrieved from the other safe.

  “What about the food, Alex? Any luck?” Tom asked, as he quickly drained the bottle.

  “There is nothing left,” Alex replied, rummaging around as the Arzats held torches. “I wonder if that other safe had a leak or something,” she added absently, “This stuff all looks perfect.”

  “Then it’s probably a good thing I stashed
these
in this one,” Tom said, holding up a long rifle with a broad smile on his face.

  “Is that a
fire stick
, Tom?” Mot asked, highly interested.

  “Well, Mot, it used to be,” Tom replied. “We are going to have to find out if the ammo is any good after all this time, but . . .” Tom worked the action on the rifle a few times. It was stiff, but still had a trace amount of oil on it. He dry-fired the rifle, just to check the hammer, and it made a comforting and distinctive click.
This thing might just actually work
, he thought, looking over the weapon.

  Ara and Mot continued to hold the torches as Alex and Tom gathered other various supplies and placed them into synthetic bags and backpacks.

  “Don’t take too much, Alex. We can always come back.”

  “That’s easy for you to say, Mister ‘I-have-four-guns-and-a-shit-load-of-ammo’,” Alex said, smiling.

  She was trying to get the blood flowing in her ice-cold feet, which were now clad in brand new, eight-thousand-year-old hiking boots.
We should have put everything into this safe,
she thought, wiggling her toes, pleased that the boots were still intact.

  Tom finished stuffing a backpack full of ammunition and first aid supplies and handed them to Mot. He had selected an automatic rifle, a tactical twelve gauge shotgun, and two pistols to take to the surface. “I think you are going to be pretty happy we have these when we get up top, Alex,” he said.

  “Will you teach me to use these
fire sticks
, Tom Pilot?” Mot asked, watching as Tom tested a strap on the automatic rifle.

  “Guns, Mot, we call them
guns
. Anyway, I doubt they are even going to work properly. But yes, if they do, I will be happy to teach you.”

  “Why don’t you just try one now, Tom, before you go to all of the hassle of hauling them out of here?” Alex suggested.

  “Now why didn’t I think of that?” Tom quickly loaded a clip and shoved it into the automatic rifle. “Mot and Ara, you might want to hold your ears. This is going to be loud. You too, Alex.”

  He ducked out of the safe and aimed the rifle into the dark and pulled the trigger. There was a loud crack and a flash of light from the muzzle as the weapon discharged. Tom fired four more rounds in succession into the depths of the ARC. The automatic was working perfectly. The sound reverberated around in the dark, reminding him of the structure’s enormity.

  “Bingo!” he said, looking back at Alex and the astonished Arzats with a smile.

  Alex looked at Tom and rolled her eyes. “We need to get to the surface. Hopefully, we’ll find something to eat up there.”

  “Yeah, hopefully,” Tom absently replied, still eyeballing the weapon. One thing was for sure. If there
were
any nasty creatures crawling around on the surface, the weapons would make dealing with them much easier. Tom pulled the ammunition clip and cleared the rifle, and then he stowed it in the bag with the other guns. “Ready when you are.”

CHAPTER 7

FIGHT

Za’at chewed the last bit of meat off a freshly roasted thighbone, then easily snapped it in two and began to suck out the marrow, which was his favorite part.
The marrow was still warm, perhaps from the roasting or because the kill had been so recent. Either way, it is delicious,
he thought to himself as he worked his long tongue around, enjoying the unique
uman
flavor, extracting all that he could from the hollow of the bone.

  He looked across the camp where Baa was still guarding the female and wondered if she would taste much different than the younger male, sweeter perhaps.
One thing is for sure, I am going to enjoy the possibility of finding out,
he thought, closely watching the strange smooth-skin and the mutinous Arzat Baa.

  When he was finally finished eating, he tossed the bone into the fire.

  Za’at felt much better now that his stomach was full. The Arzats had only cooked two of the very youngest
umans
, saving the larger youths and the adults for the trip back to the caves. He knew that the full-sized carcasses would make a much more impressive statement when they finally reached home. Za’at noted that they had all been properly flayed and cleaned and were now skewered and suspended from the trees, ready for transport—their skins, heads, and entrails lying in a neat pile on the far side of the camp.

  That will give the fanged beasts something to snack on after we have gone and distract them for a while,
he thought, examining the red mound of flesh.
Interesting,
he mused,
the color of the uman blood is so similar to that of Arzats’.
He wondered if it were true of all animals. So far, in his experience, that had certainly been the case.

  He looked over the smoke of the fire back in the direction of Baa, who was still maintaining a careful watch over the female as Za’at had instructed. He had purposely made Baa wait for his dinner as punishment for his earlier behavior, but he knew that if he pushed him much further, the young Arzat might lose all control.
A hungry Arzat is a dangerous Arzat,
he reminded himself again, his desire to eat almost as instinctive and powerful as his desire to breathe
. No sense in tormenting him any longer,
he finally decided.
I have proven my point.

  He slowly rose to his feet, brushing his greasy fingers across his chest, then stuffed another smaller piece of cooked
uman
under his arm and walked over to Baa and the female.

  “Baa,” he said silently, “go and eat. I have left you a nice portion of the young
uman
. It is there by the fire. I will watch the female.”

  Baa sprang up from his crouched position, avoiding direct contact with Za’at’s fiery-red eyes, his legs stiff from the waiting.

  “Thank you Za’at, son of Qua,” he said, using Za’at’s full name again.

  In the Arzat culture, it was proper to either use the name of one’s father or their title—were they to have one—upon first introduction or as an additional sign of respect. Baa wanted no further incident with Za’at this evening. He just wanted to eat, but he was still smarting from the intolerable treatment he had suffered from the senior Arzat.

  One day,
he thought, carefully blocking
, I will even the score with you, Za’at, son of Qua.

  Baa walked as slowly as possible over to the fire to join the rest of the hunters, trying his best to exert the last bit of self-control he had in him not to look too overly anxious, the smell of the freshly cooked meat almost overwhelming him.

  Mek was about to say something smart to Baa when he saw him approaching the fire but thought better of it when he looked into his friend’s eyes. “Here, Baa. Za’at has left the best for you,” Mek said, gesturing at a pile of charred meat. “Come join us.”

  Baa picked up a haunch of meat and examined it, flicking his tongue over it and carefully sniffing as he did so.
Probably one of the uman’s arms,
he surmised, knowing that the other hunters and Za’at would have already helped themselves to the truly choice pieces from the thighs and legs. This annoyed him even further, but the meat smelled so good and he was so hungry that it hardly mattered.

  He squatted, retrieved a small leather bag from a pocket in his scabbard with his free hand, and carefully opened it, pinching some of the fine white granules from the bag’s contents between his fingers. Baa sprinkled the grains on the meat, then, just as deftly, he cinched the bag up one handed and stuffed it back into his scabbard’s pocket.

  When he was finished, he sat down on the ground where he could still get a good look at Za’at and the female, crossed his legs, and began to eat. It was the first time he had dined on
uman
, and he found it to be even more delicious than he imagined.
Perhaps this smooth-skin meat is so delicious,
he thought,
because I had to wait so long for dinner.
As his stomach filled, his resentment towards Za’at returned.

  Baa glanced in Za’at’s direction, but his vision was momentarily obscured by smoke.

* * *

Za’at crouched down in front of the female, the light of the fire casting a strange glow around the creature’s head. Despite his poor angle, he could still make out every detail of her face in the low light.

  This was the first time Za’at had ever been this close to a living
uman
for longer than the very short time it took for him to kill one, and he found the little female to be fascinating. He had expected her to be terrified of him, but as he watched, he was surprised to find that rather than showing fear, the creature seemed quite calm. In fact, it was almost unnerving the way she chose to look him directly in the eyes, her own eyes so disturbingly ringed with white.

  She is obviously young and quite pregnant,
he thought as he sat watching her, slowly pulling in a large whiff of air through his nostrils and trying to repress his strong desire to flick his tongue so he could once again get the full flavor of her. Exactly how pregnant this smooth-skin was he could only guess. Based on the size of her protruding belly, he imagined that she was very far along, and it would be only a short matter of time before she gave live birth.

  The
umans
, like most of the rest of the animals Za’at was familiar with, were a curiosity in that way. Only birds and serpents laid eggs and fostered their young in the way of the Arzats. While Za’at had never seen such a thing as an
uman
being born, he was quite interested. He had seen plenty of other animals give birth, but never a smooth-skin.

  Perhaps we will have such an opportunity,
he thought mischievously to himself, wondering what a newborn
uman
might taste like.
Certainly, the young male had been most delicious,
he thought, remembering his dinner.
Do I dare leave her alive long enough to find out?
Perhaps I should just cut it out of her belly and try it that way.

  But the big question the Arzat had on his mind was not so much the flavor of her offspring. What Za’at wanted to know, more than anything, was if she knew how to make fire? Clearly, someone in her camp had known.

  Yes,
he thought hopefully,
perhaps this little smooth-skin can show me the secret. Then there can be no more argument with the Arzat Priests and no more questioning Arzat superiority. I will be the most famous Arzat in clan history if I am able to make that discovery. Perhaps I might even allow this female to live long enough to actually birth her offspring and roast it for dinner over a fire that I
myself
have made! Hah! Va’a, my mate, would be most pleased.

  He shook himself out of his reverie. Za’at knew that if he returned to the caves with a live
uman,
the initial reception might not be all that he was imagining. Fire or no, Va’a was likely to be quite upset, as would the rest of the clan. The Elders might object completely. In fact, bringing a live smooth-skin into the caves might very well be construed as an
atrocity.
Za’at also knew he would have a tough time convincing the other hunters to go along with his plan and not to simply kill the female on the trip back to the caves.

  Well,
he finally surmised,
there are plenty of steps between here and home.
No need to decide at this moment. But
if
she can show me how to make fire,
he mused . . .

  “Do you know how to make fire?” Za’at asked the female rhetorically, as he held out a piece of charred meat. The female flinched a bit and tried to lean away.

* * *

Maria sat staring at the beast, wondering the entire time if it was going to reach out and kill her. Its hands were so large that she imagined they could take her head off with just a halfhearted blow. Even so, somehow, she had lost the better part of her fear and had replaced it with her own curiosity.

  What is it thinking,
she wondered?

  The creature was two or three heads taller than even the largest man she had ever seen but built much the same, with powerful arms and long legs that bulged with heavy muscles.
He must have three or four times the strength of a warrior,
she thought.

  His only garment was a loincloth made out of some kind of animal hide—bison she supposed, or deer. His enormous feet were bare with three broad toes on the front of each foot and one much smaller opposed on each heal. All of them were tipped with what looked to be long black nails or razor sharp claws.

  Maria was quite familiar with reptiles. There were many types of lizards and snakes that lived on the plains. They were, in fact, often part of her diet. This creature was clearly from the same family—its skin calloused and rough on the extremities and softer looking under its arms and around its waist, much like that of a lizard’s belly or a snake’s underside.

  But its head, which looked like something between that of a man’s and that of a snake’s, was the most amazing part of the beast’s anatomy. Its large eyes were red with small flecks of green and blue buried in the predominately crimson color that surrounded elongated pupils. From her angle, she could see the flicker of gold firelight reflecting in them. Below the eyes, a small nose with slits for nostrils eventually became a jaw that she supposed housed a mouthful of very sharp teeth.

  The giant lizard had apparently asked her a question, although she had no idea what.
For that matter
, she thought,
how do I even know it was a question?
Then, the beast held out a piece of charred meat in its enormous hands. The creature had four fingers, one of which clearly functioned as a thumb, with long black nails on the tips of each of them, not unlike the ones on the toes of its feet. They looked sharp and dangerous like the talons of a large predatory bird.

  Maria shook her head. The idea of eating a part of her comrades made her want to vomit. For all she knew, it might even be a piece of her mate. The smell though, was actually not so different from that of roasted venison.

  Za’at held the meat further out, closer to the female. The shaking of her head from side to side was an affirmative gesture as far as he was concerned. But the female recoiled away from his offering. This angered and confused him.
Females!
he thought as he snatched the binding that held her hands and forced her to grasp the meat.

  “I know you are hungry, and you will need all of your strength for what is about to come, little pregnant female
uman.
We do not like to eat our own either, but I would do so at the drop of a torch if it was necessary for my own survival.”

  Maria looked back at the lizard. It was clear that it was trying to communicate, its words thick with a hiss that sounded like a rattlesnake attempting to speak.

  She looked down at her bound hands and the meat that the creature had forced on her. It was still warm from the fire, the smell so delicious and strong that . . .

  Oh Great Creator,
she thought,
please forgive me.

  Za’at watched as the
uman
began to slowly chew on her own kind’s flesh and blood.
Good,
he thought,
if I were in your position, I would do the same. In fact, had we not found you and your mates, Baa would have been first on my list.

  He stood up and walked back toward the hunters, confident that the female was in no position to try to escape. He kept a close eye on her, nonetheless, as he approached the fire.

  “Ata, go and get the rest of our supplies.”

  “Yes, Za’at.” The young hunter immediately jumped up and started for the hill.

  “Baa, go with him. You can fill our water sacks at the stream on your way back.”

  Baa did not rise up immediately, continuing to chew on the last of the meat from the
uman
’s arm, as if he had not heard Za’at’s command. Fill the water sacks? Fill the water sacks! Baa fought to remain calm on the outside, but inside, his heart was beating wildly in his chest. He was sick of Za’at and his constant insults and orders. Now, particularly since his stomach was full, his opinion of Za’at’s poor leadership had grown stronger. Za’at’s failure to kill the pregnant female was proof enough. Now he had just been ordered to fetch water like he was a lowly Arzat female.