CHAPTER THREE WESTERN ORDERS
ROWAN
The dead creature had no eyes. That was the first thing I disliked.
The second was its mouth. It opened vertically through nearly a third of its body.
I stood at the edge of the collapsed grove and decided the Hunt-Born had been withholding several important facts about local wildlife. Dr. Arad crouched near one hooked limb.
"Rootmaw."
"That's the scientific name?"
"Hunt-Born translation."
"What did the scientific team call them?"
"We didn't know they existed."
"Excellent."
Juno was scanning the exposed underside. Vorrn stood above us on a root shelf, speaking with a copper-armored western guardian. No Shaarr. I had not seen him for five days. The fact that I knew exactly how many annoyed me. I approached the carcass.
Arad looked up.
"Don't touch."
"I wasn't."
"You have a history."
"I am a medic."
"Same problem."
I crouched without contact. The dead Rootmaw was almost twelve meters long. Black mineral plates covered most of its body. Fine sensory hairs lined the jaw. Vibration hunter. That explained the missing eyes. My interface detected residual neural charge. I frowned.
"Why is a corpse generating current?"
Juno shifted closer.
"What?"
I showed him. The waveform crawled across my wrist display. Three repeating frequency bands. My stomach tightened.
I had seen them before. Not on a dead alien. Inside my own skull.
"Open my archived military spectrum."
Juno's eyes sharpened.
"You recognize it?"
"Open it."
He did. The overlay appeared. The patterns were not identical. They were related.
Arad leaned in.
"Preybridge."
"Looks like it."
Vorrn dropped from the root shelf. The western guardian followed. Copper armor. Sharp jaw plates.
She looked at me once and inhaled. I pointed at her.
"Don't."
She tilted her head. Vorrn made the chest vibration that meant amusement.
"What?"
He translated.
"Vyrr says you smell like the human."
I stared at him.
"I am a human."
"The compatible human."
"Tell Vyrr I smell like rain, sweat, and terrible career decisions."
Vorrn translated. Vyrr's jaw plates opened. Alien laughter. Wonderful.
Juno returned his attention to the waveform.
"This signal family could have traveled through the mineral root layer."
Arad frowned.
"For months?"
"Possibly longer."
I looked at the collapsed ground behind the Rootmaw.
"These animals navigate by vibration."
"Yes."
"And Preybridge weapons flooded the soil with a frequency designed to interfere with Hunt-Born nerves."
Juno nodded slowly.
"If the Rootmaws use related sensory pathways—"
"We may have turned their migration map into static."
Nobody spoke for several seconds. The creature looked less monstrous after that. Still ugly. Still capable of eating a transport. But not malicious.
In pain. Driven somewhere it did not belong. Vyrr spoke rapidly. Vorrn translated.
"Three western nursery corridors collapsed."
"Any casualties?"
"No."
"Young moved?"
"Yes."
Good.
"How many more Rootmaws?"
Vyrr touched the soil. Then held up both hands.
"That many?"
Vorrn shook his head.
"Unknown. Many."
Worse. Arad pulled up the regional map.
"If they're following contamination through the root network, we need the source."
Juno looked at me. I knew that expression.
"No."
He hadn't spoken.
"Still no."
"Your implant contains live adaptive telemetry from Preybridge."
"So?"
"It recorded how the command frequencies changed in response to human neural resistance."
"I am aware of what was done to me."
His expression softened. I hated that.
"Then you know why archived weapon data isn't enough."
I looked at Arad. She did not pretend otherwise.
"The system learned against your nervous system in real time," she said. "Your interface holds part of that record."
"Take it out."
"We can't safely remove it in the field."
"Copy it."
"Static copy loses adaptive response."
"Naturally."
Everything important apparently required the part of me I most wanted to forget existed.
"Who knows the western root routes?" I asked.
Nobody answered. They did not need to. I laughed once.
"No."
Vyrr pointed west.
"Shaarr."
"Yes, I gathered that."
Vorrn looked almost pleased.
"Territory outranks discomfort."
"You're enjoying this."
"No."
"Liar."
A communication alert sounded on Arad's tablet. She answered. The technician's face appeared. Pale.
"Another collapse."
"Where?"
A red marker appeared. Western nursery corridor. Vyrr changed instantly. No humor.
Guardian. She was gone before Arad finished speaking. Vorrn followed. Juno looked at me.
"Rowan."
"I'll investigate the Rootmaws."
He waited.
"With Shaarr if that's operationally necessary."
Still waiting.
"Nothing about that sentence includes mating."
"I wasn't going to say it did."
"Your face did."
He sighed.
"Compatibility may become stronger in proximity."
"Then it becomes stronger."
"Pain may increase."
"Pain isn't consent."
"No."
"Glad we've solved that."
I grabbed my field pack. Arad said, "You leave tomorrow." I nodded. Then remembered the scar.
Pale armor. Left lateral eye. My targeting display. My stomach tightened.
Not proof. Memory could lie. Smoke could reshape edges. Trauma loved certainty until someone asked for details. I would tell Shaarr when I knew. That decision felt reasonable. It was not.
I just didn't know that yet.