Halley
“It might already have a name.” I suppress a smile, my heart fluttering. He’s terrible at flirting. Who knew I was such a sucker for that sort of thing? “Despite our present lack of company, this isn’t exactly a deserted planet.”
“Bah.” He dismisses my suggestion. “If this was previously explored land, then why’s there no pre-existing map?” And he gestures to the tablet in Rin’s hand.
So cool. I can’t see how it’s observing the landscape. Connecting with satellites orbiting the planet? Using its own inbuilt sensors?
I’m beginning to understand Mom’s obsession with contacting extraterrestrial life. Their tablet is far more advanced than anything we’ve got on Earth. If they were to share even a fraction of the science with humans, it’d be revolutionary. Not merely life-changing, but world-changing.
I study the map in more detail. The dot that shows our location is still at the center of the screen, but the whole bottom half of the tablet now shows the small section of ravine we’ve traveled through, while the top half of the screen remains blank, showing the part we’ve yet to explore.
And the dot that marks the location of the trikon we’re hunting is still at the northernmost edge, indicating that we’re heading in the right direction but that it’s too far away from us to show up properly on the map.
“We have an actual plan, don’t we? For what we’re going to do when we find our quarry.” This feels like something I should’ve asked about before now, except that I’ve been too obsessed with thinking about pheromones and trying not to think too closely about two guys at once.
“This trip was only ever supposed to take three days,” I say.
“That means sometime this afternoon we’re going to be fighting the trikon and beginning the return journey back to the ship.
” I glance at the sky. A small sliver is visible between the ravine walls, and what’s usually a bright, clear blue is turning dusky grey with the approach of night.
“Has it wandered farther than we first thought?” I ask, with another glance at Rin’s tablet. Without being able to read any of the alien writing, it’s impossible for me to guess how much distance remains between the two dots.
“No, it’s stationary,” Eot replies, stumbling on a loose stone underfoot.
“So…is that normal behavior for a trikon? Do they usually go hunting for a farmer’s bimor and then sit stationary for three days?” I glance back at Keelo, including him in the conversation, but neither he nor Eot answers me.
“You have fought a trikon before, right? Right?” My voice pitches high as my heart races in my chest. I’d assumed Keelo and Eot knew what they were doing. I’d followed them into the desert, risking all the horrors that come with getting lost on this planet, assuming they had a plan.
They share a look, although neither of them looks at me.
“Right?”
“We’re Arrok,” Keelo eventually says, his voice a growl. “How hard can it be?”
How hard? I force myself to take a steadying breath.
“Please tell me that you at least know what a trikon is.” I don’t technically phrase it as a question, because it would be absurd to accept a job to hunt and kill a dangerous predator without knowing what that predator is.
I slip my hands behind my back, crossing my fingers that they laugh in my face.
When nobody responds, I swear my heart drops into my stomach.
We’re Arrok, Keelo had said, presumably meaning that he and Eot can body meld into a tornado and kill the trikon without first bothering to check how big it is or how dangerous it is. But if it eats bimors for breakfast, lunch and dinner, then it’s got to be big. Like really fucking big.
And I know Eot and Keelo are big too, when they’re joined together, but that doesn’t make them invincible.
“What if something happens to you two?” I demand, wrapping an arm around Rin’s waist and hugging her to my side.
“What do you think will happen to Rin then? You can’t just march into danger when you’ve got a child to look after.
” I turn to Rin. “If anything happens to us, baby girl, you grab one of the bimors and you follow the map back the way we came, right?” I point to the tablet with my free hand, but before I can say anything else, Rin wrenches herself from my hold.
“Don’t yell at them!” she screams at me, her voice cracking.
My first instant is to dance a jig. Rin spoke to me. She spoke.
“I wasn’t yelling—"
“You don’t know anything! They aren’t going to be hurt! They know what they’re doing!”
“I didn’t mean to upset you.” I reach for her, but she stumbles back a few steps, keeping her distance and glaring at me like she’s contemplating my murder.
“I’m sorry. I got scared, sweetheart, and I said some stuff I shouldn’t have.
” Not within your hearing. I should’ve waited until I was private with Eot and Keelo before scolding them, but I didn’t realize Rin would react this way.
Evidently what I said hit a nerve. Purely because she doesn’t like the idea of Keelo and Eot getting hurt? Or because something else is going on?
This has been a stark reminder that there’s still so much about Keelo, Eot, and Rin that I don’t know.
“Halley was right to be angry,” Eot tells Rin, voice soothing. “Keelo and I don’t have a plan—”
“I’m not in danger!” Rin yells. There are dark splotches on her golden cheeks, and her top lip catches on her tucks as if she’s trying not to cry. “I’m not in danger.”
“No, you’re not,” I hurry to agree. It hurts to see her so distressed. If I could take back my words, I’d do so in a heartbeat. Rewind time and make everything right. “Keelo and Eot are taking really good care of you. And of me.” I force a smile.
It was the wrong thing to do. She flinches when she sees my teeth, stumbling back another step. Her foot catches on the uneven ground, and she falls. Keelo and Eot jump forward, reaching for her. She hits the ground right as they shift into their monstrous form.
I can’t stop my gasp. Holy hell, they’re fast.
He—they?—bundles Rin into their arms, and she throws herself around their thick neck. For someone who’s scared of my smile, she isn’t daunted by the harsh-looking scar running down the center of their combined body or by their mismatched eyes.
They stand, Rin still clinging to them, and she looks small in comparison, a reminder of exactly how young she really is.
“Why don’t we stop here for the night?” I suggest, and when Keelo and Eot nod their agreement, I start dragging blankets from the saddlebags and kicking at the stones, finding a flat place to lay out the bedrolls.
My movements are jerky, and tears prick my eyes.
The last thing in the world I wanted was to hurt Rin’s feelings.
The giant rocks Rin in their arms, and even though I can’t hear her tears, I know she’s crying.
Silent, desperate sobs that shake her entire body.
She’s got her open mouth pressed to the crook of their neck, as if scared of making any more noise.
Tears and saliva dribble down their chest, not that the giant reacts, except to hug Rin tighter to them.
I lay the three bedrolls out in a circle and set the battery-powered stove at the center. Then, I find a couple of large rocks, almost too heavy for me to lift, and make a sort of seat.
The giant sits, a hand round Rin’s waist and another cupping the back of her head. She’s still crying, but her sobs are slowing. She’s exhausting herself.
I turn on the stove and hang one of the flasks on the hook overhead so that the water inside will boil. It isn’t quite dark yet, but the shadows are growing steadily longer, and as soon as the last of the two suns disappears behind the horizon, the temperature’s going to drop fast.
Our dinner is more bland nutrient bars, but I want to make Rin a warm drink—the only way I can think of saying sorry for being so thoughtless.
It’s clear she doesn’t trust me as much as I thought she did.
I’d assumed because she let me hold her hand and talk to her about clouds and sand and old riverbeds that we were friends.
Perhaps I should’ve realized I was pushing myself into her space too fast, too soon. However trusting her relationship is with Eot and Keelo, she’s never been completely at ease in my company, and I’ve potentially made everything so much worse.
I give the three of them—two of them?—some space by unsaddling the bimors and settling them down for the night.
For water, they get these strange gelatinous cubes, which are apparently easier to transport than liquid water.
And for food they get pellets that smell a bit like hay mixed with powdered beef broth.
They’ve got a dry consistency and crumble in my hand when I apply a small amount of pressure, like how I imagine freeze dried food astronauts eat on the NASA space station.
It’s not until darkness has fallen and the stars appear that Rin releases her tight hold of the giant’s neck.
She turns to sit more comfortably on their lap, snuggled up to their broad chest. She watches me across the stove as the water comes to a boil, her eyes narrowed in suspicion and bronze-rimmed from crying.
“I really am sorry, Rin,” I say again, as I add some sweetener to the water and swirl it around in an attempt to dissolve it.
I saw Eot do the same last night, although I think he had a spoon.
I couldn’t find any cutlery among the cooking utensils, and I didn’t want to go hunting through their personal possessions, so I make do without.
I pass the flask to Rin. The outer surface is some sort of material that doesn’t hold heat, because the water inside might be steaming but the flask itself is still cool enough to touch.
I’ve got to physically stop myself from smiling when she takes it, her fingers brushing against my hand.
She doesn’t say anything; I didn’t expect her to, and we eat in silence, me nursing my food bar because my stomach is too full of guilt to be hungry.
Cold air settles over our camp, and I huddle closer to the battery stove and the heat it releases.
I wish I could snuggle up to the giant, as Rin does.
In their hybrid form, I swear they’re radiating twice as much heat as the stove, and I’m sorely tempted to sneak a few inches closer.
I don’t, though, not until Rin has fallen asleep, her soft breathing the loudest sound in the valley.
“Er—” I don’t know what to call them when they’re combined. Keelo-Eot? Keelot? “Tornado?” I venture, and when they look at me and don’t growl, I guess that’s an acceptable name.
“I really didn’t mean to upset her,” I whisper, desperate for them to understand and feeling more alone now than I’ve felt since meeting them.
Tornado just stares at me. I’m a little surprised that I can tell which of their eyes is Eot’s and which is Keelo’s considering they’re both golden. But apparently they’re not as similar as I’d first thought.
As for the rest of the features of their face, it’s hard to see the detail with the muted light from the stove and the ravine casting long shadows across what little isn’t pitch darkness, but I think maybe Tornado’s right side is Eot and their left side is Keelo. Perhaps…
I still haven’t heard them speak in this form. Whose voice will they use, or will it be a combination of the two?
I don’t break eye contact. I don’t know if they’re testing me to see if I’ll flinch away, but I’m not scared.
Like Rin, I think the jagged scar down the center of their body is more intriguing than frightening.
If I thought they’d let me, I’d reach across the distance and trace its progress down their chest with my fingertips.
Instead, I lock my hands in my lap, waiting to see if they’ll accept my apology.