Cartlidge: Rise of the Imperfect Flame (15 page)

“Having fun?”

“Yep.
I brought two towels. Here.”
I tossed her one of the towels,
then
wrapped myself in
the other.

“I’m heading back, so maybe now you’ll be more inclined to
swim.” Halfway back I was fully clothed again, and nearly dry.

Planet: Unknown. Hour: 14 of 20

I didn’t wait long before I decided to swim. I trusted
Jacob, and knew he wouldn’t watch. Still… I submerged myself under the water so
that only my head broke the surface. We were a couple now, sure, but it was
going to be a long time before I felt comfortable with the idea of him seeing
me. After all, I have only recently grown comfortable with his breath on my
neck when we slept. I opened my eyes under the water. Fish and amphibian darted
about my vision. The pond really was a rather peaceful place. I raised my head
and took a breath of air. A beautiful sunset greeted me. Jacob was probably
starting dinner by now. A familiar emptiness filled my stomach. I quickly got
out, dried, and clothed myself. Hunger compelled me to run, but my aching feet
begged me to walk. I listened to both.

As I suspected, Jacob sat by the fire, frying one of our
preserved fish over it. I sat impatiently as he finished his work.

“You went swimming after all?”

“Yeah, hurry up.” I was hungry.

“You can’t rush cooking. How’d you like it?”

“It was nice.” I didn’t really care. I wanted food.

“Just nice?”
I only sighed.
“Alright, alright.”
He pulled the fish meat off of the fire,
then
placed my half onto a salvaged plate. I wolfed it
down greedily.

“It was great, but honestly I don’t know if I can fit it in
my schedule. You know, with all my naps and baths in the hot springs, I just
don’t think I can fit it in anywhere.” I was joking, course. Aside from
fishing, I often had to fight with Jacob for the opportunity to do anything
around the camp. Since he was “the man,” he just had to everything himself. The
naps really did get old, after
awhile
.

“I’m sure you’ll find a way.” He laughed. He seemed to think
that I was simply lazy. The meal was good. I ended up eating half of Jacob’s
food as well as my own. Occasionally Jacob would use spices we salvaged from
the ship to enhance the flavor. Today was one of those occasions.

We slept under the stars that night. It was calm, peaceful.
I was happy. I almost forgot about my past.

Life became routine. We slept late. I spent the day
maintaining the camp and gathering supplies and fruit while Sapphire
entertained herself through napping, bathing, and throwing jokes my way while I
toiled. This often annoyed me, but by the end of the day Sapphire would greet
me with a warm hug, and I would immediately lose the will to fight. Twice a
week Sapphire would travel to the pond to fish,
then
I
would preserve it with salt from the salt deposits in the mountains. We were
content with this life.

For four more
months
life continued
like this.

Another rainy season soon approached. I
has
been roughly a year, since we crashed. The air slowly grew cool. The drought,
however, left everything parched. The grass crackled loudly under our feet.
Trees turned
orangish
brown in color. Fall was
returning.

“I think we should celebrate.” Sapphire dropped her fishing
spoils carelessly onto the ground.

“Celebrate what?”

“You know what. We’ve been here for a whole year! If nothing
else we should celebrate the fact that neither of us have died yet.” I picked
up the fish, sat at our wooden table, and began preparing the meat.

“Don’t jinx it.” I smiled.

“What?”

“
Nevermind
.
Well, what would you propose?”

“Well, we can eat that stash of candy you’ve been hiding
from me.” I should have figured I couldn’t hide it forever.

“Anything else?
Or do you just want
an excuse to eat a few sweets?”

“Hmm… do you have any dancing music?”

“Yeah, one song.
Why?”

“Well, we can have a small feast, watch the sunset, dance
around the fire, and then we can sleep under the stars.”

“Alright.
I’ll start cooking.”
Sapphire shot upwards from her seat, then walked off to gather more fish.

She remained there for almost an hour, making me worry.
Finally she returned.

“Sorry.
Went for a swim.”
I
continued preparing the fish and the fruit. We even found a stray serpent to
cook. The day was late by the time everything was ready.

“What is this?” Sapphire took a slice of meat and ate it.

“That’s meat from the serpent we caught.”

“It’s good. A nice change from the fish meat we eat all the
time.” We continued eating until we were stuffed, then rested for a time to let
our food digest. Finally we walked, hand in hand, to the
cliffside
to watch the sunset. We didn’t speak much, preferring the peace of the moment
instead. At some point we had both fallen asleep leaning against each other.
The sky was
pitch
black. We wandered awkwardly back to
the camp. Immediately I focused on starting a fire. Not long after, we were
both resting peacefully before it.

“You want to tell me about your past now?”

“No.”

“You’ll have to tell me eventually.”

“Maybe, but I’m not quite ready just yet.”

“When will you be ready?” She inched closer.

“Don’t worry. You’ll know.” She stood up and pulled me up
from my seat. I turned to my armor set and started one of the songs. It was a
Rovanekren song that resembled a waltz. We slow danced for several minutes
while it played. Then we sat back down and watched the fire. We rested there
until the fire started to die. Just as its light began to fade I rose from my
spot to ready a blanket for us to sleep on. The last of the fire’s light
disappeared, forcing Sapphire to wander in the dark towards me.

“I’m over here.”

“I can see just fine.” She insisted. I felt her trip over my
legs. She stumbled forward, but she was able to catch herself, and she sat
silently next to me. I kissed her cheek then looked up at the stars. The
planet’s large moon could be seen just over the horizon. The stars themselves
were equally beautiful. Shooting stars could be seen everywhere. We began
pointing them out to each other. Eventually, we started making up our own
constellations. Sapphire curled up next to me.

“I love this place.”

“Yeah…” I began to close my eyes.

“I never want to leave.” My eyes gently opened back up. The
stars now reminded me of home, of the life that I left behind. I remembered the
beacon, and what it meant if someone were to find us. I turned towards Sapphire
and held her. I resolved to turn the beacon off tomorrow.

We slept in for a long time past morning. Neither of us
wanted to leave the other’s warmth behind. Eventually we forced ourselves to
start the day. Rather than take her usual swim, Sapphire invited me to help her
fish. I had intended to visit the ship, but gladly accepted her invitation. We worked
for three hours trying to catch a new supply of fish, mainly because I still
could not manage to catch a single fish. By the time we returned to our camp it
was the afternoon again. Sapphire took a towel and went off to soak in the hot
springs. I waited
some time
after she was out of
sight,
then
returned to our crashed ship.

The darkened sky made me nervous. It had been clear for
months, but was now threatening with thunder and strengthening wind. I refused
to turn back now. I had to turn off the beacon as soon as possible. The small
machine came within view, inspiring me to run. I thought of nothing else. Not
the debris, not the storm, nothing. A bright light flashed before me, traveling
from the sky to a large metal pole some distance ahead of me and a thundering
explosion echoed through the air. The light blinded me for a second, just long
enough to cause me to trip on something. I struck the ground with my left
shoulder,
then
rolled onto my back for a moment.
Forcing my body to ignore the pain, I stood back up. Rain started coming down
violently. I worried about Sapphire, who was probably still at the hot springs.
I had to go back. I swore, and started to run through the pouring rain.

Sapphire and I reached our shelter at the same time. She
carried her clothes in her arms. In their place, had a towel wrapped tightly
around her.

“You alright?”

“Do I look alright to you?! I didn’t-” CRACK! Another bolt
of lightning struck a large dead tree, causing it to burst into flames, then we
stared in horror as it crashed against our shelter. Instantly a roaring fire
swallowed up both trees and much of the dry grass. We both ran towards the camp
and started gathering supplies. Much of it was already ruined. The fire began
to snake through the grass towards the bordering trees. I set my armor in a
large tarp then tied it together with rope like a backpack. Thankfully it had
fallen out of the shelter when the burning tree struck it. I threw the
makeshift backpack over my shoulder, took my rifle and started packing another
backpack full of whatever preserved food we had left. Sweat ran down my face as
I worked. The wind caused the heat to swirl around me, and the rain trapped the
smoke, suffocating me. I took one of our blankets and tied it down to the
second pack with our remaining rope. The fire began to surround me. Grabbing a
few large nails from the pile, I abandoned the rest of our supplies and
rejoined Sapphire at the edge of the clearing. The fire followed, forcing us to
run through the forest. We ran until our lungs felt like they were about to
burst. We had long left the fire behind, but adrenaline kept us running. Before
we knew it, we were right in the middle of the outer field. The whole forest
glowed bright orange from the fire. A pillar of smoke joined the storm clouds.
Still nervous about the storm, we continued on to the adjacent forest, where
the pond was located. A small tree with low hanging branches welcomed us.

Finally we stopped to catch our breath. I looked up at the
storm that had stolen our home away from us. A heavy downpour fell
unmercilessly
from the thick cloud cover, but was somehow
too weak to fight off the wall of fire now consuming our camp. I looked back
across the field, then towards our new found refuge, and sighed. All that work,
ruined. An entire year of building up our camp, and now it was just gone.

“Alright,” I said. “We can tie the tarp to that tree there
for tonight.” Sapphire gave no reply. She stood silent behind me, shivering and
soaked. Her towel was wrapped around her as a blanket.

“I w-was… going to say … I d-didn’t ….
get
t-to ...dry o-off!” she finally replied. Before I could reply another surge of
thunder rang some distance from us.

“Alright… just hold on.” I quickly turned towards the small
tree with the tarp, carefully tied the rest of our salvage on the lowest
branch,
then
bound half of the tarp to another branch
with some of the rope. I attached the other half to the ground with two of the
four remaining nails. I sighed again. We had just lost all the progress of the
past year. Sapphire immediately hid under the makeshift shelter, then reached
for her clothes. I remained outside in the rain while she clothed herself. She
was leaning against the trunk of the tree when I entered, dry but still
shivering. I sat down and began to realize I was shivering as well. We didn’t
dare light another fire, so we both held together in a desperate attempt to
keep each other warm. It would have been almost peaceful had we not been
fighting off bitter cold. The storm lasted for about another hour.

“You know… It isn’t fair.” I said.

“What isn’t?”

“You can keep yourself warm with your tail. I don’t have
one.” Admittedly, it was a weak attempt to lighten the mood. She replied with a
smile and then playfully waved her tail in my face like some sort of brush.

“You mean this tail?” she teased.

“The fur is too long. You should get it cut short. I can
help with that if you want.”

“Don’t you touch my
tail!
” She
turned towards me and grabbed my neck as a playful threat.

“If you don’t keep it out of my face I may have to!” I was
bluffing, but she only huffed and returned to lying silent. I slowly began to
fall into the realm of dreams before her small voice woke me.

“Huh?” I blurted.

“Hold me?” The voice came from Sapphire, who was avoiding
eye contact. After a moment I smiled and wrapped my arms tightly around her. I
heard a small joyful sigh followed by the swishing motion of her tail. I smiled
and let the peaceful void of sleep embrace me.

“Be strong Jacob!”

I woke with a start. A clear sky and warm sun welcomed my
return to the land of day. Sapphire twitched at my movement but remained
asleep. I carefully freed myself from her grasp while her mind continued to
travel through the realm of dreams. I didn’t want to disturb her, so I walked
towards the pond. With a determined effort, I calmed myself. An hour of waiting
finally rewarded me with my first fish. It was as long as my arm and a shiny
royal purple in color with a reddish tint to its scales. Its eyes were bright
green. I grinned like a child. “Looks like it’s time for a celebration!” I
laughed to myself and walked towards the makeshift tent.

A few minutes later I had a nice fire going and the fish
cooking over it. Preparing the fish always created a sickening smell, but
frying it easily made up for that. I continued to grin in my pride. Soon the
tent began to stir and Sapphire crawled out like a devious cat, ready to steal
someone’s food.

“Hey! You caught one!” She exclaimed as she stood up.

“Yeah!
As crazy as it sounds, your
technique actually worked!”

“Oh shut up!” We both began to laugh. While the fish was
cooking, Sapphire went back into the forest to gather more of the fruit. By the
time I finished frying my catch, she returned with her arms filled with all that
she could carry. We decided we could save some fruit for later, but the fish
had to be eaten immediately. I had no salt to preserve it. Towards the end of
the meal Sapphire began to speak.

“
Sho
, I found
Shom-ing
while Pi-
ing
fruit-” She swallowed the piece of fish
in her mouth. “-that looked like lights of some sort.”

“You mean like a town?” I was shocked. A village could have
been a stone’s throw away the whole time.

“No. More like a ship.” Her expression became serious, and
the joyful mood faded away.

“Which way?
We’ll check it out
after we finish storing the fruit.” She pointed southwest. She seemed engulfed
in thought.

In an attempt to guess what she was feeling I began to
speak. “You know
,
if it is a ship we might be able to
leave.”

She was silent for a moment before giving a single word in
affirmation that she heard me. My mind flashed back to when we were on the
Rovanekren ship. They treated her like cargo. Perhaps she was afraid that they,
whoever they were, would treat her the same way.

“Hey, I won’t let them hurt you.” She remained silent. I
thought for a moment that it was the wrong thing to say, but then she replied
unexpectedly.

“Promise me?” She looked at me with an almost desperate
face. I thought for a moment. This was a promise that was typically impossible
to keep. I took a deep breath and spoke.

“I promise to never let anyone hurt you.” She smiled, came
closer, and stole the rest of my food just before running off to the tent. I
sighed. “What is it with that girl and food?” I muttered to myself.

After about ten minutes or so, I finished storing the fruit
in the basket at the top of the tree. First, I put all the pieces of my armor
on, quickly realizing I would have to get re-accustomed to the extra weight. I
packed a small bag with one of the larger fruits and tied it to my belt.
Finally, I reached for the rifle and checked the counter on the magazine.
“Seven rounds.” I sighed and slung the rifle onto my back. Hopefully Sapphire’s
supposed ship was crewed by rescuers and not one of the other possibilities.
Clawtrodons, slavers, pirates, or perhaps some other hostile species I skipped
over in my studies. I exited the tent as I thought of other possible scenarios.
It was almost midday now and Sapphire seemed much more eager to examine the
mystery ship than before. By the time I left the tent she had already made her
way across the field towards her sighting. I tried to run over, but I wasn’t
quite reacquainted with my old equipment, which stubbornly refused to allow me
to move faster than a slow jog. Frustrated and impatient, Sapphire moved out of
sight towards the ship.

“Hey! Wait-” I began to shout. We were getting too close. It
was necessary to remain quiet. I began to get nervous. She was probably within
eyesight of them by now. “She’s smarter than that,” I reassured myself. Finally
managing to reach the top of the hill where Sapphire once stood, I began to
scan the area. The ship (which turned out to be a drop ship) was definitely
visible from here, and about ten or so Rovanekrens hovered around it milling
about while another barked commands. “Well that narrows down the possibilities
at least.” I muttered to myself.

Sapphire motioned from a nearby bush, beckoning me to join
her hiding spot. I could tell that she was furious it had taken so long to
reach her. I silently darted over to the miniature tree she was using as a
camouflage.

“Do you think they're here to find us?” She whispered

“I’m not sure. They could be pirates for all we know.” I
replied.

“Hey, isn’t that the homing beacon from the crash?” Sapphire
pointed to an object towards the rear of the drop ship. She was right. They
must have moved it over here. I cursed myself for not disabling it yesterday,
but then thanked myself for leaving it some distance away from our camp.

“Yeah… it is.”

“Doesn’t that mean they’re looking for us?”

“Or, they could be salvagers.” Salvagers were usually
harmless treasure hunters who searched the galaxy for crashed ships to plunder
for usable parts and cargo. Normally they were not as worrisome as pirates or
slavers, but there have been cases when Salvagers would take prisoners of a
recently crashed ship for ransom, or worse, merchandise for slavers. I looked
at Sapphire. Her life gem would make her priceless and I didn’t have enough
rounds in my rifle if it came down to a firefight. If all else failed, I would
have to rely on my powers to defend us both.

“How will we be able to tell?”

I remained silent for a moment. “Well as long as they don’t
fly off we can watch them a while longer until-”

“Hands up both of you!” A voice barked. I froze in place. We
were caught. My mind went into a fight or flight mentality and my heart began
to race. From the footsteps there were three or four, obviously all armed. I
couldn’t turn to my left because my attacker may end up shooting Sapphire on
accident. If I turned to my right I would be slower and I may get shot myself.
I’d just have to pray that the round hit my armor.

“Are you two deaf? I said hands up!” My eyes shifted to my
right. Sapphire had a look of horror on her face and was just as frozen as I
was. Slowly, I raised my arms and mentally prepared myself.
Three.
Two.
One.
I swung my body as
hard as I could towards our attacker. Three shots rang out. My right arm struck
the rifle. I felt the force of a hammer hit my back twice but I kept going.
Armor, I reassured myself. I grabbed onto the barrel of the rifle with my right
hand, his arm with my left, and tore the rifle away while using my legs to trip
up his. Spinning away, I secured, positioned, and aimed the rifle where it
would be most lethal. I didn’t look but was sure the others had their rifles
pointed at me.

A voice spoke. “Wait...
Cartlidge?
Is that you?” The voice came from out of my sight line. I couldn’t see who it
was, nor did I dare turn to see.

“Guys!
Stand down! Jacob! It’s me,
Walker! Just lower the rifle…” As the adrenaline wore off, I slowly yet
cautiously complied. Only now did I realize that the soldiers were not speaking
in Rovanekren. I handed the rifle back to our would-be captor and muttered an
apology.

“It’s alright sir. We didn’t realize who you were.” The
soldier replied as he rose. I could hear the thinly hidden frustration in his
voice. Sapphire still remained on the ground but she managed to free herself from
her frozen state. I turned to face Walker, who now bore the look of a
commander, from the design of his armor.