Eden (21 page)

Stacked haphazardly in the corner was a heap of decomposing corpses. The bodies had been thrown one on top of the other like rubbish. Here and there, he could see the whiteness of bone gleaming grotesquely amongst the mound of putrefied flesh.

Matt turned and gagged. He felt shaken, and made his exit quickly. He found his way back to the main corridor, guided by the need to leave the spaceship.

He’d seen enough. Enough to know that he and Bodie had been right about Fly, and Jenny was wrong.

Movement in the far distance made him stop in mid pace and he watched as Fly, unaware of Matt
’s
watchful eye, exited from his cabin. Matt licked his lips, thinking fast. He edged around the wall, knowing that if Fly turned for any reason he would be seen.

The alien hadn’t actually forbidden them to explore, but he felt Fly wouldn’t be pleased to know he had been snooping, especially if he
realiz
ed that Matt now knew the truth about him.

As he crept along behind the alien his knee knocked against something jutting out of the wall. His old injury complained bitterly, and breath escaped from his mouth in a smothered cry.

Fly turned sharply, the long mane of his black hair falling around his shoulders, and his eyes glittered green, reflecting as a cat
’s
would, as they searched the dim area.

Matt edged further along the corridor, not frightened, but wary. He peered around the corner. Fly was still facing him but staring off into another direction.

“Ugly son of a bitch,” Matt whispered.

Fly cocked his head. Then his head snapped round, and his eyes seemingly fastened onto Matt. Automatically Matt flattened himself against the wall. He waited until he was sure he was alone before moving.

There was no sign of the alien. Fingering the bloodied knife lying snugly in the waistband of his trousers he said, “We
’re
equal now, buddy. “

Jenny and Bodie were alone, much to Matt
’s
relief. They sat either side of a small fire. Jenny was peeling vegetables and Bodie was twisting long lengths of twine.

“Very domesticated,” he said stepping out of the ship.

“Where have you been?” Bodie wrinkled his nose. “You stink!” “He
’s
been snooping around the ship,” said Jenny, concentrating on peeling the yellow skinned vegetables.

Matt patted her sarcastically on the head. “Missed me, sweetheart? What
’s
this in your hair?” He pulled something out, none too gently, and closely studied a bead of grain. He began to toss it to one side, but Bodie held out his hand for it.

“Where’d you get this?”

“Jen
’s
hair,” Matt grinned.

“They
’re
from the tall yellow flowers.” Her face turned pink, as if a memory had resurfaced. “Why the interest?”

“I
’ll
tell you why,” he tossed the small grain up in the air and caught it again. “It
’s
some kind of wild wheat. The alien
’s
done well for himself but he
’s
lived only from day to day.” He tossed the grain again, not
realiz
ing how silent Jenny had become. “If there
’s
wheat there may be other sources of cereal. We can sow crops; make our own food - God, the possibilities are endless!” His face became red in his excitement. “What exactly is there on this planet apart from ice and wolves?”

Matt watched the guilty flush rise on Jenny
’s
face.

“We’ve already planted crops. We’ve cattle, and - and everything,” she said lamely, avoiding eye contact.

“Sorry for coming to your rescue and messing up your
cozy
little home-life,” Matt said. He laughed. “Do you wear loincloths for Sunday best?”

“Shut it, Matt!” Bodie snapped, and turned to Jenny tentatively, as if afraid she was about to jump up and disappear with Fly and he’d never see her again. “Is this the same
shelter
where you keep disappearing to each day?”

She nodded.

“God, I hadn’t believed your relationship with the alien had developed so far,” he exploded. He raised his hand to rake nonexistent hair, but only disturbed old bloodied crusts on his head instead. “You
’re
a regular Tarzan and Jane, aren’t you?”

“Isn’t that what I’ve been trying to tell you?” said Matt.

“I’ve told you, time and again, that it was serious between us. But you never listen,” she cried. Both ignored Matt. “Fly and I have a good life here, a happy one. We’ve a house, cattle, crops, and we
’re
very comfortable together. “

“I never
realiz
ed you’d gone this far... he called it a shelter! I thought it was a small den not a house.”

Jenny looked both distressed and frustrated at the same time. “But I did try and tell you.”

Matt raised his eyebrows. It seemed her relationship with Fly had finally been
recognized
...

...Although still disbelieved.

“You can’t really believe you love him? He
’s
an alien. Jenny, sweetheart, you don’t need him. You have us. There
’s
no need to prostitute yourself -”

Her shocked gasp was very audible, and drowned Matt
’s
loud
guffaw.

“
I’m
sorry.” Bodie held up his hands in an act of innocence. “I didn’t mean -”

Jenny threw down the half-peeled vegetable. She stood, arms akimbo. “Just get it into your head, will you? Fly and I love each other!”

Matt gave another hoot of laughter, but Bodie
’s
face paled dramatically.

She glared at them one last time, before storming off up the
hill.

“Well done, I couldn’t have got rid of her faster if I’d tried,” said Matt, still grinning.

Bodie rubbed his eyes with the forefinger and thumb of the same hand. “We
’re
losing her, Matt. I can’t get through to her at all. The alien
’s
won.”

Matt crouched down by his chair, knuckles supporting his weight between his legs. “Not by a long shot,” he grinned. “You
’ll
never guess where I’ve just been.”

“Yes, where exactly have you been? You’ve been gone most of the morning.”

Matt smiled. “This was no ordinary spacecraft exploring the cosmos; it was some kind of a flying penitentiary system. Neither was the spaceship brought down by the asteroids - the ship had been protected by that bombardment. No, it came down because of some sort of mutiny between the prisoners and the crew. Wonder which was Fly?”

Bodie shook his head, and blustered, “What the hell are you going on about... a flying penitentiary... ?”

“System,” Matt filled in for him.

Bodie
’s
eyes grew wide as Matt
’s
words began to take effect. “Jenny said that he said an asteroid had been the cause of his spaceship crashing.”

Matt nodded. “He was lying. I saw, with my own eyes, the device that protected them from a would-be fatal impact.”

“What
’s
made you believe the ship was full of prisoners?”

He tapped his nose. “By snooping, that
’s
how. Am I gonna surprise Fly with my discovery or what!”

“Now hold on,” Bodie held up a cautionary finger.

“Keep your hair on,” he said, and laughed at his joke, but Bodie only glared at him. “I’ve sussed out the spaceship and its crew, Bodie, and I think our alien should know what we know - especially Jenny, don’t you?”

“I don’t know anything!” Bodie said. “You
’re
talking crap as usual, and not telling me a bloody thing.”

“I
’ll
reveal all this dinnertime,” he said. “Have you done your exercises today, Commander?” he asked as he noted Bodie gently rubbing the painful area on his thighs.

“Don’t change the subject,” Bodie answered. “Fly
’s
dangerous and I don’t want Jenny, or us, put into any more danger than we already are!”

“Oh,” Matt flapped a hand in Bodie
’s
face, “he isn’t any different to us really, and I don’t see why we should feel scared of him anymore.”

“You don’t?” Bodie looked
skeptical
.

“You
’re
all brains and no balls,” Matt mocked as he knelt down in front of him and took one of Bodie
’s
ankles in the two of his hands, and gently began to raise and lower the right leg, as Bodie struggled not to cry out with pain.

He did the same to the other leg. “
I’m
wondering if the splints should come off -”

“No,” Bodie snapped. “I
’ll
tell you when they come off, not you or some bloody dead-eyed alien!”

Matt grinned, and positioned Bodie
’s
legs back on the chair where they’d been resting. Rising, he locked his fingers together and stretched out his arms, simultaneously cracking his knuckles,

“Time for your physio, Commander.”

“Be gentle this time,” Bodie said, as Matt knelt down again, and took one of his legs in his lap. “Gentle, I said!”

Matt grinned. “We
’ll
have you up on your feet in no time, Commander. “

Bodie grunted and then moved his eyes in the direction behind Matt. He said, in a lowered voice, “Just promise me, you
’ll
not say anything of what you’ve found until we’ve had a chance to talk.”

Matt glanced over his shoulder and saw Jenny and Fly slowly walking down the hill.

“Well now,” he said. “Tarzan and Jane are back.”

“Matt.” Bodie said, in a warning tone.

Matt looked at him, then winked, “Dinnertime.”

TWENTY-TWO

Bodie acted as if he was in high spirits during dinner, but secretly he was petrified of what Matt was going to reveal. If the alien turned nasty what chance would they have? He was a cripple and Matt had a gammy knee. And right now, Matt was taking a perverse delight in tormenting him.

Bodie spiked a chunky piece of vegetable with his pointed wooden knife and bit into its darkened flesh. His ears pricked up. Matt and Jenny were discussing Taurus, and the perilous journey they had made through space to get here.

“Jenny tells us your cause of crash was the same as ours,” Matt addressed Fly, and Bodie
’s
heart leaped at the innocent question.

Fly looked up. His dead eyes showed nothing, but it was probably the first time Matt had ever addressed him politely and Bodie wouldn’t have been surprised if the alien
’s
pause was caution.

“The asteroids caused sufficient damage to the craft,” he said at
last.

“They went completely undetected by us, too,” said Jenny.

“You wouldn’t think a ship that size would notice the impact let alone crash because of it,” Matt said. He caught Bodie
’s
eye, and winked. Bodie
’s
heart sank. This was it. This was when Matt was going to reveal what he knew about the spaceship and the crew.

“We landed safely,” Fly said.

“Oh, I thought you crashed,” Jenny said.

Fly directed his unblinking gaze on her. “We landed safely but wounded.”

“Damaged,” she corrected. She speared a vegetable. “You landed thinking there was little damage, and the explosion caught you
unaware, I suppose.” She raised her fork to her mouth. “How awful.”

Fly agreed, and scooped up sweet vegetables on his spoon and put them in his mouth.

“An explosion created extensive damage to the lower region, but the upper deck was hardly touched,” Matt continued. “Funny that, especially as it was the place where the asteroid came in.”

“The asteroid caused a chain reaction, which resulted in the explosion in the lower floors,” Fly said. “Nothing strange when the engine room and other electrical departments were ready to ignite.”

Matt fingered his chin, and “hummed” very dramatically. “But how come the floor, where the asteroid came in, was sealed off? With that type of protection your spacecraft wouldn’t have gone through the type of devastation that occurred, other than environmental.”

Bodie
’s
eyes flickered over to Fly, knowing the next move was his. And as he looked, Fly withdrew the long knife that he kept secure around his upper thigh, and began to clean his claws with the tip of the blade. This was a deliberate attempt to intimidate Matt, and Bodie looked over to see if it had been successful.

Matt was staring hard at Fly, looking far from put off.

“Your spaceship is, or rather
was,
some kind of flying penitentiary system. “

A silence fell on the ground, broken only by the horned creature
’s
snorts as it sniffed hopefully for food while tethered to the ground by a wooden stake and Jenny
’s
soft intake of breath.

Matt grinned, obviously pleased at the impact his words caused. “Your ship was no more than a flying prison, clearing your planet of undesirables. Am I getting closer still?”

Fly returned his knife to his thigh belt. “What interest is it to
you?”

Matt looked smug, clearly knowing he had hit his target. “It was a ship designed for lengthy flights, wasn’t it? A magnificent ship really, and it wasn’t destroyed when it came down, and as I’ve said already, it was protected from asteroids. And
I’m
ninety-nine per cent certain it could’ve re-launched itself. So if the asteroid didn’t cause all the destruction, what did?”

Fly was silent, and his passive stare was fixed on Matt. But if Bodie, or even Matt, had Jenny
’s
insight, they would have seen a brief flash of pain pass over his face. As it was, nobody noticed a change in his alien, expressionless, mask.

“I found rows and rows of tiny cabins on the highest floors. Only they weren’t cabins, but stinking, filthy cells. Some we still occupied by lone bodies otherwise each cell was empty, apart from chains and shackles. And the dead I saw looked to have been victims of murder or of an assassination of some kind. Their deaths certainly hadn’t been natural, anyway.”

Bodie glanced at Jenny, and followed her gaze resting on Fly
’s
ankle. Bodie added two and two together and came up with the correct answer.

“Jesus,” he said.” He looked across at Matt. “God Matt, I wish you’d had kept this just between us.”

Matt raised his eyebrows. “Why? Do you think Fly
’s
a danger to us?” He clapped a hand to his mouth with dramatic emphasis. “My, he might have been a prisoner!”

Bodie pursed his lips angrily and said nothing. He looked at Fly who was staring at Matt without expression, or rather with an expression that was too strange for Bodie to decipher.

Matt was grinning smugly, without fear, at Fly. And that
’s
what worried Bodie. He felt helpless and vulnerable without the use of his legs, and needed Matt to think rationally before they got themselves into deep trouble with the alien.

Alien or not, Fly was a huge bison of a man. Matt on his own stood no chance against him.

Matt belched loudly, and patted his stomach. “Pardon me,” he said. “Better out than in, rather like Fly in a plane at 40,000 feet.” He grinned around at everyone, clearly pleased with his own wit.

The others ignored him, knowing his games.

“What happened to everyone else?” Bodie asked Fly, trying to keep his voice as meek as possible. He was aware Matt would think him weak, but he didn’t care. It was survival.

“I presume they are all dead,” Fly answered.

Bodie stroked his newly grown beard, his blue eyes never leaving Fly
’s
face. The scientist in him was aroused. “Why?” he asked. “Why do you presume they are dead?”

“We are an incredibly violent race,” Fly said after a moment
’s
pause. “Not aggressive, but violent in a way you could not comprehend. I used to read about Earth
’s
inhabitants and ever since, I have become intrigued by your “gentler” culture. The divide between us is great.”

“So, what crime did you commit?” Matt demanded.

“I don’t think any of that matters,” Jenny said, she glared at him before turning her angry gaze onto Bodie.

Bodie felt like she had slapped him. He lowered his head, feeling ashamed as if he had done the snooping instead of Matt. “Murder,” Fly said in a low voice. “I murdered people.”

The smug smile from Matt
’s
face slipped - for a moment. He slapped his thigh, and looked triumphantly across at Jenny. “There!” he said. “Doesn’t that prove you’d be wise to stay away from him?”

Bodie was dumbstruck. He stared from Fly to Jenny knowing his mouth was hanging open.

“I - I knew all about it,” she stammered at Bodie
’s
unspoken question. “H-he told me everything.”

Matt leaned over. “Liar,” he said in her face.

Bodie watched her
color
up, and Matt sniggered.

“So, murderer, what happened to the spaceship and its occupants?” Matt asked impatiently.

After a pause, Fly relied, “Rebellion. There was a rebellion between the wardens and the prisoners.”

Bodie felt some of his forbearance lifting. Fly seemed anxious, as if he were afraid Matt
’s
discovery would make Jenny turn against him, Bodie thought.

“Tell us what happened,” said Jenny softly.

Fly turned his head and looked at her. “The Itor justice system decided to stop executing its criminals and, instead, fly them into deep space where it could discard them on a suitable - though not necessarily hospitable - planet.” He turned towards Matt. “How did you phrase it? Clearing our planet of undesirables?”

“That
’s
right, like yourself,” Matt replied with a smirk.

Bodie bit his lip to suppress a grin. Matt certainly had balls! “How long has this punishment been going on?” he asked. He turned towards Fly, leaning as far forward in the chair as his crippled body would allow, so that he could hear every single piece of information. His earlier anxiety was gone, in its place was the abhorrence one might feel for a drunken vagrant.

“Three prison ships have been sent to inhospitable planets. The first blew up before it left the atmosphere on Itor, the second made it, and we were the third, and ironically, the final batch. I suppose, while it lasted, it was a way of marking a planet with new blood.”

“And was the ship
’s
misfortune down to the captives?” asked

Jenny.

“The ship smelled of mutiny long before it came down, and I knew the wardens were not going to abandon us alive.

“When the asteroid struck the ship, many of us were able to escape in the confusion. I made several explosives, which I set around the ship, and then I deliberately allowed myself to be captured -”

“You killed your fellow prisoners to save yourself?” Matt asked in obvious disgust. He began to say more, but Jenny interrupted him.

“Matt, please!” said Jenny. “Go on, Fly.”

“My capture meant I would be taken to the basement for punishment,” Fly continued. “But it would also mean that I would be safe when the explosives blew. It did mean many people would die, but we are not a social race... at least I never thought so.”

“Basement?” said Matt, and everybody looked at him, expecting another caustic remark. “I went down there. I found more leg chains and other devices that reminded me of medieval torture appliances. Itor carcasses had been left to rot. Many were just piles of bones, others were on the point of decomposing, but some were hardly touched by decay at all. They looked almost human...”

Bodie blew out in a whistle. “Wow,” he said. “A graveyard cellar.” He looked hard at Fly. “I suppose you were meant to be one of those bodies?”

Fly seemed deep in thought. Bodie watched his face, trying to find away into his mind. If he could’ve seen inside he would have been horrified at the re-runs in Fly
’s
head.

Jenny laid a hand on his arm. “If this is too hard for you to talk about.”

“No.” He looked at her. “It isn’t. I was just wondering how I would react to the violence now. Everyone was desperate for survival that day, me included. Each of us reacted in the way we were accustomed.

“I was taken to the basement and punished,” his face twisted into a smirk, and he said almost to himself: “although the
punishment
was a pleasure.”

“What do you mean?” Bodie asked, not willing to let any information slip pass.

“I killed my torturer, but not before I had been shackled.” He grimaced in memory. “I had to break my ankle to escape the restraints. But the fire was still raging, and I was forced back into the basement. I burst a water main and lived on nothing but water for a long time. When I got out, the bodies were numerous. Most had been killed in the blast and fire, others by their injuries and the rest just continued to fight amongst themselves until none was left.”

Bodie watched Jenny lower her hand to Fly
’s
thigh. Slowly he picked it up and turned it over in his, as if overawed by its size.

“I thought you had been in the fire,” she said. “What happened to your body and face?”

“My lifestyle.”

Jenny continued to gaze up at him from eyes that held only anxiety and confusion. Bodie felt sorry for her, Fly
’s
story hadn’t been nice, but hopefully it would put a distance between them.

“I suppose that explains why you don’t want to return home.” She shook her head. “It
’s
horrific. I really had no idea your world was like that. Why didn’t you tell me?”

“That is my past, and has nothing to do with my future.”

“Why haven’t your people come for the crew? They don’t know they are all dead, or do they?” asked Bodie with a frown.

“They know. Everybody is fitted with a logging device and only in death does it cease to work. It is probably believed as I am living on an unpopulated planet my punishment is justified. It is what they intended, after all. “

“Where
’s
the device?”

“Injected inside my body. I could not remove it even if I had the means. It is designed to move around and is undetectable.”

Bodie looked at him as if he could see inside his mind. “I think I understand,” he nodded in Jenny
’s
direction. “You
’re
enchanted by her lack of aggression, and that
’s
why you wanted to take care of her.”