The Last Hunter - Collected Edition (31 page)

14

My heart rate hits hummingbird speeds as I watch the oozing, fleshy sack descend to the floor. I reach for Whipsnap, searching around with my hands, afraid to look away for even a moment. When I can’t find my weapon, my panic skyrockets. I have no choice but to turn around. I see it lying five feet away among a pile of discarded feeder bones. A pile I accumulated during my stay here.

I dive for the weapon, snatch it up and spin around. Despite my belief that the feeder is already upon me, the thing has not yet hatched. The teardrop womb rests on the floor, still connected to Gaia far above by a pulsing umbilical.

This is the best time to strike. When the feeder is still trapped in the womb, defenseless and unaware of the danger. But I can’t bring myself to attack. Not yet. I’ve faced feeders and killed them as myself—as Solomon—when I was first brought here, but it was in self-defense at first. And then for food. This would be neither, because I still have rations and can easily hide from the feeder at the top of the fifteen foot wall. My rations will eventually run out, but I don’t want to kill something if I don’t have to. Even if it is a Nephilim.

The birth sack stretches as the thing inside tries to break free. But the shape is all wrong. This is no feeder. It’s something else. Something taller.

Fingers poke through the womb’s skin. Human fingers. A second set of fingers pokes through and pulls. The two hands pull apart, sheering the womb away. Thick fluid oozes out onto the floor. The crouched creature stands up, cloaked in shadow, silhouetted by the wall of glowing crystals behind it. I can’t yet make out the details, but the shape is decidedly human. A woman, I think. But her movements are stiff and awkward.

A thousand questions rush through my mind, but before I can attempt to answer even one of them, she catches my scent. So she has something in common with the feeders. They’re ravenously hungry when born. Her head snaps in my direction. Though I can’t yet see her eyes, I can feel them on me, sizing me up. She’s more intelligent than the other feeders, who spent little time thinking before pouncing.

Perhaps I can reason with her?
I think.

She hisses.

Probably not.

I raise Whipsnap in my hands, letting her see the spiked mace and sharp blade, hoping it will make her think twice. I have no intention of using the weapon—if she attacks I’ll scale the wall and see if she follows—but
she
doesn’t know that.

I’m startled when she leaps through the air, cutting the distance between us in half. She’s fast, strong and will have no trouble following me out of the pit. Ninnis has thought of everything it seems. I’ll have no choice but to fight, and kill, this person.

But it’s not a person
, I remind myself. As much as this thing looks human, it is Nephilim. And I still have no problem killing them.
This isn’t enough to break me
, I think.
I can do this.

She’s only twenty feet from me now. Her body is covered in goopy red birth fluid, which is different from normal feeders. Her face is hidden behind a curtain of shoulder length black hair. It’s been so long since I’ve seen anyone without a full head of blood red hair that my eyes linger on the hair. Something about it is familiar. The way it parts and descends in wet waves that will curl as they dry.

Oh God. Please, no.

My fear is confirmed when it speaks. “Solomon.”

“No!” I scream. “Not her!”

“Solomon, come here.”

I’ve heard her say that before. The voice is perfect. How is that possible?

It’s not
, I think. The only way she could be here, is if she was
really
here.

“Solomon,” she says, bending to one knee and stretching her arms out toward me. “It’s
so
good to see you, son.”

Tears blur my eyes. “Mom?”

“Yes, Solomon. Come hug me.”

I’m stuck in place, rooted like some ancient tree. Part of me wants to rush forward and wrap my arms around her. But I also remember how she moved a moment ago. My mother wasn’t—isn’t—that athletic. And the hiss. But her voice. It’s her. It has to be.

I take a step forward, but stop again.

She called me “son.” My mother never called me, “son.” I have imagined reuniting with my parents several times. If my mother—my real mother—were to see me, she would rush up and hug me whether I was holding Whipsnap or not. She would trust me. She would weep loudly. I look up at the woman, arms still outstretched, waiting calmly for me to approach.

This is
not
my mother.

I flash back to a memory. I’m four. My mother is reading
Are You My Mother?
to me despite me being fully capable of reading it to her. Even before I could read, I had the story memorized and could recite it. But I liked the scary snort and the sound of my mother’s voice when she read, “I know who you are. You are a bird, and you are my mother.”

“You,” I say, “Are not my mother.”

She stands and brushes the hair from her face, tucking it behind her ears.

I step back with a gasp.

It
is
my mother. Her face. Her eyes. Her hair.

My mind reels for a moment, but I still know, without a doubt, that this thing birthed from the belly of Gaia is not who she claims to be. “You are
not
my mother!” I scream.

My faux-mother grins, revealing several rows of shark-like teeth.

Like I said, not my mother.

She leaps forward, hands reaching out for me, mouth stretched open. If it reaches me, this thing will tear me to shreds and eat every bit of flesh off my bones.

But it won’t get close.

Its bold attack poses little threat.

And because it’s a Nephilim, I feel no guilt turning Whipsnap’s blade tip toward its chest.

She sees the blade coming and shouts, “No!” Her eyebrows turn up in fear.

And for a moment, I’m unsure.

But then the blade has struck, piercing ribcage and lung all at once. The perfect kill shot. Ull would be proud.

She staggers back, pulling the blade from her chest. Blood flows in chugs as her heart pumps it from her body. “Solomon,” she says, “How could you?”

I want to tell her to shut up, that she’s not my mother, but I can’t speak. Because her face and voice are my mother’s.

I step closer.

She backs away.

Her fear wounds me.

She falls to her knees. “I love you, Sol.”

The words strangle me. I weep openly, watching her life ebb.

“My baby,” she says. “At least I got to see you one…more…time.”

She dies at my feet.

Now that she’s no longer trying to kill me, she looks exactly like my mother. My dead mother. That I killed.

I drop to my knees beside her and lean my head against hers. “I’m sorry, mom. I’m so sorry.”

My face is wet with tears and snot and I remember the last time I felt guilt like this. It was when Ninnis first began stalking me. It was at night. And snowing. And when Aimee snuck up behind me, I thought she was him. One punch. I threw
one
punch and knocked her out cold. I was consumed by guilt afterwards. But it wasn’t my fault.

It was Ninnis.

This
was Ninnis.

Anger begins to replace my sadness as I realize Ninnis’s plan. One by one, I’ll be forced to kill my mother, my father, and who knows who else from my past until I no longer care.

I will kill them.

I will eventually eat them to survive.

And I…

Will…

Break.

I pull back from the body of this mother-shaped feeder. With my face turned to the ceiling, I fill my lungs and scream, “NINNIS!”

As my thunderous voice echoes in the pit, something else happens.

The solid stone floor beneath my feet—it shakes.

15

My fall is broken by my mother’s—the feeder’s—body. The earthquake knocked me off my feet. Several of the glowing yellow crystals in the walls popped free. Bones rattled. And high above, in the dark recess of the ceiling that is beyond my view, Gaia shrieks. It is the first time she has revealed her presence in this place.

The tremor was not part of Ninnis’s plan.

But what was it?

My first inclination is to write it off as a normal earthquake. But nothing here is normal. It felt like the pounding foot falls of Behemoth, but I know there are no caverns large enough to hold that monster anywhere near here. Maybe it was caused by the explosion Ninnis set off? I shake my head. The earthquake didn’t originate from that side of the cavern.

It originated…from me. The timing is the giveaway. At the height of my emotions, when I released my anger, the solid stone shook with my rage.

I never realized how complete my connection with Antarctica had become. I’d manipulated the air, mostly. Sometimes water. And snow. But I had never turned my attention fully to controlling stone. And here I am, believing myself entombed by the very earth to which I am bound, the earth that might well move when I command it.

I push myself away from my faux-mother, intent on escape. The three dimensional mental map I’ve created of the surrounding tunnels plays through my mind. Ninnis no doubt waits outside the destroyed entrance. Gaia lurks above. I turn my focus in the direction opposite of Ninnis, mentally working my way through the underground in search of a tunnel that will take me up, and away from this horrible place.

I find a tunnel leading slowly upward, where it connects to another tunnel, one I know very well. It is the tunnel Ninnis took me through when I was kidnapped. The very same tunnel where I once hid the Polaroid picture I now carry with me at all times. It will not only take me to the surface, it will take me to Clark Station Two, and my past.

The thought of facing that place again frightens me almost as much as facing whatever creature Gaia births next, but I can’t stay here. I can’t face even one more of those things.

The stone at the side of the pit is rough against my hand. I place my other hand against it, not knowing if physical touch is required, but it seems to make sense. I guess. I don’t really know. But it feels right, so I close my eyes, push on the stone and will it to—

—what?

Open?

Disintegrate?

Compress?

Nothing happens, and I think it’s because I really need to decide how this is going to work. It’s not like moving air or water.

Or is it?

Everything is composed of atoms. Some are more loosely packed, like water or air, and others are tightly packed, like stone. Perhaps when I shift the wind, I’m really moving the atoms? But maybe the connection is even deeper than that? When people have strong emotions, it’s reflected in their bodies. Extreme stress can destroy an immune system. Happy people are healthier and live longer. So do people with dogs. And unhappy people, well, they die faster and often on Monday mornings.

And when I have extreme emotions, the environment here reacts. The winds often react to my fear, occasionally saving me from a fall or projectile. Storms brew when I panic. And now, the earth itself shakes at my rage. It’s as though this continent—a land as vast as the United States—is now part of my physical body. Perhaps that’s why I don’t feel temperature changes? I
am
the temperature. I can’t feel it any more than I can the individual organs in my own body.

I don’t control the environment. I don’t manipulate this external thing. I am it. It is me.

But it is also beyond me. I’m used to controlling my small human body, not an entire continent. I don’t think my brain, or any brain could handle that much sensory input. Thankfully, the continent seems to be on autopilot, much like the human heart or lungs—involuntary muscles that require no actual thinking.

Carving a hole through the earth is voluntary. Something I need to focus on to achieve.

So I take a deep breath, clear my mind and imagine the earth opening. I see myself stretching out into the stone, comingling atoms. The ground starts to shake. My heart races as I exert a kind of force I never have before. I slide my hands apart. A loud crack echoes in the chamber. The shaking grows more intense.

I scream as muscles in my arms burn. My head pounds with every heartbeat. And then, when I can’t take any more, I fall to the ground gasping like I’ve just nearly drowned. My vision goes black for a moment, but three deep breaths clear my eyes and I see it. A tunnel, barely big enough to squeeze through has been opened in the stone wall.

But is it deep enough? Does it reach through two hundred feet of stone?

Too exhausted to stand, I drag myself toward the mouth of the tunnel and smell the air. It is dank and old. Like the pit. I have failed and lack the energy to try again. I’ll have to face another feeder, and—

My hair twitches, tickling the side of my face. A breeze blows across my face, carrying the scents of snow and a hint of salt water. The smells of the surface!

Invigorated by the odor of freedom, I pull myself to my feet, but find my legs wobbly beneath my weight. Using Whipsnap as a cane, I hobble into the tunnel, and lean against the wall, scraping my shoulder with each step.

When I get ten feet into the tunnel, Gaia must sense I’m no longer in the pit because she starts shrieking. Ninnis will know I’ve escaped somehow, but it will take him time to clear the debris from the entrance. Then again, maybe he’ll drop down from the ceiling where Gaia is hiding. I do my best to ignore the pain and exhaustion wracking my body, and focus on the remaining one hundred and ninety feet.

Each step feels like a knife in my stomach, and I’m fighting the urge to vomit, not because I need what little food is in there or because it would be gross, but because the scent would be easy to track. And I don’t want Ninnis to know where I’ve gone.

I stumble out of my escape route and into the larger tunnel that leads to the surface. I’ve nearly reached my goal, but now must cover my tracks. If Ninnis finds and follows my new tunnel here, he’ll know where I’ve gone. If he found me now, I would be in real danger. If he finds me after I close this tunnel, I would be defenseless.

I place my hands on the sides of the tunnel, close my eyes and grit my teeth. With the last of my energy, I bring my hands together and feel the stone closing. But not all of it. More than half the tunnel remains open, and Ninnis will follow it. But he will not find me. It will be as though I disappeared.

I slide to my knees. Sweat pours from my forehead. My body shivers. It will soon shut down.

After wrapping Whipsnap around my waist, I crawl on my hands and knees, following the tunnel up. The pain and physical trauma take me back to my past. I was eight. It was winter. I had dug a fort in the snow pile across the street from our house. My mother called me in for lunch and on my way back, I decided to pole vault a puddle with my shovel. Little did I know the sidewalk was sheer ice. When I landed, my feet shot out from under me and I fell flat on my back. The air exploded from my lungs and my whole back tensed with pain. Eight years old and I thought I was dying. I pulled myself, using just my arms, past two houses, and then up the stairs to my house, where I remained in bed for three days.

I’m repeating that memory now, crawling to safety while my body reels from a sudden and horrible punishment. While I know I’m not dying this time, I know I might if I linger. I reach the top of the tunnel fifteen minutes later and slide out onto the snow covered mountainside. Clark Station Two is just a mile away; most of the trip is downhill.

I can make it
, I tell myself.
Just push harder.

So I push.

I emerge from the tunnel and onto the snow like a new born seal. Gravity does the rest. The snow is packed tight and I slip over it, gaining speed with each passing second. I lie on my back, watching the clouds pass through the dark blue sky.

I see a bunny
, I think, blinking my eyes at a rabbit shaped cloud. It’s been so long since I’ve seen a bunny.

I blink again. My head lolls to the side. Cruising down the mountainside like a bobsled freed from the track, I blink one last time, seeing stones whizzing past.

And then I fall asleep.