Return to Krell

He rose to full height and took a step back, his massive, heavy head seeming to fly away from her as he examined the mark with his yellow eyes. Lena looked towards Sleethe, and her Krell companion seemed pleased, his gaze lingering on her forehead. She couldn't see it herself, but she knew that the elder had drawn an identical mark on her face. It must be important, moreso than she had realized. It wasn't just ceremonial or it would not have needed to be reapplied a second time. She could always use her translator to ask about it, but she felt that she might ruin the moment. She would save that question for later. Maybe it served to signal something to the other villagers, perhaps that they were a couple and that she was off-limits to prospective males.

The Krell had a rather odd method of courting. At a time during their life cycle that UNN scientists had been so far unable to determine, the Krell would collectively go into heat. They would mate with anything and everything that they could get their hands on, engaging in massive breeding frenzies in which dozens of individuals competed for the best partners.

But if at some time during this orgy of reptilian reproduction, an individual found someone that they really clicked with, they would enter a monogamous relationship and proceed to breed with that Krell exclusively. Assuming that the feelings were reciprocated of course. It wasn't yet clear how they chose their forever-mate, but if one was not found, then the Krell in question would simply try again next season. Time was certainly something that the Krell weren't short on. They had hundreds of years in which to search for their ideal partner, and if they didn't find one then it didn't hamper their ability to reproduce with the general population. To a human, free love and commitment were on opposite ends of the spectrum, but the aliens somehow made it work.

Lena and Sleethe were in just such a relationship. She had met him by chance shortly following a breeding frenzy in the Krell barracks, and he had taken a liking to her after being spurned by one of his own kind. There was no accounting for taste, in Lena's opinion that anonymous female had made a very poor romantic decision.

"Make this temple as your home," the elder said, spreading his arms as his booming voice reverberated through the floor. "You may rest within the pits."

"Thank you," Lena said, hoping that her translator would do a good enough job of conveying her gratitude without butchering the simple phrase. After a brief delay her speaker loosed a short rumble that approximated Krell speech, and the elder bowed his massive head deferentially. So far so good, the software was working about as well as she could have hoped.

The elder was now satisfied apparently, passing by them without another word and making his way slowly towards the curtain of beads that served as the door. She found herself wondering if the translation had been accurate, and if this building really was some kind of temple, or if it had a religious significance in the Krell culture. Just another mystery to unravel.

Lena watched as the elder's impossibly long tail slowly trailed out of view, then turned to Sleethe who was waiting patiently beside her.

"Looks like we're in business, big guy. Let's settle in."

Sleethe seemed to understand her well enough without the translator, but the learning algorithm needed all the experience that it could get, and so she let it run as her companion walked over to a nearby wall and set their bags against it. He seemed to have chosen a sleeping pit for them that was at the foot of the wall, knowing that she would want to brace some of her equipment against the tightly joined logs.

There was a familiar fire rising inside her now, a burning need to discover, the same lust for knowledge and recognition that fueled her on those sleepless nights when she worked herself to exhaustion. Far from simple linguistic work, she had also been given a slew of scientific equipment by Barnes and his associates. The Professors were expecting her to do some field work in their place, explore the planet, collect samples of local flora and fauna to bring back with her so that they might study them. She felt like Darwin setting foot on the Galapagos islands, specimen containers in hand as he went on the hunt for strange bugs and lizards. She was not especially qualified for such tasks, but as the only human allowed to visit the planet, they had to make do.

She patted Sleethe on his scaly thigh, grateful to have him serving as her pack mule. Carrying the gear was trivial for him, meanwhile Lena would never have made it off the ship if she had been tasked with hauling it all herself. The lack of vehicles would have been a further complication if it wasn't for her green friend. He could carry her across terrain that she couldn't traverse, and he would keep her safe from any unknown dangers that she might encounter out in the bush.

She knelt and unzipped the duffel bag, her expression brightening as she pulled out a pair of binoculars. It was more mil-spec gear, security chief Moralez had owed her big time for her help in saving the Pinwheel from the outbreak of baby Krell, and so he had let her raid their stores of surplus equipment before the expedition. 'As long as you bring it back in one piece,' he had told her.

She had also packed as many MREs as she could reasonably carry alongside all of her scientific equipment, as the deal that the UAS had made with the Brokers stipulated that she could stay as long as she wanted. She had a suspicion that the aliens might be counting on her supplies being the limiting factor, and so she was loaded up to the eyeballs with freeze dried pasta and cereal bars.

Having grown up in Munich, she wasn't much of an outdoorsman, but perhaps with Sleethe's help she could find some edible fauna to supplement her diet and stretch out her visit a little longer. She had one of the scanners that they gave to scouts in the field that would let them know if food was dangerous to eat, and so it shouldn't be too difficult.

The duffel bag contained plenty of other goodies and gadgets. She had brought petri dishes for taking samples of local bacteria and studying their growth, stasis containers that would let her freeze samples and specimens for the journey home, and a light trap for catching insects. There was a crack hammer for breaking off pieces of rock, an elemental tracer for scanning minerals, even a deep scanner that could fire a pulse below the ground. She had sub-soil probes for taking core samples, a laser range finder, and the meteorology guys had given her an automated weather balloon drone. Lena didn't want to imagine the arguments that must have gone down at the UAS over what she would bring and which fields of study would be prioritized.

The crown jewel of her hoard however was a matte white, twenty five pound plastic block. She struggled to pull it from the bag, setting the device on the wood floor beside the sleeping pit. To the uninitiated it looked a bit like a portable vacuum cleaner, but it was actually a work station with a litany of features. She hit a button on the side of the blocky device, and the chassis split open like a clam, revealing the sensitive equipment that it had been protecting.

This was about as large as they could make this kind of workstation while keeping it reasonably portable, and even then it was heavy and cumbersome. She hit another switch and it spread itself open even further, unpacking itself with a whir of electric motors as Sleethe peered over her shoulder curiously. It had a built in microscope, an internal computer with the ability to perform all of the expected functions like cataloging data and running complex calculations, and lots of other bells and whistles that would help it act as her home base where her scientific studies were concerned. It had three monitors that were folded in on one another, and she flipped them open and turned on the computer, the device booting to a UAS splash screen.

It was solar powered, which might be an issue on Krell, but its battery was charged and she had brought along a few spares. Even if it eventually ran out of juice, she could still do things the old fashioned way. Cuvier hadn't needed a portable work station after all.

"Looks like the computer survived the trip," she said, shutting it down again to save battery. "We'll use this building as our home base."

She stood and struggled out of her hazmat suit, relieved to be free of the stifling, confining garment. Beneath it she wore a pair of shorts and a tank top, remembering how humid and hot the planet had been the first time around. She felt a little exposed, the shorts rode high on her thighs and the grey tank top left little to the imagination. She was accustomed to wearing lab coats and long skirts, but the Krell didn't care about modesty and there were no other humans for light years. Might as well let it all hang out for the sake of comfort. If she had to live and work in this soup of heat and moisture, then she was at least going to minimize her suffering.

What she wouldn't give for a cold shower. Her skin already glistened with sweat and her clothing was damp and clingy, the humidity was inescapable.

She felt Sleethe's eyes on her, and she wondered how the alien saw her. Was he attracted to her in the same way that he was to females of his own species? They had secondary sexual characteristics after all, wide hips and soft chests, but Lena was so...different. Her skin was soft and smooth rather than tough and scaly, her face was flat with no snout, and she had lips to cover her teeth. While female Krell did store fat on their chests, they were nothing like Lena's breasts, now hanging free beneath the sliver of thin fabric that concealed them.

Did he like that she was soft? Was she exotic to him, or did he look past her alien appearance because his attraction to her ran deeper than simple sex appeal? One day soon she might be able to ask him those questions, and actually understand his answers.

There was a warmth rising inside her now as his yellow eyes played over her body, distinct from the pervasive heat of the temple. His gigantic form was well suited to this environment, and she was starting to understand why they enjoyed lounging in water so much when they were on the station. The atmosphere on Krell was like being in a sauna, and the moisture clung to his scaly skin to give him a glossy sheen, like someone had rubbed him down in oil. The flickering torches that lit the room reflected on his body, light and shadow accentuating his already impressive musculature.

His arms were massive and near the same length as his legs, with biceps that would have put a human weight lifter to shame. His pectoral muscles were similarly hard and prominent, the beginnings of his abdominal muscles visible despite the paunch of fat that made his underbelly so pleasant to sleep against. His physiology was different to that of humans. He had more muscles and in different configurations, but it was familiar enough that it evoked a deep and primal attraction in her. Sometimes she would awaken from a daydream to find herself chewing on the end of a pen as she watched him sleep from across her office. Overall he had the physique of a strongman, functional strength that was a result of his lifestyle, rather than the product of a carefully crafted diet and exercise routine. Something about that fact made him more attractive to her. He wasn't grandstanding, he wasn't trying to impress her, that was just the way he was.

She was a professional woman however, she couldn't let herself melt every time he glanced in her direction like some kind of giddy schoolgirl. Knowing that once he made his move her willpower would evaporate, she tapped at the wrist-mounted computer that was secured to her arm and distracted herself with the floating icons.

"There's no time to waste, we might as well get started. How long do we have until nightfall, Sleethe? How long are the days here? I need to get a gauge on how much usable light we'll get."

"Suns are high," he replied, the translator chittering in her ear. "Light for maybe six more human hours."

The days were long here then, that was good, more light meant more work. Sleethe had to live on human time, and so he had a pretty good grasp of Earth-standard hours and days, even if he couldn't do the math required to determine the exact length of the Krell equivalent. If you were expected to show up to a battle on time, then you needed to know how your employers measured it. That was a problem with some of the personnel on the station who came from colony planets, if you said 'be here in an hour' they might have a very different concept of what that meant. There was usually a period of adjustment where the intern or the recruit in question was constantly late. Lena had even met a woman who had been born on a tidally locked colony and who had been convinced that the Pinwheel's lamps shut off at night to save power.

Truth be told, it had been a long day and she was about ready for a nap, she didn't fancy wading out into the mud again so soon. What she did feel like doing however, was examining this room in laborious detail. Now that the torches were lit she could make out all manner of Krell runes and carvings. It was time to start cataloging it.

Sleethe watched as she began to walk along the wall, holding her wrist-mounted computer up to the uneven logs as she used a flashlight attachment to illuminate the reliefs and the rolling script. She took photographs as she went, perhaps the computer would be able to recognize any patterns or recurring characters that she missed.

She was pretty sure that the Krell text was read from top to bottom, like many Asian languages back on Earth. Perhaps so that it could more easily fit on the tree trunks and planks that served as their parchment. Borealan script closely resembled its ancient origins, the letters reminiscent of the cuts and claw marks that their primitive ancestors had carved into rocks with their bare hands. Krell script on the other hand was more complex, made up of swirling lines that flowed into each other like water cascading down the wood. It was almost calligraphic, what tools did they use to produce this?

Interwoven between the text were pictures, comparatively crude when compared to the obvious skill that was required to produce the writing. They depicted what were clearly Krell engaged in all manner of activities, again reminding her of the paleolithic cave paintings that she had studied on Earth. There didn't seem to be any distinct chronology to the carvings, but for all she knew she could be walking around the circumference of the room in the wrong direction.

Much of it was higher than she could reach, carved into the wood by Krell who were two or even three times her height. Even Sleethe would not have been able to reach many of the reliefs that she could see.

"Sleethe, what's this figure here?"

The Krell lumbered over to her side, crouching down to her level as he examined the picture that she was pointing at. It wasn't a Krell, it almost looked like some kind of machine. It had a bulbous body, with two legs and four arms that more resembled hoses than limbs. There were dozens of Krell crowded around it, as if they were listening to it, or it was teaching them.

"Benefactor," Sleethe replied, her translator picking up on the word.

"They're Brokers? So that's what they look like..."

She returned to her duffel bag and retrieved a handheld scanner that was shaped like a pistol, but with a dish where the barrel would have been. She returned to Sleethe's side and tapped at the buttons on the handle, waving it near the engraving. There was a series of beeps, and then the device displayed a value on her wrist computer's screen. Most of these devices could be synced to her onboard computer, and while she had disabled GPS and wireless network functionality to save battery, it could still communicate with her field equipment at short range.

"Radiocarbon levels put this log at about five hundred years old. That makes sense, I'm not sure how fast the trees here grow but they're younger than this structure, because they're growing through and around it. Can't say how old the carving itself is, but it's reasonable to assume that it's old. It certainly looks aged and worn. Sleethe, do you know how long the Brokers have been in contact with your species?"

He shook his massive head, the loose skin beneath his jaw flapping, and she scratched her chin pensively.

"You're not old enough then. They must predate your birth...uh, your hatching. Just how old are you anyway?"

For all Lena knew he could be three hundred, but based on the larger Krell that she had seen she knew that he couldn't be ancient. He was about average size for a Krell, maybe middle aged, if a term like that could even apply to such a long-lived species.

Sleethe shrugged his massive shoulders, Lena chuckling at his adoption of human gestures.

"I guess Krell don't have birthdays then? I don't blame you, who would want to buy gifts for a relative who lives to be seven hundred years old?"

Now that she knew what they were, Lena was starting to see more Brokers pop out at her, they were everywhere along the wall. There were depictions of them perhaps teaching or organizing the Krell, leading them, along with carvings of their cigar-shaped spaceships and other vehicles and machines that Lena didn't recognize.

It was common knowledge that the Brokers and the Krell had a special relationship that predated humanity's first contact, but she hadn't imagined that the two races had been in cahoots for such a long time. The UNN was the third organization to join the Coalition, an alliance of species who were fighting a war on all fronts against the hostile Bugs, with the Borealans being the fourth member. For a long period of time before making contact with humans, the Brokers and Krell had fought the war alone. How they had met and the finer points of their interactions were left a mystery. Broker vessels carted Krell troops to the Pinwheel, and Broker defense platforms ringed the Krell homeworld. It certainly appeared to be a one-sided relationship, very few people had ever seen a Broker in the flesh and they did not participate in combat, but they did finance much of what went on behind the scenes.

The Krell had not spoken ill of them, as much as Krell could make themselves understood, and they never seemed to be doing anything against their will. They were always happy and friendly, performing their duties without complaint. If they needed to go back home, then it was a Broker ship that turned up to take them away. The personnel on the station joked about Krell showing up in the right place at the right time, it was a running gag that the reptiles appeared when needed and were gone just as quickly, but Lena didn't like being in the dark.

It was clear by how pervasive the depictions of the Brokers were that learning about the Krell would also entail learning about their mysterious benefactors.

CHAPTER 4: SWEAT AND SCALES

Lena removed her wrist-mounted computer, setting it down beside the computer terminal and hooking up a cable to link the two. She had meticulously cataloged the entire interior of the Krell temple, at least everything that she could reach. There was surely a whole Krell alphabet hidden in the photos that she had taken, and now she would offload the task of sorting through them and identifying duplicate characters to the computer. It had taken her a few hours, the heat and humidity taking their tole on her. She was drenched from head to toe in sweat, her hair sticking to her face and her sparse clothing clinging to her body. She had foregone shoes and socks, they just weren't worth the discomfort, electing to go barefoot on the damp wood as she worked.