Upon a Savage Shore Ch. 12

"Describe it for us, Sergeant. Over," the commander said.

"There are buildings here, Commander," Liam told her. "They're made with local stone so they blend right in. Some are still in good shape. One isn't. The waterfall drops into what looks like a swimming pool. I think some of the central plaza, or whatever you'd call it, was a garden. That odd formation we spotted next to the pool looks like a small temple or theatre stage. In that grove on the southern slope Tem'Ma'tel found fruit trees. They've gone wild and there are a bunch of other trees mixed in with them, but it's pretty obviously an old orchard. Reminds me of an ancient Roman villa. It's amazing. Nothing like what we were expecting. Over."

"Is there any sign of inhabitants? Over," she asked. Her mouth was spread into a disbelieving smile as the image of a sanctuary blossomed in her mind's eye.

"There's nothing we've found that indicates anyone has been here in I don't know how many years. It's empty, Commander. Completely deserted. Over."

"Shall we ready the stretcher to move? Over," she asked, her tone light and eager.

"Absolutely. We'll head back now. Be there as soon as we can. Out."

"We'll be waiting, Sergeant, and well done to you both. Out."

Half an hour later when Liam and Tem'Ma'tel returned to the temporary camp they found all the gear ready to go, but there was at first no sign of the two females. Then they heard laughter from over the lip of the hill.

"I can't believe he likes that." They heard M'pel E'kmel chortle.

The marines exchanged puzzled looks and approached the source. The top of the commander's head was the first thing they saw. As the hill dropped away before them they saw more of the commander and then Clot'ilda came in view and then a sight that surprised both marines. The large aardvark thing lay on its side, a great, massively clawed paw in the air and its head lolling back and forth on the wet grass as the little Pah'Tht scratched it under the jaw. Her fingers came away from its furry hide and the creature turned to shoot out a broad tongue to lick them.

"What the hell?" Liam wondered aloud.

Clot'ilda and M'pel E'kmel turned at the sound of his voice. Clot'ilda sprang to her feet and ran to him. Clutching his hand she turned back, dragging him after. The aardvark thing rolled to its belly, eyeing big Human warily, but the commander put a hand to its neck, her fingers questing among the long quills and it settled, even rolling its shoulders into her hand as if it were a gigantic dog.

"It seems Clot'ilda has made a new friend, Sergeant," M'pel E'kmel announced. "As we finished packing the tents this fellow trundled up and sniffed about the earth where we had pulled up the stakes. Clot'ilda tried shooing him away and then he licked her. The rest is history."

"We can't keep a dog," Liam grumbled like a father from an old-time family sitcom.

"Liam look!" Clot'ilda giggled and knelt in front of the creature. She put her hand under its jaw and scratched for a few seconds before pulling it out and showing it to her mate. Small green bulbs with tiny legs rolled about her palm and the aardvark stretched his neck to get his head around her shoulder before shooting out his tongue and licking the parasites away.

Liam looked to Te'Ma'tel and said sourly, "No good eat."

"Seems he is plagued by these things," M'pel E'kmel said with a smile. "More intelligent than he looks, I think."

"We can't keep him," Liam stated again.

The aardvark looked away from Liam and pressed his head into Clot'ilda's chest with a guttural moan and a snort. She began happily scratching away at its jaw once more.

"Commander," Liam protested. "Come on. Back me up on this one. We've got enough to worry about."

"Sergeant," she chided. "I doubt he will want to join our collective. He's a beast of the wild, after all. It does no harm to let your mate have a few moments of enjoyment."

Liam looked down on Clot'ilda and had to crack a smile. She really was having fun with the monster. And whatever it was, the thing didn't seem interested in hurting or eating any of them. In fact, judging by the sound it was making, it might have just gone to sleep.

"Yeah," he sighed. "She's enjoying herself. Commander, we really need to get going. It's not a far hike, but we still need to scout the area thoroughly and see about securing our gear and getting things ready for the night. We've got a lot of work still to do."

M'pel E'kmel sighed and nodded. She patted Clot'ilda on the side and rose. Reluctantly Clot'ilda also rose and with one last scratch on the aardvark thing's head, she turned and went with them to the top of the hill.

+>0<+

"I must say, Sergeant, this is better than anything I had hoped or even dreamed of," M'pel E'kmel said once they'd set their burdens down.

"Pretty snazzy if I do say so," Liam replied, smiling. "We didn't see anything dangerous on our first look, but now that you two are here I think we'd better go as a group and inspect every corner of this place, just to be sure."

"That is wise, Sergeant," she said approvingly. "You have not slept in almost thirty hours, though. We should secure one room and let you rest properly."

"No rest for the wicked," he responded flatly. "Let's get this done and then I'll sleep as long as you like or maybe longer."

She looked at Liam, noting the dark blotches under his red-rimmed, bloodshot eyes. He was in no fit state, but it seemed unlikely that there would be any danger here he would need to face. And from the set of his jaw and the stern look in his eyes, it seemed unlikely she would be able to dissuade him. Finally M'pel E'kmel nodded and their inspection of the ruins began.

They discovered that the oddly shaped pool at the bottom of the waterfall was quite large and it formed the headwater of the stream that wound its way through the valley to the south. From the pool the water followed in a wide, shallow, stone lined channel cut into the hilltop that passed out through the western wall below a broad platform overlooking the southern and western valleys. Its water spilled down the hillside in another falls, collecting in a large natural pool among massive boulders before winding away between the grassy knolls.

"Let's see what's in the workshops," Liam said. His fatigue was clearly getting the better of him, but he soldiered on, intent on getting the job done.

Using hand lamps they examined the small rooms. The first was empty except for some collapsed wooden shelves and broken pottery.

"A sort of storeroom, do you think?" M'pel E'kmel wondered.

"Looks like," Liam nodded. He knelt to pick up a piece of pottery only to have it crumble in his fingers. "This hasn't been fired."

"This one has, but there is no glaze on it," she said, holding up half of a small jar. "Perhaps this is where they dried and cooled the pieces."

"Yeah," Liam agreed. "Maybe. Let's look in the next room."

Entering it their hand lamps revealed a kiln large enough to fire several pots at once, more collapsed shelves and a large mound of clay. Nothing more was to be made of that room so they moved on to the next. Here the floor was covered in bits of sharp stone.

"It looks like flint," Liam said.

"SarJ'ant. Commander," Tem'Ma'tel said, holding up a piece of stone shaped to a point. "It looks like a blade of some kind, Commander."

"The point of a projectile," M'pel E'kmel said, shining her light on the dark grey object. "Looks well made, does it not, Sergeant?"

"There are nodules of stone here, Commander," Clot'ilda announced. She stood near the back corner of the room, shinning her lamp on a small pile of dark grey stones.

"We can experiment with making things like this when we have some spare time," said Liam. "Might be useful."

The next two rooms were empty, but in the room closest to the gate they found a stone oven and the remains of a pile of wood, dried, cracked and turning to dust after so many years unattended. They dubbed this the bakery and moved on to explore the rooms along the northern wall. These appeared to have been where the inhabitants had lived. There were rooms that could have housed twenty or thirty people and others where no more than two could have lived. The one closest to the cliff was not really a room at all. It was more like a large pantry. Along one wall were more collapsed shelves and at the back of the room they discovered a ramp leading down into the hill.

"Looks as though they took advantage of a natural incline," M'pel E'kmel observed. "Shall we go down?"

"Yeah," said Liam tiredly.

"SarJ'ant, sleep," Tem'Ma'tel suggested.

"Not yet," he sighed. "I'll be okay for a bit longer."

When Liam tried to go down the steps she put out a hand and stopped him, saying, "Tem'Ma'tel, Clot'ilda see."

Liam frowned at her but nodded. The two younger jZav'Etch went down the ramp with their weapons at the ready. If anything dangerous lurked in the darkness below, they would be ready for it. Liam and M'pel E'kmel followed a few paces behind.

The ramp gave onto a small room with a low ceiling. Their lamps revealed niches cut into the walls, blackened with soot. Some kind of lamp must have been placed in those. An arch wide enough for two to walk abreast and have plenty of shoulder room led to another chamber, larger than the first. Here along the wall were a number of stoneware jars a meter high and half a meter in diameter. These were empty save for some kernels of grain at their very bottoms.

"Do you think the grain could still be viable?" M'pel E'kmel asked.

"Take some," Liam said. "Maybe our med kits can tell us. If we can get some of it to grow we could bake bread or something."

Deeper into the hill another arch led. From this came the sound of trickling water. They entered, shining their lights around.

"It's cold in here," M'pel E'kmel said.

"Commander, what is this channel in the floor?" Tem'Ma'tel asked.

"I do not know," the older dTel'Qohar replied. The channel was narrow and very shallow. In it ran a trickling stream of clear water that came out of a crack near the base of the wall. It flowed around the room and out through another crack.

"I think this is a cold room," Liam said. He was looking at a series of holes drilled into the walls all at about the same height near the ceiling. "I saw something like this back on Earth. In Canada, I think. These holes would have had some kind of hook or peg mounted in them. The water running in the trench keeps the place cooler than it would naturally be. Helps to keep meat fresh."

"Excellent," M'pel E'kmel said. "We can make use of this when we bring down game."

The last building they checked was the ruined gatehouse. Its roof and upper floor had collapsed, though, whether from age or violence, they could not tell. In it they found only the remnants of the roof and upper floor and a scattering of bones from long dead animals.

They returned to the main plaza, satisfied nothing was going to spring out on them to challenge battle. All in all the castaways could hardly have asked for better.

"I think we are now quite safe," M'pel E'kmel said sententiously, eyeing Liam.

"Liam, come," Clot'ilda urged, pulling him by the arm.

"We still need to unpack," he protested, sounding not unlike a young child too tired and grumpy to want sleep.

"SarJ'ant, sleep," insisted Tem'Ma'tel, pushing him from behind. "Tired. SarJ'ant, sleep."

With the stims and coffee long gone from his system, Liam really did not have the energy to argue. According to his internal clock almost a day and a half had gone by since he'd last slept, and as much as he wanted to get things done, he simply didn't have the energy. He allowed Clot'ilda to pull him into one of the buildings where she unfolded and activated a stretcher for him to lay on. He let her pull his armor off and then he fell flat on his back, asleep before his head touched the cloth of the stretcher.

+>0<+

The sun had barely risen above the low peaks of the mountains to the east, but thanks to the recent rains the air was unusually humid. The bizarrely carved pillars cast long shadows across the stone stage, the leaping waterfall poured its trickling stream into the large pool and small creatures that passed for birds circled the low peak above the castaway's new home. Below them Sergeant Liam Carter practiced forms upon the level surface of the stage.

He had awakened before dawn and come out to the plaza to enjoy the early morning, but his muscles felt wrecked. It was a natural thing for him to begin stretching and before long he had begun moving through an old routine, focusing his faculties and putting his mental house in order.

He had learned Krav Maga from a master of the centuries old art before he'd entered the Marine Corps. It was a technique that had served him well and he had built on it every chance he'd gotten. Actually, some of his best moves he'd learned from gutter rats who grew up in industrial complexes and asteroid mining facilities where crime and poverty were the status quo and technique was of no value unless it put your opponent in the hospital or morgue.

Liam worked through a series of kicks, jabs and blocks, the sweat flying from his limbs with each studied movement, spattering the thirsty stones. His bare feet left streaks in the dust as his shadow danced, accompanying him in his ritual of disciplined violence. He came to the end of his kata and breathed in deeply, tasting the sweet tang of the fruit trees in the orchard. A slight noise caught his attention, breaking into the peace he had created in his mind while he practiced for war.

Tem'Ma'tel, clad only in her shorts and undershirt, stepped up onto the stone platform. She moved casually, with no sign of the limp that had plagued her since their first encounter. Liam watched her approach, wary in spite of how well they had been getting along lately. It had been a matter of necessity for them to cooperate fully while there was a chance of danger to the group. Now, though, the group was as safe as they were likely to get. Tem'Ma'tel might just decide she had given him all the time he needed to make his formal demand of Ka' chasck.

"Good morning, SarJ'ant," she said in her customary, precisely enunciated greeting.

"Good morning, Marine," Liam replied as he always did.

"You..." she paused in thought, framing the question carefully in her mind before continuing. "You practice?"

"Yes. Haven't had a chance to for a while now."

"Practice with me?" she asked, her tail suddenly flicking enticingly to one side.

"Sure. Go ahead and warm up. I need a minute to get my breath back."

"Warm up?" she asked. The phrase was strange to her, but she had a flash of insight. "Stretch? Flex?"

"That's right. Go ahead," he said, stepping back to give her as much room as she wanted. He took a drink from his canteen and watched as the jZav'Etch Marine began her exercises. He reflected again that she had the best legs he'd ever seen. For all the time she had been sidelined there was no evidence of any loss of muscle tone. No sign she had gotten soft. Tem'Ma'tel was still two meters of spring steel and carbon fiber. And none of that changed the fact that he had not yet made the required demand.

Tem'Ma'tel could smell SarJ'ant's uncertainty. She could sense his interest, his excitement, but there was no fear. Good. She had smelled fear on him before they had ambushed the blade-beasts at the creek and when the giant animal had crashed through the underbrush afterward. It was a natural reaction in those circumstances. SarJ'ant had controlled his fear then, but she had still been able to smell it. This was different. This was not an overwhelming confrontation and he was not yet sure of her intentions. She smiled inwardly, going through her stretches. Soon enough, he would be enlightened.

"Ready, SarJ'ant," Tem'Ma'tel said, straightening and squaring off to face him.

"Alright," Liam replied as casually as he could. Something about her stance and body language told him all was not as she was presenting it. The flicking of her tail and the twitching of her ears were nervous. She had something in mind. That might not be a bad thing, but it might be that she was about to try to kill him, and he was completely unarmed. Hell, he wasn't even wearing his boots.

He'd never faced a jZav'Etch like this before. Their natural abilities, speed, strength and agility, not to mention their fucking claws, gave them all kinds of advantages over a Human. He had a slight advantage in strength and weight, but Tem'Ma'tel, though a touch shorter than he, had a slightly longer reach. And with her legs she had a considerable reach on him. The one thing she did not have and would be hard pressed to match was his years of experience. Liam had been fighting and killing since he was seventeen years old.

A flutter ran through Tem'Ma'tel's stomach when she saw SarJ'ant assume his fighting stance. She had to control her body language to not give away how afraid she was. Against another jZav'Etch of equal experience she would not have been afraid. Rather, she would have been confident of winning. Against almost any Human she knew she was more than a match. She had seen SarJ'ant in action, though. She had seen him fight against beasts that were many times her strength and speed. M'pel E'kmel had told her how SarJ'ant had charged the blade-beasts with nothing but a rock and a club. And he had done that naked!

Perhaps this was a mistake. Perhaps she should have followed Clot'ilda's example and gone to him with food. It wasn't too late. She could pretend all she wanted was practice. She could do that.

And then he took off his shirt, exposing his scars. The scars of a veteran of forty-three battles. The scars of a slayer of beasts. A warrior in the mold of heroes past. Human and alien, it was true, but so masculine it almost hurt to see him standing there, sweat glistening in the morning sun. Such a male would not respect her if she went to him meekly. She did not wish to be as Clot'ilda was, a favored and loved mate. She wanted to be seen as one who would stand by him and defend the Household. She wanted him to know she would not back down when he needed her the most. Tem'Ma'tel made her choice and steeled her nerve to face off against one of the most dangerous foes she would ever challenge.

Liam instantly knew he was not as fast as Tem'Ma'tel. She struck with a blinding combination of kicks and punches and he had no hope of blocking all of them. He knew it, so covered himself as best he could, accepting the punishment she was dealing. He struck hard, not pulling the punch at all, the instant he saw an opening and drove her back two steps. She gave him a quick, surprised glance and leapt in again.

He's bleeding, Tem'Ma'tel thought. Is he angry? He didn't follow up after that punch. What is he doing?

She tried a sweeping kick at his head, realizing in the instant that SarJ'ant was not as slow as she had thought. He dropped and swept her leg out from under her and as she came down on the stone he dropped his heel in a chopping kick right into her abdomen, knocking the air from her lungs. But he did not close with her. Instead he rolled away and sprang to his feet, resuming his fighting stance, waiting for her.

Jesus she's fast! Liam thought. His mind raced. How was he going to avoid getting the ever living shit kicked out of him? His eye was already swelling, his vision blurring and blood trickled down his cheek. At least the swelling wouldn't be too bad. He'd patch himself up later if he survived. She rolled to her feet sooner than he would have guessed and she went on the attack again.

A sweep at SarJ'ant's legs forced him to step back, but it did not cause the opening she had hoped for. Her punch deflected off his arm and he jabbed a hard fist into her ribs, rocking her back and throwing off her tempo. And unlike any jZav'Etch she had fought, SarJ'ant stepped in close and followed up with an elbow to her chin. Tem'Ma'tel stumbled over her own feet as the force of the blow shook her. She had to tuck and roll to get away from the stomp of his powerful leg and only just made it to her feet in time to throw an off balance punch at his head.