Once they’d dressed, they were lucky enough to come to a river. Baston was wary, but Sca said they should skinny dip. They’d be able to contain themselves away from the flowers. They’d made love more times than he could count, and in every way possible. His body ached everywhere. The injuries he’d sustained early in the trip were aggravated by all the activity, but he couldn’t complain.

As they waded out into the water, Baston had to admit that it made him feel better. The cool water soothed his aching muscles and washed the scrapes and cuts on his body. They waded out deep enough to swim and he allowed himself to relax for a minute, floating on the water. The river wasn’t very deep, not more than eight feet, and it wasn’t that wide. They would easily be to the other side and could continue on their way after a dip.

“Ow!” Cherie exclaimed. “Something bit me.”

She put her hand to the back of her neck and Baston saw a small round red dot.

“Oh no, Cherie. Let me get it.” He swam over and went to pull the bug from her neck.

“What is it?” she froze. The dot was the size of a button on his uniform, but before he could get to it, the bug grew to the size of his finger. He pulled it from her and she cried out. A round bite mark was showing up and blood ran down the back of her neck.

“It’s a moon cricket,” Baston said, squeezing the bug between his fingers.

“What!” Sca swam for the other side of the river and ran up on the bank. He started looking all over his body for them.

“That didn’t look like a cricket to me,” Cherie said, wiping the blood from the back of her neck. Another one on her chest appeared out of nowhere. They were small when they started, but they grew fast.

“They call them that because they glow and make a chirping noise at night. They are more like what you would call leeches on Earth.” He pulled the one from her chest and urged her forward. “Only they grow as they get blood from you, and soon they will be your size. When they grow bigger than you, they are dangerous because they can drain you.”

They got out of the water, and he realized there were at least four of them on him as they started growing from the blood they consumed.

“Shit.” He pulled them off one by one and stomped them under his foot. Somehow it seemed Sca had escaped getting any of them on him.

“Our clothes are still over there,” Cherie pointed out.

Baston thought he’d gotten them all off of her but when she turned around there was a large one attached to her back. He moved forward and pulled it off quickly.

“Ah!” she yelled.

He knew it hurt, but they had to get them off.

“I’ll go get our clothes, you just have to help me if any more of them get on me.”

“I can go,” Sca offered, looking completely terrified.

“You won’t even kill a mothera when it gets in your house. I’ll do it.” Baston took a deep breath and ran back through the river to get their clothes. He held them above his head as he came back towards them and rushed from the water.

“Do I want to know what a mothera is?” Cherie asked.

“No,” both Sca and Baston answered at the same time.

Sca and Cherie helped him get the bugs off, and luckily none of them had latched in too deep. The relaxing water had turned into a death trap and now they had to go over a sandy landscape. The dunes were tall, and the water couldn’t be consumed with the moon crickets in it, so they’d have to endure the heat and thirst until they could find another water source.

After what seemed like forever, they came upon the town they’d been looking for. Tired, worn down and dirty, the three made their way towards the houses they could see. They’d made it to fuel, to water, to food – hopefully. It was all Baston could do to get his legs to move forward. He actually found himself telling them to move in his head.

Right leg, now left, right leg again, now left.

The houses were small. There didn’t seem to be as many of them as he had imagined when Ation told him about it. Of course, to Ation, this would seem like a big town. They lived on the ground. The houses were in a line as a sort of barrier, and he could see between some of them – more were behind them. As they approached, the suns were starting to set. Baston saw a large man come out of one of the houses. He didn’t appear to have a weapon.

“Who are you?” The man pulled a gun from behind him. Baston couldn’t tell what kind it was.

“Strangers, but we mean you no harm. Our ship ran out of fuel near the tribe of Ation. He told us if we could pass the trials of the land you’d give us fuel. Was he right?”

The man laughed. He threw his head back and held his stomach with his hand while using the other to keep the gun on them.

“He did, did he? Well come on in, we’ll see what we can do.”

Baston felt a bit uncomfortable. “Could you take the gun off us, please?” His hand was resting on the knife at his waist.

“Oh, I will when you take your hand off that big-ass knife.” The man nodded at him and Baston lifted his hand from his knife. The man then lowered the gun. “Come on in, I’ll get you some water.”

When they walked into the small house, Baston was surprised to see it was full of men. There weren’t any women or children anywhere.

“Where do you come from?” Baston asked, noting most of the people looked human with an occasional scaly member and one guy in the corner with royal blue skin.

“Earth Two and Sarta.”

“No kidding, we’re from Sarta. Well, Cherie is from Earth, but Sca and I here are from Sarta.”

“Name is Han.” The man ignored Baston’s outstretched hand and grabbed Cherie’s.

“I’d introduce you to everyone, but there are a lot of names you won’t remember.”

“So, we just need fuel and were told you’d give us a ride back to the ship. We can pay you.”

Baston reached to take out his wallet and thought better about it. He didn’t trust something in the air at this place. The men were all looking at Cherie in a way that made him uncomfortable.

“Why don’t you sleep off your trials, and then we’ll talk. You all look exhausted.” Han was still looking at Cherie while he spoke. Baston noticed she was looking at the ground and shifting her weight from foot to foot.

“Okay, thank you. Show us the way.”

A woman came from the back of the house and smiled at them. “The girl can stay with us in our room.”

“Ada, take Miss Cherie to the back and let her have a bath and a nice nap. I’ll show the men to the guest room.

Cherie all but ran to the woman. Baston felt relieved that there was a woman in the group of men. He’d started to think the village was made up only of men. Sca and he were completely outnumbered if the men tried to do something to Cherie.

“Come on boys,” Han said. “I’ll show you where you can get some R and R.”

Baston and Sca followed Han through a side room where there were at least a dozen beds.

“Why do so many of you live together?”

“There are not enough houses for everyone. You’ve seen the nightmare the area can be.” He stopped for a minute and looked dazed, then shook his head. “Chopping down wood is too difficult. The trees will fight you, as I’m sure you’ve witnessed. It’s just easier to keep the houses here. If we ever grow too large, there’s a ghost town about two hundred miles from here that no one’s claimed. We’ll go there if we must.”

Baston wondered who must have lived in the ghost town before it became abandoned, and how they would grow their population with so little women. He realized he was tired and wanted to lay down. Maybe the paranoia was coming from his exhaustion.

“Who lived in the ghost town before?” Baston asked.

“Military men, I think. I haven’t ventured that way, but I know it’s there. I saw it before the planet became a death trap.

“Here you go,” Han said, pointing to a bed off to the center of the room. “You can sleep there, and you, my friend,” he walked over to Sca, “can sleep here.”

His bed was in the same room all the way across the way from him. They didn’t question their placement. Both of them climbed into the beds they were shown, and were soon asleep.