Chapter Nine

LAZ

"Let's go! We haven't got all day!"

I needed to find a way to repair my communicator, and we were running out of daylight on Xylox. Either Gabriella was taking her sweet time or humans were naturally slower than Maztek. Either way, we were taking too long.

"I'm doing the best I can over here," Gabriella grumbled sourly from behind me. "Maybe you could remember that my legs are half your size."

"That's no excuse. Wyla's only four feet ten inches, and she outruns all my men. I thought Earth women liberated themselves and were men's equals."

"Oh yeah? Well, good for her," Gabriella shot back, putting a hand on her chest. She paused. "I stand by what I said. If I'm slowing you down so much, why don't you sweep me off my feet again and carry me there? While you're at it, why don't you wipe my ass?"

I squatted into position in front of her and flexed my back muscles.

"What are you doing?" asked Gabriella. I could feel her penetrating gaze boring into my back.

"You need a ride? Get on."

"No way. You can get up now. I was being facetious, damn it. I know how to walk. You lead the way and only start worrying if I'm not within a hundred feet of you."

"Suit yourself." With a shrug, I got up off the ground and swung my satchel over my back. I had spent a few hours staking out the terrain yesterday, and my efforts were paying off now. The trail leading to the underbelly of the Xylo city was due west from our cave's water source. Gabriella and I had figured out the shortest route to the city that would minimize the chances of any Xylo contact.

We had been on the road for a while now, but I thought we were close to the checkpoint. It was only another couple of miles. I narrowed my eyes when I saw a blue ribbon tied around a tree trunk on my right. The sight of my trail marker energized me, and I moved toward the stump quickly, making a flurry of dead leaves. When I reached the tree, I untied the knot and slipped the ribbon into my pocket, adding it to the other scraps of fabric.

"Make sure I notice you if you start to lose me."

"Of course. I wouldn't want you abandoning me in an alien wasteland."

I moved on, eagerly searching for the next ribbon. Soon I heard a squawk of pain behind me. I turned around on my heel just in time to see Gabriella's feet start sinking into the earth. She tripped and tumbled forward but caught herself before she crashed into the ground. Her gas mask fell over her head and rolled to a stop next to her.

"Shit!"

I jogged back to Gabriella at once to help her ease her foot out from the hole. Her handmade shoes weren't the best for hiking, of course. Her feet were cushioned but the fall made her ankle turn pink. It was swelling already. I checked her face.

Gabriella looked nervous. I wrapped my fingers around her ankle and gingerly felt around it.

"Hold still and try to relax," I crooned. "This is going to hurt, but I'll make it as quick as possible."

"It's okay. I can do it myself."

Gabriella pulled my fingers off her leg. Before I could stop her, she carefully grabbed onto her swollen ankle. She squeezed her eyes shut, grunting as she twisted her ankle sharply to her right. A loud pop sounded in the air as her sprained fibula twisted back into place. A single tear leaked out from the corner of her eye and clung to her lashes, but I didn't hear a noise. Her eyelids fluttered like she was blinking away the pain.

I reached into my satchel and took out a flat square packet. A rectangular chunk solidified in the sealed package when I twisted off the nozzle. I tore off the top and allowed bursts of cold smoke to steam out from the opening.

"That's amazing!"

"It's just a cold compress." I took the ice and pressed it against her ankle. "Hold this here to stop the swelling."

"Thanks," said Gabriella. She let out a moan of contentment as she stretched her leg. "That feels so much better than before."

"The pain should subside in less than an hour," I told her as I wrapped her ankle. "Do you think you can still walk?"

"We'll just have to see, won't we?" Gabriella chirped with fake optimism. She hoisted herself up to her feet and started to fall. "Nope, going down...whoa!"

I moved behind her and caught her by the shoulders. "You're in no shape to go anywhere right now," I said, shaking my head. I tried to keep a lecturing tone of accusation out of my voice. "I suppose taking some time off to rest wouldn't hurt. I've got another light to last us the rest of the way, but we'll have to stay close together."

"Sounds like a plan. I'm starving."

I eased the gas mask back on Gabriella's head. Slinging her arm over my shoulder, I lifted her off the ground and moved away from the path to the city. I loaded my belongings on top of her and carried everything to the far side of the hill. I unloaded my equipment. She cried out as I dumped her onto my pile of stuff.

"Ow! Thanks for the heads up," said Gabriella sarcastically. She patted the ground before sitting back.

I reached my hand into the satchel and pulled out some rations.

"Karbachi or mandala?"

"Excuse me?"

"Spicy or sweet?"

"Sweet, I guess. I don't care. I'm so hungry that I think I'd eat anything right now."

I unwrapped the mandala bar and passed it to her.

She took a careful bite. "Not too shabby." The wrapper crinkled noisily in her hand as she hungrily chewed the flaky bar. "I don't know what the purple shell on the outside is, but the filling tastes like fudge and caramel apple."

"It's made from mandala fruit," I explained. I took a bite of my peppery karbachi meat. I had often seen Marshall eating mandala bars. Personally, I didn't care for it, but humans seemed to enjoy the overwhelming sweetness. "It's tropical. Maztek is full of them."

"That's music to my ears," said Gabriella flatly. She wrinkled her nose and looked around her. "It will be the first thing I try when we get out of here. If we ever get out of here."

"We will," I assured her, tossing my empty wrapper back into the satchel. I pulled the rag over my nose and mouth again. "It's a question of when. I've never failed a mission, and I'm not about to start now," I mumbled.

"I believe you."

There was a pause in the conversation before I felt comfortable enough to ask a question that had been bothering me.

"Where did you learn to do that?"

"Do what?"

A dark shadow passed briefly over her face when she realized what I meant, but it faded quickly and her lips curled into a tight smile.

"I've had a lot of practice, I guess," said Gabriella slowly. She raised a hand to her ear and began playing with the back of her earring. "I once had to pop both my shoulder and my knee back into place when I fell from the second-floor landing. I might be related to a double-jointed superhero or something."

"Why is that? Don't humans have doctors for that kind of thing?"

"We do." Gabriella stared into space as she carefully selected her words. "You could say I've become an expert at disguising my 'accidents' over the years."

I was taking a drink of water when the implications of her words finally sunk in. Gabriella polished off the rest of her bar and crumpled the wrapper in her fists. She stopped playing with her hands and folded her fingers over her good knee. I lowered the water to my side.

"Was it your father?"

"Of course not." Gabriella's eyes were flashing. "My dad was a great man. He was a frequent visitor to Maztek. He did a lot of work there before he died in a passenger shuttle crash on his way back home. No, it was Richard. He was a drunk asshole my mother eventually married."

"And this grown man threw you out of a building?" I whispered. I kept my face blank, but I was seething inside.

"I ruined his favorite shirt when I accidentally threw my red sweater in the wash along with the whites. We were taking school pictures the next day, and I had nothing new to wear. I tossed it into the machine at the last minute without looking. Richard wasn't amused, to say the least."

I felt like an ass for assuming her life had been problem-free because she came from Earth. Like me, Gabriella was forced to mature at an early age. I realized there was an ugly side to humanity, just like everywhere else in the galaxy.

"It feels weird talking about him," Gabriella continued. She picked at the dirt under her fingernails. "I think this is the first time I've ever admitted this to anyone. I don't want people to start feeling sorry for me."

"I do not. Seeing that you've made it, and you're sitting here in front of me right now...that speaks for itself."

"Thanks."

"If it counts for anything, your father sounds like a wonderful man."

"He was. I miss him every day." The corners of her eyes drooped as she smiled sadly. She blinked and turned her gaze to me. "That's enough about me. What about you? Are you a high-up commander of the Maztek army, or something?"

I grabbed the sturdiest branch in the vicinity and took out some tools.

"My actual title is long, complicated and doesn't mean anything. My men refer to me as the General. It's the most senior position in the Maztek forces. I have a particular team. They're the ones who accompanied me on this mission. I don't like to talk about it, but I'm ultimately responsible for the thousands of troops under my command."

"No way. Are you serious?" Gabriella stammered. Her jaw dropped open. She narrowed her eyes and studied me carefully. "Well, you don't seem to be much of a prankster. Don't get me wrong, that is very impressive, but I feel ashamed right now. I was just going to brag about managing a group of five people."

"Don't sell yourself short. It isn't about the number of people. It's about being able to think about something other than your interests. Not everyone's cut out to lead."

"When you put it that way, I think you might be right," said Gabriella thoughtfully. She flattened the sides of her shiny hair and placed the gas mask back over her head. "But why the military?"

"What do you mean? What else is there?"

"Why not start a business or go into something sports-related? You don't have to kill people for a living."

"Ah," I nodded, understanding. "Well, my father, and my Upa – that's my grandfather – were both high-ranking officers. They were in the army all their lives. They were the roughest pair of individuals you could ever meet. They raised me as best they could when my mother disappeared, but died twenty years ago in the worst Xylo attack in history. It was an unprovoked strike on Fallgold, the Maztek capital. Nearly two thousand innocent children and civilians died that day. We don't even have a name for it. We just call it the Fallgold incident. Upa and my father were some of the casualties. I suppose you could say I've felt compelled to fill in their shoes since then."

"You must have been a boy back then. I'm sorry," choked Gabriella. "I don't know what to say."

"Don't be. You didn't have anything to do with it unless you were a Xylo commander in your youth. I was just answering your question."

"What could the Xylo possibly have against the Maztek? From the stories my Dad used to tell me about the planet, it seems like a peaceful place."

"You better strap in for that epic tale." My eyebrows knitted together as I stroked my beard thoughtfully. "It's a long story, but here's the abbreviated version. The Xylo are our ancestors. Centuries ago, we fled from Xylox. At the time, it was led by a tyrant named Vladimir. We escaped to an uninhabited planet now known as Maztek and rebuilt it for ourselves. We are a democratic monarchy, headed by King Jacquim, one of the finest leaders the galaxy has ever seen. As you know, this planet isn't in the best condition. The Xylos have been fighting to claim Maztek for themselves and relocate to a better world. As for Synic, his father, Dyron, died in the Fallgold incident. He's been out for revenge ever since."

"That's a shame, but I'm finding it hard to sympathize with that heartless bastard. What the fuck was that?"

A needle-nosed fly squeezed into the gap between Gabriella's ill-fitting mask and her face. She fell to the ground and started rolling around, violently swatting the air around her. I threw the branch and my tools onto the ground. Pouncing on top of her, I forced my legs around her body to stop her from moving.

"Can you get my mask off? I can feel something crawling on me!"

I yanked the gas mask away from her face. Her dilated irises focused on the fly climbing the side of her left cheek. I closed my fist and pressed it against her nose, allowing the insect to climb on my hand. But as I pivoted toward the ground, ready to release it, the little asshole went rogue. It flapped its metallic blue wings and launched itself right in my face.

"Shit!"

I dove out of its way and fell to the ground next to Gabriella. The tip of my nose was inches from hers. Her blue eyes were hypnotizing up close. I looked at the soft pink of her full lips, and my cock stirred at the strange tightening in my chest.

I sat up quickly and pushed myself off the ground.

"It's not getting any earlier," I shouted, clearing my throat. I handed her the makeshift cane I fabricated from the branch and began to repack my satchel.

"Let's move."