COLOSSUS: A New Menace Page 7

  He received no response from Kenner so they covered their blasters with their blouses. Each man grabbed a roll of rope. Kenner grabbed the metal rod as Jak grabbed the hammer. He was the first to climb down and onto the grass, followed by Kenner.

  The two men walked over to the edge of the rim and peered down instantly noticing a long drop to the bottom if either one of them lost their grip while rappeling. Jak tied the two ropes together as he and Kenner had estimated they would need both lengths of rope to reach near the forest floor.

  As Jak was tying the ropes, Kenner began pounding the rod into the ground. Satisfied the rod was securely in the ground, Jak tied an end of the rope tightly onto the rod and both men pulled on the rope to make sure it wouldn’t slip.

  Since only one at a time could rappel down, Jak asked Kenner if he would like to go first. Kenner being the tough southern boy said, “Sure, I’ll go first. That way I can fight off any charging monsters wanting to make me their lunch while I wait on the infamous Colonel Jak Hammer.”

  “Well, hell. If you’re going to put it that way,” Jak said, as he jerked the rope out of Kenner’s hands, fixed the rope around him, and stepped off the edge of the rim.

  On his way down the cliff, Jak was beginning to get swarmed by several dozen large flying insects with one eye in the middle of their heads. The creatures looked similar to Pufferfish in the oceans back on Earth, but much smaller, and made loud buzzing sounds. Unlike a fish, the buzzing creatures didn’t have fins, instead, they had hundreds of rotating appendages moving at a rapid rate of speed.

  Jak started swatting at them as they hovered in front of his face. But they were too quick and he mostly swatted air. He almost freaked out when one landed in the middle of his forehead, but the thing didn’t sting him, as it just sat on his forehead until he finally managed to slap it off. But doing so almost caused him to lose his grip on the rope.

  He didn’t slip far, as he had his right foot wrapped in the rope, which enabled him to slow his descent while thinking a hell of a world so far. Swarmed by harmless flying tennis balls. Man, I love exploring new worlds. I’m naming those little boogers, Big-eye buzzers.

  Jak continued on down until he was almost on the forest floor, then noticed the rope was seven to eight feet short. He hung there for a couple of seconds then let go of the rope, landing fairly softly on the heavy fauna on the forest floor.

  He looked up and motioned for Kenner to begin his decent and walked over to the cliff and leaned up against it until Kenner made it down. A second or two passed and he decided to look up to see if Kenner was being swarmed by the Big-eye buzzers and laughed loudly when he saw Kenner swatting at them. Guess I could have warned him about the bugs, but where’s the fun in that.

  When Kenner let go of the rope and landed on the forest floor he turned to Jak and said, “You could have warned me about those fucking Cyclops bugs. I almost lost my grip and then you would have had to pick up the pieces.”

  “Yeah, that’s right. I completely forgot to tell you about those buzzing bugs.”

  “Sure you did, Jak. You didn’t forget about them and you damn well know it. Well, are you ready to do some exploring?”

  “Sure am. Let’s get going, follow me.”

  CHAPTER 15

  It had been fourteen days since a member of the Hive was infected with a strain of a Human virus known as the flu. Upon an order by Empress Katin on Planet Abor, the Daakie Caid Maalik and the Aborian Tage Doni were in route to Planet Daak. The mission given to them was to recon the planet to see if they could find evidence that the virus had worked.

  Tage Doni had brought her Raptor out of its jump far enough from Planet Daak to give them time to cloak without being detected by the Hive. It took the Raptor just inside thirty minutes to get close enough to start seeing an amazing sight.

  A large Hive nest was being drawn down into Daak by the planets gravity and the nest dark and without power. Maalik looked out past the powerless nest and said, “Look over there, Tage.”

  She looked and saw two large transports crash into each other and immediately explode. The closer they got to the planet they started seeing hundreds of Hive fighters floating in space around the planet. The fighter’s pilots were not flying their craft and seemed to be dead in their pilot seats.

  Caid Maalik let out a warrior’s cry, as he became overwhelmed with the thought that the virus had been a complete success. The Aborian Raptor and her crew continued to take in the sight as they watched the nest enter Daak’s atmosphere and began burning as soon as the planet’s oxygen took over.

  Fearing that the Hive might still have their powerful land-based weapon being operational, Tage kept her ship cloaked even though the ship’s sensors showed no activity at all around the planet. Tage ordered a member of her crew to take the big Aborian Raptor down into the planet’s atmosphere.

  A fair part of the planet was covered in a thick cloud base and the second they dropped below the clouds what they saw gave thrilled both the Tage and the Caid. One large nest was burning with over half of it buried deep into the ground around a mile from the Daakie palace’s grounds.

  Three more nests had crashed into the surface located several miles from each other. Tage ordered her crew to take the ship on what was basically a tour of Daak at an altitude of 10,000 feet. As soon as they dropped down in altitude the ship’s sensors began showing movement on the surface around the planet’s capital city.

  Caid Maalik became excited when he saw the movement was the surviving members of the Daakie race. Maalik wanted to immediately land but Tage asked for him to calm himself, as she wanted to survey more of the planet before actually landing her Raptor.

  Maalik knew Tage was right to ask him to wait until she was satisfied they wouldn’t come under attack by any ground-based Hive survivors, but he remained anxious to land and talk to some of his people.

  The Raptor made a wide arcing sweep around a good part of the planet and found many areas covered with dead vehicles from Hive nests, transports, ground assault vehicles, and many thousand Hive bodies were strewn about. It was plain to see the virus had done its work and seeing the widespread death of the Hive gave Tage Doni the confidence to land her ship.

  Tage guided her ship down to the surface only a mile from the palace. As soon as the ship landed and the landing ramp was down, Maalik was the first to debark the massive ship. Slowly, but surely, his people began showing themselves as they recognized Maalik and were celebrating their Caid’s return.

  About an hour after landing, Maalik had a large group of Daakie citizens gathered to hear them talk about their ordeal. Most all were severely malnourished and seeing that Tage ordered her crew to start dispensing cart after cart of food for the gathered mob.

  It was a sad thing to see for Maalik. If the sickly Daakies weren’t enough to make him sad, the large piles of flesh stripped bones practically everywhere added more to his already disturbed frame of mind. He was sad, true, but he was also consumed with anger.

  He asked the crowd how long had the Hive been dying. Their answer surprised him and Tage Doni. They said the Hive began dying as early as only a day or two before the Aborian vessel arrived. That timeframe indicated the virus took at least twelve days to start killing the insectoids, information that would be important to Doctor Victoria Stavens.

  The Daakie rescuers stayed for a total of six hours and it became time for them to get back to Planet Abor with their extremely good news. When it was close to time to leave, Maalik hated to, but he had to tell his people he was leaving but would soon return with his remaining Zurguts and would be bringing along three newly designed ships along with the eight transports carrying those few that escaped the initial onslaught, along with their King Gorvik and Queen Junal.

  Hearing that they still had a member of the royal family that survived brought loud cheers from the crowd. Many pleaded for Maalik to remain with them, but he made it clear to them that he promised he would return as quickly as he could and they
would begin rebuilding their world.

  With goodbyes said, and the last two to board, Tage and Maalik stood on the loading ramp and waved goodbye, walked into the Raptor, and within a few minutes took off for Abor.

  CHAPTER 16

  Colonel Hammer and Captain Slain had walked a bit over a mile through the thick forest in the direction Hammer’s directional indicator on his wrist defined where the open field they flew over should be.

  While walking through the forest they witnessed a bounty of small to medium-sized animals. Some had thick furry bodies and a few species were practically hairless. One species resembled pigs back on Earth with the exception of their tiny ears and large feet, much larger than a normal pig either Human had ever seen.

  Their walk through the forest was almost like walking barefoot, as the ground cover silenced their footsteps. Kenner thought if I were to hunt these woods it would be easy to sneak up on any prey.

  The two Humans were getting close to the beginning of the area void of trees where they saw the aliens run for cover when the Striker flew over. Jak and Kenner remained focused on any strange sounds or movement in the forest. Jak’s hope was to silently move to a position that would afford them a look at the aliens without being noticed.

  The weather was a perfect sunny day and the temperature hovered around eighty degrees with a light breezing blowing through the top of the trees. They started to see the forest had begun thinning out and knew they weren’t too far from the forest’s edge and slowed their pace.

  As they closed in on the open area the ground level quickly dropped three feet then proceeded on while gently sloping. When they stepped down to the lower ground level they both stepped into a couple hidden foot snares. Jak and Kenner were quickly taken off their feet and flung into the air, then bobbed upside down while leaving the two captured invaders hanging from a height of six feet from the ground.

  “What the hell?” Jak yelled.

  “I believe we have been caught in a hunter’s snare, Colonel.” Slain said.

  “Holy shit. Can you reach your blaster?” Jak asked.

  “No, mine is right in front of me on the ground. How about yours?”

  “The reason I asked if you could reach yours is that mine fell out of the holster too, but I can’t make out where it landed,” Jak said.

  Then they both heard something similar to someone blowing through an animal’s horn. The sound was coming from several different locations close by. Kenner looked over at Jak and said, “Uh oh. That can’t be good, Colonel.”

  “I agree, but if it is the hunters, I hope they hurry because all the blood in my body is collecting in my head and I feel like it’s going to explode.”

  Suddenly, the sounds stopped as fast as they started. Both men were twisting in their snares while trying to look around in several directions. They were looking to see if anyone, or anything, was approaching.

  Kenner stopped twisting in his snare and hung there without moving, with his eyes closed. Jak, on the other hand, kept trying to see if anything was coming to their aid or to kill them while they hung upside down and totally at the mercy of their captures.

  When Kenner opened his eyes again he saw a pair of moccasins positioned just back of center of his visible area. Jak twisted and saw a magnificent looking alien standing behind Kenner. Just as he was about to say something to Kenner, he felt two extremely strong hands grab him by his ankles. He looked at the large tree that the snare was tied to and saw another handsome looking man untying the rope as he was gently dropped to the ground.

  At almost the same moment the same thing was happening to his partner. While laying still, both Jak and Kenner had their feet released from the snares. Then both men were grabbed by their arms and helped up to a standing position.

  The two Humans stood still while admiring the magnificent looking hunters standing in front of them, and there were eight in total. The hunter aliens were all about six-foot tall, maybe a little over.

  They were very tanned, which implied they had spent many years in the light that shone on their planet from the star Kilkin. Each alien had several beautiful arm bracelets on both arms and Jak quickly determined they were made of gold. Well, it's obvious they have discovered gold.

  The alien’s bodies were hard and toned and had ripped abs and strong, thick, muscular legs. It crossed Kenner’s mind that the men standing in front of him looked very similar to the American Indian, with the exception of stunning blue eyes instead of the typical brown ones.

  Unlike the people they saw running as the Striker passed over them, these males didn’t have their blond hair tied into ponytails. Instead, their hair was free flowing and hung down to the middle of their backs.

  They wore moccasins that covered the tops of their feet and lengths of rope attached to the moccasins. The rope was made of an animal’s hyde that they wrapped around their legs and continued up their legs to a patch of hyde that covered their kneecaps. Then, the end of the ropes was tied off just above their knees.

  The alien hunters stood in front of their captives bare-chested and wearing a loincloth to cover their butts and private areas. Their loincloth had been made out of a striped animal’s hair and resembled the stripes akin to that of a species of tiger.

  Each man held a long spear in one hand and had a long knife with animal bone handles that were sheathed and hanging from the waistband of their loincloth. Seven of the alien hunters wore a colorful feather in their hair. But one of them wore two feathers in his hair and Jak figured he was the lead hunter. None of the hunters said a word and stood staring at the two strange beings in front of them. Kenner starting thinking that maybe the hunters were without an audible language when the leader spoke as he walked quickly and stood only inches away from Jak’s face.

  He wore a beautiful gold chain around his neck and hanging from it was a snake-shaped object. “You come from the belly of flying bird?”

  “We did, but it isn’t a bird. It is what we call a ship. We mean you no harm and come to your home in peace,” Jak said.

  Their leader shook his head and said, “Nah, you do not come in peace. You come in peace why you bring a weapon?” he said as he brought his right hand upholding Jak’s blaster.

  Damn. How do you know it’s a weapon, Jak thought.

  “Yes, it is a weapon. But we only have them to protect ourselves in case we are attacked by an animal that would like to harm us. You look like someone that would not travel without a weapon, and would do the same?”

  The lead alien looked deep into Jak’s eyes and said, “You look to speak true. Come now, we take you to meet the Ancient One, Father of all Hurons.”

  The hunters tied Jak and Kenner’s hands in front of them with a strand of rope and made them walk in the middle of their line to wherever they were taking them to meet the Ancient One. Jak was thinking if I’m thinking right, I believe Huron is a tribe of Indians back on Earth. Wonder if they are the very first Hurons?Probably not, because I’ve never seen or heard of any blonde Indians.

  They walked out of the forest and across the massive fields full of growing crops. None of the crops the two Humans were seeing as they walked through them resembled anything like crops on Earth.

  There were huge dark red plants similar to heads of cabbage, but they were bigger than basketballs. There were half-moon shaped yellow beans similar to green beans with the exception of being three times as wide. The weirdest plant looked like donut shaped bread the size of dinner plates hanging on vines.

  When the group exited the crops, they walked into a forest again and after walking another fifty yards they came into a village built under a thick canopy of tall trees. There were two long buildings with thatched roofs, four openings spaced evenly apart and held open by two ropes on each side and were attached to hooks on the buildings exterior and a single wide door leading to the interior of the buildings. Sitting behind the two buildings stood a two-story structure with two Hurons standing as lookouts on a platform near the top of the b
uilding.

  In the center of the village stood several dozen Huron males, females, young males, and children, performing many different tasks. But when the hunters paraded their captives through the crowd they stopped what they were doing and stared at the intruders.

  One small male around the age of ten ran up to Jak and kicked him in the shin and made a weak battle cry. Several adult hunters began laughing and one of them patted the boy on his head, as to say, good boy.

  Jak, continuing to walk, bent over and rubbed his shin, thinking what a little shithead.

  Kenner, on the other hand, was catching the eyes of four young Huron females he thought were in their mid-twenties. They were smiling at him and he smiled back, which made them gather and laugh. That made him think why are they laughing?What was so funny about me smiling back at them?

  He was prodded by the shaft end of a spear in his back by one of the younger hunters. Obviously, the young hunter didn’t like Kenner smiling at the females and let him know it. Kenner turned slightly to complain and received another poke for his effort.

  He grabbed the shaft of the young hunter’s spear and pulled the hunter up to him and said, “You better not do that again,” and released the spear. Kenner didn’t know if he understood what he said but he could tell the hunter got the message.

  The group walked in between the two long huts and kept walking until they stopped at the entrance of the two-story building. There were ten steps leading up to the entrance and there were two guards standing on either side of the entrance.

  The lead hunter said something to the hunter just behind him and the hunter motioned for the rest of his troop to stay where they were and he, the lead hunter, and the two Humans walked up the steps. The two guards opened the wide doors and the four men walked into the building.

  CHAPTER 17

  The Aborian Tage Doni and Daakie Caid Maalik had made it back to Planet Abor and were happily briefing Empress Katin and High Mage Cina on their findings in regard to the results of the virus being injected into a member of the Hive.