Chapter 18 Pleasant memories

We hiked through the thick brush till we had reached the top of the hill Jessica had pointed toward. Sure enough as we peered over it we saw a great expansive plains. It followed next to a long river that wound its way up for miles. Even from where we stood we could see an innumerable count of wildlife, big and small every shape and size. Even my friends couldn’t contain their awe.
We stood there jaws agape as enormous herds of eponi raced across the fields below us, and there were others too. A family of giant bear like animals emerged from the river and shook there thick fur hides dry revealing the rippling muscles that fur concealed. Farther down stream was a lone behemoth of a animal bathing in the water.
The creature easily stood two stories tall on all four legs, but it looked like the creature could stand up right if it so desired. I didn’t even want to imagine the size of it if it were to do that. The creature massive tail swung out extremely dexterously like an elephant’s trunk the animal used the tail to sweep water over it’s body. It’s front legs were slightly longer than it’s back legs and a gruesome retractable spike protruded from the forearm. It’s head was small, and mildly disfigured by the large protruding lower jaw.
Needless to say the other animal steered clear of this brutish thing, I felt that we should do the same.
"Wow." Terry whispered. "I have never seen so many mutants in one place."
"I know." Scyll added. "I can’t identify half of these." She looked anxiously across the plain. " I don’t know about this. Maybe we should find a less populated route."
Terry shook her head. "No. this has to be it." She sighed. "We can’t put this off any longer. That river will take us as close ground zero as any path in the woods, and at least out here we will be able to see anything coming from a ways off."
Gohn groaned. "Yea. That way we can get a good look at them before they eat us." He said. Caulin and I chuckled at that.
Terry rolled her eyes, "None the less, that is where we are going. Get ready we will make camp over in that grove for the night and tomorrow we will check out those plains before we head back to the dome."
Caulin snapped a quick salute. "Yes ma’am" He said patronizingly.
We set up a quick camp using few trees as cover. The spot wasn’t quite as safe feeling as our last spot and as close as we still were to all those giant mutants it took the others quite a while to fall asleep. I took watch again. I told the others not to worry about taking shifts and just to get a goodnight sleep. Terry didn’t like the idea, but I was able to persuade her eventually.
I woke the others early the next morning. "Great the sun is almost up, I am so glad to be awake." Caulin grumbled looking around with his still partially glazed eyes.
Gohn sat up, winced and then started to rub his neck, "Sleeping outside is wonderful, I never felt so well rested." He muttered sarcastically.
As the others slowly started to clean up and get ready to head out, I climbed back up the ridge to scout out the path we could take down the cliff. From on top of the ridge once again I saw the open fields below me teaming with life. I scanned the plains and watched for a moment as the tall grass rippled like a wave from a sudden gust of wind. I let the air wash over me as I enjoyed the view. In spite of the ominous look of many of the creatures below it was hard not to feel refreshed in the warm dawn light and a cool breeze, but the day was just starting and this fair weather felt like a mask for the deadly world around us.
I found a place where we would be able to safely climb down. I tested the rocks to make sure the were sturdy while I waited on the others. A few minutes later others arrived and followed me down the path I had found. We then stood at the base of the cliff
starring across the plain. From atop the cliff the area had seemed enormous, but now that we stood at the same level as everything we were awestruck. The scale of our surroundings was immeasurable. Before the creatures we had seen looked large, but now even from a distance it became painfully clear that "large" was an understatement.
The grass came to our wastes and seemed to blanket the world around us. Gohn anxiously scanned the area. "This grass is so thick anything could be lurking ten feet from us and we wouldn’t even notice." He grumbled.
"We will just have to move carefully." Terry replied. "Lets go." We walked for a while. I was amazed at how long it took us just to reach the river, from the cliff it had seemed like a short walk. As we approached the river the grass became shorter and more rocky because of the river bed. We could hear the roar of rapids coming from about a mile downstream. The river here was enormous I scratched my head trying to think what river this could have been from my time, there seemed no way a river this big could have developed out of no where.
As we walked up stream next to the river we saw several of the same mutants we had seen from the cliff. The most intimidating of which were the bear mutants. They stood about the size of an elephant on all fours, luckily for us they currently were fishing up enormous trout from the river as we passed there were four of them, one had leered at us let out a terrible below when he saw us, but he seemed to occupied to leave his fishing position. The teeth on the bears reminded me of some sort of saber-toothed cat. Needless to say I was quite relieved that the beasts let us pass unmolested.
Scyll continued to sketch out crude maps of the area as we traveled, we moved slowly not really wanting to go too far before we had to head back to the dome.
Suddenly there was a sound like thunder that came from behind us, and the ground shook beneath our feet. We spun around and watched in surprise as a herd of eponi tore across the fields only about a hundred feet away from us. As they ran they devoured the tall grass with their sweeping mandibles leaving a nice low cut path behind them. A small cloud us dust sprang up from their trampling hooves and started to sweep over us. I coughed and waved my hand futilely attempting to clear the air in front of me.
Gradually the stampeding herd slowed by the riverside, by the hundreds the creatures waded into the water to drink and bathe. To our left there was a small wooded area, I squinted my eyes to peer into the small forest. Something about the trees looked out of place. Terry came over to me to see what I was looking at. "Do you see something?" she asked attempting to trace my line of sight.
"I am not sure, but.." suddenly I knew what I was looking at. My heart dropped into my stomach as my eyes begrudgingly made out the silhouette of the same type of mutant that we had run into last time we were near eponi. "Oh God…." I prayed. "Not again."
Terry looked at me with a puzzled expression. Her confusion was soon dissipated when the creature finally decided to make its move. It tore out of its cover ripping a tree from its roots as it ran. It was halfway to the eponi herd before a rippling scream went through the eponi herd. They were jumping over and trampling each other in an attempt to escape. Before we could move we were caught up in the middle of the stampede. Deadly razor sharp teeth of the eponi cut through the air all around us. We spun around this way and that, but in spite of our efforts I received a large gash down the side of my left arm, and Caulin got a slice on his calf when he narrowly avoided being gored.
We ran with the herd as best we could trying to weave our way out of the fray. All the while the giant creature tore through the eponi. It would kill one then leave it where it lied moving to the next one. We were not as fast as the eponi. It became terrifyingly apparent as the majority of the herd escaped that we were going to be left behind with the monster, and it wasn’t going to stop till everything still around it was dead.
The last of the living eponi finally scampered past us. The behemoth was currently chewing on the haunches of one of its kills holding it’s prey with one hand as it lumbered around looking for more to kill. I seriously considered running for my life, but last time the only thing that did was wear us out, no this time we had to go in fighting.
It didn’t take long for the beast to notice us, we were small compared to its normal prey so it wasn’t terribly interested in us, but none the less it wasn’t going to let us leave. It started to bound toward us almost like an ape using its forelimbs to brace itself as it ran.
Caulin licked his lips and took a deep breath, "So here we go again." he said a slight tremble in his voice.
"You think Janus is going to barge in to save us this time?" Gohn said half joking. We all managed nervous smiles at the remark.
A shudder went down my spine. The last time we had fought one of these I had almost gotten my head crushed, I didn’t want that to happen again.
We charged together attempting to hit hard and fast and catch it off guard. Caulin circled around behind the beast while Gohn distracted it with a steady fire of darts concentrating at the head. I charged straight at him growing out a long scythe like claw. Scyll’s symbiot screamed from her arm and began tearing at the beast’s right arm while Terry’s caudal’s tail wrapped around the left hand.
The creature was stunned by the force of our combined attack. Caulin stuck the beast hard in the back of the knee with his symbiot let loose a strong jolt bringing the beast to the ground. I jumped up onto its chest to deliver a final blow before it could react to our attack, but the monster pulled its monstrous arm away from Scyll’s symbiot, and with one massive swing, I was flung to ground.
The beast let out a horrendous roar, and climbed back to its feet. Drool fell from putrid mouth. We braced ourselves for the creature to attack. I wiped the sweat from my eyes. The beast eyed each of us. The ravenous ever hungering eyes passed from person to person until it finally settled on me.
I cursed under my breath. "Here it comes." I said to myself. I started to run to get away, but a thought came to my mind. Even as I thought it I felt like screaming "No you idiot!"
In the corner of my eye I saw Terry signaling for to run to her. I slowly shook my head. I made eye contact with each of my friends. Without saying a word they knew what I was planning. Terry’s eyes went wide. She shook her head violently in opposition.
I hesitated for a second, but it was too late to back out now. Finally, the beast lunged, the bloodied claws tore the very air . I took a deep breath cringing. My teeth clenched so hard that lost feeling in my face. Terry’s blood curdling scream pierced my somewhere in the back of my mind. The creatures massive hand filled my vision. At the last second, I rolled my shoulder back and dropped to one knee.
The creature’s claws ripped into my shoulder. I felt the muscles and bone wrench and tear. I couldn’t breath. I felt dizzy. The creature lifted me from the ground pulling me right up to its gaping jaws. Its breath reeked of death, and it made me nauseous.
I shook my head trying to clear my thoughts. I mustered all my remaining strength to drive my blade up through the lower jaw of my opponent. It let out a terrible cry and flung me to the ground.
As the creature writhed from my wound, the blade still protruding from its chin, Gohn and Caulin rushed in to finish the creature. Caulin wrapped his symbiot around the creature neck and let loose a series of jolts. With a strong jerk the creature fell backwards still wailing from my attack. I wasted no time jumping up onto its barrel chest, as I grew out a spear length claw.
Terry and Syll both used their respective weapons to hold the mutant's arms down.
I released the claw I had formed and held it with both hands pointing the tip at the creatures exposed chest. It snapped at me with its injured jaw but was still to disoriented from Caulin's shocks and Gohns darts to shack us off.
With one fluid motion I plunged the spear downward into my enemys chest. It let out a bellow of despairing rage as the mortal wound struck deep.
Then to my shock rather than give up and die the beast tore itself free of our combined shackles. I fell to the ground as the seeming juggarnaut returned to its feet.
We stared I awe at its sheer force of will. It bellow another awful roar, as if to say the fight was not over yet. It charged me clearly wanting revenge for the two barbs that stuck out from its mouth and chest.
I grew another blade and move back to my freinds for support. As the beast attaked I lunged foward slicing across its left leg. The monster ignored the new wound brought its fist down hard upon my back. I dropped to the ground the air nocked out of me.
Gohn came to my aide standing over me and firing his darts directly up into the animals open mouth. The wounds in its mouth quickly turned into deep holes, filed with blood and puss. The creature was forced to back away from us for a moment to regain its focus.
This gave me the cahnce to return to my feet and prepare for another go, but Caulin jad already beaten me to it. Once again from behind he struck the thing in the back with point of his symbiote making sure to keep his distance from our dangerious enemy.
unfortunatly, this distance wasn't enough and the beast with a quick turn and a short step managed to pin Caulin to ground under its massive foot. Syll's snakes viciously ravaged the leg of the beast, the assault went unnoticed. The creature raised it right claw to skewer him. Terry's caudal quickly caught the arm and held it from its deadly work.
None the less Caulin was fadeing fast under the weight of the tremendous foot. I arrived behind it shoved my blad deep into the back of the knee on the leg that held Caulin down. That did it and the unrelenting thing finaly steped off a now uncounsious Caulin.
This time however instead of charging any of us the creature merely stumbled a few feet and then collasped. Finally the loss of blood from its wounds had caught up to it.
To our relief, this time our opponent stayed down. It flailed about weakly for a moment and then layed still. With one final bought of rage it opened its ravenous blood soaked jaws and let loose a terrible howl. The howl persisted for several minutes, I held my hands to my ears to fend off the fallen animals moans. Slowly the cry faded until it at last went silent.
We each let out a small sigh of relief. Even Caulin was back awake giving a pained smile, as he clutched his ribs.
Terry rushed to treat him. Kneeling next to him and giving him a shot of painkillers, as Syll joined her at his side. "I can't believe we did it" Caulin said cheerfully in spite of his pain.
Terry brought her hand to his mouth. " try not to talk for a bit I need to make sure no ribs were broken."
I winced at that thought as I felt my own injures. I was quite certain I had a few broken bones. Terry looked over at me in concern. " are alrigh David?"
I straigtened up and tried to play off the tension of the moment. "of course who do think I am. Caulin?" Gohn smirked, but Terry just rolled her eyes.
"you have been spending way to much time around these two." she remarked with fake distain.
Gohn laughed "what are you saying we are a bad influence on Dav..." his voice trailed off as a piercing howl riped through our ears. ...a howl that seemed to be a twin to the one the behmoth we just killed had let out in its death throws.
Syll stood up from Caulin's side trembling as she looked out toward the origin of our shared fear." no...no not another." she cried louder than her normal timid self. " we can't do this again." her words tore at my soul... She was right. This was it.
Me and Gohn readied ourselves for the impending attack. Neither Terry nor Syll seemed to have the heart to even put up that much of a charade.
The trees shook as the new monster appeared. It was as if our last oppenent had been resurected to exact its revenge. The creature took one look at its fallen mate and then another back at us. A bellow of rage was our only warning as it tore out across the plain towards us.
We braced ourselves as best we could. "at least we will go down fighting" Gohn said under his breath. I don't know if the remark was a serious one or not because at that moment it really did seem like we were about to "go down".