Beneath a Blue Sun Read online

  “You want to fight?” Joel said. “Come at me.”

  As if in agreement, the creature lunged at him with gnarled teeth. Joel held up his staff to block, and tried to shake it off, but it had sunk its teeth into the wood. He pulled back and slammed it toward the muddy floor, but it forced him off balance with a ferocious, animalistic strength. Joel staggered back but kept his grip firm and the creature away from his vitals. He maintained his composure until he heard a hard snap.

  The staff broke in two, and the beast barreled down onto him. Joel fell back on instinct, avoiding the swipe of its jaw, though close enough to smell the stench of stinky sugar on its breath. The fowl odor caught him off guard and reminded him of something he smelled distinctly, but this wasn’t the time for quiet contemplation. Joel threw up the half of his staff from his left hand to block the jaws a second time. Fierce teeth punctured the wood, and Joel searched with his hand for the second half. Somehow, it had fallen from his grasp. He glanced to his side to spot it lying in the rusty mud.

  Joel reached for the piece and squirmed to resist the pressure from the spine-riddled creature as it broke away pieces of his last remaining line of defense. Joel stretched as far as he could and grabbed hold of the splintered branch, the broken end sharpened to a fine jagged point. With weary, bloody arms, he thrust it like a javelin into the creature’s neck. He dug deep into the windpipe and shrugged off the creature. It staggered off a meter or so before it fell, the strength and air swallowed from its throat. Joel heaved a heavy sigh. It was over.

  Epilogue

  Hollow and Hopeful

  Joel sat down next signal beacon and picked it up. The beacon was a black box about thirty centimeters from end to end. The Ergo’s descent through the atmosphere scuffed the corners and edges, though the device itself retained its shape well. It made sense. His benefactors worked long nights to construct this essential piece of machinery in such a way that it wouldn’t break amidst the scuffle of a crash landing.

  The red light flashed and glimmered as it faded from red to the pale emptiness of a weak bulb. He searched for the switch, wherever it might have been. Ordinarily attached to the ship, the signal beacon would activate once the Ergo communicated the nature of the disturbance through some science he didn’t quite understand. However, he knew enough to spot the button embedded deep within one corner of the box. It was barely big enough to fit his pinkie through, but he managed.

  Joel pressed and released the button. He felt the beacon vibrate in his palms with a warm hum that reminded him of the peace and tranquility of technology. He breathed deeply in a sigh of relief and set the box down. Seconds later, the device shut off completely, the red power light faded to black as the device used the last of its reserves to send the signal.

  The beacon hardly set off with a flashy overture, but Joel had faith that the message went through. He grimaced, having little choice in the matter. It would take six months at FTL speeds for the message to reach his benefactors or less, if some passersby caught wind of it. Given the time, it would take about the same to reach him, so he had a year at most.

  Joel grabbed the box and stuffed it into his pack. In the process, the device clanked on the canister he filled with tree sap and bark chips. He pulled it from the bottom of his pack, realizing that it had sprung a leak. He searched through his pack and noticed that a thick layer of sap covered the bottom and hadn’t quite seeped through to the outside.

  “So that’s it,” Joel said. He forced a laugh as he glanced over toward the lifeless alien carcass. The spine covered creature laid quietly in the mud. “Seems no matter where I go, a thief remains a thief.”

  The stern of the Ergo happened, in this case, to be the safest spot, given the angle and descent of the crash. That section of the ship, built behind the crew quarters, housed the well-armored portion of the brig, where the crew kept men like him for transit.

  Joel frowned and chucked the canister into the mud.

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