Shattered

Shattered

By Megan Russ

A Host, a pixelated mist floated on the other side of the cryopod glass, its white eyes watching me. “Good luck Survivor.” Its voice echoed in my cryopod before I drifted into cryo sleep. I would wake up on an Ark, the cycle had restarted, again.

Naked, my back pressed against the warm sand, unafraid, as I opened my eyes to blink at the bright blue sky overhead. The familiar itch of the implant in my left forearm. What Ark was this? I sat up and took in the world around me. The sky was bright, clouds were gathering on the horizon to the west, ready to swallow the sun and cast the landscape into a gray twilight. I was sitting on the sun warmed sand of a beach, the waves crashing gently behind me, and trees looming steadfast in front of me. I didn’t recognize this beach, I knew every beach on the Center and the Island, and even the larger Ark that my tribesmen called Rag. Was this a new Ark?

I climbed to my feet, remembering the first time I woke up on the Island, shaking and scared, that was a long time ago. I looked to the western horizon, squinting through the gray gloom beneath the clouds looking for an obelisk, there was just a hint of a blue glow on the horizon. To the east into the sunlight I couldn’t make out an obelisk. That made my choice for me. I turned towards the coming storm and began to walk along the sand, my feet itching against the burning grains, but I was used to it.

I would find some of my tribesmen at the blue obelisk, when on a new Ark we went to the obelisks first.

Flocks of fat little birds scattered across the beach as I walked, the cold wind gusting towards the storm cooled my back and made me shiver. I needed to take a moment to make some clothing, even if it was just plain linen cloths, or I would die of exposure before reaching the obelisk, and I didn’t feel like restarting so soon. I went to the tree line and began to strip plant fiber from the shrubs growing in the shadows of the palms and oaks. A pile of fiber began to build up behind me. I turned and held out my left arm, I touched the glowing diamond shaped implant and the projection appeared over my arm, the fiber clothing icon was flashing green. I pressed a finger to the hologram and the fiber began to transform in front of me. A hiss came from behind me as the clothing formed, I turned my head to meet the glowing green eyes of a dilophosaurus.

“Seriously, couldn’t wait five more minutes to come get a dodo dinner?” I asked the hip tall hissing dinosaur as it bolted from the trees, its fang filled mouth open, it lifted its tongue and spit the green acid from the sack beneath its tongue. I rolled to my left and reached out to the creature as it rushed by, my arm wrapping around its neck, the spins along the top of its neck stabbing into my bicep. The dilo bucked and squawked, I pulled it head up and pressed my left forearm, my implant to the implant over the dilo’s heart. He calmed, and I let him go, he was mine now. I stood, hissing as my right arm bled from four puncture marks. My new tame hummed at me, as I pulled on my freshly made clothing, just pants and a shirt but that’s all I needed, I wasn’t one for shoes unless I had to have them on anyway. I collected some of the black berries from a bush and crushed them onto my wounds, the pain subsided.

I continued down the beach the dilo following a few steps behind. I whistled to him, and he bolted towards a dodo waddling down the beach. The dodo let out a terrified squawk as the dilo’s teeth sank into its flesh, blood stained the sand. The dilo took half the meat, while I took the hide, and the rest. With my implant I made a backpack, and I placed the meat inside.

I picked up a few sticks as we continued towards the obelisk and the storm, soon I had four spears strapped to my back, and one in my hands.

I froze, my dilo hissing at my side as the snap of a branch sounded from the shadows within the trees. I fell to a knee, my spear at the ready, my eyes straining to see into the trees. The clouds drifted overhead; the beach fell into darkness. My breath caught in my throat as red eyes stared at me from the trees. My heart pounded, those red eyes, his red eyes. I blinked and they were gone, a pegomastax bolted from the shadows, its little beak open as it screamed at me, it jumped trying to steal anything off of me it could grab. I lifted my spear and the little creature impaled itself onto the end. I hate pegos, I pulled my spear from the dead creature and let my dilo eat it, leaving the hide behind for me. I searched the shadows for the red eyes again, but there was nothing.

“Come on,” I said to the dilo, collecting the hide and breaking into a jog down the beach.

Rain began to beat down on us as the obelisk loomed up over the landscape. I was soaked to the bone, when my bare feet touched the slick metal that led to the obelisk.

“Look who only took all day to get here.” A husky voice called from my left. “Of course you would have a dilo with you.” I turned to smile at my tribe leader. Cradix, taller than me, wearing his own linen pants, a crooked grin on his face, shaggy dark hair, thick beard and shining blue eyes. He was bare chested, his broad shoulders, glistening from the rain. He was leaning against a large stone, I went to him and wrapped my arms around him and buried my face against his chest. “What’s wrong Fang?” He asked, as he hugged me back.

“I thought I saw him.”

“Who?”

“Kabr.”

“What that’s impossible you destroyed him.” He said, pushing me away from him to stare into my eyes.

“I know, but I swear I saw his eyes.” He pulled me back into a tighter hug.

“He’s gone, don’t worry about it.”

“Are we interrupting something?” I turned my head against Cradix’s chest to see three other of our tribesmen. Steven, Jmac, and Omni. The three young men were all dressed in leather armor, each holding a spear in their hands, Steven had a dodo held under one arm, and they had three dilos following behind them.

“No, you’re not interrupting.” I whispered, Cradix squeezed me tight one last time before letting me go.

Cradix pressed his implant against mine, warmth spread through me, he went to the others and made us all one tribe. The Nomads, our tribe. “We’ll wait until morning for the others to arrive, if no one else shows up we’ll head out.”

“Does anyone know what Ark we’re on?” Omni asked, dropping to the metal platform and leaning back on an elbow.

Everyone shook their heads. “Great a new Ark, new problems.” Cradix growled from beside me.

“And old enemies.” I whispered to him, letting my eyes go back to the forest.

We all tried to relax, wet, cold, the storm raging overhead, the only light that of the blue obelisk floating overhead.

“If I die of exposure, I’m gonna kill whoeve’ shows up last.” Jmac growled, through chattering teeth halfway through the night. The rain had shifted from a heavy pour to a thick mist, that was somehow worse.

Cradix, snored softly beside me, Omni was curled up with a dilo, and Steven was sitting on top of the rock behind us watching the approach from the beach, still holding his dodo.

“We’ll be fine, it can’t be much longer before sunrise. Try to get some rest.” I whispered.

“How, I’m dying,”

“You’re not dying, just try to rest.”

“You’re one to talk.” He retorted.

“True enough.” I leaned against Cradix and let myself drift off.

Red eyes, glowing in the darkness, he stepped from the shadows, a grin on his square face. I couldn’t move, frozen in place, he continued towards me. He reached out a hand and cupped my cheek.

“You thought I was gone didn’t you?” He growled in his hoarse voice, his eyes narrowing.

“How are you alive.”

“None of us are ever truly gone, not from the Arks, it’s only a matter of time.” He leaned forward, and whispered in my ear, goosebumps spread across my back and down my arms.

I bolted awake, panting, my heart pounding. “Fang?” Omni asked, from across a roaring fire.

“Just a bad dream.” I said, Cradix lifted an eyebrow, but didn’t press for more.

There were two other men sitting around the fire now. Squirrel our oldest tribe member, and another younger man named Crillian. Cradix handed me some food and woke Jmac and Steven. Omni extinguished the fire and we all followed Cradix away from the obelisk. Our little flock of dilos following us, Steven still carrying his dodo.

Together as a tribe we moved into the trees and away from the beach. We needed to find somewhere to build, we needed a home. The forest grew darker as we got deeper into the trees. The sunlight faded, and soon we had to use our implants to light the path. Omni and Squirrel made torches and lit the way for us.

Cradix held up a hand. “Look at this.” He waved me forward. I joined him at the front of the line, in front of us was a large valley, but there was no sky overhead, just a dark dome of fluorescent fungi. “What is this?”

“Home,” I whispered, smiling at him. “Just think about it, if we live in a cave no one can attack us from above.”

“How did we even get into a cave?” He replied, I shrugged.

“We’ll figure it out later, let’s just get set up here, and let everyone get some rest.”

Our beautiful cave was massive, even the trees would glow, the fluorescent fungi gave the cave a permanent twilight feeling. The tribe worked as a team to gather materials for Cradix to build the main complex. We would branch out with other buildings later on. This Ark was so unique, it had everything from a large desert to deep caves like our home. There were a few other tribes on the Ark, so far all of them had been peaceful. More of our tribe showed up, we our numbers reached fifteen, the cave became crowded. I spent most of my time exploring the new Ark and taming animals for the tribe. Any time I spent at base was spent with Cradix.

Weeks passed, we had dozens of tames, a large tribe complex, and we knew our way around the glowing forest. I was sitting on the beach near the blue obelisk, my argentavis standing on the sand beside me, preening his dark blue feathers. He was Crimson, he was the beautiful gift Cradix had given me. He had bought him from another tribe on the Ark. A female argy with white wings and green highlights landed onto the sand beside Crimson. Cradix climbed from Fenix’s saddle and dropped onto the sand beside me.

“Anything?” I asked, hugging myself.

“Still nothing, I think it really might just be bad dreams.”

“Cradix it’s all too real, I can feel him, I know he’s here somewhere.”

“Fang you said, you destroyed him.”

“What if I didn’t? What if he’s not alone?” I whispered.

“What do you mean?” I looked at him, my eyes wide, “You mean all the others? All the others you’ve killed?”

“Killed, banished, I did so much as your Admin, things I haven’t made up for.” He reached out to me and grabbed me by the shoulders.

“You don’t have to make up for anything. I banished Kabr, not you.”

“No but it was my power that destroyed him back in the crag, it was my power that killed Mejo, it was my testimony that banished Skull, Scar, Laurel.” He laughed.

“You never did like other women in the tribe.”

“I’m being serious Cradix, everything I’ve done is coming back on me now.”

“Fang,” He pulled me to him and held me. “You don’t have to worry about any of them, if they were here, we would’ve heard by now, the other tribes haven’t seen or heard of anyone who matches any of them.”

“Maybe I just need time to relax on this new Ark, and let the memories fade away.”

“We could summon one of the guardians to fight, we’ve got those rexes that are itching for something big to kill.” Cradix said, nodding to the obelisk. “We could use the resources from the fight.”

“That would be fun. It has been a long time since we’ve done a boss fight.” I laughed, burying my head against his chest again, when he held me like this the nightmares faded, and the world seemed to stop. It was just us and the sound of the waves crashing on the beach.

I opened my eyes, he was standing in the trees, his red eyes watching us, glaring at us. “Cradix, he’s here.” I said, Cradix turned to look at the trees and let me go.

“Kabr?” Cradix breathed, he could see him too, I wasn’t losing my mind.

“Hello old friend.” Kabr said stepping onto the sunbaked sand. His gaze went to me, “Firefang.” He grinned.

“How are you alive?” I growled from behind Cradix, my blood running cold.

“I told you it’s inevitable that we would see each other again.” Kabr laughed. He stepped towards me, Cradix blocked him.

“Kabr how are you alive?” Cradix demanded.

Kabr grinned, “You see the Enu have all of our DNA stored,” The Enu were the creatures who had created the obelisks and made the Hosts to oversee the Arks. The Enu had resurrected all the extinct species of Earth and put them on the Arks, even humans. “And even if our implants are destroyed on the Ark it just means we won’t come back on that Ark, but it doesn’t mean we won’t find our way back to each other on a future Ark.”

“We?” Cradix whispered, stepping back towards me, I pressed myself against his back. It became difficult to swallow, my visions were real.

Kabr grinned his red eyes meeting mine, “She knows, she’s seen us all.” He looked back towards the trees, a young girl with fire red hair stepped from the trees, a dark-skinned woman joined her, they were both smiling at us, metal pikes gripped in their hands. A yellow eyed stick of a man stepped out from the trees behind them, he hunched behind them, ringing his hands, a horrible grin on his thin narrow face. Then he stepped from the trees, the green eyes and dark skin, purple stained lips and nails. I began to shake, fear overtaking me.

“Mejo?” Cradix growled, he took a step forward, Mejo lifted a crossbow, and pointed it at Cradix.

“Meet the Destruction Company.” Kabr said with a flourish and bow.

“Destruction of what?”

“The Nomads.” Mejo growled, raising his bow, his lips curled over stained teeth.

“Run Fang, take Fenix, and warn the others, I’ll see you at base.” Cradix whispered.

“No, Cradix, they’ll destroy your implant, you’ll be lost to me, I’m not losing you again.”

“Now, now, you’re both staying here.” Kabr growled, stepping forward, he reached towards me. Cradix moved in a blur, Kabr was on the ground a moment later his nose spouting blood. The snap of a crossbow and Cradix hissed in pain. He fell against me, I pulled him towards our argies, who were squawking in alarm. I whistled at Crimson and he winged towards Mejo, who was still trying to reload his crossbow. I pushed Cradix onto his saddle, and strapped him in. Cradix had a bolt protruding from his chest. I whistled, and Fenix took off with Cradix. Cradix reached back for me, but Fenix was already too far into the air. I whistled to Crimson, but he was trapped fighting Mejo and the two women. Kabr was beside me, reaching for me again, his calloused hand wrapped around my wrists, and pulled me against him. His breath in my face smelled of blood and the black berries.

“You know Narco berries are poisonous?” I growled. He grinned and leaned closer; his breath was thick.

“Oh, trust me I know.”

“You’re trying to recreate the virus?”

“Oh, I wouldn’t say recreate, that one didn’t work as well as I would’ve liked, this is something different.” He turned to look at the others trying to fight of Crimson. “Stop,” He whispered, only loud enough for me to hear, placing a hand over my mouth. The others stopped moving and just stood there and allowed Crimson to attack them. I watched as Crimson ripped into Mejo and tore him until he dropped. The others didn’t even flinch, as pain would’ve flared from their implants as a tribemate died.

“Call your bird off and I won’t have him killed.” Kabr growled, lifting his hand. I whistled, Crimson turned and headed home. “That’s not what I said to do.” He snapped shaking me, I just grinned at him.

“I won’t let you kill him. Cradix gave him to me as a gift.” His hands tightened on my arms.

“He abandons you; he leaves you to clean up his mess, he sets you aside, and yet you are still loyal to him.”

“Always.”

He shook me, “You’ll see.”

“See what?”

He held out his left arm, his implant was solid black, his last virus had made the implants purple, this one was more powerful. I struggled against him, trying to keep my implant away from him.

“Please don’t.” I begged.

“I’m not going to, just like I didn’t last time, I want you to remember, I want you to see everything.” He pointed to a dodo a little way down the beach. A black tendril grew from his implant and extended all the way down the beach to the dodo. The bird squawked, then went perfectly still. “I can make them do whatever I want. It doesn’t matter if it’s a person or a creature. They don’t even have to be anywhere near me, I can see through their eyes. The only unfortunate thing is the virus has to be intentionally passed on, unlike the last one with the infected not knowing what they were doing. I am the only one who knows about it and I’m the only one infecting others. Of course, all I need is to be able to see someone to infect them.”

I looked where Fenix had carried Cradix. My stomach tightened, had Kabr infected him, no, I would’ve noticed the tendril. Cradix had to keep the Nomads away from Kabr, or he would destroy us. He wanted me and Cradix to both see him destroy our tribe, for what we did to him. For me refusing to love him, for Cradix casting him out.

“Ah, Mejo welcome back.” Kabr laughed, I looked over to watch a nude Mejo step from the tree, a fresh body, his old body had already dissolved. He took his armor from Laurel and got dressed again.

“Do they even know?”

“They have no idea, I’ll relax my control once he’s dressed and they won’t even remember him dying.” Kabr laughed.

“If you give me to them, Scar and Laurel will torture me.” I told him, he just grinned.

“Would you rather me give you to the women or to Mejo and Skull?”

My blood chilled, and a hole seemed to open in my stomach. “The women.”

“That’s what I thought. I won’t let Mejo touch you this time, I think he got enough on the last Ark.” He winked at me. The others took on a relaxed appearance, and a grin spread across Scar’s face as Kabr, waved the redheaded girl over to us. Laurel followed behind her and they each took me by an arm. I didn’t struggled, I didn’t see the point. Into the forest of glowing trees I was lead.

For days, I was hung in a dark room, shackles holding my wrists tight against the stone wall. I was covered in bruises fresh and old, scabbed wounds and still bleeding sores. Through one slightly less swollen eyelid I watched as Laurel paced a few feet away, a crude stone knife in one hand, a radio in the other.

She turned to me and came closer, she slid the blade down my cheek, I fought the urge to whimper, but I had received worse from her and Scar over the last few days. She held up the radio to my ear. I could just barely hear the sounds of battle over the radio. I flinched as pain flared from my implant against as another of my tribe members died. Every few minutes I would feel one of them die in the battle outside.

“All of your friends are out there dying, for you, it’s your fault their dying.” She laughed. “Remember that later.”

“I will remember everything.” I growled. She slammed her fist into the cheek she’d just cut. I just laughed.

“You really think they’ll survive to rescue you. It’s all part of Kabr’s plan.”

“Cradix isn’t as stupid as Kabr, he won’t fall for Kabr’s trap.”

“He already has.” Mejo laughed from the door. I glared at the man standing in the dim light pulling on a fresh set of armor.

“Yeah, but you’re still getting your ass kicked.” I spat blood at him.

“Laurel, we need your help outside.” Mejo stated, Laurel grinned at me and turned on her heel, leaving the radio and the knife on a table, she paused long enough to turn the volume up.

Mejo waited for Laurel to disappear down the hall before coming across the torture chamber, he pressed himself against me, I winced in pain, I was pretty sure I had broken ribs. Mejo grinned and ran his hand up my chest, and grabbed the back of my neck. “I’m going to make you watch as I kill Cradix and destroy his implant.” He ran his tongue up my cheek licking the blood from my skin. “I will break you this time, and no one will save you.” I spat at him again, he just licked the blood from his face, he cocked his arm, fist ready. Then his face went blank, he dropped his arm and turned and left without a word.

Thank the Enu and Hosts, for Kabr’s virus.

“Good thing I came along, who knows what he would’ve done to you.” Kabr said from the doorway, a wide grin on his face.

“Shouldn’t you be out there infecting my tribe?”

“Headed that way right now, I wanted to give them a chance to fight first, and make it look like we were actually fighting back before I just take them from you. Plus I want you to watch. Mejo is going to capture Cradix so I can have you both watch as I take your tribe from you.” He pulled the chains from the hook that held me to the wall and pulled me out of the cell.

“You honestly believe that Cradix is just going to let you do this?” I demanded.

“Cradix isn’t an Admin or a Host anymore, he has no power over any of us.” He yanked me out of their building and into the bright sunlight. I couldn’t do anything to shield my eyes, I tried to make out the battle but all I could do was hear the pained cries of my tribemates and their tames, and feel the occasional burn of pain from my implant.

Kabr attached my chain to the floor of the metal platform overlooking his entire valley. He took a spot right beside me, his arms folded over his chest.

I could see the battlefield now. My tribe was riding on their tames, a small army of rexes, there were a few pteranodons I recognized flying around fighting the enemy’s tapejaras. Kabr had a much larger tribe of infected outnumbering the Nomads, by the look of it they outnumbered us three to one.

Where was Cradix, I didn’t see Fenix, or even his giant crab, Kadios. He wouldn’t come into battle on one of the rexes, he preferred the tames that he used on a regular basis. I couldn’t find him on the field. I could see Omni, on the ground, his rex going up against Kabr’s giganotosaurus. There were four or five dead rexes around the gigas feet, but Omni was leading the remnants against the rampaging creature. It was fortunate that Kabr didn’t have any mechs, because my tribe would’ve already been defeated. Squirrel was in the air on a pteranodon, avoiding shots from the tapejara’s passengers. Steven was on a carno leading a pack of raptors behind him, I wondered what had happened to his spinosaurus. The others were fighting their hardest, but Kabr’s tribe were savage, mindless, and completely under his control, fearless.

“He’s not here.” Kabr growled under his breath, he must have been watching the battle through the eyes of his slaves.

“Good.” He glared down at me. “I told you he wouldn’t fall for your trap.”

“You were saying.” He pointed to the horizon, it was hard to miss, the twenty-foot tall green and red crab that had just landed in the middle of the battlefield. It was picking up smaller creatures and people in its claws, and tossing them across the valley. Using its smaller claws to smash anything that came underneath it.

“Cradix, run!” I screamed, I saw him turn in Kadios’ saddle and look up to where I was. Kadios crouched and turned to leap towards us. “No.” I screamed pulling against my chains, as Kabr reached out his arm and a black tendril spread from him to Kadios. The crab landed on the platform and stood like a statue unmoving and unresponsive to Cradix as he tried to will him forward.

“Cradix old friend, come join us.” Kabr said with a wave of his hand. Cradix stood up in the saddle and jumped down to the ground with a clang of metal as his iron armor struck the steel floor.

Tears ran down my cheeks as I strained to get to him, as I willed him to run, praying to the Hosts to reset the Ark right then and there. He walked past Kabr ignoring him, and came to me, falling to his knees, he took me in his arms.

“I’m so sorry, I left you alone, again.” I just pressed my cheek against his and cried, blocking out the pain in my implant, and the sounds of battle around us, and forgetting the burning red eyes that glared down at us.

“We always find each other.”

“And we always will.” He let me go, I watched him stand to face Kabr. I noticed the blood trailing behind him, dripping from the fingertips of his left hand.

There was no glow coming from beneath his bracers. His implant was gone. Kabr was backing away from him. Cradix had defeated him before, he had been naked, unarmed, and critically wounded, but he had defeated him.

“I should’ve destroyed your beacon that day at green ob, at least it would’ve saved us a lot of heartache in the coming Arks, but I showed mercy and let you stay on our Arks. It would’ve taken you so many cycles to come back into our lives had I only done this back then.”

“You won’t beat me this time, I have an army.”

“I don’t need an army to defeat you.” Cradix said.

“Neither do I.” Kabr spat, he lifted his arm, a black tendril spreading from him to Cradix, but Cradix had no implant to infect. Kabr’s red eyes widened, he stumbled a few steps back, pulling his rail gun from his back and pointing it at Cradix.

“If I kill you now, you’ll be gone, from this Ark, what use is there to that, what a waste it would be.”

“And you wouldn’t have your revenge.” Cradix said.

Kabr nodded and lowered his gun, he waved his hand and three men rushed from behind me to grab Cradix. They bound him and chained him beside me. Cradix didn’t fight against them. He just leaned against me, and whispered in my ear. I nodded, and shifted so he could reach my arm.

Kabr stood triumphant at the edge of the platform, his arms raised, black tendrils swirling from his arm to infect our tribemates. The battle that had raged for hours fell silent, the only sounds were the wind through the trees, and the beating of the winged animals to stay aloft.

“Watch as I destroy everything that matters to you.” Kabr laughed, he turned to face us, but my eyes were locked into the steel blue of the man beside me. He placed his forehead against mine.

“Everything that matters to me is right here.” Cradix whispered, opening his hand, two broken implants fell to the ground with a crack.

“What have you done?” Kabr demanded rushing to us.

“We’ll find each other again.” I whispered, winching as I ran the blade into my ribs.

Cradix pressed his lips against mine, as his eyes fluttered, “We’ll always find our way back to each other.” He whispered against my lips.

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