Page 80 of Caveman Alien's Heat
The Plood,it goes through my mind. What was it we said? Something someone said, back at the Borok village, a lifetime ago…
I raise my voice. “Get up here! Get up here and open the hatch!Now!”
The ice cracks like a window pane being hit by a brick and the whole glacier shakes. I scramble to get away from the hole.
The Gar men have stopped at thirty feet distance, halfway surrounding us, a semicircle of spears pointing inward.
The glacier rumbles and the ice shakes so bad I fall over. Only Nator’ax and a couple of the Gar men are able to stay upright. There’s another hardcrackas the circle of ice on top of the hole comes loose and rises like the cork of a wine bottle, pieces falling off and shattering as they hit the glacier. Then the top of the saucer appears and the ice layer on top of it slides off completely.
Slowly the saucer rises until it’s hovering a foot above the ice. The hatch snaps open, revealing the blueness inside.
All the Gar men stare, not even bothering to get to their feet.
“Get in!” I yell. “Nator’ax!”
I run over and put one foot inside the saucer. Nator’ax comes running, while the Gar men are just staring.
Only one of them runs towards us, spear held high as if he wants to throw it with his only arm. It’s Shaman Crelt’ax, eyes wild behind the ugly holes in his bone mask. “Stop them! Get the woman!”
Nator’ax calmly turns around and throws his spear at the shaman. It hits him right between the eyes, shattering the bonemask and knocking him on his back. There’s no blood - Nator’ax threw the spear with the blunt end first.
I step into the saucer to give room for him, and when he jumps in I hit the button. The hatch closes with a hiss and the world is suddenly very quiet, except for the usual hum.
I walk fast into the control room. “Go higher!”
The little Plood is standing at the controls, fully matured and making my skin crawl. It turns its head and looks at me with huge, black eyes. It doesn’t say anything, but I get the impression that it’s acknowledging my command.
The screen around us shows the landscape, with the glacier and the snow wastes around it. And the Gar men, getting to their feet and gawping up at the saucer as it rises.
“That’s enough,” I say. “Now go… that way.” I point in the approximate direction to the Gar village.
Nator’ax stands behind me. “That’s a Plood,” he hisses. “The servants of Darkness!”
“I think this one is a servant ofme,” I tell him. “At least for now. And as a servant only, he must be commanded, not asked nicely.” I embrace the giant caveman. “Are you all right?”
He doesn’t take his eyes off the Plood. “They never got close enough to do harm. But they were going to. I’m glad the saucer obeyed you.”
“It’s not the saucer, it’shim.” I nod at the Plood who’s busy flying the saucer, so smoothly and well that there’s clearly a connection between them. “He flies it now.”
“Where did he come from?” Nator’ax’s hand hovers over his waist, as if he wants to draw his sword.
“He was always in here.” I point to the compartment where the Plood was before he matured to a living creature. “He was needed for the saucer to fly. Cora discovered that.”
“There was always a Plood nearby? When we were flying the saucer? And sleeping in it?”
“Sorry I didn’t tell you, my love. But I worried that you might throw him out or do something else to him. I know how tribesmen feel about the Plood.”
The saucer steadies in the air. Below us, the Gar men don’t scatter right away. They hesitate, shifting, gripping their spears, as if trying to decide whether this is a spirit to worship or a weapon about to strike them down.
Nator’ax hasn’t moved closer. His body is rigid behind me, his attention locked on the Plood with a predator’s focus. I can feel the calculation in him, the instinct to act, to eliminate what he doesn’t trust. But he doesn’t move. He knows, as well as I do, that the thing he distrusts is the only reason we’re still breathing.
“It’s all right,” I say as soothingly as I can. “We can’t get home without him.”
Nator’ax finally tears his gaze from the Plood alien and looks at the screens. “Is that where we’re going now?”
“First you need your sword,” I tell him. “And I think the Gar tribe will give it back if you arrive like this.”
He touches his hip, where the sword should hang. “I have no weapon now. If they disagree, we may be in the same trouble as before.”
