The Wild Ba’Neesh Chapter Thirty-Seven ©2019 Fay Thompson All Rights Reserved

Morning arrived painfully. Mick remembered the header pain all too well, memory stretching. He cursed bitterly. He should have known his great idea would include a punch in the head. He wasn’t alone, all of them were suffering equally. He found the med kit and handed out analgesics while listening to the Ba’Neesh gripe and moan in a mixture of three languages. He wished they would shut up but he didn’t bother to say so. He just drank some water and waited for the pain killers to kick in.

Elias was playing with the com unit again. It made Mick nervous.

“Won’t they trace that signal?” He asked.

“Can they, yes. I’ve got it rerouting but a good tech guy could sort that given some time. I doubt they have received anything more than communication garbage, like static and weak at that. They probably think an animal carried it off, which is weirdly a bit true.”

“Do you think it is day or night?” Mick forgot he had a wrist watch.

“Evening.” Elias answered, “We all slept pretty hard. We should scout and post guards.”

“The food won’t last.” Mick said, he wanted to move out and to stop feeling chased. Runners made mistakes. That’s what happened in games. Although they had found this hole for the night or day or whatever, he didn’t trust it. To scout, as Elias suggested, would mean a person sticking their head out like a gopher out of a hole. A sitting duck, target wise and once an enemy understood the conduit, it would be simple enough to drop gas grenades down the holes and knock them out without a chance. He said as much to Elias.

Aenor made her way through the Ba’Neesh to scowl at him. “No say head pain fuck Mick.” She stated, clearly unhappy with him.

He shrugged. “You have words.” He answered. “It worked.”

She glared at him a long moment. “We go soon?” She asked.

“Could be a trap here.” Mick said, nodding. “Full dark, we leave. We should pack up now.”

“Trap.” She sniffed loudly first downhill, then uphill. “Not yet.”

“Funny,” Mick said, “My brain feels drained but I don’t get a sense of a lot of new Ba’Neesh memories, do you Elias?”

Aenor snorted and turned to walk back.

“Me either.” Elias rubbed at his temples where the header was finally easing off. “As usual, they manage to take what they want.”

“At least they got some English.” Mick stared after her. “I keep feeling played by them, they are rotten sneaks, you know. Sneaky sneaks.”

“Yeah.” Elias said, nodding. “I noticed.” Both Soek gathered up their new belongings and started a tight pack out. It didn’t take long to understand the Ba’Neesh had no clue how to pack. Both Soek grumbled as they had to unpack and repack every bag. The Ba’Neesh ate the remaining food while watching.

Mick snagged a couple nutrition bars before they were completely gone.

“Hungry.” One of the Ba’Neesh answered his stare.

That reminded him there wasn’t more food to magically show up. Either they headed toward civilization or they figured out how to hunt. He scowled. More blood.

They left through the same shaft and grate, to find the area undisturbed. Mick decided heading toward the Hollow Hills gave the best opportunity for lots of potential shelters and some height to better see a greater distance. He continued to feel uneasy and he finally tracked it down to not having a plan. Shelter and food. Sure, they were a sort of plan, but not really. What were they doing out here besides being hunted and running? The gaming adage returned again, ‘runners make mistakes’. He needed to change things up, but how?

They reached the escarpments just as the moon came out to offer its bright light. The Ba’Neesh climbed with an alacrity and speed that left the Soek waiting with the more injured at the bottom of the rough, rocky spears. They returned, reporting on lots of little caves, mostly being used by animals. Twice, they returned to drop dead animals at the Soek’s feet. Both Soek learned to tie the feet of the small animals using string from one pack. Mick noted the kills were all broken necks. One was a rabbit, another some kind of rodent larger than a rat.

They continued north, roughly paralleling the shine of the now distant river below. Neither Soek wanted to talk, both were facing away from the Ba’Neesh, scanning the thickly wooded terrain for any signs of man. In the very far distance there was a glow of lights. Mick estimated twenty-five to thirty miles at least. Was that the town where Tule Soc was located? He knew from the prep on the sub that the area was almost entirely Reserves, the corporation having obtained special dispensation to be inside the perimeter of the Reserves. Such clearances were rare in most nation/states as the objective was to heal disturbed nature and the presence of intrusive buildings negated that freedom.

They continued, gathering kills and heading north until the Ba’Neesh returned and Aenor said, “we have cave.”

They followed her up a winding, treacherous trail to a narrow crack between spears of rock. Even close up Mick had trouble finding the opening. The crack bent and twisted deceiving the eye into thinking it was shallow. Then it opened into a decent-sized cave with Ba’Neesh using harvested branches to sweep out old animal den materials. At the side there was a small, bathtub-sized pool of fresh water that dripped from the ceiling and ran out over a small group of rocks to drain somewhere else outside. It kept the pool full and it didn’t smell bad. It wasn’t a complete cave. When he looked up he could see the edge of the moon through a sliver in the ceiling. That suggested they could make a fire, an idea the Ba’Neesh were already working on. He wondered at the speed of their expertise.

Elias grunted when Mick made a comment to that effect. “Well, you did say they were rememberers.” He said, “Mael always said that Tule Soc killed them when their memories started to really come in, that’s when they get dangerous, when they remember who and what they are.”

Mick thought about this, “Do you think they remember the same things as say the Citadel Ba’Neesh? Or does each group remember different things?”

“I would guess a bit of both.” Elias answered, sharing the curiosity.

Mick laid down his string of small animals on a flat stone. On top of the savage battle the day before, he struggled to face the reality of eating in the wild. These Ba’Neesh hadn’t harvested nuts, berries or tubers, just meat. They imitated the Akaitapi fire ring with stones and several went in and out bringing in wood. They stacked it neatly back where the cave got low. This cave didn’t really have an area to pee. Mick guessed the plan was to use a corner between the spears outside. They would still be hidden from all but a directly overhead view. It was a bury your shit place.

“Will this ceiling shield us from a Vrill tracer?” He asked Elias.

“Decently.” Elias answered. “The devices function best with direct line of sight type hits. Vrill is energy and nature has some ambient radiant Vrill anyway. The rock should distort and bounce our more concentrated Vrill trace. This is likely as good as or better than the conduit for that.”

Mick was staring down at the dead animals. He knew enough emergency woodcraft to know they needed to gut and skin the creatures, poke them on a stick or a place them on a hot rock to cook them. It was gross.

Aenor gave him a hard look. “To eat, we cook.”

That was clear enough. The message also seemed to be, we caught them, you cook them for us. He groaned. The packs were already lined up along one wall so he had no excuse.

Edda and several of the Ba’Neesh came over to either watch him or supervise, he couldn’t decide which. Turned out the skinning part was not as hard as he thought, the gutting was just as gross as he feared. He remembered the intestines and anal track had to be removed and discarded far from camp or it would attract predators. He said as much. Aenor snorted and scooped up gross handfuls, followed by other Ba’Neesh. Elias trailed them and reported they raced across the top of the spears like goats and tossed the mess on the far side before returning, bloody handed.

Mick made them stop when they went to wash in the pool. “No.” He said, he pointed to a runoff area that was much smaller holding only a bowls-worth of water. “Wash here. Keep the pool clean.” They nodded and complied.

He washed the knife and found some sticks to use as spears. Elias helped him shove the spears through the mouths and bodies. By then the fire was merry and it became a challenge learning how to position the meat to cook and not become part of the fire. They all learned together and ate a meal not nearly as well made as that provided by the Akaitapi. Parts were near charcoal black and others still dripped too much red for Mick. He grumbled but by then the odor had him salivating.

It wasn’t enough. All of them agreed they would need more kills to feed the lot of them the next time. Mick eyed the skins. It seemed obscene to waste them. He wasn’t tired having slept overlong the day before. He took the skins over near the washing stones area and scraped them on both sides to remove the fur. He knew little about leather except it didn’t have fur. Edda joined him along with her friend Merlada. They played with the bits. “What for?” She asked.

He pondered that. Then he pointed at her feet, her cloven hooved heels that were now hidden by her descended foot and toes. “When you walk on stone you are noisy.” He said. This caught the attention of all of them. “I have rubber soles.” He showed them his boot soles. “These make me less noisy on hard surfaces.”

“You are very noisy in the woods.” Aenor observed. “Both of you crash and slam the earth.”

“We are carrying packs.” Mick answered, a bit defensive. He knew she was right, he made a lot of noise compared to them. “How did you learn to become so quiet so fast?” He asked.

“Like you say to Elias, we remember.” She answered. “In the woods, memory of woods return. Trees share, water shares, rock and dirt speak, we listen and hear the past.”

He gloried in her continuing improved English. Her accent was pretty bad but way better than unintelligible German.

“Iiyiko talks to trees too, and fungus.” He said, realizing he had pretty much forgotten the Neeshatari in the last couple of days. Where was she when shit was going down, anyway?” He frowned.

“What Iiyiko say to fungus?” Aenor asked with true curiosity in her voice.

At first he didn’t want to tell her, like it was a secret between himself and Iiyiko, but was it? Aenor was in his memories and it was in there somewhere, but it was more than the fact Aenor would likely find the info on her own. He straightened while Edda and Merlada were playing with the raw leather trying to cover their heels and, of course, arguing about it. He needed a better relationship with Aenor.

“Iiyiko calls the fungus the Great One.” He answered, taking his thoughts back to that conversation. “She said the fungus grows in the root hairs of trees and plants, that what we see above ground as separate, is all connected under the soil, communicating. The fungus is One, the plants above are many. She taught the trees how to harvest and use the human dead’s energy, made a trade with the fungus that was already sharing with the trees and plants.”

“This fungus here too?” Aenor asked.

“Iiyiko said so.” Elias answered. “Something in the transport when we found you, I think.”

Aenor squinted and both of the Soek yelped aloud, feeling their brains squeezed. Mick staggered to his feet to find the analgesic, getting enough for Elias too.

“Go easy squeezing our brains.” He said brusquely to Aenor, “it reduces our ability to function well, that reduces our overall defenses and it is a bad move.”

Aenor clearly didn’t like to be chastised. But, she sat and thought about it. “You did not sleep share with Iiyiko.” She announced, “But, I saw what she did. If she can do, we can remember or reason it out too.”

Mick returned to sit down facing her. “We have to work together Aenor, you and me and Elias and the rest of you. A team. You are gaining memory but you are still far behind where you should be. I have modern human knowledge, Elias modern Soek knowledge. Together we are stronger, a better team. Elias is an analyst. I am a gamer. You are Ba’Neesh, potentials unclear. We are all potentials unclear.”

She nodded in clear agreement. “Now Elias will explain sigil.”

Elias groaned in turn. The Ba’Neesh crowded round in their customary too-tight cluster. He said, “a sigil is a symbol representing an idea, action, person, place, thing or behavior of a thing. There are thousands of sigils. The first we learn in Citadel is the Seeker. When you lose your shoes you do this…” He drew a spiral in the air, his finger trailing Vrill. “The spiral is open so it leaks Vrill fast.” He pointed to the open end of the spiral. “If I were looking for my shoes I would push Vrill into the Seeker as I draw it and visualize my shoes. When the Vrill leaks out, I will see my shoes and hopefully find them.”

All of them had to try the sigil at once. Of course, they didn’t have anything to seek so they were frustrated.

Mick gestured for them to stop. “Listen, when you use your Vrill it is like water pouring out of you. When you are empty, you are empty until some time passes, defenseless. This means you only use Vrill when totally necessary.” They all nodded, already understanding this in general.

“No wasting Vrill.” He ordered firmly. “Save Vrill to fight.”

“Show us other sigils.” Aenor ordered.

Elias showed her the Identifier, the Turtle Shell Defense, and the Ear. “The Id allows you to not just seek out but use a compel to subconsciously release the nature or name of something you seek information about. It is a mixture of Seeker and Voice blended into a shape. The Turtle Shell Defense is what turned Mael into a Turtle, for real. It is very powerful when positioned passively. The Ear belongs to Master Ornius. If you have an object of a person or group, you can draw a Vrill ear on the object and listen to that person or group speaking. I’m not a caster so I only learned basic sigils.” He said, a bit apologetically.”

“There is a Watcher.” Mick said. “We need a shallow pan of water.” The Ba’Neesh scrambled and eventually they found a rock with a shallow dip, they spooned water into the dip. Elias watched, realizing Mick was teaching what he didn’t know. It was strange. In a way it was similar to Mael’s discovery process, Mick reasoned it out his own way and discovered entirely new things. Elias had seen many plates of water which Ba’Neesh used to snoop on others. He knew Mick had seen one, the boy was extrapolating and wanting these Ba’Neesh to learn with him or what, teach/learn together? It was an intriguing idea.

When the water settled, Mick said, “We all know what Mael looks like, right?” Everyone nodded, Mael’s appearance was distinctive.

Elias resisted a grin. Let the boy play this out, it would be instructive.

Mick leaned over the rock and did the Seeker sigil over the water. That was a new one to Elias, he didn’t think the Ba’Neesh peeped using a Seeker like that. “Mael Strom.” Mick said, his Vrill and Voice wobbly and uncertain. Aenor grabbed his left hand and placed it on her mount and said, “with force fuck Mick.”

He frowned both at her and himself. She was right. He knew his uncertainty was acting on his effort. He focused.

Mael Strom. Mick called out a second time, realizing several other Ba’Neesh decided a chain was in order to deliver this force. He yelped as a bolt of Vrill shot through him and into the water. “Wow.”

The water became glassy and they were looking down on a turtle helmet. Mael Strom jerked, both hands rising to his head and then he looked up. “Mick?” He said. “Fuck that hurts.” He thrust his right hand upward in a punching motion and the water sprayed all of them in the face as it burst upward.

Elias gasped. It didn’t work like that, yet clearly, it did. Mael now knew Mick was alive and well. It offered intriguing potentials. A way to check in. Sure, the Vrill use would spike on machines but a machine would need to be close or huge to be running planetary Vrill trace. It wasn’t exactly a cast, more like a mini cast.

“Maybe too much Vrill, not sneaky enough.” Aenor said, wiping her face.

Mick started to laugh. “Iiyiko spied on Elias’ Searcher sigil, we saw through his eyes.”

“Show me!” Aenor grabbed Mick by the upper arm and shook him, as if he were holding out on her. Mick decided she was a lot like Iiyiko in being bossy. Maybe that was why they butted heads.

“He was searching for searchers.” Mick said, looking over and Elias nodded agreement. “I had a mini-drone out watching him, spying on him as he was my enemy then. He swept the dirt. Then he took clean dirt and made half rings.” Mick demonstrated on the silty floor with his finger. “Then he drew a Nefertiti eye here and he cast his intention to find those searching for us and the eye mark gave him a steady visual, like long, long vision.”

“Does size of sigil matter?” Aenor interrupted?

“Yes.” Elias answered, “Large sigils are used in casting as the caster must move inside most sigils in the cast.”

She frowned, clearly in some disagreement with this idea.

Mick continued, “Iiyiko and I looked in a bowl of water through Elias’ eyes, I think She thought She just wanted to see what he saw, not to get his attention. Not like what we just did. We got Mael’s attention, right? Poked his head it looked like. Iiyiko and I didn’t want Elias to know. Sneaky like. Then Elias was tired, Vrill drop. He had to eat protein and drink enriched water to recover.” Mick finished.

Aenor sat back on her haunches, thoughtful. “You know more, memory tangles. We practice more weapons. More weapons Mick. We fight better.”

Mick nodded, she was exactly right. Like him, she was a stupid Ba’Neesh, just like he was a stupid Soek. Maybe he only tried things when under pressure. He tried that thought on but it didn’t feel exactly right. He amended the thought to, so far. He knew that in games, he tried things when he attacked, it’s what made him a challenging player to compete against, innovation.

There was no question where they slept that night, after Elias insisted the Ba’Neesh post two of them on guard every two hours. He made Mick give them the new watch so it would beep the time for them. “Good practice,” He told Mick, after they went over the rules of what posting a guard meant. Watch and warn the group. That was the job. Don’t be seen. That was part of the job. The two Soek slept warm and cozy surrounded in naked, furry, female bodies. Mick dreamed of Ba’Neesh and the Ba’Neesh dreamed of Soek.

(I was told to remind everyone that you can find me on Fay Thompson Author on Facebook. Friend me. I post chapter and artwork updates there first. Ask questions, comment, just chat. I’m home mostly in the evenings. Enjoy!)