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The engine is still running. I can hear the rumble below. Now we just must hope that it will still roll.
?????
“You must be so tired of walking between the camps and the caves,” Maysee says. I’m carrying her “Piggyback” as she called it. I added it to the translator with a reference image of their planet’s “pig.” This doesn’t help. The term makes no sense.
The Bull Dozer rolls at our side. Arjun holds the sleeping Faith across his lap as he drives.
Rain pelts us. Winds whips the sands up into my face. I fear that the main power of the storm won’t even need to reach us - these early tendrils are growing strong enough that we could be blown out to sea before we reach the caves.
No. I won’t let that idea linger. We’ve been lucky so far. We’re traveling much faster than we would have without the Dozer. If the humans had to walk themselves? It would be too dangerous. We’re cutting it too close as it is.
We do take a brief rest late at night. We intended to travel straight through, but the rain pauses just as Faith begins to wake, and Arjun brings the Dozer to a stop. “Let me just explain to her,” he says. “Give us just a few moments.” She kicks once at the door as she regains consciousness. Arjun runs a soothing hand through her hair, murmuring into her ear.
Maysee and I step away. Not far. We must remain within shouting distance. But I set her down and give her a chance to stretch her legs.
“We’re going to make it.” She looks up at the stars and takes a deep breath. “Thank you for staying with me.”
“Always,” I say. “I always will.”
Arjun and Faith trail slowly up the beach, holding hands. “I guess she isn’t too mad,” Maysee says.
We stroll back the way we came and meet them at the Dozer. “I was stuck,” Faith admits, her eyes downcast. “I couldn’t break out of this loop of thoughts, that I could fix the ship. That the only way to save ourselves is to fix it. I only hope I’m not too late. I hope I haven’t killed us.”
“No, human,” I assure her. Clouds are rolling back in across the sky, covering the stars, reaching for the moon. The wind is howling at our backs, stalking and approaching. But we haven’t reached the end of Maysee’s timeline. “We will make it. We must move again now, but we will reach the caves before the floods begin. We are almost halfway.”
“Let’s not waste anymore time,” Faith says, finally pulling her eyes up from the ground to my face. Then to Maysee’s. “Thank you both. For waiting. For your persistence. We owe you. I owe you.”
“I’m just glad we’re all going now.” Maysee squeezes my hand. “Together.”
?????
The storm is well upon us when we pass the engine. Maysee clings to my back, her arms around my neck. I’m sure her legs are sore. They don’t fit comfortably around my broad, oversized back. But she never complains.
We take a brief respite in the shadow of the huge cube-shaped engine. Arjun and Faith will have to leave the Dozer behind. The trees have grown too close. They’ve knocked some weaker ones down, but it takes time, and the forest grows more dense.
All three humans are soaked through and shivering. They huddle with their backs to the engine, shielded from the wind, while I scout ahead. Surely some of my crew have posted scouts to wait for us? I sent them a brief message on my CommPad earlier in the morning, but if they’re underground... if the wind has blown the communications antennas away...
I shout ahead of me in our language. Our words are propelled by more volume than the human language, more roaring, barking sounds. Someone must hear me. “We are here! Help me with the humans! Come get us!”
No answer at first.
But a roar carries back on the wind. “Ryle, we come!” at the same times my CommPad receives a message. The rain is pouring now, as bad as that first storm, when I was first swept away in the mudslide. I can’t read it. But it doesn’t matter. My crew and I shout back and forth until they find me huddled up against the rock wall.
Four of them appear through the trees. “We must hurry,” I tell them, and I lead them back to the engine where the humans wait.
I spot Maysee first. She’s shielding her eyes and peering out into the rain, searching for me. I scoop her up into my arms and hold her close. “Almost there,” I tell her.
I can’t wait to see her safely inside the caves, but I’m dreading the moment that she realizes that I won’t fit through the entry crack. I’m still so big.
My crew lift Faith and Arjun for the rest of the journey - one human between two Rurim, dangling uncomfortably with their toes brushing the ground, but rushing forward, moving more quickly than they could alone. Maysee rides on my back once again. I know she must be so tired and sore, but it isn’t much further. She clings to me without complaint.
All the while, the ground grows softer. Muddier. Soon I’m sloshing up to my ankles. If it weren’t for the rock wall at our side, we would easily be lost in the deluge.
It feels as if eons pass before we finally reach the caves. My crew disappears through with their burdens, cursing the storm as they pass inside. “Take them all the way through,” I tell them. “I’ll come when I can.”
“When you can?” Maysee slips ahead of me, just out of the rain, and turns to me. Her face drops, then twists in despair. “Oh. Oh, no, Ryle.”
I’m about to reply - about to reassure her - when the ground rumbles. The mudslide? The tornado? More natural disasters that weren’t predicted? Impossible to know. “Maysee,” I say, “Go inside. Please. I will be okay.”
