They moved before dusk.
Not because Ox knew where they were going.
Because the enemy knew where they had been.
Kane could not walk.
The Academy field litter had burned with the shuttle, so Bell and Mbeki built one from two young saplings, utility cord and emergency blanket fabric.
Ox inspected the knots.
Bell waited for approval.
Ox pulled one knot loose.
“Do it again.”
Bell did.
Ox pulled harder.
It held.
“Good.”
Bell smiled.
Ox had already turned away.
Lena saw the smile remain anyway.
They carried Kane uphill through wet forest.
Kessler, one arm bound to his chest, walked point with Sato because he could still see and hear. Duran carried water because his burned arm did not prevent him carrying weight on the other side. Bell and Mbeki carried Kane. Lena watched rear.
Ox moved wherever the problem was.
Nobody had assigned those jobs formally.
They had simply become the jobs each person could still do.
Near sunset Kessler raised his fist.
Everyone stopped.
Ox moved forward.
Kessler pointed to a tree.
A narrow black mark crossed the bark.
Another marked the next tree.
And another.
Sato whispered, “Energy scoring.”
Ox crouched.
The marks formed a line across their route.
Not random.
He looked left.
The line continued downhill.
Right, uphill.
“A boundary?” Kessler asked.
“Maybe.”
“Everything's maybe with you.”
“World's like that.”
Ox tossed a stone across the line.
Nothing happened.
He waited.
Still nothing.
Then, far through the trees, something clicked.
Once.
Twice.
Three times.
Ox picked up another stone and tossed it back to their side.
The clicking stopped.
Kessler stared.
“What does that mean?”
Ox backed away from the line.
“Means we ain't going that way.”
“Why?”
“Because something cared.”
That was enough.
They turned west.
* * *
Kane worsened after dark.
His fever climbed. His breathing became shallow. The wound had begun bleeding again where the litter ride had disturbed it.
Lena opened the surgical kit.
“We need an autosuture.”
“Don't have one,” Bell said.
“We need one.”
Sato was already digging through the equipment pile.
“No. We need to close the wound.”
Everybody looked at her.
She held up the surgical adhesive.
“This plus the butterfly closures. It won't hold under movement.”
Mbeki looked at the litter.
“Then we change the litter so his torso doesn't flex.”
Bell pulled the dead communicator from his pack.
“Casing's rigid.”
Ox sat beside Kane and watched them.
Nobody asked him what to do.
Bell cracked open the communicator casing.
Mbeki cut two flat sections from it.
Sato used them as splints along Kane's side while Lena closed and dressed the wound.
Ox handed them cord when they needed cord.
That was all.
Kane opened his eyes.
He looked at the cadets working over him.
Then at Ox.
“Getting lazy.”
Ox nodded.
“Yep.”
Kane went back to sleep.
Lena almost laughed.
She hated herself for wanting to.
Then Ox smiled faintly at Kane and something moved under her ribs.
It startled her enough that she looked away.
* * *
The enemy came at dawn.
This time they saw something.
Not enough.
A shape moved through fog thirty meters downslope, taller than a man or perhaps only appearing so because of the trees. Its surface did not reflect light correctly. Gray, then black, then the color of wet bark.
Mbeki raised his phaser.
Ox pushed the barrel down.
“Not yet.”
“It has a weapon.”
“Maybe.”
The shape stopped.
Something in its hand—or attached to its arm—tilted toward them.
Ox watched.
The cadets barely breathed.
The shape took one step closer.
Ox picked up an empty ration wrapper and tossed it ten meters to the right.
The shape snapped toward the movement.
A pale pulse struck the wrapper.
The ground exploded.
Ox fired.
Not at the shape.
At a dead tree above it.
The trunk burst apart and came down through the fog.
The shape vanished sideways with impossible speed.
“Move,” Ox said.
Nobody needed telling twice.
They lifted Kane.
Sato grabbed the equipment.
Bell kicked dirt over the fire without being told.
Kessler took the remaining water.
Duran stopped beside the discarded still assembly.
“We leaving this?”
Ox looked at the enemy's direction.
Duran answered his own question.
“No.”
He ripped out the thermal element and power lead, shoved them into his pack, and abandoned the rest.
Ox smiled.
“Now you're learning.”
* * *
They ran until Kane could not survive more running.
The terrain opened into a rocky basin surrounded by low ridges. Wind moved constantly across it, flattening silver grass.
Bad shelter.
Good visibility.
Ox chose visibility.
They had two phasers now.
Bell's had been damaged when he fell carrying Kane.
Sato opened it.
“Emitter's cracked.”
Bell swore.
“Garbage.”
Sato looked up.
Then stopped.
She looked at Ox.
Ox said nothing.
Sato looked back at the broken phaser.
“The power pack is fine.”
Mbeki grinned.
“And the focusing assembly.”
Bell understood.
They stripped it.
By noon they had one functioning spare power pack, a usable focusing crystal, a trigger assembly, and several centimeters of conductor.
Duran held up the thermal element from the still.
“Can we make something ugly?”
Sato smiled.
“Probably.”
Ox sat beside Kane, feeding him two measured mouthfuls of water.
Lena watched the cadets bend over the parts.
Yesterday they would have called it broken equipment.
Today it was inventory.
* * *
That evening Kane woke clear-eyed for the first time in hours.
Ox was beside him.
“You know where you are?” Ox asked.
“Unfortunately.”
“Good.”
“How many?”
“Us? Seven.”
“Them.”
“Don't know.”
“Pattern?”
“Movement gets their attention. Think they got boundaries. Don't think they like fire much. They shoot at signals.”
Kane absorbed that.
“Rescue?”
“Maybe tomorrow if Starbase can get through whatever's blocking comms.”
“And if not?”
Ox looked toward the ridge.
“Then not.”
Kane studied him.
“You got a plan?”
“Couple pieces.”
“Enough?”
Ox shrugged.
“Usually.”
Kane closed his eyes.
No questions.
No instructions.
Lena stood a few meters away pretending to check the water containers.
She had seen senior officers trust people before.
This was different.
Kane was wounded, stranded, surrounded by frightened cadets and an enemy none of them understood.
And he had just asked Ox if he had enough pieces.
Ox had said usually.
That had been enough for Kane.
* * *
After dark, the communicator in Bell's pack turned itself on.
Static filled the basin.
Then the distorted voice returned.
The same sounds.
Three repetitions.
This time Sato did not reach for it.
She looked around.
“It's bait.”
Ox looked at her.
“Maybe.”
Bell whispered, “Can we use that?”
Ox smiled.
“Maybe.”
And for the first time, nobody seemed bothered by the word.