CHAPTER TEN
ASCENDANCY The Swamp– Hannah Ramirez First Spawn
Hannah opened her eyes and panicked as she realized her face was underwater. She pulled herself up, gasping, and ran her hands over her body and neck. The last thing she remembered was the spider construct stabbing her after she pulled it off ARi. Her hands moved across her body, looking for the wounds and found nothing but bare skin.
The water around her was black and still. Massive reeds and sedges crowded the banks around her, and the air was thick with the smell of rot and wet earth.
Reaching up, she felt the rebreather secured around her ear. The device ran down the side of her cheek and under her nose.
“Tanya?”
“ARi? Where the hell am I? Hello?”
She screamed when something brushed across her leg beneath the water. A sudden realization of just how vulnerable she was hit her all at once. She slogged forward as quickly as she could toward the nearest bank.
Looking back, two bright orange eyes stared up at her. They barely broke through the surface of the black water, fixed on her in an unbroken, predatory stare.
The water shifted, and a slow ripple rolled outward as something moved beneath the surface. Its weight carried through the water and into the mud beneath her feet. She stepped back once, then again, then turned and ran.
Hannah drove forward across the narrow strip of bog, her bare feet sank deep into the mud with every step. She wrenched them free again and again as dense ferns closed in. Their thick fronds slapped across her arms and face, and she didn’t see the next channel until the ground dropped out from beneath her.
The cold water swallowed her legs again, and the sudden loss of footing pitched her forward. She caught herself with both hands, forcing her body across. The sucking pull of mud and water slowed her progress until she hauled herself up and onto the adjacent bank.
Behind her, a body rose onto thick limbs that pulled the monster forward with steady force. Water cascaded off its scaled hide while the ridges along its spine caught what little light filtered through the canopy.
Hannah turned and ran harder.
The next stretch of solid ground was longer, and she pushed across it as fast as she could, forcing distance. She could hear the sounds of heavy dragging and the rhythm of something moving behind her. The thrashing sounds grew farther away, but she didn’t slow down, and her lungs burned. Her chest tightened with every breath while the ground shifted beneath her feet.
The sound behind her faded until it disappeared, and she slowed just enough to catch her breath.
She stopped for a moment and listened.
She couldn’t hear anything pursuing her anymore. She didn’t hear anything else either. Before she saw that thing staring at her, the swamp had been alive with insects and strange sounds. Now it was silent.
“Shit, it’s still here!” she screamed. “Leave me alone!” She broke back into a run. Her bare feet slapped against the muddy ground as she pushed forward through the ferns.
The ground dipped again as she hit the next channel. The water rose from her knees to her waist in a single step as the bottom dropped away.
She lurched forward, arms cutting through the water as she tried to keep her momentum. A moment later, a rolling force pushed through the bog behind her as something displaced the water.
She kicked forward, trying to stay ahead of it as the depth increased and her feet no longer touched the bottom. She reached the far side and grabbed onto exposed roots at the edge of the bank and hauled herself up the muddy shore.
“Come on, Hannah. You’ve got to keep moving!” she said as she got up and pushed into a large stand of reeds, slipping between the dense stalks until they closed in around her.
The space tightened until she could barely move without brushing against them. She crouched with her hands braced against her thighs, her head lowered as she worked to quiet her breathing. It took several seconds before the rush in her ears began to fade and the sounds of the swamp crept back in around her. Hannah had never been this scared before, and tears ran down her face, mixing with the mud.
She froze as one stalk after another shifted out of place in a line cutting through the reeds toward her. She forced herself out and broke into a run. The monster pushed its way through the vegetation as it chased.
The ground ahead opened into another stretch of broken islands, and the water between them was dark and wide. She angled toward the nearest crossing without slowing.
She hit the muddy shore at a run and splashed through the deeper water. The sound behind her was close, and she heard the massive creature splash down, its pursuit relentless. The islands were smaller and farther apart now. The swamp was thinning; the channels were widening into a massive river delta.
Behind her, she turned to find those orange eyes fixed on her again.
The creature was immense. Its four thick legs pulled it onto the boggy island with a weight that shook the ground beneath her feet. Its scales were dark and slick, and its tail ended in a sharp point of bone that carved furrows through the mud as it moved.
The ground ended abruptly in front of her. “Shit!” The sharp drop fell away into fast-moving water below. She skidded to a halt at the edge, mud breaking loose beneath her feet as it crumbled away. “When I find my friends, I’m turning you into like a hundred handbags!”
Hannah closed her eyes and jumped.
The current hit her hard and swept her downstream. She fought to keep her head above water as she angled toward the far bank. She was halfway across when something seized her left leg. Pain tore through her as teeth ripped into her ankle. The massive crocodile-like monster spun in a death roll and pulled her under the water.
Hannah screamed and swallowed water, kicking hard with her other leg. She drove her foot into its eye until it let her go, and she tore free.
She broke through the surface, gasping. The far bank was only fifteen yards away. The creature moved alongside her, circling. It was so close that she could feel the displacement of its body in the water.
It bore down on her all at once with its jaws open, and Hannah could do nothing but wait for the inevitable. All at once, something struck it from below. The impact drove a column of water into the air. The force of it shoved her back and closer to the shore.
She lunged the last few feet, and her hands found mud and roots as she hauled herself up onto the rocky riverbank.
She dragged her body out of the water and collapsed onto the ground.
She lay there for a moment, her chest heaving as she fought to pull air back into her lungs. The world narrowed to the feel of the earth beneath her and the sound of her own breathing. She felt pain pulsing in her leg. Three deep punctures ran from below her knee to her ankle. Blood mixed with the water soaking into the ground beneath her.
Hannah pulled herself into the tree line. The dense wall of trunks closed in around her, and the river disappeared from view.
She lowered herself against one of the massive stalks. Pulling her knees in as much as she could, she pressed her back against the solid surface.
She looked down and her breath caught. Between two mossy rocks by her hand sat a smooth crystal tablet. It looked like someone had just placed it there. She picked it up, startled by the sudden text that appeared in her vision.
[SYSTEM WINDOW:]
Welcome, Champion, to the Ascendancy.
Three hundred years have passed since Earth’s champions last walked this world. As the lowest-ranking member of your team, you must find what remains of Earth’s original territory. Only then can you summon your guide.
Three other civilizations have already begun their campaigns.
Move quickly, Hannah Ramirez.
“I’m in a cradle.” The words came out in a harsh whisper.
She looked down at her leg and felt her stomach drop. Blood was running freely from the punctures, soaking into the ground beneath her. She hadn’t even felt it. She grabbed a fistful of wet moss and mud from the ground beside her and pressed it hard into the wounds. It was cold and gritty and made her skin crawl, but she held it there, pressing harder until the bleeding began to slow.
She wasn’t sure how long she had been sitting there, leaning back against the tree, but it was night now. The only light she could see was the faint glow of the alien device. Its surface was alive with strange symbols and glyphs that flowed across the crystal.
“Ten minutes.” She sobbed. “Ten minutes, Tanya. I needed you guys to tell us what happened here for ten goddamn minutes. Now I’m sitting here, naked, it’s dark, and I’m trying to survive Australia’s version of Jurassic Park! Where the hell are you?”
She winced as she pulled her hands away from the mud packed over her wounds. It wasn’t enough. She needed a tourniquet; though that window had probably passed a while ago, she thought.
Hannah looked around her. A jagged piece of rock lay within reach, and tall stalks of grass grew in thick clusters along the base of a tree. She dragged herself toward them and pressed the broken edge of the rock against the stalks. She sawed through them one at a time. The strange alien grass resisted. That same stubbornness would make it excellent for bindings. She packed another layer of moss over the mud and wrapped the strands around her leg. She pulled them as tight as she could manage, knotting them twice. It wasn’t pretty, but they held firm.
Hannah sat back against the tree and cried in the dark until exhaustion pulled her into an uneasy sleep.
Warmth filtered through the canopy as she opened her eyes.
She jerked awake when she saw a small six-legged lizard perched nearby. The little creature was sitting back on its hind legs and staring at her with its head tilted.
They watched each other for a long while before the small creature finally chirped.
Hannah realized that it looked exactly like the small mechanical drakes Roslyn had created. She felt her shoulders sag. That was the last thing that happened before her entire world was turned upside down.
“Well,” she reached her arms up and stretched with a yawn. “If I’m here, that means ARi survived, right?”
The little drake chirped in response and darted into the forest. It returned a short time later, dropping a handful of large black berries at her feet.
“Are these for me?”
The little drake pushed one of the berries toward her with its nose.
Hannah studied the little drake, remembering back to that conversation.
“Lily?”
Lily perked up all at once, ran over, and climbed onto Hannah’s shoulder, nuzzling into the side of her cheek.
“Holy shit! You’re Yumi’s familiar, aren’t you?”
At the sound of Yumi’s name, Lily jumped off Hannah’s shoulder in the middle of the clearing in front of her.
She rose onto her back legs as her size expanded, growing and towering over her.
When she dropped back down to the ground, the impact carried through the clearing.
Lily lowered her shoulder to Hannah in a clear gesture for her to climb onto the drake’s back.
Hannah pulled herself forward and crawled up Lily’s arm as she reached up and grabbed one of the bony plates that ran down Lily’s spine.
The other plates seemed to fold down seamlessly against her side. This allowed Hannah to mount the drake as she put her arms around Lily’s neck and held on tight.
“I don’t know how well you can understand me. I have to find Earth’s original territory.”
Thinking about it for a moment, “Lily, take me home.”
Before Hannah had a chance to stop her, Lily turned and bounded back toward the river.
She stepped straight into the cold water, keeping her body high enough that Hannah wouldn’t be submerged.
She was terrified of going back into that water. But when Hannah glanced back at the drake’s silhouette beneath the surface, she realized all at once what had saved her in that river.
“It was you,” Hannah said as she squeezed Lily just a little tighter.