(Mucho Thanko to my two beta's!)

Exact same disclaimers and notes that apply to parts 1 and 2. I don't own the B5 universe, please don't sue me. This went AU in mid-season 5 of B5, spoilers up to then but not afterwards - this has shifted far from canon so no worries there. Nothing especially violent or sexual yet, no pairings of familiar characters: the chars so far are all original, but we see a total of 3 familiar faces (well, 4, but she was minor in canon) much further on. And if you didn't catch the timeframe yet, this is set in the first year of 'Crusade', about 5 years after B5 ended it's run. FEEDBACK PLEASE!

I only have the one source of semi-reliable spanish, so if any of you see a mistake or can help me out, please, email me!

Send comments to: h_raelynn@hotmail.com

Rated PG 13: Some of the crew have potty-mouths. In several languages . . .

*shows emphasis*
[thoughts and telepathy]

~~~~

(Zoe)

It was the morning of the 3rd day.

Zoe groggily woke to an insistent and high-pitched “Fweep, fweep, fweeee!” sound repeating itself over and over again and a bright yellow light trying to sneak past her eyelids, which had fortunately sealed shut during the night. She took a minute to wonder what idiotic practical joke Kevin was trying to play on her this time. When she started to stretch out in the deep chill, a stab of pain from her foot made her clamp her mouth tight around what was preparing to be a blistering verbal assessment of the type of man that would steal a mattress from under his wife AND drop the temperature in their room. With the pain, her memories started to wake up as well. A few moments later, she registered that the sounds were actually birds singing, and the light wasn’t actually from a light; it was the nearby sun shining.

[Oh. Right,] she remembered, rubbing dust and dried tears out of her eyes and looking around. Her face was mere inches of the ground – dirt, even. [We’re not on the ship anymore . . .] Some of the others had piled together leaves and grass-like stuff under all of the blankets as a bit of padding, but she still felt too stiff to have slept properly. A mass of aches and other soreness made their presence felt, reaffirming her idea that 'hard equals bad'. A few feet from her face, there was a small fire crackling on top of a mass of white ashes. She could feel it’s warmth on her face, but the chill that had soaked into her marrow was not eased. There was something warming in a battered pot that looked like it had once been sheet metal, and when she sniffed, she could smell the remainder of the same meat that they’d eaten the day before, warming up. [At least there’s going to be breakfast.] She could feel someone watching her; the sensation was so strong that the back of her neck was prickling. A vague groan somewhere near her made her chance raising her head to look around.

Torres was easy to spot in her dull green fatigues, stiffly sitting on top of her own dirt-padded bed. She looked as though she hadn’t even tried to sleep. Four of the others were just lumps under the mixtures of silvery thermal sheets and rough brown cloth blankets, but the lump with the leg brace shape had to be Private Shea. Barnett was also awake, wearing just some smallish underclothes since her overalls had apparently been washed - they were now spread out to dry in front of the fire. She was poking at a small steel bowl with a medical scanner, apparently trying to decide if the contents were poisonous. [Lord, I hope I don’t look as bad as she does,] Zoe prayed momentarily, then braved sitting up and letting a chilly draft shock her fully awake. She could see Jocylen and the local man a few dozen feet off, apparently bringing containers of water from the stream that she could see behind them. Who the heck was staring at her? She could still feel it and turned around half expecting to see a horse or some sort of resident animal glaring at her for invading its space. Nothing but an assortment of trees, the unseen ‘fweep’ing birds, and . . . Zoe blinked as her eyes were drawn a few inches above where the sun was half-risen. To the orange-brown ribbon-wrapped gas giant.

“Tell me that thing isn’t looking at me,” she muttered, unable to tear her eyes off of it and feeling just a little distressed at the very idea.

“That ‘Uncle’ man says they named it The Watcher,” Torres replied. “It helps if you don’t look back at it. Want to help me get these lazy lugs upright? We need to get moving. 26 is still a friking long way off, and it’ll be even further to get to the main part of the crew – and you do NOT wanna know how far it is to reach this bloody city we’re aiming for.” She held up a map for a moment, but it was too much for Zoe to focus on at once.

“Damned scanner!” Barnett loudly cursed, saving Zoe the need to reply.

“Still malfunctioning?” Jocylen asked as he came up beside her.

“Yeah, jus’ like half our equipment is. Anything that came from the pods is turning out to be a load ’a crap, but we just din have the time ta bring stuff from the ship itself. Damned new designs ain’t worth shi- uh – aren’t working, sir. I want more than dead rations and wild animal meat available, but if we all topple over from some plant toxin? 26 doesn’t have a medic with them, and none of the pods past them did, either.”

“I was there for all the comm calls earlier, private, I know that. But the tel . . . the local man – he ate half a dozen while we picked ‘em. I think they’re fine; tried a few myself. A little bitter flavored, though. There’s supposed to be more for edible flora further down.” He sat down and filled the water filters from his container. “Few minutes and there’ll be something resembling coffee. The rest of you will need to get up by then.”

Barnett gave a mild grunt as reply, and held something small, oval shaped, and green-grey up by her fingertips for inspection. Several other affirmative mutters were heard from the lumps, and Zoe decided to drag herself up before she had to fight to use the latrine. [This is why I hated camping,] she recalled as she started off in the marked spot in the trees.

~~~~

Breakfast, rustic as it was, took longer to eat than it might have. Not because there was a great deal of food – most of the group felt just a little hungry still when it was all finished – but because Jocylen used the time to hold a meeting and figure out the situation they were in.

“We’re refugees,” Zimmer snapped. “What is there to figure out?”

Jocylen, sighing, stared down at the maps sprawled before him. “If I have to go over this again, private -” he said in a slightly threatening tone.

“No, sir,” and she subsided to merely rub at the bandage that enveloped most of her left arm and hand.

“The reports say the local medicine is not especially bad. You should let him check that again.”

“Not likely, sir.” Zimmer paused, then glanced at the local man, who was sitting with the circle, if half a pace back from the others, and rapidly scribbling in the notebook. “Nothing really personal, old man, but the answer is ‘you are not gonna touch me’.”

He scribbled for a few moments longer then closed it around his pen and handed it to Sanov, indicating he should pass it around to her.

Zimmer, after a hesitant pause about touching the book, read it while the others finished eating. She handed it back around to him without saying anything – though she did smack Cevry when he tried to open it to peek. “Ain’t nothing we don’t already know. Give it back to him. Now what route are we taking again?”

Zoe, along with every other earthforce member there, was staring at Zimmer. “Marlon,” she asked gently, “what was that about?”

Zimmer ignored her for a moment, carefully unwrapping the bandage nearest her shoulder to examine the charred flesh underneath. She shrugged her other shoulder as she said, “He wouldn’t do anything on purpose to harm us – the Captain would kill him.”

“She’s just as stuck as the rest of us, she wouldn’t be able to get away with it,” Sanov said.

“Probably not, but he would still be dead.” Zimmer paused to look at the burn, then started to unwrap the lower portions. “Jiminy Jack! Does that look only a couple days healed to you, Micheal?”

Shea leaned in a little closer to look. “No - it *should* still be gooey and bleeding. It was even getting infected yesterday, the medics hadn’t been able to get to you for any treatment. The burn sprays don’t work that fast, I’ve had to use them on other missions – but there’s not even a trace of pus left. This looks like you’ve been in the medical bays for almost a week.”

Jocylen moved over as well, getting a better look. “Mother O – is that because of that goop you spread on it?” He had directed the last part at the local, who was again writing a reply, though Jocylen did not look over towards him.

Zoe and Cevry both backed out of the circle, coming around to see the injury for themselves. Zoe only got a glimpse, but that was enough to make her feel very ill. Zimmer had been burned very badly; half of her forearm was gone, the red-black blistered muscles showing where the skin had been melted off and even a few whitish spots that had to be bone. Zimmer was not able to move her elbow or hand, she could not even feel any of it anymore, though Jocylen had said she’d gotten lucky and had not yet physically lost any of her fingers. The scorching started only a few inches below her shoulder.

“What happened, acid?” Barnett asked, her face mottled grey.

“No, the power relay we were trying to repair blew and I didn’t get out of the hatch fast enough. Murry and Kristov were closer to the corridor, they got out before me but I was still hanging onto the grab-bar 'n dropping out of the way, then boom.”

She stopped for a moment, her face expressionless. Then, quieter, “Segun was behind me.”

There was a moment of silence, and Zoe crossed herself respectfully. Segun had been one of the engineering crew that she had known fairly well. He had an ex-wife and two teenaged daughters, back on earth. Very competent, if a bit rude at times. He had kept a picture of his dog inside his uniform pocket, sometimes joking that it was ‘the only way to keep a bitch in my pants’. He had. Past tense.

Jocylen moved back and gathered up all but one of the maps. “Pick up your packs, everyone. I want to get as far down as possible before it gets too dark to move safely. We need to get to 26 and pick them up. I intend to beat the main group to that main pass. All agreed?”

A collection of “Aye, sir!” sounded, and everyone got to their feet. The local man had finished writing, and he held the page open for them to read. ‘First green layer sterilized. Red jelly helps muscles and blood to heal over. Skin treatments later, help keep scarring down. Sarah – woman with command crew – has many years healing skill. Farm produces much medicine for province, she brought best medical supplies world has yet, to assist. Also Ethan Wake is qualified surgeon. With others.’

“They’d be other tele- uh . . . other locals?” Cevry asked.

A quick note, ‘Both active. Mid-range? If tested they never said results. Level not important here – we try to be opposite of what Corps had. Doubt strong enough to scan you even if wanted to, but certainly pick up broadcast emotions or threat.’ He let them pass the book around while he rummaged in a wooden box and pulled out a clay jar, holding it up and looking at Zimmer.

“Sure, add more. It’s not like I’m near a hospital for anything better.”

A few minutes later, they were all packed up and setting off, Zimmer’s arm snug under a clean wrapping. Shea had already confessed that he had no idea how to even climb onto a horse, nevermind ride one. A brief debate over whether or not he’d slow the group down by trying to use crutches on the rough terrain was ended with the decision to let him as well as Zoe (who was already trying to edge away from the four-legged giants) go on their own until they stopped for lunch. Barnett had pointed out that if they walked, they’d be able to carry packs. The horses were already looking a little full from the stripped equipment, never mind the other supplies. Zimmer had agreed to try to ride; the blood loss from her burn would leave her too weak to withstand a long hike for several days more. Sanov stated that his arm felt fine, and had even scooped up a small pack full of stripped gadgets, though he needed help to fasten it on properly. The rest of them were unharmed, and so were weighted down with heavier loads than the small, 12 kilo pack of rations Zoe had strapped onto her back.

“If you can keep up, you can walk,” Jocylen told them finally. “We’ll see about later when it comes. Most of 26 have been hurt as well; we’ll need to reconsider things when we reach them sometime tomorrow. One of them will need carried on a stretcher, and they can’t do it.”

“Why not?” Barnett asked.

“Because it takes 4 working limbs to carry one, and two of them have broken arms. We’ll have to help. Pay attention to the comm next time there’s a conversation, private! The other pods that came down south of them were days further on, much closer to the main pass we need to get to, *and* were on the other side of some deep ravines that looked very impassable, especially when carrying wounded. They’ve arranged to leave a boosted comm unit as a relay for us to reach the rest, then retrieve it once we’re close enough to call on our own – don’t worry, old man, we’re not going to leave any equipment behind. We’re going to come down on the side where 26 set down, then continue on with them. We all can meet up at that valley junction. Both the comms and Uncle here have said there are people already there. It’ll be a right little town before we can reach it, but I repeat: I intend to BEAT the main group there! Our distance is over a hundred kilometers shorter, it’s downhill, our group is smaller and thereby faster, even with our terrain being rougher. I’ve never had to make the Captain wait for me yet. Let’s go!”

With that final order, they were off down the slope, heading through the as-yet-sparse evergreens towards a deeper valley they could glimpse as they crested each little ridge. Somewhere around the bend of the mountains nearest to them waited the four occupants of escape pod 26; and much, much further south, along valleys they could not yet see, the rest of their scattered crewmates were gathering.

[It looks like a very long way to walk,] Zoe worried, as she swung along on her crutches. [But my foot should be fine in a few more days, and that’ll give my arms a rest, anyway.]

The sun was high and all the crew was feeling extremely warm by the time they finally stopped to eat lunch. Zoe had kept up with only some difficulty - having the crutches had actually helped in a few places, they acted as braces to keep her from falling - but Shea had lagged behind, and was gasping for air when he caught up. He did not even try to argue when he was informed he’d be riding from then on. They hadn’t caught any more animals to add to the meal, but a small patch of the same berries she’d sniffed at earlier in the day had Barnett knee-deep in bushes as she picked all she could reach while the others unloaded the horses to let them rest and started the water-filters, discussing how far they had gotten and how hard they would have to push to make better time.

The local man – who still had not given them a name, only the word ‘Uncle’, had written out very plainly that he preferred to be a day later than planned if rushing meant more might become injured. He also wrote out that Byron – the name of the local man in charge of getting all the earthforce members back to the city – was expecting several of the side groups to be delayed, by both terrain and weather. Jocylen’s reply was to the effect of the other man’s being right, but that he wanted to keep up a fast pace whenever possible. They sat down to eat rations and fruit, stretching out their legs, rubbing sore muscles, just generally resting. A few of them jumped when the comm beeped at them unexpectedly.

It wasn’t official news, but nobody regretted the battery usage when 26 started to pass on some of the names of the people they’d confirmed as being found. Zimmer sniffed a few times when she found out her husband was fine, though she did not actually cry. He’d been working in a section of the ship had had been heavily damaged. Two of those on the same repair team had been confirmed dead that morning. A badly broken foot and several deep but treated gashes on his legs were better than being a corpse. He was with a two-pod group that was aiming towards the same valley junction as they were, though his group was aiming north, not south, along a different set of valleys than either Jocylen’s or the Captain’s group were following. A local woman named Desirée Yavasis was helping them come down.

“Tell me she’s ugly,” Zimmer whispered to Uncle. “Stan and I were fighting before the attack came – I – I don’t know if . . .”

‘She would rather stick a knife in a soldier then let one touch her,’ he wrote with a half-smile.

“You’re sure?” she asked as Cevry hissed at her to be quiet while the comm was on.

‘She stabbed three people while still a rogue. Maybe more. Five women came, all would defend until dead, or they were not allowed to come. Was not known if you were friendly.’

Zoe, though gifted with a deep tan by grace of her genes, was looking somewhat pale when the comm said they had completed the short list. She reached over and grabbed the microphone out of Jocylen’s hand before he could close off the connection. “26, are you sure there’s no word at all about a Lt. Kevin DeClerke? The Chief Engineer – he would have been noted down with the rest of the officers. Over.”

“Sorry, ma’am, but there’s been no word yet. Much of the crew has checked in – the main camp has a number count of over 500, though we’re all widely scattered still – there’s no word as to any of the other crew. I’ve been told that several hundred came down on the prairies, but there’s no way to contact them until we can get close enough to the settlement mentioned to call. As I said before. Over.”

Zoe handed the handset back to Jocylen numbly, and let him close the connection.

A tense minute later, “Kev’s fine, Zoe. He’s gotta be.”

“Sam?” she asked softly, her head buried in her knees.

“Yes?”

“Shut the fuck up. I know what he did, the way the ship went so radioactive so fast but didn’t blow up. It was one of those core dump things that you sure as hell hope never has to occur, and he’d have to be there – he’s the one with the command codes to do it. He would have been there – that very damned *minute* - when it went off. Nobody can get to the pods from the main center that fast. Nobody.”

There was a very long pause. “. . . maybe he set it on a timer?”

Jocylen looked very uncomfortable at Torres’ suggestion. “I don’t think it’s possible – I mean – him and the Captain would've had to change the programs for all of engineering beforehand. A core dump is very rarely needed, by the point when you’d need one a ship is pretty much already blown up. That’s why the automatic time is for 60 seconds, so nobody has to suffer further. She covered all kinds of things when training all of us, but – for something like that – I don’t know if there’s even anyone on the ship who *could* change the set parameters of the programs, never mind someone who’d think to do so. The firewalls and blocks in the system are the strongest in the fleet with a Warlock Class destroyer, I don’t think a team of twenty could even break into them, never mind change something.”

“Maybe it wasn’t that kind of thing,” Torres insisted. “60 seconds wouldn’t have given most lifepods time to get away, even! What else would match what we saw from the ship?”

Cevry, Sanov, and Jocylen all just shook their heads at her grimly.

“Something like that isn’t meant to actually be used; it’s only been covered by theories. If an enemy was strong enough to cripple a vessel that badly, the risk was too great to even release life pods. Any other Captain would have set the self-destruct by that point. But not ours! Ours was just too bloody stubborn. Instead, we finished off the last of the Drakh, and ended up here. She must have been breaking regulations left and right and sideways to even consider trying to save the lot of us. I’m actually surprised they made it into orbit, assuming it hasn’t fallen out by now and turned into a very impressive meteor. If any Drakh are still out there, if they find this world, the ship is as good as stolen. They could probably even blast us from orbit. The only radiation that would match those levels but not completely destroy the ship would be from a core dump. He’s got to be dead,” Zoe finished very quietly, with not a trace of emotion showing.

They packed up again in silence.

****

They weren’t allowed to go just yet, however. Their guide stopped them just before they set off. He had not helped them clear the makeshift camp up, he’d been writing slowly but steadily for all the time it took, not paying any of them a lick of attention. When an extra-suspicious Torres saw this, she stood and glared at him for the time it took for him to finish.

He again passed his notebook around, letting each crewmember read the pages and look at the rough picture he’d drawn to show it better.

Then, “You expect us to believe that the whole solar system is wrapped by this – interference vortex – shield thing?”

He took the notebook back and wrote one line, holding it up for them all to see. “WE ARE ALL STILL ALIVE, THAT IS PROOF ENOUGH.”

“Good point – I mean,” Sanov added hastily, “There must have been others who tried to stop you, who’d have hunted you right to here – but there were no orbital defenses, were there? That's what you all told me, remember? No ships, no shuttles, no relay beacons. No cannons on the surface that could reach orbit, even, and nothing in any of the L-points, right Zoe? Nobody would forget to guard their backs, especially nobody as neurotic as rogue telepaths. That means there’s got to be something there that’s protecting them. Am I right?”

Uncle nodded at him.

“You claim that you just don’t know how it works, but there’s someone in the settlement we’re going to that does, am I right? The Captain won’t settle for not knowing.”

He nodded again, at each statement.

“I’ve got a different question,” Torres suddenly said. “How the *Hell* were you all out here in the middle of absolutely nowhere – never mind the planetary crap, I mean in the middle of these damned mountains - and have medical stuff and extra clothes and blankets and horses? With maps and stuff – you were expecting us. How?”

Uncle, though he sighed, seemed to be expecting just such a query. He wrote: ‘There are Centauri here, there are quite a few different species, but some of the Centauri are Seers and they had visions of you coming here. And leaving again, safely! Other signs – some people were previously caught in time warps and have told us about it, about you. It was a gamble that we took – if you did not show up when predicted, bad. We had to use many of the nearby horses – one has already died, we cannot afford to lose any - and we cannot spare people from the harvest. BUT if you did show up and there was no one around to help you, that would have been VERY bad. Many plants are poisonous to humans, there are dangerous predators in the mountains and elsewhere, and you would not have had any idea which direction to go, where the rest of the crew were. It was a bit of a relief when you did show up, though it will be very hard for all of us to get you all back safely. We did NOT want any company, not for years, or decades, even. You are not welcome to stay a minute longer than you must, but we will not provoke or hurt you.’

“Time warps,” scoffed Torres.

Uncle shrugged. ‘That’s what I was told. Ask Byron if you want to pry more information out of someone in charge. I am here because I know my way around the hills, and was willing to put up with all of you and the technology you brought. This is not a job that pays money. Many others were not willing, but they will not harm you unless you try to do harm to them first. We will defend ourselves by any means required.’

“This, from a man with no name?” Torres was getting very snarly by this point.

‘I have given up what I was called before. Uncle will suffice. The others who live here address me that way.’ He gave them each a level stare as his notebook was passed around for them all to read, then motioned they should get up. However, he did wait for Jocylen to give the command to finish breaking camp. Whatever was going through the mind hidden beneath the tanned scalp and fringe of grey hair, he had no pretenses about being the one in charge of the group. He openly deferred to Jocylen in the camps, being as clear as he could with the maps and the notebooks as to their surroundings and route.

[He’s not in charge. He’s just the most essential member,] Zoe reminded herself as they started out for what looked to be a very long hike, [since he's the only one who's sure of where we're going]. She sighed bleakly, and started to flip along on her crutches. She had managed to keep off the horses again, and keeping up wasn’t especially hard, not physically. But she could feel her wedding band biting into her fingers with every lurch, the ring cutting a cold circle around her finger.

For the first hour, she concentrated on where she was going. Gradually, however, as her pace kept to a steady rhythm, her mind wandered off from the rest of her. Zoe started to lose her fight with worries over how the other crewmembers from Astronomy, and her other friends, and [¡Dios lo quiera!] her husband were doing. She wanted to believe that he could have lived, but she could not completely ignore the contrary evidence. [I work under God herself, the Captain has pulled off miracles before – let this be another one!]

Then Zoe wondered how their captain, with her infamous temper and supposed hatred of all things telepathic – or at least all things Psi Corps - was managing to get along. [26’s radio calls had confirmed that she was apparently doing just fine and hadn’t even had to threaten anyone out loud – she must have understood the danger of pissing off an entire planet – moon], her mind interrupted itself [– world!], she decided, [of telepaths. Although our local has already said that actual ‘active’ telepaths are a minority. Normal family members who had come along to help build or because it simply wasn’t safe where they were before far outnumber actives, he said], but it was still an extremely sticky thought. He’d also said there were a number of non-human races . . . but she just didn’t believe that. *Nobody* ever formed a colony with aliens. It just plain didn’t happen!

Captain Ivanova *had* to have met with – and not maimed or killed – telepaths to have survived her encounters with the First Ones, she knew. It was well-confirmed that she had been one of, if not the, main resistance leaders based off the Babylon 5 trade station during both that war and the civil war surrounding Earth. B5 had been the main training station for all the telepaths who’d fought back the shadow-ships, regardless of species - she’d had to have met at least a few. Rumor said that was where she had met Gray many years before, though she had been a ‘mere’ Lieutenant Commander back then, and the Shadow-ships were just vague rumors told by deep-space traders who wanted to terrify anyone willing to buy them another drink.

Zoe didn’t trust any of the rumors. A few people had even claimed to have heard that she'd had been fatally wounded in the last battle to ‘free’ Earth, but when Zoe’d watched her take command of the brand-new, first-off-of-the-assembly-line Warlock Class heavy destroyer ‘EAS Sophocles’ a few days afterwards, there wasn’t a mark on her. So Zoe didn’t know what to think. She’d met Ivanova personally a couple of weeks into the mission, as all the crew soon had. The Captain believed in working hands-on with her crew, and had enough of a memory of the stars to impress the then-private Zoe DeClerke, recently married to another young officer who showed a supreme gift for working with ‘his’ engines. What had struck Zoe then, as it did every other time they’d met – it had become slightly more frequent when both Kevin and herself had gotten promotions – was the Captain’s *eyes*. The rest of her looked a well-kept late-30’s, but the woman’s eyes looked as though she’d had to watch about a million years of small children being killed in various horrific ways. Being looked square in the face by their fearless leader was often enough to unnerve even the most battle-seasoned marines in the force. She could impress – if not outright intimidate – just about everyone she met, whether or not they were Human. The semi-recent cluster of burn scars that peppered her face and neck - and likely more, though with a uniform's coverage the true extent of the damage was hidden - helped the fear factor. There wasn’t a member of the crew who didn’t feel awe and respect, if not outright love, for the one named Susan Ivanova. [She even kept the ISN reporters at bay during that one spectacular event 11 months ago,] Zoe remembered with a sudden, prideful grin.

The expression faded within a few moments as the new thought banged open the door of her mind and sauntered in like it owned the place. [¡Por el amor de Dios! The Press!!! When they all find out . . .]

[They are gonna go insane when they found out that some of the telepaths lived and made it to here,] Zoe realized with a malicious grin, but that faded fast. [But – what if they don’t find out? If we don’t get to go home, if the people here aren’t willing to let their hiding place be known . . .] She had a sinking feeling that Torres might have good reason to be outright hostile. Worried, she slowed the pace of her crutching along to get a cautious look around.

The others were just off to her right, strung out in a slightly scattered line among the trees that lightly dotted the slope. The horses seem to prefer walking near the front, though she wondered why they didn’t wander off to eat again – they were not tied, not even at night. Zimmer seemed to be managing all right, though her knuckles were white on the one hand she could grip with. Zoe could vaguely recall something about needing special equipment to ride a horse, but all Zimmer had under her was a horse’s-back sized blanket. It looked somewhat painful, to be honest, though she’d been reminded to just relax because the horse had too much self-respect to let a rider fall off. Private Shea looked about as good, but his broken leg was probably as much the cause of discomfort as having his butt raised 5-odd feet off the ground. After boosting him up, the local man carefully strapped Shea’s leg in place, having left on a bit of the horse’s pack harness to do so. The other three horses were heavily loaded, but they did not seem to mind it once they had been started.

Everyone else was walking fairly easily, as this few hundred feet of ground was not too steeply inclined but was still sparse for the little bushes and clumps of grass that covered the dirt in most places. Zoe was wearing the same pack as before, though it weighed a little less now. The plus side to having picked up food – it was going to be eaten. After her ankle was healed, she’d likely have to carry as much as the others. As it was now, she had enough with just watching out for loose rocks, roots that stuck up (Barnett had tripped twice – and had proved that she knew Vree swearwords!), and looking out for the one native tree their guide had warned them all about – he claimed that if you touched it, it reacted to your body’s grounded current, and would attack you if you didn’t immediately leave it alone. That she had *not* believed, though he had pointed out the type, scattered among the more normal kinds of evergreen. Ali-lin-toc, he had called it, ‘worker-caste Minbari words that translated as something suitably vulgar’.

The birds that sang ‘fweep!’ had faded off not long after the sun had risen – they were named ‘dawn and dusk’ for somewhat obvious vocal reasons. But another kind of bird, smallish brown sparrow things that she could actually look at and see, had started up before the unseen ones went silent. [Those soft purring sounds they give off are actually nice to listen to], she decided, and looked around for whichever one was the closest – making sure that she didn’t look at the gas giant that was peeking out from behind a cloud to stare down at her back.

She was watching for the little singers of the ‘kirr, kirr, kirrrrrr’ sounds, when – in hindsight – she should have been watching where she was walking. The branches she was pushing past suddenly retracted, making her stop in surprise. She could see them moving, slowly, the long thick needle-like leaves that grew in little bunches on its branches all turning backwards to its olive-green-and-grey trunk. “How does it do that?” she wondered out loud, then reached over to feel the slightly quivering twigs.

Her sudden, earsplitting shriek brought the others running over even before she could finish scrambling backwards in fear, arms held up to try to shield her face from the slender wooden whips that lashed out blurry-fast in all directions as much as ward off the sudden rain of normal evergreen needles and twigs that had been broken off and thrown about by the enraged tree.

“Holy Shit!” She didn’t know who had said it, but she was too scared to figure it out at the moment. A pair of strong hands grabbed her and hauled her backwards, out of reach of the tree, though she was let down still in range of the fallout of equally abused pine fragments. Zoe just sat there, goggle-eyed and gasping, trembling from adrenaline.

The others were also staring while the frantic display was going on. It took over a minute for the tree to slow down, and several more to stop, but by the time it was pretending to consider being still, Zoe was already yelling, “Why the hell didn’t you say you were *serious* about that damned thing!”

Her hands had been lashed and were bleeding from several long thin welts across then, taken when she’d tried to shield her face – which had a red, oozing-blood welt from hairline to chin just to one side of her eye, the split cheek looking to be the part deepest cut. Someone – she didn’t look closely – was holding her face still and trying to stop the bleeding, but she was too rattled to let them do it yet. When she was calmer, Cevry was there, putting on little suture bandages from the half-exhausted first aid kit to keep her skin from further splitting apart. “Hold still! And don’t talk – this is tricky enough,” as he carefully pressed another one onto her forehead.

Her arms were already showing bruises when she checked them a moment later, though her uniform’s long sleeves had luckily taken most of the damage from the blows. It was looking rather ragged, little tears crisscrossing the parts the branches had reached. “I guess I’m going to be wearing a shirt from here,” she said mildly.

Zimmer had been wearing local outfits as soon as they were available, hers was burned rather badly – the sleeve over her injury was completely gone, and the whole of it was stained dark brown from all the blood she had lost. The others had been switching around a little already, wearing a local-made shirt or pants while they’d washed off the smoke and other signs of battle off their own clothing.

Once her cuts had been closed and dabbed with antiseptic, Jocylen asked her if she was calm enough to get up and keep going yet.

“Yeah, yeah – I’m fine already, I just . . .” her voice trailed off as she looked around.

“What?”

“My crutches, where are-” and she stopped as she saw them. They were still under the demon-spawned tree where they’d been dropped. “¡Maldito sea!”

“Dammit is right,” Cevry muttered as he followed her eyes. “We’ll hook them with a stick, hang on. As long as we don’t actually touch the tree to trigger it we’ll be fine, right? Right.”

After that, the rest of that day's hike seemed uneventful.

~~~~