Vitalis Omnibus (53 page)

Chapter 3

“Sharp or not, these make shitty knives,” Tarn grumbled. He’d reseated the crystal in his spear several times. They were great at thrusting and spearing, but when it came to shaving points onto the wooden logs they didn’t work so well.

“I still think our time would be better spent searching more of the caves than setting up defenses around this one.” Elsa took a break from using the hollowed piece of wood to dig trenches in the ground. She’d broken three planks of wood on the hard packed dirt and rocks already.

“Ain’t nothing around for a while, we could take a break,” Tarn suggested.

Elsa let a course laugh out. “You’re insatiable,” she said, turning to face him. “I’m dirty and sweaty and gross!”

Tarn shrugged, his teeth showing how much that mattered to him.

Elsa shook her head. “I forgot, you been stuck here for years without a woman. Why is that, big strong man like you?”

“Turns out I was waiting for the right one. None of them could handle me.”

Elsa belted out another laugh. “You’re pretty sure of yourself.”

Tarn grinned.

Elsa felt her resolve wavering. Kira and Fiona had both warned her about Vitalis and the effects it had on people. It restored years of life, supercharging energy, health, and sex drive. Elsa was a Marine and not just any Marine. She was special forces, a member of the elite Marine FIST team three. When it came to the stolen moments needed to relieve stress she’d long ago learned to make the most of them.

“Later,” Elsa forced herself to say. “We’ve got to finish these before our relief gets here.”

“Fuck them,”
Tarn growled.

“No,” Elsa shook her head for emphasis, “you’d better be fucking me. I don’t like sharing.”

“Till you can’t walk straight,” Tarn promised.

“Seems like you were the one that had trouble walking last time,” Elsa reminded him.

“Long as I keep you and your jackhammer hips from being on top I’ll be fine!”

A new voice groaned and said, “I could have gone the rest of my life without hearing that.”

Tarn and Elsa looked up to the ledge that marked the border of the jungle above them. Aran and Ben were standing with grins on their faces. Tarn waved and the two turned to slip down the side of the cliff to the passage that served as a backdoor into the pits. They emerged a few minutes later.

“Hey Gunny,” Ben addressed Elsa. Technically they were still Marines and he was a private first class. In reality, they were trapped on Vitalis for the rest of their lives and being a Marine was just a part of their old lives.

“These all the defenses?” Aran asked.

“We ain’t done yet,”
Tarn said. “Got these stakes that need shaving, why don’t you two handle that. Elsa and I’ll finish digging.”

“Sounds like fun,” Aran offered.

Tarn glared at him for a moment before moving over to help Elsa with the trench she was digging. Together they removed as much dirt as the solid rock beneath would allow. By the time the stakes were set the sun was an hour from setting in the west.

“We need to move fast to make it back,”
Tarn noticed.

“I’ve gone through the jungle at night before,” Elsa reminded him.

Tarn smirked. “I remember. I didn’t say we had to get back for our safety, I’m worried about the poor animals!”

They traded off the guard duty of the caves to Aran and Ben then headed back through the tunnels to the jungle. As they passed the passage that led deeper into the maze of tunnels Elsa paused to stare into the blackness. The porous rock walls glistened with moisture, reflecting the soft light from the crystals in both of their spears.

“There’s something down there.”

“Don’t doubt it, there’s tons of shit everywhere around here. And all of it wants to eat you.”

Elsa glanced at him, a smirk on her face. “Including you!”

Tarn
’s grin confirmed her accusation.

“Anyhow,” she said, “I can sense something down there, maybe a lot of something. It feels alive, almost like I can feel it breathing.”

Tarn sighed. “Gotta stop spending so much time with Kira.”

Elsa stared a moment longer before she turned away. “Maybe. Come on, that’s another day.”

“Happy to spend some time in a dark and wet hole with you anytime.”

Elsa smacked
Tarn on the shoulder as she walked past him. Tarn followed, letting her lead out of the cave and through the jungle. He admired her as she walked, even admitting that the loin cloth she wore added a touch of mystery and appeal to her already mouth-watering body. She wore it in Treetown, a concession to the culture most of the survivors still held to. When she was scouting or on a mission that took her into the wilds she stripped down even further, going nude with nothing but her weapons and natural dyes and muds to camouflage her body.

The jungle, still far from tamed, provided no challenges to them. The deepening darkness plunged entire sections into shadows that seemed to promise dozens of slavering animals, yet hunting and the brief exposure to the hybrid spitters had scattered or killed many of the animals. Elsa led them to one of the concealed sentry points
Tarn’s security force used, but they found it empty.

“Ling should have been here. I’m going to hit him so hard Lizzie’s gonna feel it!”

“Leave his woman out of this, it’s not her fault there’s not many eligible men around for her to choose from.”

Tarn
’s response was a scowl. “Going AWOL, you know that could get us all killed.”

“Something else might have happened,” Elsa warned. She was studying the jungle, paying special attention to the trees above them. She’d nearly fallen prey to one of the spider-monkeys that moved from treetop to treetop herself. They were fearsome predators with segmented legs as long as she was tall.

“Ain’t no sign of a struggle.” Tarn shook his head. “His ass is mine!”

Elsa raised one eyebrow as she looked at him. When
Tarn met her gaze and saw her glance down at her own partially covered bottom he let a grin slip through.

“Not like that, your ass gets first dibs.”

She shook her head. “Good, now let’s go.”

“No, we need to see if anybody else is missing,”
Tarn said. He turned without waiting for Elsa’s response and headed off to the next sentry post.

Elsa followed, her eyes scanning the jungle above and behind them. She cursed the loincloth, every step she felt and heard it rasp against her skin. The sound was faint, but on a place as deadly as Vitalis giving away any advantage could be a fatal mistake. She could hear
Tarn’s footsteps and the gentle noise of his pants. She slowed, giving herself several paces between the two of them. Elsa wasn’t using him as bait, she wanted to be able to react in case they were attacked without Tarn being in her way.

Coral, a former maintenance worker at the doomed research colony, was waiting in a shadowed hollow beneath a massive tree that had fallen. She greeted them by lowering her bow and then waving. “Expected you back sooner, you two need to stop and check something out in the jungle?” Her grin faded when she saw the serious expressions on their faces.

“Where’s Ling?”

“Have you heard anything?”

Coral looked back and forth between the two. Her mouth was open but nothing came out. Tarn scowled and repeated his question about the engineer.

“He should be at the next outpost,” Coral said. She peered past the two of them, as though she could pierce the gloom and the distance

“He’s not,” Tarn snapped. “No sign of a struggle either. You see him come out?”

She nodded. “We walked together to this post, then he went that way.”

Tarn swore.

“It’s not that far that she wouldn’t have heard something.” Elsa opined.

Coral nodded. “I’d know.”

“Fucker!”
Tarn clenched his fist so tight Elsa felt certain his knuckles were going to burst though his skin.

“Let’s get back to Sharp and see if there’s an explanation for this,” Elsa said.

“What about the empty post?” Coral asked.

“Shift’s almost over, another couple of hours,” Elsa answered when
Tarn did nothing but fume silently and stare into the jungle. “We saw nothing in the jungle, it should be fine.”

“’Should be’ gets people killed,”
Tarn muttered.

“Fine, I’ll stay, but you owe me.”

Tarn glanced at her and nodded. Elsa stepped in closer and reached out faster than even Tarn could react. She grabbed the back of his neck and pulled him closer to her, then latched her lips to his for a kiss so hungry it made Coral’s stomach twist. “The second I get back you’re going to make good on your promise.”

Tarn
stumbled back when she let go. He grinned slowly and nodded, then shook his head and turned away to head to Treetown. Coral chuckled as he left. “Remind me to compliment Sasha, I’ve never seen stitches that could handle the stress Tarn’s putting on those pants right now.”

Elsa laughed and headed to the empty nest atop a pile of rocks. Two hours until she was relieved, what could go wrong?

Chapter 4

“Captain Sharp, you’ve got to tell them to stop this!” Kira threw back the covering over the door to Sharp’s room and saw him scratching a piece of charcoal against an animal hide.

Sharp jerked, surprised at her entrance. He scowled, noting a black slash across his work, and turned to glare at her. “What should I stop and who should I tell? And why don’t you try knocking next time?”

“The Coalition ships!” Kira said, ignoring everything else. “Eric says there are more ships in system now? They want to set up an outpost? Have you told them what will happen to them?”

Sharp sighed. “They’ll be lonely and forced to wait years for communications to loved ones or when they want to return back to the core worlds. But for people who like that sort of thing, the pay is worth it.”

“What? No, if they come here they can never leave again!”

“The ‘outpost’ you’re freaking out about? It’s an outpost orbiting the planet. They’ll take measurements up there and, working with us, try to figure out a safe way to conduct research. Maybe even take samples, who knows?”

“Klous is behind this, isn’t he?” Kira spat out.

“Sharp!”
Tarn’s gruff voice preceded the large man entering Sharp’s room by less than a second. Tarn bumped into Kira, unable to stop himself in time. She’d already shifted and leaned back, driving the much larger man back with an ease that belied her size.

“Watch where you’re going,” Kira snapped at him. “Where’s Elsa?”

“She’s in post three, where Ling’s supposed to be,” Tarn snapped right back. He rubbed his ribs where Kira’s shoulder had jammed into him. “Ling’s missing and nobody knows why.”

“Who’s in four?” Kira asked. She turned and moved so
Tarn could enter Sharp’s room. As she did she glanced down and studied the charcoal sketch Captain Sharp was in the process of making. It was The
Rented Mule
, his transport ship she’d crashed onto Vitalis. At the time she had the choice of a crash landing on the planet or being consigned to waste away in deep space.

“Coral. She didn’t hear or see nothing. Two’s too far away, I didn’t bother checking there.”

“Any trouble anywhere else?” Kira spoke again before Sharp could do more than open his lips.

“Let’s go find Klous, they’re probably up to something,” Sharp said before
Tarn and Kira could continue to try and outperform each other.

Kira pushed past
Tarn, walking briskly across the bridges between trees until she reached the one that Klous and Sasha had fashioned into their home. A portion of the trunk had been hollowed out, but to accommodate two adults and their son, Kelsey, additional rooms had been built on the platform that surrounded the tree. Hide and wood, the most primitive of construction materials, made up the small residence. Given the tropical climate even the limited insulation those materials provided was more than sufficient.

“Klous!” Kira barked as she exited the suspended bridge and stepped onto their decking.

“He’s not here,” Sasha called out.

Kira pushed the hide curtain aside and stepped in, followed closely by
Tarn and Sharp. Sasha’s eyes widened at seeing all three of them.

“Momma, is something wrong?” Kelsey looked from the uninvited guests to his mother, the scraps of hide sitting in his lap forgotten.

Tarn stared at Kelsey, shaking his head before turning to focus on what Sasha was saying. “No honey, they’re just looking for daddy.” She turned to face them and frowned, then set aside the sewing she’d been doing. Sasha was the best seamstress in the colony, earning her the unenviable task of creating and repairing the clothing for the survivors. “Wait here, I’m going to step out and talk to them.”