Total pages in book: 48
Estimated words: 44088 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 220(@200wpm)___ 176(@250wpm)___ 147(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 44088 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 220(@200wpm)___ 176(@250wpm)___ 147(@300wpm)
This surge of energy is adrenaline, my body’s response to chaos and carnage. It’s another system designed to keep me alive, just like the straps and the padding, except it’s straps and padding for the inside of you.
I need food, I need water, and I need more clothing. I need shelter, and I need some way to communicate with the outside world. My mind is perfectly clear, but I can tell I am hungry, thirsty, sunburned, and cold. I’ve been exposed to the elements for some time. It must have taken me a while to come around.
Looking back, I can see wreckage strewn through a jungle broken by the ship. The trees and foliage of this planet did a good job of slowing us down. They’re almost certainly the reason I’m alive. I figure if I pick back through the wreckage, I’ll find supplies.
It’s going to be okay. I’m going to make it.
Twenty-four hours later…
It’s not okay. I’m not going to make it.
I have managed to drink a little water that I found in a puddle. I know you’re not supposed to drink raw water, but I have found no other source and I do not dare leave the wreckage. If I don’t stay here, there’s no way they’ll ever find me. I can only assume as an envoy, rescue is imminent.
I can’t find anything to eat. I am literally starving, in addition to being traumatized and wounded. The initial adrenaline surge has long worn off, and it has left me aching and afraid.
And then I see him.
The Savage.
He has impressive horns emerging from thick, dark hair tied in a braid behind his head, and a big, bulky green body. Yes, he’s probably going to be somewhat hostile to a human, but I am a damsel in distress and that has to count for something.
He looks big and strong. He is moving past the wreckage of the ship, paying it no mind, acting as if neither it nor me exists.
I immediately decide to throw myself on his mercy. There is a chance he will kill me, but there is a one hundred percent certainty that this planet is hostile and will kill me. He is my only chance to survive, and I cling to the very idea of him.
“HELLO!? HELP!”
He doesn’t turn around. He doesn’t even glance at me. He just keeps moving.
My cries don’t really sound like words. My throat is dry, and my voice is hoarse, and it is traveling to him across the valley. I thought he was going through the wreckage, maybe a scavenger, but he’s not interested in it or me.
His legs are long, and he is strong. I would have had trouble keeping up with him even if I was at full health, but in my wounded state I keep falling behind.
I can’t give up. I have to follow him. He’s a lifeline.
I keep crying out, keep gasping for aid, but my words are getting less and less coherent every time I cry out and eventually the sounds I make prove to be my downfall.
Finally, the alien male stops and turns toward me, spinning around with vicious gold eyes. He has two dark pupils, narrowed in a way that really feels like not a good thing for me.
He roars at me, displaying terrifying fangs, like those of a lion or an orc. He is green, a deep chlorophyll color. His muscles trammel his body like massive snakes. There is something plantlike about him, but there is something more viciously, dangerously animal in his bearing. I don’t know anything about the life on this planet, but I am learning quickly.
I retreat as hastily as I can, withdrawing back into the bushes. I don’t have the strength to run, and I definitely have no way to fight a creature like him. If he comes after me, I’m done for.
But he doesn’t.
He doesn’t want to hurt me. He just wants me to leave him alone. Having snarled at me, he turns around and keeps walking.
I hesitate for all of thirty seconds, then keep following, but silently now. What else can I do? I have now left the shelter of the ship, and I know I will not be able to survive the open elements of this world. This much greenery suggests heavy rain showers. Just because they haven’t happened yet, doesn’t mean they won’t.
I keep following him because I have to. Hour after hour, day after day. At one point, he drops a scrap of food, a thick chunk of dried meat. I fall upon it and devour it. It tastes like life. I don’t know if he intended that kindness, but he just extended my potential survival time by several hours.
This was the right call, even if he is hostile. He just provided the only sustenance I have gotten on this planet since landing here.