Kevin Clayton: My Spider Girlfriend

We had arrived on the planet Dania on request of its new government.

Dania is a habitual planet. It is located on the edge of the known galaxy and was discovered some sixty years ago. It has a single large continent which spans across the poles and covers over half the surface. Most of the continent is dry and arid but in the coastal regions it has a tropical climate at the equator and a more moderate climate around the poles. Seasons hardly exist and the gravity is a little lower then Therra. The stable sunny climate makes the coastal areas around the equator look like paradise. However its remote location and a lack of natural recourses have made it unattractive for serious colonization. This in turn made it very attractive to all sorts of other people.
In the first decades after its discovery Dania attracted independent colonists and a number of communes, collectives, and other groups trying to set up their own society. They were joined by various criminal organizations looking for a remote safe haven. Unfortunately Dania’s new inhabitants didn’t all get along. There were small wars, pirates raiding the more peaceful communities, internal conflicts when perfect societies failed to materialize. I don’t know the exact history of it all but there was a lot of strive and violence. At some point a sort of government formed under the local crime lord Hazechiël, not his real name by the way. He was the leader of a splinter group of a crazy religious sect. Somehow he managed to ally or assimilate a number of the more dominant criminal outfits. At the time many of these groups were already in the business of offering old fashioned protection to parts of the populace. So, after thoroughly defeating all competition, they were easily rebranded into the new government. Through violent oppression a period of relative stability began. A planned economy emerged, some political ties were made with the UAP, and a nation started to emerge, but not everybody was completely happy with the lives they were leading.
And that was where we had come in, little more than a year ago. A small rebellion on Dania had been fighting Hazechiël for some time. Most of the time they were simply hiding from Hazechiël’s forces, with the occasional hit and run attack to steal some supplies or sabotage a factory, but over the years they had managed to gain some ground. About two years ago they had started bringing in weapons and some professional assistance to help overthrow Hazechiël. They didn’t have the money for any of this of course; it was all funded by Therra agencies in response to increased tensions with, amongst others, the UAP.
About that time our services were requested. At first it would only involve some supply runs to the rebellion while evading Hazechiël’s small fleet, but from the start it was made clear our involvement could take on other forms in the future. This happened sooner than later when, on our fourth supply run, our ship the Eagle was shot down. We crash landed and where taken up by a rebel group and fought alongside them for the duration of the war, which ended several months later with the rebels emerging victorious.

We were standing outside our ship on the spaceport Kerrel.
“We suspect Hazechiël had moved one of his drone factories into these caverns, before the end of the war,” Jono explained to us.

Apparently we had made quite a name for ourselves during the liberation of Dania, because they were calling upon us once more. This time to join a small expedition into a complex of caverns located on the edge of the forested coastal region. Some of Hazechiël’s former commanders were suspected of mustering forces here. Jono was the Danian leader of the expedition.

“Any intel on its possible location?” Max asked, straight to the point as always.
“No, we only recovered one set of coordinates, and they point to this entrance.”
“So how do you know about the drone factory?” I asked. I always prefer to know a little more background than Max.
“We found traces of it in some of Hazechiël’s records which survived the final assault.”
“And you know his commanders are here to build an army?”
“We don’t know that much for sure, only rumours, but they all point to this area. If they are hiding in the Golonga they could built a huge force without us ever knowing.”
“Fine, have your men load up al their supplies so we can get going.” Max said.
“Yes ma’am.”
“So how do you feel about this?” I asked Max, as Jono walked back to his men.
“I have no idea. It sounds straightforward. We go in the caves and look for a base, if it isn’t there, all the better.”
“Right. I guess that’s it.”
I wondered what the chances are of actually finding a base. Even if it only has one assembly line it is bound to be huge. It would need supplies and so would any army big enough to be a threat. The longer I thought about it, the less likely it seemed.
Max started walking towards the ship. “I’m gonna tell R to help move the supplies; this is taking forever,” she explained.
Then again Hazechiël wasn’t a quitter and the same could apply to his men. We would see.

After moving all the supplies on board we took off from Kerrel and flew inland. It took a little flying around to find a good landing spot, but at some point I spotted a small clearing in the forest only one klick from the supposed cave entrance.
Leaves obscured the cockpit window and branches were breaking as I slowly landed the ship. The Eagle wouldn’t have fit in here, on of the few advantages of our current ship.
“Okay let’s get ready.” I said to no one in particular after we landed and turned a switch to open the cargo bay.
Max stood up from the co-pilot chair and manoeuvred through crowd in the cockpit. We were jam packed. The supplies and a small rover filled up most of the cargo deck, so some of the men had to stand in the cockpit and the small crew compartment behind it. Luckily it was only a short flight.

The supplies were blocking passage into the cargo bay, where Jono was stacked up with the rest of his men. I heard Max yelling, “Jono, we’re here!”
I activated the hatch in the side of the crew compartment to allow the men here to get off and secure the area while giving us some space to gather our personal gear. I had already put on my body armour when we arrived on Kerrel, so I just grabbed my backpack.
It only contained the essential gear. R would happily carry over five hundred pounds of supplies, so we would always let him carry most of our stuff.
“Ready to do some spelunking?” Max said as she put on her gear.
I stepped outside and walked around to the back of the ship. On of the men was driving out the rover.
“Not sure if you’ll be able to drive it through the forest.” I said to Jono, who was checking his map. “It’s half a mile that way I believe,” I pointed, “we could set up camp here.”
The original plan was to move most of the supplies to the entrance and set up a base camp there, but since we were so close, I figured we could leave it all here. In addition there would also be somebody guarding the ship.
Jono seemed to think about this for a moment.
“Okay, we’ll leave it here,” Jono said appeased.
He turned to his men. “We’re going to set up camp here. Hira, Zos will stay behind. The rest of you get ready to move out in five.”

It took us about half an hour to reach the coordinates; the forest would definitely have been too dense for the rover. We spent another two hours scouring the area in small teams to find the actual entrance. Apparently the coordinates weren’t completely accurate. The entrance ended up being a small but deep hole leading through the roof of a tunnel running beneath the surface. Max and I rappelled down first. The tunnel was about fifteen feet high and wide with an irregular but smooth surface of brown yellow rock. They suspected the tunnels had been created by the erosion of water, which, I figured, explained the smooth surface.
“Are you alright?” Max asked the man who was lying on the floor. She kneeled down beside him. There was agony on his face.
“My legs hurt; I think they’re broken.” He said, carefully laying his hands on his legs.
Max carefully lifted up one leg and gave a firm tap on the heel. The man screamed in pain.
“It’s broken,” Max said as she looked up to me with a calm smile. “Any pain in your back?”
“No.”
“Can you still feel you legs?”
“Eh. Yes I can.”
Max proceeded to tie the rope, we had used to get down here, onto the man’s harness.
I touched my headset. “Jono, he’s alive but his legs are broken. We’re tying him to the rope so you can pull him up.”
“Copy,” Jono replied.
Max finished strapping the rope on.
“You’re gonna be fine,” she said
“Okay pull him up, slowly,” I yelled upwards.

The man grimed in pain as he was slowly lifted from the ground. I looked into the tunnel and suddenly noticed how bright it was. It was almost as if a little bit of light shone of the surface everywhere.
“At least we found the entrance,” Max said as she looked up to the man being pulled through the hole.
“That we did,” I sighed.
“Do you see these walls?” I asked. “They emit light.”
“Yeah,” Max said only a little surprised. “That’s strange.”
I kneeled down and touched the rock. It felt a little warm, but besides that completely normal. They would have to pull this man out, I thought.
Max picked a handheld from her belt and started looking at a map of the caves. It showed caves in the larger locale, explored by other expeditions which had ventured in these caves, sometimes decades ago. Their combined data did indicate a complex of caves running beneath the ground across a huge area. Only a fraction had been mapped and this one wasn’t on it.

We waited while the rest of the men started rappelling down into the tunnel.
“Jono, what’s the plan?” Max said into her headset.
“I’ve called a medevac. They’re going to extract Marley. Doc is going to wait with him along with Xavier. They will catch up with us later.” Xavier was one of the professional cave explorers we had coming along with us. He wasn’t from Dania and probably had been hired just like us.

After Jono had rappelled down we were all here.
“Any idea which way to go?” Max asked one of the cave explorers.
“No, not really.” The man said.
A woman stepped forward who had been inspecting the walls since we got here. “Looking at the curvature of the walls, I would say, whatever made these structures flowed in this direction,” she said and pointed in one direction of the tunnel.

“How does this help us?” Max asked with interest.
“Well whatever flowed through here must have originated from somewhere. It’s highly likely this source itself lies or lay underground. Chances are better, and this is just a guess, larger structures, structures which can house factories or a base, are located both deeper under ground and closer to the source, in which case we should walk upstream. ”
“Which is…” Max asked hesitantly.
“This way.” The woman pointed again, now in the other direction of the tunnel.
“Then we’ll go that way,” Max ordered, “R take the lead.”
The explorer, to whom Max had initially asked the question, placed a small device in the tunnel, probably a beacon of some sort. The group started moving.

The tunnel ran straight for hundreds of meters before there was a sudden sharp turn. After each turn the tunnel would ran almost straight again for a while until the next one. I was still wondering were the light was coming from. I looked back and saw the woman walking in the back of the group and slowed down until she caught up with me.

“Hay! What’s your name again? You did introduce yourself but I forgot.”
“Eva. Don’t worry about it.”
“And you are…”
“I’m a speleologist,” she said. “I study caves.”
“Any idea where this light is coming from.”
“Yes. That is to say; I was asking the same question myself. In some of the other reports the walls are said to contain some sort of bacteria. I’m guessing they might somehow be responsible for the glow, though this is only a hypothesis, of course.”
“The rock still feels hard.”
“Yes, but a single layer of bacteria wouldn’t feel soft.” She explained brief.
“Right. Are you from Dania by the way?” I asked just to start a conversation.
“No, I’m from Therra originally,” Eva said. “Can I ask you a question, Kevin?”
“Shoot.”
“How dangerous or safe would you qualify this expedition. I mean if there are hostile forces down here, how many do you expect there to be and what threat would they be to us?”
This was a good question. We didn’t know how many. A small force might not be a threat to Dania but it could still be a threat to a light patrol, and even a tiny number of hostiles could cause us big problems considering the fact we were in a cave.
“Hard to say; It would depend on who found who first,” I explained. “We definitely need to be on our guard, but for what it’s worth; I wouldn’t be here if I thought it couldn’t be done.”
That sounded pretty confident.
“You sound pretty confident,” Eve asserted.
“I am.”
For a moment I thought about asking why someone would join the expedition if they were unaware of the risk involved, especially if they were so worried. I walked back to the front of the group.

We were already walking down on a twenty degree slope when we approached the next sharp turn in the tunnel. This one seemed to take the tunnel straight down. One of the climbers shot a bolt into the tunnel floor and attached a rope to it and the descender on his harness. He lowered himself around the bend and climbed back up moments later.
“About two thousand feet,” he said coolly, “better use a fiberwire.”
“Two thousand feet?” someone asked.
“A rough estimate, it gets a lot wider near the bottom.” He said as he replaced the rope in the bolt with a super thin wire. “When I’m down, I’ll call you.” He strapped a small bag containing the cone of fiberwire to his harness.
“Good luck,” Max said.

We couldn’t look across the bend so we just waited. Now seven hundred meters is a long way down, but this was taking long. At some point Jono decided to just call him.
“Leigh, come in.” “Leigh, are you alright?”
There was no response.
“We have to get down there now!” Max said immediately. She ran the fiberwire through her descender and started rappelling down. A moment after she disappeared across the bend I heard her on the radio.

“He’s alright. I can see him standing beneath the cliff. I’m going down.”
Again we waited for way too long.
Jono gestured to another climber. “Go take a look.”

“They’re down there.” The climber said over the radio after he turned the bend. “They’re waving. I think they want us to come down.”
“Continue, we’ll follow,” I replied calm.
This was ridiculous, I couldn’t remember the exact range specification of our radios but it was expressed in numbers of miles.
I walked up to the bolt and again attached the original rope to it and lowered myself slowly until I could look all the way down. I wasn’t afraid of heights, hell I was a pilot, but this was a big drop.
After taking a few deep breaths I activated my headset
“Jono, I think we are having some radio problems here. Standby.”
I could see two people standing down there while the last climber was already about one third down the cliff. I grabbed my rifle from my back, flicked the scope to maximum zoom and looked down through it. I could see Max holding her weapon up towards me in a similar fashion. She signalled me to come down and pointed at her headset. I gave her a thumbs up.
A little later the climber reached the bottom.
“Okay the wire is free,” I said over the radio “send the next one down.”

I held my position on the wall, so I could give the word every time the wire was free. It took a while before the whole group was down and I was relieved when I finally could hook myself up to the main wire and start rappelling down as well. I was about halfway when it came to me that at some point we would all have to climb back up here.

“What’s up with the radios?” I asked while detaching the wire from my harness.
“They don’t work.” Max said smiling before she walked up to the rest of the group who were gathered up ahead.

“You’ve got to see this,” One of the men said as I walked up to the group.
We were standing at another edge looking into a large cave. This cave quickly widened to a thirty meter diameter before it erupted into an immense structure. From our position I could only see the back wall of this structure, but it was clear it was immense. My rifles range finder read three six two nine on the back wall; large enough for a base and then some.

I walked up to Max who was in a discussion with Jono and some of the others.
“…best be careful now.” I could hear Tarak say. We had worked with him during the liberation of Dania.
“Agreed,” Jono responded. “We’ll take a climber with us, Leigh, and have the rest hold here.”
“What’s the plan?” I asked.
Max turned around. “Us, Jono, Tarak, Ghost and Leigh, are gonna scout up ahead first. We’ll leave the rest here.”
“Right.”
“I’ll take point,” Ghost said.
We got moving. The edge of the cliff ran along the right side of the cave, leaving a narrow mountain path between it and the right wall running all the way up to the larger cave structure. When we reached it I was stunned; from the ledge I could see the shear immensity of this place: It was giant tunnel of itself, several kilometres in diameter.

“This wasn’t on the map.” Tarak said.
“No shit, Tarak,” Ghost responded, pissed as usual.
The valley of the tunnel we looked down into was itself lined with smooth hills and dry rivers carved out in to the rock. At least that’s what it looked like to me. The cave we were standing in emerged a few hundred meters above the bottom of this immense structure.

I scanned the valley beneath, the part I could see from here.
“This thing might go on for miles. I can certainly see how someone could hide a base here.”
“Let’s see were this leads” Max said. The path continued along the side of the larger structure. It moved slightly upwards and got narrower the further we came.
At some point, when the width became less than a meter and seemed like it would completely cease to exist in a few hundred meters, Ghost halted.
“If you look there to the side,” Ghost said in a soft voice while pointing down the path, “you can see a bridge.”
It was a long rope bridge. It spanned across to a small mountain somewhat lower in the valley.
“Someone must have put it there.”
Leigh was the only one who felt the need to spell it out. The rest of us took some time to scan for activity.
“Let’s move up,” Max ordered after we insured there were no visuals. “Keep your heads up from now on.”

The path became even narrower and even started to tilt a little towards the cliff as we neared the bridge. We kept a healthy dispersion so when I slipped there was no one to grab me.

The first few meters were a straight drop. After that I hit a steep slope and started sliding down from it. There was nothing to grab on to.
“Kevin!” I heard max yelling.
I rolled onto my back as I continued on my way down. Just like the rest of these caverns the rock was smooth; there was little I could do to slow down. The steepness of the slope varied and tilted left and right, moving me away from anything that could stop me. It must have been more then a minute of sliding before I saw the slope ending. I started falling again after sliding over the ledge and hit the ground moments later. Everything hurt. I was lying in the middle of a floor of a round crater. The walls surrounding it ran up to the ledge I had just fallen from. Far above the ledge I could see the ceiling of the larger cave spanning hundreds of meters above me. Carefully I started moving my arms and legs. Although I was probably badly bruised, nothing appeared to be broken. I slowly stood up. My hands had bleeding scratches on them. I tried my headset, “no connection,” it replied. At least I’m alive, I thought at the moment, I took a couple of deep breaths and then there was a rattling sound behind me.

I turned around. The sound was coming from a dark tunnel in the crater walls and it was definitely coming my way. A large shape emerged from the darkness of the cave and an insect of giant proportions stepped into the light.

Ten thick legs supported a body the size of a bus standing four meters tall. Two rows of four eyes ran vertically along both sides of the top half of the head. The other half featured, what appeared to be, mouthpieces folded tightly together. The head continued into a slender torso to which the legs were attached; slender in the sense of being long in proportion to its diameter, the latter still being several meters. Its insect ass was half the length but twice the size of the torso with a crude diamond shape except for a flat underside.
I still stood frozen in place staring at it blankly as it halted halfway between the dark tunnel and me.
“Hello,” a soft female voice said, “You dropped your AR-54 Widowmaker.” It walked up to my rifle, which was lying on the ground ten meters from where I had landed. At the same time a number of long thin antennas came out from under the things mouthpieces. They grabbed the rifle from the ground and diligently manipulated it in the air, carefully inspecting it from all sides before taking the rifle up into the mouthpieces.
I slowly backed up until I hit the cavern wall.
The insect started moving towards me. I started running to the side, but it was fast. In seconds some antennas coming out of its mouth had grabbed me around the neck and shoulders. The insect pushed me into the wall. I tried to pull them off, but it was pointless. Its giant head was right in front of me. I was sure I was going to die.
“Hello,” the friendly voice said inquisitive. The voice was definitely coming from the thing, but the mouth didn’t seem to be moving. Although it didn’t look like it could produce the voice even if it was.
“Hello,” I said back with some audible fear in my voice.
“Why are you running away?” It sounded confused, even slightly disappointed.
“Ehm?” I felt the need to be diplomatic here, but couldn’t think of anything especially smart to say. “Because I thought you were going to attack me.”
“Oh, okay.” It said a bit taken aback. “Sorry, I didn’t want to scare you, you seem nice. And you are a human!” it resumed while the antennas were still holding me in a firm grip,
“That’s right I am a human,” I confirmed immediately. It had sounded positive about the fact.
“Are you a guy? You must have a lady friend you have sex with,” It asserted.
Besides extremely terrifying, this was getting awkward.
“Eh no, not at the moment, no.”
“Why not?” It asked surprised.
“Eh because,” this was getting pretty personal, “I don’t know.”
“Ah that’s too bad.” It said sympathetically. “You can be my boyfriend if you want to!”
At this point I was completely at a miss where this was going.
“Eh, I‘m not looking for a relationship right now.”
“Okay then I am going to eat you.” It politely informed. This clearly wasn’t the way to go.

“Wait! Of course you can be my girlfriend.” Its grip seemed to loosen just a little.
“You are just saying that because you don not want to be eaten.” It said accusingly. I felt its grip slowly getting firmer again.
“That is so not true,” I lied quickly. “I just wasn’t really prepared for this.” My mind was working over time. “See, I was just a bit surprised, because,” “you asked me all of a sudden.” “And I’m a bit shy.” I stumbled. I was sure I wouldn’t believe this story myself. It sounded a bit made up and a little too convenient considering the circumstances.
“Maybe I should not have asked so fast.” It said regretful. “Are you sure you want to be my boyfriend?”
“Yes, absolutely.” I said with all the enthusiasm I could feign. I actually felt a bit used saying it, but I was saving my life here.
“Okay good! What should we do now?” It asked happy while its antennas released me and slid back in its mouth.
I took a few moments trying to get my bearings on this situation, which wasn’t very successful. The giant insect took a few steps back. Although it seemed the immediate danger of being killed had passed, looking at the thing, I didn’t feel that way at all.
“I don’t know,” I answered finally, “what do you want to do?”
“Hmm,” it said carefully, “Maybe we first have to get to know each other better.”
“Okay.”
“What is your name? My name is Lilly.” I doubted that.
“Kevin. Kevin Clayton.”
“What a nice name,” it said excited.
“Thank you.”
A long silence followed. I was thinking of something to say.
“So what do you do here?” I asked.
“Me? Oh I was just walking around. You know.”
“Oh okay”
From this location there wasn’t a feasible escape route. There was the dark cave the animal had emerged from, but I didn’t no where it led, if it led anywhere at all. Also this thing could easily out pace me.
“Maybe we should go for a walk?” I suggested on a long shot.
“That sounds like a great idea!”
“You like walking?” I was shooting in the dark.
“Yes I do,” It said with some excitement.
“I don’t know my way around this place,” I said.
“Well I do, just go right here.”
The animal turned itself towards the cave.
I hesitated a moment before I walked past it and into the cave. The animal quickly followed me close behind.
The cave was dark. The rock which lined it lacked the illuminating glow in the rest of the underground structure and the surface was rough with jagged lines and loose rocks lying about. It must have been created later. I noticed how the diameter of this cave was similar throughout. After the tunnel took a second bend it became to dark for me to see anything, but I could hear the animal walking behind me.
“It’s pretty dark here,” I said.

“Do you have some night vision goggles with you?”
I had of course. This thing seemed to know a lot. I stopped and swung my bag from my back and picked out my night vision. Besides a flare there wasn’t any weaponry in the bag.
“Do you use night vision goggles yourself?” I could guess the answer but it seemed like a harmless question.
“No, I can see fine without them.” No surprise there.
“Do you live in these caves?”
“Yes I do. Where do you live Kevin?”
“In a spaceship.”
“Ooh interesting, tell me about it,”
“Well, it’s a spaceship, the Falcon. It’s pretty big. It’s red.” “What do you want to know about it?”
“Oh, I do not know,” it muttered. “What kind of engine does it have?”
“It has four Marilyn 180 lpd thrusters.”
“I have never heard of those. Are those like an Arctek Core.”
“No, an Arctek Core is only a power core, it is not an engine.” I had to admit the definition of engine in a spacecraft could be confusing. Max would often mix it all up. “An Arctek Core powers thrusters which are the real engines of the ship.”
“Does your ship have an Arctek Core?”
“Well yeah, but it is a different type.” “Actually we have four power cores built into each of the thrusters.” “It’s complicated.”
“I once saw a ship!” It said excited.
“Really?!” I said with similar enthusiasm. “What did it look like?”
“It was very big and black, with fire coming out of it!”
“That sounds impressive,” I said impressed. The cave was getting lighter; I guessed we were nearing the end of the tunnel.
“What did it do?” I asked. She seemed to like talking about it.
“It landed in the tunnels,” She explained. This could be relevant. “I was walking around the Gol crater. I was just scouring for food. I was really hungry because of the lamen, so not a lot of animals were in the tunnel. The lamen lasted very long this year. I remember years ago when there was an even longer lamen, it lasted a month. I feel strange if it last so long.”
I vaguely remembered seeing the name Gol crater on a map of the area.
“But then you saw the ship,” I redirected.
“Yes, it was very big. First I thought there was an eruption because of the noise. Then I looked in the air outside and saw the ship. I was very scared.”
“So the ship flew into the crater?”
“Yes it did,” she said.
“What happened next?”
“Well I was very scared, so I quickly moved away from it and hid between some rocks.”
“What did the ship do?”
“It just flew into the caves. Is that what you want to know?” She sounded a bit irritated. “I did not follow it.”
“I am just curious about the ship.”
“Oh okay.” She said exacting.

We emerged from the tunnel onto a flat plateau, back into the bigger cave structure. I subtly pushed the big button on my headset, “no connection,” still no connection.

The big insect walked halfway around me, then stopped and turned around to face me.
“This is the southern vein of the Golonga.” She said.
“Were does it lead to?” I asked.
“It leads to the Gol crater of course.”
“What about the other way?”
“It branches of in smaller caves, some lead up to the surface. You must have used one to come in here.”
“I guess so.” It sounded reasonable.
Golonga was the one of the names for the network of caves we’d entered. I had seen the name on the map Jono had shown us. The description of the caves in earlier briefings didn’t mention any of this however, but then they never explored it themselves and only knew what records remained from others. The naming of the caves and the crater might imply the connection was known to at least the namer, but maybe they had simply named the caves they found after the nearby landmark.
“What do you do here Kevin?” She suddenly asked.
“Well, I was exploring the caves.” My evasive answer reminded me of the fact I really didn’t know what to do. I didn’t have an opportunity to escape and I didn’t know how to create one. This of course had everything to do with the fact I hadn’t got a clue what this thing wanted and with that no idea how to approach it.
“Can I ask you a personal question?”
“Sure thing!”
“What exactly are you? You don’t seem human.” It was clearly a ten meter long insect like monster, but I didn’t want to touch on unknown sensitivities.
“Why do you ask?” She asked a bit defensive. This is what I was afraid of.
“You seemed to now I’m a human, but I don’t know what you are. So I asked.”
“I do not want to talk about this right now,” she said irritated.
“Okay, that’s fine with me,” I reassured her immediately.
The animal then turned around and started walking. I decided to keep standing still. Hell, maybe she would just walk away. She clearly wasn’t planning to however and halted after a few meters without turning around. It was worth the try. I started to walk towards her. The moment I caught up she started walking again.

A quarter passed in silence, as we continued to follow a winding route across the canyons, elevations and slopes which made up the bottom of the giant cave. I felt the need to pick up the conversation again.
“Do you live in these caves?”
“Yes I do.”
“Do you like it here?”
“Yes I like it a lot most of the time.”
“But not all the time?”
“No, but it is okay,” She said.
“So you lived here all your live.”
“I can not really remember. I think so.”
“Ever been outside the caves?”
“Yes a couple of times, but I like it much better in here. It is much too dry I think.”
The air was indeed more humid here compared to the surface.
“Yes it’s very dry there. I noticed when I landed my spaceship.”

There was no response.
“I flew it here all the way from the cities by the sea, do you know them?”
“Not myself, but I have heard about them. They are filled with buildings,” she said with awe.
“Have you ever seen a building yourself?” A reasonable question.
“Yes I have, in the base in the northern vein. Do you know it?”
It was Hazechiël’s base.
“No, I don’t.”
“I have only been there a couple of times,” she continued. This was getting useful.
“You know, I was actually looking for that base. That’s why I’m exploring these caves.”
Suddenly she sounded very critical. “Why are you looking for it? Do you have fiends there?”
“No not exactly.” This was true.
“Then why are you looking for it?” This was a sensitive subject, I sensed, but since I didn’t know why, it was hard to come up with the right answer. Something neutral.
“Well, you see, some other people hired me to find this base. I don’t know anyone there.”
“Really?”
“Yes, they thought there was a base somewhere in the caves but they didn’t know where, so they asked me to find it.”
“So, why do they want to find it and who are ‘they’?”
She was certainly thorough.
“The people in the cities on the coasts, they are scared the people on this base are going to attack them, so they want to know where it is so they can do something about it.”
“Are they going to destroy it?” She asked with calm. I thought about this and the way she asked it.
“Maybe.” I said aloof.
The animal was very silent for a while as we continued to move through the rocky landscape. I wondered where Max was.

We seemed to be moving along the length of the southern vein, as the animal had called it. In the far distance there seemed to be a lighter area. The animal had been silent for a long while now.
“Can I ask you a question, Lilly?”
“Sure, Kevin.”
“Is that the Gol crater up ahead? Because it seems lighter then the rest of the cave.”
“Yes it is. Why do you ask?”
“I was just wondering where we were going. I don’t know these caves as well as you do.”
“I was not going anywhere in particular. You wanted to go for a walk remember.”
“True.” Our relationship seemed to be cooling a little.

“Are you alright Lilly?” I asked after a few minutes.
“Why would I not be?” She asked irritated.
“I don’t know, maybe you’re upset about something.”
“What makes you thing that, do I sound upset?” She asked critical. This wasn’t going the right way.
“Eh no, you were just so quiet for a while.” I thought about the best way to play this. “I thought you might not like me anymore.” I said with a sad voice.
“That is not true; I like you a lot Kevin.”
“Really?” I asked with a tone of feigned doubt and enthusiasm.

“Yes really.” She said. “It is just that…I was thinking.”
“You don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to.” I reassured her, oh so sensitive.
“Well, there are just all kinds of things.” She said worried.
“Oh okay, I understand.” I could imagine how this whole situation could be a bit troublesome for her as well.
“Are you sure this isn’t about me?” I asked once more, just to get her to talk.
“No, not directly at least.” There was a short pause. “It is just I have not had a boyfriend for a while.”
“But now you have me right, so what’s the problem?” I asked rhetorically.
“Well that is true I guess” She said a little more cheery.
“I just feel there is something else you’re bothered with. You can be honest with me.”
“Kevin, do you remember we talked about the base?”
I did remember talking about the base of course, especially since we had this conversation less then half an hour ago and you seemed to be quit sensitive about the subject. “Yes, I remember. You don’t like the base do you.”
“No I do not.”
“Was that the reason you were so angry, when you thought I was from the base?” This was pretty obvious to me, but I wanted to make here feel understood.
“Yes it was.” She said a bit relieved.
“I just want you to know, I really have nothing to do with the people on the base.”
“I knew that.”
“That’s good.”
“I’m happy we talked it over.”
“Me too.”
It was clear I had a card here, with her not liking the base. Someone was only going to destroy it, if I was willing and, especially, able to tell them where it was. I got a strong feeling she might already understand this herself at some level; it felt best to play this carefully.

I kept silent for a few minutes before continuing.
“Why don’t you like the base?”
“They are dangerous, they shoot at me,” Lilly answered sure and angry.
“Really, why would they do that?” I asked astonished. I could think of a few reasons.
“I don’t know. They just do.”
“That’s terrible.”
“One time I was walking near the base when a couple of flying drones came from the base and started chasing me.” She sounded very emotional. “I was scared and ran away. They were shooting at me.”
“What happened?”
“I tried to get away but they were really fast and one of them shot me in a leg just before I reached a hole. It hurt so much and I was so scared. They stayed around the hole for hours. When they left I tried to walk, but my leg did not work anymore and I did not know what to do about it.” Her voice sounded like it was crying. “After a couple of days it fell off and I though it was gone. I cried for days. Later it grew back but I did not know that then.”
“I’m really sorry for you. That sounds terrible.” I did feel a little sorry actually.

“I am okay now, but I never come there anymore.”
“I can understand that. Just how long ago was this?”
“A few years, but sometimes they also move through the rest of the caves. Especially the drones, they patrol, and if they see you they chase and shoot.”
“It sounds dangerous. Can’t you go anywhere else, somewhere safer?”
“Maybe I could, but it is much harder to catch food outside and I just like to be in the caves much better. It is hard to explain.”
“Okay.”
This was it.
“I can help you get rid of the base, Lilly. If I know where it is I can go back to the people who hired me and they are going to destroy it.”
“Why would they destroy it?”
She wasn’t rejecting the idea, which was promising.
“Because they don’t like those people either. They have been at war with them for many years. I actually have fought against these people as well less then a year ago and helped to defeat them on the surface. That’s why they asked me to find the base.”
I left a small pause so she could ask questions but she didn’t.
“So if I can tell them were this base is they would come to destroy it.”
“What would they do afterwards; what would happen to me?”
I thought about just telling her what she would like to hear; they would not harm her and everything would be fine, but it seemed wiser to be honest and sound reliable instead of telling her a lie she might not buy and lose her trust.
“You’re worried they are going to stay and chase you as well, right?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t know for sure what would happen afterwards, but I don’t think they would be making a base here themselves. In either case I could tell them about you and ask them to leave you alone if you wanted me to do so. Most of them are good people just like me.”
If people would know she was an intelligent life form they might actually protect her and make a reservation of this place. Or capture her of course.
“They would not try to kill me?” She asked. I didn’t feel it had any relevance on the current conversation, but I wondered what I would do if I had a gun right now. My live was in danger here, so even at this point I think I would rather be safe then sorry.
And why would I be sorry anyway? She had threatened to kill me.
“They might if they thought you are going to eat them.” This probably wasn’t a smart thing to sau, but I said it anyway. “But you could hide somewhere for a while when they come here, maybe outside the caves, until it is safe again.”
There was a long silence.
“I would want people to leave me alone.” She said after a while.
“I could ask them to do so.”
A brief silence followed.
“I can show you the base and then you can tell the people in the cities where it is and they can destroy it.”
“That sounds like an excellent plan Lilly.” I meant every word.

“Thank you Kevin,” she said warm. “We have to keep walking this way.”
“How far is it?”
“I think about two days of walking at this speed. Can I ask you a question, Kevin?”
“Sure.”
“After you leave the caves to tell them, would you come back to me?” Lilly asked. Just when I was happy with our new found understanding.
“Why do you think I wouldn’t want to come back?” I asked sharply inquisitive with a hint of cynicism.
She didn’t respond.

We were now moving through a long ravine. The walls ran near vertical for several meters after which they turned into steep slopes at either side of the ravine. This ravine, I realized, was one of what had seemed dry rivers from above. I could imagine how animals that fell would glide down these slopes and gather up in the ravine.
“So do you have any hobbies?” The animal asked out of the blue. It had been quiet for half an hour.
“Eh, no nothing special. The usual I guess; watching vids, listening to music, reading.” I didn’t have any hobbies.
“Cool. What music do you listen to?”
“All kinds of music. I like the Weezers. Do you know them?” No.
“No I do not. Are they good?”
“I think they are. Do you have any hobbies Lilly?”
“I do not really do hobbies,” she admitted, “but I don not really want to either. It must sound kind of boring to you.”
“Oh no not at all, I can imagine you must have other stuff to do.”
“Well yeah.”
“What do you do all day?”
“Well usually I just walk around and catch food.”
“How did you learn to talk?” I really was curious about that.
“I can not remember exactly, someone learnt me.”
“Did you learn it from a human or from someone of your own species?”
“Humans taught me first I remember, but I also learn new things myself, usually from books or texts.”
“You can read?”
“Yes I can, but there is not much to read in the caves. There are no libraries or anything, so I only read if I find something with letters.”
“I have a couple of books with me. You could have them if you like.”
“Well I would like that.”
I took of my backpack and dug through its contents. There was a travel guide on Dania. We had received a couple upon landing. It was a completely revised guide but based on an older guide from the previous government. I had paged through it earlier, it also had a nice history section on Dania which no doubt included the war I had just told her about.
I held the book into the air. “This one is about Dania, this planet.”
The animal stopped and turned towards me. Until now it had been walking a few meters beside me. Some antennas moved out from under the mouthpieces and grabbed the book from my hand.
“Thank you,” it said surprised.
The antennas where thick, about two inches, and had joints a regular intervals. They looked crude but had a very sharp point at the ends. Just like I had seen them pick up my weapon, they opened the book with great dexterity in front of the head of the animal.

“Do you like it?” I asked after it had stood still for a while, presumably reading the page.
“Yes I do,” it said sincere but clearly distracted, after which it remained motionless. A minute went by, then two, so I decided to grab something to eat from my bag.
I moved away to the wall of the ravine and sat down. I was tired. A cut on my hand was still bleeding, which I hadn’t noticed up till now. After cleaning it, I put some bandage on it from a first aid kit. The animal was still standing there, focused on the book. My mind seemed to come to an ease as I sat there.
Two days travelling to the base was a little too long for my taste considering it would take another two days to get back. When this expedition was planned there was of course now way of knowing how long it was going to take. We had taken supplies for two weeks though most of it was still on the ship. In addition, arrangements had already been made for more supplies to be flown in if need be.
At this moment there was enough water in my backpack for a couple of days and food for weeks, if I counted the pills, so this wasn’t an issue. The giant insect I would be having for company was my main concern.

“Oh sorry,” the animal suddenly said after twenty minutes, “we can keep going.”
This break had done me good.
“Very well. Do you like the book?”
“Yes I do. It is about the island Bounty in the ocean,” it said, while the antennas took the book up into its mouthpieces.
“There is a lot of other stuff about Dania in the book as well.” I explained.

The animal didn’t speak anymore after we started moving again through the ravine. Maybe she was contemplating the stuff she just read.
I thought about putting forward an alternative plan. The current one wasn’t bad at all assuming she wouldn’t turn around on it later or just accidentally eat me at some point by instinct.
If we were two rational people, ‘if’ being the magic word here, I could suggest she would guide me back the way I came and just give me general directions to the base. She already seemed to have accepted the idea of me leaving at some point, but somehow I didn’t feel she would respond so well to it. Thinking about this, I became a little more worried about how much I could really trust her in the end.

“Lilly, since we’re going to this base, can I ask you a couple of questions about it?”
“Go ahead, but I do not now much about it.”
“How big is it?”
“It’s very big!”
This was useful.
“Can you give me an idea how big exactly? Maybe the size, how many buildings there are, how many people.”
“I do not know exactly how many people there are, I never counted them, but there are many.” I figured it wasn’t so important at this point.
“And it was located in the northern vein, right?”
“Yes.”
“So we first have to walk to the Gol crater and the northern vein is connected to it just like this one?”

“Yes, that is correct.”
If there would be an opportunity to get away I would at least now were the base was, assuming it was not to well hidden.
“You said it would be two days of walking to the base, but from how far would we be able to see the base?”
“On a high point you can look at it from a safe distance. Maybe half an hour of walking for me,” she explained. So the base was not really well hidden.
The way she said it also made me realize she might not need sleep or rest. So the two days of walking she mentioned, might actually mean two days of walking.

Eventually we climbed out of the ravine along a steep ridge and emerged into a wider rocky landscape above. It had taken us about two hours from the moment we entered it. Now standing above the ravine I could look back into the valley of the vein. This place seemed to be located higher than were I landed. The area we were now moving towards was rougher compared to what we had moved through before. It was preceded by a flat plane littered with rocks and giant boulders. The flat plane spanned a few kilometres after which rocky outcrops started to appear on it. These outcrops became more concentrated further away as they grew into high rough banks in the far distance. From here I could see small openings remaining between them as the banks neared each other. I imagined it looked like a coast.

We navigated between the boulders on the plane. The animal climbed across smaller boulders while I was forced to move around them. Her behaviour changed. She would climb onto a group of boulders and stop on top of them. From there the animal was constantly watching in my direction until I had moved around before climbing down. At some point two boulders were separated by a relatively small slit allowing me to move to the other side. As a casually did so, I could hear the animal darting off, only to arrive moments later on the other side looking straight at me. I stopped for a moment, primarily from the shock of the animal suddenly standing in front of me than anything else, but this wasn’t the area to go for a dash. I casually started moving again. The animal stayed frozen in place however as I approached it form the front which gave me a slight panic. When I was less then a few meters from its head it broke its frozen state, moved back and got out of the way to walk beside me again.

A kilometre or so before reaching the banks, the animal suddenly stopped. I walked another few steps before I did the same. In the distance I could hear a faint humming sound. Only months ago we heard this sound on Dania on a regular basis. It came from the direction we were heading and slowly grew louder. Some thoughts went through my head asking if I could use this to my advantage, but nothing solid came up yet. I realized this might not be the time to play games. I turned to Lilly.
“Drones, Lilly! We should get out of the open, now.”

She stood still.
“Lilly!” I said a little louder, while still trying to keep my voice down, “they’ll see you here in the open.”
Her body made a slight turn in my direction; she heard me.
“Lilly follow me!” There was a large pile of boulders lying in front to the right, some distance away. I started a sprint. Looking back a few times I could see the animal following me. It looked nervous. It would move up to right behind me with great speed, stop in place for a while and then close the distance again. As I manoeuvred between loose boulders I could here the sound getting stronger. When the big pile was some fifty meters away I could see two drones in the far distance to my left. Altitude maybe 600 feet, they didn’t seem to be moving straight at us, which was good.

As I reached the pile of boulders, I started moving around them to keep them between us and the drones.
Lilly was still to my left, at the point where we first reached the pile. She moved her body up against the side of a boulder, put it down on the ground and curled her legs up underneath it. This wasn’t the place to hide and I ran back to her.
“Lilly you have to move further this way. They are going come around a see you,” I said while pointing my finger along the Drones expected flight path. The distinct hum was getting louder.
“Kevin, I am scared.” Lilly said. Her voice did sound scared.
“I understand, but you have to move further this way or they’ll see you when they get here.” Nothing happened. Looking over her body I could already see the Drones. They were going to see her and then me.
“You have to get up now Lilly! You have to move. Come on Lilly!”
She carefully curled her legs from underneath her and raised her body a little from the ground.
“Good, follow me now.”
She carefully followed me as I moved around the pile.
“Stay calm now,” I said and pointed in the direction of the sound, “See, now they can’t see us.”
“Kevin, help me.” She said with a crying voice. I could tell she was terrified.
“Everything is gonna be fine,” I said relaxed, “They can’t see us, you understand?”
“Yes,” she said a little calmer but still scared.
“The only thing we have to do now is slowly move further around these rocks as they pass us, so we’ll stay out of sight. Okay Lilly?”
“I think so,” she said carefull
The drones were getting close and from the sound of it, they were still on their original course. They started to pass. As the sound was getting louder I saw Lilly place her body on the ground again.
“Okay Lilly, we have to move forward a little. It’s gonna be fine.” I quickly said.
She raised herself a little and moved forward very slowly, which was fine. I only wanted to prevent her from again curling up completely.
The sound became louder as the drone were about to pass the closest point.

“We have to move a little faster now.”
The animal’s legs were trembling.
“That’s right.” I said encouraging.
The drones passed and we kept on walking around the boulders, keeping them between the drones and us, until they were moving almost directly away from us.
“Okay, they are gone,” I said reassuring, “We have to stay here for a while and then we can move up. Are you okay Lilly?” She still held her body close to the ground instead of her normal raised stance which would place it about two meters high.
“I am scared.”
“They’re gone, were safe.”
We waited a minute. Lilly didn’t spoke a word.
“We can go on now,” I said.
“Okay, do you think they will come back?” She asked noticeably calmer.
“I don’t know, but we can’t stay here.”
It was the last thing I said before suddenly the antennas moved out of her mouth and grabbed me. I was hanging in mid air trying to shake myself loose. The animal was running, with enormous speed, in opposite direction of the drones. She had moved a great distance across the plane when I noticed the humming sound of the Drones suddenly stop decreasing. I could hear them as they made a sharp turn in our direction.
“They’ve spotted us.” I yelled, still being held by the antennas. The animal’s speed increased even more and it darted between the rocks and boulders. I could see we were nearing the banks, but the sound of the drones quickly swelled.
They must have been only a few hundreds meter behind when we reached the outcrops of the banks. I heard the swooping sound of an energy blast being fired. It impacted right next to us a fraction of a second later. Another blast exploded on the wall of a narrow passageway between the banks as the animal ran into it. The passageway made a turn and the drones over flew us, but I could hear them break and turn.
The passageway quickly branched in two. We took a left. I had no say in it of course. Lilly kept running through the passageways. Now and then we were, presumably, spotted when and I could hear the drones dive down and energy blasts were fired and exploded near.
But the passageways turned into deeper ravines which were winding and branching, while these drones have a slow acceleration and a low turn speed at higher velocities. As a consequence the drones started to often lose track. When they did they would linger in the ravines or just above them. These drones weren’t smart enough to immediately gain altitude after they lost track, which would allow them to cover a larger area. I knew from experience they would eventually go back to a higher patrol route, but this was more a fortunate routine than an insight like R might show.
By now I had lost every sense of direction. The drones seemed to be some distance away when Lilly ran into a cave in the side of the gorge. I remembered making at least one sharp turn when Lilly moved in it. A few moments later I was put down on the ground. My chest and neck hurt. Its grip had been strong and the ride through passageways had been a rough one. I slowly stood up and looked around; the cave was a death end.

“I think we lost them,” I said.
“They are still outside.” She responded nervously. The sound of the drones was still near.
“We just have to wait here for a while. Just stay calm.” Hopefully they would move of.
“Are you alright Lilly?”
“I am just scared that is all.”
“We’re gonna be fine, you did good bringing us here,” I said, although I wondered whether they would have spotted us if she hadn’t started running. Granted, I myself had said it was safe to move.
“But what if they find us?” Lilly, still panicked, asked.
“They won’t,” I said confident.
I wasn’t sure of course, but at this point the drones had clearly lost track.
“We just have to wait, they’ll go away eventually.” Or they can call reinforcements, I thought, but there was no need to worry Lilly. They might do so especially if they had seen me. A person in your cave seems like enough cause for alarm for any secret base.
“You knew this cave?” I asked just to distract her.
“No, not this one, but there are many in the raspings. It is a good place to hide.”
“It looks like it. So do you come here often?”
“Sometimes when I walk through the raspings I search in the caves, yes, but there is very little here.”
“Not much food.”
“No, there are a lot of better places.”
“Like the place I fell into.”
“Yes, for example. You probably fell of a cliff,” she said as if she’d just figured that out.
“That’s right.” I did. “Are there other creatures like you, Lilly?”
There was a short pause. “Yes there are but I have not seen any for years. Before the base there were two others here. I do not know where they are right now.”
“It must be lonely, do you miss them.”
“No, I did not meet them often and now I have less fighting.”
“Well, that’s an advantage, but wouldn’t you want to see some fellow creatures now and then.”
“Maybe,” she said slightly sad. “But now I have you, and you do not fight,” she followed up cheerful.
“Right.”
I could still hear the drones near. I wondered whether they could use a radio. I tried mine once more; “no connection.” If there was a jamming device they might be able to get through themselves. However jamming must, as far as I know, itself emit a signal. Our headsets would normally be able to detect this and should report ‘radio interference’ or ‘jamming signal’ instead. Also jamming would reveal in the very least the presence of a jamming device which isn’t the best way to stay hidden. In any case, the drones didn’t seem to know our location, so there was little use in trying to get past them and risk getting discovered. I sat down against a wall. It had been a long day. Lilly was standing still but she moved a single leg now and then.
“Maybe you should read something,” I suggested, “just to relax a little.”

“Yes,” she said in agreement. The antennas moved out under the mouth with the travel guide. Meanwhile I recovered an MRE from my backpack. After eating it I put my backpack up against the wall behind me.
“Lilly, I am going to try and get some sleep. Just warn me if anything happens.” I set the alarm, on the watch integrated in the arm piece of my body armour, to thirty minutes.
“Oh, okay,” Lilly said slightly distracted.
It felt like I had just closed my eyes for two seconds when the alarm sounded. The sound of the drones was still present but it was a lot softer than before. Lilly was still reading. I stood up and rubbed my eyes. Maybe I should take a stimpack.
“What are you reading?” I asked, repressing a yawn.
“I do not know exactly.”
The travel guide seemed to be open somewhere in the middle. I moved up behind the book and looked inside. The page showed transportation timetables.
“This is not such an interesting part. You should go a few pages back or forward.”
“I will read this first I think.” She said stern.
At this point, I was standing right underneath the animals head. I looked back and slowly walked underneath the insect’s body. The mouthpieces continued underneath its head up until the rim which separated it the head from the body. Or so I assumed of course. The animal didn’t seem to mind my presence. I saw the legs where segmented in three parts as I passed by them. The part closest to the body was very thick, ending in sharp point on the ground.
Then the last leg on my right suddenly started to move as I passed by it. It trembled and curled inward towards me. I did not actually touch me but it did scare me. I gently but quickly moved a few steps to the other side. At this point, without any warning, a huge mass of some liquid suddenly came down on me. I jumped away in a panic and staggered back with my eyes closed while using my hands to remove the thick clumpy liquid from my face. I opened my eyes. Looking down I saw a dark purple slime covering my entire armour and drooping on the floor.
“What the fuck is this?!” I exclaimed.
“What is wrong?” It said amazed. “I saw you moving around back there so I thought you wanted too…you know.” It said with a certain tone.
I didn’t like this at all.
“Did you not like it?” She asked disappointed.
“Ehm. I don’t know,” I said unsure and with a repressed irritation in my voice.
“Why not?” She asked. I ignored this question.
At this point I was primarily thinking about whether this was going to be poisonous, while trying to remove as much as possible from my armour without touching it. This wasn’t successful. It was sticky and smelled strange, chemical. I resorted to using my hands to get the stuff out of my collar and walked out between the legs on one side to get away from underneath this thing.
“Well you should have said so, if you didn’t want to,” she said a bit insulted, “I thought you were my boyfriend. I did like it a lot, are you sure you didn’t like it?”

After gathering a little of my composure again I suddenly noticed the thwopping sound outside the cave. It had been there longer but I was too occupied with current events.
The sound was characteristic of an aircraft using these long and relatively slow propellers for lift and it seemed to be getting closer.
“What is that?” Lilly asked frightened. Whatever it was exactly, it was clearly nearing the cave. Lilly was moving to the back of the cave as the sound suddenly swell. After a small sprint I reached a turn in the cave. From here I could see all the way up to part of the entrance. Going by the sound, I figured the craft must now be hovering right above the ravine. Looking back, I saw Lilly moving up into a corner in the far end of the cavern. I ran back.
“Lilly, they found us,” I said bland, “I need my rifle, please give it back.”
“No, I will not,” she said resolute, but she also sounded scared.
“If you don’t give my gun then they are going to come in here and kill you,” I said threatening, “do you want that, Lilly?”
“No.” She said careful.
“Then you have to give me the rifle so I can stop them.” “Don’t you trust me?”
By now the craft had been hovering there for some time and it seemed to be moving away a little. This wasn’t necessarily a good sign, I knew.
“Give me the rifle Now,” I ordered kind but firm.
A few seconds went past before the mouthpieces parted a little and slowly the antennas moved out with the rifle between them. I took it, turned, and ran up to a point I could cover the entrance from. I could hear the craft still hovering nearby. There was nothing, yet. I positioned myself behind a rock which would give me some cover and pointed the rifle towards the entrance while flicking the sight back to zero zoom.
Half a minute later, two men sprinted across in front of the entrance from left to right. Moments later an object was thrown into the cave and landed a few meters short of my position. I ducked down and the grenade exploded. My head was dazed and my ears were ringing from the blast. The skin on my face was burning from the heat. I got up on my knees and carefully peaked around the side of the rock. Four men, two in front and two behind, slowly walked into the cavern, weapons at the ready. The two behind were slightly out of line with the two in front, who in turn held enough dispersion between them for one of the men behind to have a clear shot to the front. Now, I wasn’t as refined in this stuff as Max was, but these men clearly weren’t coming in here to fight an armed opponent like me. This was a sensible assumption on their side; even if the drones had spotted a man being carried by the spider, he would be expected to be dead. Unfortunately for them this assumption was wrong and this certainly wasn’t the way to come into a cave were someone with an AR-54 was holding out.
After a short glance along the side of the rifle, to see if automatic fire was selected, I leaned out of cover and started firing. At the point in the cave they now were, there weren’t many places to go. I mowed down two of them with a long, maybe five second, burst. In a short pause I calmed myself down a bit and aimed at the man going for the exit. The second and third of a few short controlled bursts hit him. The last man alive started firing. He had immediately moved to the side and gone to prone. I pulled back into cover as bullets hit the side of the rock and one of them hit my harm. The impact of it knocked my arm back. After bringing my rifle back to the shoulder, instead of again leaning back out to the side, I stood up from behind the rock. While emerging out of cover, I had to make a small correction to my aim, but it was all over.

I kept scanning the entrance and the four bodies for activity. There came none. I looked down to my arm. There was a giant rip in the armour, it did hurt a lot and so did my shoulder, but there was no penetration. It had just been a glancing shot; lucky me.
The craft could still be heard hovering outside, but seemed to be some distance away. I ran back into the cave. Lilly was still standing in the same location.
“They’re dead Lilly, but we have to move now,” I said while picking up my backpack.
“There is still something outside,” she said worried.
“It won’t see us if we move right away.” I wasn’t sure of this of course, but we might not get a better chance. Lilly didn’t follow when I started jogging towards the entrance. This needn’t be a problem of course. I stopped and turned around once more.
“They knew we were in this cave, it isn’t safe to stay here,” I yelled loud enough to carry the distance. There was no response. Anytime now that pilot could come checking on the team he just dropped off. I was wasting precious time here. Maybe she just didn’t want to go with me. Remembering how scared I had felt all this time with her, I could imagine how she might now feel the same way.
“You can do what you want Lilly, okay? But listen to me; you shouldn’t stay in here much longer, because then they are going to find you. You understand?”
“I understand,” She said calmer but still frightened. It was hard to tell if she was scared of the craft, me or both.
“Okay Lilly, I want you now to just follow me, until we get away from this thing.” I said forceful. I just knew, if I left her in here, she wouldn’t have the resolve to leave.
She started moving towards me. I turned around and hurried to the entrance while all the way checking if she was still following me and if she didn’t come to close.
“Stay where you are!” I yelled back, the moment I arrived at the entrance. After checking both ways of the ravine, I looked into the air above. The craft wasn’t visible, by the sound it seemed to be pretty low, somewhere next to the ravine. Maybe the pilot had parked it somewhere on top. Lilly was visible nervous, standing still were I told her, but constantly moving a single leg and then another.
“Follow me.”
I crossed to the other side of the ravine and started moving along the wall in the direction I remembered we came from. Not that it really mattered which way we went, because I didn’t knew where we were. Right now we just had to get away from here. After we made some distance from the aircraft I picked up the pace. I constantly checked my back. Lilly kept following me at some distance and did a reasonable job of staying near the wall. After a few hundred meters I arrived at a fork in the ravine. I picked the gorge which was at the greatest angle with this ravine to minimize the chances of being spotted when the craft would start checking up on the cave. I moved on. With the sound of the aircraft’s propeller slowly fading I could here drones, but only in the far distance. We arrived at a second fork and by now the craft seemed to have started moving. It was hard to be sure. I felt pretty confident nonetheless. It wasn’t like this guy was going to magically figure out what had happened, even if he could, and had the guts, to land his craft in the ravine.

We kept moving away in a general direction. The drones did move their patrol towards our area, but the winding ravines and staying close to the walls kept us out of sight. At some point I felt we had put enough distance between them and us.

“Okay Lilly,” I said as I stopped and turned around, “we lost them.”
Lilly walked on for a couple of meters before she stopped as well. I would say she was standing about seven meters from my position.
“How are you doing?” I asked. We hadn’t talked in the forty-five minutes or so it took to get here.
“I am doing good. I think we should hide somewhere before we can go,” Lilly said worried.
“Well yes, things are pretty dangerous now, don’t you think?” I asked astute.
“Yes, I was scared the drones were going to see me again.”
“I think we’re safe for now, but yes, there are a lot of drones and people looking for us and there might come even more. So I don’t think it’s a smart to try to get to their base.”
“Maybe we could hide somewhere and try later,” Lilly suggested.
“Well we could do that of course, but maybe it’s better if I go back instead. Then I can go to the people who hired me and tell them there is a base down here.”
“But what about me?” She asked both critical and surprised.
“Well we already talked about this before. I will tell these people about you and convince them to leave you alone and not to hurt you. I’m sure, if they hear how much you helped them by telling me where this base is and how nice you are, they will leave you alone. These people are good people. In the meantime it is probably best for you to leave me alone…, I mean, to stay far away from the base. Maybe go further in the southern vein for a while if you can find enough food there.”
“I do not know if I like this,” she said both concerned and critical.
“Look Lilly, once this base is destroyed, things will be much better for you here. No more drones chasing and shooting at you. Wouldn’t that be great?”
“Well maybe,” she admitted hesitant.
“I’m sure it will,” I said with confidence.
There was a long pause.
“I want you to stay here, Kevin,” Lilly suddenly said firm, even a little angry.
“I understand that, but I can’t stay here. I have to go back.” I really didn’t want a confrontation, but I wasn’t going to avoid one either.
“Well I do not want you to go back.”
“But that’s what I’m going to do.”
At this point the animal started stepping closer. Immediately I raised my rifle.
“Stay back Lilly! I’m warning you!”
She halted for the moment.
“Now step back again,” I ordered calm. When people cross a border, you should always insist they move back out. I didn’t want a showdown. She didn’t move.
“Step back!” I yelled threatening.
She slowly moved back the distance she’d covered and then some. I waited for a couple of seconds and then slowly put my rifle back down. For a while nobody said anything.

“Well how are you going to get back?” She suddenly asked strangely calm. “You do not know where to go.” She was right to some extent of course, but that wasn’t the issue here.
“I’ll find my way, don’t worry about it,” I replied casually.
There was a brief silence again.
“Can I come with you then?” She now sounded a little less calm, even a little desperate.
“I don’t think that’s smart.”
“But why not?” She asked, suddenly panicked. “I just do not understand why you are doing this. Did I do something wrong?” Her voice sounded like she could break in to tears any moment.
“It doesn’t matter, I just have to go.”
“Kevin, please.” She said with a crying voice. She was taking tiny steps at the spot and inching slightly backwards.
“Look sweetheart, this is for the best.” I did really feel sorry for her. There just wasn’t much more to say.
“Look I got something for you, before I go.” I said cheerful while pulling the left strap of my backpack of my shoulder. She slowly stopped her nervous stepping on the spot.
After carefully taking my whole backpack off, switching my rifle to my left hand when taking off the right strap, I kneeled down on the ground and searched through it. There was a novel I was reading at the moment, a magazine about spaceships and I also found a manual for the new climbing gear we had bought here. I put it all on the ground before me, carefully put my backpack back on and stood up again.
“So you have some more to read.” I explained friendly.
There was no response, but there didn’t have to be.
“Goodbye Lilly.”
I started to move backwards.
“Stay safe. Maybe hide somewhere for a while. We passed some caves. There are bound to be more around further away in these canyons,” I pointed away from the direction we just came. “If you run for a while first, you can make a lot of ground before they start searching a wider area.”
The animal stood completely motionless.
I kept walking backwards to put some more ground between it and me.
“Goodby Kevin” It suddenly said said.
“Goodby Lilly, try to keep out of sight.” I waved as I turned around and started running. Looking back ever so often, I saw the animal just kept standing there, until a turn in the ravine brought it out of sight.

I started heading in the direction of the plane. This was harder then it seemed. That, I had already found out while guiding us away from the cave. From the ceiling and the walls of the vein I could easily tell my heading and I approximately knew where we were in relation to the plane. However the ravines were winding so the direction they would have at an intersection could completely change after a few turns and bends. As I progressed, I started approaching the problem differently. I started looking carefully at the shape of the intersection. Instead of choosing the direction which went towards the plane, I started picking the one which seemed to be a downstream running river. I got better at it as I went. I’m sure Eva would be proud of me. In a few hours the ravines were slowly getting shallower, so I was definitely moving in the right direction.

In the end I reached the plane, although nowhere near where I had crossed it before. The open plane did allow R to spot me while he was traversing it in the opposite direction. Max had sent him after me after I fell, but he ended up somewhere else and at a much higher point. He reported to me he had encountered a patrol, his clothes were soaked in blood. Later he had spotted some drones which apparently had lead him in this direction. We backtracked his route till near his engagement. From there we managed to navigate back up to the rope bridge.