“First Dawn” – New Fiction Writing by C. C. Brower
Part of a soon to be released book: “The Hooman Saga”
Sue woke just before daybreak, not used to having time defined by the sun instead of the ship-schedule.
Tig cocked his ear in her direction and opened one eye. “How are you now, how are you feeling physically?”
Sue thought carefully in response, still having some difficulty making words distinct from raw emotion. “Sore, but nothing really hurts.”
“That’s good, I was concerned you would have been damaged too much. That was quite drop.”
Both of them shared their visions for the re-entry. Her’s was within the capsule and his was looking up at a fireball heading straight for him from the sky.
“You were brave to stay so close, you could have been killed by the fire.”
“Some have said foolish. But your screams, during the ‘re-entry’ as you call it, didn’t allow me to go without finding out if such a powerful Sender was still alive. We’ve never had a Sender show up on a meteor before.”
“Sender, is it? Is that my new name?”
“What would you like to be called?”
“My name is Sue.”
“Then Soo-she you will be, as you wish.”
“Why not just Sue?”
“We explain our sex by the added (syllable) so we know who we are talking to. There is already a Soo-he in this tribe.” He rippled his fur across his back and stretched on the ground, yawning as he did.
“Have I met him?”
“Only if you have been listening carefully. He’s away on a hunt.”
“I’m still having trouble getting used to this ‘listening.'”
“Yes, the legends say your kind didn’t do much of this. Except some of your poets and shamans.”
Sue rose with this to sit upright and crossed her legs with some difficulty. “Stiff, a bit.”
“That should pass after our morning run. We need to be at our Safe Ground before darkness. It will take a good set of runs to make it.”
“Run? I don’t even know if I can walk.”
“Then I’m sorry, but the Ferals will have you for their meal. I won’t be able to keep them away.”
“Ferals?”
“Those-Who-Refuse-To-Listen. I think your kind would call them Politicians.” Tig let out a set of rolling grunts that passed for laughter. Several other of the pack cocked an ear at this and smiled at his joke.
“What do you know about our kind?” Sue asked.
“Only what our Teachers have told us.” The idea that came across was of those that held the legends and told those stories to the the young to entertain them while their parents were out hunting.
“Teachers are able to hear the legends from before our time and repeat them to us so that we cannot forget and so make the same mistakes again.”
“We used books and recordings.”
“And your ‘historians’ would rewrite those to suit their own biases and so your history was lost. They wouldn’t listen, or couldn’t. If they did, they would know. Once they know, they cannot forget. But your kind was weird, anyway.”
“Weird?”
“They had ears but would not hear, eyes but would not see. And their words were false as their thoughts were clouded. But those days are long gone. You are not one of them.” With that, Tig rose and stretched fully. His mane rustled and his tawny pelt flowed over his huge frame, interrupted only by scars.
Sue got up in response. With that several others of the pack suddenly rose and pointed their noses in her direction, watching with sharp eyes.
“Peace, brethren. The hooman-she is only rising to greet the sun. She respects our customs.”
Sue kept her thoughts to herself, as she certainly didn’t have time to learn their customs overnight.
One of the larger wolves, with dirt still clinging to his chest and belly, brought the pack up to date with his wide-thought: “We three pulled your ‘pilot’ out and buried him deep with smell-covering sumac and cedar. Then topped it with rocks that were thrown up by the crash landing. The Ferals won’t find him.”
Tig assented for the pack, “Your work is appreciated. You will eat first.”
Sue was alarmed, and her nape hairs bristled.
Tig sent her a single-thought, “Feral rabbits and slow deer.”
Sue then relaxed.
The rest of the pack was now up, the fire long gone and the great stone hardly warm now. Sniffing the air, some started off along a faint trail at the forest’s edge.
“Come, it’s time to run. Do the best you can.”
The pack started at once, loping off into the forest. Sue was quickly left behind, gasping with the effort to run in her clumsy space suit, more designed for moving carefully with mag-grips to semi-curved floors and hulls than jumping fallen trees and climbing over massive tree roots.
Tig waited for her, even though the pack ran ahead. He frowned. “Do you remember what I said about the Ferals? Pick it up. Move.”
And this continued all day.
The pack would be rested and ready to go by the time Sue and Tig caught up. Sue never complained. Tig never criticized, but kept demanding she do better.
While Tig was wary, he kept feeling something else was ahead that he didn’t know…
Look for more short stories by C. C. Brower here.
If you liked this article, or got something out of it…
Donate Now. | Become a patron. | Buy some books (at my author’s discount…)
PS. Sharing is caring – go ahead and send this on to someone you know.