Chapter 19: Dr Suah Painen’s adventures on Aurox
Although a geologist by trade, Suah had been on enough new planets to have picked up basic skills in cultural analysis. Observing the Auroxians had been a distraction from the horror of events since arriving on Aurox. She shuddered, remembering the day the research party had been attacked.
After finding the petroglyphs, their team leader had reported the findings to their ship for sending on to I.G.A.S.S., and visited the human in command of the settlement and prison. A group had gone to meet the humans while rest of the team had continued their examination of the petroglyphs.
During the expedition, as Suah had been collecting samples from around the glyphs, a group of the Auroxians had flown into their midst, screaming and chattering. The group, stunned by the arrival of the possible creators of the petroglyphs, couldn’t react. The creatures were pulling at their clothes and hair. The expedition thought they were under attack, and then they’d heard the shots.
Screams from the jungle and from the frightened expedition team. Chittering from the Auroxians, still pulling at them. Suah had been paralysed for a few moments, until another volley jolted her back to herself. The little Auroxian aliens were gesturing to the jungle, pulling hair, fur, clothes, anything they could grab, to drag the scientists into the jungle. It was urgent that they leave. The others were still stunned, a few falling to the bullets.
Suah had rolled into a ball and launched herself over the cliff edge. The landing was hard, but momentum kept her going. She rolled through long grass and into the jungle, bouncing over rocks and hungry plants.
Suah had stayed curled up as she listened to the screaming of the Auroxian aliens, the shouts of humans calling for the exhibition to come down from the ridge where they’d been working. Paulus, the deputy expedition leader, had called back, identifying the party as I.G.A.S.S. officials.
A human barked back.
A volley of gunfire.
Screams.
More gunfire.
The screaming stopped.
Suah sobbed. Her friends!
She scrambled to her feet, meaning to return to her friends, to help them if she could. An alien landed on her. Suah fell down, rolling up as she did.
The alien chittered quietly, holding her down.
There were shots, groans, alien screams. Then the rustle of fluttering wings as the aliens retreated. The alien sitting on her jumped off. There was a tapping on her shell. Suah uncurled slightly, looking at the alien. It pulled at her fur and pointed deeper into the jungle, where a dozen of the little aliens hovered. She unrolled and started walking, dropping to all of her limbs to move more quickly through the landscape.
Behind her, she heard humans blundering along, shouting. Occasional shots echoed. The aliens rallied, charged, retreated, and rallied again. They threw rocks and spears at the humans, beating their wings furiously, pushing the humans backwards, out of the jungle.
Suah waited with her saviour until the normal noises of the jungle returned. The Auroxian alien pulled at her upper left hand, leading her deeper into the jungle. After an hour of following her host, they emerged into a clearing. A pack of aliens that had fought the humans waited for them. Some were injured but there appeared to be no deaths. The pack screamed at her, waving their arms.
Suah watched them. They were communicating, but she didn’t know what they were trying to say. When the screaming slowed down, Suah tapped her chest.
“Dr Suah Painen, Intergalactic Alliance of Sentience Species, New Planet Inspection Division, Science Sub-Division.” She pointed at her companion, “You?”
The alien tilted its little simian head at her. It pointed,
“Suppai?” It attempted around a scream.
“Dr Suah Painen.”
“Suppai.” The Auroxian pointed, insistent.
Suah sighed, “Suppai, then.”
The alien tapped her chest, “Suppai.”
It tapped its chest and screamed something that sounded like Nrrh-tct. The second half sounded like a click in the top of the mouth.
Suah pointed at the alien and tried to repeat the sound.
Nrrh-tct tilted its head again, flapped its wings and nodded. Suah assumed this meant her attempt was acceptable.
Nrrh-tct pointing between the crowd and Suah, had screamed and then said its version of her name. The crowd responded by mobbing her. Suah felt them brush against the fine hairs on her back. They flew above her and around. Some of them bowed at her feet, touching her slippers and tugging at her tabard. Fingers slipped into pockets, grabbing at anything they could find. She yelped; one had grabbed her vestigial tail. Pain shot through her spine and back plates. The aliens stopped. Nrrh-tct screamed at its companions. The aliens backed off.
Suah breathed a sigh of relief. She patted her tabard, checking her belongings; the comms were missing. She stopped patting, looking around. One of the aliens had her comms. It was poking at it, then biting, trying to take it apart.
She dropped to all eight limbs and feeling the trauma of the day get to her at last, she bolted towards the alien with her comm. She was not going to lose her last contact to IGASS because some nosy flying monkey wanted to play with it.
As she came within reach, she rolled into a ball, launching herself at the alien. It fell over, screaming. Suah unrolled and grabbed her comm back from the flattened alien. She stomped away and turned her back, to check the device was still functioning. She needed to contact the ship, let the crew know the planet team had been attacked. The screen was scratched but it still worked. Relief rushed through Suah, making her hair tingle all over.
Behind her Nrrh-tct was screaming again. Suah turned back as she deposited her comm back in a pocket. She secured the flap as she watched her host give the other alien a bit of a kicking.
“Nrrh-tct, stop!”
The alien looked at her, kicking the alien a couple of times as Nrrh-tct screamed and mimed something to Suah.
“Yes, yes, it upset me, but I’m fine. Stop kicking it.”
Nrrh-tct grumbled, understanding Suah’s tone if not the words; it stopped kicking the fallen Auroxian. Nrrh-tct screamed at the fallen Auroxian and helped it stand. It took few minutes to get everyone settled after the excitement, before the alien squad, led by Nrrh-tct, started up again. They’d apparently decided it was safe to take Suah home.
After what felt like several hours, Suah arrived at the Auroxian’s home valley. They followed a stream into the valley; the land became marshy and difficult to navigate. The Auroxians fluttered up into the air, flying across the valley screaming their return to their family. Suah picked her way up to the valley sides, just out of the marsh.
The jungle was lighter here. Suah was able to walk down to the pool that sat at the bottom of a cliff. The cliff was full of artificial caves. Suah skirted the edge of the pool, searching for a way to get around the pool so she could look at the rocks. They weren’t the sedimentary cliffs she had come from, although there was some layering.
“Suppai! Suppai!” Nrrh-tct shouted, flying under high vegetation, waving. The Auroxian landed in front of Suah and started to push her back towards the open area by the pool.
“I see, I’ll go back.” Suah followed Nrrh-tct back, where she was met by more Auroxians diving out of the caves and flying over the water to meet the returning party and their new alien friend.
The raiding party started to shout at them and re-enacted the events at the petroglyph cliffs. Nrrh-tct pulled Suah in, pushing her to show what had happened to her. She rolled out of the jungle to the edge of the pool, where Nrrh-tct fell on her.
***
Suah spent several weeks waiting for rescue. She fixed her comms and made several attempts to contact the ship. There had been no answer, although she managed to get a brief scream of static at one point. Eventually, Sahrai and Maria had arrived with Mrrh-wah and Prrt-hai. Between the three of them, they’d produced a translation system that would communicate in IGASS Standard, Ettan, Lunglish, and Drannen, as well as Auroxian. They’d given tablets to the three Auroxians that had initially befriended them and managed to have conversations. The Auroxians had provided vital information to show that the humans were acting illegally on the planet. Sahrai had provided Suah with a tent and blankets after she refused to return with the dragon and human to Sahrai’s compound.
Watching Lah-Shah fly in with an escort of Auroxians, while pretending to sleep in her tent, had been the happiest sight she’d had for months. Nrrh-tct had poked her,
“Come, come, friends here.”
“What’s wrong with Prrt-hai?”
“He scared of dragon pretending not by being naughty. Brother Prrt-hai is anxious.”
“Tell him to get down then. Dragons only like some people riding them.”
“He down. Look, look.”
Prrt-hai had shown his teeth, jumped down from Lah-Shah’s shoulders and fluttered over to Maria. Prrt-hai had started screaming and chittering at Mrrh-wah so quickly that the tablet hadn’t kept up with the conversation. It tried though, and some of the swearing came through.
Suah politely turned away as Lah-Shah had shifted. Once the pained noises stopped, she turned back to find Lah-Shah in his basilisk form talking to Maria and Sahrai. She stood on all eight limbs, jogging over to the group.
“Dr Painen! I’m glad to see you at last. Are you well?”
“Well enough, Inspector. Happy to see you too. What news do you have?”
“The ship is in quarantine; your ship crew needs help to recover after their ship was damaged, but they’re taken care of. “
“And the ground team?” Sahrai asked.
“The ground team have landed at the human settlements and at the massacre site. They’ll collect what evidence they can find, and you’ve got witness statements from the Auroxians and Dr Painen.”
“I hope there’s some evidence left to collect. The jungle is hungry, as our friends here say.” Suah asked, anxiously rubbing her lower hands together. Nrrh-tct rubbed her fur, trying to comfort her. “Will there be enough evidence to convict?”
Everything Is Better With Dragons 