Planet Urth (13 page)

I continue to
watch June, and then suddenly her smile disappears.  Her eyes widen and a mask of terror replaces her blissful features.  My head immediately spins toward the family, toward what she is seeing.  And when I do, my heart stops beating. 

I see more
than a dozen Urthmen clutching their clubs.  Their thin lips are pulled back over their pointed teeth as they streak with impossible speed toward Will and his family. 

“No!” I scream.  My voice rips through the forest.  “They’re here!  Will look out!  They’re here!”

Will looks up.  He is watching me and I am pointing to the approaching Urthmen weaving through the trees that border the lake. 

Will and the others
look up, but by the time they see what I see it is too late.  Will starts shouting words I cannot hear over the pounding of my pulse in my head.  Asher turns to grab a spear and a nearby rock, and Kate unsheathes a blade from her thigh. 

“Oh no, oh no,” June is repeating beside me. 

I grip her shoulder.  “June!”  Her eyes are unfocused.  I worry she is in shock.  I shake her.  “June!  Please!  Get under that bush and hide.  Do not come out until I come to get you.   Do you understand me? They haven’t seen you.  You need to hide while I go help Will and his family.”  My words come out quickly, quicker than I can think. 

“No, Avery,” June finally says.  “No.  Don’t leave me.  Please, you said you wouldn’t leave me again.”

She is right, but I have to help.  I cannot sit by while another family is slaughtered. 

“I have to go,” is all I have time to say. 

Understanding flickers in June’s terrified eyes, and I hope I never have to see the look of defeat, the brokenness in her gaze, ever again. 

June scurries beneath the lowest branches of the bristly bus
h and tucks her limbs within it until she is no longer visible.  I race toward the lake. 

As I rush, all sense of time and space leaves me.  My legs feel disconnected from the rest of me and the sounds of the forest fall silent. 
I only hear the rush of my blood behind by ears and feel the weight of my weapons on my body. 

Ahead I see Will hefting a large rock.  He is at the perimeter of the lake, where the Urthmen are pouring through
, and catches one midstride.  He smashes the rock against the Urthman’s misshaped head and sends the unsuspecting attacker reeling backward with his face split open.  Will does not waste time.  As soon as the Urthman falls to the ground, he finishes him off with the stone.  He then grabs the Urthman’s club and turns to face the other two that are upon him. 

My attention is pulled from Will to the smaller children.  Three Urthmen are descending on them.  I need to get to them.  I need to help. 
Oliver is only a few years older than June, yet he is attempting to defend his sister, Riley.  He is armed with only a stick that he just picked up.  It is not sufficient to protect himself with, much less his sister. 

I am less than fifty strides away but realize I will never make it in time to help.  Oliver will be pummeled to death
, as will Riley.  I make a split-second decision and draw my spear.  I launch it midstride and watch without slowing as it pierces the air with a soft whistle just before it plunges in the center of the Urthman closest to Oliver.

The Urthma
n’s head whips in my direction, and for a moment, he is stunned silent.  He sees the lance sticking out of him and wails in agony.  He drops to the ground just as I reach Riley and Oliver.

I pull my sword from my scabbard and clutch it with
two hands.  When the next Urthman advances, I cleave the air.  The metal meets flesh, my strike landing at his neck.  I follow through with the swing, bringing my blade down until it does not move any longer.  I pull it free with a grunt.  The Urthman is opened from his collarbone to his navel.  But I do not stop to watch him die.  Two more are coming at me.

“Run!” I shout to Riley and Oliver, but they do not budge.  They are frozen in place.  I have no choice but to shield them with my body.  I will not let them die. 

The pair of Urthmen rushing me swipes their clubs at me.  I dodge both blows with dexterity I never knew I had, especially since my entire body trembles so hard it is a wonder I am even able to stand.  But I not only stand, I fight.  I feel as if the Urthmen are moving at a slower speed than I am, that I can see their actions with razor-sharp clarity and anticipate what they will do next as plainly as if they were my own thoughts. 

When the Urthma
n closest hefts his club overhead to skull me, I drive my sword through his throat then yank it free and turn on the other alongside him.  His arms are at one side and his torso is twisted.  His midsection is unprotected, and is now my target.  With a cry that comes from somewhere deep inside my core, I grit my teeth and ram my sword straight through his gut, then wrench it free.  The Urthman calls out words I have rarely heard; words my dad called swear words.  He then drops his club and clutches his stomach.  As he falls to his knees, I bring my blade up and slash his throat. 

My movements, though brutal, are necessary. 
I do not regret them any more than I regret breathing or eating.  They are fluid and natural.  They are what I have trained for my whole life.  But despite my training, I realize that the ease with which I can kill and the swiftness of my reflexes are special skills.  I understand why my father had always been so shocked by my abilities, why he praised what he called my ‘gift.’  I always thought he was just complimenting me to get me to train harder. I know now that he was simply sharing his thoughts about what he saw.  Fighting is instinctive to me.  It feels as if it is what I was born to do, that ridding the world of the hideous Urthmen is my purpose. 

A flurry of movement in my periphery jerks my attention from the Urthmen I have killed
to Will.  He is battling two that stormed him.  I contemplate helping him, but I am intercepted by my own set of Urthmen.  They both attack simultaneously.  I sidestep the first club but can’t avoid the second.  A club catches me squarely in the arm.  I cry out and evade a swipe intended for my head.  I twist and cut through air and slice open the arm of the Urthman that hit me then immediately sink my sword into the other’s heart.  But as I am retrieving my sword, a shadow crowds from behind.  My short life flickers before my eyes in quick, disjointed flashes.  And in a fraction of a second, I know I am about to meet my end, that it is too late for me to react.  I squeeze my eyes shut and brace for the blow of a club to strike my head but snap them open when I hear a scream, the scream of a young boy.  I spin and instead of having my skull cracked open, I see a spear tip protruding from the Urthman’s chest, my spear tip. 

The Urthman falls
, revealing Oliver standing there.  He is shaking and his breathing is short and shallow.  He pulled my spear from the Urthman I killed, the one that was about to butcher him and Riley, and used it to save my life. 

“Thank
s,” I say to Oliver. His eyes are wide and his mouth is partially agape as he looks over my shoulder. 

I turn
and see that Will has taken down one of the Urthmen he was fighting and struggles with the other on the ground.  My eyes travel and zero in on what has caused Oliver’s look of horror. 

“No!”  I scream.
Kate is on the ground, and an Urthman swings his club overhead. He drops it against her head, pounding her skull again and again.  “No!  Kate!” I hear myself screaming, but my voice sounds as if it is echoing from the end of a long tunnel. 

Oliver is crying and mumbling words that, while not entirely intelligible, are familiar.  I am sure I have muttered them before because I have lived through what Oliver has just witnessed.  I want to hug him, but there isn’t ti
me.  Asher has just killed one, but two more Urthmen are just about on him.  I take off at a sprint to help.

“Hey! Over here!” I shout to distract at least
one of the Urthmen, but they do not look up at me.  Their gazes are fixed on Asher.  One wields the knife Kate used earlier in addition to his club while the other circles around, behind Asher.  I just about reach them when the Urthmen strike instantaneously.  One grabs Asher from behind while the other drives the dagger into the center of his chest.  Asher falls to his knees, an expanding circle of garnet staining his shirt. 

“No!”
Will screams. His voice tears through my veins and echoes through my soul.  He attacks the Urthman he was fighting against with reckless ferocity, ignoring the possibility of being hit himself, and boldly steps forward, swinging the club ceaselessly.  The club smashes the Urthman over and over until he collapses to the ground in a pulpy heap.  Will does not stop though.  He charges toward the two that just killed his parents.  I meet him there and fight beside him to avenge his parents’ deaths inasmuch as any death can truly be avenged. 

Will’s eyes are wild and his pulse darts at the base of
his throat.  I feel his fury.  I feel his anger and sorrow, the anguish coursing through his body like lifeblood.  I remember it.  I know it well.  It is a dark and ever-present companion of mine.  I let it fuel me and drive my sword as I carve the air horizontally and behead the putrid Urthman nearest.  Will waves the club expertly and bashes one of the last two remaining until he is reduced to a bundle of unrecognizable features.  But while Will vents some of his overwhelming suffering on the fallen Urthmen, another reaches him before I do and hits him in the back.  Will tumbles forward, but before the Urthman who raided him from behind can strike again, I drive my blade through him.  The Urthman falls to the ground.  I have killed the last of them that stormed the family at the lake, but I do not feel satisfaction of any kind that they are all dead.  Will parents were lost.  There is nothing to celebrate. 

Will staggers to his parents’ bodies and drops to his knees
. For the first time in many years, I hear another human being’s heart cry out.  Through sobs, Will says over and over, “Mom, Dad, no, please no.”

My breathing snags several times before I begin to cry to
o.  I know I do not have the right to cry, but I am powerless to stop the tears from falling. 

Riley and Oliver join
Will.  Their small bodies shudder as they weep.  No one should have to see what they just saw.  No one should have to live through what they just lived through.  Through my tears, I silently vow that if I ever find another family, I will do anything and everything in my power to preserve it.  The core of humanity is family.  Whether they are people we are born to or people we embrace along the way, family is the crux of human life.  And I will defend it with every last drop of blood that pumps through my body. 

Armed with my newfound resolve, I turn and allow Will, Oliver
, and Riley time to grieve.  I set about checking each fallen Urthman for any signs of life.  I plunge my sword in all of them for good measure.  I will not take any chances.

When I have comp
leted my task, I call to June.

But June does not reply. 

“June,” I try again a bit louder.

But still, she does not reply.  I do not he
ar her shuffle or see the woods stir.  I do not hear a sound, apart from the soft whimpers coming from Will and his surviving family. 

Panic sets in. 

I race toward the bush June was stashed beneath, and when I get there, my insides crystallize.

An Urthma
n has a handful of June’s hair, and he’s pressing the tip of my spear just below her ear at her throat.  Will runs up beside me.

“Drop you
r weapons, or I will kill her,” the Urthman orders.

“Please,” I begin to beg.  “She’s just a child.”

“I said drop your weapons, humans!” the Urthman shouts.

There isn’t a doubt in my mind that he will kill her regardless of whether I drop my weapon or not.  He will kill us all if given the chance.  June will die no matter what.  I must do something.  I will not let
the Urthman kill her.

My mind scrambles for a plan. 

I look off to the right of the Urthman, just past him.  “What are you waiting for?” I say to no one.  “Kill him! Cut his head off!”

The Urthma
n turns around to look behind him, and when he does, I only have seconds to act.  I pull my dagger from its sheath and hurl it at him.  It tumbles through the air end over end, and when he turns back to look at me, the blade lodges into his eye.  He releases June and my spear and drops to his knees, shrieking. 

June dives into my arms.  I hug her tightly and mumble, “Urthmen are
as stupid as Dad said they were.”

But June is uninterested in anything I have to say.  Who can blame he
r?  Will finishes off the Urthman and hands me my dagger just before his brother and sister rush to him.  They huddle and cry.  June is crying, and silent tears stream down my cheeks as well. 

All of us have seen too much violence, too much death and destruction.  We have been left to fend for ourselves and survive against impossible odds.  But as I look around at our blended group, I feel an odd glimmer of hope spark inside of me.  I don’t know when or how, but I believe for the first time in my life that we will someday overcome the carnage and cruelty we were born into.