Chapter Eleven

The sun shown brightly, a burning jewel set in the blue silk of the midday sky. No clouds obscured the unbroken blue. The deep green of the surrounding forest was a great contrast to the vivid blue set above it.

Devon and Flim scrambled up the hill followed closely by Jacinda and Merrell. From this vantage point they could see the whole drop ship.

“Look at that,” Devon said as he gawked at the sight before him. All four friends stared in amazement at the ship. It had plowed a furrow through the forest for as far as they could see. The drop ship had come to rest against the side of a tall hill. They could not even see the front end of the ship. It was either deeply buried in the hill or completely gone. Either way, it did not look promising for the crew who had been there during the crash.

Devon pressed the talk button on his WristVid. “Mr. Jacobs, we made it outside okay. We climbed up a hill next to the ship.”

Deke’s familiar voice came from the speaker. “How does the ship look from out there?” There was concern in Deke’s voice.

“It looks like the entire cockpit is a wreck. The front of the ship is stuck in a hill and I can’t even tell if the cockpit is still there.”

There was silence for a moment. “Bad news. The transponder was up there. Now I want you to circle the ship. Make sure that everything else looks okay. Call me back as soon as you are done, or in fifteen minutes. Whichever comes first. We have to stay in contact.”

Devon clicked off his WristVid. “You heard him. Let’s circle the ship and check it out from all sides.”

Merrell and Jacinda responded with nods while Flim rolled his eyes and huffed. “First we crash, and now we have to walk…this wasn’t in the brochure.”

Jacinda wiped sweat from her forehead with the back of her hand. All of them were sweating quite a bit in the heat of the morning.

From this vantage point it was obvious that the ship had settled into a basin-shaped dell surrounded on three sides by a high hill. From here they got a much better look at the ship.

They followed the ridge of the hill around to the front of the ship. Jacinda and Devon shared a knowing look when they saw the crumpled mess that had been the cockpit.

Suddenly, Devon began to feel a strange vibration through his feet. The ground beneath him seemed to be shaking, making him feel unsteady. He looked over to the others to see if they felt it too. They all exchanged quizzical looks, wondering what could be causing the shaking. Bits of dirt and rock began to tumble down the hillside as the shaking increased.

Devon began to worry as larger pieces of the hillside began to slide down toward the ship. He sat down quickly, unsure if he could keep his feet if the shaking grew any worse. Without warning, the section of ridge Devon was sitting on broke away and began to slide down the hill. Jacinda squeaked in alarm as he began moving.

Devon scrambled backward on his rear, trying to keep his place on the ridge, but it was futile. It was as if he were sledding down the hill on his bottom. He gained speed as he went, barely able to keep upright on top of the shifting dirt. Devon hit the bottom with a grunt, rolling over once and landing in a heap. He felt stunned, but could hear his friends arguing at the top of the hill.

Merrell’s gentle hand on Jacinda’s arm kept her from following Devon down the hill to help.

“Hold on. It is too dangerous right now. We have to wait until the ground quake has stopped, or you’ll just end up falling too.”

Jacinda tried to pull away, but Merrell’s grip remained firm. “We have to help him,” she protested.

“By getting injured too…No? Believe me, we have ground quakes on New California all the time. We have to survive before we can help anyone.”

As if on cue, the shaking stopped. Devon stumbled to his feet, scattering loose dirt everywhere.

“Devon, are you okay?” Jacinda shouted and waved to Devon from the top of the hill.

He gave her a thumbs up, smiling widely. “Just a few bumps. It’s good for me to get dirty once in a while.” They all laughed.

“Hold on, I’m coming back up there.” Devon began to climb back up the slope, but soon slid right back down. He could not gain and traction on the loose dirt of the slope left behind by the ground quake. He tried again, but once again slid back down.

“Anyone want to give me a boost?” They all laughed again.

Their moment of humor was interrupted as the ground began to shake once more. Merrell grabbed Jacinda and Flim, snatching them back from the edge of the hill. They looked on in horror as the side of the hill that they had originally scaled began to collapse. It seemed as if the entire hillside was collapsing. Suddenly everything was pelted with flying dirt as something broke through the hillside. A huge snakelike creature loomed over Devon. The creature was so huge that most of it was still concealed in the hillside.

“Help!” Devon cried, his voice filled with panic. The creature swayed back and forth, as if searching for something. At that moment Devon realized that the creature had no eyes. It must be using its ears to hunt, he thought. That made sense because something that tunneled under the ground would not need very good eyesight.

Devon froze, holding his breath, hoping that not moving or making a sound would make him invisible to the creature. It seemed to work for a few moments as the creature swayed back and forth, seemingly confused by the disappearance of its prey.

The creature stopped swaying and seemed to take in a deep breath. After a moment it lowered its head. Devon clapped his hand over his ears as the creature roared. The sound made the nearby ground to shake, knocking Devon off his feet again. As soon as he fell, the creature reared up once again, aware of where its missing prey had gone. Devon covered his face with his hands and prepared himself for the coming blow.

Instead of feeling the jaws of the creature crushing him, he felt a deep thrumming coming from the ground. Peeking through his fingers, Devon watched the creature. It seemed confused by the sound, not sure where it was coming from. It was frantically swinging its massive head back and forth, searching for the source of the sound.

“Devon, behind you,” he heard Jacinda shout. Springing to his feet, Devon glanced quickly behind where he had been laying. His jaw dropped open when he saw the source of the sound. Sammy, his automatic luggage, was standing in the gash in the side of the ship. A strange looking probe extended from its side, touching the ground. Each time Devon felt the earth thrum, the dirt around the probed jumped. Somehow Sammy must be causing the sound.

Devon leaped to his feet and tried to scramble back up the slope to safety. As soon as he moved the creature swung its head toward him and began to slither forward, intent on making him a meal.

The creature gave out a bellow of pain and swung away from Devon, back toward Sammy. Over his shoulder, Devon could see another arm extended from Sammy, firing some sort of emerald beam at the creature. Where ever the beam touched the creature’s rough hide, black blood flowed. Somehow Sammy was attacking the creature, protecting Devon from being eaten.

Devon was frozen in place as he watched Sammy nimbly avoid the clumsy lunges of the creature. He had never seen Sammy move like this before, and it shocked him. With a final flourish, Sammy’s beam severed the creature’s neck. Its sightless head fell to the ground with a thump. This sent the body of the creature into a spasm of panic. Its thick coils thrashed wildly, knocking large pieces of hillside into the ravine.

With the grace of a deer, Sammy leaped over the madly convulsing coils and skittered toward Devon. Without stopping, another arm extended for its side and grasped Devon by the collar. Spindly legs digging into the loose dirt of the hillside, Sammy dragged his master up the hill and away from the edge.

Jacinda, Flim, and Merrell followed quickly, convinced by the increased amount of dirt tumbling down toward the ship that the hilltop was no longer a safe place to be. They got away from the edge mere moments before a huge slab of the hillside separated and tumbled down onto the thrashing creature.

The creature stopped moving, buried in a grave of its own making. Devon and the others sat silently, afraid to move too soon, just in case the monster was able to dig itself out. After a few moments Devon felt another vibration…and it felt like it was right next to him. He rolled away from the others and leapt to his feet, scanning the ground in a near panic. With a start he realized he was the source of the vibration. With a relieved sigh Devon realized that the vibration was coming from his WristVid. He flipped open the lid and pressed the button to activate the speaker.

“…there, Devon? Are you okay?” Devon recognized Deke’s raspy voice.

“I’m here, Mr. Jacobs.”

“Were you hurt? That slither came out of nowhere.”

Devon chuckled, “A slither? Is that what tried to eat me?”

“There were unsubstantiated reports of such creatures, but nothing confirmed.” Deke sounded embarrassed. “The survey team figured that they were just figments of a few prospectors’ imaginations. I guess you proved them wrong.”

“Lucky me.” He laughed out loud, brushing dirt from his coveralls.

Jacinda stared at Devon, shaking her head. “I can’t believe you think this is funny! You were almost killed.”

“But I wasn’t…and if I don’t laugh, I’d probably cry.”

Deke’s voice came over the speaker again. “Never mind that. What happened to the creature? We couldn’t quite see from here. The view from the passenger windows isn’t very good.”

“I thought I was a goner until Sammy distracted the thing.”

“Sammy? Who is he?” Deke sounded confused.

“Sammy isn’t a he; Sammy is a ‘what’.”

“Excuse me?” Deke sounded even more confused.

“Sammy is what I call my automatic luggage.”

“And how, exactly, did your suitcase distract the slither?”

“Well, I’m not really sure. But he did, and then he saved me. I always knew that Sammy was specially made, but I never saw him do anything like he did back there.”

Devon glanced over at the trunk, now seemingly dormant.

“I could swear I caught a glimpse of a plasma beam down there.”

Devon cleared his throat, sounding embarrassed. “I think you did. That was Sammy too. He dragged me up the hill too. I’ve never seen him move that fast before. His legs never got that long before.”

“I saw it do that. Where did you get that thing?” Concern was creeping into Deke’s voice.

“My parents had it made for me. I guess they added a few things that they didn’t tell me about.”

“Sammy sounds more like a Class One SecBot than automatic luggage. Well, that doesn’t matter right now. You people need to get back in here right now. There may be more of those things out there.”

Flim was peering over the edge of the ridge, down into the ravine.

“I think we have a problem, folks.”

All eyes turned to Flim. His normal smirk was missing.

“When that thing buried itself, it buried our way back into the ship.”

Devon, Jacinda, and Merrell scrambled over to see if Flim was right. Just as he had said, there was a huge mound of freshly turned dirt piled against the side of the ship, completely blocking the gash they had used to leave the ship.