Deathstalker 04 - Deathstalker Honor

given up trying to make sense of the situation, and was pretending interest in a quivering purple shrub the size of a small house. Owen gave his crashed ship a last look. It was already so deeply buried under crimson vegetation that it might never have been there. “All right,” he said loudly. “Cut the chatter. It’s at least ten miles to Saint Bea’s Mission, so the sooner we get started, the sooner we can get there and get out of this rain. Oz, give me directions to the Mission.” “Of course, Owen. Just head out of this clearing in the direction of those three trees leaning together, and I’ll guide you from there. I feel I should brief you about some of the more impressive local vegetation. It can be rather dangerous.” “You mean it’s poisonous?”
    “More like homicidal. Animal life never really got started here, so the plants prey on each other for space, light, water, rooting, etc. Down the millennia they’ve developed some very nasty tactics, and lots of ways of expressing their displeasure when thwarted. I suggest you all stick very close together, and be prepared to defend yourselves.”
    Owen passed this on, and the others received it with varying degrees of disgust. “As if this planet wasn’t unpleasant enough,” said Bonnie. “Bad enough my piercings will probably rust up in all this rain, but now we have to hack our way through miles of killer plants. I can feel one of my heads coming on.” “Look on it as a challenge,” said Midnight. “A warrior never quails from adversity.”
    “You look on it as a challenge,” said Bonnie. “And I’ll stand back and watch you doing it.”
    “Cool it,” said Hazel. “I mean, come on; how dangerous can a few mobile shrubs be?”
    “I have a horrible feeling we’re going to find out,” said Owen. “Moon, you take the point. Feel free to shoot or cut up anything at all you don’t like the look of. And let’s try to set a good pace, people. I hate to think what this place is like when it gets dark. And in case you were wondering, yes, all our torches are back in the ship.”
    “Somehow, I’m not surprised,” said Hazel. “God, I hate rain.”
    *
    They followed Oz’s murmured directions into the rain-soaked crimson forest, fighting the urge to look back at the mound where their ship had been. The Sunstrider II was their last link with civilized, technological Empire. From now on they were on their own.

    There was little shelter to be found anywhere, rain dripping remorselessly from every surface. They were all soon soaked to the skin, and rain squelched inside their boots with every step. Their hair was plastered to their faces, and they had to keep blinking their eyes to clear them. The ground under their feet was mostly mud, flattened and compacted like stone in places, but it could change without warning into inches-deep gunk in which the party slipped and skidded, when they weren’t tripping overexposed roots or various kinds of creeping vine or ivy.
    It was a constant struggle to push their pace to more than a slow walk, and the unrelenting rain beat down on them like a feeble but persistent bully. After a while Owen took off his jacket and draped it over his head in an improvised hood. It meant he was now cold as well as wet, but it was worth it for the simple relief it offered. The others soon did the same, except for Moon, who didn’t seem at all bothered by the rain, and couldn’t understand why everyone got so surly when he said so.
    The jungle stretched off in every direction for as far as they could see into the driving rain. Dark-boled trees soared hundreds of feet up into the sky, their branches weighed down with curling leaves the color of blood. Owen reached up to touch one of the leaves, and then swore mildly as the serrated edge opened his fingertip like a razor. He gripped the leaf more firmly, and was surprised to find it thick and pulpy, and unpleasantly warm to the touch. He let go, and sucked thoughtfully at his lacerated finger, ignoring Hazel’s acerbic remarks with the ease of long practice.
    Owen was becoming increasingly convinced that on some level the jungle was aware, if not actually sentient, and knew intruders were passing through it. Leaves rustled as the party approached, and fell silent after they were gone. Vines circled slowly on tree trunks like dreaming snakes, and tall stalks would turn to face the party as they passed, quivering agitatedly till they had been safely left