Just bloodied and disfigured.
Both her cheeks were in tatters: fatty flaps of tissue were almost cut loose from her face. Her temples were also in bad shape — punctured, gore-smeared, oozing. My paramedics professor liked to say, "Head wounds always seem worse than they are"… but in this case, I thought Ubatu’s injuries were just as bad as they looked.
As Festina bent over her, Ubatu tried to speak. The resulting slur of sound wasn’t words. Her jaw couldn’t move — the muscles to do that had been butchered by Rexy teeth. Anyway, what could Ubatu say? "I’m hurt," maybe? (As if that weren’t obvious.) Or perhaps "Do I look hideous?"
As if that weren’t obvious too.
But at least Festina could stop the bleeding. She got out her first-aid kit.
Some time later, from the bank of the river, Li uttered a weak "Help!" He’d held his tongue in fear, unable to see what had happened with the Rexies and afraid the big predators had slain his companions. I could see he was worried that if he made a sound, killer pseudosuchians would come for him… but as silence drew out after the fight, his nerves grew too frayed to keep quiet. He’d tried a few preliminary whimpers, then managed a more audible cry.
Not that Li really needed help. He could easily climb back to level ground on his own. His aura showed he just wanted to dramatize his situation, make it look like a fearsome predicament. He was dirty and wet, and in shock at being dirty and wet; he didn’t know that Festina was more so, covered with chemicals, dinosaur puke, and Ubatu’s blood. Li probably wouldn’t have cared if he did know. He just wanted attention. "Help!" he called again when no Rexies came to attack. "Help! Help! Help!"
Festina was just about finished with first aid: Ubatu’s bleeding was controlled, and her face had been swathed in bandages, leaving only her eyes exposed. The eyes had suffered no damage — the only part of her face that could make that claim. Festina murmured, "I’ll be right back," to Ubatu, then shouted, "Hold your horses, Ambassador! I’m on my way." Moments later, she dragged Li back to the top of the bank, then listened to him babble about how he’d almost been killed. Meanwhile, she scooped water from a puddle and washed off the various residues smeared on her uniform.
When she was clean, she stood up and interrupted Li’s tirade. "Did you see where Tut went?"
"How could I possibly keep track of…"
"Tut!" she called, ignoring the rest of Li’s sentence. "Tut! You can come out now. The Rexies are dead."
No answer. Tut was already out of earshot, moving south through the bush. He still wore the mask… and occasionally, he went down on all fours and growled, "Grr-arrh! Grr-arrh!" Pretas hovered around him. I couldn’t tell if they were trying to possess him or simply marveling at the sight, wondering what in the world he was doing. But whether by plan or by accident, he was heading south — toward the Stage Two station.
Festina, Li, and Ubatu would soon turn that way too: the two diplomats couldn’t be left on their own in the jungle, and they refused to go back to Drill-Press. Ubatu could walk — slowly, with a limp, muttering inarticulately thanks to her slack jaw — so proceeding forward was the best of a bunch of bad possibilities. Anyway, Festina wanted to get back to where she’d left me, to make sure I was safe. Who knew how many more Rexies might lurk in the darkness?
I knew. Two more Rexies were approaching fast from the south. They’d been coming this way all the time, following Festina and me as we’d gone back to help the others.
The Rexies would reach me long before Festina would — with her glow-tube destroyed she’d have to stumble through near-total blackness, while the Rexies came on, unerringly guided by pretas. I could even tell I’d been singled out as the animals’ target; I was helpless, and they were zeroing in on me, timing their pace to arrive simultaneously.
Aloud I said, "The next few minutes are going to be tricky." Then I began pulling myself along the ground, heading for the river.
It was hard going. My legs were useless, nothing but deadweight. I could pull myself forward with my arms, but when the foliage was low it was slippery under my hands, and when it was high I had to bulldoze my way past countless stalks and tangles. The mustard smell of Muta’s ferns was thick and pungent this close to the ground, made stronger as plants in my wake were crushed to pulp beneath me. I didn’t have far to crawl to the river — only forty meters from where Festina left me — but getting there took the effort of a marathon.
Even as I crawled, I scouted ahead mentally. The bank itself was much like the one where Festina had just finished her own battle — a low, sandy cliff, slightly less than a story high and overgrown with a breed of tall, thin ferns that unfortunately had evolved primitive thorns. The area between me and the bank was slathered with the same sort of weed, mercilessly scratching my face and hands. (The rest of my body suffered no harm, thanks to the Team Esteem uniform. Nanomesh can’t withstand rain, kicks, or Rexy bites, but at least it’s resilient enough to shrug off a few plant prickers.)
I had one great advantage in the coming confrontation: my total mental awareness. I knew exactly where the Rexies were; I knew where to find a fist-sized rock that could be pried loose from the wet mud; I knew which sections of the bank were solid and which were ready to crumble if you put too much weight on them; I even knew how much weight was too much. I thought to myself as I crawled along, I’m living a Bamar folktale — one of those stories where a saint is threatened by ravenous beasts and wins out by the power of enlightenment.
Of course, in my ancestors’ folklore, "winning out" didn’t always mean surviving. Sometimes the beasts still got you, but you earned a really good rebirth.
I reached the lip of the bank mere seconds ahead of the Rexies… but along the way, I’d dug up the rock I needed. I held the stone tight as I waited on the edge of the drop-off.
The Rexies appeared moments later — the first time I’d seen them with my real eyes. They both looked tall and imposing (at least to a crippled woman sitting on the ground). I knew they’d screech before they attacked; all the other Rexies had done the same. Perhaps it was a standard tactic to freeze their prey with panic… or perhaps the Rexies were crying in agony as the pretas in their skulls jolted their brains into action. Either way, their auras gave away the exact instant when they began to open their mouths. I threw my rock at the closest and scored a perfect hit: straight to the back of the throat.
The Rexy blinked in surprise. It tried to shriek, but only managed a wheeze. Then it coughed, trying to dislodge the blockage in its windpipe. The animal wasn’t completely choked up — the rock I’d chosen wasn’t a perfect fit. Still, the Rexy could barely draw air around the edges of the rock, and its instincts would force it to hack and wheeze until it gagged up the obstruction.
One Rexy neutralized, at least temporarily. One more to go. It charged… not a smart thing to do when the target is right on the edge of a cliff.
I rolled aside at the last split second. The Rexy still got a chunk of me; though my upper body evaded fast enough, my legs straggled limply behind and my right calf got gouged by the Rexy’s claws. Since my right calf no longer belonged to me — it was now strictly Balrog territory — I didn’t feel pain. I simply saw the claw stab in… and I couldn’t help laughing as Balrog spores under the skin beat a hasty retreat to avoid being seen at the edges of the wound. A moment later, the nanomesh uniform (briefly torn by the incoming talon) sealed itself back up, hiding the spores beneath.