In Solitary by Garry Kilworth

through the air in one of his own creations. This man was sitting at the rear of his craft managing the steering mechanism. As the craft drew closer we hid in the foliage, for the occupant would attempt to kill us if we confronted him directly, on his own territory.
    ‘I shall hold him,’ said Fridjt, ‘while you try to talk him into our way of thinking. If it seems useless, we shall have to kill him.’
    ‘Or her,’ I corrected.
    ‘Him,’ said Stella, emphatically, nodding towards the boat.
    The man, and it was a man, was standing up in the craft now and we could see that our earlier viewing of the boat’s capabilities had resulted in illusions: it did not ride above the waves but instead skimmed their crests. It gave me a peculiar sensation in my stomach to watch the voyager hopping from wave-top to wave-top and my single experience of a ride on the ocean’s surface as a boy left me in no doubt as to how I should feel as a passenger in the craft.
    As the boat skipped over the submerged white wall, from the waves to the calmer water close to the island, the new comer swiftly dropped the sail and glidedin, with the momentum, to slide onto the sand. Jumping out he secured the craft by pulling it up the beach. Then he turned and began to walk towards us. We noticed he was limping and one eye had a huge dark swelling beneath it; mating wounds, I had no doubt.
    We waited by the path that led to his primitive dwelling, the tension high between us. We heard him pushing the fronds of the larger plants aside as he walked and he was grumbling about something to himself. Suddenly he stopped and looked about him curiously. My heart began to race. He suspected something and he was a big man, almost as large as Fridjt; also a weapon hung from a thong at his waist: a piece of hard wood studded with sharp teeth along each edge. He would be a difficult man to take on in an open frontal attack.
    However, after a grunt he continued down the overgrown path, slightly more cautiously than before. I hugged the shadowy, dark floor of the jungle and waited until I heard him pass – then a gargle fell on my ears and looking up I saw Fridjt had him by the throat from behind and was trying to pull him down.
    The islander was immensely strong and Fridjt hung on to the man’s neck with his full weight off the ground for a few seconds, while the pair of them swayed on the jungle track. Then, as the islander tried to prise open Fridjt’s fingers, he fell to the floor with the mudwalker on top. There was a brief struggle, but mating had left the man weak and by the way his eyes suddenly widened I could tell that Fridjt had gripped him by the testicles and was applying pressure.
    ‘No!’ he shouted.
    ‘Not crush – kill me first.’ His dialect was strange but we understood the words.
    Stella answered. ‘No one will hurt you if you do as I tell you.’
    I glanced at Stella quickly. How easily she assumed the role of leader, without really having anything else, no physical strength or powerful mind, to offer.
    ‘Get his weapon Cave,’ grunted Fridjt, the exertion evident in his voice. They were obviously a match for each other. I quickly bent down and yanked the strange dagger from the islander’s waist, snapping the thong.
    ‘Get that cord around his hands,’ snapped Stella. I did asI was told, though he struggled violently under Fridjt’s adhesive grip. Once we had him tied we sat him against one of the trees and Stella spoke to him in a soothing voice.
    ‘We won’t hurt you, as long as you don’t try to attack us,’ she said gently.
    ‘We will die,’ he sniffed back at her, his broad face sullen. ‘We will all die when Soal catch us together.’
    I said, ‘They won’t. We’ll hide in the plants.’
    He found this rather funny and laughed.
    ‘Jungle will not hide us. They can see through Jungle with their machine.’
    We all looked at one another and I wiped a brow suddenly wet with perspiration. We had trusted that the