Yuen-Mong's Revenge by Gian Bordin

her frankness. He
would hardly have admitted to something like this. "Why didn’t you tell
me? I wouldn’t have prevented you."
            Her glance felt like she was reaching into his mind, and he reminded
himself that she was an empath. It unsettled him. "After breakfast, you’ll
take me back to my shuttle. You promised."
            "I did not promise. I only said I would if it is safe. It is not safe today.
A storm is coming. We would not make it back again. Maybe tomorrow."
She went over to the cooking area.
          "A storm coming when the sky is blue as far as the eye can see and
hardly a breeze," he protested. "This is just another excuse for not taking
me there. You’ll take me there today. I’ll make you do it even if I have
to force you."
            Her glance betrayed mild amusement. Is she laughing at me? Enraged
he went quickly over to his sleeping alcove, took the laser gun, set it to
a minimum charge, and aimed it at her. "In fact, we will go right now,"
he shouted.
          She briefly glanced over her shoulder and then turned back to mixing
nuts and sweetberries into the mash, ignoring him completely. "You want
to eat breakfast?" she asked, as she turned and offered him a bowl.
          "Put that down. We’re going now. I’m not kidding."
            She shrugged, put his bowl back on the shelf and started eating,
looking him straight in the face.
          "Did you hear me?" he shouted again.
          "I eat my breakfast now. Then we can go." She walked out onto the
balcony and sat.
          He almost lost it then. That audacity of simply ignoring his threat as
if he were pointing a child’s imitation gun at her. For a moment it crossed
his mind to teach her a lesson, but then sanity returned. He grabbed his
bowl and started eating it, while standing. This is what paper must taste
like , went through his mind, although he had never tried, since in his
world paper was mainly used to wrap things, or for hand drawing. Then
he remembered to chew the berries fully, but even so he was finished
well before she was.
          After cleaning out both bowls, she packed a few things into her carry
pack, quickly checked her bow and arrows, shouldered them and went
out to the rope. She was already below the canopy of the broadleaf by the
time he had shouldered his survival pack and gun and got to the rope. He
hurried after her, afraid that she might be playing a trick on him and
would disappear, leaving him stranded. But she was standing on the path
below the rope, her eyes closed, seemingly listening to something he
could not hear. She opened her eyes and said: "We have to go fast." Then
she was off in her graceful loping gait.
          He tried to match her speed, but within a few minutes she was more
than a hundred yards ahead, running again just inside the trees along the
beach. His pack was bobbing up and down on his back, always a bit
behind each steps, making running all that much harder. After fifteen
minutes he was out of breath. He could feel every pulse beat on his neck
and knew that he could not keep up with her any longer. Humiliated, he
slowed to a walk. She had stopped and waited for him.
          "You are overheating dressed like this. Take off that outer clothing."
            When he had peeled off the jumpsuit garment, she took it and said,
touching a low broadleaf branch: "You can tie it to this branch and we
will pick it up on our way back."
            "No, I’ll take it along. I won’t come back."
            She only shrugged her shoulders, folded the garment tightly and
packed it under the flap of his survival pack. "I will carry this. We must
go fast." Before he could answer, she had shouldered his pack next to her
own and was off again. She maintained a pattern of alternating between
running and walking, until they reached the open estuary, where they had
met up with the giant bird.
          "The craw is hunting. I will go out and I