Animosity – Chapter 1 : Home is Where the Heartbreak Is
Previous Chapter: Awake & Alert
Dashing through the familiar jungle detritus should have been a welcome feeling for Neza, but it wasn’t the same without feeling the moss on his own feet.
Recovery
The fall was much farther than Neza anticipated when he desperately ran for that window, but he landed without a scratch. The otherworldly building occupied by strange alien creatures inside was far behind him now, but he didn’t dare stop running.
For a moment, Neza allowed himself his first moment of joy in recent memory.
“I’m alive!”
He laughed maniacally for a moment, never missing a stride on the unpredictable surface he tread. After a few kilometers, the adrenaline wore down and he slowed to a casual walk. Instead, his mind raced.
He stared down at his legs and watched them maneuver as he walked. They either operated entirely on their own or responded the exact same way his flesh and bone legs had before; at least from what he could remember. He watched the ankle joint on his right side smoothly rotate as he stepped on an odd-shaped stone, and felt barely any shock or change in his equilibrium. His tail twitched occasionally, possibly out of boredom. Normally it would do some of the balance work for him, but his legs seemed to make it obsolete.
Aside from the dirt and small scratches, the metal was grey, but didn’t shine at all. There were markings on some points with strange lettering. Neza had seen machines before, but never anything this advanced. The surface was smooth like stones from the creek near his childhood home…
His mind flashed back to his mother for a moment, leading others over the creek toward something important. He tried to pry more detail out from this memory, but it held tight.
Horror struck him abruptly. He ran his hands up his legs and over his hips to find more metal. Then quickly down beneath his leather tasset to check his genitals. Smooth metal.
His tail was still mostly flesh and bone, but thick black wires ran into it from his pelvis. He could feel a few pieces of hardware under his own flesh in the transition between. Rage filled him. His eyes burned and his tears felt as if they boiled away as soon as they rushed out. He tore violently at his flesh, working upward from his hips until he felt the sharp, warm, welcome pain in his abdomen. Neza’s tears flowed freely again, as he began laughing hysterically in relief. He licked the blood from his claws to be sure it was real.
“Thank you Deitra. There’s still some of me left.”
He was stripped of his soul. Without the means to continue his family’s seed, he was an empty vessel. If Neza were to die in the presence of his closest friends and family years from now, they would not mourn him. He died in his sleep in that building. And yet, Deitra had spared his life for some reason.
“Perhaps I’m paying penance for forgotten sins.”
Neza stretched his upper body out slowly and carefully, checking for injuries he didn’t inflict on himself. The wound on his side from the weapon those things fired at him was painful to touch, but only bled a small amount. It was exposed and pink with the first evidence of recovery.
The scars covering his body were the only evidence of how long he’d been unconscious. Based on the healing progress of the scars on his knuckles, he presumed he must have been asleep for several days between the last two memories he had. Every time he ran his paws through his fur he found new spots thickened by scars from grievous wounds he couldn’t remember earning. He wondered how many of them were from those creatures, and how many were from his previous life.
The surroundings felt familiar, but Neza couldn’t extract any real memories from them. Vines, small bushes, and ferns dotted the jungle floor where beams of light sliced through the thick canopy far above. The sun had just begun to rise, but it was still nearly pitch black in the shade of the huge trees.
Neza found himself following the dull ache of familiarity in the back of his mind. With no inkling of where it would lead him, he pushed forward — hopefully toward answers.
Home
The clicks, chirps, and caws of millions of insects and birds filled the arid air with chaotic music. Neza’s comfort with his new legs grew with each step, and he began jogging toward the rising sun. Most members of his species — Felni– preferred to run on all fours, but his hind legs were already capable of higher speeds than before. He was growing to appreciate the improved vision of running on his hind legs as well.
As Neza entered a patch of denser vegetation, he noticed that the vines and ferns seemed to move away from him as he got close. The jungle was always full of movement, but this was different than anything Neza remembered seeing before. Normally, these vines would snag his ankles and feet seemingly on-purpose and attempt to drag him down to the ground. At the moment, they seemed almost afraid of him.
In his mind he blamed the robotic monstrosities that replaced his legs, and hoped that he didn’t find a similar reaction from his family and friends when he found his way home.
The more the scents of the jungle filled his nostrils, the more fragments of Neza’s memory slid together. He could remember his house in the village at the jungle’s edge. As he progressed toward the familiar smells of a particular breed of trees, he could picture laying on his bed with the same-scented breeze blowing over him. His mind drifted to other adjacent memories.
Some nights, the essence of burning wood and roasting meat from a successful hunt would saturate the atmosphere and summon the entire village for supper. He pictured his father sneaking him extra food and telling him “You have to grow big and strong so you can take care of your sisters!”
His stomach growled in response to his overly vivid imagination.
After a few more strides, a new scent hit his nose. It was like smoke, but not normal smoke from burning wood or leaves. The fumes made his eyes twitch and his nostrils burn. This scent brought forth fresher memories. He pictured the grotesque bleeding body on the floor in the room where he woke. The smooth hairless face with round eyes and a small, dull beak. The group of them standing upright on straight hind legs before he crashed past them. The creatures were small compared to Neza, but he was still frightened to the core thinking about them.
After another inhalation of the fumes, he stopped in his tracks as another memory emerged.
“An enormous machine.. coming down from the sky.”
Neza’s father grabbed him and his sisters and pulled them inside. His wrist twisted and ached from the force as he tried to look around without stumbling. He’d never seen the adults of his neighborhood so afraid.
His mother remained outside. He remembered her standing remarkably still as other villagers chaotically dashed about around her. The structure appeared to be much closer at first, but instead it was a few kilometers away and massive. She stared up at the immense black structure as it burned away acres of dense forest with a torrent of flames pouring out from underneath it.
The object was angular and smooth; it glinted slightly in the moonlight, but wasn’t shiny. Neza called his sisters to join him at the window. The structure hovered for a moment before making contact with the surface with an enormous crashing sound. The ground shook, and his sister Keeri tripped as she ran to the window to see.
Neza’s heart sped up for a moment when he remembered Keeri’s little yelp as she fell.
Shortly after the rumbling stopped, Neza remembered losing sight of his mother. He heard her voice in the distance, but couldn’t make out what she was saying. Several of the frightened adults followed her into the forest, toward the object.
He turned and started for the door, but his father grabbed him by the scruff of his neck and yanked him away from the window. The four of them spent the rest of the night in that dark room, fearing for their mother/mate and fighting away the urge to sleep.
The smell was just like this.
…is Where the Heartbreak Is
Neza sprinted through the forest at incredible speed. Branches and roots shattered around his feet as he blasted through underbrush. Splinters of wood and thorny vines ripped tiny red streaks through his face and arms. He could smell the fumes getting closer every stride and he was determined to find home.
Trees flew by him as he ran significantly faster than he could ever remember running before. He covered each kilometer in only a few moments, and used his momentum to leap 30 meters over a fallen tree. After landing, he suddenly remembered spending an entire day walking around that old tree once before.
A moment later, a tiny red light appeared in the top corner of his right eye. Neza closed the eye for a moment and blinked to get it out, but the light remained. He rubbed his eyelid with the back of his paw for a moment before realizing that he could still see it, even when his eyes were closed. When he opened both eyes again, the trees in front of him gave way to blindingly bright white sunlight. He felt the ground fall away beneath him as he flew off the steep ridge of the mountain.
Neza’s limbs thrashed through the air, trying to find anything that could slow his fall. After what felt like a full minute of flight, he hit the side of the steep decline hard and continued to tumble and slide over thick roots and gravel. His legs stayed under him as best as they could, but they couldn’t compensate for his upper body’s lack of equilibrium. Eventually he landed on his chest and knees, and dug his claws into the dirt. Eight parallel lines followed him down the slope as he gradually slowed. He’d have used his teeth too, if he hadn’t clenched his jaw shut to deal with the pain pouring into him from his entire upper body.
The fall came to an end when the cliff began to curve under him, and finally stopped when his feet caught the trunk of a small uprooted tree. He breathed dusty air heavily as his face rested in the dirt. Blood streamed down his arms and chest from dozens of cuts of varying severity. At least two of his fingers felt broken and he could only guess how many ribs. The red light was gone.
After spending several moments catching his breath and hoping his muscles would stop aching, he turned his head slowly to look behind him. The sun glared, but he could see a huge valley cutting through the forest that he didn’t remember being there before. When his eyes adjusted better to the light, he saw an enormous dark building and hundreds of small nearly-identical white buildings all enclosed by a tall metal fence. The dark building in the center was belching white smoke and had machines moving in and out of it carrying large boxes and barrels.
He flipped over onto his back, carefully gripping the cliffside. In the distance he saw a small area with run-down shacks and huts. Their were few trees blocking his view, so he could clearly see the large silhouettes of Rhin walking around. Their massive grey bodies and horns were hard to miss. When Neza squinted his eyes to focus on the buildings, he recognized his home town.
“It seemed so big before…”
Tears streamed down his face, carrying dirt and blood that caked the fur of his cheeks in thin wavering lines. His voice cracked “How long has it been?”. He lost his grip for a moment and his body slid a few inches before he caught himself again. His body shook as he wept thick muddy tears into the soil.
Neza’s body felt heavy with exhaustion and emotion. He could feel himself giving in to sorrow. The adrenaline was wearing off and — unknown to him — the last remnants of the artificial chemicals in his veins were waning. His feet slid off the tree trunk and he began sliding again; slowly this time. Neza felt able but unwilling to stop it. He limply drifted down the cliff for nearly a minute before his body lodged itself against a boulder at the foot of the cliff.
His mind began to torment him too. He looked down at his legs and imagined the horrified reactions of his family and friends that were no longer very far away.
“Get out of here you freak!” the shade of his father screamed at him from their hut’s doorway.
“Daddy, kill the monster!” his illusory baby sisters squeal as they hide from their once-beloved brother.
Neza closed his eyes and let the darkness take him. Each time he woke up, his life had gotten worse. This time, he prayed he wouldn’t make the same mistake.
Next Chapter: Lost & Found