Trek For Survival

As she lay there, feeling began to return slowly to her body, and she realized she couldn"t hear any of her family moving or making noises. Where Vonn"s shoulder would normally be in her back, there was nothing. Mikey"s soft whispers to his pet Limcheez, Sprout, her father"s soft sounds of carving, her mother"s heavy breathing as she sighed frequently, and Sudar"s grinding teeth were all absent. All she could hear was the rustle of the leathery skin of the elephant and the steady plod of its footfalls.

"Finally wake up? You must have eaten more of that jerky than I thought you would," said a husky voice behind her.

Who was that? Her mind seemed to be moving through mud as she tried to place that voice. Could it be one of the guards? But the city had been destroyed. It wasn"t a dwarven voice, it didn"t have the accent. Then everything seemed to click. It was Geth!

"Struggling won"t do you any good. Those ropes are strong. And screaming won"t do you any good. No one"s around for miles."

His husky voice drew closer to her, but she couldn"t turn her head to see him. What had happened?! She knew that the jerky he gave everyone must have been poisoned somehow, but had he done anything? Panic welled up inside her as she felt his breath on her hair for a moment, and then it was gone.

"Don"t worry, I haven"t touched you, yet."

His chuckle sent shivers down her back.

"I would let my elephant just walk, and have all the fun I"ve been thinking of, but we don"t want unwanted visitors, now do we?"

What did he mean? Sweat was trickling down her back from fear and the heat. Gia could tell that Geth had thrown her next to his piled-up furs, and there was very little air flow back there. Her mind was clearing the longer she lay still, as the last of the drug wore off, and she became more aware of the bruises she could feel forming on her arms and legs where he must have grabbed her and pulled. Her belly hurt, where he must have carried her from Sudar"s elephant to his. Was Vonn alright? Had Geth hurt any of her family? If he had…

Gia wasn"t sure what she would do, but at the moment, she wasn"t above killing him. Closing her eyes to keep the tears from falling, she knew that she would get really thirsty if she cried too much. There was no telling where Geth was taking her, but she was sure it wasn"t to the orcs like they had planned.

"A few rules we traders follow include not killing people, so you don"t have to worry about those others you were traveling with. Just be glad you have more room to spread out, here in a bit. As soon as we get past the edges of the wastes and into the desert proper, then I"ll untie the ropes. But you won"t be free just yet, oh no. I have these chains I"ve been holding on to for a while. Got them from the orcs. Never had a use for them, until now."

Gia lay there, not trying to move, hoping to conserve her energy until she could do something to hurt him when given the opportunity. All she could do was hope that Vonn and her family were safe, and that Sudar was willing to come after her. Surely the other traders knew where he was going, and were willing to help save her.

After what felt like forever, with sweat stinging her eyes, she finally heard Geth moving towards her again.

"I have a few minutes. Plenty of time to get you chained up."

He was talking more to himself, than to her as she felt cold metal sliding over her wrists. How it could be cold was beyond her, but as he began to untie the ropes, the pain and tingling of blood rushing back to her hands and feet almost made her cry out. He didn"t try to move her, just jerked the ropes out of her reach and returned to steering the elephant.

Pulling her arms and legs up under her, she huddled in place for a few moments, until she could move without screaming. Rolling over, she glanced around the elephant and saw that he had already moved everything up out of her reach, and the chains around her wrists were connected to a rib of the elephant, keeping her from being able to do much of anything.

Geth was sitting, hunched in the front of the chest cavity, watching ahead and to the sides of them anxiously. He didn"t seem to be paying any attention to her, his focus being entirely on watching for something.

All Gia could see was sand dunes as far as the eye could see. There wasn"t a sign of the cracked earth they had been traveling on. The feet of the elephant were sinking pretty deep with each step it took, and she could occasionally feel it sliding as the sand under its feet gave way. It was clear this place was not somewhere the elephant should be.

Studying the rib of the elephant, Gia slowly pulled back the blankets she was sitting on, wondering if there were a weak spot under them where she could get free. Grimacing at the grime under the layers of blankets, she finally spotted what might be a weak spot. Timing her movements to the sounds of the elephant, she began to work the chains against the bone. Keeping half an eye on Geth, and angling her body to hide what she was doing from his line of sight, Gia worked at breaking the bone. What she did once she was free was beyond her, but she focused on one task at a time. Maybe she could control the elephant, after pushing him out, and turn it around to get back to the others. They couldn"t have traveled that far, right?

"It"ll be dark soon, but we"re not going to stop anytime soon," came Geth"s voice as he seemed to be watching something in the distance. "The desert is way too dangerous. I have a couple pots back there you can do your business in, and I"ll throw it out later. If you look over to your left, you"ll see a bag with some dried meat in it and a water bag. Don"t waste it. We have a long way to go before we run into more water."

Gia glanced over at the bag that had blended in with the furs and swallowed past the dry lump in her throat. There was no way in h.e.l.l she was going to eat or drink anything this man offered her. She wanted to keep her wits about her and not become a crazed slave. There was no telling what this man had planned.

"Where are you taking me?" she managed to whisper.

"There"s this ruined city we found when we were wandering around exploring years ago, that we played with the idea of living in, but it doesn"t really have a lot of food there. And it was pretty boring. It"s really dangerous to cross the desert with the giant sand worms and snakes, but if we don"t stop, we should be fine."

He didn"t sound very confident, and it made her renew her efforts to break the bone holding her chains. There was no way she was going to go live in some abandoned city with this deranged monster. If she could get free, she still had a chance to get back to the others.

As the sun began to fade, she could hear Geth muttering to himself. He kept thinking he was seeing things, but couldn"t tell. She kind of hoped he was just delusional, rather than there actually being monsters of some kind drawing closer to them, about to attack the elephant.

The last rays of light were fading when she finally managed to break the rib bone holding her chains. There was a loud snap as it gave way, causing Geth to jerk his head around to see what the noise was. In front of the elephant, just as he turned towards her, Gia saw a shadow rise up, blocking all view of the dark sands ahead of them, and she screamed.

Geth turned back, the movement of the shadow drawing his attention, as the monster attacked. The head of the elephant was suddenly gone. A loud crunching noise was quickly followed with a hiss, and Geth had just enough time to scream, before the entire carca.s.s of the elephant collapsed. Gia watched, as the shadow moved lightning fast, s.n.a.t.c.hing up Geth and swallowing him in one bite.