"I really wish you hadn't been born," muttered Pippa.
"I could say the same to you. This world isn't big enough for two Pippas."
"I can soon sort that problem out," smiled Pippa. "Now, are we going to chatter all day like a couple of inbred footballers' wives, and get eaten by these genetic mutations? Or shall we keep moving?"
"That way."
Pippa gave a nod, and between the icy rocks of The Gangers they continued to climb.
It was hours later. Pippa was bone weary. A cold sun hung in the sky, filtered by the heavy iron storm clouds. The wind howled mournfully through rocks, and it seemed to Pippa they were no closer to their destination in the vast bowl valley below than when they had started. She looked at the sky, trying to gauge the weather and time of day, but for too long had she been reliant on tech kit. Her PAD was back in the Hornet, along with nearly everything else useful she owned, including most of her weapon stash. Now, without even her yukana swords, she felt naked. Naked and vulnerable.
She reached a rocky lip, and crouched cautiously, fingers gripping the edge. She peered over. Black rocks tumbled away into a narrow chimney, down which maybe two people could climb side by side. It looked treacherous and slippery. And even as she watched, a mist had curled in from nowhere, obscuring the valley below and filling the world from the bottom up.
"I hope you're good at navigating," she said, glancing up to her clone.
The ganger shrugged. "We're going straight down. One way or another."
"How long will it take?"
"Too long."
"Will we reach the bottom before dark?"
The clone hesitated. Pippa saw the flicker of fear cross her eyes, then it was gone, replaced by her own stubborn steel. "No. We'll have to spend a night in the mountains."
"With those
critter
things?"
"If we're lucky, they won't pick up our trail. The mist helps. Damps everything down. Disguises our scents."
"So they hunt us by
scent?
"
The clone nodded. "There's a lot gone into the genetic melting-pot. I think, somewhere, one of them has some dog in it."
"Great," muttered Pippa, and leant forward, easing herself over the rim. It was tempting to try the climb backwards, but she knew from experience you went nowhere fast. You had to swallow down your fear, look the world in the eye, lean back into the rocks and climb down facing
out.
Only then could you see what the hell you were doing. Only then could you make some
time.
It was steep. No, thought Pippa. It was steep.
She edged forward with care, the rocks seeming to envelop her. It went darker as she shifted down the narrow channel in the mountainside. The mist didn't help. It crept up further, thicker now, and disguised the ground far below; disguised the
fall
.
"Nice and easy," muttered her clone. "There's no rush, girl."
Pippa grinned. Good. Her clone was feeling the same icy, creeping dread. Not just fear of the grave, but fear of falling in this vast, lonely, endless space, and never being found. Nobody to bury you. Nobody to mourn over you. Just an eternity trapped, wedged, rotting between icy rocks - entombed by the merciless mountains.
They climbed on. It grew yet darker. Shadows crept forward, mocking them. The rocks were cold, even through gloves, and occasionally Pippa's boots slipped, making her heart climb up her throat and sit in her mouth, pumping her with raw fear. She moved on down, carefully finding footholds, inching her fingers into spaces, contorting herself into peculiar shapes she just knew,
knew
Franco would make some wisecrack about if he'd been there. The dirty but lovable little pervert. Franco. The Hornet. Shit! If she could get to the valley below, that would be the most likely place for a pickup, a rescue attempt...
She'd have to be ready to fight.
She glanced up, at where her clone was carefully picking her way down the rocky chimney. Then she blinked, as from a narrow dark cave to one side she saw...
something
. Something she herself had missed until now that she was beneath it. From the cave emerged a long, blood-red snout, like a dog's snout, only without fur and without skin, and her mouth went narrow and dry, and her tongue limp, and she wanted to cry out a warning, but the words stuck in her throat, and something long and thin crept out behind the snout, as the body emerged, and it was like an octopus, big and fat and white and bloated, only with four thick tentacles instead of eight, and from its muscular body emerged the dog's neck and bloody snout and it turned, and its dark black orbs fastened on her, and she felt a thrill of terror course through her body like liquid nitrogen injected straight through her veins. It growled, tentacles whipping, and leapt even as her clone heard the sounds and reached fast for her yukana... but the critter, the creature, the genetic
mutation
hit the clone fast, tentacles wrapping tight around her and making her scream as she lost her footing, and the two entwined creatures slipped, cannoning down the narrow rocky chute and
into
a shocked Pippa, who got a bloated white tentacle slapped in her face, leaving a thick smear of clear jelly. Pippa felt,
heard
, jaws snapping at her face and realised her eyes were shut. She'd slipped down, banged her back on rocks and was stunned. Her eyes clicked open. The dog-face was snapping at her, inches away, whilst the cloned Pippa wrestled with three of the thick tentacles and the bloated body pulsed with the heavy rhythm of its thick, squirming muscles.
What is it?
screamed her mind.
What the fuck is it?
but the professional part of her took over, took stock of the situation, and her Combat K training weighed up her predicament and made a snap judgement. She pulled back her fist and rammed her index and middle fingers into the snapping dog's eyes as hard as she could. Pitiful dog yelps cried out, reverberating up the stone walls of the chimney as the creature now tried to scrabble backwards, away from her. Pippa lunged at the beast, but slipped, sliding down yet more diagonal rocks, which battered her as she bounced from wall to wall. She had a vague impression of the dogopus, critter, or whatever the fuck the gangers wanted to call it, slithering away, using its tentacles to find instant purchase on the rocky slopes; then her clone crashed into the creature, and the yukana sliced through a thickly-muscled tentacle. A high keening rent the air, along with a wash of blood, soaking Pippa. The dog snout lunged forward and grasped the clone's throat, and she shrieked as it lifted her up. The yukana clattered, tinkling like ice, and fell through the rocks to land on a flat ledge twenty feet below. The dogopus threw the cloned Pippa against a rocky wall and she tumbled past Pippa. Her fingers snapped out, grabbing the woman instinctively, and she was jerked from her little ledge by the weight. Like marionettes they toppled together, lodging in another V of rock.
Pippa groaned, and opened her eyes. Her clone was breathing, but there were puncture wounds in her throat, leaking rich blood.
It bleeds! It is real!
cackled an insane part of Pippa's mind, as she gradually became aware of a slithering, yapping sound, and was brought clattering back into painful reality. She glanced up. The dogopus, head swaying, eyes squinting through their weeping sockets, was shifting from rock to rock in a three-limbed descent. Pippa cast about, saw the yukana only feet away, and, hoisting her groaning clone's dead weight off her own torso, leapt for the sword. She took a tight hold on the hilt and turned to gaze up at the monstrosity weaving towards her, swaying, cackling, growling, yakking and snakking like some poisonous little bastard terrier with an insane love of its own yakking voice.
"Come on!" snarled Pippa, "come
on
, you bastard!"
At the sound of her voice, the dogopus critter slowed and its head lifted, ears pricking. It gave a little whimper and finally stopped, perched on a big rock just above Pippa's head. Blood pattered down. Pippa saw it had shiny, curved claws on the undersides of its three remaining tentacles.
"What in the name of
fuck
are you?"
The creature whined, its ears flat against its canine skull. A long tongue lolled out and the creature started panting.
"
What?
"
Pippa stared in disbelief. No, it couldn't be, how could they engineer something so insane? Was it really a hybrid of what she thought it was? And did it really inherit those same traits? Surely, that was impossible. Surely, that was just God having a laugh...
"Good boy," she said.
The ears rose. The panting became more pronounced.
"Er. Lie down!" She ordered, emphatically.
Squelching, the dogopus lay down, canine muzzle resting on one tentacle. It stared at Pippa with blood-rimed eyes. It seemed to be grinning a doggy grin and Pippa felt her stomach flip and lurch. She came close to losing her breakfast. Or would have, if she'd eaten any.
"Bad dog!" she tried.
The dogopus whined.
"Good boy!"
The dogopus put its head on one side, and panted at her, almost grinning. Almost.
Pippa stood, wedged between two rocks, one boot on either side of a drop that could kill her, crush her, maim her in an instant - and traded dog-friendly instructions with a mutated mutant.
Pippa licked her lips.
Go on. It's worth a try. And the bastard is too pitiful to kill, even though I know I can. After all, a yukana can easily cut through hull steel...
She pointed, back off up the rocks. "To your bed! Go on, get to your bed!"
The dogopus stared at her with those evil black eyes, licked its incisors, then slowly stood and turned and, with a little whine, squelched back off up the mountain chimney, making short work of the tricky, dangerous ascent. It picked up its severed tentacle and then retreated into its cave, far off up the chimney. And then, as quickly as it had come, the dogopus had gone.
Pippa swallowed, and ran a hand over the smears of blood on her WarSuit. She grimaced, looked down at her clone, and cursed, and for a long minute thought evil thoughts. Then, almost reluctantly, she moved to the clone, who was breathing heavily, and drew the second yukana from its sheath, examining the blade with a faint air of curiosity. It was exactly the same as her own. Then she sheathed the blade neatly, and with a tiny
snick,
against her own back.
"Come on, wake up," said Pippa, without much compassion.
Groaning, the clone opened her eyes. Her hand went to her throat, and the new puncture wounds there, two of them deep. She croaked, and spat out a lump of phlegm and blood, then slowly sat up. She was wincing, and coughing, and Pippa pulled a medkit from her own pack, complete with skinglue. She tossed the kit to the clone, who caught it deftly.
"You got two minutes to patch yourself up. Then we move."
"Your compassion overwhelms me."
"Look into your own heart, bitch, and see what you'd do if the situation was reversed."
The clone of Pippa nodded, and cleaned her wounds as Pippa kept watch, yukana in one fist, eyes wary on the cave above. She could hear occasional panting, and a grotesque tearing sound.
What do you bet the genetic freak is reattaching the fucking limb? I guarantee it. I just bloody guarantee it!
The clone glued her own throat back together, and lay for a few moments, head back on a rock, damp hair spread out around her pale face as she waited for the glue to fix. When she tentatively removed her hand, she sat up and glared at Pippa.
"You bitch."
Pippa grinned. "Hey. I'm just the way the world made me. Now get on your fucking feet and get moving; you're lucky I didn't leave you for the dog-pussy thing. Lucky I didn't leave you as chopped up dog liver!"
The clone tilted her head to one side - as, Pippa realised,
she
must have done a million times in her own lifetime. "How did you pacify it?" she said. "How did you stop it attacking? They are renowned for being fearsome indeed..."
Pippa shrugged. "Let's just say, as an educated woman of the world, and having spent many an evening in a drunk-filled nightclub, that I've got a particular knack at fending off dogs. Now, on your feet and start climbing."
Darkness was descending like a veil over the mountains. Pippa crouched on the narrow ledge, perched like a hunter, surveying the landscape before her. The mist had cleared, at least partially, and the sky was a pastel backdrop of smeared ochre and magenta. The surrounding mountains, The
Gangers,
were alien teeth smashed up from the HeartStone of the world. Pippa grimaced, and glanced behind to the cave they'd discovered. It seemed as good a place as any to spend the night. To...
defend,
if the necessity arose.
Pippa's clone had lit a fire at the back of the cave, and was cooking some kind of emergency ration stew over meagre flames. It stank like a dead cat, but Pippa had to admit her stomach was a bunched fist, her body deprived of nutrients. Damn, but she could have eaten Franco's arse if it was served to her on a plate with salad garnish and sour cream!
Pippa retreated into the cave and hunkered down before the flames. They'd found a little dead wood, but not enough to keep the fire burning all night. It was more of a morale boost than anything else.