“Everyone should have a human, they, well, they
make you feel so close to nature, the cosmos, you know what I mean...”
I didn’t care what she said. We both knew what she meant. I just liked watching her say it. If she wanted a human that was fine with me.
“I just think it’s great, you’re so, well, open and sensitive...”
She flicked back her mane. Behind her,
reflected in an ancient chrome vessel, hot-pink, storm-winds
lashed the horizon. Ruins flickered under ship lights leaving
between storms. Red sand covered everything.
If I didn’t stay the season with her the next storm could pull me home. I had to decide. And so did she. Our cycles wouldn’t synch forever.
“Sometimes friends think it’s strange I let him in the house. And I grew up that way, humans outside.”
“Did you have many?”
“For hunting. They’re the best.”
“I’d heard that.”
“If you have a lot of them you can flush the nest.”
“Then?” I moved closer where I could see the gold flecks in her eyes.
“Depends on the breed, what you’re hunting, the hunter.”
I decided to change the subject just as
she straightened her shoulders in abrupt thought. I could tell
she’d made up her mind.
“I’ll tell you a secret.” She leaned closer. Sweat dripped in my bodysuit. “I like to cuddle with them, I keep him tied by my bed. Sometimes I let him in. They’re almost extinct. They’re expensive. My father had purebreds. Anyway people don’t just go hunting with them anymore, they’re
easy to train.”
“Let’s go outside.” Again I wanted to change the conversation. We hadn’t been outside for days and if things didn’t work out I wanted to look at the sky. See exactly how and where the storm was passing.
“Great. Let me get Ralphie’s leash, he hasn’t been out for weeks.”
“That’s ok. I feel safe without him.”
“Well, you shouldn’t.”
“Are you serious?”
“There’s a new nest nearby.”
Outside, over our heads, high wind-clouds morphed. Changing
shapes and forms, like grifftans or airglets and other creatures,
they mesmerized us for a long time. When I looked down the human
was gone.
“Darn,” she said. “they’re so fast and smart.”
Then she started yelling “Ralphie, Ralphie, Ralphie...” and running after him in the compound hills like a cheeton. I was baffled and checked the sky.
Beautiful fan tails perfect for gliding swept over the nearest
cliffs. The wind tails sprayed plumes of gold, magenta and hot-red
sand into the sky in arcs. Then I realized what I was looking
at. The edge of massive air crests rolling within the storm.
The sklyders dream. I reached behind to my sailpack feeling for
the vidid. I could take air-vids and sell them. I could leave
Mars, pay the rest of my trip searching for the perfect jetcrest.
She wasn’t
even in sight, although I heard her voice nearby. I decided to
run up the cliffs, check it out, probably take off, follow the
storm, give up, go home.
Just before I snagged a wind I thought
of her gold-flecked eyes. And as I turned around, already hooded,
front-to-the-wind, leaning back into the welcome weight of
howling airs, the human tore up out of the sand into my face.
In that
split second I ripped open the sail and was carried away. But
not before I saw gold flecks in his eyes and her long mane
whipping out behind him as I twisted up into the winds.
