“I’ll take you on the moment You’re ready.”
“Thanks. The numbness is already starting to fade.”
They walked on, letting the urine drip and dry in the air. What did it matter? They Weren’t going to any formal party.
They crossed the boundary. They were in the fourth territory, the one with the trees. The dangerous one.
“It occurs to me you may not want to have more satyr sex,” Pedro said. “There’s no lake, and my bladder is empty.”
“Good point. A skirt can at least impede him somewhat.” She took the folded netting off her shoulder and wrapped it several times around her waist.
“They seem to need that one position for it,” he said. “Maybe if you insist on facing him, with that skirt on, it will balk him.”
“Let’s hope so.”
No pair of natives approached them, which seemed curious. They walked on until they came to a giant tree. Its trunk was perhaps five feet thick, and it rose about two hundred feet before the voluminous foliage spread. It was impressive.
Pedro glanced back as they passed it. “Uh-oh.”
“What?”
“Something ugly.”
She turned and looked. There was something stuck to the trunk, roughly man height, but more like a hung gutted pig.
They went back to inspect it more closely. It was the desiccated figure of what might once have been a man, tied upright against the trunk. Yes, a man, because his shrunken scrotum and penis were visible.
“I think we now have a notion what happened to those lost colonists,” Fotina said grimly.
“Someone executed them and pinned them up against trunks, maybe as a warning to others.”
“But who, and why? Savage native animals should have devoured them, not left them to rot.”
“I don’t know. But I think we’d better find our companions soon.”
They walked on. They found another suspended body, this one of a woman, her hair reduced to a few strings, her breasts now no more than leathery flaps.
Grimly they continued. And heard a groan.
It was a fresh body of a man bound with his front to the tree. Fotina peeked at his face. “Tris!” she exclaimed, appalled anew.
“He’s alive,” Pedro said. “We must get him down.”
They inspected Tris close up. Tendrils grew from the tree and fed into his nostrils. Pedro grabbed them with his fingers and yanked them out.
Ichor welled from the man’s nose. His head dropped to rest against the tree.
“He’s no longer breathing,” Fotina said, horrified.
“We must have killed him by removing his life support,” Pedro said. “He was too far gone.”
“Let’s hope the others aren’t. We must find them immediately.” She kept her feelings in a kind of suspended animation, blocked off, so that she was able to function during this crisis of revulsion. If the two of them did not act effectively, they would be the next victims.
They searched. Fotina went out to the right to check the trees, and Pedro to the left.
Almost immediately he saw something. “I found Nola!” he called. “I’d know that green hair anywhere.” Then, after a pause: “She’s too far gone. I pulled out the nose stem and she died. Damn!”
“Keep looking,” Fotina called back. “At least we might save Lance and Ula. They were only two hours ahead of us. It must take time to—to dissolve the brain.”
“Right,” he called. “Uh-oh—there’s a nymph. She’s presenting.”
“Leave her alone! She’s trying to distract you from finding the others.”
“I know it. But damn it, I've just got to have it. That damned fruit. I’m so stiff it’s painful.”
“Pedro!” He didn’t answer. He was already after the nymph. Fotina realized that she should have made him have sex with her the moment the numbness wore off, to abate his urgency. She understood the potency of the fruit; she felt it herself. But the horrors bound to the trees had distracted her. How could a person think of sex in front of a cruelly destroyed friend?
She sighed. Pedro would just have to fuck the nymph. Then he would be able to return to business. It shouldn’t take long. She wasn’t jealous, just irritated by the distraction. She moved on.
Soon enough, she found more bodies, some ancient, some fresh. She located Ula, the faerie, bound with her back to the trunk, tendrils threading into her crotch and nose. Somehow the tree had gotten her there and infiltrated her body apertures, rendering her helpless. Her arms were bound back against the tree, so that her breasts and belly were exposed. Goo dripped from her vulva; she had been raped by a satyr.
“Ula!” Fotina said sharply.
The woman’s eyes opened. “Fotina! Don’t let them get you!”
“First I must free you. Hold on.” Fotina reached up and hooked a finger around a nostril tendril. She yanked it out. Ula screamed in agony.
But she didn’t die. Fotina had caught her in time. She tackled the crotch tentacles next, yanking them out of her urethra and anus. Then she stooped to undo the tendril bands around Ula’s ankles.
“Watch out!” Ula cried.
Fotina turned. There was a satyr charging toward them. She needed to fend him off, and she could do that most effectively if she didn’t have to watch her back. She backed toward the huge tree trunk.
“No!” Ula cried. “That’s how it got me! Don’t touch the trunk!”
Oho! But what could she do? She needed some sort of backing.
“Don’t!” Ula cried.
Well, maybe she could handle it in the open. She made sure her mesh skirt was firmly in place, and stood to meet the satyr.
“There’s another!” Ula called.
Oh, shit! One would hold her while the other raped her. The skirt could do only so much, especially if she got forced into the butt-presentation position. She had to cover her back.
The satyrs gave her no time. The one in front grabbed for her arms, trying to push her down into the mating posture, while the other rammed at her from behind.
His member jammed into the mesh skirt and bounced off. Startled, he backed away a moment. That gave her a chance.
She lurched into the satyr in front, pushing him off balance so he had to let go. Then she ran to the nearest tree and planted her back against its trunk. A few minutes shouldn’t hurt, especially since she was actively defending herself.
The two satyrs pursued her, but now there was no room for them both. Only one at a time could come at her.
One did. The other ran across to Ula on the other tree. Ula remained anchored, with vines around her neck, waist, wrists and ankles, holding her arms back and her legs apart. The satyr rammed into her vagina from the front, evidently knowing how to do it that way, and in a moment was filling her belly. She was evidently prey for any passing satyr, and had probably been inflated many times before Fotina found her. The predatory trees were a real service to the satyrs.
But Fotina had a rape of her own to fight off. The satyr’s member was banging into her skirt and getting nowhere. He was evidently too dull to realize that all he needed to do was lift the skirt clear, or bend his knees and come up from below. She had to discourage him before any such revelation occurred to him.
He backed off slightly, then rammed forward again, as if thinking that all that was required was a harder shove. She bucked her pelvis forward to meet him. His member collided so hard it could have broken. He moaned in pain, then backed off and ran away, holding his hurting member.
Fotina tried to step away from the tree. A thick vine had wrapped around her waist, holding her in place. In fact, during her distraction vines had also circled her neck, arms, and ankles. She was anchored, spread eagled, to the tree, wide open for the next attack.
“I told you,” Ula called. The satyr had finished his effort and departed, leaving her to deflate and drip. Fotina saw with horror that new tendrils were coming out of the tree and curling around the woman’s head and groin. She would soon be all the w
ay captive again. She wasn’t even fighting it; the new ejaculate was pacifying her, putting her back to sleep.
Something tickled Fotina’s bottom. She glanced down, and saw that tendrils were twining through her skirt, blindly seeking her nether orifices. She realized that the trees sought their sustenance in the urine and feces of animate creatures, and had learned to go to the source.
Something nudged her neck. It was another tendril, reaching for her nose. The trees made sure of their prey by penetrating to the brain and nullifying it, so that free will ended. Then the captive became a mere generator of refuse, probably force-fed with fruit, while the satyrs raped her repeatedly. It was a fate worse than death.
Now she understood why the original colonists had departed in haste. Why this world was called Horror.
Well, she had not been pacified by satyr ejaculate. Her fighting spirit remained.
She turned her face, caught the intruding tendril in her mouth, and bit it off. Goo welled out and it retreated. Score one for the victim.
The nether tendrils still quested. She tried to pull her groin away, but the waist bond had tightened and she had little leeway. The tendrils were snaking between her buttocks and extending toward her orifices.
She jerked her hands forward, but they were securely manacled. She might work them free in time, but not before the vines got into her body. Indeed, the first had already reached her anus and was pushing into it. She clenched her sphincter, but the tendril was insistent. It exuded a slippery sap and threaded on into her colon. This was rape of another nature.
Another tendril came at her face. She snapped it off. At least she could fight off the brain attack. But how was she to stop the infiltrating vines that were insinuating themselves into her nether orifices? Already she felt one penetrating her urethra.
None for her vagina? No, of course not that was reserved for the satyrs. The trees must have evolved a deal with the remaining colonists, trading for services. The satyrs and nymphs probably did errands for the trees, such as driving victims to their trunks, and were rewarded with sex and fruit. That was why they, and only they, were safe among the trees. They had joined the enemy.
She had to stop this. But how?
She got an idea. It was risky, but at this point, doing nothing was deadly.
She straightened her knees, pushing her bottom up slightly. The mesh of the skirt caught against the bark of the tree and slid an inch down against her flesh. She pushed her pelvis forward so that it cleared the tree by half an inch, dropped it down, and backed up. And lifted it again, scraping against the bark, so that the skirt dropped another inch.
Bit by bit, she worked her skirt down. It was slow, but she had power. The tendrils had passed though it; as it descended they were dragged down with it, and slowly drawn out of her orifices.
Finally, the mesh was around her ankles, and she was clear of tendrils. Her cleft was slimy with the tendril excretions, but clear. Another small but significant victory.
Then another satyr came. Oh, no! That was the risk she had taken when she dropped her skirt. The beast was charging, huge hard member leading.
She decided on a desperate ploy. It had worked on Ramsey the Ram in Round Two; could she get away with it again? As his member jammed at her cleft, she tightened her muscles while spreading her thighs as wide as she could. His penis came up against the slipperiness of the tree ichor, and slid right on through to her butt crack. She closed her buttocks on it and jerked her body up and down.
The satyr thrust again, and his ejaculate spewed out copiously, bathing her backside and the tree trunk. He had been fooled! Her buttocks were getting numb, but she could handle that.
Satisfied, he pulled away and departed. She returned her focus to her freedom. She had to free her hands, but the vines held them securely. She could not wrench them free.
She pondered. There had to be an answer. This was the game; there was always a way, if the player could just fathom it. She needed to think outside the box of her present captivity.
Why did the trees bother to keep the captives alive? Tris had been alive until they yanked out his brain tendril. The tree hadn’t needed his brain, but had preserved his body. It was preserving Ula’s body. There had to be a reason.
It came to her. Of course, the breeding! The present satyrs and nymphs were at least second generation. The trees might make certain to maintain a docile breeding population, introducing new genes as available. That was what the personnel from the spaceship represented. Take the women: they were pinned with their backs to the trees, made available for raping. In time, that should lead to pregnancies. They could conceive and birth babies while fastened to the tree. But how could they take care of them? Holding, nursing?
Holding, nursing. They could do it only if allowed.
The trees would have to let the captives’ arms loose so they could hold and nurse their babies. When the babies got old enough to walk they would be small satyrs and nymphs and join the existing community. But for months, their mothers would be needed. With free arms.
Did the trees have any real sense of time? Seasons, yes, but not human time. Their responses would be triggered by particular signals.
Fotina made her best emulation of a crying baby. “Waaa! Waaa! Waaa!”
And the bonds on her wrists loosened. Her hands were being freed so she could hold her baby, that she had evidently conceived and birthed after repeated rapings. Score another for the home team!
With her hands free, she worked at the vines around her waist. She drew them out to get some slack, then bent them sharply. She repeated the creasing, until they weakened and tore. She did the same for her neck band. Finally she bent forward and loosed her ankles.
She stepped away from the tree. She had done it!
She ran across to Ula. She ripped out the new tendrils, then worked at the neck, waist, wrist and ankle bonds. Ula fell forward, freed. “What?” she asked drowsily.
“I have freed you,” Fotina said. “Now, try to clear the shit out of your ass and throw off your lassitude. Your life depends on it.”
“It does,” Ula agreed. She started walking, revving up her system, as she pawed at her crotch, trying to scrape out remaining ejaculate.
Fotina went in the direction she had last seen Pedro. Soon she found him, bound facing a tree. She ran up and ripped out his tendrils, then yanked away his bonds. She discovered to her amazement that his penis was wedged into a knothole in the trunk.
“Thanks!” he said as he freed that last bit. He was not far gone; it had been less than an hour.
“What happened?” she asked. “I thought you were doing a nymph.”
“She evaded me, then backed up against the tree and beckoned me,” he said. “I went after her, and rammed right in. Then I discovered that she wasn’t really there; she had become illusion. I’m not sure how That’s possible in a science setting. I had just fucked the tree, and it would not let my penis go. As I tried to pull free without, uh, losing it, the tree put vines around me, and then into me, and I was caught.”
“Just like a man,” she said, kissing him. “I was caught too. But I managed to get free, and to rescue Ula. Now let’s rescue Lance.”
“You’re some player,” he said. “And some woman.”
“Thank you.” His honest compliment gave her a thrill.
They found Lance, stuck similarly to a tree, and rescued him. He had the answer to the mystery of the mechanism. “The nymph backed up against the tree, but slid her body aside as I lunged, while still kissing me. I was in the tree before I could stop.”
“We need to get on with our mission,” Fotina said. “We have avoided getting trapped, but the others are gone. We need to get food to the ship, or we’ll lose too. It’s not over yet.”
“I will be glad to get out of this setting,” Lance said fervently. “But I don’t see how we can win.”
“I do,” Pedro said. “We have been playing nice. Now we need to play nasty. The four of us who were caught
by the trees know they deserve no mercy. They hold women for rape and breeding, and men for semen and sustenance. They are merciless. We need to talk their language.”
The others looked at him blankly. Fotina left it to him to clarify, suspecting what he had in mind.
“Fire,” he said. “You bet That’s one thing the trees fear. We can gather some deadwood and kindling, make a fire, make crude wood torches. It will take time, but we can do it. We can threaten the trees, and make them drop their fruit. Then we’ll use the fire to protect ourselves as we trek back to the ship with our load. The wolves and sea monsters will be wary of it too. We can do it. Of course that aphrodisiac fruit will make for a rousing voyage back to earth, but we can probably handle that.” He smiled grimly. “As long as there are no trees, satyrs or nymphs along.”
“I don’t know,” Lance said. “Maybe we could capture one nymph for the trip.”
“No way!” Fotina snapped. The men laughed. The horror was fading, now that they had a way to fight it.
“If we could only make a fire,” Ula said sourly. The others nodded soberly.
Pedro brought out his lighter. The last piece of the game puzzle had fallen into place.
Chapter 5:
Coven
Pedro found himself in a court room. He had just been granted his divorce, according to the game background, and was now at loose ends. What would the game throw at him this time? Whatever it was, he was more than ready for it. He was in love with Fotina, and she reciprocated. They would marry by game’s end. The last round had confirmed what they had decided during their week’s “honeymoon.”
But his lingering joy of the prospect was tempered by the brief news of his eye test: it seemed that his eye problem stemmed from a genetic malady that was slowly rendering him blind. Fortunately there were treatments, once they narrowed down the particular chromosomes involved. Another test was doing that. The results would arrive in one more week. Since he could do nothing about it, he put it out of his mind.
The Clerk of Court approached him, probably with more papers for him to sign. She was a nondescript woman with heavy glasses and a severe hair bun, wearing a skirt suit. Her words surprised him. “You are adrift, Pedro.”