February

Issue 41

     Stain’s scales shimmered off the surface of the water in the fierce light of the noonday sun. Water lapped at his clawed feet and the rest of the muddy bank as he stood at its edge and glared out over the swollen river. He was running out of time.

     Already, the big three-horned Tressatops had waded far enough into the water that only its round spiked head was visible. It was a short-legged lezzard, lumbering around on all fours and wielding a skull the size of a boulder. Slow, yes. But it had outsmarted him. Based on the size of the creature’s horns alone, Stain had expected it to hold its ground. Instead it sought refuge in the one place he feared to follow. The water.

     “Maybe it’s time,” sighed General Spin, “for us to stop—”

     “Quiet!” hissed Stain, and he smacked his fat, blue tail against the riverbank with a wet splatter. He didn’t glance back to see if the mud had sprayed his generals. It was enough that he’d startled them into silence.

     Hot rage seared through his eyes, and he squinted through it, at the water rippling in a long arc around the Tressatops as it trudged toward the far bank. Slowly, gradually, those ripples enlarged, widened, and cascaded outward until the entire river appeared to be wrinkling its face in disgust at the situation.

     And then the ground too was quivering beneath Stain’s clawed feet, the air alive, thrumming and ready to voice its opinion of things. And just as it twisted its mouth into some prophetic word of indignation, the world expended one last burst of energy and slumped back into stillness.
It had been the strongest tremor to date.

     Stain sighed. The quakes had been an unexpected result of their mining operations. And harmless, so far. But they’d been impossible to hide. When his spying brother, Sorrell, returned to the planet a few dayz ago to check up on him, Sorrell had known Stain was up to something. What Sorrell hadn’t known was how close Stain was to completing it. In less than a weag, Stain’s engineers would be ready to assemble the Gateway. Then they could make their escape.

     But now there’d be no time to finish it.