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The sunset burned down like a fiery river, spreading over the gray stone on the edge of the world, and on one side of this “fortification wall” life boiled and blossomed, and on the other side the dead wasteland trembled from earthquakes and gaped with lakes of tar. From the powerful gusts of wind that were ready to blow the scaly heavy creature to that unpleasant place, the flying lizard was protected only by rare mountain peaks, terraformed in such a way as to turn into flattened crescents. For small dragons and rare flying vehicles, they filled this role perfectly, but the leathery orange wings of the emperor lizard were completely unsuitable for flying at such a height.
Snoring and dripping foam from its mouth, the exhausted animal fell onto a flat stone, leaving a deep hollow in it. To take pity on the dragon, however, his rider had no strength left - he already regretted too many things, and his heart was unable to contain even more grief. Killing a dragon is not so easy, but if the need to urgently take flight arises again, this dragon will no longer fit for this role. It remained to get hold of other transport. But then the question arose of where to fly, because the plateau, despite its size, was completely embraced by the forces of the invader; everything else, divided from now on into small sectors with border outposts that cannot be bypassed or deceived in any way. The rider thought about how big are his chances of presenting his friend as a food resource taken on the road alive so it won’t deteriorate in the heat. For all the inappropriateness of cemetery humor in such a situation, the idea could work, but there was a danger that the starving local homeless right now, or suspicious border guards later, would order to share "food" with them.
Buddy scowled at the hostile world, that at the moment lived independently of him, resembling a large bazaar in some Arab state. He left the riding animal untied - it will not be able to fly away, and no one will steal it; except perhaps, sawing in parts at the beginning, but the scales of a living dragon are like carved from a diamond.
The path meandered between shabby tents and covered flying wagons, diving into shallow ravines, then ascending the heights, and everywhere these buildings multiplied, built on top of each other, like an endless hive of fabric and plank honeycombs. The hot air was filled with the sounds of construction, merchants’ cries, beast roar and not the most pleasant smells typical of the accumulation of very many living beings. Fortunately for the locals, their sense of smell was not sensitive from birth, but a dense bundle, tightly tied behind Buddy's back, began to moan slowly, and this could be heard. In the heat, the wounds threatened to fester in no time, so he had to hurry.
From the prying eyes both of them were quite reliably protected by the strong enthusiasm of the locals for their business, along with the lazy sluggishness that hovered over the entire market, and the fact that news in the world of flowering life spread extremely slowly. A low-pulled hood made it difficult to notice a stranger from another tribe in the crowd by the "wrong" color of his eyes, and numerous slave brands hid the wide skirts of the cloak. However, Buddy was extremely sullen and wary: the danger was in the air and settled on the skin like an oil slick.
A shabby feline came under his feet - a skinny mountain tigress with tufts of dropdown fur stretched across the road, so at first he took her for dead. In response, she roared displeasedly, showing her mouth with broken fangs, and retired behind a rock, dragging her legs. Still is as big as her mountain ancestors, but not at all scary, completely out of place here, in the stronghold of civilization, and even pathetic. Before falling prey to invaders, settlers often bred these large felines; now, abandoned to the mercy of fate, tigers had nowhere to go - their wild brethren would have torn them to pieces as soon as they saw them.
The tent of a local healer appeared from around the corner, merrily sparkling in the sun with multi-colored glass pendants, skeletons of small animals strung on a thread and an embroidered inscription on the curtain of the main entrance. Buddy knew perfectly well that his rash undertaking would not end well, and the scattering of bright dried hallucinogenic mushrooms in baskets at the entrance did not add optimism. But he could not have been afraid and run away from the very beginning. In other circumstances, it was enough for him to negotiate with the slave owners - occupying not the lowest position in the tribe, Buddy knew how to do it. To ingratiate himself with them, chat, even pretend that he is ready to take their side - then he would receive relative freedom in the status of a jailer and the key to all the prison cells on his floor. Guerrilla warfare and support of comrades until their time came was the right strategy, and in a sense, because of his escape, he could now rightfully be considered a traitor too. Buddy never had children, but he always felt a touching instinctive tenderness for creatures smaller than himself; who, moreover, could not stand up for themselves.
The old man in the tent swung from side to side like a clockwork pendulum and smoked his pipe. His eyes were half closed and expressed unity with the cosmos. At the sight of the patient, he narrowed his green eye, as if he decided to scan Buddy for ailments. And immediately the healer sensed something interesting: the persistent smell of the Nirian was interrupted by familiar notes with interesting shades of aromas. The doctor remembered how supple and fragile the bodies of these creatures were, how interesting it was to study them, each time discovering something new. What could be better than digging your claws into the most tempting details of their bodies? Whomever the wanderer was going to treat, he brought a generous payment. The elder even trembled with impatience and, without changing his sitting position, crawled closer on the pillows.
"Are you ready to give it whole at once? Or a part as an advance payment?"
The healer did not know what rich Nirians do with such trophies, but no doubt, simply sealing it in a museum vault and leaving it to wither would be a blasphemous disregard for the great Mother Nature.
"He is your patient," the wanderer exhaled with a growl, removing and unfolding the bundle like a baby. "I want him to live! Name your price!!"
The elder, perplexed, walked around "the treasure", not bothering to get up and only rising on his fingertips. But he was too interested scientist to refuse such a deal. Restoring the human body to a viable state seemed even more intriguing and enticing task than understanding how its insides work.
"Science does not grovel before Tarium: I would take up this work for free, but… I need to feed my family, and the venerable emperor shows interest in my labors so infrequently that he pays less often than it snows here. I'm afraid you don't have enough money to pay my expenses for your… ward."
"Female imperial dragon; there are only two dozen left on the continent. In addition, she will bring offspring from day to day. The emperor has already gone looking for her, and as soon as he arrives here, you will hand her over for a good reward. The biography of the thief is known, he is on the run, so you are completely protected from suspicion"
"A worthy offer, I accept it, - the healer tried to drive away thoughts about how he would also sell a powerful dragon cub to the underground arena, so that anticipation would not obscure his sharp mind in complex procedures. – But in case of death of the patient, the advance payment is not refundable"
"I'm sure you respect your time and mine enough to prevent this from happening"
"Do not worry," the healer was already immersed in work, clinking instruments, flasks with something unappetizing, and rustling dried, strung on skewers and strings, indefinable body parts of unknown creatures, completely lost interest in the interlocutor, so his voice sounded barely audible
"How much time will you need?"
"For half a day," the healer declared confidently.
From the bundle, which was now unfolded to the level of the chest, a groan was heard again. Buddy ran a finger along his friend's arm, afraid of hurting him even more if he put his hand on his shoulder.
"Go for a walk somewhere, or sit down"
The Nirian, with a gloomy look, staked out a place at the entrance, blocking it with his broad back, and not intending to let anyone in. However, locals themselves didn’t visit the virtuoso doctor without special need: not so talented by nature, but having mastered his craft to perfection over the years of practice - and not only on humans accidentally falling into Niria, which happened once every seventy years for sure, - he was familiar to many, first of all, as a former master of torture at the court of the emperor. Bloodthirsty work benefited healer’s cause - the old man, at least, understood the anatomy of patients. Actually, that's why the prisoners survived for a painfully long time. Moreover, as a doctor, he was extremely honest and put all of himself in work, in proportion to the astronomical cost of his services.
Since its inception in a universe of tiny grains of sand, Niria has been the embodiment of the law of survival, and in a simple but exhaustive form, the tribes formulated it as: “Who is brave enough to leave his native cave, which rapidly sinking in underground waters, and immediately face a terrible predator, but will not succumb to fear and jump over it's scruff, will definitely survive”. The world did not spare them. It is better to visit a master of torture once than to remain an invalid for the rest of your life and die on a hunt or from hunger.
"You're not leaving here either until you're done. And until I see that every possible way has been tried”"
"Don't worry, even the sand hyenas and the fiery rain won't drag me by force until the end of the experiment. Humans decay quickly, you know. And His Wisdom does not deign to provide the lower castes with refrigerating chambers anytime soon"
Lester, leaning with maniacal greed on a mug of something green, willing to do anything to quench his thirst, choked and coughed at such a statement. From which he lost touch with reality for a second due to piercing pain. He understood the aliens very vaguely, but for some reason human words slipped through their speech, and with an accent. Fortunately, at least by Buddy’s expressive eyes, Lester could understand who was definitely on his side.
"Your jokes hurt my friend's state of mind. Let's go without it"
"By the way, about the mind! So, okay, I don’t call demons today...", the old man lightly threw away the parchments covered with pentagrams. "Your friend must remain completely sane upon completion, or are you only interested in in good condition of his body shell?"
In recent days already started to look like a teenager after a serious illness, twenty-five-year-old Lester stared with horror at the frankly, even indecently inedible mushroom, which the doctor quickly crumbled into a cup of boiling water. Even when dried, it gleamed maliciously with a neon color. The brew took on the hue of oil slick in a muddy pond.
"Highly desirable. I interacted with him for a long time and I know how he usually behaves, so I will immediately notice the changes. In extreme cases, he should recover in a couple of days, but under no circumstances should he be in such a state that I have to spoon-feed him until the end of his life. Not because I can't, but because it's an atrocity"
"Well, the simple way to solve the problem was rejected," the old man looked into the cup and poured it into himself. The Nirians, who by nature are something between a golem and an ancient reptile, ate everything that could not kill them - raw or cooked. And only the acidic lakes of Outland and laser weapons threatened them with death. "We are not looking for easy and painless ways, I see. But hardship and adversity advance science, after all. Still, he will have to be put to sleep: people are terribly noisy, and their protective uncontrollable. The whole bazaar and guards will run to his screams, and what should we do then? Will explain why we operate on the human without official permission, and even trying to make him survive? I did not swear an oath to Khulut to embarrass myself like this."
Buddy considered and nodded. Although he had a very vague idea about humans, even his race could hardly endure severe pain, and many women and children died almost immediately on the battlefield - they did not even have time to be helped. These memories made shivers run down Buddy's spine. His friend is even weaker than them, and a symbol of this genetic failure, as if a mark of an eternal birth curse, dark-violet marks appeared on the skin of the human from every blow and a small bouncing pebble. The places of appearance of which he protected and grimaced, rubbing. Now those have merged into a frightening greenish-black spot, like mold crawling from his friend's chest and stomach to his back.
The old man seemed to think - like a dried spider, predatory hovering over the unfortunate one, whose life Buddy was trying to wrest from the clutches of death.
"The female dragon is a most valuable pay, but I'm afraid she will only cover my basic expenses. If your friend's treatment turns out to be more difficult than I thought, something exclusive might be required, and to bring that thing here… would be the gods’ blessing if it would at least be enough to sell a whole brood of dragons. But the human will not last so long – right now his flesh disintegrates from internal injuries, and his mind dies from a lack of blood, and synthetic blood would not be enough here. Humans cannot transform the blood of animals into their bodies. Even if you go for the missing ingredients now, I will not have time: the operation is a day long, and there is still a little food left so that I can to not leave the tent to pretend that I am not here."
"If there is even one chance in a million, I will do everything"
The elder squinted at the garlands of transparent beads under the dome of the tent, sparkling in the rare rays of the screened-off sun, squirmed in thought, and bent down to the very floor in order to fish out dusty golden discs from under his sofa - the size of the lid of a small jug, double, like a coil, wound to each other with strip of skin.
"There is only one way I know of that will keep him alive until the necessary things arrive. But for this I need the heart of a warrior"
Buddy remembered his burning village and the flattened body of yang woman, from which the tame tigress, who torn between two instincts - to go to the mountains and save someone else's cub - tried to drag the crying child away, clumsily clutching child’s collar in her teeth.
How the whole detachment of his warriors, from boys to men, was locked in a huge prison - dozens of cages on top of each other - and when they were taken away, day by day, one after another, a host of hoarse voices of their fellow tribesmen sent a farewell song after them. At first, the jailers knocked on the bars, then they stopped. Each time the voices became less and less.
And a frightened creature with bright red “fur” on its head, in the gloomy lamplight, whom Buddy struggled to recognize as an animal or something sentient, as it huddled in the corner of the cage.
His world was cursed and needed healing.
"Anything you need"
***
When the sun began to mercilessly bake his leg, which lacked shade, Lester forced himself to wake up and realized that he, unfortunately, had not napped at work or after a party. It looked like he was sold into slavery on the same planet - at least, this was hinted at by the picturesque landscape. The interior and clothing of local seemed repulsively earthy; unfamiliar creatures in folds of fabric, rattling slave chains and shouting in an unfamiliar language, seemed like delusional visions. It was as if Bosch's paintings came to life and watched him; although, fortunately, a little less terrible.
The body felt heavy and slightly weakened, but not in agony and not like a single bruise, as it had recently; even the ribs did not groan from pain with every try to breathe. Wanting to make sure the disaster was over, Lester rolled up his T-shirt with a numb hand and immediately winced. A large object rested on his chest: not quite flat, but not very protruding under the fabric, most similar to a smaller copy of the Mayan calendar - with runes, arrows, rotating rings and a large green jewel or a button in the center, causing a completely abnormal desire to press it.
Large wrinkled fingers gently removed Lester's palm from the dangerously hypnotic button, and only now did he notice that the gray-brown block, covered with large protrusions and black stripes, hanging over his unprotected sprawled posture, was not a stone at all, but an alien clad in something like cloak. Only the eye color set Buddy apart from other monsters. And Lester lay beside him, his head resting on the alien’s knees in confidence; this fact alone caused nervous laughter. Not daring to move and not knowing how to check for sure is this his recent partner, Lester cringed a little, but the alien - not for the first time during their "cooperation", - portrayed a semblance of a smile. It would be better if he didn't: that's how the death mask could smile.
Buddy pointed to a thick black tube attached to the side of the second "Mayan watch" on his own chest, which bulging slightly under his shirt. The tube connected both devices, and the lower part of the disc was obviously implanted under human’s and alien’s skin - it was felt as a slight burning sensation at the incision site. Also the mechanism made a noise, as if water was being pumped through it.
"Not a weapon. It protects you and keeps you alive. Without the connection between us, you would die from wounds that cannot be healed here. We need to get to where we can find a better way to heal you"
At the very least, the moving lips of the alien allowed Lester not to go crazy this very second from the frightening realization that the unknown creatures around, among other things, were telepaths. But there could be no talk of any sense of security anyway, even with sometimes freezing and stuttering translator bringing at least a little clarity to this chaos. Whatever this device was, it was definitely implanted - neither under clothing, nor attached somewhere on it. There was nothing good either in this fact or in the existence of such technologies, no matter what exactly they were and how developed. No one will supply a slave or a prisoner with such a complex thing; if Lester appeared as a danger or a useless incomprehensible creature in the eyes of the aliens, they would immediately get rid of him. And if he was considered just an interesting incomer, they would just take him to some laboratory, but instead they carefully shot him, patched up and put in a cage. What for?
Belatedly, a striking strangeness began to reach Lester. Everything that had happened to him so far had formed into a very harmonious chain: an almost mysterious sponsor of his scientific project, a sudden opportunity to move from Earth to a desert of monsters in one mouse click - given that Lester, being many years in this work, never heard of a single portal, apart from all sorts of superstitious tales, - and, finally, a famous scientist found by aliens in abandoned ruins right before the local wildlife had time to feast on him.
Unfortunately for himself, Lester didn't believe in coincidences. In such naively rigged at least. A successful escape and a pseudo comrade in misfortune also aroused a million suspicions. It was impossible to perceive what happened in any other way, than one gang stole a trophy scientist from under the nose of another.
Lester cautiously moved back from Buddy to the length of the tube between the implanted plates, demonstrating that if he did not like alien’s behavior, he would immediately clamp the tube.
Since this monster saved him, it means that for some reason he is dear to him, and then he will succumb to provocation.
"Be careful, the device is very fragile," the alien warned and simply extended a huge paw for a considerable distance, blocking Lester’s escape route from behind.
"What you all want from me? Who brought me to this planet?", words turned out not very menacing and impressive - Lester's voice was somewhat hoarse, his throat was dry.
Buddy froze, as if listening intently. Obviously, he was trying to determine the state of the human by the sounds those made - his translator was acting up in the same way. And yet guessed to give that flask with water.
"Don't worry, I won't poison you. I am exactly the same random prisoner, and I know not more than you. Humans often stuck here, and this was tracked by the rulers of all generations. Then disappeared forever. You survived because I noticed you in time and took you away"
"What do you mean?"
"When the guard was dragging you by the scruff of the neck along the corridor, not finding an empty cell since the inhabitants of the captured tribes were already sitting in all of them, and was thinking whether to take you immediately to the torture room, I started screaming that I was terribly hungry and I would smash everything here if won't feed. And these guys, guards, are constantly tired, ready to fall asleep at any second and can’t stand noise, so they were happy to pay off"
"Your race eats humans?!"
"Everything that moves. Our bones need calcium, and the local ores are very poor of it"
"Disgusting!"
"I agree. All sentient creatures are brothers to each other, even if their intellect is lower"
Lester, unexpectedly even for himself, suddenly offended.
"Anyway, I am a committed conservationist and have never done this, not even with animals. Our tribe killed them very rarely, several large ones in the hungriest years. In any case, there were always few humans in Niria, so they were considered as sources of other materials."
"Maybe, I don't want to know about it"
"I'm sure of the same"
"Why did you save me?"
"I am a deeply religious Nirian, and our religion says that the more creatures you protect, the greater the boon will be repaid to all your descendants. The family of a kind and honest warrior will prosper, and the family of the greedy and insatiable will perish in torment, poisoned by this malice, so them won’t bring harm to others. Each tribe is glorious, but nothing can clear a defiled name. Perhaps with a sacred fire on the Riptych volcano, but no one has yet survived in its labyrinths. Our world is already too cruel, evil cannot be created artificially and within the tribes. I want my children and great-grandchildren to live happily ever after. Religion is the same for all us, but its "shackles", as the "consecrated empire" calls it, are removed from the jailers by the court priests, so therefore they are allowed to kill. They are a kind of caste rejected by religion."
"So, only your beliefs made you save me?"
"I am honest with the world and my ancestors in my actions. If I thought you were dangerous to the people of Niria, I wouldn't do it, trust me"
"And now what?"
Lester looked down at the colorful bazaar that had grown under the rock on which they sat. The blue sky stretched to the horizon beyond a jagged mountain range too symmetrical and inconceivably curved inwards like bird claws. And the plateau inside, surrounded by this belt, was a heap of rocky ledges; often rounded and flat on the upper side, like nails made of red and grayish clay. Many are cut up by either burrows or caves.
The hooded cloak now completely concealed the human form, as did the conspicuous implant, and the tube was deftly passed through a peculiar sleeve at the back, which dangling between the cloaks and sewn to them.
"Most likely, it will not be possible to cure you completely in Niria. It's an internal trauma, too complex. You can live with it as long as we are united into a single being, and all the burden goes to me. I will bear it with ease, but I must have time to bring you to your home before my body becomes too weak, and then it will be necessary to break the connection, otherwise I will die with you. I don't think I have anything to lose, but to lose a friend…" Buddy touched Lester's shoulder, "I don't want to. There is only one way out of Niria - a system of portals in the main scientific laboratory on the most protected levels of the palace. We were only at the top. The mysterious Outland beyond the plateau is endless, there is nothing there, and only a couple of caravans returned from there exhausted, and all the lone explorers died. However, the portals, they say, have not been used for a long time, and I do not know if they work. In addition, they are under the complete control and guard of the priests”