2,49 €
Mehr erfahren.
- Herausgeber: Tami Veldura
- Kategorie: Fantasy und Science-Fiction
- Sprache: Englisch
- Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021
Catch A Tiger
Das E-Book können Sie in Legimi-Apps oder einer beliebigen App lesen, die das folgende Format unterstützen:
Ähnliche
Table of Contents
Title Page
Catch A Tiger
About The Author
Copyright
Catch A Tiger
By Tami Veldura
Min-So reclined in a hammock woven of bamboo leaves and wire strung across the back of the cave she called home. A fire placed mid-cave and built around with stone kept the place cozy. The entrance was blocked with machine plating, disguised with plant matter, and insulated with animal hides, all of which gave Min-So a small, but safe place to relax away from the scanning sensors of the machines.
Down in the valley she was at risk, hunted even as she herself was a hunter, but here on the cliffside, there was nothing the machines sought to harvest, including other people.
The howling wind stayed outside, Min-So stayed inside, and all was right with the world.
Except today not all was right. Min-So wore a cobbled-together headset across her eyes with diodes set against her shaved skull. The machine's power umbilical snaked halfway across the cave where Min-So had tapped into a shallow line laid years ago by the machines. The headset transported her to another place. Into another mind.
Nara had once been an unthinking forest predator. A cat with her claws and a hunger that ruled her mind. Now she was elevated. Now she understood the work of the machines, the balance of people, and the eternal war they waged across Nara's forest and beyond. Around the world.
She flexed her forepaws--one warm and furred, the other machine and cold--and stretched her body back with a yawn. She'd been ignorant once. Now, thanks to Min-So, Nara understood.
She continued her trek, skirting the large machine-city upwind in favor of a forested game track. Her heavy paws lay silent prints behind her. She scanned the forest with her machine-eye: infrared, sonar, radar, ultraviolet, xray--there! Nara scampered up into the nearest tree, claws digging, paws scraping, until she settled in the y of a branch and crouched.
A machine walked onto the path. It stood hunched over on two powerful legs and a single specialized eye dominated its head. The eye glowed faintly red as the machine passed its scanner across the game track, then it flashed when it spotted Nara's tracks.
The machine stalked forward cautiously, checking left and right through the brush. It never looked up.
Nara fell from the branch with claws and teeth outstretched. Her weight brought the machine crashing to the ground. She sank her teeth into the hydraulics and wire holding the neck aloft and with her own mechanical assistance, tore the entire head off its body. Oils sprayed, suddenly free of compression, and settled to leaking in a breath.
Nara assessed the parts available to her. Her machine-eye scanned the wreckage and identified two delicate couplings in the belly of the beast that she needed. Extracting them was a more delicate operation than Nara prefered. She was a creature of blunt assault.
Min-So surfaced in Nara's mind and along with her, the knowledge required to dissect the machine before them. Nara's left paw, arm, and shoulder had all been rebuilt with machine parts, interlocking and elegant, designed by nature and brought to life by the children of men. They retracted their claws on that paw and the tools that rotated out instead were nothing like them. A small torch, wire strippers, clamps, screwdrivers. Min-So's understanding of machines and how they were built flooded through Nara's mind as the two of them disassembled the two-legged machine and retrieved the parts required. They stashed those parts into an empty compartment on Nara's machine-hip on the right where they wouldn't get jostled.
