Chromosome Quest- a Hero's Quest Against the Singularity Page 13
We scoured the path for several minutes, finding nothing at first. Then something moved in the grass beside the trail, and a rabbit-sized, unfamiliar armored lizard crawled gingerly out, made a noise and then disappeared into the brush with tremendous speed. Near as we could determine there was nothing else she could have fallen over, so we surmised that the critter had burst from the brush just in time to collide with her foot at the perfect point in her stride to inflict a disastrous fall.
Teena seemed little the worse for the wear, so after collecting ourselves, we set out once again. We let Teena take the lead and set the pace. She was moving noticeably slower at first, but after about a mile she began to pick up the pace. Soon we were back to nearly full speed, but the incident had shaken our confidence. A serious fall or injury many miles from a safe-haven could only too readily be fatal. How many miles could I carry Teena, should she become incapacitated, and how quickly? Worse, what if Petch or I should become injured?
Fortunately, we were not far from our destination when the fall happened, and even with the lost time, we arrived ahead of schedule and still early in the day. I noticed the last half a mile or so, Teena was slightly but visibly limping. She had not noticeably slowed, but apparently was feeling some discomfort. I was concerned.
Healing
Our new hosts eagerly welcomed our arrival. Once again, the castle mother had my afternoon's work laid out, in the form of a bevy of eager recipients of my boon. More or less the same events of our previous afternoon repeated themselves as I spread my wisdom amongst the eager padawans. Like the evening before, I gave them a boisterous after-dinner rendition of both Clementine and Barnacle Bill to rousing applause.
It soon became clear that we were going to stay another day which delighted our hosts but worried me. The prospect of resting another day was welcome, but the reason was decidedly not. Teena was limping, not severely, but enough to be worrisome. As near as we could tell, she did not have a material injury, just overstressed tendons, but a strenuous run on an abused and tender foot seemed ill-advised. We talked it over and agreed that another day's rest was in order.
We feared that resuming the trek too soon might result in even longer delays. We hoped that if Teena kept off of her feet, and kept her foot elevated for a day, she might recover sufficiently to resume our trip. I had initially suggested she soak it in cold water, at which point she sharply reminded me that in this climate, this culture had little concept of cold. The best they could do was 'not heated.' Room temperature was a long way from 'cold' here. I suggested trying hot water then, and she did for a while, but it didn't seem to help. We settled for elevation and massage, with some healing crème the fur-people claimed to be effective.
While massaging and wrapping her foot, I recognized faint scaring, perhaps indicative of a long-ago surgery. I examined her other foot and noted similar scars. The scars suggested corrective surgery, I speculated about what procedure she might have once undergone. I wanted to ask, but decided it was none of my business; I opted to ignore it, pretend I had not noticed.
With an unplanned day of idleness, I resumed my professional duties, seeding the next generation. A not entirely unpleasant way to pass an extra day and I am confident our host appreciated my efforts. But oh! My aching loins!
The following morning Teena seemed limp free, so after due consideration, we set out for the next castle. This one was a more extended run, a grueling forty miles. The length of this leg was precisely why we had opted to give Teena's foot another day of rest, and even so, I worried that she would have difficulty.
For this day's outing, we carried only a minimal burden. We each sported a small pack with water and food, fritters colloquially referred to as 'Journey Cake,' and nothing else save our weapons. We needed to make fast time, not even stopping for lunch, just slow and eat on a jog, then resume the pace. We only need average above four miles per hour, hardly a run, more like a brisk walk. However, that slow pace would mean ten hours on the road, stretching the limits of the safe daylight hours. We could do it in much less if Teena's foot were able. Petch and I could probably do it between four and five hours or so, closer to four, I'd guess.
Teena's foot was the worrisome unknown. Again we set out with her in the lead, letting her set the pace. We had a plan, should she begin to feel any stress, or pain within the first five miles, we were to call a halt and turn back. I took her arm, and with my best dominate male stance peered directly into her face and told her emphatically not to try and push through, not to ignore any pain. Any distress at all within the first five miles or so and we abort. If she were stress-free, then we would push on to the destination.
She agreed. I wished I trusted her! The last thing I wanted was to aggravate her injury at this stage. There would be time enough to play Wonder Woman later. I worried she might endanger the mission rather than admit weakness. We still had time and needed to conserve our resources wisely. She could be fiercely determined, and I feared she might not recognize when to back off.
We set out, Teena in the lead and me immediately behind her. This time I had no interest in watching her fluidly rhythmic movements. Well, not THAT interest.
Or not only.
I was positioned to be able to spot any sign of stress that might mean trouble. Petch brought up the rear. He argued about that, but when I took him aside and told him why I wanted to be close behind her, he relented.
He was as protective as I.
It seemed odd, but Petch and Athena were more and more frequently deferring to me on matters of operational tactics. More and more I seemed to be becoming the leader of our band, at least in small things, or so it seemed. I was seriously wondering about that, and the implications.
Teena set the pace and started out briskly. Not a full-on run, but close to it. Well above that four MPH minimum we needed to maintain. She seemed to move smoothly, fluidly, no sign of a limp, or perhaps only the most infinitesimal trace. I carefully watched her stride for any hint of a reason to abort.
I didn't see one.
After a couple of miles, she picked up the pace. We were making a good run now. Beating that ten-hour deadline – a word with more than symbolic meaning – was assured if we kept this up. A few more miles and she again accelerated. We were now close to our best speed. I could keep this up for hours, had done so often in training. We were probably making ten miles per hour, perhaps even slightly more, and would soon annihilate the forty mile span.
After two hours at this intense pace, I called a halt. Our original intent had been to merely slow to a jog, consume the rough carbohydrate while still moving and then resume speed. I changed tactics. I decreed that we should take a short break, eat, sit and rest. We were making exceptional time, all things considered, no need to kill ourselves.
We merely parked our posteriors on the trail. The trails these people used through the woods were well-maintained, smooth and comfortable to walk even barefooted. We were blocking the path, but there was naught in the way of traffic. Although runners indeed pass between castles on a regular basis, if someone were to come along, they would likely stop and join us for lunch anyway. We rested on the trail, consumed our allotment of journey cake and water, lay back and relaxed a few brief moments, and then post respite, gathered our supplies, repositioned our packs and readied ourselves to continue.
Shortly we resumed our trek. Again, Teena set the pace. As before she started relatively slowly and as before I watched her stride for any sign of distress. As before, she soon accelerated to full speed, and we fairly flew through the woods. I began to relax a little, the near disaster of the previous day's run was behind us, or so it seemed.
I thought hard about why I was so solicitous of Teena's well-being. Was it because she was the female. I can't deny that there was a protective male animal within my soul. I am accustomed to the woman as the smaller, weaker, slower, etc. Perhaps that had often been the case, but not here. This woman was an Amazon Warrior, the equal of any two ordinary men.
No, I convinced myself that the reason I was extra cautious was that she was, at least in my mind, our 'tech officer,' the one with the specialized tools and training to penetrate and defeat our enemy. That Petch was perhaps also highly capable, I did not doubt.
But all the signs argued that SHE was the one member of our team who was genuinely indispensable. I'm not entirely sure why I thought so, but I had come to take it as an article of faith that if either Petch or myself became injured, or worse, the other two could complete the mission. I believed that if she became disabled, we could not continue. Rightly or wrongly, I felt it my duty to protect her as much as I could.
I kept telling myself my only concern was the success of the mission. I was not becoming captivated by her undeniable pulchritude. I insisted I was not falling in love. I repeated that mantra over and over to myself. I certainly was not lacking for sex. I was spending every night with a whole room full of the lustiest, bawdiest, horniest females in the known universe, banging myself into oblivion.
All in a good cause, I keep telling myself, all in a good cause, and a man should enjoy his work.
Every night, I was doing my damnedest to plant my seed in every household we visited, determined to leave a little Fitz behind, or several, to carry on my legend, yet I found myself endlessly fantasizing about the bouncing Amazonian booty I was chasing fruitlessly, mile upon endless mile across this dinosaur-infested landscape.
River
I had come to love running through the woods. Not only was following Teena entrancing, and no doubt I was getting an endorphin runner's high, but in addition to those details, I enjoyed having 'alone time' to think. I could, after a fashion, put my body on autopilot and let my mind go its own way. I suppose that was my problem, too much time to think with gracefully bounding Amazonian pulchritude little more than inches away. I found myself wondering what life might bring after our mission.
The next several legs of our journey went smoothly and were uneventful. Nobody fell, nobody was injured. Twice we spotted easy prey near the end of our day's run and loosed an arrow or two to bring our hosts a gift of fresh meat. The longer routes left us spent and exhausted and required a second day's stay to recoup, much to our hosts' delight. Twenty-five miles was a piece of cake. Forty miles we could do with moderate difficulty. Those few legs of fifty-plus miles were dramatically worse. The arduousness seemed to increase exponentially with distance, especially anything over forty-five or fifty miles.
We must run more slowly, the greater the distance. I can run ten miles in well under an hour without feeling stressed. I can make twenty-five in a little over two hours, without being utterly spent. Forty miles requires a full four and a half hours, possibly more, and leaves me well worn. By the time you're talking fifty, we are into the range of six hours plus with utter exhaustion at the end, and it gets rapidly worse from there.
We humans just 'run out of gas' as the time and distance increase. Our bodies only have so much reserve fuel! Carrying a burden worsens things considerably. Every pound slows us and adds to the time required for a given distance and increases the consumption of our metabolical reserves. Extended runs demand fuel. Someone of my size, running as we were, can burn two thousand calories or more per hour. A five-hour run leaves us with a ten thousand calorie deficit, if not more.
We simply must carry food and water, especially water in the heat of this climate, on anything more than a short run. The weight of that food and water slows us down and causes us to burn even more calories. A single pound adds ten or more calories per hour to the fuel requirement. A fifty-pound pack means an extra two to three thousand calories on a five-hour run.
Not only must we run these tremendously long distances, as a matter of course, we must then rest but briefly and do it all over again the next day. We cannot often afford to spend more than one night recovering from a day's run. Earthly marathon runners might run these kinds of distances, but they typically have weeks to recover between events. We don't.
We had run up to about eighty miles in our practice runs, under controlled conditions. In the real world sixty miles, nearly broke us. We elected to spend two nights at the destination castle after any day of fifty miles or more. We needed the recovery time. No matter how lavish Evening Feast might be, replenishing somewhere between ten and fifteen thousand expended calories in a single evening meal is just not possible.
Even with consumption of journey cake along the way, after such an effort, replenishment and recovery demand time, and that is conveniently ignoring the physical activity I was required to engage each evening to pay our way. Anything over about forty to fifty miles per day is just more than even our genetically enhanced and finely honed bodies can sustain.
We were mighty glad we were not going to tackle the back-to-back 75 mile runs we had contemplated for the Dark Castle leg. I think we all agreed such an attempt would have been a disaster, two such days back-to-back with little rest between seemed beyond even our capability. Perhaps the adrenalin of being chased by a T-Rex might give us a second wind, but the simple reality was that if we found ourselves still on the road when lizards began to prowl, we were already dead.
Endless days of running, running, covering ground, hundreds of miles passed beneath our flying feet. Nights of eating massive feasts, trying to consume the calories we had expended each day, food and shelter bought and paid for with labor of my loins. Those busy nights were demanding enough without running all day too. As much as I appreciated our hosts and their charms, I would often have loved a good night's sleep even more.
We had covered over three hundred miles of our journey when we reached the castle closest to the Dark Castle. We had telegraphed ahead and arranged for a pirogue to be made available to us for the water journey. Boat, paddles, supplies and more were ready when we arrived.
Athena, Petch and I gathered that evening after dinner. I had given choice service to my duties, sang 'Clementine' and 'Barnacle Bill' for them and eaten my fill. We needed a little planning time.
We studied our schedule, the remaining distance we had to cover, and talked about our task ahead. Consulting my companions, we decided that we were too tired to continue immediately. The last two legs had been arduous, and we were all feeling spent. True, the next segment we would be sitting in a boat, but we would not be resting. We would be paddling furiously. We had to sustain a much faster pace on the water than we had ever made on land, and we had to maintain it far longer. We had a few minutes over ten hours between Dino-bedtime when the sun comes up, and the evening when the Dino-Rooster crows.
We must run at top speed from this castle to the river, about four miles from here. Then put our pirogue in the water and paddle fiercely, making our way one hundred and fifty miles downstream, beach our craft, then run a little over three miles to the welcoming castle before they closed their doors for the evening.
We were confident we could do it. We were brutally mistaken!
Fifteen miles per hour on the water, between the river's current and our motivated paddling, seemed simple enough. On the other hand, we had never done anything like this before. How much time would we lose getting the hang of it?
The good news is using a boat simplified carrying a burden. Our boat could comfortably hold a great deal of cargo. Food, water, and freight to be delivered to the destination residence would sit in the boat between us, far more than we could have reasonably carried.
I decided we would take tomorrow and do a dry run. Or is that a 'wet run?' In any case, we would arise early, do a full-up rehearsal of running to
the river, loading and launching the boat, and put in some time practicing our paddling, learning how the loaded pirogue will handle. Then we would return to this castle and get a good night's rest, before doing it for real the following morning.
Again our hosts were overjoyed at the prospect of having an extra day to collect my highly sought after boon. The den mother of this castle presented a fresh collection of her youngest and most nubile fertile candidates, and I fell to my procreational duties with alacrity once again.
It was well that we practiced. Our first attempt at loading the pirogue and getting it into the water was downright comical. I dearly wished I had a smartphone or even an old film camera. I suggested we must re-enact this on earth for the benefit of video. If this were for real, it could have been disastrous. Fortunately, it wasn't, and rather than a few relaxed hours doing a simple dry run we spent most of the day laughing at our ineptitude and figuring our what we were doing wrong.
By late afternoon we had the kinks worked out.
I concluded that loading the boat with provisions the morning of the trip was foolish and wasteful of precious time. Instead, we must prepare the pirogue and have it ready to launch the day before. We would place everything in the boat except the food, all strapped down and ready to float. Food, naturally, would attract wildlife and we dare not leave it out. The craft would be positioned near the shore so that a quick motion could have it in the water.
Hopefully, nothing would disturb it during the night, though this was something of a calculated risk. Wildlife and weather could be unpredictable and destructive. These people never left their boats out at night. They don't leave anything out at night!
Launching the pirogue turned out to require more skill than we expected. Not that it wasn't readily learned, but it took time and effort. The first time I managed to fall flat on my face, and both Petch and Teena lost their footing, falling comically on the slippery bank. Then we capsized the boat trying to climb aboard. We practiced that several times before we became coordinated well enough to smoothly launch the craft and hop aboard without making fools of ourselves.