Paradox Moon: The First Book of Regenesis Read online

  Then, the very reeds around them seem to move in a clustered, coordinated way. Materializing into several of the aurochs-like creatures that had demonstrated such remarkable camouflage in the belt of high reeds bordering the northern plains of this moon.

  Reasoning that, like their cousins he encountered earlier in his journey, these masters of mimicry pose no threat to the band, the man stirs the leader gently awake and motions silently toward the restless beasts.

  As the leader, in turn, stirs the rest of his band to wakefulness, the man perceives tell-tale signs the glade was created and is being maintained by these gentle beasts—evidence of trampled earth, stalky sprigs chewed down to ground level and the discarded skeletons of small reeds that will never reach maturity. All of which beg the question:

  Given their perfect camouflage, why would these creatures need such a protected space?

  The answer to that question would wait for the next night.

  For now, the man is distracted by the leader taking the band out of the glade and back to the lake. Sensitive to the man’s peculiar need for frequent meals, the hunters forage for fresh food to feed him. The effort is rewarded almost immediately as the leader and his two hunters spear several large finned creatures and other fish near the lakeshore with their extended talons. Meantime, the man is gratified to find the water sweet and pure.

  After eating their fill, the band pause while the leader and his hunters re-enter the glade and confer about future plans. They decide the band will rest in place to replenish their sustenance and strength.

  While the band remains undaunted by the physical challenges of the journey, they are still spooked by the damoclean presence of the giant exoplanet overhead and by the disappearance of the second sun. Fear is new to their experience, and it has sapped their stamina and resilience in a way physical exertion does not.

  They spend the day exploring the lake and the tall reeds and grey prairie separating it from the arid desert beyond.

  When darkness falls, the company retreats again into the protection of the glade. The members of the band find sleep at once. Only the man remains restless as he falls gradually asleep to the slow, shape-shifting movements of the perfectly camouflaged aurochs at the glade’s green perimeter.

  He awakens from a troubled sleep to the intimate sounds of snuffling and of soft, heavy breathing. His opening eyes stare directly into the knobby end of the long, narrow snout of a scale-armored behemoth whose 40-foot length stretches from the glade’s entrance to its center.

  Frozen in fear, the man peers along the length of snout to see two arched, unblinking eyes staring back at him. The eyes betray no emotion as the monster regards him with neither malice nor mercy—just mild curiosity about what manner of creature he might be.

  Remaining stock still, the man is revulsed as the monster’s snout opens slightly to release a thin, slick, slimy tongue whose olfactory forks search and explore every part of him.

  When the tongue completes its probe and retracts back into the snout, the man shudders and closes his eyes tight. Resigned to the violent, gruesome death to come.

  Instead, he senses sudden, massive movement. Opening his eyes once more, he witnesses the full length of the monster as it snatches an aurochs in its powerful jaws.

  He is stunned by the enormity of the giant crocodilian so like the eight-ton Sarcosuchus that terrorized his own world during the early Cretaceous Period. Having snapped up its prey, the creature makes a lightning-fast exit from the glade and is gone in an instant.

  The aroused band stirs from its own freeze-frame feint, having likewise remained stock still until the creature departed.

  The early light of morning is just gathering as the leader motions the band through the entrance of the glade out into the wide world beyond. This day, the leader maintains a respectful distance from the lake as they follow its shoreline to the opposite side.

  It is an uneventful day-long journey, with the man maintaining his accustomed pace behind the band. Giving him time and space to reflect on all he has seen.

  The encounter with the giant crocodile has confirmed his earlier and mounting suspicion about predator-prey relationships in this strange world—a suspicion that has blossomed into strong conviction with each new demonstration of their uniqueness. He has arrived at a conclusion that definitively answers the question of why the monster rejected him in favor of the aurochs it snatched from the glade.

  The crocodile could not identify him through either sight or smell, so it simply concluded this foreign creature was not in its food chain.

  What’s more, the man is convinced each predator in this strange world is programmed to hunt and eat one prey-species only!

  It is a crucial and limiting distinction from the predators of his own world, omnifarious hunters that kill and eat a wide variety of prey.

  This exclusivity of predator-prey relationships explains the surprising disinterest the band displayed on the northern plain when one of its hunters ripped open the dire wolf’s throat, tasting its warm fresh blood. Only to leave it uneaten on the open ground.

  It was an opportunity missed, a squandered chance for the furry bipeds to share a first feast of the flesh, blood and entrails of a land-dwelling creature.

  Such a meal could have been an epochal and emancipating event for the refugee species.

  No longer would the band be limited to the aquatic creatures that are its only source of food.

  No longer would the band be confined to the watery places those creatures inhabit.

  With a larder as varied and broad as this wide world, the band would be able to journey without fear of hunger or thirst, as the flesh and blood of land-dwelling animals would slake both.

  The band’s instinctive rejection of any prey other than the finned beasts is a testament to the stability of the singular predator-prey calculus of this world. To its role in sustaining a viable balance between species.

  The monster in the glade is only the latest example of this behavior, and the man wonders why it has taken him so long to uncover such a self-evident truth.

  The terror birds appear interested in one prey only, the black amphibians. They in turn seem to eat only the terror birds’ young.

  Even the wolves appear interested only in driving intruders from their territory, not in attacking them for food.

  Unlike his own world, where predator-prey relationships tend to be complex and distributive, trophic links in the food chains of this world appear to be both simple and exclusive. There, predators are opportunity hunters, killing and devouring anything edible that comes their way. Here, each predator is locked on a single prey, forsaking all others.

  And that is welcome news for the man, representing as he does a unique new species the carnivores of this world have not yet acquired a taste for!

  Chapter 17. Burning Sands

  Full darkness catches the band as it reaches the opposite side of the lake. There, they discover a narrow defile through the dense reeds, and the leader motions them through it to the stretch of prairie on the other side. Exhausted from their day-long trek, they curl up on the bare, open ground and fall quickly asleep.

  The morning sun finds the band rested and ready to resume their journey. Surveying the landscape ahead, the man sees endless desert as they leave the maze of lakes and rivers behind. His optimism is revived, however, by the prospect of bright green oases dotting the far horizon.

  It is a doleful journey this day as the furry bipeds suffer greatly from the unremitting intensity of the blazing sun. Demonstrating a behavior the man has not yet witnessed in these redoubtable travelers, the band makes frequent stops, huddling together for insulation against the harsh heat and casting dubious glances at the giant vivid exoplanet pursuing the blood-red sun overhead. For the man, too, it is like walking through a furnace.

  He wonders whether they can survive the scorching sands separating them from the distant oases.

  The band is gathered in a huddle as their lengtheni
ng shadows are chased by a deeper darkness spilling over the dunes and pooling in every sandy depression. Relief washes over the man in the dying rays of the setting sun.

  As the band breaks its huddle, the man approaches the leader and points in the direction of the nearest, now invisible oasis. Mustering their remaining energy, they strike out at once into the inky blackness.

  It is midnight when the company enters the frond-fringed oasis, and they soon find sleep and solace in its cool embrace. Only the man remains troubled, dreading the sun’s return when they must resume their enervating march through the merciless heat of the trackless desert.

  He does not suspect the next step he takes on the scorching sands will bring him within sight of the desert’s end.

  Suspended between sleep and wakefulness, he is lulled by the muted, melodic murmur of gushing, gurgling water cascading across his fading consciousness.

  Even the sun, already high in the sky when they awaken, cannot chase away the cooling shade of the broad green fronds shielding them from its fiery rays. While the leader shakes his band from their deep sleep, the man is greeted by the sight and sound of a low, gentle waterfall at the opposite side of the small oasis.

  Approaching it hopefully, he nearly stumbles into the waist-high depth of a stout stream that flows from the base of the fall only a few feet into a sucking well that carries it back into the damp earth. But in those few precious feet, its crystal-clear depth reveals a variety of fish including a smaller cousin of the finned beasts so favored by his fellow-travelers.

  The leader and his huntsmen skewer several of the beasts for their band, including two other fish which they present scaled and filleted to the man. It is a welcome feast, and the leader gestures his intent to remain at the oasis until the band recuperates from the rigors of their march across the desert.

  His two hunters and other members of the band plead with him to turn back. It is obvious to all they cannot survive more days in the brutal heat of the open desert.

  Leaving the others to their deliberations, the man makes a slow exploratory circuit of the oasis. The damp earth underfoot is a spongy carpet on solid bedrock, and its springy feel reminds him of the floor of the equatorial rainforest. Scraping away a small sample, he discovers the rocky subsurface is smooth and polished and perfectly even.

  Walking behind the waterfall, he sees that its rocky outcrop slopes steeply from the lip of the cataract’s mouth back down to the thick stalks of fronds framing the oasis’ perimeter. Circling back to the base of the waterfall, he notices its vertical surface is a deeper black than the surrounding rock.

  Peering intently into the blackness, he is staring into the yawning maw of a wide, high cave.

  Stepping behind the sheeting waterfall, the man enters the cave slowly and watchfully. The cave's surface is the same smooth, polished stone as the bedrock beneath the oasis’ spongy surface and, at its mouth, there is enough light to discern its features. He is drawn by its damp coolness.

  The cave floor consists of a narrow walkway transected by a deep, rushing river. Several paces inside the entrance, there is a stone flue siphoning water from the deep river and forcing it up through the outcrop to fall back again from the oasis fall to the stout, fish-filled river. A few paces farther, the man witnesses a second stone flue pushing the surface water back into the underground stream which is its source.

  The walls are so perfectly circular, so slick and so devoid of irregularities he feels like he is walking on the inside of a polished pipe. Alert to any hidden, unexpected danger, the man turns back and exits the cave.

  Returning to the band, he motions the leader toward the waterfall and, reinforced by the other huntsmen, they enter the cave. Passing the twin stone flues, they reach a gentle downward slope that proceeds only a short way before leveling out once more. From there, it is a straight, broad, high passageway forward with wide, discrete banks flanking its river center.

  The passage is dimly illuminated by a faint, pulsating glow of phosphorescent lichens that line the smooth, damp ceiling of the leveling cave.

  The man marvels at the spaciousness and linear course of the cave and at the powerful, hydraulic forces that hollowed it out of solid bedrock in some distant past.

  His musings are interrupted by the excited cry of one of the hunters. He is pointing down toward to several finned beasts and other fishes swimming in the river’s depth.

  It is a discovery that decides the leader on the band’s future course.

  Retracing their steps, the group returns to the oasis only long enough for the leader to usher the rest of the band into the cave’s dark opening. Descending the gentle slope, their relief is palpable as they reach the dimly lit, level base of the cave and espy the finned creatures crisscrossing the rushing river.

  Invigorated by the cool, wafting air, the band eagerly follow their leader along the smooth stone riverbank. Even the lichens seem excited as their dim glow brightens to rival the full light of day. It is an altogether delightful trek, and the leader is determined to follow its course as far as it will take them.

  Only the man harbors misgivings about journeying through such a confined space toward an unknowable destination in this unfamiliar subterranean realm.

  It is like being in a trap. With no way out. And no way to foretell what dangers lie ahead.

  Chapter 18. Strobing Webs

  After a long and easy trek, the company reaches a fork in the river where the leader motions them to halt for their next sleep.

  He chooses an open area of smooth riverbank made wider by a slight indentation in the cave’s wall. They have passed several such indentations in this last leg of the day’s journey, and the leader has been on the lookout for such an ideal resting place as the time approached to bed down.

  Sleep is deep, restorative and uninterrupted.

  Awakening to confront the fork in the river, the leader knows he must make a choice. One passage has smooth walls with no apparent indentations, while the wall of the other is pocked with irregularities and more frequent and deeper indentations. The first is brightly lit, the second shows only the dim phosphorescence from the lichens.

  The bright light of the first passage reflects off crisscrossing fins on the river’s surface, but the water itself is still as death. The river flows freely and swiftly in the other, but there is no sign of life within its depths.

  It is a Hobson’s choice between two unknowns—one bright and inviting, the other dark and foreboding.

  As they confer, the two hunters appear to strongly favor the former with its bright prospect of plentiful food, while the leader harbors misgivings about the stagnancy of water that does not move.

  Unable to resist the lure of plentiful finned beasts, the leader defers, and the band plunges into the brightly lit passage.

  It is a fateful choice.

  At first, the company makes speedy progress along the well-lit cave. But its welcome gradually wears thin as they begin to tire and, after making substantial progress, the leader signals a halt for sleep.

  While the band is staking out spaces to bed down, the man approaches the edge of the river and peers down into its depth. He sees finned beasts crisscrossing near the surface and a variety of fish deeper near the middle. Among them are the torpedo-shaped barracudas he first encountered in the northern river caves.

  All the creatures are actively darting through the water, but it is the inactivity on the river’s submerged walls that catches his attention. They are covered by a fabric of long, delicate overlapping strands that mimic the walls’ colors so perfectly he has to concentrate carefully to make them out.

  As he stares fixedly at the massive underwater mat, a fish swims lazily near the strands and is immediately seized. The strands glow once faintly, administering a mild electric shock, and their captive rolls immediately over on its back.

  It is what happens next that intrigues the man.

  The protracted strands gently separate releasing several barracuda minno
ws who feed on the stunned fish. To the viewer, it is like looking into an aquatic nursery in which the camouflaged strands provide safe harbor and live food to the barracuda fry.

  His companions do not appear to take notice of this remarkable scene as they approach the river’s edge with more practical ends in mind.

  This time, the hunters skewer several finned beasts as well as other fish, and the entire company eats their fill before lying contentedly down to sleep.

  The man is the first to awaken to the harsh brightness, his eyes assaulted by piercing, jolting flashes reflecting off the lichen-festooned walls. But the lichens are not the source of the blinding flashes. They are streaming up from the river itself.

  Shielding his eyes, the man awakens the leader and, together, they approach the light-pulsating water.

  There they witness an astonishing sight.

  The strobe-like flashes are being emitted by sprawling, lacy jellyfish whose transparent, radiating tentacles cling to the river’s sides like giant, rime-white interlocking cobwebs.

  The colony of web-creatures extends as far as the man can see in both directions, their eerie pulsations reflecting off the cave’s walls, an infinity of fireworks displayed on an endless curtain of white shag.

  Mesmerized by the strobing tempo, the observers are slow to grasp the approaching threat as the web-creatures begin extending their lacy tentacles onto the bank, searching and probing this way and that. Their first intimation of danger dawns as the tentacles begin plucking stunned barracudas out of the water and, while they flop helplessly on the riverbank, encase and melt their flesh with excretions from infundibulum suckers.

  Having earlier observed the symbiosis between the barracuda and camouflaged mass of tentacles on the river’s submerged walls, the man recognizes the danger at once:

  These web-creatures are acid feeders that immobilize their prey with strong electric shocks and secrete corrosive acid to melt the flesh to liquid, rendering it digestible by absorption through their acetabulum cavities.