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Joshua didn’t so much rest as he did lounge around in the bridge, blatantly eager to return to work. He took to tossing his sheathed knife up in the air and catching it repeatedly. Threat of bodily harm was clearly not worse than boredom. Tyra decided to construct — or rather scrap — something into a set of shovels.

The safety plate she had pulled off quite some time ago would work, so she took that. A simple welding allowed Tyra to split it into two workable pieces. Not the most elegant solution, but it would be more than enough for their purposes.

On the way back up to the bridge, Tyra stopped by her resting pod. She set down her bits of metal and looked into the storage compartment. The boarding spike and her firearm remained inside. She reached out to touch the weapon. What she should have done and what she could do were different things. Tunnels of fate could be crafted by her hand. Cowardice was not the only option. Tyra took it up and attached it to her jumpsuit at the back of her hips.

Joshua probably should have been told that Tyra was taking up arms, but the small fear of betrayal still lingered. A ridiculous xenophobic response, she knew. Then again, had he really wanted, he could have used a boarding spike at any point. Perhaps none of the previous moments were beneficial or opportune. Joshua likely harbored some fears about her, even if he had adapted a more human outlook on her. No matter. If it came up, she would explain herself. For now, it was a tool to be used when necessary.

Tyra retrieved the shovels and headed upward. Joshua quickly followed her out once he saw her walking to the airlock. The echoing cave welcomed them back.

“Hand me one and let’s get this show started,” Joshua said.

Tyra obliged him, handing over the makeshift tool.

“Here’s to hoping we’re not digging our own graves, huh?” he said, tapping his scrap metal against hers. A hollow clang.

“I would only ask that it is a peaceful rest,” she replied.

“Yeah, well, I’d want to be back at home. Least I can do is give my corpse back to the Earth.”

An odd sentiment, but there was likely comfort in knowing you were back in the grasp of your own species. Tyra wasn’t sure where she would like to rest. Whether it be here or back home, she would decay and return to dirt. The vastness of the universe meant that her particles would eventually smash back into space and find refuge on some other world. Though, it was possible she could be a specimen herself for other creatures to study, whether it be her own kind or some distant stellar intelligence that would find her remains when this entire conflict was merely a particle on the timeline of the galaxy.

A small bubbling interrupted her thoughts.

“Did you hear that?” she asked.

“I hear me digging to freedom, that’s what.”

“Stop for a moment.”

Joshua sighed and stuck his shovel into the dirt, leaning on it. The bubbling continued. Tyra plunged her shovel as far in as it would go, and yanked it back up. Wet dirt clung to it. Water seeped out of the freshly dug hole.

“I doubt that is a natural occurrence,” Tyra said. “Our water reserves are leaking.”

“Good thing I washed off first.”

“And it will be a bad thing when we die of thirst.”

“So, can we plug the hole?”

“Continue digging, let us assess the damage.”

The hole grew wider, the muddy puddle increasing with it. Slowly they unearthed part of the ship and the large crack along its hull. Whatever water it was bleeding had long since dried up.

“We are out of water.”

“Hold on, how come there isn’t more of a mess, then? Shouldn’t all of this dirt be muddy?”

“Are you suggesting a clog in our vacating stream?”

“I know how dirt works, alright?” Joshua seemed to realize how ridiculous that sounded. “We would’ve seen it way before. Plus, how come you didn’t see any warning about it? You guys are smart enough to have something like that, aren’t you?”

“Instruments tend to get damaged when you violently crack them against rocky, alien terrain.”

“Them or us.” Joshua shrugged.

Something disturbed the pool, and out came slithering a stark white worm, lazily swiping at the air.

“Is that the culprit?” His face morphed into disgust, crushing his entire expression to a point. “Probably came by for a drink.”

Tyra took a step back, with Joshua quickly following. She eyed the creature closely. Its lack of pigmentation suggested a more subterranean life style, and likely drawn here by the presence of liquid water. It seemed porous as well. Unlikely a good source of nutrients for them, but it might have been possible to wring out water from it.

“Well? Speak up at any time,” Joshua said. “What should we do?”

“I doubt we should eat it.”

“Not the kind of insight I was hoping for.”

“We may be able to pull the water from it.”

“Even less of what I was hoping for.”

Tyra continued to stare. If she had the proper implementations for it, she would have taken the time to examine it more closely. For now, all she could do was mentally note that the creature seemed to have one sharp tooth protruding out of its anterior, or assumed anterior. Its head also seemed hardened, or at least lacked the porous nature of the rest of its body. Another ripple in the puddle disrupted her thinking. An additional head poked out of the water. And another. And another. Several more.

“Do we hit them with the shovel or is that a bad idea?” Joshua raised his tool all the same.

“We may have to.”

“Maybe they’ll leave.”

A few burrowed through the dirt around the puddle, forcing the pair to take a few more steps back.

“Back to the ship,” Joshua said. He grabbed at her hand and yanked Tyra along.

A larger specimen dropped in from the ceiling, landing squarely on the backside of the ship and cutting them off from the door. As if to add insult to injury, smaller worms dropped in alongside it. They began the lazy searching motions briefly before squirming toward the pair.

“I don’t like the look of those horns,” Joshua said. His grip tightened on her. His other hand dropped the shovel and produced his knife.

“I’m not certain I want to risk heading into the ship.”

“We run back into the tunnel? Is that what you’re suggesting?”

“They are drawn by the liquid, surely. They will depart when it has evaporated.”

“And us.”

“I had thought that, but I figured it may be alarming.”

“Just blurt out any alarming shit.”

“In my best estimation, their teeth are likely for puncturing flesh.”

“Not digging.”

“It may assist it. The hardened portion of their head seems to shovel through, mostly.”

“Then, back.”

Tyra placed her other hand at her hips, nudging against her weapon. Not likely she could hit them accurately, and certainly didn’t have the ammunition destroy all of them. It would have been a waste.

Just then, a worm pushed through the floor next to Joshua, puncturing him in the leg. He let out a pained grunt through clenched teeth and stomped on the creature. Trickles of red ran down his leg, which scattered onto the ground upon his violent movements. Tyra took the lead, drawing him backward, but not before picking up their light source. More worms erupted from beneath them, barely missing them as they darted forward.

They ran off into the dark. The last Tyra saw of the worms, they were gathering around the fresh source of reddish fluids.

_

“Left my blood on an alien planet. Hope they enjoy it,” Joshua said. He was examining his leg, which had long since scabbed over. It wasn’t a deep wound, likely the jumpsuit pant took the brunt of it.

“Fortunate they did not have an anti-coagulant.”

“Or the sucker didn’t get the time to inject it.”

“Possible. I am uncertain if their tooth has a mechanism to deliver such a chemical. Perhaps--”

“Really do not need you to talk up the thing that tried to kill me right now.”

Tyra wanted to stab back. It was his maneuver that brought them along. His ridiculous crash landing that ended up losing all of their water. Her horns threatened to pop up. No. She would keep herself in line. Rage was not warranted in this moment, no matter how much her mind screamed to enact retribution on the interloper. It was this interloper that even allowed her to get out of her orbital graveyard.

“Yeah? Something on my face?” he asked.

“Merely pondering if they sense liquids based on movement or smell or another sensory mode.”

“So I’m a walking buffet advertisement is what you’re getting at.”

“Not necessarily, but we must be cautious.”

Their long trek down the endless tunnel gave Tyra far too much time to think. Abandoning the ship there rattled her body. Every step forward drew her further back in her mind. How could she simply abandon the last remnants of her allies like that? Let to rot and fester under the rubble, plagued now by mindless alien creatures.

It was not the first time you abandoned your allies. In life, they may have cared. Now, in death, what did it matter? Tyra ground her mandibles together. This entire trip could have been a farce. She deserved to die up above in that metallic field for her cowardice.

“You know, this kind of reminds me of some caves back home. None this big, though. No worms either. You ever do that, go wandering through caves?”

Tyra’s thoughts came to a halt.

“Excluding now?” she asked.

“I can’t even tell if you’re joking, but yes, excluding now.”

“Most cave systems were laid claim to by ancient ancestry. Now they are like hallowed burial grounds to be undisturbed. Ergo, that would be disallowed.”

“So, like, Egyptian tombs?”

“In a way, though that period lacked royalty. When we were dwellers of the underground, communities tended to focus more on the whole.”

“Walking around on the surface change that much?”

“I suppose the lack of proximity allows one to grow a solitary ego.” Not to mention the biological shifts that supported a more hostile world, but she knew Joshua would appreciate the more psychological take on the subject.

“Yeah. Yeah, I can see that.” He clicked his tongue. “So, let me guess, royalty started being a thing after you went above ground.”

“An astute observation.”

“It must have been weird, shifting to the surface and having a whole new world to play in.”

“No different from when humans shifted to the stars.”

“Guess not. Gives you a whole new perspective on the things you can take.”

“Including what others have.”

Joshua smirked. “I’m not even sure who to blame for the war. I just want out of it. Not in the business of dying for a few rocks I’ll never set foot on.”

“A reasonable stance.”

“What about you? Got a reasonable stance on that, too?”

“Asking the opinion of your enemy?”

“Well, I hope the whole shaking hands thing changed that.”

“I jest.”

“We need to come up with a signal for jokes.”

“My species has a signal. It is not one you would recognize.”

“Fair enough.”

What had she thought about the war? Nothing. It wasn’t her place to ask or judge any aspect of it. Powers far greater than her deemed it necessary, and so, it occurred. Much like the movement of the planets or the dancing of galaxies, she had no part to play in their machinations. Tyra bent to their will, or simply be crushed by them. Either side had their reasons for it, and ascribing one universal negative or positive would have been ridiculous. Billions of lives sought or disregarded the conflict for one reason or another.

“I would prefer it not happen. I have no ability to control it.”

“Seems reasonable to me. Though, with the way you talk, I thought you’d think of something longer.”

“What would you have me say? That if I were capable, I would tear every combatant ship to shreds? To have either race cordoned off in their own quarantine of space?”

Joshua paused. “Maybe. Not sure it’d ever end, though, even if you had the ability to push either side away. Definitely not in my lifetime, in any case.”

“You expect an endless series of skirmishes?”

“Way I heard it, we’re meeting up in the middle. Two bastards duking it in the ring and heading back to their corner. I don’t think either side really can do anything. Not anything serious.”

“You’ve given this some thought.”

“Yeah, well, you think about a lot of things when you steal a ship.”

Joshua’s face flinched. He must’ve realized his mistake. Masculine boasting had given him away. Tyra almost wanted to let it float undisturbed. Curiosity, however, was her downfall after all.

“You stole your ship?”

“I didn’t tell you?”

“You did not. You did, however, lie about being a scavenger.”

“Lied about the ship thing, too. There you go. Not much cash to go around for the son of a fisherman, and, as it turns out, they really want you to fight in a war. Whether you like it or not.” Joshua shrugged. “Guess I figured you guys might have a little more hesitation to kill me if you thought I was a petty thief instead of a potential soldier.”

“I’m not sure.”

“What?”

“I’m not aware of any occurrence where civilians were implicated in a battle.”

“Well, you don’t want to kill me any more than usual, do you?”

“No.”

“Then that’ll have to be good enough.”

More quiet steps passed. Nothing in the cave echoed back at them, leaving them to navigate it in relative silence.

“You think we should head back to the ship?” Joshua asked.

“I’m not certain that we can. What little I saw of the planet implies water is scarce, ergo, the worms will likely linger around the one source that had a plentiful amount and scrounge for more.”

“We have to go back at some point.”

“Haven’t you resigned yourself to hell?”

“No, no, I didn’t. That was on the water planet. It was mindless but nice. I could fish, I could eat, I could drink water. I wasn’t waiting to get chased down by an alien military, and I certainly wasn’t being attacked by… by… syringe worms.” He threw up an arm.

“That is an excellent designation for them. Perhaps next you could place them in a phylogenetic tree.”

“Alright, I know that one was a joke.” Joshua swallowed. “But we’re going to have to do something. You do realize that, right? You’re not just dragging me off to accept death. I don’t do that.”

“I haven’t accepted death yet. Had I, I might’ve chanced a closer examination at a ‘syringe worm’.” Tyra shook her head. “No. We should find a way to depart this cave if possible, then find a more amicable place to rest.”

“If the worms are gone, we can just head back to the ship.” Joshua stopped.

Tyra came to a halt. “The several cracks in the ship are more than enough of a threat. Those creatures will seek out a way in, as liquid water is their biggest concern.”

Joshua looked down and kicked a stone into the wall, causing it to loudly echo throughout. It gave only a hint at how long the thing was.

“You sure the soldiers topside won’t find us?” he asked.

“I believe they are more concerned with the ship as of now.”

“And if they just so happened to think we stole schematics for the ship?

“Yes, that would pose a problem. Pray, then, to God, that they do not.”

“Not the advice I expected hearing from you.”

“Little else we can do about that potential tunnel of fate. Ask your deity to carve you a new path.”

Joshua furrowed his brow, but nodded all the same. “Alright.”

_

More plodding finally gave way to something substantial. A literal glimmer of hope from above, up in the ceiling. As the pair approached, it became clear that the tunnel had caved in there and broken open a way into the space above.

“I don’t suppose this is the part where you tell me you can climb up walls,” Joshua said.

“It is not.” Tyra had to admit that it was certainly a shame she couldn’t. “The jagged rocks may serve as an excellent basis to boost one another upward.”

“Jagged.”

“Unless you would like to file their edges, yes. Jagged.”

“Alright, who goes first, then?” Joshua looked to her.

“I suppose I will also have to dispel the notion that I can carry several hundred times my own weight.”

“I didn’t say anything.” He pursed his lips. “So, I guess you go up first, then?”

“That seems best.”

Joshua pocketed the knife he had been fiddling with all this time and approached the haphazard mess of rocks. A few shaky steps set them at the highest point on the subterranean staircase, just barely enough for one to boost the other up above. Joshua strained the rocks underfoot. Making certain they were stable. Good. With that, he bent down and joined his hands, creating a step for Tyra.

“I’m kinda surprised I’ve never done this.”

“Guard such secrets closely in the future, please.”

“Right.”

Tyra deactivated the light and threw it up above, just in the off-chance that it was needed later. She then stepped onto Joshua’s hands and was swiftly boosted upward, easily letting her grab at the edge. A few prods at the edge of the hole confirmed it wouldn’t come crashing down with the slightest bit of force, and she crawled on upward. Immediately she swung around and presented her hand for Joshua, who took it and began clambering up. She had long since forgotten just how heavy he was. Up and over. Joshua stood upright, helping Tyra do the same.

“Wish we stayed in the cave,” Joshua said.

Tyra looked at the landscape before them. A polar opposite to the last planet. It was a desert that stretched on in all directions. A few cracks in the surface could be seen from that point, assumedly like the ravine they had passed over in their horrendous landing. Essentially, they were standing on an island plateau, surrounded by deep pits.

“The layout of the planet will make movement difficult,” Tyra said.

“Movement? Where the hell are we going to go?”

“Would you truly prefer to stay in the cave with the syringe worms?”

“At least it was cool in there. Temperature-wise, I mean.”

You did this. You caused the issue. You ridiculous mammalian dead end. Tyra calmed herself. Easy. Easy now. There was no need to be aggressive. Joshua made a split moment call.

“Come, let us see what lies in the ravines.”

“My bet is more sand.”

“In any case, a ravine would provide more shade.”

“What about your light ball?”

“It may serve as an excellent guidepost should we come back.”

“I don’t think this place has a moon, though. Night is going to be absolutely pitch black. Maybe not for you, but it will for me.”

“A fair point. But you may carry it.”

“Fair enough.”