Survivor Planet III by Juliet Cardin

confusion I crept as close as I dared. In order for my plan to work I had to move forward. My shots were pretty wild at this point—being fired on in return now, I had to duck and zigzag to keep out of the enemies range.
    The beast’s arms flailed about as though it swiped at an invisible enemy. Its head tilted back and it lifted its snout to sniff the air. Then it lowered its gaze and stared directly at me. It charged suddenly, pulling the Akkadians off their feet making them land hard on their bellies in the dirt. Seeing them go down I no longer gave them my attention; instead I focused it all on the huge monster barreling toward me, chain dangling behind it. I fired again and again, but just as I’d feared, the bolts bounced off the shiny armor-like skin. I only had time to drop and roll before it would have charged right over me. I kept rolling and then scrambled up onto my hands and knees. I felt the beast step on the back of my foot forcing me to roll over onto my rear end. My weapon lay out of reach, for all the good it’d done me. I scrambled to pull the coin from my pocket.
    â€œNow?” I screamed to Lourde. He’d come out into the open, his eyes flashing between the monitor and me.
    â€œNow!” he cried back, just in the nick of time.
    As the beast bent down its great ugly head and roared in my face displaying three rows of razor sharp teeth, I rubbed the tiny coin three times and tossed it right in its mouth to the back of its throat. It closed its massive jaws and I swear I saw it gulp before it roared at me again.
    I covered my head, promising anything and everything to the universe in that moment if I survived. Seconds later I heard a rumble and then a mini explosion. Guts, slime, gore and blood rained down and covered me as Kenix, weapon blazing, blew out of the centre of the monster.
    â€œHoly Mother Fucker!” he yelled.
    Seeing him alive and whole filled me with relief. “Thank God you’re okay!”
    Kenix, hand on his crotch, bent down and dug through the carnage to retrieve my tiny coin. “I think I’ll be keeping this, thank you very bloody much.”
    I shrugged. “There was no way to warn you they had a bullet-proof back-up plan.”
    Both of us were a bloody, sticky mess.
    But we were alive.
    As Kenix opened his mouth to begin a tirade, I scrambled over to my weapon just in time to shoot one of the pair of Akkadians lumbering up behind us. Kenix whipped round and let the other one have it.
    â€œAre you okay?” Lourde came jogging up before stopping short and making a face over the state of us.
    â€œWe’re fine,” Kenix snapped. He pulled out his coin and only paused to snap the other tiny piece he held back into place while glaring at us both defiantly. Then he tossed the coin far off in Ayres’ direction and disappeared.
    â€œThat was bloody ingenious!” Lourde winked at me, then stared down at his monitor. “It’s okay. There’s only three left. Looks like Ayres has them running scared back to their ships. He won’t let them get away. We’ll need one of those ships to get back home, since they destroyed ours.”
    Not that I’d ever really consider Taseeus home, but I was relieved all the same. The thought of being stranded on this cursed planet for the rest of my days was a fate I’d already pondered in my not so distant past.
    If we succeeded in our mission, it wouldn’t be a fate Lara would have to face.
    Not if she were dead.
    * * * *
    That night Ayres and I curled up together in one of the little alcoves we’d converted into a bedroom. On the floor making a soft nest were several warm furs brought along with us on our journey. There was still so much to tell him about what had happened with Lara, but after we’d seen each other safe and alive, we’d both been filled with a desire to enact our reverence for life. As soon as his brother left we’d scrambled back