Morgan shot a horrified glance at the body floating far out on the
swift tide. Three sharks were circling lazily. He looked around for a
boat, saw none. He swiftly estimated his chances of swimming out after
the fat man and towing him in. The chances appeared to be nil.
Nevertheless, he began stripping off his shirt.
"Don't bother," said the girl. "He was stung last week."
[Illustration]
Morgan stared at her silently for a moment. She seemed not in the
least perturbed. If the man had been stung by an Orenian, he was lost
anyway. Ruefully, he rebuttoned his shirt.
"I leapt to a bad conclusion."
"That he was an Orenian? He would have been, soon. Besides--you _have_
to leap to conclusions nowadays, to stay alive."
"You don't seem to worry."
"I told you, he was going to kill me."
"Why?"
"Because--" She paused and stared out across the twilight water,
gathering a slow frown. "Because he was crazy."
Morgan's eyes flickered over her trim figure, and he thought--_maybe_.
She had a trace of Seminole blood, he decided--with the quiet
sultriness that it leant to her face.
"I'm heading west," he announced.
"To the cypress?" She cooly inspected his sturdy arms, clipped
features, and the hatchet in his belt-rope. She nodded faintly to
herself. "Want company?"
He shrugged and turned half away. "It's okay with me." He set off down
the road and she followed a few feet to the rear.
"Florida coast's getting to be lousy with them," she called.
"Orenians?"
"Yeah. Whole truckload of them passed through yesterday. On their way
to Miami, I guess. One man said he saw an airplane yesterday."
"They must be reviving the industry up north."
"Yeah. Trucks by the dozen. Say--where've _you_ been hiding?"
"Mangrove island. Been there six months."
"Get lonesome?"
"And tired of sitting still. Small island."
"You should have stayed--but I'm glad you didn't."
He shot her a sharp glance. She failed to look bereaved at the loss of
her mate. But that was not unusual. Most marriages nowadays were
contracted by brute force--and dissolved the same way. She probably
felt that rolling the fat one in the drink gave her a claim on him.
When the last trace of gray fled from the west, they walked westward
along the old highway beyond the limits of the coastal town which was
now nearly deserted. They talked softly as they trudged along, and he
learned that her name was Shera and that she had been a dancer in a
small Miami nightspot, before the Orenians came. She had joined the
fat one a year ago--because he owned a gun, and was therefore good
insurance against wandering Orenians. But when the ammunition was
gone, she tried to leave him, which resulted in the incident by the
waterfront.
Morgan was irked that he had blundered into a family affair, and
troubled that he had relieved the fellow of all worldly cares.
Nevertheless, if the man had been stung, the free world would
say--"job well done." For in a few weeks he would have ceased to be
strictly human, becoming a dangerous threat to his fellows. And if the
girl had been unable to escape from him before that time, she would
have been subject to the same plight. Morgan decided that he would
have done the same thing if given time to weigh the situation
beforehand.
"How far are we going?" she asked.
"We're turning off on the next side-road," he grunted.
"You know the country?"
"I used to." He waved his arm to the south. "Road winds through a
swamp, then climbs to high ground. Ends in a spruce forest."
"Got any food?"
"Will have, tomorrow. Ditches are full of warmouth perch. Plenty of
swamp cabbage, wild oranges, bull frogs, papaya."
"I'm hungry now."
"That's tough."
She whimpered a little but soon fell silent. He saw she was limping,
and he slowed his pace. Pity was a lost emotion in an age of chaos;
but she was strong, healthy, and appeared capable of doing a day's
work. He decided to humor her, lest she decide to trudge alone.
* * * * *
When they reached the swamp, branches closed over the narrow trail
road, screening off the sky and hiding the thin slice of moon. The
girl hung close to his elbow. A screech owl hooted in the trees, and a
thousand frogs clamored in the blackness. Once the scream of a panther
split the night, and the girl sobbed as if echoing the cry. They
hurried ahead through the overgrown weeds.
"Drop flat!" he hissed suddenly.
She obeyed without a sound. They crouched together at the edge of the
road, listening. A distant rustling came from the roadway to the
south.
"Orenians?" she whispered.
"Orenians."
"How many?"
"Can't tell. They always march in step. Keep quiet."
Morgan gripped the hatchet and set himself for a quick spring. As they
drew nearer, he decided that there were two of them. Their movements
were perfectly coordinated, since they were of one mind, one
consciousness--that of Oren. The girl tapped his arm with the blade
of a knife.
"I'll take one," she breathed.
When the footsteps were almost upon them, Oren halted. There was no
outcry; the Orenians had no need for vocal communication; their
thought-exchange was bio-electromagnetic.
"Now!" howled Morgan, and launched himself at the enemy.
His hatchet cleft the face of the nearest foe, and he turned instantly
to help the girl. A pair of bodies thrashed about on the ground. Then
she stood up, and he heard her dry the knife on some grass. It was
over in an instant.
"Not stung?"
"No."
"That was too easy," he said. "I don't like it."
"Why?"
"They don't ambush that easy unless they're in rapport with another
group someplace close. We'll have some more of them after us if we
don't get away."
They hurried about the unpleasant task of splitting open the
once-human skulls to remove the legless parasite-entities that filled
the bony hollows where brains belonged. The Oren creatures lived in
their stolen homes long after the borrowed body died, and they could
signal others to the vicinity. Morgan tossed the globular little
creatures in the ditch where they lay squeaking faintly--helpless,
once-removed from the body of the host who had long since ceased to
exist as a human being.
"Let's go!" he grunted.
"Same way?"
"Yeah."
"But they _came_ from that way!"
"Have to chance it. Too dangerous, hanging around the highways. Out
here we can find places to hide."
They set off at a trot, chancing an ambush in reverse. But Morgan
reasoned that the Orenians had been returning to the highway after a
day's exploring on the side-roads. After plunging for half-an-hour
through the darkness, the road began winding upward. The cypress
archway parted, revealing star-scattered sky. They slowed to a walk.
"Can't we sit down to rest?" she panted.
"Can if you like. Alone."