The Goddess-Queens of Pudendor - The Abducted - Chapter 4

Chapter 4

Hard Landing

When I awoke I was buried under what looked like deflated pale white air bags. Light filtered through the material above my head and when I batted the material around I smelled air, fresh air, not the recycled atmosphere of the ship, so I wriggled and crawled in that direction, emerging from the tangle of material into bright daylight. As soon as I was free I stood up and took a deep breath of air, happy to be back on terra firma. If I’d taken a closer look at the grasses and bushes around me I’d have wondered just what terra firma I was standing on.

I glanced briefly at the container I’d arrived in, what I now realize was an escape pod. It was cylindrical and bore scorch marks. The top end had either popped open by design or broken open on landing. Pieces of blackened material lay scattered about. I didn’t waste much time examining the pod. I was much more concerned to find Stanley and the others, and then to find out where we were. I hoped their capsules hadn’t landed too far away.

The area where I had landed was a mixture of open grass, bushes, and small trees. I started my search for the others by making a loop around the capsule, then spiraling outward. I’m not sure why I attached any importance to the capsule. It contained nothing I needed. It just seemed like a good idea to keep a fixed reference point. In the process I found a parachute, made of some kind of metallic fabric, snagged on a small tree. Presumably it had separated from the capsule on or close to landing. I made a note of it, thinking the material and the ropes that suspended it might be useful.  Being nude in the middle of nowhere the material itself and the promise it held of making something like clothing was significant.

A few more spirals and I saw a reflection through the trees. Heading that way I quickly spotted the metallic fabric of another parachute draped on a tree. Not far from it I found another capsule, empty. I thought of shouting for Stanley, but then decided against it. What with all the strange things going on lately it seemed like a better idea not to draw too much attention.  I began searching the bushes around the capsule.

It only took me a minute or two to find him. He was standing in a small clearing studying a small tree.

“Have you ever seen a tree like this before?” he asked.

I hadn’t known he was much interested in plants. Machines and science fiction were what he always talked about. I looked at the leaves and the bark. The leaves were long and slender and had a serpentine shape. The bark was a dark golden color with an almost polished appearance.  I’m not that much of a plant person, so I wasn’t surprised that I didn’t recognize it. In fact it didn’t really look like anything I’d seen before.

“No. I don’t think I have. Is it some kind of eucalyptus maybe? Did we land in Australia?” Some part of my mind had latched onto the idea that we were still on earth and wasn’t going to let go of it. Australia seemed a good guess. The area was brushy, warm and dry. Kind of what I always thought Australia was like, though it might also have been some place in Africa.

Stanley looked at me, his eyes unusually serious.

“I think we’re on Gor.”

It didn’t sink in at first what he was talking about. “Where?”

“On Gor. The planet Gor. From those books I read. The ones you always say are so silly.”

“You’re kidding! Or did you hit your head when you landed?”

“I’m not kidding. I think we’ve been snatched and taken to Gor. Look at what’s happened the last few days. We were in the park. There were bright lights. Next thing we knew we were on a ship of some sort. That wild machine. The fright mask alien creatures. Did all that happen?”

“Well, yes. No. Maybe. I don’t know. About the aliens and the ship and all that, as far as I can tell that all happened, unless this is all the most elaborate practical joke in history. But those books are fiction. You do realize that, don’t you? It’s all made up. It’s not for real.”

Denial, it’s powerful. The idea that we were on an alien planet was just too frightening to contemplate. Take me and strand me anywhere on earth. I can deal with that. I can find some way to get home. Walk, swim, hitch hike. Find the American consulate. But an alien planet? How do you hitch hike back to earth from another planet?

“Even if we were kidnapped by flying saucer men, how do you know we’re not still on earth? The sun looks the same. The air smells the same. We’re breathing air, aren’t we? Sure, the plants look a little different, but they’re still basically plants, like the plants on earth. And there’s lots of different plants on earth. Lots of plants we’ve never seen because we’ve never been to Outer Crapistan before.”

Stanley stared at me for a long moment while he formulated his reply. I knew he was serious, then. That was what he did when he was dead serious.

“Gor is the counter earth. It’s on the same orbit around the Sun as Earth, only on the opposite side. So, it’s the same sun. And the planet’s very similar to earth, a twin really, since it formed at the same time and all that. It’s very earth-like, but also different.”

 “Not buying it. We’ve got to be some place on earth. And why Gor? Let’s say for the sake of argument that we are in fact on another planet. Why would it be Gor? Why not another planet?”

“Why not Gor? Until I find out different, I’m going to call this place…”

“Well, what have we here,” a voice interrupted our conversation. A woman’s voice, but mature and on the husky side. I turned to see who it was, very surprised because she wasn’t speaking English, yet I understood her.

“Now I think I’m buying it,” I said quietly. Up to that point part of my brain had been insisting, despite all evidence, that this was all an elaborate prank or maybe some weird new reality television show. Any moment some minor celebrity was going to pop out from behind a bush and say 'Smile, you’re on stupid prank television.' That idea died when I saw who had spoken.

Two women had crept up quietly behind us, stopping barely a dozen feet away. The first thing that impressed me was that they both carried spears, odd ones. They were like javelins, with a long slender shaft and a long blade that looked something like a stingray’s barb. But unlike a javelin, they carried them tucked under their arms, like lances, the tips aimed menacingly at us.

And the clothing. I’d seen a lot of unusual fashion statements at the university, but nothing like this. Wherever it was we had landed, the stylish woman seemed to be into leather and metal. Both of them wore leather caps accented with strips of metal, one with blonde braids descending below the rim, the other with brunette braids. Both wore what I could best describe as a leather bustier, with metal cups, topped with leather shoulder pads. The rest of the leather had small rings sewn on to it. Chain mail skirts covered their thighs. Leather shin protectors covered their legs up to and over their kneecaps. They looked like they were overdressed for a Dungeons and Dragons party. But the strangest thing of all was that they were riding turkeys.

Later I would learn the proper name for their mounts was vikagas, but at first glance they looked like very large turkeys. Not the fat, white, stupid things seen on commercial factory farms getting ready for Thanksgiving. These birds looked more like wild turkeys. And not the toms but the hens, the ones you see roaming in flocks in the woodlands. Sleek bodies with powerful legs, built to run. The biggest difference was that, while the bodies were covered with what looked like feathers, their necks, stouter than a turkey’s, appeared to be covered by scales. Their heads were different, too, featuring a bony crest and eyes that were oriented to look more forward than to the sides. I remember a biology teacher telling us that was the mark of a predator animal rather than a prey animal. Animals that were hunted need eyes that give them a wide field of view. Animals that hunt need eyes that help them judge distance.

And they were big, much bigger than any turkey, at least four feet at the shoulder, if that’s the correct word for that part of a giant bird’s anatomy.

Their passengers sat on saddles straddling the base of the birds’ necks, their feet in stirrups hung in front of the small, vestigial wings. They almost seemed a hybrid of bird and dinosaur. A turkeysaurus rex? Birds are now thought to be descended from dinosaurs. Were these creatures a step along the way that had disappeared from earth?

“Well, the sky just seems to be raining desaya today,” the blond one said to her partner. “What luck for us.”

Desaya? That was a word that our subliminal language training had skipped, or perhaps the meaning had been implanted in my brain, because deep down I felt insulted, revolted even, by its use to describe me. I started to protest. She aimed her spear directly at me.

“Less babbling, more walking,” she said in a voice used to giving orders and having them obeyed. She motioned in the direction she wanted us to go, then the two of them got behind us, spears aimed at the small of our backs.

There’s no arguing with eighteen inches of sharp metal ready to punch a hole in you. We started walking.

Continued in Chapter 5