Pod (2)

I draw near.  Just a few days away from New Earth.  My long journey is almost over.

 

There aren't words to describe the feelings that go through your mind.  Eve doesn't care, she just sucks hard on my breast for the nourishment she needs.  I prefer to feed her with gravity switched off, so that all I can feel is my child's suckling, no other force on any part of my body, no sound bar her greedy slurps and burps and the gentle hum of Pod as it passes through space. 

 

Eve knows nothing of our journey, nothing of the dangers involved in landing, she doesn't even realise the threat posed by the Triffids.  She just sucks my boobs when she wants food, poos and pisses when she needs to, cries when she feels like it and spends the rest of the time asleep. The worse that can happen is when she's been too greedy on my breast and goes through the 30 second misery of vomiting.  

 

Really I should be working.  In three days’ time Pod will land on a new planet and if we're going to survive those first steps I need to be prepared for anything. 

 

The first problem is making sure that we land rather than crash.  Up to now I've relied entirely on the programme Computer was given on Earth. If the calculations were accurate then we would nudge into the planet's gravitational field, circulating the planet for long enough to slow us down, then use Pod's booster rocket to steer us that final step towards a safe landing point.  However, there's a very slight miscalculation and Computer tells me that our current trajectory will send us straight into the moon.  That means I have to land us by override, take us past the moon, into a safe orbit, before guiding us down that final mile.  Sounds easy, but I'm a biochemist, astrophysicist, astronaut and mother, not a pilot. 

 

Landing is the least of my problems though.  Every feed from Lander makes me more and more concerned about the Triffids. 

 

I call them Triffids, as they're meat-eating plants, the only predators on the planet (at least the only ones I've seen). They move around, some of them at amazing speeds, and digest whatever wildlife is unfortunate enough to be in their path. Of course, once I land I'll have to be more specific.  Even from the Lander feeds I've identified seven clearly distinct species.  My hope is that I'll survive the landing, somehow manage to avoid becoming Triffid food and get to study their biology, get to categorise and name all of the Triffid species.  After all I'm a biologist not a novelist, vague descriptions don't satisfy my scientific mind.  The difficult bit, though, will be the avoiding being eaten, classifying every type of flora and fauna on a new planet will be a stroll through the woods in comparison.

 

Triffids are the most exciting thing I've ever come across, but also the most terrifying.  If there was an Earth left to lecture on I'd be thinking of the papers I could write about them, but when I left the Earth I knew I was leaving it forever, leaving it to feed the hungry red-giant star that used to be our sun. So that just leaves the fear, thoroughly rational fear, fear for myself, but even great fear for Eve and the other child inside me, the child that's just a month away from being born.

 

There is no animal on the new planet that has managed to avoid becoming Triffid food. Triffids are the ultimate hunter: fast, agile and intelligent.  There's no point running up a tree, as they are trees, and their roots can dig quickly through the earth, so there's no escape by burrowing.  Some of the animals run fast, but this doesn't seem to help, the Triffids hunt in packs.

 

Oh yes, these are a bit more than walking venus fly traps; the main Triffid species shows all the communication skills and intelligence of a pack animal; well, a pack plant in this case.  Not only that, they're farmers: they raise a fat, round, grazing animal that doesn't do a lot other than eat and sleep. I've named them Dorrells, as they remind me of someone I once knew. 

 

By farm I don't just mean keep them enclosed (which they do) and manage their numbers; I've seen the Triffids nurse a female Dorrell through childbirth, helping the baby out with tender twiggery. This would make a fascinating paper, but as I say, my academic life is over.

 

I've followed Lander feeds for eleven years now, and in all that time I haven't come across one area of the planet where Triffids don't thrive.  Their numbers must be astronomical, I don't care to think about it.

 

I know I will have to fight.  Yep, not only am I a biochemist, astrophysicist, astronaut, pilot and mother, I now have to take up the sword. There's no way I can avoid Triffids when they're all around, especially given that they look like trees and shrubs and, guess what, the whole planet is woodland, every single plant could be a man-eater.  Even the weeds in the grass could be Triffid babies, nipping at my ankles, taking me down. 

 

Maybe they'll be intelligent enough to learn that I'm a threat, so if I kill enough of them they might leave me alone.  Maybe.

 

Eve's asleep now, lucky Eve.  Other baby is restless, she hasn't got used to the changes in gravity.  I still work with artificial gravity on, but sleep in free-float, with Eve tied round my bump so she doesn't get frightened.  It took Eve a long time to get used to it, thirty seven nights before I got to sleep properly, it drove me as crazy as you can imagine, but I have to preserve Pod's energy as much as I can.  

 

It's only when you've spent a decade switching between gravity and free-float that you realise how weird it is to be bound down by an invisible force at all times.  It's like being chained down in some medieval dungeon.  Of course, once we land, I'll be bound to the earth at all times.  New Earth is slightly smaller than its predecessor and consequently her gravity isn't so powerful, so I will have something like super powers; maybe I will stand a chance against the Triffids after all. 

 

xxx

 

I should have road tested this thing, I haven't driven for eleven years and I'm not sure how to steer; I think crashing into the moon counts as a straight fail.  Ah, slight over-steer but I'm getting the hang of it, this baby is flying now. Moon is over there, so I need to tweak Pod to the left and break just a tad more.  This is it, I can feel Pod moving in tune with my body now, just like one of my babies, though hopefully he won't be kicking me in the stomach or vomiting on my breasts. 

 

Bump gets in the way all the time, but especially when you're trying to land your Pod safely in one of the few tree-free areas on the planet.  The steering wheel just isn't designed for drivers with bumps, which was a bit of an oversight given the project plan. Computer's smiling though, which means we're back on course, all I have to do now is not panic and let the auto-pilot manage the landing stage.  There's an area of flat green plane about the size of a larger cricket ground that Computer says we can't fail to hit, hopefully not too hard.  A cricket ground?  I wonder if the Triffids play.  

 

xxx

 

They won't be playing cricket on that pitch for a while, Pod has ploughed into the earth, burying itself like a self-declared seed of new life.  No Pod, you're not the seed of new life, I am.  Luckily there's enough spare energy in Pod's battery to fly us out of the hole.  Every unit of energy matters though.  Eve, myself and Bump must live inside Pod for as long as we can, while we acclimatise ourselves to the new planet. 

 

Before we can completely abandon Pod we must learn to defend ourselves against the Triffids and, through a series of tentative explorations, establish what we can eat and drink on the new planet, where it's safe to sleep, we even need to experiment to find the best place to go to the toilet.  We can't completely leave Pod's womb for a long time yet.

 

Yet I long to stretch my legs.  Must stretch my legs. I can't put off the moment forever.  I refuse to wait for the other pods to arrive, partly because I fear they never will, and partly because I fear being caught hiding inside by the other Colonisers. Once Eve has been fed I must go outside, even though the sight from Pod's windows terrifies me.

 

xxx

 

We are surrounded by Triffids, in an even circle, the way I've seen them surround larger prey on my Lander feeds.  I estimate about two hundred, though it's hard to be sure, there's a lot of trees and bushes that might be Triffids too.  I guess it proves that they're intelligent, they've come to view the giant Pod from the sky, inquisitive, sentient beings.

 

I have the laser gun that we were given for emergencies, in case there were predators.  It's built to take out Earth-sized animals, not trees, but it should sting a bit, though it won't have enough energy to take out more than a dozen of them.  Hopefully a show of force will scare them away.

 

Neil Armstrong had it easy, he could just leap out onto the moon's surface without caring, reading out a pre-prepared speech, trying not to get it too wrong.  Some of us have to try and sneak past a gang of vicious lurking Triffids, no script to cover this situation: I am I a biochemist, astrophysicist, astronaut, pilot, mother, fighter and writer of my own script. Men always get the easy option.

 

I take Eve with me, slung on my back in spite of the danger, as I can't stand to leave her alone.  If I should die I want her to die with me, in the thick of the fight, not slowly, alone in the Pod, wondering where the food boobs have got to. 

 

Oh christ, the smell.  Woodland.  Air.  Life.  I have landed in paradise. The Triffids move towards me, in unison, they must be communicating in some way, though I can neither see nor hear anything that might be a language.  Oh how I long to study them, how I long not to die.

 

I can hear the shuffle of moving roots, I can smell Triffid leaves (how do I recognise a smell I've never previously encountered?), I can see the whites of their eyes, well the greens of their leaves at least.  If I'm going to shoot I should do it now.  And yet.  And yet I'm not a fighter, these are a new species, a wonderful new form of life, I can't kill them.  Not even to save myself, not even to save my babies.  They've done me no harm.

 

Oh Christ the pain.  I can't kill them now, as I've somehow managed to fall over and drop the gun.  And Eve, Eve has broken free and is crawling away from me.  And my waters have broken.  My waters have broken.  Oh, that's great, great timing.  Through giving birth I have thrown away my life, not just my life, all human life. Forever.

 

Hello trees.  No you're not trees, you're Triffids.  Don't kill me trees, don't kill me Triffids, let me see my new child before I die, even if it's the last thing I see. But all I can see are your trunks and roots and branches and leaves.  You're all around me. Everywhere. Where's Eve? "Where's Eve? What have you done with my baby? Where's my baby?"

 

xxx

 

I wake up with Stephanie in my arms, bloody and screaming.  I use a sharp stone to break the cord and set her free.  She's alive. I'm alive.

 

Eve sleeps, cradled in the roots of a nearby Triffid.  All is still and peaceful, barely a leaf stirring.

 

I should be happy, ecstatic, but I've already worked out the truth.  I've been watching these Triffids for years remember, I've seen them with the Dorrells, seen the Triffids nurse them through birth.

 

I can foresee the future of the human race, the future of my family. I'm the first in a long line of livestock.  My beloved baby is going to be tomorrow's Triffid meat, the human race has crossed galaxies just to become farm food, to end its days being raised as so many sheep. 

 

And yet, even amidst the sheer horror of that awareness, I feel Stephanie find a nipple and I start to cry with joy.  I can't help it. I'm glad to be alive.