Excerpt: Life and Death

Omal stirs as the first rays of morning sun push into the cave, highlighting countless specks of metallic dust hovering in the air. She pushes Orzil's arm away from here, and uncurls herself from her snug nest against Orzil's furry belly.

Orzil groans a little and rolls away, her snoring interrupted only briefly by Omal's moving. Omal stands, stretches, yawns. She pushes her hair away from her face, and pulls at a few lank and broken strands with her fingers. She steps out to the mouth of the cave.

Last night's storm is now a distant line of broken black clouds on the horizon, dimming the land underneath them with a curtain of dense rain. Where Omal stands, though, it's a perfectly clear day. The black rocks are already beginning to steam as the sun boils off last night's moisture.

Omal looks around for a twig or stick. She leans back into the cave and pulls a small twig from the pile of brush they use for firewood on colder days. She pokes the end of the twig into a small pool of rainwater that's collected in a crevice in the rock, then pulls the twig out to inspect it.

It seems to steam, too, but the surface of the twig gives the lie to that. It's smoke, from the acid currently eating at the outside of the stick.

"Not a helpful rain," Omal says to herself, throwing the twig back into the pool. Clean water will be hard to come by for a few days. She watches as the twig dissolves, little bits of bark and wood falling away and disappearing as the twig shrinks.

She goes back into the cave, past the still-sleeping Orzil, and into the back where they keep their stores. She kneels, puts her mouth right into the small puddle of brackish water they've collected in a suitable depression in the cave floor, and she takes a couple of small sips. She brushes her mouth off, being careful that any drops fall back into the puddle.

She inspects the worryingly small pile of lichen beside the puddle. There's not much of it, and most of it is the dark brown -- good for not much more than keeping the hunger away. No nutrition in it. She sighs. It'll be a gathering day, apparently, as soon as the acid rain evaporates sufficiently to be safe.

She crouches beside Orzil and pokes her with a crooked finger. "Wake up, Zil," she says.

Zil reaches out a hairy paw and swats at her, but she's ready for it. She dodges backwards, laughing, then pokes again. Zil grabs rather than swats, this time, and gets a hold of Omal's ankle. She yanks, and Omal is flat on her back, but still laughing.

Orzil rolls sideways, over the top of Omal, who flails helplessly at Orzil's back. "Zil, stop," she says, through her laughter. "I can't breathe, you big lump."