Unknown - The_Growing_589064

The surface of the water ripples, and Kirsten watches her reflection waver in it, squinting as the image slowly comes into focus.

An intricate web design covers most of her left cheek. A similar one, though smaller, dots her right. She raises her head slowly, looking up at Dakota, wide-eyed. “A spider? You’re calling me a spider?”

“Iktomi zizi. Yellow spider.”

Kirsten’s face wrinkles. “I don’t think I—.”

“Hey!” Manny interrupts, chuckling, “I think it’s perfect. Spiders might be small, but some of them can bring down a man, or even a full grown horse with just one bite.”

“Yeah, but they’re—.”

“Crafty and intelligent,” Tacoma intones. “Creators of incredibly complex designs, and absolutely fearless.” He grins. “The name fits you perfectly.”

Kirsten eyes the three steadily. “Yeah, well just remember something else about us spiders.”

“Yeah?” Manny asks. “What’s that?”

“We eat our mates.”

There is a moment of absolute silence as her words are absorbed. Then Tacoma and Manny both blush, their copper skin tinting toward tomato red as they break into laughter and smack Dakota on the shoulder with good-natured teasing.

Kirsten looks on, a bit confused with the reaction she’s receiving. It is only when she spies Dakota’s rakish, eyebrow waggling grin that the subtext of her words blooms fully in her mind, and the blush that crawls up from her shoulders is so deep and dark that her pale eyebrows stand out in vivid relief against its heat. “Oh my god,” she moans, dropping her face into her hands. “I cannot believe I just said that!!”

Chuckling, Koda rubs her back. “Just relax, love. We know what you meant.” After a moment, she eases Kirsten’s hands away from her face and checks to make sure the designs aren’t smudged. “One last thing. Close your eyes.”

Said eyes narrow. “Why.”

“Relax and just close your eyes. Trust me.”

Sighing, Kirsten lets her lids slide closed over her eyes. “I’d better not regret this.”

“Just keep ‘em closed.” Taking another bowl, this filled with thick black paste, she dips three fingers in, coating them liberally. Lifting her fingers, she tilts Kirsten’s face toward her, then draws them across her lover’s eyes, from temple to temple, creating a crude, but effective black mask. “Ok, you can open your eyes now.”

Dakota grins as vivid green eyes open, their color all the more striking when set against the black paint surrounding them, like emeralds in a black-velvet jeweler’s box. “For Wika Tegalega. Look.”

Kirsten glances down into the still water, then back up at her lover. “I look like the Hamburgler.”

A moment of silence, and then the group roars in laughter. Kirsten merely rolls her eyes. “Can we get on with this, please?”

The others eventually sober, and Dakota takes back the water bowl with a grin that is slightly abashed. Her face has already been painted with the symbols of Crazy Horse, and the backs of both hands bear stylized wolf prints done in black and red.

A piercing cry spears the silence, and the four of them look up to see Wiyo circling down toward them. With a great beating of wings, she lands upon Koda’s outstretched forearm. A leather pouch dangles from one of her legs, and Kirsten eyes it curiously. “What…?”

“A note,” Dakota intuits, using her free hand to untie the simple slipknot. She hands the pouch to Kirsten. “Get it out of there for me, willya?”

The bag’s laces are tight and slippery, but Kirsten finally manages to fumble them open. Upending the small pouch, she shakes out a tiny, tightly rolled slip of paper, which she proceeds to unroll. Without her glasses on, the tiny writing is just one big blur, so she hands the scrap off to Dakota, who peers down at the message while Wiyo looks on, placidly. “It’s from Fenton. He found Toller.”

“Oh yeah?” Tacoma asks. “Where?”

“Just outside of Grand Rapids.” Dakota raises her eyes from the note. “Dead.”

“No shit!” This from Manny, who looks on, wide-eyed. “How?”

“Single gunshot wound to the back of the head.”

“Sounds like an execution,” Kirsten murmurs. “Did the judge say who he thought did it?”

“He’s guessing androids. There was talk in town about a small group of them in that area over the last week or so.”

“Any sign of Hart?”

“None.”

“Bet the metalheads took him,” Manny observes, raking a hand through his hair. “He’s the fucking commander of the base they’re about to attack. Jesus Christ.”

Kirsten rubs at the back of her neck. “Well, he’s been kept pretty well isolated from our plans for awhile now, so while it’s not the best news in the world, I’m not sure it’s the worst, either.”

“Yeah, but,” Manny argues, getting up to pace, “he knows the base layout like the back of his hand, he knows our numbers, our weapons, our strengths, our weak spots, and, worst of all, he knows you’re here. That sound like pretty damn bad news to me.”

“Manny. Sit.”

The young pilot looks over at his cousin, sighs, and sits.

“Alright,” Dakota continues, “we’re not even positive that the androids have him, but if they do, it’s a bit late to worry about it now. They’re at our gates, and with or without Hart’s information, they’re gonna be damned tough to fend off. So…we stick to the plan, and see what develops, alright?”

“We should probably let Maggie know,” Kirsten replies softly.

“Sounds good.” Koda eyes her brother and cousin. “Anything else?”

Both shake their heads in the negative.

“Good.” Shifting her gaze, she looks into the golden eyes of her feathered companion. “Thank you, my friend.”

Ruffling her wings, Wiyo closes her lethal talons around Koda’s forearm until the needle-sharp points break the skin. Three fat beads of blood well up. Cocking her head, she lets go a loud, almost triumphant cry, then launches herself into the air, wings flapping strongly, elegantly. With a feeling of almost stunned disbelief, Koda looks down in her lap, where two perfect feathers now rest. As she watches, the blood from her arm drips down onto the feathers, anointing them.

“You have been blessed, Tshunka Wakan Winan,” Tacoma says, his eyes sparkling reverently, joyfully. “By Ina Maka herself. Surely we are meant to win this fight.”

Still staring down at the feathers in her lap, Dakota finds that she can say nothing at all.

*

Kirsten sits on Maggie’s cot, the blanket tucked drumhead-tight around the narrow mattress, systematically shoving rounds into the spare magazines of her .45. One, already filled, lies beside the weapon on top of her pack. She is halfway through the second, her face frozen in concentration as she thumbs bullet after bullet into their flat carriers. Koda watches her from the desk, where she is marking their force’s final battle positions on a topo map of the ground where they plan to meet the android army. Tacoma has another copy, as does Maggie. Like them, she has no illusion that these are anything but a diagram of their opening gambit; if she had learned nothing else from the battle of the Cheyenne, from her fight with the Minot war leader, she would have learned that battle is unpredictable.

She has also learned that men and women will follow her, and that still frightens her. It frightens her all the more when one of those women is Kirsten. Perhaps she should feel easier knowing that her lover will be at the command center, guarded by Manny and Andrews and Maggie herself. A part of her mind remains convinced that Kirsten is safest at Dakota’s own side, with love as well as friendship and duty between her and harm.