“Figaro, I don’t suppose you have any idea how to handle a raygun?”

“Couldn’t even lift it, Boss.”

“Alrighty then. No sleep for me tonight. I have to be ready to shoot.”

Alix shivered in her spot in the treetop. The tree and its branches were actually in the process of being choked by parasitic vines, which was perfect for Alix. The red webwork of vines stretching between the branches formed a sort of natural canopy that Alix could curl up in without plummeting to the forest floor. Assuming the vines didn’t snap beneath her weight. They were thick, so they likely wouldn’t. She hoped. Prayed.

Alix and Figaro had agreed that they had to stop for the night once the sun had begun to dip below the horizon, and by the time Alix had found a suitable tree to camp out in, the stars were already beginning to twinkle above. As she laid on the vines, she could see them shining from the gaps in the forest canopy. A legion of light. She’d rather have kept going, but that would have ended in her collapsing on the ground. Alix hadn’t slept a wink since she’d been shot with a tranquilizer gun by some unexpectedly intelligent alien rat people. Her kidnapping by the Aexons would make for a fantastic story once she and Figaro finally got back to the research station, but at the moment she could only think of the ways the experience left her vulnerable out here in the wilderness. Alix was exhausted. Her every muscle ached, her reactions were slow, and her stomach felt ready to cave in on itself. She was at her weakest. This was a major problem.

Because she was certain that something had been following them for hours.

“Boss, you’re being completely paranoid,” Figaro told her. He was perched on her shoulder as usual. “I haven’t seen anything following us since we left the Aexons up at the mountain peak. You’re just getting squirrely ‘cuz you’re sleep-deprived. So shut up, close your eyes, and sleep already!”

“I’m telling you, I heard howling,” Alix snapped. She unhooked her water flask from her belt and took a swig. The flask was equipped with a filtrator, so at least she wouldn’t go thirsty. Assuming she could find a water source to refill from.

“It was probably just the wind. Or your overtired imagination. There, there, silly human,” said Figaro. The little robot reached out with one of his eight limbs and gingerly stroked the side of Alix’s face. He was probably aiming for a soothing motion, but given that the tips of his limbs were pointed, it just felt like her face getting scraped repeatedly. “If I sing you one of your species’ freaky lullabies, will that help you sleep? I could do the one about babies falling out of trees.”

Alix raised an eyebrow. “Babies falling out of trees? What the hell kind of lullaby are you talking about?”

“Rock a bye baby, on the tree top . . .”

“Oh, yeah. That one. Not exactly the song I want to hear while I’m laying in an actual tree top.”

“Suit yourself. What about the one where I promise to buy you an obnoxiously loud avian that no one has any business owning as a pet, then follow that up with the far superior offer to give you jewelry?”

“I think I’ll pass on that too, but thanks for the offer.” Alix yawned. She patted Figaro affectionately. “How much charge do you have left?”

“Well, my itty bitty solar panel didn’t net me much after all that time underground, but I charged up my nanobatteries pretty well before we left the station. I’d say I can run continuously for about four days, give or take, and depending on how much I can supplement with solar charging.”

“Perfect. You can keep watch while I sleep then. The minute you hear howling, wake me up,” said Alix. She unzipped her pocket then, pulling out its contents. One was a map of the area they’d stolen off the Aexons. The other was a fragment she’d chipped off the wing casing of a giant, murderous insectoid from the Aexons’ caverns. The wing casing had retained its bioluminescent quality, emitting a neon green glow. Alix held it over the map, giving her enough light to analyze the markings inked onto the parchment.

“Ugh, I can’t believe you kept that thing. What kind of nut carries around remains from a giant killer bug?” Figaro huffed.

“A dedicated exobiologist who wants to study that ‘giant killer bug’. And who is in need of a flashlight,” Alix told him as she read the map. She traced a line between their current approximate location and the spot that marked the research station. “If we are where I think we are, we’re making good time. We can’t be more than three or four days away . . .did you hear that?”

“Oh, here we go again,” drawled Figaro.

“Shh.” Alix flicked him lightly as she listened. She heard a faint howl echo in the distance, just like before. She quickly put the map and fragment back into her pocket. “Maybe we should go, find a higher spot—”

“Yeah, that won’t attract predators. Running around like a chicken with its head chopped off in the middle of the night is as inconspicuous as it gets.”

“Damn it, you’re right.” Alix ran her hand over her face, willing her heart to stop racing. She couldn’t think of any cataloged predators that could scale the trees in Kabir’s Crimson Forest. All she could do was stay still up in the tree and hope for the best. “Figaro, just promise me that if anything comes too close—”

“Yeesh, Boss, I got it! Just get some sleep already, before you completely snap.” Figaro started stroking the side of her face again. “Hush little Alix, don’t say another word, Figgy’s gonna buy you any pet other than a mockingbird, like a goldfish, or a parakeet, I mean what would you even do with a mockingbird? They just screech all night . . .”

Alix zoned out as Figaro launched into an anti-mockingbird tirade. She stared at the stars between the leaves, dimly wondering how the Milky Way looked that night as her eyelids began to grow heavier. Her fear from earlier dissipated gradually as she allowed herself to be lulled by the cool breeze blowing over her skin, the gentle rustling of the leaves, and the occasional chirp of the malars that nested in the nearby trees. Nature’s glory held her. Everything would be alright. Alix was one with the wild, and those howls were far, far away.

“ . . . and you know, they’re also insanely aggressive, they’ll swoop right down and tear at your hair just for walking by their nest . . .”

Alix shut her eyes. She steadied her breathing, and let herself fall into the sweet abyss of sleep.

***

The Milky Way was best in Kansas.

Alix stood in Dad’s field, in the tall grass that swayed around her as the stars swirled above. She knew this field, and the barn, and the woods where all the living things of the Earth watched and listened, howled and sang, lived and died, were born and ate and were eaten in the infinite cycle. Alix knew them all, and now she wanted to know the rest.

Life was so strange, and so frightening, and so beautiful. She wanted to know the living things that called the distant stars above their own. She wanted her feet lifted off the ground. She wanted to be carried away in a starship to a world no one had ever seen.

“That’s Orion, the Great Hunter” Lyle Rathan said beside her, pointing up at the sky, his long hair tangled by the wind. Or maybe it was Mason Arlway, the silver of his bionic hand glinting in the starlight. He was gorgeous, either way. And he didn’t make sense either way, because Alix met both Lyle and Mason long after she’d left Kansas.

“Damn it,” Alix muttered. She looked up at Orion, tracing lines from his celestial bow to Bellatrix to Betelgeuse. “A dream.”

“Does that bother you?” Lyle/Mason asked. “Do you wish you really were back in Kansas?”

“Of course not. There was nothing left for me there.” Somewhere, far away, Alix could hear Dad calling for her, calling that it was getting late, to get inside, to come home.

“Good. Because you’re not in Kansas anymore, little girl.” A feral smile spread across their face as they morphed into Professor Matson. “You made a mistake in underestimating the Aexons. You can’t afford to make such a mistake again. You’re in the real wilderness. No tablet, no signal to call for help, even your precious raygun will soon be out of charge. You’re just like any of the other animals, now.”

“That’s not true. I’m sentient, I’m a human! I crossed the stars.” Alix glanced up at the sky, and when she turned back to her companion, she was looking at Lyle/Mason again.

“Oh, Alix. You’re either the hunter, or the hunted.” They looked out to the Kansan forests. Once dark green, now the trees of Alix’s home were stained red. Lyle/Mason spoke again. As they opened their mouth, dozens of green, bioluminescent insects crawled from their mouth and eyes in a mad rush. “Kabir’s Crimson Forest. Red, red, red, everywhere you look. Danger, danger, get away. They’re coming for you. Can’t you hear them howl?”

Alix listened. What she’d thought was Dad’s voice wasn’t his. It was the howls after all, the echoing howls calling her home—

***

Alix’s eyes flew open. Her heart thundered in her chest, and she was drenched in sweat. The faint rays of sunrise fell over her. It took her a moment to realize that she was indeed in Kabir’s Crimson Forest of Deimos X, not back home in Kansas.

Yet she could still hear the howling.

“Figaro!” Alix hissed, sitting up.

“Morning, Boss!” Figaro chirped from his perch on a nearby branch. “Sleep well?”

“No.” Alix turned her head toward the howling sounds, then shot Figaro an angry glare. “Didn’t I tell you to wake me if you heard howling?”

“Yeah, you did. And I didn’t hear anything, so I didn’t wake you,” said Figaro. “Uh, you look angry.”

“What do you mean you didn’t hear anything? They're howling right now!” Alix snapped.

Figaro hopped down onto her knee. “Is this some sorta joke? Or a prank? Boss, there’s nothing howling. Even the malars aren’t chirping.”

“But . . . but I . . .” Alix trailed off, confused. She listened again, waiting for the familiar howls, but the forest was quiet. Alix sighed and rubbed her eyes. “Jesus, I could have swore I heard them.”

“Well, were you dreaming before you woke up?” Figaro asked. “Maybe you heard it in a dream, and when you woke up you were still half-dreaming. You got confused, is all.”

“Yeah, maybe.” Alix rolled her shoulders. She did a quick check through her pockets and utility belt to make sure everything was still there. She had her water flask, her raygun, a half-eaten energy bar, the map, and the wing fragment. She shifted off the vines, and began climbing down from the tree. “Well, no sense hanging around here. We should get moving.”

“Yes, please.” Figaro scuttled up to Alix’s shoulder. “I need a change of scenery. It was boring as hell, just sitting up there while you slept. I spent half the night trying to get a signal and ping the station with no luck, so then I just switched to counting the leaves on the tree. 220,000, by the by.”

“If it makes you feel better, my night wasn’t all that great. I had a weird nightmare.” Alix lowered herself down the final few branches and swung down, happy to feel her boots hitting the ground again.

“What’d you dream about?”

“Well, I was back home on my dad’s farm in Kansas. Lyle and Mason were both there—”

“Ugh. Ugh to both, but especially to Lyle. He’s the whole reason we’re in this mess.”

“Don’t be silly. It was my idea to go catch a live Aexon for the credit bonus. It’s not like he asked.”

“Actually, that’s true.” Figaro drummed his limbs over Alix’s shoulder. “You’re the whole reason we’re in this mess!”

Alix shook her head. “You need to switch up your state of mind. This isn’t a mess, it’s an opportunity. We get to study the nature of Deimos X up close and personal, getting a front seat to all these beautiful, majestic—oh God what was that?”

Alix froze, listening for the sound again. Not a howling like before, but a rustling, like something was in the ferns nearby. She glanced at Figaro.

“I might be hearing things again.”

“Nope, I heard that one too.” Figaro’s eye lenses extended as he scanned the area. “Holy fuck, there’s something crouched in the ferns.”

“Okay,” said Alix, slowly reaching for her raygun. Her heart picked up in double-time. “Stay calm.”

“Ohmygodohmygodohmygodohmygodohmygod—”

“Calm, I said!” Alix snapped, gritting her teeth. She couldn’t let Figaro’s nervousness rub off on her. She held the raygun up and aimed at the ferns. “Describe it.”

“Uh, okay, okay. Definitely not something recorded in the station database. Red fur, just a bit darker than the ferns. Maybe twice your size. Six eyes, three on each side of its head. Big ol’ fangs and claws that could rip through your spine like it was a popsicle stick.” Figaro rapidly poked at Alix’s face. “So shoot it already!”

“No! It hasn’t attacked yet. We don’t even know if it’s hostile. We can’t just shoot anything that moves,” Alix said, though she kept a firm grip on her raygun. For some reason, her own words weren’t landing with her, and she could feel the adrenaline pumping through her veins. All the red of the forest seemed to flash brighter. The words from her dream rang in her head like a siren. Danger, danger, get away. It was all Alix could do to keep her head clear and her aim steady as the creature emerged from the shadows.