Eventually, we reached the end of the plains and the start of the grasslands. From here, the trail was even easier to follow. A large swath of grass had been flattened, marking the passage of the Anunnaki and their prisoners. I called a brief halt, allowing everyone to catch their breath and quench their thirst, while I stared out at the swaying grass. The vegetation was taller than my head, and thus, it was impossible to see how far ahead our quarry actually were. But I knew which way they were going. Because there is no north here in the Lost Level, and because the sun never sets, directions like east or west are meaningless. As a result, denizens of this place navigate in different ways. The Anunnaki were marching the captives toward a distant mountain peak. I had never been there, nor had any of the others in our group. Between that mountain and our present location were the grasslands, and then a dense section of forested jungle, the outskirts of which could be seen far in the distance, lost in the shimmering heat haze.

  “Karenk,” I called, “can you give me a hand?”

  He frowned in confusion, and glanced down at his palms, turning them over as if considering which appendage to chop off. I grinned. This was not the first time my figures of speech had caused trouble amongst the tribe.

  “I am not sure I understand, Aaron. Are you asking me to—?”

  “Don’t worry.” I laughed. “I just want to sit on your shoulders so I can get a better view across the plains. It’s so flat here and you’re the tallest among us.”

  Karenk’s expression was one of clear relief. Smiling, he hurried over to me.

  “I thought you wished me to cut off a hand for some ritual,” he explained. “I would follow you anywhere, but I am afraid that would have been too much to ask.”

  “Nope, you can keep your hands and feet. I just need a boost.”

  He knelt on one knee and cupped his hands together. I clambered up onto his shoulders. Grunting, Karenk rose to his full height. Despite his strength, I felt him trembling beneath me, and resolved to survey the region as quick as possible. I suspected we had a long trek ahead of us yet, and I needed him to reserve his stamina.

  The ever-present, never-setting sun beat down on us. Shielding my eyes with my hands, I scanned the plains, studying the terrain between us and the forest. Far ahead, at the base of the outer tree line, I spotted a large group of moving dots fading in and out of the shimmering heat haze.

  “Okay.” I patted Karenk’s shoulder. “That’s good. I see them. You can put me down now.”

  After I was back on the ground, Tolia and the rest of our fellow pursuers gathered around me. I knelt among them and pulled my dagger. Then, I quickly cleared away a patch of grass and began to draw in the dirt with the tip of my blade.

  “We are here, and the snake men are here, along with their captives. They were just entering the tree line when I saw them, which means they’re making much better time than we had anticipated.”

  “Which also means they are pressing their captives much harder than we thought they would,” Tolia pointed out.

  I nodded. “But that’s actually a good thing.”

  “How is it a good thing if our loved ones die from exertion before we rescue them?” Tolia asked.

  “Because it means they will be dead before they reach their final destination,” another man, Apok, said.

  Dismayed murmurs ran through the crowd.

  Annoyed with Apok, I raised my voice to get their attention once again. “It also means that they’ll have to stop soon and rest. We know they want to keep the captives alive. Yes, they may be running them hard now, but they won’t run them to the point of death. My guess is they want our people so exhausted that they’ll be too tired to even consider escaping. All we have to do is keep our pace, and not stop. When they rest—and they will rest, sooner or later—we’ll close the distance. So, before we start off again, are there any questions?”

  Apok pushed his way forward through the crowd. “Yes, I have a question.”

  “Go ahead.”

  “Why are you in charge? Why do you lead us?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “I remember when you first came to us, not far from the spot we stand at now, nearly dead, swooning, raving like a madman, and weeping for that beast you called a friend.”

  I rose slowly, sheathing my dagger. My hand stole to the hilt of my sword.

  “All of this is true,” I admitted, staring him in the eye. “But speak of my friend again like that and I will spread your guts out on the ground right here. Bloop fought hard to return Kasheena to all of you. He was a warrior, not a beast.”

  Apok’s eyes darted to the hilt of my blade, then back up to mine. “And yet now the princess is gone again, and her father is slain. It seems to me you have failed at protecting them both. Perhaps it would be better if someone born among our tribe were to lead.”

  “Aaron Pace has proven his loyalty and his bravery to us time and time again,” Tolia said. “You’re a man of machinations, Apok. He is a man of honor.”

  “Aye,” Karenk agreed. “I will follow him.”

  “Enough,” I said, removing my hand from my sword. “I am going after our loved ones. Those of you who wish to follow me—I welcome your courage. Those of you who do not wish to follow me are still welcome to journey alongside us. We’re all heading in the same direction, and we all want the same thing. We can argue about who belongs and who is fit to lead after we’ve rescued our people and killed every last Anunnaki.”

  We hurried on, following the path through the grasslands. I stayed out front, with Tolia and Karenk at my side. I wondered if Apok was behind me, looking for a place to thrust a knife in my back. I had never paid much attention to him during my time living with the tribe. In truth, I’d never cared to. He was conniving and duplicitous, and many of our warriors held him in contempt. And yet, he had grown up with Kasheena’s father, who held his friendship in some regard. It was clear to me now, if not to the others, that Apok intended to make the most of the uncertainty of the tribe’s current situation and set himself up as leader. But why, then, had he volunteered to accompany us on this rescue mission? I couldn’t make sense of it, and decided not to dwell on it again until after we had rescued the others.

  Nothing else moved around us, save for the breeze, rustling through the grass. The sky was empty of birds, the ground devoid of animals or insects. The last time I had come this way, it had been with Kasheena and Bloop. We had encountered an octophant—an elephantine creature with many tentacle-like trunks. The creature had been giving birth. The moment had been one of my favorites from this place, and even now, writing about it years later, the memory makes me smile. But it had also been ruined when a group of Anunnaki had attacked us just moments after the beast gave birth. I thought of that then, running across the plains—of how the snake-men ruined everything, of the blight they were on this land, this dimension, and I swore that I would not stop until I had exterminated each and every one of them. Like every other living thing within the Lost Level, the Anunnaki had come here from elsewhere, but unlike the other denizens of this level, they upset the natural balance of the place.

  My time in this dimension had changed me, stripping away the veneer of civilization. Before, I would have viewed genocide as abhorrent. Now, I viewed it as our only solution. In order for us to survive, the Anunnaki had to be obliterated. None of them could be left alive.

  We pushed on, determined. The sun beat down upon us, and sweat stung my eyes. I don’t know how long we ran, but the forest seemed to draw no closer. The terrain stayed the same, rising and falling slightly on occasion, but mostly remaining flat. We stuck to the path, following the swath of crushed grass.

  And then, the ground began to shake and soil exploded. There was a great upheaval in the midst of our ranks. I heard several of our number cry out in fear. Those of us in the front of the vanguard spun around to look behind us. Those in the rear faltered, falling back in terror. Thrusting from the earth was a giant, segmented worm. Our passage must have disturbed it. The creature was big enough that it had swallowed one of the tribesmen. Only his feet were visible, wriggling in the beast’s gaping maw. The beast swayed back and forth, swallowing its prey whole, looming over the rest of us, as if choosing which one to eat next. I saw no eyes or visible sensory organs. Just that terrible, toothless mouth. Dirt clung to the worm’s slimy, gray and pink skin. Its hide looked rubbery, but thick, and was composed of concentric rings, each about five feet wide. The thing’s form reminded me of pictures I’d once seen in an occult tome back on Earth—an artist’s depiction of the spawn of Behemoth, an ancient, monstrous, worm-like deity who originated from a universe that existed before our own. I estimated that roughly ten feet of the monster protruded from the ground, and could only imagine how much of it still lurked beneath our feet.

  Panicked, a few of the tribe scattered, fleeing into the high grass on both sides of the path. Apok was among them. I spotted him slinking and ducking, his eyes and mouth wide with terror, so shocked that he hadn’t even drawn his weapon.

  The same could not be said of Tolia or Karenk. Both of them met our loathsome foe head-on, even as its massive head darted downward, snatching up another of our party. This time the victim was a woman, a huntress named Parrell. She was armed with a bow, but before she could notch an arrow, the worm fell upon her, sucking her into its maw with a disgusting slurping noise. I shuddered at the sound and brandished my sword. Karenk charged ahead, slashing at the monster near ground level. The rubbery flesh parted like blubber beneath his blade, but instead of blood, a noxious, watery, clear fluid gushed from the wound. Thrashing, the worm spat out Parrell and focused on Karenk. I ran to help him, but before I could, two arrows whizzed past me, striking the worm in its mid-section and head. A third missile zipped by. I glanced behind me and saw Tolia, already notching a fourth arrow. Her speed was amazing. Luckily for me, so was her aim.

  Enraged, the worm quivered and swayed. Then, it tried to sink back down into its hole. Karenk and I struck it repeatedly with our swords, slashing and stabbing. Other tribe members rushed to our side and quickly joined the fray, attacking it with spears and clubs and other weapons. The beast shuddered and convulsed and reared up again. We fell back, out of its reach. Quivering, the worm collapsed onto the plain, with nearly a quarter of its length still sticking out of the ground.

  “Everybody stay back,” I ordered. “It might still have some fight left.”

  I prodded the monster experimentally with the tip of my sword. The worm twitched a few times, but then was still. More of that noxious fluid leaked from dozens of wounds, and smelling strongly of ammonia. The stench burned my nose, and my eyes watered.

  “Have any of you ever seen one of these before?” I asked the group.

  They all stared at me, shaking their heads or shrugging.

  “Okay,” I sighed. “I think it’s blood might be toxic—poisonous. We should keep our distance from the carcass. And let’s spread out a bit in case there are more of them. We’ll still walk single file, but keep some distance between each other.”

  “For what reason?” asked one of the tribesmen.

  “I suspect this thing was waiting beneath the ground. When it sensed us passing overhead, it attacked. If we keep spaced apart, it will give us better odds against another attack.”

  “We don’t know that,” Apok challenged. “Indeed, for all we know, you led us this way on purpose, Aaron Pace.”

  There was a grumbling of agreement among a few of the tribe members, but I was glad to hear louder dissent from the majority of the rescue party. Apok glared at me, grinning.

  I met his stare, refusing to look away. “What are you implying, Apok?”

  “What do we really know about you? Kasheena says she first encountered you while a prisoner of the Anunnaki. Those same Anunnaki have just raided our village. Perhaps you are in league with them. Perhaps you are a spy—a traitor to your own race. For all we know, you led us directly into this worm’s path to slow down our pursuit. I say we—”

  My .45 had cleared its holster and was in his face before I even realized I’d drawn it. Apok’s malicious grin vanished as he stared down the barrel of the handgun. I poked his nose with it, watching his sweat bead on the metal.

  “I warned you once, Apok.”

  He held his hands out at his sides, indicating surrender. His gaze flickered from the gun, and then back up to me. Slowly, his grin returned.

  “Are you going to kill me, Aaron? Slay one of the very warriors helping in your effort to bring back our captured people? Perhaps this is simply another way of thinning our numbers?”

  “This is a revolver, Apok. I don’t expect you to know the difference, but unlike other handguns, revolvers don’t have a safety. So the next sound you hear is going to be me pulling the trigger. You won’t hear the blast. You’ll be dead by then.”

  “Aaron,” Tolia called, her tone urgent.

  I glanced in her direction and saw her kneeling by the fallen archer Parrell, whom the worm had spit out during our assault. Then I quickly looked back to Apok.

  “Is she alive?” I asked, not taking my eyes off my rival.

  “She does not wake,” Tolia reported, “but she breathes still. Her leg is broken.”

  “We don’t have time for your shit,” I told Apok. “Take Parrell back to the village.”

  “No,” he replied. “I will stay and safeguard my people—from the snake men and from any other threats.”

  My grip tightened on the handle of the .45. “It wasn’t a request, Apok.”

  He shrugged. “And yet, my answer remains the same, outsider.”

  The village tanner, a burly man named Oxsmith, stepped forward. “Enough of this. I will take Parrell back to the village. Then I will rejoin you.”

  I eyed him, hesitating.

  “Do not let my girth fool you, outsider. I am faster than a thunderbird. Continue on, and I will find my way back before you have even reached the forest.”

  “Very well.” Nodding, I lowered my weapon and stepped slowly backward. It was not lost on me that Oxsmith had mimicked Apok’s slur—calling me an outsider. Before now, I had always been on friendly terms with the man. I wondered if he was even aware he’d done it.

  Tolia tried collecting arrows from the worm’s carcass, but recoiled from the ammonia-like stench pouring from its wounds. Instead, she picked up a few unbroken shafts that had missed their mark and fallen on the ground. She distributed these among the other archers in the group. Then she unstrung Parrell’s bow and stored the spare string in her quiver.

  I surveyed the rest of the crowd. I don’t know if it was my imagination, but it seemed to me that more of them looked at me with suspicion or disdain than they had before. It wasn’t an outright revolt—not yet. But if Apok continued to sow seeds of discontent, it could turn into one fairly quickly. The villagers were scared, leaderless, and angry. They wanted somebody—anybody—to blame, and since we’d yet to find any Anunnaki for them to vent their rage on, I was beginning to make a fine scapegoat, no matter how illogical it might be. It occurred to me then that these people were not so different than the people back on Earth. Sure, they loved and laughed just as we’d done back home, but they also harbored the same fears and prejudices. Sure, maybe here in the Lost Level, the apprehensiveness stemmed from the possibility of getting eaten by a dinosaur rather than dying of cancer or a terrorist bombing, but human fear was still human fear, and xenophobia knew no dimensional boundaries.

  “There’s a tree line ahead,” I said to the assembled hunters. “The serpent men have taken our loved ones into it. And when I say our loved ones, I mean just that. Our. Most of you have welcomed me into your tribe many sleeps ago. If I am no longer welcome among you—if I am not considered to be one of you—we can discuss that, and who should lead you, later. Right now, we need to focus on the task at hand. Oxsmith is going to take Parrell back to the village. The rest of us are going to press ahead. We’re going to stay spaced out, in case there are more worms, but we’re also going to push hard. We can’t afford any more delays. If they get too far into the forest, we’ll have a hard time tracking them. Now, grab your gear and let’s go. Are there any objections?”

  About half of them voiced their affirmation. A few murmured negatively, but there was no large outcry or dissent. Satisfied, I holstered my pistol, drew my sword, and led us forward again, sweeping through the tall grass and following the trail. I glanced behind once to see Oxsmith bearing our fallen archer back toward the village, and caught sight of Apok slinking along at the rear of our procession.

  We were delayed twice more before reaching the tree line. The first time was when a looming shadow fell over us. We hunkered down in the grass, hiding as a large pterodactyl soared far overhead. Luckily, the beast didn’t spot us—or if it did, the thing decided we outnumbered it and wouldn’t make for an easy meal. It flew on, disappearing toward the mountains. The second delay occurred when we came across one of our villagers—a young woman named Slurra, lying dead to one side of the path. She bore no obvious signs of fatality. No wounds or injuries. Nor were there any indications on the ground around her of what might have occurred. I saw no blood, or scores and slashes from weaponry. No signs of a fight or struggle of any kind.

  “Perhaps she died from grief and despair,” Karenk suggested quietly.

  None of us argued with that hypothesis.

  “She will be avenged,” another villager promised.

  “We should bury her,” Apok said. “It is not right to leave her body here like this, where it can be eaten by scavengers.”

  I nodded. “I agree, but there is no time. Perhaps you could carry her back to the village, Apok? I’m sure her family would appreciate it.”