Landrise

The atmosphere began to fall like rain, freezing the instant it splashed on the thick sheet of ice that was the vast Drekeln Plain. Sharp spines bloomed from the amorphous drops, glistening under the piercing light of the moon Ilbra. Stalking out from a cave in the side of Mount Drekeln, spyglass in hand, a figure, bundled in several layers of patterned clothes stepped out and peered over the edge of the precipice.

“Find anything, Arlkna?” The gurgling voice of Brekten preceded the rhythmic shuffle of his steps.

Raising her spyglass to her goggles, she sighed, the sound muffled through her thick face wrap. “No weight of creatures in sight.”

“You’ve checked there?” Brekten’s Octrectin accent still bubbled through his Lirklin words. “I see the glass of spying now? I did work at spying escaped beasts.” He held his tentacle out, expectantly.

Arlkna looked at him, hip cocked, her silvery spyglass between her fingers, sizing him up. “Fine.” She finally said, relinquishing the spyglass into his waiting tentacle. “Be very careful with it. Last person dropped my previous one down a ravine.”

Hefting the spyglass and bouncing it a couple times, Brekten gurgled—an amused expression. “It been long time when it broken.” He put it up to the edge of his helmet. “It very light. Well used.”

“No one else has used this one since.” Reaching into her pockets, she dug out a knife, carved with runes and twirled it around her finger before grabbing the piece of frozen Carbon Dioxide she’d been working with. “You’re the first in a long time.” She said, pressing the center of the runes. The knife edge began to glow red. “Don’t break my trust. I shouldn’t have brought you in the first place.” Her knife hissed against the ice as chunks flashed into a gas, then condensed back into snow. “But here we are.”

“I’m careful. You see.” He said, using five of his tentacles as a base. The other three worked the glass, shifting the view. “You very right. No weight of creatures. Maybe over—“

It was then the rumbling started. It was quiet at first. Frozen pebbles falling from the cliffs above them. “Damn it!” Arlkna said, grabbing her things. “We’re leaving, now!” Hopefully it wouldn’t take the cave.

“Landrise?” Brekten asked. “Never seen one, I haven’t.”

Cracks, thick as rivers split the enormous Drekeln plain as the rumbling intensified. “Well, you better get moving, unless you want that to be the last thing you’ll ever see. I don’t have the food stores to get you out of trouble” Boulders began to crash on the outside of the cave, shattering sections of the ice cliff; chunks blew out into the plain, now beginning to bulge upward.

Brekten stayed just inches from the edge of the cave, transfixed, several tentacles holding imaging crystals, Arlkna’s spyglass nowhere to be seen. “Very interesting!” He yelled over the crashing and crumbling of the world around them.

“You’re an idiot, you know that?” Arlkna shouted. “Get back!” Another crack exploded through the plain, causing her to stumble. “Such a massive load of—” She cursed, cut off by another explosion of rock and ice from the ground. She fell to all fours. Brekten, still at the edge, watching the immense destruction, simply laughed.

“Never do these happen at where I’m from!”

“Get away!” Arlkna yelled again, digging her still red-hot knife into the ice wall at the back of the cave. The metal screeched and hissed she dug. This was bad, best to get farther down. “Spend your energy elsewhere, damn you!”

He didn’t listen. He simply stood on five and stared gleefully as another section of the cliff collapsed and fell into the valley. Boulders broke free from the ground beneath, levitating slowly into the sky. Another resounding snap, like thunder echoed in the mountains, splitting the cave straight down the middle. Why did I ever agree to have him along, the freezing idiot? She thought, throwing herself to the side. They always get themselves killed!

The crack yanked Brekten from his reverie and he sloshed into motion, scrambling for the space in the back of the cave where Arlkna sat, digging inward. A rumbling roar ruptured the air as the ground beneath Brekten shifted all at once, lifting; the plateau squealed against the neighboring ice.

He froze as the wall rose—1 meter, 2 meters, 3 meters. Arlkna growled, setting herself into motion. Pressing off her blade and tossing it to the side, she rifled into her bag and removed a metal cylinder, more runes carved deep into it.

4 meters.

She slammed the device against the inside of her bicep, feeling her arms strengthen, before aiming just above the edge of the raising platform. Brekten scrambled, searching for some way down. His water suit would break if he jumped. “Wait there!” She yelled up to the Octrectin.

6 meters.

Taking aim, she palmed the back of her device. It instantly grew noticeably lighter, expending that mass into the explosion that launched the hook on the end skyward. Her arms stung with pain as the laws of physics pushed back. The hook, trailed by a rope, flew, clanking into the wall of ice and falling back. “Just hold tight!” She yelled. Temperatures dropped quickly the greater the altitude. Even his heated suit wouldn’t keep him safe a few hundred meters up.

10 meters.

The grappling hook wouldn’t reach that far. Arlkna needed to improvise. Searching around, a lip of ice jutted out from the wall above her. Perhaps. She could feel her energy sapping as her fortified arms remained strengthened. She didn’t have too much food with her, but seemed within her limits for now.

15 meters.

Kicking each of her calves filled her legs with power! She leapt up, reaching heights, impossible without those runes. Her strengthened arms pulled her upward, her feet kicking off and sending her higher.

20 meters.

The landmass rose faster, the grinding sound lessening as the craggy end of the new island revealed itself, boulders and enormous chunks of ice crashing back into the crevasse that had once been the Drekeln plain. Arlkna leapt, struggling to gain an advantage on the rising mass. Balancing herself between two chunks of ice, she aimed again, firing her grappling hook a second time. Its weight dropped again as the explosion pushed her backward, her left foot slipping. The hook veered wildly off, flying into the air and back down, hitting nothing.

Arlkna began to fall and she dropped the grappling hook to grab onto the cliff. Her tool fell slowly, floating down as if it were a feather. “Freezing rains!” She yelled, trying desperately to climb. Her stomach rumbled. She was out of calories to spend.

28 meters.

A creeping ache began to enter her muscles. They would be first to go. Next, the bones. Lastly, the soft tissues, like the brain. A sense of panic filled her as she considered her choices. Above, Brekten gurgled and howled. She could not climb that far that quickly. The gnawing ache grew and cramps began in her arms and legs.

40 meters.

She sighed, looking up to her companion. It’s his fault for being there anyway. She told herself, growling. None of them ever listen. She let go of the wall, letting herself fall back to the ground, pressing the center of her chest, feeling both the warmth of fortification and the pain of her muscles being eaten away.

60 meters.

She landed, the pain of gravity ringing through her. She quickly pressed her arms, legs, and chest before collapsing back into her cave, the dull ache pulsing through her. Her mind drifted to Brekten.

“He should’ve listened!” She said to the empty air beside her. “He should’ve listened.”

No one answered. In the end, no one ever did.

So she lay there without tears—those had dried up years ago. Instead, she opened her pack, pulling out a frozen can, tapping the bottom. Heat rose from it in waves. This stuff didn’t taste great, but it was food. She placed and tapped a steel sphere in front of her for heat, and began to eat, scanning the new landscape, alone once again. It was better this way.