Chapter 381

The Prison Planet

Morales found another small hardwood tree slightly bigger in diameter than the pole he had been using for a chinning bar, downed it and cut a section to the correct length. Back in the cave, he removed the bark, smoothed the wood and secured it in the holes where the original chinning/hide stretching bar had been placed. When he had it in position, he hung with his weight on it, then bounced a bit, stressing it as best he could to test its strength, Lobo watching all the while.

That damn knot on my head has gone down some, but it's sore as hell, he thought as he tentatively touched the tender place. "I had better not hear one comment out of you," he tried to snarl at the wolf. "And don't sit there looking innocent. You know what I'm talking about."

Lobo turned and walked off, but Morales was almost positive he heard a quiet chuffing, anyway.

An hour later, he had finished the session of stretching for the second saber-tooth hide. As he was rolling it up, he caught movement out of the corner of his eye. The hen was up and drinking water from the nearby cut-off beer can. Shortly, the three chicks were copying their momma. Morales stood frozen as he watched them dip their tiny beaks in the water, then hold their heads almost vertically as they swallowed. Three tiny yellow balls were soon running around the hen's feet as she scratched in the greenery he had left for her, all the while continuing to cluck to her brood. Moments later, she had herded the chicks back to the nest where she fluffed her feathers and sat on the three remaining eggs as well as the chicks. An hour later, the chicks were moving around the nest, sometimes peeking from under Momma, and at other times, running around within a few feet of her.

Just to piss off the hen, he sat near. Enduring her squawking and threats, he remained still, just waiting. The chicks didn't know to be afraid of him, and were soon out from under momma hen again and investigating. It wasn't long until one got brave and ventured past Morales, then apparently realizing that he or she (he couldn't tell the difference) couldn't see Momma, began a frantic cheeping.

Without thought, Morales picked it up and put it near the hen. Seizing the opportunity, she halfheartedly pecked at his hand, but he wasn't stupid enough to leave it within range long, and she missed. Standing, she checked out her babies, apparently to make sure they were all there. Satisfied, she fluffed her feathers and sat back down to cover the chicks.

Morales was getting ready to go about his business when the chick poked its head past the hen's feathers again. He knew it was the same one because it had a slightly darker spot on its head. Morales reached over a little closer and drummed his fingers in the dirt just out of Gertrude's beak range. The yellow head disappeared into the hen's feathers, but a few seconds later, it was back.

Morales drummed his fingers in the dirt again. Gertrude leaned forward and pecked at his hand, but again, he was expecting it and jerked back. She obviously wanted to attack, but there was a problem. Even her chicken brain knew that the chicks would seize the opportunity to check things out if she didn't keep them covered. She couldn't go after the human and protect her chicks too.

While Momma was trying to decide what to do, Junior couldn't resist the drumming fingers any longer. Darting over, the chick stood just inches away, watching. Within a few moments, it was pecking at some tiny pieces of bacon Morales had saved just for that purpose. Gertrude glared at him, squawking from time to time, but wouldn't leave her other chicks and eggs to come attack him.

A couple of hours later, much to Gertrude's disgruntlement, the chick was following Morales around the cave as he went about his business. When it came near the wolf for the first time, the hen almost went into hysterics, but Lobo just smelled the chick and grinned at Morales.

Morales was tired of cleaning up chicken shit, starting with the first blob of it. Living with a chicken on a permanent basis wasn't going to fly, so he went outside to pick out a location for his chicken pen. After scanning the area, he decided that an evergreen tree roughly fifty feet to the left of the entrance would be an ideal roosting place for his chickens. Its fairly dense limb structure began six feet above the ground, and the tree was situated in a fairly thick area of bushes.

Starting next to the evergreen, he began cutting the bushes away to clear an area about twenty feet out from the tree all the way around. Then he worked the cut brush against the surrounding bushes, working them all into a tangled mass that should be impenetrable to full-grown chickens when the hedge fence was completed.

It took him until well after noon before he had the area cleared around the tree and those bushes worked into the beginnings of a fence that would eventually encircle the area. He would need many more bushes and more effort to fill all the holes in his makeshift chicken fence. It also needed to be higher, but he was here for life and had an unlimited amount of brush.

As he stood wiping sweat while checking out the beginning of his brush fence, a vivid mental picture of a plate of fried chicken formed in his mind. "Lobo," he said to the wolf who lay nearby watching, "one of these days we'll have chicken for lunch, and real eggs every morning for breakfast. How's that, Big Guy?"

Lobo grinned and chuffed a little as if he understood.

After a late, but hurried, lunch, Morales shelled the hen some corn, then added more greenery to her pile of food as well as scraps and also potato peelings from breakfast and lunch. He had noticed that she had begun to eat from time to time, but kept the periods away from the nest short. So far, no other chicks had hatched.

Back outside with Lobo again watching for danger, Morales brought the limbs and tops of the tree he had cut for lumber to add to his brush fence. Piling the brush into a long, circular row twenty feet out from the tree was relatively quick, but working the mass into a cohesive whole to reduce the size of the openings between the limbs took time. Still, he needed more bushes, but his world seemed full of them. He just had to cut and drag them to where he could stuff them into his fence.

By nightfall, he was tired and there was still more work to be done on the fence. Standing to check out his efforts, he realized the brush fence would be an ongoing process as the leaves dried out and fell off. That would probably reveal openings big enough for a chicken to get through, but he had hopes that the fence wouldn't always be needed. One of the articles said that wild chickens were fairly easily tamed and would generally remain near where they were fed. If the little yellow ball that was following him around was any indication, the chicks, at least, would soon be very tame, indeed. With the evergreen for a roosting place and the brush fence, the chickens should be reasonably safe in the tree's branches, especially with Lobo's keen hearing to listen for trouble. If the volume of Gertrude's squawking was normal for the chickens, even Morales would be able to hear should something upset them after he had them installed in the fenced area.

He used parachute cord to tie a group of the fence bushes together so that he could drag them aside as a unit, thus providing him with a gate of sorts. He would think of a more efficient way to make a gate later – he hoped.

At dusk, he and Lobo called it a day. As they entered the cave, the chick saw Morales and came running over with its ever-present cheeping. "Hey, Little Guy, or Little Girl," he said with a chuckle. "There's plenty of food over by your mother." But he took out another small piece of bacon he had put aside. Breaking it into tiny pieces, he sat with the chick on his knee as it ate out of his hand.

When all the bacon bits were gone, he put the little ball of fuzz on the floor. Animated as usual, it ran about until it noticed the wolf lying near Morales' bed. Dashing over, it cheeped at Lobo, then not knowing to be afraid, hopped up on a back leg. The wolf turned his head around some to stare the chick eye to eye, the attention apparently not bothering the yellow ball a bit. Ignoring the rumbling deep inside the large animal, the chick repeatedly tried to scale the mountain that was Lobo's side.

After several unsuccessful attempts, it made a major effort while fluttering its mostly useless wings. After struggling mightily for the last few inches, it achieved the crest of the mountain, much to Lobo's disgruntlement.

The wolf whined and looked at Morales as if to say, "Get this thing off me," but Morales just laughed.

It was obvious that the hen didn't like her offspring sitting on a wolf, but she was too terrified of the huge animal to attempt a rescue of the little explorer. Morales eventually took pity on Lobo when the chick decided to scratch for food in the wolf's hair ... atop his head.

Grabbing the errant youngster, he held it up to his face. "Lobo doesn't have fleas," he told the chick before putting it down next to its momma. "You're slipping, Ol' Girl," he said with a chuckle as Gertrude, who was so happy to see her offspring alive, she forgot to peck at Morales' hand.

The chick ran under Momma, but immediately stuck its head back out to stare at Morales.

He had planned to work on his arrows some more after dinner, but by the time he had everything cleaned up, he was ready for bed. All the long days, in addition to working well into the nights, had left him with a sleep deficit that he intended depleting tonight, at least to some degree. Minutes later, the light was off and he was snoring with Lobo sleeping beside the human's makeshift bed. It would be morning before he remembered the watermelon he had left to cool in the stream.

The Ship

At a little after four in the afternoon, Jeff sat in the chamber awaiting Helen's awakening. She had bathroom breaks morning and afternoon, as well as time for lunch, which she had on the Ship. Other than those, she was immersed in Ship's academy world the whole day. Roughly seven hours today had translated into nine months in the Academy. Ship had warned her that the year of advanced training would not translate so generously because of the complexity of the material she would be studying then. So far, Helen's basic courses had been similar to those that every cadet took during the first months of study, but that would change as time went on. Each crewmember would receive basic training for every position or field on the Ship. As far as the engines were concerned, however, Helen's assistants would be able to do little more than assist her in repairing the drives, but they would be able to stand duty watches.

As Helen's eyes began to blink, Jeff kissed her awake. "Hey, Love. Welcome back. And how was your first day at Ship's academy?" he asked, brightly.

"First day?" she repeated as reality firmed up about her. "I have been at the Academy for nine months yesterday." With a frown on her face, she wound down. "Oh, you know what I mean," she said, frustrated as she struggled to sit up.

As Jeff held his hand out to her, she stood, then hugged him while pressing her breasts hard against his muscular chest as she stared into his eyes. Just before his mouth descended to hers, she whispered, "I'm almost out of my mind horny for you. It's been nine months."

When his lips and mouth locked with hers, she shivered and pulled herself tighter against him. When they finally parted, he grinned down at her, "Didn't get laid on your academy breaks?" he teased, just to see what she would say.

Helen had turned to leave the chamber, but she hesitated before saying, "I didn't remember anything about our life here, and I was propositioned several times, but I was not interested, even though I was horny at the academy, too. I wonder if that was Ship's influence, or yours – somehow? I mean, I would never even think of cheating on you, but I had no memory of you while I was at the academy."

As he noticed the intent look on her face, "Baby, no sense being upset," he responded while putting an arm around her as they walked out of the chamber. "You wouldn't be cheating on me while at Ship's academy – no more than dreaming would be."

"Well, I was tempted on break – really tempted – but I am so glad I did not take him up on his invitation, but..." she said with an evil little grin, "he was very good looking and oh so sexy, too."