The Book of Apex: Volume 1 of Apex Magazine by Jason Sizemore Page A

His ankle
exploded with fresh pain and Penn pitched forward. The land rolled him over,
carrying him down a shallow slope. He stopped on his back. For a moment, the
wind did not fill his ears with its rush.
    Beyond the shelter of the small
hollow, Penn heard a hissing like a thousand fingers scraping across steel.
Another one. Why had he thought that there would only be one on the planet? His
heart kicked wildly at his ribs. He had to get back to the airlock. He could
hide in there until help came.
    Except—the fall. He’d gotten
turned around. He didn’t know where the ship was.
    Penn sat up carefully, and the
hissing disappeared into the rush of wind. The thing could be anywhere.
    Sinking back down so he could
hear again, Penn shivered. The hissing was louder. Penn sniffed the air,
searching for the scent of dog. He whispered, “Cody? On duty. On duty...”
     

The Limb Knitter
    Steven Francis Murphy
     
    With a spade in one hand and a
burlap sack in the other, the Limb Knitter dug for trench tubers in the Beaten
Zone as the early morning rain gave way to a foggy Western dawn. Down on her
belly in the mud between the Invaders to her South and Forces Velaysia to her
North, she found the pickings pretty slim. She gave up poking at the mud for a
moment and looked toward her lines.
    Spring filled the lower
elevations on the southern face of the Canarus Ranges, sowing the valleys and
slopes behind the trenches in emerald foliage. From the gates of the mountain
redoubts of Forces Velaysia, the Limb Knitter caught sight of the Brigades
Invalid, on the march with their machines to stiffen the mere flesh and bone
Frontists of the Brigades Defender along the Southern Front. Mixed in amid the
rusty, black bipeds were the Invalid Harvesters, their bodies whitewashed to
prevent friendly fire and their backs burdened with empty harvest drums.
    No more trench tubers
for a while ,
the Knitter told herself. Her two stomachs rumbled in agreement. She was sick
of digging for the tasteless, decayed bits anyway.
    The Knitter could see all of
this through the morning fog, but her true prey, Frontist Delauchen Severis was
only human. Shivering under his poncho, he could see no further than the insectile,
maggot-blown corpses of crucified Invaders on the reserve slope of the
trenches.
    You look miserable,
Delauchen, the
Limb Knitter thought.
    He was jittery too. The Limb
Knitter’s prey jumped every time he heard her spade bite into the soil.
    She watched him collect his
weapon and begin the long crawl out of the Beaten Zone toward the forward
trenches of the Southern Front. The Knitter put her spade away, still hungry,
and crawled behind him, slow and steady.
    Only when he was safe in the
flooded trenches did he remove his rusty brain bucket and scratch madly at his
greasy, matted hair. The Limb Knitter eased up to the trench with envy deep in
her chest. She could just hear their conversation.
    “Morning, grouch,” his conflict
spouse, Thalia Vetraslev said. She gave him a peck on the lips. “See anything
out there?”
    “No,” he said, avoiding her
eyes, as was his nature. “Not a damned thing. Just thought I heard some
Knitters digging about.”
    “I’ll get chow,” the Knitter
heard Thalia say.
    Delauchen started to snore
while still on his feet.
    Thalia thumped him in the
shoulder. “Hey, did you hear me, Delauchen? I’m going for chow.”
    He jerked awake, “Yes, sorry. I
think I need sleep more than food.”
    “You’ll want your tea,” she
said. “I know how you are.”
    It must be nice to have
someone, the
Knitter thought. She watched Thalia head eastward to join a line of male and
female Frontists headed for the bombproof kitchens. Thalia was big-boned and
had wide hips which formed her short, pear-shaped frame. When the Frontist waved
back at Delauchen, it was possible to see the vanilla-scented ointment that
covered the albino patches of skin on the right side of her face.
    The Knitter’s Mark.
    Delauchen
waved back