Nightborn, page 6
As he stepped down from the rock and was engulfed by people with questions, Leo watched quietly from the edge of the gathering. Suddenly he felt a warm hand slide into his own.
“You okay?” Lise asked. “You look worried.”
He smiled wryly. “Worried is my default state these days.”
She reached up and traced his hairline with a gentle finger. They’d been attracted to each other in Orientation, and even shared a few moments of hesitant intimacy, but the trauma of Julian’s death had still weighed heavily on his soul, too much for him to let his barriers down. He’d hoped that by leaving the planet where his son had died and embracing a new start in life, he could ease that burden. Instead, events on Erna seemed to be adding to it.
After a moment she leaned against his side, resting her head on his arm. And as the stars of the galaxy swept in graceful arcs across the sky, he wondered what the world would be like when they were gone—when all the lights in the sky were gone—and true night fell.
Midnight. It was impossible to sleep. He kept thinking about Tia’s autopsy, wondering what clues Lise might have missed. Intellectually he was confident she’d covered all possible bases, but that didn’t stop him from obsessing over it.
The solar lanterns had been turned off to conserve power, and there was only one moon overhead to see by. As he walked across the southern field he saw Heather Snow and David Saito standing guard by the gate, fully armed. In theory he’d put them there to watch for monsters, but they’d also see if anyone tried to leave the camp, like Tia had. Until they understood what had compelled her to head into the woods at night, it was best to be careful.
We should build a watchtower, Leo thought. Then we’d be able to see the whole camp, and the landscape surrounding.
It was such a beautiful night. And such a beautiful world. CCs were buzzing in the distance, doing a convincing imitation of insects. If you didn’t notice that they were all outside the perimeter fence, and that the camp itself was eerily silent, you could almost imagine you were home.
This is home now, he reminded himself sternly. Earth is just a story we’ll tell our children.
Grass rustled behind him. He looked back and saw the chaplain, Dani Lin, approaching. He nodded for her to join him. For a moment the two of them stood side by side in companionable silence, listening to the nocturnal music of their new world.
“Wayne came to see me,” Dani said at last. “When I saw you pass by the tents I figured this was as good a time as any to talk to you about it.” She sighed. “I think he’s a little bit afraid to talk to you directly, after the way you snapped at him when Tia’s body was found.”
Lips tight, Leo shook his head. “That was wrong of me. Everyone should feel free to say what they’re thinking.” He looked out toward the place where Tia had died. “Hell, I’m supposed to be the inspirational leader, aren’t I? Tia’s death shook me badly, but that’s no excuse. I shouldn’t have snapped at him like that. I’ll apologize tomorrow.” He looked at Dani “So what did he say to you?”
“He talked about an old movie in his collection. It was based on a story that he said was a classic, though I’d never heard of it. Genre stuff, I guess. It was about a world that had six suns, where the orbits were timed so that there was always at least one in the sky.”
“So the world was never dark.”
“Exactly.”
He smiled dryly. “Like Erna, but brighter.”
“Once every two thousand years, Wayne said, the suns would align with the planet so that five weren’t visible, and then the sixth was eclipsed. For a brief time, the whole world went dark.”
Leo raised an eyebrow. “And?”
“Wayne said all the people went mad.”
“That seems a little extreme.”
“It wasn’t the darkness that did it—not in any physical sense—but the utter alienness of the experience. These people had lived in light all their life, and suddenly their whole paradigm was just . . . gone. The rules of reality could no longer be relied upon. They couldn’t handle it.”
“Is Wayne suggesting something like that might happen on Saturday?”
“He didn’t say that specifically, but I got that impression.”
Leo frowned. “It’s quite a stretch. We grew up with darkness. It’s not an alien concept to us. Hell, as far as our subjective awareness is concerned, it hasn’t even been a week since the last time we saw night fall on Earth.” He shook his head. “I’m not really worried about anyone losing their sanity over four minutes of darkness.”
“Maybe not now,” Dani said. “But phenomena that seemed perfectly normal on Earth may have a different effect on people here. Obviously nothing dire is going to happen two days from now, but Wayne suggested that down the road something might. He said we should watch for signs of things heading in that direction. So we’re not taken by surprise if and when it does happen.”
Could our own Terran heritage become alien to us? Leo mused. That’s a dark thought. “It’s an interesting suggestion. A bit out there, but aren’t we supposed to be thinking outside the box? If I recall his psych profile, that was listed as one of his strengths. So I’m glad he’s contributing his ideas. You can tell him I said that.” He held up a hand. “No. Never mind. I’ll tell him myself tomorrow, when I apologize to him.”
He gazed up at the stars in silence for a moment. “He might be right, you know. We may have to let go of what we were before, in order to adapt to this world. Though it’s not something the other colonies mentioned.” But they didn’t have to deal with botanical impossibilities or creatures that ate human hearts. And insects didn’t flee their presence. Their planets not only looked like Earth, they acted like Earth.
“This is our home now,” Dani said quietly. “Whether we embrace its differences or resist them, in the end we’ll adapt.” She smiled slightly. “Humans always do. He’s just suggesting we embrace the change.”
“And watch out for those who can’t handle it.”
She nodded.
He sighed. “It’s not terrible advice.”
She chuckled softly and patted his arm. “You can tell him that when you apologize.”
Commander’s Personal Log
Year One
Day Four
Several loud cracks were heard today, coming from the southeast. Maybe gunfire? That could be our hunting team, though whether they have found game or encountered a monster is anyone’s guess. The lush green forest that once seemed so welcoming has become a source of fear. We need to figure out what killed Tia, and how, so we can deal with it.
TO DO:
Cargo Pods: Send tractors out to bring in the ones that landed far afield. The pods themselves will be too heavy to move while loaded, so we’ll bring in the contents first. Assuming nothing was damaged in stasis we should have Terran food staples in camp by this evening, as well as medical supplies and much-needed construction goods. Plus all the raw materials we’ll get from disassembling the pods themselves.
Mess tent: We need a sheltered place where all of us can gather. Several large tents will be combined, stretching across the middle of the camp, to serve us for meals and meetings. The southern-facing roof will be covered with solar panels, adding considerably to our power supply. That’s good, because by the time we get all our equipment up and running the need for power will be considerable.
“Glad this job is almost done.” Rod wiped the sweat from his face with a grimy hand and slid down from his tractor seat. He was a stocky man whose cheeks flushed bright red when he exerted himself, and a day of labor in the hot sun had made them even redder. He headed over to the water station, poured himself a drink, downed half of it in a single gulp, and poured the rest over his head. Glancing over at the other person at the water station, a lanky youth named Keith, he announced, “Jesus H. Christ, that feels good!”
They were two miles from the camp, preparing to unload the cargo pod that had come down farthest from the landing site. It had been damaged while landing, and one corner was crushed, but hopefully none of the vacuum-sealed storage bins inside had been compromised. Given how long they’d been in space there was no guarantee the contents were still good, but without proper seals there was no chance at all.
Staple foodstuffs, medical supplies, industrial-sized rolls of plastic sheeting, synthetic materials that could be used as planks or fed to the 3-D printer, and so much more: Earth had packed all the things a colony might not be able to produce locally, at least not in their first year. And the pods themselves could be broken down for steel if necessary. Even the parachutes that had brought them safely down would be cannibalized for fabric and hardware. Nothing that had come from Earth would be wasted, because none of it could be replaced.
“You’re a wuss.” Keith grinned broadly and waved at the work being done a hundred yards away. “This is the last unloading job today. We’ll be heading back soon.”
“And then tomorrow we get to come back here to fetch empty pods. Another fun task.” Rod snorted. “Never ends, does it?”
“Maybe you should have volunteered for some other work team. Basket weaving, maybe? That sounds like your speed.”
Rod laughed. “Bring on the raffia!”
Someone at the cargo pod whistled loudly to get their attention, then yelled between cupped hands, “Hey, you two! It’s not quitting time yet. Get your butts back to work!”
Rod put his cup down. “I guess I could go gather up the parachutes.”
Keith tsk-tsked. “You know what the priorities are. Bins first, pods and parachutes later.”
“I know.” Rod chuckled. “I was just testing you.” As he climbed back up to his seat he said, “Did you ever think about how fucked we’d be without these tractors? I had a nightmare last night in which they all broke down, and we had to haul this stuff to the camp on our backs.”
“They’ll be fine, unless you jinx them with your bad dreams.”
With a grin Rod put his tractor in gear and started to drive back toward the pod. But the vehicle only went a few yards, then the engine stalled out. “Shit,” he muttered. He tried starting it again. The motor wheezed a few times, then died. The next time he tried, it made no sound at all. “Shit!”
Back at the pod, the team leader waved impatiently for the two of them to get moving. Rod pointed to his motor and then spread his hands wide: Sorry, no can do. Others saw the gestured conversation and looked their way, including Chrissy. She said something Rod couldn’t hear and then started jogging toward them. She was the most mechanically inclined of the group, so the best qualified to help.
He slid down from his seat as she approached, giving her room to work. “Won’t start,” he said.
“Guessed that,” she said curtly.
She climbed into the cab and checked all the controls, tested a few switches, and studied the data displays. She even stuck her head under the console, though Rod had no idea why. Finally she straightened up. “Batteries are charged, fluid levels good, circuits intact, engine temperature within normal range. Everything looks good. Let me take a look inside.” She headed around to the front of the vehicle and lifted the hood. Leaning over the engine, she poked and prodded a number of things that Rod couldn’t see, then cursed under her breath. “No problem that I can see.”
“Meaning what?”
She stood back and let the hood drop. “Meaning that shipping heavy machinery halfway across the galaxy in DIY form may not have been such a great idea. Something to mention in our first colony report. Let’s see, that’ll get to Earth in, what, twenty thousand years?” She wiped a lock of sweaty hair back from her face. “This thing isn’t going anywhere today. We’ll have to haul it back to the camp, where I can run some tests and figure out what’s wrong.”
“Which’ll take another tractor,” Keith muttered. “That’s two flatbeds that won’t be hauling supplies.”
She shrugged. “It is what it is.”
Keith looked at Rod with narrow eyes. “You jinxed it, man.”
“Hey!” The stocky man raised his hands in protest. “All I did was say I was worried about stuff breaking down!”
“And how you were having nightmares about it. That’s bad psychic energy.” He sighed. “I guess I know what I’m hauling home, anyway.” He shook his head. “Leo won’t be happy about this, that’s for sure.”
“It wasn’t my fault,” Rod insisted. “So no more crap about my jinxing it, okay? Shit happens.”
Keith laughed. “Oh, I am going to tease you about that for days, my friend. Sorry, but you set yourself up.”
“And I’ll tell the others about it,” Chrissy promised. “They’ll want in on it too.”
“Fuck you,” Rod muttered. “Fuck you both.” He kicked his tractor’s tire. “And you too, you lazy motherfucker.”
Team Paleo returned at sunset, tired but exultant. As they proudly carried their kills into the camp, people came running to see what kind of animals they’d murdered. One that looked similar to a deer was tied hooves-up to a tree limb slung between the shoulders of two of the men. “Steak tonight!” one of them cried out, as people gathered around them. Some people looked more repelled than jubilant. Earth had switched to vat-grown tissue long ago, and they’d never before seen meat in its original form. They were having a hard time reconciling the bloody, gutted corpse in front of them with the concept of “dinner.”
Steve, the head cook, came over to inspect the corpse. They’d already gutted it, but it still had its skin, and its eyes were staring in a disturbing way. Steve’s only experience with butchering had been in virtual simulations during Orientation, but those subjects hadn’t looked so disconcertingly alive. Taking a deep breath, he waved the hunters toward his kitchen area, which now had several planks from the cargo pods set up as tables, and directed them to put the not-quite-a-deer on the largest one. Then, knife in hand, he discovered that practicing something in virtual reality and doing it in person were two different skills, especially when blood and gore were involved. In the end he had to play a tutorial on his tablet to guide him in real time, for which he was roundly teased by the crowd that had gathered to watch the bloody ritual. “Hey!” he snapped. “If you think you can do better, volunteer!” No one did. A few turned away to be sick, but for the rest, it was high performance art.
Leo took the hunters aside, thanked them wholeheartedly for their labor, and then told them about Tia. They should hear it from him, he said, not random comments at the dinner table. None of that would stop people from celebrating the colony’s first successful hunt, but there was a shadow hanging over the camp now that was hard to ignore.
There wasn’t enough meat for two hundred people to have steak dinners, Steve announced, but the foraging team had found potato-like tubers as well as some aromatics, and he was going to whip up enough stew to satisfy everyone. The alien perfume of Ernan herbs filled the new mess tent as synth planks from the cargo pods were laid out to serve as tables and benches, and when they were in place Anna proudly displayed the collection of cups, bowls, and utensils that she had 3-D printed. No more protein bars eaten as finger food for this colony!
By the time the food was ready the sun was setting, lanterns turning on automatically as dusk began. The plastic cups were filled with an herbed drink that Steve’s assistants had whipped up, sweet and minty, and everyone toasted the hunters, then the team that had retrieved all their cargo. And soon everyone received portions of steaming hot stew, a gourmet meal by Ernan standards. Ian revealed he had seeds for hops and promised that soon enough they’d have beer—real beer—to wash their food down with, and so they toasted him, too.
Of course the members of Team Paleo had to describe every moment of their adventure so that their exploits could fully be appreciated. Their ancient ancestors had no doubt done the same, grouped around a communal campfire; some human rituals were eternal. Taking a seat nearby, Leo felt a spark of guarded optimism. His people clearly had the spirit of solidarity needed to make this colony work, and two major milestones had now been achieved. That still left the question of what had killed Tia, but hopefully proper precautions would prevent another event like that. And death at the hands of a local predator was a tragic but not unpredictable event, when establishing a colony in unfamiliar wilds.
“You should have seen Sky,” one of the hunters was saying. “He would just point a gun at an animal and whisper where he wanted it to go. And it did! It was the most amazing fucking thing ever.”
“Like it wanted to be shot,” another hunter agreed.
“C’mon, guys.” Sky grinned. “I was just sensing where it was about to go. Talking to myself, not to it. No magical powers, just good observation.”
One of the other hunters grunted. “Fucking unnatural, if you asked me.”
Sky looked at him. “You complaining?”
The hunter snorted. “Hell no!”
Was it unnatural? Or just coincidence? Keith Esper was now telling everyone how Rod had jinxed a tractor by dreaming that it would break down. More coincidence? Things like that happened all the time back on Earth, Leo told himself. If his nerves weren’t so raw from dealing with Tia’s death, the men’s comments would have passed without notice. But right now everything out of the ordinary felt like it could be significant. So how unusual did something have to be before it was worthy of attention?
He shook his head to clear it. He needed to focus on something else for a while. Maybe this would be a good time to talk to Wayne.
