Earth Girl

by Janet Edwards

  ‘This is Site Leader. Sounds like I’d better come and take a look.’

  Pereth presumably took a look and didn’t like what he saw. He moved the teams on even numbered clock positions to work on the central circle, while the rest dealt with the problem chunk of diamene.

  So I was back working directly above Solar 5, tagging rocks, when something dazzling white and spraying sparks seemed to streak across the rubble in front of me. About three sensor sled alarms went off, I felt Fian’s lifeline yank me backwards, and there was an explosion.

  32

  The next thing I remember was that my suit was totally rigid, I was struggling to breathe, and my left leg was hurting like chaos. The suit started relaxing, and Fian was yelling in my ear.

  ‘Jarra? Jarra?’

  The broadcast channel was urgently talking as well. ‘This is Site Leader. Everyone out of the central circle and stay out. I’ve reports of five injured tag leaders. Earth 1, Asgard 6, Earth 19, Beowulf 4, Hera 6. Medical advice is do not remove their suits. I repeat, do not remove their suits because we expect electrical burns. Our doctor is coming round on a transport sled to assess and move casualties.’

  ‘Jarra?’ asked Fian again. ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘I’m in slight discomfort,’ I said, calm and stoic in the face of agony. No, to be honest, once I got my breath back I screamed.

  ‘This is Hera 6. Our tag leader is in a lot of pain. Can we give painkillers?’

  This seemed a good question to me. I was in a lot of pain too.

  ‘This is Site Leader. Our advice is open the suit enough to give one standard painkiller shot. Make sure you don’t open the suit near a burn.’

  ‘Where does it hurt, Jarra?’ That was Rono. I still had my eyes closed, in the strange theory that it would make my leg hurt less, but it sounded like Rono was next to me. There were several other people talking in low voices as well.

  ‘Left leg,’ I said. I somehow wasn’t in the mood for long conversations.

  ‘Nowhere else?’

  ‘No.’

  I felt someone take down my hood and open the front of my suit a fraction. Amid the chill of New York winter air, there was the slightly different chill of an injection, and then they closed my suit again. I’m not normally keen on meds, but I was that time. The pain in my leg stepped down several levels from acute agony to merely hurting quite a bit.

  ‘I got you out as fast as I could,’ said Fian, miserably. ‘It wasn’t fast enough.’

  ‘You did great,’ I said. ‘It would have been a lot worse than just my leg otherwise. What happened?’

  ‘We’re still working it out,’ said Rono. ‘The storm induced a current in some wiring, which triggered an old power storage unit, but the explosion was somehow magnified by Solar 5’s shields being so close.’

  ‘This is Site Leader. I think we have to thank our tag support people there. We have five nasty injuries, but it could have been much worse. Tag supports had better accompany their injured tag leaders to base camp. We’re getting close to Solar 5 now, so the rest of us can proceed extremely slowly and carefully to remove hazards and complete the dig. We need hospital treatment for both Military casualties and our own, so once the rescue is complete, we’ll drive in convoy to the nearest settlement with medical facilities.’

  A strange female voice was talking to me. ‘Jarra, where does it hurt?’

  ‘Left leg.’

  There was the sound of a scanner and I felt something odd. I finally opened my eyes to see Fian, the hood of his impact suit down, and his long blond hair in tangles round his anxious face. Next to him, was the purple and silver figure of Rono, and a yellow clad stranger who was writing on the front of my suit.

  ‘Hey! That’s a new suit.’

  ‘You can wash it off with solvent later, Jarra.’ Rono sounded amused. ‘It’s the best way to make sure a record of your treatment stays with you at all times.’

  ‘My suit is all right, isn’t it?’ I asked, panicking in case it had been damaged in the accident.

  ‘If it isn’t, you can bill the Military for a replacement, but it should be fine,’ he reassured me. ‘It’s just completed a successful self diagnostic.’

  ‘Oh good.’ I relaxed.

  ‘She’s crazy.’ Fian sounded close to panic. ‘Is she going to be all right? We can’t portal her to hospital and …’

  ‘Fian, I promise we’ll get her there by sled,’ said Rono.

  ‘I can stabilize the injury for now,’ said the strange female voice. ‘Jarra, I’m setting your suit controls to keep your left leg a little cooler than usual, and I’m giving you some meds to help with the shock and prevent infection. They’ll make you feel relaxed and possibly a little sleepy.’

  They opened my suit again briefly for another injection. Fian and Rono strapped me to a stretcher after that, and moved me on to a transport where there were already three other tag leaders on stretchers with worried tag support in attendance.

  ‘I want to stay and watch the rescue,’ I complained.

  ‘Tough,’ said Fian.

  ‘The vid bees are recording it,’ said Rono. ‘You can watch it later. Take care of her, Fian. We’ll soon catch up with you at the base camp, but call me on the team circuit if you need anything at all before then. Playdon is going to kill me for letting Jarra get hurt …’

  We bobbed our way off on the transport, and picked up the fifth injured tag leader. There was a brief argument, since the tag leader concerned wanted to keep working despite having a burnt arm. His tag support expressed his opinion on this pretty forcefully, and the tag leader was strapped to a stretcher and loaded in near to me.

  Fian was sitting next to me. He listened to the argument, and shook his head in disbelief. ‘He’s as mad as you are, Jarra.’

  ‘They’re all mad,’ said the other tag support bitterly. ‘Tag leaders are all totally, utterly, stark raving mad. Are you the two from Asgard 6?’

  ‘That’s right.’ Fian nodded.

  ‘I’ve heard about her. You have my sympathy. We’re Earth 19, by the way.’

  ‘Pleased to meet a fellow sufferer,’ said Fian.

  ‘I was all right after the pain killer,’ grumbled the Earth 19 tag leader. ‘I could go back now and …’

  ‘Nuke it!’ yelled his tag support savagely.

  Fian jumped nervously. I couldn’t, since I was firmly strapped to a stretcher.

  ‘Sorry,’ the Earth 19 tag support apologised to us. ‘I find the only way is to be firm.’

  The Earth 19 tag leader kept grumbling all the way back to base camp. Our stretchers were carried in to the dome labelled ‘Medical 1’, and the doctor came round and checked us again. I was allowed to have the front of my suit slightly open.

  ‘You mustn’t take the suit off that leg under any circumstances,’ the doctor lectured me as she gave me another shot of meds. Either this one was a lot stronger than the previous one, or they combined and ganged up on me, because within a few minutes I started feeling woozy.

  I would like to state right now, that I was not entirely responsible for anything I said after that point. In fact, the next thing I said was more a noise than a real word. ‘Wheee.’

  ‘Are you all right?’ asked Fian.

  I considered the point carefully. ‘I don’t know what they put in those meds, but I think I’m a bit powered.’

  Fian brought me a drink of water, and then mopped my brow with a wet cloth. I think he’d seen someone doing that in a vid. It felt quite nice.

  ‘You really want us to stay together?’ I asked.

  ‘Yes,’ said Fian. ‘I can write it on your suit if you like.’

  I giggled for ages.

  He gave me a worried look. ‘Was it really that funny a joke?’

  ‘It’s the meds,’ I said.

  I peered around at the other patients. I was on the end of the line, and the next stretcher was the Earth 19 tag leader. He and his tag support had stopped shouting at each other, and were now
talking in low voices. I didn’t know whether they were lovers, married, friends, or brothers, but they were totally absorbed in each other. I checked that my suit definitely wasn’t broadcasting on any channel at all, and decided that Fian and I had relative privacy.

  ‘Fian,’ I said cautiously. ‘You don’t want me to vanish?’

  He shook his head. ‘I really will have to write this on your suit. Listen to me carefully. I’m a poor panicky exo. I’m scared to death because you’re hurt and I can’t portal you to a hospital. If there was any lingering doubt in my head about what I wanted, then this situation has made things totally clear. I don’t want to lose you. I don’t want you to vanish. That is not an option under any circumstances. We get you to a hospital, we get you well, and then we tell the class.’

  ‘It’s not fair on you if …’

  ‘Nuke it, Jarra!’ Fian was obviously under the influence of the Earth 19 tag support. ‘If the class yell at you because you’re Handicapped, then we’ll cope with it. If they yell at me, then we’ll cope with it. If Playdon yells at both of us, then we’ll cope with it. If it’s really impossible, because the class are too chaos prejudiced, we’ll both transfer to a University Earth course. The Handicapped can call me an exo all they like because I don’t care. Do you understand me? Yes or no?’

  ‘Yes, but I really don’t deserve to have you sticking by me like this.’

  ‘I know you don’t,’ said Fian, ‘but I’m your tag support. Getting my crazy tag leader out of trouble is my job.’

  ‘Fian,’ I said, ‘you’re a totally zan tag support, much better looking than Rono, and I don’t just like you, I really …’

  I don’t remember exactly what I said after that, but I have a feeling it was something incredibly embarrassing. I’m not good at saying affectionate stuff, but I was under the influence of the meds and …

  So, things got a bit silly for a while, but then we spared some attention for what was happening on the broadcast channel. We’d worked on that rescue until nearly the end, but we could only listen to the comments on the broadcast channel during the big exciting finish. I eventually saw the coverage from the vid bees about a week later. Solar 5 lying in the bottom of the giant crater with its shields glowing against the rubble. The shields going off, and the escape hatches opening. The Military coming out, carrying some of their people on stretchers. Amaz.

  It was about fifteen minutes after that, when someone gave a gentle cough, and we discovered Rono had come to visit.

  ‘Gah!’ I said, wondering what he’d overheard.

  Rono read the latest medical report on the front of my suit, while I watched the arrival of a group of people in Military blue impact suits, some of them towing hover stretchers. They must be bringing their injured into the Medical domes, to be checked over while everyone else packed sleds ready for the trip across to the settlement. There were two Military doctors as well, and one of them came over, scanned my leg, and read the notes written on my suit.

  ‘This is silly,’ I said.

  ‘It is?’ he asked.

  ‘I was supposed to be rescuing you, and you’re treating me.’

  ‘You did rescue me,’ he said, ‘and I very much appreciate it. How are you feeling?’

  ‘Drunk,’ I said, happily. ‘It’s the meds.’

  ‘Good. We want you relaxed and pain free.’

  Another figure appeared to join the group round my stretcher. I already had one Fian, one Rono, and one Military doctor. I was startled to discover I’d added a Military Colonel to my collection. ‘Sir!’

  Colonel Torrek had his left arm strapped across the chest of his impact suit, and his hood was down to show the face I remembered from my Honour Ceremony. ‘Jarra Tell Morrath,’ he said, thoughtfully. ‘Well, I might have guessed. Your grandmother always had to be in the thick of the action as well.’ He paused. ‘Jarra, it was tragic news about your parents. Your brother said he’d had no contact from you, and I didn’t feel I had the right to bother you with personal messages, but …’

  I bit my lip. ‘Thank you, sir. I needed a while to recover from the news before …’

  The Colonel nodded and looked enquiringly at Fian and Rono. I pulled myself together and introduced them.

  ‘Jarra and I are Twoing,’ said Fian.

  ‘I was less lucky,’ said the Colonel. ‘Hold on to her. She seems almost as unique as her grandmother.’

  He headed off to talk to the other injured tag leaders, and Fian and Rono looked at each other and then at me.

  ‘The Colonel was an admirer of your grandmother?’ asked Fian.

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘He served with her on Planet First.’

  Fian and Rono grinned at each other.

  I didn’t have much time to think about the Colonel, because someone gave me yet more meds, my suit was sealed, and I was carried out and loaded on to a transport sled. Rono went to check on the rest of Cassandra 2, while Fian stayed with me. After a few minutes, a huge convoy of sleds started moving. Mostly transports, though I spotted the odd mobile dome and work sled being taken along in case we got stuck somewhere. We were taking a lot of sleds with us, but a lot of domes and other sleds were being left behind.

  ‘Someone’s going to have an awful job getting all this equipment back to the right dome,’ I said.

  ‘So long as we get through to the hospital, I don’t care what happens to the sleds,’ said Fian.

  ‘There’ll be wolves,’ I fretted as we headed off through snow covered ruins. I didn’t like lying there, strapped to a stretcher and helpless.

  ‘We’ve got plenty of people with guns,’ said Fian. ‘There’s an armed member of the Military on every sled. They insisted it was time they did some of the work.’ He lay down next to me. ‘Relax and let me distract you.’

  He murmured distractions into my ear for the next three hours, until someone came and gave me yet more meds and I passed out entirely. I’d missed the final exciting climax of the rescue, and I missed our convoy arriving at the settlement as well.

  33

  I woke up in a bed that felt strange. I was in a room with a white ceiling and walls. There was a white table by the side of the bed with a jug of water, a glass, and a bunch of grapes. It was exactly like when I was in hospital back when I was 14, except there was also a Fian sitting in a chair next to me.

  ‘Hello Fian,’ I said. My mouth was dry and my voice sounded a bit odd.

  He smiled at me. ‘Hello Jarra. How are you feeling?’

  I tried moving my legs. I seemed to have two functioning ones, which was reassuring. I reached down and counted toes with my fingers. ‘Fine. My left arm itches a bit.’

  ‘They had a monitor on it earlier.’

  I shifted my pillows, struggled into a sitting position, and reached for the jug of water. Fian beat me to it, poured out a glass of water, and handed it to me.

  I sipped water for a minute before speaking. ‘We made it to the settlement then.’ It was a pretty stupid thing to say. We obviously weren’t in a grey flexiplas dome, so we must have made it to the settlement. I wasn’t sure what else to say though. Fian had had time to have second thoughts about us staying together and I didn’t want to assume anything. It would be horrible if I tried to kiss him or something and he pulled away.

  ‘We made it to the settlement a week ago,’ said Fian.

  ‘A week!’ I squeaked in shock.

  ‘If you’re feeling well enough, I can tell you what’s been happening.’ He grinned. ‘I’m afraid I had to make a few decisions, and you’re rather stuck with them.’

  ‘What sort of decisions?’

  Fian took out his lookup. ‘I’ve been making a list of things to tell you. First of all, the settlement medical centre got all our casualties stable, but they weren’t equipped for serious reconstructive therapy. They decided to keep the worst cases, including you, sedated. On the …’

  ‘I’ve still got my old leg, haven’t I?’ I interrupted anxiously. ‘Surely I must hav
e. Growing new ones takes longer than a week.’

  ‘It’s the same leg,’ Fian reassured me. ‘It was a mess but they could fix it.’

  ‘Good.’ I knew a new leg would be indistinguishable from my old leg, but I had an irrational attachment to the original. We’d been getting on well together for eighteen years.

  Fian glanced at his lookup. ‘On the second day at the settlement, messaging and the vid channels started coming back. After another day and a half, the portal network came back. The settlement medical centre transferred all our casualties to Hospital Earth America Casualty for proper treatment in regrowth tanks, and I came along with you.’

  ‘How did all the settlements cope during the solar storm?’

  ‘A few lost their protective barriers, and there were a lot of fires, but on the whole not too badly. Everywhere is still running on stored power, but about a thousand Military personnel portalled in to the solar arrays two days ago and they’re working on repairs. Stored power should last for another two weeks, and they expect the power beams to be back on well before that.’ Fian paused. ‘Now for the more personal stuff.’

  ‘Personal stuff?’ I waited nervously.

  ‘When the vid channels came back, all the newzies were going crazy about the Carrington event, and the Military ships landing, and the rescue. They were interviewing everyone they could get hold of, and they were especially interested in you of course. You were only 18, an Honour Child, injured … You can see why they focused on you.’

  ‘Oh …’ I had a bad feeling.

  ‘They mentioned you in the first detailed reports of the rescue, and got coverage of your Honour Ceremony from Military archives. They mentioned me as well, and that we were Twoing. Then lots of messages came in. Ones from Playdon and the class of course, but there were also ones from Candace, Issette, Keon, Maeth, Ross … You can imagine.’