Worlds Away (The Interstellar Age Book 3)

by Daniels, Valmore

  For the first time since I was a child, tears rolled down my cheeks.

  Why had I not been affected by the illness and burns? Did it have something to do with Ekahua sharing his gift with me? Had that, somehow, made me immune to the effects of the star grain?

  I was so consumed by my own misery, I did not immediately notice that the sky was growing brighter. When I finally looked up, my breath caught in my chest, and I rose to my feet.

  It was another sky boat.

  Unlike Ekahua’s vessel, which had streaked across the sky and crashed into the mountain range, this one was coming to land on the ground near our village in a very slow and controlled manner. It was large, and resembled a massive phoenix. The hull of the ship looked to be made of the same kind of material as Ekahua’s.

  My first thought was to run for the ship, and call whoever was in there to come out and help save the women and children of our village. Then I remembered Ekahua’s warning, that others might come looking for him. I didn’t know why he didn’t want to be found, but by the way he’d said it, I assumed their intentions might not have been pure.

  Were these Ekahua’s enemies, then? Or his rivals?

  I stopped myself from rushing forward, and hid behind a tree until I could figure out what these newcomers wanted from us.

  The ship landed on eight long, thick legs. Some of the women in the village were shouting in alarm, but none of them was strong enough to get up and flee. I felt guilty for not running to their rescue, but I knew I had no power to defend my villagers against the newcomers.

  A rectangular opening in the side of the ship appeared, and a platform slid out from inside the vessel. Two impossibly tall people stepped onto it.

  I could not believe what I was seeing. They had arms and legs just like any other person, but they wore costumes unlike anything I had seen. Their outfits were made of a shiny material, almost like polished stone, and covered every part of their bodies except their heads. Instead of hair, they had what looked like a headdress of white and yellow feathers. The lower parts of their faces were drawn forward, ending in small mouths and chins. Like Ekahua, they had no ears that I could see.

  From where I was, I couldn’t make out the words they spoke, but it sounded like the chirping and squawking of a bird.

  They carried something in their hands, but it did not look like a weapon to me—it was shaped more like a small box. They pointed it around the village, and there were portions of the box that seemed to light up. It reminded me of the picture boxes in Ekahua’s sky boat. The creatures made more chirping sounds, this time quite excited.

  My heart skipped a beat as the platform lowered to the ground, and the sky travelers stepped off. Some of the women yelled curses at them; others cried out in fear. They were too weak to get up and fight the invaders.

  I felt terrible for not doing anything, but though I was not as weak as the others were, I knew I was powerless to stop the sky travelers.

  When they approached Ysalane, however, I stood from my hiding place and had every intention of charging them. I had no idea what I could do to stop them, but I had to do something. When I saw that they were not trying to grab her, I stopped, and moved back behind the tree once again.

  They spoke to Ysalane, and though their words came out in chirps and squawks, a moment later, a secondary voice spoke in our language.

  “I am a Sentinel of the Collection; I am a protector,” the sky traveler said to Ysalane. “You have been touched by star fire. If you come with us into the sky, we will complete the change in you and your people. Your lives will continue. If you remain here, this world will consume you and you will die.”

  “You can save us?” she asked, looking at her brother, who was lying on the ground beside her, curled into a ball. “You can save him?”

  “Yes, but you will never be able to return here.”

  Ysalane looked at some of the others, who nodded to her. She said, “We will go with you. Just save my brother.”

  The leader motioned to the other sky traveler, and they assisted all the villagers off the ground and to the platform. In groups of four, they lifted the women and children up and into their sky ship.

  Once all the survivors of the blast were inside, the leader approached one of the dead women—I couldn’t see whom. He swept the box over her body. He made a squawking sound, and then gestured to the other. They picked up the woman’s body and carried her back to the platform. The sky travelers repeated the process for all the dead.

  When all the villagers, both living and dead, were in their ship, the leader took something out of one of the pouches on his costume. It looked like a large ball, similar in size to the ones used at the ball court in Copán. This one, however, was not made of rubber. The surface of the ball was similar to the stone block from Ekahua’s sky boat.

  The sky traveler stepped over to the blackened crater where the common fire pit once stood, and placed the ball in the center. He returned to his ship, and went inside.

  Stepping on the platform, which lifted him up and into the ship, the sky traveler made a gesture with the box in his hand moments before the rectangular opening in his ship closed.

  The ball on the ground began to glow and vibrate.

  When I realized what the ball was for, I knew I had to flee.

  The sky ship rumbled and lifted off the ground.

  I turned away from the village and, trying to ignore the pain in my chest, ran as hard as I could.

  By the time I reached the closest farm, a blast of light, many times brighter than the one that had ripped through our village before, covered our entire village.

  I turned my head before it blinded me, and dove inside the house on the farm just as an ocean of heat, more intense than I could ever have imagined, washed over me. It burned the very air around me, and I could not breathe.

  Certain that I would die, I prayed to the gods. Perhaps they heard me. Just when I thought I could hold my breath no longer, the heat and light faded, and air filled my lungs when I opened my mouth and inhaled.

  When I felt strong enough to rise, I made my way back to the village, but it was no longer there. No buildings, no common area, no trees, and no grass; there was nothing but a huge circle of bare earth. It was as if a thousand farmers had come and tilled the soil.

  For a very long time, I could only stand there and wonder at what had happened. I knew everything that had occurred over the past week was greater than anything written in any of the story stones at Copán.

  The affairs of the gods were beyond me, and though I had been thrown into the center of these events, I could not divine their purpose.

  I don’t know how long it was before I returned to the farmhouse, but the sun had begun its slow descent from the sky, and the moon had come out from hiding.

  Sleep was not something that I thought about, but exhaustion got the better of me, and by the time I woke up, it was morning again. It had been five days since the men of the village had gone to war.

  I searched through the house for some basic supplies—a pack, some tools, a knife, and food—and then I set out on the trail for Quiriguá.

  ∞

  By the time I arrived near the area where the Ch’orti’ army was encamped, I’d had plenty of time to think about what had happened. Unfortunately, I was just as confused as I had ever been.

  The sky travelers had said they would heal the women and children of the village, but the same time, they would never be able to return. Did that make them good or evil? Were they taking them away to become slaves? There was no way I could know.

  Ekahua had asked me to burn his body, rather than bury it. I didn’t know if he didn’t have the desire to journey through the Underworld and be reborn in Heaven. In my mind, I had not felt any remorse that I had left him buried in the cave, and not burned his body as he’d requested. Now, however, I was having doubts.

  He’d told me that other sky tribes would arrive and look for him, and I could not let his body be found b
y them. Without knowing the birdlike sky travelers’ intentions, I had to believe that Ekahua had been right all along. After all, he’d given me a gift that had protected me from the star fire.

  Instead of continuing on to the warrior camp, I went wide around them, being as stealthy as I could. I decided to find the cave where I had left Ekahua, and burn his body as he’d instructed me to do.

  It was several hours before I reached the mountain, and I realized that my chest no longer hurt. My ribs had healed, and my breathing was once again strong and sure.

  With a little searching, I finally found the cliff where the crevice was, but to my dismay, the entire area was covered in rocks, boulders, and gravel. The earthquake must have caused the cliff wall to crumble.

  Even with a team of twenty men, it would take a hundred days to dig through to the cave, and there was every chance the cave itself had collapsed in on itself. For a single man, it could take years.

  The cave-in had hidden Ekahua’s body from the bird-like sky travelers. They would never find him. After all, who would think this enormous pile of rubble was a grave for a sky traveler?

  I had one duty left: to find my father and the other Ch’orti’ warriors and tell them what had become of our village. It was a task I did not want to undertake, and I sat down among the ruins of the cliff and thought long and hard about how I was going to tell them their wives and children were either dead, or taken by invaders from the sky tribes.

  They would never understand about the star fire, or about sky ships. The elders of my village, and the King of Copán, believed Ekahua was a god, no matter what I’d said. If I told my people exactly what had happened, they would doubt my words. I had to tell them the story in a way they would understand.

  A thought came to me, then. The Song of the Stars. The words Ekahua had used for the song were gibberish to me, and he’d said the words didn’t matter—it was the melody that was important for our descendants.

  I would use the Song of the Stars, replace Ekahua’s words with my own, and tell the story of our downfall. I had to make certain the story was powerful. I might have been protected from the star fire at the village, but I knew I would pass on to the Underworld one day. Combining the story of my village with the song was the best way to ensure that both would survive me.

  Over the next few hours, I created the story, and composed the words to match the melody of the Song of the Stars.

  The bird-like sky traveler who had spoken to Yslance was Kinich Ahua, the firebird god and messenger of Hanab Ku, creator of the People. The other sky traveler was Kukulcan, the feathered serpent.

  Kinich Ahua must have been angry with us because of the war with the northern tribes, and this was his punishment.

  I did not sleep that night. Instead, I worked on the story, and completed it as the sun rose in the morning.

  I headed down the mountain and across the valley to look for my father and the other warriors, and found them before the sun set that night.

  Though more tired than I had ever been in my life, I told them the story, and I felt their grief as they listened.

  After hearing the tale, my father spoke to the King of Copán. The war council agreed that the gods did not approve of the war with the Q’eqchi’, and we would return home.

  My father and the other men of our village decided to erect a monument to the memory of our lost ones where we were, to remind any Ch’orti who came north not to engage in war with the northern tribes.

  In the following months, I carved the story into the stone of four mighty columns, and vowed to return every year to recite the story and honor my people.

  23

  Qin Station :

  Sol System :

  Alice stood straight up, her face reddening with anger. “You idiot!” she screamed at Alex.

  Taken aback by her reaction, he sat there as still as he could.

  “This is exactly the reason the nations of Earth have driven themselves to the brink of destruction,” Alice said through gritted teeth. “They didn’t need any alien enemy; they’re doing a good enough job all on their own. They’ve been on a downward spiral for a century. Corruption and apathy in the government, greed and avarice in the economy, cruelty and malice in the people.”

  She swung an accusatory finger toward Alex. “And you kept this information from the one person in the system who has the resources and the strength of will to save it. My father was right; you are a petty, selfish little child.”

  The words stung, and Alex felt they were unfair. He had a brief urge to refute her claim. After all, Alex had sacrificed everything from the moment his parents had died on Macklin’s Rock.

  He shot back at her. “All those words you used—corruption, apathy, greed, avarice, cruelty, malice—those are all good words to describe your father. He may have fooled you, as he fooled so many others; as he tried to fool me. He plays on your weaknesses, prays on your feelings of abandonment. When he sees someone who he can use for his own purposes, he befriends them, tells them they are important and powerful. But once he has what he wants from you, he chews you up and spits you out.”

  Alice shook her head. “You lie!”

  “Why do you think he ended up in prison? Because of me?” Alex let out a hollow laugh. “It was Klaus, if you must know. Your father underestimated him. When I was kidnapped, your father thought he no longer needed him. Klaus figured out where he stood pretty quick, and took steps to take down your father first.” He swung a hand around as if to encompass everyone on the station. “Look around. Why do you think your father surrounds himself with people who have run afoul of the law, or are repressed, or who’ve been ostracized by society? Not out of the goodness of his heart, I can tell you. It’s because they let their anger and desperation rule them, and because of that, they’re easy to fool.”

  Alice looked ready to burst. “I’m not a fool,” she said, but her voice was low.

  “You’ve been deeply hurt. Betrayed and shamed by society for something that wasn’t your fault—I’m sorry; I know about your history: your mother, the newspapers in Beijing. It wasn’t fair, but your life was still ruined. Now, you want to make someone pay.” He shook his head at her. “But just because they did this to you, it doesn’t give you the right to conquer them or kill them.”

  Looking suddenly like a little girl, Alice lowered her head.

  Alex said, “I know you’re angry, but you don’t want to watch the world burn. If you did, you would simply do nothing and let the Kulsat do your dirty work for you. No, you got angry at me because, deep down, you care.”

  There were tears streaking down her cheeks. “I don’t care.”

  “Yes, you do,” Alex said, his voice taking on a soothing tone. “And so do I. The Kulsat will destroy us. It will be quick. Emperor Yin is going to take his time about it, but he’ll end up doing the same thing. I won’t trade one doomsday scenario for another. But you—”

  Alice looked up. “What about me?”

  “You have the power to make a difference. There is a chance to stop the Kulsat. I’ve been told there is a way, but in order to get to that point, we need to work together.”

  Narrowing her eyes, Alice said, “Against my father…?”

  Alex nodded. “Yes.” Seeing her teetering on the brink of a decision, he added, “He was directly responsible for the murder of my friend, Kenny, and he’s given the order for many others all in the name of power. You’ve watched the newsvids; surely not everyone is telling the exact same lie about him.”

  Alice wiped the tears from her cheeks. “Say I believe you,” she said. “Say I want to help you. What do we do?”

  Alex lifted one shoulder in a half-shrug. “We continue our work.”

  Looking up sharply, Alice spoke in a breathy rush. “What?”

  “The goal is the same. We need Kinemats. Only then can we learn how to defend ourselves. I told the truth: I have no idea how long it will take the Kulsat to find us. It could be minutes; it could be a millennium.
When they do find us, we need to be prepared. Other systems have been able to defend themselves. It’s possible.”

  “Then you will tell Sian to stop delaying and complete his algorithm?” Alice asked, and gave him a sly smile. “I told you: I’m not a fool. Don’t worry, my father is occupied with other matters; I need not concern him with every little detail.”

  “Thank you,” Alex said.

  “If we do solve the formula for priming the Kinemet, we’re going to have to test it.”

  Alex shook his head. “We’re not going to sacrifice any more innocent lives.”

  “Then how will we know if it works?”

  “I have a thought about that,” Alex said. “As someone who is attuned to Kinemet and its radiation, I may be able to tell if the formula is correct or not.”

  Alice stood up. “What are we waiting for?”

  24

  Copán Departmental :

  Honduras :

  Yaxche insisted that they return to his village, and would not give anyone a hint of his friend’s location until they agreed. Five of them piled into a hydrogen-powered crew cab. Yaxche sat up front with Migel, who continued his role as the driver. Michael sat in the back with another Cruzado named Diego, and Humberto, who squeezed between them. After the five-hour drive, Michael was thankful to get out and stretch his legs.

  Little had changed in Pueblo de Santa Brio since Michael had been there last. Even the older woman selling handcrafted trinkets sat on the same wooden chair in the same spot as before. She smiled at him, as if recognizing him. He nodded to her, returning the smile, though he didn’t stop to peruse her wares.

  There was a young tourist couple in town, recording their journey on a digital recorder. Humberto gave them no more than a cursory glance before dismissing their presence.

  The house that was once Yaxche’s now belonged to another family. Four years was too long to remain vacant, and without news, the village would have assumed he wasn’t alive.

  Yaxche headed straight for a different house, and before he reached it, a middle-aged woman ran out, tears streaking down her face and a cry on her lips. Michael recognized her as Yaxche’s daughter.