When he stepped through the door of the infirmary he immediately saw Ivy sitting on one of the beds. She looked tired, but not injured or ill, and he felt a sense of relief come over him. She looked up and smiled when she saw him standing at the door.
“George!” she said.
Without paying attention to any of the others in the room, he rushed toward her and gathered her in an embrace.
“What’s wrong?” he asked. “Mhavrych said that you needed me.”
“I’m alright,” she reassured him. “I just had my baby.”
“I’m so happy for you,” he said, hugging her again, but then pushing back so that he could look at her. “But I don’t understand. Why are you here? How did you get here? And why did you send him to get me?”
“It’s not about the baby,” Ivy said. “You know Rilex and Severine.”
“Yes,” George said. “They were on the ship with me and have been in the compound.”
Ivy nodded.
“They found a body.”
“A body?”
“It’s skeletonized and looks like it’s been there for many years.”
“Where did they find it?” George asked, wondering if this was another casualty of the war that they were fighting now but knew had been simmering just below the surface for far longer.
“In the tunnels,” Ivy told him. “They can’t identify it. They believe that it’s a man, but they don’t know the species, the age, or how the person got down there. We were hoping that you might be able to help examine it and find out more about it.”
George nodded and turned toward the rest of the people in the room, quickly noting that Ellora was there alongside Aegeus. The image filled George’s heart and he felt it reach out toward Maxim, happy for the young man that he had restored the family that he had longed for throughout his life. George walked over to them and stepped up to the side of the table. He looked down at the body that lay on the table and immediately noted the size and development of the bones. This was almost certainly an adult but was smaller than the Denynso or even the Valdicians. He looked over them for a few moments longer before touching them, wanting to get as much information about them from this distance as he could. It would help to prevent distraction that could be caused by other details that he discovered when he delved further. It was something that he had learned throughout the years of his scientific career. It was all too easy to get confused when seemingly contradictory elements of one particular study or research focus come to light. He would frequently find out something only to find something soon after that went against the first discovery and muted conclusions that he had already made. This confusion and too many occasions early in his career when this distraction had caused him to overlook actual discoveries and come to conclusions that were untrue, putting entire trains of research at risk had taught George to take his research slowly and isolate each discovery that he made. When he crystallized these discoveries and kept them as individual concepts in his mind, he was able to analyze and evaluate each on their own merits before starting to make connections that could later develop into more impactful discoveries.
He felt extremely aware of the presence of the rest of the group around him as he examined the body. They seemed to be watching him even as they were also looking over the bones, their eyes flickering up to his face every few seconds as if they were waiting for him to say something, to give them any details that he might have.
“Would you mind giving me some time with the skeleton?” he asked, looking at each of them. “I’ll let you know as soon as I find something.”
He could see the hesitation in the expression that crossed between Severine and Rilex, but all of them stepped back from the tables.
“I should get Ivy back to the pod,” Maxim said. “I don’t want Dove to wake up without anyone there with her.”
“I’m going to go back to bed,” Avery said. “I didn’t get much sleep.”
George watched as they all began to stream out of the infirmary, Ivy hanging back so that the rest had left and she still stood there.
“Let me know if I can help you,” she said.
“You have enough on your plate now,” George said.
“I’m still a scientist,” she argued. “What you’re able to find out about this skeleton is important not just to me or to the war, but to my daughter as well. If there’s any way that I can help you, tell me.”
“I will,” George agreed.
She nodded and started out of the room, meeting Maxim at the doorway and intertwining their fingers between them so that they could walk together back down the hallway. George was suddenly alone in the infirmary and felt the silence close in around him. His focus was instantly sharpened as nothing around him distracted him and he was able to narrow his attention directly into each area of the skeleton that he reviewed. He examined the skull, looking for any indication of the species of this skeleton, or any sign of damage that might have been the cause of death. When there was nothing extraordinary about it, and he started his way down the rest of the remains carefully, taking his time as he reviewed each of the bones. It wasn’t until he had gotten to the tatters of the shirt that still clung to the skeleton that he started noticing things that stood out.
The fibers of the shirt were familiar in his hand. He had felt this material before, which made the condition that it was in even more unusual. Generally, clothing or blankets made from this material was extremely durable, making the tears strange and difficult to explain. George decided to remove the clothing so that he could look at the bones and the clothing separately. He lifted one of the arms and drew the bones out of the fabric, pushing the fabric aside before resting the bones back into place. He repeated the process on the other arm and as he was setting the bone back in place he noticed something clinging to it. George turned the arm bone around to get a better look at the object. He peeled it off and put the bone down, turning the smaller object over in his hand a few times. It appeared to be part of a leaf, apparently left attached to the bone after the body faded away and the leaf fell from where it had been caught up in the shirt.
He had been looking at the leaf for a few moments when a thought occurred to him. He had seen that type of leaf before. It was an unusual shape and though it had dried after the many years that it had been there, he could see that its color was not the usual green of trees that he was familiar with on Earth. He stared at the leaf, rubbing it in his fingers gently as to not cause it to disintegrate. Unable to bring to mind why he knew the leaf, George set it aside on one of the counters at the side of the room and returned to the skeleton. He removed the rest of the clothing and spread it out on the next examination table. Now that he had the bones fully visible, he was able to see them more clearly. Their shape confirmed that this was a male, just as they had suspected, and a full-grown adult. He still couldn’t see any indication of what might have caused this man’s death, though he could see signs of trauma on some of the bones that told him that this man had sustained serious injuries across several years of his life.
George had nearly finished examining all the bones when a memory burst in his mind, suddenly telling him why that leaf looked familiar. He crossed to it and carefully transferred it onto one of the clear glass dishes that he found in a cabinet above. This allowed him to look at the leaf from all angles, examining it more thoroughly without causing any damage to it. He needed to preserve it as much as possible until he was able to confirm his suspicions about it. When he was certain that he was remembering accurately, he put a lid on the dish, tucked it into his bag, and walked out of the infirmary. Rilex was standing at the end of the hall and approached him as soon as he stepped out.
“So?” he asked. “Did you find out anything?”
George nodded, but he kept his expression as neutral as he could. Even though he thought that he might have uncovered something significant about the person who now lay in the infirmary reduced to bone, he didn’t feel that he knew enough yet to talk to the
rest about it. If what he suspected was wrong, it could distract the group and put them on the wrong path. Instead, he could offer Rilex the basic information that he had gathered and then he needed to get back to the compound as soon as he could so that he could further confirm what he thought about the leaf.
“You were right in assuming that it was a man,” he told him. “And he was an adult. It will take a more extensive examination to know more than that. We’ll need to bring the bones back to the compound tomorrow.”
Rilex looked as though he was disappointed with the information that George had offered, but that he wasn’t going to say anything. George bade him goodnight and walked around Rilex, heading toward the room that he and Zsilvia had shared when they came from Earth. The room was lonely without her. As soon as he stepped through the door into the pod he felt the compulsion to tell her what he was thinking and what it could mean, knowing that she would listen to him and give her own thoughts about the situation, helping him to process through what he was learning from the bones. The emptiness of the room made a painful impact and he stood in the center of the pod for several long seconds just absorbing the quiet and how much he missed Zsilvia even though it had been only a matter of hours since he had kissed her goodbye before leaving for the ship. He wished that she had come with him and that he could take her into his arms now, finding comfort and reassurance in her presence. The love that he had found with her was unlike anything that he had ever been able to imagine. His life had been devoted to science and the pursuits that had been his focus since he had entered the University. That devotion had cost him many of the things that others valued, including relationships that he thought were important but had only proven distractions and less pertinent in his life than the work that he was doing.
That had all changed when he met Zsilvia. Suddenly he didn’t feel as though he had to make a choice. It wasn’t about either having a life or being with a woman. There was no division. Instead, meeting her had felt like everything had come together and his life was finally cohesive. Zsilvia and his work existed alongside each other, neither jockeying for precedence over the other. He knew that her value in his life was well beyond anything else that he had ever had, including his career, and that he was completely and unflinchingly willing to leave behind everything that he had built on Earth to be with her. Yet Zsilvia had never asked him to sacrifice anything. She had never questioned the importance of his career or the time and energy that he devoted to it. Instead, she was supportive of him, encouraging his pursuits, and reassuring him always that she was by his side no matter where his studies would take him. It was this willingness to exist in cohesive harmony with his career that made George love her even more, and brought her even further into his heart, precious to him in a way that was indescribable, and yet that inexplicable, intangible character of the love and bond that they had made it even more treasured.
George drew the dish out of his bag and rested it on the table beside the bed. The light from the lamp glowed down on it, highlighting the delicate veins that meandered through the deep purple and crimson mottled leaf. He allowed himself only a few more moments of looking at it before he turned off the lamp, undressed, and climbed into bed to catch some sleep before the work of the next day would begin.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
“You’re his son, aren’t you?”
Mhavrych stopped at the sound of the voice behind him but didn’t turn around to face the man he knew was standing there. He didn’t want to look at him, to face the look of recognition in his eyes and the unsettling confusion that it caused.
“Aren’t you?” the voice asked again.
Finally, Mhavrych knew that there was nothing that he could do to ignore it. He turned around and saw Rilex approaching him from the end of the hallway as if he had been waiting for him to emerge from the infirmary where Mhavrych had been looking at the bones again.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he responded flatly.
“Of course, you do,” Rilex said. “You know exactly what I’m talking about and you know exactly who I am. I can see him in your eyes. They are your grandfather’s eyes. I know them as well as I know my own. You can’t hide them from me. What are you doing here?”
Mhavrych straightened, feeling strangely defensive against the man and his questions.
“I can ask you the same question.”
Of course, Mhavrych knew who Rilex was. He had heard his name his entire life, seen images of him, read chronicles of the amazing things that he had accomplished when he lived alongside Mhavrych’s grandfather, helping him not just to rule, but also to seek to untangle the challenges that had defined his life and his role among his people. Though he had known of him his whole life, Mhavrych had never expected that he would see Rilex. He had never encountered him and had known only that he had disappeared from their stream well before Mhavrych’s father was even born and not heard from again until his mother arrived through a portal believed long-sealed. Rilex hadn’t returned to the stream, though, even after he learned that he had the opportunity to. He chose to remain on Earth in the life that he had built there rather than returning to the stream that he had left behind and the people that had searched for him for so long. Mhavrych could somewhat understand his choice. His grandparents were both long-dead and the kingdom had changed dramatically, and Rilex had stated that he knew that there was more to be done in the time that he had settled in, but there was still a sense of betrayal when he looked at this man. Rilex knew that it was possible to return. He could have come back and soothed some of the pain and heartache that had been caused by his disappearance, as well as aided Mhavrych’s father in all that he had faced since Mhavrych’s birth.
There had been a time before Mhavrych was born, when there was a sense of peace and stability across the streams. It hadn’t lasted nearly as long as his parents dreamed that it would. That is how Mhavrych had come to carry the role of Protector, a role that he sometimes struggled to accept, feeling as though he was not the person who should have been given the job. Not yet. It wasn’t yet his turn. But he had been given the responsibility and he had to take it. He had no choice.
“You didn’t know that I was here?” Rilex asked. “I would have thought that your father would have told you about me.”
“He told me about you,” Mhavrych said. “I know all about you. I know that you stayed here when you could have returned and that you never tried to contact anyone from home. You didn’t come for my birth or the birth of my sister. You didn’t come for my installation. By the time that I was an adult, we all considered you dead. It was the only explanation that we could come to that my parents would accept.”
“They could have come back,” Rilex said. “They knew how to get to me. At any time, they could have traveled back if they needed my help.”
Mhavrych shook his head. He didn’t want to hear any more. The startled, confused emotions that he had felt when he first saw Rilex from across the quarry had given way to anger. It wasn’t fury or bright, explosive rage. Instead, it felt like slow-burning embers inside of him.
“I’m not having this conversation,” he said.
“What are you doing here?” Rilex asked, sounding almost accusatory. “Why would you come here?”
“That’s not something that you need to know,” he said.
“Of course it’s something that I need to know,” Rilex insisted. “I’ve spent my entire life working to guard the streams and destroy the source of destruction. If you are here for something that has to do with that, I deserve to know.”
“Maybe there was a time once when you would have deserved to know,” Mhavrych said, “but not now. You aren’t involved anymore.”
Without waiting for a response from the older man, Mhavrych turned away and stalked down the hallway, disappearing around the corner before he could allow him to see the tear that slid down his cheek.
The morning light was barely touching the edge of the desert when Mhavrych appr
oached the door to the passenger pod where he knew Aegeus was sleeping. He had been awake for more than an hour, barely able to rest after his conversation with Rilex the night before. He had tried to hold off waking Aegeus, wanting to give him as much opportunity to rest as he could, but now he couldn’t wait any longer. He felt like he was just wasting time, pacing through the ship with little purpose as he waited. Though he had been vigilant about what was going on around him as he wandered through the various levels of the vessel, he didn’t know what he should be looking for. He had known nothing about Frederick until Maxim told him, and even though he now knew why the men had returned to the ship from the compound, he wasn’t familiar with this ship or what it had been like during their crossing, so he was unlikely to detect anything of relevance.
He approached the door to the passenger pod and knocked, taking a respectful step back from it to give Aegeus a few moments to answer. When he did he was wearing only pants, revealing grisly scars across his chest and wrapping around his waist as if created by something that had been secured tightly around him and had rubbed away at his skin over a long time. Mhavrych withheld his reaction to the physical reminders of the torture that he had sustained during his years in Ryan’s imprisonment and gestured in the direction of the kitchen.
“Will you join me for breakfast?” he asked.
Aegeus nodded, looking pleasantly surprised to see Mhavrych standing there. He walked back into the pod and returned a few moments later wearing a shirt and boots. They walked together toward the kitchen, a saturated silence between them. There was so much to be said, and yet neither of them seemed to be able to form the right words.
When they arrived at the kitchen, Mhavrych went about making each cups of coffee. He had formed a taste for the Mikana version of the beverage when he was much younger and Aegeus would bring it to his stream as a gift for his parents during his visits. He liked the human version even more, finding it more complex and smoother than what he had had before. Mugs filled with the steaming beverage, he placed both on the elevated island in the center of the room and crossed to the bakery closet in one corner. It was a familiar feature, one that he had seen in other ships as well as compounds and colonies that were just beginning, and it was comforting in a way to see something within the glinting metal walls of this vessel that he understood. He opened the door to the closet and then one of the many drawers embedded in the wall within. The smell of freshly baked bread, instantly finished from a par-baked loaf set within the drawer before takeoff by the heat technology of the closet, wafted out at him and Mhavrych realized how hungry he was. They sat on the tall stools across from one another eating thick slices of bread and drinking their coffee for a few silent moments before Aegeus spoke.
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