by Rinelle Grey
He ducked his head automatically and stepped through the doorway, leaving behind the living quarters which seemed warm and comfortable compared to the cockpit. Out here, nearly every corner of the bare metal surface was covered with the many instruments needed to control the ship and the sensitive scanning equipment it contained.
Tyris’s attention was drawn to the large monitor taking up most of the space on the right wall. His breath hitched. A single planet filled the screen. Brown mists swirled over the surface, hiding it from view.
As the radar images slowly built up on the screen, Tyris’s eyes widened. A huge crater tore a hole in the large southern continent, a chilling indication that some tragedy had happened here. Battered and broken, it was hard to believe this planet had ever supported life.
Yet around one edge of the crater, the radar simulation built up little cubes and blocks, neatly divided by straight lines. At some point, there had been a settlement on this planet. Not a big one, perhaps only twenty thousand people, but a settlement nonetheless. As the scanner continued its replication of the surface, he spotted two other areas of buildings, both smaller than the main one. He shivered a little. Surely the people who’d once lived here left the planet years ago?
He shook his head, and focused back on the task at hand. He couldn’t perform a mineral scan with the shields up. His hands shook, and he begrudged the moments it took to switch between each of the external cameras and check the surrounding space for debris. Nothing he could see would pose a risk to the ship, so he lowered the shield and started the scan.
Could this be the planet he was looking for? His heart rate accelerated. What other reason could there be for its absence from the star maps? This area had been explored long ago and the surrounding star systems mapped. Why not this one? For the first time since he started this journey, he started to believe he might just do this.
The computer spewed out a lump of data onto the screen, superimposed over the image of the devastated planet. Tyris’s eyes went straight past the environmental data indicating that the planet was uninhabitable, to the information he sought.
Nothing! Only negligible usable minerals. No sign of anysogen.
He took a deep breath and forced himself to think. This couldn’t be a coincidence. A settlement didn’t just exist on an unmapped planet. He stared at the picture until it blurred, then the name at the top of the readout drew his focus. Semala.
How could it have a name if it wasn’t on the star maps?
There was only one explanation. Somewhere in the depths of the database, a reference to this planet remained.
Of course the gas he searched for wouldn’t be here. Only the desperate lived on planets where anysogen had been mined. He’d read reports about the effects on the first mining crews. It had taken years for them to realise that the gas, which had seemed so harmless at first, severely lowered fertility. Those miners had received huge payouts, and machines had been brought in to do the mining after that. Those machines hadn’t been invented when this settlement was abandoned, but they would still have done all they could to separate the mining from the research facility. The anysogen would have been shipped here to be studied. He was close.
He set his scans to a wider range, searching for the tell-tale signature. Seconds later, data readouts scrolled up beside a small picture of the next planet in the system, currently on the opposite side of the sun. A habitable atmosphere and the presence of water. Mineral analysis couldn’t be performed at this distance, but it was promising enough for him to set course immediately.
Tyris leaned back in the chair, staring at the screen. It would take at least fifteen minutes to arrive at the next planet, but he couldn’t stop his heart racing. This could be it. His ticket back to the life he knew. The life he wanted. Waiting was agonising.
Finally, the planet appeared in the front window. Barely any greener than the last, a white blanket spreading down from the pole indicated winter was on its way.
Excitement building, Tyris checked the scans as they scrolled up the screen. Under the planet’s deceptively habitable skin, large pockets of anysogen gas lurked, close enough to the surface to make mining quick and easy.
The Colonies needed this fuel urgently. When he returned with the news, they would surely be grateful enough to remove the humiliating limitations they’d placed on him.
Tyris bit his lip, staring at the readouts, but not seeing them. Something didn’t add up. Anysogen gas was extremely limited. It could be found only on the edges of the galaxy, on a certain class of planet. Someone had obviously known about this planet once, so why was it just sitting here? Whatever had happened on the first planet, Semala, was not enough to have halted mining, not when fuel was so short.
What was going on here? Would announcing the anysogen find cause him more problems than he already had?
Tyris rubbed the back of his neck, unwilling to let this opportunity pass. Surely nothing could be bad enough that the Colonies wouldn’t be thrilled at the thought of more anysogen. If he went straight to the public, the government couldn’t hide it anymore. Someone would be raked over the coals for this, but it wouldn’t be him. He’d be back on Urslat with Milandra, sipping cocktails.
He entered the commands for more scans, took some aerial pictures of the most likely mining sites, and was about to head for home when a low humming started and the proximity sensors lit up.
This area was littered with asteroids. Tyris switched back from the scan screen to his radar, easily identifying the cluster causing the warning. But all of them were small enough that they couldn’t make it through his shield. They shouldn’t have triggered the alarm.
Except, he realised with a sickening thud, as the first asteroid bounced off the Hylista’s hardened shell, he hadn’t brought the shield back online after performing the scans. He reached to turn it back on, but before he could even touch the console, it went dark.
The Hylista shuddered as more projectiles smashed into it.
Tyris staggered towards his seat, the floor rolling under him. He managed to snap on his harness just before the artificial gravity failed. He stared at the blank consoles in front of him, his knuckles going white on the control stick, waiting for the pull that would tell him the manual controls had engaged.
It didn’t come.
The Hylista drifted toward the planet’s atmosphere, eerily quiet. The planet grew larger and larger, until it filled the entire view screen.
The control column bucked in his hand. He let out a breath he hadn’t realised he’d been holding.
With one hand, he pulled back on the stick. With the other, he reached to turn the shield back on. He watched the console. Come on, it has to work. The green light indicating the shield flickered. It came on then went off again. Then came back on. Tyris watched it anxiously for a few more moments to be sure it remained green.
He checked the altitude.
His stomach rolled. He was dropping rapidly. It was too late to pull out of the dive. The planet’s gravity was pulling him down. The fact that the shields would protect the Hylista in the event of a crash was small comfort. Landing on this planet in any form would be a disaster.
The thought of the side effects of anysogen exposure spurred him to action. He initialised the rocket boosters, the only propulsion system on the ship capable of escaping the planet’s gravity. Though all systems indicated that they had fired, his descent didn’t slow.
Shudders shook the Hylista as she hit the atmosphere. Gravity caught the ship and pulled it down, and he felt like someone had landed a colony ship on his chest. His altitude was dropping far too quickly. He pulled back on the control column desperately, hoping to force the Hylista to level out. Going down was inevitable now. All he could do was try to slow his descent and minimise the damage to his ship.
There was a loud bang behind him. Sparks showered over his head, and the power cut out again, along with his shields.
Acrid smoke filled the cockpit. Tyris coughed, waving
away the smoke billowing around him. Adrenalin coursed through his body. He thrust the control column back and forth and smashed the console in front of him. Nothing responded. Panic rose in his chest, and he fought it down. He needed to stay calm.
The smoke alarm sounded its strident call. Typical. He lost power to the entire ship, but the damn smoke alarm still worked. What did it take to kill those things?
The power flicked back on with a hiss, but Tyris was too busy staring out the window to react. Below him, in a large clearing in the trees… was that… buildings? And to one side, towering over the buildings, was that some sort of spaceship?
Then it disappeared below him, and Tyris shook his head. It must be an old settlement, remnants from twenty years ago. There couldn’t be people here now.
Could there?
The Hylista shuddered as it skimmed just above the tree tops. The smoke alarm still shrieked, and the smoke irritated his throat. Sparks flew as the power went out with one last, loud bang.
Tyris’s hand clutched the small jade dolphin hanging around his neck, and he reached for the photograph taped to the console. Milandra smiled at him, oblivious to his distress, as always. His touch dislodged the picture, sending it fluttering to the floor as the ground rushed up to meet him.
Chapter 4
Marlee hovered in the doorway to the village hall, scanning the room. There wasn’t a single person here that she wanted to talk to, but she had already tried staying home and avoiding everyone.
Her mother’s visit had convinced her that wasn’t going to work. She couldn’t wait until the first snowstorm stopped them working outside. Or even for the rest day in two days. She would rather sit at home alone and knit and sew than gather here with everyone else and endure their sideways glances and subtle digs.
She spotted her friend Jaimma and walked across to her. Jaimma gave her a sympathetic smile, and dropped Jaidin, her current partner’s hand to reach out to give Marlee a hug. “How are you holding up?”
Marlee shrugged. “I’m surviving.”
“What you need is someone cute to cuddle with.” Jaimma winked.
“I don’t want to cuddle with anyone.” Jaimma was only trying to help, but it didn’t make Marlee feel any better. She didn’t want to even contemplate another relationship. Ever.
“Come on, Marlee. It’s been nearly two weeks. You can’t avoid it forever. The council is only going to be patient for so long.” Jaimma patted her on the back. “I know it’s hard, but being alone can’t be much fun either.”
Marlee ignored her comments, and stared at Beren who was walking around handing out numbers. How did he manage to stay so positive, so happy? He was alone too and had been for so long now. Since he hadn’t managed to father a child by thirty, no one even considered him as a possible partner now. Marlee felt a pang of sympathy as he handed her a number.
“What are you beautiful ladies planning to do today?” he asked, winking at them both.
Marlee took her number and turned away. It was a relief that she could be friendly to someone without everyone immediately assuming she wanted to sleep with him, but she couldn’t bring herself to smile at anyone today.
“Marlee’s still upset about Nelor,” she heard Jaimma whisper, although she was pretty sure Beren already knew it. It wasn’t like anyone had any privacy around here.
Kalim, one of the council members, called out numbers. She liked him. He was strong and fair, and always cheerful, despite suffering from horrible arthritis in his hands. Marlee turned to watch as he drew each number, written on a wood chip, from a bowl. With each number he called out, someone stepped forwards to choose tasks for the day. Hopefully her number would come up soon, and she could escape from the crowd.
Jaimma squeezed Marlee’s hand as she watched Nelor walk over to pick his job. She couldn’t tear her eyes away. His face looked bare, the beard shaved off, and Marlee felt a pang of sadness. Kalim wrote his name on the board next to digging sugar beets and he headed outside, head down. Marlee stared after him.
There were only a handful of people left by the time her number was called, and as she headed to the front of the room, she wondered if she dared request to work with Nelor. She hadn’t spoken to him since he’d left, and she missed him dreadfully. Surely there could be no objection to them talking?
“What would you like to do today, Marlee?” Kalim asked, his eyes twinkling.
She took a deep breath. “I’d like to dig beets.”
Kalim’s brow furrowed. “I think we have enough people digging sugar beets already.”
Since Nelor’s name was the only one beside the job, it was obvious what he meant—she should be obedient, move on, and stay away from Nelor.
It was so unfair. She just wanted to talk to him, nothing more. Wasn’t she even allowed to do that now? They had been friends since they were children, and barely a day had gone by when she hadn’t talked to him, even before they had lived together. Now she was expected to forget he even existed?
Marlee lifted her chin. “Nelor is the only one digging sugar beets,” she said. “That hardly seems like too many people to me.”
Kalim shook his head. “I don’t think that’s a good idea right now, Marlee.” His voice was gentle.
“What, we’re not even allowed to work together anymore? We’re just going to be talking, in full view of the entire village, what do you think is going to happen?”
“You need to let go, Marlee, and spending time with Nelor isn’t going to help that process. Pick something else.”
Marlee’s eyes filled with tears, making it hard to see. Her momentary courage deserted her. She scanned the few jobs left on the board. She didn’t want to trim the goats’ hooves—there were too many people doing other chores in the barn. And boiling up the beets to begin the long process of producing sugar was also a social task. She wanted to be on her own.
“Firewood. I’ll collect firewood.”
Kalim wrote her name on the board, and she headed outside to find a wheelbarrow. Nelor stood alone in the field, hacking at the dirt with a hoe. He didn’t even look up as she went by. Her heart heavy, she continued past him towards the distant tree line.
Ice crunched under her wooden clogs, but the thick woollen socks inside kept her feet warm. The wind whistled around her, trying its hardest to find a crack in her coat, and when that failed, forced its way through the felted wool to chill her skin. She didn’t stop even when the wind pulled her shawl from around her head. The pin at her throat kept it from being lost, though it now hung uselessly down her back. She hefted up the wooden handles of the wheelbarrow and pushed on, needing to get as far away from the village as she could.
Only when she had reached the stark, bare branches of the woods did she pause, putting down the wheelbarrow handles and breathing heavily on her hands in a futile attempt to warm them. The trees did little to hide her from the other workers back in the village, but the distance helped, and she felt a little better.
She rearranged her shawl then looked around for firewood. A fruitless search. Although recently fallen twigs and sticks littered the ground, most of this area had been picked bare in the last few weeks. She picked up the wheelbarrow handles and pressed deeper into the trees.
Each step away from the village lightened her step, and a bit further in, she began to find decent sized pieces of wood. She wasn’t in the least bit afraid of being away from the village. The sky above her was clear, and no animals had run wild in these woods for as long as she had lived here. No mammals, birds or reptiles had been able to withstand the reduced fertility caused by the effect of the anysogen. Even though they’d stopped mining right after the meteor hit, it had been too late. The wild animals had all died off within a few years.
She picked up pieces of wood and threw them into the wheelbarrow, dislodging a few scurrying insects. These, along with water dwelling creatures, seemed to be the only ones that could overcome the effects of the anysogen. Her fellow humans refused to accept the inevi
table. Eventually their species would lose its tenuous hold on this planet and be as much history as the other mammals were.
Marlee shook herself. Why were these thoughts intruding today when she just wanted to lose herself in the mindless tasks?
Jaimma’s comments signalled the end of her period of grace. She and Nelor had been apart two weeks, the accepted grieving period. Her mother’s visit yesterday, Kalim’s insistence that she needed to move on—those were just the beginning. Over the next week, the hints would become less subtle, her friends and family would start suggesting possible partners. The pressure would intensify. She’d seen it before.
Eventually, everyone gave in and made a choice. Not many had held out to three weeks, and none to four. But she had no intention of giving in. Not this time. She didn’t want that anymore.
What would happen when she continued to refuse to choose? Would everyone eventually accept her choice? Her mother? The council? How far would they push?
She didn’t know. It hadn’t happened before.
She jerked her head up, listening. Far off in the distance, she heard it again. Screams. Something was horribly wrong. Abandoning the wheelbarrow, she turned to run back to the settlement when a loud boom sounded overhead. Instinctively, she ducked.
A large object burned through the sky above her.
Marlee crouched, frozen to the spot, staring at it in disbelief. All her life she had heard tales of the meteor that had decimated her mother’s home planet before she was born, but she had never expected to see one for herself.
She needed to get back to the village, to find shelter. Would any kind of shelter protect her from a meteor strike? Her heart thudded in her chest, and she couldn’t tear her eyes away from the fireball.
