by Calista Skye
There is excitement in her voice, and her face is flushed with the thrill of discovery.
“Now, I wonder if these controls…” She turns to a console.
I look down. The elevator light is on, and I assume that by pressing it you go up. I have acquired some alien learning on this trip. Perhaps, it will be useful.
No, I have to steel myself for this. I can feel it coming. This is the moment I’ve dreaded more and more as we have explored this spaceship.
“Yeah!” Ashlynn turns to me, more excited than I’ve ever seen her. “It works! Look!”
She points at the alien console. There are strange drawings on it, and they’re moving.
I only give them a cursory glance.
“See?” Ashlynn exclaims. “That’s the energy flow. That’s how it works. And look! That’s a diagram of Bune. Of this spaceship. The Weirdness is marked with that sideways H. And that,” she points, “is the smaller spaceship. The one that is built into the larger one. See that? There is room for something there. There’a room for another Weirdness! And that is how to turn it on! It will work!”
She comes in to hug me, but I remain rigid.
“Then you can go home to your planet. You must be very happy.”
She looks up at me. “It’s not as easy as that. I mean, this brings us much closer. We understand how the whole thing works. And we can probably control it. But it’s just a start.”
“What more do you need?” I ask. “It can bring you home, and you can control it. Sounds to me like you’re halfway home already. Which is all you wanted.”
“Juri’ex, try to understand. It’s not just me. All the girls want this. If not to go home, then at least the opportunity to do it. It’s still far into the future. If it ever happens.”
It happens now. She is leaving you.
I look down my nose at her. “You just said you brought it much closer. You can go home. I know what it feels like to want to go home. I felt that way myself, for a long time. I couldn’t do it. But you can. I don’t expect you to give it up. It is what you have worked for. But my home is here. It was my hope that you might stay, that we might create a new tribe together. Or if not a tribe, then create something. A childish dream, I now realize. You want nothing like that. You only want to go home. And you should.”
“But…”
She will leave. Now or in the future.
“Now or in the future,” I continue. “It doesn’t matter when. You will leave. I see no appeal in staying with you and then waiting with bated breath for the day when you go. It is better if I go. I have protected you and kept you from harm. You reached your goal. My mission is complete. And I thank you for it. It has enriched my life and I have learned many things. But I must not be greedy. It ends here.”
I step up onto the elevator.
“Juri’ex,” Ashlynn says, and her voice cracks. “We can talk about this!”
You have talked so much already.
“We have talked so much already,” I say coldly and step on the white light.
Immediately, the elevator platform zooms upwards and into the shaft. I think I can hear an anguished “Juri’eeeeeex!” from below, but it must be my imagination.
At the service level I push the light again, so that Ashlynn can use the elevator to get up again. It zooms back down, and I step into the elevator beam forwards.
I make my way up through the levels, determined that Ashlynn should not be able to catch up with me. I also don’t want to give myself time to ponder the consequences of what I just did. It was the right thing, of course. There is no future with her and me if all she wants is to leave. Of course, she never intended to be with me when I build and lead my new tribe. That was only a way to lead me on.
Why? Why did she need me here? Just for the company? Or was she genuinely worried about dangers here in this alien spaceship? Yes, probably. I do believe that these lower levels were unknown to her and to Delyah. Well, I saw her safely to the end of her mission. And then my mission was at an end, too. I can return to her village, meet up with my friends from The Island, and plan how to get rid of the two dragons stranded nearby. It is a more useful endeavor than staying here, watching an alien female study other alien things.
I reach the playground level, and when I see the ocean with the small islands, I recall Ashlynn’s sadness when she realized what these levels are for. Perhaps I can go over to that central island and relive being there with her.
She will leave. Keep going, put her behind you.
I don’t look around anymore when I hear the voice in my mind. It is plainly my own common sense that has to speak louder to me in order to be heard over the strong emotions I’ve had lately. I have heard of similar things before. The voice of the conscience, the inner voice. I always thought is was a figure of speech, but I see now that is wasn’t. The robot is nowhere to be seen, so I can be sure that’s not the source of it. No, it is within me, saying the things that I know to be true, deep down. There are no words, of course. That’s not how the inner voice works.
For a while, I let myself be tricked by the fantasy of Ashlynn sharing more time with me. But it was a fool’s errand. It could never happen.
On the waterfall level, I almost crack. The things Ashlynn and I have done here!
She will leave. Keep going.
It will only be memories now.
Well, I did my duty and fulfilled my mission. What more does a warrior need?
I reach the uppermost level, the garden. Here, I have to walk across it to the steep and narrow stairway that will take me up to the final elevator that leads out.
It’s night time, and the starry sky is as alien as this garden is in daylight. It gives off just enough light for me to walk by.
But the smells! Fruits and flowers, all alien, all sweet. And it all makes it impossible to put Ashlynn out of my mind. This is where she started acting differently, for the first time. She came alive here, after the difficult walk through the jungle. This is where I saw the real her for the first time, the woman who is not clumsy or downright dangerous. And I really liked what I saw.
How is she now, down there by the large Weirdness? Perhaps I should go down there again and just check on her.
She is busy, preparing to leave. Keep going.
My inner voice knows better than I do what the smart thing to do is.
I reach the stairs and start climbing them, careful to keep my balance. I’m sure the slender Ex would have no trouble at all zipping up and down, but even Ashlynn bumped her hips into the side once or twice.
The thought of her body makes me groan out loud. So soft, so round, so rich in sensations and features and temptations. Just like the rest of her.
I lose myself in the memories. Oh, her bright, happy laugh...
Keep going!
I wipe some mysterious water off my cheeks and continue, my feet as heavy as if I had tied large rocks to them.
I reach the top and take a last look at the dark gardens, peering over towards the elevator beam, hoping to see familiar movement there. But there’s nothing.
I find the elevator, slap the strange symbols the same way Ashlynn did, and soon find myself where we first entered. There’s broken glass on the floor, scorch marks on the walls, and all kinds of destruction everywhere.
I absentmindedly touch the rapidly healing scars on my chest and thigh. On the far end there should be more of the miraculous substance that Ashlynn used on me.
I will leave it to her and her friends. They might need it on their way back to their planet.
A door opens without a sound.
The heat and humidity and sounds and smells from the jungle outside hit me so hard I have to steady myself on the wall to not fall over.
This is another world I’m leaving behind.
It’s her world. She knew I could never come along.
And for a few days, I knew what it could have been like.
“Goodbye, my love,” I whisper and step into the jungle nig
ht.
The door slides shut behind me, and for a moment I think I can hear a soft laughter in my mind.
My inner voice is happy that this turned out right.
17
- Ashlynn -
The empty elevator platform comes down, and for a second I think that Juri’ex is coming back.
But he’s not on it. He’s just sent it down so I have a way to come up.
Is he waiting for me up there?
“Juri’ex!”
My thin voice doesn’t resonate at all from the walls. It’s like yelling into a ball of cotton. And there’s no reply from above.
I’ve never seen him like that before. And I know that cavemen don’t say things for dramatic effect. When they say something, it’s true and serious and non-negotiable.
He’s gone.
The platform comes to a soft stop, and I’m alone.
I don’t know how long I’m just standing there, staring at the little white light in the floor. I just know that when I move my eyes, I’ll break down.
I have solved the problem of how the spaceships move through space faster than light. And I think that the smaller ship in storage is now ready to be born.
It should be a happy occasion. And for a second, it was. Now, the whole thing leaves me cold. Who cares if I can go home if I’m leaving behind the only thing that’s made me happy for a decade? The only man I could ever see myself being with for the long term
“Juri’ex…” My face scrunches up and bitter tears burn in my eyes.
I pull myself together. I have wept far too much on this planet. This is not the time to give in to it again.
I check the alien instruments one last time. Staring into the first Weirdness makes it much easier to understand the Ex symbols, the ones that it took Delyah months of hard study to start grasping.
The Ex must have been profoundly affected by discovering the Weirdness. It allowed them to think differently, to see nature in a new way, and to even change their way of writing.
Being forced to confront something the brain just can’t handle opens it up, unlocks new perspectives. That’s why the Ex had that smaller Weirdness on the amusement level, of course. The kids had to get used to it from a young age. And pretending that it was an amusement, a treat, is something that shrewd parents on Earth might also have done.
On the panel, there are now two Weirdnesses. One small one on the amusement level, one that’s just for show. Then there is this one beneath me, the one that powers all of Bune and can take the whole gigantic spaceship to impossible speeds.
And there is a room third one, almost as large, displayed as being inside the smaller spaceship. The one that was ready to take the caveman army off Xren to fight the dragons somewhere else.
I have done what I came here for, and more. Not only have I answered Delyah’s question, I now know how to flick this alien switch to turn the smaller ship on.
I feel no joy at that. No satisfaction. As it turned out, it was easy. All I had to do was give my intuition free rein. I could do that because Delyah read me the riot act and because he made me feel that I could—
Shit. He believed in me. He supported me. And now…
There’s no more for me to do here. I’ll go back up to Delyah and tell her about the progress and about Juri’ex leaving.
I shudder, but not from cold. Without Juri’ex close, that unpleasant feeling of an enemy being close has returned.
It’s my imagination, of course. All my thinking about dragons has conjured up in my mind that unpleasant feeling of hopelessness that I’d always feel when Troga was somewhere close.
Except, I haven’t thought about dragons at all while I’ve been here.
Well, maybe it’s the atmosphere that’s somehow seeping into me. I mean, the Ex must have thought about few things other than dragons. Maybe their thoughts are still lingering in these walls, in a way.
I step up onto the elevator disk and step on the white light. The disk ascends fast, and soon I’m up at the service level.
The robot is waiting for me. I think it’s pretty late at night. I shouldn’t wake up Delyah now.
But the robot comes walking towards me, even so.
And there’s something strange about its walk. It’s no longer than mincing, delicate gate it had before. Now, it’s leaning forward as if charging at me.
I back up, alarmed. “Delyah? Are you in there?”
The robot stretches its arms out in front and lunges at me, and only now do I notice that its long fingers are quite pointy.
I draw away in horror, almost stumbling over my own feet. Then I turn and run towards the elevator beam. I hear the hard taps of the robot’s feet on the floor, fast and mechanical right behind me.
Damn it! I don’t think that’s Delyah controlling it. It must have malfunctioned somehow. She did talk about more of the equipment up in the control room going haywire.
I sprint into the elevator beam, and then immediately find myself one level higher.
I take one fast step back to get out of the beam, then one more forwards to get back in. In the split second before I’m transported up, I see the robot materializing in the beam.
It’s chasing me. Well, at least I have about a second head start on it.
I travel up the levels in the same way, but it seems I’m a little faster in getting out of the beam and then back in, so after five levels or so I don’t see the robot anymore.
Still, this beam only goes up to the garden level. Once there, I’ll have to run again. Or fight the robot.
Delyah said that they’re not great fighters. And it does look pretty puny. But those fingers are sharp, and it might be pretty dexterous and quick with them.
I get to the level with the playground islands and run out of the beam and across the bridge to the first island. I duck down behind a bush with blue flowers on it. In this nighttime darkness, maybe the robot won’t see me.
It comes out of the beam and stands still for a moment. Then it turns and walks back into it and is gone.
I breathe out. That actually got pretty tense.
So. Now I know that the robot is on one of the levels above me. Is that really a lot better?
Hmm.
Well, at least I tricked it. It’s not untrick-able.
I watch the beam for a while. What would I do if I was the robot, assuming it really is out to get me?
I’d make my way to the uppermost level. I wouldn’t see anyone, so I would keep going across the garden level towards the stairs. But when I got there, I would realize the person I was hunting wasn’t there at all.
I would have to go downwards again, searching each level carefully.
That means that robot will be back at some time, and I might have to fight it.
I’ve long since lost my spear, and my shoulder bag now only contains empty food packs and an even more empty water pouch.
Ah.
And my knife.
I walk across the bridge back to the beam and step into it forwards, then keep going until I’m at the waterfall level with the October atmosphere. Those trees look real to me, and I have lived on Xren for many months now. I know how to make stuff from wood.
I walk quickly towards the waterfall and the pool, trying my best to not think of the other times I’ve been here. But it’s not hard – the landscape is the same, the waterfall makes the same subdued noise, but it seems dead and different now because it’s missing the key component that made it so great.
I don’t have time to dwell on that. That will come home to roost pretty soon anyway.
I make my way past the pool and behind the cliffs that the waterfall runs from so that I’ll be out of sight from the elevator beam.
I find a tree that’s not as thick as the others, more like a sapling, and get working with my knife.
The wood is tough and looks a bit different from the wood I’ve known on Earth. This has thicker fibers, it seems to me. And the wood crumbles easier. But after a while I have cut throu
gh half the trunk, and the rest of it snaps off when I bend the tree down and put my weight on it.
I gasp. The light suddenly changes all over the level. It goes bright as day, then dark again. Then bright for one half second, then dark, in a steady rhythm that I’ve never seen before. As if some asshole is playing with a light switch, constantly turning it on and off.
“Fuck! That’s all I need.”
Then the sound hits me. Just two tones, not harmonic to my ears. It’s clearly a siren. And it is the most alarming siren I’ve ever heard. An ambulance has nothing on this.
Someone has sounded the alarm in the ship. As if I needed more reasons to worry.
Well, I still have things to do.
I cut the branches off it, as well as the upper eight feet of thinner and thinner trunk. And then I’m left with the remainder, four feet long and pretty heavy. I heft it in my hand.
“I’ve made a fucking club,” I mutter.
Yeah. Caroline said I looked like a cavewoman, but now the similarity to a girl straight out of the Stone Age must be beyond hilarious and well into the cringey.
Okay. I have a weapon appropriate for my station in life. Now what?
Immediately, my thoughts fly straight to Juri’ex. Shit, I may have lost him.
I just can’t stop it. I start weeping, sore and hopeless. This should be a happy day, but it’s just bleak.
The alarms keeps resounding everywhere around me, adding to the despair.
Focus. I have to focus. I don’t have time for this. That robot will be back.
I look around in the unpleasantly flashing light, then see exactly where I’ll fight it when it gets here. It’s an important spot.
I drag my club back around the cliff, not wanting to exhaust the muscles in my arms by lifting it too much. If there were loose rocks here, I could pick some up, climb up on the cliff and toss them at the robot. But there are no projectiles. Still, some kind of surprise attack is probably my best bet.
