Part Five

A bonfire had been lit in the main square to partially compensate for the lack of street lighting. Although a steady wind was blowing, the black shadows of the wind generators couldn't be seen turning against the stars. Riik had said on the way from the house that some of the blades had sheared off during the storm. Their father was with a team trying to get the fusion reactor running again, but as it hadn't been used since the wind generators were completed, it was expected to take a while to start it up.

Arkyna took a pack of rations from a man she vaguely knew; he lived away from the main settlement, she thought, on one of the farms. The rations were squishy and unappealing, but presumably contained something nutritious. Arkyna ate them all as she and Riik wandered around the square, nodding greetings to people, although none of their friends were present.

'Do you know where mother is?' Arkyna asked when she'd finished the rations. Bland though they had been, they had definitely taken away most of her hunger.

'She went up to the Tireless,' Riik said. 'She's supposed to see if it's possible to power up the FTL engines and send a message back to Alledora.'

'Why would we want to do that?'

Riik looked around, then leaned closer to his sister. 'I think the situation's more serious than they'd like to admit to us,' he said. 'From what I've been able to piece together, the storm took out all our farmland. Once these emergency rations are gone, that's it. No more food. Or at least, none of the plants they brought from Alledora.'

'Can't we survive on native species?'

'I'm not sure, but they obviously don't think we can. You know mother's been continuing her research. Evidently she thinks she can get a message to Alledora quickly enough for it to make a difference.'

'Even if it gets there immediately it's still at least a three year wait for any help to arrive.'

Riik shrugged. 'Any chance is better than no chance, I guess.'

'Arkyna!'

Turning at the sound of her name, Arkyna saw Sirenya and Delar making their way towards her. Delar Kross was the head doctor on Dira Tulag; his wife Sirenya was a specialist in infectious agents, of which Dira Tulag had plenty. Delar had his large bag slung over his shoulder, and was rummaging in it with one hand even as he reached Arkyna and used his free hand to give her a friendly squeeze on the shoulder.

'Your parents said you were fine, but tired,' he said. 'Did you get some sleep?'

'Yes,' Arkyna said. 'I feel much better now.'

'Nobody ever felt good after missing a night's sleep,' Delar said, producing a portable scanner from his bag. 'But it's not usually anything some extra rest can't cure. And not many of us slept very well in that storm. It's amazing you didn't go deaf, the wind noise must have been awful in that cave.'

'We got lucky,' Arkyna said as Delar started running the scanner down her body. 'By all rights Riik and I should be dead.'

'But we're grateful you aren't,' Sirenya said. The scannar started making burbling noises, and Delar tapped its screen before scanning Arkyna again.

'Something wrong?' Arkyna asked.

'Oh, I doubt it's anything. It wants charging up, but with the main power down we're restricted on use. At least until your father gets the fusion reactor running.'

'I'm sure Koro would let you use some power for medical devices,' Sirenya said. 'I'll ask him.'

'It's not urgent-' Delar began, but his wife was already striding away and had passed out of convenient earshot. Delar sighed. 'I do have enough power for now,' he said as he changed the scanner's settings and ran it over Arkyna again, frowning this time. 'And I don't think this thing is suffering from lack of power as much as I thought it was.'

'So it has found something?'

'Yes, and I don't know what it is,' Delar said. Arkyna tried to read the scanner screen, but it was at entirely the wrong angle and she could hardly see any of it. 'Your body temperature is slightly low,' the doctor was saying, 'which might be hypothermia from last night, but it doesn't fit because your heart seems to be slightly warmer than usual, and your heart rate is remarkably high. You didn't run here, did you?'

'No.'

'Hmm. Well, I don't really know what to suggest. Get some more sleep, and come and see me in the morning. They've promised to have me enough power to run the main diagnostic systems by then, so we should be able to find out what's up with you then.'

'Okay. I'll see you tomorrow.'

Delar smiled and tucked his scanner away, nodding to her. She smiled back, and the doctor walked off. Riik was looking up at the sky, where a star appeared to be growing gradually brighter. Arkyna followed his gaze.

'What's that?'

'Absolutely no idea,' Riik said. A moment later, a flash lit up the sky, and when it dimmed an expanding ring of light was visible, which faded as it grew larger. The settlement was silent save for the crackling of the bonfire until the ring wasn't visible anymore, then someone pointed.

'Look!'

Another star appeared to be growing larger, moving across the sky as it did so. After a minute or so it vanished beneath the western horizon. A couple of minutes after that, a firey streak passed over their heads from east to west, leaving sonic booms in its wake.

'What was that?' Arkyna exclaimed through the ringing in her ears. She didn't think anybody else could hear any better than she could, but she saw several figures climbing into a shuttle.

'Arkyna! Mother was up there,' Riik was saying. Arkyna could just make out the words through the noise in her ears, partially by reading his lips. 'What if that was the Tireless? What if the FTL drive exploded?'

'I-' Arkyna looked up, looking for the familiar bright star which didn't quite look like a star. The Tireless had been visible in orbit for her entire life, but it couldn't always be seen. At some times of night, the orientation of the ship to the sun was wrong, and it remained in Dira Tulag's shadow. 'She wouldn't power them up if they weren't safe,' she said eventually. 'She wouldn't.'

Riik looked very much her little brother, a role he fit increasingly badly as his understanding of personality and motivation grew. Arkyna drew him into a hug, which he returned gratefully.

'I'll see if she's okay,' she said, closing her eyes.

'Can you?'

Arkyna frowned to herself. Could she? The idea had popped into her head fully-formed, just as the idea of using Psi to block the noise of the storm had done. Still, that had worked.

'Yes.'

It was increasingly easy to touch the barrier which held back the well of Psi, to breach it and tease a thread through into the world. She spun it outwards, upwards, past the rooftops and the clouds, through them and out of the atmosphere into airless space, where she split the thread into a net which expanded outwards, fuelled from below, from the energy she pushed up into orbit as it expanded around the planet. It didn't have to expand far. The Tireless rode in orbit in the place it was expected to be, and Arkyna could clearly feel Zaya on board.

She let the flow of Psi cease, and opened her eyes again.

'She's safe,' she said. Riik looked up at her.

'Really?'

'Really. She's fine. The ship's just where it should be.'

The shuttle took off then, rising smoothly from the ground, then engaging its main drive as early as possible to rise up into the night sky, heading directly for where Arkyna now knew the Tireless to be. Sirenya walked into Arkyna, watching the shuttle more than where she was going.

'Terribly sorry,' the biologist said. 'I was watching the shuttle.'

'Where have they gone?'

'To make sure that wasn't the Tireless.'

'But the Tireless is fine.'

'We can't raise them to check.'

'They're fine. Honestly.'

Sirenya looked puzzled, then her face turned serious. 'Yes,' she said. 'Of course they are.'

She walked off.

'She thinks you're delusional,' Riik said. 'She doesn't think there's any way that wasn't the Tireless, and she doesn't know how you could know they're safe anyway.'

'The shuttle will confirm it soon enough. Mother is safe, that's what matters.'

They paused to watch three flyers lift from the ground and head west, where the firey streak had been seen to be heading.

'And I guess we're going to find out what that meteor was pretty soon as well,' Riik observed. He was looking up at Arkyna's face, and frowned. 'What's happened to your eyes?' he asked.

'My eyes?'

'Yes.'

Arkyna looked around, and caught her reflection in a nearby window. It was far from perfect under the lighting conditions, but it was clear enough for her to see that her eyes, once a rich reddish-orange, were now an intense blue such as she had never seen before.

'I have no idea,' she said, touching fingers to her bottom eyelid. She blinked, and her eyes were suddenly their normal colour again. 'No idea at all.'

—

A quarter of the way around the planet to the west, a large but hot and barren island lay in a warm sea. The island was roughly shaped, but appeared somewhat like a squashed circle, drawn by a wobbly hand. The north side of the island had a protrusion, almost a peninsula, and upon this peninsula a spaceship had crashed.

The rather large crater which it had made smoked slightly in the night air. Closer to the remains of the ship itself, which hissed and popped and clicked as it cooled down and occasionally leaked unpleasant gases into the atmosphere, a single Alledari figure heaved himself upright, swayed slightly on his feet, and staggered towards the edge of the crater.

Half-way there, he fell over, and lay on the smoking dirt for several minutes before moving once more. The next time, he made it only half of the remaining distance, and waited for much longer before another attempt to move, which got him to the crater's edge. Once on safer ground, he crawled to the beach, and washed himself thoroughly in the seawater.

This accomplished, he heaved himself back out of the water, rolled onto his back, and lay staring up at the stars.

The sun was rising by the time three flyers appeared in the sky, hovering for a few moments before gently settling down not far from the crater. The man started heaving himself to his feet, and was standing by the time the group of colonists approached. He regarded them with vivid blue eyes, then held out a hand.

'Greetings,' he said. 'I am Iyshe De Rin.'

One of the colonists, a young man, came forward and took Ishe's hand, then took the man's elbow as well when it became clear just how close he was to falling over.

'Greetings Iyshe. I am Firnor Tu El. We were not expecting any visitors.'

'I dare say that you weren't.' Iyshe looked around vaguely. 'I would imagine the message informing you of my arrival won't arrive for another year or so yet. Isn't much of a colony you've got here young fellow.'

'This isn't the colony. We just came when we saw your ship crash.'

'Ah, of course. And you have flyers, fabulous. Is there space for a rather addled old man in those things?'

Firnor smiled. 'I'm sure there is. Is there anything in your ship which you need?'

Iyshe glanced back at the still-cooling wreck.

'I doubt it,' he said. 'I left all the important equipment in orbit.'

'Oh?'

'Bet you want to know what I'm doing here, don't you lad?'

'I do. I think we're all very curious.'

There was a general murmer of assent. Iyshe grinned, a childish grin which brought a great deal of life to those so-bright blue eyes.

'Well, you'll find out soon enough,' he said. 'Soon enough. I must talk to whoever's in charge around here.'

'We'll take you to him.' Firnor started helping Iyshe toward the flyer. 'And we'll get the doctor to look at you as well.'

'Nothing wrong with me that a bit of rest won't cure,' Iyshe said, then coughed until he could spit something out. 'Well, a bit of rest and some drugs to counteract all the gunk I breathed in on the way down.'

'Then we will delay no further.' Firnor got Isyhe into the flyer, and the others took their places. As they lifted from the ground, Iyshe watched the island grow smaller beneath them, then looked back at Firnor.

'Tell me,' he said. 'Are there many people your age here?'

'Yes. Several of us. I am among the first children to be born on Dira Tulag.'

Iyshe smiled. 'I shall look forward to meeting more of you. The viewpoint of someone who was not born on Alledora must be fascinating.'

Firnor shrugged. 'I wouldn't know.'

'No, you wouldn't.' Iyshe chuckled to himself. 'You quite definitely wouldn't.'

Unfinished History Archive

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