Another World

by Samuel Best

  Henry chuckled. “And which scientific field do you call your own?”

  “Microbiology.”

  “Ah,” said Henry. “I imagine you’ll be kept busy for a long time.”

  “Not without a microscope. My eyesight is good, but not that good.”

  “Perhaps we’ll find one on the ship.”

  Niku looked at him sideways.

  “What’s the matter?” said Henry.

  “You’re awfully optimistic.”

  “Well,” said Henry thoughtfully, “someone has to be, don’t you think?”

  Merritt stopped abruptly and held out his arm to halt the others. With the sun below the horizon, their progress had significantly slowed in the setting darkness.

  “Careful,” said Merritt.

  The forest ended suddenly at the edge of a two-story cliff. Merritt stood on the precipice, one hand against a tree trunk for support.

  Henry leaned forward to look over the edge. “Close one,” he said.

  “It looks like we can climb down over there,” Merritt told them, pointing to the left.

  Part of the cliff had collapsed, its rubble forming a ramp that sloped down at a gentler, though still not ideal, angle.

  “What’s down there?” asked Niku.

  The four of them squinted into the growing darkness below, where the land stretched out before them in uniform shadow. No bare tree trunks rose from the plateau, which seemed to extend for miles.

  “Flat land, hopefully,” said Merritt.

  He walked along the edge of the cliff, heading for the dirt ramp.

  “Maybe we should camp here for the night,” Niku called to him.

  “After what we saw in the ocean,” said Merritt, “I’d rather sleep under a piece of broken hull than risk meeting something out here.”

  Ivan hurried after him.

  “What did you see in the ocean?” Henry asked with interest.

  Niku told him as they walked toward the ramp.

  “A land of wonder,” said Henry, almost to himself. “And great danger.”

  Merritt hopped down from the cliff’s edge. His boots sank into the loose dirt of the ramp and his feet slipped out from under him. He landed on his back and slid amidst a cloud of dust, rocks tumbling next to him as he dug his hands into the dirt to slow his fall.

  His work boots hit something hard at the bottom of the ramp and he pitched forward, slamming to a stop against a tall pillar. He blinked hard, then plopped back down, groaning and rubbing his forehead as he sat in the dirt.

  The others called down after him.

  “I’m fine,” Merritt shouted back irritably. “Just don’t jump onto the dirt.”

  The pillar he ran into protruded from the ground at an angle, rising four meters from a thick base toward the dark sky. One side was razor sharp, and its tip was pointed like a dagger. Its faceted surface glinted dully in the light of Galena’s moon, which was a thin smile hovering just above the horizon to the east.

  He thought about Gavin and his energy deserted him, weakening his limbs. His breath came in shallow, ragged gasps as his heart swelled with pain, fear, love, and longing. He wanted to rip it from his chest and let it pull him across the world, to his son.

  Merritt forced himself to stand. He brushed off his coveralls as the others scrambled down the dirt ramp behind him. Ivan came down on his stomach, coughing as dirt and sand sprayed his face.

  “Not flat ground after all,” said Merritt.

  The pillar he ran into was not alone. It was but one of many that covered the vast plateau that lay before them — square miles of jagged mineral lead sulfide which had erupted from the ground, driven up through the planet’s crust to form a labyrinth of towering swords.

  Niku looked down at his bare feet and wiggled his toes in the dirt.

  “Use the rock to cut off your sleeves,” said Henry, already walking toward the nearest pillar. “Slip those over your feet.”

  In the distance, a sound like the hooting of owls carried across the field of jagged rock.

  Niku stopped sawing his sleeve against the razor edge of a pillar and looked around. Merritt stepped past him, studying a narrow alley that weaved through the jagged rocks.

  “We should hurry,” he said. “Something is out there.”

  LEERA

  After her broken shin went numb, hunger set in.

  Leera’s head lolled drunkenly against the corporal’s shoulder as he struggled to support her weight. Their group had been walking for nearly two hours without rest, and the young soldier had been straining for a while.

  The wound in her back pulsed pain with each step, as if an animal had bit into her flesh and clamped down harder every time she put weight on her good leg.

  “Need…to stop…” she said weakly. “So hungry.”

  Corporal Turner splashed through a shallow stream. He stumbled and fell to one knee with a pained grunt.

  “We need to rest,” he said as he took Leera’s arm from around his neck and propped her against a large gray rock. He unshouldered his rifle and stood next to her, catching his breath and surveying their surroundings.

  “It will be dark soon,” said Uda, glancing at the sky. “We won’t make it to the wreckage.”

  Orange clouds streaked across the darkening blue. Galena’s moon appeared behind a cloud — a thin, silver crescent smiling down at the world. It was almost double in apparent size when compared to Earth’s own as seen from the surface.

  Leera’s fingers touched the edge of the stream, and she pulled them away. The clear water rushed over a bed of flat stones. Small tendrils of green algae clung to the stones, dancing in the current.

  Walter plopped down next to her, panting. His face was flushed and sweaty, his white-and-black body suit now mostly black from constantly wiping dirt off his hands.

  They had been walking up and down rolling hills for the better part of an hour as they pushed deeper into the forest of bare tree trunks. Leera looked up at the tree tops yet again, intrigued by the three thick branches that extended from each one, like the blunted talons of an eagle claw open toward the sky.

  Her head swam and knocked against the rock. She leaned sideways and dry-heaved over the spongy ground.

  Walter guided her back to a sitting position and she wiped her mouth with her dirty sleeve.

  “Look,” she said, raising a shaking finger to point past Walter.

  He turned around and said, “Well, what do you know?”

  A gnarled bush of twisted branches hugged the base of one of the nearby tree trunks, forming a near-perfect sphere as tall as a person. Large brown fruit hung from its branches.

  Walter plucked one from a sharp branch and weighed it in his palm.

  “It’s like a grapefruit,” he said, smiling as he displayed it to the others.

  “Don’t eat it!” Uda warned as she hurried over to him. “It’s poisonous.”

  A look of skepticism replaced Walter’s amusement as he studied the fruit more closely.

  “How do you know?”

  “Even if it isn’t, do you want to be the first person to try native food on this planet?”

  “We lost all our equipment in the crash,” he said. “We have no way to test it.”

  “There will be equipment at the colony,” she replied. “We just need to get there.” Then she turned to Leera. “I’m sorry if you’re hungry. I am, too. But we can’t risk it.”

  “I know,” Leera whispered hoarsely.

  Her stomach rumbled in disagreement.

  Uda knelt down at the edge of the stream and put one finger into it.

  “It should be safe to drink if we’re near the source,” she said. “That might help with the hunger. I’ll have a quick look.”

  She followed the water’s edge upstream.

  “We should stick together,” Turner called after her.

  “Come on, then,” she said, not looking back.

  The corporal glanced down at Leera uncertainly. She patted his foot and
nodded, then leaned her head back against the rock.

  “I’ll stay with her,” said Walter. “Just don’t stay away too long. You’re the only one with a weapon.”

  After Uda and Turner were gone from sight, Leera whispered, “Do you really think we need it?”

  “The gun?” asked Walter. He thought about it a moment. “No. But knowing he has it makes me feel better. ‘No significant life forms’, Kellan said. You remember?”

  Leera nodded. “But it’s a big planet,” she whispered.

  Walter looked around at the towering trees. “That crossed my mind, too. Speaking of which, does it strike you that Uda knows more than she’s telling us?”

  Leera’s eyebrows went up, and she nodded weakly.

  “The Halcyon ran surface sweeps with its scanners on previous visits,” said Walter. “And they delivered equipment to the colony site remotely, so maybe they had some idea of what to expect down here. I doubt they’d have a way to test plant toxicity without someone being on the surface.” Something nearby caught his attention, and he frowned. “Was that there before?”

  Leera followed his gaze and saw a circular patch of deep red moss on the ground a couple of meters away.

  “I’m not sure.”

  “We haven’t seen that color yet. It’s been all green and browns and grays. I was starting to think this was a tri-tone world.”

  He knelt beside the patch of red and was reaching out to touch it when Corporal Turner burst from the trees.

  “We found something,” he said, gasping for air.

  Walter stood up quickly. “What is it?” he asked, alarmed.

  “Best to see it for yourself.”

  Leera cried out in pain as Turner lifted her up to stand beside him.

  Walter walked on the other side, helping to support her weight. The three of them followed the stream up a small incline, into a thicker stand of tree trunks.

  In a small clearing, the source of the stream bubbled from the ground — a small, half-moon pool rimmed by vibrant green algae. Water swelled up from below to spill over a flat gray rock and flow into the stream.

  “Is it safe?” Walter asked.

  “Yes,” Turner answered, stopping near the pool.

  Walter bent down and cupped a handful of clear water into his mouth. He swished it around, testing it, then swallowed. He tried two more handfuls, then scooped some up and tilted his palm against Leera’s lips. The water was ice cold, with a faint taste of earthy minerals.

  She coughed and doubled over, her body shaking as she retched.

  “She has to rest,” Walter insisted.

  “Only a little farther,” said Turner. “Just around those trees.”

  He draped Leera’s arm over his neck and took her full weight, lifting her off the ground and carrying her against his side as he hurried ahead.

  Her vision faded in and out, as if the sun were on a dimmer switch.

  “Here!” said Turner.

  They emerged from the treeline into a wide clearing. Turner gently lowered Leera against a tree trunk and stood up next to Walter.

  Leera laughed suddenly as her head rolled on her shoulders. Another patch of thin red moss lay on the ground nearby, and, absurdly, this amused her to no end. She realized she was slipping into delirium.

  Walter took a few steps into the clearing, and muttered, “I don’t believe it.”

  Uda stood at the center of the clearing, next to the remains of an old bonfire. Around the edge of the clearing was a ripped canvas medical tent, small hard-shell cabins with broken windows, and an open-air mess pavilion. Every structure was covered with a layer of thick gray dust.

  “Another colony,” Walter said hoarsely, shuffling numbly toward the middle of the clearing. “I don’t believe it.”

  “The first colony,” said Uda.

  “But…” said Walter, spinning slowly in place as he surveyed the ruins. “Where are they?”

  Uda stood with her hands on her hips as she kicked over a rock near the fire pit.

  “Gone,” she said.

  Leera laughed again. Her head fell back against the tree trunk, and she fainted.

  The dreams found her, as they had aboard the Halcyon.

  Dreams of Paul, dreams of Micah.

  Each one became a nightmare as she left them behind.

  She left her family on a deserted beach, in a crowded market, on Sunrise Station — no matter where they were, she always left her family. She always abandoned them.

  Leera woke with a start in a deep, purple twilight. She herself was alone in the ruins of a human settlement, the other survivors nowhere to be seen.

  She tried to lean forward but was pinned to the tree trunk. Something moist covered her lower back, attaching her to the tree.

  Have I bled that much? she wondered.

  Then she looked down at her legs and screamed.

  Her injured right leg was covered in a wet, brown moss, heavy as a lead blanket, smothering it from hip to ankle.

  “Leera!” Walter shouted off to her left.

  He came bounding into the clearing carrying a document binder in one hand and an empty cup in the other. He threw both of them aside as he skidded to a stop in front of her and saw the moss.

  “Oh, God,” he said.

  Leera’s hands shook as they hovered over the moss. She was afraid to peel it off — afraid of what she might find underneath.

  Walter had no such reservation. He bent down and grabbed a corner. A ragged square broke free, ripping off like a chunk of sod. He sank his fingers into the damp moss and pulled more of it away.

  Leera tried to sit up again but couldn’t budge. She reached behind her back and clenched a fistful of moss, then yanked it free, grimacing as a thousand tiny moist, fibrous strands within the moss popped loose.

  When she and Walter had cleared it all away, Leera wiggled the toes of her right foot. The goose egg that had swollen to the size of a softball over her right shin was gone. The pant leg of her body suit and the makeshift bandage Walter had slipped over her calf were torn open to reveal blotched red skin. Tiny red dots covered her shin like a rash.

  She felt the skin of her lower back, probing for the wound she sustained when her escape pod crash-landed.

  The wound had healed.

  With Walter’s help, Leera stood slowly. She put all her weight on her good left leg, then gently tested her right.

  “No pain,” she whispered.

  She stood upright and bent at the knees several times, waiting for the pain to come back. When it didn’t, she took a step, faltered, and lost her balance. Walter caught her as she fell and lowered her to a sitting position on the ground.

  Leera stared at the pile of torn moss.

  “It’s the red moss from before,” she said.

  Walter looked around, searching for the deep red patch that had been nearby when Leera passed out.

  “I believe you’re right,” he told her.

  Leera picked up a sod-like chunk and turned it over in her hand.

  “It moves,” she said, “it heals, then it dies. I’d love to get this under a microscope.”

  Walter smiled with relief. “Feeling better, then?”

  “Loads.”

  “Then you’ll love what we found. I’m sorry we left you like that. I got carried away with searching the ruins.”

  “What did you find?”

  His smile grew broader. “Aliens.”

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  MERRITT

  The moon dipped below the horizon, leaving only the faint light of a billion distant stars to guide their way through miles of jagged rock. In the wake of the last hint of daylight, a small nebula appeared in the western sky. Bright red, cloudy lines traced a lopsided spiral pattern around a glowing star nursery.

  Merritt led the way, seeking out the safest path for Niku and Henry to follow. Even with one of their sleeves cut off and pulled over their feet, they still grunted and cursed when their soles found sharp rock. Ivan followed
last, head jerking like a bird’s at every sound.

  The strange hooting they had heard at the boundary of the pillar field followed them. Niku likened it to the hoot of an owl, but higher-pitched. Each call was identical, with a single emphasis in the middle, as if the owl had been squeezed – oooWAoooo. It seemed to emanate from the very rock itself, pausing only as they drew near to its source.

  Niku tripped on a rock and fell on his hands, letting out a short yelp of pain. He got to his knees, clearly exhausted, strands of his long black hair sticking out of the ponytail he’d secured with a strip of fabric from his sleeve. Fresh blood, black in the starlight, glistened on his palms.

  “Quick break,” said Merritt, reading the same exhaustion on the faces of Ivan and Henry. None of them said so aloud, but were clearly relieved at the chance to rest.

  Merritt walked a few paces ahead, searching for any hint of the Halcyon in the darkness ahead. He could see no silhouette on the horizon.

  He placed his palm gently against the side of a rock pillar, careful to avoid the side which tapered to a razor-sharp point. Each pillar was the same. The side facing east was dull, with shallow bowls in its surface, as if some of it had been chipped by a rock tool. The western side consisted of two planes converging on one sharp edge.

  The only exception to the sameness was a collection of smooth-sided arches a short ways back, rising slightly higher than the pillars to arc gracefully overhead before burrowing into the ground. Ivan had wanted to climb one to get a look at their surroundings, but changed his mind when he saw the others weren’t stopping.

  The pillars were aligned in a natural grid pattern, which kept Merritt and the others on a straight path through the vast field, heading directly for the wisps of smoke which, he believed, came from the Halcyon’s side-hull engines. The five thin lines of smoke had vanished against the night sky, but the group had taken no major turns since losing sight of them.

  “There’s a hole,” said Henry.

  He bent over behind a pillar, hands on his knees, gazing into a black hole at its base. The top of the hole reached his knees, and was equally as wide.

  “Here, too,” said Ivan, pointing at another pillar. “And here.” He wandered off, calling out whenever he found another hole.