Didn’t take long, the gravity being what it was, for the exuberant dancing to taper off. It was replaced by wide-eyed exploration as the children fanned out about the complex, looking at this and that. Given that they’d never seen dirt, a sky, or even a plant, they were rapt.
Somebody ought to be keeping an eye on them, Vartan thought as he turned his steps for the admin dome.
Not his job. Petre had assigned him to ensure that Aguila had really left them alone. His next responsibility was a reconnaissance of the domes in order to develop a plan for their security.
Stepping inside, he made his way to the cafeteria, the smell of the food still lingering in the air. Damn! But that had been the most marvelous meal he’d ever eaten. Turned out he’d missed taste, had missed color, and open air, and . . . Well, so much.
His muscles, atrophied from all those years, pulled, and his lower back could feel the strain, but he made his way to the cafeteria, joining the group around the Messiah.
“Second Will, report?”
He nodded respectfully to the Messiah. “She’s gone. Disappeared into the east.”
“You were trained in security,” the Messiah noted, his eyes straying back toward the kitchen with a certain longing. Hell, they were all hungry. “What do you suggest we do next, Second Will?”
“Messiah, first thing, my task is to conduct a complete inspection of this place. Determine the lay of the land. Start an inventory of the station’s resources. We’ve got most of a day. We need to be organized by nightfall. The rest of the Will should assign lodging and duties. And someone has to be detailed to begin the next meal. I see that there are crates of provisions back there.”
“First Will?” The Messiah turned to Petre, “Can you do that?”
“Of course,” Petre bowed his white-haired head, the ponytail bobbing.
“See to your reconnaissance.” The Messiah turned back to Vartan. “Take a small group. I think there’s a map back in that pile on the rear table.”
“Messiah,” Vartan added. “The children . . .”
“Yes?”
“They’re running around outside. Unsupervised.”
“I have the women and young men attending to the placement of our belongings. If you think that’s a problem, detail Shyanne and Marta to keep track of them and make sure they’re safe.”
Vartan nodded and turned to leave.
“Second Will?” the Messiah called.
Vartan turned back, squirmed as that blue eye in the Messiah’s forehead seemed to bore into his soul.
“What do you make of this warning the Supervisor and that Perez woman gave us?”
“I think we should heed each and every one until we can separate the lies from reality here.”
The Messiah puckered his black-painted lips, sucked at them for a moment, and nodded. “I agree. While the universe has indeed brought us this far, it doesn’t expect us to be fools. Develop whatever security protocols you think necessary.”
Vartan fixed on Petre. “You and I should put our heads together and—”
“Deal with Tikal on that. I’m afraid the First Will and his picked team have other priorities,” the Messiah said, an absent look in his dark eyes. “He’s going to be arranging for our next meeting with the Supervisor. You saw the scars on the woman? That’s a sign, a warning from the universe itself. Worry about the wildlife and plants, yes, but ultimately, she might very well turn out to be the death of us.”
Vartan kept his expression neutral. Bowed his head again. “Of course, Messiah.”
“To defeat her, we must first reassure her. She must believe that we are not a threat. I need Shimal, who understands these things, to cause a malfunction in the solar panels. Something easy to fix that will require the Supervisor to send a party out. One that we can convince that we are humble, grateful, and thankful for our new home.”
“Of course, Messiah,” Vartan told the man. “I’ll see to it immediately.”
But as he walked off, he glanced back at the piles of boxes Aguila had left for them. Aguila might be the long-term threat, but he worried about the I’m-not-giving-you-shit tone in Talina Perez’s voice as she talked about the dangers surrounding them.
Seemed to Vartan that they’d be better off figuring out how to deal with Tyson’s dangers before going to war with Kalico Aguila and the rest of the planet.
Where the Prophets lay on their litters in the back, being tended to by the Chosen, Callista cried out, “Whaaa . . . whaaa . . . shoot.”
Watch out?
At the door he shot a look back at the Messiah. Hope you’re right about all of this.
24
“Never figured I’d see the like of those people.” Marc Talbot perched on his chair with a knee up as the Corporate shuttle arced above the clouds where they packed against the eastern side of the Wind Mountains. He glanced over to where Talina and Kalico sat in the row of seats behind the pilot.
Aguila said, “The human brain has given us the keys to the universe, allowed us to travel across thirty light-years, banish all but a tiny number of diseases, colonize distant worlds, and control the laws of physics. Can those human beings really be related to us?”
“The religious mind,” Talina mused, gaze unfocused. “It operates on faith. They choose to believe the universe has chosen them. They have faith it will protect them for its own purposes.”
Talbot rapped his fingers on his knee. “This is Donovan. Sometimes I think even the most basic laws of the universe don’t apply here. So what’s going to happen the first time they figure out that nothing’s working the way the Prophets want? And what’s with them, anyway? Looked to me like they’re spastic.”
At that moment, Raya Turnienko leaned in the hatch. Her round face was thoughtful. “Supervisor? Are you in a hurry to get back to Corporate Mine this afternoon?”
“Yeah, one of the first things unloaded from Ashanti were a pair of Semex 81-B roto mills. Brand new. We can replace our old, broken-down jury-rigged mucking machines. And besides, Talovich has half of my people building shoring in the Number Three.”
The Number Three had seemed like a good idea. Tunnel in from the bottom of the mountain, then the ore could be rolled downhill on tracks all the way to the smelter. What no one had counted on was the shattered rock zone they’d hit about two hundred meters into the adit. The impact-shocked rock was rich with exotic metals, but so unstable as to come tumbling down if it was disturbed by so much as a loud sneeze.
“What have you got, Raya?” Talina asked.
“Preliminary data on the Irredenta. I won’t know for certain until I can run some of these data through the lab. Especially their so-called Prophets.”
“Anything you can share with us now?”
“Outside of anemia, vitamin deficiency, malnutrition, and atrophy? No. But once we’re back in PA, I’ve got some serious research ahead of me.”
“You look pretty grim,” Talina noted.
Raya arched her thin eyebrows. “Yeah, they’ve got the dead inside them. No doubt about it. The problem is, if I’m right, the dead aren’t happily going along for the ride.”
“Zombies?” Talbot asked, making a face.
Raya didn’t rise to the bait. “Actually, pending results of the tests, this could be a whole lot worse. I’ll know in a couple of days.” She glanced at Kalico. “Want to be there when I figure this out? They are your people, after all.”
“Sure.”
And then Raya ducked back through the hatch, her concentration locked on her handheld monitor.
25
On the monitor, Miguel Galluzzi watched as the last of the containers dropped into Donovan’s atmosphere. In the telemetry, the rectangular box began to tumble, the corners glowing from dull red to orange to fiery as the duraplast heated.
Like the others that had preceded it, they’d acceler
ated the container, shot it out so that Donovan’s gravity would increase its speed for maximum effect when it hit atmosphere. The tumbling container glowed now, streaking through the planet’s upper skies, leaving a trail behind.
Didn’t take long. Given the velocity, friction disintegrated the container’s sides, spilling the contents into the fire. The combustibles, things like clothing, bedding, woods, and plastics, immediately flared into ash. The metals, sialon, and glass all lasted a little longer, tiny streaks of light as they incinerated. The bigger items, furniture and the like, splintered off from the main mass, trailing fire into oblivion.
And then it was gone. Only vapors and tiny particles marking the path of the Unreconciled’s last belongings.
Far beneath, dotted with patterns of white cloud, Donovan’s ocean gleamed in serene blue, Capella’s light adding a golden sheen along the planet’s curve.
Galluzzi sighed, turned, and strode down the hallway to the Deck Three hatch. He’d had the crew working in hazard suits as they packed everything loose into sacks. The room fixtures, beds, furniture, the kitchen wares, the tables and chairs, anything that wasn’t structurally attached to Ashanti, had been packed into the containers. Then, one by one they’d been jettisoned to burn up in Donovan’s atmosphere. A symbolic final resting place for anything having to do with the Unreconciled.
At the hatch, Galluzzi pulled on his hazard suit, flipped down the hood, and sealed it. Then he palmed the hatch. As it slid open, billowing gusts of steam and cleanser rolled out.
Stepping inside, Galluzzi sealed the hatch behind him, staring through the clouds of cleanser. The air here was toxic, filled with chemicals, soot, particles, and hot enough to sear a man’s lungs, should he inhale.
But along with the Unreconciled’s trash and belongings, the filth was gone. The macabre art had been blasted off the walls, partitions had been removed, every surface scoured of as much as five millimeters of material. A combination of fire, chemical, and abrasive had stripped Ashanti of every last vestige of the horror that had thrived here.
It is gone from everywhere but my memory.
That, Galluzzi couldn’t scour.
As he looked around at the snaking hoses, the pressure machines, and blow torches, he wondered what The Corporation was going to say about his modifications to Deck Three. Assuming he ever made it home.
Not that it mattered. That was then. This was now. He and the crew wanted every last trace removed. Even the notion of trying to space Ashanti with the reminder of Deck Three had been too horrifying to countenance.
Turner, in his trademark hazard suit with a yellow duck emblem on the chest, appeared out of the infernal fog. “Last one burn up?”
“It did. Just like the others. Whatever’s left can float down on Donovan now. Food for their fishes.”
“Wonder if they even have fishes. Guess Michaela’s team will find out.”
“Do I hear regret in your voice?”
“Cap, do you believe in temporary insanity?”
Galluzzi waved a gloved hand at the surroundings. “You ask me that? Here? Given what we’re doing to the ship?”
Turner’s expression through the transparency communicated a wry humor. “I’m thinking that when it came to Michaela, I’m going to be spending a lot of the rest of my life thinking I was an idiot to let that one get away.”
“Might not be too late.”
Turner’s shrug was masked by his bulky suit. He turned away, saying, “Come on. Let me show you what we’ve done.”
The finer details were masked by the noxious atmosphere, but for Galluzzi, he might have been on another ship. Dark, dingy, Deck Three was transformed. With all the light panels in, most of the walls removed, the kitchen-cafeteria and rec room as one large open space. The cabins and barracks were scoured; the entire deck was foreign, new, pristine.
Galluzzi even like the rounded effect. The cleansing hadn’t left a single sharp corner to be found. The place had a melted look, creamy and open.
“What do you think?” Galluzzi asked.
“It’s a miracle,” Turner told him. “Got a question: You sleeping better, Cap?”
Galluzzi paused, surprised when he said, “I am. What makes you ask?”
“Crew was talking about it. How the nightmares have been going away. It’s like with each day’s work, the more we clean down here, the better we’re doing. Like a weight lifted off. A terror that’s now becoming a really bad memory. Like we’re never going to be the same again, but we’re all going to make it.”
“Yeah, I hear you.” Sure. Easy for Turner to say.
Galluzzi stared around through the swirling mist. Ashanti was cleared of the physical reminders of the Unreconciled. They were all feeling better, but it wouldn’t last. The things that had happened here, the things Miguel Galluzzi was responsible for, those haunting memories would cling to him like the albatross of legend.
Ultimately, Ashanti might be cleansed of the corruption, but looking around at the scoured surfaces, it was to see the scar. A scar might be healed tissue, but it also served as an enduring reminder.
Like my ship, I will never outrun my shame.
26
Mark Talbot couldn’t believe it. It hadn’t been twenty-four hours and he was on his way back to Tyson Station. All he’d had in between was a pleasant evening with his family—a rare night when his two wives, Dya and Su, along with the kids, had been home at the same time. After dealing with the Unreconciled, the evening had been a reminder of the blessings that had befallen him. To be part of a family, to have women who loved him, children to be proud of.
Sure, they had suffered tragedy enough on Donovan, but with the exception of Kylee, they’d come through it. Adjusted. Dya’s skills had earned her a valued position as one of the preeminent researchers on Donovan. Her insight into the biology was going to revolutionize humanity’s chances for success on the planet. Su was reworking the PA computer systems, her coding abilities allowing for increased data manipulation in the town’s single quantum cubit computer.
The kids had finally integrated into the local academy, a transition made somehow easier because Dan Wirth had built a new school. As though everyone moving into the new building had leveled the playing field, hadn’t left the Mundo kids feeling as much like outsiders.
Talbot had sprawled on the couch, watching as Damien, Sullee, Tuska, and Taung had led the rest of the children in a game of snap. He’d had one arm around Dya, the other tucking Su close.
This, he had thought, is the meaning of existence.
That lingering knowledge had made his lovemaking with Su even more tender and fulfilling than usual—though he had slept that night with nightmares of the Unreconciled, recoiling from tortured dreams in which they stalked his children from the shadows, their eyes burning red in intricately scarred faces.
And what do I wake up to this morning?
Two Spot had called on the com. “Mark? We’ve got a plea from Tyson. Something’s wrong with the solar generators out there. They’re losing their electricity. Kalico wondered if you could take Sheyela Smith out with a squad of armored marines and see what’s wrong?”
So here he was, at the wheel of one of the new airtrucks, scooting along some thousand feet above the rumpled and mounded carpet of forest. Tyson Station was just ahead, a flat mesa jutting out from the broken and tumbled hills that marked the old volcano. He could see the white dots of the domes, the paler green of the agricultural fields to their south. And there, on the point, were the culprit solar collectors.
“All right, people, gear up.”
Behind him, privates, Paco Anderssoni, Dina Michegan, Wan Xi, Russ Tanner, and Briah Muldare strapped into their combat armor. The sound of the armor clicking into place was like music to Talbot’s ears. He could hear the hum of the servos as his former team checked their systems. The slick-slick of weapons check meant t
hat rounds were being chambered.
In the rear, Sheyela Smith, a woman in her thirties, called, “Whatever you do, don’t let the freaks eat me.”
“You’re our electrical guru,” Dina Michegan told her. “Didn’t even need to hear it from the Supervisor. We’ll level that shit-sucking station before we let them harm a hair on your head.”
“Indispensable,” Wan Xi agreed, a smile on his mobber-scarred face.
“Yeah,” Muldare agreed. “Second only to Inga, but that’s only ’cause while you can keep electrical shit running, you can’t brew a keg of IPA that wouldn’t gag a slug.”
“Hey, guys,” Talbot warned, “Kalico wants us to go in, fix the solar, and get the hell out without an incident. Job one is to keep Sheyela safe. Job two is to fix the electricity. Job three is to get out without an incident. In armor, with non-lethal tech, that shouldn’t be an impossible mission.”
“Yeah, Mark,” Anderssoni replied. “Who do you think you’re talking to? After all the shit we been through, you’re not going to find a tighter squad in the Corps.”
Mark turned, grinned, and slapped hands with Anderssoni. Donovan had honed them, shaped them, and compressed them. Cap Taggart, Deb Spiro, and Kalen Tompzen had torn them apart and Donovan glued them back together. What was left of the original twenty marines were closer than family.
God help the Unreconciled if this were a trap.
Mark wheeled the airtruck around, wishing he had the A-7 with Makarov at the helm, but the big bird was in orbit, tied to Ashanti for a refit.
He cocked his head, seeing people as he circled the compound. They were all outside, clustered before the domes, waving.
“Looks friendly enough,” Muldare noted as she peered down.
“Don’t see any weapons,” Wan Xi agreed. “Hell, they’re half dressed.”
“Let’s go down and see,” Mark told them. “Helmets on, kiddies. Sheyela, the marines will jump down first, form a box. You and I will climb down after them. They’ll proceed in a diamond formation to the solar collectors. You and I stay in the middle while the marines use their tech to keep eyes on the man-eaters. Russ?”
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