Building New Canaan - The Complete Series - A Colonization and Exploration Space Adventure
Page 40
she said.
As Erin took the elevator to the twins’ apartment, Walter proposed checking with Murry about Pippa’s movements.
When Erin stepped inside the apartment, followed by Usef’s hulking figure, Anwen was standing in the center of the living area, her arms dangling. She looked as though she hadn’t slept all night.
“I’m so sorry,” she repeated.
“Just tell me exactly what happened,” Erin said. “When did you realize Pippa had left?”
“It took me a while to figure it out. When I returned from my walk and she wasn’t here, I thought she’d only popped out for a while. I didn’t bother trying to speak to her over the Link to check where she was. I didn’t think a lot more about it until she’d been gone for over an hour. Then I started to get concerned. I reached out to her, but there was no reply. I was worried then, especially after what Max tried to do to her at Excelsior Spaceport. I thought I’d better contact you or the constabulary, but I…. Well, I had a funny feeling about it all. It wasn’t like her to not tell me where she was going.”
“Didn’t you think she might need help?” Erin asked, giving Usef an incredulous look.
Anwen looked down. Erin had the distinct impression that she’d guessed Pippa was doing something she shouldn’t have been, and she hadn’t told anyone her sister had disappeared because she was covering up for her.
This new information threw an entirely new light on things. Had Erin taken a wrong path in her investigation?
Anwen swallowed and took a breath. “I checked her room and saw that her case and a lot of clothes were missing. I figured out that she’d left and expected to be away for a while. Maybe forever.” Anwen’s face crumpled, and she hid it in her hands. When she spoke again, her voice was thick. “I don’t understand it. We grew up side by side, we’ve always done everything together. Why would she do this to me?”
“I don’t know,” Erin replied gravely.
said Walter,
WHISTLING WINDS
STELLAR DATE: 03.22.8937 (Adjusted Years)
LOCATION: Government Center, Ushu
REGION: Tyre, New Canaan System
Isa had spent the previous day recording an in-depth interview with Tony, gleaning all his specialized knowledge about Tyre while also capturing his enthusiasm for the place. Now it was her last day in Ushu. After spending the day visiting another of the locale’s sights, she and Martin would be traveling to Mount Carmel that evening.
The more remote region promised infomentary segments aimed at Carthaginians who loved wild places and might be tiring of the relative accessibility of their home planet.
“What are you going to say to them?” Martin asked about Isa’s Tyrian friends as he and Isa were packing up their things in their hotel room. “Do you want me to deal with it?”
“Why would I want you to deal with it?” Isa asked.
“I don’t know. You’ve known them longer than I have. They act like they think you’re all friends. It’s going to be awkward explaining that you don’t want anything more to do with them.”
“Don’t worry. I’ll be fine,” Isa said. “I have my faults, I admit—”
“Oh? Do tell,” Martin interjected jokingly.
“Thanks,” said Isa. “Anyway, getting my point across isn’t one of them. The only danger is I might be too blunt, but if they take offense, who cares? When it comes down to it, Samuel lied to me. It doesn’t matter how harmless his intentions were, that was deceitful and uncool. I mean, I appreciate all they’ve done to show me around their special places in Tyre, but I don’t have anything to apologize for, Samuel does. So I won’t feel bad about it. Besides, it’s only one day. I wasn’t going to see them again after today, unless they planned on following me all over the planet.”
“If you say so,” Martin said. “I’ll leave it up to you.”
He’d received a message from his intern, Malcolm, and he was looking happy and relaxed. Isa guessed that things were going well at his site and that Malcolm’s report had inspired Martin to feel more confident in the intern’s abilities. The knock-on effect was that Isa felt less guilty about Martin’s presence there. He seemed to be enjoying himself, too. Their time in Tyre was turning into the vacation they’d missed out on in Athens; it was a pity that Erin couldn’t join them.
“Are you having second thoughts?” Martin asked, watching her as he closed and fastened his case. “Would you like me to speak to our Tyrian acquaintances after all?”
“No, definitely not. I was thinking about Erin. I miss her.”
“Yeah, I miss her too. It’s strange we haven’t heard from her.”
“I guess she’s still busy with her investigation,” Isa said. “Are you ready?”
Martin picked up his case “Let’s go.”
They’d checked out over the Link, so all they had to do was take their cases to the pinnace, then they could set off for another day’s sightseeing. As they were leaving early, Isa thought she’d still have plenty of time to contact Samuel and cancel that day’s plans, but to her surprise, when they reached the bottom of the staircase, she saw that the Tyrians were already at the hotel and waiting in the lobby.
Perhaps the conversation was going to be awkward after all.
After Isa greeted them less than enthusiastically, there was an awkward pause.
“I’ll take these,” Martin said, holding out his hand for Isa’s case. Samuel and the others said hi, and Martin nodded as he walked around them, carrying the two cases through the lobby to the front doors.
Ada turned to Isa and said, “Are you ready? We have something really special planned for today.”
“I’m sorry, Ada,” Isa replied. “We changed our minds—we’re going out by ourselves today. I wanted to thank you all for showing me all the sights around Ushu, but it looks like it’s goodbye for now.”
“Oh, really?” said Rahmin. “What caused the change of plan? We have everything set up. We wanted to take you to one of the deepest chasms in Tyre. Hardly anyone knows about it.”
“That sounds really fun, but I’m going to have to turn down the invitation,” said Isa.
Looks were exchanged between the friends as they took in this new development.
“Sorry,” Isa added, not very sincerely. “Thanks for everything. See you around sometime.”
She moved to follow Martin and reached the hotel’s doors, but then Samuel stepped in her way.
Isa halted, a little shocked and alarmed.
“Are you sure you won’t reconsider?” He laid a hand on her upper arm. “This is your last day at Ushu, and you won’t find the chasm by yourself. I bet your viewers would love it.”
Isa didn’t reply. She looked into his eyes and then down at his hand.
He removed it and put both hands in his pockets. “I just want to help you make the best infomentary you can.”
“Yeah,” said Isa as she pushed the door open, pausing to look back. “I get that. I understand that’s why you lied to me about knowing Tony.”
“Oh,” Samuel said. “You know about that, do you?”
“Yes. And the fact that he didn’t suggest you could be my informal guides.”
“I told you,” Ada hissed.
Martin climbed back up the front steps. “Are you coming, Isa?”
“Yes,” she replied to Martin. She then glared at Samuel before turning away.
“That seemed a little more tense than you expected,” Martin noted as she approached, a look of concern on his face.
“Yeah…. I think he was embarrassed.”
Without another glance at the Tyrians, she walked down the steps with Martin.
“Huh. Well, I could feel the frostiness from outside,” he said. “I guess you laid it on the line.”
“I just told them the truth,” Isa said. “Nothing wrong with that. Samuel had the cheek to lay a hand on my arm.”
“You’re kidding.”
“No, I’m not.”
Martin had left the luggage at the base of the stairs and now carried it to the pinnace waiting on the nearby pad. Once it was stowed, they climbed inside.
“Core, those three are strange,” Martin remarked as Isa closed the doors and started up the engine. “When you think about it, who goes to the trouble they have in playing the host to a visitor to their planet? They seemed okay, but that attitude is almost fanatical.”
“Yeah, now that you put it in that light, they sure were enthusiastic to give me a lot of their free time,” Isa said. “At least since that time in the restaurant after I first met them, I was never entirely comfortable with them. Still, that’s the last we’ll see of Samuel and his crew. Unless they plan on stalking us, that is.”
“Stars, don’t go there,” Martin said. “So, where are we going today?”
“Somewhere special, but I don’t want to tell you too much or it’ll spoil the effect. What I can say is that we’re wing-gliding today, so I’m going to fly up to the summit of Mount Athos first to collect some suits.”
“Fantastic,” said Martin.
When they reached the summit, the conditions at Mount Athos were perfect for wing-gliding: zero cloud cover, and a steady wind blowing up the mountain slopes. Isa almost changed her mind and proposed that they wing-glide down the mountain, but from what Tony had told her, her initial plan was even more spectacular.
An automatic dispenser doled out the wing-gliding suits to the thrill-seekers who braved the death-zone conditions at the caldera’s edge. The suits came equipped with face masks and oxygen tanks so the gliders could breathe until they reached the lower atmosphere. Where Isa and Martin were going, they could dispense with the face masks, so she only took two suits from the dispenser. She crammed the large suits into the back of the pinnace, and set the destination coordinates for their next stop.
Their vessel followed the opposite route than the day they went to the fjords, instead turning south and skirting the edge of the central sea for a time before they moved inland over another region of vales and fjords.
“I wonder if there are any hidden waterfalls down there,” Martin said longingly.
“We can go back to the other spot another day if you like,” Isa said. “But I have all the recordings of that place that I need. Today’s trip will be just as great, I promise.”
“Those fjords are a tough act to follow,” said Martin.
“You’ll see.”
The subtropical rainforest began to thin out; the trees shrank down to scrub, and patches of open, rocky ground appeared.
“Just another few minutes,” said Isa, checking the pinnace’s ETA.
Boulders replaced the rocks, and the vegetation dwindled away. Soon, the Central Range was far behind them, but new ridges and elevations appeared in the landscape. These were more regular than mountains. As they drew closer, Isa could make out tall pillars of rock in a range of thicknesses and heights.
“Don’t tell me we have to hop between those,” Martin said.
“Don’t be silly,” Isa replied. “Look.”
Coming into view up ahead, the granddaddies of all the pillars were rising majestically into the sky. They were flying over the smaller versions, and Isa saw that they indeed had hollow centers, as Tony had explained. The effect he’d described probably wouldn’t be apparent until she and Martin exited the pinnace.
“There are no lots here where I can set us down,” Isa said. “We’ll have to leave the pinnace on top of one of the pillars, then summon it after we reach the bottom. I have Link connectivity, so that shouldn’t be a problem.”
“So we’re wing-gliding down into the valley here?” asked Martin, sounding disappointed.
Isa knew why. On the face of it, the prospect didn’t look as exciting as the same activity on Mount Athos, but Martin didn’t know everything yet.
The pillars, sand-colored columns, continued to increase in size against the brilliant blue sky. Finally, they reached the center of the formation, where the tallest pillars rose kilometers into the air. These were as hollow as the others.
“What’s that?” Martin asked, listening intently.
Isa could hear it, too—or rather, feel it. Their vehicle was vibrating. She cracked a window a few centimeters. Warm wind rushed in, but more strikingly, melodious tones accompanied it. Deep basses, smooth tenors, dulcet contraltos, and piping sopranos came from all around. The breeze passing over the tops of the hollow pillars was resonating in their inner chambers, creating a natural orchestral sound.
“Whoa.” Martin was smiling. “Now I see, I mean hear, what you mean.”
He opened his window too, and they hovered over the central pillar for a while, just listening. As the wind ebbed and waned, the sound of the pillars shifted. Always sweetly melodic, always changing, it was truly an auditory natural wonder.
Isa set down the pinnace on the edge of the tallest pillar. The space was wider than their ship, but not by much. They climbed out, carefully avoiding the steep vertical drops on each side. The drop on the outer edge led to a narrow gap between that pillar and the next, and the other drop vanished into darkness within the interior.
“Was this place created by the FGT?” Martin asked, raising his voice over the fluctuating notes that echoed around them. “It seems too conveniently perfect to be entirely natural.”
“Tony told me that these are the plugs from an ancient volcanic eruption. It was one where instead of making a single peak, a lot of low mountains were created. The mountains are all gone, but these plugs remain,” replied Isa. Then she switched to the Link to make it easier to talk.
She pulled the wing-gliding suits out of the pinnace and handed one to Martin. The bulky suit swamped Isa when she put hers on, and she was worried it wouldn’t fit well, but then it adjusted, shrinking to match her short stature. Strong, thick, wind-resistant material stretched between her arms and legs; the suit would allow her to glide fairly effortlessly. She could adjust her position to turn, speed up, or slow down as she descended, and a small a-grav pack on the back would prevent any disasters if she got into trouble. The suits also had built-in safety helmets. Isa lifted hers over her head and slotted the visor into place.
He was fastening his helmet. He gave her a thumbs-up.
Isa looked out over their descent route. The valley floor lay far in the distance, three thousand eight hundred meters below, past sets of hollow pillars decreasing in height. Above, Canaan Prime shone down, dazzling and hot, baking the wind-smoothed rock beneath her feet. All around, multitudinous notes filled the air, rising up into a cobalt sky.
Isa grinned at Martin.
They jumped.
Immediately, the wind caught in the material of Isa’s s
uit, spreading it out and sending her soaring over the pillar tops. She swept across the natural flutes like a bird of prey scouting its territory. Wheeling around, she saw Martin on a similar ecstatic flight. She turned again, delighting in the motion, while her mind was filled by the song of the pillars.
Martin was too far from her to hear her voice, though she could have spoken to him over the Link. She didn’t, however, and he didn’t speak to her. Words couldn’t express the sensations she was experiencing, and she guessed he felt the same. It was enough to share the moment.
Isa banked left, taking herself in a wide swoop across the site. She couldn’t see any other wing-gliders or pinnaces in the area. As had been the usual case during her visits to these spectacular Tyrian sites, she and Martin seemed to be alone.
She banked again, taking her closer to Martin, and for a while, they circled each other, lifting on an updraft and then lowering a little, skirting the surfaces of the black hollows below. Isa caught the faint sound of Martin’s long, drawn out ‘Ooooo-weeee’ from afar.
Of all her excursions on Tyre, even including Mount Athos’s chute, the golden cavern, the crystal cave, and the fjords, this was the best, Isa concluded. She’d have to persuade Erin to come with her one day. With Martin’s help, she was sure she could do it.
Her arms and legs were beginning to ache, but she didn’t care. She was determined to make the most of the experience.
For another half an hour, Isa wheeled and soared, maintaining her height without excessive effort. Eventually, she couldn’t ignore the tiredness of her limbs. She began to circle downward, toward the valley floor. When she finally touched down, Isa removed her helmet and unfastened her suit, ripping apart the sticky fabric strips that held it together, and leaving it hanging around her hips. The music of the pillars was just as loud at ground level.
She looked up and spotted Martin still soaring amongst the heights. She watched him for as long as he remained in the air.
He eventually came to a running touchdown some distance from her, near one of the lowest pillars that rose from the sandy valley floor. She was too encumbered by her suit to walk over to him, so she began to take it off. She pulled her legs out of the lower section, and soon the wing-glider suit lay in a wrinkled lump on the ground.