Merak pointed to several buildings. “I think you’ll find our accommodations quite comfortable. The building on the right serves as lodging for many of those working on this project.”
“Is it a hotel?” Rona asked.
“No, it’s private. We purchased this land five years ago. That’s how long it took us to get approval to dig.” Merak pointed again. “The building next to it is where we’re headed. It’s the research center. It’ll be an hour or so before they close for the day, and I’d like to introduce you to some of the scientists.”
Ellin looked to her left, where Cellerin Mountain rose far into the sky. Unlike most large mountains on Anyari, it was freestanding, not part of a range. Ellin felt tiny in its shadow. It was an inspiring sight, and she could see why people trained for months or years to climb to the top.
She yawned. Despite her lack of sleep, her mind was whirring amid all the newness. She’d never dreamed she’d travel halfway around the world like this, at least not at such a young age. Even the reason behind it didn’t stifle her excitement.
They arrived at the research center, and Merak held the door open. Ellin entered first.
The receptionist at the front desk looked up, his gaze sharp and wary. “May I help you?”
“Uh—” Ellin looked behind her, relieved to see Merak coming in.
“Oh, Mr. Merak!” The receptionist stood. “Welcome.”
Merak’s face lit with his signature smile. “Thanks, Misha. I brought three of our most promising interns with me. All right if I take them on a tour?”
“Of course!” The receptionist touched his deskscreen, and the door behind him clicked.
Merak opened the door. “Appreciate it, Misha.” He led them through the halls to a large room full of research equipment and workstations. “This is our lab. We have scientists here that specialize in so many areas, I can’t keep track of them all. Pardon me, Aline?”
A woman at one of the workstations turned, brows raised in response.
“What’s your specialty again?” Merak asked.
“Weather alteration,” she responded.
“Oh, right!” Merak looked at Ellin, Rona, and Trett. “Ever heard of that?” When they all shook their heads, he laughed. “That’s because it’s a field in its infancy. Mark my words: in the next decade, we’ll see massive changes in how we respond to weather—and how it responds to us.”
“The Cellerin Project will help with that?” Ellin asked.
“We hope so. I brought several of my foundation’s top researchers here, including Aline. It’s an incredible brain trust, all in one place.”
“That it is,” Aline said. “Can I get back to work?”
“Of course.” Merak looked at Ellin and lifted an eyebrow, his eyes twinkling. “She’s nearly as determined as you are.”
He led them to a workstation on the right side of the room. The man sitting there stood and faced them.
“Welcome, Mr. Merak,” the man said, holding out his hand.
“Efren, good to see you.” Merak shook his hand. “Ellin, Rona, and Trett, this is Dr. Rouven, a medical researcher. We were lucky enough to lure him away from his position at a prestigious university. He’s been behind some remarkable advances in public health. Dr. Rouven, do you mind showing these interns your latest research? Ellin here is our new, full-time Cellerin Project press representative. Don’t hold back on the details; she’ll want them all.” Merak grinned at Ellin, and she couldn’t help but smile back.
“Of course,” Dr. Rouven said. “Grab some chairs and gather around.”
Ellin took off her jacket and draped it on the back of a swivel chair, then rolled the chair close enough to see Dr. Rouven’s deskscreen. Trett and Rona did the same.
“I have business to attend to, but I’ll send someone to take you to your rooms at the end of the work day,” Merak said. He pivoted and left the room.
Using high-quality interactives, Dr. Rouven explained the technology that allowed them to tame harmful radiation, making it beneficial without compromising its efficacy. He was an enthusiastic teacher who explained advanced concepts with simple clarity.
“This is the same technology we use throughout the world in hospitals and clinics,” Dr. Rouven said. “We have every reason to believe the new isotope hiding in Cellerin Mountain will be even more effective than the ones we’re currently using. The radioactivity here is stronger, but our technology can handle it.”
Rona had started squirming half an hour in, but Ellin was captivated, and she thought Trett was too. “Have you tested it yet?” Ellin asked.
“We’ve scanned the radiation emanating from the dig site,” Dr. Rouven said, “but the medical devices will only work once we get our hands on the source of the radiation. We haven’t been able to recreate the isotope in the lab. In fact, we haven’t even identified it with any level of certainty. When we dig far enough to harvest the radioactive substance, we’ll begin the first phases of testing. It’ll be some time before we do any human trials; Mr. Merak always insists that we follow the highest safety standards.”
He continued to talk, becoming even more animated as he shared statistics of how many lives the new radiation might save.
When a young man entered to show them to their rooms, Ellin looked at the clock, unable to believe an hour had passed. She smiled at Dr. Rouven and thanked him.
As they followed Merak’s employee out of the building, Ellin caught Rona watching her with raised eyebrows, reproach written all over her face. Ellin looked away, but she took the warning to heart. As good as Dr. Rouven’s intentions might be, the man was wrong, to a terrifying extent.
Ellin’s room was well appointed and comfortable. A workstation waited for her with a top-of-the-line deskscreen. The screen was glowing, and there was a message on it:
I don’t expect you to work in your room, but I’m guessing you will anyway. This’ll make it easier.
* * *
-Alvun Merak
Ellin shook her head. Is he kind, or is he manipulating me into working nonstop? Either way, she wasn’t complaining. It was a really nice deskscreen.
She walked to the bed and sat. It was insanely comfortable, and she lay down and closed her eyes. Just for a minute or two.
The next thing she knew, the flexscreen on her arm vibrated, waking her.
Blinking, Ellin pulled her flex off her arm, firmed it, and found twenty messages from Rona, all sent within the past three minutes, each one reading,
DINNER TIME!
Ellin sent a terse response assuring Rona she’d be ready soon.
As she got up, Ellin heard something crinkle in the pocket of her light jacket. She reached in and pulled out a slip of paper, folded in fourths.
Paper? She rarely used paper and had no idea how this piece had ended up in her pocket. She unfolded it and found a note.
I know what Dr. Rouven told you, and I think you should hear the other side.
* * *
Meet me at the walking path behind the dining hall after dinner. You can bring your friends if you feel more comfortable. Don’t talk to them about this note. You never know who’s listening.
* * *
Tear this up and drop it in the dining hall compost bin.
The note wasn’t signed.
Ellin tore the paper into tiny pieces and put them in her pocket. In the hallway, she met Rona and Trett. They walked to the dining hall behind their new lodgings, passing two Merak security guards along the way. As instructed, Ellin dropped the note in the compost bin as she entered.
The food was even better than what they’d eaten at Merak headquarters. Afterward, Ellin suggested a walk.
“I think that’s a very, very good idea,” Rona said, giving her sister and Trett significant looks.
Ellin stifled a laugh, and they exited the back of the building.
It was getting dark, but solar-powered lights lit the walking path. They walked for several minutes before encountering a man and a woman.
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“Hi, Ellin,” the woman said. She was tall and appeared to be in her forties. She had very curly hair, a warm smile, and orange eyes that reflected the dim light. Ellin felt somehow that she’d met her before, though she knew that was unlikely.
“Trett and Rona, right?” the woman continued. “I’m Nomi. I was in the research room today.”
“Oh,” Ellin said. She hadn’t noticed the woman and tried to keep her confusion off her face.
Nomi smiled. “It’s okay, I didn’t expect you to see me. I’ve learned to keep my head down around this place.” She gestured to the man, who appeared to be in his late twenties. He couldn’t have looked more different from Nomi. He was short, with stick-straight hair. “This is Dr. Septimus. You can call him Sep. We both appreciate you meeting us.”
“Meeting you?” Trett asked.
Ellin told him and Rona about the note, adding, “I wasn’t sure when it was safe to say anything.”
“The two of us have been meeting on this path for weeks,” Nomi said. “We don’t think it’s monitored. And the security guards never seem to come back here.”
“What did you want to tell us?” Rona asked.
“Let’s walk.” Nomi led the way and began her explanation. “As I said, I’m Nomi, but around camp, they call me Dr. Anson. I work in the same field as Dr. Rouven: medical radiation research.”
“What about you, Sep?” Trett asked.
The question seemed to startle Sep. “Oh—uh, I research ancient civilizations.” He flashed them a shy smile.
“As I said in my note,” Nomi continued, “now that Dr. Rouven has given you his take on our research, you need to hear the other side of things.”
She spent a few minutes explaining her concerns about the safety of the dig-site radiation. “Dr. Rouven is convinced we can modify our current technology to make this radiation safe. I don’t think we have enough information to determine that.”
“Has anyone involved with the Cellerin Project had any health issues?” Trett asked.
“No, but the safety standards here are top-notch. Our sensors detected the radiation on the first day of the dig. Since then, every person in the vicinity of the project wears an antirad. It completely neutralizes the radiation in a field around the wearer.”
“What do Merak and Rouven think about your concerns?” Ellin asked.
“Rouven disagrees with me, and Merak listens to Rouven. In fact, a few weeks ago, I was convinced I was about to be fired. I’ve played the ideal employee since then. I marvel over Dr. Rouven’s research and claim to agree with it. Then I do my real research in secret, on a second flex that I only use in the city. I’m pretty sure Merak isn’t monitoring me off campus.”
“Wait.” Ellin stopped walking, and the rest of the group followed suit. “This sounds very . . . clandestine, for lack of a better term. Why do you trust us?”
Nomi gave her a small, closed-mouth smile. “Before you came, Merak messaged your article—the one that never got printed—to Dr. Rouven and me. He instructed us both to do all we could to convince you of the truth. I suppose you could say I’m just following instructions.”
“I want to get the word out too,” Ellin said, “but they’ll never print anything I write that questions their official stance.”
“I know. Still, I’m glad to know there are people here who want to get the word out. Perhaps by working together, we can find a way.”
“I still don’t understand why Sep is here,” Rona said.
Ellin swung her gaze toward her sister. Blunt as ever.
Sep just nodded. “Well, uh, since we’re all stopped here, I guess I should . . . show you what I’ve found?” He looked to Nomi for confirmation, and when she nodded, he pulled a flexscreen case out of his pocket.
Once he’d unfolded the screen and firmed it, he said, “I have, well, a secret flex. Just like Nomi. It’s not connected to the network right now; I’ll only show you things I’ve saved on the device.”
“I have a secret flex too,” Rona said.
Ellin swiveled her head to gape at Rona and saw that Trett had done the same.
Rona returned their stares. “What did you think I was doing in the city the day before we left, getting my nails done? You said Merak was keeping us under tighter surveillance. I was afraid his people would hack our encryption.”
Ellin shook her head and shifted her attention back to Sep. “I’d love to see what you found.”
Sep clicked something on his flex, and his mouth broadened into a smile. “Did you know that where we’re standing isn’t just the birthplace of Anyarian civilization, it’s also the birthplace of Anyarian poetry?” While his voice was still soft, his words now flowed smoothly. “In the early centuries after the colonists arrived, they had no way to write things down, beyond some paintings in caves and a few engravings on tablets. They focused on surviving, not rediscovering the art of papermaking. However, they developed a rich oral history which they preserved through rhyming, epic poetry. Later, their descendants wrote much of it down.
“Of course,” he continued, “language has evolved significantly since the colonists came. I’ve studied various dialects spoken by early Anyarians in order to evaluate other scholars’ translations and determine which are most accurate. Let me read you a passage:
“The air is warm
The grass is long
Come listen, child
To an ancient song—”
“Sep?” Nomi interrupted, giving him a warm smile. “We don’t have all night.”
“Oh. Sorry. I’ll try to make a long song short.” He winked, which made Trett laugh, before continuing, “Among the oldest of the preserved poems is a tale of the tragedy that befell the colonists as they journeyed to Anyari. Some sort of stone penetrated their ship, disabling it and killing most of the colonists.”
“Pardon me.” Trett raised a hand, getting Sep’s attention. When Sep nodded, Trett continued, “I’m sorry to interrupt. I know this is your field, but . . . we’ve all heard stories about a space rock disabling the colony ship and killing most of the passengers. I always thought it was just one of many hypotheses.”
Ellin nodded in agreement. “Our science teacher last year said the plague hypothesis is far more reasonable, because an interstellar vessel would’ve been very well shielded. Even Anyarian spacecrafts have decent shields, and they’ve never exited the solar system.”
Sep nodded, eyes sparkling in the dim light. “Good questions—very good! Most scientists agree with you, because they see no way that a space rock, as Trett called it, could stop a group of humans capable of traveling through the stars.
“Yet historians and scientists tend to differ on this point. You see, we only find plague tales in later writings. The earliest writings talk about a stone. While the colony ship would surely have effectively shielded against ordinary space rock, the early writings describe something quite extraordinary.” He began to navigate through his flex again, then froze and looked up at everyone. “This may take a while.”
“We can sit on some benches around the next bend,” Nomi said.
“That’s right! I’ll find the next passage while we walk.”
Sep accompanied Nomi down the path, fingers flying across his flex as he walked. Ellin, Trett, and Rona exchanged shrugs and followed.
They sat on the benches, and Ellin saw movement in her peripheral vision. When she looked that direction, she saw a knee-high reptid creature sitting on its hind legs, the nearby lantern reflecting off the basket-weave texture of its shiny, bright-blue skin. Its compound eyes were reflective silver, and Ellin would swear they were fixed on her. “Is—is that thing safe?” she murmured.
Nomi laughed. At the sound, the animal fled. “It’s a shimshim,” Nomi said. “Native to Therro. They’re plant eaters, perfectly safe—though if you’re eating a salad outside, one of them might leap on your lap to share it with you.”
“I’ll remember not to have any salad picnics,” Ellin said.
“Listen to this!” he exclaimed.
“The stone did shine
With vivid light
Brightening
The darkest night.
* * *
“As seasons passed
Its heat did grow
Melting winter’s
Ice and snow.”
Sep looked up. “You see? The colonists’ stone became luminescent, then hot. Other poems tell us that eventually, those who handled it developed burns. Several grew sick and died.”
“That sounds . . . radioactive,” Ellin said.
“Precisely! One poem describes the deaths with quite gruesome language. Let me find it . . . Ah, here it is.
“Skin turned white
As winter snow.
From mouths and eyes
Red blood did flow.”
Ellin’s and Trett’s heads both swiveled to stared at Rona, but she kept her gaze on Sep, her expression blank.
Nomi leaned forward. “You see why Sep’s research is vital?”
Nobody answered. Ellin was still reeling from the poem. She scrambled for something to say, finally settling on, “Why wouldn’t they get rid of this stone as soon as it started hurting them?”
“They did eventually, in a way,” Sep said. “We aren’t entirely sure why they waited so long. My favorite hypothesis is based on a passage describing a young boy who stood close to the stone.” He found it quickly and read,
“The lad went home
The Seer’s Sister: Prequel to The Magic Eaters Trilogy Page 13