Pendulum: An Aes Sidhe Novel

by A. Omukai

  He had been with Deirdre since childhood, even before she had entered the Circle. Her parents had had no such abilities. Both had been scientists, and to the best of her knowledge, no one in her family had ever possessed the gift of magic. Where she had it from, she didn’t know. Not that it mattered, but it was curious all the same. Her meandering train of thought ended when the light switched from red to green, and the inner airlock doors unlocked with a popping sound.

  “So, what’s the plan now?” she asked.

  The biologist looked at her and smiled weakly.

  “First things first, we need to pick up the team. Everyone but the doctor are just a few minutes from here. After that, we have to find my equipment, so I can check this planet for potential dangers. There is not much you can do to help me. Maybe just take a rest, while I work on this problem.”

  Deirdre nodded again. Her neck was stiff and her muscles felt sour. She did not look forward to the muscle ache that was sure to come these next few days.

  “How long do you think it will take you to find all your stuff?”

  Adams frowned for a moment.

  “Depends. It’s scattered all over the place, but the drop area isn’t that large. Finding it all might not be such a big problem. After all, it should be easy enough to see it here, without high grass or undershrub. Besides, a day on this planet takes over eight days on Earth, so we are not in a hurry. We will have sufficient sunlight for quite a while.”

  “Over eight days. That’s gonna take colonists quite a while to get used to.”

  “Yes, maybe. Thank god, we don’t have to worry about that, though. We only need to find out whether the place can be used or not. I’m not sure what your mission is. You think it’ll be more difficult than mine?”

  Deirdre shrugged.

  He might be right. Deirdre had no idea where to start looking for those places of power. She had never seen or experienced any, didn’t even know what they looked or felt like. She would depend on Cailean one hundred percent. It didn’t worry her, but she’d feel more confident if she knew she could do it on her own. Not being in control of every aspect of her task didn’t feel good.

  “To be honest, I have no idea how long this will take, or how difficult it will be. Let’s hope we can get it all done before the transporter comes back to pick us up. I don’t hate this place, quite the opposite, but I can imagine, once the novelty wears off, it gets old real quick. Also, my neck hurts.”

  Adams laughed.

  He had been right, reaching the Ghillie Dhu had only taken a few minutes. She had entered the airlock before Deirdre had even taken off her protective suit. The marine carried way more weapons than Deirdre had suspected. She had stored several guns and other combat gear in her bag.

  Corporal Hill hadn’t been in best shape when they found him. His left foot had hurt, and he had needed their help to walk. A quick med scan had shown that he sprained it.

  Getting to the doctor had taken almost half an hour, but he seemed completely unaffected by the gravity, as expected.

  Hours came and went by. The position of the suns in the sky changed little. It almost felt as if time stood still, while the Wisp floated over the endless landscape of Gliese 667 Cc. Once in a while, Adams made out another piece of gear on the ground, directed the vehicle close to it, got out and picked it up. It was a slow procedure, with decontamination breaks every time. So far, he seemed satisfied with the results. Not all the pieces had survived the impact, but the majority seem in good enough condition.

  Deirdre saw a familiar sensation out of the corner of her eye. A flicker, barely noticeable, in the back of the car. Was she just tired? This looked almost like…

  The druid shook her head and closed her eyes. She was sleepy, but restless at the same time. She wanted to sleep, but she had a feeling she wouldn’t be able to, at least for a while. Yeah, no way she’d fall asleep like this.

  She opened her eyes again and took another look. Interesting. Just staring at that part of the wall produced the same flicker again. This time, she didn’t avert her gaze. She concentrated.

  It reminded her of the wall in Brilann’s quarter. This wasn’t a coincidence. Brilann had cast a spell on the Wisp.

  The flickering intensified. It took a while, but then, just like on board the Tuatha De Danann, the wall just disappeared. A small alcove opened up before her eyes. In it, a dark brown tree trunk. Wrinkled and gnarled, it looked old. It wasn’t as thick as the trunk on board of the ship, but it was an oak tree all the same.

  The same energies were running upwards through it, coming from below, passing through the tree, disappearing in the ceiling. No idea what it meant, what it was for, but yeah, this was definitely the work of the oak seer. She walked over to the alcove, touched the bark of the tree, closed her eyes and tried to feel the power inside. Her concentration wouldn’t hold for long, the pain in her neck was just too distracting.

  “What are you looking at?”

  She shook her head.

  “Nothing, really. I’m just tired.”

  Deirdre didn’t know why she kept quiet about it, but something stopped her from telling him. She sighed. They had more important things to do right now, anyway.

  11

  Plotting a Course

  In the beginning, they had talked quite a lot, but as time went by, Adams’ mood had slowly turned sour. Recovering his equipment had started well, so he had been optimistic, but more and more of the gear he had picked up, had been damaged beyond repair.

  Ailbhe hadn’t spoken a single word since she had entered the Wisp, but she had seemed attentive, even though it was hard to say when she sat motionless and blended in with her environment, literally. The longer she sat still, the more the spot where she inhabited looked empty. Doctor Maon had taken another look at the corporal’s ankle, and neither of them had said much either. The Fir Bolg was the silent type. Not as silent as the marine, but not chatty either. Only Hill was a bit of a mystery. Was he shy? Afraid of his teammates? Or was there another reason Deirdre caught him glancing at the Aes Sidhe with an expression she couldn’t read?

  Deirdre didn’t know how many hours had passed. When Adams suddenly said, “I’m done here, it’s your turn,” it had come out of the blue sky.

  Deirdre had spent those last hours sitting in the back of the Wisp, studying the oak tree in the alcove, but in the end, she couldn’t find anything new. Cailean sat there by her side, looking at her knowingly. Seemed like he knew exactly what was going on, but couldn’t—or wouldn’t—speak. Brilann’s account of how he had asked Cailean to find those places of power had felt bad. The sting of betrayal was still sitting there in her flesh. Places of power, speaking with Aes Sidhe animals, the magical tree manifestations. The old man had kept many things from her.

  Brilann had talked to the Cu Sidhe, so there had to be a way. She’d ask him to teach her when all this was over. There was a lot she intended to learn from him, she was more than just a walking tasking jump drive.

  “Okay, first, I have to get out of the car,” she said.

  Adams looked at her with unasked questions in his eyes.

  “Let’s stop the Wisp at that plateau over there.”

  He pointed at a small area just a few metres ahead, where nothing was growing. The Wisp stopped, and Deirdre left through the airlock, followed by Cailean. She looked at the Cu Sidhe and patted him on the back.

  “You know why we are here. Let’s go, find those places.”

  Cailean raised his head, sniffing, trying to find traces of magic he could follow.

  What did places of power look like? Brilann’s explanations had only encompassed their nature, not their appearance. She hadn’t even heard about them before Brilann had mentioned them. The name “place of power” alone was mysterious enough to pique her interest.

  Cailean walked around in circles, sniffing the ground, round and round, as if desperate to pick up a scent. She didn’t know how much time had passed when Adams’ voice sounded in her he
lmet.

  “How’s your search going?”

  “Give me some time, please.”

  “Ah, okay, sorry. No need to hurry.”

  The Cu Sidhe was meandering in one direction, then another, until it stopped, his eyes focused on something in the distance, the fur of his neck standing up. He pulled his lips back and showed his fangs, while his nose was in constant motion. Then, without warning, he launched into a sprint. Deirdre suppressed a curse.

  “Not so fast,” she shouted after him.

  She had no idea if he had heard her not; he didn’t seem to react to her words at all, and then he was out of sight.

  Deirdre sighed. She had no choice, the only way to follow him was by car. A Cu Sidhe could run for hours, for days even. Cailean didn’t need to rest, but she already felt exhausted just from standing outside the car, with barely a few minutes having passed.

  She stomped back to the Wisp, gave the command to open the airlock, entered, and went through the decontamination procedure.

  Adams looked at her, but didn’t ask a question. He was now sitting in the back, on one bench, his legs stretched out.

  Deirdre went to the front of the car, sat down behind the steering wheel. She looked at the display of the outside world. She already couldn’t see Cailean anymore, but she could feel his presence. Or rather, the direction in which he was heading. That would be enough for her, for now.

  She sped up the vehicle, careful not to be too fast, so she could see obstacles in time. Though it had an impressive AI evading most problematic spots without a problem, Deirdre wouldn’t risk anything. She would at least sit behind the wheel and watch it drive.

  The exobiologist sat down on the bench, with the table deployed, and parts of his equipment scattered on its surface.

  “How much of it was okay?”

  “Not enough.”

  He fidgeted with some small thing she couldn’t identify. It looked like part of a machine.

  “Can you do your job like this?”

  His reaction was a humourless laugh. This one was easy to read. She did it herself when she was pissed off.

  “Well, I’m not completely useless. I can take samples, and I can do some analysis here, but nothing in-depth enough to determine whether, for example, it’s safe to take off our helmets outside, or whether there’re pathogens in the air.”

  He frowned and stared at the thing in his hands, then carefully put it in a small case in front of him.

  “The transporter will come eventually, and I might replace some of it with new equipment from the Tuatha De Danann. Not sure there either, the labs are badly damaged.”

  She would have helped him if there had been any way to do that, but she was useless. Thinking about it, that’s probably what he felt, too. She pressed her lips together and glanced up at the display.

  Minutes passed, but she couldn’t catch up to Cailean. He was just too fast. She could still feel where he was, but she wouldn’t be able to catch up with him.

  Things didn’t get better, they got worse. After about half an hour of driving, the Wisp spit out an error message.

  “Path not found.”

  Deirdre stared at the notification in disbelief.

  “What do you mean, path not found?”

  She turned to Adams for help, but the tall man had fallen asleep while sitting. His chin on his chest, he breathed calmly and in regular intervals. She wouldn’t wake him up for this.

  Corporal Hill looked at her, then stood up and came over.

  “Want me to look?”

  Deirdre nodded and stood up, so he could sit in front of the console.

  She opened her system, connected to the AI of the Wisp, and instructed it to show her a map of the surroundings.

  Not far in the distance, straight ahead, seemed to be a large ravine.

  Wisp was a floating vehicle, hovering over the ground, but it was not an aircraft. It could not fly.

  There had to be a way around this chasm, and looking at the map, there was further down south.

  Getting there would take a few hours.

  She narrowed her eyes and groaned. What a shitty situation.

  “Can you plot an alternative path?”

  The technician bobbed his head, and his hands wandered over the controls. She could see several flag symbols pop up on her display. Waypoints set in regular intervals around the edge of the ravine, avoiding landmarks on the map she hadn’t seen yet outside. Rocks maybe? It didn’t take him long to update the new course, and the Wisp made an annoyed noise when he started the engines.

  They would lose over ten hours this way, but there was no faster way.

  “Thanks, corporal.”

  He showed her a salute and gave up the seat for the druid again.

  She could still feel the Cu Sidhe, but there was no way to tell him to stop and wait for her. He wasn’t an idiot. Surely he would have noticed that the way across the gully was impossible to cross for her. Cu Sidhe were intelligent creatures, and Cailean was an exceptional specimen. If he ran off and out of range, she would lose contact with him, so he would wait. Hopefully.

  There was a rustle of clothing behind her. Adams had woken up.

  “What’s up?”

  “There is an obstacle here. A large ravine. We cannot cross, so we have to drive around it somehow. That’s gonna take a while.”

  “Did you program a new course?”

  “Corporal Hill did that for me. You look bad. How are you?”

  “I’m dead.” He laughed.

  “Think the autopilot of the Wisp can get us safely along the waypoints?”

  Adams cocked his head. “I’m not sure. Better not to risk it… or are you in a hurry?”

  “A bit, but an accident will only set us back.”

  Both of them were exhausted. It had been a long day. They would stop here, in front of this god damn ravine, and take a break for the night.

  Hopefully, there was no danger for them waiting outside the Wisp.

  “Have you seen any animals?”

  “No, I haven’t. I’m still wondering if there is any fauna on this planet.”

  “How high would you think is the possibility of anything big attacking us while we sit here, sleeping?”

  The xenobiologist looked at her out of tired eyes, lost in thought for a moment.

  “If there are any animals on this planet, the Wisp should be able to detect them before they come close enough to pose a danger for us.”

  The marine turned her face and reappeared from out of nowhere. Deirdre would have to get used to that.

  “Don’t worry, I’ll take care of security.”

  She stood up and grabbed her helmet. She hadn’t taken off her protective suit even for a moment. Now Deirdre saw a sidearm dangling from the hip of the Ghillie Dhu.

  “Sounds good.”

  That decided it.

  Everyone had already been up when Deirdre opened her eyes.

  The doctor had set up the table, and the smell of coffee helped her wake up.

  “Good morning, Lieutenant,” he said and gave a half-smile.

  Deirdre growled. She had never been a morning person.

  She grabbed one of the two cups with black coffee, took a sip, put it down on the table and closed her eyes.

  Coffee, the elixir of life.

  “Call me Deirdre.”

  The Fir Bolg nodded, but was already back to his grumpy old self.

  She opened the main menu of her AI and checked the clock. Only six hours had passed. Six hours of sleeping on a hard bench, without a pillow or blanket. She didn’t feel completely rested, but certainly better than before the break. At least the pain in her neck was gone, but her muscles were sore. It wasn’t too bad yet, but she didn’t want to find out how tough it would get, if she spent an entire day outside. Earth day, not Gliese 667 Cc day.

  Only now, she noticed Cailean sitting next to her bench, looking at her. Right, the Cu Sidhe didn’t need a door to enter a room, or a vehicle. Turned
out, he had been aware that they had stopped following him, and returned to her.

  It was time to continue the search. She had barely finished that thought, when he stood up, walked over to the wall, and was gone. His presence gained distance rapidly, this time in a southern direction, leading her around the ravine. Almost exactly the course she had programmed into the Wisp. She gave the command to start the engine and continue the drive.

  A slight headache in the back of her head reminded her of yesterday. It was the only remnant of her spending hours outside. If she didn’t overexert herself, she could get things done outside. One point four gravity wasn’t all too bad yet. Of course, she was in good physical shape. Brilann would have had a way worse time down here, no matter how athletic he might look. He was an old man, after all.

  The drive around the ravine was long and monotonous.

  The landscape, pretty as it was, got old after a while.

  Hours passed, and Deirdre had dozed off again several times. Something about the light on this planet kept making her sleepy, even though she had slept long enough. It was the quality of that sleep, though. Getting enough rest on a hard bench wasn’t easy.

  She looked at the map, and they were slowly nearing the point where they could change direction eastwards. The ravine wasn’t that deep here anymore. It still was best to stick with the waypoints. Better safe than sorry. That meant thirty more minutes of boring driving in a straight line, automatically avoiding minor obstacles on the path, but no risk of getting lost in this landscape that changed little and looked the same everywhere.