Pegasus Colony (People of Akiane: A Colonization Science Fiction Novel Book 1)

by Phyllis Moore

  Three large windows wrapped around the room, giving a clear view of the Pegasus Constellation and the star system they were just entering.

  “Which one do you think is Akiane?” Lu asked loudly over the chatter in the crowded room. She adjusted her chair so it sat at an angle to the table while fully facing the window.

  It wouldn’t be long before she repositioned herself. Lu was always on the move.

  Seven planets orbited the star, but from this distance, they could only see two of the planets.

  “I think it’s the smallest dot, closest to the star.” Jess knew which planet it was. She had just spent the last year and a half studying Akiane.

  Lu frowned. “Jessica, Akiane would melt and dry up if it were that close to its star.”

  “Oh,” Jess said, “then it must be the largest of the stars seven planets. That one there.” She pointed to the pale, virtual baseball-size sphere.

  “Jessica,” said Lu. “Why would you think that? That’s the gas plant. You know full well which one it is.” She looked dismayed that Jess could be so wrong about which planet Akiane was.

  “Jess,” Rona gently rebuked.

  Then Lu got it. “You’re joking.” She dropped her head in embarrassment. “Why do you always do that?”

  “Because you’re so easy, Lu,” Jess said.

  “You think me simple.”

  Jess shrugged. “Not simple, just fun to tease.”

  Lu had been thirteen when she left home. She’d spent her entire teen years on WSC Moon Base and on the transport Britannia. She hadn’t experienced the world like Jess had, so yes, she was a bit naïve and often took everything literally.

  In many ways she still held on to her child like innocence. Everything to her was new and exciting. Sometimes that enthusiasm got on Jess’ nerves. That’s when Jess would rib her not so much for fun but to redirect Lu’s thoughts thereby calming her down.

  “So how are my favorite women?” Jorg Krause slipped into the seat next to Jess. He wrapped an arm around her shoulders and squeezed. “Hey, Jessie.” He grinned, exposing his dimples.

  At seeing him, Jess brightened for just a moment, as if she’d forgotten her troubles. But almost as quickly, that which haunted her rolled back in and the smile faded.

  Rona had the feeling Jess held a dark secret that ate at her, but when she tried to pry it out of her, Jess clammed up.

  Jorg greeted everyone as if they were his best friend whom he hadn’t seen in at least a week. On Britannia, with limited spaces where civilians could freely roam, it was easy to run into the same person five or six times day. Still, Jorg greeted each one in the same manner, with genuine affection.

  Reaching across the table, he gripped Lu’s hand and held it with both of his. “How are you doing, Lu?”

  “Better than fantastic.” The tip of her tongue popped out then quickly slipped back in as she squealed. “We’re actually here!”

  Jorg chuckled. He never made fun of her youthfulness. Instead, he was enchanted by it.

  He released Lu’s hand to hold Rona’s in the same manner. “How are you, Rona?”

  “As excited as a bee in a spring flower patch.” Rona squeezed his hands back and looked deeply into his eyes, hoping he’d get the hint. He didn’t.

  Rona liked Jorg, a lot. Not just because he was 2 meters tall, with blond hair, and brown eyes. He was brilliant and genuinely cared about people. Instead of talking only about himself, he wanted to know about the other person. He was comfortable to be around and easy to talk to, unlike so many others.

  But he never noticed Rona’s interest. Even though she was almost as tall as he was, with long black hair, blemish-free velvety brown skin, midnight eyes, was also easy to talk to, brilliant, and his mental match.

  For a while Rona thought they were two peas in a pod. They were good friends, just not as close as she would have liked.

  “Where have you been?” she asked.

  Jorg released her hands and turned his attention to the window. “Running.”

  “Without us?” Jess asked.

  He shrugged as he casually leaned back in his chair and rested one arm on the back of her chair. “Can’t a man run on his own?”

  Jess leaned forward to clear his arm, but she didn’t move out of the reach of his fingers as they played with the material of her sleeve.

  “You just wanted to run without us slowing you down. Well, I guess Rona and I will have to run without you,” she said.

  Jorg laughed. “I guess that will show me.”

  Jess gave him a smirky little smile. It didn’t matter if he’d run without them, when Jess and Rona went for their run, he’d be there with them. Or rather, he’d be there with Jess.

  She refused to believe Jorg cared about her, and insisted that he was just being nice, like he was to everyone. Yes, he made everyone feel special, but Rona knew only Jess was truly special to him.

  He jokingly asked, “Did I miss anything?”

  “Oh Jorg, you rarely miss much. Don’t worry, we haven’t orbited yet,” Jess informed him. “We can’t even see the planet yet.”

  “Good, I’d hate to have come all this way and miss the big event.”

  “There.” Lu pointed across the room to the cafeteria window. “I can see Akiane.”

  “Where?” Jorg asked.

  “Squint,” Jess said with a hint of sarcasm.

  He leaned closer to the window and into Jess. She didn’t move.

  “Oh, yeah.” Jorg squinted his eyes until they were thin slits. “I see it.”

  “No you can’t,” Jess said.

  He couldn’t. No one could. Akiane was still an indistinguishable speck against a starry backdrop.

  In a demure tone, he said, “But, Jessie, I can.”

  She looked at him then swung the back of her hand in his direction.

  He ducked as if she might hit him, when in fact she had no intention of touching him. He flashed a big smile at her, deepening his dimples, and wrinkling his freckled nose.

  Jess shook her head.

  Times like this, Rona wondered what Jorg saw in Jess. She could be so serious and he so playful.

  Rona fidgeted a little as she stared out of the cafeteria window. This had been a long trip. She felt like a bear waking from too long a hibernation. She was ready to leave the cave, or in this case, exit the ship. Like everyone else, she was eager to set foot on the alien planet and get to work.

  Except, of course Jess, who just wanted to go home.

  When she and Rona had first sat down for breakfast, the Eatery was almost empty, but after the captain’s announcement, the room quickly filled.

  The Eatery consisted of three levels. Each level descended from the bar area, to the observatory window. The bar stools and every chair in the room was filled. Like a flock of birds settling in, people sat on the edge of each level and along the window’s frame. All were patiently waiting for their destination to come into view.

  A white ball suddenly appeared. The room vibrated with cheering, clapping of hands and laughter.

  “There it is,” Lu squealed, ecstatically. “This time I can see it.” She could barely contain herself as she bounced in her chair like a jumping bean.

  “Yep,” Jorg confirmed.

  The star bathed the planet with its light.

  “Akiane sparkles like a giant crystal snowball,” Lu observed.

  “It looks cold,” Jess said, her mood darkening.

  “Well, Akiane is encased in meters of ice and snow.” Jorg laughed.

  “Yes, I know. I’ve been studying it. Can’t wait to see it up close,” she said in her usual cynical tone.

  Jess had grown up in northern Minnesota and despised cold weather. When she talked about her teen years, which she rarely did, she spoke of blizzards and days being confined in her small cabin.

  When she was thirteen, she was lost just outside her home in a blizzard. If her father hadn’t found her, she would have died within minutes.

  Now h
er orders were sending her to a place where the cold made Minnesota’s winters seem like spring time in the Bahamas. The fact that she’d be living in a warm, cozy habitat hadn’t eased her mood.

  “Think they’re as excited as we are?” Lu asked.

  “Who?” Jess asked.

  “The colonists.” Lu sounded as though they were headed for a family reunion.

  “I have it on good authority that they don’t want us on their planet,” Jess said. “That’s why I’m being dispatched to the colony, remember? To talk them into welcoming us.”

  “They’ve been separated from us for 321 years,” Lu said. “Why would they not welcome us?”

  “Because, according to them, we abandoned them 321 years ago,” Jess said.

  With a puppy dog look, Lu turned her dark eyes toward Jess. “They weren’t abandoned, Jessica. WSC lost communications and thought everyone had died.”

  “Nevertheless, that’s how they see it,” Jess said.

  “Jessica, WSC sent three robotic ships so they could return to Earth, but they didn’t,” Lu persisted. “They didn’t even send word they were still alive.”

  “I can’t speak to that, Lu. I only know what they think,” Jess said.

  “But all of Earth is excited.”

  “I’m not the one who needs convincing, Lu. I’m just telling you how they see it,” Jess said. “I received their requests that we turn back. They don’t want us here.”

  Rona hoped Jess was wrong. If not, it could make her research very difficult.

  Chapter 4

  Lieutenant Jessica Hewitt

  Shuttle Ride

  WSC BRITANNIA crew had already brought the scientific equipment, personal luggage and cooking utensils to everyone’s respective offices, living quarters and kitchen. They had also dropped off a small solar powered, hovercraft for the geological teams, and an aquatic craft for the oceanographer team.

  There were four shuttles each carried 20 people. It would take six trips to bring all 103 of us to the planet. I was in the third shuttle.

  Not one scientist sat quietly in his or her seat. As soon as we entered Akiane’s atmosphere, they all crowded behind the pilot and co-pilot to look out the window. They could have seen just as well from their seats, but they were too excited to sit.

  I sat alone. I was always alone. Set apart. Different.

  “Jessie, don’t sit back there,” Jorg called to me. “Come up here.”

  I felt inadequate next to the scientists. That was the real reason I rarely participated in their conversations. They were brilliant. Each had multiple PhDs. I couldn’t keep up with most of the technical terms. They were confident of who they were and what they wanted out of life, and were a constant reminder of my lack of confidence and the lack of a direction for my life.

  With a reluctant sigh, I stood and slipped through the group to stand at Jorg’s side. I tried not to think about my inadequacies, and looked out the window instead.

  As we flew toward the surface, I had to admit it was an amazing view of an alien world.

  Salt water freezes at a lower temperature than fresh water. This planet was cold enough to freeze almost all of Akiane’s salty oceans.

  They named their star Kahair, Arabic for “good.” I presumed the good was for when the star brought light and warmth. Kahair was a larger and brighter star than Earth’s Sun, and could sustain life at a greater distance.

  Akiane was in an elliptical orbit, which took eleven years to circle its star. The orbit managed to stay within Kahair’s Goldilocks Zone, the distance from the star that is neither too hot nor too cold to sustain life. Akiane moved just far enough for the ocean surface to freeze, but not kill all life. Now it was moving closer so temperatures were rising.

  Coincidentally, spring came at the best time for Earth to send a transport.

  Soon, the oceans would thaw and the land, what little there was of it, would emerge from its winter cover. Jorg said it would bloom like the Alaskan tundra with trees, bushes, and flowering plants.

  According to him, trees would only have a few years to grow before they died during the harsh weather. They’d never get the chance to grow to their full height, therefore they’d be considered dwarf trees.

  With Kahair to our backs, the frozen world below sparkled, glimmered, and shimmered. We saw a world devoid of personality with no wild animals, trees, flowers, or grass, not even a single dried shrub. All plant life went dormant during the six years of winter. Besides marine life, there were no native animals.

  All that snow and ice reminded me of northern Minnesota. At least Oconto had deciduous and evergreen trees, and winters that only lasted five months, not six years.

  I was twelve when Dad and I first arrived in Oconto Village. The snow was halfway up to the second floor windows. Someone had dug a tunnel through the snow to our front door. I was positive the huge amounts of snow would never completely melt. I sank deeper into depression at the thought of never seeing another flower bloom again.

  As Dad unloaded the car, I stood in the house. Even with the lights on, it was dark and dismal.

  Looking at Akiane’s barren ice world, those same feelings of hopelessness rose in me. I feared I’d fail to accomplish my mission and I’d be stuck here for the rest of my life trying to work things out. I’d never set foot on Earth again.

  The only sign of life on this frozen world came from volcanoes that quietly breathed gases into the atmosphere while others spewed molten lava, creating islands that would one day become large masses of land. Steam rose as the red-orange lava liquefied ice and surged into exposed water. In some cases, the resulting steam spread like dense fog. A few volcanoes looked dormant, but for the most part, this was a new world still forming and constantly changing. I knew from the files I’d read that just under her surface, Akiane was still very much alive.

  The pilot banked.

  I slipped. Jorg’s shoulder caught me.

  His body heat caressed my shoulder, and ran down my arm, making my fingers itch to hold his hand.

  He’d pushed his parka sleeves up to his elbows. My eyes traced his forearm, his hand.

  Don’t. I sidestepped away.

  I closed my eyes, took a deep breath and slowly let it out.

  In the beginning of our relationship, I thought Jorg was interested in me, by the way he looked at me, the way he paid attention to everything I said, and the way he smiled when he saw me. But he treated everyone the same. I was no one special.

  We were just friends.

  I’m not sure what I would have done if he was interested. The idea scared me. I wanted love, but I knew it wasn’t real, not for me. If I let anyone in, dropped my guard, let them get too close, let them know the real me, they’d abandon me.

  It was best to be just friends. There’d been too many betrayals, too many broken hearts—all of them mine.

  If he knew me, knew who I really was, he’d … I couldn’t stand it. Not again. Not him.

  The warmth of his body faded.

  I opened my eyes, and looked out the window.

  We were flying over a disordered ice ridge the size of a mountain range that seemed to stretch from east to west horizons. The ice ridge was slammed up against an unblemished sheet of ice. Akiane didn’t warm up enough to melt its poles. This unchanging ice sheet covered Akiane’s North Pole. It would be the same on the South Pole.

  The thick ridge of ice looked as if someone had tried to shuffle gigantic ice blocks like a deck of cards, but gave up and dropped them in a jumbled mess. Some chunks were crushed into pieces only a few meters in size, but others were huge, at least a kilometer long.

  Every once in a while, a piece of ice, angled just right, reflected a flash of star beam like a beacon signaling, “Welcome,” or “Stay away.” I wasn’t sure which.

  “That must have been some storm,” Jorg said.

  I shook my head in wonder. “Do you really think a storm did that?”

  “What else?” he said. “Look at it, they�
��re piled one on top of the other. They’re smashed into each other and frozen in place.”

  A shiver of fear swept over me. “If a storm can toss an ocean of ice like that, I don’t want to be around when it hits again.”

  Jorg chuckled. “Spoken like a true adventurer.”

  The pilot swooped past the ridge, banked south and flew over the frozen ocean. Most of the ice lay smooth as though the waters had been tranquil when the big freeze hit.

  “I wonder what that is,” Rona said. Like every other scientist, she wanted to know what everything was, whether it was related to her field of study or not.

  “What?” Jorg asked.

  “That.” She pointed down to a red line, several kilometers long. It meandered through the ice like a river.

  “What do you think it is?” I asked.

  “I have no idea,” Rona said. “But wouldn’t it be fun to find out?”

  No, I thought, it would not!

  “Some kind of plant life. Algae, maybe,” Jorg said, hopefully. What a find for him if there was a river of algae.

  He laughed. His laugh always lifted my spirits and made me want to join in. I smiled.

  “Olivia, have you ever seen anything like that back on Earth?” Jorg asked.

  He was one of the few who would attempt to engage Olivia Zeller in conversation when it wasn’t absolutely necessary. Olivia’s know-it-all arrogance was off-putting to almost everyone else.

  “What is it?” Jorg asked.

  “Don’t know.” Olivia shook her thick copper curls. The head oceanographer admitting to not knowing something? Highly unusual.

  “The people who live here must know,” I suggested.

  “Of course they know. How could they not? It is their planet after all.” She shrugged, dismissing me. “I think it’s a river of fish caught in the ice and froze. On Earth fish migrate looking for plankton to eat. Many different kinds of species will gather in the millions. It’s a most impressive sight.” Once Olivia started talking, she could go on for quite some time. “In the Northwest Passage, there are so many fish, polar bears and seals can swim together and eat, without fear of attack.”