“It’s true,” Gal says. “Only one of you looks ridiculous, and he’s the same someone who’s going to be distracted if you both don’t put on more clothes. Do you want to know how many wars, and all around stupidity have happened throughout human history because of a curvaceous woman?”
“Not really,” I say. It’s a silly notion, waging war over a mate, but here we are, alone in non-reality space, because a man broke all the rules for a woman and got everyone killed.
Clothed in Thermals and coveralls, we strap on gripped soles that mimic boots worn on Earth, but with a fraction of the weight. We still look ridiculous, but also not very sexy, which does help me focus.
On the way to the lander, Capria and I are joined by a small army of drones, most of which I recognize as tougher engineering units capable of cutting, welding, prying, and bolting. They’re big, tough, and intimidating.
When I shoot them a skeptical look, Gal’s all-seeing eyes catch it. “You remember Earth, right? The giant frog that almost ate you?”
“Just…keep them out of sight,” I request. “There’s a good chance that the people down there haven’t seen anything like a drone. We don’t want to frighten anyone.”
“Flies on the wall,” Gal says, before three smaller drones buzz past, leading the way through Galahad’s stark halls.
The drones file into the lander first, their repulse discs humming with what sounds like excitement. They line up along both walls, locking themselves in place. Capria and I take the cockpit seats and buckle in.
“This is going to feel not great,” Gal warns. “The added gravity is going to pull hard. It’s going to feel like we’re in an elevator, going up, that doesn’t stop accelerating until we reach the surface. And when we do reach the surface, you’re going to be heavy. Like really heavy. Cool?”
“Huh?” I ask.
“Twenty-first century expression,” she explains. “Ready?”
“Ye—”
The lander drops from Galahad’s bottom and plummets to the surface. The sudden acceleration coupled with a growing sensation of falling toward our collective doom, snatches my voice away. For a full minute, all I can hear is the rushing of an atmosphere over the lander’s hull, and Gal’s laughter.
We touch down far more gently, coming in dark to avoid being spotted.
“Welcome to Cognata,” Gal says, “Home of crushing gravity, breathable air, and God-knows-what else.”
I want to quip back, to delight in the joy of first contact with a new humanity, but I have to focus my energy on standing. Feels like two heavy hands are pressing on my shoulders, stuffing me back down into my chair. I stand with a grunt. “Ugh. You weren’t kidding.”
“I never kid,” Gal jokes, but I don’t laugh.
My voice has become a deep baritone.
“What’s wrong with his voi—” Capria claps her hands over her mouth, her voice is nearly as deep as mine.
“Right,” Gal says, sounding normal. “The air density is higher here. Your vocal cords are vibrating at a lower frequency.”
Capria stands next, and compared to me, she makes it look easy. “Great. How long until our bodies get used to this?”
“The voice change is permanent, until you leave, of course. It would normally be a few months before the weight change stops hurting. Maybe a year before you don’t notice it as much. But since you weren’t born here, you’ll never be fully adapted to the extra weight. Then again, neither of you are normal, so I’m not really sure.”
I pick up my backpack, which felt manageable up on the Galahad and now feels like it’s full of lead bricks. “Geez.” It’s my last complaint. Excitement sets in when the rear hatch opens up, letting in the scent of an alien world. The best way to describe it is cool and tangy, almost citrusy, but tinged with rot and ozone. The three small drones buzz out into the night. I consider warning Gal again, but she knows to keep them out of sight. Plus, a little recon will only help us get where we’re going faster. And faster is better. I’m ready for a good sit.
We hobble out of the lander, and step out into tall grass, swaying in a gentle breeze. The air is cool on my face, but the chill doesn’t reach my body. I trace a finger along a grass blade and wince back. A bead of blood decorates the digit, but the wound has already healed.
“Razor grass,” I say.
“You know what it is?” Capria asks.
I smile. “Just naming it.”
“I’m sure someone already has.”
The hum of an approaching drone ends our fledgling conversation.
“This way,” Gal says from the drone, her voice hushed. We follow the small robot, which navigates the excess gravity without any trouble. What should have been a five minute trek takes thirty minutes, with frequent stops to catch our breath. By the time we reach the end of our half mile walk, I feel a little more acclimated to the weight, but also like I want to take a nap for the first time since Galahad left Mars…the first time.
“Over the ledge,” Gal says, stopping before a drop off. “Slowly.”
My instinct is to lie down and crawl to the edge, but I’m not sure I’ll get back up again, so I inch forward, shuffling my feet and lifting my head higher to get a peek without revealing myself.
Capria takes the more direct route, on her hands and knees, crawling ahead. She drops to her stomach the moment she reaches the edge, and frantically waves me down.
I lower myself beside her, inching closer, fighting gravity’s desire to slam me down. And then I see it for myself and flop onto my gut.
Capria looks at me, her face lit in dull blue light cast by the drone. Her words come out interspaced by deep breaths. “What—the fuck—are they?”
43
“People,” Gal says. “I think. Maybe.”
Gal’s shaky assessment is about the same as mine, but I have little doubt that we’re looking at the descendants of Galahad’s crew. The…people…below us are bipedal, with two arms, one head, and as far as I can tell, opposable thumbs. But that’s where their similarities with modern man diverge. In many ways, they are more different from homo sapiens than Neanderthals once were.
The tallest of them might stand at a height of four and a half feet. While there once were people far shorter than that, either through their genetic heritage, or various types of dwarfism, they weren’t built like these—what should we call them?—Cognatans.
The people below are nearly as wide as they are tall. Dressed in layers of animal hides, I can’t see their bodies, but I get the distinct impression that they’re muscular, like compressed body builders. They’re also hairy, with long frizzy locks extending from heads and faces, hinting at long, cold winters. Since I can’t distinguish between men and women, I think it’s safe to say the woman are also hairy—or perhaps just not out after dark.
Then again, it’s the middle of the night. Why are there so many of them out and about? The sounds of labor echo through the dark. Clanging metal. Grinding wheels. Deep voiced conversations.
Are they nocturnal? Or is this still early in the night for them? Maybe they still operate on twenty four hour cycles with waking and sleeping periods during both day and night. The possibilities are too vast to make any kind of determination based on observations. We’re going to have to ask. If they still speak English.
The village below us is lit by what look like luminous, orange crystals. From space, the glow looked like electricity. Like street lights. But the light is cast by the stones mounted atop wooden posts—or whatever passes as wood on Cognata. The buildings are built from granite-like stones and covered with roofs of flat, slate-like tiles. The streets are cobbled, with worn tracks running down the middle, where wheels have rolled for hundreds of years—if not millennia.
“Looks like the middle ages down there,” Capria whispers.
“More like Middle Earth,” I say, garnering a confused glance. “Dwarves?”
Nothing.
“Hobbits? The Lord of the Rings? The novel?”
&n
bsp; She shakes her head. “Never heard of it.”
“It’s good,” Gal says, revealing she has been digging through the tomes of Earth’s entertainment media stored in Galahad’s vast memory. I only know The Hobbit, and The Lord of the Rings because of my parents’ interest in the books. “Though the movies are a bit long winded.”
“Will knowledge of those stories help us here?” Capria asks.
“Only if they speak Elvish,” Gal says, and I’m sure if she had a mouth, she’d be grinning.
I push myself up a little. “I think I should go down.”
Capria clasps my hand, the tightness a warning, or fear. Her excitement over rediscovering the human race has faded upon finding not-reality populated by not-quite-humanity. “We should stay together.”
She doesn’t say it, but I hear ‘and leave,’ in her tone. Whether or not we leave Cognata and return to Earth is still up for debate, but I can’t abandon these people until I learn the fates of our crewmembers. While we spent roughly eight years traveling at FTL speed, they would have lived thousands of years here on Cognata. The changes to our genetic code seems to keep us from aging, and from death through conventional means, but there’s no way to know if the effect will wear off some day. Perhaps life isn’t quite as infinite as we’ve assumed—or maybe it is and our crew is still alive on this planet.
“In case you haven’t noticed,” Capria says, “the city is surrounded by a wall.”
I hadn’t noticed, but I see it now. By my standards, the ten-foot-tall, stone barricade isn’t much of an obstacle, but for the much shorter Cognatans, it wouldn’t be easy to surmount. It’s also a good five feet thick, and lined with watchtowers and guards. Several portions of the wall look scorched, while others look rebuilt. They’re keeping out more than predators.
This city has seen its fair share of battles. Humanity’s wars continue even when hardly recognizable as human.
But that doesn’t mean these people are inherently violent. I was never under the illusion that we would discover a new Eden on Cognata, where people lived in perfect peace.
I’m about to suggest Gal do some stealthy recon when a shushing sound cuts through the night behind us. The small drone hovering beside me spins around, its red faux-eyes going dark, and the repulse disc at its base dimming to a dull blue glow. “We are not alone,” Gal whispers, and then the drone flies over the ledge, its hum fading into the night.
Capria and I lie still, animals in a trap, hearts pounding. I’m trying to breathe slowly, but each inhalation is labored, shaky and too damn loud.
Footsteps shift through the tall grass behind us. My imagination conjures the image of a Cognatan predator, stalking its naïve new prey.
But that can’t be true, because whatever it is behind me, speaks English.
“Up, children.” The words are coughed, deep and resonating, the tone unapproving, maybe exasperated, but not angry.
Children? I wonder, and then I realize that we’re mostly concealed by the tall grass lining the ledge’s fringe. From the perspective of a Cognatan, our slender frames must resemble their young.
I roll over slowly, hands open in what I hope is still a universal sign for ‘I don’t have any weapons and I mean you no harm.’
The three men I see, standing in the grass just beyond my feet, are stunning. Seeing the Cognatans from a distance is fascinating, but up close… What little of their faces isn’t concealed by bushy hair, is weathered and exaggerated. Large noses. Large eyes, which like mine, are brown. One of them is yawning, not expecting any trouble from the children they discovered, perhaps on patrol. His molars are a good inch across, and his canines thick and sharp, like a lion’s, but not as long. Cognatans might be short, but they are far more powerful than their ancestors.
The yawn is cut short by a grunt when they see my face, and then Capria’s. Weapons emerge from under their animal hide cloaks. One carries a sword. Another a spear. And the last nocks a thick arrow in a bow, the head glowing orange. The tips of their blades move back and forth between Capria and me, unsure of who poses the greater threat.
“Up!” shouts the largest of the three, who is a good two feet shorter than me. “Up, now!”
English, I think, but not exactly articulate. Still, the message is clear. I move slowly, getting my legs beneath me, moving slow to show I don’t pose a threat, and because the planet’s gravity won’t let me. When Capria and I stand to our full height, side by side, the men stagger back, eyes going wide.
I shoot Capria a glance that says, ‘Be ready.’ For what, I don’t know. To fight? To run? I doubt we could overpower these three armed powerhouses any more than we could run a hundred yards without falling to the ground, gasping for air. I doubt Capria knows either, but she nods anyway.
What I’m not expecting is for all three men to lower their weapons, fall prostrate in the grass and say, “Lords!”
Lords?
I understand the concept on display here, that people of our stature are worshipped in some way, but it raises a lot of questions. Is the Galahad crew still alive and known to these people? Are they truly worshiped, or simply recognized as the founders of Cognatan civilization? Could their shock simply be because we’re new and unrecognized Lords, or have they not seen any Lords in a long time? Either way, their shock and subjugation appears genuine.
“What’s going on?” Capria whispers.
“An opportunity,” I say, and then louder, I say, “Stand, friends.” I’m not sure how much English these fellows know, but I figure keeping my language simple will help avoid confusion.
The men obey, rising from the ground and sheathing their weapons.
I place my hand on my chest. “My name is Will.” Then I reach out to Capria. “This is Cap.”
“Will…” says the biggest of them, looking me over with wide eyes. “Cap.” He mimics my hand motion, patting his chest. “I, Rolf.” Then he motions to his compatriots. “Stim N’ Bono.”
For a moment I think that’s one long name, but then realize he’s given me both of their names without really identifying who is who.
Rolf bows a bit and takes a step back. “Follow Rolf? Greet people of Renfro.”
“Renfro,” Capria says. I recognize the name, too.
Charles Renfro, chief engineer.
“Yes,” I say to Rolf. “Please.”
With an enthusiastic nod, he turns and leads the way. For their short size, they’re fairly quick, but it takes them just a minute to realize we can’t match the pace they’ve set. They seem confused by it, so I say, “Long journey. Tired legs.”
This seems to make sense to them, but the grunt Rolf offers in reply could really mean any number of things. But I take the lack of laughter, mocking, or weapons as a good sign. Thirty minutes and absolutely no conversation later, we’re no closer to answers, but we’re standing before the gates of Renfro, lit by the orange glow of two large crystals mounted above the gate’s twin watchtowers.
“Who?” a voice calls out from within the tower.
“Rolf,” our host shouts back.
“Too soon!” comes the angry retort.
“Lords!” Rolf shouts. “Two Lords!”
There’s a loud clatter and thump from inside the watchtower. Then a face appears in a small window. A shout of shock is followed by a grinding of gears. The two metal doors, each a solid sheet, swing outward, allowing us to enter the stout city. We’re led through the streets with ease, slowing when crowds begin to gather, whispering to each other, but never speaking to us, or the three men leading us ever deeper into Renfro. Up close, I can distinguish men from women. As suspected, both are equally hairy, but the women have prodigious breasts that actually make them look more powerful than the men—and they very well might be. While there are many male Cognatans dressed for battle, or carrying tools I associate with hard labor, the females are dressed in nicer, tighter-fitting skins and given a wide berth by the men.
The children, who hobble about on short legs, are comic
al and even harder to tell apart, as they’re all dressed alike. They’re hairy, like their elders, but their color is lighter and their texture far smoother. I smile at their little faces as they look up at me with what I think is admiration.
“Come,” Rolf says, leading us up a staircase composed of very short stairs that somehow still drain my waning energy reserves.
“It looks like a keep,” Capria says. She might not know Middle Earth terminology, but she has no trouble with the middle ages. And she’s right. The building we’re being led inside is like a small, square castle with large, metal gates. A second line of defense, which like the walls, shows signs of previous battle damage and repairs. Life on Cognata hasn’t been quiet.
“Inside,” Rolf says, stepping aside and motioning to the open doors. The space beyond is lit by orange crystals. The floor is carpeted in a collection of furs. Tapestries hang on the walls, covered in great murals. “Rest. For feast. Kozna visit soon.”
“Thank you,” I say with a nod of my head. The interior looks inviting, comfortable, and the murals, which appear to tell a story, might provide some answers, if not about the Galahad’s crew, then about these people, their customs, and what we might expect to be served at this feast. I step inside, followed by Capria, who reaches out and takes my hand.
A slow building gasp erupts when our hands meet. The act is offensive to these people. I pull my hand away, nod, and smile an apology, and then walk deeper inside the keep. When the doors close, and then lock with a thunk, I stop. “That doesn’t sound good.”
“It’s not,” Capria says. I turn to find her deeper inside the hundred-foot-wide, square space. She’s standing in front of a large mural, which I can now see is actually sewn into the tapestry, like a massive, intricate, cross-stitch. Each one is a masterpiece that must have taken countless hours to create. But the skill put into the images is not what holds our interest. It’s the horrors they portray, and Capria has managed to stop in front of the worst of them all.
I stand beside her, all of my hope for Cognata, its people, and the Galahad’s crew, turned to steam, dissipating to hot nothing.
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