by Josi Russell
“No trouble,” Aria said, taking careful steps toward him and holding up her hands. “I just need help.”
“What’re you doin’ out here? You work for Saras?” he asked, a jittery tension crossing his features.
She shook her head. “I don’t work for Saras.” She was, for once, glad of that fact. “My husband disappeared out here. I need help finding him. Have you seen a ship?”
He wasn’t running, but he looked like he might. “Your husband work for Saras?”
“No. He doesn’t.”
This seemed to calm him, and he took a step toward her. “I haven’t seen ‘im.”
Aria realized, suddenly, how much she was hoping he had. Her disappointment must have shown on her face.
“It’s wild country,” he said apologetically.
Aria nodded. “I’m starting to see that.”
The man hesitated, then swung his sack to the ground and rooted around in it. He came up holding a strange yellow fruit, its skin speckled with orange smudges.
She smiled. “A kwai fruit!”
The man seemed pleased. He took a few more steps toward her and held it out. “Take this. I’m sorry about your husband.”
Aria took it, smelling its thick, sweet scent. She suddenly realized she was hungry. When had she last eaten?
“How do you eat it?” she asked.
The man removed another from the sack and held it up to demonstrate. Then he bit into it. She heard the snapping sound of the skin and saw the juice trickle into his beard. She held hers to her mouth, breathing in that robust aroma, and took a bite.
She couldn’t help but slurp to keep the sweet juice from being wasted. The flesh was firm and tender, and the underlying tang of the fruit countered its remarkable sweetness. Aria laughed a little at her own voraciousness as she finished it off.
She saw him slip the pit from his into one of the pockets of his faded vest and he held out a hand for her pit as well. She handed it to him. “Do you cultivate these?”
He nodded. “I do.”
She smiled. “I was a botanist back on Earth. I just grew some Earth wheat in my house back in Coriol.”
His eyes widened and he took an involuntary step forward. “Earth wheat? Real Earth wheat?”
She nodded. “It’s my own strain. High in protein.” She closed her eyes. “I’m dreaming of a loaf of whole wheat bread sometime in the future.”
The man looked at her a long moment. Then he spoke gruffly. “I’m Hank,” he said, his voice softened by his gray beard. “What’s your name?”
She smiled and held out a sticky hand. “Aria.”
He shook it and they both chuckled and wiped their hands on their jackets.
“Listen,” he said, glancing around, “what would it take to get some of that wheat?”
Aria considered. “I don’t have much. I brought some from Earth, you know, to remember it by. I didn’t realize there wouldn’t really be an exact equivalent here.”
“Huh.” He made a disgusted sound. “A lot we didn’t realize about things here.”
She nodded encouragingly, and Hank went on.
“I came here to be a miner. Didn’t know they’d make ya use picks and shovels, and that no matter whatcha did they’d never pay you enough to repay them.”
Aria grimaced. It was a familiar story.
“You can think what you want,” Hank said, “but I walked away from it. Left my key on the table and my red uniform in the closet. Don’t take nothin’ from nobody anymore. I can make it on my own out here.” He hesitated. “Well, mostly. I do a little tradin’ to get stuff I want.”
“Who do you trade with?” Aria asked.
“Other Evaders, like me.” He gestured toward a narrow cut between two peaks. “Headin’ to the market now. You can come, if you won’t say anything about it back in the city.” Saying the words out loud seemed to make him more anxious about that possibility, and he gathered his bag quickly. “Or maybe you’d better not come.” He took a quick step away.
“Hank,” Aria said, her voice clear and calm. She tried not to let him see how much she wanted to meet others out here, to see if they knew anything about Ethan. Hank turned back toward her, searching her face. “I’m not going to tell anyone. I’ll keep your secret.”
His eyes narrowed and he studied her a long moment.
“A’right then. Keep up.”
It was a challenge keeping up with him. He scrambled between the peaks and through a boulder field. She followed him for what she guessed was about a kilometer before he parted a curtain of hanging vines and entered a brilliant, sunlit valley the size of a warehouse. The sun was directly overhead, and there were twenty or more people in the shade of the vines around the edge, sitting on blankets on the ground. They had a fascinating assortment of items spread around them.
Aria walked through the market in wonder. There were fruits of all different kinds, meat, castoff clothes and camping gear, and even homemade goods like cookies and decorations made from natural or found materials.
She saw their suspicion as she approached, but Hank’s reputation seemed secure, because a wave of his hand put most of the other vendors at rest.
He stopped beneath a canopy of leafy vines and reached in his sack, procuring a faded tartan blanket. He laid it out and carefully arranged his fruits—not just the kwai, but also long purple fruits and bright green gourds, red berries and white ones, and two huge orange blossoms dripping with nectar.
“It’s as sweet as Earth’s honey,” he said, holding one toward her. She held out a finger and he let a golden drop fall on it. Putting it in her mouth, she was taken back to the smell of honeysuckle from her childhood and its sweet taste in the air.
“I’m the fruit man,” he told her as he turned his attention to his customers. The other vendors descended, trying to convince him how much he needed their goods and trying to downplay his wares as they traded with him.
Aria watched in amazement as they haggled back and forth, coming to a mutual agreement about what each item was worth. It was so different than the experience of Gaynes’s market in Coriol. She admired it.
Finally, as the sun moved past the valley, the Evaders began to pack up. Aria realized she was missing her chance.
“Hold on! Hold on!” She caught up to them and asked about Ethan. No one had seen him, or the ship, but they did talk her out of her jacket and the pocketknife she’d brought along, trading her for several delicious fruits, nuts, and gourds gathered from the forest around them.
Most were kind, as well, telling her not to give up looking, that it was a vast place and he could be alive. Look at them. Some of them had been living out here a long time. Hank had been here twenty years.
Hank helped her carry her produce and find her way back to the boat. There was a gleam in his eye as he said, “Aria, before you leave, I want to know if you’ll think of a trade for some of that wheat—just a few grains. I think I could get it to grow.”
Aria thought about it. Suddenly, the thought of all this food, sitting out here while people in Coriol were starving, sparked an idea in her.
“I’ll work out a trade with you. But it may take a little more than just wheat. Is there anything else you need?” She gestured back toward the market. “Or that they need?”
“Sure, there’s a list of stuff we’re always on the lookout for.” He ran a hand down his beard. “Razors, scissors, knives, ropes, warm clothes, water carriers like bottles and jugs.”
A plan was forming. “Is this a good site to meet? Is it safe for you?” she asked.
Hank’s eyes darted away toward the forest and she knew he was looking toward his home. He nodded.
“Okay. I’ll get you anything you want from the city. But I need as much fruit as you can give me. And I need you—all of you—to keep an eye out for Ethan.”
Hank seemed to consider for a moment, then stuck out a hand. “Deal.”
***
Kaia breathed in the sharp scent of Zam as s
he waited in the hallway for Polara to come out of her classroom. Rigel was sleeping in his stroller, and she pushed it slowly back and forth a little. The school was small, even by Minean standards, and only a fraction of the children in Coriol attended it. Saras had no qualms about employing children over ten years old, and parents needed all the scrip they could get to pay off their heavy debts.
It was a tidy school, though. Even now a Saras cleaning crew was scrubbing the windows at the other end of the hall, scraping at the little green plants, which Aria called Taim. The plants seemed intent on filling up Coriol. The crew, silhouetted against the brightness of the window, looked ominous, somehow. Kaia turned to peer in the open door of Polara’s classroom instead, hoping that the little girl didn’t see her. She knew that Polara would likely run straight to her without regard for her teacher’s discipline plan. She always liked to see Polara learning. She was such a bright, inquisitive child and everything held fascination for her.
Today, though, Kaia saw the little girl sitting at her desk, resting her chin on her crossed arms. She didn’t look bored, exactly, or sleepy. Kaia tried to come up with an accurate word to describe Polara’s blank expression and slumped shoulders.
Weak.
That was the word. Polara looked weak and fragile. Kaia had to stop herself from going to the child. It must have been a grueling day at school. When the teacher dismissed them, Polara gathered her things and smiled broadly when she saw Kaia. There was some comfort in that. And Kaia thought there was a bit more spring in her step as she walked.
Kaia took the child’s hand. She never felt so needed and so secure in her own mind as when she was with Polara. The child’s enthusiasm had a calming and clarifying effect on her.
She thought as they walked back to her cottage. Polara chattered along and Kaia saw all the mothers coming to pick up their children. It was strange, but Minea was a world without many grandparents. The passenger ships had left the grandparents behind on Earth, stripping away an entire generation from the families who crossed the stars. Kaia was glad that Ethan’s children had her and the Admiral. They’d fallen into the grandparent role so easily.
When, four years ago, she and her father had walked into the hospital room and Ethan had brought the newborn Polara to them, both Kaia and the Admiral had seen, in the delicate features of that baby, a brand new start. Their sorrow, their regret, had, for the first time since Kaia arrived, faded into the background, washed out by the hope that Polara brought.
And Polara and Rigel had kept the memories of those hard times at bay ever since.
Chapter 16
The survey crew used Bleak House as their base for the next several days. Two weeks ago they’d dropped out of the sky, and their equipment was failing steadily. As they explored the tunnels around the dry chamber, the little group moved carefully together in the dim glow of Ndaiye’s shoulder lights, trying to preserve their remaining Maxlights while they could. The batteries on the final two pairs of Everwarm coveralls went out within hours of each other.
Something about the conversation they’d shared the first night in Bleak House stayed with them. They couldn’t stop talking about Earth. As they settled in after several hours of exploring, Ndaiye was cheering them with tales from his parents’ traditional culture.
“Sure,” Ndaiye said, “the spirits of people who have died can visit you. And the spirits of people back on Earth can visit Minea, too, when their bodies are sleeping. And you can visit them. Only you think it’s a dream when you wake up. And so do they.”
Ethan didn’t mind that myth. Actually, he liked it. He would like his sister to see Minea, though she’d be over eighty now. And he would like to see her again. It was a comforting thought.
Maggie interrupted the thought, pulling him back into the cave. “If we wanna stay warm, we’re gonna have to sleep like sardines,” Maggie said. “So I hope nobody’s shy.”
They put Brynn and Jade in the middle, with Maggie and Traore on either side and Ndaiye and Ethan on the ends. Ethan turned throughout the night to warm his back and his chest alternately. He barely slept. Finally, when he could stand it no more, he laid the packs where he had been to hold some heat near the group and stood, shivering.
There was one direction they hadn’t gone yet. He took a Maxlight and went that way. The triangular opening in the far wall was easy to slip through, and Ethan found himself in a chamber that reminded him of the Colony Offices lobby. Several passages opened out of it, which they would need to map.
He went back into the Bleak House chamber and eased the map, pencil, and marking rock out of his pack. He put them in the inner pockets of his coveralls and started down the first tunnel.
After three switchbacks, it dead-ended. Ethan exited and wrote “DEAD END” on the wall inside the tunnel with the marking rock.
He tried the next one. It ran, curving, off down deeper into the cave. Promising, he thought, but it eventually came to another dead end. He was far from the Bleak House chamber, where he’d left the others sleeping, and really alone for the first time since the crash. Ethan wanted to try something, something he hadn’t tried in a long time. He had learned to completely suppress most of the alterations made to him on Beta Alora, and this was one he hadn’t used since being on that red planet.
But when he’d used it in the past, there were consequences for those around him, and he couldn’t try it around the survey crew unless he was sure he could control it.
Ethan stood in front of the wall, his palms in front of him. He tapped into the hopelessness he felt being in the cave, into the fear and anger and loss that this place had brought him. He felt his heart beating hard and fast, adrenaline racing through him. As the energy inside him crested, a beam of it shot out through his extended palms, striking the wall with a deafening sound.
He had a moment to see the damage—a table-sized depression in the solid rock—before the tunnel began caving in. Ethan turned and ran back up the tunnel as the rocks fell behind him and the dust and air rushed past him. Tripping, he flipped over, expecting to be crushed by the collapsing tunnel, but it had fallen and was settling into a wall of rubble.
Ethan lay back on the stone floor. His fear about his power was confirmed. It was useless here. This environment was too unpredictable. Unless he could guarantee the stability of the rock above, he couldn’t risk blasting.
He walked back to the lobby outside Bleak House. The avalanche hadn’t woken the others, so he jotted a note and left it on the packs. Looking for our next move. –Ethan.
Slipping out the triangle exit and glancing toward the now rubble-filled tunnel, Ethan stopped to mark “DEAD END AND FALLING ROCK. DO NOT ENTER!” on the map over the passage he had blasted before starting off down a third passage.
Gray and bland like the rest of this area of the cave, this passage was long and snaking. Tunnels opened up on either side and soon he began seeing flowstone formations jutting from the walls. He glanced up. Strange slabs of suspended rock jig-sawed the ceiling of the passage. Walking on, he lost track of time as he studied the formations’ intricacy.
As the formations ended, the passage widened slightly and stopped abruptly. Another dead end. What if they were all dead ends? He shook his head, dreading the trip back up that rock field. And then where would they go? Any of the hundred passages they’d passed could lead them outside or to another dead end like this. Ethan leaned against the wall, trying to think what he’d tell the team when he got back to them. Switching off his light, he laid his head against the cold stone for a moment. Suddenly, an unfamiliar sensation skimmed his face. He swept his hand up instinctively to brush it away, but it remained: a constant, gentle caress. Ethan’s heart beat faster. It was air, moving through the cave. Somewhere in this room was an opening for wind to get through. And wind led outside. He switched the light back on and turned his cheek toward the breeze. Shining the light in that direction, he crossed the stony cave floor and followed the breeze around some of the bigger boulders. He fe
lt a breath of relief escape him as he saw it. At the bottom of the far wall gaped a crevice about the size of a bathtub. He knelt beside it and felt the air rushing past him. It felt fresh and bracing.
Ethan took out the marking rock and scratched his initials above the passage. He lay on his belly and crawled into the crevice. It was roomy, roughly squarish, and smoothed by water that had once flowed here. He rolled onto his back and pulled off his gloves, feeling the surface all around with his fingertips. It was dry.
Crawling farther into the gap, he found it tapering slightly to an oblong passageway. As he crawled he was suddenly reminded of exploring the ship’s shafts with Kaia. That was a lifetime ago.
He missed her company now. She would have a thousand ideas about how to get these people out of here. She may have even been able to repair the ship so they could have flown out. As the memory of the survey craft returned to him, though, he realized that was wishful thinking. Its twisted wings and the ragged gashes through its sides would have been beyond even her capacity to repair. If there was a way out, this was much more likely to be it.
Ethan felt the thud of rock on his shoulder and realized that the opening had narrowed considerably. Pausing, he shined his light ahead, down along the smooth passage as far as he could see. It grew smaller ahead. Ethan stopped to breathe. Though the last few days had forced him to move past his fear of enclosed spaces, this was extreme. He didn’t know if he could force himself to go further into the little passage. He wasn’t going to be able to crawl on his hands and knees, and holding the flashlight was going to be tricky.
His breath quickened as he looked down the passageway, shining the light around to reveal a cylinder of smooth gray stone. The breeze flowed past his face, seemingly warmer here. There was a real possibility that this lead somewhere, that getting through it got them closer to getting out. It had to be investigated.
Ethan was no stranger to facing his fears. He held the faces of the crew in his mind for a moment, then he slid the Maxlight into his pocket and tapped the one working shoulder light, telling himself not to panic as he registered how much more shadowy the way was without the flashlight.