by Chad Spencer
“A whole big herd of them. Just before we arrived at your villiage.”
“Why didn’t you tell us? We could have gone after them!”
“Why? What do you want them for?”
“Naralls are a major food source for us. We use everything on them. We eat their meat. We use the oils in their blubber for medicines and plastics. We make things from their bones and scales. Their bones and scales are the hardest things we know of. We can only cut them by using a narall jaw with the teeth still in. We get many of our gravity mirrors from naralls. The naralls dive down deep into the atmosphere and swallow them as they grow. They bring up all the elements we need from below. Culling a narall herd would give us the resources to build a real home for ourselves and solve our village’s crowding problems.”
“But doesn’t that make the naralls go extinct?”
Joonen huffed, “Of course not. We would never take more than we need. We kill the old and the weak so that there will always be naralls to harvest. Our lives depend on there being a reasonable balance between them and us.”
Growing a little upset, Joonen asserted, “You should have told us you saw the herd. It would have made our village prosperous. Now it’s too late.”
“Maybe not,” Jeff consoled. “Hugh can talk to our people who are at your village. They could use some of our life pods to take your people to the herd.”
Jeff had a quick talk with Hugh about it and Hugh contacted some of the crewmembers who were still at Xemusiana to get the narall hunt underway. Joonen was ecstatic.
Proceeding to the restaurant, Joonen ordered dinner for them. The meal was some sort of bird meat with vegetables in a sauce. It was eaten together with a starchy potato-like tuber.
Jeff’s mouth burned. His eyes watered. Joonen chuckled, “You’re not used to spicy foods, are you?”
“Not really,” choked Jeff. “But I like it. It’s good.”
Amanda ate nonchalantly. “Our head cook on the Amsterdam was Indian. Mamsen Agarwal. She made a lot of Indian food. So spicy stuff doesn’t bother me.”
Jeff felt like a bit of a hick.
As they ate, Joonen told them, “Tolool is talking with the local Tuluvet Council right now. I imagine they’ll want to meet you tomorrow. Just so you know, they’re probably going to be pretty skeptical. Visitors from another universe who can fly is not the sort of thing that happens every day. At least it doesn’t on our world.”
“It doesn’t really happen all that much on our world either,” Jeff assured him.
“Is there a way you could prove to the Council that what you say is true?”
“Yes,” answered Jeff. “There are a few ways.” He glanced in Amanda’s direction. “Whatever we do, probably the more showy and impressive it is, the better.” Amanda nodded knowingly.
32
“Of course they didn’t believe our story,” Jeff mumbled as he, Amanda, Tolool, and Joonen stood before the Tuluvet Council. He had more or less expected that. But to see them laugh so loud was a bit much.
The meeting was being held on an expansive veranda that extended out from the side of the island of Phiusmus. They seemed to be in a ritzy part of town; the Council members were all elaborately dressed.
“It’s true,” asserted Tolool. “And these people can prove it.”
“These children?” a Councilwoman mocked.
Without a word, Jeff levitated himself high over their heads. “I have power over fire,” he stated. Then he burst into flames. He made the fire as hot and large as he could. The Council members almost fell from their chairs in alarm.
Making the flames vanish, he continued, “I also have power over lightning.” Holding his hands above his head, he shot the largest bolts he could out into the empty sky. Some Council members were visibly shaking. He lowered himself gently and stood calmly gazing at them.
Amanda lifted off next. “I have power over light.” She gathered a small disk of sunlight and tossed it upwards. After it crossed a few hundred yards, it exploded with a loud BANG and a bright flash. Then she gathered a large disk of light. Jeff figured it was probably the largest disk she could manage. Vigorously tossing it across the sky, it soon became a small, bright dot in the distance.
One of the Councilmen groused, “That wasn’t especially impressive.”
Glancing down at the man airily, Amanda asserted, “Wait for it.”
After another twenty seconds or so, a huge ball of intense, almost overpowering light erupted in the far distance. Moments later, the thunderous noise of the explosion reached them–along with a hot blast of furious wind.
As Amanda lighted on the balcony, a shaken Councilman asserted, “It’s some kind of trick.”
“No,” Jeff shot back. “It’s not. It’s real. And we’re really from another world in another universe. And really, really bad enemies are probably coming into this universe. And if they do, there’ll be no hope for you at all. None. If you want to survive, you have to take us to the nearest continent so we can plant our ship seed. When it grows, you’ll take it into space and it can make more. And eventually there’ll be enough ships to carry all of your people away from here. You’ll learn to use our technology and you’ll learn to fight. That’s the only hope you’ll have for survival. So like Joonen says, you’ll take us on your fastest skyship to the continent. You’ll help us plant the seed. The fighter ship that it will produce will teach you want you need to know. After that, you’re on your own.”
The Council members made no reply. They just sat in stunned silence. Jeff didn’t wait for them. Nodding to Amanda and Joonen, he strode from the balcony with the two of them following close behind.
Joonen took Jeff and Amanda out for lunch. While they were eating, Tolool arrived at the restaurant and said, “You convinced them completely. They’ve sent a coded radio message to Nonene. Our people there are expecting us. Councilman Darphate is sending us on his personal ship. We leave tonight.”
33
“Akio,” Nuraiyana called out, “I’ve located all of our crew’s pods except the one carrying Akifumi and Eric Dunlap and the one with Kasumi and Ikko. I’m plotting a course for you for the quickest pickup.”
“Got it. Heading for the first pod now.”
‘Why did she have to be the only one left on board?’ Akio groused silently. Akio knew that Nuraiyana had saved the Hiryu and both of their lives by projecting her shield around the ship. But they were in such an unstable part of the wormhole that the entire crew had already evacuated into the life pods before Nuraiyana could get back to the engineering bay and use her shield.
‘She should have done it before they all left. Now I have to find my brother again.’ But he couldn’t stay mad at her. She had refused to leave him when he was getting everyone else into the life pods. He had even tried to physically force her into a pod with Nikko. All that had gotten him was a good hard slap in the face.
Nuraiyana interrupted his thoughts by saying, “Rick and Emily just radioed in. They say they’ve made contact with people. There are actually humans living in this planet’s atmosphere!”
“What? People? In a pocket universe? How did they get here?”
Nuraiyana just shrugged.
It took the better part of a day to gather up Akio’s crew. Akifumi and Eric were nowhere to be found. Neither were Kasumi and Nikko. Along the way, they found that the gas giant’s atmosphere was inhabited by numerous floating jungles and islands filled with all kinds of life. Akio couldn’t explain it, but he really didn’t care much. He was more concerned with finding his brother.
Several of the larger landmasses were broadcasting TV programs, rather than 3V shows, like back on planet Minerva. The ship’s computer was able to create a translation matrix of the local language, which Rick then uploaded to Nikko. So Akio was quickly able to ask the locals for information about his brother and his other lost crewmembers with Nikko as the translator. But no one knew anything. Akio was running out of patience.
Sirsen Bigley, a h
eavy-set colonist in his fifties who was assigned to Rick’s engineering staff, suggested that they try moving around to the other side of the planet. “This gas giant is big,” he reminded Akio, “very big. Our crewmembers could just be around the curve of the planet and not able to hear our radio signals.”
Nodding agreement, Rick joined in with, “And most of this planet’s land masses are near its equator. But it’s possible that their life pods are at other latitudes. We need to check both north and south of the equator.”
“How long will that take?” Akio demanded.
Rick cringed slightly. “It’ll take a while, weeks probably. With our scanners and the speed this ship moves, we can cover a lot of ground pretty fast. But Sirsen Bigley is right. This is a very big planet.”
Akio was not happy. But he couldn’t think of anything else to do until they could get the ship repaired and get back into space. “Lay out a search grid,” he directed, “and get started right away.”
With Glen Emerson, one of the colonist gunners, taking the first shift at the helm, Akio was able to relax and have a meal. As Nikko served him his lunch, Nuraiyana came in and sat down to eat as well.
They were silent for a few moments. Akio was lost in thoughts of Akifumi. Nikko left to do some cleaning. After a few more minutes, Nuraiyana surprised Akio by suddenly blurting out, “You still wear it, don't you?”
Puzzled, Akio asked, “Wear what?”
“The locket. The locket that Hikaru gave you. I see its outline on the front of your shirt sometimes. It shows now and then when you move. You always wear it, don't you?”
Stiffly, Akio shoved a mouthful of food into his mouth and mumbled, “Something wrong with that?”
“No,” she replied quickly. “I didn't mean anything like that. It's just … it's just …”
“It's just what?”
Nuraiyana hesitated. Then she questioned, “It ... it still has some of her hairs in it, doesn't it? Kasumi said that there were a few hairs left after ... after they got the DNA they needed to make my android body.”
Glaring fiercely down at his food, Akio growled, “Yes. There's some of Hikaru's hairs left in the locket. You got a problem with that?”
Again, Nuraiyana struggled to speak. But at last she whispered, “You don't really think of her as dead, do you? You still hold onto her as if she were alive.”
Akio's insides were an empty, icy, burning knot. He shoveled more food into his mouth and chewed as if he were grinding the life out of his pain. For a while, they continued to eat in silence. But at last he growled, “No.”
“No, what?”
“No, I don't think of her as alive!” He was practically shouting now. “Just look around. If she were alive she would be here with me right now. We'd be eating together and talking together and finding Akifumi together and solving problems together and standing up against the universe together and just spending time doing nothing together. But she's not doing those things with me. She never will. No matter how much I wear the locket, she isn't here and she never will be.”
Nuraiyana flushed. Akio saw it and the thought, 'Just like a real girl' flashed across his mind. Then he felt guilty for thinking that. But he wasn't sure why. No matter how human Nuraiyana looked, her body was an android, not a human. And her life force wasn't human either. It was the life force of an alien from another universe–an alien with some stolen human memories. 'Hikaru's memories.' In reality, the creature sitting across from him and sharing a meal with him was almost completely non-human.
'And yet,' mused Akio, 'and yet I can't atop thinking of her as a girl–just like any human girl.'
He forced that thought from his mind. 'It's probably better not to think of her that way,' he cautioned himself. But deep inside himself, he knew he couldn't think of Nuraiyana as an alien. He just didn't know why.
“Sorry I yelled at you,” mumbled Akio. Nuraiyana just nodded and ate her meal in silence.
34
“I wasn’t even Captain of my own ship for a whole day before it was destroyed,” grumbled Harriet to no one in particular.
Through the open hatch of the life pod, Harriet eyed the endless sky in which they were drifting. The air that flowed in was sweet, fresh, and fragrant because of the vast airborne jungle they were wafting over. Harriet’s mood was lightened by the sounds of the innumerable birds, monkeys, and other creatures that inhabited the floating forest below.
The cramped pod had limited maneuverability. But she used what capabilities it had to vector toward the pod carrying Kenji and Ai. They were still more than a hundred miles away. But Harriet figured they could rendezvous before the end of the day.
Sebastian, who had ended up in the same life pod as Harriet, squirmed as he worked the pod’s comm panel. His long, muscular frame was constricted in the small space offered by the pod. He was currently stretched out on top of one of the pod’s two cryostasis units in an effort to get some more room for himself.
“I’ve contacted all of our gunners,” Sebastian informed her. “And I just got in touch with our two missing engineers. Everyone’s setting course for a rendezvous point that’s a couple of hundred miles beyond Kenji and Ai.”
“Can you believe this place?” continued Sebastian. “There’s floating islands and forests! Kenji said that they met some people on one of them. People, Harriet! It’s just frosty, totally frosty.”
Harriet suppressed a smile at Sebastian’s outdated slang. ‘He’s been living in Japanese space for a couple of years,’ she realized, ‘and not speaking much English. So his English is a little behind the times.’
Sebastian continued to chatter with enthusiasm, “Ai said she thinks we’re actually in another universe! How frosty is that? How frosty is that?”
Feeling the weight of responsibility, Harriet turned the discussion to more serious matters.
“Have you been able to get ahold of any of the other fighter crews?” she asked.
Shaking his head, Sebastian told her, “I’m pretty sure we’re off on a different tangent than the rest of the group. If my rough guesses are right, we’re a lot farther north than them and possibly on the other side of the gas giant. We bounced across the top of the atmosphere like when you skip a stone across the top of water. Our ship skipped a long ways before it broke apart and we fell into the planet.”
Harriet wasn’t really sure what he was talking about. She didn’t understand how someone could skip a stone across the top of water. ‘But then, I’ve lived in a big can for most of my life. So what would I know about things like that?’
Sebastian’s excitement and positive attitude were infectious. ‘Being with him makes it easier not to worry,’ she realized.
But she did worry–at least a little. Harriet knew that most of her crew was older than she was and could fend for themselves. They were safe in their life pods, at least for now. Nevertheless, she couldn't help feeling responsible and fretting about them. After meeting up with Ai and Kenji, they set course for the rendezvous point where the others would gather.
Over the next few days, Harriet spent a lot of time chatting with Sebastian. In the close quarters of the pod, there was little else to do. Harriet and Sebastian got to know each other pretty well over that time.
Living in such a small space with a guy she hardly knew was extremely uncomfortable for Harriet at first. But by the end of the second day, Sebastian's ready smile and cheerful warmth put her at ease.
'Why is Sebastian so easy to be around?' she wondered. 'He's a guy with a stronger presence than Jeff or Akio. He seems so confident no matter what. He's more like Leo that way.'
The brief thoughts of Leo hurt, so Harriet immediately shoved them from her mind. Instead, she concentrated on the tasks at hand. She had Sebastian call the other pods regularly to make sure they were ok. And she tried to learn as much as she could about the world around them. Twice she and Sebastian stopped to levitate over to the floating jungles that wafted by to explore them. Their pod's scanners told them th
at the floating forests were built on vine-like plants that had gravity mirrors in large bulb-shaped pods. Each jungle had water, food, and other resources needed for life. ‘So at least we’ll be able to stay alive after our supplies run out,’ Harriet told herself.
They had enough synthpaste to last more than a month. And the pod recycled all of the water, so they were good there too. But every time she took a drink, Harriet tried not to think about the fact that the water she was swallowing was probably recycled from her own urine–or from Sebastian's.
The top of each cryostasis unit in the pod opened up into a bed. The pod had a laundry drawer that cleaned their clothes while they took a sonic shower. The shower unit, which was set into a wall, was made to be usable in zero gravity if needed. So was the toilet, if you could call the human excrement disposer (which everyone just called a HED) a toilet.
At the rendezvous point, the group discussed their situation. “These plants,” Harriet commented, “have vines that are almost as strong as aluminum cables. We could use some to connect our pods together.”
Ai, who had been assigned as Harriet’s chief engineer on the ship, agreed, “That’s a great idea. I brought some tools with me, so we can get started as soon as we get to another forest. We can weave the cables together to build walkways between the pods. We could even cluster the pods together and build a common area between them.”
“I can program all of the pods to move together in formation,” Sebastian added. “So we can basically build a ship for ourselves to move around on.”
“But how do we get back into space?” interjected Tom Wall, one of the colonists who had volunteered to be a gunner.
“We have to find someone that brought a ship seed,” stated Harriet. “Then we have to find an island big enough to implant it in. There’s no quick fix here. We have to use our pods and the vines to build a floating ship for ourselves to live on. We need to find food and gather water to drink and to power our pods. Then we have to figure out where all the other fighter crews ended up and try to get ourselves there. If even one of them had a seed, then we can make a ship, to into space, and make more ships for everyone else. This is going to take time.” The others agreed.