Station Fosaan

by Dee Garretson

  Without a word, Decker plunged in, swimming so fast he caught up and passed Lainie. I went in too. The ocean of Fosaan was so much saltier than Earth, the crystals coated my skin instantly. I concentrated on keeping my mouth closed, because taking a drink would only make me much thirstier later.

  By the time I reached the side of the living quarters, Lainie and Decker had already pulled themselves up on the framework supports underneath the window in Piper’s room. They balanced there letting the water drip off them. “I’ll go in first,” I said. “Mags isn’t going to be happy to see Decker.”

  “Decker, it’s pathetic a parrot doesn’t like you. What did you do to her?” Lainie asked.

  “I have no idea. Besides, I don’t think a bird can actually like or dislike people.” Decker snapped. “Can we just get this over with? Quinn, if you’re going first, just do it.”

  Mags looked up from her perch as I came into the main room, “Hallelujah!” she called, then went back to preening. When Decker came in, she raised her wings up and I thought she was going to squawk at him, but instead she settled back down without saying anything.

  “The comm unit is back up!” Lainie sat down in front of it and spoke a command. Nothing happened. She ran her fingers over the slip. Still nothing. She tried several different things but the slip stayed clear. “Someone has changed the recognition security,” she told us. “They’ve disabled it from the station. I can’t get in.”

  “Intruder Alert! Intruder Alert!” Mags cried.

  “It’s only Decker,” I said. “Are you just noticing him now?”

  That didn’t calm the bird down. “Intruder Alert! Intruder Alert!”

  “Can’t you shut that parrot up?” Decker said. “They can probably hear us all the way from shore.”

  “She’ll stop in a minute. It’s nothing, Mags.” I turned back to the slip.

  “Wait,” Lainie held up her hand. “I think I hear something.

  I felt a faint vibration of the floor. Decker started to speak but I whispered, “Be quiet.”

  The sound of footsteps came from the walkway and then came the sound of Ansun’s voice. “As soon as they are done at the depot, bring a group out here.”

  “Let’s go,” Lainie whispered, “In case they come in here too.”

  “Strip the units of everything useful.” Ansun’s voice sounded like it was right beside us. “Bring all the food. You probably won’t find any weapons. The Earthers are too foolish to think they need them.”

  “Not all the food.” It was the voice of the raider woman. “I think I’ll take up residence in one of these. I feel like being offship for a few days, and frankly, these accommodations are a bit more pleasant than yours, Ansun.”

  “I’m getting us some food before they take it,” Decker whispered. He grabbed a storage bin and dumped the contents on the floor. “Lainie, help me.” Decker ran into the kitchen, Lainie following.

  I tried to decide what to take. My work area was a jumble of projects, so I just swept them all into the bin. If we were going to have to stay outside, we’d need supplies, but we didn’t have anything like real Earth-style camping equipment. No one dared camp on Fosaan. I did have the small expedition pack I’d put together for exploring, but it wasn’t all that impressive. I ran into my room, grabbed the pack and a couple of light coverlets. I also took the impak out of the drawer. It wasn’t much of a weapon, only useful for stunning things temporarily, but it was better than nothing.

  When I went back into the living room, Decker and Lainie were already there, their bins full of packs of food. “It sounds like they are only two places away,” Decker said. “We need to get out now.”

  As the two darted back into Piper’s room, I saw Mags still sitting on her perch. “Mags, come on,” I whispered, though I knew the bird wouldn’t know what I meant. I couldn’t leave her, and the way Mira talked about food, I didn’t want the Fosaanians deciding the bird might be edible. Mags didn’t fly much. She couldn’t, because her wings had been partly clipped by her previous owner. Occasionally, she’d venture to the peaks of the roofs, but she’d come right back if she saw any olons flying around. She couldn’t find food for herself and I didn’t know when we would be able to come back.

  “Hurry up!” Decker said, coming back into the room.

  I hesitated, and then went to get Mags from her perch. Ansun’s voice was very close now. Waving at Decker to go, I took Mags into Piper’s room. Decker swung out the window and I followed with Mags, putting her on the ledge. Lainie were already in the water.

  “Quinn, hurry up!” Lainie said.

  “Hungry, Mags?” I whispered, ripping open a package of food. I took a bit in my hand and then climbed out the window, lowering myself in the water, so the supply bin was on my head. “Here’s some food.’’ I nearly went under, realizing it was too difficult to try to wave the bit of food with one hand, balance the bin with the other and tread water all at the same time.

  The bird just stood there, so I climbed back up on the supports and set the bin down. “I’m sorry I have to do this, Mags.”

  Chapter 9

  It all revolves around the sulfi. Who would ever guess something that meant so little to us, now is to be the means to the return of the glory of Fosaan. I must admit Ansun was very clever to understand that even though we don’t value it, others should pay dearly. He was very clever to conceal how it can be collected.—Erimik, historian of the Family

  I picked Mags up and flung her up in the air. Luckily, she didn’t squawk, too busy trying to fly. She circled around and then disappeared over the roof line. I knew she had probably just gone to perch on another roof, but I felt better she was at least out of easy reach of anyone.

  When I got back in the water, Lainie and Decker were arguing. “It’s too chancy to swim back to the beach. One of them might look out a window.” Lainie whispered. “I think we should stay here until they leave.”

  Decker swirled his hands around in the water like he was trying to part it so he could see underneath. “We can’t stay in the water. We have no idea what’s lurking around down there. I’d rather take a chance and swim for the beach.”

  “I have to say I’m with Decker,” I said. I knew I’d never forget those gnashing teeth.

  Lainie looked back and forth between us and then gave in. “Okay, but we’ll have to be really quiet. Look, the bins float so if we push them in front of us and kick softly, we shouldn’t make that much noise.”

  The idea was a good one, but once we started swimming, I felt like every kick and splash was loud enough to be heard all the way to the depot. It was worse when we reached the beach. Crossing the open ground to the edge of the jungle, all my muscles tensed up, just waiting for someone to spot us.

  Once back inside the ruin, Decker began taking things out of his bin and lining them up in a row on the floor. “Quinn, what did you get?”

  I took out the coverlets on top. They were only a little damp. I emptied out the rest of the bin, spreading out the bits of various projects. I hadn’t realized in my sweep, I’d brought along the scene setter. It was so hot I was tempted to set it to snow to give the illusion of coolness.

  “That’s all?” The disgust in Decker’s voice made me realize I should have thought a little more carefully about what might be useful.

  “I did bring the impak.” I took it out and laid it down.

  “It’s a small one,” Decker said.

  “I told you so. It’s not like we had much that would do us any good,” I said, though I was irritated at myself for not getting more. Opening my expedition pack, I held up a small canister. “I did bring an ozone generator to purify water.”

  “That’s good, because I’m really thirsty,” Lainie said. “Did you bring demineralization drops too? Purified ocean water won’t do us any good unless we can get the salt and other stuff out.”

  “Uh, no. I was thinking of streams inland.” Or at least I had when I put togeth
er the pack.

  “That means going through the jungle to look for them. I’d rather go back to the living quarters to get some drops. What’s that?” Decker pointed at the tip of my capture device sticking out of the top of the pack.

  I pulled it out and opened it up, snapping the pieces into place. “It’s something I made. I adapted an old-fashioned sport tribow so that I could use it to capture some of the bugs long enough to study them.” I knew Decker would think it was stupid, but I didn’t want to explain my whole strategy about getting into the reconnaissance corps training, and I had worked a long time on the device. “It shoots out modified quarrels that have a sensor on the end. I took off the sharp points. When one gets close enough to a bug, it releases a capture net.” I pulled out a quarrel and put my hand in front of the tip. Immediately a small net shot out and encircled my hand.

  “That’s terrific,” Lainie said. “I didn’t know you were working on that. Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “I just finished it yesterday, and I haven’t had a chance to really try it out. I’m not sure how well it works.” I hadn’t thought she’d be interested.

  “Can I see it?” Decker asked. I handed it over and Decker took aim at the back wall. “What an anachronism. Give me a real weapon any day over this antique. Can I try it sometime?”

  “Sure,” I said.

  Decker swung the tribow around and aimed it at a giant leaf above us. “Are you any good at shooting quarrels?”

  I shrugged. “I’ve practiced some.” My father had shown me how to use a whole variety of sport weapons back on Earth. Even though a military career had been disastrous for him, he’d never given up his interest in weapons and target practice of all kinds.

  “It’s not going to do us much good,” Decker said as he put it back down beside me. “We don’t need to capture Fosaanian bugs, and without real quarrel tips, we couldn’t even use it to defend ourselves. Where did you get this? And did it come with tips?”

  I knew I’d get Gregor into trouble if Decker found out I had convinced the man to add the tribow to a maintenance supply request list, so I just said, “My father got it for me. I still have the basic tips.”

  Decker scowled. “I should have guessed it was your dad. I wish I knew how to get into my father’s weapons locker. We’d have all we need.”

  “What kind of security system does it have?” Lainie asked. “Maybe I could get in.”

  “No, it’s a biometric lock coded to both his DNA and a nonstress voice recognition with a code,” Decker replied. “He’s very obsessive about safety. Nobody but him can get in, and he’s even got it set so no one could force him to open it. If they tried, his voice would indicate stress and it would stay locked. Without some sort of incredible heavy duty torch, we couldn’t even cut through it.”

  “Oh, so that’s out. I have no idea how to carve that lock,” Lainie said.

  Decker smiled. “Good, because your father helped mine set it up. Your father said he always tries to think of how you would attempt to carve into something. If he can outwit you, he knows something is secure.”

  “Ha! Someday I’ll outthink him.” Lainie grinned for a moment and then her face fell. “I wonder if he’s okay.”

  “I’m sure he is,” I said, though I wasn’t sure. “Let’s just wait until dark, and then go back to see if you can use the comm unit.”

  “I’m not crazy about swimming after dark, but if that’s our only choice, I guess we’ll have to do it.” Decker said. “What a miserable place.” He sat down on the other side of the room and began playing his carine softly, his eyes closed like he wanted to pretend he was somewhere else.

  “What should we do until then?” Lainie yawned. “Forget I asked that. I’m going to take a nap. I didn’t get enough sleep last night with everyone making noise. Quinn, your sister hums in her sleep. It would be cute if it weren’t so annoying.”

  “I know,” I picked up the tribow and polished the handle with the edge of my shirt. The silver-gray of it had a bit of a shine, and I thought it looked better without any smudges on it. “I’ve learned to ignore it.”

  “None of this looks very comfortable.” Lainie circled around the room. “It’s creepier in here than I remembered. I don’t suppose you happened to bring along an air bed.” I shook my head. “Can I use one of the coverlets as a pillow?” she asked. When I nodded, she took one and bunched it up, then lay down.

  Decker got up. “I can’t sit around here. I’m going out to the beach to see if I can tell what’s happening at the station.” He was barely out of sight before he came right back. “Quinn, your bird is out on the beach, making too much noise.”

  I bolted up. I couldn’t believe Mags had been brave enough to fly away from the living quarters.

  When I got down to the beach I saw the bird on a rock, hopping back and forth, so agitated she kept losing her balance and then flapping her wings to right herself.

  “Dogs! Dogs! Dogs! Man the weapons!” She flapped her wings and flew up into a tall plant, looking down on me suspiciously.

  “It’s me, Mags,” I said, trying to make my voice sound as normal as possible. “Calm down. No dogs here. See. It’s all clear.”

  The bird peered around as if checking for dogs and then looked down at me. “The bird is hungry,” she announced.

  “I know, Mags. Come on down.” I held out my arm. Mags gave one last weak ‘man the weapons’ and then dove down, landing on me.

  She brushed my face with her beak. “Beautiful person. Mag’s person,” and gave an almost human sigh of relief.

  “Thank you, Mags,” I said. When I carried her into the ruin, Lainie stirred and opened her eyes.

  “Daytime,” Mags told her. “Wake up! Wake up!”

  “I know Mags, but I’m sleepy.” Lainie yawned for emphasis.

  Mags heard the word “sleepy” and started to warble an old lullaby my mother had taught her. “Go to sleep, little person,” she sang the last line and then added, “The bird is hungry.”

  “Here.” I pulled out some of the fruit bits from the bin Lainie had brought and offered one to Mags.

  “Poor bird,” Lainie said. “Forced to come to a strange place with all sorts of unknowns. Why did you even bring her to Fosaan?”

  I was stung by the question. “I thought she’d miss us, and she was the only one of our pets we were allowed to bring.” I didn’t want to think of the rest of the bunch that had been left with my grandmother, my dog Marco and Piper’s cat, along with assorted fish. My grandmother had promised to care for all of them, and to keep Marco busy by having him go to work with her.

  I realized I even missed Piper’s cat who meowed way too much early in the morning. “I couldn’t leave Mags. Marco likes my grandmother, and the cat and the fish are fine as long as someone takes care of them, but Mags thinks I belong to her.”

  “I guess she would miss you.” Lainie yawned this time for real. After that, she seemed to fall asleep right away, judging by how her breathing slowed down and her mouth fell open. I envied Lainie’s ability to sleep in all sorts of circumstances. I sat there running through events in my mind, not able to figure out how everything that happened fit together. If I could see Mira again, I knew I could get her to explain some of it. I found myself thinking of the way she had looked when I’d first seen her.

  So engrossed in remembering her, it took me a while to realize it was raining. When I did, I found myself glad for it. The almost daily late afternoon shower came and went just long enough to cool things off for a little while. The rain pattered on the foliage above me, some of the droplets dripping down into the ruin, making little rivers as the water ran toward the back wall. I hadn’t noticed the floor sloped down to the inner room or circle or whatever it was. I wanted to know why Mira had reacted so strongly to the markings on the wall. When things were back to normal, I’d find a way to learn more about the place.

  Thinking I should try to sleep as well, I closed
my eyes, but my back hurt where I had hit the ground from the shock. I still had too many images crowding my head. As long as I was doing something, I could focus on one thing, but as soon as I stopped, floods of memories overtook me. I wished Doctor Becca was around to ask how long it would last.

  Restless, I gave up on sleep. I turned on my datapatch and called up the information on Fosaan. There wasn’t much useful information on it, a few maps of places that didn’t exist anymore, descriptions of exports that no longer occurred, and old population estimates. I had never viewed the one extensive file on the political history of Fosaan. It looked incredibly dull, but since it was all I had, I opened it up, ordering the sound off and setting it to read mode.

  The history was full of names and dates, nothing that seemed important. A few images of the emperor’s palace could be accessed, a not very impressive jumble of low buildings painted in vivid colors. There were pictures of the emperor and his family at various official functions. Most of them were low quality, degraded with time, the images from some antique method of recording. Only the white hair of everyone in them made it clear they were Fosaanians. Unlike modern Fosaanians, the ones in the pictures all wore very fancy colorful clothes with odd and elaborate hats. They looked nothing like the tough people Decker and I had seen in the village.

  One image caught my attention and I said, “Enlarge.” It depicted a group of people, including children, at some sort of outdoor party. There were food stations scattered around but all the people were watching a performance on an outdoor stage. On the edge of the image, a white cat stood on top of one of the food stations, unnoticed as it crouched eating something from a large platter.

  I turned on the search function and spoke softly. “Cat.” Nothing came up. I tried again. “Felal.”

  Words popped up. “Fear of upsetting the ecobalance resulted in strict laws on the imports of any non-native species of plants or animals. The felal, an unknown species of the felis genus, was one of the few non-indigenous mammals allowed on the planet. The animals were brought in as pets to the royal family by an unknown source. Strict breeding rules kept the population in check.”