The Stars That Beckon

by Kevin J Simington

  “Of course you do, bro. You’d be a fool not to.”

  “But how is that possible?” Zac asked. “I mean, I only lost my wife a couple of months ago. What sort of shallow creature does that make me?”

  “Did you love your wife?”

  “I thought I did. I was comfortable with her. We had fun together. She was vivacious and lively and ...”

  “So are a lot of people, Zac. But that’s not the issue. Did you love her?”

  Zac thought for a moment. “I think I did. But we kind of just drifted into marriage. We seemed right for each other, our career paths matched, and it just seemed the natural thing to do. My love for her was an easy, comfortable kind of thing. Does that make sense?”

  “Do you think she loved you?”

  “I’m not sure now,” Zac said. He watched Jaz and Mel joking and laughing together as they built their sandcastle higher, by the water’s edge. “I’d like to think she truly cared for me, and that it wasn’t all just pretence.”

  “And how does what you had with her compare to your feelings for Jaz now?”

  “Like comparing lemonade to champagne.”

  “And Jaz is the champagne?”

  “Vintage Dom Perignon. She sends me into orbit, man.”

  “So what’s your problem, bro?”

  “I’m only recently widowed ...”

  “Three thousand years ago!”

  “But in my timeline, it’s only a couple of months!”

  “And you’re feeling some kind of loyalty to a woman who may or may not have loved you, who was having a torrid affair with her boss, was a secret agent for the Caliphate, and who murdered hundreds of people and nearly killed us all? Help me out here, bro. Am I missing something?”

  Zac said nothing but just looked down at the sand at his feet, struggling with some kind of inner turmoil.

  “Listen, brother,” said Keo. “The Earth is gone. Everyone we knew is gone. They’ve been gone for 3,000 years. This is a new world and a new beginning for all of us. If we’re going to survive and thrive here, we have to move forward and leave the past where it belongs.”

  “I know all that, Keo. It’s just that I feel ...”

  “That’s your problem.”

  “What?”

  “You’re focussed on your own feelings. But what about hers?” he said, nodding towards Jaz, who was now helping Melody collect shells to decorate their sandcastle. “Jaz is obviously completely smitten with you, the silly girl—the Lord only knows why! But you can’t keep stringing her along while you work through your misplaced feelings of loyalty to a dead, murdering adulteress. No offence.” Keo looked directly at Zac and said, “I’m serious, my friend. For Jaz’s sake, you either need to marry her or let her go. I happen to know there is a long line of blokes just waiting for the ‘not in a relationship’ sign to go up.”

  The two sat together in silence for a moment before Keo spoke up again. “As a history professor, you might be familiar with this quote: “Accept the things to which fate binds you, and love the people with whom fate brings you together …””

  “… “but do so with all your heart,”” Zac finished. “Yes. Marcus Aurelius, the Roman emperor, from his philosophical work, Meditations.”

  “170 AD,” said Keo.

  “Actually, that’s when he started writing it,” corrected Zac. “It wasn’t completed until 180 AD, after the conclusion of his military campaigns against the Germanic tribes.”

  “You know,” said Keo, “for a smart guy, you can be pretty thick sometimes.”

  Zac nodded his head. He looked down to the shoreline and gazed at the two people he now cared for more than anyone else.

  Keo asked, “Have you heard of the songwriter from the 1960s and ’70s, called Stephen Stills?”

  “Yes, and I know where you’re going with this.”

  “His best-known song was based on Marcus Aurelius’ philosophy…”

  “I love that song, even though it’s ancient now,” said Zac.

  “In that case you’ll be familiar with the words, “There’s a girl right next to you, and she’s just waiting for something you do … And if you can’t be with the one you love …””

  “… love the one you’re with,” Zac and Keo finished in unison.

  Zac nodded silently and looked again towards Jaz, who at that precise moment looked back at him and waved. A gust of warm wind caught her hair and blew it across her eyes, and she tossed her head back, laughing. His heart suddenly swelled, and his eyes brimmed as he continued to watch Jaz and Mel playing together and splashing each other in the shallows. He turned to Keo with a spark in his eyes.

  “I’m going to marry Jaz!”

  “Of course you are! If you weren’t planning to, I was going to take you aside and knock some sense into that thick skull of yours.”

  “Will you conduct the ceremony for us, Keo?”

  “Of course, bro. It would be an honour. When will you ask her?”

  “Tonight. She’s been hinting.”

  Keo shook his head. “A girl like that could have any man she wants, and the foolish girl has chosen you! Sometimes women are just plain puzzling.”

  Later that night, after Melody was asleep, Zac and Jaz went for a walk to the beach. Both moons were in the sky and full, Big Boy directly overhead and Little Boy just rising over the ocean. They sat on the sand dunes watching the phosphorescence of the waves and breathing in the warm, tropical evening air.

  “This place is amazing,” said Jaz.

  Zac pulled her close and kissed her. It was only meant to be a tender kiss, but it quickly developed into much more. They were both momentarily swept away on a wave of passion, and Jaz moaned softly as she felt her whole body responding to his with an urgency that was increasingly difficult to control. They broke apart and Zac gazed into her eyes, pushing a strand of her hair to the side that had fallen across her eyes.

  “I love you, Jaz. In fact, I love you more than I have ever loved anyone.”

  “I love you too, Zac.”

  “You are my life now,” he continued, “and I want to spend it with you. All of it. Will you marry me?”

  “Yes,” she said, as her eyes brimmed with tears that quickly overflowed and ran down her cheeks.

  They kissed again, and this time it was tender and soft, as Zac stroked her cheek and wiped the tears from her face. They broke apart again, and Zac said, “I will always look after you Jaz. You and Mel. We are going to be a family now.” He paused for a moment. “When will we make it official? I mean, it’s different here, isn’t it? No receptions to plan or wedding dresses to make. When should we get married?”

  “As soon as possible,” she said with a mischievous smile, “otherwise I’m in grave danger of contradicting my ‘old-fashioned-girl’ status.”

  “How about two nights’ time?”

  “That long?” she said. “OK, I suppose I can wait. But not a day longer!”

  46

  Nova Day 6

  The next morning, the hoomie birds started their curious chorus as the light of dawn painted a pink and apricot hue across the eastern sky. The colonists emerged into a world still glistening from the seemingly-standard overnight tropical downpour. As the camp stirred, the word spread that there would be a wedding ceremony in two nights’ time. Keo sent the word around, inviting anyone else who wanted to be officially wed to come and see him, and throughout that day and the next, there was a steady trickle of couples who indicated that they were ready to commit to each other. Many of the couples requested that their identity remain a secret until the ceremony, so that their wedding would be a surprise. This added to the excitement and mystery of the impending celebration, as people tried to guess who would be getting married.

  As well as wedding preparations, the next two days were a whirlwind of activity from dawn to dusk, as the colonists set about making the new world their home. The settlement had retained eight of Genesis’ ten shuttles, due to Wisecroft not having a qualified pil
ot among his colonists. An agreement had been made that the Seahaven colony would retain them, provided they were available to be flown to Settlement City any time there was a significant need for them. Two of the shuttles were parked on the concourse, next to the domes in the centre of the park, and provided power and recharging facilities for equipment with batteries. They were also the comm centre for contact with Settlement City and with members of their own colony who were using portable comms. The other six shuttles were parked at the airfield on the northern edge of town.

  This morning was crunch time for Settlement City. The last of their colonists had been transported to the surface late the previous afternoon, along with enough zip-huts for their temporary accommodation. Genesis was due to break orbit and attempt to land at 0800 hours. As the appointed time approached, the Seahaven colonists stopped their chores and gathered outside, looking up into the deep blue sky. They should be able to see the fireball of Genesis’ violent descent through the upper atmosphere, as it passed overhead from west to east, travelling at 30,000 kilometres per hour. As the allotted time came and went, there was initially no sign of Genesis. People stared up into the sky, talking quietly in small groups, wondering what would happen if Genesis burnt up or crashed.

  Suddenly, a cry from one of the onlookers drew everyone’s attention to a fireball low in the western sky, just above the mountains. It tore across the sky in a flaming arc and disappeared over the eastern horizon in just seconds. Only after it disappeared did its sound reach those on the ground, an impressive roar chasing the already vanished spacecraft across the sky. After the spectacular show was concluded, all the Seahaven colonists could do was gather around the comm shuttle and await word from Settlement City. At least 20 minutes dragged by. The outcome of this attempted landing would have a huge impact on both settlements. If the Genesis landing failed and the ship was destroyed, there would be no medical facility, no backup accommodation, no backup food supply and no way off the planet if they ever needed to leave. Everything hung in the balance as both settlements waited for the outcome.

  In the end, the landing went perfectly. Under Genni’s expert guidance, Genesis achieved a feather-light touchdown, descending vertically on its fiery tail and pivoting onto its side at the last moment, so that it lay lengthwise in a field on the outskirts of the inland town of Southland. News of the success was relayed to Seahaven by Michael Gates, Wisecroft’s comm officer, and the Seahaven colonists cheered spontaneously at the news.

  Once the morning’s drama was over, the real work of the day began. Of prime importance was the need to bring the drop boxes safely down from orbit. Without the aid of satellites, plotting the projected trajectories was a challenge, involving some fairly complex calculations. Kit had worked at the calculations for over an hour in the cockpit of the shuttle, from first light, using the computer interface to determine the exact time to initiate the de-orbit burns for the drop boxes. As she finished the final check of her figures, Zac plonked himself into the seat beside her, humming a happy tune.

  “OK. What now, O captain my captain?” he said.

  “My, my, aren’t we in a happy mood this morning. Anyone would think you were getting married to the prettiest girl on Nova tomorrow night.”

  “Yep, that’d be me all right!” said Zac, cheerfully.

  Kit activated her uplink to the drop boxes. “OK, here we go.” She punched a button and then leant back in her chair. “I’ve uploaded the burn data. If I got the physics right, the boxes should come down a little south-west of us.”

  “And if you didn’t?”

  “They could land anywhere.”

  There was an anxious wait of about 40 minutes, and towards the end, a small crowd of people was scanning the sky, searching for the massive chutes. Kit came bursting out of the shuttle, saying, “The shuttle’s scanners show three objects high to the south!”

  All eyes turned in that direction. “There!” shouted someone, pointing. Three tiny dots, high in the sky, gradually resolved into box shapes, each hanging beneath three massive chutes.

  “They’re further south than I had hoped,” said Kit, but she was obviously relieved that they were at least in visible range. “We’ll have to take a shuttle.”

  Kit took charge of the retrieval operation. Martinez would drive the caterpillar back, with Boyd to keep her company. Several of Regina’s rapidly developing agricultural team had experience with tractors, and so two of them, Wally and Will, brothers who had been farmers in New Zealand, would drive the tractors back. The retrieval team boarded the shuttle, along with Anton Sturbeck, a security team member with a reputation as a sharpshooter. When everyone was on board, Zac lifted off under Kit’s watchful eye.

  “We’re getting a strong signal from the location beacons,” said Kit. “It looks like they’re about five clicks south-south-west.” The shuttle flew out of the park, over the surrounding streets, and then they were flying low over fields and farmland to the south.

  After only a minute, Kit said, “Getting stronger, nearly there. Slightly more to the west.”

  Zac banked the shuttle and almost immediately said, “I see one!” The first of the huge metal boxes, with chutes collapsed beside it, was sitting in a cleared field that had obviously been used to grow some kind of crop. Zac landed the shuttle, and Kit’s silence was the highest praise she had ever bestowed upon him. She almost seemed disappointed that there was nothing to criticise. The team all disembarked and walked up to the large metal container.

  Zac asked, “How do we open it?”

  “Like this,” said Kit, activating a remote control in her hand. There was a hiss and a pop, and then the front side of the container came smoothly down on large hydraulic pistons, coming to rest on the ground and forming a gentle ramp. The tractor inside had a front bucket, a completely enclosed cabin and a large combo slasher/plough at the rear. Wally, one of the two tractor drivers, climbed aboard, started it up, and drove it straight down the ramp.

  Wally was told to wait in the cab of his tractor while the team retrieved the other vehicles, so that they could drive back in convoy.

  The second tractor retrieval proved slightly more difficult. They located it half a kilometre to the south-west of the first tractor, in a low-lying field that was flooded to knee height. Will was able to drive the tractor out of the flooded container, but it quickly became bogged down in the muddy, water-logged field. They called Wally, who brought the first tractor to the scene. By positioning the first tractor on dry ground at the edge of the field and joining its rear tow cable to the front tow cable of the bogged tractor, they were eventually able to extricate it from the field. While Wally was unshackling his tractor afterwards, Will made his way back to the edge of the flooded field and, after bending down, returned with something in his hand.

  “Every cloud has a silver lining,” he said, holding his hand out to Wally.

  “Rice!” Wally enthused. “Well, I’ll be!”

  For a few moments the two farmers discussed the length of the grains and gave their opinions regarding the particular variant this crop might be.

  “Well, whatever type it is, there’s plenty of it,” said Zac, looking around. The field in question was square in shape, about 400 metres each side.

  Kit said, “No doubt Regina will want to come and investigate this later. But right now, we need to find the caterpillar. I’m picking up a weak signal almost due west of here. We’ll leave both tractors here for the moment while we search for it in the shuttle.”

  They lifted off and flew westwards, watching the tracking signal grow progressively stronger. After they had flown over several overgrown agricultural fields, the terrain turned to dense bushland and the ground began to rise up into the foothills of the mountains.

  “There! I can see the chute!” said Zac, pointing to the left.

  The white chute material was caught in the canopy of a thick group of trees halfway down a steep hillside. Kit banked the shuttle and they circled the chute, peering down
at the terrain below.

  “It looks like the box has crashed through the trees and is on its side on the ground in the middle of those trees,” said Zac.

  “Yeh,” replied Kit, “and we’re gonna have a hell of a time getting it out of there. There’s half a click of dense bushland between the agricultural fields and the base of that hill. And if those trees are as thick on the ground as they appear to be from the air, we won’t be able to retrieve the vehicle without doing some serious tree-felling and clearing.”

  The top of the hill was a grassy knoll, devoid of trees and bushes, so Kit took control of the shuttle and set it down there. They walked down the grassy slope and stopped at the edge of the tree line, where the slope became much steeper. They could see the caterpillar’s drop box halfway down the steep, thickly treed slope.

  “Well, we won’t be getting that out today,” said Zac.

  “No,” agreed Kit. “This is gonna take days of hard work. We’ll need to clear a track through the bushland between the fields and the hill, and a bunch of trees will need to be felled.”

  “At least Grizzle is going to get plenty of timber. That should stop him whingeing for a while.”

  The shuttle arrived back at the settlement 10 minutes later, and the two tractors rolled in 30 minutes after that. The brothers, Wally and Will, drove the tractors to the agricultural centre that Regina was establishing beyond the western edge of town, alongside the nearest field. A large tech-hut had been erected there, 50 metres by 80 metres, made with the same bio conductive, photoelectric material as the zip-huts, with sides that could be rolled up to allow tractors and other equipment to be stored under cover while they recharged.

  Regina had a large team of enthusiastic workers, some with farming experience, but most were complete novices who were simply willing to learn and make a contribution. They were sorting boxes of seeds and fertilisers, and unpacking tools. The four quad bikes were being used to survey the surrounding fields, to gather soil samples and determine what was already growing there.