by J. S. Fields
Nicholas’s hands flew to his ears. “Turn off the audio!” he mouthed as Atalant fumbled with the computer interface. Another long string of chirps and tweets followed before Atalant managed to bring the volume down.
Across the display, the Mmnnuggl language translated into Neek. Atalant read it quickly while rubbing her ears and then flicked the Lucidity’s microphone on. “Nugel, er, Mmnnuggl pod Ttynn, thank you for the, uh, welcome. This is Captain Atalant of the Keft tramp Scarlet Lucidity. It is a pleasure to meet you.”
There was no response for several long moments. Atalant turned from Nicholas to Emn and back again, both of whom shrugged their shoulders. Their identifier was correct, and their biology should not have presented a problem, but they wouldn’t be able to explain their purpose in the Neek System if the Mmnnuggls didn’t give them a chance.
Finally, a neutral voice in unaccented Common came through. “Captain Atalant, this is Captain Hhffvnoll. State your purpose in this system.”
She and Ekimet had only spoken briefly, but the words they had settled upon rushed forward. “I’m trying to return home, Captain. I was exiled from my homeworld, but I found out recently that there was a change in leadership. I’d like to see my family.” Atalant paused for a deep breath. “I understand from news reports that you have not taken issue with the Neek people directly. I’m requesting safe passage to my homeworld, nothing more.”
Hhffvnoll’s voice returned, a mixture of suspicion and irritation. “You have two other bipeds onboard the Lucidity. Identify them.”
“Nicholas St. John is a Journey youth from Earth and has a protected status in the Charted Systems. I can send you a copy of the mandate if you’d like, as well as a copy of his paperwork. My other passenger is a Keft. I’m sure your scans can confirm both.” At least she hoped they would. Scanning technology in space wasn’t nearly as accurate as a direct genome analyzer. Hopefully the Mmnnuggl scanners didn’t go down to the species level.
There was some odd scuffling on the other end of the connection, and then, a new voice, so familiar Atalant had to choke back a cry, came over the comm. “Scarlet Lucidity, you are cleared for landing on the planet Neek. Keep your noses clean and don’t expect to get off-world anytime soon. You do anything to cause trouble, and that includes even something as simple as throwing perf at someone’s head, and you’ll regret it. Deal with your fires, meet the people you need to meet, and do not attempt to contact anyone outside your planet. Copy?”
Nicholas was gripping her shoulder. Her connection to Emn was a taut cord of strained hope. No one spoke. Maybe no one had the right words.
Atalant stammered out, “Copy, Ttynn. We appreciate your understanding. Lucidity out,” before slamming the connection closed. Ships moved from the Lucidity’s path a moment later, and Atalant laid a course to the capital city of N’lln with shaking hands. Her stuk beaded on her fingertips and forehead, the latter of which she hastily wiped with the back of her hand.
“Was that…” Nicholas began before trailing off. “He… That’s a Nugel ship!”
“It was Yorden, wasn’t it?” Emn’s voice was as giddy as Atalant felt. And maybe the other Risalian Ardulan, too?
“It was,” Atalant confirmed in a voice far more confident than she felt as the Lucidity began to move towards Neek. Her mind asked the same question as Nicholas, but excuses kept popping up. He was a prisoner. He was hauling cargo with them. He’d stolen their ship. He was their new king. He…he wasn’t helping them destroy her planet, surely. Should she ask? Call them back? Maybe it was best to wait for Yorden to make contact again. If he was playing at something, she wanted to know the parameters of the game, first.
A spinning piece of metal caught Atalant’s attention. Around the planet twirled a deranged ring of debris, clumped together in places as if bonded. Atalant recognized pieces of Ardulan ships and a few bodies even at a distance. Not wanting to call attention to the debris, Atalant ran a quick scan. No Neek ships or people. It was a small comfort.
“He’s alive!” Nicholas pounded on the arms of his chair and hooted wildly, apparently having forgotten his original misgivings. “That craggily old man can’t even be blown up. Damn.”
Atalant felt a tug at her mind from her interface with the Lucidity. The rest of the scan data came in. In the fleet, there were two other Keft ships in attendance, along with several dozen other ships from Alliance worlds. The bulk of the force was Mmnnuggl and Risalian, and, inexplicably, there were maybe fifty other Charted Systems ships there as well. The biometals in nearly seventy of the ships were unrecognizable. Atalant’s stomach sank.
“Atalant?” Nicholas asked. He was about to punch her on the shoulder in jubilation, but paused. “What’s wrong?”
“Remember that fun encounter we had with the Mmnnuggls right before we landed on Ardulum?”
“Sure,” Nicholas responded hesitantly. “Ships without cellulose still haunt my dreams. Why?”
Atalant tapped the interface and brought the sensor data to the main screen. “Scans show fifteen Risalian skiffs and four cutters with low cellulose makeup. Fourteen Mmnnuggl pods of various sizes with low cellulose. And thirty-six oval ships of Mmnnuggl signature with no cellulose at all. None.”
“That’s why they never followed us to Ardulum,” Emn said in a low voice. There was tension in her tone, likely from the mental strain of blocking the andal. “They came here instead.”
“They couldn’t win in a direct attack. Not yet. They needed time—and leverage,” Atalant said as she flew the ship through thick smoke towards the capital. Crimson color began to streak through the gray as Heaven Guard settees met the Lucidity and guided the ship towards the landing pad. Atalant switched the comm to a broadband channel—the one used by all incoming traffic—hoping to hear some familiar voices.
“—stranded on the Nissil mountain range, at the Boundary Settlement. Fifteen of us still alive. Please send help!”
That feed cut off, and another started immediately after. “This is Head Ranger, of the Lowlands Division. The fire just jumped our southern barrier. We’ve already evacuated the town, but we’ve got looters back in. Going to try one last time to clear them out, otherwise we’re abandoning to N’lln.”
“My tochter—”
Atalant cut the feed and allowed herself a long breath to keep her emotions in check.
“What are we going to do, Atalant?” Nicholas asked as Atalant deployed the Lucidity’s landing gear. His voice was more tempered than she’d expected. She tried to absorb the strength he offered.
“We’re putting out the fires, first,” she responded, more confidently than she felt. “Emn can’t hold that mental wall forever. I’ll land, we’ll have a quick chat with the Guard, and then we’ll get the fires under control. If Yorden is here, there’s something more going on than just a blockade of my homeworld. He’ll find a way to contact us, I’m certain.”
The ship bumped twice on the landing pad and then was still. Heat radiated from the ship in waves, disturbing the thick smoke around them. As everything began to settle, through the viewscreen, Atalant could make out the settees forming a wide circle around the Lucidity. They were so little compared to her ship, barely larger than the Lucidity’s cockpit. Even so, they were still settees, a symbol of all she’d once lost. She was going to have to meet them—the Heaven Guard. She, a hypocrite in gold robes, was going to have to lead them.
“And once the fires are out, Atalant?” Emn gently prodded as the ramp from the Lucidity extended.
Atalant stood from her chair and entwined her fingers with Emn’s. “After the fires, we’re going to retrieve our missing eld. Then, we’re going to resolve Neek’s issues, both religious and political, once and for all. After that?” She smiled at Emn and then at Nicholas. “After that, we’re going home, wherever that might be.”
Chapter 15: N’lln, Neek
A settee is a teardrop of biometal with a stuk computer interface. It isn’t fancy, and it isn’t particularly comfort
able. It is fast and agile and, well…sometimes, even when you’ve moved beyond something, it’s important to remember those dreams you used to have.
—Excerpt from Atalant’s Awakening
JANUARY 26TH, 2061 CE
Twenty Heaven Guard pilots, uniformed in gold and green, stood before Atalant in front of rows of settees. They didn’t all have ships, of course—some were backup pilots—but they had all completed the training and been granted the robes. Most of them would be assigned a ship in their lifetime and would fly endless circles in Neek’s lower orbit, searching, serving, and discussing a planet they’d never known.
They were men, women, and gatois who had everything Atalant had ever wanted, and now, she stood in front of them in robes just as gold, but she wasn’t one of them. She wasn’t even Neek anymore, probably. She was…what?
She was their leader.
She was their Eld.
She was their god.
She was ridiculous.
The group shuffled and murmured, but they stayed at attention, their hands clasped behind their backs, their eyes directed straight ahead despite the angle of the sun. Atalant had thought they might meet in a hangar, or at the training facility, but not on the pad where she’d landed the Lucidity. She definitely hadn’t expected them to form ranks, waiting for orders she hadn’t had time to figure out.
“You should probably say something,” Nicholas whispered from behind her. Atalant shushed him by waving a hand near her hip.
Nicholas chortled. “We’ll just wait inside, your holiness. Let us know when it’s go time.”
Atalant cringed and turned to Nicholas and Emn, who were heading back up the boarding ramp. “Can you call them?”
“Who?” Emn asked.
“The other two Ardulans.”
Emn raised an eyebrow. “Eld Atalant, I don’t think either of us are the right person to speak to them.”
Atalant flushed slightly and her stuk thickened at the formal address after such a very informal evening with Emn. Then, her confidence quickly reasserted itself. “I’ll give zir a call after I talk to the Heaven Guard.”
“Come on, Emn.” Nicholas tugged on Emn’s hand. Emn gave a terse smile, nodded at Atalant, and then allowed Nicholas to lead her back into the magenta ship—leaving Atalant alone with the Heaven Guard.
Andal help her.
She took the two remaining steps down the ramp and onto the firm ground below. Atalant scanned the group but tried not to see their eyes, their faces. She knew too many of them from her training days. Too many had seen her forced public apologies, had witnessed the president haul her from her graduation ceremony. Some of them had probably helped comfort her family when her mother had died.
Atalant didn’t want to see those memories echoed in their eyes or the strange mix of disgust and wonder that was sure to be plastered across their faces. She—they—had a job to do. Reminiscing wasn’t for the Heaven Guard, and it certainly wasn’t for an eld.
“Hello.”
Even though Atalant said it in the Neek language, it sounded pathetic. Still, the Guard turned their eyes to her. The shuffling and murmuring stopped.
“Water, then. It, uh, hasn’t been working?”
A short woman with auburn hair and brown skin stepped forward and knelt on one knee. Atalant knew her immediately. The woman’s face was still etched deep into her memory from Atalant’s last visit, when the woman—her former roommate—had delivered the news of Atalant’s mother’s passing. That had been such…such a private moment, despite having not seen each other in a decade, that it felt wrong to have this woman kneel while Atalant pretended to be some high-and-mighty god.
“Tabit.” Atalant said the woman’s child-name in a clear, steady voice. She didn’t remember during which instance of late-night flying they’d talked about their childhoods, but the woman’s name came effortlessly to Atalant’s mind.
“My… My Eld.” Tabit looked up at Atalant in alarm, her shoulders shaking slightly.
“I never thanked you for telling me about my mother. Or for your friendship.”
Tabit’s eyes couldn’t get any larger, although she had managed to stop her shuddering. “Of course, my Eld. Eld…Eld Atalant.”
That settled Atalant’s nerves, finally. She felt her stuk production slow and return to normal viscosity, and it was difficult, now, to keep the smile from her face. It hadn’t been the Heaven Guard that had rejected her, and it seemed like she was still very much a part of them, even with her robes.
“Tell me about the fires?” Atalant asked, offering Tabit a hand. Tabit shook her head, but Atalant caught the quick smile and almost imperceptible wink. “My Eld. Water is having little effect. The fires are too hot, and there is too much built-up duff on the forest floor. We need a new method.”
“Trenches?” Atalant asked, deciding to ignore the kneeling and how it made her stomach both knot and do a strange sort of dance. She would have been less tense if Tabit had stood up, but she understood why she didn’t. Damn her status and the stupid, little things that kept her apart from everyone else.
“Time-consuming, although people are trying.”
Atalant turned her attention to the rows of gleaming settees. What they needed was a corridor—a buffer zone devoid of trees—as well as trenches and water. A three-pronged attack might get them somewhere, but the kind of flying she was thinking of wasn’t the kind the Heaven Guard practiced. It wasn’t the kind anyone practiced unless they flew a dilapidated tramp transport with often-broken landing thrusters that had to glide and skid to stop. It would also require a faster method of tree extraction—one that preferably didn’t kill the andal in the process.
Atalant nodded at Tabit and then moved forward, letting the swath of gold and green robes part for her as she pushed into the crowd, towards the settees. She ran her hand over the rounded nose of the first one she reached, her fingertips bumping over the low-cellulose biometal weave.
Emn, can you fly the Lucidity? Atalant asked.
Yes, but don’t you want to? came the confused reply. You’re not going to ground yourself during the firefighting, are you? I’d love for you to stay safe, Atalant, but that just…doesn’t seem like you.
Atalant grinned, pivoted on her heel, and crossed her arms over her chest. The Heaven Guard had reformed their ranks but had turned and were now facing her once again. Tabit had moved to the front. She caught a mix of curiosity and trepidation from them through her andal-enhanced telepathy, as well as a particular twinge of possessiveness from a woman she assumed was the assigned pilot of the ship she was fondling. Her settee—Atalant’s settee—would be amongst those clustered here, and that thought made her grin even broader.
Ground myself? No. Atalant sent images of the settees back to Emn. I’m going to get in my old ship and show the Guard a thing or two about what it means to be a real pilot.
EMN LIFTED THE mental barrier. Not all the way—just enough for Atalant to get her bearings in the blaze.
Burning BURNING! the andal shrieked into Atalant’s head as she plunged the settee into the forest. She stayed just above the canopy, feeling heat not from her own ship, but through her mind and the trees around her. Save us! Atalant, we burn! WE ARE NOT ADAPTED! YOU MUST STOP THE FIRE!
We’re coming, Atalant tried to soothe, but she doubted the andal could hear her over its own voices. It would have been overwhelming, should have been overwhelming. Hell, under normal circumstances, she would have melted half the ship by now, but Atalant was calmer behind the controls of a settee than she was just about anywhere else. She’d use that to her advantage. Six hundred hectares were still burning, and even though Ekimet had ordered trenches dug for containment in some areas, the fire had leapt over them. Fierce winds in the coastal forests did not help matters, but at least the fire was contained on the northern side where the ground turned rocky and the tree line scattered. Most of the plantations in the southern hemisphere were still burning, as well as about half of the old-growth fores
ts. The northern hemisphere was already burned to the ground, aside from small patches the Heaven Guard had managed to protect.
Firefighters and construction crews were still out, clearing land for trenches and burning underbrush fuel, but they were simply too slow. The settees were small and compact, and while they did not have the heaviest cellulose weave in the systems, they did have reinforcements in their shield layers thanks to Ekimet and Miketh, which made them much less flammable.
I’ve got the west side, Atalant sent to Emn as she neared the edge of the flames. How is it on your end?
Manageable, Emn returned, though her voice was distant. Showing them how to dig the trenches with the settees seems to be helping, and we’ve got maybe three quarters of the fire contained. The worst is on your end. Do you want me to send reinforcements?
No. I’ve got this. Keep them where they are. Atalant dove her ship into the eight-meter-wide channel cut through the forest. The crews had already been here and cleared the trees, but the fire was battling the tree line. One sizable gust of wind would send it over, forcing them to begin all over again.
How far to connect to the next channel? Atalant asked. Heat seared her skin as the settee approached the forest floor. Atalant had a moment of double vision, of bark peeling off her arm and her blood boiling in her veins, before she managed to push the image aside.
About eighty meters. Can you make it?
FIRE! the andal shrieked in response. Atalant rubbed at her temples with one hand and then slammed the rounded tip of the settee into the ground. Not deeply, but just enough to strain the engines. She routed all power into the rear thrusters and used her ship to plow the earth. Dirt and vegetation sprayed across the viewscreen, the fire lapping at the sides of the settee, but Atalant knew this section of forest well enough to fly without seeing, and the channel was well-laid. Slowly, the ship pressed forward. Ten meters. Twelve. Fourteen. The settee chiseled the land, mounding earth on either side and driving the flames back. With each meter, her skin seared a little more, until she was certain it would begin to blister and peel even though the inside of the settee was perfectly cool.