by Gun Brooke
While the shuttle steered toward its destination, Beaux kept looking out the viewport. Yes, it was green, and blue, and the poles were capped with ice. Perhaps Cimeria had once looked like this, before urban civilization covered eighty percent of its surface. There, only the rich could afford nature experiences. Perhaps someone would catch on to that fact and start arranging excursions to this planet, she mused. Or start colonizing it.
She doubted Ilienta Enterprises would ever give up on their stake on this planet. Too much money in it for them. Beaux shrugged and leaned back in her seat. She couldn’t blame them for seizing their opportunities. After all, that was what she’d been doing ever since she left the military and bought the Empress.
It was how the universe worked.
Chapter Two
The combination of the gentle swaying of the branches supporting the structure Moon had built during the last four years, and the sun’s warm rays filtering through the thin fabric in the window, made her smile. No matter that she had lived in the wilderness on the planet she had named Haven; this blissful tranquility managed to both elate and ground her. She rose each morning, grateful to be free.
Pulling her hair back into a long ponytail, she tied it with a thin vine. She rarely cared to look at her reflection, unless she went fishing in the lake and happened to glimpse herself, but she had to admit she was still amazed at having long hair. Being bald her entire life before now, she considered feeling the hair dance against her back yet another sign of her freedom.
After she donned her daypack, Moon pulled the hatch in the floor open and climbed down the rope ladder. She didn’t bother closing the hatch, as she didn’t store very much of her food in the tree house. If any of the tree-climbing animals took what little she had, they were welcome to it. Moon stored most of the food she’d gathered in the escape pod half tucked into a cave system half a kilometer away.
Taking the self-made fishing rods from where she had leaned them against the massive tree trunk, Moon began to walk down the hill toward the large lake in the valley below. She had done this so many times, she had created a path. What once had been a frightening experience was now familiar and instilled nothing but a feeling of security and being at one with this world. For the longest time, she had expected to detect signs of civilization, even if the scans performed by the pod while it was in automatic orbit suggested that none existed.
A rustling sound to her far right made her pull her sidearm. The scar on her leg had taught her to never leave the pod or the tree house unarmed. The large, furry mammal she later named a brummer had attacked when she had gotten to close to its cubs, after she had been on the planet for only two months. Digging its fangs into her left thigh, it had nearly killed her, first due to the blood loss and later from the infection. She didn’t hunt the animals on this planet, but she had fired on some in self-defense. Learning to fish had been important from a nutritional point of view, but to hunt the animals with a piece of technology not indigenous to this world…felt wrong. Moon had survived during her entire previous life on simple foodstuff provided for slaves. Meat had been available only for the ruling classes. As she couldn’t see anything that explained the sound, Moon holstered her weapon.
Down by the lake, Moon walked over to the sunny side of it and shed her clothes. She secured her weapon in a pouch around her neck, then threw herself into the water for her bath. As a slave, she had loathed having to adhere to routines, of doing the same things day after day, year after year. Secretly, she had dreamed of being spontaneous, of being her own boss and, most of all, free. Free to be a person who could choose what to do and when to do it. Ironically, she now craved a certain schedule. It felt good to always take a morning swim in the warmer seasons, at her favorite spot, and, like now, as she rinsed her ponytail out, to look for Dancer.
As if on cue, her only friend on the planet came strolling between the trees at the edge of the forest. Silver-gray, with black markings around his small, pointy ears, eyes, and on his chest, the beautiful animal approached. He stopped at the water’s edge and tilted his head as if he questioned her sanity for voluntarily getting wet.
“I know. You want me to provide you with some fish, don’t you, Dancer?” Moon splashed at him and giggled as he managed to look affronted and jumped a step back. She walked up and shivered as she let the sun dry her naked skin. Dancer came up to her and pushed his blunt nose into her palm.
“Yes, yes. I’ve missed you too. However, I did see you last night. Like always.”
Dancer sat down next to her, his head reaching to her hip. Moon caressed his silky ears, and he gave his usual guttural gurgle, which she had determined was a sound of pleasure. “All right. I’m going to get dressed, and we’ll walk over to the shade and see if we can catch some of those red, flat fish. Those are our favorites, aren’t they?”
Dancer seemed to agree as he trotted next to Moon over to the part of the lake where the trees lined the grassy edge. Moon spread a weathered blanket on the grass and then readied the four fishing poles she had fashioned herself after the one stored in the pod broke. After baiting the hooks with a type of berry she’d found that some fish favored, she made a whipping motion and let the hook and bobber fly as far out as possible. Leaning the poles against four large boulders she’d dragged to this spot for this purpose, she pulled Dancer close to her, and they sat there together, both watching the bobbers intently.
After only a few minutes, the bobber on the pole to the far right moved. Dancer gave a low snarl.
“I see, I see.” Expertly, Moon grabbed the pole and whipped it up and back. She felt the hook grab the fish firmly and began tugging the line toward her. Dancer was doing that special sidestepping next to her that had made her name him accordingly when he was a pup. Laughingly she told him, “Calm down. After two years of this, I haven’t forgotten that the first catch is yours.”
Dancer looked like he meant to say, “rightfully so,” or something to that effect, which made Moon laugh again. “Silly creature.”
Once they had caught ten fish all in all, Moon packed up the rods and began walking back around the lake. She intended to cook the fish when she got back to the tree house and treat them to one each. Then she would walk over to the pod to place the rest into the dry-freeze storage. Dancer trotted before her, and she smiled absentmindedly at his antics, since he clearly thought he needed to show her the way back each morning.
Moon followed the path and saw her tree in the distance. It had the largest trunk she had seen on any of her hikes. At least sixty meters tall, its crown spanned at least one hundred and twenty meters across. The sight always moved her, as did the fact that she had had the courage to make it her home. Every year she had added to the tree house, and though she didn’t actually need that much space, planning and building, and making sure she never did anything to hurt the tree, gave her great satisfaction.
When she reached the shade provided by the massive branches, Dancer growled. Dropping the poles, Moon pulled her weapon from the pouch around her neck and made sure it was set high enough to incapacitate a large mammal. If Dancer warned her like this, something was wrong. Gazing around her, pivoting slowly to not make any sounds, Moon scanned the immediate area. She had created a narrow shortcut to the pod in case danger came from the direction of her tree. It was steep, but she had practiced running along it so many times, she could basically fall all the way down it without injuring herself. If something came at her from the other direction, she knew how to pull herself up the rope ladder equally fast.
Dancer’s growl escalated now, but nothing appeared. Just like she had trained him to do, Dancer faced away from her, making sure nothing surprised either of them from behind. Slowly, they moved in a circle, once, twice, but no raging predator launched itself at them.
“What’s up, Dancer?” Moon whispered, her skin prickling. “What’s wrong, little man?”
Dancer got up on his hind legs next to her, sniffing the air. He raised his blunt nose into the
air, and then he emitted an odd, snorting sound.
That’s when Moon heard it. A low, humming resonance seemed to grow in intensity with each moment. Dancer looked straight up, but not at Moon. Instead he seemed to locate where the noise was coming from. Moon let her gaze follow the same trajectory, and at first, she thought the white lines on the sky were some odd clouds. However, they were too precise—and growing closer. Watching in fascinated horror, Moon saw the lines move to align themselves with the mountain ridge on the other side of the valley. Her mind raced as she tried to figure out what could create streaks in the sky like that, and some of the suggestions that came to mind made her shiver. Were those from escape pods like hers? She doubted it, even if she had no way of knowing what her arrival had looked like to the animals on Haven.
The moment Moon understood that whatever was approaching the mountains was slowing down, she knew they had to be some form of space vessels, as they were making their way down through the atmosphere. Using the library available in her escape pod, she had learned a lot. Someone was about to land on the planet where she had made her home, and she had no idea who they were, where they were from, or why they were here.
Dancer had lowered himself onto all four of his paws again and pressed himself against her hip. He wasn’t growling, but he sure wasn’t dancing either.
“I know, little man.” Moon scratched the top of his head. “Change of plans. We need to see where they set down and then make our way over there. All right?” Moon thrust her chin out. “And don’t worry. We’re not going to introduce ourselves, but we must try to find out why they’re here. Perhaps see if they’re from some other continent on Haven.” Moon doubted that. If spacefaring individuals had been on this planet, she would have seen traces of them at one point. No, these were from another planet, and that was one of the reasons she needed to stay invisible on her quest to find out the truth. If they were from the Territory, and they located her and found her to be an escaped slave, her life would be over.
In the distance, Moon saw what looked like two large shuttles set down on one of the less jagged mountain tops across the valley. What had reminded her of white smoke in the sky turned out to be green-tinted exhaust. Now that the shuttles had landed, the sound changed from humming to deafening as it traveled across the valley and bounced among the mountain walls. Dancer growled again, and Moon calmed him by kneeling next to him.
“It’s all right. We’ll figure this out. Perhaps this is temporary, an emergency landing to make repairs.” But if that was the case, why would two shuttles set down? As large as they seemed, shuttles couldn’t manage interplanetary travel. Another propulsion system and vast resources were required for that. She had lived aboard the escape pod for ten months and only survived because she had been one woman in a pod meant for a family unit of four plus one slave. Transport shuttles, if that was what they were, didn’t have the cutting-edge technology most passenger-vessel pods boasted. Designed to transport people or goods from orbit to planet and vice versa, they simply couldn’t be used for long hauls in space.
The sound eventually died out, and the green exhaust trails thinned and evaporated. The shuttles were too far away for Moon to see any details. She would have to fetch her ocular she’d taken from the pod and kept in the tree house. She always carried it on her hikes, but rarely on her home turf.
Pivoting, she rushed toward the rope ladder and scurried up. Dancer would be on guard below. Finding the ocular by the cot, she grabbed it and hurried across the floor and out one of the side hatches. She balanced along the thick branch that extended twenty meters toward the valley and afforded a great view of the mountains on the other side. Moon climbed into the small hammock she had fashioned from vines and hung like a net from the branch. She was twenty-five meters above ground, and from here, she could see better, as most other trees close by weren’t this tall. She stabilized the swinging hammock and then raised the ocular to her right eye. After adjusting the settings, she zoomed in as close as the instrument would allow.
The white shuttles had markings on the side. She couldn’t see all of them but made out the word Cim and the numbers 442. As she let the ocular travel along the long, sleek fuselage, an opening appeared on the one that had set down first. A set of steps appeared and reached the ground. Moon swallowed against the sudden dryness in her throat. People began exiting the shuttle, and she wished she could have zoomed in farther but couldn’t even see if they were men or women, civilians or military.
Lowering the ocular, she tugged at her still-damp ponytail. She had to make her way over there to see what was going on. Perhaps their visit was temporary, and she’d see them depart before she was even halfway across the valley. Moon growled as she climbed out of the hammock and hurried back into the tree house. She doubted it.
Pulling out her large backpack, Moon began to get ready. Some of the items she needed were in the pod, which meant a quick trip down the emergency path. She had no time to lose.
Chapter Three
Beaux had thought she’d enjoy some fresh air and then use one of the mini-scuttles stored on either side of the aft of the shuttles. Able to hold two people, they were mostly used in planetside emergencies, or when just a couple of people needed to return to the Empress for some reason. Now she stepped out on the top of the expanding stairs, inhaled, and…was floored by the sweet, fresh scent that filled her airways. Feeling ridiculous, but unable to resist, she breathed in the air again, this time slower to savor the experience.
“Not bad, is it, Captain?” asked the young male crewman responsible for making sure the stairs were secured before they could let the passengers off. “I thought someone sprayed me with some damn perfume or something.”
“This is better than any perfume.” Beaux nodded toward the crewman.
“I won’t like the recycled air when we return to the old lady.” Her crewman sighed. “Unless you think we can bottle this air and take it with us. I bet I could use it instead of money during the next beku tournament.”
Beaux chuckled. She was aware that the lower ranks, especially, referred to the Empress as “the old lady,” and she didn’t mind. “Always ready for a business opportunity, huh?”
“Aye, sir. That’s the truth.” The crewman hurried down the stairs to secure the struts below.
Beaux hoisted her backpack and made sure her weapon’s harness was strapped on correctly. She planned to look around and found it baffling how energized she felt at the prospect of taking a walk. Normally, she didn’t mind remaining on her ship while the crew loaded or unloaded cargo, but this…this was different. As she stepped away from the shuttle to avoid getting in the way of the passengers and the crews’ duties, Beaux pulled out the long-range communicator and pressed the sensor. It took a few moments for it to determine her location and connect. While she waited, she gazed at the stunning valley below them.
The sun created a golden glitter in several lakes. Perhaps she could go for a swim, if her scans determined it to be safe. The foliage seemed to consist of trees of different heights, some amazingly tall, and others more voluminous. Movements caught her eyes, and Beaux realized that quite large animals might be around. Another reason it was smart to carry firearms while exploring.
The communicator gave a muted buzz, and she pressed the sensor again. “Lestarion to Veyar.”
“Read you clearly, Captain.” Veyar sounded as if he were standing right next to her.
“Reporting in, Commander. As you have seen on Empress’s sensors, both shuttles set down successfully. This is a beautiful, pristine planet, and I intend to investigate.”
“Alone? But, sir—”
“Yes. And don’t worry. I won’t hike for weeks on end. Just a walk around the landing site. I’m armed, I have the communicator, and I’ll be fine. I’ll take one of the scuttles back later, and you can start to plan the shore-leave roster then.”
“Aye, sir.” Veyar sounded slightly pained, but he knew better than to object a second time. That w
as one reason Beaux really liked the man.
Beaux paged the shuttle pilot and informed her of her plans, then began making her way through some tall grass toward the edge of the forest.
“Captain Lestarion. Where are you going?” Kragh asked from behind.
Turning slowly, Beaux narrowed her eyes and scrutinized the man, who looked more ridiculous than he probably realized in his stylish clothes. Did he intend to sleep in a tent in his suit? Was he crazy? “To reconnoiter. You can direct any questions you may have to my crewmembers available for your convenience.”
“But my company pays top cimeros for you and your crew to accommodate us at all times.” Kragh’s voice was as silky as before, and Beaux wanted nothing but to fire her weapon right between his eyes.
“An obvious misunderstanding, Mr. Kragh. If you examine our contract, you’ll find exactly what duties the Empress’s crew signed on for. I assure you, I accommodate nobody ‘at all times.’ Good luck with your endeavors.” Not turning around again, despite Kragh even raising his voice, demanding that she come back, Beaux was soon well beyond the tree line.
Inside the forest, the sunlight filtered through the leaves above and created a mystical ambience. The ground beneath her feet was covered with old fallen leaves, golden-yellow moss, and boulders of all sizes. Not much shrubbery grew there, which made it easier to walk among the trees. No doubt most of the animals could hear her approach and kept their distance. She hoped that was why she couldn’t spot any. It would be bad news if the uninhabited state of this planet had made the animals not fear humans.
Beaux couldn’t remember when she had last experienced nature. On Cimeria Prime, national parks, which were not true nature, were only a facsimile of the forests, oceans, and lakes that had once existed on her homeworld. What was left of the mountains had been modeled into terraced areas to hold structures of all kinds, mainly commercial neighborhoods. Here, the land was untouched, which of course was a resource worth uncountable amounts of money for Ilienta Enterprises. The fact that their company had discovered the planet on long-range sensors made it legal for them to stake a claim to it, which made great business sense.