03
We decided to keep three watches - Pela style, with no set duration, just the pattern. We'd each sleep one watch and have one with all hands on deck. With the possible exception of poisonous snakes, I rather doubted there was anything very dangerous on our little tumble-weed of an island. Still, it seemed wise to have someone always awake until we could seal the gig tight. And well, it was Cin's suggestion. These days Wil Litang is nothing if not agreeable. And useful.
I don't actually remember making the decision to land on Redoubt Island, but having done so, I'd clearly made Naylea Cin my first priority. It was sobering to realize that not only was I comfortable with that decision, but I found that, turning a blind eye to certain aspects, being shipwrecked with Cin could be something of a lark. A desperate one, for sure, but a lark nevertheless. When looked on from the right angle. So with my head fixed, my belly full and my head full of ideas for a possible escape, things were looking rather promising, at the moment.
Cin opted to resume her nap - it had been a long day for her, and I was eager to survey the gig, so I took the first watch. I took the plasma cutter out to cut away the vines from around the gig so as to get a good look at the landing jets. Siss briefly turned up to watch, but was soon off chasing the small rodents my attack on the vines sent scurrying. Every so often I'd hear a high pitched squeak that ended rather abruptly. Better them than me. Between my cutting and her hunting, we scared up quite a noisy flock of small birds, flying lizards and large beetles, shrilly voicing their complaints - but no snakes, that I noticed, anyway. I was looking.
As I cut away the vines - but not all of them, I wanted to stay on this island - I found that both ends had been crumpled and almost torn off from its cartwheeling over the landscape. The central core of the boat, with the exception of the dent in the underside, remained intact. Humans have been building spaceships for some 80,000 years, and have pretty much perfected the art of it. The functional core of the gig, the control room, environmental machinery, and synth-galley were enclosed by heavy bulkheads in order to survive anything but the most catastrophic collision. The engine room bulkhead was thick and solid with only a few small holes for cables and a fuel line, and the meter and a half wide central section housing the ship's computer systems, environmental and sanitary machines, the synth-galley, and various supply lockers were set between two strong bulkheads, to prevent it from being crushed as well. Thus the key operational elements of the ship, less its engines, had survived more or less intact.
The crumpled sections of the bow and stern could be salvaged for patches to fill holes in the bow and then cut away. I'd have to make sure the upper access hatch worked in emergency/manual mode so we could seal the gig to make it airtight. The damage to the underside of the gig proved to be more extensive than I had initially hoped, but four or five of the landing jets looked undamaged - enough for my vague plans. These micro-reactor-powered plasma rockets are complete units, so that I could remove and remount them on the engine room bulkhead to drive the boat. They would work with water as well as pure hydrogen, and while they'd not drive the gig at any great speed, great speed wasn't needed for my plans. All I needed was the spaceship equivalent of a rowboat.
I was sitting on the edge of the engine compartment bulkhead with such vague daydreams masquerading as plans running through my head when I noticed it was growing darker. I snatched my darter and looked up, heart thumping.
It wasn't the shadow of a large dragon, as I feared, but the shadow of a large and very close island that was swinging into view as our little island slowly tumbled in the river of air. It was very close, indeed. Close enough to imagine crashing into it. "If this island could capture us..." I thought with a jolt of hope as I quickly clambered up to the top edge of the crater. I looked down on the tops of the fern trees slowly marching by with the usual darting lizards and birds weaving through them - they had to be only a half kilometer away. We were almost certainly close enough to the late Redoubt Island's position to have a good chance of contacting any boat Molaye might send in looking for me, if only our tumbleweed of an island could become entangled in those trees...
We must have been drifting over it for some time, since it soon filled the sky of our tiny island, horizon to horizon in all directions. Looking back, I couldn't imagine how we missed the jagged little mountain peaks astern. Looking ahead, there were hills and the towering fern trees that we might snag... Or not. It was hard to judge if we were closing in or just drifting over it like a cloud. The island was likely far too small to have enough gravity to pull us in, so it would be a matter of air currents and chance.
In any event, it was not out of reach. The locker next to the main hatch was undamaged so that we had emergency spacesuits with small jet packs that could carry us and some gear to this island. And since we couldn't be more than 200 kilometers from the late Redoubt Island's location, we'd have a good chance of being within the emergency radio's range of it, and certainly so if the rescue boat did any sort of search. But if Molaye actually followed my last order...
I was still considering all the downsides when Siss swam up next to me.
'Think it'll snag us?' I asked her.
She gave a low, rather negative hiss. She had that toothy, ever present, crocodile smile, and was, after all, an old shipmate, so I rather easily come to accept her as being, well, a shipmate. So we watched the island - so near - drift past in companionable silence for a while. We were approaching the hill line. 'If we get close enough, I'll hold on to your tail while you grab a tree...'
She gave me a one-eyed dismissive look, a low bark and languid wag of the tip of her tail, which I'd come to take as her laugh. She didn't think the idea was very funny.
I realized a decision had to be made and it wasn't mine to make. 'We'd better wake up Cin, she needs to know about this,' I said to Siss, and turning to climb down, discovered someone, or something, standing on the far side rim of the impact crater, silently watching us.
'What the Neb!' I exclaimed. Siss swirled around me, and seeing the tall, dark figure, hiss softly and froze.
At first glance, the figure looked like a very tall, thin and broad-feathered human. He stood - almost three meters tall, clothed entirely in scarlet feathers - stock still, his arms held behind him, watching. My second impression was that his head was more bird-like than human, with a protruding, beak-like mouth, with eyes set more to the side of his head than a human's. Long feather tufts on either side gave the impression of ears. He had two belts, one across his chest, the other around his waist, with the tip of a long bow sticking up over his shoulder, and no doubt, a quiver as well. He did not react to our discovery of him, but continued to watch us, like a slender red statue, with unblinking black eyes. I grabbed the handle of my darter, but didn't draw. However ominous he looked, he had not attacked when our backs were turned, and he could've been watching us for minutes, so I was guardedly optimistic that I was dealing with a non-belligerent being - the Unity Standard default assumption.
'Sorry, you startled me,' I said out loud in Cimmadarian with what I hoped was an apologetic smile. 'Didn't hear you arrive.'
He, or possibly, she - no way of telling - said nothing. He just continued to watch us with its large, rather reptilian eyes.
'My name is Wil Litang, my feathered friend here is Siss. I'm rather new to the Pela, so I don't know who or what you are, so please forgive me if I appear to be rude...' I rambled on.
No response.
His feathers were his own, so beyond the belts he was wearing no clothing, save for a collar about his neck with a large, black, and glittering gem mounted on it like a third eye. As soon as I focused in on it, it seemed to spring to life, grab me, and pulled me - or rather my mind - towards the creature. It almost seemed like I was being dragged from my body. My very thoughts were being sucked out of my head and were swirling like leaves in a whirlwind towards the three black eyes of the creature. I tried to force my eyes to close and draw my darter without su
ccess. And then, my head seemed to explode with pain...
The next thing I remember clearly was the scarlet feathered figure expanding before me, as he raised his extremely long arms - which, like so many Pela creatures were used as wings - and with a downward sweep, soared overhead. I clumsily drew my darter, but he was quickly lost from sight behind the island's short horizon. I stared at the empty sky, trying to make heads or tails of what just happened. Siss, as stiff and still as a board next to me, slowly came back to life with a long, low growl. She turned her head to me and looked at me with frightened eyes.
'What in the Neb was that, Siss?' I muttered, softly. The telepathic contact seemed to have left no trace, beside a vague headache. And yet, I'd a sense of black gap - a second or a day? 'Ever met something like before?'
She replied with a long low hiss and a slow shake of her head.
'And I suspect, we don't want to again, do we?'
She agreed with another soft hiss.
'Let's get down to the gig. We need to talk to Cin.'
Siss agreed, and led the way down. In a shot.
We found Cin awake programing the synth-galley, still hidden behind the grotesque mask, still dressed in the grubby jump suit. Siss shot forward and wrapped herself half around her, hissing excitedly.
'What have you done to my poor little dragon?' he/she demanded as I crawled through the hole in the hull. 'She's so scared she's shivering!'
'We saw something...met something. I'm not sure what...' I began before finding myself at a loss to explain what the something exactly was and why it was so frightening.
Cin waited impatiently for me to continue. 'Speak up, you're no more articulate than Siss. What in the Neb did you see that has Siss so upset?'
'I don't really know. Siss and I were topside examining a large island we're drifting close to, and when we turned back to get you, we discovered this figure...' and I spun my yarn.
He/she gave me a searching look. 'If it wasn't for Siss here, I'd say you've been hitting the synth-sauce.'
'I haven't, but it sounds like a good idea.'
'So you say that he could've sent an arrow through you without you even knowing it was there?'
'Which is why I didn't draw my darter. He looked sinister enough, but since he hadn't acted unfriendly, I didn't want to start anything.'
'And he just flew off, after trying to suck out your brain?'
'My thoughts, memories - who knows? I'm not quite sure just how long it all lasted or what it actually got from me - it got sort of black there for a moment or two.'
Cin pondered that for a while before shrugging. 'Live and learn to keep one eye on the sky. Now what about this island?'
'Come up and have a look. It's large and reachable with spacesuit jet packs. And we're likely still in radio range of any rescue mission. The downside is that we'd have to abandon the security of gig. We have no more than an hour to decide and gather what we can to take along.'
'Right. Let's have a look.'
That meant going out again. Siss and I exchanged a brief glance. Still, we'd have to go out again sometime. We let Cin take the lead and followed her up the crater wall and on to the flattened plain, to view the upside down large island, still close at hand and slowly drifting by.
'An hour, you say, to decide?'
'And to act. With the wind currents, the jet packs probably have a five kilometer range. It looks like we're coming up on the edge of the island, so we don't have much time to gather what we'll need and clear off.'
Cin said nothing. We all stood silently, heads craned back, watching the forests and mossy plains drift by - weighing our options and consequences.
'How certain are you that your crew will obey your last order and not come looking for you?' he/she asked after a bit.
I hesitated, still weighing the consequences.
'Come on, Litang, time's a wasting.'
'I'm thinking.'
'Then think out loud. Time's wasting.'
'Right. Molaye Merlun is now the ship's captain. It will be her decision. My last orders are neither gas nor dust. She'll make her own decision regardless of my orders.'
'Your guess?'
'If everything is in order on the ship - her first priority - then? Well it comes down to whether she decides to respect my wishes, or see it as her duty to provide any aid she could render.'
'And she'll?'
I shrugged. 'My gut feeling is that she'd ignore my wishes and send in a boat. She has a great deal of confidence in herself. And we're friends?'
'The odds?' Cin growled impatiently, turning her grizzled spaceer face to me and glaring from under her false eye brows.
I shrugged, 'If pressed I'd say we'd have an eight or nine in a dozen chance of seeing a rescue boat.'
'And more likely twelve out of twelve. So why are you so hesitant? Afraid of what I'll do when the boat arrives?'
'I'm the biggest fool aboard the Starry Shore, especially when it comes to you. Trust me, Molaye and the gang can handle you. You'll either settle for the compromise I mentioned last watch or wake up a decade or two from now on a planet to be decided. I owe you my life, so I'll not kill you. But I'll send you far, far away.'
'We'll see...'
'You'd not be given a choice. But I'll not argue. The real reason I'm less than wildly enthusiastic is that I don't like the downside risks. What if I they don't send a boat? Or if they do but out of range of our emergency radio? Between the islands and atmosphere, who knows its range? Neb, who knows if we could survive for two weeks down there. I've met dragons, we've both seen what talon-hawks can do. And we can't count on the continued indifference of that red-feathered chap. On a large island like that, there's bound to be large predators, not to mention poisonous snakes?'
Her mustache lifted with a grin. 'And spiders.'
Siss, floating between us, barked - her laugh.
'I'm sorry I'm so Unity Standard, but the idea of being marooned on a deserted island in the middle of a vast nowhere, doesn't appeal to me.'
'We'll have our weapons and gear. We can take tools, the emergency radio, synth-food machine, and power supply. We could pull some wires and electric motors and such to build a boat if need be if the boat doesn't come and we get restless.'
'But we'd abandon the protection of the gig, the med-unit, the synth-galley and the parts printer. We'd spend the rest of our lives - and likely short ones - eating tasteless paste from the little synth food machine and shitting in the bushes?'
'Litang!' she said with a mocking leer, 'You needn't get so graphic.'
'I'm just saying that the downside consequences are rather grim.'
'So what's our alternative? Spending our lives on this little island shitting the sanitary unit and recycling it for dinner?'
'Don't get graphic, Cin. We're not supposed to think about that. Besides, with your talent and the synth-galley our meals would be far more edible - regardless of the raw material. Plus, we'd have a med-unit to keep us healthy, and an impregnable redoubt from dragons, talon-hawks and savages once we patch that hole in the bow.'
'And "our" mission?' she sneered.
Again I hesitated, arranging my thoughts.
'Litang?'
'Right. I've only made a visual inspection of the undercarriage of the gig, but it seems that we might have six undamaged landing jets. Each is a mini-reactor/rocket engine that can be moved and reinstalled to use to drive the gig. We've got tools, plasma cutters and welders to patch the hole in the bow and clear the gig of all the wreckage, so that I'm fairly confident that I can get the gig mobile, not only in the Pela, but in the outer reaches too. At least for short runs out. If I'm right, we can use the gig to send our radio warnings, and do so over a longer span of time.
'Plus, if I can contact Tenry, and things go well, we might get a ride home aboard the Rift Raven. Nothing guaranteed, but we could achieve the same results as we would with the Starry Shore's boat, but the downside risks would be much less drastic. Even if we fai
led to make contact, we'd be left with an almost impregnable ship to explore the Pela. And, as I said, we'd have the med-unit and synth-galley?'
'And the sanitation unit,' Cin added with a laugh.
'And the sanitation unit. And well, just for your consideration, we might be able to locate and reach Cimmadar's space station in the shell reef. And, well, you being a stealth and I a spaceer, who's to say we couldn't find our way home someway?'
'Are you trying to seduce me with the promise of piracy,' he/she laughed.
'I want to go home to the Unity, and if that takes a bit of piracy, well, I'm in.'
'Unity Standard Litang, a pirate?'
'Unity Standard Litang has no desire to make the Pela his home. I've a feeling I'm far too Unity Standard to survive in the Pela for long.'
Cin shook her head sadly and said quietly. 'I'm afraid I must agree with you, though it may not be the Pela that you have to fear the most.'
'Only when I'm no longer useful, and I intend to be useful for a long, long time, the Pela permitting. I'll start by giving us a boat to roam the Pela with.'
'And how long will that take?'
'A month, maybe a bit more. I think, however, that we have the time. Given that Vinden feared the appearance of the Empress's forces momentarily, I'd have to believe they'd be a bit more cautious now. They will likely scout things out before rushing in, so that we should have time to fix the gig and still warn them off.'
'Can we fix the gig and still meet any rescue boat from the Starry Shore? We should have the better part of two weeks. How long can it take to cut away the wreckage and move the landing jets?'
'I suppose it's possible. In that case, we should make getting the radar up our first priority, since we'd need to find our way back here. Finding the edge of the Pela is easy - just a matter of putting the brightest sky astern. But for finding our way back here, we'd need a radar map. However, I have to tell you that there are likely a hundred little items that I've not thought of and that would have to be taken care of before we could sail, so that I'll make no promises of having the gig relaunched by then.'
'Is that what you're suggesting we do?'
I turned things over, and then over again, in my mind, before I realized, 'I will leave that decision to you, Cin. You're the owner now. It's your call. I've been making those calls for a decade now, and I've grown weary of them.'
'Coward. I'm asking for your advice, not looking to you to make the decision.'
'It's a coin flip,' I said. 'That's what makes it so hard. I'll support your decision, whatever it is.'
'You most certainly will, that's a given. Until I no longer need you,' he/she added grimly.
I just smiled. She'd passed on too many chances to kill me for her hints and threats to have any meaning. Ignorance is bliss, I guess.
He/she put her hand to her face and ran it across her whiskers, thinking. 'What do you think, Siss. You're no coward like Litang. What should we do?'
Siss, who'd been floating between us, looked to her, and slowly let out a soft hiss.
'Sssstay, you say? Right. I'll program breakfast. Litang, you look to get the radar up and running,' she said, turning back to the crater.
'Aye, aye, Skipper,' I said, following her. It was the decision I'd have made, but I was glad she made it rather than me.