Starship Spring (3 page)

Then it was Hawk’s turn to describe his travels, his humorous stories of the obnoxious rich tourists whose whims he’d had to accommodate. They asked about life in Magenta Bay, and I found myself recounting the small events, the incidents and dramas, of our beloved backwater township, and I realised something as I was speaking. For all my four friends had travelled the Expansion, seen sights and experienced things I never would see or experience, I could see that they’d missed life in the Bay and wished they’d been a part of the day-to-day happenings I reported with a little exaggeration.

At one point I raised my glass. “I’d just like to say a big thank you to Matt. This was a marvellous idea for a reunion. To Matt.”

We drank.

Matt said, “Well, when Dr Petronious—the man with more money than many a colony world—made the offer for the show…” He shrugged. “How could I say no? He’s a well-known patron of the arts, with his own galleries and exhibition centres across the Expansion. I know my work will be well presented.”

I’ve known Matt for the better part of fifteen years, and I thought I detected, in his words about his benefactor, a slight hint—the merest suggestion—of resentment. I filed the observation away and decided to question Matt about it when an opportune moment arose.

I held Ella to me as she dozed and stroked Hannah’s leg with my free hand. She was laughing at something Maddie had said, and telling her about a particularly funny incident that had occurred in Mackinley a while ago.

We were finishing the meal with brandy and whisky—imported from Earth—when my com chimed: Da Souza. I placed the device in the middle of the table and our guide smiled out at us.

“I hope you don’t mind my interrupting. I said I’d call in and go through the tour options with you.”

“The dig,” Maddie said, bright-eyed.

Hawk said as an aside to Matt, “How the hell did you swing it, Matt? I thought the underground site was off-limits to plebs like us.”

Matt grunted. “Thank Dr Petronious.”

Da Souza was saying, “We could take a trip to the dig tomorrow afternoon, if you wish. The next time-slot after that—I have to work around the archaeologists—would be in three days.”

“There’s no time like the present,” Hannah said.

Maddie backed her up. “I’ve been dying to see the dig for weeks. Let’s do it tomorrow.”

We agreed and Da Souza said, “That’s settled, then. I’ll pick you up at one tomorrow afternoon.” She cut the connection.

Soon after that, with the Ring of Tharssos lighting our way, we left the restaurant and retraced our steps up wooden walkways and across rope bridges to our spectacular hilltop villa.

* * *

We slipped Ella into bed and then Hannah and I sat on the balcony outside our room, just taking in the ambience. The Ring of Tharssos bathed the scene in silver, and the almost fluorescent spume of the waterfall contrasted with the surrounding darkness of the vegetation. Another unique feature of the villa was the encapsulating sound baffle, reducing the thunderous roar of the water to nothing more than a background murmur.

After a while Hannah yawned and said she was turning in. I said I’d join her shortly, and sat admiring the view and listening to the night sounds from the rainforest: the almost mechanical ticking of an army of invisible insects, the throaty rumble of things that sounded like toads.

I saw movement on the patio below, and half expected to see the slim form of an Ashentay. The figure was slim, but it was not a native. Maddie crossed the timber boards, holding a drink, and paused before the balcony.

She smiled up at me. “Can’t sleep?”

“Just admiring the view,” I said.

“Mind if I have a word?”

“No, of course not.” I joined her on the patio and we sat at a table near the rail. She offered to get me a drink, but I was inebriated enough after the whisky.

“I’m fine, Maddie,” I said. “Is something wrong?”

She worried her bottom lip with small, perfect teeth before smiling at me and saying, “It’s Matt. He’s…” She stopped.

I recalled his manner over dinner, when talking about his patron.

“Is this something to do with Dr Petronious?” I asked.

Maddie smiled at me. “Do you know, David Conway, for someone who likes to present a bluff, rough, uneducated exterior to the world, you don’t miss anything, do you?”

“I’ve known Matt for so long…” I shrugged. “He seemed bothered about something… his relationship with this Petronious character?”

“He was fine for most of the trip. He never likes travelling with his exhibitions—the whole media thing leaves him cold. But he was coping, and we had plenty of time to do the things we wanted, see the sights, visit people. I’d say Matt was on good form,” Maddie said.

“Then he met Dr Petronious?”

“We were on Bokotar, Sirius II. It’s an odd place, mostly desert, much of it too hot for habitation. The colonists there are a strange people, insular, suspicious. They’ve adapted to their inimical world and think themselves superior because of it.”

“And Petronious is from Bokotar?”

Maddie shook her head. “No, Dr Petronious isn’t human. He’s a Kallashian, from Antares II.”

“Aren’t they—”

She nodded. “They’re a reptilian race, humanoid in form, though.”

“What did you make of him?”

“Oh, I found Petronious utterly charming. Urbane, witty, sophisticated, and he possessed a phenomenal knowledge of human art. For an alien, he struck me as very… humane.”

“What happened?”

“We met Petronious at the opening of Matt’s exhibition on Bokotar; Matt had heard of him—he’s one of the most influential patrons on the art scene—but had never met him. A few days later he contacted Matt and arranged a meeting. I wasn’t there, but Matt told me later about Petronious’s offer. He wanted to buy the ten-year exhibition rights to Matt’s pieces for over three million standard credits.”

I whistled. “And Matt agreed, but then had second thoughts, right? He thought he was selling out?”

Maddie pursed her lips, considering. “I… no, I wouldn’t say that. He seemed happy with the deal. Petronious has good taste and access to all the best art venues. Matt was sure his work would get maximum coverage around the Expansion… But he seemed, I don’t know… withdrawn after Bokotar, as if he was worried about something. I asked him about it –” she laughed “– I thought he’d finally got sick of me! He was upset by that, asked me how I could think such a thing. But he claimed he was fine, not worried about a thing. So,” she lifted her hands in a helpless gesture, “I don’t know if I’m worrying over nothing, being paranoid…”

I reached out and took her small hand. “I’ll talk to Matt, see if I can work out what’s bothering him. If anything is, of course. In the meantime, let’s enjoy the break, okay?”

Maddie smiled and raised her glass. “To the break,” she said, “and to friends.”

We chatted for a little longer, then Maddie yawned tipsily, kissed me and said goodnight. I returned to the bedroom and rolled into bed beside Hannah; she turned to me and, half asleep, hugged me close.

Sleep was a long time coming that night. I lay awake, thinking through my encounter with the Yall apparition back at the
Mantis
… When I was finally dropping off I thought I glimpsed, through the diaphanous walls of the room, a pair of wide, green Ashentay eyes staring in at me.

FOUR

The following morning we breakfasted on the balcony of our room, watching silver birds dart into the wall of the waterfall and emerge with flip-flapping golden fish. Later we sat beside the pool on the roof of the complex, in the shade of the trees, and watched Ella swim in the shallows. I had insisted that she learn to swim at the age of two, after what had happened to Carrie all those years ago, and to my delight she had taken to water like the proverbial fish.

Hawk and Kee joined us. Hawk carried a tray bearing a jug and glasses, and we sat around the pool, chatting and drinking iced fruit juice.

Hawk drained his glass and stripped down to his swimming trucks, then dived cleanly into the water. He played with Ella, laughing and splashing in the dappled sunlight.

It was the first time I’d seen the extent of Hawk’s augmentations, the implants that enabled him to interface with his ship. Silver spars and webwork sat flush with his tanned flesh, outlining his broad shoulders and the line of his spine: filaments rose from his neck and cradled the base of his skull, and ports there gave access to the implants in his cerebellum.

Compared to Hawk, his partner Kee was diminutive, elf-like. She lay beside us on the lounger, tiny in her one-piece bathing costume. I suppose, given the difference of our respective planets, evolution and cultures, it was amazing that the Ashentay should resemble humans in any way, but resemble us they did: bipedal humanoids with symmetrical facial features, the requisite number of fingers and thumbs. But they were also subtly alien, and I couldn’t help staring at Kee as she lay beside us, smiling at Hawk’s antics in the pool.

Her slightness bordered on anorexic-looking, and, with her almost-white hair swept back, the bulge of her eyes was emphasized. She could in no way be called pretty, but rather…
striking
.

Now she transferred her attention from her lover and regarded the surrounding rainforest. Her big eyes darted, and I tried to catch what she was looking at. She smiled to herself a little later, and her rather serious face was transformed.

Hannah had been watching her, evidently. “What is it, Kee?”

Without turning her gaze from the rainforest, Kee said, “They are watching us, my people.”

“I’ve noticed them,” I said. “When we were travelling up here in the cable car, and again last night.”

“They are curious,” Kee said. “They have little contact with humans.”

Hannah said, “I’ve heard they don’t even have much to do with the Ashentay who do mix with us humans.”

Kee was a while replying. “They are a strange people,” she said at last. “Almost a different race. They believe that they are the True People.”

I looked at her. “The True People?”

She smiled again, her lips a little longer than any humans—and the expression on her face, then, with her exothalmic eyes and attenuated lips, was almost reptilian. “They claim that because we—my people—left the interior and moved to the coast, and took up a different way, that we no longer follow the true path, laid down by our ancestors, the True People.”

Hannah propped herself up on an elbow, lifted her sunglasses and said, “What is the true path, Kee?”

“We have two differing belief systems, Hannah. My people, the coastal people, we believe that we were created by a god who selected this planet as ours. But the interior tribes, they believe that we are descended from a mighty race that once spanned the galaxy, a race with technology even more advanced than your own—but a peaceful race which used their knowledge and power to help other, less developed races.”

“But how did they come to live on Ashentay?” Hannah asked.

“According to the True People’s beliefs, our great forbears evolved, decided that the technological way was not the right way, and came to Chalcedony—or Ashent—as we call it, turned their back on technology and lived in union with the rainforest.”

“But you don’t believe that?” I said.

Kee lifted a hand. “Perhaps it is true,” she said cryptically.

She lay back and closed her massive eyes, and I smiled at Hannah and watched Hawk as he emerged dripping from the pool, Ella dancing in his wake.

He flopped down beside us. “She’s exhausted me. I thought we came here for a rest?”

I nearly said something along the lines that rest was a rarity when you had a child—but stopped myself. Hawk and Kee could not have children. I suspected, by the way Hawk took every opportunity to play with Ella, that he would relish being a father.

We lay in silence for a while, luxuriating under the warm spring sun and listening to the insect sounds in the rainforest. Hawk’s bass rumble broke the silence a little later.

“The odd thing is, you know, I knew we were coming here.”

I turned my head. “What do you mean?”

He lodged his muscled arms beneath his occipital console and stared up through the swaying rainforest canopy. “Way before Maddie contacted me and told me about Matt’s suggestion, I knew.”

“I never had you down as psychic, Hawk,” Hannah said.

He grunted. “It was odd—not at the time, but later, when I heard from Maddie and Matt.”

“Are you going to tell us,” I said, “or does Hannah have to apply her interrogation techniques on you?”

Hawk laughed, sat up and took a long swig of iced juice. “We’d just landed on El Habib, Janata IV. This was about three months ago, halfway through the tour. I was ready for home then, I can tell you. Oh, the Stardrift was spectacular, but I’d rather not have done it with a bunch of pernickety tourists.” He grunted again. “I’m really not good at playing the polite starship captain to a bunch of over-privileged millionaires.”

“You were telling us about your remarkable prescience,” Hannah reminded him.

“I’m getting there,” he said. “Anyway, one night on El Habib, I had a dream. This figure approached me, said that on our return to Chalcedony we’d spend some time here, Tamara Falls. It said that my presence was vital here.” He laughed. “I know, crazy! Anyway, I forgot about the dream pretty quickly—and then a couple of months later Maddie calls and suggests an all-expenses-paid holiday at Tamara Falls. Of course it brought back the dream in a rush.” He gestured. “Don’t ask me to explain it.”

“Some coincidence,” Hannah said.

“There’s more. When we got back to Chalcedony, I looked into how to get here from Mackinley—I didn’t fancy a five-hour mono-train ride. I found out they had a landing pad here… and only then did I recall something else the vision in the dream told me: that I should make the trip to the Falls in my starship.”

“Did it say why?” Hannah asked.

“No, not that I recall. Anyway, that’s what I did.”

I let a silence develop, mulling over what he’d said, before asking, “Can you recall what this figure in your dream looked like, Hawk?”