Alone in the Crowd (The Chronicles of Anna Foster Book 3) (4 page)

Jason shook his head. “No, I haven’t, except maybe the announcement made over the radio when I found it.”

She sighed and nodded with her eyes closed. “Looks like we’re going to have to address this with everyone who had a communicator.

“Meanwhile,” she continued, snapping her eyes open to look directly at Jason. “I do not want you discussing this with anyone else, and I want you to stay away from that pyramid. I don’t want to take any chances of anything happening if no one else is around. Understand?”

Jason nodded.

“All right. You can go home now, but I may want to speak with you about this again at some point.”

“Sure. That’s fine.”

“Great,” she assured with a smile. “Thank you, Jason.”

“Good morning, Catherine.”

No response.

“Good morning, Catherine.”

Gradually, the young brunette awoke under the covers. She fought to free herself from the euphoric call of sleep but failed, dropping her head back into the pillow.

“Good morning, Catherine.”

Groggily, she called out through her pillow, muffling her speech. “Jason, tell it to shut up!”

“Good morning, Catherine.”

She listened for her boyfriend to respond but heard only the computer’s incessant wake-up call over and over again. Pushing herself up and arching her back, she looked around the bedroom. “Jason?”

Slipping out of the covers, she fumbled around in the dark for a few seconds. “Window, seventy-five percent opacity.”

The light filtering through illuminated the room enough to keep her from tripping as she moved through to the front part of their house, where the windows were fully clear. Blinking a few times at the sudden harshness of the bright sunlight from outside, she paused long enough to let her eyes adjust before continuing her search. Jason was nowhere in the house. She was tempted to look outside, but refrained as she was naked.

She scratched her head as she furrowed her brow. “Where is he?”

* * * * *

Several kilometers to the east, Jason flew over the lake at high speed on his skycycle, barely skimming the surface of the water and spraying a vast wake behind him. He had ignored the requirement of wearing a helmet and laughed with glee from the rush of the wind across his face and through his hair. Seeing the approaching shore, he slowed down enough to glide over the rapids at the edge of the lake and head downstream.

A few minutes later, he landed the vehicle on the same bank as the day before, dismounted, and ran into the woods toward the pyramid. He had gone only about a couple of dozen meters, when a voice stopped him in his tracks. “Halt!”

Jason peered through the trees in front of him, attempting to locate the source of the command. Two soldiers wearing camouflage uniforms and black flak vests stepped into view holding their rifles firmly in their hands. They looked stern, but curiosity in their eyes made them more approachable.

One of the troopers rolled his eyes. “Jason, why are you here again?”

The other guard chimed in with the same attitude. “Didn’t Ms. Armstrong tell you to stay away?”

A look of confusion formed on Jason’s face, as he wondered how they would know that piece of information. “How do you know that?”

Shocked, the first marine answered, “Dude! The colonel was in there with you during your debriefing! You think he wouldn’t tell us?”

Jason, now feeling a bit stupid, nodded. “Yeah, you got a point.”

“Why don’t you do something like … oh, I don’t know, like do your job!”

Noting the sarcasm, Jason pointed a thumb over his shoulder. “Okay, I’m just…going…to look…for more food.”

While the first sentry nodded, the second added with a thumbs-up and the same amount of attitude as before, “Good idea, Jason. Why don’t you do that?”

“Okay. I’m going now.”

The first one waved like he would to a child. “Goodbye!”

Without another word, the young colonist turned and walked slowly back toward the river. He could have sworn he heard one of the guards remark about his lack of intelligence before they returned to their post, but he could not be sure.

Upon reaching the skycycle, Jason decided to spend the morning exploring the river valley on foot, figuring it would save fuel and allow him to forage more thoroughly. Securing his backpack over his shoulders, he had not walked more than fifty meters before his communicator paged him to answer an incoming call.

“This is Jason,” he said after pressing the button to open the channel.

Catherine’s voice yelled, “Where the hell are you?”

“Uh,” Jason stammered from embarrassment. “This is an open channel.”

“I don’t care! Just answer the damn question!”

Groaning, he reluctantly answered, “I’m out foraging. I went a little early this morning.”

“Foraging?” she continued on her tirade. “That’s fine, but you could have at least left me a note or something!”

He narrowed his eyes. “I did.”

“You did? Where is it?”

As he was about to answer, Jason thought he heard snickering somewhere behind him, but a quick glance revealed nobody there. Turning back to the matter at hand, he furrowed his brow as he replayed the events of the early morning after such a restless night. He had felt rather tired while he had showered and dressed. Had he left her a message?

Before he could answer, another voice interrupted, “This channel is to be used for official discussions only. If you wish to continue, please move your conversation to a private channel.”

“Look, Catherine,” Jason suggested diplomatically. “We’ll talk about it at lunch. I have to get back to work.”

After a second, she replied after an audible sigh, “Fine. At lunch.”

He nodded and closed the channel before turning and continuing his hike along the river, shaking his head at first while he mulled the incident over in his mind.

As he moved down the river, Jason kept a careful eye open, taking in the sights that nature had to offer while searching for new sources of food. Although he found several berry-producing bushes, only two of them proved to be edible to humans. Out of those two, the dark blue ones tasted incredibly sweet, while the deep red ones made his lips pucker after sampling a couple. Nevertheless, he harvested several of each, bagged them, and stored them in his backpack before logging the location and moving on.

About an hour later after a slow but steady search along the riverbanks, Jason came to an odd sight that made him doubt his sanity and his sobriety. On the far bank, near a set of rapids that traversed the river about a hundred meters further downstream from his location, appeared to be something that looked like a water wheel. Although it was not a water wheel in the traditional sense, it appeared to work in much the same fashion.

Jason’s first thought was to report the find in to the colony. As he contemplated doing so, memories of the previous day’s events involving the pyramid came back to him. Hoping to avoid the embarrassment he might experience by calling attention to himself again, he decided to investigate further before saying anything.

Daring to get a closer look, Jason ventured closer to the wheel. Reaching a spot across the river from it, he stopped to examine it. Built of weather-beaten wood with eight troughs fastened to a rough, square frame, the wheel turned with the tide of the river and spilled the water it picked up into some sort of V-shaped half-pipe suspended within the branches of the trees lining the river. From his viewpoint, the half-pipe disappeared into the woods, and he could not tell where it led.

Jason stopped and listened to his surroundings but only heard the wind blowing through the trees, the breaking of the water against the rocks ahead, and the occasional squeak from the water wheel. Intrigued, he crossed the river, stepping across the rocks as if he walked a high wire, approached the old-tech device, and watched it turn on its spindle, which was secured to a large tree.

A while later, a strange odor assaulted his nostrils. He wrinkled his face and looked around for the source. Resting against a tree several meters past the wheel, Jason found another strange contraption. It looked like a few boards had been nailed together with another wooden plank on top of it. It struck him as odd that the plank on top was sharpened and bloody on one side. The blood appeared to be the source of the scent, and he turned away as his stomach began to churn from the disgusting sight.

As he turned away, Jason noticed a small group of trees growing a few meters further downstream. In particular, he noted the brownish-yellow fruit hanging from their branches. At first, he thought they looked like small, overripe golden apples, but closer examination showed they were still firm and smelled wonderful. Before he knew it, he had plucked one of them off and bitten into it. Within seconds, a feeling of euphoria washed over him. He suddenly felt that everything in life was beautiful regardless of what happened.

The euphoria passed several minutes later, and Jason found himself sitting on the bank of the river dangling his bare feet in the cool water as it flowed by. Next to him on the ground was the core of the fruit he had just consumed. A knot formed in his stomach, and he ripped his hand scanner out of his backpack and swept it over the remains. The results indicated that nothing was toxic other than a trace of arsenic in the seeds. He breathed a sigh of relief and decided to take two of the fruit back to the colony for examination.

He dried his feet and put his shoes back on. As he stood, his eyes fell upon the pipe leading into the woods. Curious, Jason followed the pipe into the forest. After a few dozen meters, he saw that it led into a clearing filled with tall grass measuring around two meters tall.

He entered the clearing. All he could see was the grass and the wooden channel leading him to its edge. After a short while, the pipe led to a well-tended garden nestled in the middle of the tall meadow. The pipe split into three smaller ones that inclined downward into the tilled soil, which hosted several vegetation types, some of which seemed to be rather appetizing vegetables. His eyes lit up at the cornucopia. He grabbed his scanner and took readings of everything growing in the patch. As he suspected, all of them were edible. Some were nutritious enough to be considered superfoods back on Earth, a category occupied by only a handful of vegetables.

Jason harvested two vegetables from each of the plants and secured them in his backpack. As he stashed the last of the food, it dawned on him that somebody had cultivated these plants, and that person may be nearby and possibly watching him steal their produce.

His first thought was to run back to the river and flee to the protection of the colony, or even the soldiers at the pyramid. Surely they would have the means to keep any harm from coming to him. Then again, he figured they would probably just laugh it off as another way for him to keep getting attention after finding the pyramid yesterday. After the humiliation he had experienced earlier, he was not keen for a repeat.

Jason determined that if the owner of the garden was watching him, he would have taken some sort of action by now. Since he felt in no immediate danger, perhaps this mysterious farmer would be benevolent enough to let him take a few vegetables if he asked. He decided to seek out the farmer, introduce himself, and ask for a sampling of his garden. He might even make a new friend out of it.

Jason observed the tree line and deduced where the center of the clearing should be. Reasoning that anyone living here would naturally build their home there, he set out in that direction. He walked for about fifty meters or so, when he happened across a robot of some sort lying in the grass. From the equipment installed on its frame, he figured it was some sort of labor drone – possibly designed for farming or some other form of harvest, considering its proximity to the garden. He scrutinized the machine and concluded that it had sat in the field without power for some time. The signs of rust on its outer shell reinforced this reasoning. He decided to look at it later and moved past it, pursuing his original bearing.

Deep in thought, he almost ran into the side of a pure white metal wall. In contrast to the drone, the wall gleamed in the shade it created, and looked to be several meters tall.

“Perhaps this is where the farmer lives,” Jason muttered.

He reached his hand toward the wall, when he thought about the scenario again. He did not know anything about this wall or why it was here. He withdrew his hand and pulled out his hand scanner instead. He calibrated the sensors and swept it over the metal plate. Several seconds later, the readout indicated the temperature of the metal and the presence of any EM signatures, which appeared to be none. He returned the scanner to its pocket in his backpack and, with trepidation, reached out and placed his hand against the metal surface, wincing as he did so, almost as if he expected something bad to happen. A few seconds passed, and only the wind blowing through the grass reached his ears. He opened his eyes and smiled after breathing a sigh of relief. With his hand on the wall, he followed its length, hoping to find a door or some other feature that would allow him to find its owner.

A couple of minutes passed with Jason following the wall until the top edge dropped to about half its height and gently sloped downward until it reached the ground. The ground next to the metal structure was greatly disturbed as if the metal had dug out a long trench. He walked to the end of the tilled soil and looked back toward the white metal wall. Staring back at him was a wide window that opened to a dusky room on the other side.

“
This is a starship.”

Jason glanced around, half expecting to find somebody there. Seeing nobody, he placed a foot onto the ship’s nose, testing his weight. When the hull plating did not give, he shifted his weight. The ship’s white metal skin supported him with no trouble. He nodded with a hint of a smile and walked onto the downed craft and up to the window. Looking through it, he saw what appeared to be a rather spacious bridge, but no one was inside. He climbed up the nose and onto the roof, easily finding a hatch about halfway back the length of the craft’s six-meter-wide fuselage. As the hatch was open, he climbed down the ladder and found only a glowing red button next to a tall hatch set in the wall. This hatch would lead the entrant toward the front of the ship. With nowhere else to go, he reached a finger toward the button with hesitation…and jumped slightly when the upper hatch closed and the one in front of him opened.