Light Bringer (The Young Ancients: Second Cycle Book 2) (19 page)

Again they laughed, as if he were
an entertainer there for their amusement. Not that he didn't get the idea. No
one would set a schedule like that and then just change things. He winked while
still looking forward, so that only the tall woman to his right and the camera
might see him doing it.

There was no reason for the
people back home to think he was a horribly mean person after all.

"My room is handily just
outside the doors here. I meant it about that nap."

Karina smiled then, as if that
was a euphemism for more than sleep. As far as he knew that actually wasn't the
case. True, nearly everything else was, but not that one.

"I'll set an alarm. I could
use a few hours myself, soon. Do I just tuck in with you?"

"Of course. Otherwise it
would seem weird, right? Besides, you're pretty much the only person I know
here. I need to keep you around to protect me." Most of the rest of the
people were foreign, after all. Not Tenet, but even there, he had that whole
strange
family
thing going on.

They didn't really have more than
a passing relationship, but one was built in, and supposed to already be there.
Karina was just some tall girl he was supposed to
get
to know. Yes, she
had a lot of things riding with her too, but someday being married to her was
the actual important part. Dareg thought that was the case anyway.

Her exuberant nod said much the
same to him in return.

"That does seem like a good
plan. Ah, here we go. The wall closed." There was a reflective section in
front of them, so that they could tell that. This landing area was huge
compared to the others that he'd used in the past, which was needed for his
ship to fit at present. He'd made it a good bit larger than was strictly needed.
To impress people. It hadn't been on accident, but the raw fact was that he
could have gone with a thing a tenth the size and still had a hundred times
more room than was needed.

It took about ten minutes to hook
up the docking tube, and set a tight airlock in place. Losing air would be bad
after all, since they'd end up forced to make more and had limited water
supplies to work from for that. Enough, but wasting things you couldn't replace
made no sense at all.

Then everyone moved to the little
room next to them, as five people of different sizes and colors walked in.
Dressed identically in silver. A short man, who was blocky and powerful for all
of that, waved as he came in. He looked a bit strange, having silver hair, and
unlined skin, as well as deep silver eyes.

"Hello. We're the crew for
this trip? I'm Lenn." He bowed correctly, doing it to Dare first, then
Tenet. As an afterthought he added everyone else. "What's first here?
Scrub the ship and start on a meal?"

The man was forceful, but not
angry or anything like that. Just a bit bossy.

Dareg smiled, deciding to put him
in charge of the others then.

"I need to go sleep. I get
four hours from when everyone leaves. These people could use guides here, since
they can go and see things, and should. None of you have been here
before?" That wasn't a known thing, but the science people all seemed to
agree with that part. Lenn looked at them, and smiled then.

"Let's break up into groups
of six or seven then? I'll stay here, and make sure no one takes off without us
all. Crew, get a head count and make sure you don't leave anyone. Meet back
here in... Three hours and fifty-minutes from... Now." He pulled a
handheld, identical to the one that Dareg and everyone else had, and set up a
countdown on it for that amount of time.

Then he turned to Dare again, as
everyone left.

"I'll wake you?" This
time he looked at Karina, who nodded as well, but there was no hint of him
thinking anything of it in particular. Even if half of known space would
presume that the yawning and eye rubbing was fake, meant to distract from the
fact that the young man and pretty woman were going to be alone. There was a
strange accent to the funny looking man. It was a fluid sounding thing, but
Dare didn't really think about it that much. You could get work done to make
yourself seem different there, and it was probably just a different version of
an Austran accent. They did have them, though this one was less subtle than
most.

Still, Dareg
wasn't
an
idiot. There had been minor differences to Bill, the faithless squire, as well.
Things that he'd ignored, when he clearly shouldn't have.
This
time he
was going to collect all the information, in case the man was dangerous. The
real worry was that anyone there, almost, could have been one of their enemies.
Lenn was actually far too obvious for that, unless it was part of a very clever
ruse to throw them off. That was actually possible, but less likely than the
danger being from someone else. One of the unknown scientists for instance.

Worse, he couldn't even just
drive the odd people away, because if they were the bad ones, they might
trigger and just kill him and Karina. The safest thing to do was to note who
they might be, and let them stay there, until a good trap could be set up for
them. If it came to a fight, then they were all dead, more likely than not.

So he acted like everything were
normal, and went off to his room, along with a princess. Just inside the door
she kissed him on the cheek.

"Don't worry, I know you
meant to sleep. I wasn't kidding about needing some, myself. You noticed how
strange that was back there, didn't you?" Her voice nearly whispered the
last part, but he nodded, getting what she meant.

"I did! Hopefully that means
it's all perfectly safe. Well, if I wake up dead, that will be a sign that
things went wrong, won't it?"

That got her to grin, and walk
with him to the large bed, which she made both longer and wider with a touch.
Then they climbed in. It was nice, since she pressed her left leg against his
right, but wasn't too close or anything. For a moment he wondered if he could
sleep that way, but then drifted off, as if it were simply how he'd always
lived. Apparently that had worked for her as well, since she started when the
door started to flash in multiple colors of light.

"
Argh
." The
flashing let him see, so he worked out that it was his wake up announcement as
he staggered that way, only half blind. Opening the door, he saw that it was
Lenn, who was holding the countdown timer in his hand. It buzzed lightly.

"There we go. Do you need me
to keep you awake, or are you good this way? I always need to have someone talk
to me for a bit if I'm short on sleep like you are right now."

"Should be good. If you
don't see me on the bridge in ten minutes, come throw water on me? I won't lay
back down. Promise." The huge yawn after that and the sleepy tone to it
all made it seem like he wasn't going to keep his word, but he would. It was
his job after all.

"Understood then. See you in
ten minutes." The clock in his hand, with the big numbers, got reset, to
show he was serious.

That meant dashing to the
restroom, relieving himself, and brushing his teeth and hair. Then changing
clothing. A full shower would have to wait. Just as he was coming out, Karina
moved in, her left eye still closed.

"I'll be right there, have
coffee ready?" There was a plaintive sound to the words, but he thought
that might be possible. He'd
had
that before, after all. The ship would
make almost anything that way, if he knew what it was they wanted.

That meant that only ten minutes
after he'd claimed they were leaving, a cup of bitter brown in his hand, he was
able to greet everyone and get a head count of his own. It did seem like
everyone was there, and no extra bodies had come in that he could see. Not that
fifty people couldn't have hidden on the ship when they weren't paying
attention. As Karina sank down next to him, Dareg quickly finished the contents
of his ceramic mug. She had one too, that he'd placed on the arm of her chair.

"Mars is reddish and has two
space stations?" Also the next planet out, which alone would be enough for
him to find it.

She nodded, and smiled.

"Want me to..." She
stopped as the planet came into view through the window. He'd come in at a
distance, in case he had to avoid a ship or station. One of those was in view,
which got her to point. "I was going to ask if you wanted me to make the
jump, but never mind. So, we're honeymooning at the next star over? I'd figured
you were just saying that for a laugh, but if you can do this..." She
waved at her planet, and stood up.

"Mars. Undergoing terra-forming
right now. That means we've introduced special bacteria and plant life to
change the face of it and build an atmosphere. We're also using magic to speed
that process up, creating air directly. Captain, if you could take us into
orbit? I can answer any questions you might have?"

The talk was educational, and
Jan, one of his chosen media crew, was busy taking questions directly from
Harmony and Austra. Oddly enough there was one from King Richard, too.

Jan, who had blue and purple
hair, as well as a Saturn logo like Tomas had, read the words from her hand
excitedly.

"Oh! This is special then!
King Richard of Noram asks, are there any plans to put a city here soon?"

The man knew the answer, but it
was the kind of thing you did to help a friend, asking a question you knew they
were ready for.

Karina nodded, seeming regal as
she spoke.

"We have a new type of
underground city to test for that. Ones created by Builder Alyssa Baker. We
also have other magical support from Harmony and Earth on the effort. We'll be
looking for the first settlers there inside a year. Sooner, most likely. Like
Harmony we're accepting applications from everywhere."

Dareg tilted his head, and not
trying to be a jerk, asked a question that got more attention that he would
have considered at first.

"Does that include
aliens?" There were three fleets coming after all, and they had near the
amount of people that Earth did, if not more. Some of them were very different
creatures, too.

Karina smiled as the others
laughed.

"If they're friendly?
Yes
.
That's a good plan. We'll start out with an open arms policy. Anyone that is
willing to work and follow the rules there can come and stay. I think we should
set the city at the northern pole. The radiation levels are a little lower
there, though it's cooler all the time."

That actually started a debate,
and a demand that he move over the place so the scientists could see if for
themselves. Dareg did one better, actually setting down. The landscape was
open, and rocky in places, but not nearly as red as he would have figured. In
fact, parts of it were a silvery green. Enough so that he didn't go all the way
down, just hovering about fifteen feet up.

Tomas, and the vain annoying man
that had the same job, Grant Bugler, both practically jumped onto the front window.
Tomas pointed excitedly out of it, while Grant tried to get in front of a
camera.

"We're on Mars! On the
surface of another world! This is a monumental day, ladies and gentlemen!
Austra has come to Mars!"

Karina nodded, but didn't ruin
the moment. Grant got to do that.

"This is Grant Bugler, for
Channel Seventeen Lima. Reporting from the surface of Mars. We have with us
Queen Karina of Mars..." He tried to wave the camera around, but Nimbus,
who had a new tattoo as well, was at the controls and was busy looking out the
shield window, getting the important footage.

Tenet spoke, his voice pleasant.

"The Revered One of Mars.
Revered Ones aren't allowed to take direct control like that. We have rules.
That means the positions of leadership are still open here."

Doctor Grainger pressed toward
the window, to take his own readings, along with ten others, some of whom
looked nearly panicked. There was a bit of yelling, and finally the older,
stout looking, man turned to him.

"Can we get some of the
equipment outside? Even ten minutes of readings would be incredible."

Dareg looked at Karina, who
glanced around at everyone.

"That should be fine. Float
above the ground however? I don't want the lichen to be crushed. It's growing
nicely, isn't it?"

That took a while and not
everyone got to go. It was Tenet and Karina, along with Lenn the crewman, that
did the outside work. They were the ones that knew how to use the shields well
enough to float around properly, as well as set up airlocks that didn't waste
too much air. All of the scientists seemed fine with that part of things, oddly
enough.

For his part Dare felt a little
jealous, since it would have been interesting to get out. His job required him
to stay with the ship however.

They stayed out for an hour, getting
readings on devices that were reported via camera to the whole world all at
once. It was the only way to get the information back home instantly. That
meant sharing it all, but other than some grousing about papers to be written,
no one complained that much.