The Touchstone Trilogy (47 page)

The walls inside the site glowed: the same sort of glow made in Pandora during moonfall, but with no free-flowing aether.  It meant we didn't have to worry about lights, at least.  Fourth and 'Squad One' split into their respective teams, and worked their way along a main central passage, moving apart to follow side-corridors and enter rooms, and then joining up again.  One thing they found out almost immediately was that the ramps down were sealed like the entrances, and when we met a longer connecting passageway on this level, it was also sealed.  So we've only gained access to one third of the top level.

It was a town, not a tomb.  I've no idea why any of the old Muinans would want to live underground – the issue of ventilation alone would be enough to make it less than ideal – but every room we looked in seemed to be living quarters, except for occasional ones which were water sources or gathering areas.  Nothing leapt out at us and there were no traps.  The communication platform was in the room at the end of the long 'spoke' passage and after a tedious amount of back and forth discussion they had Sonn try to use the platform to deactivate the seals.  Didn't work, did produce an ecstatic Ddura, but fortunately going back outside was next on our schedule.

The technology group spent the afternoon constructing another machine around the entrance to North Mountain, while the archaeologists broke into two teams: one painstakingly untangling the human wreckage just within the entrance, and the other working on the nearest of the rooms.  The archaeologists are so tremendously excited.  It's not that everything was perfectly preserved or anything, but there had been very few places at Pandora and Nurioth which hadn't been exposed to wind and rain and been pulled about by animals.  And, of course, it's working old Lantaren technology.  I don't know if this is the big break we need to fix the spaces, but it's the first major find since Tare gained 'security clearance'.

My Ddura-headache wasn't too bad, but I was feeling tired as well, so I was glad when Ruuel sent us back to the
Diodel
.  Squad One is sleeping on the
Litara
, which is staying for the night.  Most of the expedition is sleeping in the tent city, but while the Taren Setari are more accustomed to being outside because they're trained to go into the spaces, the Sight talents especially find it difficult to sleep without the shielding on our pods or their rooms back on Tare.  Combat Sight reacts to people coming near them, for a start.

Ruuel was absent, as he often is during meals, and I had a feeling Fourth Squad would probably talk about Squad One if I wasn't there, so I headed for a shower and bed straight after dinner.

I was sitting sideways on my pod seat braiding my hair when Ruuel showed up from wherever he'd been.  "Devlin.  Have you seen the cat Ionoth since the infirmary?"

This wasn't a question I wanted to answer.  But it also seemed weird for him to suddenly bring it up.  I blinked, then guessed why he was asking.  "You've been warning Kolaren captain about silly things I might do that he has to watch out for?"

"Yes."  Very straightforward, very typical.  "You've sighted it, I take it?  Report it next time."

If there's ever a time I really do need to lie to Ruuel, I'm going to have no chance at all.  And I didn't think I could just pretend I was going to do what he said, either.  "I do most things told to because either make sense to me, or don't see any choice.  Ghost I handed over once, so tests could be run, but not going to do again."

Other than a couple of fits of temper I've had with the medics, I think that was the first time I've refused to do what I was told since I was rescued – and Ruuel is really the last person I want to say no to.  I felt pretty nervous about his reaction, but he just looked steadily at me a moment, then said: "And if it proves less innocuous than you believe?  You will not be able to undo any damage it causes."

"Just because she not turn into evil, people-eating kitten in the past not mean she won't one day?  May as well lock me back up in case I decide run around stab people."

"The cat has a better chance of landing a blow," he said, totally straight-faced, and shook his head, apparently deciding it wasn't worth pressing the point.  "Get some rest."

I felt like telling him to practice what he preached, since the shadows under his eyes were worse than ever, but I was too disconcerted by more evidence of a sense of humour (or, just possibly, proof that he is totally bereft of one and is saying these things without a shred of irony).  Besides, he was already walking away.

I'm finding I like waking up a lot earlier than everyone else, not least because it gives me a chance to write up the day in this diary without anyone looking at me curiously, but today I wish I'd stayed in the dream I was having.  I was lying curled up with Ruuel, not talking or doing anything, just curled up in a dark, quiet place listening to him breathe, to his heart beating.  It was an uneventful but intense dream, and incredibly real.  When I woke up I felt so content, so happy, I wanted to go straight back to sleep.

Must find cure for besotted goopiness.

Sweat

Each of the main entrances are open now, and each third was very much the same inside.  Corpses just inside the seal, and then living quarters beyond.  We haven't found anything which was obviously controlling the seal, and won't be opening any more levels until more machine parts arrive.  The technicians weren't expecting to have to build dozens of the things.  The
Litara
's gone off to fetch that and other construction-related items, as they've begun the first stages of building the settlement, which is going to be called Arenrhon after some Taren historical figure.

Ruuel decided his squad was getting out of shape and started them on an evil training regimen.  Being in good physical condition lessens the strain of using their talents, and these constantly 'on-mission' days without their usual training facilities means Fourth haven't had much opportunity for strength training.  So they did lots of jogging and chin lifts and things like that.  And since I'm assigned to Fourth, I got to do it as well, except – thankfully – only about a quarter of what Ruuel put everyone else through.  That still nearly killed me.

It was bearable, though.  Things I could obviously not do – like chin lifts – he didn't make me stick at, and had me do milder versions instead.  I didn't enjoy the day, but I got through it, and Fourth Squad were good at not making me feel embarrassed about being comparatively pathetic. 

Friday, April 11

It's all a question of angles

Today I taught a handful of greensuits and greysuits and three Setari squads how to skip stones.  I was waiting around for Fourth to come back from their longer-than-mine training run, and since it was a very still day and this lakeshore is even pebblier than Pandora's, I entertained myself by collecting a bunch of stones and seeing if I could best my record (seven skips).

My arms were tired from push-ups, though, and the best I could manage was four skips, and was looking around for more stones when I realised I had a small audience: two greensuits and a greysuit looking immensely puzzled.  Their question – "But, how?" – says something about how different their planets are from Earth.  Kolar isn't entirely desert, but it's a dry world and most of its water is in underground Springs, while Tare is all massively violent oceans.  By the time Fourth got back I had most of Squad One and two from Ninth lined up in a row.

Ruuel let Fourth have a break to play around, but didn't try himself, going off to be captainly.  Glade easily beat my own record, and asked what the maximum was people could do on Earth, but I didn't know.  I think when he taught me Dad said something about people doing over thirty skips, but that always seemed a bit much to be right.  Par Auron took the record today – eight skips.  At least half the Setari could skip better than me on their second or third try.  They're just good at physical tasks, not to mention strong.

Then it was more exercise: stretches and lifting big water containers Ruuel had borrowed from the greensuits.  Fortunately we're doing all this training in a clearing a little north of the tents, so I didn't have to deal with an audience.  I think every muscle I have is sore. 

Saturday, April 12

Museum exhibit

Uneventful day.  You'd think exploring lost alien underground cities would be more dramatic, but going through the second level of the installation, which required another three machines to hold open the entrances, was very much a repetition of the first level.  More living quarters, larger ones.  Fewer bodies.  Wood well-preserved, metal tarnished, cloth fragile.  Not much writing.  The Lantaren caste of the Muinans did use a written language, but non-Lantarens apparently weren't literate.  Other than a couple of inscriptions on pots and statues (possibly the names of people – the alphabet has mutated a fair deal and I can only half read it), I didn't spot anything written down.  Definitely no library, or manual of instructions, or super-secret plans.  No field projector we could turn off, either.

One thing all this has made clear to me is I would not have made a good archaeologist.  I don't have nearly the patience for it.  I concentrated on my school work during the waiting about, and watched a handful of greensuits who seem to have fallen in love with stone skipping.  And tried not to look at the smooth white scar of the new settlement.  I don't like to think too much about the impact I've had on this world. 

Sunday, April 13

Large and loud

This morning Fourth Squad and I went into near-space, trying to work our way down to the lowest levels of the installation through the gaps in the walls that only exist in near-space.  But the aether shield exists there as well, and though we did go down to the second level through the holes the machines were maintaining, we couldn't find any way through to the lower levels.

And the Ddura came and looked at us while we were there, which was really disconcerting.  It's just like a humungous cloud of coloured light, and felt like tingly ice crystals on my face.  And was tremendously happy about the Setari, who all could hear it in near-space.  It Hhhaaaa'd enough that even Ruuel couldn't hide how much he wished it would shut up.  The greysuits were tremendously interested in the data we brought back about the Ddura, and Fourth Squad all went and lay down for a while.  The technology group is growing concerned about having so many of the field-disrupting machines operating together and is going to undo a few of them and open a single path downward in only the first of the thirds.  Lots of standing about guarding them while they do that for the Setari.

I stuck with the lying down. 

Monday, April 14

Worship

The third level of the installation seems to be some kind of church.  Maybe.  It was empty of anything resembling furniture, just had carved images of the same woman all over the walls, and mosaics all over the floors.  Everywhere the same beautiful, idealised woman, with rivers flowing from her tears, and animals (pippins!) hiding in the folds of her skirts, and forests unwinding from her long flowing hair.

Fourth Squad went very expressionless when looking through this area, and no-one is entirely certain if this is meant to represent their world mother-goddess.  There are three entrances to the facility, and the faces above each entrance look different.  This woman matches the face above the door for this third, so everyone is wondering, if this is Muina, who are the other two faces meant to be?

Since the levels have been decreasing in size, they'd been expecting to clear down to the lowest level today, but they don't seem to be able to get their machine to work on the next shield.  After spending the entire afternoon standing around watching them not be able to figure out how to get through, Ruuel decided his squad could do with some close-combat training to get the kinks out.  This unfortunately included me, with Sonn as my partner.  But though she gave me a heck of a bruise on my leg because she expected me to have some faint ability to dodge, Sonn was otherwise a methodical and practical teacher.

Squad One joined in after a while.  They haven't all magically stopped resenting Tarens, but they've decided Fourth Squad are decent enough at their jobs and not to blame for a few decades of interplanetary politics.  Or, more importantly, Fourth Squad don't act like they think Kolaren Setari aren't as good as Taren Setari, and so Squad One don't constantly have their hackles up.

That didn't mean both squads weren't interested in how they measured up to each other at close combat.  Particularly Katzyen (her first name is Meral).  And Fourth Squad is after all still human and took the matches seriously.  Neither squad seemed definitively better.  As he usually does, Ruuel was instructing rather than participating – I think he avoids competitive situations – but I wasn't at all surprised when Katzyen asked him to spar with her.

He agreed matter-of-factly, since it was one thing to avoid competition and another to put her back up by treating her as no competition at all.  I doubt he wants too many Kajals obsessing over him.  In a way he got that anyway, though not in a hostile way.  After countering and avoiding Katzyen's attacks for a while, as she pushed to even come near him, he ended the fight with what looked like tidy and untroubled efficiency.  And told her to work on attacks from the left, since she was weaker with those.

She's barely taken her eyes off him since.  Being comprehensively bettered at hand-to-hand combat isn't my idea of a turn-on, but it obviously worked for Katzyen.  I think it might have worked for Diav as well, and a couple of the greensuits who'd been watching from a distance.  Unsurprisingly, Ruuel failed to show any awareness of newly-earned admiration.  His squad all noticed: Glade highly amused, Mori tolerant, Sonn dismissive, Halla distant, and Par just a little pink.