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Dawn on the last day came, without much brightening at all. The sky only grew more ominous as it grew lighter, the angry red peering through the clouds upsetting the !A!amo greatly.
“If only I could see the blue sky again,” Tracker confided in him. “I would feel much better.”
Occasionally, Brooks got errors in his system; attempts by the Craton to punch through the interference from above. But no good signal could be found.
They calmed the !A!amo as best they could, but most important of all was to keep moving. They’d stolen an extra few hours marching by eating on the move and resting only a few hours. The resiliency of the !A!amo in the face of this continued to impress him.
“I would be afraid of predators,” Tracker told to Brooks in the night. “But they, too, seem to know that things are not right. Nothing is about.”
It was true; there were no birds singing, no animals calling. The only sound was the wind, and when it died down, a dull, distant roar.
Fires, Brooks thought. Fires were burning, perhaps only a few dozen kilometers away, so powerful that they were creating gusting winds.
Rain began to fall, and it was Picky Little One who noticed first.
“It burns,” she said.
Brooks held up a hand, letting a drop that made it through the canopy strike his palm.
It did sting.
Acid rain, he realized. All of the dust being thrown up, or coming down from above, perhaps even the smoke from the fires, was reacting in the water and turning it acidic.
“It stings,” he agreed. “But it will not hurt us. Hold a leaf over your head,” he added kindly, plucking one such leaf and passing it to her.
The young child put it over her head, dwarfed by the huge frond. Brooks smiled fondly to her, and she ran to the other children, who all began flitting about, gathering leaves to hand to their parents and clan-mates.
Brooks took another, and brought it over to Knows the World. He noticed as he went that the living plants were folding their leaves to protect from the onslaught.
The wise man had been quiet since they had started their journey. There was something in him that seemed broken by all that had occurred. He was pressing on, but Brooks was concerned about him.
“The world is ending,” Knows the World said. “The world is ending.” It seemed almost a mantra to him, and Brooks could not contradict it; it was true.
“You are not going to end with it,” Brooks told him.
Knows the World smiled at him, as if he knew a secret. “Am I not? I know this world. If it ends, what do I know? What am I?”
“Alive,” Brooks told him. “There are other worlds to know.”
Knows the World did not reply to him for a time. But then he asked; “Are they many? These other worlds?”
“Many,” Brooks promised him. “Some are much like here. Others are so strange that one can barely believe they are real.”
Knows the World nodded, taking it in. He seemed cheered, slightly, but then said; “I fear I am too old to come to know a new world. I have wondered if I should stay and die with my home.”
It stabbed Brooks in the heart; he cared for the old man. Yet this sentiment was one that he had heard was common among !Xomyi who had come to understand what was happening.
Though, he did wonder just how much it could really be imparted. They had never known another world; the universe beyond their land was alien, a complete unknown. He could know there were other worlds, he could be shown or told of them, know that he would have a place on them. But Brooks did not know how someone who had only known this could truly come to understand it in so short a time.
“You are still needed by your people,” Brooks told him. “You still have purpose. And you deserve good things, my friend.”
Knows the World was quiet again for a time. Finally, he admitted it; “I am frightened,” he said, bemused. “I have never been afraid like I am now. I am afraid that tomorrow we !A!amo will all be gone, and there will be none to remember us.” He laughed. “But if such comes to pass, there will be no one left to know my shame. We will be just dust.”
Brooks did not know what to say to that. He only offered the man a comforting touch on his shoulder.
They marched on. The hours passed, and Brooks could count the distance down, his anxiety growing the closer they came. It was hardest just before the end.
He knew every step, the launch shuttle was there.
But he’d been wrestling with the last surprise he would have to spring on the !A!amo.
Liftoff was immensely stressful and frightening for the most prepared people. For the !Xomyi, it would be beyond terrifying. The weight of your own body crushing you could cause panic, and beings could easily hurt themselves or others.
The safest way for them would for them to be asleep. It was not an option, he would have to do it. But he did not want to hurt their trust.
“Knows the World,” he began. They were only a kilometer out from the shuttle now. He could catch glimpses of it through the trees. “Once we arrive . . .”
He did not finish his sentence, as the land around them suddenly went wild. His eyes saw it coming, through the trees, yet his mind could not make sense of it until it was upon them.
The ground was heaving. It moved, like a liquid.
Shock caused him to blank out the first moment; he found himself thrown to the ground, a ground which was still shaking harder than anything he had ever felt.
“Impact quake!” he heard Kai yelling in his ear. But he could barely hear the words even then.
The screams of !Xomyi, and worse, the sound of the planet itself, groaning from the tremendous energy, drowned out nearly all else.
He rolled, seeing that above his head, the tops of the massive trees were crashing into each other, knocking branches loose. He threw up his arms, enormous limbs coming crashing down.
There was a scream from the ground below them, as a rent opened, pulling down boulders and even the towering trees. It appeared massive, and he clawed at the ground to pull himself away before realizing it was not even that close; it was simply that big.
The ground shook more as some of the massive trees came down, but most of them remained upright, still hitting into each other and sending down showers of debris. A piece hit his arm, the pain blinding him for a moment.
The shaking gradually subsided. Brooks raised his head, looking around. In the wake of the shockwave, it was nearly silent.
“Is everyone okay?” he yelled, then realized that his face mask had slipped a bit, his words untranslated. He adjusted it and yelled again.
The !A!amo began to call out to him and each other, and he stumbled back among the group.
The ground itself felt different, like the shake-up had changed its shape.
A part of him cursed the lie of apparent stability of a planetary surface, longing for a ship where stability was a factor of design and control rather than the result of immense forces of physics.
There were a few injuries, among them his arm, which was already bruising, but did not seem to be broken.
“Kai,” he said over his radio. It took a moment for her to reply, and her voice was crackling.
“System damaged,” she said. “Can you hear me?”
“Yes,” he said. “Are you hurt?”
“Not hurt,” she replied. “But have a situation here.”
Brooks looked back towards Knows the World.
“Keep going,” he told the !A!amo. “Stop at the base of the tall white rock and wait. I will see to the problem.”
He ran back, Kai coming from the rear to meet him.
“One of the children is missing,” Kai said quickly. “Picky Little One.”
Brooks nodded, his mind racing. “Go on ahead and get them to the shuttle. I’ll help look for the girl.”
Kai went on ahead, and Brooks moved towards the rear, jumping over the scarred land. He saw that a number of the !A!amo were already starting to spread out, searching.
“Go,” Brooks told them. “Follow Knows the World! I will search!”
Tracker came up to him, grabbing his leg. “We must find her! Gift Giver, please, call on your spirits! You must use them to find her!”
Brooks hated to play into the supernatural, but he knew that Tracker was right.
Their drones were down to just a handful; they had to regularly recharge, and that equipment had been left behind at camp. They’d kept a handful going at all times during the trip, just letting them fall when they ran out of power, and sending out a new set.
They were down to their last few; just a pittance of the swarm he’d had to start with.
“Do you have any idea what direction she might be?” he asked.
Tracker gestured in the negative, and Young Mother called out for him. He ran off towards her, calling out to his daughter. Where she had gone, trees had crashed down.
Brooks spread out the drones in a search pattern, but his stomach was clenched. Picky Little one was so small, the drones so few, and the lay of the land complicated and changed . . .
They had only minutes of power, their sub-systems already starting to go into standby. Each search ping was more time off their lifespan.
He went out as well, wading through the large, mushroom-like undergrowth.
“Little One!” he called, cupping his hands. “Call out if you hear me, child!”
Her parents were likewise calling, and the three of them were spreading out wider, growing ever further from the shuttle, and hope of safety.
The drones were finding nothing, not even animals. Everything, it seemed, was hiding in its burrow or nest. The acidic rain still fell, but lighter than earlier, and his exposed skin felt numb where it had been landing on him.
One by one the drones were falling. First one, then in twos. Then in groups of three and four, until none were left. And still nothing.
“Captain,” Kai called. “We’re at the shuttle.”
“Is it intact?”
“It’s fine,” she said brusquely. “The platform is built for hard jolts like that. The ship itself takes the same stresses in liftoff and flight. I’m just telling you that I’m going to start getting the !A!amo aboard.”
“Good,” he called back. “Go ahead.”
“How long are you going to keep searching?” she asked. “Our window is getting tight.”
“I don’t know,” he said. “If you think it’s closing, leave. Don’t wait for me.”
“That’s stupid, Captain,” Kai’s voice came back. It was cold and clinical. “This isn’t a time for that. Get back here.”
He flinched, knowing she was right. He was not thinking like an officer, and she knew better than anyone that sometimes there were unthinkable losses in response and rescue.
How could he argue?
“Five more minutes,” he said. His voice, he realized, was plaintive.
This was a child they were looking for.
Kai had not yet responded when he heard the yell. It was Tracker.
Brooks could not understand the words, his system did not catch them or they were not articulate enough.
He spoke again to Kai. “I think we have her,” he said shortly.
“I’ll start boarding,” Kai said. “Five minutes, Captain.”
He rushed towards the sound of the voice. There were no more calls, even as he called out to his friend. But he began to hear the keening, and he knew.
Stumbling at the sound and realization, he was drawn closer, unable to stop himself even if he had wanted to.
There. At the base of a tree, two people were huddled over something small and unmoving.
Brooks skidded to a stop. His legs refused to work for him for a moment, and he had to force himself to move.
“Tracker?” he said softly. The only other noise now was the soft pitter-patter of the acid rain on the curled leaves of plants.
Tracker said nothing, but raised his head – not to look at Brooks, but to let out a long wail. It started quietly and rose louder. Young Mother shook with sobs.
He came closer, and saw Picky Little One, her head twisted to one side in a way that was not right. Her bright eyes were open but looked at nothing, and everything that had been her was gone.
He looked up the tree, saw how its near side was cleared of limbs; the branches must have been broken off in the shaking and come crashing down around the child.
She must have run to the tree thinking it would be safe. Why had she left her parent’s side? He did not really know, and he never would.
He came closer, kneeling behind the two parents.
A counter in his HUD told him that their moments were slipping away.
“I am sorry,” he said softly.
Tracker lowered his head, his cry dying off and he too wracked with sobs. Young Mother did not look up, her arms out, and she slowly picked up Little One, pulling her close, cradling her head as it started to fall.
“We do not have much time,” Brooks said. “We must go. Bring her.”
Tracker keened again, and Young Mother joined him, both of them crying out to their dying world, their world having already died.
“Please,” Brooks said.
They ignored him still, and he started to feel fear welling up inside. Picky Little One had been the sweetest of children, and her loss was something unimaginable. He did not want to think that he would lose Tracker, his closest friend among the !A!amo, too.
“Please,” he repeated emphatically, reaching out to touch Tracker’s arm. “Hakki.” The word came to him without thinking. It was the due of their friendship that his friend be alive, wasn’t it?
The word made Tracker shiver with struggle, but it came out in a flash of fury.
Tracker lashed out at him, his flint-blade knife slashing just where Brooks’s arm had been.
It had been an uncontrolled move, but the !Xomyi caught himself, slowing his attack at the last moment – the only reason Brooks was able to pull his arm back in time.
“Go,” Tracker said, his voice heavy. “Remember that you are my friend, Gift Giver True Striker. But I am bound to the world, and not the sky. Hakki. You must let me have my sorrow.”
Young Mother was singing now, her words translated eerily in Brooks’s ears.
“Sleep now my dear child
Who never knew the taste of honey
Sleep alone in the cold ground
But know that soon I will join you.”
Brooks turned, running towards the shuttle, and heard Tracker join in, with his own verse.
“Sleep now my dear child
Your father feels only pride in you
Do not be afraid that you will be alone
Know that soon I will join you.”
Brooks ran as he fast as he could, but he could not outrace the pain in his chest.
< Ep 12 part 67 | Ep 12 part 69 >
Other Terrestrial 
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