Night had fallen, and the fires had burned low.

It was low enough that the flames had turned to an angry red, barely reaching past their own kindling.

A log was thrown on, sending up a shower of sparks, but it would take time to catch.

Around the fire, the men sat.

The !Xomyi had painted themselves with red ochre already, but Brooks had not. He did not know he should, it had not even occurred to him.

They left a gap in the circle, large enough for him to sit. He did so, settling in cross-legged, Tracker on one side of him and Diver on the other.

Knows the World came up. He was dressed in his full panoply, with feathers coming from his head, hanging from his wings, his body painted fully. Not just red, but whites and yellows as well, turning him from a simple !Xomyi to something like out of a fantasy.

"Tonight you hunt," Knows the World said. "Not for meat, but to ease the spirits, to honor our dead. To kill our enemy."

In the darkness behind the ring, some of the women appeared. They, too, were painted, all in white. They said nothing, but held simple drums. They began to pound onto them a beat. It was simple, but when combined, it resonated with the ground, adding an unworldly feeling to the proceedings.

It is unworldly, Brooks thought. I am far from Earth.

Knows the World said no more, but raised a bowl, sprinkling something into it. Then, taking a glowing branch from the fire, he lit it and began to dance around the fire, chanting. He came near Brooks, who watched the shaman move with an energy far younger than his years, until he had made a full revolution.

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He offered the bowl to Fast of Wing, as the drums beat their tattoo to a new, faster tempo.

"What is in the bowl?" Brooks asked Tracker quietly, his voice nearly lost in the sound of the drums.

"Hua!i," Tracker told him simply.

Which did not clear it up for him. But he saw the bowl passed again, and saw the smoke rising from it. The one who held it now, Good Hunter, breathed in deeply of the smoke, tilting his head back.

A drug!

Brooks had never taken anything like this. Such things had been extinct among humanity in the Union for centuries. At the fringes they used things like slapshots, but he had never been tempted.

"Y," he said, not spreading his voice to the others. "What is this?"

The drone appeared. The !Xomyi at the circle looked up to it, watching it for a moment, but saying nothing.

"Scanning," the drone said, its voice neutral, not the doctor. But a moment later, Y's voice took over.

"Captain, this is a common narcotic used by many !Xomyi peoples across this region and even beyond. It is not dangerous per se, and has only a mild effect upon them. However, humans react more strongly to it, even having hallucinations. I highly recommend declining or limiting your exposure."

The bowl was passed to Tracker, who breathed it in.

"Would a small inhalation hurt me?" he asked Y.

"Hurt? No. But your mind will become impaired. Others have attempted, and their behavior-"

Tracker offered him the bowl. He hesitated.

"It must be so," Tracker told him. His voice had a strange distance to it. Brooks realized that it wasn't just the bowl that had the hallucinogenic drug in it; it had been thrown onto the fire. The smoke had been reaching him for several minutes, and now he could detect the same slightly sweet smell in it that came from the bowl.

It's affecting me, he thought. He had the bowl in his hands now, though he did not remember taking it.

"Captain, are you going to-" Y started.

He did.