Stone grasped the spear, it felt light but had a substance to it, he did not worry about breaking it. He then observed the cloth house, it was impossible to imagine such a flimsy structure holding form in a storm. It would be nice for shade in this miserable heat.
"Yes the tent!" said Henry. "The tent is an ancient relic, using fabrics and other fibers we have only begun to replicate, the greatest part is the floor" said Henry as he happily strode into the tent.
"The floor acts like a heat battery, it keeps the tent warm when it's cold and cold when it's hot. This process works even in the worst of blizzards!" Stone heard all he needed, and ripped open the door, almost immediately falling to the floor.
Henry cringed as the zippered door was torn to shreds. He then saw Stone fast asleep on the floor.
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"Sara!" he shouted.
"What?" screamed back a bitter Sara. For some reason she was upset. Henry had thumb printed a significant number of covenants demanding that he cease and desist from interrogating his colleagues, so he couldn’t dare find out why she was upset.
"Can you take Stone's temperature and compare it to our first diagnostic of him?" There was no reply from Sara, but he did hear footsteps.
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Keylin could not believe how strong the tent was. In this gravity, bouncing off the walls was difficult, but she tried anyway. The tent held frame perfectly. There was enough room on the second floor for everyone to sleep but stone. Had there been tents like these on Luna, and hung them on the ceiling, more refugees could have been saved. Keylin tried not to think too much on that. Yearning for a decent distraction from that mental downer, she heard a new youthful feminine voice beautifully disrespect Henry. Keylin bonded with the owner of the voice immediately. Their friendship would be would endure the eternities. She couldn't wait to meet her and jumped out the window.
"Hello friend, My name is Keylin, it is GREAT to meet you!" Said Keylin. Sara looked at the stretched out hand in front of her. Had Sara been in her true body, the Lunarian would have been a foot or so shorter than her, but in this disgusting body Sara was only taller by an inch or two. The girl, Keylin, was blocking the medical kit, so she walked around the girl. Keylin turned in place holding posture and smile while trying to maintain eye contact as Sara as she walked past, it was creepy. This Luddite gear and supply was insisted upon by Henry. He wanted the Lunarians to have unreliable ideas of their technology.
"Sara?" inquired Henry.
"What!?" She yelled back bitterly.
"We might need a cold pack and some fluids too" That didn't sound good. Stone did not budge from that spot on the floor for a solid twenty five hours. The second day he barely managed to stand and use the bathroom once. The third he was awake sometimes but didn't move. Sara had to endure Keylin's constant companionship while changing the damp cloths on Stone's forehead. The first night, Sara was forced to hide a med patch underneath Stone's forearm bracer. It delivered a wide variety of vaccines and antibiotics. The patch itself would dissolve in a few days, likely Stone would never know, but more importantly neither would Trestle and Keylin. That was important to Henry and the other decision makers, but to Sara, she doubted the importance. The Lunarian technologies were so fundamentally different that even if the girls saw it, they couldn't replicate it. Not in any meaningful way at least.
Sara acted as Stone's caretaker, providing food he didn't eat and helping him hobble around on the third day. Her golem was set up to be more sturdy than average, at the insistence of Henry. While Sara got to maintain some of her beauty, she still had to endure being nearly a foot thicker and wildly shorter.
The worst part was being inside an abomination, an independent golem. She was fully inside, no robes or other safeguards. If she died in this body, it was for good. On the flipside the likelihood of death was practically zero, how does one kill a rock? Sara did her best to not think of the more disgusting aspects of the Golem, and failed miserably. Intentionally not thinking about something, was the same as thinking about it apparently. For Sara, it was the ghost memories that sickened her. The life the Golem had during the centuries of radiation, war, and bloodshed. The memories would slip in at random times, like when she removed a near boiling hot rag on Stone's head, she remembered doing the same centuries before, but the rag took the skin with it when it was taken. Sara shuddered.
Stone was the only not terrible aspect of the mission in Sara's eyes. Keylin asked a million questions and would appear and disappear ad nauseam, Tresille always arrived with fresh water and food for Stone but never said anything, which was almost more annoying. Tresille spent all of her free time with the cat. Henry practiced flying the hang gliders and was in the air most of the time. At night he was studying anything in the restricted databases about flight. Stone was a silent gentle giant. When conscious he was polite and kind, always saying please and thank you. One time Stone when he was barely awake, he took her hand, squeezed it gently and fell asleep. She figured it was meant as a thank you and was possibly the most endearing experience she’s ever had, if only she could get her hand free. Sara was stuck there for four hours.
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Day three and Stone was hobbling around but barely eating. Despite his claim that the wings were new, they moved so naturally on him. When he was initially scanned, they found the wings had integrated deeply into his spine. There was no possibility of removal. Whatever technologies her people had achieved, paled in comparison to such a relic. She couldn't help but feel anger toward the ancient ancestors, who had so much wondrous knowledge, yet only used it for war. Regardless Sara found herself wanting to spend all her time with Stone.
"So are you in love with Stone?" asked Keylin. The first time Sara heard that question, she stumbled over her words, which sent Keylin off in a frenzy dancing around singing ridiculous songs. Honestly the idea never occurred to Sara until Keylin said something, but the thought was like a rue set to simmer. This time, when Keylin asked, Sara decided to change the game, fortunately Stone was fast asleep.
"Yes" Said Sara as confidently as possible. Magically this seemed to take the wind out of Keylin's sails.
"Ch" was all Keylin could muster. Was she sulking? The tent rumbled in the wind, Henry must be doing low passes again. It was fortunate that the hang gliders were so sturdy, some of Henry's low passes were too low.
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Henry felt quite confident in his flying. The rush was addictive, how was it that the mountain people gave it up? The problem now was weight and endurance, despite the theoretical travel distance of a glider, reality kept him at a max of fifteen minutes. Stone's fever was fortunate, it had given Henry time to realize he needed powered flight. Henry had begun to see the museum storage as a menu. The hang gliders were from the restricted reserve selection, powered flight was almost out of the question, but he read something about an ultralight, a hang glider with an engine on it. The museum had only drawings, but with his carte blanche procurement powers, he figured the engineers could rig something up in a few hours. Looking at Stone, it would be one more day anyway. At dinner, he placed the order.
Tresille enjoyed the few days as a good breather, she did her best to divide time between ensuring Stone wasn't being experimented on and her cat Hephaestus. After what Henry put her through, Tresille had every belief that this whole trip was just a big experiment. Probably some strange interrogation technique. She did her best to make Henry think Lunarian technology was metal and electricity based, their crashed ship helped. Lunarians had moved beyond electricity and metal centuries ago. Everything now was biotic. The first living starships were only a decade or two away from maturation, they could have returned to earth or left for good had the mother tree survived. There was only one option now, it was a little too early to come back, the plan was to wait until all the radioactive zones were eliminated, but even in death the mother tree forced the decisions. It also ruined their starship plans, those had to be scrapped for the return.
Based on off handed comments by Henry, Tresille was convinced these groundlings had met Lunarians before. Was groundling an acceptable term? Trestle brought in some fresh water for Stone. As usual Sara was attending him, and probably sneaking more experiments on him, like the patch under his forearm band. It was time to break the silence.
"What do you call your people?" asked Tresille.
"My people?" asked Sara.
"Yes, l call my people Lunarians, since we have lived on Luna for so long, I have taken to calling your people 'groundlings'”
"I don't like that name" Said Sara flatly.
"l didn't think you would" Replied Tresille.
"So why use it?"
"Look, that's why I’m asking you so that I can refer to you properly"
"You can refer to me as Ms. Word maker" Said Sara. Tresille rolled her eyes.
"Not you-you, but all of you, the name for all of your people" Said Tresille.
“I’m not at liberty to speak for my people, I thought you would know that by now" Sara retorted
"Fine, groundlings it is" Said Tresille.
"But l said l don't like that"
"And l nicely asked you to suggest something better"
"That is your nice voice? No wonder you are single" retorted Sara
"What is that supposed to mean? How do you know I’m single?”
"It means your nice voice leaves a lot of room for improvement, and you are single because you act like it. You have a partner that you hardly speak to and when you do its business only. I would wager that the closest thing to human contact you have had in recent years was when Stone carried you."
"First of all, you have no business speculating on my personal affairs. Second, don’t think I haven't noticed you swooning for Stone here. If you are falling for him like this then you must be in some terrible relationships with your other groundlings"
This conversation did not go as planned, and Tresille did not care. Sara's words cut deep and the only choice was to respond in kind. It did give her some satisfaction to see Sara turn beet red with rage.
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The conversation was not going as planned. Sara was being obstinate for a few reasons, but Tresille' s words were painfully accurate. But Tresille was constantly acting high and mighty, it was time for the wisp of a girl to have some sense knocked into her. Those were the thoughts that were shoved aside in Sara's brain as her rage burned. Tresille didn’t react in time as Sara lunged. Only Stone's meaty hands prevented Tresille and Sara from resolving their differences with their fists. Despite being held back, both girls tried to fight, reaching out wildly. Stone picked both girls up, carrying them one in each arm, and walked out of the tent.
"Fighting like this on the mountain will kill you" said Stone. "On the mountain, we have a way for the little children to stop being stupid". Stone put the two girls down, back to back, he then tied the two girls together at the waist. "Now you must work together for the next week". New common enemy in sight, the two girls protested and tried to move closer to Stone. They tripped over each other's feet and fell to the ground. Stone's bellowing laugh drew the attention of Henry and Keylin.
"What kind of game is this?" asked Keylin. "Can I play too?"
"This is not a game, this is punishment for fighting stupidly, the game version needs two sticks and a flat stone" Said Stone
"My two best friends were fighting? I can't believe I missed it"
"Well this will make the trip more interesting. One week you say?" said Henry. Stone nodded. "Very well, good luck you two, Stone looks a lot better, we leave in the morning"