Wayfinder Caravan, Approaching Gemini Point
Planet Irkalla, Survivor’s Refuge
4452.3.9 Interstellar
Ryler closed his eyes and rubbed them. He was more tired than he’d ever been in his life. His back and shoulders ached from the constant hours of sitting in front of the terminals. On top of processing data about the Trials in real time and sending his recommendations back to the local wayfinders, he had less official but more important duties from Nikandros.
The cult saw the Trials as a massive data collection exercise in the experiment they’d been running since they’d fled the Great War. Like Janus, this was Ryler’s first real experience with them. During his assignment observing the Invarians, he’d kept track of the data on the Prime Dome team made available to him each year, of course. It was like having a backstage pass to the greatest sporting event on their world, only with more stats and covert surveillance. Ryler was a voracious learner, even by cult standards, which was why he’d been advanced to the post of librarian so quickly. But he’d never experienced the flood of information he was expected to absorb as part of Nikandros’ retinue. The way the other analysts were able to stay focused and alert hour after hour, day after day, was awe inspiring in its own way, although Ryler found them to be poor conversationalists.
“How are you doing, young man?” Nikandros said cheerfully, dropping into the seat next to him.
“Privileged to be here, elder,” Ryler said with a wry grin.
Nikandros blew a raspberry at him. “You look like something that crawled out of a recycling vat. Have you given thought to what augmentations you’re going to request?”
Being a member of the cult was first and foremost about service to the people of Irkalla and all the remnant of humanity. It did come with some perks, though, in both access to forbidden knowledge and lost technology, which included modifying or replacing parts of his body.
Ryler scrunched up his nose and wiped his face with his hand. “I’ve looked at the specs of a number of implants, from mnemonic devices to hormonal regulators, but it feels a little… premature to make a drastic change, especially if the adaptation would only make me better at one thing.”
He wasn’t sure what Nikandros’s reaction would be. While the sprightly cult architect appeared to be a fairly normal old man, Ryler knew he was far less human than he appeared, and at least halfway into his second century.
“Good man,” Nikandros said to him with a wink. “Delay the augmentation process as long as you can—even longer than you feel comfortable—and choose each piece carefully. Too many young wayfinders rush to cybridize themselves up to the ventilators and then are surprised when all they achieve is to become a calculator with legs.”
The other analysts in the data center looked at Nikandros and Ryler with annoyed expressions on their faces.
Nikandros ignored them. “How is our boy doing?”
Ryler sighed. That was another thing he was getting used to, how personally invasive the cult’s surveillance was. “Good, I think? It’s been nine days since they almost died at Beta Station. Janus and Syn have recovered from their injuries. The four of them are functioning well together. They’ve averaged eleven hundred kilometers a night.”
Nikandros whistled. “That’s impressive. They must be what, four days ahead of schedule now?”
“No, actually,” Ryler said. “They’ve been spending more time at each waypoint. An extra day at Tryton Road, and this has been their second day at Gaffer’s Lode. The longest leg of their route is between Gaffer’s Lode and Gemini Station, so I can understand wanting to be prepared.”
“You understand, but you don’t approve?” Nikandros said, raising an eyebrow.
Ryler huffed in frustration. “It’s like he’s working off a checklist lately. He’s optimizing his impact rather than responding to human pain, and he’s holding a press conference afterward to let everyone know about it!”
Nikandros shrugged. “He may have picked up a trick or two from Survivor’s Grace, but that doesn’t make him any less effective, does it?”
Ryler couldn’t argue with that. To strive, to learn, and to adapt were all part of the cult’s core principles.
“What’s really bothering you?” Nikandros pressed.
“I hate that Janus is stuck between factions he doesn’t even know exist. Wayfinder Mayhew was really pushing it, telling him he’d already won when the race is still up in the air,” Ryler said.
Nikandros looked away, and for once, some of his age showed in his expression. “As far as the people of Irkalla are concerned, the cult is a monolithic bloc of belief. Mayhew correctly argued that if Janus were to allow himself to become complacent, he would not be worthy of the title emissary. Do you disagree?”
“No, elder,” Ryler said, although he hated every bit of it. Life was hard enough on Irkalla without ideology putting its finger on the scales.
“Take heart, my young apprentice,” Nikandros said. “Our worthy brothers and sisters of the opposition may lie, cheat, and do even worse sometimes, but it is the Survivor who judges the outcome of the Trials, and the outcome determines the fate of all people, both ours and theirs.”
Ryler nodded.
“Besides,” Nikandros added, “if they’re focused on interfering with his performance, they haven’t figured out what we’re up to. If that were the case, they’d want him dead, not delayed.”
“But they will find out eventually, won’t they? Does it serve the Survivor to waste an emissary like Janus?” Ryler asked.
“We’ll do our best to keep your friend alive,” Nikandros said, seeing through Ryler’s argument. “But if they do kill him, we’ll have them for interfering with the Trials, and that will cost them elsewhere.” The cult architect stood up and patted Ryler’s shoulder. “This is a millennial battle, not a skirmish to be won or lost on the actions of one soldier, young Abraxxis. One thing you’ll learn with age is to make sure that even when you lose, you still win.”
***
Vehicle Bay, Gaffer’s Lode
Planet Irkalla, Survivor’s Refuge
4452.3.9 Interstellar
Janus squinted slightly against the white glare outside the vehicle bay door. The buggies and trailers were loaded, formalities observed, farewells given. He was told the radiation wasn’t as intense up here, because while Irkalla didn’t have a magnetosphere or an atmosphere, it did have dust, and the sun’s rays had to go through more of it this far north.
He didn’t trust it, even though he’d seen the readings. The Gaffrans were sun-mad, installing large bay windows to watch the sunrises and sunsets light up the sky, and Janus had to admit they were beautiful, but the sun was still death to him. He shied away from it instinctively, like he could catch rad sickness just looking at its reflection. It was just as deadly to dusters as the void was, it just killed people more slowly.
“Hey, boss,” Mick said. “We all set?”
“As far as I can tell,” Janus said, turning away from the open bay doors to look at his friend. Mick was an easy guy to get along with. He had no hangups, had a great relationship with his mom, got a little drunk some times but finished the fights that he started. He seemed to enjoy life in a visceral way Janus didn’t understand, like he didn’t have a thought in his head for what tomorrow would bring, and Janus both envied that and knew it wasn’t for him. “You say goodbye to Candy?”
“Boss!” Mick said, looking wounded. “Their names were Lola and Jade. With the amount of work they put in, the least you could do is remember that.”
“I only saw them in passing,” Janus reminded him.
“I know I was pretty drunk but… didn’t I invite you?” Mick said, genuinely worried.
“You did.”
“Oh. Good then. Next time, say yes,” Mick said, punching him in the shoulder to drive home the point.
The next and last leg of their journey took so much of Janus’s attention he didn’t have time for other concerns like drinking, seeing the sights, or getting laid. Mick was insatiable. Syn went out and partied a bit. Even Lira disappeared to “let her hair down” for a while during this stop, although she was considerably more discrete.
And Janus had to admit, Mick’s nightly choices of companions, male or female, were lovely in a carnal way. Janus didn’t think the Hunter even paid for the company, or if he did, he seemed to make no difference between the two.
“What do you think we’ll find out there?” Janus asked him, shifting the conversation to more serious topics.
“Wouldn’t make sense for it to be some sort of doomsday weapon, would it?” Mick asked.
Janus shrugged. “The cult lets people die in Mercuria all the time, and they didn’t bat an eye when Beta Station developed swarms of killer machines. I think if AI had been involved, or they’d been more likely to spread to other settlements, they might have done something.”
“So either insanely dangerous, or something else,” Mick said.
Janus nodded. His mother’s warnings about Beta Station made him lean toward “something else,” but he knew he was biased there and that human beings were prone to inconsistency.
“You worried about our route at all?” Mick asked.
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Janus grinned. “You mean that after twelve years of hiding this big secret, the cult gives us a route that goes right past it?”
“Yeah,” Mick said.
It hadn’t escaped Janus’s attention. A month ago, he’d have charged right in blind, but the Trials had taught him the cost of ignorance. “I think we have two things going for us.”
“Oh?”
Janus nodded. “I had a conversation with someone fairly high up in the cult several weeks ago. I didn’t think much of it at the time, and I don’t remember the exact wording, but it came down to there being more than one answer, and that an answer that was right one day could be wrong the next.”
“Sounds pragmatic,” Mick said. “What’s the second thing?”
“The Trials themselves,” Janus said. “I think the cult has strict rules about how they can and can’t interfere with them.”
“So we’re protected?”
“For three more days,” Janus said. Time enough to steal fire and get rid of it before they got burned? There was only one way to find out. He hoped he’d read the conversation with Nikandros correctly, and that if the architect was sending him into danger, he also had a plan to get him out.
“Let’s get the buggies switched on and in convoy order. I want us gone the second the sun goes below the horizon.”
“You got it, boss,” Mick said with a grin, untroubled as always.
Must be nice to be him, Janus said to himself.
***
The next six hours went like clockwork, with Lira and Mick alternating in the lead buggy, Janus driving the rear vehicle with the trailer, and Syn mostly slaving her vehicle to theirs so she could operate one or more small drones. They stopped halfway, set up the tent, and had a proper meal, with Lira officiating. It had become part of the rhythm of the day, and Janus no longer tried to push through in one continuous ride. After an hour of eating, talking, and giving the buggies a once-over, they set off again, carving an old road fresh through the dirt, heading north by northwest.
The ground they rolled on was markedly different from what they’d experienced before, with clumps of silicates and patches of frozen water and CO2 binding the rock, dirt, and dust. It left the landscape more rugged and pitted than he was used to, but that was more about the lack of dust, which usually smoothed out the imperfections that their tires inevitably found.
Around the ninth hour of the day, Janus spotted vehicle lights on the horizon.
They pulled up to the Hunter caravan just five minutes later.
“Mickel,” the leader of the caravan said. “How’s your mother?”
“Headstrong and fabulous, as usual. You all right?” Mick asked, shaking the man’s hand.
Janus left the two of them to talk, joining Syn while Lira handed over the second trailer to a pair of Hunters who inspected the goods.
“Pretty exciting, right?” Syn asked.
The Betan drone operator and programmer was sitting side-saddle on her buggy, downing some water.
“I don’t know if exciting is the right word for it,” Janus said. “You know, my family could live for several years off what we’re trading today.”
Syn shrugged. “You really thinking about money right now?”
“No,” Janus admitted. “It’s just… old habits.”
He’d come a long way from being a poor and powerless refugee. Another side effect of spending more time in the places they visited was that they got to experience firsthand the gratitude of the people they helped. Some of that was quickly redirected by local political figures or the Cult of the Survivor for their own benefit, but it still left an uncomfortable amount of hero worship to fall on Janus and the others’ shoulders.
Not so with the Hunters. Just like in their encampment by Mercuria, the Hunters had drawn up their crawlers side by side, linking them with extensible docks so they formed one large structure. The Hunters themselves were too busy repairing vehicles, arriving from or leaving on patrol, and trading with other travelers to pay the aspirants any mind.
Mick was talking to a cluster of them.
“You think that’s them?” Syn asked.
“Who?” Janus said, following her gaze. “Our escort?”
“Yeah.”
That was what the trailer full of materials had been for. The cult had kept people away from Prometheus Base for years on the basis that it had been overrun by triliths. Mick was skeptical, and so were the other Hunters they’d met on their previous stops, but they also acknowledged that no Hunter who’d gone looking for Haven had come back.
Janus hoped the Hunters they’d hired would be more successful. If they weren’t… well, the trade goods were meant to take care of their families if they didn’t return.
Lira finished with the inspection, and Mick shook hands with their escorts. To Janus’s disappointment, the Hunters didn’t come and introduce themselves but instead headed for the caravan, where Janus’s team couldn’t follow.
“You guys want to come inside?” Mick asked, surprising them.
“I thought it was Hunters only,” Janus answered.
Mick shrugged. “Bit past that, now, don’t you think? ’Sides, I know the caravan leader pretty well.”
“Oh?” Syn said, leaning forward.
Mick winked at her through his visor. “It’s my dad.”
Janus, Syn, and Lira followed Mick to the joined crawlers and, after a short discussion with the Hunter on guard, they passed through the main airlock into the interior.
It wasn’t what Janus had been expecting. Once they were past the airlock, which was well maintained but similar to any airlock he’d seen, Janus was surprised to see that the caravan interior was… cozy, for lack of a better term. The bulkheads were paneled in synthetic wood, worn smooth, and polished to a quiet luster. Thick carpets covered the floors, although intricate wooden floors peeked up between the gaps, and the different sections of the vehicle were separated by heavy curtains, some open and tied back, some closed. The walls were ornamented with pictures and other artwork—physical prints, not viewscreens—as well as weapons, trophies, certificates, and shelves of baubles and physical books. Janus had never touched a book like that before; the ones in Councilor Bennin’s home had been behind glass and environmentally controlled, but the ones here were just sitting on shelves like they were meant to be held.
“Come on,” Mick said, taking them inward.
Each alcove and corner revealed new curiosities, from more trinkets to functional living areas, to more technically advanced training and treatment areas than Janus would have expected to find out in the dust, including a small classroom for their children. The Hunters would have need of these sorts of facilities to take care of their people, but everything was both far better appointed and more cramped than Janus would have thought possible. The Hunters themselves were dressed in plain, soft clothes and fairly friendly, considering Janus and his teammates were gawping at them, although on two occasions the Hunter in question did get up and close the curtain to that section.
In the center of the linked caravans, there was an open room crowded with people.
“Hey, it’s Mick, everyone!” someone said. “Hiya Mick!”
“Who let him in?” another voice said cheerfully. “Oy, Mick! Your friends can stay, but you’ve got to go stand watch, mate!”
“Did you fall off your mum’s back, Mickel?” a woman said, and everyone laughed.
For the next hour, Janus sat back and basked in the flow of Hunter life. He didn’t get to meet their escorts, or at least, if he did they didn’t announce themselves as such. People came and went as they pleased, joining conversations or sitting quietly to have a drink and a smoke. Sometimes the room seemed full to bursting, but people always made room, and though Janus was an outsider he was never made to feel like one. For the first time in a month or more, Janus didn’t feel like he needed to be anywhere, assert himself, or make a plan. There was no leverage to be had here. Everything was freely given. He could just be.
“The ’van is where you come back to learn, and rest, and heal,” a young woman his age explained. “It’s not made for living in, right? People here are just passing through.”
That was the way of it. Hunters roamed Irkalla in twos, fours, or squads of eight. If they did well, they might save up enough to own a crawler one day, join a caravan, or go off to explore some remote part of Irkalla. If they didn’t, they might die in the dust or, worse, have to retire to one of the settlements. Hunters weren’t treated well there, but the ’vans weren’t permanent shelters and everyone had to pull their weight.
“Fancy a bath?” the same young woman as before asked him.
“What?” Janus asked, taken by surprise.
She led him back to a small washroom where he was able to take off his suit and clean himself up in a small tub with a sponge and a bucket of hot water. She insisted on helping him reach the spots he couldn’t, and then she insisted on other things. Janus wasn’t sure why he went along with it. It might have been the liveliness of her eyes or the openness of the moment. It might just have been that, as an outsider, he adapted instinctively to his surroundings and Hunters didn’t seem to waste much time telling each other no.
She gave him a set of Hunter garments to wear and left the room. A little of Janus’s self-consciousness remained; there had only been curtains between them and the rest of the ’van, but when he returned to the central room the others cheered and Mick grinned. “Thank the ancient stars, mate. Couldn’t have you going north all pent up and ready to blow.”
“Do you know where she went?” Janus realized, looking around the room, ashamed he didn’t know her name.
“Who, Lee?” Mick asked. “She bagged herself an aspirant and ran, mate. Don’t worry, we cheered for her, too.”
The ’van wasn’t where you lived, Janus remembered. It was where you learned, rested, and healed, and she’d only been passing through. It was a bittersweet feeling to him, but he put it down to cultural difference. At least I’m worth cheering over, he thought.
“Come on,” Mick said, slapping his back. “There’s one more thing we should do before we leave here tomorrow.”
Janus followed Mick out of the room and back the way they’d come in.
“Where are we going?” Janus asked.
“Just need to grab something in the airlock,” Mick said.
Once they reached the main entrance to the crawler complex, Mick went into a locker and pulled a couple of injectors out of his bag.
Janus knew the Hunter was into recreational pharmaceuticals, but with everything that was going on and a difficult journey ahead, Janus wasn’t sure this was the right time. “Hey, man, I think I’m going to pass. I just—Whoa!” Janus said as Mick reached out, quick as an electrical arc, and jabbed the injector into Janus’s neck. “What did you…” Janus blinked as everything brightened and he got hit by a wave of vertigo.
“We’re good!” Mick said to someone behind them as he stuck the second injector into his own neck, and the inner door of the airlock closed.
“What are you…” Janus said, starting to find his balance. “Mick? What—”
Janus’s eyes widened as the air was snatched from his lungs. He threw himself at the inner door, lungs unable to inflate, saliva bubbling on his tongue, scrabbling at the door controls like an animal. The panel was unresponsive. He smashed the cover of the manual controls with his boot heel and tore it off, almost losing fingernails in the process, and wedged himself in the door frame before pulling on the crank handle with all his might.
It didn’t budge.
He’d been murdered. He was already dead.
He pulled again, and again, muscles screaming and mouth open in a soundless shout when Mick gently placed a hand on his shoulder, beckoning him to let go.
I shouldn’t still be conscious, Janus realized. He turned and saw Mick, also exposed, silhouetted against the backdrop of the open outer door. Janus’s eyes were sandpaper dry, and the void was pulling at his skin, but he was alive and conscious.
Mick had injected him with NO2.
Hurry, Mick mouthed, nodding toward the open outer door.
Even with the emergency chem oxygenating their blood, they hadn’t evolved to survive in a vacuum for long. Fluids evaporated, cooling the body as they did. Blood vessels burst. Janus didn’t feel the prickling sensation in his skin that usually accompanied a suit breach, but he wasn’t so trusting in Mick that he was going to bet his life on a substance he’d never heard of two weeks ago.
But he was curious. Following Mick into the dust just outside, Janus found several other Hunters waiting for them. They were suited up, and two of them were standing by with emergency masks, but there was an air of anticipation in the illuminated faces behind the visors.
Mick rested a hand on Janus’s left shoulder and pointed up.
Janus saw the stars with his own eyes for the first time, without polarized glass or a camera feed to change the light. They were so bright! Steady pinpricks of light filled most of the sky, split in half by the cloudy band of the Milky Way, and Janus was even able to pick out Krandermore and Lumiara, the nearest other planets in the Survivor’s Refuge system. The extreme cold was starting to seep in through the soles of his boots, and an itch started needling his forearms, but he still stared until Mick pulled him back inside.
He was deep in his thoughts as the airlock repressurized, and Mick let Janus be.
The void had touched him, but it hadn’t taken anything away.
Back inside and heading toward the main room, Mick stopped and looked at him more solemnly than Janus had ever seen before. “We take every young duster out the lock before they’re allowed to start tagging along with the teams. Teaches them to trust the injections, to stay calm, to respect Irkalla but not fear it, but it’s more than that. It’s about remembering. Our people came here running from the war, and we lost everything, but while the void takes and the night sky has changed, the ancient stars are still the same.”