Maddrax: Volume 5 (English Edition) E-Book

Ian Rolf Hill

• Herausgeber: J-Novel Pulp
• Kategorie: Fantasy und Science-Fiction
• Serie: Maddrax (English Edition)
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 609

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2023

Beschreibung

The man from the past and his dauntless friends face perils both new and familiar! In the distant Ring Planet System, the alien Kasynari and their human allies Xij and Tom venture to the forbidden moon of Portal, hoping to access a space station that may have survived the recent disaster that brought the Kasynari civilization to the brink of destruction. While the they’re gone, though, Vasraa is scheming... Back on Earth, the parallel Rulfan learns about his self from this world, while the nefarious Aran Kormak leads postapocalyptic Scottish gangsters in an attack on the Refuge of Knowledge at Loch Lomond. Scarcely have Matt and his friends surmounted this challenge before they must venture to a new parallel world area: a version of Paris ruled by a grotesque king of Taratzes! Finally, Matt and company return to Rhaaka, city of the Dinoroids, bearing sad news...only to find a civil war is breaking out?! And if that weren’t enough, an Archivist is meddling with the situation too!

Leseprobe

Table of Contents

Cover

The Story So Far

The Sun Gate

Stranger Self

Taratzes!

The Portal

The Complete Story So Far

About J-Novel Club

Copyright

Landmarks

Table of Contents

The Story So Far

By Ian Rolf Hill

This introduction is meant to give you a quick insight into the MADDRAX universe. For those of you who want to know the whole story, please check the extended synopsis at the end of the volume.

On February 8th, 2012, the comet “Christopher-Floyd” crashed into the Earth. United States Air Force flight commander Matthew Drax was deployed to observe the comet’s approach. When Drax and his squadron made contact with the Comet, however, they were flung five hundred years into the future.

During this time, the world as he knows it changes drastically: human civilization undergoes extreme degeneration, to the point of now resembling the Bronze Age: the world’s once-great cities lie in ruins, there are no longer any official forms of government, and people regress to living in clans and tribes, moving through the wilderness like nomads and calling themselves the “Wandering Folk.” Earth’s plants and animals have also mutated in bizarre and dangerous ways.

Upon exiting the timeslip, Drax crashes alone in the Alps. His passenger, the scientist and professor Dr. Jacob Smythe, triggered his ejector seat out of panic and is now missing. There is no trace of Drax’s other comrades.

Attacked by mutated, semi-intelligent giant rats called Taratzes, Matt is saved by a barbarian warrior named Aruula. As she finds his name, “Matt Drax,” difficult to pronounce, she gives him the nickname “Maddrax.” A telepath, Aruula is instantly able to understand Matt, and the two form a connection. Soon after, Aruula falls in love with Drax and remains by his side throughout his adventures.

In London, Matt and Aruula meet a group known as the “Technos,” whose ancestors survived the comet’s impact in bunkers beneath the city. By avoiding the immediate aftermath of the disaster, the group has not only retained its twenty-first-century intelligence, but continued to invent and innovate. However, this knowledge has come at a price: due to their centuries-long stay in the bunkers, the Technos have depleted immune systems, and are only able to visit the surface in protective suits. The community in London offers to connect Drax with other Technos around the world. The journey brings Matt and Aruula to America, now known as “Meeraka” in the language of the Wandering Folk.

Along the way, they encounter the Hydrites, an anthropomorphized species of fish-people. Later, it is revealed that they are not mutants, but rather an alien race who initially settled on Mars, where they were known as Hydrees. When Mars began losing its atmosphere hundreds of thousands of years ago, the Hydrees traveled along a tachyon-based time beam to Earth, where they took the name “Hydrite” and settled the undersea frontiers.

One of the Hydrites—a man named Quart’ol—begins traveling with the pair, ultimately sacrificing himself to save Matt’s life. In the aftermath, Matt and Aruula are separated before they can reach Meeraka. While Aruula is forced to travel with the Neo-Barbarian Rulfan (son of a London Techno and a barbarian woman), Matt Drax reaches the coast of the former USA.

In Washington (now “Waashton”), Matt learns of another bunker-based civilization, one calling itself the “World Council” and claiming to be the true global political leaders. The council’s president—General Arthur Crow—is a power-obsessed dictator looking to cement his grip on the world. A rebel group, the “Running Men,” seeks to thwart his plans. The Running Men are led by Mr. Black, a clone of the last US President (and a certain beloved action movie star).

During the clash between the World Council and the rebels, an outside consciousness takes control of Matt Drax. This turns out to be Quart’ol, who at the moment of his death, transferred his soul into Matt’s brain. Quart’ol brings Drax to an undersea city of Hydrites, Hykton, in order to have his consciousness implanted in a clone of his original body.

Matt returns to Waashton where he reunites with Aruula. Together, they are forced to flee from the World Council and end up in Los Angeles (now called “El’ay”). There, they meet the android Miki Takeo, who becomes one of their closest friends.

Meanwhile, the World Council plans a mission to the ISS, where they hope to find information about the comet’s impact. Matt is forced to travel on a repaired space shuttle to make the trip and recover the data. From space, Matt is able to see that life began evolving much faster near the site of the comet’s impact in Siberia than in other locations.

Together with Miki Takeo, Matt organizes an expedition to Crater Lake. The World Council also catches wind of the discovery and a team is en route. On the long and dangerous journey to Crater Lake, Aruula is possessed by a strange consciousness which calls itself GREEN and is a type of plant-based hive mind. Upon Matt and Aruula’s arrival at Crater Lake, the warrior reveals that she is pregnant, and that her child also possesses plant DNA. GREEN has apparently manipulated the embryo’s development, whereby its gestation is changed. Cruelly, Aruula’s child is taken from her womb by an unknown creature before she can give birth.

Shortly thereafter, Matt and Quart’ol make a shocking discovery: Comet Christopher-Floyd was actually a spaceship!

The ship was an ark belonging to an alien species known as the “Daa’mures,” who were searching for a new homeworld and crashed on Earth. The Daa’murian consciousness is stored in green crystals, whose energy is not only responsible for humanity’s degeneration, but also the mutations of other species. Their motivation is clear: the Daa’mures are using the mutations to find ideal host bodies in which to rehouse their minds. A further surprise comes in the form of information that the spaceship is also a cosmic being, known as an “Oqualun” or “Wanderer.”

When Matt accidentally destroys a Daa’murian egg, he is instantly declared enemy number one. Together with his friends, he flees to Russia. There, he meets with a group of Technos who have created an immunity serum from the blood of Mr. Black, allowing various bunker inhabitants to visit the surface without protection. They also confirm that Matt’s body has been flooded with tachyons, which slow down the aging process—possibly as a result of the time slip.

Matt annihilates the Daa’mures’ mutant army and couriers the immunity serum back to London, where he forms an alliance against the Daa’mures with General Crow.

The Daa’mures succeed at reactivating the Wanderer, which sends out a planetwide electromagnetic pulse (EMP) and takes all remaining technology on Earth out of commission. Chaos breaks out, and the Technos are forced to flee their bunkers without protection. As if that were not enough, Matt and Aruula learn that the Daa’mures themselves are only one of countless servant races created by the Wanderers to protect themselves from their enemies: the Warriors, cosmic hunters of unimaginable strength.

Matt and his allies are able to hold off the Wanderer, but the Warrior is quickly on his target’s trail. In order to overcome this threat, Matt searches beneath the Antarctic ice to find a long-lost legendary weapon created by the Hydrees: the Surface Reamer. A grand artifact of unimaginable destruction, it is naturally being pursued by General Crow as well. He attempts to force Matt to fire the Reamer at Washington, hoping to eradicate the Running Men in the process.

However, Matt manages to change the target coordinates at the last second. Instead of hitting Washington, Matt targets an area in the Appalachian mountains, where General Crow was operating a factory building organic robots. The shot effectively exchanges a region five kilometers in diameter with a bubble containing its counterpart from almost million years into the future, The Earth is left defenseless against the Warrior.

With the help of a converter that harnesses the Earth’s magnetic field, Matt is able to reload the Surface Reamer, only for it to backfire when the Warrior comes into range. The Warrior destroys the Earth, and Matt only has one chance left to fix things: entering the time bubbles created by the misfire, which lead to both the past and future.

While traveling through various parallel worlds, Matt meets the archaeologist and time traveler Tom Ericson in the year 2304. Ericson works for a group of evolved humans from the future who call themselves the “Archivists.” Their goal is not only to collect technical achievements from the parallel worlds but also to remove any dangerous time lines and continuities from existence. Matt, therefore, gains an opportunity to quickly reload the Surface Reamer and defeat the Warrior. Unfortunately, too late, and the Moon is launched from its orbit into the Reamer’s firing path, threatening to crash into the Earth.

Matt and Aruula travel through a wormhole at CERN and are sent to a far distant ring planet system. There they meet another alien species called the “Kasynari.” They offer to assist humanity with the evacuation of Earth through the use of a portable wormhole generator. In reality, their goal is to feed off the mental energy of human brains. Only by doing so they are able to maintain the camouflage required to protect their home planet.

Ultimately, it is revealed that the true threat is another Wanderer: like the Daa’mures, the Kasynari are servants of the Oqualun. However, their plan fails and the camouflage screen is nullified. In order to help the Kasynari and save the Earth, Matt and Aruula make contact with the species from whom the Kasynari adapted the wormhole technology: the Pancinovas. With their help, the pair are able to transport the Surface Reamer from the Antarctic to the ring planet system and give the Kasynari a weapon to use against the Warriors pursuing the Wanderer.

And that’s not all! The Pancinovas manage to perform the impossible: They create a gigantic wormhole that sends the moon back to its orbit, saving the Earth before returning to their own solar system. However, the wormhole passage to the ring planet system has collapsed. Contact is lost between Earth and the established colony on the moon Novis.

Before the collapse, a military hardliner named Colonel Aran Kormak also had a lucky break and escaped the collapsing wormhole. Doing so triggered a chain reaction with unexpected consequences: all across Earth, regions measuring exactly fifty kilometers in diameter have been replaced with their counterparts from parallel worlds, surrounded by near-impenetrable forests of thorns.

The Sun Gate

by Sascha Vennemann

It’s cold here. That was Justipluu’s first thought when he slowly regained his vision after the transfer. Cold and dark... The ray of his flashlight flitted over the wet surfaces of the room’s wall panels.

The Kasynari flinched upon feeling a shooting pain in his breathing organs. He gasped for air, but barely managed to breathe any in. Oxygen! His mind screamed. Something’s wrong with the composition. His Kasynari colleagues behind him appeared to have problems too. They choked and coughed.

“Put on your breathing masks!” Justipluu squeezed out with a croaking voice. After everything they had been through to get here, they couldn’t just choke to death right on arrival...

He hastily fished a transparent object consisting of a gelatinous foil with a liquid tank out of his bag. He secured the mask on the smooth skin around his mouth and nose slits. Fresh air flowed into Justipluu’s lungs. After his colleagues had also put on their masks, and he had made sure that they were doing all right, he once again shone his light around the chamber.

It seemed that all the equipment had been turned off. A half-open door led toward a hallway at the end of which glowed a gentle, orangey light. Fine haze, moving almost magically in the cold atmosphere, billowed over the metal floor plates. Somewhere behind them sounded a quiet humming noise.

Is that the air conditioning? Justipluu wondered. In the brief moment before he had put on the oxygen mask, he had noticed a burned smell.

He took a few steps toward a wall panel. Approximately one meter above his head, he saw the vents of the ventilation system. He stretched out and held his hand in front of the slits. Nothing. Not even the faintest draft.

We’ll have to start by fixing this, the Kasynari thought. He flinched when someone placed a hand on his shoulder.

“Everything okay?” Wozguzz asked. His voice was muffled by the oxygen mask. He and his friend Rankiir had also turned on their lamps. The cones of light frisked over the walls of the circular room.

Justipluu made a vague noise. “Don’t know yet,” he said carefully. He pointed his flashlight at the hallway leading out of the chamber. “We should get to work.” He looked around, and his gaze was met by nine tense pairs of eyes. You knew what you got yourself into, he told himself. And what it means to lead the mission. Hopefully this wasn’t a mistake.

“You know what you have to do!” he continued. “Everyone takes care of their area. First, we restore the systems essential for survival. Only then we can get an overview of what is possible.”

As his colleague advanced into the hallway, he murmured so quietly that nobody else could hear him. “I hope we’re successful. If not, this will be our grave...”

***

Novis Prime, three days earlier

Zekiya blinked as she stared at the sky above the security central of Novis Prime. The sunlight blinded her, and yet the large transport platform approaching the building’s inner courtyard was clearly visible in the backlight. The rectangular platform, approximately ten meters long and five meters wide, lowered itself and landed on the designated field near the storage facility’s entrance.

Right on schedule... The girl looked at the chronometer of the pad she was holding in her small hands.

The deliveries from the transfer tower didn’t always arrive on time. Often they got delayed because not everything went according to plan on the other moons of the Ring Planet System from which the shipments came. Sometimes the reception committee had to wait for hours until the platform finally arrived. Vasraa considered that good training. “It prepares you to stay vigilant when standing guard,” she always said.

Zekiya wrinkled her nose when the whirled-up dust blew in her face. She wanted to turn her head, but her instructor would no doubt have interpreted that as a sign of weakness.

“Recruits! Assume your positions!” Vasraa rasped behind her, as if on cue. Zekiya instinctively snapped to attention. After all, Vasraa was not just her superior, but also her mother.

Zekiya left the waiting formation and took up her assigned position at the building’s entrance. Another soldier followed her and stood opposite her at the other side of the doorway.

She couldn’t suppress a smile upon seeing Aki’s grin. The young man was her mother’s deputy and always seemed to be in a good mood—one of several reasons why he was the exact opposite of Vasraa. He was...a friend?

Zekiya wasn’t sure whether she could call him that. She wasn’t sure if she had any friends at all. She had comrades: the other recruits from the security force’s junior team serving under Vasraa’s command. But she kept a professional distance when interacting with them, and they avoided her because she was the commander’s child. She couldn’t blame them. Being alone was preferable to getting on Vasraa’s bad side.

“What are we getting today?” Aki asked in a friendly voice and pointed at Zekiya’s pad. “What does the list say?”

First, she glanced at the platform before checking the clipboard-sized tablet. Fortunately, Vasraa was currently receiving the report of the platform pilot, who handed her the control unit.

“Mainly food from Aquus and technical components from Binaar,” Zekiya summarized after briefly studying the list.

Aki nodded succinctly. “That’s good,” he commented. “In the outer districts, the algae seedlings are running short again.” He laughed quietly. “Growing salad in your own garden pond has really come into fashion these past few weeks—which is good,” he hurriedly added when Zekiya gave him a puzzled look. “Now that the Kasynari can no longer provide us with their nutrient paste, we have to get our own food. The more people participate, the better.”

The Kasynari... Zekiya shuddered whenever she heard the name of those extraterrestrial balloon heads. She wasn’t too fond of the species. Especially not Justipluu, who represented their moon Novis at the new System Council and was a thorn in her mother’s side. Because when Vasraa was in a bad mood because of Justipluu, most of the time Zekiya suffered the consequences too.

She knew it was unfair to think like this. But she couldn’t help it, even if she felt sorry for the Kasynari because there weren’t many left of their species. Most of them had lived on the Ring Moon that had exploded following the collapse of the wormhole. Giant plasma bolts had flashed across space and virtually pulverized the moon—and with it, all the stations that had maintained some kind of holographic camouflage.

All of a sudden, the Ring Planet System no longer contained a planet surrounded by a massive debris ring that included numerous moons. All that remained was the ring by itself, orbiting a small, glowing celestial body where the planet had been. Zekiya didn’t really know what it was. Justipluu had called it the “Inner Jewel.” Maybe it was some sort of giant diamond?

A loud whistle ripped the girl from her thoughts. Vasraa had signaled her unit to unload the crates from the platform and bring them into the storage rooms of the security central. Two by two they grabbed a box and carried it to the entrance, where they put it down in front of Aki.

The young soldier bent down, removed the box’s seals and lifted the lid. Quietly, he counted the canisters filled with a sloshing turquoise liquid inside. “Forty-two units of algae pollen concentrate and the same number of seedlings,” he reported. “The unit has an ID number,” he picked up the box lid and read it out, “Alpha, two, two, eight.”

“ID match confirmed!” Zekiya shouted and with the touch of a finger checked the corresponding number on her delivery list.

While the first two soldiers carried their cargo into the building, the next two arrived. Zekiya listened to the numbers reported by Aki, confirmed them, and checked it off the list. Not a single deviation had ever been recorded—after how many deliveries? Zekiya had stopped counting.

Lost in her thoughts, she watched Aki open the next box. She didn’t understand that man at all. Of course, she knew that he was an excellent soldier. But in contrast to her mother, he treated his comrades completely differently despite also being their superior. The recruits in particular loved him. He listened to their questions. He didn’t yell at them for making mistakes, but explained what they had done wrong.

Smilingly, Zekiya remembered her first real conversation with Aki, shortly after the incident at the Hydrite clone factory which had almost cost her life. Only thanks to her mother’s courageous intervention had she survived.

Without noticing it herself, her face darkened. That’s not entirely right, she thought with repressed anger. It’s not certain that I couldn’t have saved Xenia. She had met that girl at the facility, and with her she had escaped from the dangerous spider brood through the Hydrite factory’s vents. The girl had dangled from Zekiya’s hand as the spiders had approached them from the shaft below.

And she had only let go because Vasraa had ordered her. Maybe I could’ve saved her after all, she thought once again, as she had many times over the past few weeks. If mother helped me, we could have pulled her out of the vent together.

Shortly after, when Zekiya had waited in her mother’s office for Vasraa to return from an interrogation, the memories had overwhelmed her during that rare moment of solitude. Tears had streamed down her face, and she had been unable to stop them.

Aki had found her like that. Without hesitating for a moment, he had sat next to her, both to talk and to open his arms at the right moment so she could press herself against him.

Zekiya knew that friendship also equaled weakness. If you tied yourself to someone with sympathy, you had to take care not to become dependent on that relationship. But she didn’t see how it would weaken her to unburden herself of her worries.

“Xenia didn’t die because of you,” Aki reassured her every time they talked about the subject. She hated those moments; she felt so vulnerable.

Aki had come up with a good idea to change that. They had met a couple of times in secret to practice certain unarmed fighting techniques, which Vasraa hadn’t wanted to show her because apparently, she was not ready yet. Mother knows so little about me...

“Wake up, rookie!”

Startled, Zekiya let out a small scream and nearly dropped the pad. Vasraa had sneaked up on her from behind.

It only took the girl one second to regain her composure. She snapped to attention. “I am awake, sir!” Zekiya shouted and looked straight ahead to avoid the angry face of her mother. From the corner of her eye, she saw Aki, who had also snapped to attention, giving her an encouraging wink.

“If you daydream like that on patrol, soldier, you will be an easy target for any attacker!” Vasraa barked in her ear. “Or is controlling the goods maybe too boring for you?” Vasraa circled around her at a provokingly slow pace and stopped in front of her.

Her mother wasn’t particularly tall, but neither was Zekiya due to her age. So her eyes stared at the spot between the clavicles of Vasraa’s throat.

“A precise hit and any opponent goes down,” Aki had said. Zekiya suppressed the urge to employ that technique.

“Sir, no, sir!” she shouted officiously instead. She felt her mother’s stare, tempting her to give in to her urge. But Zekiya resisted.

“The supplies from the other moons are our life insurance!” Vasraa addressed everyone present. “We can rely on the System Council. The Kasynari are people who value law and order.”

You only say that because you have to, Zekiya thought mockingly. Vasraa couldn’t stand the balloon heads but relied on their goodwill to keep her position as chief of the security forces on Novis Prime.

“What worries me, however, are their subordinates on the other moons,” Vasraa continued. “Officially, they may promise us a lot, but that doesn’t mean that everything will get here in its entirety. That’s why the controls are so important, Zekiya!”

When uttering the last sentence, her mother had shifted her gaze back to Zekiya. She rarely used her first name in front of the other recruits. It was a sign that Vasraa was disappointed by her inattention on both a professional and personal level.

I’m sorry, mother, she thought reflexively. Somewhere inside of her a quiet voice urged her to object, but she suppressed it deliberately. “Understood, sir!” she replied.

The arrival of another security guard saved her from any further embarrassment. He came out of the building, saluted Vasraa, and waited for her permission to speak.

“What?” Vasraa growled gruffly.

“System Council Representative Justipluu sends me, sir,” the messenger said. “He requests Corporal Aki’s presence in his office at once.”

Vasraa stared at the young man, who uncertainly raised his eyebrows. “Why?” she asked. It wasn’t clear whether she had directed the question toward the messenger or Aki himself.

“He didn’t say, sir,” the messenger replied. “Only that it is important.”

Vasraa nodded. “Well, go then,” she decided.

“Thank you, sir.” Aki gave a brief salute, then turned around and followed the messenger back into the building.

“Recruit Zekiya, you will take over Corporal Aki’s control task,” Vasraa rasped.

Zekiya confirmed the order and waved over the next box. Meanwhile, her mother followed the container that had just been taken away. What was she planning to do?

While Zekiya opened the box in front of her and logged its contents, her mother talked to the two box carriers and pointed in another direction away from the storage. The carriers nodded and took their cargo down another passage. Zekiya knew that it led to the security central’s administrative wing.

“Everything in order,” she announced in reference to the box in front of her. The soldiers resealed it before taking it to the storage.

What does this mean? Zekiya mused. She didn’t just refer to her observation, but also to Justipluu’s summoning of Aki. It didn’t seem like Justipluu at all. Normally, he only dealt with matters of relevance for Novis in the presence of a city representative. Usually Xaana, Xij, or Tom. That was to ensure that not only the security force but also the ordinary citizens knew what was going on in the rest of the system.

Aki will surely tell Xaana what’s going on, Zekiya thought. Everyone knew that the soldier and Xij’s daughter had been a couple for some time now. Rumor had it that they had started dating back when Aki had still been serving under Colonel Kormak and Xaana had been part of the resistance, which made it a spicy romance.

But by now, nobody cared two hoots about it. As far as Zekiya knew, Kormak had gone missing. He had exiled himself after losing the battle for Novis Prime. Apparently, later he had displaced himself with a jump from Novis’s transfer tower to another moon or the void.

The resistance no longer existed either. Following the wormhole catastrophe, they had all become castaways, a human exclave without means to contact their home. Even if, according to hearsay, they were trying to find solutions to recreate the passage.

Was that the reason Aki had been called into Justipluu’s office?

Zekiya checked the next box and sent it into the building. Vasraa redirected this delivery too.

That’s two intriguing mysteries that need to be solved,the girl thought. At least she was no longer bored.

***

“Are you sure?”

Confused, Justipluu looked at the large wall monitor depicting the faces of the council members of the other Ring Planet System moons. “But that would mean...”

The facial expressions of the other surviving Kasynari suggested that they, too, slowly understood the implications of what Aathuees, the representative of Aquus, had just said. “Does that mean we could possibly reopen the wormhole?”

Aathuees made a vague gesture. “For now it means that we could possibly recreate the preconditions for opening a wormhole,” the water moon’s representative clarified. “At the moment, we don’t even know whether the passage to Earth collapsed completely or was merely interrupted. We can only assess the situation if we manage to reach the Sun Gate.”

Justipluu could no longer be kept in his seat. This was significant news that Aathuees had shared with the council in this unscheduled and short-notice meeting. Pensively, he paced up and down his office on the top level of Novis Prime’s security central. This and the transfer tower were the only places where it was possible to contact the other moons via radio.

The Kasynari, who had taken over as chair of the committee against his will, stepped up to an office window and looked out over the city’s bright afternoon scenery. From up here he had a good view of the first and second ring streets. The security force’s building was located at the center of the capital of the terraformed moon, which was supposed to provide a new home for the humans.

It had been designated a sanctuary when the humans’ moon had risked crashing into Earth. Matthew Drax, his partner Aruula, and their friends had worked together with the wormhole architects—the Pancinovas—to send the errant satellite through a giant wormhole back to its orbit.

Nobody here knew whether they had succeeded. At the time when the Project Moon Jump should have taken place, the wormhole had quite literally exploded on this side of the passage, destroying the Ring Moon and killing the majority of Justipluu’s people.

Only the Kasynari who had been stationed on other moons had escaped extinction. The System Council hadn’t determined the exact numbers yet, but the survivors couldn’t have numbered more than a couple hundred.

Since then, there had been no possibility of contacting Earth. There was good reason to fear that the humans’ home world had also been destroyed—meaning that the colony on Novis was the only place in the galaxy where their species still existed.

What an ironic twist of fate,Justipluu thought. Humans and Kasynari, victims and perpetrators, both at the edge of their existence and trapped in this place...

Justipluu realized that wasn’t the whole picture. The current situation was a result of a long chain of events. The intervention and protection of cosmic beings played a role in it. All in vain,Justipluu sighed on the inside. That which they had tried protecting with the cerebral cloak had been laid bare: a shiny jewel, once the invisible center of a mock planet, now a monument to the Kasynari’s failure.

The Surface Reamer, a giant weapon from Earth salvaged by the Pancinovas before they had returned to their home planet Cancriss, was their only chance for protection. When the enemy—the one whom they had feared since the beginning of existence—came, the Surface Reamer would be their last remaining, fragile bulwark.

The voice of Runidooth, the representative of the forest moon Botan, ripped Justipluu out of his thoughts. “Aathuees, before you explain how we can reach the Sun Gate, please allow me to ask the question: why should we bother reopening the wormhole?” He scratched his chin, embarrassed. “I understand that the humans have an interest in returning to their planet if it still exists,” he continued, “but that is hardly a sufficient reason to start an extraordinarily dangerous mission to reactivate the Sun Gate...”

Justipluu sighed when nobody else showed signs of wanting to answer the question. “Because it may be our only chance at long-term survival,” he stated in a calm voice. “Why did we originally use the wormhole, Runidooth?”

The System Council member’s nose slits twitched. “To transport servant races and test if their brains were compatible with the cerebral cloak that protected the jewel,” he replied. “But the cloak collapsed. All the generators exploded.”

Justipluu’s eyes fixed on his fellow Kasynari. “And so the protection of the Most Holy One is no longer our mission?”

Runidooth blinked in confusion. “But we have the Surface Reamer...”

“Yes,” Justipluu agreed. “We have exactly one weapon, and we don’t even know whether it has any effect against the Warrior.” He spoke louder now to further emphasize his words. “If we want to find further help, we need to contact other peoples in other star systems. And therefore we need an intact wormhole.”

The other council members mumbled in agreement. Runidooth fell silent, then nodded. “A convincing argument,” he admitted.

Justipluu made an affirming gesture. “Good. Now that we’ve settled that matter, Aathuees can finally explain how he plans on reactivating the passage.”

The Aquus representative took a deep breath. “You all know that the Sun Gate is a space station above the sun’s pole, and that it served to stabilize the wormhole,” he began. “It had been running fully automated for generations.”

“Until the wormhole exploded and damaged the station,” Justipluu interjected. “The idea to travel to the Sun Gate and check whether it can be repaired is not new. I don’t know how often we discussed it in the past rotations.”

“A lot,” Runidooth admitted, “and always with the conclusion that it is impossible to reach. The only transfer tower with enough performance power to reach the Sun Gate stood on our Ring Moon. The range of the transfer units in the other towers is too short. You can use them to jump to nearby moons, but no farther.”

Aathuees’s black, pupilless eyes narrowed. “But we’ve been forgetting one tower that could reach the Sun Gate: the one on Portal!”

As soon as the council member from Aquus had spoken the name of the forbidden moon, all the other attendees became agitated and talked over each other. It took Justipluu several zentos to calm his colleagues down so that Aathuees could continue his explanation.

“In the recordings of the transfer tower here on Aquus, I found proof that not too long ago two people jumped from here to the forbidden moon,” he revealed.

“I haven’t heard of this!” Runidooth shouted. “Who was it?”

“I couldn’t find any information on their identities,” Aathuees admitted. “Since they never reappeared anywhere, we have to assume that they didn’t survive the transport.”

“No wonder!” Runidooth snorted. “The entire moon is surrounded by phase shifts. That’s why it’s forbidden to approach it.”

“According to our logs, Portal was reduced to its current state following experiments with transfer tower technology,” Justipluu said. “Not many Kasynari used to have access to the historical sources, so let me clarify. The potential transfer performance of Portal’s tower could theoretically reach many light years into the distance. The problem was the energy supply. An overcharge caused an accident at the tower. Our knowledge is only based on optical observations and telemetry, but apparently, there are time warps and tears in the space-time continuum.”

“That’s why it’s suicide to jump there!” Runidooth insisted.

“And let me reiterate,” Aathuees countered, “I’m talking about a purely hypothetical possibility. Assuming the transfer tower on Portal is still operable and we manage to reach it, then we could use it to jump to the Sun Gate and try to fix it.”

The council members remained silent for a while. Everyone had the same question on their mind, and it remained unspoken until Runidooth finally spoke up. “And how are we supposed to reach Portal without jumping there?”

At that moment, Justipluu had an idea. “Maybe there is a way. One moment, please...” Without cutting off the connection, he walked out of his office and waved over one of the guards outside. “Is Corporal Aki nearby?” he asked the man.

“I believe he is downstairs with Colonel Vasraa controlling the supply delivery,” the soldier replied.

“Bring him here at once,” Justipluu ordered the security guard. “And tell him it’s urgent!”

***

Whatever the reason for Justipluu’s request, Aki felt thankful while running up the stairs to the security central’s top floor. He could have used the elevator, but he considered this an additional training opportunity.

It wasn’t fair that Vasraa had admonished her daughter like that in front of everyone else. Especially because her main purpose hadn’t been to call out Zekiya’s inattention; she had merely used her daughter as a hook for her inflammatory speech.

She had started doing this more often recently, and Aki could only guess why. Maybe Vasraa had slowly realized how insecure her post had become. Since the wormhole’s collapse, the mood and the dynamic between the security forces and the normal citizens on Novis Prime had fundamentally changed. The troops still maintained a certain degree of authority, particularly in the capital. However, they were only really needed in their function as police.

More and more trainees had set out to enforce law and order in the other settlements, which were sometimes located many hours away.

As Aki was only two more floors away from his destination, he kept thinking of the strange friendship that had blossomed between him and Vasraa’s daughter.

He liked the girl, who always showed herself cool and distanced in the presence of her mother to impress her. But in reality, Zekiya longed for attention, affirmation, and affection, just like everyone else. She had never told Aki her age. If he had to take a guess, he would put her somewhere between ten and twelve years old, but looks could be deceiving. Vasraa’s draconian parenting might have made her seem older than she was.

But that was a relatively minor issue anyway. More importantly, Zekiya urgently needed a friend. Someone with whom she could talk freely and who could instill confidence whenever Vasraa’s military discipline put the girl under pressure. He wouldn’t have wanted to be in her shoes. But if he could be of any help, he would gladly do so.

Aki shook off his thoughts when he finally reached the hallway to Justipluu’s office. Without knocking, he entered the Kasynari’s office. Justipluu didn’t care about human formalities. The System Council’s chairman had moved his office chair back a little. He was looking out of the window and seemed to be lost in thought.

Aki cleared his throat and took a few steps forward. The Kasynari turned around, and his black, pupilless eyes searched his gaze. “You called me,” the security guard said.

Aki saw that Justipluu’s nose slits were trembling—a sign of tension. Whatever was on the gray’s mind, it appeared to be of great importance.

“I had an interesting conversation with the representatives of the other moons,” the chairman began. “We discussed possibilities to free our system from its unwanted isolation.”

Aki listened up. “Are you talking about the wormhole?” He pointed at an unoccupied chair in front of Justipluu’s desk. “May I?”

“Of course—yes, indirectly it involves the wormhole,” Justipluu confirmed. “But I would be getting ahead of myself to start there.”

Aki sat down and fixed his gaze upon the chairman of the System Council. “How can I help?”

Justipluu explained the situation to him. Once he had finished, Aki knew what he wanted. “You need the glider,” he concluded, “so we can take a repair team to Portal, and jump from there to the Sun Gate.”

“That is correct. You would be our contact man given your connection to Xaana, Xij, and Tom. The mission is not possible without the glider.”

Aki slid forward on his chair and sat up straight. “Two things,” he said pensively. “Just so I get it right: you can’t jump to that forbidden moon via transfer tower because...?”

“Because the phase shifts there would divert the transport beam,” the Kasynari explained. “It could go out of control and land somewhere at random on the planet, or worst case in space. I won’t expose my crew to that risk.”

Surprised, Aki raised his eyebrows. “You’ll go with them?”

“Of course!” Justipluu tilted his head. “I’ll assemble the same crew that worked on reactivating the Surface Reamer. Wozguzz, Rankiir, myself, and a few other clever engineers from the surrounding moons.” He took the pad from his desk, activated it, and typed something in. The next moment, the large monitor behind the desk lit up and showed a schematic map of the Ring Planet System.

“The safest route would of course be a direct journey in your glider to the Sun Gate station,” the gray claimed. “But the flight would take five weeks in Earth measurements.”

With one of his slender fingers, Justipluu swiped across the pad. The monitor revealed a curved line from the planet ring with the Wanderer at its center to a spot right before the system’s sun.

“That would necessitate adequate food rations for the crew, limiting the space for passengers. Apart from the two human pilots, we could barely fit three or four Kasynari—too few to reactivate the Sun Gate.”

Aki nodded calmly. “The station stopped working after the collapse,” he thought out loud. “Is that why a direct jump is not possible?”

“Even before, it would have only been possible from the Ring Moon,” Justipluu answered.

“And the other way around?” Aki wanted to know. “From the wormhole?”

“The transport capsules were directly rerouted from there to the moons,” Justipluu explained. “The last known transfer was the glider with Xij and the Trischberger family.”

Aki scratched his head. “So you need a taxi to Portal. Two pilots, a cargo hold full of Kasynari, and a short flight to the forbidden moon. No provisions?”

“There are enough emergency rations at the Sun Gate,” Justipluu said. “In the case that the repair team has to spend a long time there, we won’t starve or die of thirst.”

If you manage to reactivate the Sun Gate, Aki thought. Because if the Kasynari didn’t succeed, they would be trapped there—for at least five long weeks, the time it would take the glider to cover that distance.

The young soldier stood up. “I’ll bring your request to Tom and Xij. I’m sure they’ll gladly help. After all, there’s a chance to reestablish contact with Earth...”

Justipluu nervously averted his eyes. “A...small chance,” he murmured cautiously. “But yes, it exists. Please don’t tell the other settlers. We shouldn’t awaken any false hope among the population.”

Aki nodded. “I agree.” He stood up and turned around to leave. “Somebody will contact you shortly. You can go ahead and start planning your trip...”

***

Xaana opened her eyes and exhaled. The transfer from one moon to another happened in the blink of an eye, making it barely noticeable. Only a slight tingling sensation on the skin remained. Everything else—closing her eyes, holding her breath—was more of a personal ritual than a necessity.

But it made her feel secure. She had no idea how this technology that allowed her to jump from one moon’s transfer chamber to another worked. She had to trust its reliability. So far there had never been a problem. But the fear remained that someday she might get lost on the strange, timeless journey between stars.

Don’t think about it, the young woman exhorted herself. You’ve never questioned it, so don’t start now!

Xaana sighed and stretched. As she clambered down off the transfer platform, she surveyed the room, whose walls were covered in various consoles and alcoves. Behind a makeshift desk sat a security guard from Vasraa’s team. Next to him waited a Kasynari in green work overalls who languidly stared into the void. He was sitting on a floating platform measuring approximately one meter in width and two meters in length. The alien had lifted it so high that his feet dangled several centimeters above ground.

“Welcome back to Novis!” the man behind the desk greeted her. “How were the negotiations on Botan?” Noticing Xaana’s covetous glance at the water bottle on his desk, he threw it at her.

“It was a long day, Henri,” she said simply as she removed the lid. With big gulps, Xaana drank half the bottle, then wiped her lips with the back of her hand.

Nothing beats Novis water, she thought. On the forest moon, the weather had been muggy, and the water had carried a faint taste of mushrooms.

Henri, the guard, tapped his right hand’s knuckles on the desk. “And hopefully a successful one?”

As if on cue, a quiet alarm sounded in the transfer chamber, and the warning lights turned on. Xaana took a few steps forward, away from the platform, and turned around to face it. Out of nowhere appeared some buckets and boxlike containers in the same spot where Xaana had materialized several moments ago.

“What does it look like?” she mumbled laconically. She fished a small pad from the pocket of her jacket and handed it to Henri.

While the Kasynari began placing the boxes and buckets onto the small transportation platform, Henri checked the list of goods. “Two hundred units of mushroom steaks,” he stated in a monotone voice. “How delicious...”

Xaana shrugged. “I know some Kasynari who love that stuff,” she countered. “What about you, Kaazetee?” she shouted at the gray, who was still busy loading the cargo.

“Meh,” the Kasynari replied without looking up. “Hunger drives the appetite.”

Xaana didn’t particularly like the musty things either. However, she was too tired to explain to Henri why it was preferable to trade something with the neighboring moons rather than nothing.

Trade as a form of diplomacy and politics... If we want to survive long-term in this system without the help of the Kasynari, we have to succeed in that regard...

Over the last few months of isolation, Xaana, her mother Xij, and Xij’s husband Tom had somehow ended up taking on leading roles. Maybe because they were still associated with Matthew Drax, who had brought them into this star system and this sanctuary moon.

But that only applied to the human refugees. Some species like the Kasynari had always been native to this system. Others had been brought here by the grays. Now they were all pulling together to procure the necessary supplies in the long run.

Kaazetee had completed his task. Using a pad, he made the transportation platform float over to Henri, who examined some containers at random.

“What did Runidooth ask in return this time?” the guard asked curiously.

Xaana grinned. “Citrus fruits. Some settlements in the south are growing them. We’re expecting a trade caravan from that region to the capital soon.”

Henri looked up in bewilderment. “What does the council member of Botan want with oranges and limes?”

Xaana’s grin broadened even further. “Runidooth heard that you can use their extract to protect yourself against pesky insects.”

“Trading shroom steak against bug spray,” Henri joked and laughed. “But why not? All right, it looks like everything’s there.” He nodded contently and closed the delivered containers again.

It would have surprised Xaana if something had gone missing during the direct transport from one moon to another. However, there was evidence that sometimes goods did indeed go missing.

She remembered a conversation with her partner Aki, who had picked up some rumors in the city. Apparently, all over Novis Prime, small black markets had popped up, where local merchants sold goods that were reserved for trade with other moons to the native population.

But among the illicit goods were also articles that should have been available for free at the security central upon proof of necessity. Unfortunately, the resources there had been dwindling despite intensive controls. In essence, there was only one explanation, and its name was Vasraa.

I’ll take care of that after I get back home, take a bath, and have Aki as a little snack,Xaana thought. And a couple of hours of sleep wouldn’t be bad either. She reached for the pad in Henri’s hands. “Can I go now?”

The security guard returned the list. “Sure. Then I can finally have my lunch break.”

“Lunch break?” Xaana exclaimed. Oh no! She had forgotten about the time difference between Novis and Botan. On the plant moon it was already evening, and Xaana was accordingly exhausted. Here, however, it was still early afternoon. No sleep then... “Right, of course,” she brushed it off when Henri gave her a puzzled look.

“See you again soon, Moonjumper!” the guard shouted after her as Xaana ran after Kaazetee and his platform. She would head for Novis Prime together with the Kasynari on a larger transport platform.

Moonjumper... Not a bad nickname, she thought several minutes later, when the glistening sunlight fell onto her face while the Kasynari steered them toward her current home. She was looking forward to a couple of relaxing hours with her loved ones.

And then we’ll think of a way to prove that the security chief wants to enrich herself with our trading goods...

***

Two days later

Xij felt queasy landing the glider on the security central’s front yard and switching the engine to standby mode. As she unfastened the belt of the pilot seat, she took a deep breath.

“You see? I wasn’t that bad, was it?” Tom leaned over from the copilot chair and gave her a tender kiss on the cheek. “No complications, no catastrophes. And you haven’t forgotten how to fly this thing either.”

Xij sneered at her husband. “Don’t make fun of me,” she said in a strict tone. “Last time I was the pilot, the wormhole exploded!”

Tom clicked his tongue. “Which wasn’t your fault,” he replied and stood up. “On the contrary, you saved people from Earth at the last minute. The Trischberger family and their Catatzes will be forever grateful to you.”

“Still.” Xij also stood up. “If there wasn’t a real good reason to fly back into space, I’d say to leave it be.” Together with Tom she stepped into the glider’s cargo hold and opened the side hatch.

Warm, dry air blew into the spacecraft built by the workshop of the android Miki Takeo.

Had Project Moon Jump been a success? Had Earth’s satellite been returned to its orbit? Or had its impact destroyed all life on the planet? They didn’t know. There was no longer any passage to their home. Therefore it was so important that they were a part of this mission—a mission which at least held the hope of reopening a wormhole passage to Earth.

Tom walked out of the hatch next to her and looked toward the security central’s main entrance. From the surrounding alleys, curious bystanders stared at the glider.

By now most people in Novis Prime were aware that the former resistance was in possession of such an aircraft, so they didn’t seem surprised by its arrival.

“Ah, here they come!” Tom pointed at the building’s glass front. The doors opened, and a small group of Kasynari walked out. Xij recognized Justipluu, behind him the two former Contra leaders Wozguzz and Rankiir, as well as some other grays. Everyone carried backpacks and boxes that resembled tool kits—which they probably were.

Their greeting was short but affectionate. Wozguzz and Rankiir, in particular, were overjoyed to reunite with their Earthling friends. Following their mission to fix the Surface Reamer, they had returned to their underground base, where they had once led the resistance against the excessive power of the Initiators, the Kasynari loyal to the party line.

“That’s our home,” they had replied when Xij had asked them why they didn’t permanently move to Novis Prime.

Justipluu gave some instructions on where to store things to his fellow Kasynari, then turned to Xij and Tom. “The System Council is extremely grateful for your support,” he said. “When I asked Aki to request your help, I didn’t expect to receive a positive answer on the same day.”

Xij eyed the Kasynari dismissively. “Don’t play innocent,” she answered in a jovial tone. “You knew exactly how to lure us in. Constantly looking over Vasraa’s shoulder isn’t very exciting for me and Tom.”

“Hear, hear!” a female voice shouted from behind her. Xij turned around and saw that Xaana and Aki had come out of the security building.

Mother and daughter embraced, and Aki, too, hugged Xij. The boy was all right in her book. He had always helped them, even when he had officially still been a part of Colonel Kormak’s team. Xaana loved him a lot, and he loved her very much too.

“Anyway, it’s a welcome change of scenery,” she added as she turned back to Justipluu. “I see you managed to reassemble the Surface Reamer crew.”

Justipluu folded his hands before his narrow alien chest. “Many of the crew members live on Novis anyway, and the rest are usually close to the transfer towers on the other moons.” He lowered his voice so only Xij could hear him. “Besides, you develop a bond after being possessed by a telepathic stone together.”

From the corner of her eyes, Xij observed the security central’s entrance doors open again, and a petite yet muscular woman in military uniform stepped onto the front lawn. With a quick pace, she approached the glider.

“Someone wants to say adios,” Tom murmured with little enthusiasm, and Xij involuntarily stood up straight as Vasraa joined the group and nodded at them.

“Do you need anything before leaving?” she asked without greeting, apparently only addressing Justipluu.

The Kasynari made a vague gesture. “Thank you, but we’ve got everything we need. I’m counting on you and Corporal Aki acting in accordance with my wishes regarding council matters during my absence.”

Vasraa saluted. “Of course, sir.”

“We’ll take good care of Novis,” Aki added, which earned him an angry glance from his superior.

“Good luck,” Vasraa squeezed out before going back into the security building. Xij noticed Xaana looking after the colonel with the same aversion that she herself felt toward Kormak’s successor.

“We’ll leave shortly,” Xij announced and shook off the painful and humiliating memories of being interrogated. “We’ll stay in radio contact with the security central as long as possible. But when we reach Portal’s orbit, the signal will probably collapse due to the phase shifts. Or maybe it will stay up until we land on the surface and get close enough to the transfer tower. If all goes well, we’ll come back right away.”

“Let’s hope so,” Xaana grabbed her arm. “I’d like to talk to you in private. Is that okay?”

Tom nodded at Aki. “Come, let’s help the others load up the equipment. Justipluu, you can sit in the copilot chair during the flight if you like.”

The Kasynari thanked him in a worried voice. “Too kind of you,” he mumbled while disappearing in the glider’s hatch. To Xij it sounded a bit like a euphemism for “We’re all going to die!”

Mother and daughter moved a bit away from the entrance toward the rear of the glider. “Everything all right?” she asked Xaana, who nodded absentmindedly. “I see you’re worried about me and Tom. I promise we won’t take any unnecessary risks. But I expect the same of you and Aki!” she added.

“That’s why I wanted to talk to you alone,” Xaana murmured. “Justipluu can’t know about our investigations into Vasraa, or our entire operation is in jeopardy. Make sure not to let anything slip out during the flight.”

In essence, the operation consisted of Xaana and Aki keeping a close eye on Vasraa in the absence of the Kasynari who usually controlled the warehouse inventory. The disappeared goods gradually appeared on the black market spots. One of those was located in a merchant’s backyard in a sparsely populated quarter between the inner and outer ring streets.

If Xaana and Aki managed to prove that Vasraa was behind the black market trade and inform the System Council of her activities, they would kill two birds with one stone. The illegal trade would stop, and Vasraa would lose her position at the top of Novis Prime’s security forces.

“We’ll keep quiet!” Xij said. “And please keep your investigations on the down-low. There’s no point if Vasraa smells dangers and suddenly holds back—assuming she’s the culprit.”

“We’ll soon find out.” Xaana sounded confident. She tightly hugged her mother. “Bring dad back in one piece,” she said. Then she called for Aki, and the two of them left for the security central.

Only a few minutes later, Tom started the glider and set the course.

Next stop: Portal, Xij thought as the blue color of the sky slowly gave way to the velvety black of space during their ascent.

“Pull the formation closer together!” Vasraa barked at her recruits, then walked rapidly toward the front of the procession that was moving through the narrow alleys of Novis Prime. Her mood was at rock bottom—as had often been the case recently.

“Training recruits,” she growled unconsciously while trying to match her step to the group’s marching rhythm. Since the young boys and girls were apparently incapable of keeping their pace, she also repeatedly walked out of step. “How much lower can you sink?” she asked herself.

Barely anything remained of the great visions she had held when arriving through the wormhole. Together with Colonel Aran Kormak, she had striven to bring about law and order on Novis and to create a military state whose efficiency and affluence would leave nothing to be desired—at least not for the ruling class.

But the power fantasies had gone to Kormak’s head. Everything had gone down the drain when he had decided to attack the residents with those secretly grown giant spiders in an attempt to force the Kasynari to declare him the sole ruler of Novis.

She didn’t know where Kormak was and didn’t care either. I never want to see him again,Vasraa thought. I’ve still got some dignity left, after all.

The recruits reached a street corner where the path split into two diagonal alleys. Vasraa ordered the group to go right, halt, and line up. When her protégés walked past her, the pungent smell of sweat and desperation wafted to her nose.

Dignity? she picked up her train of thought. Just look at this ridiculous bunch! They’re pimply teenagers whose only accomplishment so far has been to annoy their parents. And now I’m supposed to teach them how to maintain law and order on our streets...

The soldier positioned herself in front of the prospective security personnel. “I see—and smell—that the warm-up exercise worked,” she growled. “That was less than two kilometers and you’re already out of breath? If you don’t improve your stamina, you might as well not show up to the final exam.” She cast her glance downward and shook her head in disappointment. Her long, blonde hair, which was tied up in a ponytail, danced in the wind. “There are still a couple of weeks left, so spend your free time training until you throw up. Otherwise you can crawl back into the huts from which you came!”

“Sir, yes, sir!” the recruits shouted with determination.

The window shutters on the first floor of a residential building opened. “Who’s roistering out there?” a deep, female voice ranted. An older woman with gray hair leaned out of the window—and winced upon seeing who was standing before her house.

The woman’s gaze fixed upon the weapon on Vasraa’s belt. It was one of the few remaining rifles with rubber bullets, which only caused fatal injuries in the rarest of cases but still hurt like hell.

“Waah!” the old woman shrieked and quickly closed the shutters again.

Vasraa indulged in a small grin. It felt good to be respected. Well, respect wasn’t the right word. Vasraa liked people being afraid of her. Not because of her appearance but her reputation.

She raised her eyebrows and turned to her pupils. “Did you see that? Do you think people would react like that to you with your current attitude?”

She pointed to the end of the alley, where several streets converged in a star-shaped open area. There were places like that in every district on Novis Prime. Sometimes, official markets were held there. Often they served as a meeting space for the residents of the surrounding streets.

Even now, in the early afternoon, the calls of playing children and the murmurs of countless conversations resounded from that direction.

“Our next exercise location!” Vasraa shouted. “People meet in spaces like that all over the city. They provide a good hiding place for potential enemies, making it possible to attack out of nowhere and quickly disappear into the crowd.” She walked past the approximately two dozen recruits, whose breathing was slowly normalizing again.

She stopped in front of a particularly young recruit. The resemblance is striking,she thought. Anyone who sees us together will suspect our relation.

“Recruit Zekiya, you will take the first squad, consisting of half the group, I will take the second. Your task will be to closely surveil the area while staying in formation, two soldiers assigned to each road, securing the left and right sides. Understood?”

Her daughter nodded. “Yes, sir!”

She wants to please you, Vasraa realized upon once again noticing that the girl, who in the not-too-distant future would grow into a young woman, already had a piercing glance similar to herself.

“Execute!” Vasraa issued the command, and Zekiya began giving the necessary orders to her group. At a leisurely pace, the recruits marched forward. Vasraa waited until there was about thirty meters between her group and Zekiya’s before she ordered the remaining recruits to advance.

When Zekiya’s squad reached the space, many of the men and women standing in groups or sitting on blankets on the ground briefly fell silent.

A merchant was selling fruits, and children were playing with balls that they had made from pieces of cloth. They had tied branches into baskets, which they had placed against two opposing house walls. The goal was to throw the balls into those baskets.

Vasraa watched them as she led her group onto the open ground. The men and women had only briefly looked up; now they were once again absorbed in their conversations. Still, the soldier thought she saw some of them stealing glances at the recruits.