P Hillard - The Teller of Lies

“It confuses most people, honestly. It’s just one of those things you take for granted once you’re using it. I can fly a ship, but I just know what buttons to push and which levers to pull. Understanding what they’re doing in the background is Kestok’s job.”

The fake star above began to illuminate faintly. Not with artificial daylight, but with a dull blue shimmer. The whole thing was glowing, giving the land beneath a strange otherworldly feeling. The people in the town all looked up as one, each enthralled by the new development.

“It’s oddly beautiful, isn’t it?” Michael said.

“Yeah. Yeah, it is.” Aileena stood up as if she were trying to get closer to the azure orb.

The show continued, as pillars of matching blue light erupted into the air. They formed a dome, each beam emanating from the ice that ran around the edge of Eden and ending when it struck the artificial star. They looked like the glowing bars of a birdcage, and Michael suddenly felt a little claustrophobic.

The pillars of light began to stretch, growing wider until the entire sky was covered in shimmering blue light. It was like being trapped inside a marble, looking out through the glass. Michael realised what was happening, the light a more high-tech version of the Seeker’s shutters. A screen to keep out the effects of jump space.

For the first time since meeting the Custodian, the reality of Eden was starting to sink in. The idea that there was a previous advanced civilisation on Earth was one threaded through popular culture, but Michael was only now realising what this meant. Humanity wasn’t first, someone else was, and they were advanced enough to travel the stars. To build synthetic worlds. Michael had always been taught that an asteroid had killed the dinosaurs, but a civilisation of the size and power to construct Eden wouldn’t have any trouble with something like that. That meant that something else had happened, something much worse. Michael resolved to ask the Custodian when he next saw the machine.

The engines of the Seeker whined as they idled, getting ready to roar to life, lifting the ship into orbit. Michael walked up the ramp to the airlock, his bag hung over his shoulder. The jump was short, taking only two days to reach its destination, but it had felt much longer. Without the light from the artificial sun, time had lost all meaning. The Custodian hadn’t appeared above ground since the field had been generated. The last people to see him had mentioned he was muttering to himself about keeping the drive system stable. Michael was annoyed, he had all these questions he wanted to ask, but looking for the Custodian in the systems beneath the ground was a bad idea. He would be searching an entire world for a single person, an impossible task.

He stepped up through the open airlock, taking a right into the cargo hold. Michael made sure the bag was on tight, before beginning his climb up the ladder that stretched up the three decks that composed the Seeker. The bottom level was the cargo hold, engine room and control room, whilst the middle deck comprised of a galley and living area. The third deck, his destination, had several rooms, enough for six people in total.

Michael tossed the bag into the same room he had chosen during the first day he had left Earth. He had considered coming back here, during the Swords long journey. The Seeker’s rooms had proper beds, with real mattresses. Aileena had talked him out of it. The Knower abandoning the Sword to sleep elsewhere wasn’t a good look for the refugees forced to use the now inferior by implication rooms.

Michael allowed himself to fall backwards onto the bed, feeling its soft surface beneath him. He remembered not finding the Seeker’s bed particularly comfortable during his first journey, but now it felt like the best bed in the universe.

There was a crackle, a voice emanating from the walls of the room. “Michael, everyone is on board and we’re taking off. You’ll want to come down to the control room.” It was Brekt’s soft voice, given a hard edge by the intercom.

Michael sat up. He remembered the flight from Earth well enough. The artificial gravity aboard starships ironically didn’t work once they were too close to a large enough object. That meant that they had to escape the atmosphere in the more traditional way, pure thrust. The gel on the control room chairs would cushion the forces upon him. Trying to make launch in a bed was probably an extremely poor idea.

“Right, Mike,” he said to himself. “Time to get back out there.”

Michael could feel the pressure against his body as the Seeker blasted upwards into the sky. The gel absorbed most of it, allowing Michael to sink into its blue surface, but it wasn’t perfect. Michael had seen footage of astronauts rocketing into the heavens, and for the first time appreciated just how much stress was being put on their bodies. He was receiving only a fraction of what they did, and it was still nearly unbearable for him. The weight suddenly lifted as the Seeker moved far enough away from Eden for the artificial gravity to kick in. Michael wasn’t going to pretend he understood the technology. It somehow made travelling through space feel like you were standing perfectly still, despite the incredible forces at play.

The Seeker swung about, turning so Eden was visible through the control room glass. It hung there like a jewel; the smattering of ships left in the flotilla buzzing about it like flies. A fair chunk of the makeshift fleet had left as soon as they were able, whilst several of the remaining ships had been landed to act as makeshift buildings in the growing town below. The last few were falling into place around the Sword, hiding beneath the protection of the massive ship. The intent was to form a defensive line, though the truth was it wasn’t going to stand against any attack. The powerful shield that enveloped the Sword was still too risky to use according to both Clive and Kestok. Eden itself was unarmed according to the Custodian. Apparently, the builders of the place simply had no need for defences.

Mellok unclipped himself from the bench at the back of the control room, ambling across to the communications console. It had taken some cajoling to get the Cortican to come with them, he was loath to leave his growing congregation. Pointing out that his translation ability was far superior to translator units and would prove invaluable in trading had swayed him, their appeals to his vanity seemingly proving the trick. Mellok pressed a feathered finger to a glowing button, and a hologram sprang to life over the console.

“So, I’ve uploaded a list to the Seeker’s computer, things we definitely need,” Kestok said, the holographic image shimmering as he spoke. “Clive reckons with those raw materials and the recyclers we found we can make replacement relays. Get the shield working again.”

“Sounds like a good idea. Get everything up and running properly,” Aileena shouted from the pilot’s seat. “Just in case there’s any trouble.”

“What’s the likelihood of that? I’m no expert, but why would ships be out here, between systems?” Michael’s knowledge of space travel was rudimentary, but even he knew that ships would jump from system to system. Stopping in the void between stars was a bit like swerving off the motorway to stop in a field at the side of the road.

“Can never be too careful.”

“She’s got a point,” Kestok said. “Besides we need the relays to work everything else on the ship properly. We get unlucky and have a few fail, then the Sword is useless. I don’t know about you, but I would rather my home kept working.”

It was strange, to hear the Sword called home. It had become that over the last few months, but no one had said it out loud yet. In theory, everyone’s associations were tenuous temporary things. Aileena and Brekt had finished their contract, though they hadn’t gotten paid. Mellok had found his messiah. Kestok and Meggok no longer had any reason for hanging around. Everyone could easily have hopped aboard the ships leaving Eden, heading off to continue their own lives. But they hadn’t. They had simply kept on working together, helping with the town or working on the Sword. Together they had survived danger after danger, deadly worlds and fierce battles. They had become bonded, an off-kilter family of sorts.