Steph Bennion - Paw-Prints of the Gods

“She’s not!” snapped Xuthus, shocked at Urania’s outburst. “She’s really brave and clever. I was there in Epsilon Eridani, when she and her friends made the news after finding the kidnapped Raja.”

“It sounds like you fancy her,” Urania sneered.

“I liked her,” said Hestia. No one was listening to her.

“I do not fancy her!” cried Xuthus.

“That’s enough!” Govannon said sternly. Urania’s views of the refugees were no doubt inherited from her parents, but given her own status as a recent immigrant to Ascension he was surprised at her attitude. “If I find that Ravana left the dig because she was being bullied, there will be trouble, see!”

“But…” started Xuthus.

“Big trouble,” Govannon reiterated, looking at each of them in turn.

The transport slipped into the hangar airlock. It took barely a minute for the chamber to be pressurised, yet each second that ticked by seemed longer than the last. Eventually, the inner door slid open and the vehicle trundled forward into the hangar. Govannon’s heart sank at the sight of a familiar microlight aircraft parked in the corner of the hangar, then cursed as he spied its owner watching from the doorway to the transit lounge. Dagan, the eager young activist with camouflage-patterned flight suit, slicked-back dark hair and oily moustache, quite fancied himself the revolutionary. Govannon had been looking forward to a relaxing few hours at the depot’s makeshift bar, catching up with the latest news from the ship’s crew, but with Dagan around he knew that was unlikely to happen.

“Look out,” he muttered. “There’s a Dhusarian about.”

“What does he want?” Urania said irritably.

“To praise the greys,” Xuthus intoned solemnly. “And bring our deliverance!”

Govannon brought the vehicle to a halt. Urania, Xuthus and Hestia were already out of their seats, eagerly making their way to the transport’s airlock. Arallu Depot was no bigger than the domes at the excavation but it was the only change of scenery they had to look forward to until they returned to Ascension.

“Hey!” called Govannon. “Can someone give me a hand with the poop-mobile?”

“Hestia will do it!” called Urania, who was already at the hatch.

The transit lounge of Arallu Depot was little more than a metal-walled shed, furnished with a scattering of plastic chairs and a battered food molecularisor that no longer served tea. By the time Govannon and Hestia entered, having spent several smelly minutes manoeuvring the toilet trailer across the hangar to the cesspool valve, Dagan was nowhere in sight. Nor were Urania and Xuthus, though Urania’s loud cackle could be heard wafting down the walkway tunnel from the docked spaceplane. Govannon knew there would be a queue to use the ship’s ED transmitter and decided to head for the peaceful sanctuary he liked to call his own. Leaving Hestia to join her fellow students, he made his way to the far side of the lounge and down the short tunnel leading into the main dome.

The towering walls of shipping crates and discarded machinery that filled the windowless dome looked the same as ever. Near the entrance to the lounge, one empty and particularly large crate had been turned on its side and furnished with a metal counter, a row of stools and one second-hand robotic bar steward serving the best micro-brewed draft lager this side of Tau Ceti, topped by a sign that read: MORRIGAN’S BAR. Govannon had no idea who Morrigan was but admired his or her foresight in establishing such an oasis out here at Arallu. Apart from a tiny habitation module nearby, the bar was the only concession to home comforts to be found within the warehouse-like environs of the dome.

The depot was unmanned, though visiting maintenance crews and the local Que Qiao security team made sure its life-support and other systems were kept in order. Govannon stopped short upon seeing a figure slouched upon his favourite stool at the end of the bar, then cursed when he realised it was none other than Dagan. The activist had previously admitted he had been recruited by the Dhusarian Church on Aram, with the aim of reminding the archaeologists at every opportunity of the Church’s consternation over the exploitation of ancient alien remains. Govannon was convinced Dagan had taken his task a step further and embarked upon a campaign of sabotage to drive the archaeologists away.

“Dagan,” growled Govannon. “What are you doing here?”

The man turned and greeted the archaeologist with a sly smile. Behind him, the robot bartender trundled to the bar in anticipation, its head swaying disturbingly as its wheels stuttered upon the uneven floor.

“Doctor Jones,” acknowledged Dagan. “Don’t tell me you’ve abandoned your hard work out in the desert? Holy sites don’t desecrate themselves, you know.”

“That’s a little hypocritical coming from Falsafah’s one-man terrorist cell.”

“Terrorist?” exclaimed Dagan. “How dare you! I fight for what’s right.”

“Any attack on a tea vending machine is terrorism to me, see!”

“Tea is a symbol of urban decadence. It cannot fulfil your spiritual needs,” Dagan said solemnly. “Don’t get too comfortable. This bar is also on my list.”

Ignoring him, Govannon took the seat at the other end of the bar.

“Would you care for a drink, sir?” asked the robot. There were several dents in its oddly-contoured head. Its humanoid upper body had once worn the traditional livery of a butler but rust had badly discoloured the plates upon its chest.

“Lager,” said Govannon. “Ice cold.”

“What have you found out there?” asked Dagan. “The girl I spoke to last time said something about a temple, mysterious carvings and all sorts of fascinating stuff! You’ll be pleased to hear the fossils you found were warmly received by the Church.”

“Stealing samples, is it?” accused Govannon. “What have you done with them?”

“They are holy relics and should not have been removed from sacred ground! Your archaeology is no more than the systematic destruction of history. What else have you done in the name of science? Perhaps I need to take a closer look.”

“You would not be welcome.”

“No,” said Dagan. “But neither are you.”

He rose from his seat and regarded Govannon levelly. When the archaeologist failed to respond, he walked smartly from the bar and out of sight. Govannon sighed and reached for the schooner tumbler the robot placed upon the bar. His long-awaited sip resulted in an unexpected assault upon his senses and he spluttered in disgust.

“What the hell is that?” he exclaimed, shoving the tumbler back across the bar.

“Warm reconstituted goat’s milk,” the robot replied. “I regret that due to a recent data infection, I can no longer serve the full range of beverages.”

Govannon gritted his teeth. Sabotaging the molecularisor and taking away his supply of tea was bad enough, but the bar was his holy ground.

“Dagan!” he muttered. “This means war!”

Xuthus looked at the pilot, puzzled. The surly red-faced Englishman had on several occasions expressed distaste at being on some far-flung frontier planet and not in his old job ferrying wealthy tourists around the inner Solar System. Yet it was Xuthus’ question about Ravana that had led the man to scowl and screw his face into a peculiar defensive frown.

“I don’t know where she is,” the pilot snapped. “She didn’t come back with us.”

“Then where is she?” asked Xuthus.

“Are you asking after your girlfriend?” called Urania, looking around from where she hogged the holovid console. “Are you upset she ran out on you?”

“Ravana is not my girlfriend!”