Chapter 1

On the wrong side of the river on an unknown planet.

The nearly naked boy came to a stop on his bare stomach in the knee-high wild oats. A thin leather band tied behind his neck held back his long blue-black hair like a tail going down his back. The grains waved in the cool, early summer breeze blowing from the direction he had come in his long flight. He slowly stretched his body its furthest underneath the undulating, immature heads of grain as he peered down through the bordering stalks and over the edge of the high embankment.

The boy was at that awkward age; not yet the young man he hoped to become while finding out he was so much more than the child that others of his camp and clan had, until recently, said he had been.

Lifting his neck, he tested the air for any scents that would signal danger. Discovering none, he paused without further movement in the wild oats at the top of the ridge. He listened to the breeze moving through the heavy heads of ripening grain around him, hearing his own breathing and the wha-ho-ho cry of some bird he didn’t recognize off to his left. Considering the descent before him, he thought it was maybe twenty lengths below his concealed perch down to the enormous wide valley he had so recently come upon—at first think it was just a wide swale. He was now able to survey what he could see of the land feature from this new elevated vantage point.

Well hidden down in the waves of grain as he was, the noon-day rays of Father Sun at this altitude still managed to warm all his growing muscles from his widening shoulders, down his spine, and to the dirty fur of his breechclout covering his narrow hips. Yet he felt a momentary chill over the skin along the backs of his exposed, strong, legs.

Gazing far out across the broad green and grassy expanse below him, he could see the landscape farther away was scattered with patches of thick, gray-blue heather. However, starting near the verge at the bottom of the embankment was an abundance of grassy hummocks dotting the deep turf out to the heather. The landscape reminded him of the verdant downs on his side of the river. From this new landscape’s gentle rise to his right, he followed the extended depression before him back with his eyes as the downs descended away to his left. The far ridgeline in the far distance he could see across the turf- and heather-covered expanse, and the ridge he was hiding on now, seemed to channel the downs toward the Toolie river valley—his intermediate destination.

He didn’t see any sign of open water out there. However, with the types of plants he saw further out on the downs that he was familiar with, he knew that water must be very close to the surface in many places all along this valley. As the breeze shifted back into his face, the boy got a small whiff of fetid bog and he felt excitement stir within his chest.

The boy knew better than to stand up-right and skyline his silhouette against the blue heavens. And his bison-hide breechclout kept his traitorous, almost-man parts warmish and safe from abrasive harm if he might need to slither off this crest edge at a moment’s notice.

The boy also knew the grassy ground of the expansive downs below him would be even more soggy than usual after the heavy rains that had slowly moved through this whole area and ended only two days ago. If this new feature of the land before him was anything like the type of peaty ground he was very familiar with back in a portion of his clan’s territory, he felt he could easily follow the downs toward the next goal in his journey.

Considering the opportunity before him, he felt certain he was light enough and sure-footed enough to not be slowed down as he fled along this receding boggy land he was fortunate enough to have come upon. This would be the best and safest way for him to continue traveling from the fells above toward his destination.

By traveling out to the center of the downs after him, his pursuers would have to track him over the boggy vastness. Their body weight would put each one of them at a distinct and dangerous disadvantage. To continue their chase, they’d be moving across areas of increasingly mushy marsh areas that his sense of smell now told him was out there—treacherous bogs and mires that would offer him increased protection as he headed toward the direction where Father Sun rose every morning.

So, if he could find a bog mire wide enough and running long enough, and which he thought would support his weight—then those danged Hurstmon on his trail wouldn’t dare to pursue him further. They would have to stop acting all breakneck and caution-to-the-wind. With their aggressive attitude in check, he felt he would get away from them while they were forced to stay to this ridge land for their own safety. Then the big warriors could only hope to find his trail once he cleared the downs when the land feature joined the huge valley of the Toolie off somewhere to his left.

He hefted up in his right hand the rawhide quiver holding his final two feathered spears as well as his spearcaster. Happy with the feel of the quiver strap over his neck and his right shoulder; he checked his woven waist belt. He was sure his big travel pouch was still tied securely to it, because he could feel the bulge of the big, egg-sized flint nodule he kept among most of his other remaining possessions in the over-sized pouch against his right thigh. Equally important, he checked to make sure that his prized, hand-long flint blade anchored to the fine elkan-horn handle with hoof-glue and shrunken rawhide, was secured on his belt in easy reach. He wanted his hand to know exactly where to go lest he need the razor sharpness of the flint blade to defend him at close quarters.

As his stomach growled his hunger, he slithered over the edge of the ridge. He slowly guided himself on his belly at a steep angle down hill through the sucking cold, thick cushion of grasses. He was vigilant to not allow his snail-pace descent to breakaway into a slide. This was no childhood game, he reminded himself, nor had it been such for nearly the last two, double moons.

If he could make it to the banks of the Toolie without pursuit, there would be easily caught cleave-eel meals—although he hated their squishy meat and muddy flavor. He would be able to find fish for his twine and hook, or put a spear through one of the small grass babbits that he was certain he would encounter in the river valley. There would be abundant water; and with no sign of pursuit and dry fuel, the sacred fire. For did he not now wear around his neck the thin hide carrier on the leather plait that held the cold, hard shard of frozen lightning? And was it not almost the length of his hand and as thick as his middle finger? And when held in his hand struck lightly with a stone, did the frozen lightning not sing and bring tingling vibrations to his fingers?

Best of all, when he swiped his flint nodule along the shard at just the right angle, the shard spit off long-lived sparks of lightning! Red-hot sparks that would cause good tinder to smoke; and with his gentle breath, the tinder might then burst into flames! No more hard labor with a fire drill—and he certainly hadn’t thought he’d need to have a drill with him before this misadventure began, nor did he have the time to construct one as he fled.

If he survived this unexpected trek into manhood he would bring the certainty of sacred fire to first his mother, sister, and then to his camp with his hard won treasure. If he survived, he told himself, he might find this accomplishment would enter his name into a new legend sung by storytellers of his people around communal campfires.

He caught a handful of thick grasses in front of him and halted his descent on the steep bank. Slowly looking around the grassy land below him for any sign of danger, the lad was happy that only the track of the breeze could be seen moving through the thick grasses and heathers out on the downs. With an absentminded nod of his head, the boy slowly continued down the steep slope.

A look of cunning pleasure crinkled his eyelids and the corners of his mouth. He reminded himself that now his sister might not smack the back of his head ever again and be able to call him simple, or clod. She would be the one to gather the water and bring it into his mother’s shelter, as a woman should.

With all of that promise before his mind’s eye, the boy knew he would find a way across the Toolie again. Even if he had to wish his way to the other side and safety, he would make it. See what he already had done—and in the beginning of his fourteenth cycle of the seasons. His sire would have been proud of him and would have boasted of his feats at the fire-ring of the hunters. His only son bringing home the pledge of quick, jumping flames on any hunt—even on a rainy day as long as there were enough dry tinder and sticks brought along. That would make any boy’s sire proud, Ureeblay told himself as he started back down the steep decline on his belly.

For a moment the memory of his now dead sire made him sad. But focusing on sadness and loss, he reminded himself, would distract his awareness to his surroundings and any danger that might be about. There was a group of Hurstmon after him. And if they were still in close pursuit once he reached the Toolie, he felt certain that no amount of wishing would save his skin. Just then his slithering brought him to the grassy bottom of the steep ridge.

He had seen one of their surprising abilities with his own unbelieving eyes. The Hurstmon could move through the deepest water with their heads above the lapping surface and they would come out on the far bank only wet for the plunge. Now, he told himself, if he could learn the secret of that trick.

Of course, around the communal fire ring he had heard the tales from one of the traders of his clan who was a member of his camp. The yarns were of another clan living along the banks of the lake called the Wyzaal. According to some of the traders’ stories, almost every member of that clan would happily strip-off whatever covering they wore at the time and throw themselves into the waves and disappear under the water!

According to the trader, men, women, boys and even little girls were able to safely and happily achieve such feats. Once they jumped in and submerged, they would pop their heads up through the dark blue water lengths away, with only a shake of their head and wet hair as any sign of agitation. The trader reported that not one of them ever came up screaming and gasping in fear of drowning. In fact, it was said they smiled and laughed in the water that was certainly deep enough to be far over their heads.

The traders said it was a skill that could be learned. It was called swimming. One of the young traders had said the next time he returned to visit that tribe he would ask if someone might introduce him to that skill—for would it not be a valuable talent for any man to master. The young trader who would learn to do this new ability had also reminded everyone around the fire that everyone knew many animals were able to cross waters deeper than they were tall by doing their version of this swimming. Were animals able to know more than people of his camp? Not one person ever reminded the trader that birds could fly.

The boy’s shoulders and spine shook involuntarily for a moment at the thought of being completely submersed in water again without a creek bottom under his feet and good, breathable air around his chest, shoulders, neck, and head. Being underwater was not a natural state for a man to find himself in, part of his mind argued. He could understand wading into the shallows to bathe, as his mother insisted he bathe at least once a week—even when snow was on the ground. But willingly putting his body into water over his head, or in a strong current?

Hadn’t he thrown-up the contents of his last meal that fateful morning nearly two double moons ago, when he finally struggled ashore on this side of the Toolie? And had not his head felt like a ripe melon until he’d gotten all that fluid that had felt trapped up behind his eyes out of his nose as he had cleared his lungs. At times he still had the bad dreams in sleep of that morning’s terrible dare.

It was a bad sign to dream of past calamities. Everyone in the clan knew—dreams were for leading one to what was to come.

Still resting at the bottom of his controlled slippery descent, Ureeblay looked around before he picked himself up from the cool, thick grasses. He started carefully, but quickly, moving along the mushy footing in the thick grass of the downs. Following the declining course of the boggy land, he charted an angling way that took him further into the middle of the vast, soft, peaty expanse.

He watched for danger that might hide in the grasses immediately around him, at the base of hummocks he passed by, and the occasional clumps of sedge and patches of deep heather further out on the downs where he was heading. Also further out on the downs he could see areas of marsh plants which marked water even closer to the spongy surface. Now his nose was telling him there would certainly be all the dangerous bogs he’d hoped he would find as he’d looked out over these downs from the ridge crest covered in oats.

As the boy traveled along, he remained always vigilant, keeping a sharp eye out, sniffing the breeze, and listening over his heartbeats for any sign of pursuit. Feeling a bit of real confidence finally, he took the small, black-and-silver, stream-rounded suck-stone out of the depths of his travel pouch and popped it into his mouth, to bring moisture to his tongue.

In this manner he began to make his way toward the valley of the Toolie; and at least, hope.

Third Mission, outbound aboard the Federation space vessel DSE Glenndeavor, 2401 CE

“You should have seen it, Jameson,” my older brother had told me, “I’ve never seen anything like it.”

I don’t know why I find myself thinking of that conversation I had with him whenever I’m really feeling sorry for myself.

“There I was—our platoon of grav-treads in over-watch, hidden in the tree line along the ridge above the valley. Exactly four-point-eight-two-eight kilometers of open terrain by the laser sight from my position to the raiders’ dirt revetments around their compound. I’ll tell you, I was high on adrenaline, but wondering when they were going to realize we’d found them. The pre-pop willies were starting to build, kid—let me tell you.”

Replaying the last conversation I’d had with Killian, in person, at my college graduation, I sat in my desk chair; my quarters were in shadows and quiet behind me.

“Then it happened, right on schedule—” he’d told me in a soft voice.

I remembered the two of us stood in the shade of a big tree and watched our family, relatives, as well as my neighborhood friends and their folks, and some of my older college acquaintances all sitting under the big tent in the park. Everyone in the shade of the big silver and blue canopy was eating, laughing, drinking free beverages, and listening to reggae music pump out of the sound system. It had been my party after all.

“They swept in, quiet as a line of ghosts, from over the forest behind us,” Killian told me, talking almost out of the side of his mouth. I remember he looked so dashing and dangerous in his uniform with all his medals and badges, and I was so happy when he’d surprised all of us by showing up.

“They were the First Winged Hussars, the Corps got nothing like them,” my brother had told me, a faraway drawl in his deep voice. “And I was about to find out just how shit-hot and merciless those Polacks are—and the look of them. I mean, there were two platoons in line abreast, stretching at least a thousand meter from flank to flank. And their armored-up jump suits made them look like big bumble bees, but with only one set of wings, deployed stabilizers actually, and all dull gray and burnt gold.

“There was this static electricity discharging off the two lines of raised, feathered louvers that was the heat sinks of each suit. Those things were sticking up high behind each suit and glowing red, down the backs of their armor,” he’d told me while I’d admired the silver bar on his crisp shirt collar and watched as his Adam’s apple moved.

“And as they swooped down the ridge-side, the icy tips of each stabilizer created these little, cork-screw contrails—two of them—streaming out behind each jump suit as the Hussars flew through moist layers of air,” Killian had said. “I don’t know if the raiders had lookouts that were asleep, or if they had some bad, low-tech scanning system employed, but nothing was happening, and it was almost twelve-hundred local. I couldn’t take my eyes off my view screen and keep zooming in on the Hussars it seemed.

“Then, right on schedule,” my older brother had said, his voice surprisingly calm to my young ears, “that long line of Hussars climbed up out of our field of fire and I received the order to engage the enemy with our plasma cannon. At the same time those killer bees opened up. After our five pre-targeted rounds, I commanded my driver to advance downhill and I notice the Hussars were looking more like a wild swarm of yellow jackets instead of bumble bees over the raiders’ base.

“By then they were getting some opposing fire coming up. Didn’t look to me to be controlled and mostly, it wasn’t effective. The raiders did get a few lucky shots off.

“That was when the second wave of those armored-up Hussars swept over our line of grav-tracks as we moved downhill, not receiving any opposing rounds at all, either,” Killian had told me. “After that, wasn’t much of a battle—and that, little brother, was my first joint operation with planetary forces provided by a member of the Federation.”

“And why are you telling me this, Killian?” I’d asked him. He’d never told me about any missions he’d pulled before. All his emails and vid sessions, when they happened, were about his buddies, what they did on leave—things like that—how his missed our folks and grandparents.

“Don’t go all dramatic, now,” he’d warned me, “or get adhesive with him ... but Pater Grand told me about your big plan. Look, if you’re actually looking for adventure and want to see other worlds and all that, at least man-up and join the Marines. Become a sky warrior. You’ll find whole nother family who will overlook your horrendous geek tendencies once you qualify and graduate from basic, Nerd-boy. The Corps might even look at your college record and decide to send you to OCS. Don’t know why they’d do that, but strangers things have happened.”

And then he’d backhanded me in the gut, but Killian was my brother. And I was sort of ready for his signature move.

“Just do not enlist in ExServ and really torch your investment in college, online? Now, let’s go get a drink.”

I looked down at the short, brown hairs showing where the sleeve of my off-duty coveralls was rolled up my right forearm. The light from my large, high-def holographic unit porting data from the comp interface in my quarters lit up my arm with its ambient light-blue illumination. My arm rested in a study of shadows and muted colors next to my desk comp keyboard that angled across the work surface of my bulkhead desk.

I shook my head, clearing my mind’s eye of that conversation with my brother. I let out a long sigh and slouched deeper between the armrests of my articulated chair.

The chair was pulled up to my desk. The desk was inset into the right bulkhead of my quarters, which I’d been assigned to at the beginning of this Mission for some unknown reason. And as I absentmindedly pondered the play of color against my skin, a bigger part of me was wondering why I thought it had been such a great idea to apply for this posting to start with. Not that I thought my brother had been right, even now.

Space, the final frontier; or so I’d heard it said in that old Earth space classic. Space might be the final frontier for some people, and exciting because of all the opportunities they found for adventure. But for myself, now out here in the Big Black on my third deep-space mission, I was still waiting for my opportunities for adventure. However, in the absence of adventure I was learning patience, at least.

My paternal grandfather, my Grand Pater, always told me patience was one sign of a maturing individual. From watching him since I was a kid I had discovered that patience was almost always dependent on the task at hand and how well the individual doing the task enjoyed the work involved, or how well they’d prepared to do the work.

When he was around me, if I applied his own patience gauge to his actions, my Grand Pater was just as much of a kid as I was back then—still was if the vids from my parents and relatives were any gauge. I’d also discovered that out here in the All Alone on long trips inside a spaceship, life could be more boring than being stuck on your little, back-spiral homeworld. So now, I really understood that any journey was just what you took the time to make of it.

Anyway, my particular long journey into the stars started when I wanted to get my ass off of my own back-spiral homeworld. Not wanting to be worried about the responsibilities an officer had to face, I had decided to enlist right out of college; much to my brother’s and Pater Grand’s chagrin. So I joined the Federation Space Exploration Service; which is a separate entity from the Federation Space Fleet.

I guess I’m not surprised anymore how many civilians don’t seem to really understand the distinction between those two Federal branches. The Fleet is a military entity, and since the Gracy Compromise in the FUP Congress allowed its formation so long ago, the Federation Space Exploration Service has been and is charted as a scientific and exploration branch of the Federation.

With the growing debate by a few political factions that seemed to have popped-up out of nowhere on the various Nets concerning the rights of individual planetary members of the Federation of United Planets, or the FUP, versus Federal Rights, you would think more people would understand the difference between the Exploration Service and the Fleet.

It seemed to me the whole debate was a rehash of all of those States rights versus Federal rights that played out back on Earth in several different geo-political areas around the globe before we finally made it to the stars. A few well-publicized civil wars had resulted back on old Earth because of that exact argument; and the debate had followed right along with humanity as we started spreading out to new worlds. I fervently hoped the member planets of the FUP didn’t fuck it up again. Those who are ignorant of history are doomed to repeat it, and all that.

But, personally, I can’t see why any FUP member planet or their civilian citizens had much to complain about. Over the last 73 years or so, the Federal Government’s economy was booming as the whole frontier economic model started to really kick in. Almost all of the new money was being generated by locating, surveying, and putting up to the highest bidder the rights for colonization and development of planets, asteroid belts, or whatever. And those new opportunities to be found in new star systems were made possible by the Deep Space Exploration ships of Exploration Service.

And yes, there were set-asides in those new systems and planets for acceptable not-for-profit organizations and special recognized groups. Capitalism and the myth of truly open markets did not have the final say in allocating resources at such a vast level as a new planet or new star system—at least, not all of the time.

Still, lots of civilians seem to think if you serve in any Fed uniform, you were from the same mold as any other individual in some other kind of Federation uniform. Granted, everyone in a Federal uniform did serve the FUP, but we served the Federation in different ways. I take exception to those civilian who see any Federation uniform as the Federation uniform, for a number of reasons.

The first reason is that I joined the Space Exploration Service, or ExServ as it is called, because I wanted something I knew I couldn’t find at home. I wanted new sights and to meet new people who weren’t from my home planet. I wanted experiences that would expand my personal horizons and perceptions of others. And, I wanted adventure.

But the adventure part hadn’t panned out for me yet.

There was another thing I wanted back then from joining up. I had wanted the Federation to serve me a free advanced post-grad education, which was what happened. And I continued to build on my learning. So for the opportunities ExServ still presents to me, I have an obligation to do my duty for the Federation. But I’ll easily admit that the only true sense of duty I have is to my own self. Well, and to my buddies on the Ship, and fellow crewmembers in that order of importance, I guess.

But sitting here in my quarters and looking at the hair on my forearm, those arguments are, I guess, beside the point. The point is this: I am here—out in the Big Black. And I am sort of bored and hoping—no, wanting—more than I have been experiencing.

For me to get here I had to enlist and go through basic training. My next stop, because I was a college graduate, was advanced training in my field of study—computing. Then I attended and passed through a couple Specialty Service training schools. After completing my Specialty training with high honors and praise, I had to get a string of orders sending me to my first couple of active duty stations that were located off-world.

Those postings amounted to traveling around star systems to different Service bases as a member of a Data Systems Installation and Upgrade Team doing tedious, ho-hum, behind the scenes data-geek work. And it wasn’t as if I got to really visit and explore the new worlds and space stations I was assigned to all that often. Okay, I had weekend passes and used those times to my advantage if my Upgrade Team happened to be working on planet or on a space facility orbiting some planet.

But looking back on my first group of postings it seemed to me more like I would arrive on a space bus, get the job done, test the work quickly, and then leave to the next assignment on some other old space bus.

I did draw installation duties that put me dirtside about one-in-three assignments. I think every DSI and Upgrade Team did, just so the techno-geeks on the teams wouldn’t mutiny. But that rotation ratio wasn’t enough to fulfill my hunger for adventure and excitement on new worlds.

And the part that really was starting to get on my geek nerves was that someone else had always already been there before me—no matter what world I was on.

More and more I had found that getting on a spaceship to travel to those off-world outposts with my latest DSI and Upgrade Team was about as exciting as getting on some sort of public transportation just to arrive at a regular nine-to-five job every day. I could have stayed on my home planet and done that sort of thing. Thank goodness for those one-in-three dirtside assignments and weekend passes.

Even though I was finally getting to see new places and people, I finally had to admit I wanted something more exciting, something more adventurous.

I wanted to be one of the ones who got there first.

So when I read a big article on EnlistedNet.exserv introducing a whole new class of DSE ships the Service had designed, I got excited. Learning that the first of this new class of Deep Space Exploration ships was scheduled to be commissioned in approximately 18 standard months, I had decided I wanted to become a real explorer and get posted to one of them as soon as possible. After all, I was in the Federation Space Exploration Service. I wanted on one of those ships when it headed out of port and into the Big Black to survey unexplored star systems and planets.

Even though space was called the All Alone or the Big Black, space wasn’t all that black. Now days most of the Federation’s exploration efforts were focused toward the center of our spiral arm of the galaxy, not away from the center. The density of star systems was greater in the direction most exploration missions were headed, and it was in that direction most known Federation Space was expanding. Still, so far, in all the 302 years mankind has been out mucking about in space since the first warp-drive ship successfully created an articulated bubble, mankind had only run into one other sentient race that we were aware of, the Eridani.

I am not even going to address the All Alone legend of The Seeders. That mythical race was right up there with little green men, crop circles, and alien abduction as far as I was concerned.

However, the Eridani were real, live, and an alien bipedal species that were almost complete stay-at-homes. They were content to inhabit the four livable planets in their original star system and the five livable planets in a neighboring star system. After first contact, they seemed to put up with us humans, for the most part, but didn’t want to belong to the FUP.

Chapter 2 »