| abstract | - It was hot. Damn hot. Not unseasonably hot for Virinat’s southern hemisphere in early January, understand, but hot enough you don’t want to be out in it unless you have to be. Morgan t’Thavrau had to be. It was late in the growing season, almost time for the harvest. The satla and kheh, analogs to Terran wheat and rye or so Morgan had been told, weren’t going to irrigate themselves, and she couldn’t handle the irrigation without being out on the tractor. And she couldn’t be out on the tractor if the Elements-damned thing broke down on her on the other side of her 230 hectares. It was hot enough that she’d probably end up with heatstroke if she had to hike back to the house. And that meant a trip down to the garage. Morgan parked the tractor under the overhang, cut the power, and hopped down, taking off her hat and wiping her sun-browned brow on her sleeve. Luckily they had a strong wind coming off Mount Hyjal today so it was cool in the shade. “Alatra!” she shouted into the machine shop. “Get out here!” “Alatra’s out sick,” came a gravelly baritone voice from inside and old D’Vex tr’Hllauyin came out, wiping his hands on a rag. “Morning sickness again?” D’Vex nodded. “Mm-hm.” “What’s she on now, number five?” He nodded again. “Mm-hm.” “She sure didn’t waste any time.” “No, she didn’t. What’s the problem?” “The blinkenlights are coming on.” “The—” D’Vex gave an angry grunt and glared at her. “Could you be any less specific?” “Hey, I’m a farmer, not a mechanic. I can change the lube and the brake pads; that’s about it. It’s the ‘check engine’ light, same as the last five times.” The older Rihanha gave a heavy sigh. “All right, let me have a look.” He grabbed the railing and hopped up into the saddle. Morgan tossed him the keyfob and he slid it into the ignition. “Thought as much. It’s that number two fuel cell again. I keep telling you to get that thing replaced.” “Well, if I replaced it I wouldn’t get to see your shining face every other week, now would I?” “Flattery’ll get you nowhere, Morgan. If you had any more Earth in you, you wouldn’t be able to move.” D’Vex hopped down off the tractor and opened the engine compartment. “Well, I have to have Earth in me, I’m a farmer. Seriously though, I’ve ordered the part but it won’t get here until two weeks from now at the earliest.” “Where in the name of Fire did you order it from? Eight-mil hyperspanner.” Morgan grabbed the tool off a nearby workbench and put it in D’Vex’s hand. “Crateris.” “Ow! Crateris? You ordered Havran?” Morgan looked at the back of his head. “You got a problem with Havrannsu, D’Vex?” “Hrmph, I’m old-fashioned. Bloody goblins are all right but I wouldn’t want my daughter to marry one.” “Be that as it may, I order Havran, I know it’ll work. They know their machinery.” “How’d you afford the shipping? Last season’s tomatoes weren’t exactly anything to write home about.” As much as they tended to scorn anything not Rihan in origin, the Rihannsu had developed a definite taste for the Terrhain vegetable when the trade embargos were briefly lifted during the Dominion War. “Well, you know Pel, that Feh’renga who runs the spaceport in Ahalris? She owed me a favor from about a dozen years back. Before you and Malem turned up in that old T’liss of yours.” “You just better hope the part’s compatible with the old girl. This tractor’s had so many parts replaced on it I think the only original piece is the chassis.” He slammed the access panel closed. “Try it now.” Morgan clambered into the saddle and hit the ignition. No harmonics, no blinkenlights, just the familiar reassuring thrum and whir of the fuel cells and gearbox. “Thanks again.” “That’s six you owe me, t’Thavrau. You planning on paying me back anytime soon?” “Just as soon as we get the harvest in, then we can crack a barrel of the ale from last year. My treat.” “Oh, no, no, no,” D’Vex said, waggling his finger. “You’re not getting off that easy, young lady. I’ve worked hard enough keeping that tractor of yours running this season I deserve the good stuff.” “Wine from ’04? I’ve still got a few bottles left.” He nodded. “Ie. It’s a plan.” “All right, then. I have to get those crops watered in the south field or they might catch fire if it gets any hotter out here.” “The aithaen vr’faeoh says it’ll cool off later in the afternoon. It’ll probably even rain tomorrow.” “The aithaen vr’faeoh says a lot of things. I’ve noticed it tends to be wrong two times out of ten. Y’hhau, D’Vex!” She released the parking brake and hit the accelerator, gunning the tractor out onto the main thoroughfare through i’Haanikh, making a left turn towards her home and her fields. No matter how many modern technological conveniences were applied to it, farming never really got any easier, and Morgan knew she looked older than a Rihanha of forty-nine standard years should have done. Not much older—a few crows’ feet here, a few laugh lines there, a couple touches of silver in her obsidian hair, and the kind of weather-beaten skin that only comes from years of hard labor under a not-always-forgiving sky—but older than she actually was. But it made her happy. As hard work as it was, she loved growing things, and she loved the land. This far from town on an early autumn day, she felt peaceful, at one with the Elements. Earth was all around her. As dry as it had been this week, Water was still in the Earth, making the lehe’jhme vines in her western pasture fragrantly fruit. The Air was in the cool breeze coming off Mount Hyjal, carrying the scent of the fruit to her nostrils, making her mouth water in anticipation of jams, jellies, and wine. Fire was in the blazing star 141 million kilometers over her head, and though it beat down horribly at midday it was bearable as long as the wind didn’t rob her of her hat. She loved it all. It made her feel a part of something again. It was a feeling she’d lost in those terrible first years after … It was just after midday, fourteen-fifty hours by local reckoning, when Morgan finally turned the tractor towards home. Her cottage was Spartan even by Rihan standards, but it was the right size for an unmarried woman and four farmhands. A cool shower, a light lunch of hlai’hwy and cheese, and an afternoon nap in her air-conditioned living room beckoned. First Interlude The bridge of the warbird is abuzz with activity as a huge ship, over two kilometers long, looms out of the blackness. Dark-colored and shaped like an in’hhui nnea aehallhai, a nightmare fish from the darkest depths of ch’Rihan’s oceans, with dozens of spiny tentacles sweeping forward as no race anyone aboard knew of would ever build their vessels. “Hail them again, Arrain,” Commander t’Ethian orders. “Unidentified vessel,” Centurion t’Yalu says into her microphone, “this is the Imperial Warbird Albintian. Identify yourself and state your intentions.” She waits. “No response, Riov t’Ethian.” “Keep trying, but remember our priority is to get Fvillhu tr’Chulan and the survivors of the Deihuit across the Outmarches. That ship is 10,000 kilometers out. If they come within 4,000 kilometers you are to assume hostile intent and react accordingly. Amnei’saehne, do you have a firing solution?” “Ie, rekkhai,” the tactical officer, Lieutenant tr’Khellian, confirms. “Ih’hwi’saehne, what’s the status on the rest of the escort we asked for?” “I don’t think they’re coming. The entire subspace relay network is a mess,” Subcommander Morgaiah t’Thavrau answers. “We haven’t gotten a response from anyone since the USS Nobel two days ago. Barring some miracle, we’re it until—” “Leih,” tr’Khellian interrupts, “target is changing vector. They’re coming straight towards us. Time to intercept, one minute twenty.” “How long before tr’Chulan’s runabout can go to warp?” “Two more minutes to repair the warp core.” “Unidentified vessel has answered the hail,” t’Yalu announces. “Onscreen.” The in’hhui nnea aehallhai vanishes from the screen and is replaced with a Rihanha who’s standing too close to the camera. He’s smooth-foreheaded, a recessive trait that still occasionally makes itself known in the Rihan phenotype. T’Thavrau thinks he can’t be older than a century, but he’s shaved bald, with dark eyes filled with bottomless sorrow and rage, and a huge pre-Imperial tattoo of mourning taking up the center of his face. “This is Riov Saeihr t’Ethian of the Imperial Warbird Albintian. Identify yourself, now.” “Hello, Saeihr, I’m Nero.” T’Thavrau quickly freezes the image on her console and runs a facial recognition search. Perhaps there is something in the Albintian’s internal records. And there is. “Riov. Nero ir-Benheris tr’Sihalian, age 69, leih of Mining Guild vessel Narada. Stationed at … at Hobus.” She can barely bring herself to say the name: The pain is still far too fresh. “Leih tr’Sihalian, what in the name of Fire happened to your ship?” “A few upgrades. The better to avenge our people with.” “Missile separation!” tr’Khellian screams. “Shields up!” t’Ethian barks. “Dorsal disruptors to point defense! Helm, interpose us between that abomination and the Deihuit’s transport, now! Tr’Sihalian, self-destruct your warheads immediately and this incident will be forgotten.” But the mad Rihanha has vanished from the screen already. T’Thavrau hears the muffled thrum of the old Raptor-class warbird’s dorsal disruptor banks going into rapid fire. Impact. The noise is deafening and the entire ship bucks. T’Thavrau is thrown from her chair. A console detonates to her right. The ceiling over tr’Khellian’s station shatters and pelts him with debris. A structural member explodes out of the floor and the operations officer vanishes in a fountain of copper-green. “Returning fire!” tr’Khellian shouts. The wounded warbird wheels and lets fly a salvo of plasma torpedoes. “Damage report!” “Dorsal shields at 41 percent!” an uhlan yells. “Hull breaches on decks one through four, casualties unknown! Medical teams responding!” The plasma torpedoes slam into the leviathan. A few of the huge tentacles snap off but the core of the ship is largely unharmed. The Narada won’t be dissuaded. Another volley of missiles erupts as the two vessels close and trade disruptor fire. The bulkhead on the left vanishes in a fireball and t’Thavrau, barely back on her feet, is thrown free and slams into the far wall at over eleven meters per second. There’s an ungodly howl as air begins to rush out into space in explosive decompression, taking the screaming t’Yalu with it before the emergency force fields can raise. “We’ve lost main engine power!” tr’Khellian yells. The pain is incredible.
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