Andy's Fan-Fiction Archive

APOSTLE OF THE TERRIANS
By
Simon Kattenhorn

Timeline: On way to New Pacifica
Author's E-Mail: simkat@sprintmail.com

AUTHOR'S NOTES:
Dear Edenites
I've tried posting this story so many times already, I'm beginning to think the fan-fiction list has a personal vendetta out against me. *Other* people's posts seem to be going through! What's going on?!! Let's see if it actually goes through this time...
Following in four parts is my latest Earth 2 fan-fic contribution "Apostle of the Terrians".
My thanks to Mary Brick for her superb editing comments.
"Apostle of the Terrians" takes place about four months after the time of the episode "All About Eve".
Earth 2 is the property of Amblin/Universal. This story, COPYRIGHT 1998,
is not intended to infringe upon any existing copyrights.
Please send any and all feedback to me at simkat@sprintmail.com.
Stories available online at:
http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Chamber/5742/
Enjoy!
-Simon K.
HellerMan

Apostle of the Terrians (1/4)
by Simon Kattenhorn

Chapter One
"Didididididididididididi."
The mélange of tens of Terrian trilling voices filled the cavern and echoed back from all directions in a crescendo of mournful sound. Only moments before, the cavern walls displayed dancing silhouettes of the congregated Terrians, like disfigured night shadows issued by swaying tree branches in the light of twin moons. Except the shadows on the cavern wall were backlit by the slowly-fading glow of numerous lines of orange rock that split the otherwise featureless limestone in an erratic lattice of pulsing veins. The lifeblood of this place that fed an energy of sorts into the surroundings. It was life itself. A womb of unimaginable beauty and power.
Fertility had come and gone in this place. The veins of rock had faded from fiery orange, to burned umber, to autumn brown, to black. The shadows danced no longer, and the Terrians filed out of the chamber in subdued silence. This place had become death. It was a concept that this species recognized but could not comprehend. For them, existence was mother. Mother, the planet. The planet that was them. They who were life. The cycle of life that began with the planet and ended with the planet, there to begin again.
For a part of the self to be ripped away was to be enveloped in pain. Confusion. It did not fit in the cycle. It refused to make itself understood and rendered no purpose. And mother could do nothing but cry out in a sad chorus of confused voices.
"Didididididididididididi."
This place was gone now. A hole in the fabric of their existence. It was time to leave it forever. Death could never be nurtured. Death did not belong.

"I don't understand. Why won't you tell me?" Uly glared at the Terrian with a scowl that gave no pretense as to how aggravating this was becoming.
The Terrian stared back with the same expression as ever. It bothered Uly sometimes that these creatures seemed incapable of emotion. Well, on their faces at least. Faces were always a good indicator of emotion. Uly had come to recognize the expressions that warned to steer clear of True when she was in one of her moods. The harsh looks that meant a stern reprimand was about to be issued forth by his mother. The gripping stare from Yale that told of his dissatisfaction at Uly's short attention span during daily instruction. But the Terrians- 'well getting a sign of emotion from one of them is as likely as Bess leaving Morgan to marry a Grendler', Uly thought to himself.
Uly sighed and stared down at the white sand once again. The glare from the bright grains of silica hurt his eyes and he had difficulty focusing on the task at hand. The grains of sand seeped through his fingers as he pushed into the loose surface, but as before, he met with the ungiving resistance that nature dictated when matter attempted to displace matter.
The Terrian looked on patiently and gestured to Uly again, as if the mere act of pointing to Uly's hand resting on the sand were enough to precipitate something more than Uly's extreme dissatisfaction.
"Nothing happens!" Uly cried at the creature. It responded with the same patient gesture towards Uly's hand.
Digging his hand deeply into the loose sand, Uly scooped up a handful and flung it up into the air, allowing it to rain down on him, filling his hair and dusting his face. He let out a giggle and threw two additional handfuls into the air as he danced around in the rain of sparkling white sand grains.
"Why do we always have to train so hard? Don't you know how to have fun?"
The Terrian cocked his head to one side and let out a quick trill. As usual, Uly's mind somehow translated a meaning out of the cry, which fell upon him in the usual combination of audible sound and telepathic imagery.
'Dididididididi. #Motion. You understand now#.'
Uly stopped his dance and stared at the Terrian inquisitively. The remaining particles of sand drifted to the ground around him.
"What do you mean?" Uly asked with another frown. "Understand what?"
The Terrian continued to communicate with the young boy in a sequence of rapid trilling.
'Dididididididi. #The motion through the air and ground#. Didididididididididi. #The ground is the air. The air is the ground#.'
Uly contemplated the meaning of the Terrian's thoughts. He wondered to himself why Terrians always had to talk in riddles. At first he enjoyed the game it seemed to be, but it soon lost its appeal. The Terrians didn't seem to know how to stop playing this particular game. They were as annoying as True sometimes. Uly silently wondered if maybe all Terrians he spoke with were actually girl Terrians. Maybe that was why they often didn't make sense.
"The ground is the air." Uly stared up into the sky as he repeated the Terrian's words. The white sun beat down on him and bleached the surroundings of all color. Only the Terrian maintained the same leathery brown appearance. He stood there before Uly, gesturing to the sky with one hand and the sand with the other.
'Didididididididi. #The motion is the same#.'
The Terrian spun around in the air with his arms thrown outwards from his body, similarly to Uly's dance in the rain of sand only a few moments before. Uly laughed at that. He had never seen a Terrian dance before. Maybe they *did* know how to play after all. But it seemed completely out of character somehow. The only thing that would have been more unusual than this particular spectacle is if the Terrian had begun laughing and giggling as he continued to spin round. Instead, the Terrian's face was as expressionless as ever, and with a final spin or two, he descended into the sand which closed up behind him, leaving no trace of his passage.
"The motion is the same," said Uly as he drifted out of the realm of the Dream Plane and back to the realm of his and his mother's tent on the surface of G889. He sat up in his bunk and concentrated on the Terrian's final words so he'd be able to remember them all day and contemplate their meaning further. He was sure they were important somehow.

"Morgan, I'm leaving now."
"Uh-huh." Morgan pulled the pillow further over his head and attempted to focus again on the dream he was having about the official re-christening of New Pacifica as the city of Morganville. Not that New Pacifica was even in existence yet, but then that hardly mattered to Morgan right now. The event was filled with pomp and ceremony and Morgan was quite enjoying the ticker-tape parade through the main street of the city with his lovely wife, Bess, beaming at his side. Morgan loved these particular types of dreams. They were like small, welcome doses of justice in a life gone mad.
"Why don't you come along today, honey?" Bess stood with her hands on her hips and glared down at her husband's sleeping form. "And why are you smiling like that?"
Morgan opened his eyes and sat up with an audible sigh. His hair was sticking up every which way and his eyes struggled to bring the soft form of his wife into focus before him, her body partially silhouetted in the sunlight creeping through the tent doorway.
"I was having a wonderful *dream*, Bess. Is it so much to ask to be allowed to sleep in and dream?"
Bess harumphed at her husband and headed towards the doorway. "I just thought you might want to spend some time together alone for a change. Away from the others, you know?"
"Bess, I'd *love* to spend time alone with you!" Bess stopped in the doorway and glanced back at her husband expectantly. "But do we have to *run* there to do it?"
Bess gritted her teeth irritably. "Morgan, if you're not careful, one of these days your heart's going to start pumping out lard. Bodies don't keep *themselves* fit, you know."
With a final contemptuous snort, Bess strode out of the tent and bounded over to the breakfast gathering to greet the early birds and begin her warmup routine before her daily run. Morgan sat on the edge of his bunk staring after her with a look of exasperation.
"I'm as fit as a fiddle," he convinced himself. "Is it *my* fault that all the vegetation in this region is high in starches?" Morgan stood up and stretched his body as he let out a loud yawn.

The air was invigorating on this particular morning. Bess had been steadily working her way up a wooded slope that was slowly steepening as she approached the edge of the forest line. The undergrowth had been somewhat thick in some places and Bess had found herself having to concentrate more on her footing than her breathing. As a result, as she loped out of the forest and into the bright morning sunlight shining down on the higher, rocky slope, she found herself beginning to hyperventilate and brought herself to a quick halt. Bending over double, she let her hands rest on her knees and attempted to regain her breath before the return journey to the Eden Advance campsite.
The view from up on the slope was stunning. Catching her breath, Bess surveyed the scene before her and laughed out loud at the pure beauty of it.
"Oh Morgan, if only you could have seen this!" she spoke out into the wind. "It's beautiful!"
She was standing approximately halfway up a small mountain- the smallest in a chain of snow-capped peaks that defined the mountain range along which the Eden Advance group had steadily been traveling for a week. The scenery had been splendorous for days and everyone in the group was in good spirits. They were well over halfway to New Pacifica now and had met with few obstacles since some difficulty with a mysterious illness that had afflicted most of the men in the group two months previously.
Bess scanned the vista before her and took in the natural features of the surrounding land. The air was clearer than she ever remembered experiencing, either on G889 or back on Earth, where a clear day was a downright anomaly. She squinted off into the far distance. It was hard to imagine exactly how far away she was able to see. A number of snowcapped peaks rose up along the very distant horizon, although their outlines were so faint, it was as if they had been gently brush-stroked onto the sky by some higher power. Bess seemed to recall John saying something about the distance to a mountain chain to the west, but the details of his words escaped her.
As time had gone by during the trek to New Pacifica, Bess had found herself paying less and less attention to the details of the lay of the land and the routes that should be taken. At first, it had seemed to her that her experience of being Earth-born and raised defined a responsibility and invaluableness to the group that required her paying strict attention to the decisions made as to how each day's travel would progress. But in time, the rest of the group had grown experienced at the travails of constant travel over difficult terrain. They recognized the dangers and learned how to read the land. She had become slowly, but inevitably, superfluous, it seemed to Bess.
Initially, this recognition of her decreasing importance in overcoming the difficulties of survival in the wilds bothered her. She had enjoyed the feeling of fitting into the group in a capacity greater than 'spouse of government liaison'. But these feelings too soon passed as she adopted and honed another role in the group of weary trekkers. Irrespective of the situation, Bess always managed to be the smiling face that told of better times to come. She infused the group with an enthusiasm for life and a faith in their abilities to overcome any obstacle. In a nutshell, Bess was the single person who somehow stayed in everyone's good graces all the time. What she had ultimately commanded from the group was respect. The one response she had never thought herself worthy of earning from a stationborn crowd. Bess no longer needed to prove herself to them. The mere fact that she was there was medicine enough for the Eden Advance group. She had proven her worth time and time again.
The valley below Bess was streaked by the snake-like course of a wide river, its water glinting in the morning sun. The water had left almondshaped sandbars everywhere along the river course where the water had dumped its load and built up the mounds of sand. She guessed the water was probably fairly shallow. Not that it mattered to them right now, as they were moving south while the river appeared to be snaking off towards the southwest horizon. Most of the valley was filled with dancing waves of tall, green reed-like grass that gently ebbed back and forth in the gentle breeze breathing down the river valley. A few animals grazed in the far distance, but Bess was unable to guess at their size or species. They had encountered a number of grazers on the planet already and most had been harmless enough to the group. They had resisted using the animals for meat as long as the supply of edible vegetation continued. The whole oldEarth concept of eating *real* meat from actual *animals* was too disgusting for most of them to contemplate anyway. 'Give me a spirolina bar any day!' she had heard Magus chuckle once. The concept never mattered much to Bess really. On Earth, you had to eat what there was, when it was available. Survival is what mattered. And if that required eating the flesh of an animal, then so be it. Bess was reminded of the incident in which Morgan, John, Alonzo, and Julia had relied on the meat of a Grendler in order to survive. The circumstances of that situation had been desperate, it was true. But secretly, Bess was thankful that the Grendler meat had been available so that they were able to survive. Not that Bess considered the Grendlers as wild animals- they were a sentient species for sure- but sometimes one had to do whatever it took to survive. It was that simple.
Bess absorbed the view before her a few minutes longer then headed back downslope into the trees and towards the campsite. She enjoyed this time to herself in the mornings, when she could reflect on the goings on in her life and appreciate the solitude. Even the time spent away from Morgan was needed, although lately she had been trying to get him to exercise a bit more by joining her for her morning run. Not that her efforts had met with any success thus far. "Perhaps I need a different strategy," Bess thought to herself as she approached the camp.
Suddenly, Bess felt her foot hit the ground at an odd angle and her entire body lurched to one side. A searing pain shot through her right ankle and she involuntarily let out a loud yelp that brought Walman dashing over to her, followed almost instantaneously by Danziger, Julia, then Morgan.
Morgan was fairly levitating over the ground between the campsite and where Bess lay sprawled on the ground, writhing in extreme pain. One side of his face was lathered in shaving cream, and in one hand he waved a razor about as if warning all before him to stay out of his way or face the consequences.
"Bess! Bess! Oh my God!" Morgan was yelling. He arrived at the scene just as Julia had started her diagnosis by running her diaglove over the region of Bess' ankle. "What's wrong?" he cried. "For God's sake, *do* something! Oh Bess!" Shoving Walman aside, Morgan kneeled down and cradled Bess' head in his lap as he stroked away the tears on his wife's wet cheeks.
"It hurts!" Bess was trying fiercely to not let her emotions get away from her. She bit at her lip and silently cursed herself for being so involved in thought to have not noticed the small hole in the ground into which she had stepped.
Walman was hovering and moving around the circle of people on the ground, looking extremely anxious. Cameron had appeared too and stood silently outside the group of fellow travelers, feeling helpless.
Julia frowned and gave Bess a sorry glance. "Looks like quite a bad sprain."
"A *sprain*?!" cried Morgan. "Are you sure it's not broken? Look at the bruising already! I think it's broken. Oh my God, how will we set the bone? She took her bone-healer vaccine. You did remember, didn't you, honey? I'm sure she did. We need to set the bone!"
"Morgan!" Julia considered zapping him with a sedaderm for her own peace of mind, but resisted the extreme temptation. Besides, perhaps Bess was slightly more deserving at this point in time, even if Morgan *was* beginning to hyperventilate. "It's not broken. It's just a sprain. We just need to reduce the swelling and block the pain."
Julia applied the sedaderm and the grimace on Bess' face relaxed somewhat. This effect seemed to carry over to Morgan, who had begun breathing normally and was focusing his attention entirely on making his wife as comfortable as possible. By this stage, Alonzo and Devon had arrived, bringing a make-shift stretcher in order to get Bess back to the camp. Yale was attempting to keep Uly and True from poking their heads between the crowd of people gathered around Bess.
"We still have some of that miracle-sap, don't we?"
Julia thought about Devon's question briefly before giving a nod. "I think we do. We should pack the ankle and let Bess rest that leg."
The 'miracle-sap' was the name given to a white, milky substance they had encountered a few months previously; the sap of an otherwise woody, leafless shrub. After a number of tests to determine its possible toxicity or application, Julia discovered the substance to be quite the medicinal wonder, similar in many ways to Grendler saliva, relieving itching, helping wounds to heal, and suppressing swelling. True had mentioned that the last of these benefits made her want to rub it all over Uly's big head. Since his increasing adeptness at communicating with the Terrians he had started becoming more and more intolerable to True. Sometimes she wished he would disappear into the ground indefinitely like the Terrians.
With a concerted effort by the gathered crowd, Bess was carried back to her and Morgan's tent where her ankle was wrapped in sap-soaked cloth before she was ordered by Julia to rest. Everyone then retreated from the tent leaving Morgan hovering furiously over a suddenly anxious Bess.
"I'll take care of you, honey," Morgan gave Bess a concerned grin.

Devon and Danziger silently absorbed the information. Yale, maps in hand, had just informed them that an extreme danger of ground collapse existed in the region they were in. Their situation had instantly turned precarious.
"We're going to have be more careful than usual," Danziger gave Devon the most concerned expression he could muster. "The last thing we need is to try to haul that monster out of a giant hole in the ground," he gestured over his shoulder at the Transrover.
"Are you sure that risk exists?" Devon was intently studying the map laid out before her, Danziger and Yale. It's hard to tell from this that the land is any different from usual."
"Oh, it's definitely different," Yale piped up. He had only just completed this latest survey map using all existing telemetry data on the planet available to the group. "Look at the pattern of drainage. The irregularity of the contours. It's all right there."
Devon squinted at the map again and wondered what on Earth it was she was supposed to be seeing. It looked just like any other cartographic sheet to her. Contour lines showing mountains and valleys. Rivers criss-crossing the landscape. Areas of dense vegetation. After all this time moving across the planet surface, Devon considered herself as adept as Yale and Danziger at reading the layouts from one week to the next. It was a small consolation to her though that Danziger was not looking entirely comprehending of the mass of lines and text defining the carto-sheet. In contrast, Yale was nodding intently as he studied the map, as if some personal muse were transmitting a three-dimensional projection straight from the map into his head.
Devon eventually shook her head and shot a questioning glance at Yale. Realizing her difficulty, Yale pointed out specific features on the map.
"Look at this river. Notice anything unusual about it?"
Devon and John both examined the thin line traced onto the map. This was followed by an exchanged look between them and a double shrug.
"It's a river, Yale. What's the point?" Danziger was starting to sound impatient.
Yale continued in unwavering patience. "The river is not continuous. See?" He pointed to one end of the river, which Devon recognized as being the river's source. A small stream, really. Perhaps merely non-perennial drainage. Then he pointed out a similar end-point further along the river's trace. John and Devon both frowned. How could a river have two source points?
"The river can't just stop," John showed his frustration. "It must be a mapping error."
Yale shot a hurt glare at John, as if the man had just insulted him, his family, and all his ancestors and their friends.
"I assure you the map is *quite* accurate."
"Then what the hell happened to this river, huh? It can't just stop!" John was beginning to find the discussion trying. He felt like he had been transported back to high school, with a disapproving geography teacher getting on his case about forgetting the principles of stereographic projection or some such nonsense.
Devon's face lit up suddenly. "Ah! The river can't stop, that's true. But it *can* disappear!"
"What?! What the hell are you talking about, Adair?"
Yale had started smiling, pleased that even this far out of her tertiary education, Devon still managed to draw upon things learned many years previously.
"It flows into the ground, doesn't it Yale? It flows back into the rock, through a crack or something. Now what was that word..." Devon drifted off into silent thought, trying to recall a distant lesson in surficial processes.
"Karst," prompted Yale. "Karst topography to be exact."
"That's right!" exclaimed Devon. "Now I remember! Limestone!"
"Exactly!"
Danziger's head moved from side to side as he followed the exchange between the two of them. He, for one, wouldn't know a karst topography if one sneaked up and bit him on the behind.
"What the devil are you talking about? We've seen limestone before." John had had enough of this game of point-out-the-geologic-feature.
"Yes, but not like this," explained Yale. "This region has an active underground water system that has eroded out the rock and formed great underground rivers. I wouldn't be surprised if the rock was full of giant crevasses and caverns. Very treacherous land indeed."
John frowned. "You mean the ground could just give way beneath us without warning?"
"I don't know, John. Perhaps. Sometimes in this type of environment, large holes open up suddenly and everything collapses into them. On Earth they are called sinkholes. I've heard of entire buildings being swallowed up by them."
John took another long look at the Transrover, trying to gauge its weight in his head, but it was a futile exercise. All he could decide was 'heavy'. But heavy enough to cause the ground to collapse?
Yale continued. "This entire area may be pock-marked by small collapse features and holes. Could be big. Could be as small as the one that tripped up Bess this morning."
"Well then we'd better put the scout teams on extra alert," decided Devon. "Is there some way we can determine the likelihood of cavities ahead of our path?" she directed at Yale.
"Perhaps. If we can figure out some way to build a wave-pulse emitter with a built-in receiver. Then we can look at signal return-times to determine the structure of the ground beneath us."
This idea was a concept John *could* relate to. "Hey, I could make something like that," he offered. He thought about it for a few seconds and continued. "Maybe steal a few parts from this and that, but I'm sure I could get something together in a few days or so."
"Excellent!" said Devon. "Now if only we could figure out in the meantime if we're safe exactly where we are..."

Uly stared up at the towering tree above him and watched the squirrel-like animals that scuttled back and forth along the branches. They were interesting to watch although he realized one would do well to avoid getting too close to the rodents. True had made that mistake once when she decided such a furry creature would benefit greatly from being her pet kitty-substitute. The animal apparently took exception to True's plans, responding by sinking its teeth into one of her fingers. Sometimes it seemed True never learned her lesson when it came to the creatures on this planet. This event, as usual, precipitated a stern lecture from both Yale and each child's respective parents, despite Uly's proclamations of innocence throughout.
Returning his gaze to the ground, Uly closed his eyes and attempted to concentrate.
'The ground is the air. The air is the ground.' Uly repeated the words again and again as a silent mantra. 'The motion is the same.'
In his mind, Uly was dancing around in circles, the sparkling grains of sand floating around him in suspended animation, like stars in a miniature universe. He moved through this private microcosm as if the stars were pure energy rather than matter. Little pin-pricks of light that he could move through without hindrance. As each point of light hit his body, he felt their warmth and allowed the heat to pass into his body and combine with his own thermal core. It was as if each tiny grain of sand- each pin-prick of light- were feeding him somehow. Giving him the energy to continue. Making him feel as one with the universe. Uly could not fully comprehend what this meant to him. He only knew it made him feel good inside. It was definitely a feeling of pleasure.
A noise in the distance disturbed Uly's concentration and he opened his eyes suddenly. He was horrified to discover himself buried up to his knees in the ground and he let out a loud yell.
"Uly!" His mother's cry was instantaneous. 'I should have gone further from the campsite' Uly thought to himself as he realized he was not hurt by the close encounter with the planet. He extracted himself from the ground as if it were made of vapor. And yet when he put his foot back down again, the soil supported his weight with its usual ungiving strength.
"Uly! Where are you? Uly?!"
"It's okay, Mom! I'm over here!" Uly began running back towards the camp as Devon appeared at the edge of the grove of trees and ran towards him.
"Uly! What happened? Why did you scream?"
"I'm sorry, Mom." He put on his best sheepish look. "I tripped over a dead branch."
Devon gave him the quick, motherly once-over and reassured herself that everything was alright. "Be careful!" she half-scolded him. "This area can be dangerous, so don't go wandering off, okay?!"
"Okay, Mom." Uly gave Devon a small hug then scampered back into the camp and over to where Baines had begun to build up the firewood for the evening campfire. Devon watched him go with a mixed feeling of relief and concern before heading back to her tent. 'Raising a child on a planet's surface is just impossible,' she thought to herself.
"Aaargh! OUCH! Goddamned T-clip bolts!" Danziger hurled the wrench to the floor and sucked on his finger where he'd just slammed it against the underside frame of the Transrover. He regretted it immediately as the bitter taste of axle lubricant hit home in his mouth. He spat out sideways, much to the dismay of True who had just popped her head under the vehicle to find out what all the hollering was about.
"Ew! *Gross*, dad!"
True wiped at her face as if an acid-spitting alien had just gobbed all over her, and gave her father a disdainful look.
Danziger crawled out from under the Transrover and sat up next to True. "Sorry True-girl. The T-clip wouldn't budge." He held up his grazed finger as if displaying a war injury.
"What were you trying to do?" True poked her head under the vehicle and surveyed the area of the rear axle where her father had been tinkering. "Is there something wrong with the Transrover?"
Danziger forgot his aching finger for a moment. "No, I was scavenging for a part for the subsurface surveyor." Danziger had already begun bandying the term around whenever possible. The fact that he had been the one to come up with it may have played a small part in that. Suddenly, his fatherly instinct kicked into gear. "I thought I told you to stay back from the Transrover!"
True retreated a few uneasy steps in the hope that this would pacify her father's abrupt turn of attention. "I wanted to see if you were okay," she stated, her posture stiff in sudden indignance as if to indicate to her father that it was her *job* to look out for him.
"True, what did I tell you about coming near the Transrover, hmm?"
True stared at the ground in a sudden fascination with dirt and scraped a pointed foot back and forth. "You said to stay away because the ground could cave in," she recited in a soft voice.
"And why is that?" Danziger questioned her again.
"Because the Transrover is really big and heavy." True was starting to feel that this entire situation had turned unfairly out of her favor. She had only been worried about her dad after all. And now she was being reprimanded because of her concern.
Danziger walked over to his daughter and crouched down in front of her. "Do we have an understanding?"
True snapped her head away from her father's glare in defiance. "Well, what about those trees over there?" True suddenly blurted out, pointing to the grove of trees beside the camp. "I bet they're really heavy too but they're not falling into the ground."
Danziger glanced at the trees and was about to say 'that's not the same thing' when it suddenly struck him that in essence, it probably *was* the same thing. He found himself at a complete loss for words then.
"I bet those trees are as heavy as the Transrover! Heavier even!" True stuck her chin out at her father, as if daring him to challenge her astute logic. She was beginning to feel a small amount of reparation from the turn of the discussion.
The look on True's face cut to Danziger's heart. Sometimes the resemblance to Elle was more than he could bear to face. The very mannerisms were even the same. The genetics never failed to amaze him. As well as cause him pain.
"You're right, True-girl."
True's face lit up with a broad smile as Danziger continued.
"From now on, you don't go within twenty meters of those trees either."
Danziger walked back over to the Transrover leaving True staring at his back in utter frustration. The smile hadn't lasted very long.
Bess felt her eyes roll back in her head for the umpteenth time that day. This was becoming intolerable.
"Morgan! Honey! I'm fine, *okay*? Just let me rest here. You go and help Magus and Cameron with the vegetables."
Morgan stopped with his efforts of re-fluffing the pillow under Bess' shoulders and looked at his wife with extreme concern. "But Bess, I have to stay here and take care of you! Magus and Cameron can manage chopping the vegetables by themselves."
"Well...well I'm sure Baines and Walman need help getting the fire started. Really, I'm fine here by myself. Really!"
Morgan was unconvinced. He seemed to be under the impression that an ankle sprain had rendered his wife completely incapable of functioning and so she needed him there to watch out for her. All the time. Hovering. There.
"Bess, I really think two can handle a fire just fine. Besides, you need..."
Bess was distracted by the sight of Walman seemingly hovering just beyond the entrance to their tent. "Walman!" Morgan had stopped in midsentence and spun his head round, expecting to see Walman standing in the doorway. Instead, he appeared a second or so later, looking slightly embarrassed. Regardless, he seemed happy to drop in to see how things were going with Bess' injury.
"Er, you called me?" he half stuttered.
Morgan was now looking at Bess in confusion. How on Earth was Bess supposed to rest with all sorts of visitors dropping by for a chat?
"Walman!" Bess was relieved that the man had heard her call. "Hi! Er...I was just telling Morgan about...you know...the fire." Bess struggled to give the most pleading expression she could muster. "Remember, you said you...ah...could use help with...er, the firewood." Walman looked slightly confused. "Right?" Bess fairly demanded.
Walman seemed to get the picture suddenly. "Oh! Right! Yeah, the firewood! Wadda ya say Morgan? Wanna give us a hand? We could use someone with your talent out here."
Morgan was looking even more confused. "*What* talent?"
Walman struggled for words. "You know? Deadwood."
"Huh?!"
"He means the dead wood, honey. You know what wood burns best, right?" Bess gave her husband the sweetest smile. It worked.
"Okay Bess. But you rest, okay?! I'll be back as soon as I can."
"Sure Morgan. I promise!"
As Morgan and Walman exited the tent, Bess felt her body relax for the first time that day. She loved her husband dearly, but sometimes... 'Well, sometimes absence makes the heart grow fonder,' she told herself.
End of Chapter One. Continued in Chapter 2.

Apostle of the Terrians (2/4)
by Simon Kattenhorn

Chapter Two

Devon gazed at her son's sleeping form and smiled. On occasion, Uly could
seriously try her patience with his antics. And at times like these, she felt he must surely be the paragon of pure innocence. It never failed to amaze her how many new emotions were borne out of motherhood. The little
boy before her had taught her more about herself and her capabilities than anyone else could possibly ever do. He had opened up her eyes to the order of things. Priorities. It was incredible how priorities could be so completely turned around by an impish smile or a woeful look from a child. How the world suddenly seemed to function by different laws. A new hierarchy of importance. And yet Devon would always discover a sheer pleasure that was a consequence of such upheavals in the scheme of things that she knew. Because little by little, there was a growing clarity of sense arising out of chaos. Little by little, Devon discovered what it meant to be alive.
Extinguishing the lamp beside her cot, Devon let her head fall back onto the pillow and she closed her eyes. It felt good to be able to drift off to sleep with a certain smile to accompany her.
As Devon slept, Uly's body fidgeted and he let out a small sigh.
"But I went into the ground! I really did this time!"
The Terrian trilled softly. The imagery appeared in Uly's mind with the usual lucidity though. '#Bird through the ground. Not stone in the sky.#' If Uly hadn't known better, he would have said that a certain sadness came through with this last telepathic statement. It was as if reference to the sky disturbed the Terrian. Uly thought about it for a few seconds and decided he understood. The sky must seem like a terribly ominous concept for a species who were linked to the earth. Perhaps it was like a fish despairing at ever being stranded out of the water. A loss that would be fatal.
"Bird through the ground," Uly repeated to himself, closing his eyes and concentrating. Flying through the ground. In hindsight, Uly realized that this was what his experience three days earlier had been like. Or more like floating perhaps. Flying implied motion. Control. Uly felt as if he lacked both those facets of the experience. He hadn't had any control over his motion. In fact, he had become most alarmed after discovering that a portion of his body had entered into the earth. What if his head had gone under the surface during his practice? Would he have suffocated? Now it was Uly's turn to shiver at the thought of being out of the element that sustained him. The image of it broke his concentration and he opened his eyes again. The Terrian merely stared at him. No answers were offered.
"How can I fly?" he demanded of the Terrian. "What if I can't move? What if I can't get back up to the surface? Will I die?"
This time the Terrian trilled loudly. Uly barely registered the meaning of the thoughts projected into his mind over the cacophony assaulting his ears.
'Didididididididi. #Planet does not kill the living. Living can kill the planet. Kill the self.#'
Uly stared at the leathery creature before him. This time the emotion had been quite clear. Emotion from a Terrian! But something was disturbing this Terrian in a way that Uly could not fathom. And yet, he also had felt reassured that his attempts to move into the ground would not be harmful to him.
"What do you mean?" Uly asked. "How can the living kill the planet?"
The Terrian filled the air with noise again and an image of geolocked ground appeared in Uly's head.
"Oh."
The incident with the geolock precipitated by Morgan Martin had not gone unnoticed by the Terrians in this region. 'Perhaps Terrians always know what's going on with all the other Terrians,' Uly thought to himself. Not that he could be sure this Terrian with him on the Dream Plane was even *from* the area where the Eden Advance team were currently camping. They
hadn't actually *seen* any Terrians in the area. Uly had merely assumed they must reside nearby.
"But Mr. Martin gave the planet its life back," Uly attempted to convince the Terrian. "He didn't know it would hurt anyone."
'Dididi. #Life sometimes gone forever.#'
Uly frowned at that thought from the Terrian. It was not like these creatures to talk openly of death. The concept of death was different for Terrians. Uly had discovered that once during a mooncross encounter with them. But even then, he had never really understood.
"You mean dying," said Uly. "Like what happened to Mr. O'Neill and Eben." Uly thought about the late members of their group who had lost their lives during the trek to New Pacifica. "I guess sometimes it's forever." Uly's voice was almost a whisper. It was not a topic he liked to think about. "But my mom says that as long as people are still in your thoughts and in your heart, then they never really completely died."
This concept appeared to confuse the Terrian. Uly was faintly aware that perhaps they hadn't been talking about the same thing after all. Terrians and their riddles...
'Didididi. Dididi. #Living kill the self. Kill the planet forever.#'
The Terrian's words were starting to disturb Uly. He felt as if the Terrian was attempting to tell him something of great importance, but Uly's young mind struggled in futility to find the meanings behind the word-thoughts. Perhaps it would be better if they resumed the exercises in Terrian-style travel through the ground.
"I can try and concentrate some more," Uly suggested. "Maybe I'll be able to fly next time."
The Terrian appeared to ponder the idea for a few seconds. Either that or the Terrian had not heard Uly's suggestion. Finally, he trilled a long, mournful barrage of imagery into Uly's mind.
'*The air is the ground. The ground is the air. Fly where the self is living. Stone in the sky where the self is black. Mountain of the night.*'
With these final thoughts imparted on Uly's consciousness, the Terrian turned and walked away until he faded into the darkness beyond Uly's depth of perception in this Dream Plane place. Uly frowned as he watched the creature slowly disappear. The Terrians *always* returned to the ground, even in the Dream Plane. He did not recall ever seeing one simply walk away before. Uly felt the Dream Plane evaporate around him and before he could think about it further, he was again deep in the realm of normal sleep. He took the frown with him.
Devon's smile remained as she slept nearby.

"But how am I supposed to monitor for transmissions, huh?" Baines looked entirely agitated. He was on the verge of using the very transceiver he was trying to protect from Danziger's large hands to beat the man into a bloody pulp.
"What, are you expecting a call from you mommy, Baines?" Danziger laid on the sarcasm liberally.
Walman, eavesdropping nearby, failed to suppress a chuckle and Baines stared daggers in his direction.
"You know damn well I've been monitoring all the designated New Pacifica channels," Baines shot back icily. "There's no telling what could be going on out there. Or did you forget about that small matter of the Council?"
Danziger had about lost his patience with Baines. "Why don't you get it through your thick skull, huh? There's no-one out there! The channels are silent, okay! No Council colony. New Pacifica doesn't exist until *we* get there. And it will stay that way until the Colony ship arrives, and if *we* don't get our asses away from this goddamned sponge-cake rock formation, *they're* not gonna have anyone there to lay down the red carpet. Got it?"
Danziger grabbed the small electronic device from Baines' grip and stormed back towards his tent. The workbench set up outside was strewn with bits and pieces of electrical gadgetry and other bric-a-brac. He ground his teeth together and silently cursed Baines for his stubbornness to give up the transceiver device. Especially considering it contained a vital component for his subsurface surveyor.
He put the transceiver down with the other items on the table surface and began taking a final inventory when Julia appeared beside him looking far less than happy.
"John Danziger!" she scowled.
He had been expecting this. Nevertheless, he felt the muscles in his shoulders tense up at the sound of Julia Heller's not-so-friendly voice.
"What can I do for you, doc?" Danziger fiddled with some of the wiring and other items before him, attempting to sound casual.
"Oh, don't play innocent with me, Danziger. You know damn well why I'm here. My portable optical microscope has mysteriously stopped working. Why do you think that might be, hmm?" She advanced towards Danziger until her face was almost pressed up against his, made possible only by the fact that Danziger was stooped over the workbench at the time. "Do you think it could have anything to do with...oh I don't know...perhaps *the laser emission pack vanishing into thin air?*"
Julia's raised voice echoed around Danziger as he subtly attempted to cover a small, rectangular object on the workbench with one of the larger items. Standing up straight, Danziger glanced around and was happy to discover that they had not attracted an audience, eavesdropping or otherwise.
"A laser emission pack, eh?" Danziger said and breathed in through clenched teeth. "Pretty rare item around these parts."
"Danziger!"
"Okay, okay! So I borrowed your light source. Julia, this is the best high frequency emitter we've got! With a few more modifications, I'll have that baby pumping out a strong enough energy beam to scan down to at least fifty meters." Danziger stared at Julia, waiting for her to recognize the logic of his actions and then leave quietly.
Julia, on the other hand, was not to be deterred. "A few more *modifications*? What have you done to my emitter?" Julia started scavenging at the parts scattered on the workbench, searching desperately for the device that acted as a high-energy light source for her microscope. Danziger stared on in amazement for about half a second before attempting to physically drag the doctor away from his precious supply of items.
"I haven't done *anything* to it! I'm not going to break it, okay?! Quit worrying!"
Julia gritted her teeth and scowled at the man. For an instant, Danziger wondered if he might be struck down by lightning. Incurring Julia Heller's wrath was not something he cared to experience on a regular basis. Of course, the same could be said for Devon Adair. Couldn't a man just be left to get a job done around here?
"Quit *worrying*?! *What* if we encounter some kind of new virus or disease, huh? What if I need to analyze an important type of vegetation or mineral? Did any of that, even for the tiniest second, cross your mind? Did it, John?"
For the first time, Danziger realized that his actions had *really* angered the doctor. Nevertheless, he attempted to downplay the situation for all its worth. "Don't you think you might be over-reacting just a little, doc?"
Julia's eyes opened wide in amazement and she found herself opening and closing her mouth repeatedly without actually finding any words to say.
"Something going on I should know about?" Devon had appeared and was standing with her head cocked slightly to one side in that way she had whenever she was attempting to mediate a dispute or ascertain the facts of a situation.
Julia regained her composure and stood stiffly glaring at Danziger. "Perhaps you could inform Mr. Danziger here that the entire equipment supply of the group is not at his disposal to do with as he so pleases," Julia's sarcasm spilled over in an undeniable torrent.
Before Devon could reply, Danziger cut in with his own defense. "If we're to get out of this Swiss cheese mountain range without the ground opening up and swallowing our entire complement, vehicles and all, I'm sorry if I happen to step on a few toes to get this device operational."
Devon attempted to look and sound neutral. "And exactly how many toes have you stepped on so far, John?"
Something- he didn't know what- but *something* in that tone of Devon's struck a chord of familiarity. Danziger was sure he didn't like it.
"So I borrowed a few pieces of equipment from here and there," he spat out. "Heck, you knew I was putting this thing together, Adair. Everyone was told about it. What's the big deal? Everything'll be back where it came from as soon as we get outta here. Come on, you know how important this is!"
Devon was pensive and bit on her lower lip gently. Julia was beginning to have second thoughts about having Devon mediate a dispute that involved John Danziger, and struck a posture of defiance regardless of the fact that Devon had yet to respond.
Finally Devon spoke up. "You're right, it *is* very important that we get this device working." Julia let out an audible sigh of frustration and Devon shot her a sharp look. "*However*..." John flinched. 'Here it comes,' he thought. "...there's no reason to attack equipment that other people are responsible for without their approval. I myself was rather surprised to discover that my gearset stopped working sometime between last night and this afternoon." John dropped his gaze to the floor, looking suspiciously guilty. "Perhaps you could look into that for me once we get out of here?" Devon gave John an inquisitive, albeit purposefully ambiguous expression.
"Sure. I'm sure I'll have it fixed in no time. As *soon* as we're out of this area." This last comment was noticeably directed at Julia, who responded with a frustrated grunt.
"But the laser emitter gets first priority once we've no more need of the surveyor device, okay?" Devon was trying her best to make it a request rather than a demand. It was hard enough trying to relate to John Danziger on a private, personal level without complicating things with an 'I'm in charge' attitude right now. Devon hoped she'd succeeded. Sometimes it seemed an impossible task. Unfortunately, her responsibility to the Eden Advance group needed to take priority over all else ultimately. At least until they reached New Pacifica.
"Sure. No problem." Danziger's face was a mask, making Devon cringe inside.
Julia started to storm off, but stopped after a few steps and spun around to face Danziger. "If there is even the slightest medical reason for me to do microscopic analyses, I want that emitter back immediately. No questions." Without another word, she disappeared around the nearest tent, leaving John and Devon staring in the direction she had gone.
"You could *try* to be a little more diplomatic, John. Everyone would probably be glad to help if you just explained why you needed the parts."
Danziger returned his attention to the workbench and began putting the items back where they'd been before Julia's attack on the equipment. "I'm trying to get us out of here, Adair, not run a seminar on the specs."
Devon sighed softly. There was just no getting through to this man sometimes. Shrugging her shoulders in resignation, she left John with his gadgets.
Danziger appeared to not notice her departure, but glanced up in the direction she had gone as soon as she was out of his peripheral vision. Sometimes he wished they could all just escape the responsibilities of the group for just one day. Throw caution to the wind and follow through on....well, whatever it was people wanted to follow through on. In the meantime, he returned his attention to the workbench and spoke to the Zero Unit, which had been standing silent beside the bench throughout the entire discourse.
"Okay, Zero, let's start working on getting these pieces together into something useful."
"Affirmative, sir. Where shall we begin?"
Bess relaxed under the shade of a large evergreen as the late spring sunshine beat down beyond the periphery of the tree's shade. In the few days since her fall, she had finally recuperated to the point of being able to hobble around outside and enjoy some of the excellent weather they had been experiencing. She'd even managed to begin helping out again with some of the day-to-day chores that the group needed done. Earlier in the day, she'd sat along the bank of a nearby stream, washing out her and her husband's laundry while she dangled her injured ankle in the cool water. Morgan had insisted on washing the clothes himself while she rested, but Bess had decided this was a perfect opportunity to get out and have a little time to herself.
She had been thankful that Morgan's cloying attention had begun to wane after the first day-and-a-half. He'd even taken her advice and gone up the hillside to the spot she had visited on the day of her accident, so he could appreciate the beautiful view from up there. Of course, he'd returned with a lustrous, black, opaque rock sample that he insisted was valuable in some way, and how fortunate for them considering it was scattered all over the hillside. Much to his dismay, however, Julia had been unable to analyze it for him for reasons which were hard to decipher from her sudden barrage of angry words. Something involving Danziger was all he'd ascertained before apologizing for bothering the doctor and fleeing the med-tent quickly.
Bess had decided not to get involved this time. The whole geolock incident still left a bitter taste in her mouth, and sometimes she felt an overwhelming dismay that she had allowed herself to get involved so deeply. She should have tried harder to talk some sense into Morgan. Instead, she had had a knee-jerk reaction to Devon's dictatorial attitude and gone ahead with helping to set the geolock device, regardless of their ignorance about how intimately intertwined all life seemed to be on this planet. The results had nearly been disastrous, and the feelings of shame that accompanied reflection on that event still ran deep for Bess.
Not that she felt this new interest of Morgan's was anything to be concerned about. He had, after all, come a long way since then. Over the preceding months, Bess had witnessed those endearing aspects of her husband's persona that had always been hidden to all but her slowly reveal themselves to the light of day and the rest of the Eden Advance group. It was true, Morgan could still be annoying on occasion. But that's just the way he was. He was also compassionate, understanding, selfless, and forgiving.
Bess had certainly embarked upon this entire expedition with a reservation or two tucked into her thoughts. Leaving the space stations to come to this planet was one of the most difficult decisions she had ever had to make. But now that she was here...well she just couldn't imagine life ever being better. Her devotion to her husband was unrelenting; their marriage stronger than ever. And life was a constant exercise in purpose. Bess found it amusing to think that they had needed to travel so far away from everything they ever knew to finally feel like they belong. But that was the exact word that Bess related to this planet. Belong. This was home.
Now Bess rested her head against the wide trunk of the tree and smiled to herself. It wasn't often that she got to just sit back and watch the day unfold around her. Watching the rest of the group go about their lives was fascinating; each person seemingly up to something productive. Devon was hunched over a map table with Yale, plotting out a course of action for when the subsurface surveyor was operational. Danziger was fussing over something at his workbench while Zero stood nearby. From the look on John's face, something was not working out incredibly well with his gadgetry. At one point, Baines walked over and exchanged words with John, which also didn't appear to turn out particularly favorably. Eventually, Baines walked off in a huff. 'Men with their toys and egos,' Bess chuckled to herself.
Julia and Alonzo were chopping and mashing something while sitting in the center of the campsite. Bess surmised they were using a local plant life to make some form of medicine. Every now and again, the air would be punctuated by their laughter- they were obviously enjoying each other's company. True was sitting nearby, sometimes observing them too whenever one of them erupted into laughter, then returning to some form of study Yale had probably assigned her. Uly, on the other hand, was not studying. In fact, he was walking right up to Bess as she watched.
"Hi Bess!" he said chirpily. "Are you all healed now?"
Bess gave the little boy a big grin. "Almost. A few more days and I'll be good as new."
Uly nodded his head and stood for a few seconds longer before deciding he couldn't think of anything else to say. He began to move off away from the camp.
"So where are you off to, huh?" Bess tried not to sound too inquisitive. She had often wondered what the two youngsters did all day to keep themselves amused. 'It must get terribly boring sometimes for them,' she thought to herself. "Out exploring for Terrians?!"
"Um. Sure. I guess. I don't think there are any around here though," Uly replied.
"Oh? What makes you think that?"
"I dunno. Just haven't seen any, is all." Uly kept darting glances over to where his mother was standing with Yale. He was beginning to look uncomfortable about being out where she could see him, and began heading off again. "See you later, Bess."
"Bye Uly! Good luck finding some Terrians!"
The boy soon disappeared into the trees and Bess smiled after him all the while. Sometimes the maternal instinct was incredibly strong. Bess loved the idea of maybe having a baby someday, but that would just be impossible as long as they needed to keep up this intense traveling lifestyle. But one day they would be at New Pacifica and then...
"Well let's just say 'bye-bye suppressers'!" Bess chuckled to herself.

Uly found himself constantly checking the way he had come on the off-chance that his mom had seen him wander off and come running to herd him back to the camp. Since he'd told her about his 'fall' in the forest a few days earlier, she had seemed unusually insistent that he stay nearby to the camp. It wasn't fair. How was he supposed to practice his Terrian traveling? And on top of that, he hadn't encountered any Terrians on the Dream Plane for a few nights either. Just when he was getting the hang of letting his body fly through the ground!
He walked for about fifteen minutes until he was about halfway up a moderately steep hill that had a wonderful view down on the entire valley. Uly could make out the camp at the base of the slope, just beyond the last copse of trees. The people moving around the camp looked like ants. Uly watched them for a while then returned his attention to the area where he was standing. There was a cool breeze blowing, whipping Uly's hair back and forth as he surveyed his surroundings.
The slope was more gentle here, having formed a shallow depression in the hillside. It was as if someone had carved a chunk of the hill away using a giant spoon. The ground was littered with rocks of all shapes and sizes that had moved down the hill over time under the forces of gravity and running water. Uly picked up one of them- it was smooth and shiny and as black as the darkest night. Uly pulled his arm back then launched the stone into the air with as strong a throw as he could manage. He laughed as he watched it hit the ground further downslope and continue tumbling down the hill. A few months ago, it would have taken most of his energy just to attempt to throw something. Now he was getting pretty good at it.
When he could not see the stone bouncing any further, Uly walked over to stand in the middle of the small depression and closed his eyes, attempting to concentrate.
"The ground is the air. The air is the ground."
The words were meditational and Uly soon felt his entire body relaxing. It was as if the ground had unlatched itself from his feet and allowed him to fly off into the sky. In reality, Uly was still standing on the side of the hill, a small frown on his forehead as he attempted to focus.
"The ground is the air. The air is the ground."
Uly felt a change in his body. As if the electrical energy had suddenly converged at one point in his body producing a warm, tingling sensation. It was unlike anything Uly had ever experienced. He wanted to open his eyes to see if anything was happening but submitted to the instinct that told him to keep them tightly shut. Uly could truly feel himself flying. He could feel the coolness of the ground around him, and yet he could not feel the ground itself. It wasn't as if his body were forcing its way through the earth. It wasn't even as if the earth had turned into something less solid around him, allowing his body to pass through. Instead, it was as if the ground were parting around him, creating a pocket of air for his body to move within. A forcefield of weightlessness.
Uly was surprised to discover that he was not afraid. Perhaps it had something to do with his initial experience with the Terrians soon after they first arrived on the planet. He had been taken into the ground then with no ill-effects. Quite the opposite, in fact, although Uly wasn't exactly sure what it *was* the Terrians had done to cure his body of the Syndrome.
With a little effort, Uly found that he could control the direction of his motion. As well as the speed of it. And it was as if his body knew instinctively which way was up. After a few seconds, he proved this fact to himself by moving back up to the surface, leaving him standing once again on the slope of the hillside.
Uly opened his eyes and let out a squeal of delight. His first successful solo! His body was not harmed in any way; in fact, he felt completely invigorated by the experience. Uly danced around a little, emitting small whoops of joy at his success. After a while, he looked up at the sky and decided it would soon be time to return to the camp. His mom would be wondering where he was and the sun was already starting to head down towards the horizon far to the west.
Closing his eyes again, Uly stood silently and attempted to concentrate. 'Time for one more try,' he told himself. This time, it seemed harder to focus. For some reason, the ground seemed less giving. But after a few seconds, Uly again felt his body flying through the ground, encased in a protective bubble of air and electrical energy, moving up and down, back and forth.
Uly decided to give in to the daring nature that lived in every young boy's heart. 'Deeper!' he thought to himself. 'Deeper than last time!'
He felt his body respond to the thought of the motion in his mind and Uly descended further into the planet's surface.
"The ground is the air. The air is the ground."
Uly felt like a bird flying, soaring, floating on an eddy of magnetism. It was as if his body and the planet had become a single, living organism- each one needing the other to survive. Uly couldn't wait to rush back to camp to let everyone know about this! Uly's thoughts turned to the idea of ascending back to the surface. The thought lasted only a fraction of a second. Suddenly, it was as if the bubble around him had vanished. As if the planet had vanished. Instead of the incredible sensation of flying, Uly felt the terrifying sensation of falling. He had time to let out a single, terrified yell before there was suddenly only silence. Uly's thoughts flickered out in the darkness.
End of Chapter Two. Continued in Chapter 3.

Apostle of the Terrians (3/4)
by Simon Kattenhorn

Chapter Three

Danziger stared at the device before him. It was almost ready. Almost, but not quite. There was still one small problem that John had to address: the device didn't work. Considering that this was the primary objective for building the device, it was understandable that Danziger was slightly irate.
"What's wrong with it?" asked Devon.
Many of the crew were gathered around Danziger's work bench, studying the device that was for all intents and purposes, their ticket out of this place. The concern played across their faces noticeably.
"Did you build it wrong, Dad?" wondered True.
"No, I didn't build it wrong!" Danziger had raised his voice slightly, and regretted it instantly upon seeing True's crestfallen expression. "It's just got a part missing, that's all True-girl."
"I thought you had found all the parts you needed." Devon was only trying to understand the situation, but it still sounded like a reprimand to Danziger. He had labored long and hard to get the subsurface surveyor working, and was not about to stand around taking condescension handouts.
"I *did*," snapped back Danziger. "At least, I thought I did." He straightened up to stretch the muscles in his back and shoulders and ran his hands through his curly hair. "Hell, *I've* never designed one of these things before! This geophysical imaging stuff is more complicated than I was expecting."
Devon was trying to understand, but Danziger certainly wasn't giving her much to go on. "I thought you went over the specs with Yale," she reminded him. "Did you follow the same designs as existing devices?"
Danziger jumped to his own defense quickly. "To the letter, Adair. Unfortunately, the device alone is not much use to us."
"Not much use?" jumped in Julia. "Why? I thought this was supposed to be used for shallow-depth ground imaging."
"It *is*!" Danziger started getting impatient. "And it's exactly what this *does*!"
Now people were looking visibly confused. Danziger had obviously been working too hard on this project. He'd stopped making sense completely.
"It ..*does* work," Baines stated slowly, hesitantly, attempting to understand.
Danziger shook his head and let out a long sigh. "No!"
"Danziger, you're going to have to give us a little more to go on here," said Alonzo. "First the device is working, and then it isn't? Which is it?"
"Oh this device works alright," shot back Danziger. "Works like a charm. But it's no use to us because we can't process the data it collects. We may as well have been given a free library full of books in Spanish. Won't do us any good."
"I can speak Spanish," offered Mazatl. Danziger glared at the man. "Well, I *can*!" he said defensively.
Devon was the one starting to get agitated now. "So what do we need to process the data? Can you find the component? Could it be taken out of one of the transponders?"
"Oh no!" interjected Baines. "There's no way he's getting his hands on any more of the communications stuff!"
"Cool it, Baines, you don't have what we need," Danziger cut him off. "I don't think any of us do."
There was a stunned silence as the news sank in.
"Maybe we can try to get through here without it," suggested Magus. "If we scout ahead. Maybe learn some geological skills beforehand."
Devon looked to Yale for a response. She knew him well enough after all these years to know what the look on his face meant. It was too risky.
"It would be impossible to accurately evaluate the potential hazards as we progressed," Yale indicated.
"Well, what exactly is it that we need to do the data processing?" asked Julia. "Is there any way we can do it manually? Even to a first order?"
Danziger shook his head, echoed moments thereafter by Yale who had been accessing his databanks.
"It would seem that the processing of such geophysical data requires a complex computational method," Yale began explaining. "Some of the numerical algorithms are quite convoluted. Even *I* wouldn't be able to do it and be able to provide an accurate final rendering."
"From what I can gather, we would have to have a means of processing the raw data and re-imaging the seismic wavelets," continued Danziger. "A compact microprocessor unit of some kind. As far as I know..." he paused to take in the entire group, "we don't have one."
It was at this point that the Zero Unit came to life, startling Cameron and Walman, who had been standing right next to it. Sometimes it was easy to forget the robotic member of their group was even there.
"That is not correct," Zero's mechanical voice began. "We have available a high-frequency compact microprocessor."
"What?!" Danziger almost fell over. "What do you mean? *Where*?!"
"I am fully equipped with the microprocessor unit required to enable the successful operation of this device."
If any of the human members of the group had been the one to deliver such news, the excitement would undoubtedly have been free-flowing. Zero relayed the information as if it were about as important as the current atmospheric barometric reading.
"You!" exclaimed Danziger. "Why would a construction worker series Zero Unit come equipped with a microprocessing unit?"
The heads of the people in the group moved back and forth between Danziger and Zero as the conversation progressed. This revelation was news to everyone. Zero had essentially been thought of as nothing more than robotic labor until now. The fact that the unit might also be able to process complex wavelet data was a little more than anyone had expected.
"I am a modified construction worker series Zero Unit customized to the needs of the Eden Project," the mechanical voice continued. "To aid with construction site evaluation, I have been equipped with the necessary computational capabilities to process and render complex scientific data."
The Eden Advance crew gaped at each other as if manna had just rained down from heaven. It seemed there was a solution to Danziger's difficulties with the subsurface scanner device after all.
"Can we remove the microprocessor unit from Zero?" Devon asked of no-one in particular. She was certainly no expert on the inner workings of a Zero Unit.
Danziger decided to put the question to Zero. "Zero, would you be able to function if we removed the microprocessor from your system?"
"Affirmative," replied the robot. "My microprocessing unit is required only in conjunction with my shallow geophysical survey hardware and routines."
Danziger felt like a ton of bricks had suddenly alighted from the sky and pelted down on him. "*What*?! You have a geophysical surveying capability?!"
"Affirmative," replied Zero.
"Then why the *hell* didn't you tell me before I spent four days putting *this* thing together?" demanded Danziger as he fought back an image of deconstructing the robot to a heap of scrap metal.
"You did not specify the function of this device," Zero stated in a mechanical drone. "You did not ask."
Danziger felt like his eyes were about to launch themselves out of their sockets and splatter all over Zero's idiot plastic visor bubble. Baines, not being able to resist the urge any longer, burst into laughter. It was enough to infect the rest of the group. Danziger found himself surrounded by laughter, and despite the utter frustration he felt coursing its way through every vein in his body, he soon found himself unable to resist the urge to laugh with the rest of them.
Devon patted John on the back and gave him a wide grin. "I guess this means I can have my gear back, Danziger?!"
"And my laser emitter," added Julia between fits of laughter.
"All right, all right!" Danziger fought back. "I'll have to remember not to underestimate tin man here again!"
"Tin man? My frame is primarily a nickel-titanium alloy," Zero attempted to correct Danziger. This only succeeded in an increase in the peals of laughter from the gathered group, causing Morgan and Bess to come hurrying over from the evening meal preparations to find out what was going on.
"If you'll excuse me," Devon was down to a chuckle now, "I need to get my son to clean up for dinner."
Devon walked off with a grin plastered on her face as Bess and Morgan arrived looking quite incredulous at the laughter going on around them.
"Could someone perhaps let us in on the joke?" Morgan demanded. Instead, he was met by a further round of laughter. "Great! Everyone here is high on a happy drug and I'm stuck chopping white-root."

Devon Adair was becoming frantic. She could not find Uly anywhere. And she cursed herself a thousand times for not paying more notice of his whereabouts over the previous few hours. She realized that she had not seen her son since soon after lunch time. What had she been thinking? With the day-to-day responsibilities of keeping the Eden Advance team operating at peak efficiency, it was easy to forget that they were traveling through an uncharted wilderness. It was no place for children to go off exploring by themselves and it was her duty as a mother to ensure that her child be kept aware of that necessity. Instead, Devon found herself now running around the campsite in a panic. Tent to tent- Uly could not be found anywhere.
"Uly!" she began to shout. "Uly!"
Julia popped her head out from the tent nearest to Devon.
"Devon? What's wrong?"
"Julia have you seen Uly? He's not in camp."
Julia shook her head. "Haven't seen him since lunch. Wait, wasn't he....oh." Julia stopped short as she realized Uly had not been with the group a few moments before when everyone had been gathered at Danziger's workbench. It was easy to assume the two children were around when in fact they may not be. True had been present. Perhaps the mind immediately allowed the assumption that the second child was also nearby- at the back of the group perhaps, obscured by one of the adults.
"We need to start a search." Devon's single-mindedness kicked into gear. There was no more time for panic. Her son could be hurt. He could be lost. She needed to find him and quickly.
"Alonzo!" Devon launched at the man as he appeared from around the corner of one of the tents. "Grab Danziger. Uly's missing."
Alonzo absorbed the information for about half a second and understood the implication. "I'll grab Baines and Walman too." He hurried off, yelling across the camp to Baines and Walman to meet up with him as he beelined towards Danziger, who appeared to be deep in some form of argument with the Zero Unit.
"What's going on?" asked Bess as she walked by where Devon and Julia were now standing, scanning the nearby hillside- Devon with a pair of jumpers and Julia using just her eyesight.
"Uly's missing," Julia filled her in. We haven't seen him since lunchtime."
"I saw him," replied Bess. "About two hours ago."
Devon spun around quickly. "Where?! Did you see where he was going?"
Bess' eyes narrowed as she evaluated if something may be wrong. "Right over there," she pointed to the edge of the nearby grove of trees. "He was walking off into the trees."
"And you *let* him?" Devon shot at the woman. "It's dangerous out there!"
Bess recoiled at Devon's verbal attack. She felt immediately guilty, as if it were truly her fault that Uly had gone off on his own.
Julia jumped to Bess' defense. "Devon, this isn't Bess' fault."
"Are you saying it's *my* fault?" Devon snapped back. She glared at Julia and then realized that she would prefer to not hear an answer. It *was* her fault. Or maybe it was no-one's fault. What did it matter anyway, they needed to find Uly.
Danziger came running over, Alonzo, Baines and Walman close on his heels."Uly's missing?" he wanted to hear it straight from Devon's mouth.
Devon nodded and composed herself as best she could. "Bess saw him two hours ago. Heading into the trees." Devon pointed off in the direction Bess had indicated. 'I told him not to go in there,' Devon thought to herself. 'Why must children disobey?'
"Any idea where he was going?" Danziger near interrogated Bess.
Bess shook her head. She was beginning to choke up. Something may have happened to Uly and it would be her fault. What was she thinking allowing a little boy to go wandering off into the forest like that?
"He said he was going looking for Terrians," Bess recounted. "He said he hasn't seen any around here yet."
They all looked at each other, recognizing that this fact was true for all of them. It hadn't struck them as strange. There had been many times when they had encountered no Terrians for a period of time. It wasn't by any means unusual.
"The Dream Plane's been quiet for a while," Alonzo added. "I just thought we were away from Terrian enclaves around here."
"You'd think somewhere with so many caves underground would have a thriving community of them," said Walman.
Danziger looked at him and nodded. "Yeah, you would."
"We need to start looking!" Devon began marching off towards the trees. "Spread out across the hillside and comb along the length as we ascend."
Danziger, Julia, Alonzo, Baines and Walman followed after Devon.
"Wait! I want to help!" offered Bess. She attempted a half-limp, half-walk after them but soon recognized the futility. She would be a burden more than anything else.
Devon's face softened slightly. "Bess, we need someone to keep a look out for him from down here. You can use jumpers to scan the hillside and stay in touch over gear."
Bess nodded, glad to be involved in some way. "Good luck."
Morgan had been standing close by and walked over to comfort Bess as the others headed into the trees. "It's not your fault Bess. You're not his baby-sitter."
Bess buried her head into Morgan's shoulder. "Oh Morgan, what kind of mother would I ever be if I can't even look out for Uly?"
Morgan's eyes widened. "Mother? Bess...what?...er...I mean...er...?"
"Morgan you've got to go and help them." Bess was now standing defiantly in front of her husband, her determination clear. "They need as many eyes as possible. I'll coordinate from down here and get the rest of the group looking off in the other directions in case Uly circled round."
"But Bess, I can't just leave you here! Alone!"
Bess was resolute. "Morgan, I am not a child. I'm fine here." She took his hands and clasped them inside her own against her chest as she looked into her husband's eyes. "I need for you to go and help them. It's the least we should do."
Morgan gazed back into his wife's eyes, and as usual, his heart melted into a puddle inside his chest. There was nothing he wouldn't do for this woman. It might take a complaint or two along the way, but ultimately she could always win. "Alright Bess. I'll be on gear. Stay in contact, okay?"
"I will. Go on."
Morgan hurried off to catch up with the others as Bess watched him go. A frown creased her brow as he disappeared beyond the edge of the trees. Her heart weighed heavy inside her.

It was difficult trying to be brave. Uly was trying very hard but the pain was intense and the tears rolled freely down his cheeks in the darkness. In his mind, he found a small consolation in the fact that he had never been afraid of the dark. It helped a little now, as he sat in all-consuming darkness. His eyes may as well be sewn shut for what use they were in the blackness of this cavern.
Uly had awoken to find himself laying on damp ground in the dark. At first, he wondered if he were still asleep- perhaps that was why he couldn't see anything. Then the pain from his broken leg shot through his body and he let out a loud yell that immediately echoed back at him from all directions. It was enough to silence him in sudden confusion. Then the dim memory of falling returned and he realized that he must have fallen into a cave beneath the ground.
No matter how long Uly sat and stared ahead of him, his eyes did not grow accustomed to the dark. There was absolutely zero light for his fully dilated pupils to attune to. So he was left with the realization that he was not going to find his own way out of here. Certainly not by sight, and not by walking either. He had attempted to stand up briefly but the pain had been excruciating and Uly had needed a good ten minutes or so for the flow of tears and sobs to subside.
As he stared sightlessly ahead of him, Uly wondered where the rest of the Eden crew were. Had they realized he was missing? How long had he been down here? Hours? A day? Uly's stomach had been growling for food since he had awoken. He wasn't sure how many meals he had missed, but it sure felt like he'd missed more than one. 'What if they don't find me?' Uly wondered to himself. The thought was a catalyst for a fresh start of soft sobbing. It wasn't that Uly was afraid of dying. He had spent so much of his life surrounded by death, and by the promise of death for himself care of the Syndrome, that the concept of dying meant little to him anymore. What Uly was scared of was being alone. Of possibly dying alone. He wanted the last thing he saw to be the smiling face of his mom looking down at him, her soft hands caressing his forehead and hair. Down here in the dark, he would not have that. He would die alone, a frightened and broken little boy, trapped forever in the darkness.
Uly wasn't sure exactly how long he sat staring ahead of him, seeing nothing. But it was long enough that his body eventually demanded rest. Slowly his eyes drooped closed and he rested his tear-stained cheek against the damp earth as his mind drifted in search of sleep.
"Hello?"
The sudden change from utter darkness to the brightness of a hundred suns startled Uly. His heart was thumping inside his chest and his eyes struggled to see anything through the tiny slits that they had become.
"Is someone there?" Uly's voice no longer produced an echo and it was almost immediately clear to him that he had entered the Dream Plane.
"Hello? Alonzo? Didididididididi." There was no answer from anyone. Why would he have gone to the Dream Plane by himself? Only the Terrians summon anyone to the Dream Plane. Unless...
"Am I dead?" Uly shouted out into the air of blinding light.
The sound was only barely perceptible to Uly, as if it were coming at him from miles away. 'Dididididi.'
Uly's mind struggled to make sense of the circumstances. Was he alive? Was this heaven? Were there Terrians in heaven too?
'Dididididididid.'
The sound was getting louder and Uly realized that a Terrian was slowly approaching, gradually morphing from a small speck to a fuzzy outline to a definable shape as the blinding light attacked from all directions. Again, the walking. Uly's eyes were almost fully open now and his mouth dropped open in surprise as the Terrian finally approached where Uly was standing. The Terrian's skin was a deathly gray color. The eyes were as black as obsidian and the sounds that the creature made were only slightly intelligible to Uly.
'Didididi.'
"What?" replied Uly. "I don't understand. Where are we?"
The Terrian's movements were slow, as if the creature's body moved within an atmosphere of molasses. 'Dididididi. #Mountain of the night.#'
The words sounded familiar to Uly. Perhaps the Terrian had mentioned this place to him once before. He wasn't exactly sure. "Mountain of the night? What do you mean? Is it because of the darkness?"
Uly glanced around him. Everything here beyond the Terrian and himself was completely drowned out in an ocean of white light. It seemed silly to talk of darkness.
'Didididi. #Darkness. Living kill the self.#'
Uly attempted to fathom the meaning behind the Terrian's thoughts and sounds. No matter how hard he tried, he could only come up with one answer.
"Am I dead?"
The Terrian cocked his head to one side in a slow, viscous arc.
'Dididididid. #Stone in the sky.#'
Now *that* was finally something Uly's mind could grasp. "Yes! Bird through the ground became stone in the sky! I fell..." The Terrian stared at Uly as if waiting for more. "You warned me, didn't you? You knew I was going to fall. That I was going to die in the dark. In the mountain of the night."
'Dididididid. #Life sometimes gone forever.#'
Uly couldn't help himself. The tears had started to flow again and he suddenly felt terribly alone.
"I didn't say good-bye to my mom..."
The Terrian said nothing.
"She's gonna be so mad at me," Uly collapsed into a small heap and buried his face in his hands. He had never cried in front of a Terrian before. He wondered if they would think less of him now. But he couldn't help himself. The tears would not stop, not even after the blinding light was swallowed up by darkness and he could again feel the coolness of the damp earth against his cheek as he lay on the floor of the underground cavern, his body heaving in uncontrolled sobs.
The tinkling sound of the gear's activator sounded and Alonzo pulled the eyepiece down over his eye. Devon's image stared back at him through the tiny optical projector.
"Alonzo. Anything?" Devon's face was a mask of anxiety. There was nothing
she could do to hide it any longer.
"Nothing. We've combed this entire part of the slope and we're almost at the summit."
Devon recoiled noticeably at the news. The worry was becoming increasingly evident in each and every facial expression. "We're already at the summit..."
Alonzo didn't know how to respond. They had combed every inch of this portion of the hillside. Between himself, Walman, Baines and Morgan, they had searched under every shrub, in every nook and cranny, and kept a lookout for any caves or sinkholes that Uly might possibly have fallen into. They had found nothing.
"Maybe he never came up here at all," Alonzo offered.
Devon shook her head. "Where else could he have gone? There was no way he could have gotten off the slope without passing right by the campsite. It doesn't make sense."
Alonzo heard Danziger's voice from Devon's end of the communication. "He's a kid, Adair. He could have slipped by the camp easy."
"But why?" Alonzo watched Devon, who had turned to talk directly to Danziger, although from Alonzo's perspective she was looking slightly off-center from directly at him still. "Why would Uly try to make it appear he was walking off into the woods and then double back again? No, he wouldn't do something like that. He would know that would be silly and dangerous. I think he came up here. Somehow we missed him. He must have climbed down into a cave and gotten lost."
"We didn't find any cave entrances on this side, Devon." Alonzo turned to receive confirmation of this from the nods of the other three men in his search team. "What about you?"
Devon shook her head and frowned. "We must have missed it. We're gonna have to work our way back down and look again."
Baines and Walman exchanged a glance between them that spoke of their doubt at finding anything the second time around, but they nodded anyway and began heading back down the slope.
"Alright Devon, we'll keep our eyes open for any entrances. Out."
Alonzo pulled the gear's eyepiece away from his eye and looked at Morgan. "What about up there?" he asked. Did you search up there?" Alonzo was pointing at the cliff-face that ran along the edge of the summit of the hill, about ten meters upslope from where they were standing. It wasn't a very high cliff- perhaps five meters total- but would still be a foolish venture for a child to contemplate.
"About to head up there," replied Morgan. "That's all that's left on this side of the hill."
"Come on, let's give it a look."
The two men completed the short distance of the ascent to the base of the cliff while Baines and Walman backtracked down the hill, each covering the other's ascent routes. The cliff was fairly featureless limestone, and was obviously too crumbly and unstable for anyone to attempt to climb it.
"There's no way he went up that way," said Alonzo as he scanned left and right along the length of the cliff face.
"No, but he might have taken a peek in here," replied Morgan excitedly. "Look!"
Morgan was standing beside a small shrub that resembled what on Earth was referred to as a yew.
Alonzo frowned. "Look at what, Morgan?"
"Here!" Morgan replied as he lifted back the pliable branches of the shrub to reveal a small opening at the base of the cliff. "I guess we've found our cave entrance."
Alonzo smiled broadly and was about to pull down his gear to tell the others when he hesitated. "I dunno, Morgan. That looks kind of small. I'm not sure if Uly would go in there, assuming he found it at all. Are there any footprints?"
Morgan blanched as he stepped away from where he had been trampling around the entrance to the cave. "Er...I'm not sure. I, er..."
Alonzo rolled his eyes. "Great! Let's take a quick look before we contact the others."
Morgan nodded. "Yeah, you're probably right. You'd better take a look before you contact the others."
"Me?" Alonzo shot back. "Don't you mean 'we'?"
Morgan darted nervous looks back and forth between Alonzo and the cave entrance. "Don't you think one of us should stay out here?"
"Morgan, don't tell me you're afraid of a li'l ol' cave?" Alonzo taunted the man.
"Of *course* not," Morgan shot back. "I *have* been into caves before...remember?"
Alonzo did recall, although in that case, it would have been best if Morgan had never gone into the Terrian caves in the first place.
"So what's the problem?"
Morgan peered tentatively into the cave entrance, seeing nothing but blackness beyond. "Well it *does* look kind of tiny in there..."
"Fine, Morgan. Whatever." Alonzo ducked his head down to fit through the cave opening as he grabbed onto Morgan for support. "Let me take a quick look while you just stay right out..." Before he had a chance to finish the sentence, Alonzo felt his footing give way on the steep slope of wet mud immediately inside the cave entrance. Before he had an opportunity to register what was happening, he was tumbling down the wet slope in the dark, like some form of water-slide amusement ride, dragging a hapless flailing Morgan behind him in an open-mouthed, silent yell.
End of Chapter Three. Concluded in Chapter 4.

Apostle of the Terrians (4/4)
by Simon Kattenhorn

Chapter Four

Alonzo opened his eyes and squinted against the light that seemed to fill the cave. He was having trouble seeing anything. In fact, even the walls of the cave weren't visible. And where was Morgan?
"Great," Alonzo said under his breath as he climbed to his feet. "Morgan, where the hell are you?"
The reply from somewhere nearby in the brightness surprised Alonzo enough for him to recoil a step or two.
"Didididididi."
"What? Morgan? Who...hello? Who's there?" The realization hit home and Alonzo cursed himself for not being able to recognize when he was on the Dream Plane considering his numerous previous experiences.
The Terrian stepped closer towards Alonzo, the light forming a halo around the creature's body like it was some form of angel or other godly apparition.
'Dididididi. #You seek the chosen one.# Dididid. #The child.#'
Alonzo's heart raced. "Yes! We're looking for Uly. Do you know where he is?"
The Terrian looked at Alonzo with a haunting expression. Alonzo noticed the deathly pallor of the Terrian's skin. Even in the bright light surrounding both of them, it was unmistakable. Suddenly the light vanished and Alonzo and the Terrian were engulfed in darkness. The only light appeared to be emanating from the Terrian itself, as if its skin contained a natural phosphorescence that dimly illuminated the surroundings. They were standing in a cave, at the foot of a steep, muddy incline. Alonzo assumed it must have been the slope he had just fallen down. There was no sign of Morgan however. The Terrian gestured at the cave around them with his arms and continued with his trilling communication of sounds and thoughts.
'Didididididi. #Caught in the mountain of the night.#'
Alonzo frowned. "The mountain of the night? You mean these caves?"
The Terrian pointed back into the darkness where a small tunnel joined onto the chamber in which they were standing.
'Didididididid. #Swallowed where mother is gone. Life gone forever.#'
There was such an obvious sadness conveyed in the Terrian's message that Alonzo was taken aback by the strength of his empathic reaction. He had not experienced such a raw conveyance of emotion from a Terrian before. The emotions permeated his being while the Terrian's thoughts filtered into his mind. The Terrian did not like this place. Nor did he wish to be here. It was only his obvious concern for Uly's safety that drove him to enter the Dream Plane in this place at all. Alonzo realized that the mere act of being here was sapping the very life out of the Terrian. It was killing the Terrian to be here, both mentally and physically.
"If Uly is back there, we will find him. You need to leave now, my friend. You really need to leave."
The Terrian sensed Alonzo's concern and felt reassured that the human might actually understand what it was about this place that made it so disturbing. With a final cock of his head, the Terrian retreated into the darkness, the glow of his skin slowly dissipating. Then he was gone, and Alonzo opened his eyes.
"Well it's about *time*," Morgan heaved a sigh of relief. "I was about to give up hope and try to go and find help."
"Morgan, is that you?" Alonzo felt groggy. His head ached. He must have hit it when he and Morgan fell.
"Of course it's me! Who else would it be?" Morgan rolled his eyes and helped Alonzo up to his feet.
"Right," said Alonzo. "Where are we?"
"Stuck in a hole in the ground, no thanks to you," Morgan gave Alonzo his best told-you-so expression. "We should have called the others on gear first. Before you dragged me into this death-pit, that is."
Alonzo steadied his one-hundred-pound head with one hand and tried to take in the surroundings. Fortunately for them, the lumalight they had been carrying had made the journey with them into the cave successfully. Morgan had turned it on to illuminate the entire cavern. Alonzo recognized the cave immediately from his recent encounter on the Dream Plane.
"Will you shut up, Morgan. Uly's down here."
Morgan looked unconvinced. "We don't *know* that."
"*I* do," shot back Alonzo. "A Terrian told me."
"*What*?" erupted Morgan. "Are you insane? There've been no Terrians in here. You were unconscious for heaven's sake!"
"The Dream Plane, Morgan. I saw him on the Dream Plane."
Morgan stopped short. "Uly?"
"No, the Terrian."
Morgan frowned. "And he told you that Uly's down here?"
"You got it."
Morgan pummeled the fist of one hand into the palm of the other. "I *knew* those Terrians weren't to be trusted. But does anyone ever listen to me? Noooo."
Alonzo didn't have the slightest clue what it was Morgan was going on about now. "Morgan, what are the hell are you talking about?"
"The Terrians," replied Morgan, nodding his head up and down in complete comprehension of the situation. "They've gone and taken Uly."
"What?! Why would the Terrians take Uly for heaven's sake?"
Morgan was pacing back and forth as the numerous scenarios played out in his head. "I dunno. Perhaps to make him their king or something. Maybe they want something from us."
"Kidnapping? You think the Terrians kidnapped Uly? What could we possibly have that they would want, Morgan? Their own Transrover to cruise the local Terrian nightclubs?"
Morgan was having difficulty trying to tie the loose ends together. It *had* to make sense. Somehow. "Where are you going?" Alonzo had started working his way towards the tunnel that led off of their cavern.
"To find Uly. The Terrians haven't taken him. He's trapped in here somehow. And for some reason- I'm not sure what, but it's something bad- the Terrians can't help him in here."
Morgan stopped suddenly. "Bad? What do you mean something bad?" Morgan risked a few glances around him, half expecting a face-eating bat or something equally not-what-he-wanted-to-see-right-now to come thundering out of the darkness. "There's something down here?" Morgan hurried forward to catch up to Alonzo and grabbed onto his arm. "We must stick together..."
"Morgan, get the hell off of me!"
Morgan let go and again looked around nervously.
"I don't know what's down here," Alonzo continued. "But I'm sure it's not some *thing*. It's just this place. It's bad for the Terrians. It can kill them.
"Disease?" squealed Morgan as he made a point to wipe his hands vigorously on his clothing. There was no telling what kind of diseased fungus or flesh-eating bacteria resided down here in the dark.
Alonzo was getting tired of trying to ease his companion's idiot fears. They needed to find Uly, and fast. He could be hurt. "Yes, Morgan, the whole place is full of disease. Don't touch anything. Including me."

Alonzo and Morgan lost track of time. They had been working their way through a virtual labyrinth of caverns and interconnecting tunnels. Despite numerous attempts, there was no getting through to anyone on the surface using gear. Alonzo had been pushing ahead steadfastly but Morgan had found himself wheezing and puffing trying to keep up the pace. And to top things off, he was pretty sure by this stage that they were lost. Every tunnel had begun to look the same.
"What?! Alonzo there it is again! I *knew* it! We've been going in circles!" Morgan was gesturing to what he considered to be a memorable rock formation and was acting generally panic-stricken.
"Calm down, Morgan! *Every* chunk of rock looks like that down here."
"Oh, so now you're the geological expert?" Morgan let the sarcasm flow.
"And you *are*?" Alonzo shot back. "Morgan my sense of direction is working just fine, even down here. We haven't been going in circles, we...."
He was interrupted by a sudden sound from just ahead.
"What was that?"
Morgan's eyes opened wide. "What?!" He jumped up and gravitated to Alonzo's side, glancing around nervously.
"I thought I heard something. Kind of like a....there! Hear it?" This time they both heard it. The unmistakable sound of a child-like whimper. A faint cry.
Alonzo stormed forward, followed a second later by Morgan as if the two were attached by an elastic band. "Uly! Uly! Where are you?"
The faint crying appeared to be coming from up ahead. Alonzo was running by this stage, trying to avoid colliding with rocky walls and dangling stalactites as the light of the lumalight cast ghostly shadows around him. Morgan was beginning to fall behind, calling for Alonzo to wait as he saw the glow of the lumalight advancing further and further ahead of him.
"Alonzo! Alonzo!" yelled Morgan.
"Uly! Uly?!" Alonzo continued forward. "Where are you?"
"Alonzo!" came a cry from behind Alonzo.
"Alonzo?" came a cry from ahead of him.
"Uly? Where..." Alonzo caught sight of the little boy, trying to crawl towards the source of the light and sounds.
"Uly!" Alonzo rushed forward towards Uly and dropped to the floor beside him to give him a warm, full-body hug. Uly's eyes narrowed to thin slits in the sudden glare of the lumalight, and he cried out in pain as Alonzo jarred his leg.
Alonzo realized immediately the boy was in pain. "Where are you hurt?"
Uly winced, as if the mere mention of the injury compounded the pain. "My leg! I think I broke it..."
Alonzo attempted to examine it as Morgan finally came wheezing up to them.
"Uly..." was all he managed before collapsing against the rock wall and heaving huge breaths.
"His leg is broken," Alonzo concluded. He felt scared to check the boy too thoroughly. He was so small and fragile, he was worried he may break him further. "How did you get in here in the first place?"
"I fell," Uly said, trying now to choke back any tears and put on a brave face in the company of these two fellow men.
Morgan nodded. "Through the cave opening," he said.
Uly shook his head. "No, through the roof." He hung his head in embarrassment. "I was Terrian-traveling."
Alonzo's eyes opened wide. "What?! You can Terrian-travel?"
Uly nodded. "I've been practicing. The Terrian was helping me." His eyes dimmed as he recalled the very same Terrian's warnings about the caves. "He warned me about the mountain of the night, but I didn't understand."
Alonzo nodded his comprehension. "The Terrians are scared of this place."
"Why?" asked Uly.
"It's diseased," piped in Morgan. "There's bacteria everywhere." He surveyed around him, nodding his head as if his visual inspection were enough to convince him that his appraisal of the cave was right on the mark.
Uly looked at Alonzo with a suddenly worried expression. He didn't like the sound of "bacteria everywhere". Alonzo rolled his eyes and gave an almost imperceptible shake of his head to reassure Uly that the bacteria only existed inside Morgan's head, probably devouring his brain as he stood there, glancing around and nodding like an idiot.
"Are we gonna get out of here now?" asked Uly. "I'm hungry."
Alonzo and Morgan glanced at each other and a momentary mutual sentiment of worry passed between them.
"Sure we are, kiddo," Alonzo tried to reassure the boy. He knelt down in front of Uly and tried to sound unconcerned so as not to alarm him. "This is gonna hurt a little Uly, but I need to get you onto my back so I can carry you out of here."
Uly grimaced at the thought of the pain. "Alright," he said meekly.
Morgan helped lift the boy onto his uninjured leg and then up onto Alonzo's back. He gripped Alonzo furiously with his arms wrapped tightly around the man's neck and his uninjured leg curled around Alonzo's hip, leaving his broken leg dangling.
Morgan lifted the lumalight and shone back towards the direction they had come when he let out a loud gasp.
"What?!" responded Alonzo, trying to spin around slowly enough so as not to injure Uly further with the motion.
"Oh my God." Morgan stood motionless and stared at the illuminated cave wall ahead of him with a mixture of disbelief and fear.
"What is it?" asked Uly.
"Did you see something?" Alonzo had turned around now to face the direction of the illuminated cave wall and he let out a small gasp. "Oh."
The three of them stared ahead at the cave wall. It looked like honeycomb; there were so many tunnels leading off of the cavern in which they were standing, it was difficult to believe that the rock wall had enough solid portions remaining to prevent the entire lot from collapsing in on itself. But that was not what had caused the two men to react the way they had. For along the entire length of the cave wall as wide as the light of the lumalight pierced the darkness, extended a line of Terrian staffs, imbedded in the cave floor, separated from each other by a distance of about two meters and forming an open barrier of sorts, like a broken fence. It was incredible that neither Alonzo nor Morgan had barged into one of the staffs as they thundered into the cavern in search of Uly.
"This doesn't look good," whispered Morgan, his eyes still wide in near-panic.
"What does it mean?" asked Uly.
"I don't know," answered Alonzo. "I've never seen anything like it before. Why would the Terrians leave their staffs behind like that?"
Morgan became animated. "I'll tell you why! It's because it's a warning, that's why! We shouldn't *be* here! It's probably some kind of Terrian burial ground or place of worship or sacrificial chamber or something and we need to get out of here *now*!"
"Morgan! The Terrians do not sacrifice anyone," Alonzo shot back. "Why don't you spend a little more time thinking and a lot less talking, hmm?" He flicked his eyes to indicate to Morgan the presence of Uly on his back, to remind him that they needed to be calm and not alarm the boy.
Uly watched the exchange silently, his eyes moving back and forth between Morgan and the side of Alonzo's face he could see from his position on Alonzo's back.
Morgan regained his composure and stood ashen-faced in silence for a few seconds. It was as long a silence as he could muster. "Well, what else could it be?"
Alonzo walked towards the nearest Terrian staff and ran his hand along the cool wood. He examined the circular metal plate attached to the top of the staff and noticed how adjacent staffs in the line were all different in some way. Alonzo had yet to discover the significance of the differences in Terrian staffs or even how the Terrians made the staffs to begin with. There was still so much about the race that they had yet to discover. It was both exciting and simultaneously discomforting.
"The staffs all face outwards," noticed Uly.
"What was that?" asked Morgan as he walked over to join them next to the staff.
"You're right," agreed Alonzo. "Look how all the staffs face towards the cavern wall, rather than the interior."
Morgan cocked his head back and forth as he examined the staff and others nearby. It was unclear to him how to discriminate the front from the back of any staff, or even if there *were* a front and back.
"Oh yeah," said Morgan. Well if they could tell, he certainly wasn't going to let them know that it wasn't at all clear to him.
"Which means," continued Alonzo, "the staffs were intended to warn people coming *into* this cavern from the side tunnels."
Morgan's eyes widened once again. "You mean it *is* a warning?" He darted his eyes back and forth, trying to pierce the darkness around him. "Maybe this cavern is the source of the bacteria..."
Alonzo gritted his teeth. "Morgan. Will you *please* shut up about bacteria. There is no bacteria, okay?"
Morgan was entirely agitated now. First the place is diseased and now it's not. First the staffs are not a warning and then they are. 'Alonzo really needs to get a grip,' he thought to himself. 'The man is talking nonsense.'
"Maybe we should leave now," suggested Uly in a quiet voice.
"Good idea," seconded Morgan. He made a move towards the cavern wall and stopped abruptly. He turned and directed a nervous question at Alonzo. "Er...which tunnel?"
Alonzo stopped dead. He had no idea which tunnel. He had been so completely focused on locating Uly, he hadn't thought about the possibility of getting lost in the process. "Damn," was all he said.
"Oh that's just great." Morgan turned and ran his gaze across the cavern wall, with its network of tunnels leading off in all directions. It was not a particularly wonderful sight.
Morgan and Uly sat on the cold stone floor of the cavern watching the dancing shadows approach along one of the tunnels as Alonzo returned towards them. Morgan had his arm around Uly, trying to keep the shivering boy warm. Uly had been lapsing in and out of sleep, his stomach growling from time to time. Alonzo appeared at the tunnel mouth and walked over to them, a somber expression on his face. Morgan immediately knew what that meant.
"Nothing?"
"They all look the same," Alonzo said angrily. Morgan recognized that the anger was directed at their predicament rather than at him personally.
"Just lots of boulders and rubble. And these dark veins of rock everywhere." Alonzo walked over to the cave wall and pointed out one of the veins of rock that had intruded into the surrounding limestone.
Morgan got up gently, resting Uly softly against the floor. He walked over to the cave wall and examined the rock veins.
"Any idea what it is?" asked Alonzo.
Morgan shook his head. "I found something similar up on the surface a few days ago. But I don't remember seeing any of this on our way in. Do you?"
Alonzo shrugged. "Can't say I was really paying much attention to the rocks themselves."
Morgan looked at the veins closely. They formed an impressive network throughout the limestone wall. "Same type of look as Morganite veins," said Morgan. "But this rock is black, like obsidian."
Alonzo glowered at Morgan. It never ceased to amaze him that the man had no qualms about using his own name to identify features and formations on this new planet. "Maybe we can call this one Martinite," suggested Alonzo sarcastically.
Morgan's eyes lit up. "Really?!" He returned his attention to the rock and rolled the name around inside his head a few times.
"Maybe the rock already belongs to the Terrians," Alonzo added.
Morgan stepped back nervously. It was true this place *did* seem to be a Terrian site of sorts. He glanced at all the Terrian staffs and wondered out loud, "perhaps the Terrians are trying to warn us off about the veins." He ran his finger along one of the veins again. "Can't imagine why though. There's no energy emanating from *these* rocks. They're completely dead."
Alonzo was getting restless. He couldn't see how the veins were significant in any way in terms of getting them out of here. "We still need to find the tunnel, Morgan. I haven't seen anything in any of the others yet."
"No footprints or anything?"
"Nothing. Most of the tunnels have solid rock floors anyway."
Morgan nodded and silently analyzed the situation. They needed to do something. In his condition, Uly couldn't afford to stay down here any longer. "We need to just pick one and keep moving," suggested Morgan. "Try to keep moving upwards. We need to get Uly out of here."
Alonzo nodded as the two men looked at the boy. Uly was asleep, a troubled expression on his face.
Uly had all his weight on his good leg and supported himself against one of the Terrian staffs. The cavern was dark except for the almost imperceptible glow from his Dream Plane Terrian companion. The creature looked terrible. Uly almost burst out crying at the sight of him.
"What's happening to you?" Uly wailed.
The Terrian's chest moved in labored breathing. He attempted a few times to take in enough oxygen to finally trill back at Uly.
'Dididi....dididi...di. #Stone in the sky.#'
Uly shivered in the cold. His mind struggled to understand the Terrian but the riddles were as unfathomable as always. "Are you dying?"
'Didididi....didid....dididi. #Mountain of the night. Must go forever.#'
The Terrian looked at Uly with a sad expression. He reached out with his right arm and rested his large, gray, leathery hand on Uly's head. Then he closed his eyes and projected his thoughts directly into Uly's mind. The exchange was silent. And yet Uly, eyes closed, saw clearly the thoughts and messages conveyed to him. The Terrian was showing him which
tunnels to take. How to reach the surface. How to escape the ground and breathe in the open air.
And there was more. Uly struggled to absorb the rapidity with which the images danced through his thoughts. Uly watched in awe as he saw a cavern filled with Terrians- more Terrians than he had ever seen before. And the walls were glowing, pulsating with light and energy from a thousand veins of Morganite. The sense of unity amongst the Terrians, and between the Terrians and the planet was so palpable, Uly felt himself to be a part of the planet. As if he had always been a part of the planet and the planet had always been a part of him. Uly saw the images change and watched in sorrow as the veins of rock became dimmer and dimmer and the Terrians were forced to flee this place of 'joining'. Forced to separate and fragment into smaller and smaller groups, trying to survive and understand what had become of their mother planet. What had become of themselves.
And it suddenly occurred to Uly. What it was about this place. The mountain of the night. This place that had once sustained the Terrians in a unified oneness unlike anything they had ever since rediscovered. This place was death. Anathema. It was life undone. Strength eroded. Understanding cursed. They blamed themselves. The Terrians believed that it was they who had emptied the place of life. Too many of them together as one. The living had killed the self. It was a place to which no Terrian dared return.
Uly opened his eyes and cried out. "No! You have to go now! Please!"
The Terrian projected his reply. '#It is too late.#'
Not able to control his emotions any longer, Uly allowed tears to flow down his cheeks as he reached up and clasped the Terrian's arm. "I'm sorry. I didn't know I wasn't supposed to come here. I didn't know it would hurt you."
More images flowed from the Terrian's mind. Uly saw things he did not understand. A man, standing with a group of Terrians in a compound. He was shouting at a group of men Uly didn't recognize. Men wearing uniforms. Council insignias! The man was a friend of the Terrians. They respected him. They accepted him as their own. Uly did not know this man but he felt a connection to him he couldn't comprehend. Somehow, Uly knew this man was going to be a vital link in the survival of G889 and the Terrians. He was the Terrian's hope for peace. For survival. Deep in his heart, Uly hoped that one day he would meet this man and help him in his crusade.
The images stopped.
Uly opened his eyes.
The Terrian stared at Uly. Uly stared at the Terrian.
For a moment, it was as if their very souls reached out and knew each other.
And then the Terrian was gone.

"Come on, Uly. We need to go now."
Uly opened his eyes and squinted at Alonzo, who was gently shaking the boy's shoulder. "What?"
"We have to go. Time to get out of this cave, kiddo."
Alonzo picked Uly up and with Morgan's help lifted him onto Alonzo's back again. They began moving towards one of the tunnels nearby. Uly stared ahead of them and noticed the dark veins of rock in the limestone cave wall.
"No," said Uly. "It's the wrong way."
"What?!" exclaimed Morgan. "You *know* the way out of here?"
Uly gripped onto Alonzo tighter. "Yes. My friend told me while I was asleep," he said sadly.
"The Terrians!" whooped Alonzo. "They showed you the way out on the Dream Plane! What took them so long?!" Alonzo was smiling broadly and the sentiment immediately spread to Morgan.
Uly looked around them at the line of Terrian staffs and the walls of the cavern fading to either side until swallowed up by darkness. "They don't come around here anymore."
With Uly's frequent input, the three of them managed to wind their way slowly upwards towards the surface. Morgan had begun complaining about the ridiculous amount of time they had been heading upwards and that they should be higher than the mountain was to begin with by now.
After what seemed like hours, they came into a small chamber and were immediately struck by the rumble of rushing water. For a frantic second, Morgan expected to see a wall of water thundering towards them down the tunnels, ready to whisk them off to their deaths. Instead, they discovered an underground river flowing through the center of the chamber, apparently cutting off their path of advance.
"Ah, great," Morgan moaned. "Now what?"
Alonzo looked to Uly. "Any ideas, Uly?"
Uly shook his head. "That's the way we need to go," he said. "I don't think it's much further beyond here."
Morgan walked over to the river and surveyed their chances of successfully fording the stream. The water was flowing rapidly and disappeared into a crevasse nearby that Morgan was sure he didn't want to get the opportunity to examine up close.
"It's too dangerous," he concluded. "It's too wide to jump over and the water's flowing too fast to walk through."
Alonzo nodded. For once, he was in total agreement with Morgan. It was too risky. He let out a loud sigh of frustration and pummeled a fist against the chamber wall. "Damn!"
Kneeling down, he allowed Uly to ease himself off of his back and sit on the stone floor. He stood up again and walked over to the river, examining it along its entire run through the chamber, searching for any point where they might be able to get across. There was none. He walked over to where the river streamed out of the chamber walls.
"I think I might be able to climb up and over here," he shouted back at Morgan.
Morgan dashed over and, taking a look at where Alonzo was beginning to climb, threw his hands in the air in horror. "Are you crazy?! You can't climb over that! It's too dangerous."
"Well I don't see you coming up with any better ideas, Morgan." Alonzo grunted as he pulled his body up onto the rock face.
"Not getting the three of us killed sounds like a good idea to *me*," Morgan retorted.
Alonzo was carefully playing his hands across the rock face, searching for suitable holds. Pulling his body up and across the outflow point of the rushing water, Alonzo continued his verbal attack on Morgan. "Oh, come off it, Morgan. If we stopped and buried our heads in the sand every time you thought it was too dangerous to continue, we'd still be down in the main chamber, chewing on Terrian staffs for breakfast."
"Is that right, Mr. Hotshot? Well let me tell *you* something. If you'd listened to me in the first place..."
"*Please* stop yelling!" shouted Uly, cutting off Morgan.
Morgan and Alonzo both turned toward Uly in surprise. Alonzo froze on the rock face, confused at Uly's sudden outburst. Morgan sighed and moved towards the boy.
"We're sorry Uly, we didn't mean to..."
"Shhhh!" interrupted Uly. "I thought I heard something."
Alonzo and Morgan both craned their necks, as if this would naturally amplify any sound they were attempting to hear.
"I don't hear anything," said Morgan. "What did it sound like?"
A sudden rumble from above echoed throughout the chamber.
"Like that!" exclaimed Uly, a big smile jumping onto his face. "They're digging through!"
The smile spread to Morgan's face and he let out a loud whoop. "Alonzo! They're digging through!" he shot back at the man who had begun climbing back down the rockface. Suddenly, Morgan's grin vanished, replaced by a look of horror as he watched Alonzo's hand slip away from the hold onto which he had just grasped, upsetting Alonzo's balance and sending the man careening off of the rockface and into the torrent of the river beneath him.
"Alonzo!"
As Uly looked on in terror, Morgan sprinted across the cavern towards the point where the river disappeared into the crevasse. It took every ounce of effort to cover the distance quicker than the rate at which the water was carrying Alonzo inexorably towards the promise of death in the deep crevasse. Alonzo was kicking furiously with his legs, trying desperately to reach out towards the edge of the flow, an expression of panic dancing across his face.
Reaching the edge of the crevasse, Morgan flung himself onto the rock floor so that he was lying on his stomach at the edge of the river. Alonzo was moving towards him rapidly, his arm outstretched in a desperate plea for help. Alonzo knew he would not make it to the edge of the river before it emptied him into the crevasse. Morgan saw the look in Alonzo's eyes and knew that the man knew. Without a sound, Morgan stretched out his right arm as far as he could reach and opened his hand in a gesture for Alonzo to attempt to grab onto him. 'Come on, Alonzo. You only get one chance at this,' Morgan willed the man telepathically.
Alonzo saw his only opportunity for survival, reaching out across the water to him. Willing him to give everything he had to grab a hold of that opportunity. To Alonzo, it was as if time suddenly slowed to a fraction of the speed. The sound of the roaring water became a distorted, low-pitched reverberation. In slow motion, Morgan's hand inched closer and closer to him until finally, Alonzo forced his arm out of the water and clenched his hand around Morgan's.
Time returned to its normal speed. Alonzo felt the force of the water yank his body around as he held onto Morgan's arm. To his complete horror, Alonzo's legs moved over the edge of the crevasse and he felt the water pulling down on him, as if the lower half of his body had moved into the event horizon of a black hole that was slowly pulling his body apart. Both men simultaneously let out a yell- Alonzo's one of determination to live, and Morgan's one of sheer pain as he felt his shoulder threaten to pull completely out of its socket.
Alonzo fought against the river's power to pull his dangling arm out of the water and grabbed onto Morgan. His body ached as the suction of the crevasse demanded his submission. With each hand pulling furiously on Morgan's arm as the other moved up it like it were a rope, Alonzo pulled himself towards the edge of the river. Morgan fought back the urge to scream out at the constant pain in his shoulder. It was as someone had taken burning knives and plunged them deeply into his shoulder blade, pushing him to the very verge of consciousness.
As if sensing defeat, the river suddenly surrendered to the men, and Alonzo felt his legs pull out of the crevasse as his torso fell onto the rocky cavern floor alongside the river. With a final effort, he dragged himself out of the water and rolled onto his back, lying beside Morgan as the two of them fought to catch their breath. Uly dragged himself over to them, snapping out of the frozen state he had been in while the scene played out before him in a period of less than thirty seconds.
"Oh God. Thanks, man," Alonzo gasped.
Morgan's shoulder still ached but the pain was no longer the searing agony of a few seconds earlier. "No problem," he gasped back. "Anytime."
"I don't think so!" Alonzo laughed between snatches of breath. Morgan began laughing then and Uly looked at the two men as if they had both turned stark raving mad.
"I think that's enough spelunking for one day," Morgan decided.
"You bet!" agreed Alonzo.
As if on cue, a stream of dirt and debris began falling from above as the sound of digging above them intensified. Large clumps of soil and fragments of rock were falling from the chamber roof now and eventually a metal shovel pierced the roof completely, letting in a stream of bright sunlight.
"It's daylight!" exclaimed Morgan, getting up onto his feet. "We've been down here all night!"
The hole widened enough for someone above to shine a lumalight into the darkness below.
"Hello?" came the unmistakable voice of John Danziger.
Uly, Alonzo and Morgan responded in chorus. "Hello!"
"We're down here!" added Morgan.
"Uly? Uly!" The frantic voice of Devon Adair streamed through the hole from somewhere above.
"I'm here, mom!"
"We're sending down a rope," shouted Danziger. "Tie on one at a time."
"Okay!" Alonzo yelled back. "Uly's leg is broken. Be careful."
There was a moment of silence. "Gotcha." Alonzo guessed Danziger omitted
to pass the information along to Devon, at least until they had gotten Uly safely to the surface.
Within ten minutes, the three of them had been successfully pulled from underground. Alonzo came up last, and he blinked blindly as the bright rays of the morning sun filled the air. They were standing on the slope of the hill, about two thirds of the way up from the base. Julia was fussing over Uly's leg while Devon hovered nearby, her expression a mixture of anguish and relief. Morgan was off to one side talking into a gearset, obviously with a duly relieved Bess back in camp.
"How did you find us?" Alonzo asked Danziger.
"Oh we had a little help from Mr. Subsurface Surveyor here," Danziger chuckled as he patted the Zero unit on the back. "It was Bess' idea actually. I can't believe I didn't think of it."
"It was a complex mathematical correction to the seismic reflection data pattern," explained Zero. As if sensing the need for layman's terms, the Zero unit clarified. "I imaged you."
"Well not a moment too soon," laughed Alonzo. "I was about to toss Morgan there into a river."
"Sir?" responded Zero.
"Looks like he beat you to it, Alonzo," Danziger smiled broadly.
But Alonzo had already walked over to stand by Julia, waiting for her to finish attending to Uly's injuries so that she could then attend to him. On a more personal level.
"Let's move out!" Danziger barked out at the group and they began heading back down towards the camp.

Voice-over: Personal Log of Devon Adair.
'I sit and watch the sleeping form of my son, and I fear to ever let him go again. This planet has shown us more about ourselves than we ever dared discover. Our strengths. Our weaknesses. Our determination to survive. And our capability for compassion and kinmanship. But it has also shown us danger and pain. It has shown us fear. It has shown us death and it has shown us grief. I believe it has also shown my son something more. Uly told me of his encounter with the Terrian while in the 'mountain of the night'. How this Terrian gave his own life so that Uly may live. The images he showed my son. I'm sure Uly doesn't understand the meanings, but deep in my heart, I know I do understand. Uly is vital to the survival of the Terrians and they are willing to risk death to ensure his survival. I don't know how and why they know of the future. How they escape the prison that is the linearity of time for us in life. But there is something about the future of this place, this planet, that the Terrians alone cannot overcome. They need my son. And although it gives me comfort to know that Uly has these guardians watching over him as we travel towards New Pacifica, I can't help but be filled with dread about what is in store for us there. Over the horizon. Where the future waits. For I know now that despite the greatest of intentions I've always had for the colonization of this planet by the Syndrome families- for a new hope- something is going to go horribly wrong. And I fear that no matter what I do each and every day to stop it, it is ultimately out of my hands. And in the hands of my son.'

-The End-

Send feedback to simkat@sprintmail.com

This text file was ran through PERL script made by Andy. Original text file is available in Andy's Earth 2 Fan Fiction Archive.