We Shadows

Chapter 5: clear lavender sky

Esperanza kept checking her bins nervously, hoping that she remembered everything that she could possibly need. Lully laughed, squeezing her shoulder.

"Petal, we're fine. Stop worrying."

He took the bin from her and set it on the trailer and out of her hands. Others were milling around, waiting for Joan and Vertov to clear everything. They were going to use both hovers to get the crew out to the site, but bring one back this evening. Esperanza wished she had seen them put together the base, wondering how they were able to print and create everything from scratch.

"I'm not worried, I just want to be prepared," she told him. "We'll be hours away from the base and occasionally without the hover. And we're not in charge of food? That'll be new."

"Even on the Aeneid?" Lully inquired.

Esperanza pursed her lips. "We still ate separately. The ship was a continuous process; someone was always awake. But you are right; we had a couple cooks per shift."

Joan shouted at the group to take their seats. Bell waved to Esperanza and Lully, patting a spot next to Emerson and her. Lully lifted Esperanza up to the hover and climbed in after her. The hovers navigated out of the printing bay and out into the bright sunlight of midday. Esperanza had to shade her eyes, but the landscape was so beautiful it was worth the momentary discomfort.

"We're on our way," Bell gushed, leaning out. "Look, there's the mountains!"

"Bell is a little excited," Emerson confided. "Don't encourage her, she'll start talking about the hover data and soil samples again and we'll never get her to stop."

"As if he was being dragged on this trip," she scoffed. "We're all excited. Exploration has never been organized enough for research to coordinate. And we couldn't explore far until we could predict earthstorms, and we have less than a year of data."

Lully wrapped his arms around Esperanza, resting his chin against her shoulder. His beard tickled her neck, but the low hum of the hover was lulling and Esperanza closed her eyes, falling asleep against Lully.

He shook her away some time later. The first hover had already stopped. Bell had gathered her assortment of bags and bins and was grinning broadly. The mountain formerly in the distance had grown to tower over them. Esperanza had never seen anything so large. She had no way to describe it; it was easily ten times the size of the Canary. It cut off nearly half the horizon with its reddish brown hue. At the top, if Esperanza squinted her eyes, she could see the mountain changed from red-brown to white.

"I need to help Emerson with the printer, but then I can help you with your equipment? Lully inquired, surprising her at little. "It'll take builds a while to set up the shelters.

"I'll be fine," she promised. "Go on."

She hopped off the hover, following Bell since she had a bit of time to wait. Bell wasted no time; unfolding a small table and rummaging through her bags for her holo-rib, setting it up before taking soil samples. Other people bustled around, but Esperanza quietly watched as Bell's table was covered in gadgets and screens. She even set up a large pronged wire that reached a meter into the air.

"What is that?" Esperanza inquired.

"My antenna," she said. "I want to get information from our satellites and not wait for Ibsen to send it to me. And I can send him data quickly. Hopefully I can convince whoever is taking the hover back to base to grab some more samples. I want to get as much data as I can before I have to work on ore samples. That will not be as exciting."

She sighed and adjusted her holo-rib. Esperanza wasn't certain that any part of what Bell did was exciting, but she clearly enjoyed what she did. Lully and Emerson were hovering over the printer as if it was their sick patient.