HAWK

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE: AWAKENING (1/5)

When Kas awoke, she briefly thought she was back on board the Calista and was startled to rediscover herself still in the cosy room in the roots of an alien mountain. The situation was so bizarre that it took a moment to separate the experience from her dreams and affirm that it was actually happening.

She rolled to the side of the bed and looked at the clock on the wall. It was five-past-eight; she'd been asleep for almost nine hours solid. With still waking limbs, she swung her legs over the edge of the bed and stood. The soft rug hugged her bare toes as she stretched out her arms. She went to the wardrobe and took out a pair of linen trousers and a loose-fitting white shirt. She put them on and approved herself in the mirror before leaving the room.

Kas had no idea where she was going. She started back the way she thought Mana had taken her, but after almost two minutes, she had got herself well and truly lost and was yet to see a single person.

Maybe they're all asleep...

She turned a corner and found herself face to face with an old man sear-sweeping the floor. He was short and carrying out his work very slowly.

'Hey,' Kas said.

The man stopped sweeping and looked up. 'Bishacht cara,' he replied.

'Huh?'

'Ista lufft bego.'

'OK... Where is everyone?'

The man sighed as he turned his back on her and walked away. Kas thought he was trying to get away from her until he gestured for her to follow. It took her a few seconds to catch up with him; he apparently moved much faster than he worked. He led her down a short corridor and stopped outside a wide tunnel. He pointed to it and said, 'Diesco nich,' before turning and shuffling back the way he'd come.

'Thanks,' Kas said to his back, not sure yet if she meant it.

Kas entered the tunnel and followed it a short distance until it opened up into large round room. The floor was hollow at its centre with a railed path spiralling down around its edge. Kas went to the railing and looked down.

The ground was over a hundred metres below. At the bottom was a huge pile of metallic debris that looked like a scrapyard. Kas spied an auto-conveyor with a back full of junk drive up to the stack and tip its load onto the pile. Kas squinted and saw dozens of people huddled around its base. She pushed herself away from the railing and began following the spiral path downwards.

It took a couple of minutes for Kas to reach the bottom. The path twisted around the junk-pile at its centre, as though it was some grand and pretentious piece of art made impossible to avoid. It was made up of mostly mechanical components. She remembered what Rhaspa had said about salvaging equipment from the underground refinery in order to build their home and assumed this was part of the stockpile.

She'd barely reached the bottom when a voice called out her name.

'Balera!' Captain Mack was waving at her from twenty-feet away. She slipped through the crowd towards him.

'I was wondering where you were,' he said as she arrived.

'Me? I've been asleep. I woke up to a ghost town. What's everyone doing here?'

Mack nodded to the junk pile. 'Up there.' Kas followed his eyeline to the debris. It took her a second to understand what she was looking for, but then she spotted Worm forty-feet up the pile, clinging to its edge like a rock climber.