It was so beautifuclass="underline" all of it, valley and terrace and house. Her lahk had built it two years ago, when Tony’s job and Isabelle’s art and Nathan’s inventions had produced enough money. Well, mostly Nathan, and Isabelle was grateful to her lahk-mate, even though he was never home anymore and wasn’t that nice a person to begin with.
Made entirely of karthwood, the house sat on the top of a low hill. Karthwood, which it had taken Isabelle a year on World to stop calling “bamboo,” was the basic building material everywhere, and structures were designed for the natural curves of its hollow, tapering stalks, which were treated with natural salts against insects and weather. “Let the karthwood become what it chooses” was the construction motto, and what karthwood wanted to become was buildings with swooping curves, oval rooms, woven roofs lacquered against rain, sliding panels to open houses to World’s semitropical air. Karthwood had the tensile strength of steel, the compressive strength of concrete, and the beauty of natural wood. In addition, as one of the few lighter colors in nature, its warm tan stalks were a welcome contrast to World’s other vegetation.
But the fields and gardens were beautiful, too, in their more somber way. Vegetation used rhodopsin instead of chlorophyll; the darker coloration allowed less light reflection and more retention from World’s orange sun. Skihlla rose above the horizon, suffusing the valley with its delicate light and glinting on the river that flowed to the east of the house until, beyond several other lahks, it fell in shining stages to the valley. From the garden below Isabelle’s terrace rose the sweet, heady scent of pika¡ leaves, perfuming the moist air. And now all of it, the whole lovely life her lahk had put together, might not last.
Isabelle drained her tea, raised the cup to the rising sun, and said in World, “Mother World, you are beautiful beyond compare.”
“Bullshit,” a voice behind her said in English.
Isabelle turned. “Good morning, Kayla.”
“Yeah. Right.”
So this was one of her sister’s bad days. Kayla vacillated between staying in bed all day and complaining bitterly when out of it. Kayla had hated World for ten years, and it seemed to Isabelle that the hatred was growing. Isabelle recognized depression but had no idea what to do about it. Antidepressants did not exist on World. Medicine here, as on Earth, developed according to need. Isabelle, naturally robust, tried to be patient. But she had liked World from the beginning, even during the first difficult months of microbe-adjustment, financial dependency, and language ignorance, when the clicks and trills and inflected syllables of Worldese had swirled around her as incomprehensible as the insect sounds it resembled. Kayla still had learned no more than a few words.
She said, “I need help today, Kayla, in the studio, if you will.”
Kayla snorted. “‘Studio.’”
Isabelle hung on to her temper. “Please.”
“You’re just going to go on with this sham life as if nothing is going to happen? As if everything isn’t going to come to an end in a few more months?”
Isabelle lost the battle with her temper. “I thought that’s what you wanted! For World to come to an end!”
“Not us with it. Face it, Isabelle, when the spore cloud hits, everything ends.”
Isabelle didn’t answer. They’d been through this before.
Kayla gripped the railing and glared at the valley below. Figures moved, now, among the fields and gardens; bicycles sped along the roads. “Look at them, going to work like nothing is about to happen to them.” Then Kayla’s voice turned plaintive. “No, Izzy, I didn’t want World to end. What I want is to go home. Have you forgotten home? Green trees and a yellow sun and cars and computers and steaks and—”
“Have you forgotten home—the home you and I knew? Welfare didn’t exactly provide us with steaks or a car. Our cousin was shot outside the apartment building. Your child brought home a used needle he found on the sidewalk. The gangs—”
“So shoot me!” Kayla flared. “I remember the good stuff, and I don’t want to die next month! When the spore cloud—Austin!”
Isabelle turned. Her nephew stood there in the Terran pajamas Kayla had sewn for him and insisted he wear, blinking against the brightening day. His thin face showed nothing. Sometimes he tried to make peace between his mother and aunt, which always filled Isabelle with shame; a thirteen-year-old should not have to take on that role. Today, however, he merely said in a flat voice, “We are all going to die?”
“No,” Isabelle said, before Kayla could say anything. “You know we’re not, Austin.” She had explained it all to him more than once, even though once had been all that was necessary. The kid was smart. However, there was something of Kayla’s negativity in him, too, which worried Isabelle.
Austin said, “We’re immune, right. We’re Terrans. But Mom is worried about all the people here who aren’t. About everything falling apart and Worlders just losing it and going on rampages.”
Isabelle turned on her sister. “What have you been telling him? God, Kayla!”
“The truth. I’ve been telling him the truth about what happens when a society falls apart! As in, you know, history!”
“World’s history is not ours!”
“They’re human, aren’t they? That’s what you always insist!”
Kayla’s face shone with petty, pathetic triumph. Isabelle turned away in disgust, to find out exactly what Austin had been told and to correct it if she could. But Austin was no longer there. He’d gone into his privacy room, and when Isabelle whistled softly at the door to request entrance, he neither opened the door nor answered.
“Shit,” Isabelle said softly.
The studio would have to wait. This was more important. Isabelle sat cross-legged on a pillow outside Austin’s karthwood door and waited for the boy to come out.
He did, five minutes later, eyes wild. “Tra¡kal!” he cried in World. “On the radio… killed! A whole city—” He started to cry, tears flying off his face with the violent shaking of his head.
“Check weapons and then recon the area,” Owen said, and Leo and Kandiss jumped to obey, even though Leo wasn’t sure what “the area” actually was. The shuttle still burned, smelling horribly. They’d crashed beside a small, very irregular hill covered with boulders and purplish vegetation. Fallen rocks littered the ground, although away from the hill, the land was level. Owen had backed the civilians under an overhang of rock, almost a small cave. Zoe guarded them, weapon at the ready, even though Leo suspected she was having trouble staying upright. Dr. Bourgiba was bent over Dr. Sherman, treating his burns with something from Dr. Patel’s suitcase. If that was all filled with doctor stuff, then it was a good thing that Dr. Patel had refused to let go of it. It was something they still had, anyway.
What else did they have? As they performed the weapons check, Leo cataloged their resources. His 107A1, the .50 caliber long-range sniper rifle zeroed to him. Four Mk 19 SCARs, Special Forces combat assault rifles; one of those was fitted with a modular shotgun system for ballistic breaches. Four Beretta sidearms. Ammo and hand grenades—Christ, no wonder Owen had staggered a little under the weight of the duffel. The gear they had all been wearing, even Zoe, who must have gone back to her quarters from sick bay to put it on right after Owen had told her to stay in sick bay. Filter masks for everybody. One person who spoke Kindese. No fucking idea where they were, or what kind of OPORD Owen could put together.