Story Game v2.0

Oooh, I like that ending. Very atmospheric and intriguing. Makes me want to turn the page and keep reading on.

Obviously everyone else has been invited to the royal wedding.

Yana emerged from the tunnel entrance carrying the bulky tripod. This was the last bit of equipment to be removed from the site after their final scans. Lawrence had taken the sub-micron beam unit back to the camp leaving her to manage with the stand. It wasn't too heavy really when it was folded up like this. It was just a little awkward getting the stuff in and out through the cramped tunnel.
"You guys packing up for the day?" It was one of the guards asking, his voice a little muffled and distorted behind his breathing mask.
"Well, I'm done anyway." She smiled at the soldier while her brow frowned a little, the contradictory expressions indicating a kind of bemusement as she asked, "Do you really still have to wear those things?" She waved her hand in front of her face.
"I guess not," he admitted. "After a while it just becomes part of the uniform. And they do look kind of cool."
"It'd be cooler to actually see who I'm talking to at any given moment."
He reached up and snapped the lower part of the mask down, it crackled and hissed, then he pulled it all over his head and completely off, revealing his face. "Better?"
"Always," she said, looking up into his dark eyes that reflected the dappled, evening light falling through the surrounding foliage. He looked younger than she imagined, maybe they were all young, yet he still had a faded scar that turned over a sharp cheekbone. "Now you have a face. All we need next is a name."
"Halvett."
"And I'm-"
"Yana. I know. You show your ID everytime you go past."
"Well, it's good to know you're paying attention beneath the masks." She put the tripod down and groaned a little.
"You OK?"
She didn't answer immediately but after rubbing her eyes for a moment she said, "Just tired. It's been a busy few days. Sometimes I feel like I'm running on autopilot."
"Well don't run yourself into the ground with your work. All work and no play..."
"I wouldn't change it for anything. All of this..." She looked all around her. "...is amazing. It's all I've ever wanted to do. And now I'm finally here I'm not letting it go." She picked up the tripod, nodded to the soldier and set off back to camp.
"Hey," he called out after her. "If you do want a bit of a break then some of the guys are having a few drinks at the end of the current shift rotation."
Yana acknowledged with a wave of her free hand and carried on.

As she reached the two tall, pillar-like trees she couldn't resist stretching her neck back to gaze up at the towering trunks. She suddenly recalled that conversation with the guard. Wait, was he coming on to me back there? she wondered. What was his name again? Halvett or something. Perhaps she should have said yes to his offer. Perhaps she should have said 'something' instead of just waving. Did he think that wave was a yes or a no? Such conversations are always a bit awkward when you recount them afterwards. But perhaps it's good that people feel relaxed enough to talk like that now. Things were a little more tense just after landing with everyone worried about what they'd find down here The atmosphere was a bit like 'Them' and 'Us' but now Soldiers and Scientists seemed to be fraternizing with much more ease. And it wasn't just with the soldiers either. The factions between the scientists seemed to have melted away with each new discovery. Even Professor Hays had stopped worrying about quarantine once she'd been down here and seen the site at first hand. This place had the power to bring people together. This place was special.

Huwo sat waiting with the others. Motionless, like the others. That's all he was now... Like the others. He whimpered a little as his wounded leg reminded him of pain. It used to be just an instinct but now it was something felt deeper. Before it was just his leg that hurt, but now that same hurt was in his head too. And the feeling in the head remained even when the feeling in the leg faded. The memory of pain is also pain.
The feeling made him weak. That's why the sphere abandoned him. The leg was not healing, will never heal. It was not like the old body, before. This body was stuck in weakness. Huwo was stuck in weakness.
Huwo looked up at the sphere on the branch. As he watched, head down, peeping from under his brow, the metal sphere expanded to a larger sphere of glittering dust. It hovered in defiance for a time and then cascaded to the ground like water, and, still like water, it flowed to the centre of the group and the sphere re-formed again. Huwo watched and waited, like the others.

The sphere again became dust and the dust became Hawa. That's why the sphere abandoned him. Huwo was weak. Hawa is strong.
Hawa raised a fist and screamed. The group stirred and looked at her. She hooted deeply, the sound was layered like two voices, sinking lower unlike any noise that Hawa made before... Before the sphere. The group stood to attention but Huwo stayed seated. His leg was still painful. Hawa came close. She placed a hand on his head, her fingertips scratching gently, picking as if grooming for parasites on his skin. She made another noise, a soft, low murmur, a noise more familiar, more comforting.
At the will of her touch, Huwo turned to dust and the dust turned back to Huwo. When the body returned he was standing. Hawa patted the side of his face. Hawa raised her arm high to gain attention and then swept it forward with an aggressive point. She called out with a high pitched howl and bounded off in that direction.
The group followed. And Huwo followed.


Elander couldn't sleep. Her mind was alive and active, fizzing with ideas and questions. She never expected to feel like this. In a way, she felt conflicted, and in another way she felt guilty about that conflict. She had come on this journey armed with her protocols and regulations. She had even prepared, and rehearsed, the entire speech she would give to shut down this whole expedition if it got too dangerous. She had been fixed in her beliefs. Rigid with certainty. And yet here she now was, down on the planet, exploring alien sites, touching- actually TOUCHING alien history, and loving it like... Well, like that girl Yana. She felt reborn. She felt new. She felt like she mattered again.
Had she been wrong for all those years? She remembered the public hearings after Kantika Moon. Was it really 25 years ago? It seemed like only yesterday that she was standing before that inquiry to urge and then convince the authorities to place a moratorium on manned frontier exploration. She remembered those adversarial debates where she even argued with the crew who were there and lucky to escape, including Renek Cardo! She remembered undermining their subjective testimony with the facts. The main fact being that even now we didn't know what that huge relic was, that vast, incongruous ruin that imploded in that release of strange, dancing, blinding light, with a power and energy no-one had ever seen, taking half of Kantika Moon with it. Was it a temple, an outpost, a graveyard? Or just a trap. It's one thing to catalogue bugs and trees but when you start dealing with intelligence, sentience, sapience... That's when things get risky.
So all her recommendations had been put in place back then, supported by the authority of Professor Relin, all the limits, the restrictions, the protocols. And yet their implementations had softened over the years. People had become more optimistic about the universe and all its wonders. New planets gave people new hopes. And now here they were exploring once more and she was right there on the front line and loving it, with Renek's daughter. She wondered if Professor Relin would appreciate the irony.
The girl added even more conflict to her mixed feelings. Elander had never had children. Taking on such responsibility seemed arrogant, both then and now. To have a whole life dependent on you! How could you ever focus on anything else? But being here with Yana made her realise what she had missed out on. Of course Yana was an adult now, but she still felt protective of her like any mother would be and yet she also rejoiced in her discoveries and enthusiasm. Who was she to take that away with regulations and protocol? Did she now finally understand Yana's father too? Understand his need to explore and the way he tried to take the baby Yana from her protective mother? She remembered his words documented by the subsequent investigation and now understood the meaning of the nickname. "Yarenka will be an explorer like me. We live out there. We belong out there." Perhaps Renek had been right about that at least, perhaps we do all belong out here. As a race. As a people. But Renek had been wrong to try and take the baby by force and he'd been wrong to take that ship to explore on his own in defiance of the laws. Because of that, Elander was glad that Yana didn't know about her father, glad that she didn't know that his ship was shot down as part of the moratorium that she had put in place. In a way she was partly responsible for his death and Yana would only hate her if she knew.

Huwo limped along at the back of the group. They all followed Hawa. All in a line like those little juicy ants that he used to eat before. Before the sphere. They all followed Hawa. Out of the forests, beyond the trees, across the streams. Through tunnels and caves. Over new and unfamiliar lands. And now up this long, unrelenting hill. Its slope not steep yet still hard on Huwo's wounded leg. Finally at the top, Hawa stopped them with an arresting bark. She pointed in the distance beyond the valley. She pointed at the singular mountain.
Huwo knew of the mountain from his time with the sphere, but he didn't fully understand. He was still too weak to grasp it all. Huwo just knew OF the mountain. He knew they had to get there and get there before.. before... something. He was too weak to fully understand. That's why the sphere abandoned him. Hawa could understand.

Elander tried to close her eyes but it was no good. In her mind she just saw afterimages of that alien artwork. She couldn't stop thinking about it. Who were they? What did it mean? The symbols, the circles, the dissolving figures. Was is a transition of some kind? Their way of expressing death or birth? Or some kind of primitive sacrifice? It was fascinating. "I wonder," she thought, stirring upon and idea. "I wonder if..."
Noises outside her bunk stopped her from finishing the question. It was just voices. Probably soldiers drinking. But then more voices. They didn't sound drunk, they weren't raised like in argument or dispute, but they did sound urgent. "I'd better check," she said out loud to no-one. "It's not as if I'm sleeping anyway." She pulled on a few clothes and ventured outside. Her first thought was, It's morning already? And it was. She obviously hadn't slept all night. Then she noted the scientists scurrying about the camp grabbing equipment.
"What's going on?" she asked one but was ignored. She bumped into another. "What-" but the young man shook his head and pointed in the direction he continued to go in. Finally she found Lawrence and tried to ask him.
Before the question came out he told her.
"It's the cave paintings. Something's changed."



"And you are?" After hearing from the botanist and making her way here, Elander was now eager to get inside the chamber, but the questions had to be asked.
"My name's Halvett, ma'am."
Elander didn't like the "ma'am" but she let it go and inquired, "You've been here all night?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"Awake?"
"Always on duty, m-"
She cut him off and asked him to confirm. "And no-one- nothing- has been in since we left last night."
"Nothing at all."
She left him and went in with the other scientists. Down the tunnel. Into the chamber. The fire had been lit for her already. She looked around at the marks. She didn't need a scan for reference. She knew what they looked like from before. They were burned in her memory. Now she just needed to note the difference. And there it was.
The image of the mountain had two new figures at the base. And above the spiral jewel was a word. A word she could read and understand. She spoke it out loud and her voice echoed in the chamber.
"Come."
She turned and saw Yana behind her. She smiled at her and touched her shoulders with both hands She could feel the girl shaking with excitement. Or was it just her own body shaking. She too was excited.. But a little scared. And conflicted. It was everything she dreamed. And everything she feared. "Th-They're..." she stuttered at Yana. "They're inviting us."

Yana didn't respond. Her eyes remained fixed on that word. She didn't know how this had happened. She didn't know why this had happened. She just knew one thing.
She knew that the word written on the wall looked exactly like her own handwriting. As Elander hugged her Yana glanced down at her own hand and saw one of her fingers glowing in the firelight with a trace of the pigment.
Yana wiped it off on her clothes and told no-one.