I shrugged. "Been more worried about killing everyone with nightmares. Do you – do you ever think you can’t deal with being a Setari any more?"
Mara straightened on the knee-lift machine she’d been using, then unhooked her feet. "In the early days, when everything was new, we thought we were invincible. When Jorly – the first Setari to die on duty was Jorly Kennez, and if there had been some fault, some error of judgment which we could blame her death on, then perhaps it wouldn’t have been so hard. But it was a rotation we had cleared a dozen times, we were all performing well, and still she died. A single lucky blow was all it took. It was only then that I really understood that we were fighting a war of attrition. And their numbers would never decrease. 'Lese – Helese Surion – helped me immensely with that, just by pointing out a few statistics on the number of lives not lost to Ionoth since we began."
"And then she died," I said, in a small voice. I hadn’t expected Mara to really answer my question.
"Yes. Of the original First Squad, only Alay and I were left. Second, Third, Fourth and Seventh – as they were numbered then – had all lost someone. Lohn was injured, but not badly, and he gave me…more than I’d ever thought to have from him, an anchor that I needed. If I’d been in Maze or Alay’s situation, losing the one who mattered most, I doubt I could have continued in the Setari. As it is, they’re neither of them the people they once were. Though–" She paused, and made a wry face. "Maze was convinced, immediately convinced, that the Cruzatch were involved, were more than just escort Ionoth in that massive’s wake. I thought his focus on them, his determination to prove that they had a level of agency above other Ionoth, was simply something he clung to after losing 'Lese. A way of dealing with his grief. Even after the Pillar – it wasn’t until seeing them in Kalasa that I could let myself believe that we really have an enemy to blame. The impact of that is something I can’t describe. And, of course, you had already given us the shift of air when you opened Muina."
She said then that I should go eat before my Sights training, but I stopped and hugged her and whispered, "Thanks," before I went, because she’d told me things that were personal to her, despite my second level monitoring, and that meant a lot to me. I had to look up what "shift of air" meant – it’s a phrase a bit like "the light at the end of the tunnel", except it grew out of a past living deep underground and was all about being trapped in the crushing dark, suffocating, and then feeling a breeze, a hint of fresh air which told you there was a way out. And that’s how Mara felt about being a Setari.
I liked the idea of an anchor. And I’d like to think First Squad is mine: the people I can turn to for comfort and support, who can help me keep it together. But I know it’s Ruuel. Even the comfort, when I’m seriously on the edge. Well, sort of. Hand clutching counts.
Sight Sight talents apparently have an overwhelming need to understand. The Sight is always trying to puzzle out the world, and they see a lot of people’s secrets, and I guess that’s part of why Ruuel works for me – I always feel he sees me very clearly, that I haven’t succeeded in hiding anything from him, and so he knows just what to do or say when I need it most. Of course, he’s also doing his level best to keep me at a distance, but I’m okay with that at the moment. Right now I’m more interested in not Killing People With My Mind.
Tuesday, June 10
So over testing
Today I spent my Sights training session wondering if Ruuel was having nightmares too, since he looks like he’s hardly been sleeping. He’d probably be amused if he knew I was worried about him. The session went well, though, and I’m feeling more confident that I’m not on the verge of self-destructing.
Tomorrow we go to Muina and now that I’ve stopped having dramatic daily nightmares, I’m having to work at not thinking about standing back on that platform.
Wednesday, June 11
Heading Out
Excellent surprise when I arrived with Lohn and Mara at the hanger to board the Litara. Isten Notra is coming with us. She told me that she’d been longing to go since Pandora was established. Shon is coming along to be her minion – nepotism at its finest, she said – and one of her bossy secretaries as well. She’ll be living at Pandora for a while.
I worried about her, though I tried not to be all obvious about it. Isten Notra is what Tarens consider past retirement age and though she’s incredibly sharp and not as wrinkled as your average ninety year-old from Earth, there’s a fine fragility about her which I don’t think really needs to be introduced to her first Winter.
I had fun exposing Shon to Eeli while the Litara hauled itself through a full-on storm to the rift. The atmosphere on this trip is difficult to define. The four most senior squads, all of them tight and professional, and friends between the respective age groups, and I’m pretty sure they’re all absolutely keen to see inside Kalasa. But Maze is tight-lipped and unusually terse, and I’ve caught people from every squad looking at me strangely. After having a primary assignment of keeping me alive, I think they’re all trying to think up some last-minute way to avoid me standing on any platforms. I guess I am too, but I’ve been preparing myself for weeks because it always seemed inevitable, and the more they watch me for signs of imminent breakdown, the calmer I get. I just want to get it done, and then I can relax.
Nearly through the rift now. Today we’re going to try me giving people security clearance. If that doesn’t work, tomorrow I try to take Maze to Kalasa.
Big Boxes
The information being shown on the public channels on Tare is well behind the reality of Muina’s settlement. They started building Pandora just three months ago and already it’s become a living town, with external lighting and sidewalks and bits which will be gardens when it’s not Winter. Of course, having buildings which just grow themselves in a few days, so long as they have enough raw material available, really makes it a lot easier, but they still would have had to do a huge amount of designing and planning and working out power and water and connecting up the toilet recycling system and air-conditioning and outfitting the interiors.
Over fifteen hundred people are living and working here.
There’s only one or two small individual buildings. The rest are blocks three stories high and something like six suburban houses square. Quite huge, in other words. It reminds me a bit of the university campuses I toured (via website) halfway through last year, when trying to decide where to apply. Each of the blocks is devoted to a particular area of exploration and science – so far they’ve built blocks for animals, plants, geography, geology, weather, archaeology, devices and Ena research – along with a bigger central command thing, which combines coordination with greensuit barracks and supplies. There’s a combination of both dorms and permanent accommodation in the science blocks, along with a few outer blocks which are primarily residential and something called services which appears to be where everyone’s food is cooked and laundry is done and stuff like that (though I don’t think they have one centralised mess hall any more). And attached to that is the greenhouse – just as much a big white block as all the rest, but devoted to ensuring that the settlement can survive even if the Litara stops showing up. I’m told they’re already busily producing crops of Muinan plants identified as edible. And a lot of Taren algae which is processed into food.