My Ddura-headache wasn’t too bad, but I was feeling tired as well, so I was glad when Ruuel sent us back to the Diodel. Squad One is sleeping on the Litara, which is staying for the night. Most of the expedition is sleeping in the tent city, but while the Taren Setari are more accustomed to being outside because they’re trained to go into the spaces, the Sight talents especially find it difficult to sleep without the shielding on our pods or their rooms back on Tare. Combat Sight reacts to people coming near them, for a start.
Ruuel was absent, as he often is during meals, and I had a feeling Fourth Squad would probably talk about Squad One if I wasn’t there, so I headed for a shower and bed straight after dinner.
I was sitting sideways on my pod seat braiding my hair when Ruuel showed up from wherever he’d been. "Devlin. Have you seen the cat Ionoth since the infirmary?"
This wasn’t a question I wanted to answer. But it also seemed weird for him to suddenly bring it up. I blinked, then guessed why he was asking. "You’ve been warning Kolaren captain about silly things I might do that he has to watch out for?"
"Yes." Very straightforward, very typical. "You’ve sighted it, I take it? Report it next time."
If there’s ever a time I really do need to lie to Ruuel, I’m going to have no chance at all. And I didn’t think I could just pretend I was going to do what he said, either. "I do most things told to because either make sense to me, or don’t see any choice. Ghost I handed over once, so tests could be run, but not going to do again."
Other than a couple of fits of temper I’ve had with the medics, I think that was the first time I’ve refused to do what I was told since I was rescued – and Ruuel is really the last person I want to say no to. I felt pretty nervous about his reaction, but he just looked steadily at me a moment, then said: "And if it proves less innocuous than you believe? You will not be able to undo any damage it causes."
"Just because she not turn into evil, people-eating kitten in the past not mean she won’t one day? May as well lock me back up in case I decide run around stab people."
"The cat has a better chance of landing a blow," he said, totally straight-faced, and shook his head, apparently deciding it wasn’t worth pressing the point. "Get some rest."
I felt like telling him to practice what he preached, since the shadows under his eyes were worse than ever, but I was too disconcerted by more evidence of a sense of humour (or, just possibly, proof that he is totally bereft of one and is saying these things without a shred of irony). Besides, he was already walking away.
I’m finding I like waking up a lot earlier than everyone else, not least because it gives me a chance to write up the day in this diary without anyone looking at me curiously, but today I wish I’d stayed in the dream I was having. I was lying curled up with Ruuel, not talking or doing anything, just curled up in a dark, quiet place listening to him breathe, to his heart beating. It was an uneventful but intense dream, and incredibly real. When I woke up I felt so content, so happy, I wanted to go straight back to sleep.
Must find cure for besotted goopiness.
Sweat
Each of the main entrances are open now, and each third was very much the same inside. Corpses just inside the seal, and then living quarters beyond. We haven’t found anything which was obviously controlling the seal, and won’t be opening any more levels until more machine parts arrive. The technicians weren’t expecting to have to build dozens of the things. The Litara's gone off to fetch that and other construction-related items, as they’ve begun the first stages of building the settlement, which is going to be called Arenrhon after some Taren historical figure.
Ruuel decided his squad was getting out of shape and started them on an evil training regimen. Being in good physical condition lessens the strain of using their talents, and these constantly on-mission days without their usual training facilities means Fourth haven’t had much opportunity for strength training. So they did lots of jogging and chin lifts and things like that. And since I’m assigned to Fourth, I got to do it as well, except – thankfully – only about a quarter of what Ruuel put everyone else through. That still nearly killed me.
It was bearable, though. Things I could obviously not do – like chin lifts – he didn’t make me stick at, and had me do milder versions instead. I didn’t enjoy the day, but I got through it, and Fourth Squad were good at not making me feel embarrassed about being comparatively pathetic.
Friday, April 11
It’s all a question of angles
Today I taught a handful of greensuits and greysuits and three Setari squads how to skip stones. I was waiting around for Fourth to come back from their longer-than-mine training run, and since it was a very still day and this lakeshore is even pebblier than Pandora’s, I entertained myself by collecting a bunch of stones and seeing if I could best my record (seven skips).
My arms were tired from push-ups, though, and the best I could manage was four skips, and was looking around for more stones when I realised I had a small audience: two greensuits and a greysuit looking immensely puzzled. Their question – "But, how?" – says something about how different their planets are from Earth. Kolar isn’t entirely desert, but it’s a dry world and most of its water is in underground Springs, while Tare is all massively violent oceans. By the time Fourth got back I had most of Squad One and two from Ninth lined up in a row.
Ruuel let Fourth have a break to play around, but didn’t try himself, going off to be captainly. Glade easily beat my own record, and asked what the maximum was people could do on Earth, but I didn’t know. I think when he taught me Dad said something about people doing over thirty skips, but that always seemed a bit much to be right. Par Auron took the record today – eight skips. At least half the Setari could skip better than me on their second or third try. They’re just good at physical tasks, not to mention strong.
Then it was more exercise: stretches and lifting big water containers Ruuel had borrowed from the greensuits. Fortunately we’re doing all this training in a clearing a little north of the tents, so I didn’t have to deal with an audience. I think every muscle I have is sore.
Saturday, April 12
Museum exhibit
Uneventful day. You’d think exploring lost alien underground cities would be more dramatic, but going through the second level of the installation, which required another three machines to hold open the entrances, was very much a repetition of the first level. More living quarters, larger ones. Fewer bodies. Wood well-preserved, metal tarnished, cloth fragile. Not much writing. The Lantaren caste of the Muinans did use a written language, but non-Lantarens apparently weren’t literate. Other than a couple of inscriptions on pots and statues (possibly the names of people – the alphabet has mutated a fair deal and I can only half read it), I didn’t spot anything written down. Definitely no library, or manual of instructions, or super-secret plans. No field projector we could turn off, either.