"I think it's a park, Lady Gallowglass."
"Then there should be few folk about," Gwen said, with growing excitement. "'Twill make a good landing field."
The park swelled in the screen. They could see individual trees, which moved off to the edges of the screen as they grew.
Gwen concentrated all of her attention on the screen.
The stream grew broader and broader, filling the center of the screen. Then it drifted off to the right and out of the screen entirely.
Chornoi and Yorick stared for a few seconds, holding their breath. The wreck jolted violently, slamming everybody back against their acceleration couches. They all sat still for a few minutes.
Then Gwen spoke, her voice soft in the dimness of the emergency lights. "My apologies. I had not meant to strike with such force."
"Oh, that's fine!" Chornoi held up a palm.
"Wonderful." Yorick nodded, with great enthusiasm. "Believe me, Lady Gallowglass, that's a much softer landing than we were expecting."
"Any landing is just great," Chornoi added.
Yorick loosed his webbing and stood up. "Here, let me give you a hand." He helped Gwen disengage her webbing. She caught his arm as she stood. "Gramercy, Master Yorick."
"Oh, it's nothing. It's… Hey! The major! Is he all right?"
Rod was leaning back in his couch, his eyes closed, chest heaving.
"Aye, he is well."
Rod pried an eyelid open. "Yeah." The other eyelid opened, too, and he rolled both eyeballs over toward Yorick. "Just a little tired."
"He did aid me in the moving of the vessel," Gwen explained.
"A little tired." Yorick nodded. "Sure, Major. Uh—before we do anything else—how about a little nap?"
Rod shook his head, loosening his webbing and struggling to his feet. "Haven't got time. We've got to get out of here before dawn."
Yorick reached out to stop him, saying, "No, Major. You're not…" But Rod was already past him, tottering toward the hatch.
Yorick shoved himself to his feet with a shrug. "Well, he's got a point. We landed pretty close to the terminator, as I remember my last glimpse of the viewscreen."
Chomoi hurried after Rod, bleating, "But how do we know the air is even breathable here!"
"Because approximately two million colonists are already breathing it." Yorick swung into step beside her. "And, of course, there's always the hole in our own roof. Nice try, lady, but you're not going to stop him with cobblestones for roadblocks."
Rod threw his weight against the locking lever and shoved. The door swung open, and he went with it. He half fell, half jumped, and felt as though he were dropping through molasses. As his feet touched the ground, Gwen was beside him, holding onto his elbow. "Gently, I prithee, my lord!"
"Why, with you there to cushion my falls? Thanks, though, darling."
Gwen smiled, and shook her head. "Wilt thou not rest, my lord?… Nay, 'tis even as thou sayest, we must be gone—yet favor thine own weakness, I prithee!"
Rod smiled gently at her. "You can always float me, if I collapse, dear. After all, I won't be able to float alone…" He looked around. "Hey! Not bad."
One moon was high in the sky, and another just above the horizon. Between them, they gave just enough light to show manicured lawns and sculpted trees all about them. Flowers rustled in formal beds, their petals closed against the night, and a small pond gleamed like a mirror a few hundred yards away.
"Why… 'tis beautiful," Gwen breathed, looking about.
Yorick sidled up next to Rod and nudged him with an elbow, pointing toward Chornoi. She was silent, her face strained and eyes haunted, drinking in the lush beauty around her.
Rod looked and nodded. "Yeah. Glad we got her off that prison planet."
"Aye, the poor lass!" Gwen said. "To have so much of beauty, after years of such bleakness…"
"We may have it again, if we don't get out of here." Rod scanned the trees and shrubbery, feeling his fatigue shoved into the background as adrenaline spiked him. "No way to tell which inviting piece of topiary is hiding a vision pickup. Maybe even sound."
Yorick nodded. "Somebody's got to have noticed we dropped in on them."
"Well, then, let's see if we can disappear before they send a welcoming committee." Rod turned away. "See if you can't wake up Chornoi, will you?"
Yorick reached out carefully, touching Chornoi's arm. Her head jerked around, eyes wide, and Yorick stepped back fast, just as a precaution. "I really hate to interrupt your reverie, Ms., but we gotta get going, or we're going to have company."
Chornoi whirled, staring about her, wild-eyed.
"Right." Yorick nodded. "No telling where from. Only that they're on their way."
"We can't be sure of that." Chornoi swung back to him. "But we'd be fools to take the chance. Which way did the Major go?"
Yorick pointed, and Chornoi set off after Rod and Gwen at a pace that made Yorick hustle.
They came out onto cobblestones as dawn was lightening the sky, permeating everything with a dim, sourceless light, punctuated by slivers of late moonlight. It was the time when night had died and day hadn't been born, a time between realities, when nothing is definite and everything is possible—a time of fantasy when anything can happen.
And the landscape was right for it. Mist rose about their knees, and its tendrils wisped up to veil a row of half-timbered houses, their second stories overhanging the street. Shop signs creaked in the breeze. Far away, something barked.
"Why, 'tis like home," Gwen said, wide-eyed.
"Yeah." Rod frowned. "Wonder what's wrong?"
"Why're we talking so softly?" Chornoi whispered.
"Who could be loud in a place like this?" Yorick murmured.
"Besides, we might wake the neighbors." Rod shouldered his fatigue and mustered his resolution. "And we don't want them to see us—just yet."
"Wherefore not?"
"Because they're going to find that capsule that brought us here, and we don't want some idle bystander with a high sense of drama telling the authorities that they saw us near the park this morning."
"I get the point," Yorick said. "Some enthusiastic soul might jump to the conclusion that we came in on that ship."
"But wherefore ought we wish him not to?" Gwen looked from man to man, puzzled. "We were aboard it."
"Yeah, dear, but whoever tried to shoot us down thinks we're dead. We wouldn't want to disillusion him, would we?"
"Or her," Chornoi put in.
"But when they find the empty ship, they will know we do live!"
"Yes, but they won't know what we look like!"
"Camouflage, Lady Gallowglass," Yorick explained. "Odds are that our attacker doesn't know what we look like, aside from a general description. He'll know we escaped, but nothing more since nobody on Otranto has seen us. But if he can get a detailed description from an eyewitness…"
"Hold on!" Chornoi held her hands up like a football referee. "Time out! You're both assuming that pirate was out to get us! He could have just been after the ship!"
Rod looked at Yorick. Yorick looked at Rod.
"All right, all right! I get the point!" Chornoi snarled, yanking her hands down. "Come on, let's go!" She set off down the street, walking fast.
Rod followed after her. "Can I help it if I'm a cynic?"
"Dost thou wish to?" Gwen murmured.
Four blocks later, Rod came to a sudden halt. "Would you look at that! You'd think a surveyor had drawn a line and a town board had declared a zone."
"Probably did," Chornoi declared.
"There goes the neighborhood," Yorick sighed.
"And the business district begins." Rod agreed.
"But what manner of business isn't?" Gwen wondered.
"Woman's oldest," Chornoi stated.
"Oh, they're not that exclusive." Rod pursed his lips. "I see at least three gambling halls in there, and five saloons."