In search of Fountains, chapter 11. (Patreon)

Here we are. Third chapter of the month, and I think it is a good one. A bit of a slow burn, setting some things up. What things? Let your imagination run free. I'm going to try and get one last chapter out this month; we shall see if I make it. For now, please enjoy:

It was morning at last. I could see those looking to replace us on watch, heading our way, much as we had last night. They were going so very slow....

I picked up my rope samples. I had five now, not counting the ones I'd broken testing the strength of. The broken remnants could be left here, of course. They would decay without causing damage to the environment. Still, it bothered me a little that I might be the first person on the new planet to be leaving waste behind. Not polluting exactly, but something close to it.

We couldn't risk them being put in our compost just yet; we didn't know what odd genetic surprises the plant matter from this planet held just yet. The chances were the A.I. knew by now, but we weren't on speaking terms. It and the rest of humanity, that was.

Finally, my own relief arrived. Another woman, or girl I suppose, she looked younger than I did. I think. She was a bit taller, however, and had some interesting carrot colored hair. She was built... bumpy, but not curvy. Maybe this was how a girl looked when she was growing into curves? I didn't know, but she looked a little odd compared to most of us. She even had some freckles on her cheeks and arms.

I wasn't about to guess if she'd been born to it or tampered with, but I was tempted to. I'd have to watch that.

The other girl waved... and that would never not be weird to think. "Hi, my name is Amy."

So she was American. Well, probably American. Probably former American. I returned her little wave: "Hi, I'm Dani."

At least for now.

"Pleased to meet you. Any trouble last night?"

She looked anxious, as if I'd be telling her yes, and that trouble was coming back for her any moment. Or something like that. "Only boredom. It was quiet last night. I didn't see anything at all."

I couldn't speak to what others might have seen, but no one had raised the alarm, so I doubted anyone had. If there were any critters out there, they either didn't care about us, or were staying away from us.

Amy looked away, and her eyes widened a bit. "Who went into the line, and stripped those vines?"

Confession time. "I did, as I said, I was bored, so I wanted to test how suitable the stuff was to make rope from."

Now she looked interested. "Is it any good?"

"I've seen better, but it works well enough at small lengths. I think I'd need to strip it a little more fine for a real test, but I'd need a machine or two for that." The machines I'd need were two simple things, easily made with what I could get, but I didn't have them now.

"Well, that's great anyway. Anything we can replicate is something we can save our own stock of."

Thanks Amy, for telling me something we all knew, and all had drilled into our heads when we were back on Earth.

No, that was the boredom and the fatigue talking. Even standing around doing nothing got tiring after hours of it.

Aleksei walked in close; he'd been relieved during our meeting. He must not have said much to the guy who relieved him. A bit weird, it wasn't like I'd talked a ton. "Come on, let's go report in."

"Have fun... as much as you can," I told Amy, who was in the process of collecting my broken vines, for her own investigation I assume. At least it gave her something to do.

I fell into step; the others were already grouped up and waiting. At long last I could get my canteen back. There it was, hanging off Shanise's belt.

I held my hand out for it, and she pulled the item off and slapped it down in my palm... just a little too hard. There was very little water left, but I was thirsty.

Aleksei grabbed it before I could so much as twist the top off: "You mind?"

I shrugged. Shanise opened her mouth, but closed it again when Aleksei raised the canteen to his lips.

Then he dropped it, canteen mouth first. "My bad."

I wanted to give him a good glare, but he was busy glaring at Shanise. There was something going on there... surely she wasn't childish enough to...?

Yeah, she was. For whatever reason, she was. And so, we were out just a bit more filtered water that we could have recycled. Our chances of survival ever so slightly lowered due to the petty issues of one person.

I guess there was always one, even now. It's a shame. I guess we will have to work around her? Aleksei picked the canteen up and began to move.

She frowned at me, as if it were my fault. I guess it was; I'd have fallen for it. I was too trusting, now that humanity was on the other side of the universe.

"Anyone hungry?" Aleksei was leading us to the mess hall.

"I'm not." I wasn't, even if I should be.

I wasn't alone in that. Everyone else chorused a negative of some kind or another.

He kept leading us there anyway, which was fine I supposed. We had time before we were supposed to report in.

Like a mama duck and her ducklings, we entered the big tent. Aleksei stopped at the door, put my canteen in a bin where others were, and grabbed a fresh one from the table. Which he delivered into my hands.

"There, clean, full, and chilled."

"Thanks." I hadn't known they were doing this, I'd gotten mine with the rest of my gear from the nurse at medical... who did they get to do nothing but wash and fill canteens all day? Guard duty was starting to look better and better.

"Grab one if you need one," Aleksei continued, turned to the rest of us.

Joe and Shanise each grabbed one of their very own, the others just waited patiently, then we all set out again.

It was a little weird; I wasn't used to having so many people around and immediately dealing with me... at least not unless they wanted something I had or worse. I wonder if the others were the same? I could see a bit of wary behavior, some body language among the others, but not everyone. Maybe those had been closer to civilization than I. Even though at the end, there were precious few such sources left.

Whatever, it wasn't a big deal. Being wary was a good thing, according to my father. I'd continue with it until proven otherwise.

But in my heart of hearts, I wanted to trust.

We went to the command tent; it was packed. Completely packed, without even the room to stand in.

"You all can go back to our tent; I'll make the report. No sense in all of us losing sleep to this. If they need all our reports, you all can just send it through pads." Aleksei grabbed near me for a moment, coming up with one of my small ropes.

That worked, I supposed. "Fine with me."

"Fine with me, too," Shanise hurried to say, and immediately started out. She did that to make it look as if we were following her now; a petty power play. Shanise didn't seem to have the wariness I was used to. Maybe it was related.

I hoped it wasn't related.

Joe shrugged and followed. I did too; people were starting to line up outside the tent, and the lack of space was getting a little... annoying.

I followed. Shanise could play all the little power games she wanted. The truth was, she was just as powerless as the rest of us.

I needed sleep.

The tent was where we left it, and everything in the tent was where we'd left it. My sleeping bag was as comfortable as I remembered.

Joe grabbed her pad and lay down, looking at it and flipping through things. It seems she was planning to stay up after all. So was Roe, already fiddling with some small contraption or another.

I lay down... and woke up refreshed and more than a little hot. A quick glance around showed we were all present, our little group, and I was the only one awake. According to my pad, we had nowhere to be until tonight. Another boring watch at night, it seemed that we had been set to our job. A shame, really, I wanted to explore more.

Still, I was rested now, and if I was quiet, there was no reason I couldn't explore a bit more now. Maybe even get some food. It was three now after all. Or three according to our old time. The new clock would take some getting used to.

The encampment was still bustling, still busy, with many going to and fro, but it still felt more than a little empty. There was no one really stopping, or talking to each other.

Even the launch site for the Ponce De Leon had more of a communal feel. I guess it was something that could only develop with time, but it couldn't come fast enough.

The mess tent was half busy, with the temporary tables ranging from fully filled to fully empty.

I decided on picking one of the half full tables. Someone would need to start to make friends, and I would be that someone. Who to pick though?

There. A table with two women, both looked older than I was, and one guy who looked a little younger. Not that any of us were kids anymore, but if he was older than fourteen I'd eat something unpleasant.

I grabbed my plate and filled it up. Today's lunch leftovers were mostly rice dishes, which made some sense; I grabbed something that looked like a little bit of everything in a whole lot of rice. It tasted as good as it looked.

"Hi."

The three looked up, startled, when I greeted them. They hadn't even been talking to each other. The guy small, a scrawny that fell just short of wiry, and plain. His brown eyes were a little too large as he stared into his soup, and his black hair was just long enough to be tangled from his lack of combing. He looked like a fellow American to my eyes.

The other two were seated opposite him, and one looked to have clear indian descent; she was that shade of walnut, willowy and with lively brown eyes that were taking everything in, and long straight black hair. I could see her taking in my details, cataloging everything about me.

The last was likely Chinese. She fit the theme of the three, with brown eyes and black hair, oddly enough she looked to be the tallest of the three, and well endowed. If forced to guess, I'd bet she was the A.I.'s handiwork, the same as I was.

"Name is Dani. Mind if I sit here?"

The guy answered first. "My name is Jarod, and no, I don't mind."

Only after he gave his answer did he look around at his fellow table companions.

Both of whom ignored him in favor of me. "My name is Anjali, and no I do not mind. Please."

The other chimed in right after: "I'm Laurie, and no, go right ahead."

I sat and decided to go for honesty. How someone reacted to blunt honesty usually revealed much about a person.

"I noticed that almost no one was speaking to each other, and thought I'd buck the trend. I'm glad all three of you speak English."

I'd been at least partly lucky in that regard; I might have taken a guess that these three looked like we had at least one language in common, but looks were probably not a good thing to go on here.

The A.I. probably didn't change how we looked too far, but it was possible. Even if there was no reason for it that I could see. Genetic variation was important in a species, or so I'd been told.

"An admirable goal; we do need to communicate with each other, now more than ever." Having said that, Anjali decided to stop talking and return to picking at her own plate.

Said plate was nearly empty, when the others were still only half done. She must have been hungry.

Eating slow was a privilege.

"Well, what would you like to discuss?" Laurie asked. As I'd expected, she had a slight accent that pinned her as Chinese, at least to my limited experience.

That was an easy question to answer, and yet not. "Anything. The weather, what you think of the new planet, thoughts on our time table, the current situation. Anything you want. I'm interested in what others think about what is going on."

"I see," Laurie answered, clearly thinking. "Well, the weather on our new planet is very nice, and the stars are captivating."

What? "The stars?"

"Laurie here is an astronomer," Anjali answered for her. "She knows all about them, and she's been trying to determine where in the universe we've ended up, by checking all the stars."

Well, that was an interesting exercise. Something to do, at any rate. The woman must have another field of study, however, because just an astronomer wouldn't have any use at all for us after the ship landing. She'd have been a navigator, or given her age, a backup navigator during our journey.

It was also interesting that she wasn't just asking the A.I., who would know without a doubt. Even if we were having our differences, this seemed like the one question the machine would answer. Maybe Laurie didn't want to learn it that way. Maybe it was more about the thought, the activity, than the answer.

I could understand it. Maybe I would look up and map the stars myself tonight. We had guard duty again, after all. I could sneak a glance or two, and while I hadn't really been concerned with them before, the stars in this neighborhood might be more kind.

I couldn't compare them to much, but I could still map them for my own, and that might beat cutting vines down.

Who was I kidding? I was never really one to sit still. I'd have to think of something else to do while I stared anxiously into the dark.

Anjali clearly had something to say, but took a sip of her water first. "I for one am rather cautious. We've got a world much like ours, perhaps a little more hot in general. Yet we've seen no signs of animal life as yet. Nothing mobile, either eating or being eaten. That seems... unnatural to me. Against the laws of nature and the universe as we understand them."

That was a pretty large concern: "Still, we have some form of plant life. So that's something."

Anjali nodded, but then slightly disagreed: "It is precisely because we have plant life that I'm so concerned. One should follow the other, should it not?"

"Not my field," I was forced to admit. "I'm a carpenter."

Jarod chimed in for the first time: "Oh! That is a great job to have. Any idea when we might see something other than tents?"

He wasn't going to like the answer. "Whenever the planners get done laying everything out and either releasing the resources to build to us, or we find something the scientists approve as suitable for housing construction."

The A.I. would be involved in the first choice, and it was not willing to release anything to us just yet, or I'd have already gotten the assembly call. I think; there were many of us around, after all. So far the weather had been pleasant enough that we just didn't need to, and if worst came to worst, we could always take shelter in the ship until whatever disaster we'd encountered passed us.

Laurie and Anjali were both rolling their eyes at Jarod, looking away. There was a story there, and I wasn't sure I liked it. If we were all doing this... then again, it could just be as simple as the man saying something obviously stupid.

"Right."

Now I was curious. "What job do you have, Jacob?" His hands were too soft to work wood or stone... no, I couldn't judge by that, my own hands were soft now too. The A.I. could be to blame for that, or it could have been just the cryo.

"Um, I'm a cook." Jacob replied. He was shifting in his seat, and not looking my way. Was he ashamed?

"Great. You must be thrilled to be here, and ready to look for any potential new food sources or see what growing what we brought in new soil."

Jacob straightened a bit; there were his eyes. "Yeah, I am. I'm pretty thrilled about it, yeah."

His two companions gave him another look as one, and then rolled their eyes again. Being a cook was a pretty important job for us, even if it wasn't considered glamorous. It would remain essential to keep us all fed and not poisoned long after I was considered useless. Sure, carpentry might be needed for generations, but my own skills might not be enough to carry me to fame and usefulness as demand for us in general slowed. But we would always have need for cooks, even if we stopped rationing, like some of the old people had told us we might.

I was pretty sure we'd never stop that practice, but my Dad had mentioned a time when his own father had been able to buy food he wanted at a store. It might be nice to see.

That was it, I could watch a movie with those sorts of things. Even with the feud, the A.I. should allow us such small entertainments.

Alright, I was done eating.

Right on cue, my tablet beeped. The message was "Where are you?" from Aleksei.

Right. "Guess I need to answer this. Sorry."

"Eating," I posted my one word answer. The momentary lack of attention was enough to kill the conversation utterly. It felt like work, and it felt as if all that work was wasted.

A new beep, and a new text. "Come back when done."

Well that was annoying. I guess we did need to talk, and talk quickly.

"Got to go. Have a good day, you three."

"Oh we shall try," Anjali answered, apparently for all three of them. The other two waved; that was good enough.

Maybe it wasn't all for nothing; maybe a foundation had been laid; something I could build on. I was good at building.

The camp was more alive now, for some reason. The most activity was still around the ship and the medic station, which was more a collection of tents today, rather than just one. The camp was also growing, with another district of tents being set up away from us.

It made me a little nervous, since we hadn't really seen the weather of this planet yet. One really bad wind storm... or anything else, really, and all these tents might be blown away or be turned to ruined canvas.

Whatever, I didn't really have anywhere else to be. The tent should be tolerable, or maybe there was a spot just outside it to people watch or something.

Aleksei was waiting in the lane outside the tent. He was clutching his hands, almost mauling them. The behavior was a bit obvious.

"What's up?"

Aleksei blinked a minute, then his brain clicked. "You need to stop going places alone."

Now it was my turn to blink. "Why?"

"Because its dangerous."

He didn't mean from outside threats. "None of us are even armed. We have all the food and water we could want, and shelter is at least better than home."

"That isn't the only reason people do bad things. You don't know all of these people. We don't know all of these people."

I had to point out the obvious: "You all  don't know me. All of us have likely done things to survive that we aren't proud of, yourself included."

Aleksei's face twisted into something ugly for a moment, before it settled. "You're right - but some people enjoy it, and people can lie. Haven't you noticed? No one is travelling alone."

I had noticed; almost everyone had at least one companion, even just going to the bathroom. That had been something I'd noted the entire day.  "Alright, I'll consider it."

I appreciated the thought, but I could take care of myself. I still had a taser, and I was good with knives. Better than most, I'd say. Tools of more than one trade, as father would say.

My statement didn't seem to help settle his mind any. He leaned in to whisper: "I'd prefer if you did more than that. I'm considered to be responsible for you right now, and even more important than that, I think you might be the only one I can trust among our little group. The only one who isn't looking at me like...."

This was new. "Like what?"

He drew back. "Nothing. Its nothing."

His eyes flicked to my tablet; once, then twice. Right; the A.I. could be listening. Any number of people could be listening, actually.

So if I ditched the tablet, maybe he'd tell me then, what way people were looking at him. Then again, I was sure I already knew. The same way most my fellow colonists seemed to be looking at those few men we had left. With both jealousy and contempt. As if thinking 'why not me?' and at the same time 'were they not good enough?'.

I knew because I'd harbored both thoughts myself. I likely would until the A.I. explained itself - if it ever did. I wanted an explanation, and if anyone bothered to ask me, I would push for it.

"Fine. I'm here now, but I'm not the least bit sleepy. How did the reporting go?" I'd been asleep by the time Aleksei had been back.

"It went. They didn't care if we all made a report, just that one of us did. They said that would change if we saw something. They were also interested in your unsanctioned sample attempts at rope. The guy in charge called them 'crude'."

Well wasn't that obvious? "Of course they were crude. They were something anyone could do with a knife and a little time."

Aleksei nodded. "They said they would test them; they are testing the stuff around us for poisons or toxins or any other strange surprises. So far, they haven't found anything, so its not likely your arms will rot off, but I was told to pass along a message to you: be more careful, they said."

Yeah I should be. "I was bored."

Aleksei nodded again. "Well, hopefully the security forces will automate the process soon, and we won't be needed for it. Or not needed to stare off into the dark for hours and nothing else."

I wouldn't hold my breath on that front. "We are supposed to go low tech before we reach back to high. I'm surprised they allowed the use of motion sensors."

I was surprised they even had motion sensors. I hadn't known everything of course, but I hadn't known they had packed those. It made me wonder what else had been packed in the supposedly carefully managed space of the ship. We had guns... maybe even lasers. Did we pack anything stronger? It would be very human of us to pack something stronger.

"Yeah. But people keeping a watch is the worst form of security. It's proven that people can't keep their attention focused like they need to for long periods of time, a historic fact."

I could agree with that; I'd seen as much in my time on Earth.

"Got to be something else we can do."

"Funny you should mention that," Aleksei said. "I agreed, and so did command. So before we go to our shift, we're to stop at the end of two-A and grab something. Command said they would have something ready to go for us to turn our attention to if we got bored. Something that wouldn't take up much focus and we could do or put off as the mood struck us."

That sounded promising. "What do you think it is?"

Aleksei grinned. "Some other boring grunt work the higher ups don't want to do."

Made sense.