Hadrian's Colony: Chapter Seven, Part One

 Notes: Ooooh, time for some ACTION! Poor Catie, that's all I have to say.

Title: Hadrian's Colony: Chapter Seven, Part One

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Chapter Seven, Part One

 

The sensors Elanus and Catie provided were rudimentary, capable of transmitting environmental data from up to half a mile in diameter from them that Catie could then synthesize and interpret. With Lizzie actively working on assessing weather patterns from space, the idea was that these monitors could help the girls begin to identify when conditions on the ground and conditions in the air created a window of opportunity to leave. Catie’s energy stores weren’t fully recovered, and without changing over her solar radiation absorption to thermal, they weren’t likely to be anytime soon—the clouds were just too thick, the rain too persistent.

They had one shot to get off this planet safely. Kieron wasn’t going to waste it.

That didn’t mean Elanus had to like the plan.

“We can have Blobby set the sensors,” he grumbled from where he was stuffing the last of them into the backpack Kieron would be carrying over his EV suit.

“Blobby doesn’t even have a steady gait yet, much less the ability to assess the terrain and potentially handle reptilians on his own,” Kieron replied as he stepped into the legs of his suit and began to zip it up. His thin, one-piece undergarment was still slightly damp from the last time he’d been out, and the clammy feel of it on his groin made him want to shudder, but he controlled it. The EV suit would warm him up and dry him out soon enough.

“He’s got to get better somehow.”

“Yes he does,” Kieron agreed. “With adequate supervision and oversight. We want to build up Blobby’s confidence, after all, not tear it down. He’ll be more successful if I’m out there with him, and this way neither of us will be alone.”

Elanus sighed and leaned his head back against the wall. “I don’t like it.”

Kieron took in the dark circles under Elanus’s eyes and the way his cheekbones had sharpened over the past few weeks. Being confined on a ship as small as Catie was hard for someone so active, and his injury was uncomfortable enough to keep him awake for much of the night. He was exhausted, he wasn’t eating well, and they couldn’t heal him quickly with the autodoc due to the power issues.

This is why we have to go. We can’t hang around and wait for things to fall into place; we have to make it work. Kieron knelt down in front of Elanus and put one hand on his chest. The other he placed on his lover’s cheek, skimming his thumb over the prickles of Elanus’s beard. “It’s going to be all right,” Kieron told him. “I won’t be alone, and you and Catie will be in contact with us the whole time. And once we’re in space again, we can go wherever you want to recuperate.”

Elanus opened one eye. “Anywhere?”

“Anywhere?”

“Yes.”

“Including Galena?”

Kieron rolled his eyes, but he smiled anyway. “Including a planet dedicated to nothing but spa services and pleasure, yes.”

“Medical breakthroughs too,” Elanus reminded him. “We’re partnering with Galenian scientists on reversing some of the effects of Elfshot Disease in Regen-resistant individuals, the results have been pretty promising so far. We could call it a work trip. I could write it off on my taxes.”

“Taxes?” Kieron raised his eyebrows. “What are those?”

“Oh, haha.” Kieron didn’t blink. “Stop it, you know what taxes are.”

“Kind of? I mean, I’ve never had to pay any, so…”

Elanus looked downright scandalized. “You’re a fully-fledged adult! How can you not have paid taxes over the course of your life?”

“Who would I have paid them to?” Kieron asked, then leaned in a kissed Elanus on the tip of the nose.

“The place you lived in, of course! Not here, you were still a minor, but surely on Trakta—”

“I was a refugee on Trakta,” Kieron reminded him as he stood up and pulled the suit up over his shoulders. “They don’t let refugees have permanent status there, so everything we had was from the government. Basically, they paid to maintain me, not the other way around.”

“Cloverleaf Station, then. The government running it—”

“It was classified as a hardship outpost,” Kieron said with a smirk. He didn’t often scandalize Elanus, this was kind of fun. “There were no taxes associated with my pay because of it. Seemed like a small perk at the time, but I guess I should have appreciated it more.”

Elanus stuttered but managed to blurt out, “Gania then! Chelen City levels municipal taxes against every inhabitant, no matter what their resident status is.”

“If they have a job,” Kieron agreed. “Which I didn’t, because I was on medical probation thanks to my history here on the Colony. So my taxes were deferred to my sponsor, who is—”

“Me.” Elanus’s eyes were wide. “I can’t fucking believe it. You’ve never paid taxes. That’s unreal. I’ve been paying taxes since I started my first business, I was eleven, and you’ve never paid taxes in your whole life.”

“Well, cheer up. Soon we’ll be married and then I’ll start paying taxes,” Kieron said cheerfully as he shouldered the backpack full of sensors, then held out a hand to Blobby. The little bot was on four legs this time, but made a fifth tendril to wrap around Kieron’s hand.

“Joint taxes aren’t the same thing!” Elanus protested, but he was laughing as Kieron and Blobby jumped down from Catie’s door.

“Life signs?” Kieron asked.

“Nnnone that I cannn detect,” Catie said. “The sensorrrs will help me keep you safe once you’re beyooond my normal rrrange.”

“Sounds good. Let me know when I’m far enough to place the first one.”

“I wiiill.”

Kieron looked down at Blobby, who created two eye-like bulges and looked back up at him. “Ready to go, little guy?” Blobby danced back and forth on his legs for a moment. “Great, let’s go.”

It was raining—of course it was raining—and cold enough that Kieron’s breath steamed in the air despite the ambient temperature being above freezing. They were fairly close to a geothermic feature that kept the ground warm, while the rain was one step above sleet. It was uncomfortable, but Kieron was still grateful to be out doing something and stretching his legs. A fresh surge of compassion for his fiancé welled up.

Anything he wants, he promised to himself as he and Blobby rounded the creche building and started making their way through the low scrub brush speckled here and there with tall, spiky-leaved plants in shades of gray and green. If I have to sit through an entire Galenian opera, I will. Just one, though. Those things could go on for days.

They made it about a kilometer before Catie said, “This is a good spooot, Kierrron.”

“Got it.” He awkwardly reached around to the backpack, pulled the near edge open, and got a sensor out. It was a nubby little black device made from the same alloy as Blobby, and it glistened even in the faint sunlight. Kieron collapsed the button on top that would permanently activate it, then set it on the ground. “Are you reading that?”

“One momennnt…” It took about a minute for Catie to come back with, “Yesss, I am now. Go southeast forrr the next one.”

“Will do.” There was no polar north on Hadrian’s Colony, but there were standards that could be used to transpose cardinal directions on novel environments. Kieron got his bearing, then headed out, Blobby bumping along beside him. The little bot didn’t seem as bothered by the terrain today. “You’re doing a good job of keeping your feet beneath up,” Kieron said to him, and Blobby’s tendril warmed for a moment in his grasp. Was that the bot’s equivalent of a blush, or a hug?

They laid two more sensors over the next hour and a half before finally deciding to call it quits. The rain was getting worse and the temperature was dropping rapidly. Puddles were turning icy, and Blobby was starting to slip more and more. “We’re heading in,” Kieron said.

“Good,” Elanus said. “These readings are a good start, but we might have to replace that first sensor. I’m getting some strange feedback from it.”

Kieron frowned. “Strange how?”

“Strange as in they don’t match any of the environmental readings we’ve taken so far, but they’re not concurrent with reptilian life signs either. If I didn’t know better, I’d think that it was a…”

“Was what?” Kieron prodded when Elanus went silent. “Was what?”

“Daddeee?” Catie said, her voice going high-pitched. “It’s charging!”

“Up, baby, get us up, now!”

“What’s happening?” Kieron demanded, breaking into a run as he towed Blobby along. “What—”

Fire erupted in the distance, marked with concussive sounds that could only be manmade. A second later a dark shape rose into the air, punctured here and there with bursts of flame. It took Kieron a second to realize that the shape was Catie, getting off the ground with a terrible whine of her overstrained engines.

Catie and Elanus were being shot at.

“Kieron, where are you?” Elanus demanded.

“Don’t worry about me, go!” he shouted. “Get to safety!”

“We won’t leave you here alone!”

“Get Catie out of here!” She was screaming in fright—not pain, thankfully, she didn’t the receptors for that, but it had to be scary to feel her hull being battered so violently. “Go!”

“Fuck,” Elanus bit out, but then Catie was moving, slowly at first but gaining speed. A few more shots hit her as she sailed over Kieron’s head, but then she was lost to the storm.

Kieron could only hope that whoever had been firing on Catie didn’t turn their guns on him next.