Tuesday, April 29, 2025

Hadrian's Colony: Elanus: Interlude

 Notes: Time for some togetherness, don't you think?

Title: Hadrian's Colony: Elanus: Interlude

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Interlude: Elanus

 


Photo by Glen Carrie

When Elanus gave himself the time to think about finding Kieron, which wasn’t very often as he committed himself to repairing Catie and fabricating parts and healing his leg with the help of their renewed Regen, he tended to think in very vague terms. He recognized that this was unusual for him—Elanus delighted in specificity, that was part of what made him the genius engineer and businessman he was. He liked to investigate things, he enjoyed breaking them down into their component parts so he could put them back together again, he liked complexity.

He didn’t like any of that when it came to his fiancé.

Anyone born smarter than was good for them knew that creativity was just as much of a curse as it was a blessing. Elanus didn’t have to meditate on the fact that Kieron was missing to come up with a hundred different ways he might be dead right now. This godawful, star-cursed, pestilent place ensured that nothing Elanus thought of was out of the realm of possibility.

Capture and torture? Check.

Being eaten alive by a reptilian? Check.

Becoming injured and dying of a fierce infection? Check.

The list went on and on, and the only way to keep going in the face of it was through rigid mental control. Kieron focused all his creativity toward topping off Catie’s power, recreating her missing parts as best they could, and fixing himself. He also made half a dozen different types of weapons, because why the hell not? When they were both as good as they could be, Elanus told Catie to start with expanding the reach of her communications array—the new one wasn’t as good as the old one, and they were down half their heating coils now, but it was way better than nothing—to see what she detected.

He didn’t honestly expect a lot. Between the storms and the inhospitable landscape, Elanus was pretty sure they were going to come up empty. And yet, his girl managed to surprise him.

“I hearrr…a beat.”

“A beat. What kind of beat?”

“It’s an SOS, Daddeee. It sounnnds like this.” She played the sound over her speaker and Elanus froze as he heard the Morse code as clear as his daughter’s own voice.

“Where is it coming from?”

“Here.” She projected the image onto her viewscreen, including estimated landmarks indicating the creche and basic geological features. The SOS was coming from what looked like some sort of rugged—oh, what were those things called, big and flat-topped and—

“The plateau?” He inspected it, wondering if that was where the people who’d fired on Catie had set up their base. If so, flying there was going to be asking for trouble.

That said, it wasn’t like he had a choice. They were going to get Kieron and Blobby back whether they had to shoot their way in or not.

“Yes, Daddeee.”

“Are you detecting any other electronic signals from there?”

“No…but…” Catie’s pause was worrying. “I am detectinnng some seismic disturbancesss.”

“Like rocks falling?”

“Perhaps.”

Well, that was clear as mud. It wasn’t Catie’s fault, though. “Thanks, honey.” Elanus leaned back in his chair and thought for a minute. The SOS was almost certainly Kieron, or rather Blobby—there was no reason for the local population of assholes to put a message like that out even if they knew it, and Elanus was certain that Kieron was protecting them on his end as much as possible. He wouldn’t have Blobby send up a signal if it meant pulling them into danger along with him, the idiot.

There was only one thing to do. “Let’s take a look, then. Carefully, though,” Elanus emphasized. “I want your skin on the whole time, full shielding from visual and electronic surveillance. We can’t be spotted, Catie.”

“I know, Daddeee.” She was quiet for a moment. “Do you rrreally think it’s Kieeeeron?”

“There’s only one way to find out,” he said, and strapped himself in as Catie began to initialize her engines. This wasn’t quite their first test flight, but the plateau was a good thirty miles away, farther than he’d asked her to go before. If things got hairy, he needed to make sure he didn’t break another stupid bone.

But Catie soothed his fears as she lifted smoothly into the air despite the increasing wind and rain, then set in on a course toward the plateau. Elanus tried to control his reactions, but he couldn’t seem to stop his heart from pounding harder at the thought that they might be heading toward Kieron now. He might be only minutes away from finding the love of his life and the little bot he knew Kieron would never abandon. He might also have a hell of a firefight on his hands soon, but Elanus was confident that Catie’s passive defenses would protect them for now.

It was dark out from the storm, and despite his better judgement Elanus asked for a focused light to illuminate the plateau in the viewscreen as they got closer to the signal. It was risky, but it didn’t take a genius to realize that this plateau was actually a terrible place for a base. The terrain was unstable, the canyons were narrow, and—

“What in the hell is that?” A creature like he’d never seen before was trundling along one of the ridges, its body made from what looked like interconnected, antique shields and its head like a farming combine. It was moving away from them with intent, and Elanus shouted before he consciously registered what he was seeing. “Fire on it, Catie!”

She loosed one of her slender javelin rounds, and it penetrated the creature’s tough hide and sent it careening down the cliff, but Elanus didn’t care. He was already on his feet, ignoring the ache in his leg from the still-healing bone as he moved toward the hatch. “Catie—”

The door opened before he could say anything else, and Catie maneuvered dangerously close to the ledge so that Elanus could reach out and gather the mirage in front of him into his arms.

It was Kieron. Bloody, bruised, looking like he was inches away from death and staggering along the top of a fucking plateau in the middle of nowhere, fuck, what had happened to him? A thousand questions welled up behind Elanus’s teeth, but all he could say was, “Kieron? Blobby? Baby, are you okay?” He pulled back from his hold on his fiancé just far enough to look into his battered face. “Kieron, Kieron, sweetheart, tell me what I can do. Talk to me, tell me anything, please.

Kieron looked at him, really finally looked, and the fear in his expression melted into the starkest combination of anguish and relief that Elanus had ever seen. He wailed, rough and mindless, wrapped his arms around Elanus’s waist, and dropped like a stone.

Elanus caught him, held him fast, and tucked him gently against his chest. It felt like his heart had come to life again, like he could take a full breath after far too long being squeezed silent. “It’s okay,” he murmured. “It’s going to be okay, I’m here. We’re here, we’ve got you.” Catie was moving, chattering to him and Kieron and Blobby as she found them somewhere more defensible to settle in, but all Elanus could hear was Kieron’s breaths, wet and pained against his chest, and so very, very precious.

He had Kieron and Blobby back again. Everything else could wait.

 

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