Epilogue
“You’re almost there,” Lyric said over Torian’s headset.
“That’s good to know,” Amelia drawled, her voice sounding mechanicalized through their envirosuits, “because from our perspective, it’s fucking impossible to tell.”
They were traveling through one of the long, round tubes that connected the smaller bio-domes to the center of Vaesa—a process that had seemed so straightforward until about thirty minutes ago. Torian thought they’d be simple walkways, closed in on either end with an airlock or energy barrier.
But apparently the nylarians of old had decided that even these corridors needed to be beautifully filled with plants from Verdaan.
And after millennia, some of these corridors had grown absolutely wild. Plants stacked so close together, craning for the artificial light, that it was nearly impossible to venture through it without a machete and an envirosuit.
And those two things weren’t easy to maneuver together.
“The air quality is toxic,” Moss intoned from Peat’s speaker. The tiny fox-dragon was hopping alongside them, finding much easier paths through the thick brush. “Do not remove your helmet. Captain Perrosk, I’m talking to you.”
Torian glanced sideways to see Amelia’s hands drop to her side. “I was just going to test it.”
“Oh, that’s a very bad idea,” Dutch said gleefully. He was having a much easier time, strolling behind Zenthielutos while the draic captain literally clawed the flora into submission. The nylarian waved a hand at one of the purple plants nearby. “This is a zomast. It emits a powder when disturbed—”
Zen, also in an envirosuit, albeit a bulky one with even less maneuverability, sliced one of them. A puff of purple powder coughed into the air, and settled on his suit. He glanced at it, then back at Dutch.
Dutch stared, then cleared his throat. “—ah, yes. Like that. Without a suit, that powder eats right through—”
“Eats?” Zen began swatting at his shoulders, batting the dust off.
“It can hardly dissolve these suits, puatic,” Dutch tutted.
Zen paused. “Oh.”
“But what it does to your lungs? Eeesh. Anywho. This way!” Dutch pressed forward into the space Zen had cleared.
Lyric cleared their throat, yet again speaking over their headsets.
“Ah, you are almost there. Ten more paces forward. At least, according to Moss’s scan.
” The mechanic had indeed packed up their entire workshop and relocated to Vaesa, and now delighted in helping them explore the space station … from the safety of their new workshop.
Dealing with this voyage, Torian couldn’t blame them.
It took another sixteen minutes of cursing, cutting, and thrashing, but finally they made it through the jungle-like mess. Dutch keyed in the code to unlock the door.
(Plants could snake through energy barriers, he’d said when they first entered the corridor. Nylarian leaders decided doors were a better choice for separating biomes.)
(Amelia had replied, Just get it open, to which Dutch had stuck out his blue tongue.)
Now, Dutch hauled this door open, revealing an even bigger jungle. “Inside, quickly.”
Zen stepped in first, grimacing as he stretched his arms out. His suit was exceedingly awkward, where they’d saved on materials by forcing his wings flush against his back. The result was a thick, turtle-like shell that made the fearsome draic look … almost comical.
Amelia slid through next, then Peat followed. Torian drew up the rear, and Dutch closed the hatch behind them, locking it with certainty.
They stared at Biome 4, the first bio-dome they chose to explore. “I admit,” Torian said skeptically, “that I had higher hopes for this place after you said it could be the easiest to repurpose.”
“The fastest to repurpose,” Dutch corrected. “This biome has the closest ecosystem to Verdaan’s surface, or Rhymarra’s. But it is still a jungle from the draics’ star system, which means it’s hot, humid, and vaguely deadly.”
“Can I breathe here?” Zen asked curiously.
Dutch waved it off, but Moss was the one who answered.
“Not at the moment.” Peat leapt onto Torian’s shoulder, one of the places it had found to get the best view of their surroundings.
Moss spoke through its speaker as the creature examined the dome curiously.
“Scans indicate this biome has fallen out of balance and grown toxic. In another hundred years, everything will likely be dead.”
“Can you fix it?” Torian asked.
“I can fix anything,” Moss said. Peat added its own chirp to the mix, then hopped back to the ground, purring as it wound between Amelia’s legs.
She bent down to pet it through gloved hands. “Well, let’s get started. I want to take off this suit.” A dark mutter: “Could be traveling with my crew, but nooo, I wanted to stay and help Torian. Opula must be having a field day as acting captain.”
“She’s on a supply run,” Torian replied. “We’re exploring somewhere no one’s stepped for ages.”
Amelia offered a fond smile that made Torian’s heart flip. “Yeah, I don’t think I care about that as much as you do.”
Zen sighed. “At least your crew is coming back soon.”
Dutch patted his arm. “When the Empress calls—”
“We respond,” Zen said dutifully.
“Except for you, because you’re escorting a foreign dignitary.” Now Dutch grinned. “And I needed your help. You know, for the plants.”
“Thanks,” Zen drawled.
Peat started walking with purpose into this biome.
There was clearly a path here, once, although it was also overgrown.
Huge, thick trees towered over them, their foliage so thick they couldn’t even see the plenaria dome overhead.
Unlike the glimmering leaves of the kerrac tree, these had waxen leaves easily as big as Torian was tall. Their trunks looked eerily smooth.
“The best place to plant Moss is in the biome’s center,” Dutch said absently, retrieving the container of Moss’s moss that he’d brought just for the occasion.
“I’m detecting—” Moss stopped, and ahead, Peat bent down to sniff something.
It was a simulated behavior, since a bot didn’t need to sniff anything, but it was very cute nonetheless.
Torian and Amelia exchanged glances, their unspoken squeee barely contained when Moss continued dreadfully: “Fungus. The battle recommences.”
“Fungus versus Moss,” Dutch drawled. “It’s a long war.”
“I will triumph, as always,” Moss replied stiffly.
Over the headset, Lyric stifled a laugh.
“You are mocking me,” Moss said.
“Never,” Lyric lied.
Dutch was humming as he stopped beside Peat, pulling out a healthy clump of Moss’s moss. He settled it on the tree’s roots beside the fungus, and Peat seemed satisfied with that. It backed away, its long tail swishing.
Torian watched it for a moment, and then her eyes caught something new.
Apparently, there were rooms along the outer edge of this dome, and one was left open.
Its interior was oddly compact, and highly technical—a stark contrast to most of the rooms in Vaesa, where everything but basic technology was absent.
Holographic displays lined the walls, and they flickered to life when Torian stepped inside.
“What’d you find?” Amelia asked, trailing behind her.
“A control room?” Torian guessed. “Or maybe it’s an archive?” She tapped a few buttons, eyes widening as the nylarian language spread before her. “Dutch! What is this?”
Dutch and Zen both entered the room, and Dutch examined the writing with curiosity. After a moment, his face paled. “Ah—this is—”
A timer blinked on-screen. Torian couldn’t tell what it counted down to, written in nylarian numbers.
Dutch, however, could read it perfectly well, and he shouted, “No, no! Blast it all! We have to go—”
But at the same breath, the entrance behind them slid closed, locking them all inside.
Peat leapt onto a taller branch, mewing pathetically at the door, but the robot couldn’t get inside.
Zen growled and tried to grip the door’s seams, but Dutch yelped and grabbed his arms. “Don’t! You’ll mess with the pressurization—”
“Pressurization?” Zen asked sharply.
“Deploying in three seconds. Two. One,” a mechanical voice said pleasantly over the speakers ahead. Unlike the writing, Torian’s translator had no problem with those words. “Enjoy your stay on Verdaan.”
They had just enough time to exchange looks of horror before the pod jettisoned away from Vaesa, with the four of them trapped inside.