Epilogue #2
That’s been on my mind, too. I don’t know what might happen if that damn mushroom were to actually become a living Plood.
The saucer settles softly, hovering an inch above the grass. The hatch opens, and I look longingly at my spear, leaned up against a tree trunk twenty feet away. But Kenz’ox is here.
Dex comes zooming out. “That was fun after years in that basket. This ship appears to fly. I tried some maneuvers, and it held up well. It may be ready to test flying at higher altitudes. The main concern is whether the hull is airtight. I would prefer to be able to fly inside it, which is impossible if the air leaks out. Any questions?”
“Do you still need the Plood to make it fly?” I ask.
The drone hovers in front of us. “Oh yes. Without that Plood mushroom, it won’t fly at all. I thought we had established that, Theodora.”
“Sure, but… okay. Did you see a bright flash?”
“Oh. You saw that? I spotted a nest of creatures that looked a lot like predators. They were nearby, and I thought Theodora and Kenz’ox and little Aker’iz might be in danger from these.
And the saucer does have some fearsome weapons.
I didn’t kill them! I just scared them, like the Tratena tribe.
Well, not as brutally as I scared the tribe.
I didn’t like them much, and it is possible that I was too harsh with them.
But these innocent predators will find a new home at some distance. Are there more questions?”
“What are you two talking about?” Kenz’ox asks. “I enjoy the alien sounds, but I feel like there are vital things being said but passing me by completely.”
“Dex says the saucer flies fine,” I sum up. “And he chased away the krolts in the nest nearby.”
“That Plood ship is powerful,” he says with a glare at the saucer. “I was going to seek it out and chase them away myself.”
I look up at him. “You never told me that. That would be incredibly dangerous!”
“I would surprise them,” he says defensively. “At dawn, when they are drowsy.”
I squeeze his hand. “My love, I asked you not to do dangerous things again.”
“And I didn’t,” he argues with a little smirk. “The Plood ship did it for me.”
“Well… all right,” I offer, outmaneuvered. “Just keep it in mind.”
“I would never do anything too dangerous,” he says. “Only to protect you and Aker’iz.”
I squeeze his hand. “I know.”
That night, after Dex retreats into the control room to “process data” and the forest settles into its nocturnal chorus, we lie outside on soft furs, Aker’iz safely asleep between us.
The fire glows and sometimes crackles, while the ocean roars calmly in the distance.
“You know,” I whisper, “on Earth, people often have a ceremony for giving their child a name.”
He turns his head, blue eyes reflecting the firelight. “Here, we do not always name them at once.”
“I wondered about that.”
“A true name is given when the tribe believes the child will stay in the world,” he says. “When they stop preparing themselves for loss.”
“Her name means my heart. You loved her from the beginning.”
“Aker’iz. Yes. It was all I could say, when she was so small. When she might leave. When the Ancestors could take her back for being too wonderful, too perfect. They might be jealous. My tribe was, and they almost succeeded.”
I reach for his hand and lace my fingers through his, grounding both of us. “She’s not going anywhere now. Neither am I.” It’s just a fact.
“I know,” he replies. “Now I know.”
Aker’iz stirs, her mouth puckering, then relaxes again. Kenz’ox watches her for a long moment, then looks back at me. “But I think she should have another name,” he says. “One that has been more thought about. One that is more about her. Perhaps you can think of one?”
I smile, although moved tears burn at the edge of my eyes. “I was hoping you’d say that.”
I lean closer and whisper it, as if speaking it aloud might set something delicate into motion. “Calliope. After Callie.”
He repeats it slowly, testing the sounds with care. “Ka-leye-o-peee.”
“It means music,” I tell him. “A voice that carries. A story that survives.”
He considers this, then dips his head in solemn agreement. “Then she is Aker’iz Calliope. My heart. Your song.” He gets up, carefully lifts the baby, and places her in her cradle inside the saucer.
When he returns, I press my forehead to his shoulder, overcome by the quiet rightness of it. His arm comes around me, heavy and warm, and for a while we simply breathe together.
When he finally bends his head to mine, the kiss is unhurried, full of everything we are not saying. I let myself sink into it, into him, into the certainty that whatever worlds await us, we will face them as one.
Smoke rises from the hut for drying meat, which we rebuilt and now want to try to use for smoking meat instead of just drying it. If it works, we can preserve meat for weeks. The smoke smells wonderful, anyway. The frit still, we never really got working.
The fire burns low. The forest hums in the background, and the surf hisses on the ocean side.
It took a lot to get here, to make this place ours. And Callie is still missing. We will keep looking for her.
But this moment belongs only to us.
- - -
“Ithink I have them,” Dex announces in his tinny voice. “Three smaller females, one big native walking in front.”
I sit up and rub the sleep from my eyes. The saucer hums around me. Kenz’ox and Aker’iz are playing with a leather doll and a primitive rattle made from a big nut, a stick and some gravel.
“Are you sure?” I didn’t expect our search for Cora, Morgan, Riley and Sprisk to be successful that quickly. They’ve been walking in the jungle for weeks, and we could only guess where they might be along the straight line from our clearing to the red rock village that lies somewhere to the east.
“I can’t be completely sure until you confirm it,” Dex says. “But I am as sure as I can be.”
“Three girls?” I ask. “Not four?”
“Sorry,” Dex says. “It looks like Callie didn’t join up with them after all.”
I sigh. It wasn’t unexpected, after the tracks that Kenz’ox spotted in the sand. But still I had hoped that he was somehow wrong. “Can we land?”
“There’s no clearing,” Dex screeches softly. “But we can make one between the trees.”
“Don’t use weapons,” I quickly urge him. “That will scare them.”
“Very well,” the drone says with a hint of disappointment. “I will find a spot where the canopy of treetops is thin.”
A minute later we’re down.
Kenz’ox stands up and touches his sword. “We’ll go out together.”
“But me first,” I tell him and smooth down my dress. I’m strangely nervous, partly about having lost Callie. But mostly I look forward to showing my friends my new husband. “Don’t draw your sword.”
He places Aker’iz Calliope in her cradle and takes up his position by the hatch. “Ready?”
“Are they right outside, Dex?” I ask.
“The male is nearby. The females are hiding, which seems prudent.”
“They’re pretty sure it’s our saucer, but they can’t be sure,” I explain, “They’ll stay back until they see me. Open the hatch, please, my love.”
Kenz’ox hits the button and the hatch hisses open. The smell of the jungle fills my nose, the hot humidity like a punch to the face. I step down onto the ground.
“Greetings, Sprisk,” I say out loud into the greenery. I know he’s there, although I can’t see him. “It’s me, Theodora.”
Kenz’ox steps out right behind me.
Sprisk moves, becomes clearly visible and comes towards me, chameleon skin flickering, hand still on his sword. “Greetings, Dorie. You have a friend.”
“Not a friend,” I tell him. “A husband. This is Warrior Kenz’ox from the Tratena tribe. Kenz’ox, meet Foundling Sprisk.”
“Greetings, Sprisk,” Kenz’ox rumbles. “I have seen your traps and the result of your fighting skills. Please tell me you are not an enemy.”
Sprisk chuckles and takes his hand off his weapon. “I think we shall both be relieved to be friends. Anything else would be bad for us both.”
There’s rustling from the bushes, and then Cora comes towards me with a grin on her face, visibly more pregnant than last time. “Dorie! Are you serious?! You got it working?!”
“We got it working,” I tell her, going to meet her. “It’s so good to see you!”
We hug as Morgan and Riley approach. “That’s incredible. How did you do it?”
“I had help,” I tell them, wiping a happy tear. “But first I have really bad news.”
Cora peers into the saucer. “Callie?”
I nod tightly. “She’s been missing for weeks. The day after you guys left I woke up alone. Kenz’ox says he saw tracks of her being abducted by a single caveman. He fears it was an outcast.”
The relieved mood evaporates.
“We’ll find her,” Cora says with determination. “We have a saucer now. Nice flying, by the way.”
“Dex, can you come out?” I call into the ship.
“Dex is here?” Morgan asks, incredulous. “Then… we might…”
“You might be able to go home to Earth,” I finish her sentence. “We don’t know for sure yet. The saucer flies fine while there’s air, but we haven’t tried it in space.”
Dex zooms out and hovers. “Good afternoon, Cora, Morgan, Riley and Sprisk. I have nothing much to say to you. I will retreat and hope that you will all get in, so we can go to the Borok tribe.” He zips back inside.
Cora raises her eyebrows. “Same old Dex. And there’s someone else in there, too.”
Kenz’ox steps into the saucer and brings out his daughter. “Aker’iz Calliope, this is Cora, Morgan, Riley and Sprisk. Everyone, this is my daughter. We usually call her Aker’iz.”
“Your daughter?” Riley asks, puzzled. “We haven’t been gone that long, have we? Or did you secretly know him for months, Dorie?”
I quickly explain it to them, as well as I can. “All right. You guys want to get in?”
Riley and Morgan climb inside, while I keep Cora out for a moment. “You’re a midwife, Cora. Can you explain to Kenz’ox how it works?”
Her eyes widen. “Oh, you’re… pregnant?”
“Pretty sure,” I nod tightly. “But maybe you can confirm it, when we get to the village?”