Episode 2 – Arrival © C. J. Hoare 2006.
All rights reserved.


Gisel left the observation room, glancing around before launching herself out of the door. She cruised down the centre of the corridor and reached out with her left hand to stop herself by the handrail at the intersection leading to the gym. The headband she'd wrapped around her cut arm slipped but no globules of blood came spurting out. Not even a major vein – the blood must be coagulating already. Just as goddamn well, the headband was soaked scarlet.

She checked the cross corridor in both directions. Still no one about. That seemed strange for a work afternoon. As long as she didn't bump into anyone inquisitive – what she did to her own arm was her business. She clamped her right elbow tighter to hold the katana against her side. The corridor to the gym was empty and dark. The overhead lights came on as she kicked off gently down it.

She stretched out a foot to stop herself at the door. Clear so far. She could wash up and put an invisible tape on the cut. Just wear long sleeves for a few days. She reached for the door control. It started to slide open even before she touched it.

Someone inside. A man. Goddammit! Her father.

"Oh, at last, Gisel. Where have you been? There's a general meeting. Hurry, you're late–"

His black hair and hypnotically dark eyes – that she'd inherited – made him a stooping bird of prey in the doorway. The image was enhanced by his dark skin and large hooked nose – thankfully a gene she'd escaped. He moved awkwardly under weightlessness – a sign of too much time spent at a terminal. She squeezed past him, keeping her left arm behind her. "I'll clean up. Where is it being held?"

"I've looked everywhere for you." He frowned at her. "What's that on your arm?"

"Nothing." She kicked off from the wall. "I'll be there ASAP, Dad. Where?"

"That's blood."

"Just a graze. I'll disinfect it."

He turned to follow. "That rag is soaked. Let me look."

Goddamn. Of all the luck. "It's nothing I tell you. I can look after it."

"You've got that damned katana. I told you to let me keep it under lock and key."

She changed direction and scooted faster toward the female changing room. He followed.

"You can't come in here."

"I'm in. What did you do?"

"You gotta leave . . . I need . . .. You know –" She took hold of a cubicle door with her left hand, pressing herself tight to conceal her arm.

He stopped, beside her and somewhat higher off the floor. A hawk hovering. "Gisel, quit trying to put me off. I know when you're trying to evade."

She placed a hand over the makeshift bandage. "Leave me alone! I'm not a little kid any more. Go and sniff around Badry. She seems to like your fussing."

His eyes widened. "You saw . . . you were . . .?"

"Damn right I did. You two couldn't wait to get into the sleeping niche? Just animals out in public view. You were too hot – "

His face suffused with red. "That'll do. Just keep a respectful tongue in your head."

"Respectful, shit! Like naked savages on the floor! You and that slut –"

His hand darted like a diving hawk, catching her on the side of the head. "I said, enough!"

She shook her head to clear it. This was the Indian half of his Anglo-Indian again. Goddamn ancestry – his genes didn't know they weren't fighting for the Raj any more. She let go of the bloodstained headband and released the sword from under her elbow. "One of these days, I swear –"

"Don't you threaten me. Give me that katana."

"No!"

He grabbed her arm. "Give it here!"

She shifted her fist to take it by the handgrip. "You just try to take it."

"By God, I will." His own fist closed over hers.

She tried to anchor herself as he jerked at the sword. No such luck, his effort pulled her away from the cubicle door.

"You little –" He tried to wrench the sword free. "I've spoiled you too much. That's going to change, young lady –. Jesus H Christ! Where did all that blood come from?"

She followed his glance to the door; a great scarlet smear where she'd pressed the headband against it. "Studialo!" A pity her grandmother hadn't taught her more Greek swear words – she felt like ripping off a long streak.

Her father let go of the sword and reached for her left arm. "Let me look."

"No. I'm fine. I can look after it – just get to your meeting. You're late too."

He didn't take any notice. Just wrapped an arm around her shoulders and pulled her over to the washbubbles. "How did it happen? I knew I shouldn't have let you keep that sword." He stared into her eyes and then unwrapped the bloodstained bandage.

"I was doing an exercise and it slipped."

"Bullshit, Gisel. You never slip when you're exercising – too good for that."

She felt a grin pull at her lips. "I'm not as perfect as you."

He bent over her arm. "It's not too deep."

"I know. It's just about quit bleeding."

He left her with her arm inside the washbubble to sail to the far wall and collect the first aid kit. "How did it really happen?" he said as he glided back.

"I told you – an exercise."

He stared into her eyes, as if a lie was written on her pupils. "One more evasion and I ground you."

She grinned widely this time. "Up here?"

He glared a moment, before his eyes met hers and he smiled. "That's what the meeting is about. The whole crew are considering our options. We'd better hurry. I give you until it's over to prepare an honest answer."

He worked quickly, cleaning the long cut and pressing the edges together while she sprayed the disinfectant and wound sealant on it. "Give it a good coat. Make sure it doesn't work open or you'll have a scar."

"I was doing the meditation exercise," she said. "In the Observation Room. I guess I should clean up any blood still floating there."

"God Dammit. You were told never to do that alone – and in weightlessness! What the hell were you –"

"It won't happen again. I just needed to . . . that's all."

He stared at her without speaking.

"I was angry . . ."

He reached out and laced his fingers into her hair. Either about to shake the shit out of her or hold her head while he slapped her with his other hand. She tensed.

He shook his head. "Do you have a jacket here? Don't want anyone else seeing that cut."

***

They hurried to the Intruder hangar, where the meeting was taking place. The aircraft was outside in space, ready to drop out of orbit to check the surface. Voices echoed in the empty metal hangar and Gisel's nose twitched from the reek of lubricants and that universal aircraft smell of sour sweat.

Every one of the Iskander's one hundred passengers and crew were ranged about the vacated space – the only one large enough to hold everybody. All eyes turned to them as Gisel and her father entered. The Iskander's captain, who liked to be addressed by his military rank, Colonel M'Tov, paused in his address as they found places. Henrik swooped across the hangar to settle beside Dr Badry while Gisel tucked herself in beside her brother Robert.

He grinned at her momentarily and then faced forward again.

M'Tov, thumbs hooked under the ample belt of his Space Service uniform, his greying hair freshly clipped short, watched them a moment before continuing to speak. "So, to recap for the late arrivals –. We do not know how Iskander arrived at this world – it's obviously not Colony N-3 we were bound for. It's also plain that we may never learn enough to find our way back. If we wanted to refuel Iskander for any further voyage, we must set our deuterium separator working at a safe seashore location down there for ten years to refill the tanks." He paused to survey the glum faces. "We have learned everything possible about the planet from space. The next step is to take an investigation team down to question people on the surface."

"Is that wise? What if they take us for enemies?" Gisel looked toward the speaker, Dr Maria Hather, a heavy, round faced woman who was their senior medical practitioner.

"Better than sitting up here, waiting for them to shoot us out of the sky!" said a younger voice from the centre of the group.

"What makes you think they can?" Commander Johansen, the Intruder's chief pilot, said. "They don't even have radio. No microwave radiation at all. Whoever's down there doesn't even know we're here."

"I think that's an unlikely assumption," Hannan Badry said, her dark Levantine coloring matching Henrik's as she leaned toward him. "With a satellite as large as the Iskander arriving in their sky – they could be pretty tense down there."

M'Tov nodded. "If they're primitive. Yes. We need to go armed. The problem is – we have no idea what we might find."

"Do we have any armaments?"

M'Tov stared toward the speaker as if reluctant to answer. "We have some automatic rifles in the security locker," he said eventually. "There was a plan to form a police team when we arrived on N-3."

Dr Hather's chin jutted forward. "Policing who, M'Tov?"

He shook his head. "Just a precaution – in the planning."

"How many rifles." Commander Johansen demanded.

M'Tov shrugged. "Six."

Richard Norris, an active leader of Oceanographic expeditions, looked around at the group. "Not many to start a war against a whole planet."

"Good God! Who says we need to start a war?" came a loud voice.

M'Tov pinpointed the speaker with his cold grey eyes. "We don't, but without going down to interview someone, we'll never know."

"If someone wants to be interviewed," Johansen said.

Norris gave him a twisted smile. "Who says we're going to ask permission?"

"Damned cowboys," Maria Hather snapped. "We need to behave like civilised people."

M'Tov nodded. "I agree, but our very existence could be at stake."

Loud murmurs and low voiced comments rang against the metal walls.

"It's plainly necessary for us to send down a team," Henrik Matah said after the hum of concern died. "What this meeting needs to settle is how we go about it, what it's objectives are, and who comprises it. I'm ready to go, for one."