Earth Legend (4 page)

"I just wish I could take one of the kittens.
But I'm not settled yet."

"I know how it is. This is a busy time for us
all." She smiled, but it was a sad smile. "Maybe by the time the
kittens are ready to be adopted, you'll be settled in and will
change your mind." I mumbled something and pretended to look for a
couple of outfits for myself. What I really did was watch the woman
to see what she did next. She simply went to the touchscreen panel
near the door, held out the items so they could be swiped, then she
swiped her comunit to identify who got the items, and left.

Perhaps I could get some clothes after all.
If the comunit was as good as I thought it might be. Imitating her,
I found a couple of outfits in my size. I could have carried my new
clothes right past that touchscreen and outside and no one would
have known any different. The store was empty, evidently the honor
system was being used. But I didn't because I wanted to know how
well my fake comunit worked. My family is financially well off so
perhaps their money had been put to good use.

So, carrying my own supply of clothes from
the store, I imitated that woman and swiped my comunit. I waited
for alarms to go off but nothing happened. No blinking red lights
appeared. No uniformed policeman came to drag me away to prison. I
gave thanks to Betts and vowed to thank her somehow, some day. Then
I went outside.

I meandered around the village square, for
that's what it was, a precisely laid out park surrounded by supply
depots disguised as stores. I entered several. No one was in any of
them. In the grocery store, I chose pre-packaged food that I ate in
the park sitting on a bench beneath a dwarf peach tree. Then I
dropped the empty containers in one of the recycling bins that were
everywhere and went in search of the launch party.

My plan was to find a corner in the viewing
room and sit there all night with an expression that said I wasn't
up to conversation. I figured it would be understandable in the
circumstances. Leaving home never to return. But I'd have made an
appearance, I'd have begun the process of becoming a part of the
Destiny community.

I headed towards the viewing room buoyed by a
decent meal and a shower in the washroom of the Laundromat where
I'd changed clothes. I'd hidden the beginnings of a stash of stolen
things behind a thick cherry bush in the middle of the apple/cherry
orchard that was to become my new home.

I felt optimistic for the first time since
entering that elevator, maybe due to decent food in my belly. I
lifted my chin and walked towards the viewing room with purpose. I
could do this. I could survive on the Destiny. Of course, sleeping
might be a bit of a problem. The ground wasn't real earth but was,
instead, some kind of manufactured stuff that held roots firmly
while providing water and nutrients. Whatever it was, it was hard.
Really hard. I'd be lucky to get any sleep at all.

On the other hand, if I could walk into a
store and take whatever clothes I needed, why couldn't I also take
a mattress, pillow and blanket? I'd seen them through the window of
a furniture store. So, as I joined a group of colonists headed
towards the viewing room and the party, I tucked a reminder into
the back of my mind to wander by the town square when the party
ended. When it was late and the town of New Rochelle was deserted.
And to steal some bedding.

"I don't believe I know you," a middle-aged
man said pleasantly as we ended up walking beside each other. My
face went stiff.

"She lives around here somewhere," a woman
replied. The same woman whose daughter was trying to give away
kittens. "I saw her earlier."

What to say? As it turned out, it didn't
matter. His attention had turned, albeit unwillingly, to an
eloquent plea by a small girl to adopt an unborn kitten. The tiny
blonde didn't stop talking until he agreed to take one. As she
skipped ahead, having achieved her objective, he simply shook his
head and rolled his eyes at me. Then someone beside him spoke, he
spoke back, and then he forgot I existed.

By the time we entered the viewing room, more
people had joined our group. We were a small crowd as we walked
into that place and I was glad because there's safety in numbers. I
looked like I belonged.

I looked around for Wilkes Zander and found
him on a couch surrounded by several kids. The little girl with the
kittens to give away broke free of her mother and ran to him. He
gathered her in his arms and lifted her high in the air. She gave
shriek of delight then fell into his lap and proceeded to tell him
that she'd found a home for another kitten.

Then he noticed me. He waved me over and I
went gratefully because, being with him, being with anyone
specific, was a sign that I belonged. That someone knew me as a
colonist. The couch and surrounding floor were filled with kids so
I pulled up a nearby chair and settled down to watch the Destiny
depart from as close to Wilkes Zander as possible.

If it left. If the countdown went
smoothly.

It must have done so because in less than an
hour, as if on cue, we saw the space beyond the viewing ports shift
slightly. Nearby ships appeared to move, inches at first, then more
and more until it was clear to all of us that we were the ones who
were moving even though there was no sensation of motion.

"See, kids. I told you it would be okay. You
didn't have to brace yourselves." Wilkes Zander stood up on one
foot to prove that the Destiny was stable. Then he threw a handful
of candies into the small crowd and left them in order to join the
grownups. He waved me along and I followed. "I didn't get your name
earlier."

"Elle." I wasn't sure whether I should give
my right name because I didn't know if the comunit had been
assigned to my cousin Betts or whether it would accept the name of
whomever used it. But I had to say something. I decided that if
there were questions I'd say Elle was my middle name and I'd used
it without thinking, though if that happened I'd probably be in
jail and they'd already know all about me.

There were no crew members in the viewing
room, nor were there any security personnel. I asked Wilkes about
it. "Too busy. There's hundreds of ships out there saying goodbye
and the Destiny is huge. The captain doesn't want any
collisions."

"But where are the security guards?"

"They are around. You may not notice them but
they are everywhere." I shivered. "You see them now and then." His
eyes gleamed. "You're looking for Cullen Vail, aren't you?" I
informed him that the head of Security was none of my concern but
he waved aside my protests. "Nice guy, Cullen, though a bit on the
stuffy side and he'd make a good hermit." He inspected me carefully
as if wondering what Cullen Vail saw in me. "Unless some woman gets
her hands on him and changes that." I told Wilkes that Cullen had
dealt with my stomach ache and couldn't get away fast enough. He
laughed, not believing a word. "I wish you luck if he's what you're
looking for. You'll need it."

Someone produced pop and cupcakes and in a
corner there were stronger beverages. Soon the party went viral,
with music and dancing and if there'd been an empty table, someone
would have been on it. I drank only pop because I couldn't take a
chance on getting tipsy though I gobbled enough cupcakes to go a
week without food. Then I found a couch as far away from the
viewing windows as possible and tried hard not to cry. Unlike
everyone else in the room, I didn't want to watch my home slipping
inexorably away.

Eventually the party ended, as much from
sheer weariness as because anyone had to be at work in the morning.
"Good thing tomorrow is Saturday," someone commented. Someone else
answered, "I'll be way too wasted in the morning to go to work."
And a third put in, "Shouldn't this become a holiday? Destiny Day
or something like that? The day we started the journey of a
lifetime." There were cheers and whistles and someone said they'd
bring it up at the next village meeting.

No work tomorrow? That meant colonists had
jobs. Just like home. I decided to wander into town Monday morning
to see where they went. I should figure out a way to look as if I,
too, had a job like everyone else. Then I pretended to fall asleep
as the party wound down.

After the last colonist had tiptoed softly
past in order not to wake me and disappeared down the path towards
New Rochelle, I rose quietly and followed at a good distance. By
the time I reached the town square, it was deserted with the
exception of one figure in the darkness. I eased behind a store and
waited for him to go home. He didn't.

I squinted. Darn. It was Cullen Vail, pacing
steadily back and forth. Making his rounds. Keeping New Rochelle
safe from felons like me. I dropped to my knees behind a voluminous
raspberry bush by the store wall and waited for him to leave, which
he did after a few moments.

When I was sure he was gone, I slipped into a
store and pulled a lightweight mattress, a pillow and a blanket
from the shelves and then dragged them into the apple orchard. I
was glad for the artificial dirt because I left no trace behind.
But when I was getting ready to turn the mattress into a bed,
something stopped me. A sound.

I froze. Dropped to the ground and lay as
still as possible as I waited to be uncovered. I was afraid to look
towards the sound, afraid to make any movement at all, so I just
lay and waited to be caught. To be imprisoned. The be thrown out
the airlock.

Those are the things I expected to happen.
Instead, I heard music. The clear, lovely sound of pan pipes
drifted towards me through the night air. I'd heard them before.
One of my aunts had whittled a set from reeds growing near her home
and bound them together with twine. When she was finished, she'd
winked at me and played a melody. I danced and after that I danced
every time she played them because she played happy music.

The songs I heard now were hauntingly
beautiful but I couldn't decide whether they were happy or sad
because, in a way I couldn't fathom, they were both. I wondered who
was making such music and what led to the choice of songs. Was the
musician pouring out what he was feeling, what everyone was most
likely feeling beneath the public gaity, as the Destiny headed out
of the solar system?

I crawled on my belly without a sound through
the cherry bushes until I could make out a form in the dimness that
passed for night on the space ship. No moon because there was no
need for one. But the darkness was a good imitation of night. It
was almost like nights on earth when the moon was new but stars
were bright though instead of stars the night sky on the Destiny
was a bluish, filtered glow. In that faint light I could vaguely
make out the musician's form but not well enough to recognize it. I
scrabbled back to my cherry bushes. Then I settled down to
listen.

The concert went on for what I judged to be
the better part of an hour. Then, abruptly, the musician rose and
left. He passed within two feet of my hiding spot but the bushes
were thick and he saw nothing. I said a prayer of thanks for my
invisibility even as I wished I could tell him how much I liked his
music. How it reminded me of my aunt's songs. But speaking would be
suicide and in moments he was gone.

I crawled to my mattress, slid onto it,
pulled the blanket over me, shoved my face into the pillow and
eventually fell asleep, the first night of my new, unplanned life.
But the lovely melodies of pan pipes floated through my sleep and
were a comforting counterpart to dreams of the formidable, sculpted
face and shoulders of Cullen Vail. In my dreams, his figure was
intimidating and frightening as we headed away from everything I'd
ever known. But because of that unknown musician those dreams were
interspersed with the memory of beautiful music. I clung to those
remembered notes because somehow I knew they'd keep me sane in this
new, totally insane life.

Chapter Four

I receive phony papers.

I hung around the apple orchard Saturday and
Sunday, exploring and getting to know the trees, bushes and other
growing things. Monday, after a breakfast of cherries and apples I
set off for New Rochelle to see what a day in the life of a
colonist was like so as to better know how to imitate that life.
What I found was an almost empty square. Only one person was in
sight. The little girl with the kittens, in the same place as
before, holding her very pregnant cat and trying to find homes for
the unborn kittens. She saw me and waved. "Can you take a kitten
yet?"

I dropped to the curb beside her. It felt
right to do so. In fact it felt more like the small town I'd grown
up in than a gigantic space ship. The designers were genuises. In a
few days I'd forget that I wasn't really in a peaceful farming
community. "Not yet."

"I saw you at the party." She looked me up
and down. "My name's Alicia."

I held out my hand. "Elle."

"I know. I heard you tell my
grandfather."

"Wilkes Zander is your grandfather?'

"He's also the Mayor of New Rochelle." She
cuddled her cat. "He's important." She stroked the cat and it
purred loudly. "But not important enough to save the extra kittens
if I can't find homes for all of them."

"I'm sure you'll find homes for every one of
them."

"If you take one I'll bring food every
day."

I sighed, stroking the cat's plush fur. "I
wish I could. I had a cat when I was a kid. But I can't right
now."

"She was pregnant when we moved here. I
sneaked her on board. She'll be fixed after the kittens come so she
won't be a problem after that." To Alicia, boarding the Destiny was
as simple as a move to a new town. "I didn't see you yesterday. Do
you live in an apartment? We live in a big one."