The Texas Renegade Returns

June


Sunday, June 1

Pedestal, schmedestal

I was right to worry about being treated as an experiment by Ruuel.

The day started well enough. I was pleased with myself for succeeding in dreaming of otters, and in a calm frame of mind. There was an email from Nenna waiting for me, and after I read it I had to go and watch last night's The Hidden War episode, because Nenna's email was an apology for it.

To think I used to think it would be cool to go on reality TV. Nothing makes me feel less like myself than to watch my introduction to Tare turned into entertainment.

It wasn't as bad as Nenna obviously felt. The entire episode was from Nenna's point of view (or a thinly disguised version of Nenna called Senna) and was all about her Dad bringing home a stray to foster. Since most of my time with the Lents wouldn't have been detailed on my file, it was pretty obvious the scriptwriters had sat down with Nenna, and maybe the rest of her family, and had her describe everything I'd said and done while I was there. From the level of embarrassment in Nenna's email, I'm presuming she got paid for it.

The episode was really about Nenna, about what it had been like for an ordinary Taren girl to have an alien stray added to her family. They'd even written in a boyfriend for her, just so he could be caught ogling the stray's legs and make 'Senna' feel conflicted. And there were all these conversations I'd never heard, so didn't know if they were true. Did Nenna's sister protest the idea of her father taking in a stray in the first place? Did the Lents really have a doubtful discussion about my difficulties with the language and how little I seemed to be progressing? The actress's very fractured Taren is being used as a source of comedy and cuteness, far more appealing than the reality – it helps when the person saying things backward and being barely comprehendible is a gorgeous, kittenish girl with huge eyes, and the words she uses incorrectly tend to be mild double entendres or accidentally witty.

I wonder what Earth's copyright position is on the songs I'd played to people from my phone being used in Taren television shows? It was very weird to hear Gwen Stefani and the Portal closing credits song being used in a Taren show. I could tell from the brief explanation given for the Portal song that my lab rat is definitely going to feature in upcoming episodes.

They showed Nenna and me falling and getting hurt, and then it stayed with Nenna for her first few days in hospital, scared and guilty and angry, and facing arduous rehabilitation work. If she'd been relying on Earth's level of medical technology, she'd be in a wheelchair for life and that would be my fault. Of course, on Earth people don't teleport and neither of us would have been hurt.

Instead of replying to Nenna's email, I sent her a channel request and ended up chatting to her for half an hour. The fact that she'd spoken to the writers didn't bother me nearly as much as the thought of her hating me, and I was incredibly relieved that blaming me for her injuries wasn't the reason she hadn't returned my emails. [I was also more than a little relieved to know that KOTIS wasn't blocking my emails, which had occurred to me more than once.]

Once she was sure that I really wasn't upset, Nenna reverted to the girl I was more familiar with, and immediately started trying to pump me about the Setari. I did tell her there was someone in Third Squad who reminded me so much of her, but figured it was best to wriggle out of telling her any real detail.

First Squad were on rotation today, but that didn't stop Mara from snaffling me before they were due to go out and throwing balls at me, and then ordering me to go through some of the junior grade combat exercises after lunch (there's lots of interfaced-based training I can follow – I don't actually need any of the Setari to stand over me to do it). And in this case I was glad to do it because I really needed to not concentrate on upcoming training with Ruuel.

I may as well have been fourteen and going on my first date, I was so keyed up. Since Fourth Squad's on the next shift from mine, my Sights training is scheduled for late afternoon for me, and first thing in the 'morning' for Ruuel. It's so hard to be sensible about getting to see him. I ended up taking a needle-cold shower to distract me from the waiting, and filled in the last of the time brushing my hair a few thousand strokes and braiding it into a French braid so that I could at least look all efficient and businesslike.

The area where I was supposed to meet him was a new one to me, a series of rooms off a single corridor, all with observation windows. 'Sights Training'. I was booked in room five, but was distracted by room three, which had two Kalrani weaving their way through it. It was a kind of obstacle course, but with moving sections. I can only suppose it helps train Combat Sight. Suitably padded, but I bet it was no fun being hit by swinging beams – let alone falling to the ground from the more aerial parts. I can only hope that none of my training ever takes me into such a room, because the gymnastic expertise required looks to be Olympic level.


I'd been watching a couple of minutes when Ruuel arrived, standing to my right and just a little behind. I'd been having grim and dramatic thoughts about the reasons the Kalrani were pushing themselves so hard and asked: "How many have died in training?"

"Five. Put this on."

He looked like he was in a bad mood, which was not the way to make me look forward to the session. Ruuel with his eyes nearly shut is best avoided, especially when he hands you a blindfold by way of greeting. Nanoliquid too, so that when I reluctantly held it up to my eyes and touched the ends together it oozed under my fingers, then flowed down to cover my ears as well. Yuck. It was extremely effective, and very disorienting. All I could hear was my heartbeat, and I could see nothing at all.

"Your interface will be reduced to minimal function during testing," he said in text, and immediately cut it back so I couldn't do anything at all. Then I was levitated off my feet and moved. It was hugely disconcerting. I'd come to expect brevity from Ruuel, but this made me feel way too powerless, especially when I wasn't put down, but kept floating in the air. All I could see was blackness, and a square text box floating in front of me which said: "Test 1" and the date.

It changed to: "You will be given a series of containers. Attempt to divine the contents of each container. If you cannot make a clear identification of the content of the container, use the first word or image which came to mind when you touched the container. Responses are to be verbal. Signal that you understand."

"...understood," I said, making an effort not to show I was annoyed. After all, sensory deprivation was logical in the context. I lifted my hands up obligingly, and something cool and round dropped in them: it felt like a glass ball, about softball size.

The first word which came into my head was softball, which is not a kind of ball I've seen on Tare and obviously wrong and related more to the container than the contents. I was shuffling through all the random other words which came after that when it occurred to me that I didn't feel like I was with Ruuel. Now, I feel a lot of different things when I'm with Ruuel – right then I was pissed at him, with a touch of fretting about embarrassing myself and lowering his opinion of me – but there's simply a level of him being present which I'm always very aware of. Or absent, as when I wake up each morning knowing he's not there. Today he was standing beside me, and I'd put the blindfold on, and been lifted up, and after that I hadn't really felt like I was with him. I could tell that I was moving; even a blindfold and earplugs can't disguise the sense of being moved, of travelling maybe thirty or fifty metres. I'd assumed it was Ruuel levitating me, but it was obviously someone else.

It's a good thing those containers weren't fragile because I squeezed that first one violently. I felt like the butt of a practical joke, with everyone laughing at me secretly and waiting for me to twig. But after a few seconds of silent temper I turned my attention to who it was if it wasn't Ruuel. I could sort of tell where they were, a fact that I found very interesting, and which went a long way toward distracting me from being angry. Not within reach, and a little below me – I guess I was floating higher in the air than I'd expected. And it was Par, felt like Par. There didn't seem to be anyone really close, but the more I concentrated on Par, the more I had the impression that there were people at a distance, but out of reach like a word you know you know but can't quite remember.

It had been a long time since I'd been given the container. I made a genuine effort to try to divine what was inside, but couldn't tell if it was working or not. I didn't have any kind of certainty, nothing like knowing Ruuel wasn't there.

Finally I gave up and said: "Is test to try and guess object, or to see if I can tell that Auron has kidnapped me?"

"Both observations are relevant. Continue the container test."

I hadn't recovered from being annoyed, so decided to be very literal in following instructions and said: "Softball," and held it out.

There was a slight pause, then the container lifted out of my hands and another one the same size and shape replaced it.

I kept my responses strictly to English after that. I don't think in Taren, after all, and if they wanted the first word that came into my head they were going to get it. I'm not sure how much Symbol Sight would assist in interpreting my answers: things like "Daffodil" or "McDonalds" or "Stefani". I did censor myself a few times, when I went through a spate of sex terms which there was no way I was going to risk to Symbol Sight or possibly being asked to translate it later. Most of my answers I knew had to be wrong, because there was no way an elephant would fit in a globe the size of a softball.

After a couple of dozen globes, the interface switched to saying: "Test 2", then: "Describe your surroundings, including all objects and persons."

I thought it over. I expected I was in Sight Training Room 5, but I hadn't actually seen it. Although it was probably as bland and white-walled as practically everywhere in KOTIS, saying that would be an assumption. The only thing I was really sure of was people.

"Auron is down there," I said, moving an open-palmed hand toward him. "There are four – five? – people over there." I indicated what was probably the direction of the corridor, but I wasn't entirely certain about that. "One person over there?" I pointed to my right, feeling a bit uncertain. Whoever it was was moving about. "Everything else just guess."

After a moment, the floor came back below my feet – Par had lowered me to the ground. I managed not to stagger and was feeling pleased about that, then had another message: "Test 3. Identify and track the location of room occupants."

Par began to move around the room and I pointed to him as he did. If he went too fast I would lose track of him, and if he kept moving quickly I'd lose him altogether and only know that he was near. Then one of the group of five came closer and turned out to be Glade. He and Par stood together a moment, then split up, but I had no trouble telling them apart so long as they didn't move too quickly.

A third person came in. I could track them just as distinctly, but didn't know who it was. The fourth person, I almost missed. It was a lot harder to tell she was there, but I eventually recognised her as Ista Chemie.

All this time I'd been working on a headache, which grew steadily worse until it was at Ddura-level pounding, and I was thoroughly relieved when the next message was: "Test session concluded." I straight away lifted my hands to my head, trying to figure out how to take the blindfold off, but the nanocloth was smooth and unresponsive to my touch, then abruptly melted back into a single strip. Not designed to be removed by the wearer, which made me like it even less. My interface functions were restored a moment later.

The person I hadn't been able to identify was a Kalrani, someone I hadn't met. I could make that much out while squinting through my headache and sudden exposure to light. Ruuel said in text over the interface: "Report to medical. If they clear you, practice sensing your surroundings before the next session, but do not push yourself."

Par very kindly levitated me down to the medical section, and I only had to wait through the shortest of scans before Ista Chemie gave me something for my headache. I fell asleep there, but didn't dream, and Zee came and collected me for a quiet dinner in her quarters. I told her I felt even sorrier for the Kalrani and Setari if they had to keep giving themselves headaches when they were only little kids. She said the first few times are usually the worst – it sounds like it works a bit like having your ears pierced – when you start using talents actively, pushing them beyond a 'passive' state, it opens pathways, but repetition strengthens rather than continuing to hurt.


I had a long bubble bath after dinner, and let the water get cold thinking about myself. Not the weirdness of being this touchstone-psychic-mysterious whatever. To tell the truth, I think staying on Muina turned me psychic. Maybe it's something in the pears. I sure as hell couldn't do any of this before I got stuck there. No, during my bath I was trying to remember if I used to hate surprises. I don't think I did. No-one's keen on unpleasant stuff being sprung on them, but these days I just hate it if anyone does something without warning me. Really hate it.

It's hard to believe Ruuel had forgotten the psychological aspects. He's far too sharp to not understand that blinding me and then switching places with Par would leave me confused and vulnerable. I'm sure it helped with the test, pushing me into a more sensitive state, and really it was logical and not something I should make a fuss over. But it made me so angry.

I'm telling myself it's a good thing, though. I'm an assignment to Ruuel, and I had an unhealthy level of faith in him. Maybe over the next week he'll keep pissing me off, and I'll end up thinking him on par with that ass Kajal.

Well, okay, that's not very likely. But I don't even want to listen to him telling me to think of otters now, and I would never have guessed that I'd feel that way.

Monday, June 2

Second in Command

So last night I dreamed I was arguing with Ruuel. He was being very cold and cutting, saying things about how worthless my trust is if it takes such a small thing to shatter it. I was saying that trusting someone was like being a little bit pregnant. You either are or you aren't. You either trust or you don't.

It wasn't as bad as the tentacle nightmare. I kept waking up, instead of being unable to, and was just unhappy rather than nearly having a heart attack, but I could do without having dreams like that. When I woke the last time I had an email from Selkie with the draft report from yesterday's session linked and instructions to fill in translations of what I'd been saying for my object identification attempts. I'm not entirely sure if this means it was Selkie conducting the testing session, or if he was just reviewing the report, but how much difference would it make if Ruuel was playing tricks on me under orders? It doesn't make me feel any better about it. I filled in the report results, unsurprised to discover that I'd been wrong for every single one of them. Reading the rest of the report didn't tell me anything I hadn't already concluded about my ability to know who is near me, but I did discover that part of the test had involved Glade and Par feinting blows at me to see if I reacted to that. I'm going to end up not wanting to be around all of Fourth Squad at this rate.

I was feeling very down and tired-eyed when I went for my first session of weapons training. The greensuit in charge of my training, Drake, looked like a poster-boy drill sergeant: fortyish, world-weary, no-nonsense. I started out half-expecting him to yell at me, but he was carefully correct and just a trifle indulgent – I bet he'd be the type of guy who calls women "Little Lady" back on Earth. The weapon he was training me with today was some kind of laser pistol, and I was hopeless with it. It's got to be the easiest gun in the world to use, but while I was okay (not dreadfully accurate, but okay) with shooting big, unmoving targets, as soon as he started me on moving or pop-up targets (all generated by the interface), I rarely hit anything. I've never had very good aim with ball sports and the like. Plus – maybe it's an Australian thing – but it just felt wrong having a gun. I've never even touched one before, and I'm too convinced I'll accidentally shoot someone.

After seeing how useless I am, Drake booked me in for more practice sessions, but since I don't think he expected me to be any good at it in the first place, he was all very relaxed about it. There's some other weapon he has to train me in as well called a 'pulse', which is what we'll focus on in the next training session. I guess all I can do about this is practice a lot.

I had a relatively light exercise session with Mara after lunch, weights and resistance. The gym's one of the few places you see Setari out of uniform – well, in a 'training' uniform which is basically shorts and a Singlet. They also use a light-weight outfit when doing combat training which doesn't involve weapons. There were quite a few people in the gym today, and I found it very distracting that they weren't dressed in form-fitting black. None of the Setari are body-builder muscular – they work out for strength but not mass and I gather too much muscle impedes agility. Mara could tell I was down, I think, but since I like being with her I cheered up a bit, and then Lohn came and joined us and he can always make me smile so it was an okay afternoon.

I ended up going to the Sights training area early, mainly because I think if I hadn't I would have given in to the temptation to wear one of my lab rat shirts. I was still annoyed and distrustful, but I didn't want to make a big fuss over what everyone else probably thought was nothing. Nor did I want to start a fight with Ruuel, or spend my time sulking or having tantrums. At the same time, I didn't want to be made to feel like that again, and I figured I'd have a better chance of avoiding it if I took a proactive, rational approach. The session was booked for Room 6 this time, a smaller room with a few brown square things scattered randomly about which I decided were some kind of blockish, backless chair. I sat cross-legged on one, listening to music until he showed up, also very early.

As soon as he came in I said: "If have to be blindfolded, can I have one I can take off myself? Really didn't like that thing yesterday."

"There's no need," he said. "This session is training, not testing."

I was relieved, but couldn't quite relax, and tried not to look obviously nervous as he made one of the squares slide across so it was opposite mine. He sat, one foot hooked under the opposite knee, relaxed like someone who'd never even thought about being in a bad mood.

"These are visualisation exercises," he said. "They are designed for attempting to pre-select which dreams you have, rather than changing the course of a dream you wish to escape. There are techniques for that, but these are a first step. You succeeded with the otters?"

I nodded, and he went on to explain the different things you could think when you were trying to get to sleep. It was a bit like counting sheep, really. Think of the details of a safe place. Construct something you liked, piece by piece. Follow a familiar routine. Do something which step-by-step focuses your mind on a particular thing, so that other things, like tentacles, don't slip in.

As I'd expected, Ruuel was a good teacher, giving examples of each of the techniques in a clear and really quite evocative way. He told me to try a different one each night, and use the most effective ones, even when I hadn't been stressed or suffering from nightmares. An entirely non-annoying session but, even though he did nothing but talk, I stayed tense and wary the entire time, not able to convince myself that there wouldn't be some test or trick, and struggling not to dwell too much on how I felt yesterday.

I let out a little relieved breath when he told me that was enough for the day, which I should have known better than to think he wouldn't notice. Probably he'd had a fair idea all along how I was feeling, but that made his eyebrows draw together slightly.

"Your dreams are too potentially destructive for you to not fully engage with this," he said, going into extra-captainly captain mode. "While I did not agree with the approach to yesterday's testing, I did carry it out. If that isn't possible for you to overcome, I can arrange for another person to oversee your training."


I'd hate to get into a real argument with Ruuel – I get the feeling I'd be outmanoeuvred at every turn. As it was, I felt my face burn, but I managed to meet his eyes steadily. "What was making me upset supposed to achieve?"

"Stress is a primary trigger to talent development." He was channelling his inner humourless robot, with no hint of expression. "In your case it mixes very badly with how you came to be here, and why you choose to tolerate being used by us. Do you want me to arrange for a different trainer?"

"Would they be more likely to disobey orders than you?" I asked, and was glad my voice was dry instead of hurt. Then I shook my head and stood up. "No. But thanks for the offer."

I left, needing to think about how I felt, somewhere away from Ruuel and all his Sights. I still haven't decided, really, other than to know I was happier for the explanation. For Ruuel that probably passes as an apology, too, and I wonder if that was the reason he'd seemed in such a bad mood: knowing that playing games with me would make me angry, and yet told to do it anyway.

I thought Selkie understood me better, too...and I just looked up his schedule, and saw that he'd been away on Muina again, and arrived back a few hours before he emailed me the report to complete.

Ah well – hopefully I won't have dreams about arguing with Ruuel tonight. If my visualisation works properly, I should dream about being in my room, cleaning it up. I'm kind of looking forward to that.

Tuesday, June 3

One Thousand Cranes

It occurred to me before going to bed last night that trying to dream about home was probably not a good idea. I really don't want to end up in Earth's near-space needing to be rescued. The otters really are the ideal 'safe place' visualisation for me, but I either have to disassociate it with Ruuel, or fully get over being upset with him before I use it again.

I decided to go with the 'think of making something' example, and went to sleep remembering Noriko Yamada teaching me how to make origami cranes. She was making a thousand of them, which she sewed onto long strings and was going to give as a present to her grandmother. I didn't make that many, but I remember the pattern well, and so I curled up in my window seat and thought through the steps of making origami cranes, and I had a dream about the day I met Noriko in the library at school, and made cranes over lunch.

After a while, Mori and Ruuel came and stood down by the far end of the table, but then Ruuel went away again almost immediately. I made cranes and listened to Noriko telling me about how the strings of cranes would be strung up in her grandmother's garden and as they fell to pieces they'd take the wish she made for her grandmother on the wind.

Then Ruuel and Taarel came in together, standing by my chair. "Do you want me to show you how to make one?" I asked Ruuel, handing him the crane I'd just made.

He held it up for Taarel to look at, and she touched a wing and said: "Impressive. Caszandra, do you know where you are?"

"The library?" I looked around, but started to think at the same time and said: "Oh, I'm dreaming," and woke up, still curled on my window seat. The lights were on, about three-quarter strength, and Mori was standing watching me. "But it wasn't a nightmare," I said.

"No. You were pouring out energy at an excessive rate, and that triggered the alert." She perched on one arm of one my couches. "What were you dreaming about?"

"Doing one of the sleeping exercises, making things." I sat up and looked around the room, surprised Ruuel and Taarel weren't there, because they'd felt very real to me. "Kind of have a headache," I said, finding that movement didn't agree with me much.

"We'll head down to medical in a minute. Just waiting on the captains to return."

"Ruuel and Taarel were here then?" I actually found their absence very disorienting, and my head pounded more as I tried to reconcile them talking to me and then not being there.

She smiled. "They went into the Ena, to this point in near-space, to follow a theory. They shouldn't be long."

I went and dressed, since even though I'd added long pyjama pants to my nightwear after my excursion to Earth, I still felt at a disadvantage dressed for bed when people came to talk to me, or when I had to go to medical.

Mori was watching the rain pounding steadily down outside the window. "What was the theory?" I asked her, but she said it would probably save repetition to wait till the captains were back, and instead we chatted about the last The Hidden War episode, and I found myself explaining a little about how I felt about hurting Nenna. Mori was in great agreement with this, and said that the main fear of practically every Setari was letting their squad down and getting them killed. Then Taarel brought me and Mori into a channel with her, Ruuel, Selkie and (to my mild pleasure) Isten Notra.

"This is the location in near-space," Ruuel said, and gave us a fragment of his own log, a rapid ascent up the outer wall of the KOTIS facility, Taarel just visible in peripheral vision, and then something very odd ahead – a swirling blurriness centred around the outlines of a building apparently poking out the whitestone wall. I recognised it immediately. My school library building.

It didn't have the sketchy quality of near-space – there were no holes in the walls – but there was a soap-bubble intangibility about it, like it was a mirage which would pop if you touched it. Still, Ruuel and Taarel had to push open the heavy swing door to get inside. There was a suggestion of a library assistant behind the front counter, but she didn't seem to see them, and they turned right and went past long rows of shelves to the tables at the back of the main room, where a ghost of me was sitting with a ghost of Noriko, folding origami cranes.

There were two me's. One sitting there folding cranes, and a glowing outline of me in roughly the same spot, curled up in my window seat. Ruuel and Taarel had to detour slightly to get inside the Taren near-space room as well as the library room, and Ruuel did a lot of Sight-switching, which really didn't help my headache.

"Do you want me to show you how to make one?" the ghost me asked Ruuel, handing him one of the cranes.

He switched through his Sights again, and held it up for Taarel to look at, and she touched a wing and said: "Impressive. Caszandra, do you know where you are?"

"The library?" The ghost me looked around, then said: "Oh, I'm dreaming," and then the whole thing vanished and Ruuel and Taarel were standing alone in the near-space version of my apartment, looking at a faint afterimage of the sleeping me fading away, and a dozen origami cranes scattered across the floor.

The log extract ended and I opened my eyes to find Taarel and Ruuel had arrived, each holding a handful of cranes of all different colours, some patterned like the fancy paper Noriko had been using.

"What do the paper birds represent?" Isten Notra asked.

"A wish of good luck," I said, closing my eyes again because my head was pounding. "Noriko, the girl who was with me, is from a part of Earth called Japan. They have an art form there called origami: making things out of folded paper. The bird is called a crane, which is considered a kind of magical beast in Japan. Japanese tradition to fold a thousand origami cranes, as a luck-wish." I opened my eyes again, and since Taarel was within reach I leaned forward and took one of the cranes she was holding, and unfolded it. "It feels like ordinary paper," I said.

"Analysis will tell us more on that level," Isten Notra said. "Caszandra, we're going to place a drone in near-space at the location of your room to monitor the development of your dreams on the Ena." Before I could be more than totally horrified she went on: "The visual component will be locked to my viewing only, unless I deem there to be some critical value in releasing it further, and otherwise deleted after my review. Is that acceptable to you?"


I couldn't hide the DO NOT WANT on my face, and there was a long, painful pause before I could say: "I guess," sounding anything but happy about it. The idea of anyone watching my dreams is beyond awful. But that it would be Isten Notra made it just, just bearable, so I added: "Yes."

"Good girl."

"Medical now," Ruuel said, and I was dropped out of the channel. He gave Mori his handful of origami cranes, and waited to see whether I was going to walk myself or needed to be carted about. I managed to walk, just a bit slow and wobbly, but getting to medical mainly involves elevators anyway.

"Do you sleep there because of the window, or because you're frightened of the other room?" Ruuel asked, just before we reached my home away from home.

"Both," I said shortly, knowing it would be useless to lie to him. "Getting better about going into the bedroom though." I no longer had to nerve myself up to fetch my clothes, at least.

He didn't comment. Ruuel's good at knowing when to shut up, and he left me to the familiar routine of having my brain scanned and mapped to the last neuron.

I don't seem to have dreamed at all the rest of my sleep shift – no doubt Ista Chemie was privately relieved about that – and was collected by Maze this morning.

"You're having fewer unbroken nights," he said, after we'd settled in the canteen over breakfast. "And I know you must be far from happy about this latest development."

"Would you want anyone watching your dreams?"

"Not for a moment," he said, so firmly I immediately wondered what he dreamed about. "I'm glad Isten Notra found an approach which is bearable for you, since it's clear your talent development is accelerating. What you managed last night is well outside what we would call Ena manipulation, startling enough that the details are being kept within the squads working directly with you."

"Dream talent might be what a touchstone is?"

He nodded. "We haven't found anything like you mentioned in any of the histories, but it's becoming apparent that enhancement is the least of your talents. For the moment we're going to concentrate on trying to understand more about what it is you're doing, and helping you learn to not use it."

"Was easier just watching First Squad fight," I said, with a sigh. "Did you watch my shooting training session? So hopeless."

"You'll improve with practice." He gave me a captain-look to underline that I better take the sessions seriously, but then couldn't help but smile. "Though I concede that you're not a natural fighter. It doesn't sit well with me that we're even considering you having a need for weapons training."

"Are there lots arguments?"

"Little but. For the most part over timing, about how urgently we move forward on Muina. I can't pretend that there isn't a huge amount of pressure to find a way to the city you visited."

"I get to say I told you so?"

"Perhaps. The argument isn't settled yet." He studied my face. "You've had a run of difficult weeks, Caszandra. I can push to delay the decision, give you more time–"

"Would rather get it over with," I said, feeling oddly cross and embarrassed. "Don't want to do it at all, but Ionoth numbers still increasing, yes? Thought of someone I know dying more horrible than standing on platform. And won't have to worry about it once it's done, can go back to being enhancing stray."

"I'm not sure that's possible," he said, seriously. "What you did last night is something with wide-reaching implications, and it can't be left uninvestigated. Fortunately the tie to the Ena brings you into Isten Notra's domain. Now that Notra has assumed direct control we should be able to be more consistent with you, and avoid idiocies like subjecting you to one of the standard Sights tests." He made an exasperated face, then waved a hand to dismiss that train of thought, adding: "Today we're going to take you into the Ena to see whether you can directly manipulate it."

So instead of having Sight training with Ruuel, I spent the rest of the day with First Squad. Ketzaren tried, completely unsuccessfully, to teach me to do the most basic Ena manipulation while Alay guarded us and the rest of First Squad cleared whatever space we happened to be in. They did what they considered basic spaces – what apparently is called a 'scatter rotation' because they don't follow a string of joined spaces, but keep going in and out of near-space. I've been given some Ena manipulation homework, with a little cube smaller than a fingernail which I have to will into being green instead of yellow. Changing colour is apparently one of the easiest things to do, but I feel a complete idiot glowering at a little cube while nothing happens.

And I have very particular orders from Maze not to do 'making things' visualisations tonight. I should really do my otters 'safe place', but I don't want to risk anything Ruuel-related. Even if it's only Isten Notra watching, I know the only real secret is one you keep yourself.

Wednesday, June 4

Do Androids Dream?

I dreamed of counting sheep. It was a 'real' dream, but didn't last long enough that people had to come stop me from exhausting myself. While it felt very real – me sitting in the grass on a beautiful sunny day watching these hairy sheep leap over a fence barely bigger than their knees – counting sheep is such a sleep-related thing that I just knew that I must be dreaming.

And there was a drone there, lurking incongruously in the middle of a bush. I found this funny and annoying at the same time, and I waved at it when I noticed it, but for some reason it made me wake up. No headache, and I feel calm and rested, which I'm very glad about. I've hated these days of feeling like I'm barely keeping it together.

My morning appointment had changed to breakfast/dinner with Isten Notra, which was a nice surprise and turned into a fun outing. She lives in a residential section where some of the more important people who work at KOTIS live. It seems to be the equivalent of a gated community and the important thing to me was that it counts as within KOTIS' security and I could go there without an escort. Very cool. I almost didn't arrive on time because I was busy gaping at gardens, and a little café/milk bar that I so wanted to go and buy something from all by myself.

I'm a sad case.

People did recognise me and stare – even in KOTIS few outside the Setari and the medical staff ever see me – but no-one made any move to stop or question me, and I found Isten Notra's home easily enough. It was off a wide, high-ceiling 'plaza' area, which made it feel more like a house to me. No windows, though, which I will always find eternally strange. Apartments on Tare don't have doorbells: you use the interface to tell the door you're there and it lets the person you're there to meet know you're waiting, or just alerts everyone in the apartment. I stood outside feeling incredibly conspicuous until the door was opened by a girl a few years younger than me who started to say something, stopped, and stared in disbelief.

"Isten Notra lives here?" I asked, then paused while another girl, maybe eleven or twelve, came to the door as well, took one look at me, and shrieked.

I swear, I'm starting to want to go back to Earth solely so people don't react to me like that. It's seriously embarrassing. Both me and the older girl went very red, and I tried to say something, but the younger girl shrieked again, pointing at me. The older girl hastily stepped back, gesturing me inside so she could shut the door.

"Kanna, stop it you idiot," she hissed, shaking her sister by the shoulder. "I'm sorry, um, I'll – Kanna didn't–"


"Jor, Kanna, what in the spaces are you–" A guy around my age appeared in the foyer, blinked twice, but managed to neither shriek or be lost for words. "You must be here to see my grandmother," he said. "I'll take you through, but first let me apologise for my sisters. I'd say they're not usually like this, but that wouldn't be entirely honest."

"Shon!" The older girl looked even more embarrassed. The younger girl kicked him in the ankle, but he ignored her and led me further into the apartment.

It was a big place, really nice and comfortably cluttered – Isten Notra lives with her daughter Keel, Keel's husband Fellan, and their children, Shon, Jor and Kanna. She'd told them she was expecting a guest for dinner, but hadn't told them who. I gather Isten Notra likes to keep them on their toes. They were having pancake/crepe things for dinner, and so it worked as well for breakfast for me.

Unsurprisingly, they were all formidably smart. We ended up talking about Earth's space program, about moons and different sorts of planets – they were really interested in Earth's tilt giving us seasons and how that didn't apply to Tare or Kolar, but obviously did for Muina – and then we talked about Mars and Earth science and as usual I wished I'd paid more attention at school, but I didn't make too big an idiot of myself. I wish I'd read more hard science fiction as well as space opera novels, though.

After dinner, and a very yummy gooey toffee dessert which is not precisely what I should be eating for breakfast, Isten Notra asked me if I'd show them how to make origami cranes and so we had an origami session – I can make cranes and a cup and the chatterbox game and paper airplanes and a turtle, which is the most complex thing Noriko taught me. Isten Notra had had a large supply of paper brought to her in preparation, but she didn't have a single pen in the house, and none of them could write anyway, so I couldn't quite explain the chatterbox game properly until one of Isten Notra's minions turned up with a pen. I bet he loved discovering why he'd been sent urgently to find an anachronistic holdover from the pre-interface age, but Kanna adored the chatterbox and had me write several up for her full of the kind of responses an eleven year-old imp thinks is funny, in my slightly strange-looking written Taren (I can write in the Taren alphabet if I concentrate, but I can't write neatly enough to make it look precisely like the standardised letters).

I'd been at the Notra apartment for nearly three hours when Isten Notra dismissed her grandchildren and took me up to her office to talk about what the drone had recorded of my dream last night. I had been projecting into the Ena again, though less strongly it seems, and I didn't make any permanent sheep, unlike my cranes, a dragon-patterned one of which was in Isten Notra's office. She showed me the visual recording, of a mirage-like image of me sitting in nebulous grass watching sheep, and also the white outline of me sleeping in my window seat. A little after I waved at the drone, the whole thing faded away. I explained counting sheep to Isten Notra, and said yes, I had been aware that the drone was there and described what it had looked like to me.

"We are still at the very theoretical stage with this, Caszandra," she said. "I can tell you this is not Ena manipulation. It does not give the same readings at all. My best initial evaluation is that, at least temporarily, you are creating something resembling a space."

That was far more than I'd realised, and I didn't like the thought of it. "Am I likely to get much stronger? Make permanent spaces?"

"Unlikely. While you are still at the beginning of your development, and these cranes of yours demonstrate you are already capable of producing small, simple objects, the energy required to make a permanent space – you simply aren't physically capable of producing such power. Though I would recommend that you vary what you focus on during sleep as much as possible, as there is a possibility that repetition might achieve what you cannot in a single burst." She tucked a stray curl of white hair behind one ear, and shook her head. "We are only beginning to understand you. The drone has been running scans on the barrier between this space and the near-space around your room, but it shows no sign that your dreams have caused it to weaken. Yet your dream of the Array massive produced audible sounds and even physical reactions among the technicians who were in this space. That is a dangerous possibility. That you are capable of producing a thin version of a space is a thing of curiosity with interesting possibilities. But the implications of you causing effects in real-space, that is something else altogether. Not least because you are terribly at risk of injuring yourself."

Isten Notra sent me off with Shon as an escort, which I thought unnecessary until I noticed how many people were lurking about the streets back to KOTIS proper. Not huge crowds – the general public can't come into the area without a pass – but far more than there'd been when I'd arrived. I could see that Shon had noticed them, but he chattered on blithely about exploration on Muina, which made me feel less uncomfortable. Shon's very torn between the work his grandmother has pioneered in Ena studies, and natural sciences. He's David Attenborough at heart.

He also asked if he could email me, if I was willing to talk about the comparisons between Earth's and Muina's wildlife, and left with a wave when we reached the entrance of KOTIS proper. A nice guy, very relaxed and on top of things. I have a faint suspicion Isten Notra was indulging in some matchmaking, but I think I'll pretend that hasn't occurred to me. I liked Shon, but it's easier not to think about romance at all right now. I figure if I can start waking up not missing Ruuel, I can start thinking about the possibility of other guys, but it's pointless until that happens. Even when I was so upset about that testing session, I still woke up knowing he wasn't there.

I had weapons training after lunch, which involved struggling into bulky grey chest armour. I felt like a Stormtrooper. Drake stood me in the middle of a practice room with actual physical targets in it and had me activate the chest armour, which briefly made an energy shield around me, and then let loose a sort of area effect concussion blast, sending the targets flying in pieces in all directions. It has two blasts, and then will slowly recharge. They're relying on it, far more than any ability I might gain shooting blasters, to keep me safe. I hate it.

What if there was someone I didn't see in range when I set it off? I kept thinking of all the terrible accidents I could cause, which made it hard to concentrate on my blaster practice. Drake kept me almost a full kasse practicing in the armour and while I did start to come closer to hitting stationary targets more consistently by the time he let me go, I still suck at moving objects, never notice anything that pops up behind me, and really am kind of sick of the whole exercise.

After that I took a long bath, and went down to the Sights training area early, intending to play my murder mystery game until Ruuel showed up. I'm liking the game more and more, and it helps me de-stress, but it's amazingly huge so I only play it when I have a good wodge of unscheduled time. On the way to the small training room I couldn't help but notice four female Kalrani gathered around the viewing window into the obstacle course area.

"–by far the best," one was saying. "Absolutely edible."

"If you like your meal ice-cold," another snorted. "You're wasting your time anyway. You think you can compete with her?"

"People always say that," said a third. "But it's all just rumour."


"Rumours don't go on for years without some basis," the second said. "And–"

"It's about time we got to drill," said the fourth, and I could tell from the way they all straightened and very carefully didn't look around that she'd spotted me and told them I was there. They all headed off down the corridor, and I went to the observation window and looked down.

Ruuel and Taarel. Ruuel was wearing one of the horrid blindfolds, and Taarel was attacking him. Blind and deaf, and he could still avoid her attacks and hop about the moving obstacle course. He couldn't quite counterattack swiftly enough to hit her, but it was a very near thing, and they both kept barely avoiding swinging bars and things which shot out of the walls at them. It all looked incredibly dangerous.

I watched for a minute, then went up to the roof. It was raining, but not too hard, and I stood in it for a while, then went and had a hot shower so I wouldn't catch cold and get lectured. Then I went down and was exactly on time for my appointment so that Ruuel could step me through techniques for what he called 'release triggers'. Every time you go to sleep you have to try and build into your dream something which reminds you that it's a dream, and allows you to wake up. A door, or an alarm clock. He said I shouldn't use the drone as a release because I wouldn't always be sleeping somewhere there was a drone. I stayed really focused, and asked what few questions occurred to me, and he dismissed me quite quickly.

It's not easy to hide things from Ruuel. But all this talk about visualisations and methods of focusing your mind has been very handy. All the time during today's session I was counting. Listening to what he said and keeping count took a lot of effort, and lessened the amount of energy I could devote to feeling stupidly dejected. He at least didn't act as if he could tell I was upset.

All along I've had a sense that he and Taarel are together. They make a great couple, really. And like the Kalrani said, who could compete with her? Even if you ignore little issues of our comparative looks, I'm someone who's still afraid to sleep in her own bedroom. Someone who has to be babysat.

It's stupid to be upset to hear someone say no more than I already knew – that people think they're together, but aren't sure. But I've spent the evening worrying about what I'm going to dream tonight, and stayed up incredibly late and can barely keep my eyes open. Being upset is one of the triggers for my nightmares. And even if Isten Notra is the first person reviewing what I dream, that's no guarantee others won't see it. And I can't talk about it to anyone at all.

Which at least means I have a huge amount of motivation to get this release trigger thing absolutely right first time. I don't think I've ever been so determined to do something in my life.

I'm going to do a counting dots visualisation. And every dot is going to have 'This is a dream' written on it. And every dot will be a release trigger to get me out of the dream. And I will be in a room which is nothing but dots, and every one of them a release trigger. And I don't care if I wake up a thousand times tonight, kicking myself out of my dreams: that's the only thing I'm going to dream.

Ghost just showed up and got very annoyed with me for squeezing her so tightly.

Thursday, June 5

A short history of

I'm glad I've been told to go back to sheep. I did manage to dream of being surrounded by buttons saying "This is a dream". But they were all paintings of buttons. Corridor after corridor of paintings of buttons, and me wandering endlessly through them trying to find the right one to push. It was a long night of feeling exhausted and alone – and all the time feeling watched, though I couldn't see the drone this time. I wasn't scared, and obviously wasn't churning out enough power to have anyone feel the need to come wake me up, but just because I didn't give myself a heart attack didn't mean I didn't feel totally battered and done in by it all.

And woke missing Ruuel like hell, worse than ever. What is it going to take to stop me feeling this way about him?

At any rate, I had breakfast with Lohn and Mara, since I was supposed to be training with them before they went on rotation. I had to talk Mara out of sending me to medical, but I'm really glad we chatted since with them I find it easier to admit what a wuss I am, and how stressed I'd gotten about not wanting people to see my dreams. I guess it is kind of odd, since it was a private conversation with Lohn and Mara being made into television which had me so upset. Maybe it's all the hugs which makes them easy to talk to.

One thing Lohn said really struck me – that if I can control what I dream about, being able to project my dreams in such intense detail is really an opportunity. I could show him what surfing looked like, for instance. That's a nice idea, changing the drone from an intrusive spy to a handy recording device. The big problem is the presumption that I can manage anything resembling control, given how badly I failed last night.

We did some mild training, and grabbed a light mid-morning meal before First Squad went into rotation. Then I had weapons training, which being drained and tired really did not help with. Drake was very tolerant, which is one good thing about him having low expectations for me. After that, I went up to the roof, and admired the sheer blackness of the approaching thunderclouds while I tried to think up a way to tell Ruuel that maybe someone else should train me after all. It was hard to come up with a reason that didn't sound wildly insulting, or underline that the problem was just that I was too emotionally messed up about him. I'd rather not have to deal with him at all for a while – not until I stop waking up knowing he's not near me.

Everything I could come up with sounded so feeble, and I had just decided that I'd put off changing trainers till tomorrow when I felt someone standing to my left. The Nuran, Inisar.

"Hello again," I said, after a moment. I'm sure if anyone was paying attention to my vitals monitor they would have noticed a huge spike, but since he was just standing there, all I did was add: "Another rescue attempt, or something else this time?"

"Do you no longer choose to aid the Tarens?"

The question was so neutral I couldn't tell if he was simply curious, or was ready to cart me off through the Rift as soon as I said 'yes'. Or kill me if I didn't.

"No." I stayed sitting down, though I had to lean back a little to look up at him. "Situation hasn't gotten better. More Ionoth, more gates. Don't see how I can walk away from that. I had a – well, I have lots of questions, but I particularly wanted to ask what Cruzatch are."

"What do you think they are?" he asked. Totally unhelpful.

"Muinans become Ionoth. Trying to make themselves immortal. Or into gods. Or both. And now trying to stop Tarens because Tarens reached the point where they can move about spaces and find Pillars and turn them off. Do the Cruzatch drive massives to attack Nurans too?"

"I have been forbidden to answer questions."

That made me feel nervous, since if he wasn't here to talk, kidnapping or assassination moved up the list. "Just here to look at the scenery?"

His eyes – rather too like Ruuel's for my comfort – considered me steadily. "I am commanded to observe your development as a touchstone. While I am here I am to avoid all contact with any of the lost children of Muina."

The rules-lawyering made me smile. He wasn't quite answering my questions, and he wasn't talking to a Muinan-descendant. "Following instructions very exactly. I don't know which bits of what's happening to me are the touchstone part, but just lately I've started projecting my dreams into the Ena. If that's what being a touchstone is, would appreciate a few hints as to how not to have dreams. Or at least stop half-killing myself with them."


"Control is not a thing gained during sleep," he said, and handed me a book. I glanced down at it, very surprised, and when I looked up again he was gone.

"Straight answers not a thing gained from Nurans," I muttered, and sighed, then looked with extreme interest at the book.

It was handmade, the paper creamy and lightly textured, with firmly sewn bindings forming a thick solid edge. The covers were plain wooden boards, fine and undecorated. The whole thing looked newly made, and when I opened it the writing was dark and cleanly written. And in Old Muinan, which I have as much chance of reading and understanding as Old English. I snorted, but carefully went through it page by page, committing them to my log – and hoping for useful illustrations.

Then it was time to face the music. I'd already checked on 'my' captains, but Maze was still on rotation and Ruuel was asleep. I tossed up contacting Taarel or Grif Regan from Second Squad or even Zan, but decided to skip the preliminaries and emailed Selkie the conversation from my log, with a subject heading of "Nurans" and in the body: "Have neat handwriting." I cc'd the email to Maze, Ruuel and Isten Notra and then sat there trying to puzzle out what the damn thing was about. Not, as I'd hoped, "The Idiot's Guide to Touchstones".

I'd just decided it was some kind of history of Muina when Isten Notra sent a channel request to me with the text: "You are an endless source of amusement," making me laugh.

"Hello," I said. "Suspect 'amusement' is not word everyone will use."

"You may well be right. And how cruel of you to only send the first four pages with that log. Pass me the rest."

That was easily done – I'd already separated out the fragment for my own review. "Can you read Old Muinan, Isten Notra? This is Nuran history book?"

"More than that, child. It is a copy of an account written by a Lantaren just after arrival on Nuri. It is a compilation of everything the Muinans who fled to Nuri knew of the disaster and the events leading up to it. It is–" Her voice throbbed. "It is very exciting, and I will leave you now while I devour it. You'd best get yourself to Selkie's office before he finishes reviewing your conversation."

I'd not been to Selkie's office before – it was in a part of KOTIS I think of as 'Command Central'. An area with lots of bluesuits walking about, and an excess of meeting rooms. I could tell when Selkie finished reviewing my log, because an appointment for a meeting with him appeared in my calendar, scheduled for immediately. But I guess Isten Notra had already told him I was on my way, because he simply waited for me to show.

Some offices on Tare have remnants of design from when Tarens used table-top computers, but most of them are like Selkie's – just a meeting room assigned to a particular person, with storage space for equipment, but little to do with desks or paper shuffling. Selkie's had a small rectangular coffee table thing, with four low chairs around it, and a taller café-type round table with two 'upright' chairs with high backs (like wing-back chairs). He was in one of these, and didn't look amused.

"Sit."

I put the book on the table and sat, feeling like I'd been called to the principal's office. Except it was a school I couldn't go home from at the end of the day. For psychic soldiers.

"I've spoken to you on the subject of your alert before," he said. "If I need to do so again, you will have a squad assigned to you permanently. Do you understand?"

Setting off my alert wouldn't have made any difference if the Nuran had wanted to kill me, and I'd been all prepared to say that until I saw the look in Selkie's eyes. Any argument, and he'd assign a squad to me straight away.

"Understood," I said, resigned to having to do it.

"What is the basis for your theory about the Cruzatch?"

"Arenrhon obviously about godhood or immortality. Bodies in the non-blurry sarcophagi were burnt. And Cruzatch keep showing up. Is just a guess – we don't have anything like Cruzatch on Earth. Don't think I've even heard any legends about things like that."

He didn't comment, but didn't look surprised, either. I was hardly the first to speculate on what the people at Arenrhon were trying to achieve.

"Remain here until Notra has reported on this," he said, picking up the book and leaving.

It wasn't a short book, but I'm not altogether sure if having to sit in Selkie's office for a couple of hours was supposed to be punishment, or just that Selkie wanted me somewhere he thought it hard for the Nuran to get to. I mused for a while on where the Nuran was going to sleep on a planet like Tare, where there was so little unoccupied land. Avoiding all contact with the descendants of Muina would be quite a task.

Not that he seemed to have had the least trouble finding me. If he had been sent to kill me, I'd be dead right now. I think in a way I've grown used to the idea of probably dying. That's what spending so much time in intensive care does for you.

Selkie didn't come back straight away, and I ended up playing one of the interface games I'd bought, caught up in the very curious world Tare had been before it had advanced so far technologically. Cave-dwellers, with their whitestone cities under a sky of stone, and thus with an 'outside' they would go out to, of sorts. Ionoth were present, but far less of an issue, and there was not this obsession with the yet-to-be-formed Setari. Instead the focus was on sorties into the surrounding darkness of the caves, and tunnels leading to undiscovered parts. It was Tare's 'Here Be Dragons' stage, and really quite a different world.

When First Squad came back from rotation, Maze replied to my email with: "Urth person is asking for a lecture. I'll see you shortly." But it was Ruuel, not Maze, who showed up first, walking in and sitting opposite me while I was preoccupied with a puzzle. I felt him there, and shut down the game, opening my eyes.

"The trigger technique was not successful?" he asked, presumably having spotted the huge circles under my eyes.

"Long nightmare about looking for triggers," I said, shrugging. "Will try the action variation tonight." That was where a particular action on your own part, like a hand signal, was the trigger to wake up. "Do you think Nuran was actually answering my question, or just being deeply annoying?"

He tilted his head slightly. "It is possible that your abilities are triggering during your dreams purely because you have no control over them waking. Have you been practicing sensing the location of those around you?"

I nodded, though it was not so much practising as I increasingly happened to know people were on the far sides of walls.

"When the Cruzatch first attacked you in Kalasa, did you sense it before you saw it?"

That was hard to answer. "Don't really know. Don't think I heard it, but something made me look up."

"We'll try a visualisation exercise until Isten Notra is ready. Close your eyes."

I gave him a rather wry look, which he didn't react to, and after a moment I obediently shut my eyes, despite knowing my face had gone red. And I was stupidly happy. It's the feeling that I'm an annoyance to him – and the idea that he and Taarel are together – that bothers me. I'm still not pleased that he went along with upsetting me for the purposes of testing, but – yeah, I can't pretend that that or even the high probability that he's in love with Taarel cured me of wanting him.

For the visualisation exercise he described a room. High ceiling, Pillars, some low cushioned benches, and a whole bunch of square display cases with different things in them – old weapons and jars and jewellery. I had to hold a picture of what he was describing in my mind, and repeat it back to him with every thing he added. One of those memory games. I was surprised at how easy I found it. Ruuel describes things very vividly, and I could really see the room, so had no trouble repeating back the contents, but started to struggle with an increasing headache.


"This is making my head hurt," I said eventually, opened my eyes and then flinched because everything around me was blurry and seeing that felt like a needle going into my brain. Just faintly, I glimpsed the room he'd described, superimposed on Selkie's office, but then I had to close my eyes and do rather a lot of head-clutching. Ruuel, after a little pause, moved me to another room and called a medic up to drug me to the point where the pain was pushed behind a wall, but didn't really go away. I was very wan and shaky when Maze and Selkie arrived, but at least could open my eyes.

They'd ordered food, and eating did help me a little, but I mainly wanted a dark place to curl up in, and only half paid attention to Ruuel describing the results of the visualisation – not looking at the log file he shared at all – until he started pointing out details in the ghostly image overlaid on Selkie's office which he hadn't mentioned but which were in the museum he'd been describing. And something which he didn't remember being there. Not to mention that the things he had described were exactly correct.

"We will obtain a current log of the museum for comparison," Selkie said. He paused a beat, then added to me: "Attempting to use this ability to see your own world would be crass stupidity."

Guess I'd been looking too obviously delighted. "Probably," I agreed, reluctantly. "Will stay away from trying to visualise Earth until have better idea of limits. Dream visualisation I had night before last of sheep was set on Muina though. And one with origami cranes was Earth building. Possibly all the energy isn't in the looking but the reproducing."

"Either way, you will limit visualisations to controlled experiments until further notice. Knowledge of the expansion of these abilities remains restricted to the assigned squads. For the short term, the other events of today are wholly restricted, even within your squads."

He brought Isten Notra into channel with us then, and she gave us a very cheerful run-down of the content of the Nuran history.

"What this book primarily gives us is confirmation of certain assumptions, and a timeline, but also a few discoveries," she said. "The author was not directly involved in the creation of the Pillars, but details her memories of the project from the time it was first proposed by a group called House Dayen. The major revelation is that stabilising travel through deep-space was only a fortuitous additional benefit, while their primary goal was the aether, which was intended to power what is termed as 'great devices'. There was considerable debate between the controlling houses regarding the risks, and it was the unexpected support of a House Zolen which saw the project move forward. The author notes that during the period of construction, House Zolen also built a number of 'insufferably proud' underground dwellings, which is almost certainly a reference to the Arenrhon installation.

"The Pillars project was considered a resounding success until gates began to tear between real-space and near-space. Ionoth became an immediate issue, and after numerous attacks House Dayen created the Ddura using one of these 'great devices'. The disaster followed only five days later. First, news of an attack by unknowns on House Dayen, swiftly followed by loss of contact with Kalasa. And reports were received from those within sight that a wound had appeared on 'Daman', which is one of the names for the Muinan moon.

"Nurioth and Teklata fell silent within hours of Kalasa. Most of what the author terms 'focus towns' were not responding, but one reported that the platforms had ceased to work, and instead 'stung' any who touched them. Those settlements still with mind-speakers shared what little knowledge they had, and there was considerable argument as to whether the Ddura were responsible, as the Ddura cannot access Kalasa, and that was the city which fell first. Within a day of Kalasa's loss, as more and more voices fell silent, a decision was made to flee."

Isten Notra paused, then added: "What remains gives us some more detail on the methods used to access deep-space, and protect a sizeable town's worth of refugees from the aether and Ionoth encountered."

"Thought aether came from platform towns, not deep-space," I said, finding that the more my headache receded, the harder it was to stay awake.

"Indeed," Isten Notra said. "Our observations have certainly shown that aether is generated on Muina. Whether all the aether encountered in the Ena is that same aether is yet to be ascertained."

"How much does this change?" Maze asked.

"In the short term, nothing. The information about the Arenrhon installation usefully establishes that it was not part of the Pillars project, but does not explain its actual purpose. Perhaps it is one of these 'great devices'. But much of the book merely establishes a timeframe and order for information we already have."

"And leaves open the question of why this Inisar of Nuri has been forbidden to speak, yet chooses to pass this on," Ruuel said, and I thought this a fair point, but was too busy falling asleep to even hear the response.

I woke in my apartment – on the window seat, not in the bedroom, and all neatly tucked up. I'm guessing it was Maze who brought me back, but would he know I needed to sleep in the window seat at the moment?

Isten Notra had sent an email with the first few pages of the book translated, and I suppose that fact that they're leaving the translation to her for the moment is a demonstration of the current level of secrecy. I guess that's to protect Inisar, since there was a possibility the Nurans had spies on Tare. The history book becoming public knowledge would basically be a statement to the Nurans that Inisar had betrayed them. I find it more than uncomfortable to not be able to talk about this to the rest of First Squad or Fourth Squad, but I'll make sure to keep my mouth shut.

I've been switched to the same shift as Fourth Squad, with all my appointments being weapons training in the morning and Sights training in the afternoons, with a little physical training wedged in between. And in another week it's back to Muina, so it's obvious they've decided to use me to find Kalasa. First, Second, Third and Fourth will all be part of the same mission.

Just now I'm more worried about six nights of coping with the problems in my head, than anything a whole week away on Muina.

Friday, June 6

Keszen Point Warehouse

No dreams last night. Nor yesterday after the meeting. Not that I can remember, anyway. I'm not quite ready to relax, but I'm starting to hope.

One thing about switching to the later shift is that I'm awake when The Hidden War premieres each week, although I'm not going to make the mistake of watching it with company again. Last night's episode was mission-focused and action oriented, except for the last ten minutes or so when Nori, the main character, is called to a testing chamber and – along with the godly-good and lusted-after-by-everyone captain of Squad Emerald – tests the newly-discovered enhancement talents of the wide-eyed and kittenish stray. Then Nori was assigned to give the stray some basic combat training and baby-sit her.

I don't think it's a good thing to have a link made between Zan and the main character. Nori's not her squad's captain, and doesn't look at all like Zan, but just like Zan (so far as I can tell) she's painfully and secretly devoted to the godly-good and lusted-after-by-everyone senior captain. And I bet Zan's going to get all sorts of smirky comments from that bitch Forel thanks to that. I debated contacting her, but I figure Zan was going to be taking a firm attitude of indifference toward anything on The Hidden War, and that there was no need to add my voice to the crowd. But I'll make sure to try and chat with her in the next few days.


This morning's shooting practice went much better, since I'd actually had some rest beforehand and wasn't distracted by any imminent meltdown. I'm still terrible at knowing one of the targets is 'sneaking' up behind me – since they're not alive my brand-new people detector doesn't help at all – but I'm getting better at remembering to check occasionally. I still miss moving targets 99% of the time.

I had lunch/dinner with Maze, who confirmed the reason why the Nuran's book is so secret is not wanting to give away that he'd helped us. He doesn't know how long it will be kept from the squads. Apparently Drake has given me a good report for overall improvement, and Maze wants me to focus on getting comfortable with the practice, to try and make shooting an automatic thing.

"Why didn't you share your theories about the Cruzatch?" he asked toward the end of lunch.

I shrugged. "They nothing new. Couple people at Arenrhon saying almost same thing, and no way to confirm it. Don't like it when total guesses mine given weight just because I say it. Asked Nuran because hoping he knew answer. Do you think that what they are?"

"My guess isn't any better than yours," Maze said, and looked sad. Maze knows he's not exactly impartial where Cruzatch are concerned, which is another reason I wasn't keen to start making guesses.

I left to go meet Ruuel, intending to be early but miscalculating how long it would take to get there. Instead of a testing room, we were supposed to meet at Transport Platform 15, which turned out to be a train station deep underneath the island. Ruuel and Ista Chemie were waiting for me, and he started out with his usual terse briefing as we all boarded a lone train carriage.

"We're travelling to Keszen Point, where we'll be conducting testing for this week. For the next two days we'll concentrate on similar visualisations to yesterday – testing whether you will react to a description of a place that is unknown to the person describing it, and how much detail you require. Two talents seem to be in play – the ability to see the place, and then reconstructing it using the Ena – but don't concern yourself with separating the two immediately."

"Testing there because I might damage things?" I asked, and he nodded as the train started off. It was a very zippy one – I think the line might be used to shift freight swiftly around the underneath of the island. I looked Keszen Point up, and found it was an outlying rock off one side of Konna. A big boxy warehouse, with a few side rooms. It was cold and echoey, smelled of ocean and something acrid, and they had rearranged countless packing crates to the edges so that the entire centre was empty except for a couple of tables and chairs, and a scanning chair for me. There was another greysuit waiting – a gadgets type – and a man called Far Dara who I gathered was the person in charge of the warehouse, who I bet just loved having to turn it into a test facility for a week, but who hid his opinion well and was formally polite, showing us the few amenities of the place.

"Is it possible to go outside?" I asked, which seemed a simple request, but involved a lot of blank looks as to why I'd want to, and then checking the weather. But Tsa Dara was willing to show me, and Ruuel didn't object. I had to talk Ista Chemie into coming: she was typically Taren about going outside and maybe she was justified in that given we had to put on a harness with attached safety ropes. Then it was a double-airlock kind of arrangement before we were out and attaching our safety ropes to a railing/fence thing which ran around the edge of the small bit of rock which wasn't building.

It was the final hours of Tare's long dusk and you couldn't see much more than the outlines of the rocks we were standing on, and the shifting of the great waves almost to our height. But you could look up, and that was well worth it. High, black vertical rock, and then white city. I'd already known from my roof-visits that the whitestone wasn't lit, except in one or two points, but it still caught what light there was. And it was so high, so monumental, so unlike Earth that it really reminded me that I was living on an alien planet.

I leaned over the railing and pressed my hand on the top of a waist-high rock, cold and slimy. "I've been on this planet for half an Earth year and this is the first time I've touched it," I said, discovering some furry green moss-like stuff on one slope of the rock. "But best I can tell, most Tarens haven't even done this much. Is so strange for me to understand."

"Would the people of your world be so different?" Ista Chemie asked. I think being outside and looking up at Konna was a big thing for her – her voice was really strange.

"Hard to say how they'd be if they'd come to Tare like Muinans did. But if you transplanted population of Australia to Konna, every time the weather eased up enough not to be fatal, the roofs would be covered with people having picnics, and flying kites and hang-gliding and a few insane people base-jumping." I'd had to use English words, and laughed at how incomprehensible I must be. "In Australia, there's a job called surf life-saver. Spend all day at the beach watching for drowning people."

This was really good timing for one of the waves smacking the rocks below to be extra-large, and to break over the ground we were standing on. It wasn't enough to make any of us fall over, but Ruuel was abruptly a few millimetres away from me, a stabilising hand on my arm. He only said: "We'd best get started," and gestured for us to go back inside, but he hadn't moved away before he spoke, and I stopped being all chatty and started hoping I could get my mind off those few moments of him being so close, of how I'd felt his voice as well as heard it. I really didn't want to be projecting anything that was on my mind at that moment, and concentrated on thinking through the Taren alphabet backwards and things like that.

Ista Chemie was distracted by having shoes full of seawater, and Tsa Dara took her off to dry them. Nanosuits are so much better. I sat on the scan chair, and was glad of the other greysuit, who wanted to check the scanner's calibration. From there it was all business, with Ruuel reading out piece by piece details of an indoor garden with fountains and stony artwork. The description wasn't as well-done as when Ruuel used his own words, but it worked the same – and gave me another massive headache. Ruuel didn't let me open my eyes as quickly this time, which meant the headache was worse and I was completely limp and exhausted afterwards. I managed to stay awake for the trip back, though, and ended up sleeping it off in medical because Ista Chemie wanted to monitor me more. No nightmares. Maybe, just maybe, these exercises are exactly the right thing to do to stop me having them.

But I woke from my post-testing nap really knowing Ruuel wasn't there, and lay remembering his hand on my arm, the warmth of him, his breath just faintly stirring my hair.

I'm not succeeding at all in this getting over Ruuel thing.

Saturday, June 7

Echo of a wind chime

Since knowing Ruuel isn't there is still my dominant sensation on waking, I've taken to lying in bed for a while each morning trying to sense his location. My range is expanding, but the Setari quarters – including my own – all have various levels of shielding on them, and till now I've only be able to feel people if they're in the corridor on this or the next level up. This morning I knew Lohn was in his room, though, so it is possible for me to sense through their shielding.

And I can tell when Ghost is in my room, even when she's invisible. Something I've no intention of admitting.

Today's test was a fictional place, a magnificent underground hall with intricate and gorgeous murals on the walls and an incredible puzzle-pattern floor. Ruuel didn't tell me it was fiction beforehand, and it took longer for me to get any kind of mental image of it, but it still worked, producing a lot more detail than Ruuel had read from the novel the test was based on. I didn't get so immediate and overwhelming a headache the instant I opened my eyes this time, though the world went very blurry – two images overlaid on each other. The hall had an immense floor to ceiling wind chime, but no wind to blow it. Ruuel went over and touched it and it actually shifted in response.


There were people who came along as part of the room, though they hadn't been in Ruuel's description at all. Very grand and noble sorts, who didn't seem able to measure their clothes, which were all hanging sleeves and trains and twice as much fabric as necessary. When Ruuel touched the wind chime, they all looked at him, which startled me enough that I stopped concentrating on maintaining the image – which was good because I really felt myself stop that time. Though I could have lived without the headache afterwards. It felt like someone had smacked a huge gong right behind my eyes, and I had to lie still until Ista Chemie's medicking had taken the edge off.

"The scans are showing four distinct areas of brain activity," Ista Chemie said, while I was sipping one of the horrible restorative drinks she insists on giving me. "One only activates when you open your eyes while the others are in effect. Can you describe what you experience then?"

"Pain."

Ruuel gave me a captain-look, so I shrugged and added: "Two images overlaid, and a sense of...dissonance? It wasn't too bad this time until you touched the wind-chime and they all looked at you."

Ruuel frowned, then said: "Reviewing log."

I'll never get used to someone accessing the world through my eyes. Ruuel didn't give much away, just stared into the distance abstractly for a minute, then said calmly: "The people weren't visible to us. You're seeing both the image in this world, and the one in the Ena. The drone set at this location in near-space should confirm that."

I got a bit quiet after that, thinking things over. On the trip back Ruuel told me that tomorrow we'd start attempting to find a way for me to separate the talents and gain some measure of conscious control of them. If I had been feeling particularly daring I would have asked him if he had had a lot of difficulty untangling six different sights, but I was busy feeling headachy and worried. I never did get around to telling him I thought I should swap teachers. Even though I get all sad and repressed around him at times, I feel reassured knowing that he has no trouble seeing right through me. Right now I need all those Sights to keep me going off the rails. And I figure I can feel sad about him and Taarel, but see him every day, or feel sad about him and Taarel, and miserable because I don't get to see him at all.

Which is not what I'm worried about right now, but a useful distraction. I wish I wasn't so tired, but don't think I can keep myself awake any longer.

Sunday, June 8

Overwrought

I was getting ready for bed after yesterday's session when Mori sent me a channel request. "Feel like some company?" she asked, when I opened the channel. "I've been given a firm suggestion that I might want to sleep on your couch tonight."

My first reaction was to resent the babysitting, to hate being thought of as this weak-ass neurotic liable to fall apart without hand-holding. I almost told Mori that I was fine, but the problem was that I wasn't, so after an overlong silence I told her: "I think I'd be glad if you did."

"I'll be down in a moment, then." She sounded pleased, so at least I didn't have to feel she found being told to sleep on my couch annoying. And she was smart enough not to pretend that the idea was anything but an order, which is one of the things I like about Mori.

She brought a big, cushiony eiderdown with her, and was wearing a singlet, short-shorts and slippers – I'd love to know if anyone saw her in the elevator.

"You had a bad day, huh?" she said, plunking the eider on one of my couches. "I thought the testing was going well."

"I guess it is." I shifted from my window seat to the opposite couch, feeling embarrassed but stupidly relieved someone would be with me when I slept. "I just started thinking things through properly. The tests have been about places, rooms. Even though there was that whole horrible dream about the massive, it hadn't occurred to me that I could make Ionoth that might attack Setari in near-space."

"Really? It's the first thing I thought of. So you're worried you'll summon up something nasty?"

"Earth has some pretty scary stories." I could tell she didn't understand, that she thought I was scared for myself. "It's very annoying, because the more I tell myself not to worry, the more stressed I get about it. I never used to be like this."

I dimmed the lights back down, and told Mori about slumber parties. She told me about what it had been like for her when, at six, she was brought to Konna to be a Kalrani. During the early days, they'd been allowed to talk to their families as much as they wanted over the interface, and the training had focused mainly on physical education. Only the expansion of the interface network had been particularly distressing. After that, interface rights had slowly been pared back, and the training focused more on their talents.

Mori is glad that she became a Setari. She loves being in Fourth Squad, which is a very tight team, and really enjoys the exploration role, of being the first squad to go into a space. She's excited by everything they've done on Muina, and is looking forward to getting into Kalasa. She fell asleep trying to explain how she felt.

It took me a while longer, carefully doing my visualisations – sheep again, because I find that safest. I don't think I dreamed of sheep at all, dreamed instead of sleeping on the couch, comfortably aware of Mori curled up across from me. Right up until Mori suddenly leapt to her feet and sent a small bolt of lightning arcing across the room. She's only a minor electricity talent, and while the thing she hit squealed and jerked, it didn't go down. Lacking her nanosuit, she hoisted up my coffee table, swung it like an abortive hammer-toss, and threw it at the thing as it came at us.

Struggling out of my couch, I saw movement, started to yell a warning, but too late. A cat-sized purple-black bug hit her in the chest and she staggered backward as it hooked spindly legs around her arms and shoulders and stung her over and over. The first one hadn't been stopped by the table and came toward us as Mori went down. I fixated on another bug climbing over the back of the couch I'd been sleeping on, but I knew that I was sleeping, that I'd made it happen, and reached frantically for the bit of my head I'd felt in the wind chime room.

And woke up, Mori standing over me, a hand on my shoulder. "I'm not sure I want to know what you were dreaming," she said.

There were fading red welts on her chin and throat. I stared at them, feeling sick, then said: "Let's go to medical."

Mori was willing to go along with that, waiting for me to dress, then taking me with her up to her rooms so she could put on something over her bed-clothes. I could barely speak I was so upset, wanting to scream at her to hurry. When we finally got to medical and I insisted that she get scanned, telling the greysuits to look for a parasite in her chest, she was watching me with open concern, but told the greysuits to do as I said. And there was nothing, and I fainted.

I woke up in a scan-chair with three of the greysuits fussing over me trying to figure out why I'd passed out, and deciding eventually that it really was just relief. I'd only been unconscious a few minutes, but that had been enough time for one of the Setari to duck out into near-space to download the data recorded by my drone. After making certain I was no more than embarrassed, Mori brought me into a channel with Maze, Ruuel and Isten Notra.

"I'll share the visual on this if you don't mind, Caszandra," Isten Notra said, and linked the images recorded by the drone. I didn't say anything, just watched it, flinching inside and feeling incredibly sick. "These creatures exist on your world?"


"Only in story I was reading before went to Muina. They lay eggs in people. Is it possible to remove a talent from someone? Do brain surgery?"

"It's been done," Isten Notra said. "When the risk is judged great enough. Since your talent is unique, we would be extremely reluctant to go so far, especially when as yet you have not come anywhere close to the kind of power level you would need to produce Ionoth that endure."

"What you're creating in real-space seems closer to a tangible illusion than actual substance," Maze added. "There's no trace of it once you've stopped projecting."

"I don't want to wait until I kill someone to find out whether it's possible," I said, struggling not to sound as upset as I was. But my voice had gone high, and I had to swallow to make myself not shout.

"You're overlooking the important point," Ruuel said, interface 'voice' clipped and sure. "Unlike the dream of the Array massive, you were able to break out of this one. That after only a few days of training. You're now aware when your dreams have taken on a tangible aspect?"

"...yes."

"Then your current exercise, whenever you find yourself dreaming in this way, is to break out of it, no matter if the dream is threatening or not. And in future remember that Eyse is a considerably better fighter than you give her credit for."

He dropped out of channel, leaving me feeling I'd been overreacting, which in retrospect was no doubt exactly what he'd intended. Maze and Isten Notra spoke to me a little longer, just a few questions about the training of the last few days, then told Mori to take me back to my room.

Mori was trying unsuccessfully not to look hugely gratified – outright compliments from Ruuel are rare and preciously hoarded by his squad. "Combat Sight would have told me if I'd had a thing like that in my chest," she told me as we rode the elevator. "Do you think you'll be able to get back to sleep?"

"Maybe. I'll have a shower and read for a while. Fourth is on rotation tomorrow, yes?"

"Yes – but broken nights are half the reason rotations aren't scheduled for first thing."

Mori's a lot better at getting to sleep than me, out of it by the time I was finished in the shower. Instead of reading, I reviewed various bits of my log, mainly time I'd spent alone at Pandora and Arenrhon. Scenery. I fell asleep and didn't dream, and woke mid-morning to find my shooting practice cancelled and one of the 'extra-long and thorough' medical checks put in its place. I sensibly took my diary down. I've arranged lunch with Zan, since I saw she was free, and then it's training when Ruuel's back from rotation.

Eggshells

After my meltdown yesterday, I wasn't surprised when Maze came along for my test session, even though it finished around midnight in his 'day'. I can just picture all the discussions they're having on how to stop me going off the deep end.

Ruuel told me that today I had to try to use my talents separately – to see things without making them happen, to make things happen in the Ena and not in real-space, to make things happen in real-space but not in the Ena. He also said I should expect to fail. What I needed to focus on was becoming aware of the mechanism, concentrating on what I did.

He started out just describing an object, one which was found in many places, to see if I could consciously conjure something a little less over-the-top than an entire place. That worked. It took a lot longer to get an image of what he was describing, but wasn't as exhausting, so this session lasted a lot longer than previous ones. I also ended up with less of a headache, which was nice, but the cumulative effect of several projections in a row left me semi-conscious.

"I'm pleased you haven't given in to the temptation to try to create visions of your own world," Maze said on the trip back.

"Too tired of headaches to give myself more," I said, struggling to stay awake. "Besides, I think Tsur Selkie meant it about assigning a squad to me full-time. Think he'd put interesting far-sight experiments in the same category as chatting with – as not using my alert."

I managed not to look across at Ista Chemie, sitting opposite with Ruuel. It's very difficult to be all secretive about Nurans when you're sleepy.

"Range is part of the test outline," Ruuel said. "Scheduled for when we're on Muina."

For some reason I'd assumed my training would be on hold while chasing Kalasa. I wondered if I'd be sleeping two pods away from Ruuel again – and whether there'd be a drone recording my dreams. And promptly fell asleep. I think I slept on Maze, or dreamed I was sleeping on Maze, but it didn't feel the way it does when I'm projecting. I didn't try and force myself awake, anyway, and was back in my window seat when I did wake up.

Not long now until we head to Kalasa. I'd probably be worked up about that if the prospect of making monsters in my sleep wasn't sucking up all my Emo tendencies.

Monday, June 9

Moving Target

I dreamed of sheep last night, and managed to make myself wake up almost straight away. Which gave me a headache, but was also immensely reassuring. I don't know if I'll always be able to break out of them – or am always sufficiently aware of the dreams which I'm making 'real' as opposed to dreams which just seem real – but it did give me a faint sense that I might gain enough control to not be doing things accidentally all the time.

This morning brought a nice bunch of packages from a spending spree I'd indulged in when they scheduled my return to Muina. Another diary, since I'm past two-thirds on this one, and a little cold environment gear because Pandora is hitting Winter now. It took me forever to find a non-hideous beanie. People on Tare don't have a lot of call for hats, particularly not for the purpose of keeping warm. Most of what I could find was rainproof, heavy-duty, tied-down headgear for the poor bastards who have to venture outside for maintenance in all kinds of weather. Chapstick was a little easier to find, and I managed to put together a couple of tolerable Winter outfits and something which could pass as daywear or nightwear to sleep in. I was thoroughly sick of wearing my uniform all the time when we were at Nurioth and Arenrhon.

Lots of shooting practice. Drake had me in a different training room, with a maze where half a dozen greensuits stalked me. I had fake weapons which registered hits instead of actually working, and had to try and find my way through the maze without dying (having one of the greensuits grab me). As a game it could have been kind of fun, but they were all super-serious which made me feel stressed out and stupid. I died a lot.

After that Mara had me for some time in the gym. She soon had me talking about how hopeless I felt about ever coming close to being able to do something like get through that maze without dying.

"No-one expects you to," she said. "A couple of weeks of training isn't going to make you capable of picking off Cruzatch with a simple hand weapon. The force vest is what we're counting on to give you a chance, should you be transported alone." She made a face. "The arguments all this is causing are overwhelming, especially since most of those pushing to return you to Muina are unaware of the latest developments in your talent set. The Array massive has only exacerbated the debate, demonstrating to any who weren't already certain just how valuable your enhancement can be. But there's a sense that matters are becoming urgent, that we don't have the luxury to explore Muina at our leisure, and need to access Kalasa as soon as possible. Do you still feel that you'd rather get it over with?"

I shrugged. "Been more worried about killing everyone with nightmares. Do you – do you ever think you can't deal with being a Setari any more?"


Mara straightened on the knee-lift machine she'd been using, then unhooked her feet. "In the early days, when everything was new, we thought we were invincible. When Jorly – the first Setari to die on duty was Jorly Kennez, and if there had been some fault, some error of judgment which we could blame her death on, then perhaps it wouldn't have been so hard. But it was a rotation we had cleared a dozen times, we were all performing well, and still she died. A single lucky blow was all it took. It was only then that I really understood that we were fighting a war of attrition. And their numbers would never decrease. 'Lese – Helese Surion – helped me immensely with that, just by pointing out a few statistics on the number of lives not lost to Ionoth since we began."

"And then she died," I said, in a small voice. I hadn't expected Mara to really answer my question.

"Yes. Of the original First Squad, only Alay and I were left. Second, Third, Fourth and Seventh – as they were numbered then – had all lost someone. Lohn was injured, but not badly, and he gave me...more than I'd ever thought to have from him, an anchor that I needed. If I'd been in Maze or Alay's situation, losing the one who mattered most, I doubt I could have continued in the Setari. As it is, they're neither of them the people they once were. Though–" She paused, and made a wry face. "Maze was convinced, immediately convinced, that the Cruzatch were involved, were more than just escort Ionoth in that massive's wake. I thought his focus on them, his determination to prove that they had a level of agency above other Ionoth, was simply something he clung to after losing 'Lese. A way of dealing with his grief. Even after the Pillar – it wasn't until seeing them in Kalasa that I could let myself believe that we really have an enemy to blame. The impact of that is something I can't describe. And, of course, you had already given us the shift of air when you opened Muina."

She said then that I should go eat before my Sights training, but I stopped and hugged her and whispered, "Thanks," before I went, because she'd told me things that were personal to her, despite my second level monitoring, and that meant a lot to me. I had to look up what "shift of air" meant – it's a phrase a bit like "the light at the end of the tunnel", except it grew out of a past living deep underground and was all about being trapped in the crushing dark, suffocating, and then feeling a breeze, a hint of fresh air which told you there was a way out. And that's how Mara felt about being a Setari.

I liked the idea of an anchor. And I'd like to think First Squad is mine: the people I can turn to for comfort and support, who can help me keep it together. But I know it's Ruuel. Even the comfort, when I'm seriously on the edge. Well, sort of. Hand clutching counts.

Sight Sight talents apparently have an overwhelming need to understand. The Sight is always trying to puzzle out the world, and they see a lot of people's secrets, and I guess that's part of why Ruuel works for me – I always feel he sees me very clearly, that I haven't succeeded in hiding anything from him, and so he knows just what to do or say when I need it most. Of course, he's also doing his level best to keep me at a distance, but I'm okay with that at the moment. Right now I'm more interested in not Killing People With My Mind.

Tuesday, June 10

So over testing

Today I spent my Sights training session wondering if Ruuel was having nightmares too, since he looks like he's hardly been sleeping. He'd probably be amused if he knew I was worried about him. The session went well, though, and I'm feeling more confident that I'm not on the verge of self-destructing.

Tomorrow we go to Muina and now that I've stopped having dramatic daily nightmares, I'm having to work at not thinking about standing back on that platform.

Wednesday, June 11

Heading Out

Excellent surprise when I arrived with Lohn and Mara at the hanger to board the Litara. Isten Notra is coming with us. She told me that she'd been longing to go since Pandora was established. Shon is coming along to be her minion – nepotism at its finest, she said – and one of her bossy secretaries as well. She'll be living at Pandora for a while.

I worried about her, though I tried not to be all obvious about it. Isten Notra is what Tarens consider past retirement age and though she's incredibly sharp and not as wrinkled as your average ninety year-old from Earth, there's a fine fragility about her which I don't think really needs to be introduced to her first Winter.

I had fun exposing Shon to Eeli while the Litara hauled itself through a full-on storm to the rift. The atmosphere on this trip is difficult to define. The four most senior squads, all of them tight and professional, and 'friends' between the respective age groups, and I'm pretty sure they're all absolutely keen to see inside Kalasa. But Maze is tight-lipped and unusually terse, and I've caught people from every squad looking at me strangely. After having a primary assignment of keeping me alive, I think they're all trying to think up some last-minute way to avoid me standing on any platforms. I guess I am too, but I've been preparing myself for weeks because it always seemed inevitable, and the more they watch me for signs of imminent breakdown, the calmer I get. I just want to get it done, and then I can relax.

Nearly through the rift now. Today we're going to try me giving people security clearance. If that doesn't work, tomorrow I try to take Maze to Kalasa.

Big Boxes

The information being shown on the public channels on Tare is well behind the reality of Muina's settlement. They started building Pandora just three months ago and already it's become a living town, with external lighting and sidewalks and bits which will be gardens when it's not Winter. Of course, having buildings which just grow themselves in a few days, so long as they have enough raw material available, really makes it a lot easier, but they still would have had to do a huge amount of designing and planning and working out power and water and connecting up the toilet recycling system and air-conditioning and outfitting the interiors.

Over fifteen hundred people are living and working here.

There's only one or two 'small' individual buildings. The rest are 'blocks' three stories high and something like six suburban houses square. Quite huge, in other words. It reminds me a bit of the university campuses I toured (via website) halfway through last year, when trying to decide where to apply. Each of the blocks is devoted to a particular area of exploration and science – so far they've built blocks for animals, plants, geography, geology, weather, archaeology, devices and Ena research – along with a bigger central command thing, which combines coordination with greensuit barracks and supplies. There's a combination of both dorms and permanent accommodation in the science blocks, along with a few outer blocks which are primarily residential and something called 'services' which appears to be where everyone's food is cooked and laundry is done and stuff like that (though I don't think they have one centralised mess hall any more). And attached to that is the 'greenhouse' – just as much a big white block as all the rest, but devoted to ensuring that the settlement can survive even if the Litara stops showing up. I'm told they're already busily producing crops of Muinan plants identified as edible. And a lot of Taren algae which is processed into food.

To my surprise, although there's some similarities to the severely plain central command block, someone has actually put some thought into appearance when designing the rest of them. There's all kinds of etched patterns and designs breaking up the severity of the whitestone, and lots of windows (almost all opaquely shuttered to keep out the cold or the view). And sloping roofs! Just a mild tilt – you could probably walk around on them quite safely, but definitely sloping, with some gorgeous patterns cut into them which also serve to direct drainage. Even the central block had been retrofitted so that its roof slopes.


"I'm impressed," I told Isten Notra, peering out the window of the ten-person shuttle taking us from the Litara directly to the central amphitheatre of the old town. "Tarens remembered that buildings have outsides."

"The cities we will one day build on this world..." Isten Notra began, then stopped and hugged me. "We will make it our home again. Thank you for that, Caszandra."

This embarrassed me incredibly, of course, though I am getting more used to people thanking me emotionally for something I did by accident. I distracted myself by digging into my backpack and pulling out the two beanies I'd bought. I gave Isten Notra the blue and purple one and talked about things I'd learned on my two whole trips skiing at Thredbo, particularly that you lose a surprising amount of heat through the top of your head. Isten Notra was very sensibly dressed, but like everyone else who'd been travelling on the Litara, had nothing resembling headgear. She thanked me and plonked it on right away, making her secretary act like he'd just eaten a lemon. I think beanies might count as 'little kid hats' on Tare or something. Lohn certainly looked like he was trying not to laugh.

I didn't particularly care, though. My beanie was two shades of green and when they opened the shuttle door I was damn glad I'd brought it. It was cold enough to make my nose hurt, and everyone's breath steamed out in clouds. It hasn't snowed at Pandora yet, but they think it will very soon, and you can see a dusting of white on the higher hills in the distance.

New arrivals to Muina are always taken first thing to a platform to be cleared, and whenever possible are all done at once to avoid making the Ddura anxious. There were about twenty newcomers on this trip, easily handled. I stayed on one side of the arena with First Squad as Shon and Isten Notra became official Muinans. The Ddura showed up midway through the process, and made happy noises, but was far less wildly exuberant than those first days. The question of whether I could give people access to Kalasa was settled as soon as the shuttle took the new arrivals off to the warmth of the buildings. No.

I tried thinking all sorts of commands at the platform, but it didn't react at all as it does when it gets told people are Muinans. And no-one was teleported anywhere standing on it. Maze didn't push against the inevitable once we'd run through the test options, having Mara take me off to the medical section in the main block for the headache the Ddura had given me. It's not as excited as it was, and shuts up more on command, but it does still hang about letting off occasional moans if people play with the platform. He's scheduled the mission for quite early the next day since by then it was evening for me and very late in First Squad's 'day', though only just sunset at Pandora.

After my headache had lifted, Maze sat with me to explain exactly what we'll be trying tomorrow, and was being very calm and reassuring, but with his eyes so unhappy. I wish I could make him feel better about this. They want me bunk down here in medical tonight, thoroughly monitored. I can see they're worried I'll have nightmares about Kalasa, and I can't tell them what's distracted me from tomorrow. You see, it's occurred to me that there's a faint possibility that Ruuel was at least partially aware of the 'good dreams'. If I could make Mori feel she was being stung by giant insects, could Ruuel have spent night after night on the Diodel wondering why it felt like there was a girl snuggling up against him?

It's an awful thought. I'm hoping it's just me being paranoid, since I suspect that if he'd been aware of the strangeness of my dreams at Arenrhon he'd have sent me straight for testing. But now that he does know, and now that I definitely am strong enough to make people feel things, I get to be all worried about having a good dream, instead of looking forward to it.

Ruuel has been tied up with something. I glimpsed him once on the Litara, but it was only during the platform experiments that I was close enough to see he still looks tired, and I haven't seen him since then. I don't know if the Setari are even in the same building – except for Jeh from Second, who seems to have drawn first babysitting shift, and is in the next room. It's probably best if Ruuel's far away, preferably somewhere shielded.

Unfair. Good dreams about Ruuel had almost made me look forward to this mission. But while I have no problems with me privately having all sorts of fantasies about him, it's totally another ball game making him have dreams about me.

I'll try for otters.