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I'm finally done with the first draft of Chapter 1. Onto chapter 2, Watched.
In the first scene, Kendra's Quarters, you learn what happened to Kendra after she returned to the colony, and become familiar with some of Kendra's friends. She needs fellow conspirators to get in trouble with, after all ;-)
Kendra lay down on the bunk within her barracks. Darkness had fallen across the colony now, and the lights of her room were turned down low, as she was fighting a horrible headache. Most of her bunk-mates were currently at dinner, but her stomach was twisted in knots, and the last thing she wanted to do was eat.
The Spirit Dawn colony had been Kendra's home for six months now. She had been one of the first humans to land, after the colony material had descended with the first shuttles, guided by android workers. Once the initial habitats were set up, the human workers, the "flesh-and-blood" androids, had followed, plus their immediate supervisors, the “low-tech” humans, the Sub-Hybrids, that were among the more expendable.
Kendra had been among these workers. While often derided, there were advantages to being a Non-Hybrid. She and her friends were considered expendable. This often meant they were the first in, checking out problems aboard ship, and the first to land on Shendar.
Matthew had brought Kendra back to the Spirit Dawn colony around noon to the hospital, a small building in the main complex. She was fed, hydrated, and given a round of anti-biotics to fight off anything she might have caught in the wilds, that could cause her fever.
During the treatment, which Kendra did not like because she hated being confined to a bed. She also kept the noise in her head to herself, the singing valley, and the feeling like a warm river running through her body.
The hospital kept her under observation that day and the following night, but during the night Kendra's fever broke. She was released the at the end of the following day, with permission to return to duty.
"What did you think you were doing? It is dangerous going out there by yourself. We know next to nothing about this world yet, other than this small valley that we have landed in. Not to mention that I’m sure everyone knows you were gone, and you are going to be in some serious trouble."
The person talking was Matthew. Pacing in front of the bunk where Kendra was sitting, Matthew had a pained, worried look on his face. Matthew and Kendra knew each other well, having worked together for the past couple of years, even before they had arrived on the colony world. He was also Kendra's best, most trusted friend.
Matthew had short-cropped, blond hair, and a heavy build. He was a couple years older than Kendra, now eighteen Sols. Standing almost six feet tall, his size dwarfed that of the younger girl. He had a rounded face, one that smiled easily but was now filled covered with lines of stress.
Like Kendra, Matthew was a non-Hybrid, unable to access the colony's Song, the river of thoughts from the people of the colony, all accessible to all other colonists. For him, too, it was quiet. And for this the Non-Hybrids were not trusted. People regarded them as "secretive", and threats, even though everyone knew it was not the choice of the Non-Hybrids in their physical rejection of the Song technology.
It was easy to tell the Hybrids from the "Nons", as Matthew did not have any evidence of chips embedded under the skin, along his arms, neck, or skull. Matthew's body, his nervous system, was not "evolved" enough, and could not handle the digital connections required to interface with the river of thoughts, or the separate interface into what was known as the Grid, the computer networks aboard ship that allowed most everyone to access the shipboard and planet-side computers mentally, using their mind's eye as the video screens, or overlaying their actual sight with electronic displays.
This lack of technology in Matthew made him feel inferior, but to Kendra he was beautiful. She saw Matthew as herself, more a part of nature than just an extension of the computer systems that she viewed as ruling the colony.
Like all of the non-Hybrids of the colony, Matthew's classification was that of Worker, those colonists that were deigned to do non-intellectual, grunt work, with the direction of the more-evolved, of the technologically advanced.
He and Kendra had been working together for a couple of years now, first aboard the Phoenix, and now planet-side. They had both been trained as mechanics, and would physically lay computer cables, cooling hoses, and the like. Matthew liked to say that he helped to make ships "breathe", to live, that he helped the ship to be a living thing. He longed to talk with the ship, with its technology, more intimately, and was bitter at not being able to use the Grid to communicate with it, instead having to rely on outdated interfaces - voice, keyboard, and touchscreen.
"Please stop," Kendra replied. "Not so loud." Her voice came out almost in a whisper. She knew she was going to get a lecture from her friends, and especially Matthew, but right now she did feel up to it. She was back in the barracks, and sitting on the lower bunk, head in her hands.
"Leave her alone for now, Matt."
This was Sarah, another one of their friends, though Kendra suspected that Sarah was much more interested in the young man also in the room. She would be a good match for Matthew, Kendra thought. She was happy, carefree, in a way that Kendra only wished she could be.
Sarah was just a tad smaller than Matthew, and she was very cute. She had a roundish face, and had freckles that always broke out with sunlight. She had long blonde hair, usually tied back in a ponytail that hung all the way down to her buttocks. She was a bit older than the others, now having lived for twenty-two Sols. And she had filled out like a woman. Her body was curvy, full in the chest, with sexy rounded hips. When she smiled, whatever room she was in became brighter, at least to the men close by.
But while Sarah was able to capture a man's heart easily enough, she seemed unable to keep them in a serious relationship. Sarah, like Kendra and Matthew, was considered technologically "defective". Her body, her nervous system, also resisted integration with technology. But her disability was less pronounced than that of her two friends. She could not hear the Song, but could access simple computers and security cameras on the network. Her abilities were generally not good enough to master the computers she could access, but was good enough to look up information.
Hence she was good enough to head up guard-duty in the base, and both Matthew and Kendra. Though Kendra and Matthew were assigned to a different unit, and more often when on explorations of the valley, at times her friends were under her direct command, and she would have to become distant. This, fortunately, was not one of those times. Kendra much preferred the concern of a good friend than the reprimand of a superior officer.
"I understand the desire to explore this new world we are on, Kendra, and the freedom that it seems to give us. But you cannot just go out on your own. You are already going to get a reprimand for this, and I hope you don't get any time in the brig. You really must not do that again!"
Kendra lay back on the bed, closing her eyes. "I know, I know," she mumbled. "But this colony is so stifling. I thought, if we could just get to this world, that once we arrived things would change. We would be able to set up farms or schools, that we wouldn’t be under the all-seeing eye of the government anymore!"
Sarah and Matthew exchanged uncomfortable glances. Such things being said were usually logged.
"Don’t say things like that around me. I don't know if the my tech level allows for remote recording." Sarah's faced Kendra, her face turning stern. That look, it made Kendra nervous. She glanced at Matthew, who gave her a knowing look. If what Sarah heard was recorded, and if anyone in command was looking for trouble-makers, Kendra was now on their list.
Kendra sighed. Here, in the colony, she had to play her part.
"I know," she said. "It won’t happen again."
"See that it doesn't," Sarah demanded. She then turned, and left Matthew and Kendra alone.
Kendra closed her eyes again and draped one arm over her forehead, moaning.
"You can't just go around saying things like that with Sarah around. You will get her in trouble. You'll get us in trouble as well."
"It's not like she is going to report us," Kendra protested.
"She doesn’t have to report us, not if what she hears is being recorded," Matthew declared. "Don't give The Assembly more reason to distrust us, Kendra. They’re already going to be watching you very closely after that stunt you pulled yesteday. What made you want to go outside the colony anyways? I mean, I get the exploring, but you will have more than enough time to explore this world. You can’t explore if you get thrown into the brig."
Kendra wanted to wish Matthew away right then. She didn’t need the lecture, but she knew he was right. What she had done was reckless. But she had felt so free! It might be unwise, it might be wrong, but Kendra already knew she was going to go exploring again on her own.
"So, what was it like?"
Kendra opened her eyes and looked up at her friend.
"What do you want to know?" she asked.
"Well, we’ve tried to send out probes that have gone beyond the rim of this valley, and our ships in orbit have done some recording of the surrounding land despite the interference, but I think you've gone the farthest on foot of anyone in the colony. What was it like?"
Matthew smiled down at the young lady before him, and she couldn't help but smile back. Her head hurt, her body hurt, but she had had a fun adventure, and she wanted to share it with one of the few people in the colony she could trust.
"I want to tell you some secrets," she said, "but you have to promise to keep these things to yourself. Don't even tell Sarah."
"I promise," he agreed. Kendra said up on the bunk, and Matthew plopped down beside her. She looked around the room, uncertain, and he added, "Okay, let's go for a walk. You need some air anyway."
Kendra pulled on a gray jacket, one of those provided to the "workers" of the colony. Matthew followed suit, and they stepped out of the barracks. Kendra moved slowly, as incredibly sore as she was. Matthew put his arm around her, to help support her. They walked down several hallways, all of which looked the same, dull gray metal, small lights running along the top. It was so functional, unimaginative, unartistic. Sterile.
In a few minutes, they stepped out a side-door to the barracks. The barracks was toward the edge of the colony, and before them not 10 yards away was a wall, 15 feet high and lined with guard towers. The wall wasn't complete, and there were gaps in the defenses, which is why she had been able to slip out the day before. But the wall was being constructed quickly, and within a month or two the entire colony would be surrounded by the wall, the only way in or out through designated gates.
It was for their "protection", of course.
But to the carefree young lady, it was a prison.
Close by was a pair of androids, operating machinery that was preparing more large metal sections of the wall that would later be lifted into place. Kendra knew that behind the androids' eyes were human operators, controlling the artificial lifeforms by connections via the grid. The androids could perform many of the tasks independently, but it was military rules that all androids be watched, controlled.
Not that different from how they treat us, Kendra thought.
Matthew and Kendra angled away from the androids, who turned briefly to watch them walk away. The Hybrids controlling them may have been surprised at the sight of the humans, two humans that could not be heard in the Song. After a moment, both androids turned back to the work at hand.
The young pair moved onto a tree-lined walkway, away from any buildings, and hopefully they were free of the surveillance microphones and cameras that seemed to be everywhere.
The sun was now dipping behind the mountains to the west, and long shadows were cast over them by the nearby trees. Kendra shivered as the temperature began to drop, something that happened quickly on this alien world.
"So," Matthew said in a low voice. "Why don’t you tell me what it is like out there?" He looked down at the small woman who was still leaning on him for support.
"You wouldn't believe the things that I saw," Kendra began. She told him about the strange creatures that she had encountered, the large beast with the horns, the birds, all of the wildlife. He had seen many of them on his own, authorized, expeditions exploring the valley, but the large beast intrigued him.
Matthew was amazed at the description of the glow that surrounded the beast, and the way it had tried to communicate with Kendra. And he became very worried for his friend after the description of the way the beast had assaulted her with its strange powers in the hidden valley.
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