Earth Girl (33 page)

Fian and I headed out of the hall door. We could only faintly hear Dig Site Command in the corridor, but they were loud and clear in the portal room.

‘This is Dig Site Command. When you’ve found your control units, can team leaders please call in your team numbers, dome, and status. The messaging service is going to be limited to emergency messages and may fail entirely. A lot of teams decided to go off world for a break rather than sit out a three day portal outage. We’re not sure who actually managed to get off world, and who got caught by the portal lockdown. We want to know who is here, and where you are, so we can help each other out in emergencies.’

‘This is Beowulf 4,’ said a voice. ‘Six people here. Our team was in the middle of portalling out when the system locked down.’

‘This is Earth 19. There are twenty-nine of us.’

‘Found it!’ I cried. The box was hidden away on the wall behind the portal control system. I flipped open the cover. ‘This must be the remote unit.’

I took it out and headed back to the dining hall, where Rono was still searching round the food dispensers.

‘I think this is the remote, sir.’

‘Wonderful. Someone tell team 2 that Jarra found it.’

He peered at the remote, pressed a button and spoke. ‘This is Cassandra 2.’ His voice echoed from some speaker overhead, so it was clearly working. ‘We have ten people here.’

Teams kept calling in for a few minutes, and then it went quiet.

‘This is Dig Site Command. If anyone else is out there and can’t find the control box, please call us over the usual impact suit system. We’ll patch you in from that.’

There was about five minutes of silence, then the voice came over the speakers again. ‘This is Dig Site Command. We’re getting no calls on the suit system, and the team check is consistent with what we knew of everyone’s plans. Surprisingly enough, the old inter-dome system is still working despite being abandoned fifty years ago. This is a situation that only happens every five hundred years, so I think we can relax the usual Dig Site communication protocols a little unless any emergencies crop up. Feel free to chat a little.’

‘This is Achilles 1,’ said a voice that sounded strained but deeply thankful. ‘We’d like to thank whoever remembered the old dome comms system. I didn’t even know we had it. I’ve got a class of thirty Foundation course students here, and we got caught just before we left for Achilles. My students were starting to feel a bit isolated, so this is reassuring them a lot.’

I could imagine what the Achilles 1 lecturer was facing. If Asgard 6 had been trapped at their dome, Playdon would have had blind panic on his hands.

‘This is Dig Site Command. Remember you aren’t alone. Our count says we have 238 people in the dig site domes, and there are five of us here at Dig Site Command. It was mostly the research teams that stayed, so there are a lot of highly experienced people nearby to help.’

‘This is Earth 8. I think we’re in the next dome to you, Achilles 1, so if you have problems we can reach you by hover sled in about fifteen minutes.’

‘This is Achilles 1. Thank you for that Earth 8. It’s reassuring but don’t take unnecessary risks. My class is feeling rather happier now.’

‘This is Earth 8. Just shout if you need company. We’re an Earth team, we’re all Handicapped and used to carrying on life as normal during a portal outage. I admit this one is a bit special, but the inter-dome system will help a lot.’

‘This is Earth 19. We’re happy to hover sled to anyone needing help as well.’

‘This is Beowulf 4. We’re only pathetic little scared exos, but we would try and help too.’

‘This is Dig Site Command. We’d rather have everyone staying safe in their domes, but if anyone has problems then just call and we’ll work out who is closest and can assist. Any other Foundation courses out there?’

Rono spoke into his handset. ‘This is Cassandra 2.’

‘This is Dig Site Command. You can’t fool me, Rono, you aren’t a Foundation course.’

Rono laughed. ‘I’ve ten people here, but only eight are my team. As some of you know, Stephan is in Hospital Earth for a few more weeks yet, and his wife is staying with him. We had two visitors from Asgard 6 Foundation course with us when the portals went into lockdown.’

‘This is Dig Site Command. Does that mean you have tag leader Jarra with you?’

‘This is Cassandra 2. We have tag leader Jarra and her tag support Fian with us.’

‘This is Dig Site Command. I hope you’ll treat your guests extremely well. They did a very fine job there.’

‘This is Beowulf 4. That was great work on the rescue. What we want to know is has Cassandra 2 paid their traditional debt yet?’

Rono held the handset towards me and I nervously spoke into it. ‘This is Jarra. They gave me the most wonderful impact suit of my very own.’

‘This is Dig Site Command. If they hadn’t, then they’d have been banned from every dig site. It’s a long standing tradition among the professionals who work the sites. If the tag leader who digs you out doesn’t have their own suit yet, then you buy them one.’ There was a short pause. ‘While we’re checking up on who is out there, do we have any medical experts?’

‘This is Earth 19. We have a qualified doctor on the team, though obviously she has limited medical equipment.’

‘This is Dig Site Command. That’s good to know. All domes should have emergency medical supplies. Call on Earth 19 for advice if you need to give anyone any medication. The nearest settlement has a hospital unit but that’s several hours away by hover sled.’

Fian tapped me on the arm, so I turned to look at him.

‘Jarra, I was checking what was happening with the messaging system. It says absolute priority goes to the emergency messages, but they’re going to try and keep some of the other services open for compassionate reasons. Contract Registry is one of them. I know our families aren’t here to witness, but in the circumstances … It would be really romantic.’

I stared at him. I was grazzed.

‘Jarra, can we Two? We could call up now and register …’

I hadn’t expected it to happen this soon, but let’s be honest. Ever since I pinned him to the floor of his room and kissed him, I’d intended to tag Fian with a Twoing contract one day. How could I say no to registering it now? Just imagine. One day, we might be telling our children how we registered our first Twoing contract during the Carrington event. Nothing could be more zan than that!

I grinned. ‘Call them!’

Fian kissed me, and called Registry on his lookup. It was slow, desperately slow. Several minutes ticked by. They might be trying to keep Registry open, but Earth was heading into a solar super storm and maybe we wouldn’t get through.

Dig Site Command and the other teams were still chatting away over the inter-dome system. We were cut off. Humanity’s scientists were finally going to discover whether its technology, carefully designed to survive solar storms, could actually cope with a Carrington event. It was rather scary, but somehow the inter dome system had turned it into a sort of party. We weren’t alone. The dig teams were facing the unknown together. I hoped Achilles 1 were feeling that too.

‘I’m through,’ said Fian. He entered codes fast, and placed his hand on the lookup screen to verify his identity.

By now the Cassandra 2 team had realized what was going on, and were clustered round us watching. We had another long wait before the system accepted the data. Every safety protocol they had was being used to protect equipment from the solar storm, so the system was literally down to crawl speed.

Fian thrust the lookup towards me. ‘Quick before we lose connection.’

I entered codes, clumsy with haste, and placed my hand on the screen.

There was another painfully long wait. Fian and I exchanged agonized looks. Having decided to do this, we wanted it desperately. It would be the greatest let down in history if the connection failed now.

‘Come on!’ I ordered the lookup. ‘It’s stuck in the middle of verifying I haven’t got a current contract registered.’

‘You’d better not have,’ Fian teased. ‘That’s an automatic fraud conviction.’

‘Registry could have lost connection to the data net or …’ A message popped up on the screen. ‘It’s through!’

Fian grabbed the lookup and read the message. ‘Your Twoing contract is officially on record and valid for the next three months. Congratulations and best wishes from Registry.’

‘Congratulations!’ chorused the Cassandra 2 team.

Fian blushed. ‘I suppose this seems a bit rushed to you.’

‘Not at all,’ said Rono. ‘Tag leader and tag support often develop an intense relationship pretty fast.’

‘I’m betting Jarra got buried,’ said Keren.

Fian and I looked at him, startled. I’m not sure what our faces gave away, but everyone laughed.

‘Don’t worry,’ said Rono. ‘It’s like tag point itch. It happens to a lot of people. When anyone gets buried or hurt, the rest of the team tend to react strongly. Just look at me!’ He tapped the scar on his forehead, and there was another ripple of amusement from the Cassandrans at what was obviously a private joke.

‘I’d suggest opening some wine to celebrate,’ continued Rono, ‘but we need to keep clear heads during the Carrington event. Another dome might need help from us, and I don’t want a drunken team making a journey by hover sled through the snow and the wolf packs.’

‘Pity we couldn’t actually get married,’ said Fian. ‘We haven’t got the three prior contracts and the full year required.’

I giggled. ‘I think actually getting married would definitely be rushing things too much.’

Rono spoke into the handset. ‘This is Cassandra 2. Sorry to interrupt the conversation, but I’m sure you’d all like to know that Jarra and Fian just signed up for a Twoing contract.’

‘This is Earth 19. That’s a wise move, Jarra. Fian’s a good tag support, so you want to hold on to him.’

Rono handed me the hand set for a moment. ‘This is Jarra. I know that, and I’ve got Fian firmly tagged!’

‘This is Dig Site Command. I want that officially confirmed by Fian. Let’s hear from him.’

Fian blushed and spoke into the handset. ‘I’m definitely tagged and pinned down.’

There was the sound of laughter and cheering from what sounded like several different teams.

Rono took the handset back. ‘This is Cassandra 2. You’ll have to excuse us for a few minutes now. We’ve got a lot of spare rooms in our domes, but they’re all singles. I think it’s time to move a wall.’

The Cassandra 2 team really did move a wall. They got a special gadget from the store room, dragged furniture out of the way, and unlocked the bolts securing the flexiplas wall between two of the bedrooms. Fian and I watched them shift the wall along and attach it to a neighbouring one. We were completely grazzed.

‘I didn’t know you could do that,’ I said.

Rono tapped the side of his nose and winked at us. ‘We keep it a little quiet, because we don’t want students messing about with the walls. You can never depend on them to put them back for the next poor person who has the room. However, since you two took part in a rescue, you count as fellow professionals.’

Keren appeared carrying a tray of food and drinks, and Rono grinned at us. ‘Right, you’ve got food, drink, and a double room. There’s a single room free next door as well, so you can arrange yourselves however you like. We’ll give you a call when it gets dark outside, because they’re predicting the sky is going to be incredible with auroras from a storm this size. Until then, we’ll leave you to …’ Rono’s grin widened. ‘Unpack.’

The Cassandra 2 team gave us a flurry of good wishes and headed off back to the dining hall. Fian shut the door behind them and looked at me.

‘So …’ he said, hopefully. ‘Is this where I finally find out what happens after the end credits of
Stalea of the Jungle
?’

‘That depends,’ I said. ‘Just how badly behaved are you by Deltan standards?’

He gave me a dreadfully wicked grin.

Fian and I joined the Cassandra team as night fell. We knew it would be bitterly cold outside, and the wolves might be roaming in the darkness, so we all suited up. I was wearing my new, beautiful, odourless impact suit. The Cassandra team had their own personal suits too, in a range of colours from Keren’s sedate plain blue to Rono’s spectacular design in purple and silver, but poor Fian had to settle for one from the store room. I felt a bit guilty.

When everyone was ready, we opened the dome door and we got our first glimpse of the sky. I’d never seen anything so amaz! It was filled with streaks of violet and crimson flame. The spectacle of the sky was reflected by the snow, turning the ground into ripples of fire. We stepped outside, wading through glowing snow. Night had been overwhelmed by the solar super storm and it was as bright as day.

Rono spoke in a mesmerized voice. ‘It’s … incredible. Stay together and close to the dome though. This is no time for accidents.’

We didn’t need to go far to appreciate the splendour. The Cassandra 2 dome was on the top of a low hill, and we could look across the blackened ruins of New York Main Dig Site, and see the remains of skyscrapers silhouetted against a burning sky.

There must have been people everywhere on Earth, recording scenes like this for future vids, but seeing it on a vid could never match this. We were there, standing in a landscape more alien than any inhabited world, as dramatic as anything anyone would see on Planet First. We stood there, just looking at it, for an hour or more. Fian had his arm round me, impact suits rather reduce the romance of that, but the suits did stop us freezing to death while we were lost in the magic around us.

The voice that came over the communication channel made us all jump. ‘This is Dig Site Command. I know a lot of you are outside admiring the view, but I think you might wish to check the Earth Rolling News channel.’

It was a calm, measured, professional voice, but we could tell something was horribly wrong.

We headed back inside, and Rono double checked we were all safely in before he closed the dome door. We didn’t change out of our impact suits, just opened the hoods, and hurried into the dining hall to put the vid on.