Rain of Tears (3 page)

“It isn’t, it’s just bulky.” The urge to defend her design wasn’t lost on her. This was her child, and it was finally going to get the home it deserved.

With the weather machine settled on the dolly, she unlocked the wheels and smiled. “Shall we start the walk to the pick-up site? It is going to take a while.”

“I thought that they were coming to meet us.”

“They are, but it will be easier for them if we are not within the city limits.” She grinned and started to push her creation back the way they had come. “You might want to inform the populace what we are doing. They might get nervous otherwise.”

He blinked and looked through the doors they were approaching to the crowd outside. His cursing lingered in the air as he ran forward to explain what was happening as she pushed her beloved creation out into the public eye for the first time since it was assembled.

Chapter Four

The crowd parted for her, and she had to admit that Unrik was a fast talker. No wonder they had made him mayor.

She kept a bubble of dry air around her with absent attention as she pushed the weather machine toward the city limits with a crowd following her every move. It felt good to have her creation back in her grip. When she had replaced the missing piece of the puzzle that made up the weather machine, she would be so happy to watch it do her job.

Pride in her ability had long since faded. Her sisters were lucky that they had been given the programming to go dormant. It hadn’t been a consideration when Reyan Ikali Mar had been created since she was supposed to be perennially active, and she lived each day from dawn to dusk just like everyone else, only her count of days never ended.

Her first days were on Ichadra, mastering her skills until they realised the mess that she was making of their eco system. She was sent to an unnamed world that was being bio-formed, and there, she mastered the power that the Ichadra had imbued her with.

Once she was under control of her abilities, she was returned home, and she spent a few decades helping to improve the output of the farms of Ichadra before she asked to be set free.

The Elemental was alredy off on Ki, the Destroyer was in the design stages and the researchers saw nothing wrong with allowing their goddess of nature to leave. It wasn’t like they could really stop her, but she wanted to abide by their wishes.

She had bumped around the sector for a while until she ended up in this system, and she hadn’t left since. It was occasionally fun to be an urban legend in most of the cities in the system. She came when she was needed, and if it weren’t for this situation on Jarko, she would have attended any number of famines and monsoons in the last several hundred years, but she just couldn’t leave the population of Jarko at the mercy of her design.

It took her over an hour to push the weather machine through the city streets, but by the time she exited the gates, quite a few locals were following her. Guards followed her, and she reached inside her jacket to set off a beacon.

The unit chirped twice and she smiled. They were on their way. She whistled again, a song that she had heard a long time ago. It was a composition that her friend Redmiril had written for her, a complex melody that sounded like hail and rain tapping on a window while wind whistled past.

She missed her friends as time passed. It was something that she never got used to, so she made it a point to keep parts of them around in her mind. Music, favourite foods, ideal colour for a sunset, all those thoughts ran through her mind endlessly, and she used them to keep the people she had loved in her life close to her. Keeping them in her memories was all she could do. They usually died when they were worlds away from her, and she returned to their homes only to find them gone. It was the burden of someone designed for immortality. She would outlive all those she loved, and there was nothing she could do about it.

Unrik came up behind her and addressed the crowd once again, assuring them that the weather machine would be repaired and that their crops would soon flourish once again, albeit in a slightly different format.

Reyan reached into the top of her boot and gave a sharp tug. The long metal spoke quivered in her grip. Humming idly and ignoring the new mayor’s attempts at damage control, she slide the metal spoke into the machine, and it chirped happily.

Running her fingers across the controls, she shut it down. It needed a full reboot, and she needed it to be in place when that happened.

She hopped up and sat on top of the machine as the slow, steady rain fell everywhere but on her.

Mayor Hobbs looked at her. “What are you doing?”

“Waiting. I have signalled the ship, and they are sending a shuttle to move the unit into place.” She kicked her feet idly. “Now, I wait.”

A squeal drew her attention, and two children burst from the crowd, chasing each other until the smaller of the two skidded face first into the mud.

Reyan scowled. She hopped off the weather unit and went to the little girl who seemed very confused about why the ground was sticking to her.

“Hello, sweetheart. Are you muddy?”

The little one looked up wide-eyed and blinked, trying to see into Reyan’s hood.

Sighing, she flicked her hood back and let the toddler look.

The little girl held out her muddy dress, and her lower lip wobbled.

“Can I fix it?” Reyan waited.

The little girl looked to the crowd, and she nodded quickly.

With her hands outstretched, she created a warm, gentle rain out of her palms and coasted her hands down the mud, inches from the child’s body. When she was clean, Reyan used the heat of a mild southern wind to dry the girl from head to toe. “Be careful in the rain. The ground is muddy, and it will get you wet and messy if you fall again.”

The little girl looked down at the floral print that covered her dress, and she beamed before she ran back to her mother.

The older girl was standing nearby with her eyes wide.

Reyan formed a snowball and handed it to her. “Go throw this at a boy.”

The girl smiled and sprinted back through the crowd until the shout of, “Hey!” came out of the mass of bodies.

Chuckling, Reyan returned to her machine and popped back on top of it.

Unrik was looking at her carefully. “You didn’t have to do that.”

“She would have started crying, and I hate to hear children sobbing.” She shrugged.

He smiled. “Of course you do. When will the shuttle arrive?”

She felt a tremor in the atmosphere. “It’s here.”

Out of the clouds, providing the rain the silver sheen of lights, it came into view. The shuttle came in and hovered above her, the downdraft causing the crowd to back away.

She waited, and the grapple extended until she could attach it to the machine. “I will be back once this is in place. I need to confirm the site.”

Mayor Hobbs realised what she was saying, and he cleared his throat. “I will join you.”

“No, you won’t. Your people need you to explain what we are doing and that means that one of us has to stay here so it doesn’t look like we are stealing their machine. You do your mayor thing, and I will be back in a few hours. I should return by moonrise. Sooner if the shuttle gives me a lift back.”

He nodded, but his lips were tight, and she knew she was going to get an earful when she returned.

She touched the signal chip inside her jacket again, and the shuttle lifted off, hauling her into the sky before heading off to the dome site.

Life was getting interesting, and she did so love being interested. It made the time pass quickly.

Chapter Five

The shuttle did indeed give her a lift back to Nekahar after she had anchored the weather machine at the site and confirmed that the water table was where she had last measured it. It was good. The dome was a go.

She returned to the city and made her way to the mayor’s office immediately.

Unrik was sitting at his desk and rubbing his eyes.

“Evening. Everything is in place, and the dome will be lowered within the day, centred on the weather station.”

“You just left it there?”

“Of course. I mean, it is anchored to a rock plate underneath it, so they would need to pull up a few tons of rock to shift it, but it should be fine.”

He blinked, and she saw those inner lids again. They were not standard on the species in this system, but then, he was a Citadel member, so she had no idea where his origin point was.

“How did you anchor it?”

She grinned, “I used the anchors that I designed. They were designed to pierce and lock into anything under them. Having a mobile weather unit is not safe.”

He rubbed at his eyes again. “I would have to agree.”

“Why are you rubbing your eyes?”

“I am dehydrated. It is a pretty common situation when I travel. I come from a much more humid environment.”

She twisted her lips, and a thick cloud of vapour surrounded him. He had been under stress, and he needed more water than he was taking in.

“Why aren’t you drinking more water?”

“There is still a shortage on. The rain has only begun to replenish the tanks. I won’t drink carelessly until everyone can.”

“They are Ukirns. They don’t need as much water as you do to survive and remain healthy. Where are you going to sleep?”

He gestured to his couch. “Over there.”

“Lie down, and I will keep you wrapped in humidity. I am pulling it from the air, and I am providing it to the air, so consider it my gift from me to you.”

He blearily got up and staggered to the couch. She knit a column of air and water around him, and his breathing immediately eased.

She spoke to a new guard and whispered a request for a cot and a cold meal if he could arrange one. Even extra rations would be good.

He nodded and disappeared.

She sat on the window ledge and watched Nekahar at night while Unrik slept. There were parties all over the city, dancing, celebrating and laughter that she could just hear in the distance. They were getting water, but the rain was going to stop soon, and they needed to work on what to do next. Without manipulative and greedy leadership, this city might soon regain its status as the entryway to Jarko. That would enable more trade, more visitors and an increase in commerce. Nekahar was not a tourist trap, but it was a very attractive gateway when it was all clean and shining.

Jarko was usually the first world passed on a ship’s way into the system. It was important to put on a good face and get trade going again. Having a reliable food source would be a great first step.

A light noise came from the couch, and she increased the humidity in the fog bank she had created for him.

She moved behind the mayor’s desk and brought up the computer records, reading up on the political prisoners and their time for incarceration. Unrik had, indeed, been in the prison for six months. She winced at how thirsty his body must have been.

Nine other prisoners were listed from approximately the same time. Four were still alive, and she guessed that they had been released from custody. Two were tech mechanics and one was a weather specialist. The occupation of the fourth was not mentioned.

She made a note of the names on a small piece of paper and checked on what Unrik had done to her plans.

He had divided the domed farms into segments of complementary plant cultures. The ship was bringing several colonies of pollinators, and the farm was arranged so that the insects would cover the entire span strategically. Colony overlap would be inevitable, but it was minimized in case of trouble.

Reyan went over what he had decided was appropriate for the soil, and she made a few adjustments based on the species she had requested when there was a knock at the door.

She answered and waved the young men in, putting a finger across her lips as Unrik snorted and rolled over. They set up the cot and tiptoed out of the mayor’s office, closing the door softly on the way out.

Reyan settled on the cot and closed her eyes. She didn’t need to sleep, but it made it easier to keep track of weather patterns in the region and to keep what she was doing from having any catastrophic effects on anyone else.

Moving weather was a tricky business. If she didn’t calculate the warming and cooling properly, someone else’s settlement could be washed away. Fortunately, she was very good at what she had learned to do, though learning it had been a hair-raising experience for those around her.

She sat up when Unrik grunted and started muttering to himself. Dawn was peeking through the window, and she got to her feet, stretching a little before dissipating the fog she had him in.

He looked larger than he had the night before. She blinked. “Did you get bigger?”

He glared at her in the manner of all those who were not morning people. “I am Shithikan. I absorb water and can store it for months.”

“Like a sponge.”

His scowl indicated he was not flattered by the comparison. “I maintain a skeletal structure, but it flexes as the rest of me does.”

Reyan hid her grin as he stretched, and the clothing that had barely fit him the night before split along every seam. The beacon in her jacket had chirped the night before, so she was not surprised to see robed Citadel personnel waiting for them in the reception room outside the office. Reyan went first and kept the door tight for the sake of Unrik’s modesty or at least hers.

The young man got to his feet, and the young woman extended a bundle to Reyan. “This is for Specialist Hobbs.”

“I really hope it is clothing.”

The woman grinned. “It is. It will change shape with him.”

“Fabulous. Back in five minutes.” She returned to the office where Unrik was still picking shreds off his body. “They brought you a present.”

He walked over to her with nothing on his body but the dark wave of hair that kept flipping into his eyes. She had to admit that yes, every part of him increased in size when he was hydrated. It was something to keep in mind.