Science Fiction: Welcome to my Worlds

entire cliff. “Scanner,” muttered Daren. “What could they be looking for?”

The ship was only a speck in the distance and he thought they were leaving. Then it grew rapidly larger until it hovered over the cliff dwelling. Daren could see everyone had gone inside after the first pass.

“No!” This beam was high violet and barely visible. The mark of an energy weapon. The ship held position with the beam on for barely a minute then flew on. The rock beneath it sagged and ran molten. It cooled to mere red-heat as they watched in horror.

“Gone. They’re all gone,” Daren whispered. He felt dead inside. His face should be streaming with tears for all the loved ones he’d lost. That he’d never even gotten to say goodbye to. But right now he felt frozen like the land around him.

Belatedly he hugged Cesily to him trying to give her warmth and hope and, perhaps, get some for himself.

“We should search. There might be survivors.” She looked up into his face as if hoping to find something there.

“There is no one. I could feel them snuffed out in an instant like Mayday candles.”

“Why would someone do this? First my family, now yours. They just, just exterminated them, like bugs.”

She was crying again into his shoulder and Darin knew he should be too. The cold anger squeezed his heart like an extension of this frozen planet. He had no idea why they’d done it, but he knew they would pay.

Darin had always liked Cesily and she looked so miserable and lonely that he wanted nothing more than to hug her close and tell her that everything would be all right. But he knew it wouldn’t. In the tests he’d been given he’d always scored at the bottom in precognition but right now something was screaming in his brain that they had maybe a fractional chance to live through the next ten minutes. He grabbed Cesily’s arm and dragged her under a natural stone arch where there was a fallen stone slab miraculously clear of ice. “Put them on now!” It came out too harsh and she gave him a hurt look. He would have to explain later.

The skates were too small but he strapped them on tight to his boots and waited impatiently while Cesily fumbled with hers. Skating in a grav-and-a-half on uneven ground was the height of stupidity, even if you were born here. Take a spill and the damage could be severe. But he’d been a kid once too and you had to do something for entertainment on Targus.

A screeching roar split the air overhead, and in its wake Darin could hear a faint challenging roar from the hill cat along with the ringing in his ears. Glinting golden in the setting rays of the sun, a squat starship flew over the arch toward the Cliffside dwelling of his family. A faintly green beam fanned out covering the

Cesily shrugged. “Either several barrels of it got accidentally spilled when a caravan went through or…”

“What?”

“Someone put it there deliberately to slow down travelers.”

“Hmm.” Darin didn’t care much for that idea. They’d have been completely helpless if an attack had come while they were occupied there. He couldn’t help casting a few extra glances over his shoulder. There was nothing to see or hear, but his half-trained psi sense told him there was something coming. Something he didn’t want to meet.

“Cesily we need to hurry and get there. I can feel it.” Darin could plainly see the cliffside where his family home had been carved even though he knew they were still more than a kilometer away. Tiny dots out in front were some kids playing and adults soaking up the sun as best they could. He certainly knew from experience that you couldn’t spend all your time in a cave. If only he could just teleport them there. Some of the masters at the school could do it but he was nowhere near that level of proficiency.

Cesily pulled two pairs of skates from her pack and handed one set to him. “I was going to give those to my brother for his birthday.” She looked like she was going to start crying again.

“Dead?” Darin felt a twinge from his newly sharpened senses. He’d known that he needed to get home, but he still wasn’t good enough to get a clear why. “How can they all be dead? Your cousins and uncles and others too?” She nodded miserably, tears leaking from closed eyes. “Who killed them Cesily?”

“Outworlders I think. Rumor has it there’s something here they want.”

“On Targus?” Darin would have laughed if Cesily wasn’t hurting so much. Everyone knew there were no gems or precious metals here. Targus was a dense world so there had been a lot of speculation, when it was settled, about the possibility of heavy metals. Nothing was ever found but rock and snow and ice. He looked across the chasm to the glazed hills beyond. Lots and lots of ice.
Darin wanted to ask her more questions about what happened to her family but his psi sense was telling him to get moving. “You’re coming home with me,” he decided.
“Thanks,” she said, the quiver in her voice tearing at him. “That’s where I was headed. I was hoping they’d take me in. I have nowhere else to go.”
They stepped very carefully through the oily spot on the path and managed to get by it without any further mishap. “What do you think the story is on the oil?”

slivers of ice that curled around it’s legs but Darin could see it wasn’t going to be enough. It was going over the edge. Cesily screamed and Darin grabbed for the cat’s heavy tail as it whipped by and thumped him in the stomach, nearly knocking the breath out. Now he was being dragged along sliding behind the hill cat. He knew he should have gotten his old boots restudded.

Darin grabbed the climbing pick from his pocket and swung it as hard as he could into the ice under his feet. He felt a muscle tear in his arm as the pick dragged out a foot-long furrow, then they were stopped. The cat’s front paws dangled helpless over the edge. Cessily grabbed it’s tail too and together they managed to pull it back to firm footing. Darin could tell it was not a happy cat, but its rough tongue gave each of them a lick of thanks.

Cesily dropped to her knees, wrapped her arms around the cat’s neck and began to sob uncontrollably.

“Easy, easy. He’s okay. We’re okay. Everything’s—okay—now,” he finished a little lamely. Then Darin winced as his arm reminded him that not quite everything was as normal.

“You don’t understand Darin. Purz is all I have left. They killed my family. Everyone is dead.” A tear dripped from her cheek landing on silver fur. The big cat gave her another lick.