Not long into the following Satamia day, Arantiloria briefed them on their next mission, the one that was supposed to be easy.
Kibi was delighted to discover that it didn’t involve any long deep-space trips that would require cramming her cupboards with food.
Boro looked at the flight plan and laughed, saying he could fit that much fuel into a pinkfruit juice carton.
The entire crew was excited that an old friend would be among the three passengers.
Ilika decided it was a good mission for some cross training.
“Siminia Three Planet Station, this is response ship Manessa Kwi in low orbit, requesting landing instructions,” Rini said from the navigation console.
“Welcome to Siminia, Manessa Kwi!” a male monkey-mammal voice declared in greeting. “No other ship traffic right now, but watch for fanators.
Weather is clear, moderate breeze from the west.”
A female voice took over. “Use standard approach pattern A, maintain one hundred meters to landing beacon B-One, wait for hand signals, then make visual descent into the indicated landing circle.”
Rini touched his console as he listened, then repeated back the instructions.
“Ion three, full inertia canceling,” Kibi requested from the pilot’s station.
Sata confirmed the engines.
NEBADOR Book Eight: Witness 24
Mati, in the command seat, got a gleam in her eyes. “Visual sensors only.”
Boro, at the watch station, moaned and went to work canceling everything else.
Mati turned and smiled at Ilika, currently the steward. “Our passengers won’t mind, will they?”
Ilika grinned, then glanced at his passengers.
T’sss’lisss, her coils draped over two seats, shook her head.
Kolarrr’ka fluffed up his feathers. “As I understand it, bok, this mission could take weeks. A little training won’t change that, and might help us with the essays we have to write.”
Ashley shrugged. “We’re not due back until the Manessa Kwi gets back, and I have no idea what I’m going to write about.”
Mati nodded and turned back to the bridge. “Inertia straps.”
T’sss’lisss reluctantly coiled herself into one seat.
“Siminia Three Planet Station,” Rini began, “our commander has decided to give us a little challenge, so I need some visual landmarks . . .”
Nearly an hour later, after navigating by islands, mountain peaks, an old airport gone to weeds, and finally the giant artificial tree in the center of the planet station, the Manessa Kwi hovered over a landing circle where a monkey mammal stood with his arms out-stretched, a bright-red marker light in each hand.
Kibi knew the landing circle could hold much larger ships, so wasn’t surprised when the landing controller swung his arms for the little ship to follow. He soon stopped in the middle of a smaller circle, turned completely around with arms wide, then shut off his marker lights and moved out of the way.
Kibi lowered the deep-space response ship, extended struts, and carefully brought her power levels to zero. “Finished with engines.”
As the passengers and crew came down the ramp, they beheld two tall, proud monkey mammals, most of their bodies covered with fur, long tails swaying in the air behind them.
But as the new arrivals approached, the pair seemed to shrink, became hunched with age, leaned on each other, and everyone could see that their fur
NEBADOR Book Eight: Witness 25
was gray, almost white, and in places very thin.
The female began coughing, and the male comforted her. They hobbled toward a bench in the shade of a building. A large avian and an ursine with a medical kit, who had both stayed out of sight before, walked with them.
Once they got settled, the elderly male monkey mammal looked at the bird. “Thanks, Rrr’tana, for letting us do that one last time. It’s been years, and it was great fun.”
Rrr’tana bowed with sad eyes.
The bear kept two eyes on her charges, but said nothing.
Kibi knelt on the ground in front of the bench, and the other crew members and passengers did the same. T’sss’lisss was already on the ground.
The ancient female monkey mammal tried to clear her throat, without complete success. “Thank you for coming. You are witnesses, as we once were. You will hear our story, if we are blessed with enough time to tell it.”
She started coughing again, and quickly mastered it, but didn’t have the energy to go on speaking, so she looked at her partner.
“I am Jimox, and this is Teina. We have been the hosts of Siminia Three Planet Station for . . . how long?”
Teina searched her memory. “Just had the two-hundred-year celebration last year . . .”
Jimox scrunched his wrinkled face. “Wasn’t that three or four years ago?”
“Maybe. I don’t remember.”
Jimox kissed her tenderly, then turned back to his guests. “Let’s just say
. . . a long time!”
Everyone
chuckled.
“Of course,” he went on, “we don’t do any of the work anymore. We poke around, talk to people a little, but someone else has to finish anything we start. Rrr’tana, and others, are the real hosts now. Brora is a wonderful healer, but there isn’t much she can do for us anymore. Somehow, in between all the things we’ve done in our lives, we got old.”
Among the listeners, not all eyes were dry. Teina looked ready to speak, so Jimox deferred to her.
“We have hundreds of friends we know by name, and thousands more we remember, but . . . we didn’t want . . . a big fuss . . .” Nearly blue from the
NEBADOR Book Eight: Witness 26
effort of speaking, she looked at Jimox.
“We want this to be a quiet time, and Kerloran wants us to have a few witnesses with a fresh perspective on our lives and our work, so . . . we decided to invite people who’ve never been here before. It was hard to find anyone . . .”
Several people chuckled. T’sss’lisss’ coils quivered with humor.
“. . . so I’m not surprised that all of you are young. Manessa has been here before, but with a different crew, avians as I remember.”
Ilika
smiled.
“We need to tell them!” Teina managed to whisper.
“I know. You want to?”
“I . . . don’t have the strength.”
Jimox turned back to the guests. “Kerloran tells us we have four great missions. Three of them we know all about, and have completed to the best of our abilities. The fourth one . . . we don’t know much about yet. You are here because . . . we are dying.”