“Don’t call me stupid!”
“Oh, right: to call you stupid would be an insult to stupid people. I’ve known sheep that could outwit you. I’ve worn dresses with higher IQs! But you think you are an intellectual, don’t you, ape?”
(Kevin Kline and Jamie Lee Curtis, A Fish Called Wanda, 1988)
Gliese 614, coordinates 285.747/+79.016/23052.661
July 23rd, 666 GE
For a few hours, the ship had been maintaining a low, inclined orbit just above the equatorial plane of Gliese 614e. Below them stretched a continent in the Southern Hemisphere. The high-resolution camera displayed images of dark red forests, jagged rock outcrops, and sweeping grassy plains. Now and then, small herds of massive creatures could be spotted roaming across the landscape.
“STILL NO RADIO CONTACT, CAPTAIN,” the Aranui reported.
“Any evidence of intelligent life?”
“FRACTAL ANALYSIS IS NEGATIVE: NO CITIES, NO VILLAGES, NO STRUCTURES OF ARTIFICIAL ORIGIN. NO ENERGY EMISSIONS.”
Kyle glanced at Twiglet, seated beside him.
“You sure this is the right planet?”
“Of course I’m sure!” she snapped. “You can’t expect the base to be in plain sight. Still… the info I got from my contacts wasn’t exactly complete.”
“Hmph! You call that information? All we’ve got is that the base is north of a continent shaped like a four-pointed star… Piece of cake! We just have to comb through a few thousand square miles!”
He spun in his seat and tapped a few icons on the holo-screen. A 3D section of the image enlarged and began to rotate slowly.
“Identify this, please,” he told the Aranui.
“IT’S A CANYON, CAPTAIN. VERY DEEP AND NARROW. PROBABLY A RIVERBED…”
“To hell with it,” Kyle muttered. “We’re just wasting time.”
Twiglet silently agreed, unrolling a fair length of her tongue.
Kyle was right, of course. The Holroyd Society’s headquarters was too well hidden to be found by sheer luck. Still… there had to be a way. They’d come too far — Aral and his family’s deaths, their own escape from the Nine Wonders — to give up now, just because of one missing detail. She knew the clue had to be in the data somewhere. If only…
She cast a frustrated glance at Uful’lan and Shirl, sitting quietly in the two rear passenger seats.
“What about you guys? Any brilliant ideas?”
The synth stared into space, her expression vacant. She seemed far removed from her usual, carefree demeanor. Despite her other concerns, Twiglet couldn’t help but wonder what was going on with her.
“How do thhey keep in thouch withh thhe resst of thhe Galaxy?” Uful’lan asked.
“Well… as far as I know, they use their own relay stations. Don’t ask me for the technical specs, but there should be several of them in heliostationary orbit. That’s standard procedure for all Holroyd bases.”
“Relay stations… interesting,” Kyle said, frowning in thought.
For a moment, he seemed to mull it over.
“Why didn’t we spot them coming in?”
“Huh? What do you mean?”
“The stations. They’re artificial satellites, right?”
“Yes, of course, but…”
“You just said your friends launched them into orbit around Gliese 614. If that’s the case, we should have seen them. The Aranui’s radar can detect a metal object half a foot across from three AUs away.” He grinned. “I had it installed to dodge the authorities.”
“I’ve no idea…” Twiglet admitted. “I told you, I’m not into this kind of tech stuff. I was a synchroanalyst, not an engineer. I suppose the satellites are very well hidden. While we were approaching Avalon, we saw lots of—”
She cut herself off. Avalon! She’d always assumed that was just the colloquial name for Gliese 614e. But what if…
“Did you recall anything usseful, Thwigleth?” Uful’lan asked.
“Avalon!” Twiglet repeated, eyes wide. “The resting place of legendary heroes! In ancient human mythology, it was the island where the faeries took King Arthur after he was mortally wounded… C’mon! You must’ve heard of it,” she added, more to herself than anyone else.
“Don’t look at me,” Kyle said, hands raised. “I barely remember the dirty jokes I hear in taverns…”
“Avalon! Then the directions were enough! How could I have missed it?”
“Hey! Care to explain?”
“Sorry, Captain. When I’m excited, I get ahead of myself. Anyway — Avalon was an island, in the middle of a lake, where—”
Kyle was already punching the console. “The lake! I must’ve taken at least ten shots of it! Aranui, load the images tagged with ‘lake.’”
“YES, CAPTAIN.”
What they’d assumed was a lake turned out to be a vast inland sea. Floating near the center was a single, elongated island — shaped like a slit pupil in the iris of a monstrous eye. The coastline was deeply indented, and the interior appeared dense and forested.
“Now… blow it up… more… more… Stop! That’s too much. Give me the grid instead… There you are. Enhance from x24 to x46…”
Twiglet leaned forward, eyes fixed on the hologram. Her tension seemed contagious — even Uful’lan had crept forward into the cramped space between the front seats. Only Shirl remained slumped and distant.
“What’s the matter?” Twiglet asked. “Something wrong?”
No answer.
“Hey, Shirl! I’m talking to you. Can you hear me?”
This time, the synth stirred, her expression faintly pained.
“Oh… Twiglet. Sorry… I was just… thinking about something else.”
“You okay?”
“Sure,” she replied too quickly. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
“Thhere’ss ssomethhing…” Uful’lan pointed. “Over thhere… Lookss like a landing pad. And thhath glow…”
“Hmm… you’re probably right,” Kyle said. “Aranui, enhance from y56 to y87.”
The holo-screen sharpened, revealing a wide clearing paved with evenly spaced, metallic panels. The reddish light of Gliese 614 reflected off a massive satellite dish — the unmistakable source of the glow.
“IDENTIFICATION CONFIRMED, CAPTAIN. PROBABILITY OF NATURAL ORIGIN: ZERO.”
“Aha!” Kyle exclaimed. “Nice job, old girl!”
“THANK YOU, CAPTAIN.”
The first radio contact came just before landing, as the Aranui glided above the dark, rippling waters of the lake.
“Weddell Bay Naturalistic Base calling starship No. KT7605477655257X,” a female, official-sounding voice announced. “Please identify yourself.”
Twiglet shook her head.
“It’s just their cover. I’m sure of it. They have to protect themselves from possible intruders.”
“Are they going to shoot at us?”
“Oh no!” Twiglet looked horrified. “The Holroyd Society is against violence.”
“If you say so…”
Kyle tapped his earpiece and replied,
“Hello there — Kyle Tokalau speaking. I’m the captain of the freighter Aranui, serial number Kilo Tango 7605477655257 X-ray.” He shrugged. “Requesting permission to land… and while you’re at it, would you mind turning on the lights? I’d rather not scratch your nice antenna.”
Silence.
After a long pause, another voice cut in — male this time, and far less welcoming.
“Access to Weddell Bay Spaceport is restricted. Only authorized vessels are permitted to land. I repeat: unless you have a valid identification code issued by the Ministry of Scientific Research, you must immediately alter your course. Failure to comply—”
“Listen, man,” Kyle interrupted, “if you’re really a naturalistic base, then I’m Chancellor Chang. Try not to waste my time, okay? I’m bringing home one of your people.”
Twiglet was waving frantically.
“Give me your headset! Quick!”
“Here — just speak into the mic.”
She opened her mouth, but no words came out. Her throat was dry. Sore. She closed her eyes and forced herself to breathe. No reason to be this nervous…
“This is Twiglet Skunks,” she said at last, her voice slightly hoarse. “Senior Fellow of the Holroyd Society since 627, discharged on July 1st, 652. I need to confer with the Honorable Bernala. I’m carrying urgent news.”
“Twiglet… finally!” the male voice responded. The hostility was gone, replaced by something close to relief.
“We’ve been waiting for you!”
“Waiting for… me? How did you know I was coming?”
“Odie Binx told us, of course. Didn’t he mention it?”
“Yes… Yes, he did, actually, but… Who am I speaking with, please?”
“It’s Fern. Fern Lescovar. Remember me? Fourteen years ago, I was one of the junior fellows. Now I run the base.”
Twiglet unrolled her tongue in disbelief.
“Fern?”
Of course, she remembered him — that unimpressive, sycophantic human whose only purpose in life had been to inflate his already bloated ego. The kind of guy who’d sell out his own mother for a promotion. No surprise he’d finally clawed his way to the top.
“And the Master?” she asked.
“Still in decent health, if that’s what you mean. Over the past couple of years, though, he’s handed off most of the administrative responsibilities to me… to focus on science.”
“I see. And you’re fine with that, I gather.”
“I’m not sure what you’re implying, Twiglet. But we’ll have time to talk later. I’ve got to go now — see you at the spaceport.”
Twiglet returned to her seat.
“Trouble?” Kyle asked, adjusting the controls as they prepared for final descent.
The Aranui was now just a few hundred feet above ground. Below them, a square landing pad lit up in the darkness like a beacon.
“I hope not,” Twiglet muttered, scowling.
Kyle left the Aranui and hurried to catch up with Twiglet and the others at the end of the landing pad, where a dirt road vanished into the forest. The orange sun was slowly sinking, but the air remained warm, heavy with the smell of rotting vegetation.
The mahjit noticed the large shoulder bag slung over his back.
“You brought Wolfram along!” she said.
“I had to. He pines if I’m gone for more than a day.”
“Maybe you should have brought a weapon too.”
Kyle smirked.
“I thought your friends were against violence.”
“They are… in principle. Still… what if the werewolves already infiltrated them?”
“No worries, sister. I tend to learn from my mistakes: after the nice fellows we met on New Xanadu, I never leave home without a toothbrush…”
He opened his jacket, revealing a holstered blaster.
“Ssomeone iss coming,” Uful’lan said.
“How do you know?” Kyle scanned the trees. “I can’t hear a damn thing.”
“It’ss two humanss, one female, coming on a four-wheeled vehicle… Camoco K202, hydrogen engine.”
A set of headlights—indeed belonging to something jeep‑like—appeared at the end of the road.
“Oh, I see… the legendary k’rell smell, right?”
The vehicle rolled to a halt a few feet away. The driver was a young woman; the passenger who emerged first, though, was a male. He strode up to Twiglet with open arms.
“Welcome back!” he said, holding her in an awkward embrace. “It’s terrible that we must meet again in such a tragic time. So many of us have already fallen to the werewolves’ savagery…”
Fern Lescovar was of medium height, lean, with frizzy blond hair and a short goatee. Casually dressed, he looked like a grad student in his early forties.
“Thank you, Fern,” Twiglet said. “I followed the news, but it’s hard to distinguish our assassinated undercover agents from the rest of the deaths. Are the casualties really that great?”
“Unfortunately, yes. Of about five thousand agents spread across the three hundred and sixty galactic sectors, only fifty-nine escaped the werewolves. The enemy acted fast, and with terrible accuracy. So fast, in fact, that many survivors were cut off, with little hope of ever reaching Avalon. You’re only the third one to make it here.”
“I’m sorry, Fern, but something feels wrong.”
“Wrong? What do you mean?”
“Well, you just spoke of their ‘incredible accuracy.’ Isn’t it strange they knew exactly where to find us?”
“Oh, I see. You’re thinking one of us might be a traitor… an infiltrator. And yes, you’re correct. There was a traitor. We identified him about a month ago.”
“Really?!” Twiglet blurted. “But how…?”
“During a standard security audit,” Lescovar explained, “one of our senior analysts—a trusted human—turned out to have forged his DNA certificate. He’d been doing so for years, at least since we began a strict clampdown on lycanthropic percentages. His real number was 49.7%, but he claimed it was only 5%.”
“That’s awful!” Twiglet said. “Did he have accomplices?”
“We couldn’t question him. He vaporized his own head with a blaster. In his final video, he insists he acted alone, though I’d rather not discuss it further right now.” He lowered his voice. “It’s not a pleasant topic. Besides, the matter is settled. Have you met Theresa Yu, instead?”
He beckoned his young companion forward.
She was petite, with short brown hair and freckled cheeks, her large dark eyes bright with curiosity.
“Theresa is one of our best graduate students,” Fern continued. “She was eager to meet Twiglet Skunks—the analyst who introduced synchro-temporal coefficients to the Holroyd equations.”
Twiglet blinked.
“But I didn’t… I mean… I wasn’t aware the Society’s stance on that old matter had changed so much.”
Fern smirked, giving her a knowing look.
“Oh… you must mean that unfortunate misunderstanding with the Council, correct?”
“I’m not sure ‘unfortunate’ is the right word,” Twiglet retorted. “I was expelled and given one week to leave New Xanadu.”
“Yes, yes… that was a mistake on the Society’s part. Sadly, even the most enlightened among us sometimes get things wrong. But…”
He smiled around them.
“Why don’t you introduce your friends?”
“Oh… well…” Twiglet unfurled her tongue in exasperation. “Right. This is Kyle Tokalau, captain of the Aranui. And the big guy is Uful’lan Siirt, a good friend of mine, who—”
She broke off, noticing Lescovar was no longer paying attention. His gaze lingered on Shirl.
“And the… girl? Who is she?”
“Don’t get too excited, man,” Kyle said dryly. “The synth belongs to me.”
Lescovar stared, incredulous.
“I see. Interesting.”
He gave Shirl a long, appraising look.
“We’d better go now,” he said at last. “Sunset is coming fast, and headquarters is more than half an hour away.”
He turned and walked back toward the jeep. Twiglet and the others followed.
“Ah… Fern!” the mahjit called, hurrying. “There’s something I meant to ask. Is Durrell Wang still a member?”
He stiffened.
“Why do you want to know?”
Twiglet blinked, surprised by the sudden coldness in his voice.
“Well… years ago… before I left the Society, he was one of my closest friends.”
Lescovar sighed.
“Twiglet, I know this is hard to accept. That’s why I didn’t want to tell you now.”
“Oh no. What happened to him?”
“You see… the infiltrator I mentioned—the werewolf spy…” He paused. “That was him.”
On the way to the Holroyd Society’s Headquarters, no one spoke. The passengers in the jeep seemed lost in their own thoughts.
Lescovar was driving, with Twiglet riding shotgun. She still struggled to process the devastating news.
All those dead colleagues… and Durrell.
Now, at last, she understood why he’d stopped writing.
It was hard enough to learn he’d died—far worse to be told he had betrayed them.
Durrell… one of the rare, likeable humans.
Back at the Holroyd Base, he’d been one of the very few genuinely interested in befriending an odd, short-legged creature with a too-long tongue.
Had he ever been sincere? She wondered.
She remembered him as an excellent analyst—focused, meticulous, maybe even obsessive. He would spend long nights holed up in his office, working until dawn. And when he wasn’t working, he’d vanish for days on end.
“I’ve been hiking,” he’d say. “Hiking and thinking.”
His serious, no-nonsense demeanor had made it hard to believe Durrell could ever be fun—yet some of his pranks had been memorable. Like the time he’d “accidentally” left Twiglet’s living lunch wriggling in the Dean’s office.
No… she couldn’t believe it.
Maybe he did have lycanthropic genes—many humans did, unfortunately—but that didn’t mean he was capable of betraying the Holroyd Society. Or his friends.
According to Fern, Durrell had left behind a farewell video where he confessed everything.
But that proved nothing. Confessions could be falsified… or extorted.
No, she didn’t believe it. And more importantly, she didn’t trust Fern.
There was an old saying on Shing-Na: Don’t throw the ambassador to the tarantulas. Fern Lescovar had always had a taste for bad news—a Galaxy-class scaremonger.
She had to find out the truth about Durrell—whatever it turned out to be.
As soon as she got the chance, she intended to speak with the Master—a far more reliable source than Fern.
Twiglet yawned and glanced around. She was exhausted—and deeply uneasy.
The trip felt interminable. The bumpy road kept the jeep crawling along at a slow pace. Outside, the forest loomed, dark and oppressive, alive with strange smells and animal cries.
But that wasn’t what truly worried her.
She’d spent years on a primitive world.
And compared to Bageechaa’s wildlife, this was tame.
Trying to distract herself, she turned her attention to the others.
Theresa sat directly behind her.
Then came Kyle and Shirl, pointedly ignoring each other.
Only Uful’lan seemed content, stretched across the rear seats, enjoying the breeze, his wings flapping lazily in the evening air.
At last, they passed through a large gateway, and the roadbed improved. The vehicle stopped bumping. The trees thinned, and Twiglet caught a glimpse of the sky. It was nearly dark… and starless.
“Is it here, Fern?” she asked.
“Yeah. We’re close.”
“But… I can’t see anything.”
“Of course not. We impose a curfew after sundown.”
“I see. Do you think the enemy might attack? I mean… openly? Here in the Halo?”
“Hmm… I don’t know.” He frowned. “I agree—it’s not their style. They’re far more subtle.”
Twiglet thought of the Nine Wonders’ fire.
“Well, you can’t take too many precautions.”
The jeep rolled to a stop in front of a massive building.
By the reddish headlights, she took in its size—easily over 150 feet tall, twice as long.
“I had no idea the Base had been so extensively renovated.”
Fern didn’t respond. He got out, pulled a flashlight from his pocket, and gestured for the others to follow. He ascended a short staircase and fumbled with a partially hidden access panel.
A metal door slid open.
“Where is everyone?” Twiglet asked as they stepped into a brightly lit lobby. Two long hallways stretched out in opposite directions. Nearby, a pair of new antigrav-wells glowed softly.
“It’s supper time,” Lescovar said. Everyone’s in the cafeteria. You’d better hurry, or there’ll be nothing left.”
“Good idea!” Uful’lan said, perking up.
“Aren’t you coming, Fern?” Twiglet asked.
“I need to finish preparing my talk.” He pointed to a large holoscreen by the entrance that displayed the evening’s seminar program. “It’s at ten p.m., if you’re interested. And… please don’t be late. It’s usually crowded.”
“Will the Master be there too?”
“Well, he rarely leaves his office. But tonight he’s making an exception—he asked me to reserve the last ten minutes for an important announcement.”
“We won’t miss it, then,” Twiglet said.
“Good. Theresa will take you to the cafeteria. See you soon.”
She watched as Fern disappeared down the left-hand corridor.
“So… will you follow me, please?” Theresa said, heading in the opposite direction. Kyle was instantly at her side.
“Ahem, excuse me, Miss Yu… or should I call you Doctor Yu?”
She laughed.
“Oh no, please! Theresa is fine… Captain!”
“Great. You can call me Kyle, of course. Listen, Theresa, I’ve got a bit of a problem…”
“Yes? What can I do for you?”
He opened his bag and revealed the feline inside.
“Can you get me some cat food?”
“Eh? Oh… look at that! What an adorable little kitty! I love cats! Can I hold him? Please… oh, please! Ugh—what a weird eye!”
During the short walk to the cafeteria, Theresa showered Kyle with giggles, coos, and affectionate glances—most of which were clearly for him rather than the cat.
Twiglet caught Shirl’s eye.
The synth was no longer pretending to be indifferent. She was watching Kyle’s every move.
Oh dear… Twiglet thought. I have a bad feeling about this.
Please return to the novel’s main page to read the first six chapters for free!
