Halcyon's Wake: Faith
Chapter 9

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Beth and I were strapped in tight for the reentry. The first bumps of the atmosphere greeted us with a vibrating jolt as we slipped through the eye of the sky-skin, a scant magenta light seeping in through the lone porthole; bathing the cabin in garish and smoky stage light like the front row of a Deep Purple concert. I prayed the sturdy Russian craft hadn’t taken too hard of a drumming from the meteor shower, but if the shielding failed I wouldn’t even have time to cuss before we cooked like a marshmallow absently dropped in a campfire…

“Pitch is a tad steep, Zack” cautioned Beth, a scant second before I began adjusting our descent. The Soyuz was shaking like a ’57 Greyhound bus with bad shocks going a hundred miles an hour down a gravel road — and seemed to be about as responsive as one of the old cruisers. My minor course and pitch corrections were doing little to alleviate the jolting, and the vessel creaked and popped like a submarine plunging swiftly beyond its crush depth.

The first tendrils of gravity started digging their fingers into our chests as the purple atmosphere roared a welcome all around us, a brisk and violent ‘hello’ as we plunged to earth at almost 800 feet per second - about fifty feet a second too fast. Warning lights were flashing across the control panel and I hoped the drogue chute could handle the extra strain. I raised the pitch a tad more and watched the air-speed bleed off back into a more acceptable rate just as the drogue chute deployed, and was greeted by the welcome ‘thud’ of the four main drop-chutes deploying. Gravity punched a hole square in my gut - a hit that never felt so good. Terra Firma in eight more minutes.

The braking engines fired when sensors detected the ground’s steady approach and the Soyuz landed with a mumbled thump that rocked us both pretty hard, but the craft remained upright. We sat there in the quiet as I shut down the main systems, the Soyuz still hissing and popping as it’s hull cooled from reentry. The whole cabin was dimly lit by the purple twilight streaming through the porthole. I unlatched and removed my helmet and leaned back in the seat, sucking wind hard. Gravity was welcome, but it pressed down on places untouched for more than three months and I found it challenging to even take a breath.

“Nice flying, jarhead” Beth said, removing her own helmet with difficulty and oozing back into her seat. She’d been in space for almost a year - the gravity must really be kicking her fanny pretty hard. I snatched the oxygen mask next to her seat and pressed it close to her mouth, and with genuine effort she raised her arms and pressed it closer, breathing deeply like an asthmatic desperate for an inhaler. Her warm eyes whispered thanks and I began the arduous task of clambering out of the space suit - no easy feat in the cramped space with unfamiliar gravity crushing my every movement. Beth had to be absolutely miserable, and I knew she’d never get out of the suit unassisted.

I had no idea if the air outside was tainted with radioactive fallout, but we only had a few hours of oxygen left, anyways. I reached my mind out, looking for the faint tickle of Lothar’s presence, but all I perceived was the cooling capsule and Beth’s labored breathing. I donned another oxygen mask, mumbled ‘here goes nothing’ then punched the button that would blow the outer hatch. A loud bang shook the capsule, and a whiff of thermite and tangy citrus drifted in through the open hatch on a gently drifting, thin sheen of purple dust - followed moments later by nervous laughter and the sound of shuffling right outside the craft.

With genuine effort I clambered over to the hatch and peered outside, greeted by a smiling, very ancient, Native American man covered head to toe in the fine, purple powder that defined the entire landscape. If the artist formerly known as Prince had hired a landscape contractor, this would undoubtedly have been the result.

“Howdy” the old man said. “Welcome home.”

“Howdy” I replied, “And just where might home be, sir?”

“Last I checked we still called it earth, young man.” He grinned broadly, revealing perfect white teeth that stood out against the dust clinging to his kind, deeply lined face. “But we call this particular stretch of land Sedona, Arizona, if you want to get all technical.”

He pulled a blue bandana from his jeans pocket and wiped most of the purple powder from his face. “Lothar told me I’d have guests today, but I really wasn’t expecting this!” He cackled amiably, wandered closer to the shuttle and extended his hand up to me. “Jimmy Blue Smoke’s the name - folks just call me ‘Smokey’, though, and you’re welcome to do the same. What say we get you out of that Russian sardine can?”

I shook the firm grip and slipped the oxygen mask from my face. “Zack Dalton, sir - glad to know ya. And I guess any friend of Lothar’s is a friend of mine, too. I think I can clamber out, sir - but my partner’s gonna need some help, I fear.”

“No problem - I brought a few younger hands with stronger backs along with me, Zack.”

Two young, powerful-looking natives leading horses approached from the right and gave me a friendly wave and smile. “My grandsons - Mark and Chase, they’ll help haul your partner out, son. Get to it, boys.” The young men scaled the side of the capsule with ease and crouched near the hatch, as if they’d been retrieving astronaut’s their whole life. I went back inside and helped ease Beth out of the seat. She was sweating profusely and breathing very hard. “If I’d known we were gonna have company I’d have put on something a little nicer,” she wheezed. I guided her to the hatch and the young men lifted her free with ease, gently lowering her to the ground, then pulling me free and doing the same. The earth felt solid and welcome beneath my feet, and I leaned back against the still warm capsule and lowered myself into a seated position. I rubbed my fingers through the fine, purple powder and risked a sniff. It was like putting my nose into a freshly opened jar of Tang; citrusy, sweet and a wee bit acrid, but not unpleasant. The powder was like fluid talcum - similar to the drilling mud oil-field workers used. Slippery stuff, like greased goose liver - and it was everywhere.

I looked up at the sky-skin for the first time from this side, and it was nothing like the view from space had been. I had no idea what time of day it was, but the diffused light streaking across its surface made me think it had to be sometime in the afternoon. It was a dim pall, like a perpetual twilight, but the underbelly of the sky-skin seemed to emit a uniform glow of white light, broken in places by faint, hair-thin cracks of purple that spider-webbed across the entire horizon. It reminded me of a glazed pot my wife had bought in New Mexico years ago; velvety blue criss-crossed with horse hair by the potter that left distinct marks after it burnt off in the kiln. I scoured the horizon but saw no trace of the eye.

Smokey came and sat down beside me as his grandsons helped Beth out of her spacesuit. He offered me a wineskin and I gulped down the cool water greedily, thanking him kindly. It was refreshing to drink something without having to suck through a straw. Beth looked like a rag-doll in the hands of the two strong men, and sweat and purple dust painted her tired face. She looked like she was about to pass out any minute. One of the boys brought one of the horses closer, a big chestnut mare, and I saw that she was dragging a makeshift travois behind her. They laid Beth down on a pile of blankets and furs, and she was asleep before they could ask if she was comfortable. The new gravity was pushing me towards the same state in a hurry. I remember mumbling something to Smokey about the provisions in the shuttle then feeling strong arms lift me - and then nothing but sweet, sweet blackness.

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