Hearth

Clarissa could hear the drones in the distance coming over the red hills. She crouched amoungst blackened scoutberry shrubs long dead or maybe just hibernating, lacking leaves or feathered overgrowth to make her safe haven. Her hope relied solely on her silky fur camoflage. Luckily for Clarissa, she knew, her costume was invisible from above. The fools, she silently cackled, they had no idea. Their entire approach was wrong. This thought made her cracked lips stretch into a grim parody of her usual bright smile. She briefly let her thoughts dwell on a drink. Water was a valuable commodity on the blistered surface of the landscape.

This did not last for long. Her situation was grim. She had wandered too far from famillar territory and they had been stalking her for three days now. Unfortunately she had lost her artificial limb in the dry creek bed as she had fled and now progress was slow. She would have to place all her faith in her disguise. Again a painful smile creased her face. Placing faith in very little was something that Clarissa was accustomed to. She even enjoyed the freedom that came with living life with minimal possesions. A nomad’s life is not to be sniffed at. The enemy drone again hovered nearby.

The drone swooped, its propellers whizzing and clicking like some kind of mechanical insect. As though in a dream a face appeared in her mind. For just a moment and then it was gone. The face she did not recognise, but she knew with a certainty of her natural premonition that he was the operator of the drone. He had a single blue eye set into a bronze face. This eye glowed in his skin like a shiny sapphire lagoon in a hazy desert. On the other side of his face was an old style prosthetic eye. The type where you could stil see the appeture opening and closing as his eye focused and unfocused. The medics had not installed this type of visual augmentation since century twenty-seven and Clarissa wondered briefly about such an antique feature on a member of a society completely consumed by their up to date technology. She had only seen them once before during one of her dreams. His long straight nose with a slightly hooked end like the beak of a heath owl. The massive predatory birds that flew the night skys of this world, known as Hearth.

Hours later quiet finally descended and Clarissa was finally able to emerge from her fur pelt to breath gently in the night air. More a creature of night than day she focused solely on her ears for a moment, able in the silence to hear for miles around the deserted planes. The thrum of a drone in the distance told her it was time to move again. Quickly she set about finding a suitable peice of broken timber to fix onto the nub under her R) knee where her ankle and foot had been sliced off in a childhood accident. She fashioned a harness to fix it securely and began the long trot. Under the cover of the darkness her discuise as a small red fox, another immigrant fro Earth, Clarissa found she was generally free to wander as she liked. Her family never understood how she didn’t fear to be out where the others could find her. What they didn’t realise was the greater fear felt by Clarrissa being inside the home-caves with them. He disguise was simple, yet effective. Who would notice a small fox among many? No magic was involved. Merely a spoonful of courage. Besides she had disguised herself as a fox for so long that she occassionally felt more fox than human being. And the foxes liked her because she brought them food.

The people of the Sor had lived on Home for a thousand years, however, they did not claim to be Indigenous. They knew their history and that they too were migrants from the great mother planet, Earth. The once elite people had been amongst the first to seek outwards for a colony on another planet. As overcrowding, global warming and overpopulation issues that looked unresolvable they decided to brave the outer reaches of space in a generations long journey. Later in history came the Erathian’s. Their journey was shorter. Most of the Erathians are able to remember Earth. They had more modern ships, technology and weapons. As legend says, as Earth’s sun began to fade, the Earathians had no choice but to leave. The only other colony in the known universe. At least the only colony to have sent word and co-ordinates to Earth which arrived early enough. The technology once possessed by the brave people of Sor was now reduntant compared to the new technology the Erathian brought with them and the once brave people had decided to hide away. There had been altercations. People had been killed in skirmishes over food and weapons.

The people of the Sor had suffered the worse casualties as in self defense they had used the only defense they had, their knowledge of the wild planet and their special powers to disappear. They had moved deep beneath the crust of the planet, to the caverns and spaces created by the Brackwell Sor, the large underland water reservoir of Home. The Erathian’s were livid. Left alone to work out how to live on inhospitable Home, they continued to seek the people of Sor. They also wanted to understand the powers of the Sor. Powers which meant that the people were able to go for days without food and water. The people could communicate using telepathy, which made them even more diffucult to catch. The people of the Sor had been citizens of home for a thousand years and in that time had become more suited to the ways of the planet than their Erathian counterparts.

The Erathians, once landed on Home, began to notice that the culture before them had made a sudden disappearence. Home is not a hospitable planet. Covered ninety nine percent by desert it is home to many native monsters. Reptiles larger than humans and great cats. The Erathians from an Earth completely bereft of all animal life except humans, had suffered some in their attempts to set up a city. All attempts to farm the land were fraught with diffuculties in the foreign soils. They had seen what remained of the Sor peoples cities. Constructed of stone and covering hundreds of kilometers, they now were completely silenced. Pale green vines fought the blistering sun to twine around majestic columns and through long disused rooms, outdoor courtyards and spaces. What had obviously been once a paradise which the Erathians, with no ancient skills such stonemasonary, could not rebuild or make functional again. Back on Earth recycling and reuse had become the mainstay. Engineers working to house massive populations in tall multistoried buildings.

Unfortuntely to majority of Earths population had had to be abandoned. Without the technology to move billions of people billions of light years across the universe. Thus the Erathians were a group of elite’s. People with either the money to buy a place of the ships or the required knowledge to be of use. Prior to leaving Earth the Erathians had been composed of a group of powerful families with the funding to support the mission ito space.

Clarrisa’s small nose twitched, she knew better than to think that she was alone. The wind blew strongly tonight and the sky was dark. Her vision remained well adjusted to the dark. She was used to night travel. She has been keeping up a steady pace for the last few hours. Not towards home, unfortunately the direct route was not possible, rather a circutuous route through miles of sandy red earth and shrubs, her fox fur pelt pulled up over her head. She could smell something in the distance to the east. She would need to find somewhere sheltered to get some sleep before the sun rose. She knew of some nearby caves. And yet… her nose twitched again. She cautious approaches the ancient cave network which was the entrance to many underground tunnels. None of them reached as far a Braithwell Sor unfortunately but they would do for tonight, she climbed a small way up the side of a hill and settled in.

After an hour or so of trying to sleep Clarissa again awoke with a dry tongue. She got up and walked to the side of the hill and then she saw them. Three men gathered in the rain. A tin ragged tarpaulin tied between two trees blowing around as they tried to set up camp. Erathians. Dressed in their thin, tech suits. Water resistant and flame repellant. Clarissa had been wanting to get her hands on one for a very long time. They looked unhappy. One was yelling but his words were picked up and discarded by the gusty winds. Rain was a rare occurrence on Home, but it did happen and it paid to be prepared. Never one to miss an opportunity for entertainment Clarissa pulled her fur over her head and slipped closer to the small group. Instantly, she recognised the man from her vision the day before. He turned in her direction and she crouched behind a large rock. The appeture of his strange eye moved slowly as he scanned the horizon before returning to tying his shelter down. With a small shiver Clarissa decided not to dally and she moved on. Silently she gaves thanks to the great Mother for this storm that would give her the opportunity to slip away.

Jonas sent shivers down her spine. The greenish darkness of his robotic eye revealed nothing, seeming to be a portal into an empty world showing only an opaque reflection of herself. Clarissa found herself focusing on his human eye, if you could call it that. A clear fathomless blue, this eye gave even less away if that were possible. Showing a depth that seemed to go on forever, despite only being the size of an iris. They say we carry our cages with us, and Jonas cage had a bredth and depth which had the capacity for endless loneliness or endless refections of other people. That’s the trouble with not letting people in. Clarissa prefered not to think about him. Not when her furry pelt was on the line. Jonas would have to sort himself out.


Clarissa slipped gently through the door into the large living area where her family sat around faintly glowing lumistones. The lumistones could be recharged through the waters of the Sor itself and the amount of light they shed dependent on how long they had been submerged for. For daylight hours were invisible below the crust, so the lighter rocks were used during daytime activities. Minnie, her mother looked up from her embroidery and gave Clarissa a bemused look.
‘Did you get the lemons?’
‘Yes, I did Mother,’ Clarissa moved towards the kitchen and a delicious smell which wafted throught the caverns. Lemons had to be retrieved from some distance away.
‘Hey Clari,’ Zac, her best friend and confidante, also the best cook in this section of the caverns was stirring a large pot and surrounded by piles of herbs and green vegetables.
‘You will never believe what I saw out in the bush.’
‘Oh, yea, another giant scarcat?’
‘No, some Erathians.’ Zac shot her a look of concern.
‘They were making camp just past the Hillerns’
‘I managed to get away while it was raining.’
‘This is news for the Elders, you must let them know that the Erathians have come this close to the Sor.’ Clarissa reluctantly agreed. She would go to the Elders.
‘But you must come with me!’ Zac nodded in agreement and Clari felt relieved. She didn’t much enjoy the company of the Elders. She would just take a small trip outside around the perimeter to get some air first.

Clarissa pulled her coat up over her head as she exited the complicated network of caves that hid the entrance to the Sor. The dry arid air hit her face and her cheeks burned briefly in the heat of the day. As she came around a corner she saw them. How had they come this close? The three men, near a small copse of vegetation. Clarissa had never seen Erathians this close to the Sor and she paniced silently. She quickly made the only decision possible- she had to lead them away. They obviously had not found the entrance yet but a few more hours and they would surely see someone coming out. She felt a small thrill of unfamilliar fear and pulled her pelt closer. And then she ran.

Silently, swiftly, doging between shrubs. Clarissa headed away from the Sor. At some point she would have to show herself so that the enemy would follow.