Page 91 of Ava Stargazer

Ava did as told, and almost immediately a sensation like a video feed played in front of her. She briefly shook in shock, opening her eyes and taking herself out of it, before settling again and closing to watch. The images were disjointed and jumbled together.It's fuzzy.Ava scrunched her face, with her eyes closed, as if that would sharpen them.

Finally, the images gave way to clarity. A sunset. From Earth. With one large sun overhead. Next to a moon. A single moon, large in the sky, obscured a bit by clouds. It wasn’t completely full but hung there, friendly, in a way that made Ava open her mouth in wonder as she sat in Iryl’s hardback chair.

Ava was in the memories of a child, looking through Joy’s eyes, as she ran in a clearing near dusk, the yard covered in a grass similar to that which grew in the solarium. Her small hands squirted water out of a hose, and there was another hose sheran through that had water shooting upward, over and over. Joy laughed while an older woman with pale hair like Joy’s watched. An animal with golden fur and a tail ran by her, carrying a green sphere in its mouth, and Joy ran, chasing it.

Her mother eventually stopped her and served her a cool drink in a large red cup with ice cubes. A big red fruit with black seeds with a green rind sat next to the cup on the table.

Ava’s brows narrowed as she scrunched her face even more. The pictures were hazy, and then changed to a different scene.

In this one a bright blue vehicle that traveled on wheels was in the vision. Joy opened the door to get in, struggling to climb up, until the woman with pale hair came over and helped. The woman leaned over, and Joy was strapped into a seat with a buckle over her, and she watched the scenery pass as they left a building where the vehicle was kept. There were animals on the side of the road that looked like coars, only they had white and black spots and were not shaggy. And others that ran fast with a mane and tail that whipped in the wind. The memory focused a lot on those, but other details, details Ava wished she could see, were not in focus, blurred out in favor of what the child was interested in. But she did notice a smattering of tall buildings in the background after they left the animals behind.

There was another memory, one of many tall buildings, and vehicles next to them. It was all metal that twisted high into the sky, looking like some of the large cities she’d visited doing transports with Ebel across the stars. Only, these buildings reflected the light of the single sun that was present in all of these memories.

And Humans. They were there.

They were everywhere.

Their faces and shapes were fuzzy, but clear enough to see them everywhere walking. Humans all around as that single sun shone down on them from overhead and Joy looked throughthe window of the vehicle as it traveled.There were once so, so many.

Then there was one more memory. In this one Joy was scared. There were people fighting while the eyes she looked through hid. Loud bangs were everywhere. And the older woman with the pale hair, no longer having the soft eyes like she did when the child was playing in the sprinkler, held on to Joy’s hand as they were pulled together and marched along by creatures that the child hid her face from and did not get a good look at, but Ava could see that they wore robes.Very familiar robes.But Joy did look back as they walked up the ramp, one last time, at the world, at Earth, with fire everywhere behind them. The air was so dark with smoke that the sun from the first image was not visible at all.

The memory ended there. Iryl played the sunset image once again before finishing.

Joy said softly as Ava came back to awareness, “That’s all of Earth I remember myself. I don’t know if any of that was real either, or my imagination. I was really young when we left. My mother told me much more about the animals and things though, before she passed away. I put it all in the log you had.”

Ava sat, stunned, feeling an attachment to the place in Joy’s memories. It felt like looking at a ghost, and she rubbed her arms where goosebumps had formed. She didn’t know quite how to categorize or rationalize what she had just seen.

“Do we know what happened? To Earth? My mother just told me that she was taken when she was asleep,” Ava said, trailing off. “Every one of us children at Cipra was born there, so none of us knew anything other than what our mothers told us. They said right before they were kidnapped that they had made contact with aliens and fighting had started on Earth, and it was poisoning everything.”

Joy looked at her sadly. “Right, yes. I was awake when we left. You saw it. I was put on a large ship. None of us had a translator implant then so we ... couldn’t really understand. Anyways, my mother and I went directly to a farm to work. They kept children with their mothers as sets.”

Just like how I was kept with mine.Ava said idly, “The robe. It looked like the ones the Yar wore, in your memory.” She let that thought hang a moment before asking, “Were Humans successful at fighting? At all?”

“I don’t know, but then everything was on fire and they just came and took as many women and children as they could. I don’t know what happened after we left. We had to be quiet. If w-we weren’t...” Joy’s voice choked up and the stammer she had returned by the end.

Iryl stepped forward, his tone soft. “The logs from Cipra, the bit I downloaded, said the planet is no longer habitable. It just said that in reference to not being able to gather any further breeding stock. But I don’t know any more. We do have coordinates now, however, of Earth.”

Ava felt a pang, thinking of the sun overhead from Joy’s memories.That sun should still be there though. I would like to see it someday.

Instead, she turned to Vox. Vox looked stunned as well, seeing those memories for the first time like Ava. “Vox? Can you show Joy Xai?”

Joy smiled. “I already saw. The mind thing is harder for them to do back to me. Iryl showed me pictures instead. I can’t wait to go there.”

Ava shook her head, looking out over the courtyard right outside a window in Iryl’s quarters. It was bathed in shadows, the trees above filtering the sunlight from the twin suns that reigned over Elyheim. But Ava felt nostalgic for a different sun.And not even the one on Earth. She missed the one on Xai, and the triple moons that hung high at night.

Ava put her toe on the edge of the lake. The water was cooler than a hot bath, but not chilly. She had taken off her jumpsuit and stood in only her undergarments, some flimsy underwear and a strap she used to compress her breasts. She always wore that strap, as it was easier to maneuver around the engine with it on.

Vox insisted she wear something, in case any visitors passed by, and Ava agreed, her body feeling almost fully exposed like this outside with her midsection unclothed as it was. She didn’t have any privacy on the Phor ship, but it was just Ebel then, and he didn’t care what she looked like, other than if she had any cuts or bruises. Here on Xai, she knew others were more curious about her form.

Vox’s gaze on her was heated as he walked swiftly into the water. He turned and beckoned her to follow.

Ava left the biologics on her chest, thinking they might find swimming through the lake fun. She looked down at the water, dubious.If I can figure out how to swim, that is.She reached down and touched the water, dipping her hand in and watching the water drip off like the rain did before. Ava looked up at Vox, already swimming, admiring his clean strokes across the lake.It does not look too hard.

She loved the bath, and even though the lake water was chilled, it looked like the same sort of fun, so she walked swiftly in until the bottom gave out and she fell.Oh!Immediately, her fun turned to fear as she realized she didn’t know how to stay up.

“Help!” she yelled, reaching toward Vox.

“Steady, sweet bird,” Vox said, grabbing her around her midsection and pulling her back to the area where her feet had purchase on the slippery rocks.

---