starve to death, or that Darkstar Marauders might come for us at any time.
“I think we can stay here and lay low until my cousin gets here,” Ramses says. “When we lost the ship, we lost our communications capability though.”
I was afraid to ask about that. “How can Sara find us then?”
“We have four days left. I’ll have to figure out something by then...some way to signal them.”
Every time Ramses has said he’d do something, he’s done it. I’m tired of worrying and doubting him. Now when he says he’ll find a way, I feel I can trust that he will.
Ramses’s clothes are hanging on a hook he’s nailed into the wall, and he starts to pull them off and put them on.
I frown at him, and he laughs.
“What?” he says. “You want me to keep walking around naked?”
“Well,” I say, “I was getting used to it...I have to say I’ll miss it.”
“Don’t worry,” he says. “There’s nothing for us to do at night except each other.”
I laugh. “That’s an amazing line.”
He grins. “I was up all night thinking of great lines...that one is just a sample.”
He puts on his coat and hat, then steps outside.
I get dressed and follow him out. The sun is rising across the frozen sea, and it looks brilliant and beautiful as the light reflects and shimmers across the ice.
“What do you think happened to them?” I ask. “The people who lived here. Were they even human?”
“I think they were,” Ramses says. “Though I don’t know why. You humans used to call Venus Earth’s sister planet, before you knew what a hellishly hot place it was. It’s the same size as Earth, the same mass...looking at it through a telescope, early humans thought it might be a thriving place just like Earth. With technology we’ve managed to get cities and jungles floating in its upper atmosphere, but the pressure and heat on the surface is not survivable. And now...Atlantis. Another sister planet – or maybe a brother planet. It stayed habitable longer than Venus, but where Venus became too hot, Atlantis froze over.”
“How do you know it wasn’t always this cold?” I ask.
“Just another feeling,” he says. “From what my father said, it sounded like this planet used to be like Earth.”
In the sky, I see a bright light that looks almost like a star, though it’s too bright to see any other stars now. “Is that Venus?” I ask, pointing.
Ramses looks up and squints. Now I can see that the light is moving. It’s not a star.
“Shit,” Ramses says. “It’s Grius. Gather what we can carry...blankets, some food, nothing too heavy.”
The light has a tail as it breaks through the atmosphere, and soon it’s growing closer and closer. We gather as many supplies as we can, stuffing them into our bag, while the ship grows larger and larger above our heads.
And then it seems to explode, but it’s close enough now that I can see it consists of a handful of smaller pods – maybe five or six.
A few fly off toward where we originally landed, while others drift toward the other side.
“They’re cutting us off,” Ramses says. “They’re behind and in front of us, with mountains on the side.”
“What do we do?” I ask, lifting up my bag.
Ramses looks over to the ridge, and points to a shallower slope. “We need to try to find a way up into the mountains. This way they will have to follow us up, and we’ll have the high ground.”
I swallow nervously, but decide to put my faith in him. I can’t argue with the logic of his plan – not that it’s a good plan – but it’s the only one we have.
“Let’s go,” he says, taking my hand.
We walk toward the shallow slope on the ridge line, but as we begin to ascend, it suddenly doesn’t feel shallow at all. Ramses cuts a path through the snow, but with the heavy pack on his back and the slippery terrain, it’s incredibly hard to climb at all, let alone quickly.
“They seem to have a rough idea where we are,” Ramses says as we climb
“I think we can stay here and lay low until my cousin gets here,” Ramses says. “When we lost the ship, we lost our communications capability though.”
I was afraid to ask about that. “How can Sara find us then?”
“We have four days left. I’ll have to figure out something by then...some way to signal them.”
Every time Ramses has said he’d do something, he’s done it. I’m tired of worrying and doubting him. Now when he says he’ll find a way, I feel I can trust that he will.
Ramses’s clothes are hanging on a hook he’s nailed into the wall, and he starts to pull them off and put them on.
I frown at him, and he laughs.
“What?” he says. “You want me to keep walking around naked?”
“Well,” I say, “I was getting used to it...I have to say I’ll miss it.”
“Don’t worry,” he says. “There’s nothing for us to do at night except each other.”
I laugh. “That’s an amazing line.”
He grins. “I was up all night thinking of great lines...that one is just a sample.”
He puts on his coat and hat, then steps outside.
I get dressed and follow him out. The sun is rising across the frozen sea, and it looks brilliant and beautiful as the light reflects and shimmers across the ice.
“What do you think happened to them?” I ask. “The people who lived here. Were they even human?”
“I think they were,” Ramses says. “Though I don’t know why. You humans used to call Venus Earth’s sister planet, before you knew what a hellishly hot place it was. It’s the same size as Earth, the same mass...looking at it through a telescope, early humans thought it might be a thriving place just like Earth. With technology we’ve managed to get cities and jungles floating in its upper atmosphere, but the pressure and heat on the surface is not survivable. And now...Atlantis. Another sister planet – or maybe a brother planet. It stayed habitable longer than Venus, but where Venus became too hot, Atlantis froze over.”
“How do you know it wasn’t always this cold?” I ask.
“Just another feeling,” he says. “From what my father said, it sounded like this planet used to be like Earth.”
In the sky, I see a bright light that looks almost like a star, though it’s too bright to see any other stars now. “Is that Venus?” I ask, pointing.
Ramses looks up and squints. Now I can see that the light is moving. It’s not a star.
“Shit,” Ramses says. “It’s Grius. Gather what we can carry...blankets, some food, nothing too heavy.”
The light has a tail as it breaks through the atmosphere, and soon it’s growing closer and closer. We gather as many supplies as we can, stuffing them into our bag, while the ship grows larger and larger above our heads.
And then it seems to explode, but it’s close enough now that I can see it consists of a handful of smaller pods – maybe five or six.
A few fly off toward where we originally landed, while others drift toward the other side.
“They’re cutting us off,” Ramses says. “They’re behind and in front of us, with mountains on the side.”
“What do we do?” I ask, lifting up my bag.
Ramses looks over to the ridge, and points to a shallower slope. “We need to try to find a way up into the mountains. This way they will have to follow us up, and we’ll have the high ground.”
I swallow nervously, but decide to put my faith in him. I can’t argue with the logic of his plan – not that it’s a good plan – but it’s the only one we have.
“Let’s go,” he says, taking my hand.
We walk toward the shallow slope on the ridge line, but as we begin to ascend, it suddenly doesn’t feel shallow at all. Ramses cuts a path through the snow, but with the heavy pack on his back and the slippery terrain, it’s incredibly hard to climb at all, let alone quickly.
“They seem to have a rough idea where we are,” Ramses says as we climb
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