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The alien woman ushers us forward, leading our group behind the remains of what looks—to my human eyes—like a broken spaceship that crashed through the ceiling of the cave. It’s the size of a small airplane with no wings, and behind it is a cozy little abode. There’s a mattress fluffed with moss and covered in lizard-skin, along with a few homemade pillows. Behind the bed are clay pots and a covered area that looks as if it is storage. There’s a firepit and Noj’me immediately pulls out what looks like a dried mushroom cap the size of a dinner plate and sets it down in the center of the pit and uses a striker to spark it. Within a few moments, there’s a small fire burning, and she feeds it shavings the same brownish shade as the mushroom cap. I watch as she fills a metal bowl with water from the stream that gushes from the rocky pool near the front of the plateau, and then she hurries back to us, adding herbs to the water and setting the entire thing directly atop the flames.
“The oracle will record this day for us,” she says excitedly. “A day of visitors is a good omen indeed.”
“So it is a good omen? You are not just saying that?” Set’nef sounds skeptical. He sits by the fire, resting one pair of hands upon his knees, the other pair crossed over his chest. Tal’nef seems less inclined to be social than his brother, pacing back and forth between the ledge and our fire, as if unable to rest.
R’jaal sits down near the fire and when I sit next to him, he puts an arm around my waist, pulling me close. I know that’s just his khui at work…but I still like it.
“Visitors brought the oracle to us,” Noj’me says. “Anytime there are visitors, they bring change. How can change be anything but good?”
Okay, so Noj’me is an optimist. I like it. Better than the sour look on Set’nef’s face, as if he doesn’t trust any of this and never will. I tap R’jaal’s knee. “Ask if they have more oracles or if this is the only one.”
R’jaal nods at me, giving my side a squeeze. “Wise observation, my R’slind.”
I hate myself a little for how much his words please me.
He speaks to Noj’me and she shakes her head, one hand gesturing at her ear. “Only one oracle. It whispers…here…when you lay down.”
That sounds…strange. I touch R’jaal’s arm. “Ask if we can go look at it?”
Set’nef and his brother don’t seem pleased when R’jaal asks, but Noj’me nods. “Yes! Look. See. Listen.”
She jumps to her feet, forgetting all about the tea, and moves to the “oracle.” She doesn’t hover as we approach it, as though she wants to let us discover it on our own. I’ve never seen anything like it before, of course. The metal looks as if it was poured from one large piece, and even though it’s scraped from its journey, there are parts that are shiny enough to be a mirror. Part of me wants to stare at my reflection and examine how horrible I look after days and days of roughing it in a cave, but that’s probably not a good idea. I deliberately avoid studying my reflection too closely and focus on the ship instead.
Because that’s absolutely what it is. I’ve seen enough science fiction novels come through the circulation desk and I’ve watched enough science fiction movies to recognize the general shape and the control panels inside. The part that blooms open like a flower isn’t ripped like I thought it was—that’s the opening—a bit like an aperture of a lens, but instead of folding inward, it pushes outward when the “door” is opened. There’s a long, rectangular-shaped bed tucked amidst the controls that gives me uncomfortable flashbacks to when I’d woken up. My pod didn’t look exactly like this, though. Mine had tubes everywhere—even under my skin—and the lights seemed to be flashing everywhere around me. Then again, I didn’t pay much attention to it in my panic.
I definitely remember the lid, though, and it moved to the side like my first keyboard phone did when it opened. Like a jewelry tray or a tackle box, I decide. This one isn’t the same type. I touch the edge of the door “petal” and it feels cool under my hand. Idly, I wonder how many spaceships are around here. The buttons and screens are strangely shaped and a few of them are cracked, but there are no spiderwebs or dust inside. I touch one panel hesitantly. “Noj’me must be taking care of this.”
“Perhaps,” R’jaal says. He watches me with a curious expression. “Do you know how to work it?”
“Me? Oh gosh no. This technology is as strange to me as it is to you.” I touch a panel, and yup, no response. “I don’t see a keyboard, and even if there was one, I doubt I’d know the alphabet it uses.”
