Unmanned craft were sent out across the stars to the planet, the fourth mars-like ever discovered, subsequently named Theta Mars, equipped to terraform its surface into a usable colony of Earth. Contact with the probes was maintained for nearly a century, at which point the inhabitants of Earth were seized by one of those periodic fits characteristic of their race, and descended into their particular brand of global chaos, a state called War. From that point of total collapse, no records of Theta Mars remained.

  -Abalone Shell On The White Beach, A New History Of Theta Mars

  “They have to be sending a wyrm, Captain,” said Madeline DuCourt, pulling the blue wool of her shawl close around her shoulders. “It’s that or more than half of the children, and they wouldn’t give up the only thing that keeps negotiations open.”

  Captain Francios Havern rubbed at the stubble on his chin, looking down his nose at the hastily sketched changes to the modular accommodations for the emissary aboard Divine Messenger.

  He had ferried passengers of the highest esteem all his career as captain of the flagship courier in the service of the Imperial regime. Kings and prophets and hosts of oligarchs who feared betrayal from their brother rulers to the extent that the entire planet’s leadership had needed to attend off world meetings. Divine Messenger doubled as a pleasure ship for more than half the voyages she made.

  The requests from Theta Mars had seemed almost spartan in comparison to the star-leagues of litho-film he had on other occasions received, detailing cabin pressures to the micro-barometer, and pantry requirements down to the individual plant grains, and weight of animal flesh, both live and after preparation.

  He had forgotten to consider that they were not expecting a multi-person entourage. There were simply too few human beings left on the planet to justify the specifications requested. As the Journeywoman now reminded, those humans were hostages, and would not be permitted to leave.

  “From the volumes, it can only be at the maximum one wyrm, who may or may not have a human companion,” the Journeywoman continued. “If you cannot make the adjustments, the emissary will be living in your cargo bay for the duration of the voyage.”

  “We can make them, Journeywoman,” Captain Havern replied. “Thank you for bringing this to my attention.”

  DuCourt left the bridge and paced the narrow halls to her quarters. She did not find the leniency of ship-grav soothing, nor the white lights that beamed into every corner of the passages familiar, though they were designed to stimulate the body as sunlight did. For twenty five years she had lived on an orbital colony in the neighboring sector. For twenty five years she had longed to see her home world again, to witness dawn. The vision of it suspended in the darkness through the viewport turned her stomach. How she wished she could go down in the shuttle to greet the emissary.

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  To do so would be to beg for death.

  She was exiled, as were all human colonists, those who managed to board the ill prepared ships in time, when the Expulsion was enacted. All others were ash. Maybe there was peace to be found in that. Ash at least, remained on the soil.

  The door to her quarters slid open before she reached it, Liam emerging to wrap her in his arms. He did not know the reasons, but he, as always, could feel the unease that scuttled about the shadowed corners of her heart.

  “The captain agreed to adjust the accommodations,” she said, her face turned against his shoulder.

  “Could have been done before we arrived, if he’d just shown us the plans,” Liam grumbled.

  “We caught it soon enough,” Madeline said. Now steadied, she entered their rooms, standing by the desk where they worked, shoulder to shoulder. “This is why they sent us, to catch these things before they start.”

  That was of course only partially true.

  They had brought everything. Twenty five years of work splayed out across the sloped worksurface. The wyrm captured in blurry prints of century old film, cramped pencil notes marching across the pages of handbound books of recyc. Yellowed typed copies of field logs. Data sticks and an ancient coughing computer. It spilled across their small berth, metal boxes stacked and secured against the wall in case of a grav-loss event. Everything that had ever been collected, in the brief history of the Society for Understanding’s Theta Martian branch, by the Wyrm Observation Corp.

  Twenty five years at a desk, unraveling more than a hundred and fifty consecutive years of lies and obfuscation.

  It did not absolve them of complacency.

  Madeline’s hand touched the corners of a print. A young man sat cross legged in a meadow, showing coloured cards to a wyrm. Neither subject knew they had been photographed. A strand of her hair slid from its place to hang in front of her eyes. The brown was streaked with grey.

  “I’ve never felt so old as I do here, Liam,” she whispered. His arms curling around her as worries and exhaustion whispered between them.

  “You don’t think she will come, do you?” Liam asked, a tightness moving from his chest to hers. The wyrm in the print was red. Everyone who had survived the Expulsion knew her. The man beside her in the meadow was regarded as a terrorist by what shreds remained of what had once been the Theta Martian government.

  “No, it won’t be her,” Madeline said. She turned over her hand, rubbed the acid burns and puncture scars that scraped across the centre of her palm and dripped down her wrist. Longing clawed at her heart like some wild thing, she could hear Liam’s shaky breath as it hit him unexpectedly. She was sorry for that. They had been sharing a soul so long, those days of uncontrolled emotions were behind them.

  She thought now that maybe they had only left them in orbit around their home.

  “Tranquil would be a good choice,” he said, to comfort. “She is wise, and patient. She willingly spoke with mankind before.”

  “I’m afraid to hope, my love,” Madeline whispered.

  They returned to their quiet work. Sifting, cataloging, decoding. An institution founded on a lie had educated them once. A Tranquil teacher had taught them a different history. When their labours were complete others would weigh their findings. There would be no absolution, and they would never go home.