Read Kinder des Schicksals 4 (Xeelee 9): Resplendent for Free Online Page B

content to toil in the darkness, to
turn a few scraps of our land back the way they should be. That
should be enough for any life.’
    Nomi just snorted.
    Already the two-seat flitter was beginning its descent, towards a
Conurbation. Still known by its Qax registration of 11729, the
Conurbation was a broad, glistening sprawl of bubble-dwellings blown
from the bedrock, and linked by the green-blue of umbilical canals.
Hama saw that many of the dome-shaped buildings had been scarred by
fire, some even cracked open. But the blue-green tetrahedral sigil of
free Earth had been daubed on every surface.
    A shadow passed over the Conurbation’s glistening rooftops. Hama
shielded his eyes and squinted upwards. A fleshy cloud briefly
eclipsed the sun. It was a Spline ship: a living starship kilometres
across, its hardened epidermis pocked with monitor and weapon
emplacements. He suppressed a shudder. For generations the Spline had
been the symbol of Qax dominance. But now the Qax had gone, and this
abandoned Spline was in the hands of human engineers, who sought to
comprehend its strange biological workings.
    On the outskirts of the Conurbation there was a broad pit scooped
out of the ground, its crudely scraped walls denoting its origin as
post-Occupation: human, not Qax. In this pit rested a number of
silvery, insectile forms, and as the flitter fell further through the
sunlit air, Hama could see people moving around the gleaming shapes,
talking, working. The pit was a shipyard, operated by and for humans,
who were slowly rediscovering yet another lost art; for no human
engineer had built a spacecraft on Earth for three hundred years.
    Hama pressed his face to the window - like a child, he knew,
reinforcing Nomi’s preconception of him - but to Lethe with
self-consciousness. ’One of those ships is going to take us to
Callisto. Imagine it, Nomi - a moon of Jupiter!’
    But Nomi scowled. ’Just remember why we’re going there: to hunt
out jasofts - criminals and collaborators. It will be a grim
business, Hama, no matter how pretty the scenery.’
    The flitter slid easily through the final phases of its descent,
and the domes of the Conurbation loomed around them.
     
    There was a voice, talking fast, almost babbling.
    ’There is no time. There is no space. We live in a universe of
static shapes. Do you see? Imagine a grain of dust that represents
all the particles in our universe, frozen in time. Imagine a
stupendous number of such dust grains, representing all the possible
shapes the particles can take. This is reality dust, a dust of the
Nows. And each grain is an instant, in a possible history of the
universe.’ A snapping of fingers. ’There. There. There. Each moment,
each juggling of the particles, a new grain. The reality dust
contains all the arrangements of matter there could ever be. Reality
dust is an image of eternity…’
    She lay there, face pressed into the dirt, wishing none of this
was happening.
    Hands grabbed her, by shoulder and hip. She was dragged, flipped
over on her back. The sky above was dazzling bright.
    A face loomed, silhouetted. She saw a hairless scalp, no eyebrows
or lashes. The face itself was rounded, smoothed over, as if
unformed. But she had a strong impression of great age.
    ’This won’t hurt,’ she whispered, terrified. ’Close your
eyes.’
    The face loomed closer. ’Nothing here is real.’ The voice was
harsh, without inflection. A man? ’Not even the dust.’
    ’Reality dust,’ she murmured.
    ’Yes. Yes! It is reality dust. If you live, remember that.’
    The face receded, turning away.
    She tried to sit up. She pressed her hands into the loose dust,
crushing low, crumbling structures, like the tunnels of worms. She
glimpsed a flat horizon, a black, oily sea, forest-covered hills. She
was on a beach of silvery, dusty sand. The sky was a glowing dome.
The air was full of mist; she couldn’t see far in any direction, as
if she were trapped in a glowing bubble.
    Her companion