Cath

The Cradle

Freyr pantomimed thinking for a second, stroking her imaginary beard. “I’ve never been up on stage at a music thing before.” She raised one eyebrow as the singer, not too far away now, ripped his sweat-drenched shirt off, swung it around his head and chucked it into the crowd. A dozen arms reached out to grab it at the front. The band started playing slower but harder as they transitioned from one song to the next.

“Ah, there you are!” A voice called out from the throng around them. Alderney pushed through the crowd and stepped aside to let Wallace through. She’d somehow changed her stola for a lightweight purple jumpsuit. “You’re all wet! Good, well, I think we should head back inside now. I’m afraid we’re attracting a bit of attention…Dr Lang?”

Freyr pushed through the crowd towards the stage. Liquid from the bottle she’d stolen spilled all over her mask when someone’s elbow jogged her as she tried to drink. “Hey, cool outfit!” Someone shouted in her ear. “You’re an amazing crowd, and we’re Precept. You’re listening to the early 21st, right here on Réunion beach!” The singer shouted as the song ended. “This one is for our new government - fuck you!”
The band started playing again, playing with new vigour. Lights shone up into the sky from around the stage, and large gouts of smoke puffed out and around the ensemble. Freyr pushed on towards the front.

Wallace just smiled as Freyr ran away, then looked at the two Rothians. “I’m going to put a shield out, but we should really leave soon. Want to head back to the ship and I’ll collect Dr Lang?” As she spoke, a subtle oil-slick bubble extended from the partly visible Cradle ship to encompass the concert within it. If you were listening carefully, you could hear a sound like undersea cables being pulled taut.

Song Reference time

Literate and stylish
(Literate and stylish)
Kissable and quiet
(Kissable and quiet)
Well that's what girls'
Dreams are made of
And that's all you need to know
(And that's all you need to know)
You have it or you don't
(You have it or you)
You have it or you
(Don't)

Halo: Aegis Team

While listening to the others discuss options, Tar sniffed the air and looked around. A tingle ran all the way down her arms and into her chest, taking cues from atmospheric pressure. Thinking back to when she was last here, Tar finally understood what was coming. “A rolling bank approaches… I say we use speed over stealth; take those buildings to shelter if it passes over.”

She scraped a couple of steps forward and looked through her carbine’s scope just as the rapidly darkening sky suddenly lit up like daylight for a split-second. Tar studied the platform, looking for any signs they had been spotted. After a few seconds, a deafening boom washed over the mountainside they were on. The sky lit up again, and Tar growled. “We’re exposed - whatever we do, we have to do it quickly!” The Commando looked over at the squad leader.

The Cradle

The hit from her stim stick moments before rushed up Freyr’s spine, like a thick fog. The music slowed in tempo slightly and rose in pitch.

“Who says we need Wallace? We have a bar right here, all around us!” As if to demonstrate, Freyr snatched a square green bottle away from the lips of a teenager with orange trunks. She effected a sweet smile when he looked angrily her way, and pushed him off the side with one almighty shove.

The soaking wet biologist upended the bottle and took in a mouthful of the pungent liquid. It tasted like liquorice and chilli peppers. Freyr winced as she swallowed, then took another smaller sip. “We can make our own party.”

---

A long bike whirred out of the long lines of air traffic above the city centre and dropped down to the promenade overlooking the lake. A girl in a full body protective suit and helmet parked it next to the man who was watching the concert and hopped off the bike. He looked over and offered her his binoculars, which she took wordlessly and moved to the parapet.

“I marked them. The mask is back on now, but body language matches known records.” He remarked. The girl quickly rewound the footage recorded in the device until she got a look at half of Freyr’s face. “Any shields?”

“I can’t detect anything. The lizards might.”

The girl clucked her tongue softly, tapping the parapet with a fingernail.

The Cradle

Freyr hung awkwardly in Marae’s embrace for a moment, feet softly kicking to help them float. Then she wrapped her arms around the scientist’s muscular form and gave her a squeeze. She wanted to say ‘thank you’, but couldn’t. The mental congestion was the same as if she were crying out of the water.

“My son is missing too. Wallace’s voice entered Freyr’s head. It was clear she had been listening in, somehow. ”That was why I called on you specifically. You may not know it yet, but you have influence with our people, Dr Lang. More than you know. We can help each other.”

Freyr didn’t say anything, but released Marae after a few seconds. ”Let's go up. I’m ready for a drink.” She signalled in a monotone fashion. The music had been in a lull for a little bit, but was building up to a crescendo again.

“Just forget
All about fate
While I unlock this gentleman’s promise.”

The sound of the band exploded back into Freyr’s ears as she broke the surface of the water. Turning her head, she could just about see the singer on their raised platform, holding onto the microphone stand while knocking their knees together.

“With flesh like fire, but it lacks the colour
And chemical laughs fly round like drama.”

Freyr grabbed onto the nearest pontoon and dragged herself up, clothes releasing large amounts of water back into the lake. ”I don’t understand what you mean.” Freyr sent back to Wallace. She looked back at the ship, which was mobbed by partygoers.

The Cradle

Freyr did smile a tiny bit at Nirann’s deadpan humour. It didn’t last long though. “I’m just finding it hard to be optimistic right now. I spent my whole adult life so far trying to understand the next phase in synthetic life. Now we have the greatest chance I'm ever going to see, sitting in my lap, and all I want to do is find my family and get far away. Go live in the wild somewhere. As long as I have them, the rest of this galaxy can burn for all I care.” Even as she said it, Freyr was surprised by the vitriolic words emerging from her head. But she knew they were real, if buried deep down like white embers in a dying fire.

The Cradle

Freyr blew out some vapour. It was a different colour to before, slightly green. She chuckled and shook her head. “At least then they’ll get back the time they lost.” Lights reflected off the dark, warm water as she ran a hand through it. Nirann might have been talking, but she wasn’t taking anything in. After a little while, Freyr leaned slowly forward from her position, sat on the side and entered the lake fully.

The comforting blackness engulfed her, and the cacophony of sounds around them changed into a muffled clang and hum. Freyr kicked her legs once, then twice, arms at her sides. Her fist closed around the stim-stick to prevent it floating away. Someone jumped in nearby, and began swimming around, nearly kicking her in the face. Freyr breathed out, feeling bubbles of air crawling along the top of her mouth.

The Cradle

Freyr followed Nirann’s lead, taking off her shoes and rolling up her leg garments before sitting with the warm water lapping at her knees. She smiled sadly while watching the video Nirann showed, drying her eyes as much as she could under her mask.

Eventually the happy scene became too much, and she looked up and past the screen at Réunion. It was late now, but the city was still lit up with a kaleidoscope of bright lights, snaking their way between platforms up to the mountains above.

“You make it sound so easy.” Freyr murmured, running her index finger through the water. “Like we can just bung my family into new bodies and life can go back to normal.” She sighed. “I’ve had…dreams. Or visions, I don't know. I can see them inside the Cradle - they’re being…chased, or tortured. I can’t tell if they’re asleep or awake, or where they are. But something is happening to them and being broadcast to me.”

Freyr pulled out her stim-stick and popped it in her mouth; the light lit up. “I sound crazy, I know. But it feels like a trap that I can't avoid. No matter how i approach it, none of us come out whole.”

The Cradle

Freyr nodded hesitantly in response to Nirann. She knew some of this already, but hearing it from the robot didn’t make things any easier. After a few shaky breaths, Freyr closed her eyes. A blurry image of her family entered her mind - they were running down a beach that didn’t exist, away from her. Tears rolled down both her cheeks as the concert boomed around her. Freyr couldn’t hear it anymore, only the sound of her breathing and a high pitched whine in each ear.

Slowly, she raised a hand and tried to wipe her tears. She felt instead an alien, rubbery texture against her face, where the mask had settled in. Reaching around her neck, Freyr pushed the mask up and away, using the back of her arm to dry her face. At the same time, she reached out another hand, searching blindly for Nirann’s.

---

Staring through the spyglass, the spotter up on the raised promenade zoomed in on the woman’s face as she wiped her tears away. The device matched this person to a high value target with a 85% probability. He put his secure phone to one ear, bulky transmitter pointing straight up. “I think I have something. On the beach.”

Hello!

Hello!