She woke up drenched in sweat. Her heart hammered in her chest. She tried to look around, but there was only darkness. Was she in her aunt and uncle's house? Had it all been a nightmare? She focused on her breathing until her pulse steadied. She felt her body adjusting, as if she stood on the deck of a rocking ship. Her head was full of images: T1N boarding the Hermes to return to Earth, Bella — his cruel creator — hanging from her spiderweb of cables and tubes, a bird's eye view of the metal city shining in the dawn… it all came back to her piece by piece.
She sat up, ready to get moving. She needed answers, but first she needed food and water… and some way to escape from Eidolon. As she lifted her body, there was a burning pain that ripped through her abdomen. Her hands flew to her stomach and it felt like there was a fire beneath her skin.
Again she remembered: the grey-haired old man and the leaper's venom, the pain of the hook stitching her skin and all of the blood. It wasn't just a nightmare.
Sitting on the bed, she reached for the floor with searching toes. The metal surface was freezing. She tried to hold herself straight up, but she needed to support her weight with her hands against the mattress. Then, holding herself up on the side table, she shuffled towards the crack of faint light in front of her. With each step she regained more control of her limbs. A shiver ran up from her feet to her hands.
Coming closer to the light, she saw that it was the gap between the side of the tent and the curtain that acted as a door. She took a breath and crossed to the other side.
What she saw quickened her pulse again. The shelter she had emerged from sat upon a giant metal girder. Steel cables as thick as her arm hung all around, linking this girder with many others like it. They were all over the place, pitched at different angles, stretching off above her head and sinking into distant shadows. The surface was no wider than five or six metres. With her toes pointing over the edge, she couldn't see the floor. The space was around fifty metres wide, both walls metal and slightly convex. There were holes in the walls that gave way to the Eidolon night beyond. She could make out faint stars in the distance.
Was one of those stars the Hermes on its way to Earth? What would T1N be doing right now?
Dotty hugged herself, shivering. She was wearing only a thick yellow tunic and her underwear beneath that.
"There you are!" She heard a voice from above.
Dotty looked up and saw the peak of a tent protruding from the edge of the girder above. Beside it there was a girl with pale skin and sharp eyes waving to her.
"Miso?"
"I'm coming over," she said, approaching the edge. "I can take you to my mum. She said she wanted to speak to you."
She leapt into the open space and Dotty's hand flew to her mouth with a gasp. Miso plummeted and, just when it seemed like she wouldn't make it, she pivoted in the air and landed at Dotty's side.
"Don't be afraid." She showed Dotty the cable in her hand. "I do it all the time. Are you coming?"
"Yes," she said without looking away from the girl's face. Her skin pulsed with light.
"I'm so happy you're feeling better. I was excited to see you again."
Dotty smiled. Between each girder and the next there was a series of planks arranged to create a serpentine path that disappeared from view as it stretched towards the roof.
The girl was too quick between the platforms and Dotty had to stop and catch her breath a couple of times. The worst came as stabbing pain in her stomach.
Miso, seeing Dotty had stopped, retraced her steps with all the grace of a cat and took Dotty's hand. "Does it hurt a lot? I'll help you."
"No," Dotty tried to lie. "I just need a moment. Where are we even?" Her breath was short between words. "What is this place?"
"We're inside the walls of sector R6. This is our camp. Here, we're safe from the monsters."
"It's bizarre…" replied Dotty, her breath finally returning to normal. She dried the sweat that left salt crystalised on her brow.
"What is?" asked Miso.
"That you live inside the walls like some kind of pest from Earth."
"Haha, I bet it is a bit like that." Miso laughed and her eyes stood out like two dark voids in her snowy white face. "You know what? I said before that I was taking you to see my mum, but Mercedes isn't really my mum. She's not Caza's mum either. We just call her Mum because she's always looked after us. We were both abandoned at birth around the time the leapers arrived on Eidolon, but Bour — the Elder — was the one that found us and brought us to her."
Dotty nodded. "I need to thank both of you for taking me to see him." She thought for a moment about her aunt and uncle, about her father, and the mother she had never known— she had died when Dotty was only a little girl. "But there's something I have to ask you."
Miso tilted her head.
"What were you two doing alone in the tunnels?"
"Hunting." The girl stared at her feet. "It's only five weeks til Caza's sixteenth birthday. He wants to be a hunter-gatherer just like our dad, but to do that he has to pass the proving rites. We were just getting some practise together. We were trying to lure one of the monsters to see if we could kill it just the two of us."
"Are you completely crazy?" Dotty cried.
Miso nodded in silence, blushing. She wore a black kimono that shook as she moved. Then she looked Dotty straight in the eyes. "Can I ask you something?"
"Of course, whatever you want."
"Is Earth really as beautiful as they say? I've only seen a few holograms my mum showed me."
Dotty, surprised by the question, took a moment to respond. How would it feel to grow up having never seen the Earth? Anywhere else would be better than growing up on Eidolon, at least as it was now.
"It's a complete mess," she said. "I don't recommend going even if you get the chance to board a ship. In fact, I'm questioning whether I even want to go back."
"Really? But in the holograms…" Miso's eyes opened wide and her mouth twisted into a sad grimace.
"Well…" said Dotty in a softer tone. It wasn't her place to destroy the girl's dreams of Earth, even though the reality was just as deceiving. "There's still a few beautiful places, reserves where the Biosphere Recovery Commission have managed to get rid of the worst pollution," she lied. "They're green, and the water is clear there. There's still all kinds of animals living in harmony."
"Oh, tell me more!" Her smile filled her face.
"Of course." Dotty nodded and stood up. She was already feeling a bit better. "I'll tell you on the way. Didn't you say your mother is waiting for us?"