Flopping down next to the wall, she watched the house burn. Deep craters surrounded it, and the structure had been reduced to rubble and charred beams. Whoever had attacked her had tried to ensure that she would not survive.
Rayne recuperated in the shade, strength seeping back into her limbs. After about half an hour she rose, wincing. Dried blood caked the back of her jeans, but she hobbled along the street towards the meeting place, keeping a wary eye on the sky as well as the houses. She had given up wondering why an alien ship would want to kill her; it made no sense. No other houses were damaged, and vagrants emerged to gape and point at the smouldering ruin. She hoped the aliens thought she was dead, so they would not try again.
By the time she reached the grove of dead trees that was the meeting place, she tottered from exhaustion and hunger. She stumbled into the grove, fell to her knees and flopped down. Her brother's absence brought a fresh wave of despair and loneliness. She longed for his comforting presence and needed his help to bind her wounds. The trees hid her from prying eyes, but hunger gnawed at her, not allowing her the luxury of rest. Crawling across the soft leaves to the rock where Rawn always stashed extra food, she groped under it. Finding the sleek rustle of plastic, and she tore at the chewy, orange-flavoured concentrate, desperate to relieve her gut's emptiness.
While she ate, she pondered her situation. Staying in one place was dangerous, even in the grove's secrecy. Some raiders had noses as keen as dogs. Rawn must have gone in search of her, but she did not have the strength to travel back into the city to look for him. She could only hope he would return soon, and no one else found her before he did. Tiredness turned her limbs to lead, and she curled up in the leaves, drifting into a deep, exhausted sleep.
When Rayne woke, the sun's rays slanted through the dead trees. After eating more food, she examined her raw, sooty palms, picking out a few splinters. Although the wounds were not serious, the risk of infection in this polluted environment was high, so she went to the stream that chuckled through the rocks nearby. Stripping, she washed in the cold water, scrubbing her jeans. She emerged shivering, to wrap herself in the blankets she dug from under the rock where the food was stored, then lighted a fire.
The wounds in the back of her calves were easy enough to tend, and she removed several more splinters, but she could only examine the ones in the back of her thighs by touch. When she finished, twilight filled the grove with shadow, and she curled up next to the fire for another lonely night. At least she was safer in the country.
The swollen, sickly sun's first rays woke her, stealing into the grove with their slight warmth like fingers of light. She sat up with a start as the events of the previous day flooded back, making her glance up at the sky. It contained only dirty grey clouds, and, after studying it for several minutes, she relaxed. A hoar frost whitened the ground, liming the trees and bracken with a coating of ice.
The chilly air nipped at her nose and numbed her fingers and feet. Her legs had stiffened, and the pain made her gasp as she dragged more wood from the dwindling pile and lighted a new fire. As soon as a tiny blaze took hold, she huddled close to it and almost thrust her hands into the flames to warm them. Her breath steamed, and she clenched her jaws to prevent her teeth from chattering as she waited for the sun to warm the air.
By mid-morning, her jeans were dry, and she ate a little food, then dressed and sat beside the fire. She pondered the flying saucer's attack again, trying to fathom the reason for the senseless assault on an unimportant girl. The more she thought about it, the more convinced she became that she would never figure it out. She sighed and stared into the fire, remembering the dangers that had honed her reactions so keenly.
Her parents had joined the revolution in twenty-twelve, when wages had been cut to food only, and so many had lost their jobs. It had been madness, not a real revolution. They had been killed in a riot when the troops had shot most of the crowd on the government's orders. Massacring crowds reduced the overpopulation that ruined the economy and threatened dwindling food supplies, as well as curbing civil unrest. People had become a burden, and the army had been ordered to sacrifice the many for the sake of the few. She and Rawn had been at home when their parents were killed, and ran away to avoid the looters who came afterwards in search of food.
Harvests had failed, and the erratic weather wrought havoc. Floods had washed away entire crops, while droughts hit other areas. Unseasonal hail storms had wreaked terrible damage, and freak winds or wild fires ruined what was left. Earthquakes had ravaged some countries, and the resulting famine and disease wiped out entire populations. Crops that had survived the weather became sickly, and the remaining livestock was slaughtered. The ozone layer had thinned, and millions starved. People had eaten their pets, turned on each other and abandoned their children to die in the streets. Mankind had turned to the last remaining food source and hunted whales and dolphins to extinction, wiping out fish stocks.
It had been a time of turmoil and terror. People had killed randomly, burnt and looted in their desperate search for food. The government had ordered the army to keep order and reduce the population, but the soldiers rebelled and went home to their families. The putrid stink of decaying or burning flesh had filled the air, and hospitals became charnel houses. All the while, the world had died.
Rawn had looked after her since then. They had run and hidden, trusting no one, two frightened children in a world gone mad. They had nearly been caught a few times, but survived.
Rayne frowned as a prickle of unease made the hairs on her nape rise, and glanced up. Years of being hunted had honed her survival instincts, and she never ignored her sixth sense. Her eyes flicked back down as a golden glow appeared about ten metres away, growing brighter until she was forced to squint. Seconds later it faded. A man dressed in strange white clothes, a tinted helmet hiding his face, stood there.
Rayne stared at him, frozen with shock and fear. If he had moved she would have run, and she sensed his scrutiny as she groped for and found a fist-sized rock. The stranger wore what appeared to be a weapon on his hip, and she waited, holding her breath as she wondered what use the rock would be if he chose to use his weapon. The stone dug into her palm, which grew damp with nervous perspiration, and she was forced to breathe again as her lungs burnt for air. The golden light shrouded the stranger again, and when faded, he had vanished.
After a while, she rose and limped to the spot where he had stood, searching for tracks. She found two footprints, which proved she had not been hallucinating, and she shivered, glancing up at the empty sky. The uneasiness stayed with her, and her neck prickled in warning, making her retreat to her fire and build it into a blaze. Her eyes darted around, vigilant for any sign of danger.
On board a ship that orbited high above the Earth, the man who had recently shed a white bio suit studied the image from the spy cam he had ordered to follow the girl. The wafer-thin crystal screen gave a sharp, perfect colour picture, almost as if he was still there with her, just a few metres away. He recalled his amazement when he had first caught sight of her. The shock had kept him rooted to the spot for several minutes, ignoring the growing urgency of the telepathic calls of his crew. He still thought it amazing to find such a creature on this dying, polluted world, where half the people had degenerated to shambling monsters and the other half were undernourished and diseased.
Although he had been sent to find her, he had not been prepared for his first encounter, and still marvelled at it. Her golden hair had gleamed in the weak sunlight and her grimy skin glowed with health. The sharp intelligence of her luminous eyes had startled him. They had been filled with suspicion and fear, while her thin, callused hand had gripped a largish rock, ready to hurl it at him if he made the wrong move. She exuded a kind of leashed savagery, the alertness of a wild animal mixed with the rational response of a civilised being.
This girl was the one. He was more certain of it than he had ever been of anything in his life. He turned to the book that lay on the desk's smooth white surface and ran his fingers over it. Soft leather bound it, and the gold that trimmed its edges also depicted the name inscribed on its cover.
The Olban, set down thousands of years ago, contained all the teachings and prophesies that had guided the Atlantean culture throughout the ages. This particular copy was, of course, a symbolic token. His home city's high priest had given it to him before he left on this mission. It signified the sacred duty imposed upon him and his crew; a constant reminder of their objective. The Olban's contents were, and always had been, available on the central data processor. Over the centuries, many prophesies had come true, affirming the wisdom of the ancient seers who had foretold them.
Now a grave and momentous prophecy was about to unfold, which could change the course of the Atlantean Empire's fortune. He opened the book to the marked page and read the short passage that had brought him to this dying planet.
'In the time of the junction of Perinus and Lodis, when the comet Vistar appears in the heavens, travel through the void to the dying world. Here will be found a golden girl child, pure of spirit and flesh, she who must be
