<It was a tense situation. No need to apologise to me, Ryann. Suppose we were fortunate that Brice is so bloody independent.>
<Reminds me of someone else,> she sussed, giving her voice a playful tone.
He paused, as she knew he would. <I was never that much of a handful.>
<Of course not.>
He was silent for a moment, then sussed, <So what do we know of these caves?>
<Like I said before, not much. The company doesn’t see them as a priority.>
<And what about without Kaiahive’s crap?>
The use of the name surprised her, especially the way he gave it no inflection. But his use of the word ‘crap’ gave a better insight into his thoughts. The company was what it was, and he’d deal with that. But he didn’t like being kept in the dark.
And his mind was connecting the dots.
<You know as much as me. If you want my thoughts, then yes—there is a chance the cave systems in the cliff reach to the gully. If the missing crew were forced to retreat, we might find them. But it’s a long shot.>
<You knew that was on my mind?>
<Thought it was a sensible assumption. Isn’t that one of the reasons for this search?>
<Harris, with perception like that, a century ago you’d have been burned as a witch.>
<You’ve still not quite escaped the backwaters, have you?> Ryann gave her voice a playful lilt, but she knew this was a distraction, and she continued with greater seriousness. <Anyway, we have no accurate map. We’d be searching blind.>
<You picking up any life down here?>
It wasn’t the question Ryann had expected, and it caught her off-guard. She hated to lie, but…she had to do what was best for the crew. She couldn’t encourage unfounded fear or panic.
<Maybe some strains of lichen. But there’s no light, so that cuts out most life. If you’re looking for monsters in the dark, stick to stories.>
<Suppose that’s good to know.> He paused for a moment, and Ryann bit her lip in frustration at the stupidity of her last comment. <But anything strange, give me a heads-up, right?>
<Of course.>
Why did she have to mention monsters? It wasn’t like she even gave any credence to those rumours.
Of course people muttered about the caves, and what they might contain. It was human nature to populate dark corners with fears. There were those who pushed the company to allow exploratory missions into the caves, if only to reject the fanciful rumours, but Kaiahive refused. Their focus, they said, was on the basin, especially the area closest to Haven.
And, Ryann understood all too clearly, it was in their own interests if the rumours and stories persisted. Stories worked on the mind. They were far more powerful than physical restraints.
Ryann pulled her thoughts back to the cave as they neared the rear wall. She started to analyse, running through some of the data stored in her pack. There was not much that excited her. The rock was a dead thing, dull and uninteresting. The few patches of life clung to the cave entrance, and she ran through the various variants of lichen and moss she’d detected. None of them excited her.
But as they retreated from the entrance, those other traces grew stronger. They had a bitter taste that took her back to her childhood, and her father slaughtering their livestock. Even as a child, she could tell his reasons by the tang in the air. The healthy ones he killed either for sale or for food were lively, their essence struggling to be contained. But the sick ones, and those close to death, had a distinctive flavour that permeated her gut and twisted her stomach. Before she understood her innate abilities, she would blame her father for their suffering, and would refuse to speak to him for days on end.
Now, of course, she understood how he was setting them free from suffering, even though such actions always pained him.
The traces in the cave had a similar flavour. Ryann considered the possibility of a crew carrying a fallen colleague, but she discounted that. She’d have sensed the traces of the healthy ones. She knew no crew apart from her own had set foot in this cave, at least not in the last few days.
“Okay,” said Cathal, pulling Ryann from her considerations. “Check your data, then double-log it. Anything worth noting?”
“Just a big empty cave,” said Tris, trying to sound confident. His voice was too loud, though, and he flinched at the reverberations.
Data flowed through Ryann. It pushed in from the others, heading straight to the storage in her pack, and at the same time her own data pushed towards Cathal.
“Brice, you ready to send?” Cathal asked. Ryann scanned—Brice’s data hadn’t transferred automatically.
“Sent it.” Brice spoke quietly, and there was confusion in his tone.
Cathal stepped towards Brice. “Hard transfer, just to make sure.”
<Don’t single him out,> Ryann sussed.
“Keelin, Tris, the same. Ryann, we’ll triple-log.”
He reached out to Brice, placing a hand on the back of his neck, at the lattice’s focal node. Then he did the same to Keelin and Tris, before turning to Ryann. His hand was warm and calloused. She felt the data run like liquid.
<What can you tell me?> he asked.
<Brice? Without full diagnosis, I can’t say.> She resisted the urge to run through data.
<What of the cave? Anything?>
<Old trails, but nothing recent.> He deserved to know that much.
<Trails of what?>
<Too old to tell.> Then, because he was waiting for more, she added, <I’m working on it. I’ll give you more when I can.>
He removed his hand, and for a moment her neck was cold. She resisted the impulse to use her own hand to rub some warmth back into it. Instead she shrugged her pack higher.
“Okay,” Cathal said, sweeping a hand round at the rock. “Three tunnels. Any thoughts?”
“This one,” Tris said, pointing to the left. “It’s the biggest. Don’t want to be all crouched over.”
The tunnel was biggest, but the floor was
