Welcome to Gaia! ::

The problem of portability couldn’t be ignored. The preparations for the Black Watch founding meeting had established pretty quickly that a given non-royal senshi could only transport two humans and a Mauvian to and from space. Traveling to Athene with the other Eternal had demonstrated likewise was true with some mystery give regarding a second person’s weight, density, or surface area taken up in supply packs and camping gear. There was give, but it was a relatively hard barrier in the way of emergency survival provisioning or of actual team research and archaeology. Thraen had spent a good amount of time with the problem since his last visit at the start of June- camping equipment for two people and books were already brought to the small asteroid world, but not any real breadth of food and water. He’d finally found a solution.

There was a company, one of many, actually, that catered to the survivalist, off-grid, heirloom and end-of-civilization culture. They had options of food supply pantry for long term storage. 25 year shelf life for every packet, with a choice of 2-weeks, 4-weeks, 3-month, 6-month, and 1-year emergency food supplies. All packages included free shipping. He’d chosen the 3-month option which came in two very reasonable, grey totes. Four hundred and fifty total servings in 4-serving Mylar pouches, prepared by low-heat dehydration, which could be prepared with boiled water poured into the food and simmered for 15 minutes. The menu options were reasonable- strawberry cream of wheat, maple oatmeal, lasagna, potato soup, stew, chowder, creamed chicken and rice, Alfredo, chicken noodle soup, cheese and broccoli soup, mac & cheese, mashed potatoes, stroganoff, chocolate pudding, banana chips, and drink mixes. It was like large format MRE’s. It was heavy on protein and carbs, which concerned his sense of nutrition, so he’d ordered an additional tote that was their Fruit, Veggie & Snack mix bin with 114 servings total of dried green beans, strawberries, broccoli, blueberries, pineapple, and honey-coated banana chips. Water was the next very real problem, so he’d picked up two Platy bags with two purifier systems. They sat neatly on top of the totes in his grasp. Water that was kept in a container, at least according to most information he’d been able to find through sources like Truls Krogh, director of the Department of Water Hygiene at the Norwegian Institute of Public Health., didn’t ‘spoil’. The taste could go off, and for longtime storage glass was much better a choice than plastics. He hadn’t come by some appropriate jug-forms yet, but they would just be well-cleaned glass bottles, and then he could fill them with tap water and close them tightly. The water would last an entire life and longer. The whole secret of keeping out most microbes and safety was a good cap and not back-washing.

It took nothing to vanish away to the asteroid— concentration and meditation were like breathing. He appeared on the flagstone, near the campsite, as he’d hoped. What determined the difference in where a senshi appeared on their world? Was it controllable? Another question to the list of questions of the lives and powers they all too in some measures for granted. Whether straining and complaining that they hadn’t asked to be infused with magic, or proud and loud, at least five years of active senshi had produced so little in the way of answering basic mechanics they all enacted as ritual. The darkened skies, pregnant with black masses of other asteroids that blocked out the greater canopy, as well as brilliant Jupiter, Saturn and Mars much closer than they were to Earth, yawned timeless of day cycles overhead. There were light and darks, and by some magic he could breath and walk as he could on the moon, but there didn’t show any evidence of a atmosphere the way that Earth boasted. There were no clouds. The sky was not blue during the ‘day’. The senshi took the burdens to a waiting space between low built planter wall and the pitched tent.

He pulled a journal out of the tent and made notes from the camp gauges.

The needfuls done, Thraen rummaged out drafting pads, pencils, ruler, T-square, compass, french curves, and leads, as well as a travel stool. It wasn’t hard to find a decently clear view of the massive conservatory from various angles. Phone-first for pictures to preserve what any patio or walkway looked like before his passage, then the Senshi of Gardens spent his hours in an almost meditative dedication to formal architectural elevations of the ruins. He missed lunch. Then dinner. The Front and (probably) West side were completed. He pushed graphite smudged fingers back through his own hair, then pulled them down his face. His eyes felt glass and sand dry. A check of the carry canteen showed it was hours emptied. The watch accused him of fourteen hours passed. Thraen stood.

“It is costly. It would be irresponsible. “
“Thraen is not dead. Moved to the chamber and laid there, the requirement is fulfilled. I’m not needed.”

He looked around, turning to find the speakers. They’d sounded close enough to have lips at his ears. Two distinct voices, but they could not be. He knew it and guessed the source even as his arms and neck prickled with goosebumps. I brought no one with me. Nothing lives on this world. It is memory, like Athene experienced. Auditory hallucination. If ‘hallucination’ can be used in such cases- vision? phantasm? apparition? The language is imprecise, as though there were ghosts or souls still here to be tangible and affect the place or me. There aren’t. It is all inside me. Some strange relation between my starseed and the asteroid? Like ‘listening to the song’? Resonance? I should eat...return to camp and mark it in the log with the rest.



So what were the questions it begged? Thraen rolled back on the open sleep sack, staring at the yawning black-and-starred sky. “Who are each of the speakers. What is costly and irresponsible. What and where is the Chamber. What requirement is needing to be filled. “