The Devourer

An unexpected encounter-1

An unexpected encounter

Doctor Belmis said goodbye to Althea and handed her the hospital discharge papers. She had forced her to stay one more day not only to make sure she was okay, but also because Lieutenant Neralis had wanted to ask her some more questions. Althea was in perfect health and her answers had satisfied the officer, who had revealed to her that, although at first he had suspected her, he was currently fully convinced that what had happened had only been an unfortunate accident. Of course, she had told him nothing about the Abyssal.

Left alone, Althea looked around her former hospital room. She saw her comfortable work clothes resting at the foot of the bed, washed and ironed: her wide brown trousers, gray tank top and, on the floor, her heavy dark brown boots. She took her nightgown off, remaining in her panties and b*a (which she had changed the night before), put her clothes on, and gathered her blond hair in a low tail behind her neck, leaving some bob on her forehead with some tufts that came laterally down from her temples.

She turned to the backpack under the table, took it, placed it on the bed, and opened it to see what her colleagues had left her: a complete change of clothes (somewhat more elegant than her work ones) and underwear, black shoes, and other personal effects. Without further time-wasting, Althea put her slippers in one of the bags in her backpack front pocket and tucked them to the side of her clothes, then folded her nightgown and put it behind her shoes.

Finally, she went back to the table and looked at the vase with the yellow flowers that had been given to her by a friend of hers as a wish for recovery. They had begun to wilt, so she preferred to leave them there; however, she took the envelope addressed to her and leaning against the vase. She turned it for a few seconds in her hands, somewhat hesitant, then decided to open it. It contained a message from her colleague Vemo Lanris:

‘Dear Professor Althea,

I hope your health will be restored soon.

After the accident, Manager Svetnis has decided to interrupt the expedition on the advice of Colonel Finnatris until they discover what has happened. Regretfully, we have to pack everything up and go back to Norcadia, to the University History Department. I will leave your things in your study, together with the finds that we had collected and that must be analyzed and catalogued.

I hope you can come back to us soon to continue your work. In the meantime, I and our assistants will try to prevent Professor Candasis from getting his hands on your research and taking credit for it.

May the Astrals help you.

Kind regards.

Dr. Vemo Lanris.’

She sighed. She should have guessed that Vemo would not have missed the opportunity to behave as a gentleman with her for the umpteenth time. She had been suspecting he had a crush on her, but to Althea he was only a good friend. She was sorry to go on deluding him, but she did not want to see him suffering because his expectations had been disappointed, so she went on with the comedy, pretending she was not aware of his feelings. After this act of his, however, it was going to be more difficult.

She went back to the bed and put the letter in a side pocket of her backpack, put it on her shoulder, and glanced one last time at the room to check that she had taken everything.

Her gaze fell on the device above the headboard of the bed. That object was a relic from a distant past, when treating diseases and wounds must have been of crazy simplicity. Owing to her trained eye, Althea estimated that it must have been at least three hundred years old. Those old machines were still able to work thanks to the Maintainers. Unluckily, not many people chose to specialize in that discipline — which depended on the Departments of History and of Engineering — since it was increasingly more difficult to keep old machines active as time went by, and failures in repairing were never well received. What was the world going to be like when ancient technology stopped working?

Such thoughts brought to her mind a discussion she had had several times with Trevan and which dealt with one of the reasons she had decided to become an archaeologist. The last time had been just a few days before…

… Althea and Trevan had been walking alone outside the boundaries of the scientific expedition camp. Hot Cianus had already set and Aurus was going to follow it below the horizon soon, as always in this part of the summer season, but the air was already somewhat cooler. Althea had always been surprised at how rapid thermal excursions were in the desert. Just then, she had realized she had left her jacket in her tent, and she was afraid she was going to regret it.

“This morning the workers started digging the tunnel in order to reach the underground passage as per my instructions.” Trevan had been saying. “If everything goes as planned, tomorrow I can finally see you at work in an unexplored archaeological site. Being here together is wonderful!”

“Admit it: you asked to be part of the expedition” Althea had teased him, looking at him with an exaggeratedly suspicious expression.

“Not really. The Manager asked for a volunteer from the Department of Engineering and I offered: it is not easy to find engineers willing to go where technological presence is limited… and then I could not miss the opportunity to participate in a mission on the field with you!”

Althea had shaken her head smiling.

“I still don’t get why you engineers don’t like places where there’s no active technology” she had said, taking his hand. “The beauty of research lies exactly in discovering new finds of ancient technology, which you study…”

Trevan had stopped and, squeezing her hand, had forced her to stop too. Then he had made her spin towards him and had said softly staring into her eyes:

“This is the point, Althea. You historians live in the glories of lost technology, you are always looking for new finds that can enrich our technological equipment. But we engineers are merely studying something that we are increasingly less able to understand… The only thing we are useful for is maintaining such objects: most of the Maintainers are engineers who resigned themselves…”

“That’s exactly what I can’t grasp! Why is there no way to understand how to replicate ancient technology? Why is it possible only to repair ancient artifacts? And then the most absurd thing: why is there no one who can create a new technological working object?”

Althea had almost been trembling with despair at such thoughts and Trevan had held her close as if to comfort her.

“I know how you feel. Common people can be satisfied by the priests’ explanation that we have been abandoned by the Astrals who have taken back the gift of creating technology… After all, why — referring to the ancient myth — have they called this era of decay ETE, the Empty Throne Era? But to us scientists this is not enough… Remember that you are not the only one asking yourself such questions, Althea, but unluckily no one has ever found an answer so far… We can only go on studying what we have, hoping to find something that will lead us to the truth.”

They had been on the verge of kissing, when a male voice had interrupted the magic of the moment calling her name…

… Althea sighed, coming with her mind back to the present. Vemo was the one who had interrupted them: he was looking for her because he had found an unknown artifact in the dirt of the excavations for the tunnel. Unluckily, it had turned out to be inactive and Vemo had sadly taken it to the warehouse tent.

Having checked one last time she was leaving nothing hers behind, Althea left the room and went through various wide and illuminated hospital corridors towards the exit. The people she met did not pay particular attention to her.

When she reached the large entrance hall of the hospital, she paused a few moments before leaving. They had confirmed she was in Verdana, where she had bought things together with the other components of the archaeological expedition before going into the desert. It was the only real city on the edge of the Great Desert although, as its name suggested, it was in the middle of a verdant plain a hundred years earlier. Althea thought with regret that was yet another sign of how their world was decaying.

However, that was not the reason why she was hesitating. While observing the large white and bright room, where several people were waiting both standing and sitting in the seats arranged in several rows in the area to the right of the entrance, she had noticed three telephone booths near the left corner of the entrance, by the restrooms. She was pondering about calling someone to ask for some information so as to shed some light on what had happened.

She went to the telephone area and waited for one of the three booths to be free: one was occupied by a middle-aged woman, one by an elderly man and the third by two young women who took turns talking on the phone. While waiting, Althea pulled her diary out of her backpack and looked for the phone number of the Special Corps Barracks in Norcadia, where Abel had been serving since he had been promoted to Captain.

Ten minutes later, the man came out of the second booth, muttering to himself, and Althea hurried to enter. She took three five-tenth of Aureus coins from her wallet and put them in the slot next to the numeric keypad of the blue telephone; she took the receiver and, after having heard the continuous dial tone, called up the number she had found in her diary.

On the third ring, an expressionless male voice answered:

“Norcadia State Army, Special Corps Division. Whom do you wish to talk with?”

Althea was surprised that she had not been asked who she was, but it probably was because her brother had given her a number reserved to soldiers’ relatives.

“Good morning, I’m Professor Althea Eburnis.” She said after a short hesitation. “I would like to hear from my brother, Captain Abel Eburnis…”

The man was silent for a few moments, then replied:

“One moment, please hold on.”

Althea waited for two minutes. She was wondering whether to hang up and give up when she heard the man’s voice again, saying:

“Sorry about the wait. I immediately put you through to Major Tannaris. Have a nice day.”

The receiver transmitted slight discharges, similar to ticking, a sign that her call was being diverted to another device. After less than five seconds, a new male voice asked her without too many preambles:

“I am Major Norvo Tannaris. You said you are Captain Abel Eburnis’ sister, right?”

“Correct. I’d like to know whether you heard from him after he got involved in the Mount Cor-3 accident four days ago. I was the archaeologist responsible for the excavations, but…”

“Excuse me,” the Major interrupted her, “but we know nothing about Captain Eburnis. Indeed, to be honest, it has been two years since we have last heard from him, precisely since he resigned without any justification after his mission to the Bluenta Museum. Actually, since the Captain was a good officer, his resignation was not accepted, but he was placed on long-term leave…”

The news hit Althea like a punch in her stomach. Abel had never told her about this, yet he had always told her everything, he had never hidden anything from her.

“How comes? My brother had officially taken up the post of security officer for the Giant’s Teeth expedition. Colonel Finnatris had even expressed full confidence in his abilities: how comes he did not know he had no title to be there?”

“I guarantee you we will investigate to find out what happened, Miss Eburnis,” the Major reassured her.