Humankind has found the stars - and forgotten the coordinates of their home planet. Then Hana does the impossible and gets pregnant. Her mother's predictions ringing in her ears, she sets out to find humanity's lost cradle. She only has a myth to gu...
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Chapter 16 — by RookWri78
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The green mudball of a planet that appeared on the unhurried Mollusk's navigation screen was not the Earth that they were looking for. A few blue wrinkles covered the surface, hardly the vast oceans that Phili's sources about Earth had described. But that wasn't the reason why Sanju's crest glowed the darkest shade of orange.
ALI still hadn't recuperated from the virus attack of yesterweek, though her speech was more slurry than blithering gibberish. H'ver was missing from last night, leaving xem alone with the recovering AI. And Hana, more pallid than xe could ever imagine, was about to disembark the Strawberry Mollusk. Alone.
"It's not safe to be out," Sanju snapped. Xeir voice boomed across the corridor, xeir arms locked and tightening every moment. "We don't know what's out there."
On the other end of the corridor, Hana stepped out of the head (the ship's bathroom quarters) her drenched face contorted in anguish. Spots of yellow splayed on Sanju's arms as xe watched her descend the raised platform, her arms resting behind her back. After the messy debacle last week — Sanju was only trying to help a drowsy Hana reach the head when she smacked xem on xeir crest multiple times, and threw some undecipherable tantrums at xem — it was best to leave the expecting Captain alone. Well, until she decided to venture out into the unknown.
"I'm not meeting anyone," Hana said, mustering a small grin, a flicker of hope in her bloodshot eyes. "I just want to see something."
"What?" Sanju marched some mighty steps forward. "This is the sixteenth time I'm saying this, Hana. ALI and H'ver can scan this site and find what you're looking for."
"As if they are capable of doing so right now," Hana responded with an exhausted sigh. "It's taken us ages to reach here, with ALI in recovery mode and H'ver brooding in some corner of the ship." She felt a sharp kick from baby Phili and patted her bump with a wince. Looked like she wasn't the only restless one. "Besides, this is the eighteenth time I'm saying this. I want to see it with my own eyes."
