Aya was exactly how she imagined an alien paradise. Finally, this new galaxy got something right.
Warm, slightly humid, but with a breeze, the port was dotted with plants and trees that Sara had never seen before. Clusters of balmy leaves she could imagine a loincloth-clad Liam using to fan her as she rocked aimlessly in a hammock. But it was the water (if it was actually, molecularly water and not some other crystal clear blue chemical,) that she found particularly breathtaking. It spilled into waterfalls off the sides of floating islands surrounded by green and purple foliage.
Then she saw the glint of a sniper's laser aimed at her chest.
Of course Liam joined her off the ship. The fact that people like Peebee and Drack all mysteriously found tasks that needed immediate attention aboard the ship and didn't blink as Liam scampered ahead to the boarding ramp sent a pit plummeting deep into Sara's gut. Like a sacrificial lamb lining up for the slaughter.
He didn't get far. Liam still looked amazing in paradise, even under armed guard. His bare arms gleamed golden in the sun and the breeze carried that beautiful scent.
SAM was whirring in Sara's skull and calculating. It was her first time encountering the angara and she was unsure what they'd deem rude or threatening. She moved slow and kept her hands raised and hoped SAM would pull enough from whatever they were shouting at her to work a translation.
But then their governor started speaking Common Trade and Sara began to realize just how little she knew about what in the fuck the Initiative had been up to while she slept.
"She's a human from another galaxy, a Pathfinder." None of this was new or shocking to Governor Paaran Shie.
Even the one she (it sounded like a "she" to Sara, maybe it was wrong to assume,) was informing, Jaal, didn't look at Sara with the awe she thought appropriate for encountering an alien species for the first time. He just glared at her suspiciously.
Still, Jaal had no compunction about getting close enough for her to see every inch of derision on his face. The snub nose and large eyes in a startling blue made him look feline, but she couldn't see any fur. It made her want to touch him, to see what the texture of his skin was, but she was confident a move like that would guarantee him wanting her dead if he didn't already.
The angara were a bipedal species, in warm shades of pinks, mauves and blues. Sara hoped they didn't find staring offensive, because man, was she staring. Humans may not have been unheard of to the angara, but it was a very new experience for this particular human. She wanted to absorb as much as she could from the strange folds of skin that wrapped around their skulls and trailed off somewhere on their chests, to the satyr-like bend of their knees.
Liam was sent back to the ship. It was good to know Sara was the unequivocal "leader" and Pathfinder when imprisonment or worse at the hands of the natives was on the line. Well, with luck, she wouldn't cram her foot in her mouth and they wouldn't decide to kill her. And if they did? Sara only hoped she failed so abysmally with her diplomacy that the angara also felt it necessary to execute every crew member onboard the Tempest who thought it appropriate to abandon her to singlehandedly determine the fate of the Initiative.
She snorted and tried not to stare directly into the laser point.
The one called Jaal stormed off to inform his superior and left Sara in the capable hands (each with four capable fingers) of Paaran Shie. Sara made awkward conversation with the governor until SAM could pull enough from the patchwork of whispers from onlookers to update her translator.
"How did it find us?"
"She, not it." Good to know some things were universal.
Sara couldn't stop her nervous giggles. Much too late she realized she'd never introduced herself. She knew she was with the governor, with Paaran Shie, but all Sara thought to announce was, "I'm the Pathfinder," like some self-important ass. Fumbling through intergalactic diplomatic incidents should not be so funny. Sara was losing her mind.
The upside was she was able to gather from her small talk with Paaran Shie that the angara were also waging war against the kett. Which was why Jaal had been so furious at the Tempest landing on Aya: it was supposed to be a hidden, safe haven. Everyone on this planet could be at risk due to their emergency landing. Did the angara know it was an emergency landing? Did they know Sara and her crew were running from a fleet of kett and that's why they flew directly into the electrical storm Tann nicknamed the Scourge? Did the angara even call it the Scourge? They were here first.
So many questions. Still, the enemy of their enemy and all that.
Really, she wanted to know what those orange colored fruits were called. They dangled beneath deep blue fronds on the trees that bordered the walkway and threatened to overtake the buildings in the background. SAM was drawing a blank, which was unusual for the AI. Instead of the numerous, childish questions that cluttered her brain, Sara went with the more cautious statement of, "Your city is beautiful."
Paaran Shie was more gracious than Jaal had been. She was the governor for a reason, Sara supposed. "Thank you. You're the first outsider to see it."
Score one for the Pathfinder. Finally.
SAM was more concerned with the fact that the angara had an elevated level of electrostatic energy. Sara shrugged it off. Maybe the angara would think electrostatic energy in humans was unnaturally low. They were the newcomers to the angaran world and it was becoming more and more apparent that they knew precisely shit about the Heleus Cluster, much less the Andromeda galaxy.
Paaran Shie continued to lead Sara slowly and carefully toward a ramp that led into a building. The governor stopped at the door and ushered Sara inside.
"I'm Ryder," Sara blurted out. "Sara."
"Well, Ryder-Sara." Sara didn't bother correcting the gaffe as Paaran Shie nodded. Close enough. "Speak with our Resistance leader, Evfra. If you can earn his approval, perhaps you will be welcome here, again."
If. Maybe. Perhaps. Sara's people were starving. She didn't think olive branches were edible and soon they would need more than words to sustain them.
She recognized Jaal because of the bright blue shawl type garment that dangled from his shoulders and the eyepiece that she stupidly wanted to call a "space monocle." Sara knew it had to be some kind of useful tech, probably a site for a sniper's rifle, but felt it was unwise to question anything that could be viewed as insensitive when her goal was to ally them with the Initiative and escape the planet with her life. Evfra was, at least she assumed, the blue angaran with Jaal. The Resistance leader appeared more nondescript than his compatriot, no tattoos or markings, no fancy gadgets. He could have been no one and yet he was the one Sara needed to impress.
He seemed courteous, but guarded. When he turned to face her, Sara realized she'd been wrong about no markings. She almost thought the faint line that started beneath his mouth was a tattoo, until she followed it up his cheek and watched it become deeper, darker and jagged as it puckered below his eye.
Evfra wasn't won over by the fact she was the Pathfinder. Maybe he didn't realize it was more than a title. Evfra wasn't won over by the fact she activated the vault on Eos. Maybe the angara with their different physiology were well suited for the atmosphere when it was radioactive. Maybe terraforming it for denizens of the Milky Way would be detrimental to those native to the Heleus Cluster. With all those maybes, it would have been nice to be able to wow and impress him, even just once.
Still, with how fierce Jaal had initially seemed, she was startled by Evfra's polite demeanor. She didn't take it for kindness; it reminded Sara too much of her father and she'd been present for enough of Alec Ryder's private opinions after all the clipped "pleases" and "thank you's" to view Evfra as nice.
The Resistance leader seemed agitated that she'd been in a vault, though it was hard to say why. Both the angara and kett had been previously unsuccessful, so maybe it was jealousy and frustration. Or maybe he knew she screwed something up big time by tampering with it.
Basically, it didn't come as a surprise when he wouldn't allow her inside Aya's vault.
"I feel for you and your people, but our vault was shut years ago and the entrance hidden." As Evfra spoke, Sara could hear the implicit, "I don't trust you" as clearly as if he had just said it. She only hoped the additional chorus of, "fuck you" that danced around his words was her being paranoid and not astute.
The "fuck you" was confirmed when Jaal explained that only Moshae Sjefa could open the vault and Evfra immediately pulled him aside. Sara pretended to admire the floor tiles and had SAM amplify her hearing.
"...the Moshae would want us to be brave! Let me assess this alien. I'll be your eyes-"
"Go if you want. But when she tries to kill you, be prepared to strike first. "
Evfra didn't bother with goodbyes, or even addressing her for that matter, as he left. Sara wondered if he too had twin children at home that he was equally disappointed in.
Jaal's earlier anger gave way to an energetic bluster. But he was polite enough for formal introductions, which gave Sara an opportunity to respond appropriately.
"I am Jaal Ama Darav. I'll be your envoy."
"Ryder." She held out a hand and then watched him stare blankly at the gesture. "Do you have any preference on bunk assignments? Because I have a shipmate who is all about that sort of thing. "