The Journey Begins (7.1)

RIVI WOKE UP WHEN SHE FELL OUT OF her bed onto the soft-carpeted floor. Closing her eyes and summoning the station's computer to turn on the lights in the room, she looked around at the aftereffects of her dream. She laughed to herself, thankful she had put away the more breakable objects. The table was tipped over, a few books were scattered on the floor, and even a painting was askew on the wall. But everything seemed to be in one piece, at least.

Rivi went into the lavatory to freshen up for the day. When she came back out, the clothes she had been wearing since school and the fire yesterday were now neat and clean. Her long hair was brushed and put up into a bun, and her face was washed and ready for a new day. She walked around the room, putting things back into their places.

With the nightmare-created storm over for now, and the mess left in its wake cleaned up, Rivi removed the objects she had stored safely in the chest and put them all back in their places. She turned to leave the room, hoping she could find the colony's garden.

As she opened the door, she smiled at Dan, who was just about to knock.

"Hey, how did you sleep?" Rivi asked, in a bright voice.

"I slept fine. And you?" Dan asked, confused by her sudden change of behavior overnight.

"I slept decently enough. It's another new day," Rivi said with a grin. "Have you been to breakfast yet?"

"Yeah, I just came from there. Where are you heading?" Dan asked, deciding to leave yesterday alone for now.

"I've heard that the colony's garden is in Area 4. I was going to go see it," Rivi said, as Dan followed her down the hall.

Rivi and Dan found Area 4 with ease, and soon, she and Dan were walking through the mazes of paths that interconnected throughout the garden. Miniature trees were in bloom, and flowers dipped over the carefully manicured grass that came up just to the edge of the walkway. On the other half of the domed room, the gardens were kept in carefully tended rectangles, and each rectangular bed contained rows and rows of foods. Wheat grew in tall stalks, peas sprouted in bunches, tomatoes crept high on carefully trained vines, and there was even celery stretching straight and green in the carefully engineered soil. Rivi breathed deeply, absorbing some of the energy that all these plants created.

"Does Aun have gardens like this?" Dan asked, watching her.

"Yes," Rivi answered with a smile. "Though most of the plants would be very unfamiliar to you."

"I'd imagine so!" Dan answered with a laugh.

"Someday I hope to take you there, Dan. Aun is a very different world compared to Earth. On Aun, each person has a job that he or she is uniquely equipped to handle. A long time ago, the Aunantet found out how to use the rest of their minds, and it opened up a completely new way of living for them.

"The Aunantet society is very well organized. Some Aunantet, called herboviromenters, specialize in creating gardens just like this one. If you were to watch them, it would almost appear as though they are talking to the plants around them. As they nurture the plants, their minds are nurtured in the ways of nature in return. They are the ones who are the first to know when some type of natural disaster is coming—everything from Earthquakes, mudslides, and eruptions, to tsunamis and droughts.

"Others—healers—specialize in medical processes. They have the ability to join their mind to a person's body and heal most ailments, and they can do it without having to give the patient any drugs or perform operations. Things like cancer and heart attacks are no longer a problem on Aun. I'd love to show you just how much a person has the ability to accomplish. On Aun, you can really see it, full-scale."

"Sounds like a vastly extended version of the project we just finished for school," Dan replied, trying to imagine it.

"The project we did stands at the very base of everything I've ever learned on Aun," Rivi answered, looking at Dan, who seemed to be deep in thought.

Rivi smiled, then looked around at all the plants in the garden once more.

"I think it's about time we head back to Earth."

"Are we taking the hyper-dimensional express again?" Dan joked.

Rivi smiled and pushed his shoulder playfully as they headed back to the airlock connected to her ship. Rivi and Dan walked through the airlock doors, through the ship's wall, and into the ship itself. Rivi took her computer from its docking station in front of the chair at the front of her ship. She formed the ship back into a cube, which began to rise gradually off the Martian sand and into space. Going through the steps that she could now almost do while asleep, Rivi got them through the fourth dimension and back to Earth.

Sitting in the chair in front of her computer with Dan beside her, Rivi was just guiding the ship back into Earth's atmosphere, when she began hearing her name. Daniel had not said anything, so naturally, she assumed it must be someone else. Spreading her amalgamator link, she found the call being relayed by the satellites toward Mars. The e-phone call was addressed to her, so she decided to intercept it. Slowing her descent into Earth's atmosphere, she fed the e-call through to her computer, which now displayed a split screen. One screen showed her the slowly approaching ground, while the other showed a woman with straight, blonde hair and glasses, sitting at a desk.

"What's going on?" Dan asked Rivi, seeing the screen change.

"I'm not certain. You wished to speak with me, ma'am?" Rivi asked the woman on the screen, as her ship was buffeted slightly by some atmospheric turbulence.

"Yes, but I perceive you are no longer at the Mars Colony. Have I called at a bad time?" the woman asked.

"Nothing I can't deal with. I'm only trying to land my ship," Rivi answered. "It probably would be easier, though, if I could call you back once I reach the ground."

Rivi traced where the signal was coming from and fed the computer address into her own computer's ever-expanding memory.

"Okay. Thank you, Miss Rivinaig," the woman said.

"Talk to you soon," Rivi said, switching her computer back to the one screen showing the approaching ground.

"I'm not too fond of talking and driving," Rivi said to Dan, who laughed while thinking about the many people who insist on using portable phones and computers in their cars while driving to work.

Rivi brought the ship down and unplugged her computer from the console. She helped Dan step through the wall onto the grass of his own back yard and then turned the ship back into a cube. She shrank it back down into its diminutive size and then bent to pick it up. When Rivi stood up again, she found Dan staring at the small silver cube sitting in the palm of her hand.

"It's amazing, you know," he told Rivi. "We just went all the way to Mars and back in something as small as a marble."

Rivi looked at him. She took his right hand and turned it palm up. Placing the cube in his hand, she placed her hand flat under his. Dan looked from the cube lying in his hand back up to Rivi.

"Close your eyes, Dan," Rivi instructed.

Dan did as Rivi asked and his mind was suddenly filled with all sorts of data he had never known before. Quantum physics, geometry, and maps of the elements making up the small cube in his hand all flashed through his mind so fast he couldn't understand it. It was all just a blur. Dan held his breath as he watched the maps of the cube's elements change and rearrange in only a few seconds.

"Open your eyes," a quiet voice said.

Dan opened his eyes to see the cube levitating a few inches off the surface of his hand. Wide-eyed and thoroughly shocked, he looked at Rivi across from him.

"I'm not doing this, am I?" he asked.

"No," Rivi said with a sorrowful smile. "I cannot teach you how to do this, but I did want to show you how it looks to me."

"Amazing," Dan said, looking again at the cube.

Rivi lowered it back down to his palm and removed her hand from under his. Dan handed the cube back to her with a slightly dazed expression.

"Thank you," Dan replied, not knowing what else to say.

"I've never done that before," Rivi replied. "I'm just as surprised as you that it worked!"

Dan smiled, shaking his head.

"I'd better go inside," Dan said. "My foster parents will be wondering where I've been." Dan started for the back door of his foster parents' home.

"I don't know if they'll believe you," Rivi said, patting his shoulder with a laugh as he turned to go inside.

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