2954-09-23 – Tales from the Service: The Siren of the Galbrandt 

Vann Rudenko found himself awake in the pitch darkness of a Galbrandt night. The downpour had ceased, and the only sound in its place was the slow, infrequent thud of heavy drops falling from the overhead branches onto the shelter over his head. 

He had the impression that he'd awakened from a pleasant, leisurely dream, but the details of the dream fled from scrutiny. With a sigh, he sat up, wondering what time it was. 

Then he remembered. It must be at least midnight. Had the pale woman come and gone already? 

Scrambling out of his bedroll, Vann felt his way to the side-panel which had the exit blister on the inside. Though in hospitable climates he could use any seam as a simple tent flap, the blister was quieter to open, and would be less likely to let in a shower of droplets. 

Outside the shelter was nearly as dark as inside it. Directly overhead, between the treetops, a few stars winked between the scudding fingers of the retreating clouds. All else was indistinct shadow. The wind had vanished, and no animals had yet come out of their holes to croon into the night. 

Vann, being effectively blind, turned around once, not really knowing what he was looking for. Each of his gloves had a small flashlight built into it, but activating those would probably wake his fellows, and he wasn't going to do that until he had something to show them, or at least something to tell them. 

Seeing nothing, hearing nothing, he wondered whether he should go back to his bedroll. He had no doubt about what he'd seen earlier that day, but it was only too likely he'd missed the rendezvous, and they'd all been asleep when she passed by. That might be for the best; he shuddered to think of what his compatriots might do, with the advise of their implant computers. Without his damaged implant, he doubted he'd have been so ready to lower his gun, when he'd first seen the creature himself. 

Just as he was about to give up, Vann spied a pale, gray light behind a nearby tree-trunk. He crept in that direction, still not daring to use his lights. 

"Gather your fellows." A voice so quiet Vann wasn't sure he'd even heard it at first whispered. Despite its volume, the voice's words were perfectly clear. "There is much ground to cover before light returns to the world." 

Vann frowned. "What about our shelter?" 

There was no answer, only an impatient-sounding rustling. A strand of something like a cobweb brushed against his face. 

Vann sighed, flicked on his lights, and headed back for the shelter. As he had suspected, the light waked Langer, who poked his head out of a detached corner of the temporary structure to investigate it. "Problem, Rudenko?" 

"We need to move. Now. Pack up what you can." Vann gestured behind him. "We don't have to die out here. There's another way, if we hurry." 

"What?" Langer frowned. 

Vann passed him, went to the next seam, and got inside the shelter, where he hurriedly stowed his bedroll and other gear. Fisher was sitting up and cradling an electric lantern. 

"Another way?" The crippled Guardian asked at length. "You will need to explain, Rudenko." 

"Better if I don't." Vann shook his head. "Grab what you can and follow me." 

"If we don't?" 

Vann hoisted his pack onto his back. "Then I'm going alone. And you'll die out here." 

He could almost feel the flickering of silent radio messages between the others as he went back out into the night. When he killed his lights, he could just see the ghostly silhouette of the creature ahead, leaning lazily on a tree with twisted, drooping branches. He headed in that direction, using his carbine to brush aside foliage. 

The pale figure disappeared as he approached, but again he heard the almost-inaudible voice. "What did you tell them?"  

"As little as possible." Vann muttered. "They'll follow even if it's because they think I'm crazy." 

Sure enough, he heard Langer calling out behind him, and Fisher stumbling along somewhere farther back. He turned to wait for them. 

"Another way means getting turned around in the darkness and losing the shelter?" Langer held up his hands. "What's going on?" 

"Forget the shelter." Vann shook his head. "Follow me. I've got a lead on a way out of here." 

"How? You've got no nav overlay. No compass. Your implant is dead." Langer massaged his head with one hand. "This is madness." 

"Maybe." Vann shrugged. "I'll try to go slow enough that you can help Fisher along." With that, he turned away, just in time to see the gray, faintly luminous form darting between two trees far ahead. 

After he'd taken only a few more steps, Vann realized that he was no longer crashing through underbrush. He was on a sort of a path, gently meandering between the trees. Hard earth underfoot, occasionally broken up by an upturned root, made the going easy. 

Once again, he turned back to his follows. "Look at this." He shone his glove-lights at the ground. "A footpath." 

Langer and Fisher frowned at the obvious path. "Could be an animal track." Fisher said doubtfully. They all knew there wasn't supposed to be any animal on this planet big enough to make paths a human could use. 

"If there's a path that means human settlers." Langer nodded. "Okay, Rudenko. I don't know how you found this, or why at night, but let's see where it goes. I've got a nav marker on the shelter for when this plays out." 

Vann turned once more to lead, and he set off along the path at an easy pace. The night-time noises they'd heard their first night were still absent, and with Fisher and Langer continuing their silent conversation, the silence was nearly total. Every so often, when Vann was doubting the way, or when the path seemed to split, Vann killed his lights and looked around, and he always spied a gray glow or a flitting, luminous figure ahead of him. If the others spied her at any of these points, they gave no indication. 

With no implant chronometer, Vann quickly lost track of time. The march seemed to have no beginning and no end. The forest seemed not to change; they could have been walking in circles, on a path looping back on itself, and he'd have no way of knowing until dawn. 

Just as the horizon began to lighten into the creamy lavender of a Håkøya dawn, Vann saw the pale woman one last time. This time, he came around the bole of a particularly sickly-looking tree of great size, and found her there, laid out among the roots as if they were a comfortable divan. 

"What now?" He asked quietly, aware that the others were only a few dozen paces behind. 

An enigmatic smile and a gesture of one long, slender arm were the only reply. Vann looked in the direction indicated, and he saw nothing except a faint yellow glow down at the bottom of a gentle slope, shining between the trees, and a thin, hazy curl of smoke rising into the dawn sky. 

"Settlers!" He gasped, turning to thank the pale woman. When he returned his eyes to the place she had been sitting, however, he found it empty, except for a few loose strands of silky thread like cobwebs, dangling from the overhanging branches. 

The account does not mention how Mr. Rudenko convinced his fellows to surrender rather than to attempt to pillage the settlers' supplies, but evidently he did. Perhaps he simply ditched his weapon and went in before they could stop him, and forced their hands. 

It will surprise those who are familiar with the legend of the Gossamers that the "path" which these castaways were following was not there when they  tried to find it the next day to satisfy their hosts, who knew quite well there were no paths through the Galbrandt forests. 

When Mr. Rudenko mentioned the pale woman who had guided them to his hosts some days later, they treated this as an entirely satisfying explanation. I wonder what their own history with the Gossamers was.