Touchstone 1 - Stray

everyone to return to the shore to collect the new drones they’d left there, and head toward the amphitheatre.
    The drone left by greensuits before the last moonfall had exploded. They’d been expecting this, since it wasn’t transmitting, but spent a small age doing examinations and taking readings and putting another drone in its place. I watched the cats, which had all retreated to the far side of the amphitheatre and were watching us back, tremendously annoyed.
    While Third Squad messed with the remains of the drone, Fourth and Seventh Squad took me down to examine the extra-big central circle. Even enhanced, none of them could make out anything more from it than an afterimage of the aether. Having me stand in the middle made no difference.
    “Should we clear these animals out?” Tsennan asked.
    At the time I just thought he was a gung-ho idiot, and only glanced at him as Sonn straightforwardly said: “No threat.” It’s only thanks to my ever-present log that a later review gave me a peripheral view of Forel shifting to watch me beforehand. They were seeing if they could get a rise out of me because of Ghost. My log also showed Ruuel turn his head in Forel’s direction, but he didn’t react otherwise. Still, if I was her I wouldn’t play petty games in front of Sight talents. Particularly since she seems pretty keen on making herself look good in front of that particular Sight talent.
    The four squad captains on this trip were a soap opera in the making. Forel seems to want to impress Ruuel. Ruuel, well, I don’t know for sure, but he seems to spend an awful lot of time with Taarel. I’m trying to pretend that doesn’t really mean anything. Taarel, at least that one time while we were out in the city, seems intense about Maze. And Maze isn’t playing romance any more.
    Not having seen this at the time, I just shrugged off the whole thing and went back to thinking about poetry translations and the embarrassment involved in walking around my town with an escort of twenty-four psychic space ninjas who all seemed to think far more was going to happen than I did. I can’t say I ever held great expectations for the outing, given that I’d lived there for a month, and the Setari had already gone over the place, if only casually. I wasn’t the least surprised when we all went down underneath the amphitheatre and found no monsters, just a short white corridor which curved down to an empty circular room with a round, thigh-high platform in the middle. I was pondering the less-than-fun prospect of returning to do this again, except with me probably having to get drunk on aether again, when Sefen from Third looked across at Ruuel and said: “I don’t even begin to understand what I’m seeing here.”
    “It feels like a gate,” Taarel said. “But–”
    “No, not a gate.” Ruuel moved to my left and touched my arm, frowning. “Far more complex. The Ena is tangible here.”
    Maze, who had been toting one of the replacement drones about with Telekinesis, lowered it to the ground by the outer wall. “We did expect to find an outlet for the aether, after all.” He checked that the drone was stable and turned it on, verifying with the Litara that the ship was receiving the drone’s transmission. “If it’s some sort of device in addition to that, what’s your evaluation of function?”
    There was a bit of shifting about, as the rest of the Place and Symbol Sight talents took the opportunity to enhance themselves and view the platform from different angles. Maze was running scans with the drone. To me it looked like nothing more than a platform: there were even steps up one side.
    “Communication,” Ruuel said eventually, and there were a few hesitant nods of agreement.
    “Getting an aether reading from it,” Maze commented, then said over the interface: “Orders?”
    The bluesuit in charge, Tehara, said: “Take contact readings, but no more until we return. Analysis of the scans taken in the interim may give us a better idea of how to approach it.”
    Between them the two Sight squads had four Place Sight talents. “Go unenhanced, Sefen,” Taarel said. “We’re still not entirely certain if there is any distortion in play for enhanced Sights.”
    He nodded while the other three – Ruuel, Halla and Marana – made their gloves flow back into the sleeves of their suits. Place Sight talents often go about fully gloved, since touching an object can give them a deeper reading, like when