A Small and Distant Galaxy: The Fourth Quadrant

By Susannah Israel

After many years lost in space, very far from Earth, human explorers arrive in an unknown galaxy and settle in an uninhabited corner of it. We find the human colonists divided and living on different planets, over five hundred years later. A young farmer and his telepathic animal friend team up with a bioengineered detective to retrace their hidden history, venturing into the remotest part of the galaxy against all advice. They find unexpected answers on an ancient world under a dying red sun, but the greatest challenge remains - how to heal the splintered cultures and reunite the xenophobic colonists after so many centuries of separation.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Austin Macauley Publishers
• Release date: Jul 21, 2023
• ISBN: 9798886936391

Susannah Israel

Susannah Israel is an art critic and a renowned sculptor with a lifelong love of science fiction. Her art works are allegorical narratives filled with fantastical people and animals, held in public and private collections around the world. Five years ago, she began writing about an unknown galaxy, bringing together her love of storytelling and her passion for science fiction literature. A Small and Distant Galaxy is her first work of fiction. Israel lives and works in her studio in Oakland, California.

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About the Author

Susannah Israel is an art critic and a renowned sculptor with a lifelong love of science fiction. Her art works are allegorical narratives filled with fantastical people and animals, held in public and private collections around the world. Five years ago, she began writing about an unknown galaxy, bringing together her love of storytelling and her passion for science fiction literature. A Small and Distant Galaxy is her first work of fiction. Israel lives and works in her studio in Oakland, California.

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Susannah Israel 2023

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other non-commercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher.

Any person who commits any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

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Publisher’s Cataloging-in-Publication data

Israel, Susannah

A Small and Distant Galaxy: The Fourth Quadrant

ISBN 9798886936384 (Paperback)

ISBN 9798886936391 (ePub e-book)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2023907007

www.austinmacauley.com/us

First Published 2023

Austin Macauley Publishers LLC

40 Wall Street, 33rd Floor, Suite 3302

New York, NY 10005

USA

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Book I

The Binaries

Prologue

The setting sun cast harsh orange shadows across the Andes mountains as it sank. Half a mile below the cresting peaks, on a broad, flat plane of stone set with low buildings and covered with thick trees and flowing vines, a man was standing, accompanied by a large black and white cat. His round face was lined with thought as he gazed out upon the glorious, gloomy scene without really seeing it. It no longer resembled the sunset of his early years.

Estellarin was a scientist, a steadfast recordkeeper and the last man on earth. The ecocide of the human species had doomed the whole world along with it. Two magnificent ships, products of the best minds of the human species, had lifted off for Tau Ceti almost fifty years ago, but for most of those years there had been only silence. The ships should have reached their destination ten years later, but they had ceased to signal before their scheduled arrival, leaving one stalwart watcher alone to record the end of the world.

For eight years, the two colony ships had sent back their reports, while steadily proceeding toward the Nebula. From Earth, there was nothing to report—once, a fire far below, perhaps a last convulsive conflict, perhaps a natural event, far in the distance to the east. There had been few capable of undertaking the journey, at the end, with toxins and plagues decimating cities and farms alike like a fire in dry corn. Less than a thousand qualified candidates had applied to crew the two enormous ships, and less than half were accepted. Fortunately, there were the bioengineered passengers. The herpetologists had won the day, in the end, and the bioengineered explorers-to-be went into half the precious stasis chambers. The other half were occupied by the wealthy elite who had funded most of the project and the cost of building the ships. To the crew fell the responsibilities of monitoring the sleeping passengers, running the day-to-day operations, and guiding the huge ships to humanity’s future home.

Those who remained on Earth had not believed that irreversible disaster had overtaken them. The few who did not fall sick hunted and killed each other, and it was fortunate indeed that this science institute was hidden in the peaks of the mountains, where a scientist could live out his life in secret and safety. The bioengineering project was a tightly guarded secret that had paid off in the end. Or had it? for they would never know what had happened when the two ships both fell silent. Dutifully, Estellarin still sent his reports, asked the same routine queries, and heard nothing in return. For fifty years now, only silence. It seemed that humans had perished, not only from Earth, but from existence.

The cat yowled, as if in protest at these gloomy thoughts, half-rolling over at his feet to bring its furry belly closer to his hand. Absently he rubbed, the cat purred, and the night slowly deepened to a muddy, dark orange. Three other cats appeared on the porch of one of the long, low buildings, expecting dinner, and Estellarin turned away from the edge and went inside.

#

There was no time on the colony ship. The chronometers stopped instantly in the huge cosmic storm that overtook the expedition from Earth. With no warning, the two great spaceships were blinded, separated and thrown off course. The second ship, carrying most of the science equipment, had disappeared and was never heard from again. Implacable fail-safe mechanisms locked down the first ship’s controls, and although the environment was automatically maintained, there was no access to that or any other systems.

Faithfully, the crew monitored their sleeping passengers, whose stasis beds functioned flawlessly. There was air, water, light and power, and food. The locked bridge controls held steady while the huge ship sailed on, unthinkingly faithful to its obsolete navigation program. They were safe, warm and comfortable, propelled relentlessly through the infinite darkness of cold space, on an endless course into the unknown.

Inal was the first child born on the lost colony ship, to Sallyride and Quincy. They were crew, a bonded pair who shared the same unmodified biopattern that was dominant on their planet’s largest continent. They kept journals, where they noted that Inal was born about twelve years after they lost control of the ship.

The child’s birth had not been planned. Sallyride’s pregnancy was greeted with a mixture of hope and concern, and of course there had been endless discussions about it. That was the way of things, Quincy told Inal. People always needed to talk about changes. And ideas. And food. When three more shipborn babies came, little Inal had brothers and sisters to play with, running and shouting up and down the smooth rounded corridors. Life, said her parents, had asserted itself.

All this was perfectly familiar to Inal and her friends. It was just a part of life, like knowing which of the crew didn’t like seeing a mob of children running around, and which ones gave you treats and told good stories. Inal’s father Quincy had the best stories, but she was also proud of her mother Sallyride. Sallyride was a scientist, and she taught in the little schoolroom next to the kitchens and gardens. As Inal grew bigger, so did the kitchens and gardens, it seemed. People began moving from their little rooms, out into the corridors, first hanging blankets, then bringing out things from the ship’s stores, building tables and seats to gather at, and sharing food and goods. Certain corridors became good places to trade; some traders told stories, some fixed things, and everyone had a special recipe they made better than anybody else.

There were more children born, and there was a way of doing things. Without a destination, no path back, and no timekeeping, the crew did their jobs, just like the ship. They had signed up for the unexpected, after all, not the long sleep of stasis but the full experience of space. There was honor and satisfaction in work, and in promises kept. The crew came from different points of origin on their lost planet, and there was much to learn about each other. Over cooking and planning and storytelling and building and feasting, they made a place and a space for themselves. For the children, there was play, and sleep, and meals; there was school, and chores, and there was looking out into the vast darkness from the viewing room. Inal could spend half a day gazing out there; she never got tired of looking. Sometimes the children saw a flash of light that flew past in the distance – a flying star, Inal’s father called it.

Inal remembered the way the empty space used to echo where all the empty corridors met, when she was very young. Now that open space was filled with gardens, growing under the warm yellow lights they found in storage. Many times, she and her friends had been chased away for playing games in the garden, scolded for damaging the vines or snacking on the berries. But that was long ago, Inal thought. She was so tall she came up to her father’s shoulder, and she knew how to pick the tastiest vegetables and fruit for dinner. The second generation was growing up, the same way the gardens began to grow down to the ends of the main corridors, and Inal started thinking about what kind of work she would do.

When she was grown, Inal became a parent herself. By then, she shared a living space with her lover, on the corridor closest to the viewing room. Regina was almost as tall as she was, a thoughtful, calm person whose brother became father to Inal’s child. They welcomed the baby and raised her together, naming their daughter Sally after Inal’s mother. Life had a predictable, satisfying pattern, a rhythm of work, sleep, love and play, and everyone came together daily in the gardens, the learning rooms and the many eateries, large and small.

Their daughter’s needs were the structure of their life. The seldom-used formal gathering room behind the gardens had been made into a school where all the children went, and there were many teachers. This was Regina’s workplace, where she taught math. Soon enough their Sally was running around with a mob of friends, in and out of the kitchens, pestering the cooks, and usually to be found listening to her grandfather’s stories.

Inal chose to do the work she had learned from Quincy, who was a monitor for the sleeping passengers. She had begun to accompany him down to the lower levels of the ship when she was tall enough to reach his shoulder. In the dim light, the rows and rows of hooded beds had alarmed her at first. She couldn’t help peering in at each of the people inside. She was both scared and fascinated, sticking close to her father as he checked the lights displayed by each bed. But she enjoyed learning what all the machines did, what the dials meant, and the feeling of protecting the unconscious sleepers. There were hundreds of sleeping passengers and twenty monitor teams, and Inal became part of those teams before little Sally grew tall enough to reach Regina’s knees.

Little Sally, as distinguished from her grandmother, was an avid student who read everything in the schoolroom. Usually, her reading led to a storm of questions. Only her grandfather Quincy never seemed to mind being peppered with requests for explanations. Though quiet in manner, he was a compelling storyteller, and had many tales to entertain a curious young girl. It was Quincy who told his grandchild the story of her name.

During berry-picking time, there were only so many berries a child could eat, and the kitchen was humming. Boiling water, hot fruit and an inquisitive child were a poor match, and she was quickly sent out to take a bowl of berries to her grandfather. Little Sally’s mouth was stained with juice and her stomach was full, but she was still indignant when she joined Quincy in the back of the gardens. He liked being hidden from view by the tall rows of corn, his long legs comfortably stretched before him, chewing tobacco.

Grandmama made me leave the kitchen! Little Sally announced, giving him the berries.

Well, they must’ve known I needed some refreshment out here, he commented, since I’m working so hard on getting rid of these garden pests. He sat up, folding up his tobacco pouch, and delivered a perfect stream of juice to the base of the corn plants.

Sally climbed up on his lap and proudly opened her notebook. She had recently declared herself ‘an historian’, and carried a notebook in which she scribbled notes about everything she heard.

All I asked was, why are we both named the same? she complained.

That’s a perfectly sensible question. Quincy leaned back a bit, nodding thoughtfully. Have you read anything about early space travel yet? maybe heard about Sally Ride, the first woman in space? Well, we have a family tradition now…

It was then that Little Sally began writing down all the stories her grandfather told. After she learned the story of her name, she wrote a report about the first woman in space, Sally Ride. Proudly she explained that her grandmother had chosen that name because she was the first one from their family to go into space. She had found her work; she was an historian of the journey of the lost ship from planet Earth.

When Little Sally had a baby of her own, a girl, she too was also named for Sally Ride, and called Sary. From babyhood, the child loved to be with Inal and Regina, and was usually to be found in their living space, listening to stories. Sally’s dual roles as historian and a monitor on Quincy’s team, kept her busy all the time, and so the little one usually slept at her grandmothers’ as well.

Their home became her home. Sary loved them both and she shared Regina’s love of mathematics and science. Inal took Sary to the lower-level stasis chambers, and explained about the two different groups that were sleeping there. One group were private passengers who had paid for their arrangements and helped make it possible to build the ships. The other were bio-engineered humans, enhanced to survive on the new, unknown worlds they might encounter. It was Regina who had to explain to the child that the crew were unmodified workers, who would live in the worlds that were found safe for them to land. It was all very fascinating, but very abstract to a fourth-generation space dweller. It seemed to Inal and Regina that time went more quickly with Sary around. Somehow, even after she moved in with her friends in the Sciencers House, it didn’t seem possible that she was already as tall as Regina.

Tonight, they would have the all too rare pleasure of seeing both their daughter and granddaughter at the dinner table, Inal thought happily. Humming, she picked out the plates that Sary had made in school, squares with yellow stars on a black background, and laid them on the table. Sally was too busy because she just never stopped working. And now that Sary, grown as tall as Regina, had moved into the Science House, she was much too busy to come over for dinner.

Inal lifted the yellow pitcher and tested it with her palm; it was full, and cold. She took five tumblers from the shelves, still thinking about Sary’s friends. Most likely it was that big, serious-looking boy at the Science House who kept her grandchild so busy, she thought. She knew his family and often sat in the gardens with his aunt Tanoa. Quincy’s best friend Levu had been from that family. They were island folks. What was his name again?

Tama, she said to herself, smiling. Yes, that was it. Just then Regina strolled in, her hair bushy from a swim, carrying a flat basket.

Tama? she asked. That heartbreaker over at the Science House? Sary better watch herself. There are already a few sixth-generation babies around.

Inal snorted. First time anyone’s ever beaten Sary to anything.

Regina grinned and opened the flat basket, showing Inal the hot pies she’d bought from the family in the rear corridor.

You got them! Inal exulted. I’m really amazed, I can never get there on time.

Honey lamb, I had to run all the way home, keeping people off me! Regina laughed, hugging her.

They put a tray of sliced pickles, hot peppers, cucumbers and greens on the table. Regina covered the pies with a cloth while Inal poured water, and they both sat down.

Regina sighed and Inal looked at her questioningly.

I heard Levu’s son arguing with Josiah, is all, she said, sighing again. I don’t think even Josiah can be serious about turning off the sleep chambers, though.

Nobody’s going to allow that, Inal commented.

True, Regina answered, crunching a pickle. "It’s more the way Josiah’s always raving about how we’ve lost our way because we don’t all follow the one true god. He wants Levu to tear down the bure kalou, or so he says."

The spirit houses? He’s ridiculous, Inal grunted. Forget about Josiah. I just hope Sary won’t complain about me using her old plates again. Her hand stole toward the basket of pies.

Ha! Regina swatted playfully at her, Pie thief!

Who’s a pie thief? called Sally, walking in the open door with a bowl of fruit. Surely not Inal?

Never, protested Inal, getting up to hug her daughter, and Sary entered with her tall friend in tow.

This is Tama, Sary announced, from the Science House. We’re working on a big project, about how to wake up the exploration teams…wait, did you really have to use those ugly old plates?

You know how much we love your plates, Sary, Regina laughed, stepping forward. Welcome, Tama.

She embraced Sary and took the fruit bowl from Sally with a hug as they all seated themselves.

Sally leaned forward, taking two pies. It’s all happening so fast! Systems we’ve studied and watched forever are all awake again— ‘online’… she corrected herself, and functional. There are manuals for everything, even though all the automatic systems are still running, and we’ve already figured out how most of them work. Soon we’ll be able to start awakening the people in the stasis chambers.

She paused for a big bite of pie.

After all this time, the ship had suddenly come back to life— ‘back on-line’, as Sally called it. They were in the vicinity of a star system—more than one, evidently. In only a few more sleep periods, they would be able to see planets. The ship’s systems were still working, the controls could now be programmed, and the original data was accessible, though there was nothing to show what had thrown them off course, or where they were now. They certainly had all kinds of data to examine, and young Sary was right in the thick of that. She was disappointed not to be on the exploration teams, but she was excited about working with the biopatterned humans. With the certainty of a large planet somewhere ahead, plans to wake up the sleeping passengers were being finalized. Three generations of crew had never seen a planet. The fifth generation were completely at home in space. The first generation were almost all gone. It was hard to imagine all the changes that lay ahead. But everyone was ready.

Regina slept very lightly, these days. Sometimes she still woke up thinking she had heard little Sary calling, even though that baby was living in the Sciencers House now and was even taller than she was. Old memories. These days, it sure looked like Sary and Tama were planning on a family of their own, although they wanted to wait for planetfall. That would make six generations, she thought. As she turned over, being very careful not to put weight on her stiff left shoulder, she saw that Inal’s side of the bed was empty, the covers cool. She sat up, rubbing her cranky shoulder, letting the cool air circulating through the room refresh her. Old bones, she thought.

Pulling on a light robe, Regina paused and rummaged in the kitchen for berry juice and biscuits. She knew where she would find Inal, and she knew some snacks would be welcome. Then she stepped out barefoot into the quiet hallway, enjoying the smooth floors. The hall lights were set for sleep time, the lumens low, and with that pretty, faint blue color the children were calling night-night now. She padded down the silent corridor.

Regina quietly opened the doors to the darkened viewing room. Seeing Inal sitting, silhouetted against the window, she went over and sat behind her. Inal leaned back into her embrace. Absently Regina began combing through her tangled curls. It was a sweet habit from their earliest days. Inal’s once-long hair had grey streaks in the rusty red now, and she kept it short for convenience, but she still loved the feeling of Regina’s fingers.

She sighed. Did you miss me?

I woke up from dreaming that I heard baby Sary, again. Regina said softly. Figured you could use a sip of berry juice.

Thanks, Inal told her. It’s just so hard to believe, after all this time…planetfall. I wish my parents could be here to see it.

I know, Regina agreed, bending forward to kiss the top of Inal’s head. They sat in silence for a long time, arms around each other, gazing out at the familiar darkness.

Chapter 1

The Binaries: Blue and Stone

Life was flourishing under the management of the Stellar Associates of the Suns, a stable, respected member of the Planetary Trade Consortium. Relative newcomers to the galaxy, the human colonists of the Stellar Associates had arrived in the galaxy’s fourth quadrant many revolutions ago, settling on a few uninhabited planets. The association had only three systems, but they exchanged goods and services profitably among themselves, and provided a welcome way station in the otherwise empty backwater of the galaxy.

The splendid-sounding name had come from the fertile imagination of an early member of the lizard line humans who had settled on the giant planet Arobi. Their nearest partner was an ancient asteroid cloud called the Griebus Cluster. The Edge of the Cluster included two planetoids, Salamandra and Mindus, inhabited by the amphibian and frog line settlers. The most distant associate of the Stellar Associates was the little system called The Binaries, which imported only a few manufactured goods and exported an equally small amount of bluewood and minerals. The unusual binary formation of the two fourth planets made the system a destination for astronomers, students, and tourists looking for a rustic experience. It was certainly not a luxury destination.

Settled and quiet, the Binaries took little notice of life on either the huge planet Arobi or the planetoids of the Griebus Cluster, its distant partners in the Stellar Associates. The remote system had a small yellow sun with four single planets and one double planet in the fourth position. The first planet was a small ball of molten rock, the second a luminous gas planet always visible in the sky, the third was green, warm and uninhabited. The twin planets, Blue and Stone, were followed by a fifth, distant little ice planet. The binary planets were stable according to Asimov’s equations, with a proper balance of mass between them, and a proper distance from the sun, and they were home to the descendants of the humans who had found their way to the galaxy’s end after a navigation failure on their ship. These settlers were unmodified by any genetic enhancement. They had developed some mental communication with animals but made no noteworthy impression in the galaxy.

The two planets were quite different. The smaller one called Stone was a rocky ball with mountain ranges, underground minerals, a single river and a vast plain that covered two-thirds of the planet. Fish-like creatures, birds and small mammals had evolved there, but most lived in the plains and provided scant food. The settlers farmed only the edges of the great alkaline plains. Stone was sparsely populated, agrarian, xenophobic, and puritanical. The demands of subsistence-level farming left its inhabitants indifferent to life beyond their own horizons. A local ferry station allowed intraplanetary shipments between the twin planets, but Stone had no interplanetary spaceport.

Commerce, which drove the economies of both planets, was left to the people of the blue planet. Blue had the spaceport, which meant trade, innovation and exchange with the rest of the galaxy. It was Blue planet who had traded with the affluent Arobin System and eventually petitioned, successfully, to join their consortium. Blue had its huge bluewood forests, canyons and mountains and a single lake, where the city had been built. Marketown had a city council and free schools, a healer’s house and a radio program. To Blue came the tourists, the astronomers who studied the twin planets, the merchants and traders, the pilots, mechanics, and cooks, and the profiteers.

Chapter 2

Stone: Doppin Farmhold

Maro was a farmhold child of the Third House on the southern edge of Doppin Province. Doppin was next to a wide, windswept plain, ending at the foothills of the forbidding mountains called the Thiu Hills. The farmhold itself was nestled among low hills on the other side of the plains, around a clear stream of very cold water. The tall hills were crested with groves of red charra trees, and the slopes were covered with terraced gardens. The farmholders’ lives were devoted to subsistence, for the silvered grasses that waved and tossed so beautifully on the plains were too alkali to eat, and the soil there could not be cultivated.

From Maro’s farmhold, the Thiu Hills were tall and ominous, their pointed peaks thin against the sky. There were many old stories of poisoned springs and strange sicknesses that early settlers had encountered there. The lucky ones who made it back confirmed that this was no place worth settling. Nor did the Stone planet people have any interest in the crystal mining, away from the farmholds in treacherous territory. It was only off-worlders who wanted the mines, and they were welcome to them. Doppin farmholders were deeply traditional, with no interest in space travel. They seldom looked skyward except at shadowfall and were quite content to leave the rest of the solar system to Blue planet.

Terrace farming and the leathery eggs of kuka birds, though monotonous, were the sustenance of the farmholds. Maro’s farmhold served six families, and because farming life was arduous, all the children were schooled early to patience, diligence and endurance. Food was adequate; studies were prescribed, the traditional teachings were followed, and the natural beauty of the place gave pleasure to even the work-hardened elders.

Maro’s parents had both gone to live in the northern settlement when he was a young toddler, and he thought of his great-aunt’s hearth as home. He was a big strong child, like his mother RySalla, they said, and the three elders of the household were glad to have such a good worker at their hearth. They were also, guardedly, proud of his quick mind.

The Doppin farmhold buildings formed a half-circle nestled into the many rounded hills rising from the wide silvergrass plains. Each household lived in its own circular house, connected by long, high-roofed hallways, with a large meeting room in the center and schoolrooms, workrooms and kitchen between each household. Inside the circle grew the raised herb beds used only by the cooks and healers. The well-worn flat square of bare yellow ground behind the kitchen, tamped firm by the feet of generations of running children, served as playground, work yard and gathering place.

Maro could see the yard below, from high up on top of the hill where the charra bark was prepared for burning. He always made sure to have plenty of cooking fuel in the kitchen before dayrise. His reward was the beauty of the early light, growing brighter as he descended, the shimmering sparks of blue planet’s corona dancing in the sky just overhead.

Kessen was awake early too, squatting on her heels at the edge of the square, a cup of cold bai in one hand, watching the sparkling of dayrise. She didn’t have to turn, at the noise of small feet descending the hill behind her, to know it was Maro, returning from the fuel sheds. This child had been very attentive to the Duty lectures, listening gravely as Kessen explained the Circle of Work. The community depended on all its workers for the good of everyone. Certain tasks fell to certain individuals who had the right capabilities. Among these were cooks and healers, farmers and teachers. It was customary for elders without family to help care for the farmhold children, and those with the knack taught Basic instruction.

Kessen was such a person, like her twin, Kema, who lived on blue planet and ran the children’s home there. Schooling here on Stone was rigorous, didactic, and brief. Everyone was needed on the farmhold, and no intellectual activity could ever interfere with chores. After Basic levels, all the children were expected to work at adult responsibilities on the farmholds. Kessen lived in Maro’s farmhold, the third house. She had helped care for Maro since his aunt had appeared with the toddler, solemn and silent, at the door of the schoolroom five revolutions ago.

Before he had eight revolutions, Maro had learned to recite the Saying: From each according to ability, to each according to need. Solemnly he had pondered the question of community with characteristic seriousness. Then he had chosen a Duty for himself. Now he had seen his ninth revolution, and he climbed the hill to the charra grove every morning and evening to fetch fuel for the fires. The oily, fragrant bark felt free from the trees with a touch, and easily regrew. It was sorted into buckets and stored in sheds to dry. The charra trees provided the fuel for cooking and heating for all the farmhold. It was an important Duty. And the buckets were heavy, but Maro was the strongest child.

Seeing Kessen watching the sky’s corona, Maro crossed the ground on quiet bare feet to sit beside her. She tugged his braids roughly, gathering him to her with her free arm. Silently he peered up into the sparkling sky.

Kessen watched him fondly. This one, she was sure, would qualify for the InterPlanetary Institute, though it would be hard to convince the farmholders to let him attend it. The other elders might cling stubbornly to their traditional suspicion of any kind of change, but she knew better. Things were always changing. Stone had preserved its isolation all this time, but more and more visitors were coming to Blue planet, with new ideas. They would soon need someone to learn the ways of the