Dust and Grit
STARDRIFT – Episode 1: Dead Reckoning (Scene 5)
The crate was half off the glidetrolley when Haneth Beyli hugged it tight, her fingers gripping around the corners. It was not to steady the crate but to steady herself.
For the past four days bombs had been dropping. Now they were falling on the Precinct of Sicadro, the most holy quarters of Guzmul Order. Even inside the hold of the Dilradasi which itself was inside a reinforced and shielded hangar she could feel the intermittent vibrations coming through the ground.
This last one severe enough to make her knees tremble.
It passed. The frantic activity in the hold became as overwhelming as before. Another novice took hold of the other side of the crate and they moved it to the growing stack.
Around them other swarmed—tutors, novices, even kitchen staff—in and out of the hold. They were loading an assortment of crates, and fastening them with straps and cables to ensure safe transport. Ancient books and documents, data capsules, ritual objects—everything valuable to the Guzmul Order that could be packed and moved.
She looked across the growing pile where two elders of the Order, Seferi Dyma and Kasadi Dyma, were preparing to enter stasis pods. It surprised her that she could remember their names in the moment.
Their novice assistants held up sheets for modesty. The two old women had to get fully undressed to enter the dull metal coffins. The fluttering sheets did nothing to hide the fact that underneath all the robes they were frail and shivering like all the rest of them.
There was more to fetch and Haneth turned her glidetrolley around, and took a circuitous route across the hold floor to avoid the steady stream of traffic onto the Dilradasi.
At the open door and the top of the access platform she had to stop dead and step aside. Three more of the seven elders came onto the ship, followed by double that many assistant novices carrying even more crates and other baggage. The elders, their names escaped Haneth completely, looked as hurried and anxious as the novices, their usual stern serenity gone. Maybe for once they were dealing with something they had no ancient answer to recite in response.
When Haneth stepped off the ship another bomb exploded close by. This time she could see the stone floor shake, and small flurries of dust thrown up in the air swirled around her feet. It was not for her to ask but was there going to be enough time to get everything onto the ship, or was there going to be a final hit that would bury them all?
Haneth jogged through the maze of pale stone corridors of the precinct, back to the apartments of Lyschus Dyma, the elder who she, as a novice at the Sacred Precinct of the Sicadro, served as a personal assistant. She had been a novice for only a hundred days and Lyschus Dyma’s assistant for less than ten.
She found Lyschus Dyma at the doorway of the apartment with a broken glidetrolley and the large crate slipped halfway onto the ground.
“Dyma,” she called, her voice shaking, “you should be boarding the ship. The other elders are already there.”
Lyschus Dyma looked up and across the crate, his chin pressed onto the flat surface, hands gripping the bottom. “No! The hand on the ground steady the mind at flight.”
Lyschus Dyma had found an ancient reply appropriate for the situation.
“Help me get this onto the other trolley,” he continued.
There was a straining in his voice and sweat beading on his temples and Haneth realised he was holding up a heavy weight while she was scolding him for being tardy as if he was a novice late for duties.
The broken glidetrolley had wedged the large crate, about a metre and a half long and clearly heavy, against the doorframe.
“We must get another to help us, Dyma. I can go fetch—”
Lyschus shook his head violently. “There is no time.”
It took all their effort and was nearly not enough. With grunts and shoves they pushed the broken trolley out of the doorway. Lyschus was an old man and Haneth but a skinny young woman.
With the space cleared they could bring her trolley in closer. To lift and slide the heavy crate from the one to the other took even more effort and Haneth was surprised when Lyschus Dyma added weight to his effort with a curse she had only heard once before, and that during a drunken brawl.
“What is this, Dyma? Surely the furniture itself need not be taken with?”
Lyschus Dyma paused, both hands flat on the crate as if to bless it, but with a gentle smile on his face. “This isn’t a carved chest or such, dear. It is the Nedrilsten itself.”
Haneth stepped back, her hands snapping away from the crate as if it was a hot stove. The Nedrilsten was the most holy and precious artefact of the Guzmul Order. She had only seen it herself once from a distance and here it was, close enough for her to touch if it wasn’t in a crate. Why, it should have been loaded onto the Dilradasi first, before anything else.
The bombing had been eerily quiet while they were busy.
Now a series of them dropped. The ground shook and the deafening noise assaulted them. Both Lyschus Dyma and Haneth bent double over the crate with the Nedrilsten as if their bodies were enough to shield it. The air filled with dust and grit, and the smells of noxious fumes.
“Surely if the enemy knew they were bombing the Holy Precinct of Sicadro?” Haneth asked, her head close enough to Lyschus Dyma’s that she could speak into his ear.
“They know, dear, they know.”
“We have to get to the ship, Dyma. You and the crate.”
Lyschus Dyma pushed himself up from the crate. “Yes, you get along. I just need to fetch one more thing.”
Haneth had her back turned with her hands on the trolley handle when an explosion struck behind her. It shoved her forward and smacked her ribs against the handlebar and peppered her back with small bits of stone.
She pushed herself up and looked back at a cloud of dust, the doorway a ragged hole in the wall.
© 2025 Gerhi Janse van Vuuren