Daan and Marta, the Headwall Stationhands, were waiting for the twelve boys and the Husky family at Theden Spaceport.
Nineteen people, including the drivers Daan and Marta, needed to be distributed between two vehicles. The mathematics of this had been Daan’s problem to solve and he’d solved it incorrectly twice before finally getting it right.
Daan: Right. Two vehicles, nineteen people. That’s… um…
He scratched behind his ear vigorously.
Marta: Nine in the first vehicle, ten in the second.
The situation had certainly not been helped by the three pups, whose combined ideas on passenger loading dynamics defied any known logic to either human or hunde.
Fergus: I’ma sit next to Charlie!
Fergus was still hopeful that there might be a cheezo left in the bag that had survived an Earthly apocalypse, a subway backpack journey, and a hyperspace traverse across several star systems. Sadly for Fergus, they were all gone.
A small paw patted Seb’s arm.
Hamish: Me, go you.
The highway out of Theden, the Capital of Hundeerde, was wide and long, but it soon gave way to the narrower and winding regional roads that would take the boys to their new home, Headwall Station. The road hummed beneath the wheels of the two vehicles. Hamish was asleep against Seb before they had cleared Theden’s outskirts. Seb put his arm around Hamish and he had not moved since.
Lewis, Dogger on his lap, was watching the changing landscape through the window, carefully cross-referencing all that he saw, with the information he had read about Hundeerde on his week long Chasetail journey. Raven sat beside him, looking at the same landscape, but he was content to just soak it all in as the scenery flashed by.
The planet’s rings, shone brightly overhead in the late afternoon light, which created a golden bow that crossed the deep blue sky.
Angus: They look way bigger than on the ship.
Lewis: We’re closer.
Charlie: Are they always just there?
Grandpa Jake: Yes. They are always there.
Charlie: And nobody thinks that’s incredible?
Grandma Bella gave a small smile.
Grandma Bella: We think it’s home.
This was a sight that the boys riding in either vehicle would not tire of seeing any time soon.
Samson had been intrigued by something else entirely.
He’d noticed that the ground vehicles shared the same faint sweet syrupy smell when they started up as he had smelt on the Chasetail flight deck when they boarded the Howler. For the short time he’d been able to stand on the flight deck, his eyes had been anywhere and everywhere. Seeing the various fighters and shuttles up close with their engine hatches open, was a memory he would keep for a long time.
Samson: Grandpa, do these vehicles use the same fuel as the ships on the Chasetail?
It kinda smells the same.
Grandpa Jake: Close enough, Samson, yes.
Ground vehicles use a different formulation, but it’s basically the same plasma base.
Samson: Interesting.
The small town of Veldmeer stood at the mouth of the Greyfall valley. It had an unhurried feel to it with people going about their business and living their lives. The town passed by quickly as the road narrowed and the valley proper began. The green of the wide valley floor gave way to almost vertical sides of grey rock. The walls soared above them, and the boys had to crane their heads back to see the tops. Down the middle of the valley the Grey River chattered alongside the road, it ran clear and fast, flowing over countless small rounded stones.
Charlie was thinking about dinner, when his daydream was interrupted suddenly by Raven.
Raven: Look!
What had caught his eye at the cwm headwall, were magnificent twin waterfalls, with simultaneous columns of white water, cascading down hundreds of metres from the top of the headwall to the valley below. The twin falls were just catching the late afternoon sun turning them into golden ribbons of fire.
Daan: Those are the Greyfalls. They do that every evening as the sun goes down.
Daan pulled the vehicle over to a stop so that they could look. Marta following pulled in behind.
Charlie: Wow. Just — wow!
Daan: You’ll get used to it.
Marta: No you won’t.
I’ve been here thirty four years, and I still haven’t gotten used to it.
After one more bend in the road the house swung into view. It was stone built, with two main storeys, various annexes, multiple chimneys, and a verandah that ran the full length of the ground floor. It appeared to have grown from the same grey rock of the headwall that surrounded it. Warm welcoming light spilled from the lower windows.
Above the headwall, just visible in the deep blue of the early evening sky were the rings, catching the last few rays of the sun.
Rebecca was on the verandah steps before the vehicles had stopped and the doors opened.
She didn’t wait to be introduced. She just came down the steps and started warmly, hugging people. There was no fuss, people got a hug whether they were ready or not. Most were ready. One or two who weren’t would live.
Hamish, still half-asleep, got an extended one.
She greeted each boy by name, she had learned them all, before their arrival.
When she got to Seb she hugged him for just a moment longer than the others. She said his name. His full name.
Rebecca: Sebastian James Jarvis, you are very welcome.
Seb nodded.
Seb: Thanks.
Finally it was just Grandma Bella and Grandpa Jake left to hug and greet.
Rebecca: Bella. Jake.
Welcome home.
Several sets of tails waved back and forth to complete the greetings.
The inside of the house smelled of woodsmoke and roasting meat, and something else that nobody could quite identify. Whatever the aroma was, it drifted through the whole house.
Charlie stopped dead in the hallway.
The others flowed around him, like water around a rock in a stream. They were upstairs already, their voices growing exponentially.
Amidst the noise, Charlie stood in the hallway with his bag still over his shoulder, his nose internalising something complicated in his olfactory. He dropped his bag in the middle of the hall and followed his nose to the kitchen doorway at the end of the hall.
Peeking in through the door he saw copper pots on hanging beams. A black range against the far wall. A prep table. The smell, concentrated and enormous.
Rebecca appeared, wiping her paws on a cloth.
She looked at Charlie. Charlie looked at her.
Rebecca: You can come in, Charlie.
If you wash your hands.
Charlie was through the door and heading for the sink before she’d finished the sentence.
His bag remained in the middle of the hallway.
Upstairs, the situation was evolving.
Jake and Bella had a plan and it was a sensible plan. It had been explained clearly and it lasted approximately ninety seconds before the collective energy of eleven boys and three pups overwhelmed it and a new system emerged, which was essentially first-come-first-served modified by negotiation, and an occasional loud disagreement.
Hamish despite already having his own room, sat firmly on one single bed and refused to move.
Hamish: Seb’s bed.
That particular selection was settled. Seb dumped his bag by the single bed and Raven and Lewis took the bunks.
After rescuing Charlie’s bag from the hall, Samson managed to secure a room for himself and Charlie with two bunks.
In the end despite the pandemonium, rooms were allocated more or less according to the original plan.
Four roast chickens, complete with roasted vegetables and rich brown gravy. Freshly baked bread, that Charlie had helped to mix, knead and bake, his sleeves rolled up and his hands washed several times. Rebecca had been impressed.
A table set for twenty. Nine on each side, and one on each end. No complicated mathematical equations had been required.
Grandpa Jake sat at the head and Grandma Bella sat at the end. Everyone else found places in-between. Hamish was beside Seb, and Fergus by Charlie. Charlie who had helped to bring out the food and place it carefully on the table also sat next to Rebecca.
The food sat steaming in the middle of the table, but nobody moved toward it, because Jake had raised his glass slightly and tapped it a few times with his fork. The room had fallen quiet immediately.
Grandpa Jake: Before we eat, let’s say one thing we are thankful for.
I am thankful to be home.
He nodded to Daan, who was nearest.
Daan: Flush toilets.
Everyone laughed but nobody asked why.
Marta: This table.
She’d helped build it, but none of the boys knew that yet.
Grandma Bella: A full house.
She looked warmly at all the boys.
Rebecca: Helping hands.
She smiled, looked at Charlie and her tail wagged from side to side.
Fergus: Cheezos!
Angus: Being the oldest!
Hamish considered for a long time. Everyone waited, because you waited for Hamish.
Hamish: Seb.
Seb chose at that moment to be very interested in his napkin.
Charlie: Food. Real food.
He looked at Rebecca, who acknowledged with another wag of her tail.
Samson: This.
Samson held his hands under the table and touched his father’s watch where nobody could see.
Lewis: Dogger.
Dogger was on the bench beside him.
The boys spoke in turn. Some were funny and some were reflective.
When it was Raven’s turn he was quiet for a moment, then quietly he said—
Raven: The river.
He’d seen it from the window. Running clear over small rounded stones. He hadn’t been to it yet.
Then it was Seb’s turn.
He’d been looking at his plate on the table that would soon be filled with food.
Seb: Red.
Jake nodded once; it was the same nod he’d given Seb on the Howler flight deck.
The room went quiet.
Grandma Bella let it sit for a few moments before she broke the silence.
Grandma Bella: Let’s eat.
The table came alive in a happy cacophony of voices, as the chicken was carved, and the plates were passed.
Angus almost upended the gravy before Daan caught it just in time and Fergus sitting in-between Charlie and Lewis didn’t stop talking, even when his mouth was full.
Such was the first dinner at Headwall Station.
Clearing up happened without anyone being asked.
Jake helped to dry. Whoever ended up next to him got a quiet conversation and a question about something, nothing important, just a question. He worked his way through several of them that way, quietly getting to know each boy, from the loud ones to the reserved.
Charlie and Rebecca washed up together. He piled her with questions about the herbs, the vegetables and the seasoning. As she answered each of his questions patiently, Charlie soaked every answer in like a thirsty sponge.
Rebecca: You can come back tomorrow if you want.
He did, and he came back every day for the next seven years.
Bedtime came at the end of a day that had started in hyperspace and ended with solidly built wooden beds and quilted covers. Slowly the room became quiet. While some continued to talk, others were asleep before their heads had even hit their pillows.
Fergus was asleep within exactly seventy three seconds, audibly. Hamish was put to bed by Bella, who sat with him until his eyes closed. Angus declared he was old enough to put himself to bed.
Seb lay on his back in the dark and listened to the gentle wash of the Greyfalls. They were loud enough to hear through the stone. They did not intrude, it was more like the softly beating heart of the valley, underpinning everything there like a pulse. He’d never slept somewhere that had its own sound before.
The Greyfalls continued completely unbothered by the sudden arrival of twelve boys from Earth. They were there before and would be still there long after the boys had left.
Seb looked at the ceiling until eventually, sleep came.
He didn’t hear the door, creak softly open, or the noiseless footfalls of small paws on the floor.
At some point in the dark of the night, he was not alone, a warm weight of soft fur pressed against his side, with the sound of Hamish’s breathing.
The house settled into silence.
In the kitchen, one light was left on, the way Rebecca always left it.
Outside, the Grey River ran under the stone bridge, talking to itself in the dark.
The Greyfalls fell and the rings overhead, turned silver in the night.
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