Free Footsteps in the Sky by Greg Keyes Page B

around. The Dragonfly sat still in the distance, a silver toy. Near it was the alien craft. A small blue figure stood, looking in her direction.
    SandGreyGirl, get hold of your thoughts! She sat down, panting, eyes fixed on the distant figure.
    Not her mother. That “woman” could be a million things, but not her mother. A planet somewhere where everyone looked like stocky Hopi women? No. A ghost or a Kachina? If the traditionalists were right, they would not come in space ships. They would not wear bad imitations of Hopi clothing. A two-heart?
    Sand had to consider that last one, since her fine and beautiful world was now broken. She hadn’t believed in witches before, especially shape-shifting ones. Did she now?
    But again, why would a two-heart need a spaceship?
    But it was not her mother. She believed that. She could not, would not, accept such a possibility.
    Sand sat, watching. The figure seemed to be wandering around, looking at the landscape, at the Dragonfly.
    The Dragonfly! Sand came to her feet. This thing—whatever it might really be—had come before and stung her mother. It knew her mother, knew what she looked like. Knew what she looked twenty years ago. And that’s how it looked now, the way her mother had, one child and four handfuls of years ago.
    â€œDamn you—get away from there,” she screamed, and broke into a run once again, this time towards the creature.
    Fine, she thought, as her legs pumped her along. They know what mother looked like. This could be a hologram, a robot, something else. They want to appear human, and mom was their model.
    But part of Sand believed in ghosts. This part controlled her breathing, her bowels, large portions of her spine and brain, and to some extent, her feet.
    Ghosts don’t need spaceships, she reminded herself, seven times and then seven times again. That brought her back to the Dragonfly. Back to the mother-thing.
    Thing was a wonderful word, Sand thought. It could abstract fear or focus it, depending upon your state of mind.
    Sand looked, long and hard, the light of her new skepticism shining brightly on the familiar face. She expected that light to melt those features away, reveal something hideous and alien, but it did not. Pela’s face remained her face, though Sand was struck once again by how young it was. How much it was like her own, both broad ovals, though Pela’s tended towards round and Sand’s was more elongate. They both had the same almond shaped eyes, just touched at the corners by a hint of epicanthic fold. Pela’s orbs were black, however, while Sand’s held her father’s grey. Their mouths were most similar; wide and full, both of them, able to lift into smiles of stunning beauty or fold into awesome, froglike frowns. They differed more in body, Pela generally thicker through the hips, waist and thighs, her shoulders a touch broader, too. It was like looking at one’s sister; their apparent age was the same.
    â€œI know you aren’t my mother,” Sand remarked, aware of the hideous, uncontrolled sound of her own voice, jerking and quivering like a wrestling match between crying and hysterical laughter.
    The Pela-thing looked at her closely.
    â€œI am not your mother,” the thing agreed—with Pela’s voice. And yet, finally, it wasn’t Pela’s voice. It had the same resonance and timber, but there was nothing else—neither inflection, modulation, nor tone—that reminded Sand of Pela.
    â€œThen what the fuck are you?” This was upsetting Sand more, not less, though she couldn’t quite see why. She couldn’t quite see anything.
    â€œI’m … I don’t have a name. Not one that I can say.”
    The thing spoke with a lowland accent, used lowland slang and contractions. Pela had always spoken with the conservative mesa speech, even when she was drunk, despite a year or two down there, by the sea.
    â€œYou look like my mother.