Chapter 3

"Gabriel? Gabriel, can you hear me?" Shannon's voice echoed through his skull. The picture in front of him was the exact same symbol as was on the church. Down to the minute details. What had been here before? He shook himself out of his trance. 

"My love." He said to Shannon, "I have found something, but I need you to promise that you will not share what you have found with the rest of the search team. Not until I can make sense of it." 

"Gabriel you are asking me to lie to the recon team. I don't know if that is wise, what if someone finds out?" She replied.

"If someone finds out you can blame me, just please do this for me will you love?" He asked. After a long pause, Gabriel heard Shannon's smooth voice through the comm static. 

"I won't tell anyone my love, but I expect that you will tell me what the hell is going on when I return."

"I promise I will tell you everything, but for now I need to think. I am going to leave now. Please be careful." 

"I thought talking to me helped you think?" She said wryly. 

"It helps me work. Important difference." he said as he cut the connection. 

Shannon rolled her eyes to absolutely no one. Perhaps some unseen microscopic creature saw her and wondered what it meant. This man. He did things like this from time to time, followed hunches, made strange decisions. His reason for coming on this expedition had always confused her. He had told him that he had 'felt like it was the right thing to do' whatever that meant. As much as it was maddening sometimes, his strange behavior is what made him so endearing. He was confident without being cocky, Insightful yet authentic. His hunches were rarely incorrect. Shannon often wondered what it would be like to live a life like his. No more second guessing herself, no more agonizing over decisions. She laughed to herself. Maybe others would see his life that way, but she knew better. Gabriel agonized over all his decisions. For her, most things were a simple calculus. If she wanted water or wine with dinner was weighing advantages. Did she want to let loose or stay reserved? Did she need to do something important later? Did she want to deal with the headache the next day? All the factors went on the scale of the decision with their own personal weights. For Gabirel it was different. His decision may seem simple, but oftentimes he would have all evidence pointing to one option but have a 'feeling' that it was incorrect. How much decisional weight to give to this hunch was the endless question of his life. He routinely lost sleep over it.

Shannon finished her investigation of the cave. Her short-range ground penetrating radar revealed nothing here but more rocks and dust. If there was water, it was too for down in the earth to be of any use, besides it was getting late, and she would need to rendezvous with the team soon. She pocketed the small cross that she had found and turned back to her rope, giving it a small tough to make sure it was still stable, she began climbing out of the cave. All in all, it took her about an hour and a half, but she made it out of the cave safely and stood up to survey her surroundings. Her normally white suit was stained green with the dust of this place and shone a brilliant color in the light of the setting sun. She turned to the sunrise and lined up a photo. It would be another nice landscape for her journal. She began searching for a souvenir to take back with her. One day, when her and Gabriel were finally home, she would set up an office or a shed or even a museum with a record of every world she had ever visited. A place she could take their children and show them how cool their parents used to be. She selected a nice-looking rock with stripes of emerald green and slate gray and mounted her bike, starting it up and turning back towards the shuttle. She opened the channel to her team. 

"Shannon Cordelia reporting in. I have finished my inspection and am returning to the shuttle. ETA 17:34." Her teammates acknowledged her report and others chimed in their statuses. She replied to them with a robotic 'copy that'. each time, only half paying attention. Instead, she was occupied with what on earth Gabriel knew about the cross she had found, and remarkable thrill of speeding along the surface of an alien planet. 

Gabriel threw the doors open to the captain's office without knocking. 

"I found it!" He said excitedly. He had spent the last few minutes stuffing down the panic of the matching crosses and preparing a short report for the captain. Who was currently in a meeting with what looked to be his senior support staff. Most looked red in the face and ready to bite each other's head off. Theodore on the other hand was perfectly calm, if a bit annoyed.

"If you will all excuse Officers. I have an urgent matter to attend to. I request that you take your petty squabbles somewhere else." There was much protesting, but the captain gave them a stern look, and they began packing up their things and leaving the room. Gabriel collected a number of nasty glares from those who passed him by. He sheepishly stepped to the captains desk. 

"Sorry about barging in." He said. 

"On the contrary, thank you for interrupting that useless meeting. filled with nothing but egos." Theodore said checking another monitor with little dots on the hologram of Cuprum Theta with little blue dots scattered across it. It seemed that he was tracking the recon team, he always did that when he sent people to the planet. It was one of the things that made him a good captain, he looked out for his people. 

"Now," he said as he looked back to Gabriel. "You said you found something?" 

"A planet sir" Gabriel replied, "The one we have been waiting for I think." Gabriel placed his data pad down on the captain's desk and it projected an image of the planet he had found. The image was not detailed enough for Theodore to see the church that Gabriel had discovered, and besides, he had carefully edited the official version of the planet, so it had no such building. The original scan he kept with him on a personal drive. He preceded to explain the features of the planet. Its native flora being so close to the species in their home system, and the rivers and snow he had observed. As he continued to talk Theodore went from shocked, to interested, to content, sitting back in his chair observing Gabriel with a smile. 

"The planet is only about a two-month journey." Gabriel finished. Captain Theodore stood up and put his arm on his shoulder.

"You did it Gabriel, I knew you would." He said as he went back to his desk. "I will call in the research team. We will need to stop somewhere to mine fuel, but if we are quick about it, we will be there in time for the planting season. Gabriel set the course, it's time to make for our new home, by the way you didn't name this one?"

"Apologies sir. I didn't feel like Silva Alpha quite fit. I will have to think of something later." Gabriel said sheepishly. 

"Very well. Let me know when you do, I would like to announce it to the passengers and crew." Theodore said. Gabriel nodded and walked off back to his office and began the work of finding a preferred path through the galaxy to their new home. It was true that the pilot was responsible for final say of the route, but it was less work for them if he gave them something to start with, besides he liked this part. It involved him walking his way through the map, putting himself in the shoes of the ship as it slowly navigated its way past planets, asteroid fields, stars, and comets. It always made him feel like he was flying. The only thing stopping him was the pesky math. making sure to stay the proper distance away from celestial bodies and taking into account the ships turning radius always meant calculations, so as he stepped through the galaxy, he was typing away on his data pad.

Hours passed, and just as he was calculating the likely takeoff trajectory from the planetoid, he had the Fortuna refueling on the door opened and he looked up to see Shannon filling the doorway. She was in clean clothes and hand recently showered. In her hands she held a small bag. He smiled at her as he went back to his work, navigating the ship around the planetoids single moon. She slipped in, closing the door behind her and placed the bag on his desk. She stood there and watched for a while as he navigated the ship out of the solar system and towards a destination unknown to her. Once Gabriel got his path out into deep space, he made some gesture on his data pad and the ship pathing program paused. He would pick it up later. 

"Welcome back my love, sorry to keep you waiting. Space travel calculations take all of my concentration." Gabriel said as he turned to her. 

"It always amazes me when you do that." She said softly  

"you may be the first woman I have ever met who has liked me for my math skills. Now I have to show you something." He said as he manipulated the map to show her their new home with all its green trees and snowy mountains. Shannon's eyes lit up. 

"You found it!" she gasped. staring in awe at the boreal planet before her. 

"I did." Gabriel said rather reluctantly "There is something I nee-" He was interrupted as Shannon grabbed his face in both her hands and pulled him into a kiss. They rested their heads against each other for a long moment. When they finally parted, Gabriel could see tears in Shannons eyes. 

"You did it my love" she said holding has face in her hands. 

"There is something I have to show you" he said reluctantly, captivated by her face lit only by the greens and whites of their soon to be home. 

"Ok." She said through the joyful tears. 

Gabriel extricated himself form her arms and moved and turned back towards the planet. He fiddled with the controls, and they both flew over its surface until he made it to the church. Shannon gasped next to him. She recognized the symbol above the door. the both shared a look, Shannon wide eyed and astonished, Gabriel intense and worried. 

"This is why you didn't want me to tell anyone about the cross." She whispered. They both knew the implications. The church on the planet was evidence for an intelligent civilization. One that could build buildings and even had the concept of deities. The amulet Shannon found on Cuprum Theta meant that they were space faring. The fact that they had seen no trace of this alien culture until now was unsettling. Even if this was one of their more remote outposts, what could have happened to them that they were nowhere to be found? 

"Who knows?" Shannon asked. 

"About the planet? The captain, and most likely the senior crew. About the aliens? Just us." He said. 

"Why are you keeping this a secret?" She asked. Gabriel paused for a moment, considering. He turned off the map and sat in the dark for a while until Shannon turned on the lights and looked at him concerned. 

"I have been having this dream." he said. "At first I thought nothing of it, but lately I have been having it more and more. the ship is rocketing towards the Tear, and I can see through it to a planet with trees, mountains, rivers and snow. On that planet is a person. A figure with golden hair and amber eyes. It is human except there are white feathered wings sprouting from its back. In its hand was the exact symbol that you dug up. The same one that is above the doors of the church. The figure always felt like it was beaconing me. I didn't realize it at first, but the planet I have found is the same one as my dream. I don't know what it means, but I don't want to share it with anyone but you." Shannon stepped closer to him. She could no doubt see the fear in his eyes, but he didn't shy away. Not from the woman that meant everything to him. She stepped within a hair's breadth of him and reached out to cup his face. 

"My love." She whispered "It's alright. The fate of the universe does not rest upon your shoulders. We will keep this a secret for now. Now come to bed I am tired." And Gabriel obliged, letting her lead him out of the office.