The Homecoming

By johnnedwill

The descent pod hovered over the dry grass and dun earth of the Olduvai Gorge. A few animals had noticed the sphere's arrival but, after it had proved itself to be neither a threat nor potential prey, they had ignored it. The pod was not allowed to land, let alone touch the ground in any way. This place was considered too sacred, too fragile for even the slightest contamination by outsiders.

Inside the sphere, Athena stood naked under a violet ray; her arms and legs were outstretched so that no part of her body was shielded from the sterilising radiation, a pair of dark goggles protected her eyes. A chime sounded and the light shut off.

"Legal Entity Athena Haruna." The voice was calm and, like the chime, seemed to come from nowhere. "Cleansing has been completed. You may commence your pilgrimage. However, I am required to warn you that pilgrimage is undertaken at your own risk. Should you require assistance during your pilgrimage - ."

"I know," Athena replied brusquely. She took off the goggles, then continued in a more apologetic tone. "I'm sorry. I know you have to go through this with everybody, but I know what I'm letting myself in for. I've trained for this."

"I do not bear you any ill will, Legal Entity Athena Haruna," the pod voice said. "However, I require you to provide a formal acknowledgement of the conditions of pilgrimage before I am allowed to release you."

Athena opened a sealed storage locker and took from it the items she had elected to use on her pilgrimage: a stone knife, a wooden staff and a carrying sling. As demanded by tradition and custom, all of these had been made of natural materials from Earth, shaped by the hands of those who had gone on pilgrimage and returned. Athena wasn't superstitious, but she felt comfort in knowing that she was carrying items that had brought other people luck. As soon as she had arranged her new belongings to her satisfaction, she straightened up.

"Very well." Athena took a deep breath. "I, Legal Entity Athena Haruna declare that I formally accept the conditions of pilgrimage. I am solely responsible for this, and alone shall bear the burden of my decisions."I therefore request to commence pilgrimage." She glanced up at the ceiling of the pod. "Will that do?"

The voice chuckled. "Indeed, Legal Entity Athena Haruna. Please stand by."

The light in the pod's interior started to change, simultaneously becoming brighter but becoming softer in tone to match the sunlight in the gorge. Then a hole appeared in the pod wall, allowing Athena her first proper sight of Humanity's birthplace. She clambered through the opening and lowered her feet to the soil, enjoying the sensation against her skin.

"One last thing, Legal Entity Athena Haruna," the pod voice said.

"What?" Athena glanced back over her shoulder.

"Welcome home."

Athena walked away from the landing pod. After she had taken a dozen steps, she heard the keening of the pod's engines and felt a momentary wind tug at her. When she turned around to look, she saw that she was alone.

By sunset, Athena had walked for what felt like miles. In the rolling landscape of the gorge, her untrained eyes had found it difficult to make out any distinguishing features. The only landmarks Athena could remember from her briefing were the distant crags of the Naibor Soit hills - and those were too far away to be of any help to her. They rose above the horizon, never seeming to move. As the day's shadows lengthened, heralding the coming of the night, Athena realised she had not had anything to eat or drink since leaving the landing pod. The rules of pilgrimage were simple - she had to live in the same way her distant ancestors had: surviving on whatever she could find or kill. While she could have asked for some rations to help her in the first week of her pilgrimage, she had refused, confident that a 30th century human being could do just as well as the humans of more than half-a-million years before. Now Athena was regretting the decision.

"Alright, girl," Athena muttered. "Let's try and find something." She tried to remember the words of her instructor. Food is everywhere - if you know what you are looking for. Water too. Seeds, insects, animals, tubers. All you need to do is keep your eyes open and your wits about you. Athena stood still and shifted her focus. Instead of looking at the distant horizon, she focussed on the ground closer to her, looking for the signs she had been told about.

On a rock under a thorny shrub, a lizard, maybe twenty centimetres from head to tail, looked back at Athena, its black eyes reflecting the orange sunlight. Athena gripped her staff, feeling the ridges of the wood against her skin. "Don't move," she whispered, and began to edge forward. She didn't want to frighten the animal away. "I'm not going to hurt you." She lifted her staff. The lizard continued to stare at her, seemingly uncaring of her intentions. Athena considered her next move. Should she get closer to the lizard, make it easier to grab; or should she stay where she was and use her staff? She decided to risk another step forward.

The lizard took fright and scuttled away under the thorn bush. Athena, driven by the gnawing in her stomach, lunged and dived after the creature, hoping to grab it by the tail and drag it back. She fell on the stony ground and started pulling at the bush's dry branches. "You little - !" But the lizard had vanished from sight.

Athena pulled herself out from under the bush and looked at the grazes left by its thorns. "Dammit!" She looked towards the horizon. The sun was touching the horizon. Soon it would be too dark to do anything but sleep. Now her priority was shelter. It didn't take Athena long to find a hollow that she could snuggle into, that would shelter her from the night winds. She lay down in the earth's embrace and waited for sleep to come to her.

It was a restless night. Athena slept in fits and starts. The stony ground dug into her and the cold, night air leached her body heat from her. Distant animal calls woke her, and she reached for her knife, holding the stone talisman close to her. She was simultaneously tormented by a full bladder and a nagging thirst. As the night wore on, Athena tossed and turned. Her thoughts grew increasingly dark. Have I made a mistake? I shouldn't have come here. Maybe tomorrow I should just go to the monument and send the evac signal? Get back to where I belong.

At some point during the night, Athena found she could sleep no longer. The grit from the hollow had worked its way into her, making every movement feel as if her skin was being scraped away. Athena sat up and started to brush the sharp sand from her body. It was then that she saw the lights of distant campfires spread out across the plain, and Athena knew she was not alone. Somehow, after this, it was easier to sleep.

Athena woke with the dawn. She was tired and stiff; her limbs ached and popped as she uncurled herself from the scrape she had spent the night in. But she was in better spirits than the night before. Now Athena knew that there were others in this land - other pilgrims like her! If she could find them, she might be able to join them and learn from them how to survive her pilgrimage. There was no rule against pilgrims banning together for support and protection - rather, it was one of the pieces of advice from the briefing given to every person who went on a pilgrimage. Every pilgrim embarked on their journey alone, but there was no need for them to remain in solitude unless they wanted to.

Athena stared out across the scrub and rolling hills of the Olduvai Gorge, and to the escarpments and cliffs that marked its borders, trying to remember where she had seen the campfires during the night. Then, hoping that her memories were not leading her astray, Athena set out on the second day of her pilgrimage.

It was not long before her body had thrown off the fatigue from the night before. Athena's limbs moved easier as the heat of the day warmed her muscles and joints, but it did nothing to lessen the pangs of hunger or the thirst that gripped her throat. Well before the sun had reached its zenith, the pain in her belly became almost unbearable. She had to find food! Athena stopped and focussed on the land. There, about a dozen metres away, was a clump of green shoots rising from the stony ground. Tubers can be found underground. Even though the leaves on the surface do not look promising, that is no indication of what you might find if you dig. Remembering the lessons she had attended, Athena hurried towards the patch of green and, using her staff, began to scrape away the soil.

Athena was able to scrape a shallow trench and clear most of the rocks from the ground around the plants. Then she knelt down and, with her hands, dug deeper, hoping to expose something. Meantime, the sun beat down on her, tanning her back and sweating more and more of the precious water from her body. But, in the end, it was worth it. At the bottom of the hole, about an elbow's depth down, Athena found clusters of small, yellow spheroids. She grabbed at them, ripping them from the ground, and brought them up. The tubers were about half the size of her fist and had a waxy texture to them. Carefully, Athena brushed the dirt away from them, cleaning them as best she could. Then, with her stone knife, Athena cut a glistening slice from one of the tubers and examined it. The root was moist and delicious. Athena tore into her finds, devouring them in fibrous mouthfuls, satisfying her needs. Then, exhausted, she lay down in the shadow of a bush to digest her meal.

"A good meal?"

Another person! Athena sat up, blinking in the bright noon sunlight. There, in front of her, was a man dressed in a breechclout and jerkin. A large bag and a gourd hung from a strap across his chest. He was whipcord-thin, and his skin had been tanned by exposure to the sunlight. However long he had been on pilgrimage, his skin was still lighter than Athena's.

"It was." Athena reached for her knife.

"Don't worry," the man said. He knelt down and held out a hand. "Let me help you up." Athena accepted the offer. The man's grip was strong, but not intimidating. "You arrived yesterday?"

"How can you tell?" Athena hauled herself upright, then set about gathering her few belongings.

"We saw the pod come down. We knew it had to be a drop-off - the landing was too far away from the monument for it to be anything else. I got sent out to greet you and ask you if you wanted to join with us."

"So you're part of a tribe?"

The man nodded. "We thought we'd ask first. Some people like to do pilgrimage on their own - like they have to prove something more."

Athena thought the offer over. "And if I don't get on with the tribe?"

"Then you're free to go. There's more than enough space out here. But it will be easier at first if you have people to help you. We could teach your instructors some things if they came down here." The man laughed. "You can call me Stick. Everybody who knows me does."

"Stick?" Athena laughed. "I can see why. I'm Athena."

* * *

A month later, Athena was tending to the tribe's garden. She had been learning the rudiments of agriculture - it was a lot easier than travelling the land as a hunter-gatherer. Of course, if she wanted to do that, then all she had to do was walk away from the tribe and set out on her own. That was something she had learnt on her pilgrimage - that there were many different ways of doing things, and there was room enough on this world for everyone to follow their own path.

The sound of a distant thunderclap caught her attention, and Athena looked up to the sky. A small hole had appeared in the cloud layer above the Olduvai Gorge, punched by a landing pod that was on its way down from orbit. For a moment a ray of yellow light fell on the pod's hull, causing it to shine out like a pinprick beacon. Athena watched the vehicle fall, trying to gauge whether it was going to land close enough for someone to get to the newcomer within the next day or so. There was always room for another person in the tribe.