With Alicia praying in the last segment, that opens the story to a little more religion, both hers and her speculation.

Even knowing better, she’s still a girl and takes an action wish seems innocuous, but in fact changes everything.

I wonder what’s going on back on the surface?

Enjoy my content? Buy me a beer!

Back to the edge at once, off to her left, further down the lake, something had disturbed the surface.  Ripples were again spreading out and moving away with the faint current.

Was that something tossed in or something breaking the surface from below?  So many questions.

She stood still and waited to see if there was any repeat of the phenomenon.  After half an hour, she began her trek back to ground level.  Not hesitating at all, she turned left and walked along the narrow way next to the lake.  A score steps after the end of the building, another stop.

Running water.  And a lot of it, from the sound.  Again relying only on the faint glow, Alicia moved until she could see what she heard.

A stone pipe, about seventy cm in diameter.  Water gushed out strongly not falling to a cut in the walkway for a meter and a half.  It smelled quite different than the lake, so she stuck a finger in – cool – and put it on her tongue.  Seems fresh.  Risking a little light, she was surprised to see some lichen and even straggly, white plants where the water from the pipe was.

Alicia squatted down to sniff at the plants.  Nothing that sets off any alarm bells, but I’ll wait until things get a little more desperate before trying them.  Back up, she moved closer to the lake to step over the cut, before returning to her walk.  Almost immediately, she heard more flowing water.  Sounds like a lot more.

This was a waterfall, but on the opposite shore.  Water thundering over a cliff about two hundred meters up.  A lot more lichen and plants on that side.  Which gave her an idea.

Two fingers back into the lake, she tasted the water again.

“The saltiness is lower,” she said.  “Not much, but I can tell.  I wonder why the, well, I guess I can just call them Crabbies for now, had that building at the far end?  Different metabolism?  Or maybe it had some religious significance.”

Like most of the greater imperial family, Alicia was Catholic.  In fact, one of the few exceptions was her grandmother, Bound Concubine to Crown Prince Robert.  It did not even occur to her that an alien race might not have some kind of faith.

Along with the salinity, the faint glow was lessened.  Whatever produced it, it seemed, needed the brackishness.  “And if I recall from some lessons, some of the early fish we introduced from Old Home were species which could live in water like this.  Perhaps seafood might be on my menu later!”

The path abruptly turned left as the lake became significantly wider.  The other shore must have been over quarter-kilometer away now.  There a few more pipes on her side and at one point she had to make her way through a waterfall without slipping on the wet stone.  Hard to see, she drew her light.  Halfway through it, it reflected something on her left, near the wall.  Her head and her dark hair already soaking, Alicia approached.  A pedestal, maybe half a meter high with a metal or ceramic blue globe atop.  A religious shrine?

In the back of her mind she recalled when her great grandmother and her son found something on Mars and were tossed three hundred years into the future, only to be rescued by Cousin Kalí and her grandfather, Robbie.  That device is still hidden from all of us by Aqua; even Kira never speaks of it.

Brash and cautious at once, she leaned forward and tapped it with her light.  Nothing.  Oh, well.  A roadside shrine, like the Japs have in their lands, here and Old Home.

Once past that, the glow of the lake was so dim she had no choice but to use her flashlight, lest she step somewhere she shouldn’t.

“And I’ve already my quota of that for today,” she smiled.

Some of the plants were now as tall as she was.  Alicia could only guess their life cycle as there was no possibility of photosynthesis.  Yet they retained a leaf structure, perhaps pointing to a time when they evolved on the surface.

Her left boot slipped.  She steadied herself.

“That should never have happened,” she fumed.  “Not to someone like us.  I’m more tired and shocky than I think, from the drop and all.  Time to rest.”

A few steps out into a mix of soft dirt and sand, she sat.  Flashlight off, she propped her back against a rock the size she was.  As demi-humans did, she made sure her brain stayed acutely tuned to her ears.  After a short pause, Alicia reached down to the knife on the inside of her left calf and set it in her lap.  She closed her eyes and was instantly out.