Two hundred years after a terminally ill Earth was forsaken by mankind in favour of a 'domed' life on Mars, the red planet itself was abandoned en-mass in humanity's search for a new and better world. One of the fourteen vast exploratory fleets, Gamma Interstellar, climaxed its weary journey at the brightest point in Canis Minor. The voyager's new home seemed idyllic until the catastrophic arrival of the Noise, an unpredictable and devastating volume of sound that was to reduce the million strong settlement to no more than a few hundred within three generations. Qat Kusha, a fearless and uncompromising young woman, has always suspected that the Noise is something other than a natural phenomenon, and she organises a last desperate expedition to discover its source. But even Qat hasn't reckoned on the price to be paid when she comes face to face with the Noise-Makers themselves. Prologue It begins, as ever, with no warning other than a faint and distant hum, more vibration than sound. It increases exponentially then, filling every void, every space big or small that it encounters. As always, the hum deepens, and is joined by a high whistling, thin and continuous. Within seconds the space between hum and whistle is filling with notes, half notes, quarter notes, eighths, in every tone and timbre, until there is no room for more. The whistle has become a scream by then, the hum a growling roar. The Noise is greater this time, perhaps greater than ever before. The houses, anchored deep into the ground, shudder and strain against their ties. Material has become scarce, and the smaller buildings are made from the last of the ancient timber, reminders of the days of the Forests. The out-houses, store-houses and the like, are lost in a cloud of fine dust that rises like morning mist. The oldest of them begin to come apart, joints loosening and boards flapping as though a great wind is attacking them. Suddenly one of them, a garage concealing an ancient and treasured vehicle, explodes, its constituent parts screaming away. The air-car rises shaking from the ground, as if trying to relive its triumphant past, then accepts the same fate as the garage. The two explosions are practically soundless, for the Noise is greater than anything. Still it persists, grows, swells. Inside the houses, purpose-built from the strongest cast lorinium, the Villagers hide and cower. Most are already underground, deep in their dark cellar. Those who are not wish they were, but it is already too late to move. The very molecules of the air writhe and shudder as they strive to maintain their complex arrangement. The air is becoming visible; a thick, glutinous haze that chokes and defies passage. Those who have managed to reach their window-less bunkers in time sit huddled together behind the bolted doors. They resemble ancient photographs of the first astronauts, their helmeted heads, smooth and opaque, eerily reflecting the yellow candlelight. Inside the helmets are faces disguised by breathing apparatus and padded ear-muffs. The helmets are clipped to suits made from heavy animal skin. The skins are necessary, for even contact with a vibrating wall will leave great welts across uncovered flesh. Most of the Villagers are young adults, in their prime, which is why they have survived. The few remaining children cling whimpering to their parents, their helmeted heads grotesquely outsized atop their small bodies. These are the fortunate ones; the ones who may survive. Those left outside - the deaf, the old, the plain unlucky - are the first to die, alongside those foolish enough to have become momentarily distracted by Lampetia's pink-purple beauty. By the time they sense the imminence of the Noise they are already doomed, and will hardly feel the bursting of their eardrums before the rest of their body follows suit. Those who have made it home but have yet to don their protective gear and find shelter are the worst off. Their death is slower than those outside, and that much more painful. Hands over ears, they burrow under anything they can find, choking and fumbling blindly in the thick air. The pressure builds in their bodies and as the fluid within them expands, their cells begin to swell. Before the final seconds, before the room they are in is dripping with the remains of their exploded bodies, comes a moment of excruciation that is said to be without comparison - though few have been brought back to tell of it. Those who have, those fortunate enough to have had help close by, keep that information to themselves, living in silence for the rest of their lives. Reaching its climax at last, a tumult beyond all description, the Noise begins to fade as quickly as it arrived. Dust settles back, air clears, light returns, and as the last faint murmur fades to nothing, a strange silence assembles. For a while nothing moves, as if the entire planet were holding its breath. A heatsmell fills the air around the Village; a mixed odour of hot earth and hot bodies, like that left behind in the cool of the evening after a baking summer's day. A pebble rolls then, disturbed by the slipping of a shattered shard of timber. The sound it makes is crisp, clean and normal, and the world begins to live again.