Bright Face

349 is the security officer responsible for eighteen people, six Tango Cars, and a 570-kilometre unsupported crossing of the Sunrise desert. Then their radios fail, the vehicles begin overheating in the alkaline dust, and members of the expedition steal two cars, most of the fuel, and nearly all of the water.

The survivors are left with damaged vehicles and twenty litres of water. As 349 strips one Tango Car to keep the others running and tries to move the expedition toward recovery, she finds something that does not appear on any survey: cultivated ground in the desert. Beyond it is a stone settlement supplied by check dams, cisterns, irrigation cells, livestock, and people speaking Slovenian.

They call themselves the Bright Face

They have been living on Sunrise for generations, and no one who sent 349 across the desert seems to know they exist.