“A Traveler contacted a Munti two weeks ago. He was from a different Faction.
“His visit is known to us but we are not aware of what Faction he belongs to.” His face again had a weird look when saying this.
“There are at least two but no more than three Factions involved on our world.” Do you sense that I am not from this world? I think not. Why are you looking like this?
“Who was contacted?”
“Borg.” Houston gave me the coordinates of the encounter and then I matched them with Munti counselors’ travel patterns, together with Duras. Borg was their first Marshall. He stared at Delena, trying silently to read some reactions. Her face changed in surprise, yet she said nothing. Good control. Is the Erin able to read more than I am? I bet he is.
“How do you know all these things?” he asked. I told again the story about people dancing under hypnosis. “This can only partly explain your knowledge. How is it that you know about Factions?” Be aware, he is not Siena. You have learned nothing.
“I met another team earlier on my road to Dava. They had different belts, so they don’t belong to the same Faction,” I said with a sudden inspiration.
“This means that you know about Factions having different belts.” He was really good at setting traps ... and I at falling into them.
“This piece of information is known in my city.” That moment the buzz came: chrono-particles. “Spread out!” I screamed, and moved away. “They are the good ones,” I shouted a second later. “Yesss!” The black spheres materialized for some seconds then disappeared.
“Can you feel them?” Can you feel them too, I mimicked him. What can I say? “Why are they good?” We returned to the game we had been playing from the beginning.
“They saved us from another trap some months ago.” Give him something gray, half truth, half lie, some plausible parts good enough to hide things too dangerous to disclose.
“These are terrible weapons.” What do you really know about them Armin? You are nothing but a savage! Stone Age! But you felt their presence too. How should I continue the game? You need a strategy. Where to find it? “Terrible weapons are not used to kill flies.”
“I ... I don’t know what to tell you.” My tongue was restless over my suddenly dried lips. “I have no knowledge about ... about how these weapons function.” This, in the end, was almost true.
“Why are they hunting you with this weapon?” He pushed further. I have to tell him something, I force my mind to think. Let’s start with bits about the SAT-mines.
“We were once surrounded by these powerful weapons; I don’t know what they were looking for. Other people were in that place ... many.” I abruptly stopped, realizing that the bad white mines had not appeared, only the good ones. Why did the good guys came? What is happening here? “I cannot tell you why they attacked us, I don’t know. No one knows for sure ... what they are and where they are coming from.” He was still listening and did not interrupt me, yet I could not give more. What is so important? An ambush set in this place for me and Armin? A failed one? What changed those dark plans?
“Bad news,” he suddenly whispered. “Borg is coming.”
“How do you know this? I don’t feel anyone coming now, and anyway I can’t distinguish different people’s mental signatures.” Delena asked him.
“I am much more sensitive to mental signatures than you.”
“You are very different from all of us,” I turned the game against him.
“Much as you are.”
“I can’t read mental signatures at all, you have an above the average skill and ...”
“Yes, some Munti are coming,” Delena confirmed, ending the quarrel, before my poor senses heard the faraway hooves hitting the ground.
“Something good coming from a Baragan; I am glad you have captured the enemy I am searching for.” Borg dismounted and positioned himself in front of me, not because he really wanted something from me, but because, inadvertently, I was between the hunter and his prey. It was a polite way of saying: things will be better if you move, I have some unfinished business and you are impeding me.
“He is not an enemy, neither for us nor for you. He is wounded and in my custody.”
“Your custody means nothing in our lands; it is not up to you to decide in these matters. Don’t forget that you are only tolerated until we have a satisfactory explanation for your covert attacks on our village.”
“No more covert than the attack on the Erin village last night.”
“None of your business either.” But that was a mistake on his part, as Delena stepped into view.
“Were you involved in the night attack against the Erins?”
“This is not something to discuss here.”
“Munti were involved in that attack,” Armin stated calmly, but Borg ignored his words completely and made a step toward me, indicating that I should move. “You are challenging me,” he snorted.
“Yes, you could say that. If you want a fight don’t pick on a wounded unarmed man,” I answered without thinking.
“Your choice. I have never lost a fight.” His riders started to laugh.
“No two fights are the same.” I remembered Altamira. Pray that she is not right or you will lose now. “You are bragging about past fights. Is that from fear?” His face darkened, but he said nothing and his sword glided smoothly out of its scabbard. You don’t fear, you are too sure, yet you know I won against Duras. This is your weak point, Duras was also too sure, he lost. You are untrained and easy prey. Stop bragging! You become him.
“We shall see.” His voice was flat. We stood for a moment, eyeing each other with unconcealed animosity.
The small mound of flat stone with no grass on top, a few inches higher than the field, was ideal for the plan I had in mind, to use his native qualities against him. My eyes were fixed on Borg as he started his almost hypnotic dance around me. I raised myself onto my toes to gain a little more height, eyes at the same level as his. Duras had told me that the attack he had used when fighting me at the volcano camp was, in fact, Borg's invention. I had barely escaped then, and Borg was faster, and stronger: Nogi heritage from his father. No one was able to avoid his attack, coming like a lightning bolt in the middle of the jump, the strength of his arms doubled by the body pushing down at full speed. This is the climax, individual will and training against will and training; thoughts floated freely inside my mind. Everything else is a mere chess game. Something I can never really control, only channel. From here, possibilities will open; if I escape alive – now, then later the Munti will acknowledge the result of the fight. That’s why the spheres appeared... Did you really want to attack Armin or is it me who you want? Did Travelers set you against me? Was I stupid again? Stop this!
I half closed my eyes. A voice from a past I did not know whispered in my mind: ‘You are one with your sword; you have to go into the state of No-mind.’ The master I had never really had was inside me, together with the fighting knowledge itself. A subtle conditioning helping warriors focus on their most difficult fights: a calm and confident voice, in a world of fear and uneasiness. I stopped following Borg’s movements and fixed on his eyes, remembering that they always dilated briefly before the jump. ‘Use the first moments for study,’ the voice continued. ‘Take your time and be in no doubt. Eye has to meet eye, body against body, sword against sword. They have to work together outside your conscious mind, outside thinking. Fights are never meant to be thought, they must be lived.’ His eyes were now my whole world, and I was answering his staccato movements with fluid motions almost entirely coordinated by my inner self and body.
Then the flash came. I stepped forward instantly, putting my right foot on the grass, flexing it – the waiting samurai position – lowering my body as much as I could without losing stability. In the same fraction of a second his body was close to the highest point of his jump with the sword falling on me. He realized the jump was higher than my actual position and shifted the sword’s trajectory, while his b
ody was still rising, losing the full power of his weight. My sword was also raised at a steep angle, with the hilt over my head and the point lateral, at the height of my shoulders. Steel crashed into steel, with a long shrill of friction as the two blades glided one against another. The strike was intended to push down my guard with enough force to crash the sword into the skull – if the blade had been horizontal and the blow had carried his full power. But the strike carried only half the force and his sword started to slide on the steep angle of mine, until it went out over the point, close to my shoulder. I felt a short scrape across the top of my skull but my hands resisted the pressure, and I sprang up once the blades separated, my blade meeting his body in full fall. He fell over me with his knee hitting my jaw, in despair. Too late, I whispered before falling. My jawbone was broken, he was dead.
I was lucky. With only half of my training Borg would have defeated me with his eyes closed. His native warrior skills, speed and force were far better than mine. The deep samurai conditioning I had received saved me, and for the first time I did not curse Houston for the harsh training she had forced me to endure.
Armin pushed away Borg’s body, which was pinning me to the ground, and made me stand, but I did not try to move. I was tired. Tired of continuous fighting, tired of these domino puzzles I had to fix, in a game which was not a game. Fear grows once the thrill of the fight is over, devours your flesh from inside, dominates you. The winner can afford to fear, the fighter must not. I was still an inhabitant of Earth's twenty-first century with all the baggage belonging to it, happy to see wars and blood only on TV. All the conditioning in the world could not make me immune to this kind of situation while leaving me the same. Houston had decided not to alter the fabric of my basic sentiments or experiences, she wanted me to react to everything as me, not as a zombie of I do not know which long-dead warrior, apart from the fighting technique itself. I had to learn in the process, and I had to act despite all the disgust and fear for blood and death I had in me. The fear would give motivation to my self-preservation and disgust would lead to the desire to solve the conundrum of violence and extermination engulfing this civilization, doomed to be wiped from the planet. Then there was something related to Borg’s friends I could not remember directly, as blackness came. The spheres ... it was something about the spheres ... I have to remember.
The pain from my jaw woke me. I saw Armin close to me, holding my jaw with his left hand while the right was closing on my neck.
“It will hurt,” he said softly. Thank you, until now it has been a real pleasure. He slowly moved his hands in order to hold the upper and lower parts together. And he was right. There was a nightmare of pain. I do not know if I fainted again, probably yes. I remember a black fog disappearing from my eyes and a strange, warm sensation infiltrating my face. Armin’s hands were in the same position, I do not know for how long, but the pain was almost gone.
“Don’t move,” he said gently, continuing to keep my head between his hands. I was feeling the steady flow of warmth coming from his hands, and a continuous tingling sensation in the bone. “You should not eat for the next two or three days; speak less and softly.”
“What was that?” I mumbled – softly.
“Our way of healing.”
Delena later told me the rest of the story. Borg's companions were stunned to see their invincible chief fall. For a moment, they thought it had been a draw with two slain warriors. Then Armin had lifted me and put the sword back in my hand. Their shock turned into a desire for revenge, but they were split between their desire and fear. Even wounded, I commanded a lot of respect. The turn of the tide was determined by Delena joining me, her sword up, and she was the princess of the Munti – fear and social conditioning fighting black hats’ conditioning tormented them. Armin, meanwhile, had Borg’s sword in his right hand, still keeping me from falling with the other. Their will broke; they could do nothing but leave, carrying Borg’s body. Later, when my head cleared, I understood why Armin lifted me up, despite his strange medical knowledge. It was a matter of life and death; he anticipated a possible attack by Borg's friends, despite Delena’s authority.
On the way back, I finally realized the new situation: the Second Marshal of the Baragan Kingdom had killed the First Marshal of the Muntis and this would bring as much good as bad.
A troop of guards was waiting for us, and took me to the rooms reserved for foreign envoys coming into town, instead of the royal area of the castle as before. I was kept there for days, the official reason being my slow recovery from the fight; not even Delena or Duras were allowed to see me, only the housekeepers bringing me food.
The room was large; yet walking thousands of steps, for many days, made it feel small. Fortunately, the time was more than enough to work through everything in my mind. Borg was not alone in his action. He must have political cover from at least part of the council. Had. Had, has, doesn’t matter. Why would someone else from the council have endorsed this course of events? Black hats? I have to ask Houston. When you are allowed to leave this bloody room. Not when, if. Not if you leave, but if you leave alive. Shut up! Attacking Erins was against Munti interests. They need allies to fight the Nogi invasion. One Faction wants a Baragan-Munti war, the other a Munti-Erin war. My Faction? Why? They work together now. What does it really mean, for them, working together? What about me? Where do I fit in their game?
*
“An unusual circumstance again,” Armin entered the room escorted by two Munti guards.
“The difference is ... I was free before and now I am not.”
“Outside interference doesn’t count, what I mean is that in our own direct experience, we were enemies by mistake, then you became my savior, for which I still have to thank you, and now we are diplomats trying to find a solution to a common problem.” There was a moment of silence as Armin took a chair and looked around with a glimmer in his eyes; death was an unpleasant subject, but I sensed more in his silence. We had to cover my ‘strangeness’ before everything else. Erins are watchful people, and they do not like things out of the ordinary, for good reasons, considering their short but incredible history.
“I see only one of us deep in trouble now, and that’s me.” Why are you here? No queen, no Delena, no Duras. You are an outsider, like me. What’s the play? I had made many strategies for this debate, but none of them looked useful now that things had started. Armin was not in my plans.
“Your problem is only a small part of a much wider chain of events. You puzzle me with your apparent inconsistency, or duality, however you prefer to describe it. One moment you are thinking in terms of the general good, the next you are very selfish. If this is a strategy, I don’t see the benefit coming from it.”
“One thing at a time. If there is a necessity for me to participate in more general events, first I need to be out of this luxurious cage.”
“Now we can start,” he said after the Munti guards had left the room. “Who are you?”
“This world is large and I don’t have the answer you are looking for. I am not Nogi, and if you have not experienced something similar in your past, I cannot help you.”
“Actually, I have.” A thin smile lit on his face. “Not directly, but I have.” You know something. Not directly, another Erin told you... Stupid! One of them met Arun or Scorylo.
“Do you know Arun?”
“Arun?” His reaction made me smile. “He is the vice-president of your Assembly, of course I know him.”
“He is different too.”
“He is quite large for a Baragan, even for a Munti...” I liked his indecision; it left me more room for maneuvering. “We are discussing mind patterns, not bodies.” What do you mean? He has the same mind pattern as me. “His mind is Baragan. Your pattern comes from a long time ago.” What the hell? Did Houston switch his mind? Idiot! He emigrated; he has to look like them. Next time ask him if he can read mind patterns. What now? A long time ago ... this means something. Old stories? How can you describe
mind patterns in words? They are different... He sensed my turmoil. “I will take the first step. We are memories of many things, things from our past, things from other people’s pasts, way before we came to life on this world, and things whose destiny was not fulfilled and will never be, alternate paths of events lost forever in the waves of time. They are in my mind as they are in the minds of other Erins.” You speak like a Gate...
“Are you a collective species?”
“What do you mean by collective species?” Keep your mouth shut, think at their level... “There is a unique tree in the south with countless trunks, it is one and many at the same time,” I avoided the trap with a sudden intuition. “Are you of the same kind?”
“I have no memory of that, but I will gladly take the information.”
“Do you want to read my mind?”
“We do not read other people’s minds, not that we can’t but we won’t,” he frowned; my words irritated him, there was much bitterness in his tone; then his eyes relaxed. Good conditioning. Should I apologize? No, if he asks uncomfortable questions he must swallow the bitter drink too.
“You are able to do it, and I have to believe you that it is not used, for purely altruistic reasons,” I pressed further, trying to assert some control over the discussion.
“You misunderstood me. We can develop ourselves so as to have that capacity, but we have chosen not to.” You can develop... Are you able to self-control your genetics? With what? Stone axes? “We don’t like to be the toys of other entities; we don’t play the same game with people who have lesser abilities.”
“Then you consider yourselves superior to the rest of us.”
“This is something we did not ask for; it was imposed on us without our agreement. Don’t take this as a blessing for it is not.” You are defensive. He is open. What does open mean? Others must know about their abilities. I sensed him acting as if being caught off guard and suddenly realizing this and said nothing. Let him speak... “We kept just enough so as not to be the Travelers' toys again, and to pre-empt others who tried to do the same.”
Io Deceneus: Journal of a Time Traveler (The Living Universe) Page 32
