Being of the Field

by Traci Harding

  The blood drained from her face as her brain struggled to digest the phenomenon. It was too much to ask—an intelligent being that did not have solidity!

  ‘Are you distressed?’ she asked, as the FFRD reading seemed to support this conclusion.

  Again the needle swung briefly into the positive.

  ‘Are you in danger or pain?’

  Twice the needle bounced into the positive.

  ‘Is there something I can do to assist?’ Taren was concerned. She didn’t want to cause another being pain.

  Positive.

  ‘Let you go?’ Taren guessed, and was surprised when the needle wavered at the negative end of the readout.

  Taren closed her eyes to focus her telepathic knowhow on the sample. Telepathy was not one of Taren’s strengths; she was sensitive to energy fields, body movements, emotional states and suchlike, but she was not a true telepath. ‘I need Kassa,’ she decided when she kept sensing the same desperation and bewilderment that she felt every time the vision of the sample being stolen came to mind.

  If someone had stolen a sample, they had breached quarantine and Taren needed to reclaim the misplaced substance, as exposure to the gas could be disastrous!

  Outside the mess room door Taren spied Kassa chatting with Leal. Knowing that the co-pilot was rather sweet on the doctor, Taren was loath to interrupt, but couldn’t count on their conversation stopping any time soon.

  ‘A thousand apologies,’ Taren said to Leal and then looked at Kassa, ‘but I urgently need your assistance, Doc.’

  ‘What is it?’ Kassa was intrigued by the turbulent energy of Taren’s inner panic, which was not apparent enough to the eye for Leal to be concerned by it.

  ‘I’ll catch you later.’ The man’s disappointment at losing Kassa’s undivided attention was reflected in the weak smile on his face when he waved and departed into the mess. Kassa must have been aware of how Leal felt. Why was she torturing the poor guy by pretending not to notice?

  ‘I’m not sure it would work,’ Kassa whispered as she kept pace beside Taren.

  Shocked by just how telepathic Kassa was, Taren paled. ‘But you’re interested,’ Taren ventured, picking up on the whimsical tone in the woman’s voice.

  ‘He is a little young for me, and we are very different people.’ Kassa shrugged noncommittally. ‘How about you tell me what’s so urgent?’

  ‘Wait until we get to the lab,’ Taren replied.

  As soon as they were locked inside, Taren spilled her guts about everything, including her vision regarding Amie, which she was sure Kassa would pick up on before long anyway. She was careful not to even think about anything that occurred before landing on this ship, but told of the dialogue that had passed between herself and the anomaly sample in quarantine via the FFRD. ‘And as I can only ask it yes-or-no questions, I need you to see if you can telepathically perceive what this entity’s problem is? It might even be able to identify the thief.’

  Kassa, although stunned and rather concerned by Taren’s claims, was eager to help if she could. ‘You ask the questions and I’ll tell you if I perceive any answers.’

  ‘Do you mind if I tape this?’ Taren suspected this might be a sticking point.

  Kassa considered the request a moment. ‘On the provision that you consult me before you make anyone else privy to it. I can’t hide forever and I’m not sure I want to any more, but it’s a big coming out for me, so I want to be consulted should it come to that.’

  ‘I understand completely.’ Taren gave a nod in agreement. They both turned as one to confront the anomaly in the lab and Taren instructed the computer to record.

  ‘What can we do to assist you?’ The FFRD needle again wavered about in the negative range, but the fluctuation wasn’t detected by the computer systems monitoring the sample.

  ‘Ah…’ Kassa gave a slight moan of pain, or perhaps frustration.

  ‘Something?’ Taren queried.

  Kassa screwed up her face. ‘Distorted sound,’ she informed. ‘It’s like it’s trying to tune into my frequency.’

  ‘Perhaps it is.’ Taren gave the theory some thought before doublechecking that Kassa was still keen to do this. ‘Does it hurt?’

  ‘I’m good,’ she hissed, motioning Taren to silence, as she was perceiving faint words in a voice not specifically male or female, but monotone and distorted. ‘Return the missing part. Return all parts to the whole.’ She repeated the words she could now hear. The unearthly tone of the being’s voice echoing in her mind caused Kassa to shudder as she continued: ‘A part is not infinite in energy, as it might at first seem. The part draws from the whole and the whole is weakened. It is damaging to us to be sucked of energy in this manner.’

  Taren had stopped breathing during the discourse and drew breath to query. ‘What manner? I have only measured the electric charge of this part, which, as you say, seems infinite. But I have not attempted to extract a charge,’ Taren explained to the sample and its channel.

  ‘The missing part was the energy extraction point,’ Kassa conveyed.

  ‘Was?’ Taren queried.

  ‘Now it travels,’ Kassa relayed, ‘to the next star system to be further abused. This will not be tolerated by the whole. We will do whatever we must to protect ourself from attack. Return the parts to the whole, before the whole departs.’

  ‘Departs?’ Taren was anxious. ‘Where are you going? When do you leave?’

  ‘Fourteen more times around the planet of water and our job here will be done. Home is the next project to which we are drawn across space and time to tend.’

  ‘Wow!’ Taren was pleased to be taping this. The way the being referred to itself in the plural and the singular was very interesting, the implication being that the separated parts of this substance were still in contact with each other and with the whole. And the anomaly’s use of the word ‘tend’ seemed to support her theory that this entity had been drawn to this planet to implant the potential for the genesis of life here—much like the role attributed to devas in the ancient legends of her home planet of Maladaan. Perhaps a deva was exactly what this was? Still, Taren had a big problem. ‘If you depart in two weeks, there’s no way we’ll be able to return the missing part to you in time. Our space travel is not fast enough.’

  ‘Release the parts from containment. That is all that is required,’ Kassa stated, snapping out of her trance-like daze. ‘It has withdrawn,’ she informed Taren, feeling a little giddy.

  Taren looked at the FFRD to find the needle still at zero point. The colourful electrical activity inside the sample in the containment lab had ebbed to some degree.

  How did I get in so much trouble in so little time? Taren quashed her defeatist attitude to determine her next course of investigation. ‘Who is in charge of pod launches here on AMIE?’

  ‘That would be Bonar Colbers,’ answered Kassa.

  ‘Are you okay? Can I get you anything?’ Taren inquired as she looked towards the door.

  ‘I’ll come with you.’ Kassa stood, but as she was clearly still woozy Taren declined.

  ‘I’ll be back soon.’ Taren quickly moved off.

  ‘Try the mess room,’ Kassa called after her.

  Bonar was punching buttons on the menu of the hot breakfast dispenser when Taren caught up with him to inquire whether any pods had departed the ship during his last shift.

  ‘No, nothing,’ he informed.

  ‘You’re sure?’

  Bonar grinned, his cheeks all rosy. ‘No one gets in or out of here without my knowledge, and yesterday was dead quiet on that front.’

  ‘Oh.’ Taren didn’t know what to think. How could the sample possibly be in transit to the next star system if it hadn’t gone by pod? ‘No deep-space cruisers docked with AMIE yesterday?’

  Bonar shook his head. ‘I told you…nothing.’

  Was the sample lying? Had Kassa misunderstood the message or messed up the translation? The message had seemed extremely clear.

  ‘There you are, fi
nally.’

  Taren was startled by Zeven’s rather loud entrance into the mess room.

  ‘What do you mean, finally?’ Taren protested. ‘I was up early.’

  ‘On your second day of sleep,’ Zeven informed. ‘You slept right through your shift last night.’ He had to laugh at the stunned look on Taren’s face.

  ‘Tell me you’re joking,’ she requested before panicking too badly.

  ‘I’m deadly serious. But don’t worry, everyone tends to oversleep at first.’ Zeven did his best to allay her horror.

  ‘I’ve really been asleep for two days?’ Taren gripped Zeven’s shirt, desperate for the truth.

  ‘It’s no sweat—’

  ‘Oh, my cosmic forefathers.’ Taren ran back to Bonar, who was now seated at a table with the rest of his crew. ‘Did a pod leave for Maladaan any time during your last two shifts?’

  Bonar seemed a mite bored with her obsession, but as he cast his mind back he recalled, ‘Yep, the shift before last. Eleazar Kestler left for Maladaan. He’s finished his sabbatical and was headed home with his research results.’

  ‘Kestler?’ Taren knew that name. ‘The physicist?’ Her heart jumped into her throat. She’d attended some of his lectures at the University of Esponisa many years back. His passion was electrodynamics. The man was a legend and she didn’t want to be the one to accuse him of stealing a quarantined sample. ‘No other craft?’

  ‘Nope,’ said Bonar, biting into his sandwich to avoid having to pursue this conversation any further.

  ‘We did have that pod misfire when Kestler’s launched,’ mentioned the youngest technician at the table, whose name was Raggus, which kind of suited him as he looked like a bag of rags. All his clothes were too big and his blond hair hung past his shoulders in long knotted clumps.

  ‘Really?’ Taren looked back to Bonar. ‘Did you chase the pod up?’

  Bonar shook his head as he slowly chewed up his mouthful.

  ‘It’ll show up on Maladaan in a couple of weeks,’ Raggus added.

  ‘Does that happen often, pods misfiring?’ Taren now directed her questions at Raggus, as he was more eager to oblige her with responses.

  ‘First time for us.’ He looked to his companions, who nodded confirmation, and then, noting Bonar’s dark expression, he shut up and went back to his food.

  ‘Thanks, guys.’ Taren wandered back to the doorway in a daze.

  ‘What’s the matter?’ Zeven headed her off. ‘Why are you so interested in departures?’

  ‘Where is Lucian?’ Taren needed to see him yesterday.

  ‘I’m here.’ He walked in with Kassa in tow. ‘You need to speak with me, I believe.’ He motioned to Kassa, who’d passed on the message.

  ‘I haven’t told him anything,’ she said, letting Taren know Kassa had left that pleasure to her.

  ‘My office.’ Lucian led off, and Kassa served Taren a smile of reassurance as they both fell in behind him.

  Zeven wanted to follow them and find out what had everyone so excited, but he’d not been invited so he decided to grab a sandwich and see what he could discover about the missing pod.

  CHAPTER 5

  BEARER OF BAD NEWS

  ‘Okay, Taren, you have my undivided attention.’ Lucian reclined comfortably in his desk chair, appearing eager to be enlightened. Kassa had taken a seat on the lounge, but Taren was too full of information and theories to sit.

  ‘When was the last time you saw your wife?’ Taren began and Kassa looked at her, stunned that Taren would choose to begin her explanation this way.

  ‘Amie’s been analysing data from the recent dive on Oceane for the past few days.’ Lucian was frowning. ‘So, I guess the pick-up of E module was the last time I saw her…why?’

  ‘Would you page Amie and ask her to come to your office, please?’ This was more of an instruction than a request. Taren had to determine if that part of the vision was true or false and if it had any bearing on anything else that had transpired.

  Lucian detached his communicator, punched in Amie’s number and at the tone left a message, all the while never taking his eyes from Taren.

  ‘Okay!’ Taren slapped her hands together and drew a deep breath in preparation for her confession. She fixed her eyes on Lucian and let him have it. ‘How well do you trust Swithin?’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Lucian smiled but he was very disturbed by this question. ‘He’s my brother. What are you driving at?’

  ‘Yes, what indeed?’ Kassa echoed, concerned, and as the telepath focused on the other woman she perceived the memory of Swithin that was playing on Taren’s mind.

  ‘Lucian doesn’t know about the problem. He’d have a fit if he knew any of his precious research might be going astray, or that one of his team out there might not be faithful to his project and his people. None of the crew are aware of the spy, nor are they to become aware that you are seeking one.’

  ‘I believe I might be a double agent.’ Taren further shocked her company. ‘I believe I allowed a spy to steal a sample of our quarantined substance, because I was stupid enough to permit your brother and an old acquaintance from my MSS days to hypnotise me before I embarked for my stay on AMIE.’

  Lucian was dumbfounded. He didn’t know whether to start fuming or laughing. He looked across at Kassa, who appeared equally confused. ‘There’s more to this than I knew about,’ she told him, ‘but I believe Taren might be telling the truth about Swithin.’

  ‘What?’ Lucian was surprised by this turn of events.

  ‘And I know there’s more to that sample in the lab than meets the eye…best hear her out,’ Kassa encouraged.

  ‘All right.’ Lucian pressed his fingertips into his forehead in an attempt to maintain his composure. ‘How about you start at the beginning?’

  Once brought up to date, Lucian only had one question. ‘What has all this to do with my wife? And what is keeping her?’ Lucian buzzed for Rory and sent her on a mission to find Amie.

  ‘Hopefully, nothing.’ Taren was starting to get a bit concerned at Amie’s failure to arrive or communicate with Lucian and, clearly, so was Kassa.

  Taren had not mentioned anything about Kassa’s channelling session, as promised. She had only revealed enough to get Lucian interested in investigating the matter further.

  The chime on Lucian’s office door alerted them to company.

  ‘At last.’ Lucian pressed the intercom key on his desk. ‘Enter.’

  It was Zeven Gudrun at the door and on sighting him, Taren’s and Kassa’s moment of relief was snatched away.

  ‘Sorry to interrupt.’ Zeven noted that they all seemed disappointed to see him.

  ‘State your business, Zeven,’ Lucian said shortly, as his mind was awhirl with other matters. ‘We have a bit of a situation unfolding.’

  ‘I understand that you do.’ Zeven’s eyes turned to Taren. ‘I decided to run a trace on that missing pod for you.’

  Despite the horrible day she was having, Taren felt warmed that the pilot cared enough to take the initiative in this matter.

  ‘And, guess what?’ Zeven handed her a printout. ‘It’s not headed back to Maladaan at all. It dropped like a stone when it misfired and fell to Oceane’s surface…smack bang in the middle of the area covered by our anomaly.’

  Taren was mortified by the news and cast a horrified gaze towards Kassa. They both realised that the misfired pod could not contain the missing sample because the stolen substance was on its way to the next star system. Therefore, Taren could only assume that the missing sample was on the same pod as Eleazar Kestler. Still, she could not tell Lucian of her suspicions without giving away Kassa’s secret. ‘Can we retrieve the pod?’

  ‘We’d bloody well better,’ Lucian objected. ‘Our insurance is bad enough without that kind of a claim. What the hell was Bonar thinking, not chasing it up sooner?’

  A very good point, thought Taren.

  ‘I plan to give Bonar an earful on the matter,’ Zeven assured Lucian. ‘I tried t
o extract the pod from Oceane’s surface with the magnetic retrieval system but the electromagnetic disturbance inside the anomaly must be jamming it. I thought I could take a salvage vessel down to the surface and see if I can locate it that way.’

  ‘And risk losing another expensive craft and my chief pilot? I don’t think so.’ Lucian was most annoyed, although Taren knew it was Amie’s failure to turn up that was worrying him more than the thought of financial stress. ‘We’ll just have to cop the loss of the pod.’

  ‘Maybe not,’ Taren proffered, and Kassa stood, knowing what the young woman was thinking. If their sample was still in contact with the whole, then perhaps it could help them to get the pod out.

  ‘Let us try something,’ Taren begged Lucian, who was not in the mood for playing games.

  ‘Like?’ he queried impatiently.

  ‘Why, an experiment, of course.’ Kassa intervened to take some of the heat off her younger colleague. ‘Have a little faith, Lucian.’ She ushered Taren out the door ahead of her. ‘We’ll report back presently.’

  ‘Why didn’t you tell me about Swithin’s suspected involvement in this theft sooner?’ Kassa asked on the way to quarantine.

  ‘I’m winging this, Kassa,’ Taren confessed, sorry that she had the need to keep secrets. ‘I love this project and having admired the work you do here for so long, damned if I will be the one to bring the project into ruin or disrepute. I just want to do whatever is best for AMIE.’

  ‘I know you do,’ Kassa assured her. ‘I know the inner thoughts of all and you are a good soul, Taren Lennox.’

  Taren’s curiosity was sparked by the comment. ‘What do you feel about Bonar Colbers, Kassa?’

  ‘You don’t think he’s the spy you’re looking for?’ Kassa was half stunned, half amused by the suggestion.

  ‘Only he has access to all the equipment and technology needed to sneak a sample out of quarantine unnoticed.’

  Kassa shrugged; this was true but he had no motive. ‘Bonar might be a little obnoxious and simple minded at times, certainly, but he’s a simple man. He loves his work and the people he works with. I feel very sure he is loyal to AMIE.’