by Renee Duke
Vorlans usually come across as being vague and dreamy. Some people even think they’re non-verbal, and to some extent they are. Until you get to know them. Once you do, once they establish a rapport with you, it’s just like having a conversation with anyone, only with some of it going on in your head. They can’t read minds, or anything like that — and wouldn’t if they could — but can reach out to request a mind conversation. I thought they had to be in very close proximity for it to work, but apparently not. If they really concentrate, they can talk to people streets away. Jip had only had one visit with Challa and Kadi since her return to Cholar but the rapport she’d built with Challa some months earlier was still in effect.
“So, you found her? Talked to her?” I asked eagerly.
“No. Merely sensed her. I think she may be asleep.”
“But you know what building she’s in?”
“Yes. I did not want to leave Arlyne alone in the street while I went into it through another dimension but will do so now she is back with you.” She turned to Simon. “Did you happen to bring the wildlife observer with you?”
“Right here.” He pulled it out of his belt and handed it to her.
“Then I will take it with me, return to the initial plane long enough to set it in some unobtrusive place, and come back here so we can watch what is going on with the children and come up with a plan for getting them away from their captors.”
“Jip, no,” I protested. “Their captors might capture you if you’re on the initial plane.”
“I will not be on it long and intend to wait until their attention is diverted in some way.”
She took the observer and disappeared.
A few minutes later, she was back.
I gave a sigh of relief. “I take it their attention was diverted?”
“Challa appears to have woken up in a bad mood and was having a tantrum.”
We settled down on some park benches and brought the observer’s observation feed up on our computers. The screens showed a dingy room with a table, three chairs, and three beds. One of the Quorlians, Mux, was in a chair rocking Kadi back and forth in two of his arms while holding off a kicking Challa with one of the others.
She wasn’t screaming — though I imagine she had been — now preferring to apply herself to inflicting as much damage on Mux as a small Cholarian could inflict on a big Quorlian. Which wasn’t much, but Mux still didn’t care for it. He tried to ignore her and concentrate on Kadi.
“Good baby,” he crooned. “Good baby.” He looked across to his brother, who was shuffling around the room. “I like baby. He nice. That one not. She all the time yell and kick me. We keep him. Sell her.”
I don’t think I was ever jealous of Arlyne, or her of Simon. We were all company for each other. But Challa was still working on sharing the limelight with Kadi. Taking exception to this blatant declaration of favouritism, she kicked Mux again, even more forcefully.
“See?” Mux said plaintively.
“We sell both,” said Zud. “Get rich.”
“When we get rich?”
“When father pay. Or other man pay. He say he give most money. Has friends to help.”
“I’ll just bet he does,” Kirsty muttered. “AUP friends. And that’s not to the good. AUP’s substantial coffers could provide Drazok with enough money to outbid Taz.”
“Why he not pay us yet?” Mux inquired.
“He not know where we are. I not trust him, so I not tell. Get money first, then tell.”
“Och, so he dinna trust Drazok, eh? Can’t be as dense as Chief Rupin thought, then.”
I gave a short laugh. “Oh, they’re smart enough about some things. They knew to go hide on the cloaked ship. And leave orbit before it uncloaked.”
“How we get money first?” Mux asked.
“Not sure. Have to think about that.”
They talked about pay off options for quite a while, never really getting anywhere.
Bored, Challa stopped kicking Mux and said, “I’m hungry.”
“Okay,” said Zud. “I feed.”
He reached into a hold-all with one of his hands and pulled out what looked like a package of mixed fruit. He then opened it and placed the fruit in a bowl before giving it to Challa, who had clambered up on a chair and was sitting at the table in readiness.
“I feed baby,” said Mux.
He rummaged through the hold-all and brought out a bottle filled with milk, of which there appeared to be several, but Kadi pushed it away and started to cry.
“Why cry?” said Mux, puzzled. “Is good milk. Nice milk. Babies like milk.”
“Not just milk,” Challa said scornfully. “You always give him milk. He’s not a really little baby. He eats other things too.”
“What things?”
“Things like this.” She pointed to her bowl. “But you have to squish it up first and give it to him with a spoon.”
“Oh. Okay. I do that.”
“They seem to be looking after them,” said Arlyne. “Or at least trying to. But how can we get them away from them? Wait until they’re asleep and have Jip sneak them out through another dimension?”
“I cannot do that,” said Jip. “Dimension-travel requires training and a suitable metabolism. Challa and Kadi have neither.”
“How, then?” Arlyne wanted to know. “They’re too big for us, even all of us together, to overpower.”
“Stun guns are a great equalizer,” said Simon. “Jip can go in through that other dimension again, pop out, and blast them.”
“What is it with you and blasting things?” I asked, glad I’d taken the stun guns away from him and even gladder he hadn’t been able to get his hands on any liquidators.
“It’s a good idea,” Simon insisted.
Actually, it was, so we decided to go with it. Not the popping out of another dimension and blasting them bit, just the Jip going back in through another dimension bit.
The room Mux and Zud were in was on the ground floor. We thought if we waited until they were asleep, Jip would be able to slip back onto the initial plane and pass the kids out to us, with me keeping my stun gun out in case one or both of the Eth Thulos brothers woke up.
Late that night, we put our rescue plan into effect. The observer showed Mux and Zud snoring in two of the beds and Challa and Kadi asleep in the other, with Challa clutching her musical baton, just as she must have been when she was abducted. I was pleased to note two of the chairs had been placed against the sides so neither child could roll out.
As soon as the rest of us had stationed ourselves under the window, Jip disappeared into a dimension corridor, reappearing onscreen moments later.
According to Jagri, Challa and Kadi had not woken up when Mux and Zud took them. I was keeping my fingers crossed they wouldn’t on this occasion either, but Challa did. Fortunately, she recognized Jip and merely nodded when Jip put a finger to her lips to warn her to keep quiet. Jip then passed her out to Arlyne and went back for Kadi.
She was halfway across the room with him when he woke up too and was not as willing to go along with this interruption of his slumber as his sister. He didn’t full out cry, but he did make little protest noises, and that was all it took to alert Mux to his distress.
Mux instantly stopped snoring and went from sound asleep to fully awake in about a second. He sat up, blinking, and glared at Jip.
“Who you? And why you have my baby?”
Chapter Thirteen
“I am his guardian angel,” Jip proclaimed.
I hadn’t known Vorlan culture embraced the concept of guardian angels but was thankful it did because, even if Quorlian culture didn’t, I thought Jip might be able to sell this one on the idea.
Mux heaved himself off the bed and lumbered towards her while his brother, by great good luck, snored on. At the sight of his large, hairy caretaker, Kadi stopped whimpering, fondness apparently being mutual.
“What that mean?”
“It means I look after him. I mak
e sure he is safe and happy.”
“I make sure he safe and happy.”
“Yes. I know. You have been doing a splendid job. But it is time he went back to his parents.”
“Why it time he go back to parents?”
“Children belong with their parents. Do you have parents?”
“Yes. Stay with parents when home. Parents like having Mux and Zud at home.”
“Just as Challa and Kadi’s parents like having them home. They have been gone a long time. They miss them very much.”
All this was more than Jip usually came up with during a conversation with someone new. She told me later it had taken a fair bit of effort, but she’d been able to draw on fear and desperation for motivation.
“Parents like baby?”
“Yes. They love their children. They want them back.”
“Even want other one?” He looked around. “Where other one?”
“Outside, with some other guardian angels. And they want them both back. Please let me take them, Mux.”
“You know name?”
“I know lots of things. Guardian angels do.”
“You know Zud want money for children?”
“Yes. And I know the man Zud said he did not trust might hurt them. He might hurt the baby.”
Mux scowled. “Hurt my baby?”
“Yes. He is a bad man.”
“Parents not hurt my baby?”
“No. They are good people. They will look after the baby.”
“Then they must have baby. I tell Zud.”
“He might not agree. If the bad man has more money, Zud will want to give the children to him.”
Mux thought about this. A slow process. Then his scrunchy face brightened, the perfect solution having come to him. “If you take baby, Zud cannot give to bad man.”
Jip beamed. “That is correct.”
Mux glanced over at his brother. “Zud still want money. Will be mad if he not get some money.”
I immediately reached into my belt and extracted every bit of cash I was carrying. The others hastened to do the same and handed it to me.
“Here,” I said, thrusting it through the window.
Jip took it and passed it to Mux, who smiled.
“Good. Zud be happy.”
I doubted that but wasn’t about to argue.
Neither was Jip. “I am going to give the baby to another guardian angel now, Mux.”
“Wait.”
Turning, Mux stretched out one of his longer arms and picked up the hold-all with the food. Passing it to Jip, he said, “Now go,” and patted Kadi’s head with the hand on one of his shorter arms. “Good-bye, baby.” He looked out at Challa, whom Arlyne was still holding. “Good-bye, other one.”
Challa wrinkled her nose at him, which was the equivalent of an Earth child sticking out her tongue but must have a different meaning on Quorl because Mux looked quite pleased.
I took Kadi from Jip, who then waved us away from the window.
“Take them down the street, around the corner.”
Though puzzled by this, I nodded to the others and we did as she asked.
We used Kirsty’s computer to watch Jip retrieve the observer, and as the screen distorted heard her say, “I must return to the realm of guardian angels now, Mux. Farewell.”
A few moments later, she was down the street with us.
“I thought disappearing in front of Mux might add authenticity to the tale he will tell Zud,” she explained.
Simon nodded approvingly. “Good thinking.”
“Aye, it was,” said Kirsty. “But I suggest we get moving before he gets over the awe of it and wakes his brother. I’m not saying Zud’s much smarter than Mux, but even a tad’s enough for him to know if the bairns are gone, his chances of getting rich are and all.”
Keeping to side streets, we made for the little park, me carrying Kadi, and Arlyne and Kirsty trading off with Challa, who was heavier, and felt more so after she fell asleep again. Deprived of Mux, Kadi fretted for a bit, but by the time we got to the park, he’d dropped off as well.
No one was around so we deemed it safe to talk.
“Right then,” I said. “Time to get off Lurgos. The stowaways won’t have to get starliner tickets, but the rest of us will and we no longer have any money.”
“I still have some,” said Jip. “Enough to get us all to the starport and enable at least one of you to purchase a ticket to Borel, and another to Cholar. But not enough for all three of you to do so.”
“We mightn’t have to get any further than Borel,” said Kirsty. “Once we’re there we can get a message to Taz and have him come pick us up in a royal cruiser. With his whole space fleet in escort ready to bl—.”
“—blast anyone who gets in his way, like Simon here would advocate?” I finished. “I don’t think so. Now that AUP’s in this game we can’t expect it to be as easy as having Taz come for us. It wouldn’t take Drazok long to figure out where he was going and why. AUP has a lot of powerful ships too, and can call in more, still using the contagion ploy. There’s no way Taz is going to go up against them with Challa and Kadi in the middle. Once they’re back on Cholar, different story. The independent planets will flock to his banner and AUP’ll stop supporting Drazok and back off to lick its wounds. Or what’s left of it will. Most of the planets that stuck with AUP before are likely to pull out over this latest stunt, which should make even our parents see it for what it is.”
I glanced at my sister, but she made no attempt to defend AUP. If nothing else, this affair had convinced her of its true nature.
“We still might be able to get a message to Taz and have him come in secret,” said Kirsty.
“Maybe,” I conceded. “For now, we have to concentrate on the money thing.”
Kirsty shrugged. “Why not just access oor accounts on Cholar again? It should be easy enough, now that they’ve been modified.”
“Too risky. I doubt Taz has openly publicized our absence, but someone in the palace might have inadvertently let something slip about us being gone. If Drazok got wind of it, he’d soon guess what we were up to and have people watching for things like bank activity that could tell him where we are.”
“What about our accounts on Yaix?” said Arlyne. “They wouldn’t be likely to check those.”
“There’s nothing to check. Mine’s currently empty.”
“So’s mine,” said Kirsty. “I took it all oot for the trip to Cholar.”
“But I didn’t.” Arlyne allowed herself a small smirk. “I only withdrew a little. I still have quite a bit left.”
“Likewise,” said Simon. “Come on, Arlyne. There have to be bank machines around here somewhere. Let’s find one.”
“I will come also,” said Jip, “I, too, have funds at home on Vorla.”
In addition to food, the hold-all contained blankets, nappies, and other baby supplies, so while they were gone, Kirsty and I wrapped the sleeping children in the blankets to conceal their ethnicity en route to the starport. That much of her doll proposal I considered practicable.
A ground taxi got us to the starport. Once there, Jip used a rapid transit dimension to determine which of the cargo barges in the freight yard were loading freighters going to Borel and found one that was about to head up to a vessel leaving relatively soon.
Simon scooped up Kali. “We’d better get going then. Watch for us in the freight yard after you get to Borel.”
The rest of us went into the starport and got tickets for a Vorlan passenger ship. It left some hours after the freighter, but freighters move slowly, and I knew we’d probably have to wait at least half a day for the others to turn up. It was nerve-wracking to set off without knowing if they’d even got aboard the freighter but, fearful of having messages between us intercepted, neither party dared let the other know how it was faring.
That’s why, when my computer alerted me to an urgent transmission only a few hours into our journey, I went into a panic.
So
did Kirsty and Arlyne. We were in our cabin at the time and both hastened to my side as, with trembling hands, I took out my computer.
“It’s not from them,” said Kirsty. “It’s coming in from Cholar.”
That calmed me a little, but not much.
“Should I answer? It could be one of Drazok’s people. Answering will allow for a trace.”
“Not if you just stay on a few seconds to find out.”
Taking a deep breath, I opened the channel.
The face appearing onscreen belonged to Taz. Or did it? The Borelian who’d impersonated Drazok was in custody, but what if Drazok had others on his payroll?
It was as though Taz read my thoughts.
“It is me, Meda. Ask me something Drazok could not possibly know.”
“Okay. Um…uh…where was Simon that time he couldn’t be found back when he was Challa’s age?” Something I’d told him when Challa was on one of her walkabouts.
“Up a tree no one thought he could climb, happily watching people run around looking for him.”
I breathed a little easier. There wasn’t any way Drazok could know that.
Taz smiled. A weary smile.
“I commend you for your caution. I, too, am being cautious. Mr. Skoko has assured me he has provided us with a secure channel but advised against contacting you until you had had time to find the children. I…we…Vostia and I…we couldn’t stand to wait any longer. Have you?”
“Yes.”
Vostia pushed onto the screen. “You have them? They are all right?”
“Jip and Simon have them. The Quorlians took good care of them.”
“But they are not with you?”
“No. It was safer to travel on two different ships.”
“I assume you are making for Borel again,” said Taz. “Be cautious. It is Cholar’s closest non-suspect planet and Drazok will be having traffic to and from it watched. But only covertly, as he knows the Borelian government will not co-operate with him in any way.”
“Or with you either?”
“Borel, like Vorla, prefers to remain neutral when other worlds engage in interplanetary squabbles. Though, in this instance, neither are quite as neutral as they appear.”
