Lost In Translation

by Edward Willett

  Which she had. She shook her head, confused. “I’m blind,” she told Jarrikk. He would know how she meant it.

  “You were very brave,” he said. “Tomorrow both sides will present modifications to your proposal, but I expect ultimate success.”

  “How?” Kathryn whispered. “I can’t Translate.” A lump in her throat choked her; she swallowed angrily. She would not cry, not in self-pity: never!

  “Would you please come to my quarters?” Jarrikk cocked his head to one side, watching her.

  Kathryn blinked. “Why?”

  “Please. We must talk—to Karak.”

  Karak. She closed her eyes for a moment. Of course, he was right; Karak would know if there were another human Translator close enough to be of assistance, and if there weren’t, Karak could arrange a non-inflammatory delay in the negotiations.

  But talking to Karak meant telling him what they had done. And she thought that might hurt as much as the death of the Beast, but in a far deeper way.

  “All right,” she said.

  In a way it was a relief not to feel the crowd’s hostility as she walked with Jarrikk to his sunny apartment. She sat on the closest thing to a human stool in the room, although she suspected the round, truncated pillar was actually a waste disposal unit, and watched as Jarrikk keyed his computer to call the Guildhall. She breathed the sweet smell drifting from the censer and for a moment felt almost tranquil. The thing was done, the decision made, the action taken. She would not second-guess herself: whatever the consequences, she would accept them and deal with them.

  Karak appeared on the screen. “Translator Jarrikk,” he squeaked. “Is Translator Bircher with you?”

  “I’m here,” Kathryn said, standing and stepping into range of the computer’s vid pickup.

  “Translator Bircher, Translator Annette Ursu is en route to S’sinndikk and will take your place in the morning session.” Karak’s tentacles wove a slow dance around his beaked face as he spoke.

  “Annette—” Kathryn stared at Karak, then turned furiously on Jarrikk. “You told him!”

  “No.”

  Kathryn spun back toward the computer. “Then how—” Another thought struck her. “You said no other Translators were near enough—”

  “I said no suitable Translator was near enough. You were the ideal choice, therefore Translator Ursu, though relatively close in distance, was unsuitable for the task.” Karak ignored Kathryn’s glare, if he even knew how to interpret it. “The Guild Council felt that if you and Jarrikk, with your unfortunate personal histories, could overcome your mutual distrust and successfully Link, it would demonstrate graphically the possibility—and need—of humans and S’sinn working together. As well, both of you have recently demonstrated your unswerving devotion to the good of the Guild and the cause of peace. With that in mind, we worked within the Commonwealth to arrange these negotiations, and insured you were the Translators: the only people, other than the negotiators, who might be able to arrive at a peaceful solution, because both of you so desperately wanted it.” He raised a manipulator and moved it in a small circle. “It worked.”

  “It worked—” Kathryn stopped, took a deep breath, and repeated, “It worked because I broke my Oath.”

  “All unfolded as anticipated.”

  “Anticipated!” Kathryn’s face flamed. “You expected me to break my Oath?”

  “You did not break it,” Karak said. “You upheld it. Your Oath states that all races are your kin. You kept your kin from destroying each other.”

  “But Translators—can’t lie. If the Seven Races knew—”

  “Please see they do not find out.”

  “I need to sit down.” Kathryn’s stomach churned and a hot steel band seemed clamped around her forehead. She leaned against one of the padded wooden shikks. Jarrikk moved close beside her. “Why me? Why not Jim?” Did Karak know what Jim had said to her before she left? she wondered, suddenly worried for him.

  “Translator Ornawka we felt to be unsuitable,” Karak said.

  “Why?”

  Karak said nothing more, which didn’t make Kathryn feel any better. In fact, she felt rather worse. She shook her aching head and coughed. Jarrikk placed one clawed hand on her shoulder and she leaned gratefully back against his warm bulk. She looked at Karak again. “There’s something else,” she said hoarsely. “I’m empathy-blind. I’m not—I’m not a Translator anymore.”

  “True,” Karak said simply, and Kathryn closed her eyes. She’d hoped, with the illogical hope of a child, that Jarrikk’s information had been wrong. “How ever,” Karak continued, “your natural empathic ability will slowly recover.”

  Kathryn’s eyes flew open. “Truth?”

  “Translators do not lie.”

  Kathryn grimaced. “So what happens now?”

  “You may soon be feeling rather ill.”

  Kathryn laughed, which turned into an aching cough.

  “This will provide the perfect excuse for you to withdraw. The ship delivering Translator Ursu has an unusually well-equipped medical bay. Its personnel will take care of you.”

  Jarrikk moved around in front of her, blocking her view of Karak. “Until then, I will take care of you,” he said.

  She wished she could read his emotions; at least he could read hers. She let her gratitude flood her. He patted her knee clumsily, and she laughed, knowing he had drawn the gesture from her memories. He moved around behind her again. Karak watched them both. “So it all worked out the way you predicted,” she said. “But you couldn’t know I’d do—what I did. I almost didn’t. I almost backed out. The thought of no longer being a Translator . . .” Her throat closed on the words.

  “We didn’t know,” Karak said. “One can never know. Nor did we know what Jarrikk would do—until he initiated his library search for information on the effects of Linking without Programming. Such information is normally restricted, but I personally cleared it for him. The decision, however, was entirely yours—and his.”

  “Both?” Kathryn twisted around to stare at Jarrikk. “Both?”

  Jarrikk met her shocked gaze steadily. Every joint in his body ached and the old wound in his shoulder seemed to be on fire, along with his blood. He hadn’t wanted her to know he was sick; she’d soon be gone and he knew she would worry about him, which, in view of the circumstances, was a singular waste of energy. But of course he’d had no way of telling Karak that. “Both,” he said.

  “Why? There was no need . . .”

  “But there was. The S’sinn would be shamed if a human took a risk a S’sinn did not. Such shame could poison relations.”

  “But they’ll never know!”

  “Someday, they may.” Someday, he might be known as the Flightless One who saved S’sinndikk, if S’sinn prejudice against the Flightless were ever overcome to that extent. He touched Kathryn’s forehead gently. “You’re a very brave human. I couldn’t let you risk what I would not.”

  “But if you didn’t Program . . . you’re as blind as me!” Kathryn whispered.

  “As of today, two fewer Translators,” said Karak. “Two new names in the Hall of Honor. And a new hope of peace.”

  Kathryn put her hand on Jarrikk’s chest. “You’re a very brave S’sinn,” she said softly. “And a very kind one.”

  He touched her forehead again, moved by her compassion for him, remembering the hatred that she’d held for his race. “And you’re my very good friend.”

  “Yes,” she said. “Oh, yes.” She kept her eyes on him, but spoke to Karak. “What use are we to the Guild now?”

  “When your natural abilities return, you will still be able to seek out new human and S’sinn Translators. We will now need many more.”

  Kathryn’s eyes lit up and she turned toward the computer. “I’d like that. I’d like that very much.”

  But Jarrikk, the fever burning hotter and hotter inside him, lifted his hands in denial. “No. I cannot. The S’sinn will not accept such judgment from a Flightless One.�
� Not yet, anyway, he thought.

  “Then what will you do . . .” Kathryn began, turning toward him, and stopped, the color draining from her face. He knew that the knowledge gleaned from his memories had just given her the answer.

  Flightless, no longer a Translator, he had no useful function on S’sinndikk or any other world of the S’sinn. Today he had wiped out all the years that had passed since Ukkaddikk had come into his healing room. Without Translation, they meant nothing.

  Unflinching, he answered Kathryn’s question. “I will die.”

  Chapter 12

  Kathryn stared at Jarrikk, stunned. That part of her that had been S’sinn warmed with pride that at last Jarrikk would follow the traditions of his people, uphold the glory of his race, but the human part of her went cold as the depths of space. She wanted to scream at him, to reason with him, but, at war with herself, all she could manage was a choked, “No!”

  “It is our way,” Jarrikk said. “As you know.”

  “Karak . . .” Kathryn turned pleadingly toward the terminal.

  “It is the S’sinn way,” Karak said, and his image vanished.

  Kathryn faced Jarrikk again. “But—there are other Flightless Ones who still live on this planet. You don’t—I don’t want you to die!” The words exploded out of her.

  Jarrikk opened his scarred wing. “Only in Translation am I free of pain. I no longer have that freedom. Death is my friend.”

  “I would not sentence you to a life of pain,” Kathryn whispered. “But I will not be free of pain. Not if you die.”

  Jarrikk touched her cheek. “You will remember me. You will remember my memories. In you, I will live on.”

  Kathryn had no more arguments to give him. She gazed mutely at his face, the face she had thought horrible only a few days before, but that now seemed sadly beautiful. She reached up and ran her fingers along the furry curve of the underside of his muzzle, and breathed in his warm, living scent. A gaping black hole seemed to have opened in her heart, or maybe it was the same bottomless pit left by the death of her parents. Strange that the death of one of the aliens that killed them could tear open that old wound.

  Blackness now seemed to be leaking from that hole into her vision. The room had started to turn slow circles around her. “When?” she whispered.

  “Soon. When you are gone.”

  “Gone?” His words seemed to be coming from far away. “When I am . . .”

  The hot steel band that seemed to encircle her head suddenly clamped tight, and she crumpled into darkness.

  In his quarters in the Guildhall, Karak killed all lights and floated in silent water, black but for the faint phosphorescence of the microscopic creatures that kept it clean and oxygenated. When the call came from Akkanndikk, he left the lights off, confronting the Supreme Flight Leader with a blank screen.

  “Equipment malfunction?” the S’sinn leader asked.

  “I mourn the death of a Translator,” Karak said. “As should you.”

  “Jarrikk?”

  “He and Translator Bircher found a way for you to preserve peace and keep your honor and title. But they gave themselves. Now Jarrikk says he will die as a Flightless One. For this, I mourn.”

  “That is where we are different, Guildmaster,” Akkanndikk said. “I rejoice! As Translator, he lived with honor. As Flightless One, he dies with honor.”

  “I think your people worry too much about honor, Supreme Flight Leader. Would this sacrifice by those who are more my flightmates than yours have been necessary if not for the need to preserve your precious honor?”

  “My honor preserves the peace,” Akkanndikk growled. “If my honor is impugned, I will be overthrown, and those most likely to replace me want war. They could still find a way to get it.”

  “All this, I know,” Karak said wearily. “It is why I agreed to this plan. I accept the necessity of this sacrifice. But still I mourn its cost.”

  “Mourn, then. But maintain vigilance. I do not believe we have achieved final victory yet. The enemies of peace will regroup. They will try again. Do not let your sorrow for this sacrifice weaken your resolve, Guildmaster. There may yet be greater sacrifices to be made.”

  “My resolve is strong. But I have a question for you, Akkanndikk, you who talk so well of sacrifice. What if, in the end, the sacrifice required is that of the very honor you value so greatly? Will you still rejoice?”

  Only silence replied, then the beep that signified the end of the connection. And that gave Karak things to worry about as well as mourn.

  Kathryn struggled up from the sucking depths of a deep black nightmare to wakefulness, her heart racing and her pulse pounding in her temples. “Jarrikk!” she cried at the last moment, and her eyes flew open.

  They focused first on the Guild insignia, then on the immaculate uniform it was stitched to, and finally on the smiling face of the wearer—Jim Ornawka. “Not furry enough,” he said. “How are you?”

  “Jim?” Kathryn licked dry lips with a dry tongue, and found it unexpectedly hard to draw air into her lungs. It sighed in listlessly and wheezed out. “Where—”

  “Sick bay. Human-crewed Guildship Unity.”

  Jim poured a glass of water from a pitcher on a small table beside her bed and held it to her lips. She drank it gratefully, and then, in a stronger voice, asked, “How long . . . ?”

  “You’ve been unconscious for three days.”

  “Three—” Kathryn turned her head from side to side on a neck so stiff she expected grinding noises. On her left an IV fed something into her arm. On her right a scanner monitored her vital signs. Beyond it, over the water pitcher Jim had poured from and three empty beds, she could see a glass wall and, behind that, a woman in a green medical tunic talking to another patient hooked up to a bewildering and intimidating array of equipment. To the left of the glass wall the room’s only door stood open, revealing the empty corridor beyond. The air smelled of antiseptic and the faint piney scent humans pumped into the air on their spaceships to more-or-less mask the unavoidable personal odors that accumulated during recycling. “Are we still on S’sinndikk?”

  “We are.”

  “The negotiations?”

  “Proceeding.” His smile slipped a little. “You shouldn’t have done what you did.”

  “Couldn’t let war . . .”

  “Yeah, well, there’s still no guarantee there won’t be one. And look what it cost you—”

  “No guarantee?” Kathryn tried to struggle up, and fell back, barely fighting off an urge to start a cough she was afraid she might never be able to finish. “You said negotiations are proceeding—”

  “They are. But S’sinn and humans, working together peacefully?” Jim shook his head. “It will never happen.”

  “It already has,” Kathryn said, remembering. “Have you—have you heard about Jarrikk?”

  “Heard what about him?” Jim didn’t sound particularly pleased to be asked.

  “Is he . . .” Kathryn swallowed.

  “Dead? No more than you are. He collapsed not long after he carried you back to the human quarters. But I hear he recovered more quickly. In fact, he’s been asking to see you.”

  “Please!” Kathryn tried and failed again to sit up. “I’ve got to talk to him.” Maybe she could still change his mind.

  “Kathryn.” Jim took her hand. “Let it go. We’ll be off this planet in a couple of days and you’ll never have to set eyes on a S’sinn again. They’ve caused you enough grief. First your parents, now this stupid scheme. You could have died, you know. You almost did. Forget the S’sinn. You’re not a Translator any more; concentrate on being human.” He ran one finger along her cheekbone. “I could help you . . .”

  Kathryn remembered Jarrikk touching her face just that way. “Jarrikk is my friend, Jim,” she whispered through the heaviness in her chest. “He’s planning to kill himself because he feels he’s worthless now that he can no longer Translate. I have to stop him. Please tell him I’ll see him.”

/>   “You shouldn’t interfere. You’ll only get hurt. The S’sinn aren’t like us. Their traditions are different. If he feels he has to kill himself, you’ll only be hurting him by arguing against it. Let him go, Kathryn.”

  “He asked to see me, remember? Please do as I ask, Jim. Or I’ll simply get the doctor to do it for me.”

  Jim dropped her hand. “All right. But I still say you’re making a mistake. I’ll be back later.”

  He strode out, passing the doctor at the door. “Translator Bircher, nice to see you awake,” she said, coming over to Kathryn’s bed and putting her small, cool hand on Kathryn’s forehead.

  “Nice to be awake.”

  “I’m Doctor Chung. How are you feeling?”

  “My lungs . . .”

  “A little leftover congestion.”

  “Left over from what?”

  Dr. Chung took her hand from Kathryn’s head. “Immune system rejection of the Translator symbiote,” she said as she checked the IV. “You slept through the worst, but you’re going to feel lousy for a while yet.”

  “The worst?” Jim had said she’d almost died . . .

  “Raging fever, dehydration, vomiting, diarrhea, lungs filling with fluid . . . your body’s been doing everything it can to rid itself of that dead symbiote.” She rounded the foot of the bed to look over the scanner readings.

  That dead symbiote, Kathryn thought. Not much of an epitaph for her life as a Translator. “Not much company in here,” she said to change the subject.

  “Nobody except poor Garth in intensive care.” Dr. Chung pulled an electronic notepad and stylus from the pocket of her dark green lab coat and made a few notes.

  “What’s wrong with him?”

  “Accident in the cargo bay. A programming fault in an automated loader. It ran out of control and pinned him against the bulkhead.”

  Kathryn winced. “Bad?”