by Amy Thomson
Moki slipped away from the arguing humans. He walked down the hall, and into a room full of sick children. Some of the children were playing listlessly, others were sitting idly in chairs, too sick to do more than watch the others play. The children stopped what they were doing and stared at him when he walked into the room.
“You’re Moki the Tendu!” a fragile little girl exclaimed. “I saw you on the Tri-V!”
She was a small child with pale, almost translucent skin. Her eyes were pale blue and surprisingly large, with dark shadows underneath them.
“Yes, I am,” Moki said. “And who are you?”
“My name is Shelley Richter,” she said. “Are you sick too?”
“No,” Moki answered, “we came here to make people better. Are you sick?”
“We all are,” she told him. “That’s why we’re here.”
“What’s wrong with you?” he asked.
“There’s a hole in my heart, and my lungs don’t get enough oxygen,” she explained.
“If you hold out your hands, like this,” he said, extending his arms for allu-a, “I’ll look and see if I can fix it.”
“Will it hurt?” she asked.
“It will be like pricking your finger on a thorn, but after that it won’t hurt at all.”
The little girl considered this information seriously.
“All right,” she said, holding out her arms. “Fix me, please.”
Moki sat down across from the little girl, and clasped her arms. He linked with her, and found the problem almost immediately. He slowed her heart as much as he could, giving her oxygen through his spurs. Working between beats, he closed the hole by encouraging the growth of overlapping flaps of tissue on either side of the hole, which he then fused together. It was delicate, challenging work. When he was done, Moki paused for a moment, savoring the rich taste of the girl’s newly oxygenated blood, then broke the link.
Shelley woke up. Her pale skin now had a faintly pink bloom. “Am I fixed yet?” she asked.
Moki nodded. “How do youjeel now?”
She closed her eyes and breathed deeply. “I don’t feel tired,” she said, “and I’m hungry.”
“That’s good,” Moki told her. “You should eat a big meal as soon as you can. Your body will need that.”
A little boy came up to him. “Mr. Moki, can you fix me too? I have leukemia.”
“What’s that?”
“Don’t you know?” he asked. “I thought you were a doctor.”
“No,” Moki said. “I’m a Tendu. Sit down and let me look inside you, and I’ll see if I can fix you.”
They linked. This one would be harder, he realized. The cells that ate disease in the boy’s blood had proliferated and thrown his entire body out of balance. Moki went deep inside the child’s bone marrow, searching for the cells that created the problem, killing those that were out of balance. He gently encouraged the proliferation of healthy cells, and filtered out the unbalanced killer cells.
He was undoing the damage from the medicines the doctors had used, when suddenly he was torn out of the link. He cried out in pain, colors flashing across his body. A human woman was standing over him, shouting. He scrambled away from her, and fled.
Juna walked home with a bag full of groceries, reviewing the day’s disastrous events. She still vibrated with anger when she remembered how Moki clung, cringing and terrified, to a small tree in a planter, trying to hide in its inadequate cover. Even with Ukatonen’s help, it had taken several hours to get a coherent version of what had happened.
And then there was Ukatonen. Juna rubbed her free hand across her forehead. The doctors should never have asked him to heal someone so seriously ill, especially not as a first attempt. She understood that medical protocols required that any experimental technique be tried on terminally ill patients first, but—
“Dr. Saari?”
Juna looked up, startled out of her reverie.
It was a woman close to her own age. She was thin, worn, and nervous; her clothes were shabby. Juna’s security escort moved to cut her off.
“Please, Dr. Saari, I need to talk to you about what Moki did to my daughter.”
“It’s okay,” Juna told the security man. The woman looked too spent and tired to be a threat.
“Dr. Saari, I really don’t think– ” the guard began.
“It’s okay,” Juna insisted in a voice that did not invite argument.
“Yes?” she prompted, looking back at the woman.
“I’m Loreena Richter, Shelley’s mother.”
“What did Moki do, Mrs. Richter?” Juna asked a bit sharply. It had been a long day, and she wasn’t really up to dealing with another problem.
“I wanted to thank him. My daughter, he– ”
Juna realized the woman was on the edge of tears. “Here,” she said, guiding her to a park bench, ignoring the protests of her guard. “Sit down. Tell me what happened.” She put her groceries down, fumbled out a clean handkerchief, and handed it to the woman.
“I’m sorry, Dr. Saari. It’s just that it’s all so sudden and unexpected.”
“Yes?” Juna said, and waited.
“My daughter, Shelley has– I mean, she had, a hole in her heart. She was on the waiting list for a transplant, but it’s such a long list, and the older she got, the harder it was for her heart to keep up with her. The doctors gave her another six months if we didn’t find a heart. I was beginning to give up hope. I mean, the list is so long.” She paused, fighting back tears.
“Moki healed her this morning. The doctors haven’t seen anything like it. She could leave the hospital today, and live an ordinary life like any child, but the doctors want to study her.” The woman took a deep breath and looked up at Juna. “I came straight from the hospital. I wanted to thank Moki for saving my daughter’s life.”
“Come with me,” Juna told Mrs. Richter. “I’ll take you to see him.” She looked up at the guard, challenging him to make another protest.
“It’s your life,” he said with a resigned shrug.
When they reached the apartment, Juna asked Mrs. Richter to have a seat while she saw if Moki was awake. The guard stood by the door, watching Mrs. Richter war-ily.
Juna went into her bedroom. Moki was lying on the bed, his eyes hooded by his nictitating membranes.
“Moki, the mother of the girl you healed is here. She would like to see you.”
Moki got up slowly, and pulled on his shorts. “Is she angry at me?” he asked, his skin flaring pale orange with fear.
“It’s all right, Moki. She wants to thank you. Come and talk to her.”
Mrs. Richter hesitated slightly when Moki came out of the bedroom, but she conquered her uncertainty and stood.
“Moki, this is Mrs. Richter. She’s Shelley’s mother.”
“Pleased to meet you, Mrs. Richter,” Moki said. “Is Shelley all right?”
“She’s completely healed, Moki. I came to thank you for giving me my daughter back.”
Moki nodded.
“My husband died in an accident a couple of years ago,” Mrs. Richter continued. “My family is back on Earth, so Shelley is all I’ve got. I thought I was going to lose her too.” She bowed her head, blinking back tears, then looked up. “But now she’s going to be all right, thanks to you.”
“Does this mean you’re not angry at me?” Moki asked.
Mrs. Richter looked startled. “Moki, why would I be angry with you? This is a miracle.”
“The other woman was angry,” Moki explained. “I was healing a boy with”—he paused, searching for the word—“leukemia. A woman broke the link. She was yelling at me. I don’t know why. It isn’t good to break a link like that. The boy could have been badly hurt.”
Mrs. Richter turned to Juna. “I don’t understand.”
“Moki got bored while Ukatonen and I were discussing a case with some of the doctors,” Juna explained. “He wandered off by himself, into the pediatric ward. That’s where he met your da
ughter. After he healed her, a little boy came up and asked to be healed. While he was in the middle of a link, a nurse came up and saw him with the boy. She ripped Moki’s spurs out of the boy’s arms, breaking the link.” Juna paused, trying to stanch the anger that welled up in her. “Moki is still young. He isn’t fully trained yet. Breaking the link like that threw him into shock. He panicked and ran.”
“Is he all right?” Mrs. Richter asked.
“He is now. Ukatonen helped bring him out of it. But the hospital isn’t very pleased with us, I’m afraid. Moki was healing those children without permission. And– ” Juna paused, uncertain about what to tell this woman. “The first patient that Ukatonen was asked to work on was so far gone that he died while Ukatonen was linked with him. I don’t think we’re going to be here much longer.”
“Oh no! That’s terrible! They can’t send you away! Think of all the good that Moki can do!” Mrs. Richter said. “Please, let me help you. Shelley’s been here so long, I know the hospital administration backwards and forwards.”
Juna thought it over; she was a stranger here, and didn’t know the system. They needed help.
“We’d appreciate any help you could give us, Mrs. Richter,” Juna said. “Thank you.”
“Dr. Saari, it’s you, and Moki, who deserve the thanks. Without you, my daughter might have died.”
“We’re here to heal people,” Moki declared. “Besides, healing Shelley was easy. It was just one simple thing. The boy with leukemia was much harder to heal.”
Mrs. Richter shook her head in amazement. “I’ll call the hospital administrator first thing tomorrow morning.”
Around the middle of the morning, Juna received a coram call from the hospital administrators, asking her to meet with them in an hour.
The hospital’s chief administrator, a round, rather jovial-looking African, called the meeting to order.
“Dr. Saari, I wanted to apologize to you about yesterday’s misunderstanding. According to Mrs. Richter, your son performed a miracle yesterday. Two miracles, actually. The doctors can find no trace of leukemia in Ian Mcln-tyre. He appears completely cured. Clearly the Tendu are capable of great things. We very much want you to stay here. However, we do need to set up some rules for the Tendu to work under.”
“Thank you, Dr. Andraia,” Juna said. “The Tendu have a very different view of health and medicine than conventional human doctors. I agree with you. The Tendu and your doctors need to have a better understanding of how to work together. Ukatonen and I have discussed this, and we have two suggestions. First, let the Tendu choose who they can heal. Second, give each of the Tendu a medically qualified escort, someone who can explain the nature of the medical problems they encounter, as well as what human medical ethics are in these situations.”
“These seem like good procedures,” Dr. Andraia said. “Are there any other suggestions?”
“If the Tendu are going to just wander around the hospital and heal people, how are we going to monitor what is going on?” one doctor protested. “And how are we going to keep this classified?”
“That’s a good question, Dr. Shaw,” Andraia said. “Juna?”
She turned to the enkar. “Ukatonen, do you have any suggestions?”
“We could include a doctor in the link with us, I suppose.”
“I’m afraid that wasn’t quite what we had in mind,” one of the other doctors said. “We need to hook you up to machines that can monitor your heartbeat, and your brain waves.”
“I see,” Ukatonen said. “How much time does it take to set up these machines?”
“It takes about fifteen minutes to set everything up. We can use one of the upstairs examining rooms.”
“Then Moki and I will heal our patients in that room,” Ukatonen said. “I will be interested to see what these machines do.”
“But what about those of us who want to investigate how the Tendu heal a specific problem?” another doctor asked.
“We can work on that after we’ve found the best way to study what the Tendu are doing,” Dr. Andraia said. “Ukatonen, Moki, I apologize for the initial misunderstanding and I hope that we can figure out a harmonious working arrangement.”
“Thank you, Dr. Andraia,” said the enkar. “Moki and I are looking forward to learning from you.”
A lavender ripple of relief coursed over Ukatonen’s body as he turned on the shower. It had been a very long day. He and Moki had healed five people today, four yesterday, and two the day before. He was drained and weary, and beginning to feel as out of harmony as the people he healed. He needed a green, quiet place in which to restore his balance. Tomorrow, they would rest, he decided. He would get out with Eerin and Moki and they would find a tree, and climb it, and not come down until they felt more in balance.
He emerged from the shower and climbed into bis moist, heated bed, and fell asleep.
The next day they explored several of the station’s gardens, climbing trees, swinging from branch to branch. They found a small, quiet park with gnarled pine trees and rounded, moss-covered stones. Water trickled from a bamboo pipe into a dark pool where bright orange fish swirled and circled. The garden’s tranquillity and balance filled Ukatonen with peace.
“I like this place,” he remarked to Eerin. “It has ruwar-a.”
“This garden,” she told him, “was designed by Mo-toyoshi XVI. His family have designed gardens for almost a thousand years, first in Japan, then around the world. A branch of the family moved into, space two centuries ago. Do you remember the Uenos?” she asked.
Moki nodded. “Your neighbors, the ones with the strange fish.”
“Mrs. Ueno is a Motoyoshi; she told me all about her family.” Eerin smiled, remembering. “You should see her garden. There’s a bonsai that’s almost three hundred years old. It was a wedding present from her family.”
“I would like to meet the man who created this garden,” Ukatonen said. “I think I would like him very much.”
“I think you would too,” Eerin agreed. “But he died ten years ago. He was Mrs. Ueno’s grandfather. She told me about this garden.”
A grey cloud of sadness passed over the enkar’s skin at this news. “You humans live such short lives,” he said. Eerin’s people desperately needed the healing he and Moki were providing.
“Actually, Mr. Motoyoshi was nearly one hundred and thirty years old when he died,” Eerin said. “He lived a very long life for a human.”
“But that would still be young for a Tendu, even with the difference between your years and ours.”
Eerin nodded. “We live longer now than we once did. Until the twentieth century, most people were lucky to reach sixty.”
“I know, but even a hundred and thirty years seems too short to me. But then, it’s hard to believe that most of what I have seen here is no more than a century old. Where are your people’s roots?”
“On Earth, where we came from,” Eerin said. “But we brought our roots with us,” she added, gesturing at the little gnarled tree.
“Earth,” Ukatonen said. “When are we going to see it?”
Eerin ran a hand through her hair. “I don’t know,” she said. “Soon, I hope. In a few more months, I’ll be too pregnant to travel.”
“Why can’t we just get on a shuttle and go?” Moki asked.
“Because people are still afraid of you,” Juna replied. “They don’t want you on Earth because they think you might spread disease.”
Red lightning forks of anger flickered over Ukatonen’s skin. “Haven’t we been through this already?”
“I agree. It makes no sense,” Juna replied. “But this is often true of my people. One of the reasons that we are here, healing people, is to show them how much good you can do.”
“I see,” Ukatonen said. “This is not just research, then? Healing these people will help your people trust us?”
“I hope so,” Eerin said. “I hope so.”
About a week after they had settled things with the hospita
l, Juna was watching the Tri-V with Moki when the door chime rang.
It was her guard. “Excuse me, Dr. Saari, but this gentleman insists on seeing you. And well– ” Glancing beyond the guard Juna saw a handsome, dark-skinned man with sharp-chinned features that looked vaguely Vietnamese. He was dressed in a quietly elegant suit that must have cost a great deal, and he had the presence of someone who expected to be recognized wherever he went.
“My name is Yang Xaviera,” the visitor said. “I am here on behalf of the Xaviera family. Please forgive your guard, I really have been most persistent. He has checked my identification, and searched me most thoroughly. I am quite safe.”
Juna was too stunned to speak. The Xaviera family was one of the wealthiest and most powerful group families in the solar system. They practically owned the Moon.
“I see,” she said, recovering herself. “Please come in.”
“Thank you, Dr. Saari. I apologize for not contacting you first, but your comm is very tightly filtered, and we were unable to get through to you. We could have worked through an agent, but this way is both more discreet, and more direct. As I mentioned, I am here on behalf of the Xaviera family. We have come to ask permission to court you.”
Juna stared at him, astonished for the second time in a minute.
“It is most gracious of you to see me,” he went on. “I apologize for surprising you in this manner.” He remained polite and serious, though Juna knew she must present a laughable spectacle.
“Please, sit down,” she said at last, motioning him to the couch. “Would you like some tea?”
“Thank you,” he replied.
She headed for the kitchen, grateful for a moment to think, but Moki already had the kettle on and was spooning tea into the pot.
“It’s all right, siti,” he told her. “I’ll do it.”
Juna returned to the living room. Yang was perched on the sofa like some rare tropical bird. She sat down in the armchair, painfully aware of how untidy the apartment looked. They had been working very hard, and there hadn’t been any time to clean.
