The Touchstone Trilogy

by Andrea K Höst

  Isten Notra sent me off with Shon as an escort, which I thought unnecessary until I noticed how many people were lurking about the streets back to KOTIS proper. Not huge crowds – the general public can't come into the area without a pass – but far more than there'd been when I'd arrived. I could see that Shon had noticed them, but he chattered on blithely about exploration on Muina, which made me feel less uncomfortable. Shon's very torn between the work his grandmother has pioneered in Ena studies, and natural sciences. He's David Attenborough at heart.

  He also asked if he could email me, if I was willing to talk about the comparisons between Earth's and Muina's wildlife, and left with a wave when we reached the entrance of KOTIS proper. A nice guy, very relaxed and on top of things. I have a faint suspicion Isten Notra was indulging in some matchmaking, but I think I'll pretend that hasn't occurred to me. I liked Shon, but it's easier not to think about romance at all right now. I figure if I can start waking up not missing Ruuel, I can start thinking about the possibility of other guys, but it's pointless until that happens. Even when I was so upset about that testing session, I still woke up knowing he wasn't there.

  I had weapons training after lunch, which involved struggling into bulky grey chest armour. I felt like a Stormtrooper. Drake stood me in the middle of a practice room with actual physical targets in it and had me activate the chest armour, which briefly made an energy shield around me, and then let loose a sort of area effect concussion blast, sending the targets flying in pieces in all directions. It has two blasts, and then will slowly recharge. They're relying on it, far more than any ability I might gain shooting blasters, to keep me safe. I hate it.

  What if there was someone I didn't see in range when I set it off? I kept thinking of all the terrible accidents I could cause, which made it hard to concentrate on my blaster practice. Drake kept me almost a full kasse practicing in the armour and while I did start to come closer to hitting stationary targets more consistently by the time he let me go, I still suck at moving objects, never notice anything that pops up behind me, and really am kind of sick of the whole exercise.

  After that I took a long bath, and went down to the Sights training area early, intending to play my murder mystery game until Ruuel showed up. I'm liking the game more and more, and it helps me de-stress, but it's amazingly huge so I only play it when I have a good wodge of unscheduled time. On the way to the small training room I couldn't help but notice four female Kalrani gathered around the viewing window into the obstacle course area.

  "–by far the best," one was saying. "Absolutely edible."

  "If you like your meal ice-cold," another snorted. "You're wasting your time anyway. You think you can compete with her?"

  "People always say that," said a third. "But it's all just rumour."

  "Rumours don't go on for years without some basis," the second said. "And–"

  "It's about time we got to drill," said the fourth, and I could tell from the way they all straightened and very carefully didn't look around that she'd spotted me and told them I was there. They all headed off down the corridor, and I went to the observation window and looked down.

  Ruuel and Taarel. Ruuel was wearing one of the horrid blindfolds, and Taarel was attacking him. Blind and deaf, and he could still avoid her attacks and hop about the moving obstacle course. He couldn't quite counterattack swiftly enough to hit her, but it was a very near thing, and they both kept barely avoiding swinging bars and things which shot out of the walls at them. It all looked incredibly dangerous.

  I watched for a minute, then went up to the roof. It was raining, but not too hard, and I stood in it for a while, then went and had a hot shower so I wouldn't catch cold and get lectured. Then I went down and was exactly on time for my appointment so that Ruuel could step me through techniques for what he called 'release triggers'. Every time you go to sleep you have to try and build into your dream something which reminds you that it's a dream, and allows you to wake up. A door, or an alarm clock. He said I shouldn't use the drone as a release because I wouldn't always be sleeping somewhere there was a drone. I stayed really focused, and asked what few questions occurred to me, and he dismissed me quite quickly.

  It's not easy to hide things from Ruuel. But all this talk about visualisations and methods of focusing your mind has been very handy. All the time during today's session I was counting. Listening to what he said and keeping count took a lot of effort, and lessened the amount of energy I could devote to feeling stupidly dejected. He at least didn't act as if he could tell I was upset.

  All along I've had a sense that he and Taarel are together. They make a great couple, really. And like the Kalrani said, who could compete with her? Even if you ignore little issues of our comparative looks, I'm someone who's still afraid to sleep in her own bedroom. Someone who has to be babysat.

  It's stupid to be upset to hear someone say no more than I already knew – that people think they're together, but aren't sure. But I've spent the evening worrying about what I'm going to dream tonight, and stayed up incredibly late and can barely keep my eyes open. Being upset is one of the triggers for my nightmares. And even if Isten Notra is the first person reviewing what I dream, that's no guarantee others won't see it. And I can't talk about it to anyone at all.

  Which at least means I have a huge amount of motivation to get this release trigger thing absolutely right first time. I don't think I've ever been so determined to do something in my life.

  I'm going to do a counting dots visualisation. And every dot is going to have 'This is a dream' written on it. And every dot will be a release trigger to get me out of the dream. And I will be in a room which is nothing but dots, and every one of them a release trigger. And I don't care if I wake up a thousand times tonight, kicking myself out of my dreams: that's the only thing I'm going to dream.

  Ghost just showed up and got very annoyed with me for squeezing her so tightly.

  Thursday, June 5

  A short history of

  I'm glad I've been told to go back to sheep. I did manage to dream of being surrounded by buttons saying "This is a dream". But they were all paintings of buttons. Corridor after corridor of paintings of buttons, and me wandering endlessly through them trying to find the right one to push. It was a long night of feeling exhausted and alone – and all the time feeling watched, though I couldn't see the drone this time. I wasn't scared, and obviously wasn't churning out enough power to have anyone feel the need to come wake me up, but just because I didn't give myself a heart attack didn't mean I didn't feel totally battered and done in by it all.

  And woke missing Ruuel like hell, worse than ever. What is it going to take to stop me feeling this way about him?

  At any rate, I had breakfast with Lohn and Mara, since I was supposed to be training with them before they went on rotation. I had to talk Mara out of sending me to medical, but I'm really glad we chatted since with them I find it easier to admit what a wuss I am, and how stressed I'd gotten about not wanting people to see my dreams. I guess it is kind of odd, since it was a private conversation with Lohn and Mara being made into television which had me so upset. Maybe it's all the hugs which makes them easy to talk to.

  One thing Lohn said really struck me – that if I can control what I dream about, being able to project my dreams in such intense detail is really an opportunity. I could show him what surfing looked like, for instance. That's a nice idea, changing the drone from an intrusive spy to a handy recording device. The big problem is the presumption that I can manage anything resembling control, given how badly I failed last night.

  We did some mild training, and grabbed a light mid-morning meal before First Squad went into rotation. Then I had weapons training, which being drained and tired really did not help with. Drake was very tolerant, which is one good thing about him having low expectations for me. After that, I went up to the roof, and admired the sheer blackness of the approaching thunderclouds while I tried to think up a way to tell Ruuel that maybe someone e
lse should train me after all. It was hard to come up with a reason that didn't sound wildly insulting, or underline that the problem was just that I was too emotionally messed up about him. I'd rather not have to deal with him at all for a while – not until I stop waking up knowing he's not near me.

  Everything I could come up with sounded so feeble, and I had just decided that I'd put off changing trainers till tomorrow when I felt someone standing to my left. The Nuran, Inisar.

  "Hello again," I said, after a moment. I'm sure if anyone was paying attention to my vitals monitor they would have noticed a huge spike, but since he was just standing there, all I did was add: "Another rescue attempt, or something else this time?"

  "Do you no longer choose to aid the Tarens?"

  The question was so neutral I couldn't tell if he was simply curious, or was ready to cart me off through the Rift as soon as I said 'yes'. Or kill me if I didn't.

  "No." I stayed sitting down, though I had to lean back a little to look up at him. "Situation hasn't gotten better. More Ionoth, more gates. Don't see how I can walk away from that. I had a – well, I have lots of questions, but I particularly wanted to ask what Cruzatch are."

  "What do you think they are?" he asked. Totally unhelpful.

  "Muinans become Ionoth. Trying to make themselves immortal. Or into gods. Or both. And now trying to stop Tarens because Tarens reached the point where they can move about spaces and find Pillars and turn them off. Do the Cruzatch drive massives to attack Nurans too?"

  "I have been forbidden to answer questions."

  That made me feel nervous, since if he wasn't here to talk, kidnapping or assassination moved up the list. "Just here to look at the scenery?"

  His eyes – rather too like Ruuel's for my comfort – considered me steadily. "I am commanded to observe your development as a touchstone. While I am here I am to avoid all contact with any of the lost children of Muina."

  The rules-lawyering made me smile. He wasn't quite answering my questions, and he wasn't talking to a Muinan-descendant. "Following instructions very exactly. I don't know which bits of what's happening to me are the touchstone part, but just lately I've started projecting my dreams into the Ena. If that's what being a touchstone is, would appreciate a few hints as to how not to have dreams. Or at least stop half-killing myself with them."

  "Control is not a thing gained during sleep," he said, and handed me a book. I glanced down at it, very surprised, and when I looked up again he was gone.

  "Straight answers not a thing gained from Nurans," I muttered, and sighed, then looked with extreme interest at the book.

  It was handmade, the paper creamy and lightly textured, with firmly sewn bindings forming a thick solid edge. The covers were plain wooden boards, fine and undecorated. The whole thing looked newly made, and when I opened it the writing was dark and cleanly written. And in Old Muinan, which I have as much chance of reading and understanding as Old English. I snorted, but carefully went through it page by page, committing them to my log – and hoping for useful illustrations.

  Then it was time to face the music. I'd already checked on 'my' captains, but Maze was still on rotation and Ruuel was asleep. I tossed up contacting Taarel or Grif Regan from Second Squad or even Zan, but decided to skip the preliminaries and emailed Selkie the conversation from my log, with a subject heading of "Nurans" and in the body: "Have neat handwriting." I cc'd the email to Maze, Ruuel and Isten Notra and then sat there trying to puzzle out what the damn thing was about. Not, as I'd hoped, "The Idiot's Guide to Touchstones".

  I'd just decided it was some kind of history of Muina when Isten Notra sent a channel request to me with the text: "You are an endless source of amusement," making me laugh.

  "Hello," I said. "Suspect 'amusement' is not word everyone will use."

  "You may well be right. And how cruel of you to only send the first four pages with that log. Pass me the rest."

  That was easily done – I'd already separated out the fragment for my own review. "Can you read Old Muinan, Isten Notra? This is Nuran history book?"

  "More than that, child. It is a copy of an account written by a Lantaren just after arrival on Nuri. It is a compilation of everything the Muinans who fled to Nuri knew of the disaster and the events leading up to it. It is–" Her voice throbbed. "It is very exciting, and I will leave you now while I devour it. You'd best get yourself to Selkie's office before he finishes reviewing your conversation."

  I'd not been to Selkie's office before – it was in a part of KOTIS I think of as 'Command Central'. An area with lots of bluesuits walking about, and an excess of meeting rooms. I could tell when Selkie finished reviewing my log, because an appointment for a meeting with him appeared in my calendar, scheduled for immediately. But I guess Isten Notra had already told him I was on my way, because he simply waited for me to show.

  Some offices on Tare have remnants of design from when Tarens used table-top computers, but most of them are like Selkie's – just a meeting room assigned to a particular person, with storage space for equipment, but little to do with desks or paper shuffling. Selkie's had a small rectangular coffee table thing, with four low chairs around it, and a taller café-type round table with two 'upright' chairs with high backs (like wing-back chairs). He was in one of these, and didn't look amused.

  "Sit."

  I put the book on the table and sat, feeling like I'd been called to the principal's office. Except it was a school I couldn't go home from at the end of the day. For psychic soldiers.

  "I've spoken to you on the subject of your alert before," he said. "If I need to do so again, you will have a squad assigned to you permanently. Do you understand?"

  Setting off my alert wouldn't have made any difference if the Nuran had wanted to kill me, and I'd been all prepared to say that until I saw the look in Selkie's eyes. Any argument, and he'd assign a squad to me straight away.

  "Understood," I said, resigned to having to do it.

  "What is the basis for your theory about the Cruzatch?"

  "Arenrhon obviously about godhood or immortality. Bodies in the non-blurry sarcophagi were burnt. And Cruzatch keep showing up. Is just a guess – we don't have anything like Cruzatch on Earth. Don't think I've even heard any legends about things like that."

  He didn't comment, but didn't look surprised, either. I was hardly the first to speculate on what the people at Arenrhon were trying to achieve.

  "Remain here until Notra has reported on this," he said, picking up the book and leaving.

  It wasn't a short book, but I'm not altogether sure if having to sit in Selkie's office for a couple of hours was supposed to be punishment, or just that Selkie wanted me somewhere he thought it hard for the Nuran to get to. I mused for a while on where the Nuran was going to sleep on a planet like Tare, where there was so little unoccupied land. Avoiding all contact with the descendants of Muina would be quite a task.

  Not that he seemed to have had the least trouble finding me. If he had been sent to kill me, I'd be dead right now. I think in a way I've grown used to the idea of probably dying. That's what spending so much time in intensive care does for you.

  Selkie didn't come back straight away, and I ended up playing one of the interface games I'd bought, caught up in the very curious world Tare had been before it had advanced so far technologically. Cave-dwellers, with their whitestone cities under a sky of stone, and thus with an 'outside' they would go out to, of sorts. Ionoth were present, but far less of an issue, and there was not this obsession with the yet-to-be-formed Setari. Instead the focus was on sorties into the surrounding darkness of the caves, and tunnels leading to undiscovered parts. It was Tare's 'Here Be Dragons' stage, and really quite a different world.

  When First Squad came back from rotation, Maze replied to my email with: "Urth person is asking for a lecture. I'll see you shortly." But it was Ruuel, not Maze, who showed up first, walking in and sitting opposite me while I was preoccupied with a puzzle. I felt him there, and shut down the gam
e, opening my eyes.

  "The trigger technique was not successful?" he asked, presumably having spotted the huge circles under my eyes.

  "Long nightmare about looking for triggers," I said, shrugging. "Will try the action variation tonight." That was where a particular action on your own part, like a hand signal, was the trigger to wake up. "Do you think Nuran was actually answering my question, or just being deeply annoying?"

  He tilted his head slightly. "It is possible that your abilities are triggering during your dreams purely because you have no control over them waking. Have you been practicing sensing the location of those around you?"

  I nodded, though it was not so much practising as I increasingly happened to know people were on the far sides of walls.

  "When the Cruzatch first attacked you in Kalasa, did you sense it before you saw it?"

  That was hard to answer. "Don't really know. Don't think I heard it, but something made me look up."

  "We'll try a visualisation exercise until Isten Notra is ready. Close your eyes."

  I gave him a rather wry look, which he didn't react to, and after a moment I obediently shut my eyes, despite knowing my face had gone red. And I was stupidly happy. It's the feeling that I'm an annoyance to him – and the idea that he and Taarel are together – that bothers me. I'm still not pleased that he went along with upsetting me for the purposes of testing, but – yeah, I can't pretend that that or even the high probability that he's in love with Taarel cured me of wanting him.