On Assignment to the Planet of the Exalted

by Helena Puumala

  “If you can get the animal to release it to me, Kati,” Lank added, grinning.

  Kati ran her eyes over the people following them and found the Klenser youth.

  “Zass, will you assist me with this?” she asked him.

  “Of course, Kati, if you want me to,” the boy replied with a beatific smile, and closed his eyes.

  Kati closed hers, immediately sensing the proximity of the Forest Spirit, and that of Zass, leaning into it. Determined to inveigle the Klenser boy into communicating with the Spirit the way she could, she, using the Granda’s added mental strength, broached Zass’s mind, encouraging him to follow with her into the wispy essence of the Spirit.

  “We would ask the creature to bring down the mechanical object,” she subvocalized carefully to the Spirit, forming the thought as precisely as she could.

  She could sense Zass’s mind following her thought, and then repeating it in a mental voice all his own:

  “Yes, we would like the tree-rat to bring the off-world object back down to us on the trail....”

  “And hand it to the off-worlder named Lank, who is standing at the front of the group,” Kati continued.

  “And hand it to the brainy off-worlder in the front of the group.”

  Kati could not help but grin. Zass was developing his own mental voice! He was taking to this kind of communication like a fish to water! The Resistance Base was going to find him a very useful addition to their number, indeed!

  “Hmpf!” The Monk mentally growled. “The ether around here is getting crowded!”

  Kati ignored him.

  Chittering and complaining the tree-rat began to climb down along the bark of the tree, clutching the com in the talons of one front paw. As soon as it was in motion, Lank moved into position under the tree and when the animal came close enough to pass the object to him, he took it from it with a courteous nod and a “Thank you”. Released from obligation, the rodent rushed back up the tree to resume its position on the lowest branch. Kati sent a thought of thanks to it via the Forest Spirit before breaking her ties to the Spirit and Zass.

  When she turned to look at Zass, the boy was grinning at her gleefully, looking not in the least like a mindless Klenser. Mathilde was staring at her brother in amazement and delight. Zass placed his finger across his lips to gain his sister’s silence; she nodded at him and turned her attention back to Lank who was examining the communicator.

  “Shelonian manufacture,” he said, and, pressing some obscure button, opened the thing into two halves to expose its inner workings.

  Keros gasped. Kati guessed that he had had no idea that it was possible to open up the gadget; he had been merely following instructions. Not that Kati herself would have known how to open the thing, she told herself wryly—although, if she had given the Granda the freedom to handle the thing, it might well have known what to do, the way Lank obviously did.

  “Although if I’d let you at it, I would have had to hope that it could not be used as a weapon,” she tartly subvocalized to The Monk.

  “No worries of that, by the looks of it,” came the answer, just as acerbic.

  Lank was studying the com’s innards. Suddenly he handed one of the halves to Vic who had come to stand beside him.

  “Hold that while I...,” he said, leaving the thought unfinished.

  He held the remaining half in one hand, and reached in with the long fingers of the other one, probing with their tips, finally removing a small metallic piece, still attached to the wires he had disconnected from the com.

  “This is it,” he said triumphantly, displaying the prize. “This is what was splitting the signal to send it wherever it was being diverted. This com is now safe to use—as long as it’s used with another safe communicator.”

  “How do you know that?” Vic asked, looking from the communicator half to the piece that Lank had removed.

  “Simple.” Lank grinned at Vic. “This is obviously an addition, not part of the original manufacture. Whoever attached it used wires to connect it. Shelonian technology is more sophisticated than that; they do everything with crystalline structures. See here, look at the way this is put together; there’s not a wire anywhere. It’s all these tiny, shiny crystal things; much more effective and space-saving than wires, even wires as small as the ones on this added component.”

  “Wow.” Vic was suitably impressed. “We’re still using wires on our generator and electric grid,” he said. “And they’re much fatter wires than the ones on that little spy thing there.”

  “But of course,” Lank agreed. “You don’t need this sort of sophistication for your electric grid here. And there’s not much point in using a more complicated technology than is necessary. You don’t want to need me to maintain your grid and generator.”

  “That’s indeed so,” said Jorun, finally letting go of Keros’ arm.

  “It’s one of the principles that the Lamanians take very seriously,” Lank said. “They never want to over-complicate things. They only use as sophisticated a technology as the job being done requires. They say that things are easier that way.”

  Kati recalled the mixture of simplicity and sophistication that had surprised her on her arrival in The Second City. Lank had just explained it, she realized. Of course, he had been on Lamania considerably longer than she had; likely he had asked questions, and searched through public records to sate his curiosity.

  “However,” Lank added, looking at Jorun, and at Keros whose other arm was still firmly in Mycha’s grip. “I wouldn’t let Keros have this back to contact his comrade in the Capital City. I doubt that anyone has done the excising that I just did, on the communicator that this Cirazin is using. So it’s still broadcasting to the government lab, even if this one isn’t.”

  *****

  Jorun declined to try to make use of the communicator, at least for the time being.

  “I don’t know if I’d dare trust anything that the Oligarchs might be able to tap into,” he said on the way back inside. “The runners are safer.”

  He grinned back at Santha who was behind him.

  “Maybe, for now, I’ll just store it in a safe place and we’ll stick with our old practises.”

  Lank handed the communicator to him with a shrug.

  “You should do what you judge to be best,” he agreed. “You know the situation here. We newcomers are not the best judges of it. Although, Kati sure picks up on stuff fast.”

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  The people in the Base Hall were rushing to and fro looking somewhat panic-stricken when the group arrived back inside. A woman whom Roxanna greeted as Cathe approached Jorun, looking frightened.

  “Kaya’s gone into labour,” she said, “and it’s not going well. We need a trained Healer, and we need him or her now. Sira and I can’t handle this; she’s having convulsions of some kind besides the labour pains. I’m not sure what’s going on.”

  “Kaya’s a Klenser,” Roxanna explained to the newcomers. “She’s been in a trance of some sort pretty much the whole time that she’s been here.”

  “She hasn’t done any cleansing on account of her pregnancy,” Cathe added. “I don’t know if that’s been a good, or a bad thing, since I don’t know all that much about Klenser physiology. A Healer would know, but Sira and I are both just amateurs. Healers are busy enough in the towns and villages; they don’t want to come here and sit around, since, generally, we Rebels are a pretty healthy lot.”

  “I can run off to Bouldertown to see if their Healer can come,” Santha said, “but that is going to take a while, even under the best circumstances. And if Healer Mirta happens to be off treating someone on the surrounding farms....” She was biting her lip.

  Joaley turned a tight-lipped face towards Kati.

  “Kati, if you will take a look at her, using whatever it was that you learned from Master Healer Vorlund, I’ll come and try to help however I can,” she said. “Not that I can do much, but all City Peace Officers took a First Aid Course; I’m
not totally useless.”

  “Maybe I can help to ease her mental state,” Zass offered. “If she’s a Klenser, possibly I can reach her, and if she’s fighting her body, I might be able to help stop her doing that.”

  “If some of you can do something, I’ll just grab a lunch and head back to Bouldertown to look for Mirta,” Santha said, apparently taking heart from the newcomers’ willingness to help. “If you people can keep her even somewhat stable until Mirta and I get back....”

  She was on her way to the dining area to ask for sandwiches to take with her, even before the words had finished tumbling from her mouth.

  Jorun gave Kati a hard look.

  “Do you think that you can be of some help?” he asked her.

  “I won’t know until I take a look,” Kati replied. “I can possibly use my ESP to figure out what’s wrong with her, but I’ll have to admit that I’ve never dealt with a problematic childbirth before. However, I have borne a child myself, although that was before I knew I had any extra-sensory powers, so maybe that’ll help me figure out what’s wrong.”

  “Klensers often have trouble birthing babies,” someone—a female voice—in the background piped up. “The Exalted at their Klenser farms usually just cut the baby out when it’s time, and sew the mother back up, leaving her to heal as best she can. They then give the child to someone normal to look after; the Klensers aren’t considered capable of looking after themselves, never mind their babies.”

  Kati and Joaley exchanged a look.

  “We’ll see about that,” Kati muttered. “Where is she?” she added, directing the question to Cathe.

  Cathe took a couple of steps in the direction of the room where the Klensers were. Then she stopped, and turned around, holding her palms out.

  “I really don’t want a crowd in there,” she said. “Only the most necessary persons.”

  Kati looked around her.

  “Joaley, Zass, myself—and Mathilde, maybe, for now, if she’s willing. She has been dealing with a Klenser now for some time, so she may know something useful.”

  She turned to squeeze Roxanna on the shoulder.

  “Keep the rest of my Troupe alert, and if we in the birthing room lose track of time, let us know when our music is needed, and we’ll try to accommodate,” she said to her with a quick grin.

  With a nod to Jorun she then turned to follow Cathe; Joaley, Zass and Mathilde following her.

  “Well, Roxanna, it’ll be a few hours yet before show time, but if you can lead a sing-along, we three fellows can manage a show in a pinch,” Jock said. “Assuming that the others cannot be spared from the birthing room.”

  “Oh, I can probably step into the breach,” Roxanna said lightly. “I learned a lot from Kati on the slave ship when we had to keep a roomful of children entertained. I bet a crowd of grown-ups is easy in comparison with dealing with kids.”

  *****

  Cathe took Kati and the other three into a room where five people lay asleep on pallets arranged with their heads against a wall. A sixth pallet was on the other side of the room, a heavily pregnant woman lying restlessly on it, and a woman in a chair next to it, her hands clutching the arm-rests, white-knuckled. She looked relieved to see others arrive, even if two of them were off-worlders. Zass clucked audibly to see the sleepers on the other side of the room while Kati and Joaley followed Cathe over to the pregnant figure.

  “She had another convulsion,” Sira, the woman in the chair said to Cathe, looking distressed. “I held her hand through it; I didn’t know what else to do.”

  Joaley went down on her knees beside the pallet. She moved the patient’s head to its side, and gently forced open the woman’s mouth.

  “During convulsions you want to make sure that she can’t swallow her tongue, and that her air passages are clear; that’s about all a non-professional can do,” she said to Sira. “That, and make sure that during the times in between she drinks liquids, so as to remain hydrated.”

  “Well, I’m definitely not a Healer,” Sira said with a sigh. “Right now I wish that I had never volunteered to help look after the Klensers. Normally they are so healthy, but with Kaya and her pregnancy, I‘m just out of my depth.”

  “Santha’s going to run back to Bouldertown to try to get hold of Healer Mirta,” Cathe said. “In the meantime Kati and Joaley here, and Zass and his sister Mathilde are going to do what they can to help us with Kaya. Joaley has some knowledge of what she called First Aid, and Kati apparently has done some work with a Master Healer off-world. Zass is a very highly-functioning Klenser and Kati thinks that may make him useful to us. And Mathilde, obviously, is no stranger to Klenser traits.”

  Having made certain that the patient was in no danger of suffocation, Joaley gently lifted the light blanket which covered her. Underneath it, Kaya was wearing a long tunic which had become twisted over her pregnant belly and on her thighs.

  “Kati, help me take a look between her legs, will you; she might object,” Joaley requested. “I want to see how far along the dilation is. Is there a speculum or something resembling one, somewhere in this room?”

  Cathe walked over to a table across the room from the door. She picked up a bag of objects from the table and brought it over.

  “Mirta sent this when she heard that we had a pregnant Klenser here, just in case we had to act before she made it here,” she said. “She wrote down some instructions for us, too, but I have to admit that even though I’ve read them, every word has flown, now that I need them.”

  Sira shook her head, looking shamefaced.

  “I’m no better,” she explained. “Her convulsions sent me into a panic, and I’ve forgotten all I ever knew about childbirth—and what I knew wasn’t much.”

  “What you people need is a First Aid Course,” Joaley said, digging in the bag. “Once you’ve been taught stuff, your confidence levels just soar. You feel like you can handle things, and that can make all the difference.”

  She found what she was looking for, wrapped in pristine white cloth, and while the other women held Kaya’s thighs apart, she checked the dilation of the cervix.

  “Lots of time still,” she said, sighing with relief, when she had straightened again. “She only a few centimetres dilated. The convulsions are convulsions, and not labour yet. We’ll have time to try to deal with them before her pains begin—at least I hope so.

  “Kati, if you and Zass can get into her mind and find out what that’s all about, maybe I can help Cathe and Sira get things ready for the actual birth. First of all, we’ll need boiling water—to sterilize the speculum once again, among other things.”

  While Joaley set about organizing the birthing area, Kati arranged herself and Zass on either side of the pregnant woman’s pallet. She asked Mathilde to sit at Kaya’s head, to keep an eye on things, especially in case there would be another convulsion. If there was one, Kati told the girl, she ought to alert Joaley immediately, since she knew how to keep Kaya safe.

  “Zass, see if you can follow my mind into hers,” Kati then said to the Klenser youth who nodded at her seriously.

  Kati took a deep breath. How had Master Healer Vorlund done it? The Granda would know, she decided, drawing the image of the brown-robed monk to the front of her mind.

  “You’re going to have lots of help,” The Monk subvocalized to her. “The Forest Spirit has penetrated a wisp of itself in here, and we have the boy. And the consciousnesses of the other Klensers in the room are connected to the Spirit; I think that they will help, too. As I see it, the trouble is that the woman bearing the child is psychically running away from the reality of the coming birth. Can you sense her cringing away, even from the Forest Spirit which delights in all the births that happen within its domains?”

  As Kati examined the knot of pain that was the mind of the pregnant Klenser woman, she realized the truth of what the Granda was telling her. Unlike the psyches of the other Klensers in the room, Kaya was not in any way in touch with the Forest Spirit, even though it
was dangling strands of itself to her, as if to entice her make contact. Instead, the woman’s mind was reacting to what had to be remembered abuses and terrors; she had mentally curled in on herself.

  “I’ll have to try to go in to find out what happened to her, and to try to straighten her out,” she told The Monk, checking to make sure that Zass, too, was aware of her intent.

  She was glad to note that the youth, with the exuberance of his age, did not seem to find the notion daunting.

  “The Spirit of the Forest will help me to follow,” he told her.

  Zass and the Forest Spirit had developed a remarkable rapport, apparently. Which was all to the good.

  “How did Master Healer Vorlund do this with Kerris?” Kati directed the query to The Monk.

  “Follow me,” The Monk subvocalized back to her, sending her an image of himself, brown-robed, walking steadily towards the tangled knot of emotions which was Kaya’s mind.

  Kati pictured herself following him into what looked like a confusion of weeds, underbrush, and deformed trees. The poor young woman, she thought. Was this mess the result of whatever Kaya had been through, or was her mind setting up defences to keep the latest intruders—the Granda, herself and Zass—at bay? Or was it a combination of the two?

  “The Master Healer healed all the wrongs in Kerris’ mind,” the Granda subvocalized as he reached the thicket. “I don’t think that there’s any way we can rid her of all of this. What’s most important?”

  “We need to find the reason for the convulsions,” Kati replied. “Whether it’s a mental problem or a physical one. The rest can wait.”

  “The way this looks, the original cause will have been mental, emotional, psychic, what have you,” The Monk said, with a head-shake. “This lady has a plenty messed-up mind.”

  “She has suffered a lot of abuse,” a mental voice which Kati did not recognize said behind her.

  She turned her attention towards it, to realize that five mental strands had entwined with those of the Forest Spirit, to ride with it into the “landscape”, next to Zass. They had to be the other Klensers in the room! Of course, they were Kaya’s roommates, and would be concerned for her!