The Inosculation Syndrome

by D. B. Reynolds-Moreton

  The steady pad pad of the large cat like creature could be heard by the little ones before Kal picked it up, and he took his cue from them.

  The cat came into the clearing, looking around for the thing that smelt of food, and seeing the little person at the edge of the rift, bounded forward to grasp its prey. As it launched itself for the final killing strike, Kal gave the signal, and the group on the rope threw themselves off the other side of the wagon.

  The bait was also attached to the rope that lifted the back edge of the bronze plates, and as the plates lifted, tipping the cat into the rift, the bait was swung up into the wagon.

  Kal jumped down along with several others, and ran over to the rift. The cat was some three metres down the cleft in the rocks and was sounding it’s fury at losing its evening meal, and being jammed in the rocks into the bargain.

  The sound alone would have put most people Kal knew off any further action.

  It seemed a shame to do it, but Kal knew that it had to be done, and drove his bronze tipped spear hard down into the neck of the beast hoping to break the spinal cord.

  His spear was followed by at least six others, not thrown with as much force as his, but putting the finishing touches to the death of the giant killing machine in the rift.

  They were all shaking after the event, Kal more so than the little people. He did his best to tell them how brave he thought they were, especially the ‘bait’ and those who jumped over the side of the wagon; it was difficult using pictures, but he did his best.

  They all slept quite well that night, but memories of the beast filled more than a few dreams.

  Having made such a success of the cat incident, he thought it worth trying again to persuade the others to co-operate in filling in the rift, so enabling them to go on their way.

  A team had gone along the rift to see if there was a point where they could cross, but came back without finding one. This was apparently the closest the rift got to a bridging point, and they had found it by pure luck.

  Early next morning the rock filling began. The first thing to do was to roll the biggest rocks they could find into the rift so as to form a jam part way down, and then fill up to the top of the rift with more manageable stones.

  The steam wagon, with the aid of ropes, dragged the largest rocks as close to the edge as possible and sheer manpower moved them the rest of the way.

  By midday, the larger rocks had wedged themselves across the awful drop and the filling in had begun. It would be the following day before they would have enough material in place to risk taking the wagon over.

  The time came for the great test of their hard work, and no way would they let Kal drive the wagon, so most of the crew including Kal assembled on the other side of the rift as the mighty wagon chugged into position, and they all held their breath as it slowly inched forward.

  The wagon was halfway across when there was a loud crack, and the wagon gave a lurch, but the bridge held and she was safely over to the other side. The crew were overjoyed, and this time the emotion was unmistakable, as Kal joined in the merriment. Once again he had proved his worth, and felt more at one with the team than he had for some time.

  The food stocks were checked, and water sticks added to supplement the remaining water supply in the tanks, and then they were off on the homeward trail.

  Kal could not believe that they had travelled around in a circle, and not spotted the fact.

  A compass would have shown this up, but even so, he thought it very strange that they had arrived at the point on the planet’s surface where he had landed the shuttle. It could have been by chance, but somehow he didn’t think so.

  The vegetation was now changing to that which they were all a little more familiar with, and home didn’t seem to be too far way, although the journey would take them nearly five days.

  After leaving the rift behind, the wagon was on a downhill course to the lower plateau, and this meant a detour out of their intended way.

  The going was good, and time rolled by without any mishaps, apart from the occasional bit of road building where gullies had formed from heavy rainfall.

  Everyone was feeling much more relaxed, and the evening games began again, although Kal still couldn’t make out how they scored, or even if they did score.

  So far, Kal had not seen a drop of rain, and only a few clouds, usually towards evening.

  ‘So when did it rain?’ he wondered. There must be rain sometime, as the vegetation couldn’t go on forever without water, and then there were those gullies, they had been cut by a strong water flow.

  As there didn’t seem to be any seasons as such, he couldn’t put it down to being wet in the winter, or whatever passed for winter on this planet. It played on his mind from time to time as one of those little things that didn’t quite add up.

  One evening, in the far distance they could see the cliffs of the compound in the pink of the setting sun. Some of the little people were all for trying a night journey, but the oil lights were not really good enough for this, and common sense prevailed for the safety of all.

  Next day was a different matter. The wagon had steam up at the crack of dawn, and the early morning meal was bolted down rather than eaten so that they could get away quickly, and hopefully be home by evening.

  As they approached the area of the compound, Kal wondered just how long they had been away. The whole place had changed.

  There were now quite good tracks linking the garden areas together, and a wide main road going up the middle to the compound. Even this had changed, as it was now much bigger, and a form of ornamental battlement had been added to the heightened encompassing walls.

  Kal had to admit that it did look very impressive as well as being safer against just about anything he had seen in the way of wild life.

  The whole area had been expanded to nearly three times the size it was when they left on their journey of exploration, and many other improvements made, which in time were to make Kal blink in astonishment.

  The rate at which these people were progressing would have been a threat to any other race, had there been one.

  With the chimney belching steam and sparks as they made their way towards the settlement under full power, a welcoming committee was on its way out to meet them.

  A chorus of squeaks and whistles almost drowned out the noise of the steam wagon as it rattled along the last few hundred metres.

  As they reached the beginning of the main track to the compound, Kal had to reduce speed as he was concerned for the crowd which had clustered around the wagon, waving and calling to those on board.

  This was an overwhelming welcome if ever there was one, and the intensity of it surprised him as this was raw emotion in full flood, which he had never seen before in the little people.

  At long last the steam wagon was back in the compound, the fires raked out, and the samples they had collected stowed away in the cave reserved for such things.

  By now it was quite dark, but the compound was a blaze of light from oil lamps and another light source which Kal hadn’t seen before.

  Tonight was going to be one to remember by the look of things he thought, as he sat down at a long table on a raised platform along with the rest of the crew and some of the old committee. Below them everyone else had gathered, and the feast began.

  For the first time since being with the little people, his food had been prepared for him, and he carefully checked it to make sure that they had only used things which he knew to be safe. As usual, they had got it right, so he tucked in to a meal that he would remember for a long time to come.

  After the feast, it was time for the speeches, or rather for the crew to tell their tales of the long adventure.

  Although he couldn’t understand a word of it, he could get the gist of what was being said. The main elder made a welcoming speech which was roundly applauded, and this was followed by the leader of the expedition giving his reply.

  All Kal could do was stand up and wave his a
rms about and smile, at what he thought were the appropriate moments.

  Several other members of the crew then stood up and squeaked and whistled their versions of the various events that had taken place on the journey, with many references to Kal, who felt obliged to stand up and do a little bow every now and again when all the attention was focused upon him.

  It was indeed a night to remember, and well into dawn before they all retired to get a little rest, if they could.

  Kal found it difficult to sleep; the images of the evening and of the perilous incidents of their adventure kept coming back, running like a series of films before his closed eyes. Eventually he dozed off, only to dream, and that was worse.

  Electricity

  The next day seemed like an anticlimax to Kal, and he supposed it must have also affected the rest of the crew, although they seemed quite cheerful when he met then at the steam wagon.

  He had not really taken a good look at the works of the new and improved steam wagon before, as everything had been a bit of a rush going out on the expedition, and their time was mostly taken up surviving the hazards along the way, or driving along recovering from the previous incident.

  He was amazed at the simplicity of the whole thing, as it only consisted of a firebox and water boiler coupled to a steam regulator valve which sent the steam on to a pair of crude cylinders and pistons. These in turn, were linked up to a crank on the main drive shaft with a rather complicated system of levers and gears.

  The main frame of the wagon was made from cast beams and riveted together, upon which the engine was mounted along with a water tank for the steam boiler and a fuel bin.

  The steering mechanism would have won prizes for novelty if nothing else, but it worked, and had done them very good service indeed. His respect for the ingenuity of the little people went up several notches.

  Accommodation was rather crude as it only consisted of benches of wood, placed wherever there was a space big enough to put them, and some were placed where Kal would not have liked to sleep.

  Every nook and cranny was filled with a cupboard or storage space for the food and a simple collection of tools and weapons.

  As they had been able to work out how to build the wagon based only on the very basic principles which he had demonstrated to them over the preceding months, what would they be capable of if they had access to a good scientific field of data and a fully equipped workshop.

  ‘Space travel in about six months’ Kal thought wryly.

  As Kal moved about the compound looking at the new additions which had been made to the water wheel and foundry, he noticed that the workers, if it was possible, stopped work and stood respectfully by their equipment while he inspected it. He wondered what this new attitude of respect was all about, as they rarely did anything without a good reason. It was only just noticeable, but it was there, and he didn’t really like it, as something must be brewing and he wasn’t in on it, yet.

  The glass makers had advanced their skills beyond anything he had ever seen, and as well as having taken the art of glass blowing to extreme heights, had now developed some beautiful glazes which were being used by the ceramics team.

  As yet they had not gone in for building houses, but what they had done was to extend the cave system beyond all recognition, cutting back and up into the mountain.

  The rooms were now on four levels, joined up by passageways such that each room looked out onto the compound and had top hung windows which opened.

  It had been discovered that once the initial surface of the sandstone like rock had been broken into, the rock behind it was relatively easy to cut with bronze tools, while the new surface hardened over in a few days once exposed to air.

  With so many willing hands, the system had been expanded almost to the level of a small city.

  On the other side of the linking corridors, store rooms had been cut from the rock, so that every room had its own store for food and anything else that was not in daily use.

  The steam engine idea had been developed to make small wagons that had a crew of five to ten and a box like storage space at the rear. These were used for food and material gathering, and a larger version for transporting people around the field system.

  The new wagons were a little more sophisticated than the original one used for the expedition, and a lot faster.

  Some days later, Kal was asked to a meeting of the elders and was presented with the child he had unwittingly produced. It had grown considerably, and was now walking quite well.

  It was obviously a mixture of the two races, and Kal had to admit that it carried more of his genes than its mothers, and without wishing to be prejudiced, was more human like than the little people.

  He had long ago dropped the idea that they were nearer to an animal than anything else, as they had developed mentally to such a marked degree. It was only their looks that had brought about that unfortunate simile.

  Once the niceties were out of the way, out came the sketch blocks, and the benefit to all concerned for the continuance of the cross breeding program was illustrated to him in no uncertain manner.

  Kal hesitated before giving his answer to the proposal, as it did make sense and would produce a much superior race. If they were willing to lose their racial identity for the sake of a new and more able breed, then he should also give it some considerable attention.

  He indicated his thoughts on the matter to the best of his ability, and luckily they seemed to accept it. ‘At least for the time being’ he thought.

  The smelters had not been idle while he had been away. They had successfully extracted silver, tin, lead and of course copper, and in quantity, which was stock piled for future use in billet and bar form.

  The main problem with all this smelting was that they had to go some distance to harvest the wood for charcoal, and that was now holding back production.

  Kal wondered if another means of producing heat could be devised, and toyed with the idea of electricity, but the problem with that was he didn’t have any copper wire, or the means with which to make the copper billets into the wire needed to wind a generator.

  He put the idea across to the smelters and forgers to see if they could come up with something, feeling sure they would, if past experience was anything to go by.

  A meeting was held, and the sketch blocks flew back and forth for some time, but no earth shaking breakthrough was forthcoming. It would, no doubt, given enough time.

  The water system had been improved, and every cave now had its own supply, complete with a tap. A waste system was also installed, and the contents were piped out of the compound and into a seemingly bottomless pit they had discovered at the edge of the field system. All in all, things were taking on a very civilized state of being.

  The little people had not devised any form of barter or monetary exchange. They all had a job to do, or so it seemed, and no one person was responsible for asking them to do it as far as he could tell.

  Every one of them proved to be a willing worker for the good of all. If a job needed doing, then someone would do it, without being asked. Some were better at some things than others, while some, he suspected swapped jobs every so often, and the whole system worked very well.

  Whether they generally rotated their jobs around, Kal couldn’t tell, as they all looked so much alike, with only a few having distinguishing marks that he could recognize.

  There was no election of a leader or of the council of elders, as he liked to think of them. They just seemed to take on the post, and carry out their duties as if they had done it all their lives.

  There may well have been some form of election among the little people, but Kal missed it if it had occurred, which he very much doubted somehow.

  As there didn’t seem to be any seasons here, there was no need to store the fruits, berries, and other foods for long, as supplies were always replenished as they were needed.

  A few more foods that Kal could eat safely were added to his diet by his ‘cave k
eeper’ as he thought of her/him or whatever, and so far he had suffered no ill effects from the additions.

  Life was settling down again to a nice steady routine, and although he missed the excitement of the expedition, it was very pleasant to relax a little, and think about things for a while, and there was a lot to think about.

  But no matter how well organized one gets, such things don’t last for very long, as he was about to find out.

  If they were to make an electric generator, then they would need iron, or some other magnetic material. So far, Kal had seen no sign of iron ore, and that had been disappointing, but then he doubted if they would be able to smelt it, because of the very high temperatures required.

  He was rummaging about in the cave containing the materials they had found on their various journeys, when he came across one of the very heavy black crystalline rocks which had been brought in some time ago.

  Kal had found no use for it until now, and wondered what it was, as it didn’t fit into any known ore group he could recall. It was very heavy for its size, and deep down in his memory, it rang a bell.

  If it was magnetic, it showed no trace of wanting to cling to the other pieces of the same material, so maybe it was electromagnetic, taking on the properties of a magnet when in an electric field. But how was he going to generate an electric field?

  This was the typical chicken and egg situation, but it would have to be overcome somehow if progress was to be made.

  A visit to the forgers and smelters got him under way with his generator project with regard to the copper wire.

  They had managed to beat out a bar of copper to a very thin rod, annealing it every now and again to re-soften it, and were in the process of drawing it through a hole in a piece of hardened bronze to reduce its diameter still further.

  This was repeated several times using smaller and smaller holes, until he had his copper wire, not quite up to the quality he was used to, but serviceable none the less.

  The next thing which had to be done was to coat it with an insulating layer of varnish, and he knew that was going to be a little more difficult.