by Don P. Bick
Chapter 10
The flowers were well tended along the walkway to the small wooden lift that served the tree house. In fact, the flowers along all the walkways in the village were well cared for, as were all the other plants and shrubs throughout the village and surrounding areas. To beautify was a way of life here. And it definitely was beautiful.
There were sculptured shrubs and manicured trees everywhere. The flowers were of all sizes, colors, shapes and heights, but grown together in such a way it was as if they were special flower arrangements. They definitely were not planted haphazardly.
Ve-Nah stood up from kneeling in the flower bed where she had been working. Brushing the dirt from her knees she looked down at her freshly planted Hurriets. She smiled to herself. Life was good here, although she sometimes missed her life back on Venus.
Ve-Nah had arrived nearly four months ago now. She had died in a gas cloud explosion. Although they did happen on Venus, they were rare. Usually, they didn't happen in or near the mountains, which was where she and her class were on a field study trip. The explosion undoubtedly killed the entire class, the instructors and everyone else within at least fifty miles of where they had been. No one could have escaped it. But no one else had come to this land with her, which made her wonder why she was brought here and they weren't. It was hard for her to believe she was the only one to be transported to this world out of all those who had died at the same time.
Although none of the others had come to this land with her, she did know of another Venetian who had arrived here during the past year. Having just arrived posed a unique problem for the two. Her mind went back over what she'd been told about the possible decision they were going to have to make. This morning a resolution to this situation was her major concern.
Word had come that a quest for some other land or something was being organized by a person from Earth. A message had arrived yesterday for her to come to the High One's tree palace. The other Venetian who had arrived this year had also been summoned. They were both told that one of them would possibly be joining the troupe involved in the quest, a Venetian might be chosen based on the outcome seen at the Gateway to the Stones a few days earlier. The High One had heard of the Gateway to the Stones, but knew little about it. The two new arrivals were to decide between them which one of them would join the group, should one of them be called upon to do so. The High One did not know the results of the process at the Gateway so was not positive if a Venetian was in fact needed for the quest.
The problem was neither of them wanted to go. Sure, Ve-nah thought the idea of doing some traveling was nice; however, there was danger to this quest, as the High One had pointed out. The attempt on the life of the man from Earth on the Isle of Flowers was one example. She didn't believe in violence of any kind. And she wanted no part of any quest that would be involved in those kinds of activities.
That was what was bothering her this morning. Should neither of them be able to decide who would go, the High One or the quest members would decide, if they came to her village. Ve-Kim, the other woman, wanted to stay near her new found male friend as much as Ve-nah wanted to stay away from the potential violence. Neither of them wanted to be the one to leave their newly created lives behind. In her brief moments of selfishness she thought, why should she have to go, she had just died. Didn't that mean she deserved a break and a rest for at least a little while? Unfortunately, she also knew everyone else in this new world had also died, many recently, so who was she to get a break and rest over anyone else?
Walking over to the wooden lift that served the tree house, she stepped inside. She pulled the rope connected to the latch on the water tank. This tank of water acted as the ballast, to counterbalance the weight of the lift and the dead weight that raises it. When the latch moved, the water began to drain from the tank onto the slab of stone beneath that side of the lift, and down into the small pool in the garden at the base of the tree. As the lift became lighter with less weight in the tank, the dead weight suspended up at the tree house slowly lowered, raising the lift. At the point Ve-Nah started to rise, she began to regulate the spring loaded latch, to slow down and monitor the water flow. In that way her rate of ascent could be regulated. The less water in the tank, the faster she would go up.
The dead weight, which was a bag constructed from a tree leaf, was filled with sand. She always noticed this bag was larger than she was as it passed her on the way up. When she neared the top of her travel, the lift would hit two soft spring-like brakes. These brakes were set at an angle to the upward motion of the lift and contacted the top edges. As the lift pushed on these wedges, the upward movement gradually slowed until it came to a complete stop. The floor of the lift stopped at the same level as the floor in the tree house.
There was lots of water in the area and the tree house had a built in wooden hand pump. A unique drainage system was also built into the tree house and consisted of wooden pipe attached to the tree trunk. It ran out of the tree house, down the drainage pipe and into an underground tank. The tank fed several drainage lines out into the flower, fruit and vegetable gardens.
Stepping off the lift Ve-Nah immediately looked to make sure the storage tank near the lift was filled with water. This tank was used to fill the lift tank again when the lift was needed to descend. The amount of water would vary depending upon the load going down. The tank would be filled until the lift started to go down, with a little extra for insurance. There was a similar tank at the bottom. At times, the lift would carry down so much weight the water tank would hardly need any water. Before unloading the lift at the bottom, the tank on the lift had to be filled to keep the lift on the ground.
The tree house was also served by a long series of stairs, switch-backing up the side of the tree trunk. It was like a series of Z's. At each angle there was a pull down ladder. You would walk under the extension, turn around and pull it down in front of you, to continue on up. It was a long trip and not any fun. The stairs would only be used in the event of an emergency. Ve-Nah had only had to use them once. She never wanted to do it again.
It had been her fault for not tightly closing the latch to the valve on the water tank, which served the lift tank. During the night the water gradually leaked into the lift tank until enough weight was in the lift to send it to the ground. There were no leaks in the tank on the lift so when Ve-Nah got up the next morning there was the lift, sitting down on the ground. And that wasn't the worst part of the ordeal that morning.
After negotiating all those steps, she found out there was also a way to throw a couple more bags of sand in the sand bag to increase the weight enough to raise the lift, even if the water tank was full. It had been designed that way. The water tank could never itself hold more weight than the sandbag at her disposal up in the tree house. Anyway, that was her second week in this strange new land. It hadn't happened to her again and she was determined that it never would.
The tree house was three to four stories above the ground. The one she lived in was built in the shape of a V between two branches, about fifty feet out from the tree trunk. Some of these houses were built into natural hollows in the trees and in a couple of rare cases the bark was hollowed into to create a site to build.
The trees were so deeply rooted and solid in the ground, and were so massive in size, that the tree houses never even swayed under the heaviest weather conditions. The tree also acted as an umbrella to the sometimes very heavy rain in this area, as well as protecting them from any possible night creatures. Attacks were rare but seemed to be on the increase. These shelters insured them their safety, not to mention their comfort.
Ve-Nah liked it in her tree home. From the window in her kitchen she could see far down the hill, into the main part of the settlement. There wasn't what you would call a downtown area in the village of Pod, as this place was called. The Venetians lived very simply, growing what they ate and creating or building most of what they used. The members of the village helped each other whenever th
ey were needed. Ve-Nah not only felt comfortable here, she also felt a sense of belonging in Pod.
Along with the kitchen, the tree house had a living room, study and loft bedroom, as well as a utility room. In the corner of the living room there was a counter window looking straight down to the ground below. The window was handy when someone came calling and Ve-Nah wasn't yet dressed or presentable. Alongside the glass was a port she could open to talk with whoever was below.
Walking into the utility room, which was also the bathroom, Ve-Nah looked at herself in the mirror as she washed her hands in the washbowl. Her hair needed washing she thought, looking at the long auburn hair cascading over her shoulders. Ve-Nah was 5' 4'' tall, slim waist, with soft cream colored skin. Her eyes were striking. They were brilliant blue, almost as though a light shone from behind them. As far as her looks went she considered herself plain and average, at least as far as other Venetians were concerned. Hanging up the towel she left the utility room and walked into the kitchen to get some fruit to eat.
The tree house was surrounded by decking. There was several times the square footage in decks as there was in the entire house. There was also a wooden walkway, complete with railings, going out one of the branches the house had been built between. The walkway ended at a wide bulge in the branch. This bulge rose up higher than the branch and formed sort of a platform. A few steps up to this natural platform a gazebo type arrangement was set up. There were chairs and a couple of tables, as well as a small brick lined fire pit. These trees were so immense the next highest branch above was quite far away, so the fire pit posed no real danger of starting a fire. Actually the fire would have been like trying to start a large tree on fire by holding a small match to the tree trunk. Anyway, the view from this platform was tremendous. It was a very nice place to live.
The community was built in the foothills of the mountains. The platform had a view down the valley and out to the lower land below. On a clear day it was possible to see all the way to the sea, even though that was over a hundred miles in the distance.
This tree house was not fancy or modern compared to many of the ones in the settlement. In fact, this particular home was well over two hundred years old. The community kept building tree houses to take care of the needs of the ones who would come. The newer homes went to those with the most seniority. Not all of the people in the community lived in tree houses, however. Some didn't want the hassle of the lift; others didn't like heights, while some few were disabled and not physically capable of living in or tending to one of these homes.
The air was clear here compared to back home, thought Ve-Nah, once again bringing herself back to the problem confronting her. She took off her shoes and leaned back in the chair in the living room. She sat quietly eating her fruit and thinking about the decision facing her. She couldn't come up with any answer other than she didn't want to go. She loved it here, was happy and content and didn't want to make a change. But she knew one of them might have to go, like it or not.