Ice Giants Wake!

by Gary J. Davies

  That included wolf and bear clan animals, which frightened him even though he had been told by Talking Owl to expect them and that they would not harm him. Clan leaders Running Bear and White Cloud sent them. Several members of each species individually approached and then quietly watched him for hours at a time and poked at him with their noses to get a good whiff of his scent - which usually included Old Spice deodorant. When Ed probed bear and wolf thoughts he was immediately aware of keen intelligence that although not at a human level was far superior to other wild animals.

  Wolf and bear thought patterns had odd twists to them, and were most strongly tied to immediate needs such as food. "NOT PREY" and "NOT RIVAL" were what they mostly thought repeatedly as they watched him, as though it was a notion that they were fixing more firmly in their minds. "FRIEND," he mostly thought fearfully back at them, though they seemed to be dismissive of that notion.

  "They become familiar with you and your thoughts," Talking Owl explained, "and you with theirs. They will tolerate and to some degree respect you now as a recognized Tribe member and acquaintance, but do not expect more without having to work for it. In that they are not so unlike humans. It takes time and effort to establish true friendships." Apparently romping and foraging for food with them for a time in the woods would be required for actual friendship, and Ed couldn't imagine that ever happening. For now Ed was perfectly satisfied not to be attacked and eaten by them.

  One day Ed found himself to be alone with grumpy Singing Moon in the Lodge. "As a white man born and raised, what do think of the notion of Stone-Coat giants, Ed Rumsfeld," she asked him.

  "To me it sounds like some sort of crazy myth," Ed replied. "But in pluralistic America you are free to believe whatever you want to believe."

  "I don't believe in Stone-Coats either," she admitted, surprising Ed. "Many in the Tribe no longer believe. The Stone-Coat myth keeps the Tribe from joining the modern world."

  "Your daughter Talking Owl believes in Stone-Coats."

  "She believes the web of nonsense that Turtle Man and Mouse maintain around themselves in this Great Lodge of deceit. Years ago they took my only child from me and brought her here to be further indoctrinated. But they have failed, for she remains honest. She does not claim to hear the Stone-Coats dream because they have died, if they ever lived at all. That is her truth that they refuse. Now they have brought you here to boost their waning power over the Tribe. You are supposed to lie and say that you hear Stone-Coats. Is that not what they pay you to do?"

  "I'm supposed to try to hear them, but I wouldn't lie about it."

  "If that is true I support your efforts, Ed Rumsfeld."

  "That's good to hear, Singing Moon."

  "But if you lie about it, that will be your last act on this Earth, white man!" Singing Moon said tersely, before she abruptly turned from him and walked away.

  "Swell," Ed figured.

  So far Ed hadn't distinguished any turtle thoughts, much less Stone-Coat thoughts. Of course Singing Moon was right: that Stone-Coat business was nonsense, it had to be. Maybe turtle talk was also nonsense. After all, people the world over swore that they talked with ghosts and gods and so-forth, without any objective evidence whatsoever. People could talk themselves into all sorts of crazy notions; they seemed to be wired such than many of them strongly needed to do so. Ed doubted that Stone-Coats were any more real than the Easter Bunny. However he had to admit that as he identified the thoughts of more and more forest creatures, the boundaries regarding what he believed to be possible were expanding significantly.

  In every direction he hiked Ed encountered jant thoughts. They had established at least a dozen queen-inhabited Reservation nests already, and like the Mohawk, were busily preparing for winter. And like Ed, they were expanding their telepathic abilities.

  What Ed learned, through their connection with him the Jants also learned. However they were reluctant to bite Mohawks in order to better read their thoughts; some of the Mohawk were naturally telepathic and might prove dangerous. They had encountered a few scattered telepathic humans elsewhere, but here there were more than a hundred concentrated in a single small community. Such a phenomenon deserved careful, cautious study. So did the Stone-Coats, if they existed. The jants were in no hurry. The jant collective mind was essentially immortal, and would exist as long as any of its colonies existed. However they decided that should bite a selected few members of the Tribe before winter sat in. As they studied Jerry, Ed, and countless thousands of other selected humans, they would now study the Tribe and its secrets.

  Every few days Ed met very briefly with Turtle Man, but the visits were becoming fewer and briefer. The old man was clearly fading towards death. Talking Owl made it clear to Ed that the visits were mostly to keep up the old man's spirits, and not to impart wisdom that would help him talk with turtles or Stone-Coats. He wished that he could give the old man better news. Like Talking Owl he could now telepathically connect with just about everything in the animal kingdom except turtles, but it was not enough.

  Doc and Jack focused on the plan to study the Bear Claw, aided by White Cloud, who turned out to be a mechanical engineer. "White Cloud, as thrilled as we are to study the artifact you do surely realize that this is an absurdly weak science team," began Doc.

  "Very weak, and with very limited equipment availability," agreed White Cloud, "which is why I'm here to help." He stepped up to the marker-board that he had brought from his administrative office in town. "First let's list our requirements," he suggested, in engineer-like fashion. "We need to hold what you white folks call a brainstorming session, first on requirements and then on design."

  "Despite our precautions what we do may be dangerous, so we should do the examination remote from any lodges," said Doc as White Cloud wrote 'isolation' on the marker board.

  "That will mean using some sort of stand-alone structure," Jack added. "A laboratory building."

  Under the 'design' column White cloud wrote 'lab' and underlined it. "We don't have the time or resources to construct a truly stand-alone self-sufficient lab complex," said White Cloud. "Frankly some in the Tribe, led by Singing Moon, oppose the use of any resources at all. Anyway, one practical trade-off is that the lab can't be very far from the resources of an existing lodge."

  "As a safely factor it should be possible to set the lab afire, and continue the resulting fire indefinitely without being overcome be the cold of winter," said Jack. "That suggests proximity to existing supplies of firewood and manpower. So you are right, White Cloud; the lab can't be overly remote from lodges."

  White Cloud annotated the lab entry with a 'close to lodge' note.

  "The object will have to be contained in some sort of container at all times," continued Doc. "We need to rigorously control what it comes into contact with."

  "And contain it if it becomes animated," added Jack.

  "It will eat what it is in contact with," said White Cloud, "especially if it is cold. The container structure must be renewable somehow. We have changed its location in the fireplace every few years, and replaced the stone blocks it rests upon. Otherwise over the centuries they crumble away." He wrote a great deal about the container under his design collumn.

  "And its temperature will need to be monitored and controlled and recorded at all times," White Cloud added. "There need to be observation devices within the containment box itself."

  "We need to write up a protocol on how to handle it and what we should do under various circumstances," noted Doc. "We don't want to be making up everything as we go along."

  "Besides, it will need to be monitored night and day," said Jack. "Several other Tribe members will be needed. Everyone involved will need to be familiar with the protocols."

  "We'll need measurement instruments, cameras and notebooks," said Doc. "We need hand tools and probes, needles and drills, chisels and hammers, water misters and microphones, fire extinguishers and propane torches."

  "Most of that already exists somewhere on
the Reservation, but we will need to purchase a few things," said White Cloud "And we need to do it immediately, before the snows cut us off from the outside world. We'll also need electricity 24-7. There is no power line from the outside world, but there are a few rechargeable nine-volt battery assemblies that we use in conjunction with solar panels, and more nine-volt direct current gizmo's than you'd imagine exist that were designed for truckers and RV folks. There are even a few gasoline powered backup power generators for full temporary A/C power, and a Tribe gasoline tank to draw fuel from."

  Planning went on for hours. White Cloud's efforts were indispensable. He took notes, knew what Tribe resources were available, did most of the design of the lab, and identified a suitable location for the lab not far from Turtle Man's lodge. Jack suspected that this was not the first time that White Cloud had thought about building a lab to examine the artifact.

  The next day the plans were presented to Tribe leadership and approved, though there was strident opposition from Singing Moon. Construction began immediately.

  A week after the induction of the four white outsiders into the Tribe, the lab was completed. On that day the snow began to fall again and this time it didn't stop for three days. Two feet of powdery snow was deposited everywhere on the Reservation, with six-foot deep drifts in some places. Winter had arrived.

  ****

  On a nearby ridge overlooking Turtle Man's Lodge and the lab construction, Running Bear watched and waited, propped against a tree trunk in a white outfit that rendered him virtually invisible to those he watched. The construction effort intrigued him. These Mohawks here were definitely up to something, but what? He took more photos and studied the construction efforts using high-powered binoculars.

  At the peak of construction as many as twenty Tribe members were diverted from other necessary duties to construct the new building. Compared to the huge dome and lodges nearby it was a very small building, but there were many solar panels arrayed nearby to provide power to it. Indeed half the solar panels of the Reservation had been relocated to power the new building. What could be so important and urgent?

  He carefully studied everyone who came and went, looking for Green. He identified only four white-skinned people, but none of them were Green. They were undoubtedly the Rumsfelds, the uncle, and the Reservation doctor. He continued taking photos and videos, and watching using his binoculars, even after the snows came. Now that the heavy snows had finally stopped, and he sensed that something important would soon happen at the new building.

  "I brought you hot soup, Running Bear," said a voice behind him abruptly.

  He span around so fast that he dropped his binoculars in the deep snow. Not ten feet from him stood Mouse: the damned mind-reading Mohawk witch-woman! She held a big thermos in her colorfully gloved little hands.

  "You have been thinking with so much disgust about the cold meals you eat that I grew concerned about your health," she said.

  "You read my thoughts, Old Mother?"

  "Since you arrived here ten days ago, Running Bear. We always keep track of trespassers. Come back to your tent with me and I'll feed you hot soup. It is venison and barley; your favorite."

  "You know too much about me!"

  "Only as much as we need to know in order to decide what to do with you."

  "And so you decided to feed me soup? Is it poison?"

  "I am hopefully not so poor a cook as that," she said, as she bent low and slipped into his tiny tent.

  After glancing about futilely for other Tribe members Running Bear followed her into his tent, and found her sitting at the far end of it, already pouring soup out of the thermos into two cups that she must have concealed in her robes. The aroma was incredible. He hadn't had good hot food for ten days, not since he began his long clandestine incursion into the Reservation. He had used trails that he learned about from the white Forty-Sevens Club members that had tried without success to reach and climb Giants' Rest Mountain. They were careless and were always stopped by the Mohawk Guards before they reached the Mountain.

  Running Bear was not careless. When possible he paralleled the trails instead of traveling directly on them. He made no fires or loud noises. He traveled mostly through the night using infrared goggles. He drove most of the way using a four-wheel all-terrain vehicle with a super quiet electric engine. He had indeed been very careful, but he had been discovered anyway. He might as well eat her soup, he decided. She probably had a dozen warriors with rifles hidden nearby to enforce whatever she wanted him to do.

  "No," she said, "there is only me here with you, Running Bear: a harmless little old woman with her thermos of tasty soup. Have some."

  Harmless? Running Bear doubted that!

  She handed a steaming cup of soup to him. The cup warmed his hand and the smell of it brought back fond old memories. His Mother and his Aunt used to make soup like this for him. His mother had made him this soup the last time he saw her alive. He watched as Mouse began to sip soup from her cup. Elders eat first, he thought, remembering his manners.

  "And then warriors," she said, finishing his thought. "You may now eat, young warrior."

  He sipped the soup. It was incredible!

  "Yes, it is true. I came to bribe you with my incredible soup, Bear Cub."

  He shook his head and smiled. "Bear Cub! I haven't been called that for many years!"

  "Yes, I know. And I know the promise that you made to your Mother years ago just before she died. It is a promise that you have kept for the last decade, to value the welfare of your Tribe and all Native Americans above all else."

  Running Bear could only nod his head. Like his father before him he had been wasting his life in his tribe's casino, drinking and womanizing, but on his last visit to his mother she had extracted the promise from him, a promise that at the time he had no intension of keeping. Indeed he was partying at the casino the night that she died alone. After that his previously ignored pledge to her somehow become the driving force in his life. He had never told anyone of it, but there were evidently no secrets to be kept from this woman. "What do you want of me, Old Mother?"

  "What did you think of the ceremony that we held the day that you arrived? The one that diverted you to camp away from the village and to instead spy upon this more isolated Lodge?"

  "You made the whites in your midst members of your Tribe, did you not? I was most impressed with the bears and wolves."

  "I was most impressed to detect you on our Reservation less than twenty-four hours after we removed you from it," said Mouse. "You must have traveled all night to accomplish such an amazing thing."

  "I like to challenge myself, Old Mother, but I was indeed just in time to witness the end of your ceremony that inducted the four whites."

  "And why do you think we did that?" she asked.

  "You must need them for some purpose that I have not yet determined. You have now constructed a strange and modern looking building for them."

  "Yes, and we obtained from them their pledge of secrecy. That is what we want from you, Running Bear. We want you to honor your pledge to your Mother by promising us not to divulge our secrets to anyone, especially the NSA. In return you will personally learn our secrets. You are an intensely curious man. That is what you want, isn't it?"

  "Perhaps. I have not told the NSA about the jants here, as that might cause them to invade your Reservation. Are there other secrets that you keep?"

  "You know that there are. Unless we discover otherwise, the jants are a white man problem. There are other secrets and responsibilities that are strictly Tribe business. Those secrets must remain with us. You must agree to this."

  Running Bear smiled. "Isn't that a bit perverse, to let me in on your secrets but forbid me from telling anyone about them? That would not be an easy thing."

  Mouse smiled back at him. "Who said that life is easy? Perhaps you have lived too much among the white man, Running Bear. "

  "I do not mind so much living here, Old Mother, beneath the stars
and among the trees and animals. It reminds me of my youth."

  Mouse smiled. "Accept our belated hospitality, Mohican. Come out of the cold to instead stay with us in our Great Lodge. We will talk further and I will make you more soup. Besides, I'm afraid that any alternative is much less attractive."

  ****

  The next day was colder yet but clear, and at mid-morning the Bear Claw was moved to the new laboratory building from the Dome of Elders of the Great Lodge. From the lab Ed, Mary, Mouse, Talking Bear and White Cloud watched as without ceremony it was carried towards the lab by six straining braves, trailed by anxious looking Jack and Doc. The artifact was contained in a sturdy steel box twice the size of a very large suitcase. Under it was a tray of hot coals, and around that was a canvas tent-like enclosure that kept out some of the cold. The whole apparatus weighed nearly three hundred pounds, and the artifact itself added roughly two-hundred pounds more.

  A path had been shoveled through the snow down to the ground such that the men did not risk slipping but their burden was heavy. When the six straining men were half-way to the lab from the lodge Ed and Mary were astonished to recognize that one of them was the New York State Border Guard John Running Bear!

  "Yes, it is indeed the man you knew as the Border Guard John Running Bear," Mouse confirmed.

  "Is he a Mohawk disguised as a Mohican disguised as a Border Guard?" Mary asked.

  "No, he is a Mohican disguised as an NSA agent now acting as a Mohawk," Mouse clarified, though the statement only further confused Ed and Mary. "Running Bear leads a complicated life, but he has recently wisely decided to join our cause for a time."

  "And he works for the NSA?" Ed asked. "Those are the guys that are looking for the jants and Jerry Green!"

  "Yes," said Mouse. "His NSA assignment is to follow you in the hope that you will lead them to Jerry Green."

  "But we have no idea where Jerry Green is!" Ed said.

  "True," said Mouse. "Right now John's true objective is to keep the NSA off the Reservation by being here himself. He has agreed to keep the jants here a secret from the NSA, and to keep our other secrets from the NSA also."