“Yes.”
“Can you take me back to where I was abducted?”
“Yes. But I will not. I want to help you save all those people. If you are again a prisoner of the norms, I cannot help you. Do you have a name you want me to call you? I know what the norms were calling you, but using that term for you—well—that might be insulting. How do you wish to be addressed?”
“I am Janae, and you said your name is Siiri-Peter, but just what are you? I mean no disrespect, but your appearance is so misshapen, from what I know, yet you are nearly identical to the one who carried me all the way here.” Janae was hoping Kimberly would understand what she was conveying. “Forgive me for being so blunt, but your eyes, ears, nose, mouth, and body all are vastly different from what I know of as human, yet you speak well, and you are intelligent, except for having your people abduct me, you have not harmed me. Not yet, anyway.”
“Two of our people died in freeing you,” Siiri-Peter stated. “Is relinquishing a life for others a sufficiently good deed to warrant the term human? Or do you think only your tribe and clan are worthy of that title?” There was no bitterness in Siiri-Peter’s words, just a deep resignation. “Our life spans are short, but still our lives are precious. Two were lost helping you escape.”
“Humans vary to a large degree, but I have seen nothing like your appearance, aside from—radiation?” Janae trembled as she spoke the word that all who lived in Dome 17 dreaded. Her mind flashed with lessons in school about the after-effects of the 90 Hour War, and the ruined populations on the old Earth.
“Yes, radiation is our creator,” Siiri-Peter answered. “A fairy god parent to all us, tants.”
“Tants?”
“Mutants who are resistant to the creative radiation,” it replied.
Janae involuntarily backed away, and wished to pull up her hood, and other accoutrements of the RAM suit, but she also knew that even without its full covering, she had a bubble of protection around her from the radiation absorbing materials. “Radiological mutations?”
“Indeed, that is our genesis. You, however, are in no danger here, not now. We have a way to stabilize the genetic drift, but it leaves us, well, as I and my chums appear. Now, from wince to you come?”
Kimberly the AI added to Janae, “Keep relaying as much information as you can. Ken is currently conversing with Butterfield about your captors. They are called tants, and are the enemies of the people of Ida. Ken says that Butterfield claims you will be used for breeding purposes.”
Janae shuddered, and with revulsion looked more closely at Siiri-Peter. She could not tell if the being was male or female.
“I will ask again, what habitat did you come from?” Siiri-Peter remained standing, but several others walked over and joined. They all looked nearly identical, except for one that was somewhat shorter and smaller. The same disfigurements were evident even on that younger one.
“You said you knew we came to the Trailblazer? Where do you think I came from?”
“Obviously, you came from one of the high-tech biomes. That leaves Ida, or Christianopolis, and you were in custody in Ida, so are you from Christianopolis? We were unaware they were doing much by way of exploration outside the Trailblazer.”
Janae bit her lip. She wondered how much to share, and felt overwhelmed by her own lack of knowledge. “There are eight habitats, right?” she offered. “How sure are you we did not come from a place unknown to you?”
“Interesting. Indeed, we do not know all places on all habitats. The norms are cruel, heartless, and evil. Our watches reported that you seemed different, but I have my doubts now. Some thought your Dome 17 must be a variant from the norms, but others disagreed. Our networks are in all habitats, since each connects to Axis Mundi, and we supply power to supplement all of the Trailblazer. Why are you so secretive? Where is this Dome 17 we have heard about? In which habitat? We know it is not part of Axis Mundi, just, where is it? Why is it threatened? Is it because you do not conform to the norm way, or because you want to dominate all the norms? You and the male seek to be a new queen and king?”
“If you give me my gear, I will show you where it is, and answer all your questions,” Janae stated. “Only, we must hurry. Dome 17 is in danger.”
“As I said, I am not aware of where your supplies were taken, but I can make a guess. Recovering them would be difficult. I will consult with our Outer Limits friends, and get back to you.” Siiri-Peter turned to leave.
“Outer Limits? Who are they?”
“Your feigned ignorance is hard to assess. I think it is not feigned, but real, genuine, which leads to other unanswered questions. Intriguing, absorbing, probing questions.”
“I can do nothing without my tools,” Janae crossed her arms and glared. “A worker needs the proper tools, especially if working on the outer limit of somewhere, right?”
“Outer Limits is not so much a place, but a state. I am an Outer Limits friend. Our order took its name from old-Earth records. In some habitats, our roles would be called scientists, in others sorcerers, or witches, or blasphemers, but we are more, and less than that. We call ourselves friends. Friends of each other, friends of the Trailblazer.”
“I do not understand,” Janae said.
In a clearly rehearsed voice, it said, “We of the Outer Limits are now controlling investigations. We search the horizontal and the vertical, and from tiny depth to immense expanse. We study things which can deluge someone with a thousand concepts, or expand one single idea to crystal clarity and far beyond. We shape the Trailblazer’s vision to anything our imagination can conceive, and our science can provide. Since the Encounter, there has been awe and mystery which reaches from the deepest hidden thoughts to the outer limits of our shared experiences.” With a gesture, of six-fingered hands, Siiri-Peter was dismissive of further elaboration. “You are free to remain here, or you may leave as you see fit. No one will guide you back to Ida, but you are not a prisoner here. What little comfort Axis Mundi offers is yours to share with us. Beware becoming lost in the labyrinth.”
Janae found herself standing alone in that strange cargo area.
13
Forest City
“I have told you all I care to say about the tants,” Butterfield huffed out yet another response.
“They took Janae! We must go after them!” Ken forcefully rebutted. “They looked like…,”
“Stop it. You have described them to me several times now. I have seen them with my own eyes, long before I met you. Quit babbling. Enough! Your friend is gone. No more talk of tants.”
Surrounded by four red security automacubes, Ken and Butterfield emerged from an elevator. The first thing Ken noted, which brought his attention back from pondering the things which had attacked him and Janae, was the smell. His nostrils flared as they were assailed by so much aroma, not all of which was pleasant.
Looking about as he followed Butterfield, and still flanked by the security machines, he walked out and into the biome he had only seen through the window in the isolation condominium. The sight was amazing. Huge structures, taller than Dome 17, but more angular, rose in front of him. They were the buildings he had seen, but he was now on the ground level, and they reached toward the ceiling so far overhead.
Almost as if they had not been in a heated discussion, Butterfield spoke, “You will strain your pretty neck if you keep staring up at the sky tube like that. Your home habitat must have a similar look, for solar mimicry is in all eight habitats. I forget which one you came from. Or was it Axis Mundi?”
Ken sighed. He really wanted to turn around and rush back to chase after Janae, but he knew Butterfield and the red machines would not let him. “I was admiring these immense structures. I see they are constructed, but there is an abundance of growing things on them as well. And I see flying creatures, soaring, gliding, swooping, cackling. Such variety and colors. What do they all do?”
Butterfield look back at Ken, “They live. Just as I do, and as you do, and as your
friend did.”
Ken paused. Again, Butterfield was stating that Janae was dead, yet Kimberly kept giving him updated reports on her condition, and she was very much alive. Ken wanted to ask the AI Kimberly for more details about Janae, but could not compose a cryptic phrase to do so. He had over-described things for Kimberly’s sake, but he was frustrated, growing desperate, and very worried. “Janae?”
Butterfield stepped back and stroked Ken’s cheek, “Oh, do not grieve so much. We can hope her death was swift.”
“You are confident she died?” Ken managed to say. “If only I could talk to her again, tell her my feelings, or whatever else I had come to mind.”
“She is dead. If alive, she is now a thrall to the tants. If she is not dead now, she wishes she were. No one who is ever taken by the tants comes back. Not a single one,” Butterfield stated, as she looked intently at Ken. Her russet eyes were piercing. “I pray she died quickly, but I doubt she did. It is too ghastly to ruminate.”
Tears welled up in his eyes, even though Ken seriously doubted what Butterfield was saying. He kept his thoughts to himself. He was still overwhelmed by the flying creatures which were soaring back and forth among the foliage. To finally see a living biome, up close, but without Janae.
As they walked along smoothly paved paths, which had short green foliage growing alongside them, Ken noted that the other people they encountered resembled Butterfield’s dress and bodily decorations. The females all had the red blaze of decorative color, horizontally across their eyes, eyebrows, and cheeks. That blaze ended in front of the ears. The males had a stripe of white covering that same part of their faces. Each person had slightly different variations on the decorative colors for his or her lips. While Butterfield’s garments were more outlandish in colors than most, all the people wore billowy, flowing kinds of robes. Even the children were so clothed, and marked with colors on their faces.
“Butterfield? I would still like to have my tools, if you would be so kind.”
She rolled her head and laughed a bit. “Oh Ken, I told you those props were just fakes. My conservation slate reports all of them as being in disposal.”
“Would you take me to where they are? It is important to me, please.”
“Dear, sweet Ken, sweet and ignorant Ken. Disposal is where things are sent which are worthless and unneeded. Like your friend Janae, they are gone. Gone is gone. Now just ahead is your new abode.” She walked toward one of the towering buildings. Ken could not tell if it was the same building he had seen from the window, but it was the same style. He had not been able to spot where the window was in the vast wall behind him, nor had he been able to keep track of their location as they moved through the corridors, especially after they were attacked.
“I am to live in there?” Ken asked.
“Yes, the Benefactor has seen fit to assign you a studio in this tower. You are the newest resident of Forest City’s Cedar Tower. It is quite the honor for you,” she replied. “I rather thought you would be put on one of the outlying farms, or orchards. I suppose my requesting you be near me, helped somewhat.” She grinned at Ken and pouted her lips. Then without warned she reached over and squeezed his buttocks. “I will take good care of my little Ken, do not worry your pretty head.”
The red automacubes kept pace with them until they reached the main entrance to the tower. Ken looked up, and his neck could barely bend far enough back to look so far upward. Glancing back the way they had come, he saw the sidewall of the habitat. It stretched way into the distance upward and sideways, and seemed to arch over to meet the illumination source that Butterfield called the sky tube. Ken knew from his time in the isolation condominium, that the sky tube lit up at what he thought of as dawn, and faded out at evening. His body had adjusted better to that circadian sleep-cycle than it had to the exotic foods.
“How tall is this tower?” Ken asked.
“Ken, dear, do not be petty. I know this tower is only a hundred meters tall, but you cannot expect to be in the big ones right away. You are new here. Now, when you have completed your remedial education, the Benefactor might reconsider your assignment.” She stroked Ken’s cheek, and not-so-subtlety licked her painted lips. “I will help you with all that. Trust me.”
“But those things which took Janae. What…,”
“Enough already! Ken, you have protection now. We will not talk of the tants again, we did that too much in the elevator here already. Now come along, you are not the only thing on my agenda today, and I must make reports.”
Butterfield led Ken into the building. The security automacubes rolled away. There were trees and flowers and shrubs on nearly every available surface—on the decks outside the patio doors, and in planters, and boxes, and in hanging baskets. Some tiny things flew across Ken’s face, and he was unsure what they were. Swatting at them, he heard a small buzzing noise as they darted away.
The lobby of the tower had more people than Ken had seen leaving Dome 17, and many gave him curious looks, but when they saw who he was with, most of them averted their eyes and looked elsewhere. Butterfield commanded their respect, and Ken took note of that fact.
“Mother, why is that man dressed so silly?” a small child said as she pointed at Ken. “He is nearly naked.”
Ken looked down at himself in reflex, and he was still wearing the RAM suit which covered nearly all of his body.
“Hush, darling, obviously the man is being taken somewhere so he can be appropriately dressed,” the mother explained. “Do not point at social misfits, it is impolite and uncivil.”
“But mother, it is rude to show a naked face, just rude, you told me that yourself,” the child repeated. “Only tants are so barbaric as to be uncolored.”
The mother put a gentle hand across the child’s face, just below where the red decorations were across her eyes. The child tried to say something more, but the mother pulled her away and they were lost in the crowd.
Butterfield walked over to a bank of elevators, placed her hand on the wall, and a blue illuminated symbol surrounded her hand. That caused the elevator doors to open. Ken followed her into the elevator.
“Your studio is on the tenth floor, so you will have a nice view,” Butterfield stated.
On the tenth floor, Butterfield led Ken to another door. This one had a box next to it. That box was divided into nine different colored sections. “Your access code is red, yellow, green. Do not forget that.”
“Red, yellow, green,” Ken parroted back. He was finding that being submissive to Butterfield in his tones resulted in her offering more information.
The studio was about eight meters wide, and ten meters deep. A square table and four chairs were in the very center of the room. Along the far side was a sliding door made of clear permalloy, next to an equal size window of the same tough materials. There was a large bed in one corner, a countertop area with sink in another corner, and set as an angle, was a wall in the opposite corner with an open door. Toileting facilities were visible beyond that. Light from the sky tube shone brightly in from those views to the outside. The other walls were off-white colored opaque permalloy. Beyond that patio door was a deck with green growing things in boxes.
“Adequate.” Butterfield walked over to the central table, and picked up a device. “This is your new conservation slate. It has tutorials—those are just basic lessons—about how to operate the studio. From using the lavatory, to cooking in the kitchenette, to how to tend your patio garden, you will need to study this. Just press your masculine hand on the small button here, and it will work with you. After you are acclimatized—that means you know how things work—I will advance you on a job assignment.”
“Thank you,” Ken replied.
Butterfield set the slate down and kissed Ken on the side of his face. “You had a hard day, sweetness. Take time to rest now. Soon, I will help you to look socially presentable. I know it is not your fault about how barren you appear. Do not let that child’s comments haunt your heart and soul. Appropria
te clothing is in that closet by the lavatory.” She gestured to a small door he had not noticed.
“Okay.”
“Until tomorrow then.” Butterfield turned and walked off. “I have to amend my report, and reassign that other studio which was to be used by your deceased associate.” She looked back briefly and gave a warm smile, which looked odd behind her painted lips. Then the door closed as she departed. The nine-section color pad on this side of the door flashed three times and then went dark.
Ken briskly abled to the door, remembering the code Butterfield had given him. When he put his hand on the nine-section color pad, a voice came on, “Access denied.” He tried it several times, but each attempt resulted in the same automatic refusal to cooperate.
Ken walked past the table, and over to the clear permalloy patio door. If he could not get out the main door, perhaps there was a stairway, ladder, or something from that patio. The door was not powered, but slid back as he pulled at its handle. Stepping onto the patio, again, Ken was amazed by the aromas which wafted from the plants all around him. None of them were familiar, and they were various shades of green, yellowish, and bluish, some having brown bark on their upright center stalks. A few had small pods of something hanging on them, while others had delicate flowers of white, pink, or orange. He searched the patio, which was surprisingly large, and wrapped around a part of the exterior of the building, yet while it had a waist-high railing around it, there was no exit. Peering over, he saw there was no safe way to climb down the side of the building. It was slick permalloy between the levels, and even with the various plants, trees, and shrubs, he was effectively prevented from leaving.
Tracking the Trailblazer (Colony Ship Trailblazer Book 1) Page 18