Silent Songs

by Kathleen O'Malley

  The trainer left them and K'heera turned back to her filters, to begin Bruce's training.

  "K'heera," he signed, his hands trembling slightly, "it's so good to see you!

  I've been so worried about you."

  The Simiu stared at him in open amazement. He was happy to see her?

  She'd thought he would hold her in total contempt for her submission. After all, wasn't it her capture that had alerted the aliens that there were other sentient beings on Trinity they could enslave?

  "I'm so sorry about your hearing," he apologized. "Don't worry. When we get out of this, Terran doctors can fix that."

  K'heera blinked slowly. When we get out of this? That kind of talk could get her punished. Didn't he understand that?

  "Let me show you this diagnostic machine," she signed.

  Bruce's brow furrowed, but he watched attentively as she went through the tutorial. "K'heera, are they drugging you?"

  Why did he insist on talking about things that weren't part of their training?

  "They tried to drug me," he told her, "but I was allergic, so they used fear conditioning instead . .. pretty effective, but it doesn't dull my mind. Are they drugging you?"

  "No," she signed finally. "I... had a long conditioning. They felt drugs were not necessary." Even talking about that time made her tremble.

  "You poor kid," Bruce signed, his face grim. "Don't worry, those bastards'll get theirs."

  She glanced around for the trainers. Seeing one eyeing them, she had Bruce go over the tutorial. As he did she tried to make it appear that her signs were correcting him. "You mustn't say things like that, Bruce. We could both be punished."

  "You're right," he admitted, "we'll have to be careful. But we're not alone, darlin'. And every passing day brings hope."

  Her throat tightened. Hope? Was he joking? "You mock me, human."

  "There is hope, K'heera! Tesa and Jib are still free. They're with Taller!"

  The Simiu trembled. "Don't you understand what'll happen if there's resistance? Don't you know who'll be hurt?"

  Bruce nodded. "Whoever they think will be the most effective 194

  persuader. I'm ready to take my lumps."

  "You don't know what you're saying!"

  "Yes, I do. I watched them brutalize Szu-yi"--his hands shook--"when I couldn't tell them where Jib and Tesa were. But we'll be careful, so they won't discover anything we do. And if they do catch us ... we'll just have to take what they dish out, till we bring this system down."

  K'heera had to fight the urge to call the trainer and confess Bruce's intent.

  "You can't do this. . . ."

  "We have to! We have to resist, little by little, like water striking a stone. We can't lose hope. We'll make it, day by day. We'll have to be clever, but we're good at that, being clever." His eyes shone. "You were right about the alien probe, kid. I followed your lead, removed its power cell, and used it to transmit a warning to the Brolga."

  A flash of nearly forgotten pride surged through K'heera. He'd followed her lead? He'd sent a warning. .. ? Reality crashed in again. New Terrans had been appearing on the work crews for days. She'd even seen one of the formerly haughty dram dancers among them. The Brolga had clearly been captured.

  Bruce understood her expression. "Yeah . .. they got the ship . . . but it still had time to boost our warning and send it out to the CLS! Don't you see, K'heera? You and I being teamed together is incredibly fortunate.

  Separately, we might've done a little damage, but together. . . ?" A wry smile creased his face, "Honey, we're going to give these guys a hurtin'."

  K'heera shut her eyes, blocking out Bruce's traitorous signs. But her conscience insisted, Pay attention to this human. This is how a being with honor talks.

  She blinked the voice away. Time was growing short; Arvis would be here soon, and she'd taught Bruce almost nothing. Pulling his attention back to the task at hand, she explained the filter system, including the recent problems she'd been having.

  "Molds?" Bruce signed, fingering the damaged filter.

  "The molds in this river are especially tenacious. Once the biochemists learn enough about their life cycle, they'll be able to introduce growth inhibitors onto the filters to eliminate the problem. But as for now, only vigilance and repairs . . ."

  "These organic water filters . .. they'd be ruined if these molds were just allowed to ... grow?"

  "At this time, yes. But it is a temporary problem they will shortly resolve. In the meantime .. ."

  "Must be fail-safes in this system . .." he signed, glancing over 195

  the myriad banks of equipment. "Warnings .. . alarms .. ."

  "An alarm indicates someone has not done their job monitoring the filters,"

  K'heera signed tersely. "An alarm is an announcement that someone will be severely punished." It had never happened to her, but she'd witnessed it once. That had provided sufficient motivation for her to have a perfect record.

  Bruce nodded absently, not really paying attention to her warning. "But this hatchery . .. feeds them their own native food. . . . And it depends on this treated water.. . ." He smiled, an expression that struck terror in K'heera's soul.

  He turned to her. "They let me keep my equipment. I told them I needed it to keep everybody's sound nullifiers charged and working. They glanced through the stuff, and took some out.. . but they missed chips I took out of the probe and hid. Think we could adapt them to bypassing that alarm system?"

  K'heera blinked. How could he just assume she would do such a dangerous thing? And the results... the hatchery would be ruined. Eggs would die. Her perfect work record ...

  You're thinking just like an honorless slave, she realized, horrified at how indoctrinated she'd become.

  "I just wish we could find some way to get their workers to help us," Bruce signed.

  "They'd never do that," K'heera told him. "They're terrified of the trainers, and they're mentally stunted."

  "That doesn't mean they can't be organized into a work slowdown or passive resistance. Made any friends among them?"

  She scowled. Simiu were not good at that.

  "The trainer told me ... you go to the home of the Anuran leader at night. She said ... it was a very ... prestigious thing."

  K'heera watched him choose his signs carefully, so as not to insult her. She knew very well the trainer held her in contempt for her relationship with Arvis. He was, as far as any of the Chosen were concerned, just another Industrious who had not tasted the rod nearly enough. Bruce's attempt to discuss this without increasing her humiliation, in fact, his entire conversation with her, had been the first time any sentient being had shown her respect since she'd been taken captive. The dignity he granted her nearly overwhelmed her with gratitude, and she found herself forgetting some of her fears.

  Bruce glanced around and signed, "Is there any way you could use your influence with the leader's son?"

  To do what? she wondered, but didn't dare ask, for fear the respect he'd shown for her would vanish. Also... she didn't

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  want to admit that it felt wrong to take advantage of Arvis .. . and that she was afraid of losing her position in his home. Yet, every night, she stayed with the son of the First and had never even considered using that to her advantage.

  "Think about it when you're over there," Bruce suggested. "Is this him now?"

  Arvis padded over to them, signed a greeting to K'heera, then asked if she was hungry. She indicated she was, and with a final glance at Bruce, she left him to follow Arvis home. As she strode along beside the red and blue alien, he laboriously signed to her in their primitive communication. K'heera's thoughts raced. What could she really accomplish in his home? She rarely saw his father. And then there was Lene, the one who had helped in her own capture. She burned with shame thinking of that. It was ridiculous to think she could effect any change on Trinity.

  Suddenly a shadow sailed over the ground. The Simiu stared as an Aquila wheeled gracefully
in the air. The avian's carefree freedom made K'heera's breath catch in her throat, overwhelming her with the sudden desire, the need to fly. If only she had wings she could escape these monsters--but Weaver had wings and she was just as much a prisoner as K'heera.

  The avian dipped her wings. With a shiver, K'heera realized it was Thunder.

  The Simiu found herself hoping vainly that the avian might light on a nearby tree .. . somewhere where K'heera could see her, maybe even surreptitiously sign to her. . . .

  That thought shocked her. She would be caught signing to the avian and punished severely, brutally. These aliens might even kill Thunder if they caught her.

  But that thought wouldn't go away. Perhaps she could communicate with Thunder. Perhaps she could get word to Tesa. Even though she was terrified, K'heera's inner voice murmured, That is what a being with honor would do.

  "First," Tesa signed, "we steal their horses." She paused, realizing she'd used an ASL sign that only Jib understood, and he was sitting on the other side of the clearing, his back to her. The cohort of fifty young Grus merely blinked, confused.

  The Indian woman waved her hands, indicated she'd made an error. "I meant sleds. First, we steal their flying sleds. Do you all remember what you have to do?"

  There were affirmative signs throughout the cohort. She tried to feel confident, but Father Sun would rise soon. The time was upon them. Peering up into the tall, bronze-colored tree where

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  Thunder perched, Tesa watched the dark shadow of the Aquila cock her head. With a quick move of her long fingers, the avian updated Tesa on the small group of Anurans.

  When Thunder had first spotted them, Tesa was afraid that they might be hunting for her and Jib. But they were so far from the River of Fear that herd animals lived here in comfort, though the Gray Winds only visited. The Aquila female learned that these Anurans were studying a herd of grazers.

  There were ten of them .. . and they had seven flying sleds.

  The electronic readings of Terran sleds would be easy to trace. She needed their sleds, whose readings matched their own. But stealing horses would be a hell of a lot easier.

  The Moon Family had already set, leaving the tiny Child Star as their sole illumination.

  "You're really going through with this?" Jib asked finally, approaching.

  She frowned. It was the first thing he'd said to her in twenty- eight hours.

  "With flyers, we can liberate the Singers."

  He turned away again.

  She turned her attention back to her task, and started out for the Anuran camp. She could find it easily, even in the dark. With lights posted all over it, the small outpost sat like a beacon in the surrounding darkness.

  Tesa ran through the night, a figure in black and white in her hooded Grus shirt and black leggings. She'd coated her face with black charcoal in an hourglass design that ran from the temples, narrowing around the nose and mouth and broadening back out around the chin. Her cheeks and throat were plastered with a stark white clay. Above her blackened eyes, she'd painted a semicircle of bright red clay that ran from her forehead into her hairline. The colors were traditional war paint--the design emulated the facial markings of the Grus.

  When she arrived at the camp she waved at Thunder from behind tall grass, then watched the Aquila relay her signal. Within moments, the young Grus lifted into the sky, flying toward her. Remember, she thought at them fiercely, no calling!

  The flock circled the camp, alighting around it, and among the herd of grazers. Larger than American bison, with longer legs, they were mottled roans. The males had racks of blue, fan-shaped antlers on their heads. The herd lay in the dry grass, many chewing cud, but most still slept. Flies-TooFast led his group among them, but the grazers ignored them. The White Wind people were a normal part of their World.

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  Tesa's regular cohort, including Lightning, surrounded her. With Tesa hiding in their midst, the cohort casually ambled over to where the seven sleds were parked. The Grus probed the ground, acting as though they were simply settling here to forage.

  The floodlights the Anurans had perched on their small, portable dwellings gave Tesa all the illumination she needed to study the flyers. They were different in design, but there were recognizable similarities. She wondered about security systems. On Earth, security codes were installed in flyers sold in urban areas, but sleds used on exploratory missions to other worlds rarely had them.

  Lightning kept one eye on her, and the other on the Anurans' dwellings. It was his job to inform Tesa if the sleds made noise when she powered them up.

  There were a minimum number of switches on the machine, but the control pad was set up oddly. She reached into her pouch and pulled out the crude box Bruce had built. It was one of the last things he'd accomplished before they'd had to leave him. Part Terran circuitry, part Anuran space probe, Bruce hoped she might be able to use this makeshift diagnostic tool to

  "translate" their electronic equipment. This would be its first field test.

  Tesa placed it on top of the control panel and turned it on. English lit up half the screen, and incomprehensible symbols the other. She punched in a series of simple commands Bruce had set up. After a few seconds, the screen showed her a diagram of the sled's schematics. Unfortunately, only parts of the diagram were in English. She scanned the image, getting enough information to proceed. Picking a switch at random, she pressed it, while watching the interactive diagram.

  Immediately headlamps flared on, lighting up her dark corner. Slapping her hand down, she shut it back off, then glanced at Lightning. He was on tiptoe, wide-eyed, wings spread in surprise, and she had to bite her lip to keep from laughing.

  She glanced at the diagram and tried another switch. Telltales lit up the control panel, and she could feel vibrations in the platform. Lightning assured her of its silence. The diagram flashed, pointing to another switch, so she pressed that, and the machine lifted off the ground and hovered.

  Grinning, she sat on the sled and held on to what the diagram indicated was the control bar. She pushed it forward slowly, and the machine lurched.

  Pulling it back made it reverse. Okay .. . now where was up and down? The diagram was no help at all.

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  She found a likely control on the handle, but before she could test it, all the Grus snapped to attention, their heads lifting on their impossibly long necks.

  She turned, alarmed.

  An Anuran emerged from a dwelling and wandered around. Who the hell is that? she thought, peering through a forest of stalklike legs. The damn cook?

  Lightning stood in front of her, spreading his massive wings in a Grus warning pose. Other cohort members did the same, effectively blocking Tesa from view.

  Tesa didn't have time to finish testing the controls. She'd have to turn them on, send them west, and catch up with them later. Hope they don't run into anything, she thought, moving from machine to machine, activating them.

  The Anuran wandering around camp was the cook, she realized with surprise. He peered into containers, then began assembling meals, while Tesa crept from sled to sled behind Grus wings.

  Finally, the human cupped her hands around her mouth, letting out a lung-busting Grus alarm call. "B-B-B-B-R-R-R-R-AA-A-A-AA," she yelled, over and over, and the others joined her.

  The Anuran cook jumped in surprise, dropping one of the containers. Food and liquid burst out. The grazers, surrounded by raucously calling Grus, leaped to their feet, nervously searching for the predators they were sure the Grus were warning off. Flies-Too-Fast bounded through the herd, flapping his wings and calling, the other Grus imitating him, warning the herd of imminent danger. The lead male grazer circled, seeing nothing-- but the Grus' calls were too frantic to be ignored. His broad flat muzzle lifted, tasted the air.

  Flies-Too-Fast's panicked cries were finally too much for the herd, and they took off running. The Grus chivvied them onto the path they'd selected.

  Tesa cros
sed her fingers, hoping she hadn't adjusted the flyers' speed too high. She sent the sleds into the sky one by one, then watched the Anuran cook react as his sleds flew away of their own volition. His huge eyes widened, and his already brilliant green and gold coloring flared until he was almost luminous. Then he spun to see the herd bearing down on him.

  The sleeping Anurans must've felt the drumming hoofbeats through the ground. They came barreling out of their tentlike dwellings just as the fear-crazed grazers pounded through the camp as though it weren't there. While aliens leaped and ran for safety, their supplies and buildings were pounded into the turf.

  Tesa called again, leaping onto the last sled. She soared into

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  the air, Lightning and her cohort surrounding her, as they chased after the fleeing sleds. Below her, the Anurans stared, pointing. Shaking her lance at them, she whooped triumphantly. Yeah, she thought gleefully. First, we steal the horses.

  "Well, of course they're resisting!" Atle told his Third-in- Conquest, Amaset.

  "It's a natural part of the process. We must anticipate it, and stamp it out swiftly." He watched the Council members who'd gathered in his home to discuss their concerns. "Our ancestors met with such resistance and persevered."

  "But, Glorious First," the Third protested, "this one human destroyed an entire scientific study camp."

  The First turned cold eyes on Amaset. "Those biologists should've never been sent out without soldiers."

  "It won't happen again," the Third agreed.

  "It wouldn't have happened in the first place if I'd been in charge," Dacris sang out.

  "That's enough," Atle snapped. He turned back to the Third. "Henceforth, all exploratory excursions will be accompanied by a squadron. I very much want this human, and her companion, captured unharmed" --he turned flashing eyes on Dacris-- "something I could not expect from you." He faced the nervous Councillors. "Think what a persuader she will make! Whoever captures her will have their own territory, regardless of their class or standing. Make sure the soldiers know this." He signaled to the Councillors that the meeting was over. "Dacris. Stay behind."

  As the others left, Dacris stood stiffly.