by S. H. Jucha
“Then, let me ask you this, Tacticnok: Are all the sentient races, which the Jatouche have met, members of the alliance?”
“We wish it were so, Captain, but the Messinants, in their hubris, made mistakes, egregious mistakes. More than one alliance member has to contend with unwelcome visitors who’ve learned to operate their end of the gate pair.”
“Do the Jatouche —” Harbour began, but the question died at Tacticnok’s upraised hands.
The small alien faced the captain. “I’ve said more than my father would have permitted had he known. This information is for you and your confidant.”
“Confidant?” Harbour asked.
“Every leader must have one, Harbour, to whom they can confide and who can provide honest counsel. I would imagine yours in Captain Cinders.”
Before Harbour could reply, Tacticnok flashed her teeth and said in a joyous voice, “Come now. I would visit the cantina and witness the celebrations. Fruit juice!”
* * * *
“You’re saying there’s no monitoring necessary?” Olivia asked Drigtik, seeking to clarify his statement.
“Not of our device, Olivia,” Drigtik replied.
“It’s not like we could do anything about it, if there were a problem,” Bryan riposted.
“What if it fell over and the microwave beam hit a dome?” Pete asked.
“The intravertor has a stabilizer sensor,” Drigtik explained. “If it tilts more than a few degrees, the microwave transmission will shut down. If the device falls over, it will cease operating, before it touches the surface.”
“You’ve thought of a lot,” Olivia admitted.
Gatnack, who wasn’t one for wasting words, said, “The Jatouche build well.”
“Then that’s it. Time to pack up your team and your gear,” Olivia said, a sudden sadness clenching her chest.
“Yes, we’ll be ready soon, Olivia. Will you join Pete and Bryan to journey with us to the gate? Gatnack and I would wish it,” Drigtik asked.
“I’d love to accompany you to Triton,” Olivia replied. “I’ll talk to Evan Pendleton for some time off and request passage with Captain Harbour.”
“Not necessary, Olivia,” Gatnack replied. “Both have given their permission. Come. Let’s see you packed.” He ambled off, and Drigtik raised his furry eyebrows at Olivia.
“You’ve been busy,” Olivia said.
“Efficiency. It’s an engineer’s watch word, Olivia. Let’s not keep old Gatnack waiting. You know how he gets.”
It took less than a day for the Jatouche to recover their equipment from the YIPS. It was carried in the belly of the old shuttle, which could more easily accommodate the remaining crates. There were quite a few less than had been carried on the journey from Triton. Much of the containers’ contents was now on the surface of Pyre, sucking up heat, spitting out fused pellets of pollutants, and shooting excess energy to the YIPS.
When the Jatouche and Pyrean personnel were ready to transfer to the Belle, Danny and Claudia, whose transfer was approved, did the honors via the new shuttle.
Gatnack was the first to climb aboard. He took in the new interior and nodded in appreciation. “This transport I heartily approve,” he said.
“Will it be able to land on Triton?” Drigtik asked.
“According to Danny, it’s prepared to do just that,” Bryan replied.
“Here I was lamenting the loss of our home world’s comforts, and Pyreans are beginning to provide upgrades. Should we stay, Gatnack?” Drigtik asked.
“I’ve had enough excitement for a few annuals, my young engineer. I’m anxious for home,” Gatnack replied.
When the elderly engineer settled into one of the shuttle’s plush seats with a heavy sigh, Olivia and Drigtik exchanged concerned glances. The effort of the last few months had cost Gatnack a great deal.
* * * *
While the engineers, the techs, and the spacers made the transfers to the Belle and Jessie readied his ships, Harbour and Tacticnok shared a celebratory dinner in the captain’s quarters. The conversation was light, while they were being served. When the plates and glasses were removed, Harbour accepted a brandy, and Tacticnok relished her favorite fruit juice concoction. They adjourned to the study, where Harbour threw the twin couch seats on the floor.
“I’ve meant to ask you, Tacticnok, your race is called the Jatouche, but none of your names are similar to this word. How did you come to be called this?” Harbour asked, slipping off her deck boots and stretching out on the pallet. She was enjoying this method of conversation. The postures tended to eliminate a discussion’s more aggressive actions, such as hand waving, fist thumping, or arm motions, in general.
“It wasn’t our choice, Harbour. Jatouche is a Messinant word. It’s what they called us. From early times, before records were kept, ancestors handed down stories of Messinants’ visits to our planets. It’s been told they observed us over the course of many generations.”
“Did they assist you, in any way?” Harbour asked.
“Not that the stories said. They merely watched us develop,” replied Tacticnok in a desultory fashion.
“You don’t sound as if you admire them,” Harbour said, carefully observing Tacticnok for her reaction. She was tempted to read the royal daughter, but realized she’d have no basis from which to compare what she sensed.
“Why should we?” Tacticnok said with heat. “We’ve come to understand that the Messinants were involved in some grand scheme of genetic tinkering. They spent eons playing with the creatures of many worlds to see how effectively they could introduce intelligence and speech. Then they stood back to monitor their experiments.”
“Do you have any idea why the Messinants did this?” Harbour asked.
“Races have postulated more theories than you could imagine, Harbour,” Tacticnok replied. “The most popular is that the Messinants lived enormously long lives. Therefore, they didn’t procreate frequently. In which case, they needed a larger number of sentient individuals to do their bidding.”
“Is that a theory that you subscribe to, Tacticnok?” asked Harbour.
The royal daughter merely cocked her head to the side and back, as if to say it made no difference to her. Then she pulled on her glass straw for another sip of her juice.
Something Tacticnok had said earlier to her about unwanted guests coming through the gates caused Harbour to have a dark thought and decided to give it voice. “It makes you wonder how many of their experiments produced negative results.”
“You needn’t wonder,” Tacticnok cackled. “There have been a sufficient number to antagonize many of us.”
Harbour waited for Tacticnok to say more, but she didn’t. “Where do you think the Messinants went, when they left?” she asked.
“This is unknown, Harbour. None of the races we’ve met have seen them for more annuals than can be counted. It’s assumed that, at some point, they grew tired of their scheme and left the experiments to their fates.”
“How do the Jatouche and the other races feel about that?”
“How do humans feel about Pyre and their existence here?” Tacticnok rejoined.
It was Harbour’s turn to offer a limited reply. She said, “It is what it is, and we’ve got to make the best of it.”
“Just so,” Tacticnok replied. Her straw made a sucking sound, as the drink was finished. There was a slightly disgusted expression on the little alien’s face, and Harbour was unsure whether that was from the empty juice glass or her opinion of the Messinants’ desertion of the races they uplifted.
* * * *
On the evening before the ships sailed, Jessie visited with Harbour aboard the Belle.
“Looks like we’re back in the slush business,” Jessie said, enjoying his brandy with his feet comfortably resting on a stool in the captain’s study.
“Only four percent of the energy supply for a single line,” Harbour lamented. “I guess that’s something, but I was hoping for a little more.”
�
��That’s for one intravertor, at the present time,” Jessie replied. “Plant some more, clear the air a bit, and you’ll improve transmission.”
“That’s easy to say,” Harbour rejoined, sitting in a chair facing Jessie, “except more intravertors means more Jatouche equipment.”
“You’ve requested more, haven’t you?” Jessie asked.
“Where do you come up with these sorts of questions, Jessie?” Harbour asked, aghast. “You expect me to go up to Tacticnok and say, ‘Thanks for your help. Your fantastical experiment worked. When can we expect the next shipment?’”
Jessie delivered a cross between a grimace and a shrug, and Harbour laughed at the absurdity of his question and his response.
“Listen, my confidant —” Harbour started.
“Your what?” Jessie interjected.
“Oh, yes, Tacticnok said every leader must have a confidant, and, according to her, you’re mine,” Harbour replied tartly. “Now, as I started to say, I think we’ve developed the wrong impression of the Jatouche.”
“How so?” Jessie asked, suddenly attentive to Harbour’s words.
“My impression has been of this superior race, with advanced technology, who’s engaged in some incredible alliance and whose members are connected via a series of gates,” Harbour summarized.
“Agreed,” Jessie replied. “What’s your pic now?”
“I think the characterizations of the technology and the gates are accurate, but not the alliance.”
“Oh, interesting,” Jessie said, sitting up.
“Bits and pieces of things Tacticnok and Jaktook have said, during the time they’ve been with us, have me thinking,” Harbour replied. “The most interesting comment she said recently was that there’s little respect for the Messinants.”
“From the alliance?” Jessie asked.
“I don’t know about that, but certainly from the Jatouche. She’s said the Messinants have made some big mistakes.”
“Mistakes? When? How?” Jessie asked.
“We were discussing the alliance and its membership, and Tacticnok said many of the races had to deal with unwelcome guests. She implied that some of the uplifted species, who aren’t members of the alliance, still attempt to use the gates.”
“I wonder if it’s a matter of poor visitation manners or something a lot worse,” Jessie mused.
“It got me thinking about the alliance in terms of Pyre,” Harbour said.
“You mean our political mess?” Jessie asked.
“Exactly. Who says that technology makes everything better?”
“It improves the quality of life,” Jessie argued.
Harbour nodded her agreement and said. “And yet, does it make for better relationships or does it just embolden the powerful?”
“Good question. Did Tacticnok say anything else?”
“Yes, I was asking about the alliance members and if they were equal. My intent was to discover whether we would be junior members or some sort of lesser category if we were to join. Tacticnok replied that all members are supposedly equal by approval of a charter, but that some members are more equal than others. And here’s the important part, Jessie. I got the feeling that the Jatouche are not one of the highly regarded members.”
“With their technology?” Jessie asked, incredulous at the concept. “That’s frightening.”
“I wonder if it’s not a matter of who has the greater technology, Jessie, and I’ve been trying to see us through the eyes of the Jatouche.” Harbour said, sitting up too. “Ask yourself why the Jatouche came here, Jessie, besides checking out to see if the Gasnarians repaired the gate.”
“You mean when they didn’t appear to get anything out of it?” Jessie replied. “I was too focused on the operation and keeping the governor and family heads at bay while we reached the endpoint, I guess.”
“By the way, well done there,” Harbour said, hoisting her crystal glass to Jessie. “You’ll have to tell me about those meetings when you get an opportunity. But, back on the subject of the Jatouche. Did they get nothing out of this entire process?” she asked.
“Not much more than our goodwill,” Jessie replied. He made the comment offhand, but when Harbour’s eyebrows went up, he considered what he’d said. “Ah, I see where you’re going. There’s this big alliance with various degrees of equality, and the Jatouche don’t have a big piece of it. They find us … this backward race … and hope to develop allies.”
“I think that’s a simplistic description, Jessie,” Harbour said, sitting back in her chair and taking a sip on her brandy.
Jessie was intrigued. It was obvious that Harbour had been mulling over these subjects for a while and was earnestly trying to assimilate the elements into a cohesive image.
“Educate me,” Jessie requested, hoping to help Harbour coalesce her thoughts by speaking them out loud.
“If you were a race among many, who didn’t hold an equal level of respect from some of the others, what options are open to you?” Harbour asked.
“Fight for your rights, invent a superior technology, discover resources that everyone covets, or …” Jessie froze in midsentence.
“What? What’re you thinking?” Harbour queried.
“I was going to say or find a powerful ally, but that’s not us,” Jessie replied.
“Maybe because you’re thinking like a man,” Harbour teased.
“Ouch,” Jessie replied, smiling at the jest. “What’s the female’s point of view, if I might deign to be annotated with such a rare gift?” When Harbour frowned at his choice of words, Jessie said, “I heard that in a vid and always wanted to use it in conversation.”
Harbour laughed, and then her face took on a serious countenance. “Remember, that Tacticnok spoke of an emissary visiting her world, when she was describing the first steps toward alliance membership.”
“And it was a female who visited us,” Jessie said, lightly smacking his forehead.
“Yes, and a royal member at that,” Harbour added. “We have to ask ourselves why she would see us as valuable allies.”
“My impression is that the Jatouche are a gentle race,” Jessie replied, his brain kicked in gear by Harbour’s musings. “They would see us surviving and slowly progressing under extremely difficult circumstances. Wait … Jaktook once said that he wondered if the Jatouche would have survived on Pyre under similar conditions.”
“Now, put that together with the concerns of Tacticnok, Jaktook, and, especially, Jittak, as to whether humans could be trusted,” Harbour added. “In addition, Tacticnok and Jaktook wanted to make certain that we were the leaders who could make the decisions necessary to ensure the implementation of their intravertor.”
“I think that last part was our test,” Jessie posited.
“I’d agree,” Harbour replied. “It came when the Jatouche learned our language from you and your crew via the console’s programmed queries, which had to be Messinants’ filtering for potential interspecies relationships.”
“And we passed,” Jessie said with pride.
“Then Aurelia slipped and things changed,” Harbour said, shaking her head at serendipity.
“Are you thinking they changed for the worst?” asked Jessie.
“Oh, no, at least not for Tacticnok,” Harbour hurriedly replied. “For Jittak, yes, I’m afraid, and I wonder what he’ll tell his superiors.”
“Especially after that stunt he pulled on the bridge,” Jessie added. He thought to summarize their train of thought by saying, “So Tacticnok sees qualities in humans that she admires … our perseverance, our lovable personalities.” Jessie couldn’t help throwing that in, and he grinned at Harbour’s wince, which was followed by her lips curving in a tiny smile. “And your empaths,” he finished. “So where do we go from here?”
“As far as we’re concerned, nowhere,” Harbour said. “According to Tacticnok, the next step is on their side, and it involves His Excellency Rictook.”
“Hmm, going to be an interesting prese
ntation of counterviews between Tacticnok and Jittak’s superiors,” Jessie posited.
“You know, it’s all rather anticlimactic,” Harbour said, finishing her brandy, and twirling the crystal glass to see the reflections from the overhead lights. “I mean, one moment we’re meeting aliens, creating a marvelous device, and taking the first step to rescue our planet, and, the next moment we’re back to slinging slush.”
“Well, let me offer you a pragmatic way to look at this,” Jessie offered, finishing his drink. “Despite what we raised to cover the YIPS costs, how’s your general fund doing? Because my company account is low.”
“Mine too,” Harbour replied. “Paying for YIPS cabins, laying out stipends, purchasing the shuttle, and now overhauling it has emptied it of a great deal of coin.”
“So, we sling slush,” Jessie said.
“Ready when you are, Captain,” Harbour replied. “You taking your ships directly to Emperion?”
“I think we can fill the Pearl before you arrive and send that ship on to the YIPS. We can probably do that several more times before your ship’s full, especially since our crews are accomplished at the process. Any concerns about handling the return of the Jatouche?”
“If you’d asked me that two years ago, I’d have wondered if you’d lost your mind, making me the responsible party.”
“Lot’s happened in two years,” Jessie agreed. He stood, walked to the study’s door, reached for the latch, but Harbour’s hand held it shut.
“I’d like my kiss here,” Harbour said, in a husky voice. “It’ll be a long dry period until Emperion,” she added, with a little smile.
“And I’d like one with a taste of your emotions,” Jessie replied.
Harbour’s face was close to Jessie’s, but she pulled back to study his eyes. Thoughts warred in her head. She desperately wanted to oblige Jessie’s request but felt it was too early in their relationship. “Not yet, Jessie. Maybe someday,” Harbour replied.
“I’ll leave the timing in your hands, Harbour. You’re the expert,” Jessie said, leaning across the short space to kiss her.