At least one word translated well enough I understood the meaning.
“So what do the players on the pumpus have to do?”
“Get the ball past one of the opposing team’s goalies, twice in a five minute period,” said Ruen.
It had amazed me that, of all the worlds I knew of, the length of the day had turned out to be similar. Hours weren’t really the same, but a minute was close to the same length of time as on Earth. Of course, the only worlds I knew were Earth, Arandis, and Basili. And they were all populated by humanoids.
“Getting two goals in five minutes must be tricky with two areas for each team,” I said.
“It does make it hard to follow for the spectators. And the players must somehow communicate with each other to determine who tries to get a goal, and who tries to defend, and which goalie to attack, and on, and on.” Ruen smiled. “But I love this sport.”
We watched for a while. Our police escort sat beside us and seemed totally engrossed in the game. Although she glanced our way regularly, I imagined any movement on our part, would break her concentration immediately.
The birkl game lasted for a couple of hours, and then we were on our way to The Temple of Enlightenment.
The four of us stopped for a snack.
“Ruen, how did you like the game?” I asked.
“It was pretty exciting, but my team lost,” she said.
“How do you pick a team to cheer for?”
“Well, there is this guy in one of my classes I am attracted to, so I decided to pick his team.”
Attraction, huh? She is still so young. But then I realized I had had attractions of my own, at her age, too.
Eonus just gave the Arandi approximation of a snort.
“Be quiet, Tata,” said Ruen. “I know what the two of you have been up to.”
Eonus ignored Ruen, except to say, “Call Eonus. Ruen good friend now.”
Ruen seemed pleased with his announcement. “Thank you Eonus. I consider you my good friend too.”
The acolyte at the entrance to the Temple of Enlightenment quickly found the high priest for us. Ada Chap then led us further into the bowels of the temple than we had ever been before. Much to my delight, we ended up in their library.
Ruen gave me a nudge—the high priest was speaking and I had gone to another dimension.
“… so our religion is based on the concept of equality and duality. Does anyone have any questions?” he asked.
Ruen piped up, since she knew I hadn’t heard much. “Could we look at some of the volumes in your library? This is fascinating.”
“Of course. What would you like to see, Tata?”
“Old science,” said Eonus.
The high priest nodded. “And you, Ruen Title?”
“Do you have any volumes on ancient animals? Nara made me think of that today when we watched the birkl game.”
“I missed that game,” said the high priest. “Too many other commitments.”
Ada Chap looked my way. “Nara Scotia, what would you like to view?”
“I am interested in ancient biology. Do you have anything like that?” I asked.
“I can certainly accommodate all of your requests.” He waved at the acolytes who had accompanied us, and they scurried off. “In the meantime, join me in a cup of tea, while we wait.”
The three of us followed him a short distance further into the depths of the temple.
We found ourselves in what looked like another conference room and settled on some stools. An acolyte joined us, and proceeded to make our hot beverages.
I did enjoy the Basilian equivalent of tea. Quite relaxing, but not addictive, as far as I had been able to tell.
“Drink well,” said the high priest. “The volumes you requested should be here shortly, and beverages are not allowed around library books, in case of damage.”
I sipped for a bit, and then looked around the room.
The room became increasingly blurry, and then my eyelids were suddenly so heavy I could no longer keep them open.
Chapter 25
Okay, now where am I?
Once again, I found myself face down on a cold floor. I opened my eyes to find myself in another unfamiliar place, and it was getting to be a little monotonous. I knew I’d been transported again—this time from the Temple of Enlightenment—but to where? The flooring looked suspiciously like that of our previous prison.
“Nara, are you alright?”
“Dad?” I pushed myself up to my knees, and confronted my long-lost father hovering over me. I threw my arms around him. His came around me, and he pulled me to my feet, hugging me tightly to him. “Where have you been?” I sobbed into his shoulder.
“Right here, where you were held and where you are again. Now, tell me…are you all right?” he asked again.
“I guess so…” I pulled back from him, sniffed and wiped my tears away. “…but I’m thoroughly annoyed at being abducted again.” I wanted to hit something, or at least stamp my foot. Dad knew me so well that he took a couple of steps back.
Looking around, I saw Ruen and Eonus being tended to by Raen and Ilandus. At least this time, our confinement included most of our parents. Since Kikess had arranged our afternoon outings at The Temple of Enlightenment, he was not going to be pleased about our second abduction.
And I knew that creepy high priest was involved. Somehow. I expected him to pop through our door any minute now.
Although the room I stood in appeared similar to our previous confinement area, it turned out to be much larger. It had a series of bunk beds—enough to accommodate ten people. The center of the room had a number of tables and stools. Apparently this jail cell had the same interior decorator, as the walls remained the same boring color.
I took a couple of steps to reassure myself that my body parts still worked.
I noticed our parents had already been given similar clean clothes to what we had received during our previous imprisonment. “So this is where you guys got to,” I said to the ambassadors. “Officer Kikess has another massive manhunt going on, and he’s not going to like the fact that the three of us have disappeared again. I can’t say I’m very happy about it either.”
We definitely needed to get to the bottom of this—and fast!
Ruen, Eonus, and I settled at one of the tables, but there weren’t enough stools for all six of us to sit there. Raen pulled an extra stool over from another table to sit by Ruen, and Eonus took my hand to tug me down onto his lap. I could feel my cheeks redden, considering we’d never been this demonstrative in front of our parents before. However, Eonus seemed comfortable, so I decided to take his actions in stride as well. I draped my arm across his shoulders as his went around my waist, and we smiled warmly at each other, ignoring the surprised looks from Dad and Ilandus.
Then Dad smiled. “Well, look at you two. When did this happen?”
“Recently,” I said, keeping my eyes trained on his face. “Eonus, you aren’t saying anything.”
“What say? Unhappy to be here, but together.” Smiling, Eonus kissed me lightly, and then I rested my forehead against his.
“Just ignore them; I always do,” Ruen said. “So, how did you three end up here, in this lovely vacation condo?”
Laughing silently, Dad shook his head. “We were on our way to see Aron to get our tracking devices when we appeared in this room. Earlier, I was skeptical about your notion of a transporter, but I’m pretty convinced of it now.”
“Again I will say our captors are neither Arandi nor Basilians,” I said. “And they certainly aren’t human.”
“But they sure look like us,” Ruen added, “except for their skin color. Basili has never had any incidents of albino births.”
“Not Arandi,” said Eonus, putting a hand to his head.
I frowned. What did his gesture mean? “What is it?” I asked him, but he merely shook his head and remained silent.
“What’s the meal schedule?” Ruen asked.
“Yea
h, will it be suppertime soon?” I asked. My stomach was definitely telling it was.
“Yes,” confirmed Ambassador Tata. “Soon.”
“What have you all been doing with your time here?” I asked.
“Waiting for our captors to contact us. Since we’re ambassadors, and I’m sure they know it, it only stands to reason they would make face-to-face contact. We need to negotiate our release,” said Dad.
“Actually, what we need to do is find out why we keep getting abducted,” I said. I shook my head, but it didn’t help my mood. Getting repeatedly uprooted made me cranky. “Anything else?” I asked, pointing at the ceiling.
“No,” answered Ilandus.
So they hadn’t been adventurous. That didn’t surprise me.
I gestured towards the amenities room. Dad gave me a thumb’s up. So the setup worked the same; we’d just been transported to a different room this time.
Ushering everyone into the amenities room, I said, “We need a plan. Staying here and not trying to escape is futile. We could wait forever for negotiations to begin. We need to be proactive.”
My father wasn’t happy with my boldness, but I had had enough.
“What do you suggest?” asked Ruen.
“We have to know more about our captors, so we need to continue our exploring. After dinner, I think the three of us should explore again. The ambassadors can stay here and send our food trays back and such. And I think we should also ask for paper and writing instruments, as before, so we can ostensibly create games and write letters but, in reality, draw our maps.” I looked around the room, but I saw no indications of yea or nay. Which didn’t surprise me much when half of us were diplomats.
“Well?” I looked from face to face. “What do you all think about my proposal?”
“No,” said Ilandus. “Naru and Raen stay; I go.”
Not what I’d expected from Eonus’ mother. She proved to be more adventurous than I’d imagined.
I looked at Dad and Raen. “That seems like an excellent plan,” he said, after glancing at Raen.
What? I thought. They want a little privacy. Is that why Ilandus wants to go with us? I wondered if she knew what I suspected was going on between my Dad and Raen. I sighed. I needed to think about Dad perhaps being with Raen. In recent memory, he’d not had a long-term female friend that I knew about, or even a close female friend. Perhaps he’d hidden his affairs behind meetings and other absences to protect his young daughter. But I wasn’t a child anymore.
Mom dying in a freak accident had left him devastated for years. So, this relationship might be a good thing for him. Perhaps for both of them. And I guess it didn’t matter, since we needed someone to stay behind anyway.
“However, I think your plan should not be put into effect until tomorrow morning,” said my Dad. “You’re all looking tired. I’m starting to think the transporter takes a toll on our bodies.”
“You may be correct,” said Ruen. “My limbs feel weak, and I’d welcome dinner showing up any moment.”
I looked at Eonus. This decision made me grouse inwardly as I was anxious to get a look at the tunnel above us to see how it differed, if at all, from the tunnel we were familiar with—not wait till morning—but I suspected I was also not at my top physical form. So I supposed a night’s rest wouldn’t do any harm.
After we returned to the main room, the first dinner tray started to exit the food slot. We gathered our food and proceeded to the tables. I put my tray down and jammed my hands down on my hips. “Hey! We need paper and pens. We need to make up some entertainment. This confinement is boring, boring, boring.” My voice got louder and louder, as I spoke.
The ambassadors stopped what they were doing and stared at me for a moment, and then they returned to their meals, my Dad shaking his head at my ill-mannered behavior. In a few moments, my wishes were fulfilled. A stack of paper and writing instruments arrived by transporter on an empty table.
“See how well that works,” I said. Pleased with my accomplishment, I returned to my meal.
“Too bad, your previous screaming fit, demanding we be let go, turned out to be unsuccessful,” said Ruen. “Otherwise, I would suggest you try that again.”
I frowned. Was Ruen trying to annoy me? I studied her face. No, I didn’t think so. The smile that tried to escape led me to believe she was giving our captors a message. The ambassadors’ reactions to the wink I gave her remained mixed.
“I am going to draw up the game I told you about,” said Ruen. “Does anyone want to help?”
We returned our dinner trays to the slot, and then we all gathered around one table. At least the stools were mobile; the tables were bolted to the floor. Ruen spread some paper out, and Eonus got busy, being the artist of our group. To keep the rest of us occupied for a few moments, Ruen explained the rules and had the rest of us make some game pieces.
One run through of Ruen’s game was enough. Although it reminded the ambassadors of what we’d previously revealed, ninety minutes of play proved to be their undoing. No one could beat Ruen at her own game.
Three snack trays arrived—one for each race, I assumed—but we wouldn’t let our parents eat. Belatedly, they remembered our comments about drugs.
“I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m tired,” I said. “It’s been an eventful day. Why doesn’t everyone take their turn in the amenities room, and then we can turn out the lights?”
Ruen took my hint, and went to the amenities room. The others followed suit.
Eonus and I waited until last. “Okay. We will now take our turn in the amenities room,” I said.
After Dad realized what I’d said, he spluttered. Ilandus had a knowing look on her face—perhaps because her son looked a bit uncomfortable.
Deal with it, I thought.
Chapter 26
The next morning we devoured our breakfast in a hurry. With Dad and Raen staying behind to look after the food slot, Eonus, Ruen and I packed up our bags. For some strange reason, the three of us had been abducted when we were again carrying our school bags. A peculiar thought, but one that might mean something.
It now took us just moments to remove the grate and assist each other up into the tunnel—we’d done it so many times—and let Ilandus look around. Everything was new to her.
“What do you want to see first, Ambassador?” I asked.
“Ilandus to you,” she said, while giving me a knowing look. I guess being intimate with her son made me a family member. What a weird thought.
She then continued with “Old, but need new.”
My best guess from my interaction with Eonus, was that she wanted to see what we’d explored before, but realized we needed to move on. We had no idea how many days we would be held captive this time, but our parents had been given our previously discovered information via our debriefing a day ago, and by our board game.
“So, let’s go as fast as we can to the bow. There should be elevator access there. If there’s no one around, then we can try and take the elevator to another level. What’s the worst that could happen?” I asked.
“Different skin,” Ilandus said. “Not albino. If seen…”
“That may not be a problem.” I told her about the yellow-skinned ‘albino’ we had seen. “There may be others with not such white skin.”
No one responded to my comment. We all had fears of what might happen to us if we were discovered by our captors, but I think we all decided to keep our fears to ourselves as if voicing them would make them come true.
The four of us jogged quickly along the walkway to the ship-like bow. Ilandus kept up with us quite well. She did make us stop for a moment at each area so she could get a quick look at what we’d already seen. It didn’t take us long to realize this was the same exact tunnel we’d explored during our last captivity.
When we arrived at the elevator, we held back around the corner until the corridor cleared.
“How are we going to know if someone is going to come out of the elev
ator when we want to go in?” asked Ruen. “Maybe it is not an elevator. Maybe it is …” She stopped talking. I didn’t want to know what she had been about to say.
Good question. We thought for a moment.
“My gown similar,” said Ilandus. “Go first.” She pulled out her gown from her bag and slipped it on over her clothes. It was indeed a close approximation to the female garments we’d seen on our previous trip. So letting her go first would be a viable action. However, was putting an ambassador at risk a good idea?
Before I had a chance to air my thoughts, Ilandus left our little group. We watched her stroll up to the door and press a button. And I mean strolled—she had all the moves.
I couldn’t see which button she pushed. The elevator had two—presumably up and down.
The doors opened and Ilandus waved us over, after peering inside. No one was about, so we piled in, and started breathing again.
“Which way are we going?” I asked.
“Down,” said Ilandus, pointing at one of the buttons.
I had no problem with her making that decision; we only had two ways to go anyway. But I did have a question. “How do you know that means down?”
“Similar character,” said Ilandus.
So had we been captured by Basilians after all, despite the belief albinos were nonexistent in their historical records?
When we arrived at the next floor, Ilandus looked out and then motioned us to follow her. We scurried around the corner and out of sight of anyone on this level—we hoped.
Whatever this level was devoted to, another tunnel supported travel and utilities. Apparently, each level had its own self-contained life support system.
We huddled there to consult. “This is a tram entrance,” Ruen said, pointing to a set of double doors. “Why not take the tram to its next stop?” she suggested. “Then we can get off and study the area in front of us. If you’ll remember…” She looked at Eonus and me. “…there is an opening in the walkway—the access/egress points—at each stop. We can conserve our energy by riding the tram and get off anytime we want.”
All our walking and jogging had indeed taken a lot of energy. “But what if we have to pay a fare?” I asked.
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