The Enemy Papers

by Barry B. Longyear

  "You shall wait for me here. Namndas; at this mark. If I am correct, I shall see you again, and at this place."

  I looked from the Akkujah out over the Madah, then back at Shizumaat. "And if you do not return? What then, Shizumaat?"

  "Then either I am wrong about the shape of this world, or I did not have the strength to prove myself right."

  "If you fail ... If you fail. Shizumaat, what should I do?"

  Shizumaat placed a hand upon my arm. "Poor Namndas. As always. it is your choice. You can forget me; you can forget the things we have learned; or you can attempt to prove that which I am attempting to prove."

  —The Story of Shizumaat, Koda Nuvida, The Talman

  Joanne Nicole's first shower. The water pierced her skin, making her feel as though she were in a high-velocity stream of needles. It hurt, but felt. so good. Vunseleh, operating the controls, cut off the water. Slightly warm air, smelling of flowers, shot up from the floor.

  "Turn in the air column, Joanne Nicole, and it will dry you."

  She turned in the rush of sweet-smelling air, running her fingers through her hair to fan it. "Vunseleh, what is that smell?"

  "Smell? Oh, there is a fine spray of oil in the air column. It is for aesthetic purposes, and it softens the skin."

  "Is it safe ... for me? I remember what happened with the burn ointment."

  "It is safe. It has been used on humans many times with no ill effects."

  The blower stopped and her hair was still wet. She felt her skin. It was not wet, but it felt slightly moist—pleasant. She could feel no scarring from the burns. "Do you have a towel?"

  "A towel?"

  "Something—a cloth—to dry my hair."

  A hand touched her hair, then withdrew. "Emmmm. It is not good to keep you in the dry cycle until that mess is finished." Vunseleh's footsteps left the shower room then returned. Nicole felt a robe thrust into her hands. "Use this. I have another robe for you to wear." She threw the robe over her head and began drying her hair. "Joanne Nicole?"

  "Yes, Vunseleh?"

  "Is hair functional?"

  Nicole paused for a moment, then continued rubbing the, robe against her hair. "I suppose not. Why?"

  "We could have it removed. It would make your cleansings more efficient; and less time consuming."

  She held the wet robe out until the Drac took it, then used her fingers to again fan her hair. "Thank you, Vunseleh, but I think I'll keep it. Sentimental reasons."

  It handed her another robe, and she began putting it on. "I have seen female humans with such hair before. Usually it is more ... even."

  Once her robe was on, Nicole felt her hair. On the right side of her head, the hair was short and ragged. "The fire, Vunseleh. My hair was burned in the fire. I could use a ... I can't think of the word. My hair should be cut to make it even."

  "Emmmm." Vunseleh took her hand and led her from the shower stall. "We should be able to do that. Is anesthetic required?"

  "No. It is a routine cosmetic task."

  "Emmmm. I will see what can be done."

  Nicole felt Vunseleh's hands open the front of her robe, then one of its hands cupped her left breast and squeezed it. She pulled back and tightened the robe around her. "What do you think you are doing?"

  "Those things—you must look your best before being presented to the Ovjetah. Those things ruin the drape of the robe."

  Joanne Nicole chuckled a bit nervously. "I don't know what you have in mind, Vunseleh, but these things stay put. Hands off, understand?"

  "Perhaps they could be strapped down. They seem sufficiently malleable -"

  "Forget it!"

  There were many English words Joanne Nicole wished had equivalents in Dracon. "Just forget it, Vunseleh, understand?"

  "If you wish."

  "I wish."

  Vunseleh led her back to her bed. She climbed upon it and turned to Vunseleh as she wound and draped the robe about herself.

  "Is there anything else you need, Joanne Nicole?"

  She thought for a moment. "Yes. Just who is Tora Soam? What is the Ovjetah of the Talman Kovah?"

  There was a very long silence. Then Vunseleh spoke. "Considering your content of knowledge, I am not certain how I should answer." The Drac paused again. "How much of The Talman do you know?"

  "I have listened to 'The Myth of Aakva,' 'The Story of Uhe,' and parts of 'The Story of Shizumaat.'"

  "Emmmm. If I should tell you that Tora Soam is the most important being among the seventy-two planets of the Dracon Chamber, would you understand?"

  "Tora Soam is your political or military leader?"

  "No. Nothing of the sort."

  "A kovah; I know what a school is. Is Tora Soam a teacher?"

  "Of a sort—but more than that. Much more." Vunseleh was silent for a long time. "Joanne Nicole?"

  "Yes?"

  "Would you object to listening to the entire document of The Talman?"

  "Why should I?"

  "Your answers are there, if you have the wit to comprehend them. I shall send Vencha Eban to you with a pair of cutters. Tell Vencha what you want done with your hair."

  Vunseleh's footsteps left the room. Nicole groped around upon her bed until she found the player. She indexed to the Koda Nuvida, "The Story of Shizumaat," and stretched out to listen.

  Rhada said that God is;

  Uhe said that God is wrong;

  Shizumaat said that god is irrelevant ....

  In the days that followed Joanne Nicole listened to The Talman several times. It was more than the history of a race. It was the story of the evolution and use of method: talma.

  The word 'talma' had no equivalent in English. The word seemed to apply to anything composed of system: direction, ordered events, life, equation, methods, law, procedure, path, road, science, sanity.

  In the period containing late human prehistory, Shizumaat intuitively came up with what is essentially the scientific method. Through its method, the young student derived its theory of worlds: the rotation and configuration of Sindie; that Aakva and its children were fires at varying distances; that the other stars could have about them bodies such as Sindie; and the concept of Universe.

  To gather evidence in support of its theory, Shizumaat traveled the equator of the planet, leaving the faithful Namndas to wait at the monument the two of them had built. Many years later, after discovering many new oceans, lands, and peoples, Shizumaat appeared in the east and came to the monument.

  At the return of Shizumaat, Namndas was ecstatic; but Shizumaat's mind was occupied with a new problem: understanding the method—talma—it had used to see what others could not.

  Before Shizumaat's execution at the hands of the Servants of Aakva, it had communicated its conclusions to Namndas, who in turn taught these things to Vehya.

  Vencha Eban was snipping away at her hair. "Joanne Nicole, did you not find Shizumaat's adventures exciting?"

  Nicole thought for a moment. "Yes, but ... do you see the greatness of the thing it did?"

  "Which thing? Its struggle to cross the Madah? The crossing of the poisoned seas? Shizumaat outwitting the Hadyi, or its combat with Seuorka, Chief of the Omela?"

  "I meant Shizumaat's discoveries: its theory of worlds; its discovery of talma?"

  "But everyone knows that, Joanne Nicole."

  Nicole felt slightly exasperated. "They know it now, because Shizumaat taught it then!"

  The snipping stopped.

  "I do not understand why you are angry."

  "Vencha Eban, can you not see that Shizumaat's discovery of talma is more important than all of its other adventures combined?"

  The snipping resumed for a moment, then stopped. "I do not fly or fight among the stars, Joanne Nicole. I clean floors."

  The snipping continued.

  In the Koda Ayvida, Vehya taught talma to Mistan, who used it both to improve talma, and to invent writing. Mistan's students reproduced the stories of Aakva, Uhe, and Shizumaat; and Shizumaat's talma spre
ad throughout the world of the Sindie.

  The Koda Schada told of the increasing oppression of the Servants of Aakva's rule, their overthrow by Kulubansu, and almost five hundred years after Shizumaat's birth, the story of Ioa, who founded the first Talman Kovah.

  The Schada concluded with the invasion of the Sindie by the Hadyi, the destruction of the kovah and the dispersal of the Talmani, and the death of Lurrvanna under the rule of Rodaak The Barbarian. Then followed almost four hundred years of war as the different races of the planet Sindie struggled for dominance.

  The Koda Itheda told of Aydan and the War of Ages. Aydan, a secret Talman Master, applied talma toward the task of waging war, then toward the task of establishing and maintaining peace. As the warring neared its end, another Talman Master, Tochalla, began the movement to reassemble the Talmani and to rebuild the Talman Kovah.

  The following books of The Talman tell of the next six thousand years of progress and application of talma under many Jetai: Cohneret, Maltak, Di, Lita, Faldaam, Zineru, Dalna.

  Throughout this period, talma is made the core of a unified science of existence. By 2000 BC, the Sindie had made its first probes into space.

  The Story of Dalna, in the Koda Siayvida, is the last of the Sindie books of The Talman.

  Pur Sonaan visited to inform Nicole that the solution to her blindness was still outside its talma. "But I am constantly working to move the limits. Joanne Nicole."

  "Pur Sonaan, you are called a Jetah, but of the Chirn Kovah."

  "Yes."

  "But you speak of talma the same as any Talmani."

  "I am Talmani. I apply talma toward the goal of health."

  "When I was an intelligence officer, I saw recordings of Drac prisoners. Soldiers; Tsien Denvedah. They, too, spoke of talma. One of them called itself a Jetah."

  "The soldier and the health master are in the same discipline. Joanne Nicole. They specialize according to the goals they desire and the diseases that stand in the way of those goals."

  The first of the Draco books, the Koda Sishada tells first of the division of the Talmani. Almost two hundred years after the death of Dalna, it is proven that Sindie is a dying planet.

  A movement begins within the Talmani to escape Sindie and find other planets upon which to live. The larger faction chooses to remain on Sindie, hoping for a solution; or as the ancient Mistan wrote in the Koda Ayvida: "Talma shows each one its path. But, as beings of choice, we can choose not to see the signs."

  ...Mitzak reading the news to her, and from all she could tell, the war was stalled; going badly for everyone. Military casualties were into the millions; civilian casualties were into the billions ....

  "Mitzak, what are you going to do after I leave here?"

  "My plans are made."

  "Are you going back with the Drac Fleet?"

  "No. Thanks to my service to Tora Soam, I am being allowed to continue my work at the Talman Kovah. I think I have had enough of this war...."

  The Koda Shishada concluded with the Story of Atavu, the Ovjetah of the Talman Kovah, who left with the armada of generation ships toward the unknown. Two hundred and forty years later, Poma writes the Koda Sitheda. Poma is one of the founders of Draco and the Ovjetah of Draco's Talman Kovah. The stories of Eam, Namvaac, and Ditaar, the last three books of The Talman, tell of the development of Draco and the colonization of many other planets, and the beginning and end of the Thousand Year Rebellion, which saw the formation of the first Dracon Chamber more than a century before the birth of Copernicus.

  Until the USE had come into conflict with the Dracon Chamber over the issue of the planet Amadeen, Dracs had seen nothing but hundreds of years of peace....

  Talma.

  Talma is composed of fundamental rules of situation assessment, goal definition, and goal achievement; methods for finding out where one is, where one wants to go, and how to get from the former to the latter; individually and/or collectively. It is the foundation for all activity, from individual conduct and social relationships to science, business, and law...

  The Jetai, masters of the Talman, are the ones who study, invent, experiment with, and apply these fundamental rules. The Talman Kovah is their institution; as much laboratory as it is library and philosophers' hall. The Ovjetah is the First Master of the Talman Kovah. And Tora Soam was the current Ovjetah: the overseer of talma.

  Tora Soam was the Drac equivalent of a chief economist political theorist, attorney-general, first military strategist, the board of the USE Academy of Sciences—and too many other things—all rolled into one person.

  And if the war ever paused long enough for a truce, Tora Soam or some subsequent Ovjetah would advise the negotiations for peace. And Nicole felt that peace would have to come, or there would be no human race. The Dracs had fought an Interplanetary war for a thousand years without a moment of shaken resolve. Tokyo Rose had said that the war would not last forever. But the Dracs were prepared to fight for all of the forever that belonged to Joanne Nicole.

  Then came the day she was to leave the Chirn Kovah.

  On her feet were open sandals. Everyone who cared to had wished her well; and Pur Sonaan had promised to keep her informed of any progress in its research efforts. Pur had also added a cryptic sentiment:

  "Joanne Nicole, if things go well in the future, you will have great cause to hate me. When that time comes, I ask you to remember this moment. The things I have done..." Pur searched for words. "This I should not say. May the many mornings find you well."

  Nicole sat on the edge of her bed, feeling the softness of her new robe, slightly apprehensive about leaving the known of the room for the unknown on the other side of the walls.

  There were strange footsteps. They halted and there was a moment of silence. "I am Tora Kia. I have been sent to bring you to my parent's estate."

  She stood up. "My name is Joanne Nicole."

  Hard footsteps crossed the room and a rough hand grasped her left arm. "We must go now."

  There was the sharp odor of happy paste. Nicole reached for the arm that was holding hers and touched the cuff of a sleeve. Drac civilians wear robes.

  "Who are you?"

  "I said my name is Tora Kia. I am the firstborn of Tora Soam."

  "This sleeve says you are wearing a military uniform."

  "I am—was—Tsien Denvedah." There was a laugh; an almost hysterical laugh. "You will find the other sleeve empty, human."

  TEN

  And Lurrvanna looked up from its bandaged stumps and spoke to its students:

  "Talma is forbidden to us. The Talman Kovah has been destroyed. Our friends have been either murdered or frightened into hiding. Our writings earn their authors the loss of their hands. Rodaak and its soldiers would have The Talman disappear from Sindie.

  "But memory is the refuge of the Talmani, and it is there where we shall hide The Talman from Rodaak. Fix the words into your minds; then take them, whisper them to others, and have those others fix into their minds The Talman.

  "The eternity of truth makes a friend of time. In time, Rodaak will no longer be. In time, we shall make known again the value of talma. In time, The Talman will again be written and the walls of the new Talman Kovah will stand upon these broken stones. In time, tomorrow will come."

  —The Story of Ioa and Lurrvanna, Koda Schada, The Talman

  As Nicole was being hurried from the Chirn Kovah into Tora Kia's waiting vehicle, a strange thought crept into her mind: she was curious about these creatures, and what would happen to her; but, if she could have seen, she would have been terrified. Terrified of everything.

  The loathing fairly radiated from Tora Kia, but it could easily have been human hate. The strangeness—the alien unknown—of everything was made almost familiar because the images from her eyes were prevented from overpowering her other senses and her ability to think.

  Nicole was seated upon plush upholstery, a door slammed, and she inhaled the eternal smell of new car. More doors slamming, a weight depressed
the upholstery to her left, a whine, then a gentle pressure against her back as the vehicle accelerated. The sounds of other traffic came dimly through the vehicle's sound insulation.

  Tora Kia barked out an order: "To the estate, Baadek."

  "Your parent asked me to deliver these notes -"

  "Then return to the city and deliver them—after you have delivered this ... guest to the estate!"

  Both of the other occupants of the vehicle remained silent as the sounds of traffic died and the change in pressure on Nicole's eardrums said that they were climbing in altitude. Still there were the sounds of the road. They were moving up into some mountains.

  "You are silent, human."

  "I didn't think, Tora Kia, that you would appreciate conversation coming from my direction."

  "Dah!"

  They rode in silence a moment longer.

  "Tora Kia, your parent doesn't seem to carry your weight of hate."

  "My parent! My parent has all of its limbs. To Tora Soam, the war is ... an immense puzzle to be solved; a fascinating problem. I think my parent basks in the size and complexity of the puzzle. You and I are nothing more than two factors among the trillions that comprise this puzzle."

  "You seem bitter."

  "And they say that you are blind." Heavy sarcasm.

  They seemed to go higher, the road twisting left and right. The silence in the compartment was oppressive. The sharp smell of happy paste again assaulted her nostrils and the one called Baadek spoke. "Kia, your parent—"

  "Mind the road, Baadek! When Tora Soam has carried its butcher ax against the enemy on Amadeen, then its views upon my medications will be of interest to me." The sharp smell remained in the compartment. "Ah, human. What an ugly thing you are."

  "It would concern me more, Tora Kia, if I could see."

  The Drac laughed, then that sharp smell grew sharper. "It is true. The war has treated us both badly, human. Was your life's work dependent upon your eyes? That is my sincere wish."