Dadr'Ba

by Tetsu'Go'Ru Tsu'Te

  The point of view of the resistance is that the secrets they’re keeping don’t support the stated goal of delivering Dadr’Ba, its crew, and cargo safely O’M. The resistance suspects something evil and malicious, why else would they be willing to kill to keep the secrets.

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  Mi’Ka’s concern about P’Ko’s ability to compartmentalize himself satisfactorily and be trusted with keeping Resistance secrets, a critically important matter, seems to be unfounded. More than once a partner in the throes of sexual intercourse has let slip private thoughts with disastrous consequences. P’Ko has demonstrated that he has a particular innate control even under the throes of passion.

  It’s no easy task to hide things when together, as one, exploring, understanding, giving and taking of each other’s pleasures, searching for, finding, and sometimes even creating a stress or frustration, only to later satisfy it, letting go of inhibitions, then finally losing oneself in a final reset.

  Even during their most intense mentoring sessions P’Ko displayed an instinctive ability to, without deceit, keep private that which needs to keep secret and share that which needs to be shared. He possesses a kind of natural psychic modesty that many naturally psychically adept Mi’Nr’s take decades to develop and some never do.

  P’Ko doesn’t hide many of these things from Mi’Ka, a trusted, impartial third party; this shows an almost incredible level of psychic control Mi’Ka hadn’t expected. Z’Shi may deserve credit for some of this; Mi’Ka will need to discuss it with her to help figure this puzzle out.

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  Tonight it was Tn’Ya’s turn to lead the session, and she was to take a risk and do something she had fantasized about for a long time. It was risky and if it didn’t go well could end their relationship. If successful, it would take them to an entirely new level of trust.

  P’Ko and Su’Zi, her mentors, arrived together as was their custom, the three of them sat and drank a cup of tea; Tn’Ya had sought out a special tea, which wasn’t psychoactive but was known to create a mood of calmness yet heightened awareness.

  At the appropriate time, she revealed the lesson plan for the session. It involved her blindfolding and tying restraints to P’Ko and Su’Zi; then she would be the sole actor during the session.

  Tn’Ya explained that her whole life she felt that she had never been in control, never trusted to be in control and that she had been pushed around and taken advantage of all her life. When she met P’Ko that first time and every time since, while she was with P’Ko she felt protected and didn’t fear being taken advantage of.

  This session would put her in control of others for the first time in her life. She made it clear that she cared deeply for P’Ko and Su’Zi and that she wouldn’t dream of hurting them, they needed to trust her. She introduced a code word “Tff’Ni”[96] but that they would be expected to remain silent, and keep their thoughts to themselves, but if for any reason; if they felt they had to end the session to end all they need to do is to recite “Tff’Ni.”

  P’Ko and Su’Zi apprehensively agreed, Tn’Ya dimmed the lights, and while all were still fully dressed, she restrained their arms and legs and blindfolded them. Then waited while the tension built, guarding her mind as strongly as she could to prevent P’Ko and Su’Zi from reading what she intended to do next. She then touched both of them. First one, then the other trying to stay unexpected, heightening the tension, working deliberately to tease, increase their senses and raise their levels of arousal, slowly increasing the amount of contact, eventually rubbing her whole body against theirs.

  The feeling of power and control she felt was exhilarating, she began to feel intoxicated, she then undressed them, slowly and carefully, untying an arm or leg as needed to accomplish the task. If one of them tried to reach out, she took hold of them gently and waiting until they relaxed the urge to move or reach.

  At this stage, she took the blindfold off P’Ko and Su’Zi having placed a pillow between them so they couldn’t tell that the other could see and then she began to undress, occasionally touching, P’Ko and Su’Zi with a part of her body or clothing she just removed or unveiled.

  Once completely naked, she blindfolded P’Ko and moved the pillow to allow Su’Zi to watch as Tn’Ya worked on P’Ko. Nobody called the code word as Tn’Ya slowly and deliberately bought herself and P’Ko to a reset that sent spasms radiating through their bodies, Tn’Ya collapsing on top of P’Ko.

  Oblivious to Tn’Ya, Su’Zi also reset, although much milder, just by watching and sensing the psychic energy. Tn’Ya then blindfolded Su’Zi and un-blindfolded P’Ko, allowing P’Ko to watch as Tn’Ya performed on Su’Zi with the same results.

  When finished Tn’Ya got a basin of warm water, scented it with a perfume and bathed first P’Ko, then Su’Zi and finally herself. She then unbound them, satisfied and exhausted she lay down between P’Ko and Su’Zi and they all slept.

  The session had lasted many hours, which meant it wasn’t long before Su’Zi had to go to work. Tn’Ya and P’Ko got up and saw her off.

  Everyone was in an excellent mood. They drank strong tea while discussing the night’s session, ending with a toast. It was an entirely new experience for them all, allowing each to experience and recognize new aspects of themselves, challenging and opening in certain real ways capabilities of trust and relinquishment within themselves that they had never experienced or exercised before.

  As Su’Zi left for work, her parting comment was “don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.” And not long after Tn’Ya and P’Ko were having for the first time, their own session. Yet, they both could feel Su’Zi’s presence psychically.

  Chapter 44, Chn’Gi Gets Religion

  Chn’Gi entered the chapel late at night; she was troubled and desperate. What she was doing could result in forced retirement, she could be terminated, or just disappear, like so many others, to be declared never to have existed.

  She knew of one person that she had personally known to have disappeared. A young person, younger than herself, a friend, single. He was living on his own. He just disappeared, his apartment turned up empty, entirely vacant. An available for occupancy, notice suddenly appeared, that had supposedly been posted for weeks.

  All evidence that he ever existed was gone, photos and documents that had been stored in online storage disappeared. As well as, all government records. No one within the CA acknowledged he ever existed, and offline photos and documents were declared fakes.

  Family and friends investigating were accused of psychiatric illness. The CA’ response, was “That person, doesn’t exist.” Followed by a not-so-subtle hint, “I recommend you don’t pursue this fantasy. It shows possible instability and may result in your psychiatric evaluation and treatment”.

  Alternatively, they were accused of contriving a prank, which prompted the CA response of “Stop wasting our time and attempting to file false complaints. This wastes CA resources and is A’Pa[97].

  Chn’Gi had even heard of family members living together in an apartment who have disappeared. The family member’s bedroom door would just vanish, replaced with a seamless wall. Any contact with the CA, met with, the same as before, “That person, doesn’t exist” along with the same threats of psychiatric treatment, retraining or arrest. Most people painfully leave it at that and quietly mourn.

  Those that don’t, actually do get psychic evaluation and treatment. When they return, they’ve lost all joy of life, barely recognize their family or friends, and perform the functions of life robotically, having lost the spark, the joy of life.

  Psychiatric treatment mostly happens to U’Te’s, due to sheer numbers and the jobs involved. U’Te’s can undergo psychiatric treatment without significant impact to maintaining their work quotas. The times it’s been done among the Mi’Nr’s, the victims of the treatment have met with “accidents” after their return in the mines.

  The mines are a dangerous place; it doesn’t take much impa
irment to turn a worker into a danger to themselves or their co-workers. The loss of a fully qualified Mi’Nr takes away a valuable resource that takes fifty to seventy-five years or longer to replace.

  Most Mi’Nr’s that are condemned to psychiatric treatment, instead go into isolation at a forced labor cell. After fifty or a hundred years of forced isolation, made to perform tedious, hazardous or robotic tasks for extended periods of time, without contact with family and friends, come back changed. Not the vacant shells that are the fate of the treated U’Te’s, They’re altered, changed, they know what being forcibly retired is like. They have had much of their adult life taken away, bleeped out of existence and live a half-life, a part of their lives is a void, not unlike those that have had a loved one disappear.

  Chn’Gi felt terribly alone; she had started having nightmares, terrible dreams. Foggy and out of focus, her dreams are of O’M, polluted with industrial waste, the atmosphere corrosive, the waters and oceans poisoned and diseased, and every major city devastated.

  In her dreams of O’M, death abounds, so much death. Billions lay un-retired in the devastation that had once been cities, littered across countryside’s and along shorelines. Millions float bloated, mixed among the debris of massive destruction carried to sea by some gigantic apocalypse.

  Images that she saw of Or’Gn in the histories she was reading, she saw applied to O’M, but magnified manifold.

  She dreamed too of Dadr’Ba, dead, broken, dirty, strewn with debris and most troubling, littered with bodies.

  She thought of P’Ko, and Lu’Gs, she wants to trust them, but what if they are discovered and forced to tell, she could be found. She should warn them against reading this knowledge, but it might be too late.

  She knows she’s monitored; is she being followed? What do the people watching her know? She looked around and saw a few people nearby, was one or more of them following her? Are P’Ko and Lu’Gs suffering her same fate? She closed her eyes and practiced slow breathing, calming herself not very efficiently, wishing she had drunk just a little more liquor, just to calm herself down, reprimanding herself for being paranoid, is she going insane?

  She shook herself back to the present, and reached into her pocket and felt the note she created during her last reading under the strange glow of the reading lamp Lu’Gs gave her and remembered his instructions always to use it whenever she studied the histories contained in the reader. Was it the lamp? Could it be doing something to her mind, it had become her habit to take long baths away from the surveillance cameras alone in her bathroom with only by the reading lamp for company.

  She made it a point not to even look at the note she made after its creation. Palming the note and passing it to the usher, who shows just a hint of surprise, recovers quickly and welcomes her into the Church, directing her to a seat in one of the pews near the back. There were no services in progress, other worshipers were there, and others arrived, some appeared to be already praying, others meditating, some repeating a mantra, song like, not unpleasant, providing a tranquil aura.

  At the front of the Church on one side was a podium, the other side stood several rows of seats for the choir. Behind the podium and the choir, a broad arch that reached up to the top of the building and near the apex, a bright star that lit the podium and choir area. It was strangely pleasant to look at, despite its intense light. It illuminated the podium and choir area in a bright halo.

  Along the back against a black backdrop, were racks upon which sat rows of small translucent bowls, some containing a light, small and bright. The unlit bowls, almost disappearing into the dark background.

  At the near end of the racks, closest to the door, sat a credit reader for donations and a dispenser for the light tabs. A simple gesture authorizes a debit of your choice buying you a small tab that ignites when placed in one of the clear bowls. The tab reacting with a catalyst in the bottom of the clear bowl becomes a small bright pinpoint of light; the symbol of the Church and the Touch of God.

  Chn’Gi wanted to purchase a light, but had trouble moving, trouble translating what she wanted to do in her mind into action.

  The peace and serenity of this place were in such sharp contrast to her visions that she found herself blinking and with each blink seeing flashes of Dadr’Ba, this place, devastated. She saw flashes of O’M devastated, strange dead faces sprawled before her eyes, flashed before her eyes, fueled by the forbidden knowledge she was harboring. She became dizzy and started to have trouble breathing. She felt flushed; her hands were shaking, and her spine and legs lost all energy, and she slumped to the floor between the pews.

  Chn’Gi was engulfed in a miasma; she could make out people speaking words of encouragement. In the fog, she became aware that the usher and some other person helped move Chn’Gi quickly along the side of the Church through a door behind the podium into a hallway, then into an office. She was laid on a couch with her legs raised, someone offering her something to drink, then a brief examination, she was asked questions but didn’t know if she even answered, then followed an injection, it was all very dreamy, she closed her eyes.

  When she opened her eyes again, everything seemed different; she couldn’t tell how much time had passed. She couldn’t afford to raise the attention of the CASS following her and tried to get up mouthing “how long?” but was interrupted. “It hasn’t been long” and someone helped her sit up, it must have been the other person that had appeared with the usher; the usher was gone. The room’s lighting had a strange tint to it. She recognized it as the same as the light given off by her reading lamp.

  A woman’s voice said, “it’s safe to speak, Chn’Gi.” Chn’Gi forced out, not caring anymore about the consequences, needing to get the poison out of her mind and share her pain, desperate for help “I know, I mean, I’ve learned, about Or’Gn.” The woman, “How? Where did you get it?” Chn’Gi, “An old reader, and backups from before the Touch.”

  The woman gave Chn’Gi something more to drink, saying that she had become dehydrated and hadn’t been eating properly. The drink will help make her feel better and clear her mind.

  As Chn’Gi’s mind cleared, the woman told her that what she had done was very dangerous, but that she had made it to the right place to get help. Adding, that she could have died.

  Whether it was the drink or the peaceful, safe and secure place she was in or the injection.

  Chn’Gi began to feel better. Not knowing if it was the drink, it was cool going down and soothing to her stomach, or the woman’s calm, confident, comforting words.

  The woman identified herself as Gi’Ya. She explained to help properly; she must know more about what forbidden knowledge she was exposed to and if anyone else was exposed. Gi’Ya reminded Chn’Gi that “we’re not the CA, and the CASS has no power in our spaces, though they try.” “We must act quickly, though, if you are here too long. It will raise their suspicions; they’ll send someone to check up on you.”

  Chn’Gi thankful to Gi’Ya for saving her life and feeling that a great weight was lifted off her shoulders, confessed all the forbidden knowledge she discovered. She talked “around” P’Ko’s and Lu’Gs’s involvement, not naming their names, but realized later that she gave enough info about them that the Church wouldn’t have any difficulty figuring out who they were. But she trusted Gi’Ya and knew that the Church was at odds with the CA and especially the CASS, and hoped that Lu’Gs and P’Ko would be safe.

  Not much time was spent on explaining the content of the forbidden knowledge; Gi’Ya seemed to know already and didn’t ask any questions. She just let Chn’Gi perform her data dump.

  Gi’Ya showed little outward emotion when Chn’Gi reported her discovery of IL on O’M and her reports to the Central Council. But by this time, Chn’Gi was feeling much better and starting to get her wits back. She detected hesitation in the woman’s questions and responses and guessed that Chn’Gi’s latest revelation was probably new information. She began to cut short her answers.

 
Gi’Ya with a sudden sense of urgency told Chn’Gi that she was going to be alright for tonight. The injection she was given will calm her, and it will last through tomorrow, adding that she should go to Mi’Ka’s in Ol’Tn tomorrow, and get some tea. Mi’Ka will know what is needed and have it ready for her, and she should follow Mi’Ka’s instructions.

  Gi’Ya told Chn’Gi that the CASS has been dispatched to check on her, and she needs to go back out to the chapel and kneel and pray or at least pretend to pray before the CASS operatives arrive. Gi’Ya cautioned Chn’Gi to avoid liquor and not to read any more from the reader, but to “continue to use the reading lamp for privacy and come back immediately anytime, day or night, if you feel another attack coming on or whenever she feels the need.” Adding “This is a peaceful calming place, even if you’re feeling better come back in a week, or sooner if you feel the need, enjoy the peacefulness here and we’ll talk more. Try not to worry; we’ll help you.”

  Chapter 45, P’Ko’s Quarters Broken into

  P’Ko listened to the girl’s voice singing through his TaC-B, she was accompanied by a band and had a steady beat. It was a Mi’Nr’s song, made for working. It was the perfect accompaniment for performing routine cleaning and servicing of the bore head. None of the cutting disks had been identified as needing replacement, which would have made it at least a two-person job, so he was working alone. He had done this many times since the start of his apprenticeship and was trusted to accomplish the task alone. This work was considered routine, and all the critical components of the T’Bm and his work will be inspected before the start of the next day’s bore.

  P’Ko reflected on all that has happened since the beginning of his apprenticeship, the Run with the Se’Ro’Bs, Tn’Ya’s mentoring, and P’Ko’s father assigned a new job. P’Ko knew little about his Ba’s new job, only that it was supposed to be a promotion. Then after he accepted discovered that it’s in a secure area, tightly controlled by the CASS, he’s forbidden to say anything about it.