Dadr'Ba

by Tetsu'Go'Ru Tsu'Te

  The junkyard where P’Ko used to work was placed under CA control. Lu’Gs is making the best of it, is still there but was shuffled into a liaison position, saved from a total job reassignment by his in depth knowledge of the junkyard.

  P’Ko put the bore head cleaning and servicing on autopilot as he frequently did with repetitive tasks and waxed philosophically. P’Ko thought how much of a double standard it is, the CA strictly forbids philosophy, but both the CA and the Church use philosophical arguments to bolster their positions.

  It doesn’t seem fair; the CA asserts that it’s the CA’s (and the Church’s) right to decide on philosophical matters such as destiny and right and wrong. Individuals, on the other hand, are forbidden to raise a counter argument or self-derived philosophical concept. The people are expected to accept the tenants and dogma provided to them without question and never to contradict authority.

  P’Ko knows that the CA and the Church can’t stop people from thinking, the people that get into trouble are the ones that come out and begin debates or proselytize their views, views the CA, and the Church might have trouble defending against.

  The Church is relatively immune from philosophical attack; it simply falls back on faith. A religious concept once accepted as an article of faith is impossible to argue against or logically defeat. How can you argue against something that doesn’t exist in the physical world and is backed by doctrine?

  The psychic ability that all the people of Dadr’Ba are conceived and born with is molded and reinforced during the ToG Ceremony, which serves as the basis of its religion. The workings of it remain an unexplained mystery and provides a solid platform for the Church, where science fails faith prevails.

  The Church and the CA work together, though they wouldn’t openly admit it.

  The Church cares about the people, their feelings, and emotions, their hopes, and cares. Its role is to supply a peaceable stable, productive and reproductive workforce for the CA.

  The CA’s role is the running of the ship, and its multitude of interacting pieces, parts, mechanisms, structure, and infrastructure, guiding it to O’M. The CA, unlike the Church, abuses its authority by many orders of magnitude. Using its role as the governing command and control of the ship as its power base, the elite in control of the ship have disenfranchised the people and strives with its multitude of secrets, indiscriminate punishments, restrictions on speech, to turn the ship into a massive machine.

  Are the people so dangerous that they can’t be trusted to gather and talk about things, anything, without presenting a danger? P’Ko didn’t think so.

  P’Ko moved to a different section and continued his work. The trouble with doing this particular maintenance routine is that most of the work must be done while the equipment is shut down, cutting into the time he could be spending was Su’Zi. It even cuts into the time he could spend with Tn’Ya, but not as bad.

  Being Tn’Ya’s mentor gave P’Ko a sort of respected teacher status, which has helped keep Tn’Ya at a safe distance, yet comfortably cordial.

  P’Ko had doubts that Su’Zi would accept the situation with Tn’Ya but after her initial anxious, hostile rejection followed by their counseling with Mi’Ka, she accepted it. As a matter of fact, they seemed to hit it off. The three of them have become friends, even maintaining a physical relationship, sometimes two’s and sometimes three’s, but, thanks to Mi’Ka’s counseling, staying within the bounds of a continued mentoring relationship.

  Tn’Ya’s devotion to P’Ko remained undaunted, she’s been slow to make other friends at her apprenticeship in sector three’s fabrication shop, but progress has been achieved.

  All in all, P’Ko was satisfied and comfortable with the P’Ko, Su’Zi, Tn’Ya multiself they’ve created. As far as P’Ko could envision they seem destined to continue to be best friends. P’Ko could foresee after some years the Mentor respected teacher relationship toward Tn’Ya will fade. It could be possible for Tn’Ya to pursue a more romantic relationship with P’Ko and he wondered if he would be against it and how that might work out and what kind of couple they would make.

  He and Su’Zi aren’t mated and haven’t even discussed it yet; they’re decades away from that discussion. Both are still each other’s best boyfriend and girlfriend. P’Ko put the thought of future mates out of his mind, there will be plenty of time for that later, and if Su’Zi sensed these thoughts it could cause unnecessary and meaningless hurt feelings. P’Ko instead focused on the good things, here and now.

  Instead of creating frustration and drifting apart, the differences in jobs, locations, and work schedules, only seemed to heighten the anticipation for their meetings and gave each plenty to share with the rest when their schedules allow them to meet.

  Messaging technology helps, but Su’Zi always mistrusted messaging, and P’Ko has grown reluctant to trust it too. The messaging system is operated and maintained by the CA, and they have grown to prefer, if not in person, mutual visits to virtual worlds, harder to monitor. Their favorite virtual meeting place is Vr’Chm, P’Ko and Su’Zi introduced Tn’Ya to “their beach” and Tn’Ya loved it. Unbeknownst to Tn’Ya, they also had her occasionally visit their private room, Tn’Ya never recognizing the protections in place. P’Ko and Su’Zi furnished it, and instead of being bare, decorated it similar to an apartment that one would find in Capsule Flats, complete with personal touches.

  P’Ko thought of people who go through their entire lives without establishing multiselves[98]. He, Su’Zi and Tn’Ya make a trio multiself. There are community multiselves, U’Te’s aren’t a good example, they’re not a close knit community, but Mi’Nr’s are, and P’Ko had to admit D’En’s even without much psychic ability are an excellent example of a community multiself.

  P’Ko replayed in his mind the feeling he had during the Run with the Se’Ro’Bs. Running down dark tunnels, not as an individual, but as a group, seeing and sensing not only from his senses but the whole group’s senses. It was awe-inspiring; he actually felt connected; he felt larger and stronger than any one person could ever feel. Even toward the end, when at times he thought it was just he and the Se’Ro’Bs, he knew that his pack was with him, sharing his experience of the chase.

  P’Ko thought of the Mi’Nr multiself-community; he had become comfortable and felt accepted, but he still didn’t have the full feeling of oneship with the Mi’Nr community as a whole. Not like he felt on the run.

  He still had so much to learn about the job and Mi’Nr life; he hadn’t yet visited the community school in the Mining Camp or visited many Mi’Nr homes. He had so many things he needed to learn to have the core, base knowledge needed to be one with the Mi’Nr community.

  P’Ko wondered how long it would take him to learn the core Mi’Nr knowledge necessary to really, truly become “one” or how he would even gain the more esoteric knowledge. He didn’t know if he would ever achieve it completely, Mi’Nr’s are born a Mi’Nr, they live a Mi’Nr’s life from Bo’Ba’s and know no other. Will he ever really be a Mi’Nr or will he always be on the edge?

  There are many multiselves, they’re not exclusive, a person can be part of a Mi’Nr multiself and part of a gender multiself, and family multiself. Sports fans are multiselves, some multiselves are short lived, a sports team fan multiself’s might only last the length of a game. But P’Ko felt that he would have a special bond with his pack from the Run with the Se’Ro’Bs for the rest of his life.

  P’Ko expanded his thought and wondered about the Church, the CA, and even the Dadr’Ba multiself. He was a minuscule part of their multiself’s. Did that make him in some small way responsible for the atrocities that the CASS was conducting? Then he thought, no, the complacent ones were passively complicit, he wasn’t complacent, but he wasn’t exactly actively trying to make things better either.

  How did the Dadr’Ba multiself go so wrong and allow the CA to take control? And turn Dadr’Ba into a victim, keeping so many secrets, using, and persecuting its people?

&n
bsp; The root of the problem had to be the military origin of Dadr’Ba’s command structure and the creation of the Central Council to manage and run things. The Central Council had become too strong, and too independent, too disconnected from the people.

  People had gotten too wrapped up in their personal lives and ignored what was going on around them, thereby relinquished any say they may have once had regarding the management of Dadr’Ba.

  The Central Council forgot who they owe their existence to. Instead of serving the Dadr’Ba community the CA is making the Dadr’Ba community serve them. To make matters worse, it’s an unchallenged rumored that the Central Council is virtually powerless, that it is dominated by the Commander and his henchmen that use rank, bribes, intimidation, threats and blackmail to neuter the other members of the council, gutting the council of its authority. Leaving control of the ship practically to one person, alone, not even a multiself.

  That instant P’Ko got the TaC-B alarm from the sack safe in the bottom of his footlocker, he knew that somebody was in his quarters, had found and was attempting to probe or open his sack safe. P’Ko dropped his tools and scrambled through the hatch at the T’Bm bore head and within seconds was racing toward his quarters near the other end of the T’Bm. As P’Ko got to the crew quarters hallway, he spotted someone outside the door to his quarters.

  What happened next occurred so fast, P’Ko had time only to react, not to think. Only afterward would he have a chance to replay the events in his mind and try to make some sense of it. At first, the intruder didn’t see him, P’Ko saw him but didn’t sense him. Then an alarm began sounding from above the intruder. P’Ko glanced up and saw something move, it was the size and roughly the same shape as Mi’Ka’s Ku’Ma. As soon as it stopped moving, it seemed to disappear.

  The intruder turned away from the door and looked directly at P’Ko. They made eye contact, but P’Ko still didn’t sense him psychically… the intruder was invisible. The person P’Ko looked at is clearly a Mi’Nr and wore a data helmet similar to one that he’d worn during training.

  P’Ko couldn’t get over the fact that he couldn’t sense him, especially, considering the expression on the intruder’s face. The expression of shock, apprehension and something P’Ko had trouble isolating without psychic clues, maybe pain, or longing.

  The thief shouted something over the alarm coming from the bot on the ceiling; it may have been “let’s get out of here.” There must have been someone inside P’Ko’s quarters. Then, with one hand the intruder pulled open the front of his overalls with one hand and reached in with the other. Strangely the intruder awkwardly turned more than necessary giving P’Ko a glimpse inside his overalls.

  P’Ko for a split second saw the glint of metal where the intruder’s inner clothes should have been. Then the thief withdrew something from an inside pocket and threw a small object towards P’Ko. Though P’Ko’s first impulse was to catch it, which would have been easy, an impulse warned him otherwise. Instead of snagging the thing out of the air as it passed his shoulder, he dodged it.

  It detonated with a blinding flash, the overpressure, like a tunnel collapse, forced him forward pinning him to the floor. They must have been thieves, but what would they be stealing? Theft is a serious crime, with serious punishments. The multitude of surveillance systems scattered throughout Dadr’Ba ensured nearly all thieves get caught, making theft rare. But if it’s not theft, what was it?

  It took a few moments for P’Ko to recover and as the tunnel vision caused by the force of the explosion began to fade, and his eyes focused, P’Ko saw two Mi’Nr’s in work coveralls exit the hallway leading to the stair down to the lower level. P’Ko crawled forward his equilibrium slowly returning.

  Some of the rest of the crew that stayed, electing not to go to the Camp or Ol’Tn began to arrive on the scene from their quarters and the recreation room. They helped P’Ko up, questioning what had happened. P’Ko quickly explained but didn’t go into detail about what these intruders or thieves may have been after.

  By this time, P’Ko realized that the only thing of real value, in his sack safe, the only thing that would be worth killing or being killed for must have been the reader and the data cartridge it contained.

  A search ensued, and it was soon discovered that the culprits entered through the processed fuel transport tube. They cut into it a couple of levels up and descended into the T’Bm, in their haste to leave, they left where they broke into the delivery tube open. The tool marks that remained made it apparent that they had planned on sealing it, but their being discovered spoiled their plans.

  An investigation ensued, the intruder’s showed on no security cameras. P’Ko identified them as Mi’Nr’s. No Mi’Nr’s had ever been turned and worked for the CASS. The psychic ability of the Mi’Nr’s would have quickly discovered it.

  It was possible that the CASS could have taken one of their detainees, perhaps, thought dead by the community, and not expecting to get caught, they could have coerced them into doing the job.

  It was evident that reporting it to the Up’Lndrs, in spite of their advanced forensic tools, was a waste of time. There’s no way this is going to be reported outside the mining community, and it’s equally obvious that this wasn’t an ordinary theft.

  P’Ko’s sack safe that had alerted him was an old model that P’Ko upgraded with a scan alarm. By looking at the sack safe there was no way to tell that the sack safe had a scan alarm, that was the intruders mistake. When the thieves tampered with the sack safe and scanned it to discover its contents and access code it alarmed.

  There was something about the intruder that he saw, something about the way he acted. It was like the intruder was trying to tell him something, the intruders could have killed P’Ko.

  As near as P’Ko could tell nothing was touched in his quarters, but later when the Mi’Nr investigator arrived with specialized equipment, equipment that P’Ko was surprised that the Mi’Nr’s possessed, and performed a scan, a surveillance device was detected and carefully removed.

  Chapter 46, P’Ko’s Burglary Investigation

  Su’Pr Ve’Ln led the investigation, Mi’Ka assisted, and more surveillance devices were discovered, not just in P’Ko’s quarters, but elsewhere as well, which initiated a thorough search of other T’Bm’s, mining camps and key locations in Ol’Tn’s.

  Analysis of the devices provided emission signatures that made it easier to discover others but yielded no clues to who was responsible. The CASS was the prime suspect, though the Church, as noble as they strive to be, is known to have its intelligence requirements, and motivations for keeping tabs on the Mi’Nr’s.

  The suspicion of the Church increased when P’Ko shared his experience from the Touch of God ceremony followed by the not so discreet surveillance he was subjected to afterward.

  Mi’Ka conceded that the Church probably surveilled P’Ko but had nothing to do with the break in. Based on these few data points, using her psychic ability and centuries of experience living under CA control, Mi’Ka became convinced that the Mi’Nr’s involved were Prz’Nr’s forced to help the CASS.

  The metal glint P’Ko saw beneath the coveralls must have been a shield device preventing psychic communication. The CASS has been working for centuries studying psychic abilities and how to understand control and exploit them. The vest probably included a remotely controlled explosive, known to be used by the CASS in the past to control Prz’Nr’s.

  The data helmet communication device the perpetrator wore was probably used to direct the actions of the Mi’Nr from a control center somewhere.

  A course of action evolved. First, they needed to find out more about the intruders and who’s behind them.

  Chapter 47, CASS Report on Failed Burglary

  CASS Director Chi’Yo sat at his desk staring at the report, his anger and frustration surging, not so much, by what the report contained but by what it didn’t.

  This idiot Sh’P’Po standing before him should be retired immediat
ely. He’s being forced to risk his career, his hard-earned status, his life… on this clumsy buffoon. He was sorely tempted to reach for the weapon in his desk drawer and retire this idiot, now.

  Chi’Yo continued to stare at the report and ironically found himself practicing the mental calming techniques that his surveillance agents had discovered Chn’Gi beginning to practice.

  Sh’P’Po stood at attention, facing Chi’Yo across the desk that separated them, and watched.

  Chi’Yo stared at his report, thinking through the disaster. Okay, the operation failed, that’s one of the risks in this business.

  But based on their analysis and profile of P’Ko and his financials, he shouldn’t have been able to afford a scan alarm model, and the records show that he purchased a non-scan alarm model. There’s no way the team could have known that that Dr’T loving U’Te P’Ko upgraded it himself. EXCEPT, for the fact, plain in his record, that P’Ko is a mechanic and a good one too, and had access to the components and tools to do the sack safe upgrade himself.

  They should have suspected and came prepared, but to get that level of expertise down in a T’Bm would have meant using a D’En agent in an exoskeleton equipped eSuit instead of those stupid Prz’Nr’s[99]. He and his advisors should have known they would eventually get caught; there had been close calls before.

  But an exoskeleton equipped D’En’s sneaking into an operating T’Bm even off shift is a recipe for disaster. It’s like sounding off with loud speakers “Hey, everyone, we’re not supposed to be here! And we’re up to no good!”

  Studying the report, Chi’Yo saw that they got sloppy, they deviated from the plan, and took too long. They were directed to plant the surveillance devices and look around for and investigate anything that could be linked to the resistance, including the cheap budget model sack safe purchase records indicated P’Ko had.