by T M Roy
“What the hell, Povre!”
Cursing as dead sticks and spiny branches scraped and poked, he wriggled around to grab her shoulders. Her face held the same expression as it had yesterday morning. Kent didn’t have to push her hair back to know her little catlike ears would be flattened against her skull.
“What is it?” He silenced as the sound overhead grew louder and closer. Povre clamped her hands over her ears.
“Helicopter,” shouted Kent as the incredible din pounded over them like an avalanche. Helicopter? What would a helicopter be doing in the area? Maybe some hikers were lost up on the mountain and it was part of a search party. Maybe some forestry company was traveling to or from their logging operations bordering on Forest Service land. Maybe…he couldn’t think of any more excuses, any more reasons. The truth stung him. Maybe they were coming for her. “Oh, jeez. Oh no. Someone’s on to us.” Trying to wipe away his fears, he shook his head. “You did see something yesterday morning.”
~~
Povre felt his hands close around her and drag her deeper into the sheltering brush.
She peered through the bristly screen in time to glimpse the source of the teeth-jarring racket. The craft skimmed low, following the course of the river. It passed them by in a blast of air and sound.
“Let’s go,” urged Kent.
Her feet and legs obeyed, her body followed the tug of his hand. Povre’s heart thudded in sync with the fading sounds of the noisy machine. She wished she’d taken a better look at it, saw what made it fly. Perhaps she might suggest a way the humans could make their aircraft quieter.
Listen to yourself, Povre! Right now for all you know these humans are hunting you down like you’re nothing more than an animal!
She shook her head and tried to dispel the muddle of thoughts still bogged down by her bonding with Kent.
~~
Kent decided to cut through the forest instead of follow the trail. He checked his Forest Service map, took a bearing with his compass, and thanked his lucky stars that he knew this area fairly well. His shortcut would make them less visible by air, plus save them least two miles on the trail. If they could only get to his bike…
Once they got to his bike, he corrected. Once there, he’d feel safe. Since he never knew when he might have to give someone a ride, he always carried a spare helmet and gloves. Povre’s jumpsuit, in its dark color, looked normal enough unless one got close enough to examine or feel the material that made it. And the full helmet would effectively cover her face, just as the gloves would disguise her six fingered hands. When they got home to Eugene, he’d think of something else, at least he hoped he’d think of something else.
Because right now he didn’t have a clue.
* * * * *
SHE TOOK SLOW, CAREFUL steps as she moved through the forest. The scientist took comfort that four others from her team, within shouting distance yet out of her immediate sight, were traveling a course parallel to hers. Each of them was loaded with a wide variety of equipment. Her personal gear was slung across her shoulders, placed on her belt, or held in her hands. A quiet symphony of hums, clicks, beeps, and other electronic sounds surrounded her like a melodic swarm of mosquitoes. Like her teammates, she wore the latest in personal communications gear, including a small, hands-free, voice-activated radio headset to convey any positive news to their headquarters as quickly as possible.
The eager anticipation she felt within increased with every forward step. All her life she, as well as those with her, had dreamed of such a moment. Prepared for it. Spent personal time and effort and training in something that was so much more than a job. Despite a long history of hoaxes and dead ends, every call made to their organization was taken seriously and investigated with undaunted hope.
She loved what she did. She had to, since the pay barely covered expenses. All the generous endowments from private sources went into equipment and travel costs. Now if they could just keep the government agencies out of things, ETIS might actually get somewhere in their goal of establishing an intelligent, human, and peaceful contact with intelligent life from other worlds.
* * * * *
SOME DISTANCE AWAY, FAR enough not to be picked up by the ETIS team’s equipment, a government agent watched the group’s progress through the forest.
“Those suckers will never catch on,” he snickered. “Look at them, marching through the woods like a bunch of scouts on a field trip. They think they’re advancing human society trying to make peaceful contacts with aliens. Makes you sick.”
“Peaceful contact. They’d welcome with open arms what would turn out to be an invasion. Well, that’s why we’re here. And when this is over, they’ll never know what hit them. They don’t have the funding,” said his partner.
“Yeah, it’ll take them a while to figure that new wiretap protocol. And they’ll never be able to stop our hackers. By then, they’ll have done all the legwork, and we can just swoop in for the prize.”
The other made a rude noise. “If anything comes of this.”
“Something should,” said the first. “We’re here because we traced a call they took, you know. It actually sounded promising.”
“Oh, really?”
“Yep. Came from a cellular number.”
“When will people learn cellular phones and e-mails are anything but secure?” Shaking his head, the partner lowered his high-powered binoculars. “Well…who’d it belong to?”
“Number belonged to a ranger right here in the Bend-Fort Rock Ranger District. Another agent’s tracking him down as we speak. And you can bet if that dude wants to keep his job, he’ll sing like a drunk cowboy on Karaoke night.”
* * * * *
“WE'RE GOING HOME,” KENT said in relief as he broke through the treeline and spotted his landmark. “Stay here while I get the motorcycle ready and the gear packed, Povre. Just in case anyone comes along the road.”
She nodded and sank down. For a moment, Kent watched her with concern.
“Don’t worry. Once we’re on the main road, we’ll be just fine.” He eyed the lowering clouds anxiously. That is if we don’t run into a snowstorm over the pass. He’d been foolish to take the chance to come over the Santiam Pass by motorcycle so early in the year.
He pulled brush aside and then the covering from his bike. His leathers and helmets were safe in the locked saddlebags, and he donned the thick chaps and jacket. Then he repacked the luggage carriers with the excess of the camping gear. “Now start, baby,” he told the sleek BMW as he slid the key into the ignition and reached for the fuel petcocks.
The warmth from the extra layer started him thinking. “Povre is going to freeze if her clothes aren’t as insulating as they look.” He considered their options. “That’s it. We’ll go into Bend and rent a van. Then I can put the bike in the back.”
The BMW started right up and he let out a soft prayer of relief. “Come on.”
Povre emerged from the brush, silent. She examined the motorcycle with curiosity but without comment. Kent wondered if the mind-link accomplished what he’d hoped it would—give her a better command of English. Perhaps all it had managed to do was fry her brain, since she’d yet to speak anything since the first time the helicopter passed overhead.
“Are you all right, Povre?”
“Yes.”
He doubted that. Her eyes were dull, the brief curiosity of the motorcycle already faded. She stood passive as he settled the helmet on her shaggy head, taking caution not to hurt her delicate ears. She looked at the gloves he handed her for a moment, then at her hands, and folded her littlest fingers over her palms before pulling them on.
“Double-jointed, too, I should’ve guessed. Let’s go.”
He legged on, settling in the cold saddle, and patted the space behind him. “Hold on to me.” He pulled her hands around his waist, and she locked them willingly and slid her seat forward so she snuggled in tight against his leather clad back.
He went just under a reckless speed f
or the unpaved forest road, for he expected the helicopter to make another pass any time. They were far from the place they’d been spotted, if they’d actually been spotted. But if anyone had passed by and saw his note on the trailhead before this, they’d be sure to check back if they failed to find Kent in the area he had designated.
By the time they reached Century Drive, just outside Bend, a light rain fell. A left turn would lead west to Mount Bachelor and the Cascade Lakes resorts. Kent made a right, toward Bend, and knew his decision to rent a four-wheeled vehicle was a good one. If it was raining here, it was surely snowing in the higher elevations.
* * * * *
“THEY'VE DISCOVERED HER.”
H’renzek stood motionless, not even turning as he heard Jennsle give this bit of news. His heart froze.
“One of their aircraft is in the target area now,” added Jenn.
“Whose?” H’renzek asked. “Government agencies, the military, or the nice guys?”
“What does it matter?” said a tactical officer who had come a few minutes earlier to go over the data they collected. “The Earth military and the government agencies always seem to take over from the nice guys.”
“One can always hope they don’t.”
This voice caused H’renzek to turn his head enough to see the ship’s captain slither through the doorway. Just as quickly he sidestepped over to Jennsle’s station and eyed the readouts on the displays.
The Kemmerian sounded sympathetic, and H’renzek felt a soft tentacle touch his arm.
He turned, facing her squarely. “Captain, I’m asking permission to go to the surface.”
The captain’s milky white orbs appeared to whirl as the stalks they were attached to leaned toward the readouts. “A location has not yet been targeted just yet, Commander,” she said in a mild tone.
“I don’t want to go where she is. I want to make a diversion while Jennsle and the others find that out.”
The skipper’s eyestalks stiffened and her squat pink body rippled with deeper color as she thought this over. “In effect, they’ll get you instead of her?”
“Yes.”
The captain’s tentacles twisted, and the mottled stripes and spots of agitation became more visible. “No doubt you are probably the most qualified aboard for something this desperate. But what of your sacrifice if we cannot recover Povre, H’renzek?”
“I couldn’t live knowing I left her behind and tried nothing,” H’renzek said. “Povre is all the family I have.”
“I’ll consider your request, Commander H’renzek, but you know we have another hope.”
“The Folonar lifers on this planet can’t always help us,” H’renzek said before the Captain could bring them into the picture. “They’re supposed to keep their anonymity and not interfere with native policies. They haven’t stayed undiscovered for the past three thousand planetary orbits by getting involved.”
The Folonar, a race who looked amazingly like the humans populating the world below, had started the Affiliated Cooperation that united the star-traveling folk and other less technical, but emotionally and socially advanced cultures back in home space. They saved the struggling Sirgel race from extinction four hundred years earlier, and gave them, as well as others, the gift of the stars. Three of the Affiliated races were represented in this ship’s crew: the Kemmerian, the Sirgel, and the Lazorta.
“It would take a Folonar mega-psi to get Povre out of the hands of their agencies,” H’renzek added, “and as far as we know, none of that genotype exist among the lifers.”
“Nevertheless, I have made the proper signs and signals that we need to contact them. This is why I came here, to tell you. We’ll wait. No,” she said firmly before H’renzek said anything more. “That is an order.”
H’renzek’s fists were so tight his fingers hurt. But he made his face and voice professional again. “Yes, Captain.” He remained in place until she left with the tactical officer. “But Povre may not have time,” he added then in a soft, hoarse voice.
Goddess, that he was willing to bend, break, or forget the rules. Throw them all away in an instant. A professional, serving all his adult life in Exploration. Living and working by those rules for well over sixty decades.
But Povre was his only child. The only part of Silpova he had left. Even worse, Silpova’s death resulted from nearly the same circumstances that might lead to Povre’s: the independence, the thinking processes unhampered by convention, and unbounded curiosity that made both mother and daughter such brilliant field observers. He turned away from the knowing and sympathetic looks from the few crewmembers in the conference area and gazed at the planet revolving below. Most of them knew why he was so gruff and strict, especially with the teams that went down to the surface, especially the older ones. No one spoke of it, at least not where he could hear, but they knew. The incident—if not the full details—was a matter of public record, after all.
It seemed a lifetime ago, but the pain still stabbed as deeply as it did then. Another world, with natives even more xenophobic and violent. His beloved Silpova trapped, and H’renzek had come too late to save her.
And most everyone knew. Except for Povre.
H’renzek had never told Povre exactly how her mother died. Not only had it been to painful to talk about, he supposed deep down inside that if Povre did not know the awful truth she would, somehow, be protected from it.
“I am a fool,” said H’renzek, feeling his eyes get dry and start to burn. He leaned his forehead against the cold material of the viewport.
“POVRE?”
She roused, blinking at the sound of her name. With wonder she looked out through the glass barrier of the vehicle. No snow flew past the window. No more furious flakes to make her feel dizzy and blinded by unrelieved whiteness. It had seemed like hours, like days, like forever. Was that ordeal finally ended? Drops of moisture beaded the glass and she gasped in awe as her vision focused.
Green. Green everywhere, in any shade or value imaginable. Towering trees, bushes, plants. Her fingers went to the cool material blocking her from this wonderland, her face pressed against it. Her breath clouded her view. She fumbled to find the awkward latch holding the door closed.
“Povre!” Kent’s voice laughed.
She rallied and searched for the word she needed. “Out,” demanded Povre, frustrated, fighting the handle. She had to get out. To see if this was real.
“Hang on, I’ll come around.”
She nearly scrambled after him on his side, but the forgotten straps of the safety harness held her in place, only adding to her agitation. Kent appeared outside her window, opened the door, and reached to free the buckle.
Moist, living air washed into her lungs. Her throat closed with emotion so intense she thought she would faint.
“What is it, Povre? I thought you had to go…what do you see?”
Life, she wanted to say. Oh, such life! This is blessed land, touched by the Goddess. This is how my planet looked before the Passage. This is the environment burning in the blood of my people.
Her fingers clutched his arms for support as she continued to fill her senses. It took several moments before she was able to stand on her own, absorbed in wonder. She felt the pulse of the forest with every empathic sense she had. She wondered if somehow they were transported to an entirely different planet. This forest positively hummed with living energy. The singing of living things called to her from every direction.
~~
Kent, head cocked, watched Povre turn a slow circle. She had her arms outspread and her face tipped toward the overhead canopy of foliage and cloudy sky. The look on her face was pure rapture. Bliss. Intense sensual pleasure.
Once out of the snow zone and needing a break in driving, Kent had turned up Route 242 to find a little-used National Forest campground where they could stretch their legs for a while before continuing. He had no idea Povre would be so affected. So instantly renewed. “We’re on the other side of the pass, well out of the
snow zone. This is the Willamette National Forest—”
She shook her head and interrupted his lame tour-guide speech with another one word statement. “Heaven.”
And Kent watched her touch each living thing with reverent hands and shining eyes. Watched her lips move with silent words as she greeted soaring Douglas firs and western hemlocks covered with soft green lichens. Stroked gentle fingers over the feathery fronds of bracken fern, which stayed green all year here. She dropped to her knees to examine an early trillium and a thick coat of moss on a rock and another on a long-cut tree stump of gigantic proportions. When she touched it her face tightened and a soft crooning sound reached his ears.
“A lot of the old growth was logged,” Kent said, needing to speak. His words came out hushed. Povre’s rapture made him feel like he was in church.
She gave no sign of having heard him, but stood and followed the circular road leading to the campsites. Kent followed. She made a beeline into one picnic-tabled site where a tremendous old hemlock leaned over a stream bank.
“If I ever told anybody watching an alien hug a tree was erotic, I’d be sent off with the guys in the white suits so fast nobody’d even remember I was born!” muttered Kent. He stopped and rested his hand on his hips. “Not to mention I’m damned jealous of that tree right now.”
~~
The tree whispered to her, of rain, of floods, of wind, rockslides, and fire. Of the birds and animals that visited and lived among its soaring branches. Of other trees around it felled by forces of nature or humans. Of the incredible vistas seen by its uppermost growth. Come see! whispered the tree. Come up! Come talk to me more.
“Yes,” breathed Povre. Taking the invitation, her body reacted of its own accord. She kicked off her boots, the liners, and like generations of her agile ancestors, used her strong fingers and long toes to scamper up the welcoming trunk.