A minute later, when the Xandee set them down in front of the massive cone-like building called Center Cone, both twins were very glad they only had water in their stomachs. Slow? They call that slow??
13: Xandee
Perched atop tall chairs that the twins suspected were hastily constructed with them in mind, the two Dracon children looked around curiously at the — “laboratory” was probably the most appropriate word. The Honorable Xiel-qoran-el, whom they'd learned was the head of this scientific research facility, was literally perched on a short stand designed for clasping by their peculiarly jointed appendages at the end of their rudimentary legs. Meanwhile, he attended to a device which tested their blood samples to determine what sort of foodstuffs might be safe for them.
“As I mentioned before,” he spoke up gently, “our staff here at Center Cone is a select group of Xandee who have this interdimensional power of perception. We are far from population centers because...” He hesitated.
“Honorable,” Zanil spoke up from a similar perch a short distance away. The impression was that the utterance of the title was meant to reassure. Obviously this was a tender subject.
“Yes, it's all right, Zanil-nilox-el,” Dr. Xiel — as the twins had started to think of him — murmured to his associate. “We must be completely open with our guests. Unfortunately we are isolated from our general society because there is a great deal of misunderstanding of our powers. Because we possess this extra sense, those who do not share it believe that we are mentally unstable and dangerous to society. We were ousted. It was either remove ourselves completely or be eliminated. Obviously we chose exile.”
Cory, her imagination already going into overdrive, blurted out, “So are they testing everyone in your society to see if there are any more of you? Won't people who have your extra sense just know to shut up about it so they're not discovered? Do you have families you left behind? Were you tortured?”
“Oh, wow, Cory, slow down,” Story spoke up quickly, appalled at her forthrightness. “I apologize for my sister! Really, you don't have to share all that with us.”
“I'm just curious,” Cory muttered, sagging.
Dr. Xiel made the shrugging gesture with his digits again. “The immature of our species is also very curious,” he commented. “It's understandable. In fact we have a few sympathizers in our cities who carefully observe and notify us if another Xandee is discovered with the extra sense. Usually we are able to extract them without too much trouble.”
He's not going to tell us the rest, the twins realized in parallel thoughts. It was clear that the history of these extrasensory Xandee had been difficult. “How old is your community here?” Story asked carefully, hoping qer question was a less sensitive one.
Dr. Xiel smiled. “We do not have common time references, of course, but based on our observations of the Vriesians and the Humans on Vriesia, I'd estimate that our little society here has existed for about sixty of your Solar years. The number of our kind who are still being discovered is very small anymore. Since the Separation, we have continued to grow and there are now about a thousand living in small group clusters spread around Center Cone which serves as our center of government, our medical facility, and research center. Fortunately, the more progressive of Xandee citizens have worked to secure our autonomy and we are now completely self-sufficient.”
“Live and let live,” Cory murmured, nodding.
Zanil and the Xandee leader exchanged looks. Story wondered if the arrangement with the general Xandee society was stable after all.
The device analyzing their blood samples made a chirping sound. “Let's see now,” Dr. Xiel murmured. “We have studied the plant species on Vriesia as best we could remotely, as they seem very similar to ours. Our powers of perception are limited, of course. We cannot perceive the makeup of things, only their visual appearances. According to our analysis, you should be able to tolerate a couple of our more protein-rich fruits. And there is a carbohydrate and fiber-rich fungus which might be palatable.” He gestured rapidly to Zanil, who gestured back, then left the room, presumably to collect the appropriate foodstuffs.
“Prater could have done this analysis more accurately,” Cory muttered, frowning. “I'm starving, but I don't like fungi.”
Story flinched at the reference to the cybernism, but shrugged it off. “I'll eat yours,” qe replied, winking at her. “We might be twins, but all of your mushroom-loving genes were given to me, remember?”
“Fraternal twins,” Cory retorted. “You really don't have to remind me that I take more after Fama than Bapa.”
Story snickered; it wasn't true, of course, except regarding mushrooms. Both twins strongly resembled their tall, blond father. If they hadn't been different genders, they could easily be thought to be identical.
Listening to the exchange, Dr. Xiel wondered about the references. In their observations, they'd heard the children refer to a “Prater” but it was one of the things about the Human children which had baffled them. It seemed to be a name, but there was no other entity with them as far as they could determine.
“We'll have a meal prepared for you in a few moments,” he murmured to the children. “There is still a lot we have to talk about, however.”
“We can talk while eating,” Cory said breezily, waving her hand and hoping it didn't mean something weird in their language. “I got lots more questions.”
“I think he means he has questions to ask us, Cor,” her twin murmured to her. “I'm sure they're wondering how we got here.”
“Oh, right.” Cory sagged again, disappointed. Were the Xandee even going to accept their strange tale of telepathic, bodiless, galactic pranksters? “Go ahead... we'll answer questions, of course.”
“You referred to someone named Prater,” Dr. Xiel began to their surprise. “Who is Prater?”
Cory opened her mouth, then closed it. “Stor, this one's yours,” she muttered under her breath.
“Ah...” Story shifted in qer chair uneasily. “Not sure if you're going to believe this... but I'm mentally linked to a mind... the mind, I mean... of a... a—”
“Cybernism,” Cory offered, unable to keep silent
“Well, you'd probably consider it something of a computer. It's not a computer. We call Prater a 'cybernism.' Our father built him,” Story tried to explain. “Cybernetic but with some parts that allow adaptation and change... not an organism, therefore, but a cybernism.” When the Xandee scientist nodded, qe plunged on. “Prater has this thing inside its unit called the HAGE — Human Analogue Generative Element — that lets it adapt. Well, hard to explain now, but it just makes it very smart and more—”
“Human-like,” Cory took up the explanation, smiling broadly. “Prater doesn't have much personality. Crater is way more like a real person. He's the first cybernism, the Crater Trizero-One. Prater, as we call it, is the Crater Trizero-Two. I don't know why Bapa decided to call them Craters. Maybe because they're like this huge empty hole that can be filled up.”
“Ba...pa?”
“Our father,” Cory murmured.
“The capacity of the Craters for information storage and processing is really incredible,” Story picked back up the explanation. “The HAGE allows them to actually develop a personality and to change and grow like a Human psyche. Prater's pretty new... I think it's still getting there. Crater, though, he's a great guy, insatiably curious! He studies, well, everything! I... I really miss him.” Sorry, Prater!
This is understandable, Vestor, came the dim voice from within his mind. You've known Crater much longer than this unit.
Story was momentarily stunned; the mental voice of the cybernism was much weaker. Qe swallowed hard, glancing away.
“I know, I miss Crater, too,” Cory murmured. “Our family had a lot going on this past year. Crater was there for most of it to help us keep it together. Do you know that Crater wants to be a medical doctor? How crazy wonderful is that? He's quite a guy!”
“Not a machine,” the twins countered together automatically, then Story added, “But I know what you mean. We can't explain it either. When we came here, somehow his mind was still with me. I don't know how that's even possible.” Again qe felt the sensation that something was very wrong. That qe should be alarmed or upset. Instead qe felt a weird disconnect. I can't do anything about Prater... no one can from here.
The Xandee smiled again; the twins weren't sure they could get used to his grin made up of razor-sharp teeth. “Which leads to my next question, how you came here... but before that, I must tell you that we were able to extrapolate from observing you in your Alpha Universe that there are two other entities involved in what happened to you.”
The twins both straightened. “You know about Slimy and Scorpa?” Cory asked, then added silently, “You're busted, Scorpa... might as well reveal yourself now!”
They could both cept that Scorpa was still around them, had silently followed them to Center Cone and listened to everything, though he hadn't deigned to speak to them again. “Whatever. I'll chime in when I'm ready... or not,” the entity menttransed back to the twins.
“From your speech and reactions when you arrived on Xanda,” Dr. Xiel went on, “we determined that possibly you were not alone, that there was at least one more being to whom you were speaking. Perhaps that Scorpa? And you referred to someone called Slimy... are those beings both here? Did they bring you here? I apologize for the need to question you about them, but this concerns our security.”
Story paused for a second to see if Scorpa was going to comment further, but the energy creature was silent, probably sulking. As if we don't have enough to worry about… Qe took a deep breath. “All right. Yeah, there are two beings; energy creatures is how we think of them. They don't have physical forms, at least not that we've seen. Slimy is the really bad one...” Qe trailed off, frowning.
“Is he here or at least listening?” the qild menttransed to Scorpa. “Do you know?”
“Nah, he can't be bothered,” Scorpa replied, bored. “All he cares about is that you're stranded here, which of course you are. It won't do you any good to cooperate with these bug folk except to get food, I suppose.”
Story straightened and shrugged. “Slimy isn't here. We think. Anyway, the other one is Scorpa. They brought us to the planet in Hendor Universe just as Slimy sent us to your universe. If it weren't for them, we'd have been deep-spaced... and dead. So I guess you could say Scorpa isn't all bad.” The qild made a wry twist to qer mouth. Well, not ALL...
The Xandee doctor nodded in excitement. “So that's what happened! We observed you hanging in space, alive but with no apparent life support system. Because of the one you call Slimy?”
“Yeah, we were in this bubble which he called his holding tank,” Cory muttered sourly.
“But why? Do you know what his purpose was?”
The twins exchanged glances. “He wanted us to stay away from some little project he had going on in the Gozgazel System,” Story explained.
“Dude didn't cause the Eye,” came a voice from the other side of the room.
When they looked over, they saw a tall Dracon-Human, by appearance a male — evidently — dressed in black leather pants, long black coat, boots and wearing a black fedora which dipped over one eye. Long, coal-black hair spilled over his shoulders with one strand dramatically falling over the corner of a dark eye. He was leaning indolently against the doorjamb at the entrance to the laboratory. Now he pushed off and ambled over to them. “Sorry, I didn't have anything better to do than to manifest,” he added with a decided smirk.
“Scorpa?” Cory inquired, her eyes widening.
“Who do you think you are, Staro Royal?” Story demanded, naming a popular figure in Orbglen mystery fiction. “And please tell me that's not real leather!” Dracons abhorred the use of animal skins for clothing or decoration. Plus it was highly illegal in the USC.
The man shrugged, pulling over another stool and perching upon it, the leather clothes cracking with his movement. “I can look like anyone or anything I like,” he explained, and straightened leather lapels on the coat. “You Dracons are so provincial. It's just atoms, you know. Don't worry your tender sensibilities; of course I didn't kill animals to get this material. It's just matter replication. You're High telepaths just as I am. You can mattmorph, too.” He ran a hand along his leather-cased arm. “I just like the feel of it,” he murmured, adding a pleased grin that was ironically less pleasant than the toothy grins of the Xandee.
“We would never!” Cory said under her breath, equally disgusted. “So, Dr. Xiel, this is Scorpa. It's not his real body, of course, if he even has one.”
“Amazing... to incarnate like this,” the scientist murmured respectfully. “May I assume you do not have any ill intentions toward us or the children?”
Another shrug. “I'm no sadist. I'm merely on the run from my own universe. You could say I hitched a ride with Slimy... not his real name of course. Curhef is the latest name he's gone by.” He refrained from revealing his own recent designation. “It served me to assist him for a while, but I didn't see any reason to eliminate the kids here. Not my style.”
“And you're still hanging around us because—?” Cory asked, peering under the hat.
Scorpa waved her away with a black gloved hand. “If your people look for you here, I can hitch a ride again, can't I? I’d just as soon hang around your Alpha than Xost.”
“Unbelievable,” Story murmured. “Are we supposed to trust you now that you've saved our lives? How can we be sure you won't keep playing games with us?”
The man hitched a shoulder in a bored shrug. “Slimy was the one playing games. I'm not the one with ill intentions. I'm just trying to survive, just like these dragonfly people here.”
“Hmm?” Dr. Xiel made a noise that the twins took to mean surprise. “Dragon...fly?”
“Your wings,” Story explained, throwing Scorpa a look. Qe turned back to the Xandee scientist. “Sorry, but we have insects on our planets which have four wings like you do.”
“Order Odonata,” Cory added. “The biggest, er, dragonfly we've ever seen was a little bigger than this.” She showed him her palm, fingers splayed out wide. “But the wings look so similar! They can stop and start and change direction abruptly like you can.”
“Interesting... yet we have never observed such creatures on Vriesia.”
A Xandee came in at that moment with trays laden with fruits and mushrooms. “Food materials for the Humans,” he murmured, bowing in deference to Dr. Xiel.
“Oh...”Story looked over the handfuls of mushrooms. There were several varieties of the frilly fungi, ranging in colors from yellow to lavender to dark brown. “Um...”
Cory already had a pink fruit in hand, ready to take a bite. “Ha, even you don't eat mushrooms raw. Here, have a piece of fruit, Stor.”
“Raw?” the three Xandee all said at once.
“Heh, of course they don't cook food here,” Scorpa spoke up, glancing over with a smirk. “So, Honorable, you never observed the Vriesians preparing food?”
Dr. Xiel hesitated, then murmured, “Indeed we saw them using heat to bring foodstuffs up to a certain temperature, likely to sterilize them. Since we eat all our food live, there is no need for that here. I assure you the food has been cleaned.”
“You've been observing Humans, too?” Story asked of the interloper, suspicious.
“Me?” Scorpa shrugged. He leaned over and snagged a piece of dark green fruit. “I doubt the heating was for sterilization, Doc,” he drawled, and bit into it. A thin stream of yellow juice trailed down his chin. “Juicy!” he declared, chuckling as he swiped at his chin with the back of his hand.
“I don't understand,” the Xandee murmured.
Glaring at Scorpa,
Story explained, “Some foods we just don't like to eat raw. Some Humans eat raw mushrooms, but we like to cook them.”
“With dolanut butter,” Cory added, licking her lips. “With a sprinkling of basil and oregano.” She narrowed her eyes at Scorpa, then took a bite of her pink fruit. “Salty!” she uttered abruptly. But continued to eat, hunger giving way to expectations.
“I’m not actually digesting this,” Scorpa commented with a wink. “I can throw anything down this hole; it just all gets converted to energy. Lucky me.”
Cory threw him a black look.
“Butter, basil… I don't think we have those things here, or a suitable substitute,” Dr. Xiel said, concerned.
Story picked up a frilly lavender fungus. “Well, actually Bapa eats all sorts of things that we usually don't because he's had to in his travels. And he can't always cook things either. So maybe this would be all right.” To Cory's horrified look, he took a bite of the fungus... and froze.
But not because the fungus tasted like chocolate cake.
“P...Prater?” Qe'd felt a sudden change in the presence of the cybernism in qer mind, as if something had broken open... and something else was beginning to drain out.
Vestor, came the significantly weakened mental voice within his. This unit shall not be with you very much longer. The limit has now been reached.
Story was shocked that qe could barely perceive the other mind anymore, could barely hear it. Though qer sister was saying something to qer, qe had to block her out. “But where are you going?”
That is unknown.
Then there was nothing.
“Prater? Prater?”
Story gasped abruptly as someone was tugging on qer arm. Qe came back to qer awareness to see qer sister yanking on qer.
“What's the MATTER with you? Are you all right? Is the fungus hurting you?” Cory asked her qother anxiously, peering closely at qer.
Story shook her off, turning away. “Nothing's hurting me,” qe snapped, feeling surreal and angry all at the same time. Prater was gone, the Link evaporated, the mind connected to qers gone. To where, the qild could not imagine. Qe brandished the lavender fungus at qer sister. “And this is all mine! It tastes like chocolate cake!”
Eye of the Gazelle Page 13