Terra

by Mitch Benn

- Is there anything in there about using it on Ymns? asked Terra hopefully. Or maybe NOT using it on Ymns? she added, more hopefully.

  - Well, there’s a trouble-shooting section . . . Here we are. It didn’t sync with your brain because your head’s slightly too small, that’s all.

  Terra heard a brief burst of titters, which ceased abruptly.

  - So now what? Can I come out?

  - No, it’s fine, said Bsht, I just have to compensate by increasing the sensitivity a little . . . There. Let’s try again.

  Terra waited forlornly. Her neck was starting to stiffen up. She heard the three blips, and then . . .

  - I think she’s coming round.

  Terra opened her eyes. Her head ached appallingly and her vision swam. She could just see a ring of concerned-looking faces peering down at her.

  - Take it easy, said Bsht. There’s been . . . an incident.

  Terra sat up. She was at the back of the lectorium. Between her and the front desk, on which sat the Interface, a path seemed to have been cleared straight down the middle of the room, the chairs shoved out of the way.

  - Have I been . . .? Terra croaked.

  - It was incredible! enthused Fthfth. You got blown right out of the dome all the way back here!

  Terra blinked. She was sore all over and there was the most horrid smell coming from somewhere.

  - It was pretty amazing, actually, said Pktk. I wish I’d recorded it on my slate so I could show you.

  - What do they call that fibrous stuff that grows out of her head? Shnst asked Bsht. Bsht was busy speaking to someone on the Lyceum’s internal communication system.

  - What was that? asked Bsht distractedly.

  - What do they call that fibrous stuff that grows out of her head, Lector Bsht? asked Thnst.

  - Oh. Hair. It’s called hair.

  - Right. Only it’s on fire, that’s all.

  - I’m so sorry. I should have made them exempt you from using that thing.

  Lbbp and Terra sat on the smooth bench seat in the main room of their apartment. After the regrettable Interface incident, Lbbp had been sent for and had taken Terra home immediately. Though the Lyceum’s resident physician had found no lasting damage to any of Terra’s vital systems (although by his own admission he wasn’t entirely sure what he was looking for), it had been decided to give her a day off to recover.

  - It’s all right. It wasn’t your fault, said Terra, pretending not to know anything about Lbbp’s earlier misgivings with regard to the Interface.

  - Well, said Lbbp, thankful that Terra didn’t know anything about his earlier misgivings with regard to the Interface, if it’s any consolation I don’t think they’re going to make you try to use the Interface again.

  - What? Oh no!

  Not the reaction Lbbp had been hoping for. - I thought you’d be relieved, he said.

  Terra sighed. - Don’t you see? Everyone else will just be pouring information into their heads using that machine while I’ll have to read it all up the old-fashioned way. I’ll get completely left behind!

  Terra got up off the bench and stomped across the room to the window. The sun was setting over the city. The towers and spires glinted pink and orange against the deep red sky. It was, by any standard, a breathtaking sight, but at that moment, it filled Terra with an aching loneliness. It was a beautiful world. But not her beautiful world.

  - I already feel so . . . different. This is just going to make things worse.

  Lbbp stood behind her and put a slender grey hand on her shoulder.

  - And what’s so wrong with being different? Doesn’t make you less important, or less clever, or less . . .

  Terra turned. - Aren’t I? Aren’t I less clever? she asked angrily. Aren’t Ymns stupid and primitive? Wasn’t that the whole point of bringing me here? So I wouldn’t grow up like them?

  There was an awkward silence as Lbbp took the time to frame his response as carefully as possible.

  - It was a spur of the moment thing. You were in danger and I made the decision to help you. It wasn’t any sort of judgement on the Ymn race in general or even on your parents in particular. I just found an abandoned baby. The fact that it was a Ymn baby was a secondary consideration.

  Lbbp breathed heavily. That seemed to come out all right. Terra was still staring out of the window. Lbbp needed to cheer her up and, if at all possible, change the topic of conversation, and at that moment he suddenly thought of a way to stun two drftgrf-bgshns with one bdkt, as the saying had it.

  - Look, he said, they don’t particularly need me at the Life Science Hub for the next day or two. Those cell cultures can develop themselves without my help. How do you fancy a trip somewhere, just you and me?

  Terra turned towards him, smiling. He already knew what she was going to suggest.

  -Rfk? she asked.

  Lbbp smiled. - Rfk it is! he said. Tomorrow, first thing.

  I think I got away with that, thought Lbbp.

  2.8

  The nature reserves along the coast at Rfk had been Terra’s favourite place on Mlml ever since Lbbp had first taken her there at just three orbits old. Lbbp had watched, beaming with pride, as the tiny Ymn girl had capered through the forest and along the shore, agog with fascination at the plants and wildlife. How gratifying that she should share his love of nature. A parent always hopes that their children will share their passions, but it’s by no means a certainty that they will. This is doubly true of adopted children, and several thousandly true of adopted children from different planets.

  Lbbp had made a point of taking Terra to Rfk at least once an orbit ever since. Several times an orbit, if work and other commitments permitted. The place had many guises, all beautiful in their own way. During the hot season, towering tree-sized flowers and delicate flower-sized trees would be in full bloom, a festival of colour around which bird-sized insects and insect-sized birds would buzz and flutter. During the cooling season, the foliage would turn a deep blue as it dried and fell, forming great cushiony piles which Lbbp would expressly forbid Terra to jump into, before joining her in jumping into them. During the cold season, icicles and frost would decorate the land and vegetation like glittering baubles, which Terra found curiously moving for reasons neither she nor Lbbp could guess at. During the warming season, the tree-sized flowers would punch their way through the ice like deceased warriors of legend, resurrected by their ancient gods to fight another battle. It was all especially fascinating because the climate within the city had been artificially controlled since eras past, so one had to venture out into nature in order to experience ‘weather’ at all.

  That morning, Terra had set her sleep-well to wake her early and had Lbbp’s configuration 11 ready for him by the time he woke up. They had made up a bag of food – slices of configuration 9 (it tasted better cold than the other configurations) some wsht rolls, pt-ssh paste and a flask of hot zff. They fitted their gravity bubbles (- Did you remember to charge your bubble? - YES, I remembered to charge my bubble) and packed spare power cells; it was almost a whole cell’s journey to Rfk. They set off just as everyone else was floating to work and study . . . Lbbp and Terra exchanged mischievous grins as they floated off in the opposite direction to the flow of traffic. No work for them today.

  The sun was high in the sky by the time they arrived. They set down on the beach, a stretch of crystal sand which refracted the light in rainbow patterns along its length. The sea, reflecting the sky, was a deep pink. Terra gazed out towards the horizon and breathed deeply, all thoughts of Interfaces, gshkth practice and singed hair cleansed from her mind.

  - Wonderful, isn’t it, said Lbbp.

  - It is, it is indeed, replied Terra.

  They sat in silence for a moment, drinking it all in.

  - Lbbp, asked Terra, what’s Rrth like?

  There was a heavy pause.

  - Well, said Lbbp, a lot of it is very beautiful.

  - As beautiful as this?

  - Some of it is pretty close, yes, said Lb
bp. At least it was the last time I was there.

  - How do you mean?

  - It’s the Ymns. They’re not as . . . careful as they could be with regard to their planet, said Lbbp, choosing his words with care. He knew that the way Ymns were perceived by Fnrrns – primitive, savage, stupid even – had become a difficult topic for Terra, and this Interface business hadn’t helped one bit. He didn’t want to make matters worse by launching into some bitter diatribe about Ymns despoiling their home world. He’d got most of that out of his system many orbits ago, he recalled with a shudder.

  - Is there hope for the Ymns? Terra asked, with genuine curiosity.

  - There’s always hope, replied Lbbp after a moment’s thought. Culturally and technologically they’re about where we were five or six eras ago and we turned out all right. Mind you, we’d never developed the sort of weapons they have on Rrth now.

  - Weapons?

  - Weapons that can destroy a whole city in one go, said Lbbp. They’ve actually used the things, too. I’ve seen pictures. And no you can’t see them, it would scare you out of your wits. They’ve made enough of these weapons to kill everyone on Rrth several times over.

  - Why? asked Terra, distressed.

  - Who knows? By the time they’d set off the first few there’d be nobody left to set off the rest. There doesn’t seem to be much logic to it. And given that they seem to be willing to go to war over the tiniest thing – minor tribal variations, ancient superstitions, even differing economic theories, if you can believe that – it seems pretty inevitable that they’ll wipe each other out sooner or later. That’s assuming, said Lbbp, rather hitting his stride, that they haven’t done already.

  - What? Terra was genuinely alarmed now.

  - Well, think about it; we can see Rrth from here using astroscopes and the like, but the light we’re seeing left Rrth many orbits ago. It could all be over on Rrth already and we wouldn’t be able to tell.

  Terra’s face fell and Lbbp suddenly realised how stupid he was being. The implication of what he’d just said hit him too late; he could see that it had hit Terra already. She’d come to terms with being the only Ymn on Fnrr (although it seemed to be weighing rather more heavily on her these last few days); the idea that she might actually be the last Ymn left alive was truly disturbing. You fool, thought Lbbp, letting your scientific enthusiasm run away with your mouth. You’re talking to a child, not addressing a symposium. He decided to change the subject.

  - Hungry?

  - Starving.

  They went to eat their food in the shade of the forest, the sun being quite fierce now. Fnrrns turn a bright blue if they get sunburnt, and Lbbp didn’t want to turn up to work with a blue face in the morning, since he’d made no mention of trips to nature reserves, but rather had told his colleagues he’d be working at home today.

  They found a clearing with a carpet of soft red grass and made themselves quite comfortable. Lbbp leaned his back against the stem of a giant lgsh-chr flower and chewed blissfully on his configuration 9. The stem swayed in the breeze, with an almost hypnotic effect.

  Lbbp’s eyes snapped open suddenly. Had he been asleep? He felt weirdly vulnerable; it was the first time he could remember being asleep out in the open. Fnrrns had been using gravity-wells to sleep in for eras and found the notion of lying down to sleep, as animals do, to be slightly degrading. Lbbp himself hadn’t just dozed off like that for a long time.

  - You were asleep! giggled Terra. Flat on your back like a jrrg or a big grey gff-gff.

  - Or a Ymn, reminded Lbbp. You’re having a Ymnising effect on me.

  - Don’t worry, I won’t tell your clever Postulator friends that you fell asleep in the forest and lay there snoring away like a big—

  - I do not snore! protested Lbbp.

  - How would you know?

  Lbbp got up and stretched. The slice of configuration 9 was still in his hand. He took another bite, then asked - How long was I asleep for? Fnrrns don’t dream, not adult Fnrrns anyway, so they can have difficulty keeping track of time while sleeping. For all Lbbp knew, he could have been unconscious for six shades or half a cycle.

  - About half a spectrum. Don’t worry, I kept myself busy.

  - What have you been up to?

  Terra was holding her slate. She’d sketched the flower that Lbbp had been leaning on. The flower was three times her height and was changing colour, almost like a clock; purple, red, orange, red, purple, blue.

  - It does that to attract lots of different birds and insects, said Lbbp. They all have a different favourite colour, so this way it gets them all sooner or later. Look, the hjj bugs like the red best. Terra noticed a little swarm of blue insects hovering around the flower. Ingenious, Lbbp went on. Makes it difficult to draw, though.

  - Look, said Terra holding up her slate. She’d animated her drawing so that it changed colour like the flower.

  - Clever, said Lbbp.

  - And here . . .

  Lbbp looked at the bottom of the drawing. Terra had sketched him, leaning against the stem with his eyes closed.

  With a giggle, Terra tapped the figure of Lbbp on the slate and it began to make little snoring sounds.

  - A bit TOO clever, said Lbbp.

  Terra laughed and tapped the slate to make the sound stop. The sound didn’t stop. Or rather it did, but a similar sound carried on. A snorting sound, then a rustling sound. Terra and Lbbp exchanged curious glances.

  The sound was coming from behind a hedgy patch of purple bush. - What is that? asked Terra. She put her slate down on the grass and skipped off to investigate.

  - Just a moment, said Lbbp, but Terra was gone. He put down his slice of configuration 9 and went after her.

  Terra found herself in a clearing overgrown with tall reedy grass. She looked through the grass towards the rustling sound. She saw nothing. She was about to decide that whatever she’d heard had already gone when a great section of undergrowth moved. She gasped and kept very still.

  What had looked like a grassy mound was in fact an almost perfectly camouflaged animal. Twice Terra’s size, it crawled along the forest floor, visible only when it moved. Terra couldn’t quite make out its shape; it was covered in long purple quills which were almost indistinguishable from the grass. She couldn’t tell which end was the head, or even if it had such a thing as a head. A brightly coloured sknth, a small furry arboreal creature, was scampering down a tree trunk about an arm’s length away from the creature; at that moment, the creature settled the question of which end was its head. It reared up and bared a set of sharp yellow teeth, taking the sknth with one swift chomp.

  Terra froze in fear. She watched the creature chewing its prey in horror and fascination. Something touched Terra on the shoulder. She started in fright. It was Lbbp. She wanted to punch him but was afraid to make any noise.

  - A znk! A wild znk! Fantastic! whispered Lbbp.

  - Fantastic? hissed Terra. I know at least one sknth who wouldn’t agree with that.

  The znk spat out a ball of multicoloured fur.

  - Isn’t it beautiful? enthused Lbbp, getting a little louder. These were almost extinct an era ago, you know. It’s so good to see them re-establishing themselves in the wild.

  - Shouldn’t we, er, be keeping quiet? whispered Terra, remembering those teeth.

  - Don’t worry, said Lbbp, their sense of hearing is terrible.

  The znk raised its head and made a sniffing noise. It swung round to look directly at Lbbp and Terra.

  - Their sense of smell, however, is excellent, said Lbbp, who knew he’d forgotten something. Terra, listen to me and do exactly as I say. That flower you were sketching?

  - Yes? whispered Terra, trembling.

  - Look at it. Look directly at it. Whatever you hear, don’t take your eyes off that flower.

  Terra turned her head slowly and fixed her eyes on the flower. It continued to change colour; blue, purple, red, orange, red . . . She could hear sniffing and shuffling, but did not turn her eyes away
from the flower . . . orange, red, purple, blue, purple . . .

  - It’s gone, said Lbbp.

  Terra exhaled. - Why did I have to look at the flower?

  - You didn’t. Well, not the flower specifically, anyway. I just needed you to focus your attention on something that wasn’t the znk.

  - Why? asked Terra, as they walked back to the clearing.

  - Well, like a lot of predators, znk are only interested in other animals if they’re a threat, or possible prey. It has just eaten so it’s probably not hungry at the moment, but if it felt threatened by us it would attack to defend itself. That’s why I needed you to keep still and look away. If you’d looked right at it, it would have taken it as a challenge, and if you’d tried to run, its hunting instinct would have taken over and it would have chased you whether it was hungry or not. As it was, it decided you were irrelevant so it left you alone.

  Terra wasn’t sure she liked being referred to as ‘irrelevant’ but she was glad Lbbp knew his animals. Lbbp gave a proud little smile. - And people say scientists are useless in a crisis, he said happily.

  - Is it time to go home? asked Terra, hoping that it was.

  - It is indeed. You’re back at the Lyceum in the morning. Better get an early night. And besides, Lbbp had noticed that something had eaten the slice of configuration 9 he’d left lying around and he wasn’t keen to find out what.

  Lbbp and Terra arrived back at the apartment building just as the sun was setting and the moons were coming out. The main room window shutter slid open; Terra was about to step inside when she was startled by the sight of Bsht sitting on the bench seat. She didn’t look happy at all. - And were have you been all day? This was addressed to Lbbp, who was hovering behind Terra. For a moment Terra thought he was actually hiding behind her.

  - What? Oh, out . . . We’ve been, you know, out, said Lbbp innocently as he floated into the room. I didn’t know you had a key to . . .

  - I’ve been trying to get hold of you since this morning, interrupted Bsht. Your friends at the Life Science Hub said you were working at home.

  - Home? No, no, field trip, that’s . . . that’s what I told them, field trip. They probably weren’t listening. You know what us scientists are like. Can I get you anything? Bowl of gssh?