“How far does it go? Do you gain their skills and abilities? Can you do what they do? Can you operate weapons or vehicles they are familiar with? Do you know the people they know? If they have a specialized skill such as dancing, or surgery, or speaking a certain language, does that transfer?”
“Sometimes, but not always. Languages can be learned from the mind, but art forms and high performance skills are more difficult. For example, if the host is an accomplished painter or musician, or athlete, you can’t gain such capabilities, because most of them are improved over time by practice. But if the host likes blueberries for instance, you might crave them as well.”
Tess stepped away for a moment, and then turned around. “Now let me show you something else, Naero. When you become more adept at shapechanging, you don’t have to copy a host completely, unless you need to look exactly like her or him or it. If you just need to blend into a crowd, you can settle for what I call, generic approximations.”
In a flash, Tess transformed into a young lander woman very similar to the test subject, but still different in many subtle ways. “In many instances, approximates can be faster and easier, because you aren’t trying to duplicate someone’s appearance, personality, and genetics completely.
“But at the same time, you have to keep appearances within an acceptable range, so that they do not look freakish or call undue attention to you. It all takes experience and practice. Do you think you’re ready to give it a go? Remember, most shifters don’t get it on the first try. Stop if the pain becomes too much and back off.”
Naero linked with the test subject and attempted to do everything that Tess had done.
It was much more difficult than she thought.
She gasped and almost cried out. Tess transformed from the ground up, from feet to head. Naero attempted to do the same, and was up to her ankles in the shapechange before she realized that the agony was akin to having her legs lit on fire.
Tess linked with her, sharing her pain.
Naero, go as far as you can go. I know it hurts. I’ve been there. You can get past it. Keep trying.
Naero focused, and pushed the transformation up to her hands and lower torso. Great. Now the bottom half of her was on fire. She resisted the urge to transform into an energy being to endure the heat.
Excellent. Keep going, N. the sooner you complete the change, the sooner the pain will abate. That’s why you want to learn to shift as quickly as possible.
Naero pushed it up to her shoulders, shuddering and whimpering as she did so. The pain was agonizing, almost unbearable, even for her.
Almost there, N. Finish it. Go ahead and scream.
Naero did just that. She collapsed to the ground and nearly blacked out.
Tess dragged her back up to her feet. “Naero. Look in the holomirror.”
The face of the young lander woman stared back at her.
“You did it,” Tess said. “You completed your first shapechange.”
It didn’t feel like a victory. “I don’t like it,” Naero groaned.
Tess patted her shoulder. “No, it is odd and unusual, sometimes downright weird and even unpleasant, becoming someone or something else, and knowing what it is to be the other. As a shapechanger, it all comes with the territory. You just have to suck it up and deal with all of that. Now, let’s get you back. That’s going to be just as tough, your first time, so steel yourself to that fact. Change back to yourself, your base form. Do it as quickly as possible to limit the pain.”
“Haisha!” Naero exclaimed, “Give me a few more minutes to prepare myself. That was rough. It took a lot out of me.”
“Rest for a few minutes then. It’s not a race.
“This isn’t right,” Naero said. “Is this what it’s like to be a lander?”
“Remember, to them, all of these parameters are within their normal range.”
“Tess, I…I feel so weak, so slow and vulnerable. Haisha! How do they manage?”
Her counterpart chuckled. “N, the average Spacer is far stronger and faster than the average lander human. Different lifeforms are going to be just that–different. Spacers forced themselves to evolve. And Psyonic talents are common among the Clans. And in your base form, you are something beyond even a Mystic Savant. We still don’t quite know what you are exactly. Of course this would be a step down for you. If you don’t like what you are, then transform back to your original self.”
Naero pushed through changing back, slightly faster, and slightly less tormenting, by duration if nothing else.
By then she was done in, completely spent. She felt as if she were drifting into a coma.
They brought her back to The Xanadu on a medbed, and it took her three days to recover from the ordeal.
After that, things continued to progress. Shapechanging grew easier, faster, and less tormenting. Especially under Tess’s tutelage. Sometimes Master Jo observed closely at hand, studying Naero’s continuing progress.
It did go smoother with practice and progress. Weeks and months passed. Naero learned the variations of gender, and then age. Age was actually surprisingly tricky. Once again, her Chaos training with Master Vane gave her surprising insights, as she recalled her biomancy understanding of the life cycle from birth to death.
After she had mastered shapechanging into the various sentient humanoids, Tess and Master Jo agreed that it was time for her to explore the realm of animals and other types of near or non-sentient creatures.
Tess continued to be her priceless guide, explaining any complexities or concerns with various forms.
All shapechanging became a variation upon a theme.
“Animals are easier in some ways than sentients,” Tess said, “and in some ways more difficult.”
Naero frowned and sighed. “Of course they are. It’s not like any of this could ever be easy.”
“That’s just it,” Tess told her. “It’s easier to transform into many animals. The hard part is in maintaining your focus on your base form–who you were, and being able to shift back to it. The allure of animal forms is that they are much more mindless and driven by base needs. It is far too easy and tempting to simply go wild, and never come back. That is the animal mind.”
“Great,” Naero said. “So, where do we start?”
“Something easy. Something closer to us, fellow mammals–primates and pigs work well for your first animal shapechange. Don’t go for anything far fetched or exotic.”
Tess had sedated test subjects brought in on medbeds. A variety of jungle ape, and a specimen of domesticated pig.
Naero mindlinked with Tess as the latter transformed into one beast, and then the other.
Naero, notice how much concerted effort it takes for me to maintain my own mind and consciousness. The impetus of my new form’s mindset and neural net constantly just wants me to be an ape, or a pig, and nothing else. You have to maintain your center, your true mind. That is the only way to be able to find your way back to your base form.
Tess shifted back. “Your turn, now. I’ll stay linking with your mind and help you if you drift off. It’s easier than you think it is, so stay constantly on you guard.”
Naero took in a few deep breaths.
She attempted the ape first.
Tess was right. In one way, the physical transformation was easier.
But immediately she felt the strong pull to simply give in to her form and its overwhelming desire simply to be an ape.
Tess gave her tips to focus on through their link. How to, in effect, maintain two minds: the animal mind, and her own mind, all at the same time.
You’re doing well, Naero. Now let’s bring you back and try the pig.
Sure thing Tess.
Yet that return was one of the most difficult she had ever faced, except for her very first.
Naero was forced to call it a day, and tackle the pig transformation the next.
Tess counseled her, “You’re going to feel really weird, N. You aren’t accustomed to this. Anima
l minds can linger in you head for a bit when you’re not used to them. You don’t get all of their influences out right away. I’ll warn Khai to have you kept in medical and under observation, until the mind traces and imprint patterns completely fade. We don’t want you going ape.”
Naero stuck her tongue out at her friend. “Hah hah, how amusing.”
Tess chuckled. “I couldn’t resist. Just a little shapechanger humor. Want me to come by and groom you for fleas and ticks?”
“No, that’s Khai’s job. Although I do have a weird craving for mangoes.”
Tess laughed. “I’ll see what I can do.”
From that day forward, Naero explored the ins and outs of various animals and lifeforms. She didn’t enjoy becoming reptiles, amphibians, or bugs and insects, but she learned what she could when she had to.
Who was going to expect a bug? Yet they might swat her by accident.
Actually, being a pig was glorious. But becoming a dolphin was fascinating and liberating. Dolphins had amazing minds and very close relationships with each other. But all of their intellect was based and focused around being a dolphin and living their intense lives to the hilt. They were extreme athletes and animal world hedonists.
Birds of many kinds were intriguing, and the range of their powers of flight alone were exhilarating and staggering, let alone their many other powers and abilities.
Plants and trees were less than exciting, but there were still valuable insights to be gained from their long term view and perspectives. They were still living things, and they experienced life in bizarre ways that were completely foreign to other living things.
Then Master Jo gave her an extreme test.
He introduced her to Jati–a genetically and mentally modified Ejjai. The two were actually sitting together sipping Choolien violet tea with honey and lime in the gardens.
Naero’s first reaction was to summon her swords and prepare to remove the Ejjai alpha’s head from her shoulders the next instant.
“Stop!” Master Jo insisted, temporarily shielding Jati behind a golden screen of force. “Do not attack my guest, Naero. Jati is not like the hyperviolent slaves of the enemy. I have gone to great lengths to modify her much further to be rational, reasonable, intelligent, and even in her own way, quite compassionate.”
“I don’t believe it,” Naero snarled, refusing to let down her guard.
Jati wore a rather pained expression on her face. “Master Jo has explained matters to me, Ms. Maeris. I quite understand your strong reaction to my…my presence. But please, sit down and let us speak of many things. Will you allow me to pour you a cup? The tea is really quite good.”
Naero sat down and nodded, not taking her eyes off the Ejjai.
Om, check that tea for poison.
Already done. No poison. Drink away.
Naero took a sip. They were right. The violet tea was superb.
“So,” Naero said, “does this mean that there is an enclave of these hyper-uplifted Ejjai on Oorrii like Jati somewhere? Or is it the regular, vicious, warlike breed that the invasion worlds came to know and love?”
“What would you do if there were?” Master Jo asked.
Naero kept staring at Jati. “Easy. If they are of the latter kind, I would locate and eradicate them.”
Jati lowered her face and sighed. “I am the only one of my kind,” she said. “I was selected from the frozen specimens that your Intel and Master Jo keep on hand for experimentation. He uplifted me to my current state, and I am thankful to him for that. I’m very sorry that these foes of yours have used less evolved versions of my race and species to attack your worlds and do such great harm.”
Naero sneered. “Sorry will never make up for all of the atrocities that were committed by the Ejjai invaders–and that is still going on in some places. There can be no talk of forgiveness.”
Jati bowed her head. “No, I suppose not. Yet remember, my people did not ask for this. They did not ask that these things be done to them. Your people are just as warlike. What if the enemy took over Spacers and turned them into their shock troops and weapons?”
Master Jo interrupted Naero. “You’re being very rude and hard upon my guest, N. Ease up. Jati had no part in the invasions. And in her current incarnation, she would never do so.”
“Master, with respect, I cannot stomach or accept any comparison or parity with the Ejjai. Indeed, Spacers make war when there is no other way, they are a valiant people. Yet they have always been liberators, never conquerors. But I have witnessed firsthand the abomination that the Ejjai call warfare; it is etched and branded forever in my mind for the rest of my days.”
“Naero, listen carefully. Jati is going to be sedated, and I want you to shapechange with her.”
Naero recoiled in fear and horror. She dropped her tea cup, the cup broke, and her lavender tea spread quickly and stained the table.
Jati moved quickly to clean up the mess.
Master Jo placed a hand on Naero’s arm. “We must fully understand our enemies in order to be able to defeat them,” he told her.
“No!” Naero insisted. “Become one of them? Are you mad?”
“Quite possibly,” Master Jo said with a grin. “This is no jest or joke, Naero. I am quite serious. Just as I have done, you should see for yourself and understand what the enemy actually did to the Ejjai. How they twisted that species for their own ends, making monsters out of them that they were never intended to be–that they never would have become, on their own. That was an abomination as well.”
“So, is there a Dakkur habitat on Oorrii as well?” she said in jest.
Master Jo shook his head. “I wish there were, for our sakes, but those creatures are far too advanced and volatile. They were tainted and corrupted long ago. I don’t think there is any help for them. But I think the Ejjai can still be saved.”
Naero rose and kicked her nanochair behind her, shattering its form. It quickly re-shaped itself at the table according to its presets.
“Saved?” Naero said, nearly in a rage. “We can’t save them. They need to be exterminated!”
“Naero,” Master Jo said earnestly. “you will change your mind. Certainly the twisted monsters we face can only be put down. But the Ejjai were never that in the beginning. And they were never meant to become what they have been warped into. Trust me. Do this to gain knowledge, insight, and enlightenment. How better to understand our foes? To know them, we must become like them and exist and think like them for a time.”
When they went into the med center, Naero still shuddered when she saw Jati sedated on that medbed. She took her place on the one right next to it.
Shapechanging into an Ejjai was one of the scariest, and among the weirdest things she had ever done.
Yet right from the beginning, she began to see that Master Jo had been right all along.
The Ejjai evolved from opportunistic pack animals. Their humanoid forms were primal, prehistoric in function and intellect. Statistically, they were no more rapacious than other early sentients at their primordial level of existence. They were pack hunters, pure and simple.
When Naero used her advanced biomancy to study Jati, and then shapechange into her copy, Naero read the genetic history clearly.
What Triax and then the alien enemies mostly did to the Ejjai was monstrous indeed. The pweaking of their genetics was unlike any kind of genetic manipulation she had ever observed.
Everything was done to turn them into hyperviolent monsters and shock troops. All of their increased intellect was bent to shape them that way.
It took Master Jo months of intense labor to undo all that for Jati–just one specimen.
By becoming an Ejjai herself, Naero could see the raw effects of positive and negative life energies of the universe at work. There was indeed good and evil, to every degree and form. The G’lothc were like a Cosmic disease inflicted upon the universe.
They marred and corrupted everything they touched. Yet most things simply existed. They were ne
ither good nor evil, yet each of them had the potential to be shaped into something that was more one than the other, if taken by powers greater than them.
The Ejjai had been enslaved and victimized as badly if not worse than anyone else, and turned into an affliction and a curse upon the galaxy.
After Naero returned to her base form, Master Jo took her and Jati to the storage areas where thousands of frozen, captured Ejjai were held for study and experimentation.
“Do what you think is best,” Master Jo told them.
Naero looked to Jati.
Jati nodded and bowed her head.
Naero went among the Ejjai, some of her most hated adversaries, and put forth her advanced, biomancy powers.
She returned them, every one, to their initial forms at the point they had been taken, back to what they had originally evolved to be–just another prehistoric hunting group. Not monsters. Just a stage between animals and sentients.
The task took Naero six entire days of difficult labor.
It was only a few thousand, barely a symbolic gesture, yet it still felt right. They would be kept in their frozen, hibernation sleep for the time being.
Naero took one healthy male and did what Master Jo had done with Jati. She uplifted him to the same level, and gave him the Ejjai name of Baroon, so that Jati would have another of her kind to keep her company. Now they would not be alone.
They could live out their days on Oorrii.
Naero and Master Jo worked out a plan to find a proper world to introduce the Ejjai somewhere, a place where they would not be so invasive, where they wound find challenges, and a place for themselves in an acceptable ecosystem that was right for them.
By that time, Naero had spent nearly an entire year mastering shapechanging. Master Jo met with her very early the next day before dawn.
“The Ejjai matter was your final, official test for shapechanging,” Master Jo told her. “And might I add, that you did very well. May you continue to do so. Naero, you now possess a rare gift that few shall ever know. You can understand sentients and other creatures in deep ways that most people never will. That gift will continue to allow you to grow and your personal enlightenment to expand.”
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