Descend- Seeing Stars

by Sean Oswald

  The challenges are based upon our heritage. They include contests of leaping, climbing, spear throwing, hunting, running, and if things are not clearly decided by that point, combat.”

  Jay said, “Okay, I can handle that.”

  “We shall see, my little Eesa has never been defeated. Today is not a challenge for your right to mate with her, but rather about the respect you will have with her and our people,” the Lepar elder replied.

  His other wives were given a position of honor next to the elders and their wives, while Jay and Eesa were led out to a line marked on the ground. Jay knew that beneath the soil lay a metal floor but for all intents and purposes this could have been the African savannah.

  Up from the ground metal arms sprang forth with six-inch targets hanging from them. The closest were fifty feet with the furthest out being three hundred feet. Then the thin cables that held the targets started to sway back and forth slightly making the targets mobile and unstable.

  Namur-san signaled for warriors who shoved six spears into the ground next to each of the competitors. “The targets are set out every fifty feet. There are two at each range. The winner of this contest is the one who can hit the most targets. But it only counts if you pierce or break the target.”

  Jay nodded to Eesa and said, “My people have a saying, ‘ladies first.”

  With that, Eesa whirled, grabbing one of the javelins and then continued her spin with almost supernatural ease as she threw it right through one of the marks at two hundred feet. On the one hand, Jay was impressed. She was agile and skillful at a level no normal human could have attained. Then there was another part that once again realized how unfair this was for her.

  Jay scanned outward toward the targets with his senses, activating the Hyper Accuracy that he now possessed. Then he picked up a spear, intentionally slowing his movements so that he only would appear to be moving at almost blur like speed. The projectile launched from his hand faster than any arrow and he guided it with his Kinetic Manipulation so that when it hit one of the three-hundred-foot targets it blasted the target into fragments that flew in every direction.

  The crowd that had erupted in cheers for Eesa a moment ago was deathly silent now. Jay looked at Eesa and said, “Excellent job, do you want to move onto another challenge now?”

  “No, if nothing else, my lord husband should know that his wife finishes what she begins,” Eesa replied.

  Then she whirled and threw another spear taking out the second marker at two hundred feet. Then without waiting for him, she took slightly more careful aim and threw for one of the targets at two hundred and fifty feet. It was a close thing, but she managed to drive the spearhead through the target.

  Jay realized what she was doing. He couldn’t let her get more of the high value targets. So, he threw a spear and took out the second target at two fifty. He judged it unlikely that she would be able to handle the three-hundred-foot target, so he moved in a blur and took out both the targets at one hundred and fifty feet.

  Eesa returned the favor and took out both of the hundred-foot targets. Then wanting to keep things close, Jay threw one to take out a fifty-foot target. That left each of them with a spear. Jay assumed that she would be forced to take the other fifty-foot target which would give him a clear win if he took out the second three-hundred-foot target.

  He learned though that he underestimated both her competitive spirit and willingness to take a risk. She backed up three paces and then bolted forward to the line putting all of her strength through the final three-hundred-foot target even if just barely. That resulted in her having eleven hundred and fifty points while he only had nine hundred.

  The only remaining target was a fifty-point target and that clearly wouldn’t close that gap. At first glance there was no way for him to win now and the smile on Eesa’s face showed she had done the math too. Unfortunately for Eesa, Jay had grown up watching Robinhood. So, he knew that just because your enemy hit the target first it didn’t mean the day was over.

  Jay focused and took his time, even more than was necessary. Then he fired out his final spear with enough strength to shatter stone. Again, while he didn’t have Eesa’ martial skill he did have kinetic powers to make sure the course of the spear was perfect. The audience’s gasp was delayed by a couple seconds in awe as his spear struck and split hers from the end of the shaft up to the metal tip and all the way through the three hundred point target sending shards flying everywhere.

  Namur-san was the first to speak, “Most impressive, you may be a worthy match for her after all.”

  Jay looked at Eesa but she simply said, “There are still more events in the challenge.”

  He shrugged and then followed as they were led to another section. There they found two circles cleared out and smoothed in the ground at the foot of a cliff which had risen from the ground to tower three hundred feet above them. Each of them was directed into one of the circles.

  Namur-san said, “This is a test of your jumping ability. You must leap from within your circle up as high as you can on the wall. The height of our leap is important, but you can also earn extra points by carrying weights upon your back. Each of you will get three leaps and the best overall leap wins.”

  Jay nodded at Eesa who first made a leap without anything on her. He had no idea that the Tamoori were this physically powerful. Watching her made him wonder how humanity could have dealt with such a foe prior to evolution. She made it a full two thirds of the way up the side of the cliff in one powerful bound. Her claws scored the rocks at the apex of her leap and then slowed her descent as she slid down the cliff face.

  “Why don’t you rest and then do your other two jumps. I will only make one attempt,” Jay said.

  Once his words were spread to the crowd there were whispers of how confident he was. Others seem to think he was foolish. One very human voice could be heard above the others calling him a bone head.

  For her second jump, Eesa had the equivalent of one hundred pounds added onto her back and still managed to leap about one hundred and seventy-five feet. The final leap was in many ways the most impressive. They piled a full three hundred pounds onto her. She was a bit denser than a human but that was still likely twice her weight.

  As she prepared her legs coiled and her tail shot out straight. Her legs strained and she leapt upward, managing to swipe a claw a full one hundred and sixty-one feet in up the cliff face. She did seem to have a bit more trouble with that descent, but she made it down without falling.

  The crowd cheered for her. It was an impressive show of strength and agility all tied up into one. Jay joined in the applause and felt genuine pride in his wife. It wasn’t like he had any emotional connection with her, but he did have respect for hard work, and if the price of this alliance was to be bound to her, it could certainly be worse. That and the votes of approval from his other wives went a long way with him.

  Jay looked around at the weights they had available. If he used all of them, he would be able to add about twelve hundred pounds but that wasn’t enough for what he had in mind. So, he dropped to one knee and punched his hand into the ground. With a burst of PSI energy, he shoved a construct all the way down till it hit the A’snkarnt metal fifteen feet down.

  Some quick math with the portion of his brain partitioned for calculations told him that one cubic foot of the earth here was likely to weigh between two thousand and three thousand pounds depending on what was in it. He realized he needed to come up with a better way of describing that portion of his brain but put that off as a problem for another day.

  Once upon a time the A’snkarnt metal had seemed completely indestructible. But that was before metalmancy and before having stats that were above forty thousand. The outer hull of the ship was much denser and reinforced with energy fields. This internal decking was durable but not reinforced.

  Jay reached down with his power and forced the floor to do his will. The metal bent up into a cup shape fifteen feet wide and fifteen feet deep
. Not including the twisted metal of the floor, the soil and rock was about one hundred and twenty-three cubic feet and came in at just over one hundred and thirty-five tons. With the metal it topped one hundred and fifty.

  Still Jay’s new max bench press as more than twenty-thousand pounds. He chuckled as he considered that. It wasn't like he had any equipment that he could set up to create a gym like that. And that wasn’t factoring if he used his kinetic manipulation.

  As he bent down and picked up the metal bowl that he had created, it was about the equivalent of what two pounds would have been like back on Earth for old Jay. Of course, the expression often heard when moving furniture that it wasn’t how heavy it was rather how awkward, was definitely appropriate here.

  He propped the bowl up on his head and held it in place, maximizing his strength and durability. He wanted to make this look easy, not like a struggle. Jay wondered if this was godlike power now. Comic books grounded him again. He remembered the hulk lifting a mountain or something like that. Quick calculations said that must have weighed billions of tons, so he was no hulk. Even a simple skyscraper was a couple hundred thousand tons and many heroes had done things like that. Jay smiled and scoffed. He would just have to be content with his paltry powers.

  Then he bent his legs down and pushed off with enough force that Namur-san and Eesa were both knocked back by the release of force. The crowd shrieked in awe as Jay soared up over the cliff. He had already scanned and realized that this was a massive space in the ship set up for some reason by the A’snkarnt. The ceiling was a full six miles up, so he had plenty of room.

  With Uremi’s power now he had the ability of flight. It was not winged, or propulsion based but like many other PSI abilities it defied his limited understanding of the way the universe worked. He could now simply will himself to move through space. Things like distance from the ground, gravity, speed, weight being carried all factored into how much PSI was required, but he had absurd amounts now. So, he flew up until he was nothing more than a speck and then let himself start to drop.

  He was coming down at terminal velocity in nothing flat. Jay halfway wanted to see if he could survive the impact. He was 99.9% certain that he could even without erecting a PSI construct to soften the impact. But the force of the impact would be like a bomb going off and might very well kill some of his new allies. That was to say nothing of his newest wife and her father.

  So, he slowed his speed and only hit the ground hard enough to send a dust cloud blasting up into the air. He shielded himself instinctively with a construct because he was more worried about getting dirt in his mouth than he was about the force of the impact. Once he was back upon the ground, he shifted the bowl onto the ground.

  The crowd which had started out in the thousands now numbered in the tens of thousands. There were large floating screens that displayed images of him. They had clearly been in Eesa’s court before and likely still were, but an eruption of applause burst out. It wasn’t exactly clapping which Jay supposed made sense for beings with claws in each finger. They slapped their chest and howled out his name. It was definitely exhilarating.

  Namur-san looked from Eesa to Jay and said, “It would seem as though a race or climbing contest are pointless. I love you daughter and you make our people proud, but who can compete with what our husband can do.”

  Eesa’s eyes were darting all over as though she was desperately trying to find a solution. “Very well, I will concede the foot race and climbing challenges if my lord husband will agree to allow me to set the prey for our hunt.”

  Jay couldn’t let her win, but he also didn’t want to crush her spirit. Her performance so far had been amazing. It wasn’t her fault that she never really had a chance. “As my wife wishes.”

  “Then I name the quarry of this hunt to be the Forlorn. The first one back here with a slain Forlorn will win, but extra points may be earned for bringing back more than one.”

  Chapter 25- Refining Eesa

  Jad-bal-ja stepped up at that point as did Jay’s other wives. Amelia said, “That is insane. This was fine as a way for you to show off but neither Eesa’s pride nor your desire to impress her are worth risking both your lives over.”

  The lion man looked at the much smaller blond human and then said, “I must agree with your wife. The Forlorn are not a game.”

  “Nor are the challenges. This is a serious matter. This marriage is bonding two peoples together for the primary purpose of destroying the Forlorn. If I am to give myself to this fully, then why should we not hunt Forlorn?” Eesa demanded.

  “You are this man’s wife, and so not part of my house, but I am still an elder of the Tamoori people and will not be spoken to in such a manner,” Namur-san said.

  Then he turned his back to Eesa and said to Jay, “We try to understand that your culture is different than ours, so we allow your other wives to speak freely, but this wife was of the Tamoori before she became one of yours. I would appreciate it ally to ally if you kept her under better control.”

  Jay was torn between wanting to explode on Namur-san and trying to understand their culture. The issue was resolved though as Eesa knelt next to him and grabbed his leg. He could hear her thoughts as they were so intense. She felt shame that her husband had been called out because of her. Oh, and threaded through that he could feel her terror that Jay would do something to her father.

  Her emotions helped Jay control himself so he simply answered, “I may have a way to make her stronger. If I can do that, will that put your mind at ease?”

  Namur-san was thinking but Trina answered, “There is still no point to this.”

  “Actually I think that Eesa has a good idea. We really don’t know anything about how our abilities or the Tamoori ships will hold up against actual starships. From the data the scans show, all the Forlorn ships are working their way through defenses to the A’snkarnt planet. Wouldn’t that leave them vulnerable to a hit and run attack on their flank?”

  From there they had a great deal of discussion and ultimately it was decided that Jay would try to refine Eesa. They had no idea how it would work on a Tamoori, but it was worth the effort. He arranged to set up a Tempus Fugit field for their scientists and Jay’s people. The next hour would give them thirty days to work on as much improvement of the fighters.

  It took a little explaining to go over the time dilation, but the elders were understandably excited about the potential and sent their best fighter pilots, other than Eesa and their brightest scientists to participate. The alliance was already bearing fruit. Now though Jay had to set up a private area for him and Eesa to train and refine in.

  His first thought was that she wasn’t like the humans. From the little that he had learned about the Tamoori, they liked the outdoors and large open spaces. That was confirmed by the way that the A’snkarnt had set the spaces up inside this leviathan. There were a number of huge open savannah or jungle-like areas.

  With that in mind he had several of his combat fuses form a circuit with him. Once his PSI was doubled three times in a row by Trina, Meikiyo, and Bong-Cha, he had enough to create a Tempus Fugit field that was a mile in radius. That should give Eesa plenty of room to wander. What he didn’t tell them was that he enhanced the field to make it a 1:4320 time dilation. That would give him six months alone with Eesa.

  Jay knew that any of his wives would have called no fair, but he figured that he and Eesa had far less in common than he had with his other wives. If it went badly, he could always cut it short. Beyond that, refining her might be much more complicated since she wasn’t human.

  Not knowing what to say now that they were cut off from everyone else the first lame line that came to his mind popped out, “I’ve finally got you alone.”

  Eesa looked at him. One of her ears arched up higher than the other and her body language seemed defensive. It was yet another reminder of how much communication was done through non-verbal means but that was difficult with a race that had different body language. La
tely, he had become dependent upon telepathic communication and the fusion to tell him what the women around him were thinking. This was back to the not knowing how to act part of life that he remembered as being so clumsy.

  Once again though she misinterpreted him and pulled her gym shorts down before starting to take off her one piece that he would compare to a gymnast’s outfit.

  He shook his head and said, “No, that isn’t what I meant.”

  Now she looked even more confused if he was reading her expression correctly. “Why not, I’m your wife. It is your right.” She paused then said, “Maybe your other wives didn’t tell you, but we are compatible. I thought I had explained that to you already.”

  “Yes, you explained that we are physically compatible but there is more to this than that. Don’t you want to get to know me, first? See if we even like each other?” Jay asked.

  “That wouldn’t change the need to consummate the marriage and therefore the alliance or the need to procreate. I may not be able to be a pilot anymore, but I can still share my strength with your house by bearing your cubs,” she answered.