NAAN (The Rabanians Book 1)

by Dan Haronian

  “They are right,” she said.

  "You think?" he asked, his eyes open wide.

  She shook her head and looked through the window again.

  "It can also aggravate the locals," said Daio. "This is the last thing we need right now."

  “I wish I could go outside," said Su-thor still looking through the window. "But Ashima doesn't agree.”

  “She is an experienced nurse. I would listen to her.” He said realizing she didn’t want to talk about Sosi.

  She opened and closed her left fist several times, and then started to cough.

  “Are you okay?”

  She nodded, but continued coughing.

  “Do you need something?” he look toward the door and hoping Ashima would appear.

  Rapid beeping suddenly erupted from the device that controlled the oxygen machine. Footsteps drummed on the stairs.

  “What happened?” asked Ashima rushing into the room.

  Su-thor was coughing heavily now.

  “She… clenched her hand several times. I thought maybe she had some kind of circulation problem, and then she started to cough,” he said. “I don't know if it's related,” he added clenching and releasing his own fist.

  Ashima looked at Su-thor’s face.

  “Su-thor, I am injecting something to calm your cough. It will make you drowsy.” She straightened immediately. “What am I telling her this for?” She fiddled with the infusion tubes and a few seconds later a liquid began to trickle into the lines.

  “Is she okay?” asked Dug.

  “What do you think?” returned Ashima sharply. “What did you tell her that caused her to cough like this?”

  “Nothing. We just talked,” he said backing up a bit, still staring at Su-thor. Her eyes were closed now. The cough had faded to small barking noises with whistling breaths in between.

  He turned and left the room. He went down the stairs. “Damn this disease,” he mumbled to himself when he stopped at the bottom of the stairs. His gaze settled on the kitchen to the right and the table that was hardly large enough to seat four people. He then looked into the living room with barely enough space for a couch and two armchairs. It was more than they’d had in Seragon, but much less than what he’d gotten used to on Naan. Angry, he walked outside slamming the door behind him.

  He took a deep breath and walked to the edge of the yard. The sound of a window closing came from behind him. He turned and looked at Su-Thor's window.

  I didn't do anything at all, he said to himself, as he shifted his gaze to the front. All I did was mention the searches. He’d had a reason. He wanted to convince her that these search were pointless. He shook his head and grinned. She’d immediately agreed, he thought to himself. "Damn plague," he said and gritted his teeth. If she told Daio the searches are pointless he would listen.

  The workers in front of him were trimming the trees. Four long ladders, with closely spaced rungs, were leaned against the trunks. They made him think of the locals. The sounds of cutting and trimming grew as he approached the trees. There were bright circles on the trunks where the branches had been trimmed. The trimming was intended to clear away the lower branches that obscured the view of the fields beyond. It was Daio’s request, but Dug knew it was what Su-thor wanted.

  “Be careful,” he heard someone say from above. He looked up and saw a man standing on a ladder leaned against the trunk of a tree.

  “Ahh, sir, I didn't notice it was you,” said the man.

  “How are things progressing here?” asked Dug.

  “Fine,” said the man and looked around him, “I think this is high enough.”

  “Yes, I agree,” said Dug.

  The man came down the ladder and stopped just above Dug. “We'll finish today,” he said.

  Dug nodded and looked around him. His mind was still on Su-thor, her wracking cough and whistling breath.

  “Is everything okay, sir?”

  Dug gazed at him. “Everything is fine.”

  “Do you need any help inside the house? Cleaning or fixing things? As you can see we are very good at any kind of labor you might have”

  “Yes, maybe,” said Dug.

  “How is Sosi?” asked the man and Dug looked at him quickly. “Sosi?”

  “Yes, he is your brother, right?”

  “Yes,” said Dug. The man suddenly had his full attention.

  “He is a very special person,” said the man.

  “You think?”

  “Of course. Everybody thinks so. He suffered for us.”

  Dug wanted to turn around and go back into the house, but a Naanite expressing empathy for Sosi was so strange to him. Suddenly he thought he could use this to build some empathy.

  “Yes, he is such a giving person, my brother Sosi,” he said forcing a smile to his face.

  “I haven't seen him in long time. I understand he is out.”

  “Yes, he is not here. He left to go into the mountains,” said Dug. He wondered if it was possible that people in Naan didn't know Sosi was gone. They surely knew about the search missions.

  “So he left to think?” asked the man.

  “Yes, something like that. It was hard for him, the thing with… the plague. I assume you know how hard he tried to find a cure for it.”

  “Yes, of course,” said the man.

  "I hope he is well out there alone in the mountains."

  “And what about Su-thor. Did she go with him?”

  “No,” said Dug and looked back at the house. “She is sick,” he said. “She has caught the plague." He looked back at the man. "You see, we are susceptible to this plague as well.” he saw the stunned look on the man’s face and a good feeling went through him. “This plague doesn't discriminate between old and new Naanites,” he said. Dug liked the sound of that. The connection between old and new Naanites sounded humble from one side but connecting from the other.

  “Yes, the cursed sinners plague,” said the man. “Is she is in the hospital?”

  “No, she is here. In the house.”

  “Great, then she'll probably get better soon.”

  “I hope so. She didn't want to stay in the hospital. You know, she worked there for a long time. She took care of sick people when the last wave of the plague struck. Still she didn't want to take up one of their beds and preferred to come home.”

  “What a remarkable woman,” said the man. “So how is she?”

  “I hope she'll be fine. I just visited her. She was fine in the beginning, but after few moments she started to cough.”

  “Yes, this plague is like a ghost. Sometime it goes away for a while and you feel good, but then it returns like a storm.”

  “Interesting image.”

  “I speak from experience. You probably noticed the scar on my face.” He came quickly down a few steps. “It's so deep you cannot miss it."

  Dug eyes opened wide when he saw the deep scar.

  "The plague caused an inflammation in my nervous system and the doctors needed to remove a tumor from my face. They said it had nothing to do with the plague but I’ve never believed that.”

  “I am glad to see you are strong enough to do what you do."

  "I hope she'll survive and come out of it unscathed," said the man.

  "We all do, but her hand has not been functioning for quite some time. I can only hope it will be the only thing she'll lose.”

  Two days later Daio walked to the entrance door holding a cup of tea. He took few steps into the front yard, stopped and looked ahead. Su-thor sat in her wheelchair, at the edge of the yard, facing the trees, as if she expected someone. He didn't walk to her. From here he could look at her and think about her. He couldn't face her anymore. The searches for Sosi were still on. He never gave anyone the feeling he was giving up, but he also had doubts Sosi was alive.

  People make hard decisions in life. No one knew that better than him. But he also knew that sometimes decisions are like steps in a long staircase. If you slip, the only way to go is down.
This was how he felt about her. He hoped she would survive. That fate would intervene and somehow stop the deterioration. Even then, she would surely lose her hand.

  “How is she?” asked Dug coming up behind him.

  “The same.”

  “The illness is really dragging on with her,” said Dug.

  Daio nodded while looking at her.

  “She should have stayed in the hospital. Maybe there it would have ended by now.”

  “It?”

  “You know what I mean. Maybe she would have walked out of there by now. Maybe even without losing her hand.”

  “There is no treatment there that she is not receiving here,” said Daio.

  “Still they have doctors.”

  “There is one doctor on every shift in the hospitals and all he does is give out pain relievers.”

  “I understand a new team went out today,” said Dug after few seconds of silence.

  “Yes.”

  “Any news there? Have they found something?”

  Daio frowned and shook his head. “Nothing.”

  “And Musan? Is he still cooperative, or is he also fed up with this?'

  “He’s not fed up with anything. He will keep looking until Sosi is found.”

  “If they ever do,” said Dug.

  “If?”

  “It's a small planet, yet it's easy to disappear into one of the valleys. You need more than a few hovercrafts to find someone that doesn't want to be found.”

  “I guess, but still we'll do what we can. Maybe he'll change his mind and leave some sign.”

  “It's also easy to die out there, especially if you are alone. He could die of starvation or thirst, be killed by an animal, or simply get sick. It already happened to him once.”

  “Why are you doing this?" asked Daio turning to look at him. Immediately he turned his head towards Su-thor and hoped she didn't hear him. "Do you really hate him that much?” he continued almost whispering.

  “I don’t hate him,” said Dug and turned around to face Daio. “The people in the Commons are talking.”

  “No they are not. Musan is sending his teams on routine patrols and the searches are part of them.”

  “They are not fools. Maybe they haven't noticed what you are doing yet, but they will at some point and it will cost us dearly.”

  “And what exactly am I doing?”

  “I spoke to one of the workers who came to take care of the trees, a man with a deep scar on his face. I was surprised to hear words of empathy coming from his mouth. People are starting to get used to us and that is not something to take lightly.”

  “Why are you telling me this?”

  “Because we could lose the little that we have in a moment.”

  “The people from the House of Commons know about the new hovercrafts. They approved the purchase. They know that Musan needs to train his pilots, and they finally understand the need to map Naan.” He took a sip from his cup and gazed again at Su-thor. “The searches for Sosi are secondary to Musan’s activities and they will continue until we find him,” he said with finality.

  The tress looked like tall mushrooms now, thought Su-thor, gazing through them, with their tall trunks and branches high in the air. Evening was near. Mampas hung over the mountains, but she was happy she couldn't see it from where she was. She couldn't bear the mixed emotions seeing it always created.

  An oxygen tank was on the shelf underneath the chair, and a compact control unit that the Doctor had arranged for her was hanging on the chairs handles. Her right arm was tied to the arm of the chair. Ashima had tied it there before they brought her down from the second floor. She didn’t want the useless hand to get tangled in the wheel. Her hand was still tied but she didn't care. The oxygen mask was still over her face, but the flow was less than in the past.

  Her condition had stabilized after the incident two days ago, but her disease was still there. The swing effect was maddening. Every time she thought she felt better, the disease came back and her breathing became shallow. This was how she described the suffocation she was feeling. She couldn't tell if the symptoms of the disease were fading, but she was pleased she could tell they weren’t intensifying.

  She’d had additional insights regarding the disease. For example, she'd say that the disease was going to gain momentum to come back all at once, like a blow to a stump that was sawed almost completely through to completely disconnect it. She’d gotten this idea when looking through her window at the people trimming the trees.

  She lowered the mask and took a long and slow breath. Not a deep one. Deep breaths could suddenly awake all sorts of things.

  “Is everything okay?” asked Ashima sitting behind her and to the left.

  “Everything is great,” she answered.

  But nothing was great. She still had the feeling that if Naan were a normal place, it would be possible to manage this plague much better. She didn't think about the plague and what caused it anymore. No one knew the cause or what should be done to stop it, if there even was a solution. But this disease, and the infections that followed, were a disease like any other. With the equipment, available on any advanced planet, it was possible the disease could be managed without difficulty.

  She thought of Mampas. If, in some mysterious way she had caught the disease there, she would probably have received proper treatment and would have walked away unscathed. She looked down again at her right hand. She tried to move it, but beyond a strange tingling feeling, the hand remained where it was.

  She took another long slow breath and looked out across the fields, between the trunks of the trees. The view was clearer now. The field just beyond the trees was green. So were the other fields past it. It was the growing season of the year. She was happy to see green covering everything. The mountain was swaddled in a green blanket. It was so different than what she remembered on Mampas.

  She thought of Sosi as well. She often did, and with time she’d come to the conclusion that he wasn't healthy in his soul. It happens sometimes to special people. Their souls cannot contain their capabilities. She remembered the things he said during in the days before he left. They were like a puzzle she’d put together and concluded that he knew something, something new about the plague, something that was on tip of their noses.

  A hum came to her ears. Everything was so quiet around the house that she could hear things far away. The noise stopped and she looked around, thinking it might be some bug.

  “Do you need anything?” asked Ashima and walked up to her.

  Su-Thor shook her head, but then the noise came back. “Do you hear that?” she asked.

  Ashima looked around her. “Maybe…” she said but paused.

  “Hovercraft,” said Su-thor.

  “Yes, maybe,” said Ashima.

  Su-thor closed her eyes and tried to control her breathing. “It’s more than one, maybe several,” she said and open her eyes.

  Ashima looked at the sky. “They are far away,” said Su-thor.

  She heard footsteps coming up from behind. “It’s probably Musan.” said Daio, passing by Su-thor’s chair.

  “Do you see them?” asked Ashima.

  Daio looked at the sky and Su-thor started to cough.

  “Come, let's get you inside,” said Ashima. “I don't understand what is so exciting. It's only hovercrafts.”

  Su-thor put the mask back on her face and shook her head. She removed the mask for a second and said. “No, I am fine.”

  “This excitement is not good for you,” said Ashima.

  “I would be excited inside the house as well,” she said and her anger began to rise.

  “Musan would have called me if they found him,” said Daio moving closer to her.

  She looked at him and shook her head. She didn't know what she felt for Sosi. Was she simply angry with him? Or was there something under her anger? Something from the days when he was still with her, something that would revive when the anger passed? She coughed again. Ashima played with
the control panel, mumbling something to herself.

  When the noise grew louder Daio called Musan, but the line was disconnected. Something unusual was happening here. He looked at Ashima and motioned her to the house with his head.

  “No,” said Su-thor and grabbed his sleeve with her left hand. She looked at the sky. She thought she recognized something in the noise, but she wasn't sure. She raised her hand up and covered her eyes, trying to focus.

  “What's wrong?” asked Daio.

  “That noise,” she said removing her hand looking up.

  “It's probably the new hovercrafts.”

  “It's sharp. Too sharp,” she said and took a deep breath.

  Dion was about to set. Mampas had yet to rise, but I could see a bright area above the mountains. A few hovercrafts flew by above me as I walked from the creek to the shade. I wanted to run to the trees, but I couldn't. I wasn’t sick; at least I didn't feel sick. I hadn’t eaten anything bad as far as I knew. Everything I ate was fresh, but maybe that wasn’t enough. At least I had plenty of water.

  When I reached the shed and looked back at the vegetation that hid the water, I suddenly remembered the paragraph. It wasn’t clear in my mind, but I remembered the key words.

  'Reengineering of the molecular coupling sites.'

  I remember what it meant. At least what I thought it meant. That insight had driven me from the town, from the Doctor, from my brothers, and eventually from Su-thor.

  The Doctor and his people had assumed this meant the coupling between the molecules and the binding sites in the lungs. That was what I’d thought too, at first. It was the most obvious interpretation. That was what I thought when I first saw the paragraph. Although I saw it only after I knew their interpretation, I doubt I would have thought differently otherwise. But this was only one interpretation. I realized this like I many times realize things; suddenly without any intentional thoughts.

  Reengineering of the molecular coupling sites meant the coupling sites of the different gases as they emerge from the bottom and enter the pools. It could refer to how they coupled to each other, or to the water molecules, or to something else, as long as they became heavy enough not to leave the surface of the water.