Rhuna- New Horizons

by Barbara Underwood

Rhuna felt deflated and deeply distressed by his negative outburst.

  “But it’s very important! I must get there and rescue my mother before she is killed!”

  The Caretaker raised both eyebrows high, and then lowered them in another deep frown.

  “You must use water transport, not an RTE,” he said more calmly.

  “But why? Don’t you have any maps or charts with Chinza on it?” Rhuna asked pleadingly.

  “Yes, of course. There are many maps in the Repository including Chinza, and far beyond, in fact!”

  “Then show us some,” interrupted Kitlamu in a forceful tone.

  “Very well,” The Caretaker replied with a loud grunt. “Follow me.”

  Rhuna looked at Kitlamu and saw a satisfied smirk on her face. Then she looked around at all the strange objects on display on both sides of the passage. On one side, Rhuna saw large wooden furniture with many sliding drawers, each one with symbols in the corner.

  “That is storage for textile charts and maps,” said The Caretaker. “They must be stored in a particular manner to prevent decay, mould or insect infestation.”

  “Look at that right ahead!” said Kitlamu, and Rhuna spun around to look at the giant object filling the far end of the long room. “A giant ball!”

  “It is a model of the planet!” scoffed The Caretaker angrily.

  “I knew that, of course!” retorted Kitlamu in the same gruff manner.

  Rhuna ignored the bickering pair and approached the massive sphere to see the details more clearly. She noticed that the surface was not smooth at all, but had mounds to indicate mountains, and faded paint outlined oceans, lakes, continents and islands.

  “It is a replica of the planet model made by the First Atlans,” The Caretaker said as he looked at it with awe. “The original was solid metal with etchings and inlays of precious stones. This replica is only clay on a wooden frame.”

  “Where is the original?” Rhuna asked.

  “It is not known,” replied The Caretaker, ushering them further into the long and narrow building. Rhuna was fascinated by the variety of navigational objects, from the very small to extremely large. She admired the large wood panels with intricate carvings and gold etchings, and then marveled at a small metal orb covered in strange symbols.

  “What are those marks and dots?” Rhuna asked, pointing to some of the symbols.

  “Writing, of course!” The Caretaker responded with astonishment. “And numbers.”

  “I don’t know how to read and write,” Rhuna said.

  “Then you must learn!” insisted The Caretaker. “The ability to read and write is essential for the furtherance of all knowledge and insight!”

  Finally, the Caretaker stopped and turned towards the side wall. “Here is a chart you may examine,” he said, pointing to a large stone slab that hid the entire wall in the rear section of the building. Rhuna stepped up to it and saw the many indentations and marks on the stone. “You are too close. Step back and find a location you recognize.”

  Rhuna obeyed and after a while she recognized the shape of the land of Atlán, and then she identified Safu and finally Varappa. She admired the stone map for some time, recalling some of her earliest lessons in the Atlan School in Medíz where she first saw such representations of lands, oceans, planets and stars.

  “Chinza must be somewhere here,” Rhuna said, moving her finger down across the wide space that represented the ocean. “I can’t find it.”

  “It is here,” said The Caretaker, pointing to a tiny speck that Rhuna thought she would have overlooked and mistaken for a particle of dirt. “If you cannot find it on this map, you shall never find it in a Rapid Transport Enclosure!”

  “We shall see!” quipped Kitlamu, and then told The Caretaker that she wanted some textiles, ink and chalk to make references from to the stone map. The Caretaker grumbled as he shuffled away to find the items Kitlamu requested.

  “Is it too far away?” Rhuna whispered.

  “No, not too far,” said Kitlamu absently, still scrutinizing the marks on the stone map. As soon as the Caretaker brought the implements she had requested, Kitlamu began making marks on the textile.

  “Here, hold this,” Kitlamu told Rhuna. “We must measure as accurately as possible!” Rhuna held the end of the string taut and placed it on the various points on the map that Kitlamu instructed, and then watched as Kitlamu used a flat circle with etchings on it. “It is to measure the angles so that we can use the Astronomical Location Device,” Kitlamu explained.

  “Do not make this journey!” The Caretaker said as he watched them. “Such a small piece of land in the middle of a vast ocean would be most difficult to locate with the usual means of navigation for a Rapid Transport Enclosure.”

  “You mean we cannot navigate by sight alone – this I know, old man!” Kitlamu said irritably. “We shall use the Astronomical Location Device!”

  “Not good enough!” retorted The Caretaker angrily.

  “Do not undertake this foolish journey!” The Caretaker repeated vehemently.

  “Finished!” Kitlamu announced, and quickly folded the textile as she began walking briskly towards the entrance way.

  “Foolish journey!” The Caretaker called after them. “Foolish woman!”

  Rhuna hurried to keep up with Kitlamu’s determined strides. “Is he right?” she asked the older woman. “Is Chinza too hard to find?”

  “We shall find it!” Kitlamu retorted with emphasis, and Rhuna wondered whether a compulsion to prove her former husband wrong was clouding her judgement about the journey.

  “What if we can’t find Chinza, like he said?” asked Rhuna, unsettled by doubts.

  Kitlamu stopped abruptly and spun around. “He was always too careful, too obedient to tradition and rules!” she snapped. “We shall find it, and we shall rescue your mother!” Kitlamu added with firmness, then revealed her broad grin which creased her face into many fine folds.

  Rhuna was overcome with relief, joy and excitement at the prospect of undoing the damage she had unintentionally done to both her mother and father.

  “Let us be well prepared with sufficient food, water, and personal items,” Kitlamu said with vigour. Rhuna followed Kitlamu’s instructions to pack necessary items that were stored in the RTE base building such as blankets, containers for water and food, as well as a few replacement parts for the controls and magnetic generator.

  “You must assist me in navigation by reading the names and numbers I recorded on this map,” Kitlamu said as she opened up the textile she had used in the Repository.

  “But I can’t read!” said Rhuna woefully.

  “Then learn now!” Kitlamu said, flashing another broad grin. “You can operate first while I study the map and give you directions.”

  Rhuna stepped in front of the controls and began the procedure for lifting off the ground.

  “Now we must go in a straight course at this heading,” she said, pointing to a mark on the textile and then at a lever on the control panel. “Then give the generator exactly this amount of energy release,” she said, pointing to a mark alongside the levers. “It must be exact! Then we shall arrive in Safu by the time the sun has completed its daily arc.”

  “We’re going to Safu?” asked Rhuna with alarm. “But they don’t like Atlans, and…”

  “We are not going to descend there,” Kitlamu interrupted. “Merely stop, change direction and speed to reach the next destination, namely the land of Atlán!”

  “And then change direction again until we reach Chinza?” Rhuna asked excitedly.

  “Yes, but we must be exact!” Kitlamu repeated with emphasis.

  Rhuna felt the tingle of excitement course through her body as she directed the RTE in the specified direction and adjusted the generator’s output to the level Kitlamu had indicated. It thrilled her to journey back to Safu in an RTE, and she wondered what she would be able to see from above. “I might see my beautiful house!” she told Kitlamu.

  “Tell
me about your life in Safu,” Kitlamu said as she settled down on a cushion. “We have a long journey ahead!”

  Before long, the sunlight began to fade, and Rhuna realized that she had been talking almost the entire time since they left Judharo.

  “We must look below now and find Safu,” Kitlamu said as she approached the glass window in the floor of the craft. “You look out to the sides,” she instructed Rhuna.

  “I think I see the Great River!” Rhuna said after a few moments. Kitlamu looked at her textile map and then out of the window where Rhuna pointed.

  “Yes! Very good! Follow the river and we shall soon see Safu!” Kitlamu said excitedly.

  Rhuna scanned the near horizon while guiding the RTE along the course of the river, and suddenly a flash of gold caught her eye. “The Golden Pyramid!” she exclaimed.

  “Oh!” Kitlamu said with awe. “How majestic! How beautiful!” she said breathlessly. Rhuna slowed the RTE so that Kitlamu could admire the pyramids for a while. She shared Kitlamu’s wonder as she admired the precision of the pyramids and the beauty of their exact shape. Then she remembered the events that transpired below, and her feelings of joy and excitement began to fade.

  “What is the new direction to Atlán?” she asked Kitlamu, who had removed an odd contraption from one of her bags. “Is that the Astronomical Location Device?”

  Kitlamu nodded as she moved some of the pieces on the strange device. “When this points to the sun,” she said, indicating one of the movable stick-like pieces. “…and the other is level with the horizon, like so, then these symbols along here indicate our location.”

  Rhuna felt that she would never learn everything there was to know as she watched Kitlamu determine their next heading. She watched Kitlamu set the appropriate levers and controls to transport them to the land of Atlán, and then sat down on the floor as Kitlamu operated the RTE.

  “My family will be wondering where I am!” Rhuna said as she began to relax and look at the supplies beside her. Kitlamu had removed several crystal lamps from the bag of supplies, as well as containers of food and beverages.

  “We shall check the controls at intervals, and one of us should sleep,” Kitlamu said. Rhuna felt too excited to even think of sleep, and asked Kitlamu to continue teaching her to read the numbers and words on the textile map instead.

  Rhuna awoke with a start, confused about her whereabouts until she recognized Kitlamu smiling at her. Weak rays of sunlight filtered through the windows of the RTE, and she quickly rose from the cushioned mats.

  “I didn’t mean to go to sleep!” she said, rubbing her eyes and trying to remember falling asleep.

  “You learned a lot,” Kitlamu said. “It tires the mind.”

  Rhuna nodded and then looked through the windows to see yellow-brown earth alternating with greenery, separated by rugged peaks and rivers. “It looks just like the maps we saw in the Repository,” Rhuna observed.

  “This is the land of Atlán,” Kitlamu said.

  “I thought we would see the city of Atlán,” Rhuna said. “The land of Atlán is very big.”

  “Yes, I know,” Kitlamu said absently as she consulted her map again.

  “Where exactly are we now?” Rhuna asked.

  Kitlamu remained silent.

  “I’ll check the controls,” Rhuna said, trying to ease the awkward silence.

  “Good,” Kitlamu nodded, still examining the map and re-checking her measurements with the metal disc.

  “Look! What’s that?” exclaimed Rhuna pointing out the forward window. Kitlamu strained her neck to look, and then gasped when she saw the ground of the flat and barren terrain ahead of them.

  “It looks like a giant bird drawn on the ground!” Rhuna said, unable to take her eyes off the fascinating sight.

  “It is most extraordinary,” Kitlamu said with awe.

  “There’s another one!” Rhuna shouted as more strange markings appeared in her scope of vision. “That one looks like a spider – look, with eight long legs!”

  “Yes,” said Kitlamu with wonder.

  “What are they? Why are they there?” Rhuna asked, but Kitlamu merely continued to stare.

  “And there!” Rhuna called out when she had stepped across to another window to her side. “It looks like a strange bird!”

  “Assist me in putting down on the flat hilltop there,” Kitlamu said with sudden excitement. “We must stop a while to refresh, and then we shall make new calculations from here to Chinza.”

  Rhuna looked out of each window as Kitlamu set down the Rapid Transport Enclosure on level ground near the peak of the hill. Rhuna removed her ear protection, then opened the hatch and breathed in the fresh, cool air. She thought it smelled of dry earth, not unlike Safu.

  “Some people are gathering on the other hillside there,” Kitlamu said looking in the direction of the sun and shading her eyes with one hand.

  Rhuna also shielded her eyes against the rising sun and scanned the barren terrain below where the animal shapes were still recognizable. Further away, she saw the people, some of whom were raising and waving their arms in greeting.

  “They saw the RTE and are curious,” Kitlamu stated.

  “But where are they from? I didn’t see any houses or villages around here,” Rhuna said.

  “It shall take some time until they reach us,” Kitlamu said. “Let us be on our way as soon as possible,” she said with a frown.

  “We are so close to Atlán right now – I really want to summon messages and visions by means of the Gazing of the Waters!” Rhuna said with excitement.

  “The Gazing of the Waters,” Kitlamu repeated with awe. “May I observe?” she asked wide-eyed. Rhuna nodded as she quickly rummaged through supplies for a suitable wide and shallow bowl, and then asked Kitlamu to bring the water carrier. Rhuna soon found a suitable level area outside to place the bowl.

  “Here in the shadow of the RTE,” she told Kitlamu. “It will be easier to see the images in the water.”

  “Oh,” whispered Kitlamu.

  “First I should summon any messages someone spoke to me since we arrived in Varappa,” she told Kitlamu when the water in the bowl had stilled and looked like a sheet of glass.

  Rhuna sat in front of the bowl in the position for Inside Focussing and breathed in deeply. She closed her eyes and concentrated on summoning any messages, then slowly opened her eyes and looked down at the bowl. The water had the appearance of swirling in many different colours, and Kitlamu gasped with surprise.

  “You did not speak an incantation?” she asked Rhuna.

  “No, I don’t need to,” she answered. “Since I was young, I can do many things just by focusing my mind in a certain way.”

  “Oh-h!” Kitlamu responded with deep awe.

  Rhuna watched the swirling colours fade into the usual opaqueness, then dissolve to reveal a clear image. She was surprised to see Guardian of Harmony, and she instantly smiled at the sight of a familiar and friendly face.

  “The High Council of Atlán greets you most heartily,” began the soft-spoken woman with the kind face. “We deeply regret the events of the past which caused you and your daughter such trauma…” the woman said with a shaky voice full of emotion. After a moment, she regained her composure and continued her message to Rhuna.

  “Everything is as always, here in the city of Atlán,” she said, and related a few stories about mutual friends. Then her expression changed to anguish as she paused and slowly began to relate her next message.

  “Harbinger of Solace…” she said awkwardly, and Rhuna felt a heavy weight press on her chest as she heard Tozar’s formal Atlan name. “…has had extensive healing treatments of various kinds, and he appears to be less distressed. However, he has left Atlán recently to find further special treatment elsewhere, far away,” she explained.

  Rhuna was surprised by this news and wondered where Tozar had gone for further healing. She waited for Guardian of Harmony to finish her message with wishes of being reunited in At
lán one day “We often speak of you – in good terms, of course – and hope you are happy in your new home. We are confident that you shall visit us one day, and to this we greatly look forward!”

  Rhuna said that she would now speak a message in reply to Guardian of Harmony, and explained to Kitlamu that one can speak a message anywhere, and the receiver will be able to summon it later by means of the Gazing of the Waters.

  “Extraordinary!” gushed Kitlamu.

  Rhuna smiled, and then proceeded to summon visions of the City of Atlán with merely her mental power. Once again, the water swirled with many changing colours, then became opaque before clearing to show brilliant scenes of an immaculate city gleaming in the bright sunshine. Broad, tree-lined avenues joined major buildings and centers, and sunshine twinkled in the many glass, metal and even gold panels adorning many important buildings.

  “Oh!” gasped Kitlamu. “It is more beautiful than I ever imagined!” she said breathlessly. Rhuna nodded silently, and then closed her eyes to focus her mental energy on other aspects of life in the City of Atlán. Once again, after colourful swirls and opaqueness, the water revealed more stunning images which made Kitlamu sigh and swoon.

  “So peaceful!” Kitlamu said as she observed the garden areas of the city where people relaxed or played. The next images showed the lake nearby where residents of Atlán enjoyed swimming and other water activities. Rhuna thought that she had never seen the lake such a beautiful dark blue colour as it appeared now.

  When the images faded and the water returned to normal, Kitlamu expressed her delight at the experience of seeing Atlán by means of the Gazing of the Waters, and then returned to necessary activities while the RTE was on the ground.

  “Go ahead and speak your message,” she told Rhuna. I shall examine the exterior of the RTE, and then unpack some food and beverage for us.”

  Rhuna thought about Guardian of Harmony’s kind words, and then began to speak a message in response.

  “Varappa is just amazing,” she began after the customary introduction. “It’s extraordinary! So much variety, so many interesting people with different ideas and ways of life.” Rhuna continued to prattle about her impressions of Varappa and how it contrasted with Atlán.