Alien Alliance (37 page)

Over tea, they all discussed at length
flying foxes (not possible, only one large tree), rope bridge (not
enough rope), pulling him across by rope (veto’d by Az) and in the
end decided to sleep on it. Privately, and out of earshot, Dan and
Helene made plans. Everyone except Az, washed in the river which
was cool, but not uncomfortably so. That night, Li slept between Az
and Helene. Again the nightmares came but comfort was there from Az
and she managed to fall asleep again. Just having him beside her
seemed to help.

Next morning, they breakfasted, then the
women all headed off out of sight and the men all stripped off,
walked or dived into the river, washed themselves and changed their
clothes, towelling off with a cloak. When Az did nothing, Karl
politely said,

“You stink and water is all we have to get
clean with.” Karl tried to hand him the soap and offered to help.
Az was having none of this.

“I’m not getting into that!” said Az
adamantly refusing to wash.

The women returned to see a stand-off.
Jolene came up with the idea of using a bowl to pour water over
him. Az refused. “I’d rather be filthy than pour that disgusting
stuff over me!”

Without warning, Dan and Karl grabbed Az and
pinned his arms while Tue tied him up securely, Az putting up a
panicked fight and yelling as it dawned on him what this was for.
His arms were tied tightly to his body and his legs were also tied
together. Helene came over and lifted Az’s head up looking into his
eyes which showed terror and anger, the former predominating.

“We’re going to get you across. Don’t panic.
Sorry about this but I can’t have you struggling. You’ll drown us
both. Relax now. We have a few things to do first,” and they laid
him down. Very upset, Li stayed out of sight. She had refused to
have any part of this.

Karl swam across carrying one end of two
ropes. Dan went with him. They turned the ends around the only
sturdy tree in sight. Helene tied one rope around her waist and the
other around under Az’s arms which were tied together. Az started
to struggle again. Jolene, Mayling and Tue helped lift Az up and
carried him into the water up to their waists while Helene
followed.

“How are you going to do this? Asked
Mayling.”

“I’ll have to swim sidestroke and carry him
like a child with his head and chest as far out of the water as
possible. He’ll have enough trouble coping without getting his head
under water.” She signalled she was ready then started to swim
strongly as Dan and Karl pulled her and kept the rope around Az
taut. The others all went in downstream of Helene and swam with her
ready to help if needed. They all made it across with good speed
though the others drifted a good bit downstream before scrambling
out. Karl and Dan helped pull Az out, untied him and got back out
of the way in case he decided to lash out in retaliation.

“You bastards,” he spluttered among many
other comments the Translator declined to translate. Helene
towelled him down with a cloak while he continued to gasp and swear
and the other girls straggled up and helped. Then they all walked
off except for Li who had kept out of all this and been designated
to stay with him. Karl left carrying Az’s pack until Az recovered.
After a few minutes, Az followed, furious and very embarrassed. Li
followed, watching him carefully, unsure what to do. After a few
minutes, she took his hand and walked beside him where she could.
Some places the undergrowth was thick and they took turns helping
each other through.

Az was thinking hard. They had played him
well. He didn’t know what to think of this. They had planned this
all, he had not suspected a thing. He grudgingly had to admire
that. Even to all the ones involved moving away and surrounding him
with the girls, using towelling him down as an excuse. They
anticipated he would not hit out at the girls. They were right.

Now he was still wet through and his clothes
were soaked. His shoes were full of water. They walked on in
silence, Az maintaining his distance behind the others, Li keeping
pace with him. After another hour or so, Li said,

“What is your world like Az?”

He paused for a while to think. He sat down,
took his shoes off and dried them using foliage, as best he could.
Li helped. “Not like this except in midsummer in the hottest
places. Colder even in the cities because Petislay can’t afford
climate control yet. There’s snow most of the year or all of the
year. Plants grow, but little in the way of food crops. Food is
mostly grown indoors.”

“What about native animals?”

“There’s a lot of them. Some very beautiful
ones. Some very big, some small. Some that fly too. Not like the
balloons though.”

“What do they eat if there’s not much
vegetation?”

“There’s food they can eat but we can’t. A
lot of plants grow on the rocks some under the snow and the main
crops grow in the snow itself. Some eat the plants and things in
the seas and rivers. We can eat some of the fish and some of the
tree crops. A lot of food is imported, dehydrated. There are a few
places we can grow crops outdoors now but that’s recent.”

“What colour is the sky?”

“Light blue.”

“Ah. Same as Earth.”

“Why do you call your planet different
names?”

“Well, we have a lot of languages.”

“Why?”

“Because we lived away from each other. We
developed apart. So we speak differently.”

“Is that why you have a different way to
measure things like temperature and weight?”

“Yes. We programmed both into the Translator
but used metric system, base 10, for most stuff and for the
Translator.”

“Why base 10?” asked Az thinking he knew
that one.

Li held up her hands and spread her
fingers.

“Us too. Base 10, same reason,” and they
both laughed. They stopped talking while they scrambled up a small
steep hill on all fours. Li noted that going on all fours didn’t
seem to be against some silly protocol or other.

“So, when you say you are different races
does that mean you are different in other ways? Are you different
species?”

“No, all the same species.”

“Even Dan?”

“Yes. And me.”

“Are you all, well, able to reproduce with
each other?”

“Yes. We’re all the same. The differences
are superficial.”

“You have so many differences.”

“Do you mean you don’t?”

“No. Most of us look very similar. I mean
our faces are different, but not body colour or size or shape.”

“Stella said you have albinos.”

“Albinos?”

“Pure white People with pink eyes.”

“Yes, but not many. They are increasing
though. Especially the ones with blue eyes.”

“How come?”

“The pink eyed ones have trouble with their
eyesight. Many can’t see in daylight unless they wear special eye
covers. The blue eyed ones have no eye trouble. They are very
popular.”

“What do you mean?”

“They all get Chosen. Because their colour
is so lovely.”

“Oh.”

“Anyone who is different is popular.”

“Oh. How about me?”

“Very popular. And Dan would be too. And
Kelly.”

“Why Kelly?”

“Blue eyes.”

“Oh.”

They walked in silence a while, still
following the others but well behind them. Ahead of them, the
others stopped. Catching up, Az saw to his horror that there was
another river. He stopped abruptly. The others had scattered to
each side and seemed to be looking for something. Some of them were
in the river. Where they were seemed shallow. Mayling called out
and the others went over to her. They spanned out and started
picking up rocks and splashing them in the river. Despite his
dread, Az was puzzled about what they were up to. Li went over to
talk to them then came back grinning.

“Relax. This river is really shallow.
They’ve picked out the shallowest part and are making a crossing of
stones for you. You’ll get your feet wet but not much else.”

Warily, Az stayed where he was. Finally, Li
came over and took his hand. “There’s a sort of bridge for you.”
She tugged gently. Az stayed put.

“Az, it’s OK. We’ll balance you either side.
Please trust me.”

Slowly and reluctantly, Az walked over with
her. He looked. They had piled stones up making a sort of crossing
which looked only a few inches below the water. Dan and Karl stood
either side of the piled stones ready to balance him as he walked
across.

Az wanted none of this but at least it
looked like he could walk across. Slowly, balanced by Karl and Dan,
the two tallest, he walked across, getting wet only up to mid calf.
In some places, the way was narrow and he needed the others to
balance. Finally, he was across.

After a quick discussion, they decided to
have lunch then keep going. They were making good time but anything
could happen yet. They kept on for several hours, snacking on the
dehydrated museli-type bars. As it started to get dark and they
were looking for a camp site, they came up to yet another river.
This one was swift and wide and looked deep. Az looked at it in
horror. Most of the others were looking too, half at the river and
half at Az.

Kaz, Stella, Kelly, Akira, Ali Nedri,
Mahmoud, Miyuki and Steve were the ones chosen to go to the
Northern Continent. Their journey was anticipated to be much easier
as most of it would be by ship. They were travelling as fast as
possible to get there before the Keulfyd. Akira was piloting, and
teaching the others. Kelly had partly come because she had had her
suspicions of Kaz’s intentions towards Stella. She decided to
supervise. She should have known better. Kaz and Stella decided
this was a challenge and reacted as Kelly really should have
anticipated. Especially because it was exactly what Kelly would
have done at Stella’s age. Predictably, the others aided, mostly,
Stella and Kaz. The two were together as much as possible given the
restrictions of on board life although often Mahmoud was there as
well.

Stella and Mahmoud were full of questions
and often there was a fascinated audience of others.

Mahmoud was interested in technology. Using
his watch and Kaz’s equivalent, he had figured out how to programme
Earth time and Petislay time into the Translator. The others
watched, fascinated, as Mahmoud calculated it out. Finally he was
ready.

“Exactly how old are you in Petislay time?”
he asked. Kaz calculated it out, and turned out to be just over 25
in Earth time while Az was nearly 27. Kaz then, using Mahmoud’s
calculations, wanted to know how old Stella and Li were. Li was
almost 16 and Stella a few days younger. Kaz was amazed that Stella
was the younger. He thought she looked years older. Mahmoud was
next at just over 15 and a half and Donny had not long turned 15.
Mahmoud was still on the subject of technology.

“Do you have an internet?’

“What’s an internet?”

“Information stored in cyberspace.”

“What’s cyberspace?” asked Kaz who knew but
looked innocent as they tried to tell him.

There was hilarity and a bit of discussion
as Miyuki, Stella and Mahmoud discussed trying to explain this.
Finally Kaz said,

“It’s OK. I get it. Cyberspace. We call it
something similar. Yes we’ve had it for centuries.”

“Wow!” from Mahmoud, “how big is it?”

“Yeah pretty big. Lots of rubbish in it but
we have very good…umm…search dictionaries. Sarah told me about
search engines but we have something that sounds better.”

“You knew exactly what we were talking
about!”

“But it was fun listening to you try to
explain it.”

“I want to hear about your planets. How did
you get three?’ Miyuki asked. By this time, Kaz had most of them
listening.

“Our original planet, Medala, we won in
battle. We were slaves. We finally overcame the race that were our
masters. It took us a long time. It’s hard to measure time that
long ago. Jaynar, we bought from the Zeobani. It needed full
development. As planets go, it was cheap because it was cold and
needed a lot of work to be habitable. It was much too cold for the
Zeobani. They like worlds more the temperature of this one.

Petislay, we found ourselves and claimed it.
It also wasn’t wanted by other Races because it is so cold but it
is getting warmer.

“Is it coming out of an ice age or
something?”

“Well we don’t really know Mahmoud but we
think so. According to our scientists, the planet has been a lot
colder and a lot hotter. The changes are slow though, but the
fascinating thing is that the plants and animals are adapting and
surviving.

Petislay, we found soon after we got space
flight. It is close to Medala but was thought to be too hard to
develop. We claimed it anyway. It had some minerals we wanted but
the climate was so bad, even for us, that we intended to wait till
our technology was better. But as the centuries passed, the climate
changed and it became warmer. Then it was a possibility. We started
to take a good look. By this stage, we could land and we could
survive on the open for a while. It was by then about fifteen
degrees warmer on average, which is a lot for a planet. We finally
put a permanent settlement down and claimed our third inhabited
planet. We prepared in secret for nearly forty years and then had
to move very fast or it would have been taken off us once other
Races realized it was able to be settled. The Zeobani helped us
which is another reason why we like them. That was over 340 years
ago. My ancestors went there 165 years ago. The planet is still
getting warmer. It’s now averaging twenty degrees warmer than when
we first found it. That’s at the warmest part at the equator. We
first settled there but we are spread out over the planet now. The
next step is to get a planetary Defence System. Medala and Jaynar
have one but we don’t.