Chapter Two of my current wip. All and any comments very much appreciated

Jess cursed, such wretched timing. What now to do? He didn’t want to abandon a newby-bud Obs to the terrors of a first waking. But neither did he want to antagonise the Techs at the Briefing so soon after the re-assignment of Kookka to his team.

“Eight bits to Briefing,” the P.A. warned.

Which way to turn? Follow the other Zems to the Briefing Room or zoom down to the Sleep-Hold? Could he be there, attend, counsel, do what was needed, and still be back in time for the Briefing? His feet decided for him.

“Wrong way,” a yellow jacketed Zem told him as they passed.

“I’ll be there,” Jess said, and hoped that he would. It was a sure guarantee if he was late whoever had lost Kookka would use it against him. That was too much grief on his first day of waking.
His soles squeaked on the rubberised floor as he ran to reach the Sleep-Hold.

“Five bits to Briefing,” the P.A. warned as Jess entered the dimly lit room. He sighted at once the sleep-tank with the red-light flashing and weaved through the rows towards it. But that wasn’t Joel’s tank.

He sighted another flashing, and another. No sign of other Zems, preferring to leave it to the Techs to supply the emesis-basins and fresh dampened cloths. All very well, but Techs couldn’t offer kindly assurance.

Joel’s tank located, Jess took the proffered cloth and basin, and waved the Tech away, a hand to steady the ashen-faced bud.

“First jump?” he asked.

Joel gave a barely discernible shake of his head. “First this long.”

“This your first Obs assignment?” Jess asked. To keep the sufferer talking, that was the thing. It kept them distracted from the physical discomforts.

Joel started a nod but winced instead.

“Headache? Dizzy? It’ll pass,” Jess assured him. Waking wasn’t a dangerous process; just for some it could be disorienting and uncomfortable.

“Three bits to Briefing,” the P.A. warned.

Jess asked as he’d asked numerous buds before, though usually once down at their base camp, “Where were you before – which programmes and assignments?”

Joel’s face contorted. Jess pulled back, expecting a projectile vomit. Instead, Joel asked him, “Have you pencil and paper?”

“Sure.” Standard issue on an observation programme. No Techs’ gadgetry to reside planet-side. He dug out paper and pencil from an inner pocket of his wide-cut yellow silk jacket and watched as Joel wrote a single word.

He nodded. He understood now why the requested paper.

“They wiped you?” Jess asked. “Before reassigning.”

Joel nodded again, this time the movement more obvious. “But the memory surged with the jump. Does that often happen, do you know?”

“Two bits to Briefing,” the P.A. said.

“Not that I know of. I expect that’s something that stays behind lips.” Yet it explained the bad jump: bad dreams in his sleep. “Gotta run, but you’ll be fine now. We’ll talk again later. Planet-side.”

Jess wanted to look again at the word Joel had written. Adamzal. What in the whole of the spheres had he been doing there?

*

The P.A. no longer warned of how many bits to Briefing. Jess waited for the door to shush open, aware he was late.

“Hng,” the Zem nearest the door voiced as Jess entered. Danipe, his name, and not exactly Jess’s favourite Zem, too much the Tech-lover.
Jess bit back his immediate response – to tell Danipe to go play with his toys. He knew himself in the wrong with his late arrival. Besides, why aggravate, so long as they didn’t have to rub shoulders.

The Briefing had already begun. But his sixth tour now as a Zem, Jess knew exactly how much of the Briefing he’d missed: basically, the Introduction to the Programme, its underlying reasons, its purpose and goals. So many times heard, Jess could reel it out word-perfect.
During the Amzal-Monza war, the Amzal had released a virus which killed off Monza’s fertile females. That was the given story, and no one with sense would question it in the presence of Techs. Now, if the Monza were to survive as a species those females must be replaced. To this effect the Techs had instigated the GM Programme. The first stage of this was to identify host species with compatible biology, their search criteria being carbon based, 4 base DNA of the stated amino acids, quadrupedal and able to brachiate, with opposable thumbs, and finally either marsupial or mammalian. Seven species were located, and the GM Programmes instigated. However, only five now remained.

Five GM Programmes, on five planets orbiting five different stars in five different galaxies. But while the Techs had overseen and engineered the early stages of the Programme, they allowed that subsequent observations were best made by the non-Tech caste of the Monza, those they called the ‘Pinkies’, with their greater range of sensibilities.

And where within these five galaxies were they this time?

Jess slipped into one of the green canvas seats that formed the last rack and waited for that snip of information.

The Obs were rotated, though in no discernible pattern, visiting different planets within the Programme, observing different breeding pools upon those planets. The tours never exceeded twenty years planet-side. Waiting while the Tech droned through the statistics, passed comments on progress, successes and failures, Jess used the time in a quick calculation. Eleven tours of twenty years each. He should now be over two hundred years old. But the STC-jump rejuvenated while it transported. Even so, were he to return to his home planet…. But why would he do that? His sister was dead.

By the time the Tech gave out the awaited details, Jess had already figured it. He’d been here before and recognised the images displayed on the walls. Familiar land masses, their shapes. Ayin, a planet-form satellite to the star Zian in the Sipa system. Better known as Sipaziann Ayin.

But where amongst the land masses was Landmass Six, the one to which he and his clutch of Obs and Ops had been allocated? He waited for the numbers to appear.

Landmass Six. A peninsula, contiguous with a greater landmass to the northeast and northwest. His spirits sank. Adjoining northwest was Landmass Eight, where Kookka had originally been assigned.
The Zem-names appeared. Landmass Eight: Zem Ezen.

Jess scanned to east of that: Landmass Seven. And groaned again. Zem Danipe – who didn’t like Jess as much as Jess didn’t like him. Jess prayed they’d never have need to meet.

“One last word,” said the Briefing Tech before dismissal. “It needs no saying, and yet I repeat it. This is a watching brief only. No contact with the breed pools. I don’t have to remind you what happened to the breed pools on Urgula Teth.”

Every time. Every. Time. Yet for all his twelve tours, Jess hadn’t yet been told what had happened to those breed pools on Urgula Teth. Why didn’t the Techs give more information? Did the Techs not know?

Zem Ezen was already leaving the Briefing. As he neared the last rack of seats he looked directly at Jess even though Jess sat at the far edge. Jess saw Zem Ezen’s lips curl.

“Enjoy your tour, Zem Jess, Obs-stealer. But watch out for the dragons. I had that quadrant last time here. It teems with brutal beasts, eat you soon as see you.”

“And wouldn’t that be the best thing to happen,” Zem Danipe joined in as he followed Zem Ezen out with a swish of his silk jacket. “For a Zem so disrespectful of Techs that he arrives ten bits late for a Briefing.”

Jess nodded at the insults. He could have retorted that it hadn’t been ten bits. And he could have explained his lateness: that to him the wellbeing of a new Obs was more important than sitting through data reeled out by Techs who didn’t take the time to check who had heard it and how many times before. But the thought of these two Zems being his closest neighbours, those he’d need to call on if disaster struck his base-camp or clutch. He couldn’t imagine a worse situation.