Chapter Nine of my current wip. As before, all and any comments very much appreciated

“Oh-oh.” Kookka gave a nod down towards the fly-port, to where the three Techs and a certain catering ops overseer had gathered. They seemed to be scanning the sky. “A warm reception? And not from affection.”

“Affection?” Jess jumped at the word. That wasn’t good. Now he had to cover it. “You’ll find more affection in a stone.” Pendoling Techs with their Pendoling rules, he muttered deeply to himself and cast a look back at the two others of his Obs team, the four unevenly distributed around the flier’s pentangular cabin. “You ready for this?”

He brought the flier into port, resting it precisely on its assigned stand. He’d not have the Techs fault him on his control of the craft. At the flick of a switch the door shushed open. He stepped out.

“Zem Jess…”

Jess looked at the Tech’s badge: Tech 3333099.

The Tech approached, a leather-bound log firmly held in hand. “Again, you take a flier without permission.”

“Again, I logged it. See, there in your hand,” he retorted, anger rising at the Tech’s attitude. Insufferable, every one of them. His stay on Colabri with the Fire-keepers had supposedly assuaged his anger. Huh, maybe he had better control of his anger, but the Techs’ attitude remained to goad and inflame.

“Quote: To check on the perimeter holos,” Tech 3333099 said.

Jess tilted his head. And?

By now his three ‘rule-breaking’ Obs had joined him, forming a tight arc around him. He ignored Canipse’s muttered comment of his needing support. What did a catering overseer know of anything. Not even of food, judging by the stodgy tasteless gunge served up that morning.

“While we might tolerate you, as the Zem, taking a flier to facilitate your duties as the Obs team overseer, it is not part of your duties to check on the perimeter holos,” said Tech 3333099.

All that with no hint of inflection. Were the Techs actual living, breathing beings, or just droids? This wasn’t the first time Jess had questioned it.

“I do agree, and admit it isn’t part of my duties to check on the perimeter holos.” The Fire-keepers had given him the means to hold and to hide his anger; he now could enjoy prodding his verbal fingers at this Tech. “It is yours, the Techs, severally or corporately. And it is something in which you have failed. As penalty for your negligence of duty, a juvenile of our observed breed-pool was made to die in a most horrible way and our breed-pool left to wonder why.”

“And did you find the holos defective?” Canipse asked. Like something that scuttles from beneath a rock when disturbed, the catering overseer had sidled closer to the Techs and the Obs team whilst they were talking.

“Four,” Jess said, before returning his attention to the Tech. “Four defective. That you three Techs should have checked and fixed before we arrived.” Was that only yesterday? “Moreover, had your preevos seen to it, it wouldn’t have been needed. The security of this basecamp depends on those holos. The well-being of the breed-pool requires it too. I want them repaired. Now. Without delay.”

“And who are you to tell—”

Jess rounded on the intrusive Canipse. “I am the Zem responsible for Clutch Six. That means not only this Obs base, but all personnel in it. That includes you. What are you responsible for? Keeping us fed – with food which is edible. Reports will be written and in due course logged with an STC. Anything else you wish to discuss?” He turned back to the Tech and stared, hard-eyed.

*

“Brilliant!” Kookka said with a slap on his back. “By the highest sphere, I have to say that was your most magnificent performance yet. Not once losing your humour – and that after being scared halfway to Pendolsphere by those dragons. You still feeling shaky after that?”

Jess shook his head. Although he wouldn’t soon forget how close he’d come to his death. But no, it wasn’t the dragons, it was her. He must squash that thought, squash the memory. He couldn’t allow thoughts of it here, not where the Techs could access them. He didn’t want to join that juvenile hanging on that tree.

Kookka nudged him. “You’re distracted again.”

“No, I’m…I’m not.”

“Then why have you walked straight past your hive as if it’s not there?”

Jess glanced back. “Oh. It’s the thought of that holo – the one that was working.” Well, that was what was distracting him now, with that memory brought fresh and full to the fore. “What was the vision saying, before the skin….” He shuddered, unable to continue. In his mind’s eye he saw the holo’s image replaced by her. Her skin stripped, blood seeping and dripping from her raw body. His stomach churned worse than space sickness.

“Don’t tell me you’re fine,” Kookka said. “Something’s wrong with you. Look at you, pale as…as pale as Ayin’s moon. And away into some other sphere.”

“I admit I need to talk to you, Kookka.” He looked around to see where there might be a listening ear. But he couldn’t risk talking here, even without the Ops and Obs there were still the Techs. “You remember yesterday on our recce, those islands we saw offshore? We need to visit them.”

“You’re thinking there might be another skein out there, not yet picked up by the Techs?” Kookka asked.

“Yea,” Jess grasped at Kookka’s suggestion. “Yea, that’s right. Well, we’ve just seen how inept the Techs. Anything could be happening over there, unknown to them. We’ll take a flier. And Joel.”

*

Jess signed for the flier. The Tech – number 4492321 – bodily blocked access to the port until it was done.

“Purpose?” Tech 4492321 asked and again held out the leather-bound log.

“Exploratory visit,” Jess said. “There might be another skein to our breed-pool inhabiting.”

“We have no record—”

“You had no record of defunct holos either. Now move. Or I shall pick you up and physically remove you.”

The Tech’s eyes travelled up the height of Jess – taller at least by a half, not to mention robust of build – and stepped aside.

“It is already far past midday,” the Tech said. “We shall have that flier returned before the light dies.”

“Sure,” Jess said, and with determined tread walked out to the three holding stands. Two were empty: one in use for the holo-repair, the other transporting textile ops, Eulal and Niapse, with their domestic and catering support to Hive Seven, on a plateau above the lands of Skein Three. One flier remained.

Jess gestured for Joel to take control.

“Yea?” the bud’s eyes lit up.

“Providing you can lift it high without a wobble and then head it out southward.”

“South-westward,” Kookka amended.

Jess glanced sideways at him. Then nodded agreement. “South-westward.”

“Hey,” Joel exclaimed as they left the shoreline behind. “Did you two see what I saw? Those Sanki are dabbling in the sea. And I’d swear I saw one disappear then a few blinks later reappear.”

“Diving,” Kookka said with a glance at Jess.

Right now, Jess wanted to shrink into his silken jacket.

“Do they swim?” Joel asked.

“I’ve seen that on several planets,” Kookka said. Jess knew the tale that his friend was about to tell and wished that he wouldn’t. “The breed-pool not only splash about in water but dive as well. Shellfish, they’re after shellfish.”

“Can either of you swim like that?”

“Your mind should be on flying, not swimming,” Jess said. “And we’re Monza. Techs and Monza do not swim.”

“Not even if we get pushed in,” Kookka added.

“Did that happen?”

“Joel, you’re allowing yourself to be distracted. You crash this flier, we’re in big trouble.”

Jess didn’t want the story told, how he’d been near to the water on Simmah Zayin when a four-footed hive-sized dlangi caught him a glancing blow and over he went. And in. And down, and down, and down. He had flailed, trying to find a way up and out before he ran out of air. Kookka had fished deep into the water, found his hair, and yanked him up. “You shouldn’t panic, panic just takes you deeper.”

Jess never asked how Kookka knew that.

“Far enough yet?” Kookka kindly changed the subject. The basecamp had disappeared within the folded hills. Beneath them all was sea.

Jess reached a hand up to the control panel above him and threw all switches to off.

“Even air?” Kookka asked with concern.

“This flier holds plenty,” Joel said, as if he already knew what this was about. Perhaps he did; Jess judged him a bright one.

“Keep to south-westward,” said Jess. “Take us over the first island, but then beyond it take us down – but not so low we skim the sea. Then two islands along, veer eastward.”

Without looking at Jess, Joel remarked, “Your south destination, as you originally said.”

“He catches quick,” Kookka said.

“Yea, well, let’s hope the Techs don’t.”

“Not thinking there might be another breed-pool there, then,” Joel more said than asked.

“It’s been checked out,” Jess said. “Though that was five preevos past. Fifty years. Solar. Local.”

“So, there might be,” Joel said. “Lots can happen….”

Jess agreed. “Like a freshwater spring might suddenly appear.”

“Ah, no water source?”

“Not fresh, no. Plenty of sulphurous stuff.”

Jess watched Joel’s face, watched his eyes as they looked from himself to Kookka and back, more than once. He watched while the bud chewed on his lip while he thought. He watched the bud frown.

“I’m thinking this flight’s just an excuse, that really you want to know about…” Joel licked his lips “…a certain place.”

Jess looked around the flier’s pentagonal cabin. They must now be way out of range of the Techs, even a Tech determined to hear them.

“What place might that be?” Kookka asked, having made the same risk assessment.

“Adamzal,” Jess said. “Our one-time home planet; inhabited now only by the Amzal.”

“The same Amzal who declared war on the Tech colonies?” Kookka asked, though Jess knew that he knew the answer. “The same Amzal who, during that war, killed off all our fertile females.”

“The Breeders are gone, we are left only with Phantasms and Dreams,” quoted Joel.

“Yea, those,” Kookka said.

“But it wasn’t the Amzal,” Joel said. “It was the Techs. None of the Techs’ tales are true.”

While Kookka looked askance, a frown showing his thoughts, Jess merely nodded. This wasn’t the first he’d heard of it. But he’d never heard it from someone who’d actually been to Adamzal and retained the memory.

To be continued

Meanwhile, I appreciate any comments you make