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

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Jess had a problem. The Techs’ hive beside the fly-port had insufficient space for the five would-be fliers he was to instruct that morning. He could move to another hive. But which one? He shared his with Armar and Armar would freak if anything happened to his harp. Besides, could he trust Canipse not to snoop into the report folders? But what other hives were available for use? The only solution was to arrange the novices into two groups and instruct each group separately. He’d start with Zeke, Saker and Brib, who being observers were used to the fliers and ought to take to it like birds to the air.

“Then Canipse and Dorsin, we’ll start yours tomorrow.”

Canipse said, “No, you can start on my instruction today. And I’d prefer not to be grouped with Zeke and Saker.”

Jess clamped his jaw, inhaled slowly through his nose, his chest inflating high, and worked at keeping his fingers relaxed. “It makes not a grip of difference who if anyone trains at the same time. There’s no interaction. Those with the talent will perfect their skill in the psi-sphere.”

“You misunderstand me.” Canipse made no move to leave but gave a sniff and uptilted his head. “Ask Zeke and Saker what they do when not ‘observing’ for you.”

“I know what they do, and what’s that to do with you?”

“Canny-Canipse’s afraid we’ll get into his head while he’s away in the psi-sphere and siphon off some of his recipes,” Zeke snarked.

Jess laughed. “No, Canipse, I shan’t be telling you or anyone else how to sneak into a person’s unconsciousness. I shall be instructing purely in how to control a flier by using the psi-sphere. But since it worries you, I’ll instruct you and Dorsin today, and my team tomorrow. Does that suit?” He didn’t wait for Canipse to respond but went on. “And now I’ve done something for you, you can do something for me.” And the sooner he had Canipse trained and out of the way, the better. Never had he met a pernicketier Monza, as if birthed by a Tech. “But first, tell me, how much surplus do your farms produce? I’m thinking for now just of the tubers.”

“And how am I supposed to know that? Crops in the field, we won’t harvest tubers till the next moon cycle. Earliest.”

“But the preevos left you records?”

“Which the Techs keep. Call yourself zem, you should know it. My records stay with me, the preevos’ go to the Techs.”

Canipse was right, Jess should have known it. But easy enough to recover and get his plan back on course. “But as overseer you must know the acreage put to tubers, and the potential yield? And as the head caterer you know the quantity of tubers you’ll need to keep us all fed. Can’t you calculate that in your head? If not – Zeke, find our caterer some paper. The Techs must have a store of it somewhere around here.”

“I can do it,” Canipse snapped. “It’ll…it’ll…” His face took the look of the fierce red flowers that now adorned the forest trees, his golden hair a replication of the flowers’ stamens. That face opened up with his jaw slumped low. “Our preevos must have planted too much. We’ll have a fifty percent excess yield – barring disasters.”

Yet Canipse had told the Techs, and Jess, that the harvests were too sparse to feed the clutch, which is why the operatives had to forage beyond the perimeter despite Jess and the Techs had said not.

“An oversight by the Techs?” Jess arched a brow as he faced off with the Techs’ staunchest supporter.

Canipse waved his hands, like batting a fly.

“And might you know what usually happens to this excess?”

Again, Canipse stuttered and flustered. “All I can say is there’s no sign of any excess tubers in store.”

“So, what are you saying?” Jess asked, genuinely curious. “That the Techs take it? To where? How? These fliers haven’t any great range.”

“Perhaps a long-range lander?” Saker suggested.

But this was his sixth stint as a zem, his twelfth as an observer, and in all that time Jess had never seen a long-range craft arrive at a base-camp other than at the end of the twenty years when the clutch were collected and transferred to the STC-Transporter.

“Well,” he said, “whatever the Techs did in previous years, this is what we’re going to do now. We’re going to set aside the excess tubers and from half of those surplus tubers we’re going to feed the Banmakka.”

Jess waited for the explosion. But Canipse said nothing, just looked at Jess as if the zem were empty headed. No, Jess was not. Already the overseer of the clutch, he now was overseer of the entire region covered by that clutch. In effect, he was the Tech. But unlike the Techs who worked as clusters, Jess was a Tech alone. No one to consult, to discuss, to agree.

But what if a replacement Tech arrived in a lander? One, or three. Yet maybe he was doing exactly the same as the Techs would have done. Indeed, they had done. They’d set a high yield with the intention of feeding the Banmakka. God-given. But the Banmakka hadn’t been fed this season and so they’d collected it for themselves.

But that didn’t explain the spear thrown at Tarad. Had the Techs taught them that behaviour by hurling a ‘god-spear’, stunning them and bringing them down?

Confusion raddled his head with this seeking out threads and unravelling them.

“And how do we feed these…animals?” Canipse asked. “Are you telling me to send my operatives far beyond the perimeter – in transgression of the Techs’ unyielding rule?”

Jess raised his brows in unspoken challenge, no need to mention the present and regular transgression. Canipse stared back, apparently unflinching except for the red creeping up from his neck.

“But you will have use of a flier,” Jess broke the tension. “And the ability to control it. You can deliver the food far from the farm. That way there need be no more trespass, no more thefts.”

Canipse jumped at that. “There has not—”

“Oh, but there has. Did you not see Shelek bring Tarad in? Antel attended his wound – inflicted by a Banmakka who was standing guard for a raiding party. But no, you wouldn’t have noticed for you were busy stirring up discontent.”

“I—”

“You shall do as I ask. And I shall be writing a report – against the day replacement Techs arrive. Agreed?”

Canipse pursed his mouth but did agree it.

“Right. Saker, Zeke, Brib, off you go. Go brew, bake, and – what is it you do, Brib, paint?”

“Studies of the plants that grow around the base,” Brib said.

“Well, thanks to Canipse, you’ve the entire day to indulge your pleasures. We’ll start your instruction tomorrow.”

And now to continue his tangle with Canipse. For Jess doubted that Canipse would easily release his grip on the lock to his thoughts.

To be continued next Monday

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