Earth Star

8

‘Jarra,’ said Fian. ‘We really have to talk.’

I groaned and buried my face in my hands for a long moment before looking up at him again. ‘I know you want to discuss the rings and the Betan clan thing, but I can’t do this right now, Fian, I really can’t. The Betan clan, and Tellon Blaze, that’s a huge shock, and talking about my parents was …’

‘I appreciate how difficult that was for you,’ said Fian, ‘and we obviously can’t talk right now because you’ve got to meet the History team. I meant later.’

‘History team! Nuke it!’ I checked the time on my lookup. ‘We’d better go.’

We hurried out of the dining hall, and through the maze of the Military base. I was calling myself an idiot all the way. I’d been so wound up in my private concerns that I’d forgotten about the History team.

‘I’m a dumb ape,’ I muttered. ‘I’m not fit to go out alone.’

Fian laughed. ‘You’re always incredibly focused on whatever you’re currently doing. That makes you brilliant in some ways, but …’

‘But a complete nardle in others.’ We reached the door of the History team office, and I checked my lookup again. ‘A whole ten seconds to spare.’

I counted to ten while I got my breath back, opened the door at exactly 09:00 hours, and went inside with Fian a step behind me. Eight leading pre-history experts were standing watching a wall vid, but they turned to look at me as I came in, and one of them froze the vid sequence. Their massed frowns showed their annoyance at a couple of 18-year-olds strolling into the room and interrupting their important work.

No, I mustn’t think of myself as an 18-year-old kid who had no right to be here. I was a Major in the Military and a descendant of the incredible Tellon Blaze. He’d been a cadet on a field trip from the Military Academy, when he got caught on Thetis at the start of the chaos year. He hadn’t wailed he was only an 18-year-old kid, he hadn’t screamed and run from the chimera like everyone else, he stepped forward to do the job no one else could handle. At the end of it, he issued the order that destroyed Thetis and gave humanity a new swear word. ‘Nuke it to cinders!’

By that time, Tellon Blaze had been given field promotions all the way up to Colonel; he was a living legend, and humanity worshipped the ground he walked on. I was no Tellon Blaze, but if my ancestor could defeat the chimera then I sure as chaos could cope with a bunch of history professors. I spoke in my best formal Military manner.

‘I’m your new team leader, Major Jarra Tell Morrath. This is my deputy, Captain Fian Eklund. I’ll begin by establishing your specialist areas of pre-history, so I can create a work plan to systematically cover Earth’s historical records looking for evidence of prior contact with aliens.’

‘Work plan?’ said an elderly man. ‘We’ve already been working for a day and a half.’

‘Covering which areas?’ I asked.

‘The obvious place was the flying saucer scares of the twentieth century. Of course, you won’t know about those.’

I’d worked out who I was talking to now. Professor Lee from University Osiris. He’d picked up a History Nobel thirty years ago, but done little since.

‘You mean around 1950, some years before the launch of the first satellite, Sputnik,’ I said. ‘UFOs and the Roswell incident. Extensively debunked, though there were claims of a cover-up. Did you find anything relevant?’

He seemed disconcerted, but rallied bravely. ‘We passed some interesting things on to Colonel Torrek.’

‘He didn’t find them helpful. That’s all you’ve achieved so far?’

The others were still staying quiet and leaving their self-appointed representative to do the talking. ‘Yes,’ he said.

‘We need to progress much faster and more methodically. I’ve just had breakfast with people who are up in space right now, and will be the first to die if that sphere is hostile. Anything we can find out to indicate whether it’s likely to be friendly, or suddenly open fire, is vitally important, and we may have very limited time before something drastic happens. Now I need to know not just your specialist periods of history, but other areas you can cover as well.’

There was dead silence. Giving me the information would be an admission that I was in charge, so they weren’t going to do it. I realized I’d failed. If they didn’t care about Drago and his team up in orbit, then nothing else I could say would get through to these people. I might as well walk out of the door right now because …

One of the watchers took a step forward and spoke. ‘Of course we have to do everything possible to help. I’m Professor Chan, University Earth. Specializing in 800 to 1000 AD, but I can cover about five hundred years either side of that. I’m afraid that may be too early to be useful to you.’

I held back a gasp of relief, and tried to keep my voice calm as I answered him. ‘Not at all. My personal theory is we’re more likely to find evidence of the aliens well back into pre-history. There’s nothing to stop anyone with a telescope seeing that sphere in orbit. Nowadays, people will just assume it belongs to the Earth Africa solar array, but centuries ago …’

I made a couple of notes about Chan on my lookup, and turned to look at another random team member. There was a second of suspense before she shot a guilty look at Professor Lee and admitted to general knowledge of 1600 to 1950 with a specialization in pre-history of Earth Europe.

That decided things. One after another, the others all answered me apart from the grimly disapproving Nobel winner. When I finally looked at him, he folded his arms in a graphic bit of body language.

‘We’re leading experts in our fields,’ he said. ‘We don’t need an unqualified team leader who’s still wearing nappies.’

Nappies! I was strongly tempted to grab him, throw him across the room to take the superior smirk off his face, and tell him where he could stick his Nobel, but I went for a more dignified approach.

‘You’re leading experts in pre-history, but you don’t share my knowledge of the Military tactical situation. I don’t need to be highly qualified in pre-history myself. I just need enough knowledge to be able to understand the real experts. Do you accept that or not?’

Professor Lee wasn’t backing down. ‘No. We should have someone properly qualified organizing this team. Myself for example.’

That made his position totally clear. Mine was clear too. Colonel Torrek had told me to get rid of anyone who wouldn’t co-operate.

I gestured towards the door. ‘Please go and pack. Military Security will inform you whether you can return to Osiris, or have to wait on another base until this situation is public knowledge.’

He looked grazzed. ‘I’m the number one in my field!’

I ignored him and turned to the others. ‘I’ll need a replacement for Professor Lee, and I want to recruit a palaeontologist as well. Fossil evidence is unlikely to help, but we can’t ignore any chance of finding something. Anyone know a suitable palaeontologist?’

Chan suggested a name and I checked it on my lookup.

‘She’s from University Earth,’ objected a voice. ‘Do we need another ape?’

I restrained my urge to strangle the speaker, merely turning to look him straight in the eyes. He obviously didn’t know what I was, and this wasn’t the best time to tell him.

‘You’re a guest of the Handicapped while you’re on this planet. They’re the true experts in Earth’s history, and you’ll treat them with appropriate respect.’

The short, bearded man saw my expression, and took a nervous step backwards. ‘I didn’t mean it as an insult, everyone says ape, and Professor Chan doesn’t mind.’

‘Actually, Professor Bergen, I do mind,’ said Professor Chan with quiet dignity. ‘It’s bad enough that all the awards go to off-worlders, even when everyone knows their work is inferior to ours, without you actually calling me an animal to my face.’

Bergen flushed red. ‘I really do apologize. I hadn’t thought how it must be for … for the Handicapped.’

Chan gave a nod in response. ‘I accept your apology. Life is extremely frustrating for Earth academics. The anonymous submission process means we can get some of our papers published, but every award committee excludes us by using the excuse we can’t travel to the award ceremony. We’re not living in Exodus century, they could easily set up a live vid link for us, but …’ He gave a graphic shrug of despair.

‘I take your point,’ said Bergen. ‘I’m on a couple of award committees myself, and you have my word I’ll suggest a live link. I’m only one person, but I can try.’

‘If you’d speak on our behalf, it would be greatly appreciated,’ said Professor Chan. ‘We never get the chance to be heard ourselves.’

I was grazzed at Bergen’s reaction. When I remembered my own conversations with Petra …

‘We’ll give that palaeontologist a try,’ I said. The Nobel winner was still loitering, so I turned back to him. ‘Did you wish to recommend your own substitute, Professor Lee?’

He didn’t say anything. I guessed he was torn between his pride and his desire to remain part of one of the most dramatic events in the history of humanity, so I decided to offer a peace treaty.

‘You could make valuable contributions to this team if you chose to assist. Do you wish to reconsider your position on accepting my authority as team leader?’

He managed an ungracious nod.

‘Good. What historical periods could you cover for us?’

He muttered dates, I added them to the data in my lookup, and slung everything into a planning algorithm we’d used at school to make work plans for the history club excavations. The lookup spat results back at me, and I scanned rapidly through them.

‘We’re looking very thinly spread at the early end of pre-history, but there won’t be much data from that far back. I’ll mail a work plan to each of you, so you can make a start. If you find anything interesting, tell myself or Captain Eklund, because the Colonel says he’ll portal you all to Kappa sector if you bother him again.’

I marched into the small side room that was my office, and Fian followed me. He carefully closed the door, while I flopped down at the larger of the two desks and let out my breath in a heavy sigh.

‘You were amaz,’ said Fian. ‘I’d never even heard of Sputnik.’

I giggled. ‘Neither had I until Major Tar Cameron sent me copies of all the History team messages. The only bit of the ancient space programmes that interested me were the Apollo moon flights.’

Fian laughed. ‘You mean you’d read about Sputnik and Roswell in the team’s own messages?’

I nodded and used my lookup to send a copy of the work plan to each team member. ‘I was lucky Professor Lee didn’t realize that. I was lucky with Professor Chan too. The fact he’s from Earth made all the difference out there.’

‘He was certainly helpful.’

‘I’d better sort out that palaeontologist.’ I tapped rapidly at my lookup. ‘Done.’

Fian blinked. ‘It’s that easy?’

I nodded. ‘I just tell Recruitment a name and within minutes another victim is as grazzed as we were yesterday. We could get Ventrak Rostha himself!’

‘Dalmora’s father makes history vids about modern history. I thought the idea was the aliens might have been here back in pre-history when humanity only lived on Earth.’

‘True, but it would be fun to have Ventrak Rostha.’ I used my lookup to access my personal messages. ‘I’ve got a mail from Issette. Keon’s got an off-world agent to try and sell his light sculptures. Utterly zan!’

‘Didn’t getting an agent involve a lot of effort?’

‘I’m sure Issette did most of the work. There’s a mail from Playdon too.’ I giggled. ‘Even the Alien Contact programme can’t get us out of watching his lectures, because he’s going to send us vids of them. I’ll ask for permission to talk to him about what’s going on, because his advice would be a big help. I can’t tell Issette of course, so I’ll have to make up a reason for being back in Earth America time zone or she’ll be calling me in the middle of the night.’

‘I’d better call my parents this evening.’ Fian paused. ‘Can we talk now?’

We’d been happy, sharing jokes together, but now the sick feeling in my stomach returned. Fian had his stubborn look on his face, which meant I wasn’t going to be able to avoid this.

‘I suppose we’d better.’

‘You’d no idea about the Betan clan?’

I shook my head. ‘When I first asked for information about my parents, their place of birth was listed as Military bases. Nobody has said a word about Beta sector or clans until today, and even Drago only mentioned it in passing. I suppose everyone thought I knew. For chaos sake, no one tells you the blindingly obvious. As a child, I had a random surname given me by Hospital Earth, but at my grandmother’s Honour Ceremony I was given her surname. The clan prefix has been right there in my name ever since, but I’m not used to looking for them.’

I gave Fian a wary look. ‘I suppose you’re not very happy about it.’

‘I’m not ecstatic, no, but I can see you’ve got your wildly enthusiastic look.’

‘Well, you must admit it’s kind of zan to have Tellon Blaze for an ancestor. I’ve always had reservations about Beta sector because of the way they split off from the other sectors during the Second Roman Empire, but that ended a hundred and thirty years ago. Beta sector is still a bit … different, and they’re known for making sex vids, but how many Betans are actually involved in that?’

I realized I’d made a tactical error there, even before Fian gave the obvious reply. ‘The only two Betans in our class are.’

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Lolia and Lolmack’s clan are, but they admit it’s regarded as a low class trade. My clan is Military, so they won’t make sex vids.’

‘It’s not just the sex vids. It’s the triad marriages, the suggestive clothes, and the lack of a nudity taboo. The way Lolia and Lolmack behaved …’

‘They deliberately behaved badly at the start of the course, but that was because they were trying to scare the rest of us away. They didn’t want us to find out they had a Handicapped baby. They’ve acted perfectly reasonably since we found out about Lolette.’ I shook my head. ‘But none of this matters, Fian. The Tell clan won’t want anything to do with me.’

‘Drago wasn’t exactly rejecting you,’ said Fian.

‘Drago may be happy to accept me, or feel he has to pretend he is while we’re at the same Military base, but the clan is a very different matter. Lolia and Lolmack have to go to incredible lengths to keep their daughter a secret, doing a pre-history course that they hate just to have an excuse for being on Earth, or their clan will disown them to avoid losing status over a Handicapped baby.’

I shrugged. ‘The Tell clan won’t want anything to do with me, and I wouldn’t change even if they did. Some kids go wild when they leave the Hospital Earth residences and get the freedom of being adult; even Issette has been having some nardle moments since she left Next Step, but I haven’t been behaving that way, have I?’

Fian sighed. ‘I’m not expecting you to go wild just because you have Betan ancestry, but the idea of you being Betan is a bit unnerving, and if my parents find out … There’s no problem with them knowing you’re descended from Tellon Blaze, I agree that’s incredibly zan, just don’t talk about Betan clans.’ He frowned. ‘Nobody ever mentions Tellon Blaze being Betan.’

‘Well of course they wouldn’t. People are still suspicious of Beta sector, so no one wants to hear a legendary glittering hero of humanity was Betan.’

Fian nodded. ‘And the ent vids about Thetis chaos year aren’t very accurate.’

I finally risked saying what neither of us had dared to put into words. ‘We keep hiding things your parents wouldn’t like, but they still aren’t too happy about me, are they?’

Fian ran his fingers through the long strands of his blond hair. ‘My father didn’t approve of me having a relationship with you, but he never approves of anything I do. My mother decided it was really romantic and talked him round. Everything seemed to be fine for the first few weeks, but then …’

‘Maybe they didn’t realize all the problems my Handicap would cause, or maybe they just don’t like me.’

Fian wore his stubborn expression again. ‘They’ll have to learn to like you. After all the battles when I chose to go history instead of physics, my parents must know I make my own decisions. Anyway, this isn’t just about us. There’s been some family stuff going on for a very long time. It’s just reached crisis point and …’

He shook his head. ‘I don’t want to talk about my parents now. I want to talk about us. Whenever I try and discuss our future, you change the subject.’

I frowned down at the fancy grid display inlaid into the top of my desk. ‘It’s difficult. I know people in Delta sector have different expectations about things like marriage.’

He pulled his chair across to sit next to me. ‘I know you find it hard to talk about anything emotional, but please try.’

I played with the grid display for a few moments while I tried to work out how to say this. ‘It’s not just differences in customs. It’s about the Handicapped and about families. Hospital Earth are given plenty of guilt money by norm humanity to care for their wards, and they do their best. We get ProParents. We get psychologists inflicted on us.’

I glanced at Fian and saw the creases on his forehead as he concentrated on my words. ‘They carefully keep groups of kids together all through their childhood so we can form our substitute family, but we see real families on the vids and know it’s not the same. Some Handicapped kids react by becoming grabbers, rushing into creating their own family to fill the gap in their lives.’

I sighed. ‘I don’t like saying it, but Maeth and Ross are classic grabbers. They were devoted to each other all through Next Step. At our last Year Day party there, after midnight passed and made us 18 and legally adult, they started their first Twoing contract. Earth law requires three Twoing contracts adding up to at least a year before you can get married. Next Year Day, they’ll get married, and Maeth wants to have three kids by the time she’s 22.’

I shuddered. ‘It’s Maeth’s life, her decision, and I hope she and Ross will be happy, but …’

Fian was silent for a second. ‘You think I’d want something like that? Some people in Delta sector do get married quite young, but I don’t want to rush us into anything, and I see children as something a very long way in the future.’

I relaxed a little and gave a foolish laugh. ‘The worst thing is Maeth’s plans terrify me, but sometimes a bit of me envies her. The thought of having a proper family, people who really belong to you …’

Fian nodded. ‘I understand, but I’m not pushing for anything drastic. I just want to know we’re both serious about our relationship. I get nervous when I see you with someone like Drago. You obviously thought he was pretty impressive.’

‘Drago’s impressive, good-looking, and a heroic fighter pilot, but you don’t need to feel threatened. He’s just looking out for his friend’s kid sister.’

Fian pulled an expressive face of disbelief.

‘Don’t be a nardle. Drago wouldn’t want to tie himself to an ape.’

‘Please don’t call yourself that, Jarra. I know you deliberately use the ape word yourself, so you can pretend it doesn’t hurt when other people say it, but I don’t like it. As for Drago, he’s Betan. He might not want Twoing contracts, just to …’ He stopped, inhibited by his Deltan background from putting it into words. ‘You know what I mean.’

‘If Drago wants a quick tumble, he’s out of luck. He must be ten years older than me, and he isn’t my type. Naturally I’m interested in talking to him, I’ve never met a relative face to face before, and I’d love to see his fighter.’ I frowned. ‘I wonder what really went on at Hera. If Drago was such a dreadful pilot that he flew straight into an asteroid, he’d never be leader of shift 2 now. Maybe …’

‘Twoing rings.’

I’d thought I’d escaped discussing the real problem, but now Fian firmly interrupted with the two words that brought the chimera out of the shadows. I shut up and waited nervously.

‘As Drago helpfully pointed out, we’re not wearing Twoing rings. Chaos knows what he thought when you said we hadn’t got around to it yet. I’d just told him we started our first Twoing contract during the solar super storm, and he must know exactly how many weeks ago that was.’

Fian stood up and began moving restlessly around the room. ‘Like I said, I’m feeling insecure and want to know where I stand. You don’t want us to wear Twoing rings. In Delta sector that signals someone regrets registering the contract, and intends moving on as soon as it ends. It wouldn’t bother me if Twoing rings weren’t worn on Earth, but I’ve seen your own friends wearing them, so …’

‘I don’t regret anything, Fian. I just don’t like wearing rings.’

‘Jarra, I’m finding it hard watching heroes like Drago sniffing around you. I’m asking you to help me by wearing a Twoing ring while we’re on this base.’

That sounded dangerously close to an ultimatum. I made a last attempt to lighten the mood. ‘If I could, I’d wear my top that says “I TAGGED FIAN”. It’s not exactly Military uniform though.’

He just stood there in grim silence. I looked at the pain in his face, and gave in. I stood up and faced him.

‘All right. I surrender. I didn’t want to tell you, because it makes me look such a coward. Nobody knows this except Candace. I’ve even kept it hidden from Issette. It’s not just that I don’t like wearing rings. I’m terrified of them.’

Fian frowned. ‘What do you mean? What’s frightening about a ring?’

I groaned. ‘You know I had to have my left little finger regrown after a dig site accident when I was fifteen?’

He looked grazzed. ‘That was …?’

I nodded. ‘All the kids at my school were wearing stupid snake-shaped rings that year. I wore mine on my left little finger, and it didn’t fit properly. I knew I shouldn’t wear it under an impact suit, but one day I forgot to take it off. There was an accident, the suit material triggered to protect me, going rock hard, and the ring cut … Ever since then, just thinking about wearing a ring has given me a creepy feeling.’

Fian shook his head. ‘Jarra, why didn’t you tell me? I’d never laugh at you. What did your psychologist say?’

‘I never told him, only Candace. You know I hate psychologists.’

‘There must be rings that are safe to wear under impact suits.’

I shuddered. ‘I know there are special rings that are safe, I’ve seen Rono Kipkibor of Cassandra 2 wearing one, but my head still …’ I broke off. ‘Oh this is stupid. Tellon Blaze was the only human being who wasn’t afraid of the chimera. His descendant can’t be scared of a nardle ring. I can face this. I’ll find out about the special rings and …’

Fian grabbed me and gave me a fierce kiss. ‘You don’t have to do that, Jarra. You’re serious about your relationship with me. That’s all I needed to know. You should talk more.’

‘Issette always says I talk too much.’

He shook his head. ‘Not about important things.’

‘Blame my psychologist. He was always trying to force me into talking about things that upset me, like being Handicapped and my parents dumping me. Issette thought her psychologist was wonderful, but …’

I shrugged. ‘Maybe Issette had a better psychologist than me. Hospital Earth tries to give the Handicapped the sort of jobs they want, whether they’re any good at them or not.’

‘I’m not your psychologist. You have to talk to me, Jarra. I’ve been worrying about the rings for weeks. When I saw you hero-worshipping Drago, I was wondering if I should just give up, pack my bags, and head back to join the class. The Military don’t really want me here, and I can’t stay in a relationship, however good, if I know the other person is already planning to walk away at the contract end date. It would be pure emotional torture.’

I had a painfully sharp mental image of what might have happened. ‘I’m really sorry. I know I keep dodging discussions, and I’m not very good at saying sentimental things, but …’

He laughed. ‘Not very good? Jarra, it’s easier to dig up a stasis box than get you to say a word about how you feel. I have to look for other clues. That’s why the ring symbol was so important to me.’

I pulled a face. ‘It’s just that some things are hard for me because … well, growing up in residences run by Hospital Earth can be tough sometimes.’

‘You’ve never talked to me about your life in the residences.’

‘You’ve had such a different childhood that I didn’t know how to start explaining. All that really matters is that I’m not used to sharing emotional stuff. I didn’t want to talk to my nosy psychologist, Candace always had a lot of other kids to worry about as well as me, and Issette had too many of her own problems for me to bother her with mine. When something hurt, I tried to pretend to myself that it didn’t, tried to avoid thinking about it. I know that’s not …’

I broke off for a moment. ‘I can’t totally change the way I am overnight, Fian, but I’ll work on this. I mustn’t keep shutting you out, so I’ll try and talk more, and I’ll do something about the rings as well.’

He shook his head. ‘Now I know we’re both committed to our relationship, I can cope without rings. It’ll probably only be a few days before we’re back at the dig site and are civilians again.’

I automatically corrected him. ‘Well, we’ll never be civilians again, but yes.’

Fian stared at me. ‘What do you mean?’

I looked at his puzzled face. He really didn’t know. We’d bypassed all the background information and basic training for sector recruits, skipped intake testing and just taken the oath, but I’d still assumed he’d realize … I broke the news to him.

‘We’ll never be civilians again. We’ve taken the oath, and those promises are for life. The Military have accepted us into their family, and their obligations are for life too. Once you’re Military, you can’t just leave and be civilian again. They worked that out centuries ago. It’s not just that people who’ve been Military for decades would find the adjustment hard. Delayed traumatic stress after something like Thetis can hit many years later and when it does people need proper support.’

‘But! But!’ Fian literally stuttered in panic. ‘What can I do in the Military? They want people to explore new planets and run the solar arrays, not to be archaeologists, and you can’t even leave Earth, so …?’

‘Calm down, Fian. The Military aren’t unreasonable. When this is over, they won’t just thrust us into Military careers. I expect they’ll offer us a choice between a Military career, which I obviously couldn’t have, and a permanent civilian sabbatical.’

I grinned. ‘Sabbaticals are usually for medical or solar array specialists working in University research groups. We’ll probably be the first ever Military to be on sabbatical studying history.’

Fian shook his head. ‘My parents will get a huge shock when they find out the family failure is a Captain in the Military. It was bad enough when I told them I was going history instead of science, but this …’

I laughed. ‘I think they’ll be even more grazzed about the aliens.’