First Warning: Acorna's Children

Chapter 9

It wasn't until the end of the first week on the Moonbase that things began to go wrong. Up until then, while Shoshisha's public fawning over Khorii was annoying, and there were a few more mean looks from the one boy, looks that were not only for Khiindi but for Khorii and even Elviiz, classes were, if not challenging academically, at least good opportunities for studying human nature.

And then, before she realized it, Khorii's psychic ability began to manifest itself, and she was studying human nature far too closely for the comfort of most of the humans involved.

Furthermore, without realizing it, the human students in her applied astrophysics class were privy to some of her thoughts. This became apparent after a test, when the teacher, Captain Bates, reviewed the results. Shortly afterward, the captain, a pleasant-faced woman with soft, wavy, brown hair, a smile as quick as her keen intelligence, and a pantherlike prowl when she was unhappy about something, prowled back and forth in front of the class. Her expression said that this panther had found more prey than she knew what to do with and was just considering how to use them up without ruining her digestion.

"If I were going to plagiarize a test paper," she said, "I would have sense enough to change some of the words and at least a couple of the answers, especially if I were dumb enough to plagiarize answers from the paper of someone else in this class. I would not pass out the test answers to everyone else in the class ahead of time either."

Everyone looked baffled. At first Khorii was, too, but when she saw the papers, she understood what had happened. The answers on the paper she turned in were hers-and so were everyone else's. All of her classmates thought the answers they'd turned in were theirs because they had put down the answers that were in their heads. She'd put the answers there. Her answers.

She had been sending. Ulp. Aunt Maati had told amusing stories about Mother when she first arrived on narhii-Vhiliinyar, after she first began realizing and developing her psychic abilities. She was a strong sender. Everyone on the planet could know what she was thinking almost before she herself did. Of course, that was on narhii-Vhiliinyar, where everyone else past puberty was also psychic, but a strong sender could influence nonpsychics as well. Oh, dear.

She should tell Captain Bates and she would. She would. Only, maybe not right now in front of everybody.

Unfortunately, Captain Bates had to rush off after class, and Khorii had no opportunity to speak with her. She started to go after the teacher, but suddenly she smelled food and the thought occurred to her, Why bother? It's not like we're real students here anyway. We're only observing. Our education in these matters already far surpasses what they're learning. If everyone else heard our answers, then they heard the right answers, didn't they? Maybe they learned something. Isn't that the point?

But then she wondered, What am I thinking? Our answers? They were mine. Elviiz certainly isn't telepathic. It's not the kind of thing his father could program into him. But before she could pursue that line of thought, Khiindi looked up at her with a wide-eyed stare, whiskers, ears, and tail tip all atwitch. Hmm. He hadn't had a nice fish since the first day they were there, at least, not that she knew of. And some tasty varieties of reed grew in the poopuus' pool. Really, it would be more interesting to lunch with the waterbound students than sitting in the cafeteria while her own lunch wilted watching that nasty boy, Marl Fidd, make threatening faces at Khiindi and make fun of Hap for talking all the time. She wondered what made him so unpleasant. It was as if he wanted to do her harm but was waiting for just the right moment to take her on. Right now, for instance, she knew very well that he would have been nasty to her, too, but Shoshisha made a point of sitting with her and showing everyone what great chums she and her "alien" roommate were. And Marl liked Shoshisha.

Most of the boys did, in fact. Shoshisha, Khorii had noticed, depended on this fact and cultivated her male acquaintances carefully. All except Hap. She wasn't very nice to him at all. She laughed at the jokes Marl and Fawndra made at Hap's expense. Like there was something wrong with him. Really, he was just smarter and a lot more skilled at so many practical things, he ended up doing much of the maintenance in their bubble. For some reason, according to the ranking among the students, that was supposed to make him inferior.

Khiindi put a paw with claws slightly extended against her knee and narrowed his eyes at her.

"Fish," she said. "Very well, Khiindi. We will visit the poopuus." So she and Khiindi headed for the iris door between the bubbles. Meanwhile Elviiz explained to anyone who would listen how the laws of probability were against all of the students in their class coming up with identical equations in answer to the questions as they all headed to the cafeteria.

Inside the air felt fresh and moist. Light dapples danced on the inner skin of the bubble, diffusing the businesslike illumination into something slightly mysterious.

Khorii did not need to call out. Her friends of a few days ago bobbed in the water at the pool's edge, watching their approach.

One of them dived and surfaced with a wriggling fish, which Khiindi pounced upon the moment it hit the deck.

Khorii didn't disrobe this time. There was no practical need to since her shipsuit was waterproof as well as fireproof and windproof. It was made of a lighter version of the same fabric from which the pavilions of Vhiliinyar were constructed. She'd undressed on her previous visit to be polite, only to be told that it was actually considered not merely rude but shocking to the other students. The poopuus did not appear to care. No one greeted her in the conventional way, but once she dived in, she was surrounded by so many swimmers the water lapped in waves around her chin and face.

She noticed that the bobbing in the water and the swimming back and forth was rather nervous. "What's wrong?" she asked.

"What do you know of the sickness?" one of them asked.

"I know that it's very widespread," she said. "But my parents have gone to the place where it's the worst to try to contain it at that source and cure as many as possible with-our Linyaari technology."

"What place is this?" asked another one.

"A place called Paloduro. Why?"

"Because the disease has come to LoiLoiKua, according to the 'puters," another said, pulling her underwater and pointing at the screen which, beneath the lessons being transmitted, had a plague status banner scrolling through the current statistics, place names of the newly quarantined areas, and, in some cases, links to find the names of the dead in certain locations.

"What's LoiLoiKua?' she asked.

"It is our homeworld. Our parents and elders are there. They sent us here to learn in fresh new waters, hoping that if we do not find a way to save our own world, we might at least escape the destruction of our seas. But all we learned is that now we are far away from our kinsmen while a sickness comes upon them that strikes elders but not children. And we are not there to care for them. I am Likilekakua. I want to go home."

"I know what you mean. I want to go home, too. This trip is not working out at all in the way I thought it would. But the Federation won't allow any of us to go home now."

It came to her that she and the poopuus had in common something the other students lacked: living parents.

Khorii did not sleep well that night. She dreamed she was looking through a telescope and saw her mother drowning, much too far away for Khorii to save her. She scanned the pool-which turned out to be a sea, and saw something circling overhead. It was RK, carrying Khorii's father in his mouth as if he were a mouse. Khorii wanted to tell RK to put her father down, but if he did, then Father would drown, too. But someone had to save Mother. Then the dream turned around and it was Khorii who was drowning, though she was actually her own mother. But then RK knew about it and reached out for her, fishing for her with one paw, claws cruelly extended, digging into her shoulder.

She cried out and RK gave her a disdainful look and turned tail. The underside of the tail brushed her face, which was not so bad, but RK also "marked" her at the same time with some of the hormonally charged tomcat urine that Uncle Joh claimed could eat through steel.

Khorii was really drowning now, gagging and coughing and wiping at her mane. Of course, the smell was dispersed almost immediately by her horn, but the sound of her mother screaming was not.

However, it did change. It was not her mother. It was Shoshisha screaming. "I'm going to kill it!" she wailed. "That cat just sprayed all of my new silk underwear. I waited months for it to arrive!"

Khorii sat up, fully awake. That part of her nightmare, at least, was quite real. Shoshisha was on her feet, brandishing a shoe and dodging back and forth around her cot in an effort to head Khiindi off. Khiindi, of course, thought it was a great game. Khorii rose, lay across Shoshisha's bed, and picked her cat up by the nape of the neck before holding him firmly, though perhaps not tenderly, against her.

"Bold, bad cat," she scolded, but stroked his head as she did, so he broke into a loud purr.

"He ruined it!" Shoshisha was crying. "I forgot to close the drawer all the way last night and he got in and soaked it with that horrible smell."

"Let me see," Khorii said. "Maybe it's not as bad as you think."

She wasn't surprised Khiindi had found her roommate's clothing. Shoshisha was very untidy. No doubt this was the result of having been brought up with servants who picked up after her. She left things lying around, drawers half-open, clothing draped from every possible surface. Anyone could have told her that you just couldn't do that around a cat, especially not with anything you prized. But she probably wasn't used to cats.

"Maybe it's not as bad as you think," Khorii said, raising a handful of soiled silk to her face and almost gagging on the cat musk. Her horn, as if accidentally, touched the affected garments and the smell went away. "I think if we put them through the swash right away they'll be good as new," she said, using the students' term for the sonic wash they all used to bathe and do laundry.

Shoshisha's lips clamped together to show that she didn't believe it.

"May I try or not?" Khorii asked.

Shoshisha shrugged irritably and flipped her hand in a dismissive gesture.

Khorii carried the garments into the lav between their room and the adjoining one. Khiindi's interest in the clothing had not lessened, but he carefully kept Khorii between him and Shoshisha.

Khorii closed the door behind her. The walls automatically glowed with light by which she saw that the horn touch had turned the cat urine as clear and odorless as water. She stuck the underclothes into the sonic wash-seven pairs of silk panties and lacy bras, plus an extra sleep shirt, all of the finest quality, soft and sheer as moth wings. Shoshisha might be an exiled and orphaned princess, but she was evidently not a poor one.

"You are very lucky that I am your friend, Khiindi Kaat, or that girl would have your pelt for her knickers," Khorii scolded. "And after what you did to her knickers, she'd need it." Khiindi wound himself around her ankles. When she pulled the underwear out of the swash he mewed for her to return it to him for further destruction.

She held the silken bundle out to Shoshisha. "See? Good as new."

Shoshisha snatched it away from her, unbelieving. Then sniffed it, looked surprised, and stuffed it back in her drawer. "This is a school, you know, Khorii. I'll bet if your grandfathers were here, they would never allow you to bring that-that-livestock in here."

"Well, he can't go outdoors. There's no atmosphere," Khorii said reasonably.

"A very good reason to put him out if you ask me," Shoshisha said.

Of course, nobody had asked her, but Khorii decided to change the subject. She was, after all, training to be a diplomat.

"I wonder how the grandfathers are doing and if the baby is all right."

"I'm surprised they haven't contacted you before now," Shoshisha said, clearly meaning to wound Khorii by reminding her she was being neglected.

"I don't think they're able to right now. Besides, everybody is probably busy with the baby," Khorii said. "I sure hope they're all right. Are you going to sleep now?"

"If I'm allowed to, yes," Shoshisha replied.

"We will, too, but I have something to do first. Don't worry. I'll take Khiindi with me."

She decided to have a late snack and left the dormitories, taking the hubbub down to the 'ponies gardens. The garden appeared much depleted from when she had first arrived. Khorii knew she hadn't eaten that much since she'd arrived. There was always plenty on the Condor, where the garden was much smaller and there were two other Linyaari and a human to share the harvest. Of course, the school used the 'ponies garden for fresh nourishment for the other students in addition to the starches and proteins they had from different sources.

Leaving the gardens, she decided to try to contact Kezdet and headed to the computer lab and holo suites.