“Don’t forget we have to return his ancestors and the old Neans to their planet once the storms have settled. We’ve got plenty of time to do it all before returning Captain Kachilles to his home planet. I think he will enjoy travelling with us for a while.”
Tsiesschkir spoke directly into our minds, “We must be careful that culture shock does not damage him.” We settled for visiting his alternate solar system.
We jumped realities and arrived within a lightyear of his solar system. Freddie took a look at his distant sun through his shaft and we jumped. He froze as he saw his planets on our screens. I felt his mind withdrawing and quickly spoke to him. “We have no intention of harming your people. We do not consider any sapient species lower or higher than us, we are all equal and have the right to live.”
“You will destroy us when you see your people.” Our alien friends were quick to understand that he meant that they hold Terrans from our Earth and they surreptitiously tried to monitor our reactions. They got nothing from me, for I would be equally upset or not, regardless of the origin.
“Prisoners from our world of this reality? We might demand they be returned to us, that is all. Captain Kachilles, any other species you hold captive or dominion over, we will demand they be freed and returned home.”
“Then you will destroy us.”
“Your civilisation cannot survive without slaves?” He clammed up so I knew I’d guessed right. I grinned at Robbie and Cherine. “Oh goodie, fun and games again. We have a new kind of ethical problem. We can’t let them keep slaves, but we also cannot destroy his species.”
Seltwe asked, “You do not have robotics?”
Sifi answered, “They must have since they have spaceships. I am correct Captain?”
“Yes.”
Sifi continued, “I guess a pertinent question that may provide us with an idea of the size of the problem, would be to ask how many slaves are held.”
“Less than five thousand. It is the reason why the escape of nearly half our slaves hurt us that much. It has cost our people the existence of some of our most important people.”
My first assumption had been that they need slaves for their females who are weak. Five thousand was too low a number so I was only left with one possibility. “You mean leaders of your government?”
“I will not answer any more questions. Please undo this body for me and let me find peace with a vestige of honour.”
“Leonida, we need to take the Captain back to your World. He needs to see that we have brought here the slaves they were trying to kill. Captain, whichever questions you do not answer, surely they would?”
He was only given a few minutes to see them and before they could panic, we returned him to Freddie.
“Would you find it more honourable to have them answer our questions?”
His voice chinked angrily, “We will not be betrayed by animals, far better we are responsible for our deaths. Yes, we need the slaves for our fathers.” He shuddered with the grief he’d tried so hard to keep private. “There were only seven hundred of them, but the loss of slaves means we probably only have about two hundred left. We are doomed anyway.”
“Of course!”
“The entire crew were female? What about the government person who took your life?”
“All female.”
“Robbie, it is time we remember our manners, the Captain is our guest. Please take Inguel, Anadir and any other scientists with Claudia to examine the full history of her species and to study their biology. Answering our questions is causing her too much distress.” I turned to her. “Captain, we apologise, we did not realise how sensitive the information we demanded was. Do you require some time alone to recover?”
When they returned to their bodies, none of them would explain to us, insisting they should share once they have the full story. It took them four days to be satisfied they have all the information needed for us to begin deciding strategies. I don’t know how I controlled myself for that many days without sneaking a peek in their minds. J
“Subject to further studies, this is what we believe occurred. Their early evolution is thought to have been formed as a semi-hive society. Instead of having one queen per hive they had a small number of males - not anywhere as small in number as they are now. Each hive, according to their records, had about two thousand males. There were nine hives with two more planned when there was a sudden change in their ecology. Before the change, there were two kinds of males. Those who could sire children and those who were not fully male. The full male cannot be cared for by the females, as their presence forces the body of the male to react instantly and sex has to be initiated immediately, however exhausted the full male may be. We think it was the duty of the half males to care for and be companions to the full males.
A species, unknown to us, visited their planet. They were friendly and offered their technology. Within a few years the Vilatchi noticed that no half males were being born. At the same time, reports claimed the visitors were acting erratically. Within the next few years, all the visitors died. Whatever killed the aliens also permanently damaged the Vilatchi so that no more half males were born. They tried damaging females so that they could care for the males. It was not successful and the full males were reducing in number steadily.
They tried using robots, but the males need a certain minimum of human contact - which they cannot receive from the females. Without such contact, they lose interest in living. Instinct forces a female to leave immediately after copulation, so there is no tenderness, no conversations or even just the simple comfort of holding a hand. The last of the aliens showed them star charts and taught a crew of females. They went to the planet they’d been told hold a species that could survive on their world. Hence the presence of Terran slaves. There is one more twist to the story. They bred their Terran slaves for a lower aggression quotient.”
I joined Kachilles at her favourite place, the bank of the river. I gently told her what we’d learnt. She nodded, emoting despair. “We are trying to find another way to keep your fathers alive. Kachilles, I think your people forgot that just as your full males need to be cared for, so did your slaves. They too needed to be made to feel loved and needed. When your half-fathers still existed, did you treat them like animals?”
“I do not know, it was too far back in time.”
“Not really, it was not that long ago, we found records in your libraries. You just did not care to learn. A pity, if you had, you might have appreciated the people you stole from their world and forced to live on yours.”
“Will you allow me to die on this world? It is not my home, but I know it well and it will welcome me.”
She watched as we returned in time. At first she only answered questions asked, but slowly she grew to believe and drove everyone crazy with her need to be a part of the salvation of her people. The day she asked whether she could meet those we’ve saved so that she can explain to them they no longer need to fear her kind, we knew we’ve succeeded with her.
“I’m sorry, Kachilles, we cannot allow you to meet them, you may only speak to their descendants. Those you hunted, we will be returning them to the planet they’d escaped to and for thousand of years they will live, die and new generations live until the day arrives that our friends are born. We will not risk changing the future and you’ll have to live your lives knowing that for many generations to come there are a people living in fear of your return.”
She looked at Orgg, Meesartus and the rest of their people. “Do they hate us?”
“They grieve for their people, but they also sorrow for yours and are hoping we can find a way to bring back your half-fathers so that you can grow as a people again.”
Examining a culture that has had technology artificially grafted to it, is very interesting. In some ways they are very sophisticated, but in many other ways they are almost primitive. They do not seem to have an instinctive love of learning, only studying what is needed for maintaining and developing factories to keep their spaceships and other technology given to them operational. We saw no signs of research being conducted and they have not created anything of their own. I have a feeling that as a species they would be happier reverting to a bucolic culture. They love tending plants and the majority of them lived scattered throughout the countryside, which is why I keep saying they only have a semi-hive mentality. Wendy is hoping to collect a wide sample of their music, since documents speak of them being a joyous people before they were visited and gifted with technology. We have not found any signs of them keeping animals for their meat. As a matter of fact, they seem contemptuous of all animals. Their semi-hive mentality could be responsible, but I can’t help wondering if it is not because they instinctively sense they are close to them in their needs.
Over a number of conversations and from watching their educational facilities, we learnt that from each new generation, a few are chosen to be trained for maintaining their technology and for crewing their spaceships. The captain admitted that those children tend to become antisocial, some to the point of cruelty, and all develop neurosis unheard of before. With a dwindling population it is only a matter of time before they begin to abandon the technology gifted to them. They have opened new arguments among us, for they are intelligent, but lack the necessary curiosity to expand their knowledge base. The question is, how or why does a species develop intelligence if it lacks curiosity. As we discussed it at a time the captain was not with us, Cassie just had to get her little barb in.
“I’m puzzled as to why you are all so surprised. After all, if the other extreme is possible, a burning curiosity about everything without intelligence, as Samantha proves, why shouldn’t it work the other way around?” I chased a laughing Cassie for about half a mile but she is too fast and agile for me to catch. We walked back with our arms around each other.
It took weeks but success was announced. The problem now was how to convince an entire population that they must be inoculated (psychically). The only answer was to teach the Spartan healers how to use their powers to undo the damage while also making changes that would enable the half-fathers to resist becoming infected again. The scientists told us that the virus was a freak occurrence, brought about by a virus from each species causing the other to mutate for the purpose of protecting themselves. They were worried that should any of the mutated virus spread to other ecologies it could mutate again. Robbie groaned. The cell we’d used for creating the captain’s body could have been infected. It was also possible the Roulans and Neans carried the virus or a mutated version of it. At least the Spartan World was not in any danger, the Spartans only had to allow it to stop existing and recreate it - not that they would want to, since they are hosting a number of species plus they have carried entire solar systems into their World, and they treasure their existence.
We explained to Kachilles and she seemed to go into shock. We apologised, but told her we had to check her for the virus. Within the hour we were informed that she is a carrier. Urgently now, members of each species donated scrapings of cells to be examined. This time there would be no quick answer as they could have mutated again or caused a virus of each species to mutate.
A representative from the Inguel, Anadir and Unation medical teams came to meet with Robbie at his request. “I presume the healers of each species have searched for mutated viruses and not found any or else I’d have been notified. What if we have been infected, but they are not harmful, at this stage or permanently. We could pass them on to the Normals of our species or to each others species and they might not be immune. Is it possible?”
“We’ll cover that possibility Robert.”
“Thank you. Please consider Freddie under quarantine. I’ve already asked the Wirms not to wish themselves elsewhere until we are certain their bodies are not infected. Can you give them priority as they could then act as our messengers should we need them to warn other worlds.”
“Is it likely anyone will try to jump to us?”
“I’m more worried about the people who’ve been to the world of Orgg and the planets Roulans and Neans have travelled to. We must not forget to add to the list the planet we took the Neanderthal survivors to.”
I went to check that Kachilles was coping and she glared at me. “I told you to let me die from the first day!”
“I’m glad I didn’t listen to you. Join us, we are one team, let’s fight and plan together and we’ll beat the shit out of these miserable viruses. We’ve taken the first step Kachilles, your people will now be able to breed half-fathers.”
“To what purpose? Soon there won’t be enough fathers to maintain a viable population. The half-fathers need at least thirty years before they are mature enough to care for their fathers.”
“What if we take a shortcut and make mature half-fathers available within the week?”
“How!”
“Ah!” I shook my head, not in exasperation, for I am starting to sort of like her, though she’ll never become a friend, and it saddens me to see how weak the spark of life is in her. “You give up too easily. I wondered why you allowed yourself to be killed for something you were not to blame. Let’s go talk to Robert.”
“We first have to sanitise this planet Sam.”
I made my voice cheeky. “That’s okay, I did explain to her it could take up to a week.”
“If you want to move that fast we’ll need Solomon with his Sparklers here. All possible areas that a virus could survive have to be examined by their healers - and that includes plants, all bodies of water and so on. It would be better Vincent goes without his body.”
“Hold on Vincent, I want to try something. Dad, do you remember that time I carried our World within me?”
“Don’t say you’ve done it again!”
“Okay, I won’t. All I’m saying is that it’s given me an idea. Won’t be long.” I jumped to be alone and meditate. I searched for any signs of Adam, hoping for even a mote. No luck. I left my body and went to the void. I searched again. I was certain there had to be something left behind, but I was not having any luck. I wondered whether Adam had any thoughts while I held him. Do thoughts have energy and does that energy have motes? I sank into myself and searched for ways to refine my sensitivity. I was amazed at how much I found within myself that was not from me. It brought some memories back that I had to control as I did not want to lose my focus. Now that I know/remember, I will be doing this again to feel those lovely emotings I’ve hidden within myself. Distantly I sensed Robbie and my family arrive in the void, but I ignored them, diving even deeper. I began to use his name as my chant, including with the name the ‘feel’ of Adam. It was as if my consciousness had tightened into a pinprick, intense as a laser. I felt something but I was not certain what it was. I bent all my concentration on it as I called and called.
*Samantha! You are in the same reality?*
*Adam! You can hear me? Wow! Robbie is going to freak out. We are in the same reality, but we are by a different solar system. Adam, we need Solomon to send all the Sparklers to us, keeping only about ten billion there for emergencies. The Spartans are with us so they should be able to find us. Adam, just the Sparklers who have healers.*
*You’ll have to explain when you return. Solomon confirms Sparklers arriving in Freddie right now.*
*Over and out then Adam. Love you and bye.* It took me a while to return to the point where I was able to communicate with my loves. I sent them a whopping big grin and the message that the Sparklers are waiting for us in Freddie and we must hurry back. Ignoring their cries for an explanation I returned to my body. Even as I opened my eyes I was laughing. In his hurry to grab me, for this once Robbie temporarily ignored Candy and lunged at me.
“What did you do?”
“I had a chat with Adam and arranged for Solomon to send most of the Sparklers to us. We can talk later, we have a job to do.” I pretended to try and get away because of my sense of urgency, but I betrayed myself by laughing. Robbie pulled me to him and held tightly until I stopped. When I pulled away Aganthi had brought me my coffee. My big moment of triumph and I had to go and cry like a baby! I could feel Cherine, it felt as if her hearts were afraid to beat in case they found out she’d guessed wrong and I had not found another way to make Robbie safe. Her dark eyes were huge and fixed on me.
“Cherine, it is not what you think, all I succeeded in doing was talking with Adam.”
“From here.”
“Robert, could you?”
“No.”
Her hand touched my cheek. “Can you teach us?” I nodded and her eyes gleamed as we felt her rejoicing. “Do you think we could from a different reality?”
“I don’t know. I’m too exhausted to try Cherine.”
She smiled, her emoting like a hot water bottle for my heart. “After your week is up?” I laughed as she hugged me.
Thank goodness everyone got too busy in searching the planet to pay me much attention after that. I asked my healer to go with them, but it did not. Without realising what it was doing to me, I fell asleep.
It was a tight squeeze, we just made it within a week. We did indulge our laziness and impatience by leaving Spartans to collect souls and cells from half-fathers as they died of natural causes. We jumped ahead by ten years and collected about three hundred and forty half-fathers. Not one of them chose to stay dead. Having seen how the Vilatchi lived at that time gives us an indication of how they will be within a few hundred years. Their technology is low level, but they live happy lives without stress - and I think it was as I had suspected, without the stress, their spark of life is stronger, but not comparable to ours. They don’t seem to have any history of large scale wars, just local battles and even those are fairly rare. Their wars are brief and clean - no rapes (all soldiers are women so no congratulations are called for in that respect) and they have not evolved a sophisticated array of tortures. Even after a battle, no father of the other hive is ever harmed, since only females get angry with females. Having said that, I must admit I do not particularly like them as a species. When faced with adversity they give in too easily. They hate confrontation, even to the point of meekly submitting to a death sentence without arguing the case. I can understand they had to take desperate measures, but there is no excuse for the way they treated the aliens they stole from other worlds. Even the captain has shown no interest in the one quality that drives us. Their empathy is limited to only those they care for - or so it seems to me. On the other hand, everyone likes their ‘fathers’ and ‘half-fathers’. They have much warmer personalities and the Terrans and other aliens speak highly of them.
We sent the captain on her own. She told her people of what we have done and then we sent the half-fathers. The entire population celebrated and wanted to meet us to show their gratitude. We sent a message that they should gather all aliens for us to collect. We had told the captain we would be visiting her reality next, so she returned with their aliens. In this reality, the Roulan ancestors (actually, our ancestors, but we are taking them to live with the Roulans in our present, so we already think of them as Roulans), had not succeeded in their escape attempt. The Vilatchi destroyed their ship before they even left the solar system. About one thousand eight hundred Terrans and about five hundred of a different species were taken to the Spartan World. We’ll return the aliens to their world once we’ve finished with the Vilatchi.
The second species taken hostage by the Vilatchi call themselves the Firmziani. I don’t know whether they have also been bred for lower aggression, but it is difficult to imagine them as being aggressive. They are the sweetest and most gentle species and (disconcerting to everyone else) they weep at the slightest hurt - of theirs or of anyone else. We were told by the captain that the fathers grieve at their departure, even though they can be better taken care of and loved by their half-fathers. A number of the Firmziani also wept at being parted from the fathers they’d taken care of. Freddie waited, despite Robbie telling him to jump to the alternate planet of the Vilatchi. He’d sensed Cherine was brooding and he guessed she would countermand Robbie’s request. She did.
“They would.”
Cherine had guessed right, but not only for the reasons she’d thought of. They explained to me that they have lived among the Vilatchi for generations and they would feel like aliens back on their home world. I went across to the Roulans and asked them whether any of them wanted to stay as employees. Only a few did, the rest were excited by the idea of having their own planet to start over on. The captain was taken back and she returned with all the conditions we’d demanded fully agreed on. We’d insisted that the children of both groups be educated and allowed to choose the profession of their preference. I explained to the captain, as Freddie jumped, that I see technology does not sit well with her people and they will revert to being as they had been before the Derkirt arrived on their planet. I told her I am hoping the other two species can fill that niche, providing the advances needed without her people being forced to change for the worse. I hope it will turn out to be a good partnership with benefits for all sides. I only foresee one major problem. I do not think the Vilatchi will ever qualify to become Cherinians while those staying with them will. I’m asking myself, will they, as Cherinians, accept the burden of caring for the Vilatchi? How would that affect the Vilatchi? Will they feel inferior? We cannot sacrifice even one soul that is potentially a Cherinian, but how do we hurt so many?
Cherine: Sam, you are ignoring that you’ve already indicated that the fathers and half-fathers are likely candidates for linking? If they are linked, please consider from now how it will affect them and their relationship with their females.
The people of Captain Kachilles were startled by our appearance and when she appeared among their government ministers without her ship, they thought their ships had been destroyed. She corrected them and explained what had happened. On our suggestion, she promised half-fathers will be arriving within one week. Without them being told, billions of healers were already healing their world and their bodies. From there onwards, everything occurred exactly as before. We did not meet their governments and only promised our Captain friend that we will return someday soon, as we’d like to meet their ‘fathers’. Apparently she has been re-instated as captain and the government has promised to re-examine the advisability of having a representative on board. Governments never like giving up an edge, so I bet they’ll temporarily deal with the problem by sending a representative along just for monitoring and gradually they’ll be given back their powers. It is an amazing fact of life that I find hard to accept - most species do not have a Cabal because, for many of them, their own governments are their Cabal - it being the only way they can achieve and retain total control forever. Those species who do not, like our Cherinian friends, have become twice as precious to me.
We only found ourselves with about seventy Firmziani from both realities. We asked them whether they prefer to travel with us for a while or do they want to be returned to their home planets immediately. They chose to return home.
We have arrived. This is one of the most interesting planets I’ve seen in a long time. First of all, it is a sweet water world. The planet is very low on all kinds of salts. I’m too lazy to look it up, but I imagine the word ‘sea’ only applies to saltwater bodies of water. This planet has no large seas or oceans - sweet or salt water. The biggest lake is smaller than the Mediterranean but they have a lot of lakes. Perhaps about thirty five percent of the surface is covered with water. It might sound too dry, but there is a lot of underground water and marshy areas cover another twenty five percent of the surface. There are no deserts. The viridity of the planet can be seen from space. The green of their plants is a dark emerald so we’ve dubbed it, when speaking among ourselves, ‘The Emerald Planet’.
The next oddity is the landscape. There are no large mountains reaching for the sky. I’m told the planet must be almost devoid of earthquakes because of the peculiarity I’m about to mention. It looks as if the planet, in the early days, thrust teeth out of the ground. There are rocks, relatively thin and sharp sticking out of the surrounding land, from a metre to (the tallest one) nearly two thousand metres. The specialists tell us this is a sign of youth, for erosion has hardly marked them. There must have been enormous pressures when the planet was forming, but instead of the rock being crushed, it splintered. Haven calls them the blade mountains. We have learnt that no Firmziani ever touch any of the sharp rocks, not even the small ones, if they can avoid it.
The Firmziani are tall, averaging two to two and a half metres. They are slim and lithe, comfortably leaping across branches and roof tops, their bodies covered in a fine hair. They do not wear clothing, but wear belts with tools and hunting weapons. Most of them wear from two up to eight belts. They tell stories of one Firmziani who wore nine belts and he sounds like a mixture of historian and sage with a love for making up dream stories. There are belts that are purely decorative and we learnt that they announce the position of the wearer, the leaders allowed metal threaded through the surface in decorative designs. We convinced them to trade for a belt their recorders wear. It is the only belt that is strapped over the head and is designed to carry the pens and other small writing materials the recorders need. Even should a rare fight break out, between villages or between families, none are allowed to attack a recorder - unless he or she has removed their head belt. The belt we traded for was a gift from all of us to our Meli.
We’d expected the Firmziani we’d brought back home to have difficulty in adapting and becoming part of their society. Within a day we had difficulty in identifying them. They were treated as family from a different village and place was made for them. The Firmziani of the other reality confirmed they would be just as happy here so they were landed in a different jungle village.
We were welcomed and when they learnt of other species in Freddie, they invited them. For a few days we were prodded, examined and left with little dignity. They were almost childish with glee as they pointed out to each other the differences. Since they have creatures that resemble spiders, we expected them to feel uneasy around the Eqkee, but all they evinced was delight in their metallic sheen and slender limbs. Once Iona and the other children of the Eqkee started playing with their children, they were accepted as family. They do not use fire for many purposes, as it is difficult to find fuel in a damp jungle. They plant a certain kind of flower that glows at night to light their way between homes and also in the areas they gather to tell stories and exchange the wonders they experienced that day. Their wonders could be something as trite as the pleasure one of them experienced when a berfir did not frighten and remained on a branch just before their eyes and sang its song as its sail-like membranes swung from colour to colour. ‘Trite’ is according to the eye of the beholder and for those who cannot share in the joy of such a moment, I can only feel saddened.
We were sitting in a large ring made up mostly of the Firmziani, a couple of Anadir families, two single Inguel, twelve of various species from the Unation and our family. The flowers glowed gently in different colours and the heat of the day had not reached through the branches overhead. We had brought cold drinks and Robbie had a food machine that makes three different coffees for him - cappuccino, filter coffee and Greek coffee. It also produces cigarettes for him, but he did not need any that night, even though he was not as relaxed as us and was looking around as if he does not entirely believe what he sees and senses.
“It is not natural for any species to be so lacking of any of the manifestations of xenophobia. It does not make any sense in an evolutionary way.”
“Why not?” I shrugged. “They have not had to scratch their way to intelligence through use of tooth and claw. They have no natural enemies that I’ve noticed.”
“Do you mean they’ve killed them all?” I hadn’t thought of it that way, so I mulled it over for a while. I spoke to Wendy. My thoughts were that any species that has a history of fighting to survive, of killing or running away, would have songs about those days. They may be old and not sung anymore, but a literate society would have some kind of records. She promised to search through whatever archives they have and thanked me for the idea. She was excited and was soon immersed in mind-whispering with Candy.
One of the older ones sitting close to Jade asked her whether she knows what it is like to age and die. Jade answered that she does not. She was then asked whether she would like to know. Jade shrugged. “Perhaps I’ll find out someday.”
“We can help when you wish to learn.”
Cassie didn’t like the direction the conversation was taking. Threading her arm through Jade’s, she aggressively stated, “She’s going to stay young and beautiful forever!” Unfortunately even Cassie cannot fight an idea once it starts dancing within a mind. The next day Jade asked another Firmziani what the elder had meant.
She was led to the top of the trees and her guide pointed at a mountain. “Those are the teeth of dreams. Climb any one of them and give yourself to the spirit of our world and it will send you to a different life. When you die in the dream world, you will return.”
“Do your people go to the mountains?”
“Very few do. Those who do return changed. They no longer love their family as they did, for they had another family in the dream world and lived a full life with them. From the time they arrived there, until they died and returned, they did not recall themselves or their family, they became other persons. Only those who are not loved go to the mountains and there are not many who can honestly say they are not loved. It is as true for you?”
We did not want to upset them by going to their mountains within view of any town, so Robbie took some scientists to a mountain that has no Firmziani living within view of it. They took samples with the expectation of finding hallucinogenic chemicals. Tests proved negative; it was just plain rock, a different composition to our slate, but similar in some ways, for instance, far more durable, less brittle and heavier. Our scientists came to the conclusion that their dreams were self induced because of their beliefs.
We had an emergency today. It is five days since we took samples from the mountain but still, it is an unfortunate coincidence. The children were playing and they love it when Iona runs at full speed, vibrating her way through trees. Iona was in an open field, but the vegetation was taller than she is. To prevent the movement of the plants from giving away her position she was vibrating herself continually. She ran into a mini blade rock and smashed herself against it. At the speed she runs, the damage and pain should have killed her. The vibrating of her body could have exploded her into tiny pieces. Luckily there was enough for the healers to repair her while Allan held her soul to him. The scientists went back to their studies of the samples. Adult Eqkee vibrated without running and tried passing a leg through. They failed. Since even their trees are denser than rocks on our world, we had a very puzzled bunch of scientists. They were even more puzzled when they discovered that the rocks are not denser and not harder than Eqkee trees. They now started their experiments in new directions. They were startled when one of the rocks, in reaction to extremely gentle electronic pressure, combined with a soft probing by their digits, melted. As soon as they stopped touching the rock it reverted to its original shape and solidified.
Jade asked the question on our behalf, keeping the question in line with previous discussions. “When a person goes to the dream world, what happens to the body. Does another person stay by them to care for it?”
“You said an entire lifetime is spent in the dream world until death arrives from old age or an accident kills them. For how long do they remain on the mountain?” The answer was that in our terms, the length of time seems to be between two to five days. That brought up the question for us, does time alter within the dream or does the mind get sent to a different reality? The dreams we were told about indicated they each went to a world different from theirs in many ways while also similar enough that they could understand it. Robbie is convinced that the planet has a soul and it is able to communicate through the jagged rocks. That sent the scientists off into new experiments, some of them carried out in the void with them as souls. Nothing conclusive was proven, but there are some enticing hints of a strangeness.
Jade has decided she wants to go to the mountain with a Firmziani guide. None of us are happy about it and we’ve tried to discourage her. I can sympathise, if this had started because of me, I probably would have felt the same way. We were still trying to find arguments to stop Jade, when Cherine shocked and frightened all of us. “It is your right Jade. However, if you want to leave with my love, then you’ll take Robert with. Live your dream life as a new family with him. I will not have you return with memories of other males and children lost to you. We’d have to share them and it would not be fair to us. Meli and Dommi, you will implant the correct suggestions and compulsions so that neither of them accept other partners.”
The Firmziani insisted they must purify their body by only eating fruits for three days. During this time they are not supposed to have any sex - that really upset all of us. They have to meditate with their Firmziani guide so that they learn how to offer themselves to the spirit of their world.
We’ve had to move out of the jungle, which means we would have suffered from the sun and heat if we were not Cherinians, because thousands of Cherinians of all species wanted to be with us. Everybody is keeping quiet, even trying to keep their emoting calm and calming. The bubble young men and women who’ve come are not allowing any bubbles to form. Six Elipians have joined us and they, as with everyone else, have to remain sheathed for their entire visit. At least, whoever needs to, can return to Freddie and then return to us as they wish, once the meditating is over. The jumping does fluctuate what is felt by Robbie and Jade, so no one is jumping until they are dreaming.
We were not allowed to follow them, not even to the foot of the mountain. We are all struggling to control our nervousness and fears so that we do not undo the calm and openness they have achieved. Arthur is right, Cherine is brave, I understand her logic, but I do not think I would have had the courage to risk losing Robbie. Losing Jade would shatter us, but losing both of them would destroy all of us - even if they have just shared for bringing them back to life. Vincent and Kirsten are on standby to make certain that if things go wrong they force our souls to go to our Kaleidoscope World.
So as not to intrude and hinder their merging with the mountain, we kept our contact vague and distant. We sensed them arrive, lie down, and as they became unaware of us, we felt the link cut. Their souls are gone. Wild-eyed with fright we looked at each other.
