"So, the way I see it, we're basically screwed," Levits said.
"I'm freezing my ass off over here," David said his teeth chattering in spite of the dry space suit and three solar blankets he had wrapped around him and his close vicinity to the fire.
"It should pass in a couple of days," Poley informed.
"That's very comforting, thank you," David said sarcastically.
"Shut up, shit boy," Levits hissed from where he sat across the fire.
"All right. What happened with the shit?" David asked.
Levits started to tell him in what would, no doubt, have been very colorful language, but Topaz stopped him.
"Let's not go back there," Topaz said putting a gentle hand on Levits' chest.
"Ever," RJ added. She sat down behind Levits, and he laid his head against her chest. She wrapped her arms around him and kissed the top of his head.
"What the hell is going on?" David asked, wondering if he was still hallucinating or had indeed ever stopped.
"They have sex," Janad informed him.
"Really?" David asked looking at RJ.
"Yes, really!" Levits hissed, apparently taking immediate offense at the note of disbelief in David's voice. "You got some problem with that, shit boy?"
David was stunned silent for a moment, but finally found his voice. "Ah, no . . . Not at all." It was a lie, and probably not a very convincing one.
He was shaking all over, and now suddenly his stomach hurt and he felt heartsick. Neither of these latter symptoms had anything to do with his disease. RJ hadn't been ready for a relationship. He admitted now, if only to himself, that he had harbored some hope that RJ still loved him. That when she was ready to have another relationship it would be with him. He tried very hard to hide what he was feeling because it just wasn't appropriate. He didn't get along with Levits, but he didn't dislike him, and if he was sure of nothing else he was sure that Levits loved RJ. David didn't really love RJ, not at least with the sort of passion he knew to be romantic love. The truth was he thought he would never feel that way about anyone ever again, and RJ would have been the next best thing. At the very least he knew he could trust RJ. He wasn't sure he could ever really trust anyone else. So, now the way he saw it he was doomed to go through his life alone.
"David, are you all right?" Topaz asked, making David realize just how long he had been silently staring into the center of the fire.
"No, I'm not all right. I feel like crap, I'm freezing to death, and everyone keeps reminding me of the hideous things I did when I was delusional. I think I'm going to go in the ship and lie down." David started to get up.
"I'll help you," Poley offered.
David was about to snap at him that he hardly needed help lying down, when Poley reached down and helped him to his feet. He realized he actually did need the help, or at the very least he was glad to have it. Poley helped him into the ship and helped him to lie down on the cot, and then he covered him up with the three blankets.
"Thank you, Poley," David said surprised at how tired he suddenly felt.
"You're welcome," Poley said and turned to leave.
"Poley?" David called after him.
Poley turned to face David. "Yes."
"Poley . . . Do you think RJ is happy with him?"
"Who?" Poley asked.
"Levits?" David said trying not to scream. Sometimes the obvious seemed to go right over the robot's head.
"She seems to be. Yes," Poley answered. He turned and left the ship.
While a human might have sensed that David needed to talk, Poley had answered David's question and since David said he wanted to sleep, Poley was leaving so that he could.
David stared up at the ceiling and started to feel trapped – like he was back in space. So he quickly looked out the open door. He took a breath and made himself calm down.
I can't begrudge them whatever happiness they can find. Even if they chose to find it together. It was foolish and selfish to think that RJ and I would wind up together. Levits cares about her at least as much as I do. He even loves her, and I don't. Not really. I'd like to, but I don't and I never will. So I have to be rational. But she's the only almost human woman in my life, and I just don't feel like being rational.
He had just decided to stay up all night brooding about it when he fell asleep.
Haldeed and Taleed stood several feet away from the others. It had gotten dark fast, but soon Grande Lune, the largest of the six moons, would be up. The second brightest of Beta 4's moons, and this early in its cycle, it would light things up so bright that it would almost – but not quite – blot out the light of the smaller moon in this cycle, Azure Lune. Between the two of them the night would be almost as bright as day.
"I think she knows who I am," Taleed said.
Who, the girl? Haldeed signed.
"No, the woman, the white headed woman, the one they call RJ. I think she knows who I am. But how could she know, Haldeed? How did she figure me out when no one else – not even the Reliance men did?" Taleed asked.
She is a god, Haldeed signed frantically.
"Look at the facts, Haldeed. She's no god, she even said she wasn't . . ."
Haldeed cut Taleed off with a shove – something he hadn't done since they were boys.
No! You look at the facts, Taleed, Haldeed signed. You are lying about what you are. She came from the sky. She was wearing the silver suit of the gods. She utterly did smite the enemy of the people and cleansed the temple of the poison gold. She runs too fast to be mortal. She doesn't look like us, and she doesn't look like them, either.
"There is another people I have heard of. The ones who fight the Reliance. It is said that they are white headed, blue eyed and bronze skinned. She must be one of those," Taleed said. He glared back at her. It hurt to know that she had already figured out his clever ruse. That his "hands" hadn't fooled her. It had been nice to be seen by others as normal. It bothered him to think that his disguise hadn't fooled her for even a minute. "They are all strange, all different. I admit I don't know that much about the Reliance people, but these seem even stranger than those."
All the more reason we should leave here and go back to the palace where we belong, Haldeed signed.
"I'm staying with them till I find out why they have really come here," Taleed said stubbornly. "I don't understand everything that they say because they speak too fast and use slang words, but in a few days I shall know everything that they are saying. In a few days I will know what they are really doing here." He looked at his friend, pleading for his understanding. "I . . . I have this odd feeling, Haldeed, that my destiny is tied up with these strange people. If I leave now, I may never reach my true place in the universe. I may die without fulfilling my destiny. And if I leave now, I will never know one way or the other. I will always wonder whether this was the road I should have taken and didn't."
I do not understand you anymore, Taleed. You say you do not believe in the gods, but now you talk of destiny. Surely if there are no gods, then a man makes his own destiny. Why risk your life on the off chance that your destiny may be linked to these people? If you truly do not believe that someday you will be a god, if you are never to be any more than a man, why worry about your destiny at all?
"You make good arguments, my brother, but I still will not go. Perhaps there is a larger power. If there is, then truly it has guided us to be here with these people now, for what were the odds that we should all be in that one place at that one time?" Taleed said in a passionate whisper.
Haldeed reluctantly nodded his head. Whatever Taleed wanted to do he would do, whether he thought Taleed's actions careless or not. Haldeed didn't need to find out what his destiny was. His destiny was to serve the young Prince. His destiny was written in stone, even as his tongue had been cut from his head.
Taheed glared down at the old priest. "Are you calling me a liar, Ziphed?"
"No, Your Majesty, but, well . . . Where is the Prince? He has missed his last three lessons, and . . . He has made a habit of running away, My Lord. His man servant Haldeed has also been noticeably absent from the palace grounds." Ziphed said with as much reverence as he could muster.
"Just because he's not here doesn't mean he's gone!" Taheed screamed. He played his words back in his head, and shook his head as if to clear his thoughts. "What I mean to say is just because he's not on the palace grounds doesn't mean he's left." He played these back as well and decided they didn't sound any better. "All right! All right! You pompous old snit! The Prince has run away again. In fact he has been gone longer than ever before, and we have no idea where he is. Perhaps you made some mistake. Perhaps he was not the Chosen One at all. I've had twenty sons born this month. Test them see if one of them isn't The Chosen."
"For all the generations since the soul of The Ancestor first moved, the Priests in the Service of the God of the Clouds have picked the Chosen One, and never have we been wrong. He must be found and brought back here, or we will all lose face." Ziphed sounded more thoughtful than angry.
"Let me worry about my son. You worry about curing this disease," the King said looking at his mottled skin. "We look and feel worse with each passing day, and yet the commoners walk around with no sign of this plague on their flesh."
"The two are linked," the priest said. "The God of the Clouds punishes us all because we have let the Chosen One escape. Worse, we have made him so unhappy that he feels he can only be happy by leaving us. We must find the Prince. Only then will the gods intervene on our behalf."
"Then we shall find him," the King/God said. "I shall double my efforts." He pointed his stump towards the door, and the priest knew better than to stay.
"If I'm a god, then why is my flesh rotting?" he asked his mute manservant, who just shrugged. "Perhaps my son is right." He stared out the huge window at the night sky full of the glow from two moons, both full. The smaller one, whose name he could never remember, cast a pale blue light. He often thought of himself and the Chosen as these two moons in this cycle. The one brighter and over-powering the other, but the other different and therefore more impressive. As the large one faded the blue one came into its own radiance – the smaller one waiting for the bigger one to cycle out so that it could shine alone.
"If my son is right, Yashi, bringing him back will not save me. It will not save any of us that have been so afflicted."
If Yashi could have spoken, he would have pointed out that he wasn't sick. He would have told the King that he thought their ailment was related to the gold metal the Reliance had traded for their people. After all, it wasn't until after they had fashioned chains of it and all the priests and the King had worn them that they had fallen sick. But he couldn't talk because having been chosen to serve god they had cut out his tongue. Also having been chosen, they had never taught him to write. He pointed frantically at the King's chain, making a gurgling noise.
"No, Yashi, how many times do I have to tell you? Gold metal is for priests and gods, not for servants. I would give you one anyway, as you are my dear companion, but the priests would be displeased," Taheed said.
Yashi sighed and slumped against the wall.
"So how radioactive is the gold?" Topaz asked RJ. She turned to look at Poley.
"Nine gray," Poley answered.
"So what does that mean?" Levits asked.
"It's dangerous but not immediately lethal. Exposure at a distance of several feet probably wouldn't even be detectable. More immediate exposure for a longer length of time is going to cause radiation sickness, and prolonged exposure will cause death," Poley said.
RJ let out a long breath shaking her head.
"What?" Topaz said seeing the look in her eyes.
"Don't you see, Topaz?" RJ said. She got up suddenly, practically dumping Levits on the ground. She started pacing back and forth with a look of concentration on her face. She was obviously calculating.
"What!" Levits demanded as he tried to get comfortable and regain his dignity, after having been dumped so unceremoniously on the ground. "God, I hate it when you do that. Start to say something and then stop. What already?"
"The Reliance isn't just giving these people radioactive gold to get rid of something that would be otherwise useless to them. They did it on purpose to kill off the planet's leaders," RJ said. She stopped pacing and looked down at them. "They give them cotton and wool cloth, farming and cooking utensils, and gold. The priests make the distribution just as the Reliance knew they would. The cloth and utensils are distributed to the families of the people the Reliance takes away as a form of payment, and the priests keep the valuable stuff – i.e. the gold – for themselves. Of course they share some with the King, who is also a god. The people don't know about the gold. Or if they do, they no doubt believe it was gifted to the priests and their God/King by the bigger god. The one we all know is no more than a series of antiquated thermo electric power plants."
"The King and the priests deck themselves out in this gold. They drape it all over the power plant and throne room where they live and work, slowly killing themselves with radiation," Topaz said with sudden realization.
"How does that serve the Reliance?" Levits asked in confusion.
RJ gave him an I'm so tired of mortals look and explained. "No leaders, no leadership. No leadership, no resistance. No resistance when the Reliance comes down, states that they have killed the people's impotent gods, and now they own them. They send the war-ready population off to Earth to destroy the New Alliance and leave the rest of the population with the mess they have created. The only people left here to try to rebuild their civilization would be the old, the sick, the crippled, and the very young. They take generations of work on genetic uniqueness and perfection and destroy it in one generation. Then they continue to trade with the inhabitants for the items they want, screwing them worse than ever before, and making sure that they can never again raise an army that the Reliance might ever have to worry about."
"Could they do that?" Janad asked.
"Could they?" RJ huffed. "Hell, they already are."
"I never trusted them," Janad said of the Reliance. "Let's hope that the runner you sent out can make people believe him. Make them fight the Reliance. Many in my village also didn't trust the Reliance. No one wanted to go, but the priests . . . Well, they ordered it, and we are used to obeying the priests. We saw the Reliance weapons, how they pierced through even stone with nothing more than light." She looked over at where the two boys from her planet stood having their own conversation and she lowered her voice. "There was talk among my clan of revolt against the priests and against the gods. None of us thought it was right to leave the planet. None of us wanted to get into machines we didn't understand for reasons we didn't understand to fight a battle that wasn't ours. But in the end my people would not oppose the priests. They would not oppose the gods. They acted as if they had never had any doubts."
Topaz nodded. "It makes sense. When the priests tell the people that god orders them to do something, they are too afraid to revolt. They will turn off the voice in their head that is telling them that something is wrong and follow blindly. Every evil thing that has ever happened on Earth can be traced back to religion. Faith, a belief in a higher power, can be a very helpful thing to people. It makes sense of things that are wrong in the universe and explains things that cannot otherwise be explained. But religion. Now that is a different matter all together. Religion is what happens when one group of people wants to take control of another group of people they consider inferior. You take a small child and you tell him If you do this good thing I'll give you candy, but if you do this bad thing I will whip you. Religion does that in the biggest possible way. Do this deed and you will be rewarded with heaven and eternal life, do this deed and go to hell – or its equivalent – and burn forever. Depending on the ultimate goal of the religious leaders, these commanded deeds could be anything. In this case it just happens to be Go fight this war."
"That's very interesting, but not really very helpful," RJ said and continued pacing. Suddenly she turned in her stride and said to the native girl. "For the record, there is nothing stronger than light."
She stopped and looked in the direction of the two boys. She was silent and still, just watching them. As if sensing her eyes on them, they turned and started towards the fire.
"Well?" Levits asked, knowing what she had just been doing.
"The mute boy is afraid, probably believes we are gods. The other one . . . He puzzles me; he seems to have a great need in him. I think he thinks we can give him what he needs."
"Can she see in peoples thoughts?" Janad asked, more than a little afraid. No doubt because she'd had thoughts she didn't want people knowing.
"Only their emotions," Poley informed her.
From the look on her face Janad obviously didn't feel very comforted.
"Did you have gold on this planet before?" Topaz asked Janad curiously.
"What the hell does that have to do with anything?" Levits asked.
"If they didn't, how did they know it had value?" RJ asked, giving him that stupid mortal look again.
"Quit doing that to me! I think it makes me stupider," Levits said with a smile. RJ smiled back and shook her head.
"In the Holy of Holies, wherein lies the things which belonged to The Ancestor, there are an earring and a pendant of gold," Taleed said as he and Haldeed arrived at the fire. He had heard part of the conversation as he was walking over. "Once every cycle of Luisant Luna, the King dawns the Silver Suit of the Gods, puts on the Regalia, and rides through the streets in the Holy Vehicle. The priests follow behind him carrying Religious symbols of power . . ."
Haldeed threw his arms around and Taleed nodded.
"The people carry their sick into the street, and the priests give them potions and pray for them," Taleed said.
Haldeed made some more signs.
"They don't care about that, Haldeed," Taleed said dismissively.
"Try us," RJ said.
"Excuse me?" Taleed asked not understanding.
"What did he say?" RJ asked with a sigh.
"The Chosen One walks at the rear of the procession, and when his brothers and sisters see him they must bow down," Taleed said. "See? That information is of no use."
"You mean only the Chosen One of all the King's descendants has any importance? Only the Chosen One lives in the palace?" Topaz asked.
Taleed, Haldeed and Janad all laughed loudly.
"What's so funny?" Topaz asked.
"The King, our god, has over four thousand children," Taleed said. "The palace would have to be very large, indeed. Besides women aren't allowed in the Palace. Only menservants, the King, and The Chosen, may enter the interior rooms of the palace. Even the priests are not allowed anywhere but the throne room and the outer halls."
"OK, I'll bite," Levits said. "How does a man sire over four thousand children if no women are allowed in the Palace?"
"He goes to the Temple and the priests bring him women in their cycles. A different woman every night. Some times more than one," Taleed said. "It is his duty to impregnate as many women as possible."
"Hell of a life this guy's got. He gets to have all the fun, and he doesn't have to put up with a woman," Levits said, giving RJ a meaningful look.
RJ glared back at him not wanting him to be disappointed and he smiled his very best, just kidding, smile.
"Is the Prince chosen because he is born with no hands?" Topaz asked.
RJ watched the boy carefully now; she even noticed the way he looked at her to see if she was looking at him. He knew that she knew. She wondered how he would play this out.
"No. He is chosen and then the priests cut off his hands when he is an infant," Taleed said bitterly.
"Christ on a crutch!" Topaz exclaimed.
"What does he mean?" Janad asked Poley in a whisper.
Poley shrugged and whispered back. "I don't know. I only know that he says that when he is shocked by something, or very agitated."
"It has to be a belief imbedded pretty deeply within them to maim an infant," Topaz said more to RJ than to Taleed.
"Or these priests are just some blood thirsty bastards. Remember what you just said about religion. Create a god, cut off its hands and make it dependent on the priests for its livelihood. A handless man is helpless in a world like this," RJ said. She looked right into Taleed's eyes as she said it, and he glared back at her. "Such a man may want to go against the priests, he may even try to escape his servitude, but how far can he get without help? How can he take care of himself, and how can he hide? Who wouldn't know this handless man on sight?" She looked away from Taleed then, and back at Topaz. "Look at what we already know about them. They encourage their people to have as many children as possible and then have them wage war with each other to keep the numbers down. Thus insuring survival of the fittest. They cut out the tongues of the palace servants so that they can't tell anyone what goes on there."
"How did you know that?" Taleed asked angrily. Perhaps at this point he just wanted her to expose him. RJ wasn't about to make it that easy.
"Someone must have told me. Or it just made a certain amount of sense."
"It is customary to cut out the tongues of the palace staff," Taleed obviously found her revelations annoying. "How do you know things which no one tells you? Do you read people's minds?"
Levits laughed and muttered under his breath. "That seems to be the question of the evening."
"It's just simple deductive reasoning," RJ said with a shrug of her shoulders. She walked over and threw some sticks on the fire. "You ought to understand that. From what I've observed while I've been here, you and your people are very good at it as well."
"Like I know that there is something wrong with your brother," he said pointing at Poley, still mad and wanting to aggravate her if he could.
"He's perfect," Janad explained to Taleed.
RJ smiled at her answer. "Who told you that?"
"He did," Janad said. She got up and walked off into the brush.
"Getting a little full of yourself aren't you, Tin Pants?" RJ asked.
Poley shrugged. "I am perfect."
"If you say so. Remind me to come and borrow an ego circuit next time I'm feeling bad about myself," RJ said.
"I think you have quite enough ego, dear," Levits chided.
Taleed realized they had forgotten all about him, and this really aggravated him. He turned to Haldeed and said in his own tongue, "These people are fools. Perhaps we had better leave."
"Oh, no, you're our insurance policy," RJ said in his own tongue.
He frowned, really angry now. "I thought you didn't know our language," he said accusingly.
"I told you I'd know it by tomorrow evening. I just learned it a little faster that's all," RJ said reaching in her pocket and pulling out a coin. She bent the coin around a link of chain to mark their victory today. "Going to have to get off this planet soon or I'll run out of coins, and even I can't bend rocks," she said to no one in general. She watched as the look on Taleed's face turned from one of surprise to one of total defiance. "Put all that out of your head. You wanted to join this party, and you know too much now for us to let you go. Get comfortable and enjoy yourself. You aren't going anywhere."
Janad walked up then carrying some large skinned and gutted reptile on the end of a sharpened stick. Apparently she had been hungry. She held it over the fire.
"Wow," RJ said taking a whiff. "That smells really good."
Topaz nodded his head in agreement. "Funny I can remember a time when I would have been completely grossed out at the thought of eating a lizard."
"You can remember a time when rocks were soft, Old Man," Levits laughed.
"Why do you call him an old man when he is not?" Taleed asked, his curiosity peaked.
"Because I am," Topaz said with a smile. "I most probably predate your race."
"You think this race is that young?" RJ asked skeptically.
"Well at least human influence on the race. Remember that I was alive when they first discovered interstellar flight and humans couldn't have gotten here before that," Topaz said.
"You still think these creatures have human origins?" Levits asked curiously.
"Yes, they must," RJ said. "Besides the fact that they look like a human race that has disappeared, and speak an ancient Earth language, their cloud making god is a human made machine?"
"Oh?" Levits prompted.
"It turned out to be an old thermo-electric generator. The kind they sent out with the old colony ships. It even still had the Reliance bar code on it," RJ explained.
"Are you saying," Taleed ran through everything he had just heard again to make sure he'd heard what he thought he had, "that my people are related to the Reliance people?"
"Yes," Topaz said. "Had to be. Ironic when you think about it. The white man is once again enslaving the black man, and once again it is your own chief who is selling you. But then they always have said that history repeats itself."
"What do you mean?" Taleed asked.
"And gravy!" Topaz said adamantly. "Gravy was always very important, especially with potatoes. No sense in even trying to eat potatoes without gravy – all dry and get caught in your throat and make you cough." Topaz started coughing until he was jerking around on the ground. Janad ran to try to help him as RJ rolled her eyes.
Suddenly Topaz quit coughing and sat up. He looked at Janad. "So, do you want to ride my pony?"
Janad had grown very fond of the old man and didn't understand the way the others seemed so unconcerned about him. Even if he did heal really fast. "What does he want?" Janad asked.
"Just say no," Levits said with a laugh.
Topaz stood up and started walking into the brush. "My hair is an absolute mess. Now if I was a hair brush, where would I be?" he mumbled. Janad started to go after him, but RJ grabbed her arm.
"Poley, go after Topaz. Keep an eye on him, and don't let him get too far," RJ ordered.
Poley nodded, got up and went after Topaz.
Janad looked at RJ and said with concern, "What's wrong with him? Does he have the same thing that David does?"
RJ let go of the girl's arm. "No, he's fine. He does this sometimes. It's nothing to worry about really, Janad. He's not sick. He's only insane."
Somehow Janad was not comforted.
Toulan bowed low as he entered the throne room.
"Well!" Taheed bellowed.
The Captain of the King's guard visibly cringed.
"My lord . . . We went down the Agua'boue, and we found spots where a camp had been made. We believe this is where the Prince made camp. "We . . . Lord we found a broken reed boat which was destroyed at the bottom of Agua'boue falls."
"What are you trying to say!" the King bellowed. "Did you find any bodies?"
"No, My Lord, but . . ."
"Are you an unbeliever, Toulan? You know my son cannot die. He is a god. Now get out there and find him. He must have gone on from there on foot." The King got shakily to his feet and pointed at the door. "Now go. My time grows near, and he must be here to take my spirit."
The guard left, only too glad to do so. The King and the priests were afflicted with some disease. It had started simply with vomiting and diarrhea like many other diseases, but had quickly escalated to skin lesions and hair loss. Obviously they had enraged the God of the Clouds, and He had sat a plague upon them. They had lined their pockets and their necks with the people's blood. This was not the intention of The Ancestor, nor was it the intention of the god. It was the will of the priests, and the King/God had allowed himself to be lead by the nose by his brothers to keep the peace. Soon the Reliance would swoop down and capture their prize, and the world as they knew it would be no more. As it had been written, so mote it be.