Extremis-ARC, page 13
And that was the precise moment when Jennifer felt the first twinge that was not simply Alexander repositioning himself to reacquire his favorite sitting position atop her bladder.
She recalled the next eleven hours as a kind of hallucinatory madness. There was the first desperate hour when the Baldies seemed to have no idea what her trouble was. Her response—largely driven by the hormonal impulse and god-given right of all pregnant women to shout at anyone who Does Not Get It—was to let the aliens know what she thought of them and their whole, hideous, town-murdering, planet-stealing species. Then, as they backed away from her using that same slow caution with which sensible people attempt to distance themselves from rabid animals, Jennifer remembered: Oh, right—they often kill people who start screaming and acting aggressively. Kind of like what I’m doing right now.
So Jennifer controlled herself—for her baby’s sake—and the Baldies eventually reapproached. She finally got the message through to them by digging around in the magazines they had brought her and by pointing—first, to an advertisement for baby formula, depicting an insipidly serene new mother and her gorgeous new infant—and second, to her own distended belly and other relevant regions of her physiology. There was some eye-dancing among the Baldies—some kind of hyperexcited staring match they seemed to engage in right before they changed any established routine—and off they went. Leaving her quite alone.
Her water broke about half an hour before the two hijacked midwives arrived. At whose appearance Jennifer cried like a child—as much for seeing other humans again as for the aid and comfort that their presence ensured. But that presence only lasted seventy-two hours, and Jennifer had neither the clarity of mind, nor training, to think of passing the two women any information useful to the local Resistance—whatever that might be. And the midwives—scared, out of their element, uncertain if the next minute was going to be their last—never brought up, or probably conceived a single thought toward, that topic. When they were removed—almost forcibly—from Jennifer and her infant, their faces fell inward, suddenly seamed and old with the surety of what they presumed would be their imminent execution. Jennifer felt that was a very unlikely outcome. But, unable to reassure them with absolute certainty, and unclear herself exactly why she felt so sure of their safety, she spent a critical moment floundering to craft a farewell that was both comforting and true—and in those two seconds, they were gone.
In the days following, things went along rather well—better than Jennifer had expected. The Baldies seemed to have either studied post-natal–care manuals or discovered that in this regard, human needs were not too dissimilar from their own. They were attentive but did not intrude unless something was clearly wanted. Things that were clearly wanted—Jennifer pointed to the items in the various magazines, and then online catalogs—they brought swiftly. Nothing else changed, and that was just fine with Jennifer, who focused on her new son and tried to believe that Sandro was not dead. The Baldies who had abducted her had roughed him up, but the blows had certainly not looked fatal, or even particularly serious.
Two days after the midwives had been removed, Jennifer was led to her new—and very properly appointed—accommodations. Interestingly, the eye-gouging color combinations of her former room were gone: pastels had evidently guided the aesthetic choices made for this environment, with everything being a variation on either blue or white or cream. It was rather dull, but it was also comforting, and she was able to settle into her new routine.
That routine alternated between caring for Zander and reciting lengthy documents for her captors. Once they were able to demonstrate—by rather pathetic pantomime—what they wanted her to do, Jennifer was never without a script in her hand: they had her recite stage plays; they had her recite public addresses dating back to Cicero; they had her read aloud from Aquinas, Aristotle, Sartre, and Seuss. After several days of this, they then encouraged her to share—vocally—her opinions regarding a short film they screened for her, a brief article they had her read, and then an endless array of essays, stories, and more. They asked her to name an insane number of objects—and now, with a baby to care for and a growing sense that the attempt at communication was genuine, she cooperated fully. But still, Ankaht had not returned, and Jennifer actually felt…well, not saddened, but disappointed. She had thought that Ankaht was somehow at the center of the efforts to establish communication with her. Jennifer’s belief in that conjecture arose not from any message that Ankaht had sent, but from her behavior: specifically, her dogged determination to bridge the gap between them. Likewise, the careful way that Ankaht moved and positioned herself in the room bespoke a studied, meticulous methodology.
Jennifer had also detected an undercurrent of desperation—but how had she detected it? Where had that impression come from? Jennifer could not identify its source, but it was strong—almost as though it were an emotion that had been sent to her by Ankaht. And, given what Jennifer had wondered and tried to ask in their last session—whether Ankaht might be trying to link minds with her—perhaps the notion of having been “sent” the impression of desperation was not entirely wrong, after all. But if this were true, and the two of them had been on the verge of making some genuine progress in communication, then why had Ankaht not resumed coming to see—
The door opened—and Ankaht entered. Jennifer took a half step in her direction…then stepped back, holding Zander closer to her. She fought the primal defense reflex. No, she would approach the alien—just not while holding her child. Jennifer put up a hand as if giving a traffic signal to wait and paced slowly back to Zander’s crib, where she laid him, carefully and gently, among his blankets. After covering him up, she turned and came back toward Ankaht.
The small, dark alien flushed very light—almost olive-drab for a moment—as she lifted her sinuous arms and fanned wide the ten tentacles in each cluster, so that the end of each of her arms suddenly expanded into a pattern very like the spokes of a wagon wheel. However, with each tentacle tapering to a point, it looked more akin to an opening star, or the welcoming gesture of some impossible anemone. And with the gesture came a tingle at the back of Jennifer’s skull that mounted, threatened to become almost painful, but then resolved into—
(Celebration.)
Jennifer started: Had she heard, or felt, that sense of…“celebration”? And then the not-mirrors to her left revealed that they were not just one-way observation windows: they were projectors of a sort. For across them, in light blue, luminous block letters, words slowly bloomed into existence: “Male child joy congratulations Jennifer Peitchkov.”
To which Jennifer Peitchkov responded: “Holy shit.” She stared at the words for what seemed like a very long time. They’d been very busy, these Baldies, and they’d come a long way. But she wanted to be sure.
Jennifer went to the beginning of the Baldy “sentence,” touched the words “male” and “child” in sequence—noticing that her fingers left a lingering orange glow behind—and then pointed at Zander’s crib. She looked back toward Ankaht. “Yes?”
Ankaht’s very physical response alarmed Jennifer, who feared that the Baldy was having some kind of fit…until she recognized the jerky up-and-down motions of the three-eyed head were not some alien version of an epileptic seizure but her visitor’s stiff and awkward attempts to mimic a human nod. Meanwhile, a tingling buzz at the top of Jennifer’s spinal column resolved into—
(Affirmative.)
—even as the wall blanked and spelled out: “Yes. Male child. Joy dam Jennifer Peitchkov.”
Jennifer smiled but wondered: Had they misspelled “dame” as “dam”? But no, they would be sticking to the dictionary, and come to think of it, the term “dam” did specifically refer to a mother—albeit among species of livestock. So why not simply use “mother”? Unless…
Of course. If they’re going through our dictionary, they’ve learned that a “mother” might have adopted a child, or has many other possible meanings—not all of which are pleasant. But “dam” is a word with only one meaning; it is not susceptible to the same confusions of context—
And another pulse intruded—gently—upon her thoughts:
“Affirmative. Clarity requirement.”
Jennifer looked up: Ankaht was almost tan. She swayed; Jennifer leaped forward, snagging a chair by its backrest and swinging it around and under Ankaht’s rather humanlike posterior. The alien sank into the chair, and Jennifer felt—without any tingling in her head whatsoever:
(Gratitude.)
It wasn’t a word…but it was more than a feeling. And predictably, on the mirror smart-boards of her cage-become-classroom, Jennifer saw the words “Ankaht thank Jennifer Peitchkov.”
When Jennifer looked back at Ankaht, she saw the three eyes focused on hers and was suddenly struck by how, studied closely, they were surprisingly like human eyes. She almost imagined they were glad, smiling even….
Jennifer leaned back, set her shoulders, nodded, and realized she had come to a decision. She was going to learn to communicate with this Baldy. This one felt—right. But before the lessons began, before she started down the path of complete communicative cooperation, there was one thing she had to have, and know, first. And getting this across was not going to be easy.…
*
Ankaht rushed out of the observation cell with her arms in motion, her tentacles writhing. She knew she should calm herself, but at the moment she could not be bothered to conceal her urgency and distress from the members of her human research cluster.
“Ankaht—Elder—what is it? What distresses you so?”
(Insistence, focus.) “When Jennifer Peitchkov was taken from her house, there was a brief altercation. A human male resisted and was subdued. Rendered unconscious. What further information do we have on this?”
Orthezh, the linguistics prime, exchanged glances with Ipshef, the cognitive science prime. “There is no further information, so far as we know.”
(Fury.) “Then find the information, and swiftly.”
(Shock.) “Yes, at once, Elder—but what is so important about this human male?”
(Composure composure composure.) “This human male is our subject’s mate, the father of the human Firstling. And as far as Jennifer Peitchkov knows, he may have died.”
Ipshef nodded. “I see, Elder. We shall find if more information was recorded by the Enforcement team that went to collect her from her house. But even if the mate has been discarnated, it is not particularly seri—”
(Patience.) “Ipshef, these beings—the humans—apparently do not believe they incarnate again. They believe they live one life, and that is all. So she fears she has lost her mate to oblivion, to xenzhet-narmat’ai. For although my selnarm has touched her mind, which makes them people, they nonetheless believe themselves to be zheteksh.”
Ipshef and Orthezh started at the term zheteksh, which had heretofore been a synonym for a nonsentient species. But for a zheteshk to be able to think, to anticipate a death without incarnation—zhet—was the stuff of Ardu’s most fearsome myths. Only the most cursed or tragic of creatures fell forever into the abyss of eternal unlife, torment, and chaos that was called xenzhet-narmat’ai—“the place of eternal death beyond order or hope.” Ankaht felt Jennifer Peitchkov’s distress become very understandable to her two Primes.
“We shall search the files,” affirmed Ipshef.
Ankaht sent (urgency). “Do more—send an Enforcer unit to her house. I believe she shared it with the male. See if the house is inhabited. If so, determine if the male still lives there, or what his status might be.”
“It shall be done as you ask, Elder.”
“And call an immediate meeting of the rest of our research cluster. We need to concentrate all our efforts on completing the vocoder.”
The two primes looked at each other. “With respect, Ankaht, creating the vocoder is delicate work. To construct a portable, multimedia translation machine is a most difficult and time-consuming project. In order to achieve that goal any faster would require that we take effort away from—”
(Decisiveness, urgency, command.) “Do it. Do whatever you need to do. But complete the vocoder swiftly. Nothing is more important than this. This human, this artist and mother”—she flung all the tentacles of her left cluster so forcefully in Jennifer’s direction that they whipped out with a snapping sound—“she is the key—the touchstone and foundation—for the communication we must build with the humans. With her, and the vocoder, we will be able to bridge the gap between our races. But without them both—”
*
Heshfet toggled the communicator off: she radiated (annoyance). “More make-work.” The waves of her selnarm were irregular, testy, fierce: again, Lentsul had to temper and conceal his arousal.
“What is required of us?”
Heshfet rose, stretched out her spine with a sinuous and almost violent whipsawing snap and extended her arms and clusters until they quivered, rigid and golden. “The human-research cluster has ordered us to inspect a house near the Zone.”
“Suspected terrorists?”
“No such luck for us. We are just being sent to knock on the front door and see if the house is still infested—eh, ‘occupied.’ Apparently, one of the griarfeksh artists being studied by the cluster lived there, and her mate resisted the Enforcers. He was knocked in line and now the pathetic female griarfeksh is whining about what might have happened to him. So we have to check and see if he’s still in their ugly little warren of foul-patterned rooms.” She finished her stretching with a luxurious ripple of her spine.
Lentsul was sure Heshfet knew how provocative her motions were—which made themeven more provocative, of course. He watched her remove her machine-pistol from its ready locker, snug the toroid magazine into place beneath it, run a major tentacle through the round aperture made by the juncture between the weapon and the magazine: her selnarm radiated a primal (battlelust) that was already spreading to the other members of her group as they donned their torso armor. She seemed to have no consciousness of her own vulnerability, only of her profound certainty as, and eagerness to be, the annihilator of her race’s foes. She, like Torhok, took a certain fierce pride that their awareness stopped at the peripheries of their own present lives, which Lentsul could not comprehend. As he carefully slipped into his own armor, he sent a quiet pulse to Heshfet: “Does it not disturb you that you do not remember your past lives, Manip?”
(Amazement, amusement.) “Disturb me? Little Ixturshaz, not remembering all that past drivel liberates me. My mind is my own—no one has painted upon the canvas of my existence before me. I anoint the points of my skeerba with my enemy’s blood by my will and my skill alone, not in part-service to memories of times and places long gone, and meaningless to me.”
“Then how is it that you shotan your soul, your life and incarnations beyond this one? Remembering nothing before this life, does it not feel that this life is your only life?”
Heshfet’s answer was tossed to him almost as an aside. But it came a little too quickly, and the selnarm pulsed a little too stridently, to seem as fully nonchalant a response as Heshfet had apparently intended. “I need not feel a thing myself to know it exists and functions within me. What organ produces our selnarm? So far as we can tell, the brain. Have I ever seen my own brain? Has anyone been able to point to one part of it and say, “Here, here is the source of your selnarm?’ No and no. Similarly, have I memories of past lives? No. Do we know how it is that Illudor gathers up our souls and restores us to new bodies? No. Yet I know that both exist and function, and if I have no experience of the latter, I see it in others all around me. Why should I worry? I persist. I am greater than my memories, after all.”
I’m not so sure of that, thought Lentsul.
But he kept that thought to himself.
*
Alessandro McGee steered the old fuel-cell four-wheeler around a bear-sized boulder, then swerved to dodge a tree stump that protruded past the margin of the road. I know Rashid said the cabin was pretty remote, but hell!
The forty-minute drive Rashid mentioned had already consumed seventy minutes, and that had only brought McGee to the beginning of the cabin’s ungroomed camp-road, off the main highway. And as far as McGee could tell, the only thing that made the last fifteen kilometers of road a “highway” was that it was paved. Or had been, sometime within the last ten years.
McGee checked the chronometer on the dashboard and winced: he was going to be late getting back. In fact, his guests were now sure to arrive at his house before he did: no doubt about it. And Van Felsen would not be happy.
Of course, Van Felsen would have been even less happy if she knew about his private war against the Baldies. On the other hand, given her comments at the training facility in Upper Thessalaborea, McGee suspected that she knew about those activities anyway. But she had also seemed to be sending him a message that, if he stopped, all was forgiven. And maybe, deep down, she understood why he had had to carry the war to the Baldies.
And she damn well should understand, he thought. It’s easier to wait and watch, now that I’m on a special action team, now that I know we’re really going to do something. But before, it had all been just inane training without any action. And that’s not my thing. I guess it’s just like Harry said when we mustered out: the drill instructors started calling me Tank not because of my size but because of how I deal with obstacles—I plow straight through them. When Jennifer had arrived in his life, McGee had started to learn how to moderate that headfirst proclivity—but then the Baldies had come, and then the baby, and he couldn’t just sit around any longer.
But now I’ve got to clean up my act, he thought, tapping his pocket communicator. He spoke: “Call home.”
The communicator complied. He heard a line open and a faint, rippling hum that meant his call was going through.
*
Just after the house’s comm net stopped toning, Corporal Diane Narejko reached the top of the basement stairs and, upon seeing who had summoned her, snapped her best salute.
