Running from the Deity

  “Quite surely so,” Pyrrpallinda agreed. “Let us hope this is not another one.”

  The senior counselor looked momentarily startled. “Surely you don’t lend any credence to this rustic nonsense, Highborn? I wouldn’t be surprised if this turns out to be an invention of one of our neighbors, designed to disquiet a portion of the population. It’s exactly the sort of troublemaking subterfuge I would expect from, for example, the Warden of Nyheurr.”

  “No, I don’t believe it.” Pyrrpallinda gazed down at the pile of official documents spread out and piled all too high on the table before him. “But by the same token, Treappyn is right: I can’t afford to just ignore it.” He glanced toward the doorway that led to the main hallway. “He has been too intense, lately. His mating time is upon him, and he is distracted. This short journey will allow him time to reflect, and to relax. He will return chastened, I suspect, and moderated in manner.”

  Having made his points, Srinballa was willing to be generous. “The overexuberance of youth.”

  “Yes,” Pyrrpallinda agreed, ignoring the fact that he was little older than the unhappy counselor he had just sent on his way. The matter settled, his thoughts had already moved on to matters of more pressing import—and reality. A pair of gripping flanges grasped a scroll, opened it, and beckoned Srinballa come around behind the desk so that he could also see it clearly. “Now, as to this request to construct a toll bridge in North Province, I would ask your opinion on certain specifics of the proposal...”

  Despite his hosts’ assurances that they had limited those seeking help to the initial group of friends and relatives who had confronted Ebbanai and Flinx in the baryeln barn, more and more Dwarra in need seemed to be finding their way to the isolated homestead. Flinx raised the issue more than once, only to be told that “This group is the last” or “Can’t you take pity on them? This family has nowhere else to turn.”

  What could he do? In the face of desperation, he was reminded of his own difficult childhood. These poor Dwarra were intelligent like himself, capable of the same depth of feeling as he was. Maybe he couldn’t track down an ancient wandering sentient weapon, and maybe he could or could not in some as yet unknown, unfathomable way influence a looming galactic cataclysm. But he could speed the knitting of a broken bone or the healing of damaged neural connections, or answer a young male’s query as to the true nature of what lay beyond his world. He could, and did, do all of these things because he had always, at heart, had more compassion than common sense.

  When informed (politely) that he valued his solitude at night, his hosts had not been affronted. Instead, they had rapidly fashioned a separate sleeping place for him in one of the upper barn lofts, where the cooling breezes off the nearby sea made for the most pleasant sleeping conditions. This despite the fact that they believed his preference in climate dangerously chilling, something Storra was at pains to mention whenever the opportunity arose. In this the Dwarran female was more diplomatic than Mother Mastiff would have been. His adoptive mother would simply have told him to shut up and throw on another blanket.

  The slimmer bodies of his Dwarran hosts were more comfortable inside their well-insulated home. They slept vertically, in squatting position, their upper bodies sunk as far as possible into the lower, swathed in multiple layers of cloth. In contrast to them, he found the peninsula’s sometimes bracing climate downright salubrious.

  On this particular evening only Storra was present, having just brought him the nighttime meal she had expertly prepared, when the Teacher chose to make contact with its owner. She looked on in fascination as he plucked the com unit off his belt and acknowledged the call. He could have ignored it, waiting until she left, but he had already broken so many laws regarding contact with a species of her level of accomplishment that he barely thought twice about responding.

  “Repairs are proceeding smoothly and on schedule,” the ship informed him courteously.

  “How much longer?” Flinx ignored the captivated, wide-eyed stare of the female Dwarra standing at the top of the rough-hewn wooden stairs that led to his sleeping area.

  “As I said, on schedule. With proper facilities, I would be done by now. But I have only on-board tools to work with. Do you wish me to repeat the schedule of work that needs to be done?”

  This time, the ship was not being sarcastic. “I remember it, better than I care to. If there is any change, let me know.”

  “Always.”

  The transmission ended, Storra could not restrain herself from asking, “Ebbanai and I thought you came alone among us.”

  “I did. I mean, I am.” A pile of furled wings and bright colors, Pip dozed nearby on a pile of raw, unstripped seashan. He carefully snapped the compact communications unit back in place on his utility belt. “That was my ship I was talking to.”

  Storra was understandably confused. “Your vessel talks to you? But it sounds so much like a person. As if it had a mind of its own.”

  “It does,” he told her. “Sometimes too much of a mind of its own.”

  Her Sensitives strained toward him, as if by making contact she would be able to grasp what he was saying. “How can a machine have a mind of its own? My loom has no mind. The new steamcraft some of the watermasters are said to be building do not have minds of their own.”

  “There are machines more complex than you can imagine, Storra.” He dug into the food she had prepared. As always, it was plain-tasting and filling, much like the countryside from which the ingredients that had gone into it had been harvested. So far he had encountered nothing in the way of local produce that threatened to upset his digestive system.

  “As you are more complex than I can imagine, Flinx.” She backed toward the stairs. The Dwarra possessed an excellent sense of balance and considerable confidence in their footing. Not surprising, he mused, when gravity was light and one was equipped with two pairs of forelegs.

  “I’m not all that complex,” he countered as she retreated. “Confused sometimes, but not complex.” It was a comforting lie he did not even believe himself.

  She paused at the top of the stairway that led down to the floor of the barn. “I would like to see your ship sometime, Flinx.”

  “I’ll consider it,” he told her. In fact, he had already considered it.

  Helping injured natives was one thing. Allowing them to explore the interior of a Commonwealth starship, and a uniquely advanced one at that, was simply not in the offing. Not that someone like Storra was likely to take anything but astonishment away from such a visit. She did not possess sufficient references to allow her to understand what she was seeing. What would a tenth-century human, for example, make of a modern timepiece? Or something like the needler holstered at his side? But he saw no reason to disappoint her by turning her down cold.

  No one but Ebbanai had seen the Teacher. With a little effort, the net-caster could probably find its camouflaged location again, but as far as Flinx knew his host had given no indication he intended to try to do so. Showing disbelieving visitors a large pile of sand and claiming it was a vessel that had come from the sky was not likely to enhance the net-caster’s reputation among his neighbors.

  Storra was talking to him again. “Whatever you are, you have been a blessing to the afflicted.”

  “Speaking of the afflicted, while I’m happy to help people as long as I’m here, I expect to be leaving before long. I wouldn’t want anyone to have to go away disappointed on my account. As, for example, by having someone else, say an unnamed third party, encourage them to come here seeking my help only to find me gone.”

  When he spoke the last, he wanted to meet her eyes. But she had already started down the stairs. So he settled for probing her feelings. As was often the case, much more so than when he probed her mate, her emotions were a complex, hard-to-penetrate jumble. There was concern for him, excitement that probably stemmed from his apparent agreement to consider her request to see his vessel, plus overtones of contentment and concern. What he could not
do was isolate and identify their root causes. Was she concerned because he had spoken of leaving, or for some other reason? And if the first, why?

  At the moment, he was too tired to care. Blessing to the afflicted she had called him. Nonsense. Doing good deeds was a way to simultaneously underpin his humanity and alleviate boredom while providing an unmatched opportunity to study the dominant local life-form of the Arrawd system. The way she had phrased it made what he was doing sound almost like a religious experience. Weary as he was, he didn’t bother to explore the possible ramifications of his own observation.

  He should have.

  By the following week it was difficult to say which was being put to more use: his limited store of knowledge, or the medicinal supplies and devices he always carried with him whenever he was out and about on an alien world. Finding itself in daily use, the beam-healer needed constant recharging from the storpak he carried. Eventually, even the pak ran down. This required a trip to the Teacher to recharge them both, as well as to replenish his other supplies.

  Clearly fearful he might not return, Ebbanai and Storra did everything they could to prevent him from going. He reassured them that as long as honest individuals in need of his aid remained at the homestead, he would return to help them to the best of his limited abilities. He did not add that he might as well do so because he couldn’t leave anyway until his ship had completed its necessary self-repairs.

  Through the storm of emotions that boiled inside his hosts he could perceive how hard it was for them not to follow. He was gratified when they did not do so. Pip served as his eye in the sky, circling high above as he followed a deliberately circuitous path back to the camouflaged Teacher. She could not talk to him, of course, but by reading her emotions he could tell if anything out of the ordinary was active in his immediate vicinity yet outside the range of his own perception. Thankfully, his hike back was as uneventful as the weather: clear skies mottled with gray-white clouds, and a shifting, cooling breeze flowing from east to west off the nearby sea.

  The Teacher was as he had left it: a high ridge of rippling beach “dunes” whose concealment was all the more effective since real, blowing sand had by now covered parts of the ship’s expertly camouflaged exterior. Always seeking to improve on its own efforts, the vessel had responded by adding imitation shoots and sprigs of local vegetation to its outward appearance. One had to admire the result. Without the tracker attached to his belt, he would have been hard put himself to find it again. That it was well hidden from any wandering locals he had no doubt.

  He luxuriated in its familiar interior. Even some of the plants in his relaxation lounge seemed affected by his visit. Small vines and creepers twisted toward his feet and legs when he took his ease among them that afternoon. He felt equally at home in their presence. Something about the imported greenery that decorated the lounge always seemed to relax him.

  Of course, he had been relaxed ever since he had first set foot on this world. His ability to simply shut out the babble of sentient emotion surrounding him whenever he felt like it was not only unique to Arrawd, but bordered on the addictive. If only he could do the same on places like Earth, or New Riviera, or Moth, or any of the other inhabited worlds he had visited, his life would be far less stressed and very different.

  And still, after the many days he had spent here, not a single headache. Not one. For the first time in his adult life, he was free of such pain. Nor did it seem to matter whether he was utilizing his Talent to scrutinize the feelings of the Dwarra around him or not. In the absence of such pain, and the constant worry attendant on when it might strike, it was as if he had been given a new outlook on life.

  He could not keep himself from thinking about the possible ramifications. Could he possibly live here? It was the only world he had found where he could dwell among other sentients free of the intermittent cerebral assaults that threatened not just to inconvenience, but to kill him. He could still assist Bran Tse-Mallory and Truzenzuzex in their quest to understand and hopefully find a way to counter the oncoming evil that threatened galactic stability. Perhaps he might even persuade Clarity Held to join him. The climate was accommodating, the local food tolerable if bland, the natives he had met thus far sociable and welcoming.

  There was a whole new planet to explore, and if boredom set in, the Teacher would always be available to carry him to other worlds. It was also conceivable that the Commonwealth authorities who sought to question him would ignore him even if they could find him. Not only was Arrawd technically outside Commonwealth jurisdiction, but any forces sent to detain him would themselves be in violation of the regulations governing contact with Class IVb worlds.

  He had come to Arrawd to find raw materials for fixing his ship. He had not expected to find himself in a situation that might help him to fix himself. Albeit more than a little far-fetched, the prospect was definitely something to consider.

  As a puzzled Pip mused on the current curious state of her master’s mind, the endless wanderer seriously considered the possibilities attendant on turning himself into a real immigrant.

  CHAPTER

  7

  Ebbanai and Storra’s joy at his return was unbounded. Their skin flaps fluttered uncontrollably as they caught sight of him coming down the path toward the house. The surge of gratefulness he felt from them was submerged by the flood of thankful expectation from the crowd of hopefuls camped out all around their home. Flinx had to smile to himself as Pip adjusted herself on his shoulder. To look at the throng of stumbling, imploring, forlorn natives while simultaneously perceiving their emotions, he thought absently, one would almost think some weird kind of alien messiah had returned to them.

  Re-installed in his basic but comfortable upper-level quarters in his hosts’ barn, he resumed dispensing his ministrations, his efforts bolstered by the fresh supplies he had brought with him from the Teacher. He was more than content—a condition with which he was generally unfamiliar. According to the Teacher’s AI, necessary repairs were progressing smoothly and on schedule. Meanwhile, his endless curiosity was being sated by the constant flow of information about the new world on which he presently found himself, and by its eager, grateful inhabitants. Couple that with the longest continuous period of mental peace he had experienced on a civilized world since his childhood, and it struck him that for a change he was not merely tolerating his surroundings, but actually enjoying them.

  Though the Dwarra were entirely alien, the reaction to successful treatment of a sick or badly wounded sentient was generally the same irrespective of species. Gratitude and hosannas were heaped upon him in a steady stream. That the majority of supplicants were poor only made their thankfulness that much more heartfelt (the analogy assuming some sort of relevant circulatory pumping mechanism). One especially common injury involved young Dwarra whose quartet of forelegs had not yet fully matured. Apparently, the pace of development of the two upper legs exceeded that of the four lower into which they branched, resulting in a plague of breakage among the lowermost youthful limbs. If not set properly while the individual was young, such injuries resulted in serious consequences as the individual matured. Judicious application with his recalibrated beam-healer caused damaged bones to knit properly and with unprecedented speed.

  Eye repair was another area where the simple tools he carried for personal first aid turned out to be capable of working small miracles among the locals. The joy he was able to generate by restoring full sight to the near-blind was unbridled.

  It was a wonderful way to spend time while waiting for the Teacher to conclude its repairs. He had never been able to seek help for his own singular condition out of fear of alerting the authorities to it or, worse, to his location. He had been forced to flee the one hospital he had recently been compelled to spend time in when a couple of its practitioners had become suspicious of, and interested in, his unique mind. He could not allow that kind of probing. And by not being able to allow it, he had closed himself off from any kind of advanced me
dical help either for his devastating headaches or for the modified neurological condition that gave rise to them.

  Ministering to others served to alleviate the depression that was always close at hand. He had at his disposal the means to do for the natives of Arrawd what no one could do for him. It was very likely he couldn’t do anything to rid the future of the vast incoming evil he encountered in periodic dreams—or whatever such episodes actually were—but here he could at least help needy individuals. That they were not human made no difference to him. Sentience was everything; appearance meant nothing. That was a lesson humankind, spreading outward into space, had learned once and for all as a consequence of the Pitar-humanx war.

  He knew himself well enough to know that his activities were not purely altruistic. He derived pleasure from helping the Dwarra who came to see him. If that was an indication of selfishness, however slight, so be it. The genuine pleasures to be had from his nomadic, confused existence were few enough. The good feelings rubbed off on—or rather were perceived by—Pip. So relaxed had she become enveloped in the constant air of benign emotion that she spent most of her time sleeping, only occasionally rousing herself to check out a newcomer or hunt for the small, furtive creatures that infested the barn.

  As for the Dwarra he aided, they proffered an endless stream of gratitude, and nothing more. It would never have occurred to him to ask for some kind of remuneration for the services he continued to freely dispense. It was in that regard that certain other individuals displayed considerably less restraint, and more foresight.

  Ebbanai was relaxing at the small, unprepossessing gate he had constructed midway along the turnoff to his ancestral homestead. Squatting there, alone, with only the sky and fields of seashan that flanked the main road for company, one could grow bored very quickly. On the other hand, it was much easier work than net-casting at night for elusive marrarra. And with each passing day, the unpaved road between Sierlen and Barazoft saw more and more traffic taking the unmarked, previously unheralded turnoff.