Chapter Twenty-Six
Sometimes a storm of the heart is more uncomfortable than any other kind.
—Mutati Saying
On a rocky promontory, Noah and Eshaz peered through thin plates of binocular glax that floated in front of their eyes. Automatically, the respective focal points shifted to accommodate their vision, and presently Noah made out the details of an encampment in the canopa pine woods below them. It was early morning on a cloudy day, and thirty Humans were arising in the camp, crawling out of their lean-tos and lighting a community fire to cook breakfast. It had rained heavily the night before, and those who had not constructed adequate shelters looked wet and miserable.
“Anton and the girl are on the right side of the clearing,” Noah said, pointing. He had a reddish stubble of beard.
“I see them.”
Noah watched as Tesh stood in front of the foliage-roofed, blue-bark structure that she shared with Anton. He was sitting inside on his sleeping mat of soft jalapo leaves, stretching and yawning. He looked dry. Outside, Tesh pulled on a coat and blew on her hands to warm them. Up on the promontory, Noah was cold himself. If he hadn’t known it was midsummer, he might have thought snow was coming.
The rock outcropping on which he stood was five kilometers from his administration building but still on the grounds of the Ecological Demonstration Project. He and Eshaz had flown a grid-plane there, an aircraft that was parked on a flat area just above them.
Anton and Tesh lived in the primitive encampment with other Guardian trainees, and every day they had to trek back to the administration-education complex for classes. In the evenings they studied under dim lantern lights in their simple structures—a battery of classes that included Outdoor Survival, Cellular Mathematics, and Planetary Ecology. It was a challenging life, a test of the students’ endurance and ability to live in harmony with nature. They were provided with only a limited quantity of packaged foods (such as capuchee jerky and puya coffee), and had to forage and hunt for the rest … according to instructions they received in class.
So as not to interfere with important ecological relationships, they could only kill certain animals (such as claymoles and abundant birds), and only for food. With respect to the flora, they were also restricted. Monitors in the woods graded their performance.
Through his floating binocular glax Noah saw Tesh carrying a covered bowl over to contribute to the community breakfast. Based upon a report Noah had seen, she planned to prepare a protein paste from wild ingredients: kanoberries, ground grub worms and red ants, and honey. Anton was nursing several bee stings from going after the honey the day before. Tesh had been with him, but according to the report the bees had not bothered her at all.
Now she was urging Anton to get up; he appeared groggy, and kept trying to lie back down. She wouldn’t let him, and finally dragged him out of the shelter, half-dressed. Other campers gathered around to watch, and were obviously enjoying the show. Even at this distance Noah could hear them laughing and clapping. But around the perimeter of the group, some people were looking up at the sky instead, which Noah did as well. The clouds were an ominous shade of dark gray, as if they were about to disgorge their heavy, wet contents on the land.
In a few minutes Anton was up and moving around, carrying a big coffee cup. He seemed to have as much energy as most people in the class … but nowhere near as much as Tesh. A Human dynamo, she seemed able to call upon some inner reservoir of vitality.
Tesh had a bucket now, and carried it down a steep path to a nearby creek, for water. Noah followed her movements, watching her closely.
“She is strikingly beautiful, isn’t she?” Eshaz said.
“What?” Noah felt his face flush hot.
“I’m referring to Queen Zilaranda of the Vippandry Protectorate.”
“Huh?”
“Just kidding. I mean Tesh Kori.”
“Anton’s girlfriend? I hadn’t noticed.”
“Is that so? Then I must have mistaken that gleam in your eyes, my friend.”
Noah began to gesture with his hands as he spoke. “Well, she is attractive, but I would never think of showing her any interest—other than professional, of course. She’s my … friend’s … girlfriend.”
An exceedingly observant sentient, Eshaz had noted with interest Noah’s hesitation over the word “friend” … but he said nothing of it. Eshaz wondered, though. If young Anton was not a friend, what was he? Certainly not an enemy, or Noah would not have permitted him to train for a position with the Guardians. A rival, perhaps? Had they competed for women in the past? But Noah was at least fifteen years older, and maybe a bit more than that.
A light flashed on in Eshaz’s head. At a voice command he increased the power of his binocular glax, which enabled him to study the face of Anton Glavine. To his surprise, the Tulyan noted similarities with the way Noah looked: strong chin, aquiline nose, and wide-spaced hazel eyes.
Could Anton be Noah’s son?
As for the young woman, Eshaz found her extraordinary himself, in more than just her beauty, her high energy level, and her resistance to bee stings. The Tulyan had noted in brief conversations with her how quick she was, how obviously intelligent. He could see it in the glint and flash of her emerald green eyes, could hear it in her well-chosen words. In his own intellectual way, Eshaz found her eminently fascinating, but solely for the quality of her mind. Yes, Tesh Kori would make an excellent Guardian one day, and should receive rapid promotions.
Inevitably she might work closely with Noah, perhaps even on his staff. Eshaz envisioned problems between the “friends” if that occurred. In the realm of Human relationships, some things were quite obvious and predictable to the Tulyan.
In the camp below, Tesh brought the bucket of water back … while Noah continued to watch her.
Just as the campers finished their breakfast, snow began to fall, only a little at first, and then a blizzard. They ran for cover, while Noah and Eshaz took shelter in their grid-plane and put on warm coats and insulated boots. Hours passed, with no slackening. By mid-afternoon, a meter of white lay on the ground.
During the unexpected snowfall, Noah stayed in touch with his headquarters via the onboard telebeam transmitter. Finally, when the storm let up, he confirmed that a rescue team was about to set out in snow trucks. Concerned that this would take too long, he transmitted back that he and Eshaz were going to inspect the camp, and would meet them there.
Noah and his trusted aide slid open the door of their small aircraft and cleared snow away so that they could get out. With Noah wearing a backpack full of survival gear, the two of them slogged through deep, pristine snow to the edge of the hill. From there, Noah fired a wire at a tree down in the woods and then connected a sling and descent clip to the wire. Glancing back at Eshaz, who held another sling and clip, he said, “Follow me.” And he jumped over the edge.
One after the other, the two of them went down the steeply-angled wire. The descent clips had braking mechanisms that squeaked, but they worked properly, enabling the pair to proceed at a controlled rate of speed.
When they descended as far as they could on the wire, they switched on motors to lower their slings to the ground. Reaching the camp a short while later, Noah feared the worst. Heavy snow had caved in many of the roofs, and the air was still. He detected no signs of life.
Then he heard something, and looked to the right. On the creek side of the camp, snow shifted, breaking away with soft thumps, and he heard voices from that direction. “It’s about time you got here!” a woman shouted, cheerily. Noah recognized Tesh. As she stepped out from what looked like a snow cave, he counted four others behind her, including Anton.
Eshaz got to them first, and looked inside the opening. Moments later, he reported, “They’re all here … and all are smiling.”
“We’re OK, except one of the boys has a broken wrist,” Tesh said to Noah. She wore a sweater and jeans, and with a bare hand brushed snow from her shoulders and arms. Then, while Eshaz tended to the injured student, Tesh told Noah that the entire class had been caught unawares, but had pooled their resources, especially when some of the lean-to structures failed. As snow pummeled them, they had built a larger shelter, and huddled together inside.
“Do we all get A’s?” Anton asked, with a wide grin.
“You can count on it,” Noah promised. “But this is crazy. It never snows around here in the summer.”
As if to show him how wrong he was, a howling arctic wind blasted through the trees, and the temperature dropped precipitously. Noah and Eshaz joined the others inside the makeshift shelter. This further delayed the rescuers in their snow machines, but they finally rolled noisily into to the camp.…
* * * * *
At well past midnight, Noah and Eshaz stood in the large lobby of the Guardian administration building, wearing dry clothes and drinking hot chocolate. Around them their companions chattered excitedly about the unexpected adventure. Curiously, the temperature had been rising quickly in the last few hours, and snow was melting outside, with water running off the rooftop and overflowing the gutters.
Standing nearby, Tesh and Anton had been bundled up in warm coats, but heat coming in from outside forced them to remove them. Others were doing the same, and no one understood what was occurring. With one exception.
“Canopa is not healthy,” Eshaz murmured, as he gazed into the distance.
* * * * *
By the following morning, even with the sun shining, the temperature began to drop once more, and snow accompanied the plunge, although considerably less than before. By evening the temperature rose and melted away the blanket of white, but it did not get as warm as the first night. Another day and night of this ensued—three in all—with the odd reversal of expected patterns repeating themselves, but in diminishing form.
On the third night, Noah and Eshaz stood outside the main building, gazing up at a starry sky. To a certain extent Noah understood the Tulyan’s remark about Canopa. Both of them believed that planets were vital organisms, and that the galaxy was populated by living, Gaea-type worlds. They had discussed this subject in the past, but only in general terms that never quite satisfied Noah’s desire for information.
It always seemed to him that Eshaz knew more than he was revealing about the subject. Even though Noah had coined the phrase “galactic ecology,” he did not really feel like an expert on the subject. He was only a student himself, with a great deal to learn.
“Perhaps one day you will decide to tell me more,” Noah said.
“Perhaps,” came the response.