Authors: Theresa Snyder
Tim stood rooted to the ground. Jake here?
It wasn't possible.
Arr led the stunned mercenary toward the
tree house. "He was really bad when I first sent for you. He's
better now."
"But how?" Tim asked, almost at a loss for
words for the first time in his life.
"I'll tell you later after you see him. He
heard your pod. He's waiting to talk with you. Go on up. I'll
gather our meal while you two are visiting."
Tim awkwardly climbed up to the tree house,
his large body not built for agile climbing. Jake was lying on a
pallet by the fire. If he was looking better Tim wondered what in
heaven he'd looked like before. He was nothing but skin and bones.
His beard was gone. The bones on his face stuck out to such a
degree that he looked like a skeleton.
Jake could see the shock on Tim's face at
the sight of his condition. He peered out from hollow eyes and with
a mischievous grin on his face said in a hoarse voice, "I look
different without my beard, huh?"
Tim sat for a half hour while he listened to
Jake tell about the ordeal he went through. He attributed his
salvation to three things. He was the last put on the planet and
therefore the strongest, he decided if the locusts ate everything
he had a right to eat them, and Arr finally came.
Jake told Tim the amazing story of Arr's
breaking of the drone ship's crew's binary code and about the
rescue that he thought would never come.
Arr returned a short time later with the
fixings for supper. "That's enough for now," he ordered. "Get some
rest before supper." The young Henu pulled the covers up over
Jake's frail frame.
Jake drifted off into a restful sleep. Tim
moved to the fireside and sat watching Arr prepare a stew.
"Why didn't you tell me what you were up to
at the penal planet?" Tim's tone was slightly reproachful. "I feel
like I deserted him."
"Don't. I didn't know if I could do it. I
just knew I had to try." Arr paused, his eyes misting over. "I
thought he would die the first few days. That's why I sent you the
message. He kept talking in his delirium about you and his
father."
When the stew was ready Arr gently woke
Jake, pulled him to a sitting position up against his chest and
helped Jake feed himself. The weak man made valiant efforts to hit
his mouth, but his hand shook uncontrollably. Each time he'd miss
Arr would wipe him off with a rag he kept close at hand. Jake saw
the pained look on Tim's face. He smiled reassuringly.
"You think this is bad you should have seen
me when I couldn't even swallow, drooled down my chin. That's the
reason he shaved the beard off, got tired of cleaning it." Jake
teased.
"That's not so and you know it," Arr
reprimanded. "He had lice in it. I would have shaved his head too,
but he stopped me." Arr smoothed a stray curl back off Jake's
forehead and out of his eyes.
Jake may have been a shadow of the man he
was, but he was in good spirits and in excellent hands. In time
he'd recover to the man he once was.
Tim stayed on for about a week. He found it
horribly painful to watch Jake. It reminded him of the recovery
time after Taylor's death, which brought back too many painful
memories. When a job came up he jumped at it and told Jake and Arr
he'd be back after it was settled.
Jake steadily improved. As summer turned to fall and
fall to winter he regained his strength and weight. With his beard
grown back, his body fleshing out again, he began to look like the
old Jake.
Tim visited often and always came bearing
gifts, tidbits he thought Jake would find appetizing, Goo Chews for
Kay-o and usually some exotic fruit or vegetable for Arr.
On Tim's last visit in the late fall he
tried to convince them to join him on a job, but Jake decided
against it. It wasn't that he didn't think he was up to it. He was
feeling good by then. But, he and Arr had spent a lot of time
talking. He had little strength to do anything else. Arr and Jake
had become even closer through the ordeal of Jake's recovery. When
someone feeds you, gives you baths because you haven't the strength
to do it yourself, in short, does everything for you, it creates a
bond that is beyond words to express.
Arr told Jake about Nor's stories of the
snow, then about his horrible nightmares after their first battle
on the ice planet. Jake wanted to do something for Arr. He would
help Arr chase these particular demons away for good. They would
stay until the first snow.
Last night there was a smell in the air, a
crispness that you could feel. Jake said it felt like snow. They
awakened to a light dusting of the white stuff. By mid-morning the
flakes were as large as the palm of your hand. Jake had never seen
anything so beautiful.
By mid-afternoon there was enough of an
accumulation to play in it. They built a snowman with Goo Chews for
eyes, nose and mouth. They made a mistake using the candies for
buttons. Kay-o got a whiff of them and the snowman was knocked down
and relieved of his adornments. Jake started a snowball fight. He
was winning until Arr thought to put Goo Chews in his balls. Jake
couldn't handle the onslaught of snow and a rampaging dar-dolf. Arr
had the idea of using Kay-o as a sled dog later in the afternoon,
but by then they had run out of bribery material. Instead they
built a fire under the shelter of a tree to dry themselves.
In the evening the temperature dropped to
such a degree that the three moved up to the warmth of the
Calpernia. Their stay on the Henu planet came to a natural end with
the move to the ship. When Tim arrived the next day the three were
ready to accompany him on his next mission.
Mother Ships are the largest known vessels in the
universe. They are the brain child of a group called The Order.
Their crews alone number close to four hundred. Their whole
compliment could go as high as twenty five hundred. They are the
heaviest armed ships in existence. They are peacekeepers. When a
Mother Ship enters a solar system it usually accomplished that
feat.
However, fighting is not their main
function. They are research vessels. They have the best equipped
labs, the finest scientists and doctors available. When they move
into a solar system the planets use the ship's facilities to
augment their own. Problems that have a planet bound scientist or
doctor baffled for days, weeks, maybe even months, can usually be
solved in a matter of hours aboard the Mother Ships. There are ten
Mother Ships. Margaret O'Connor was Chief Medical Officer aboard
the one named the St. Mary.
Dr. O'Connor was a remarkable woman. She was
not only brilliant, but also a true humanitarian. She studied with
all the top physicians in her field and left them all behind. She
joined the St. Mary's crew because it was the only position that
could challenge her mind. Among her other duties as Chief Medical
Officer she was in charge of the study of new life forms. Her
specialty was the rare and exotic.
She was a woman of just over forty years of
age. Margaret liked to jokingly tell people she was born the height
she was, 5' 10" in her stocking feet. She had strawberry blond
hair, milk white skin and large, blue, inquiring eyes.
Her father was in the Earth Forces. Her
mother dragged the family from pillar to post following him on his
many assignments. It was no wonder that Margaret liked strong,
forceful men.
The job Tim needed their help for was a 'cake walk'
as Tim put it. Not having been on a mission in over six months it
was a good easy break back into working life for Jake and Arr. Tim
hadn't really needed help just company. They escorted and protected
an ambassador from his home planet to a meeting and back again.
Jake and Arr just tagged along for the ride.
They passed the Mother Ship on the way back
to the Henu planet to pick up the Calpernia. Jake thought it would
be fun to show Arr the better side of space travel. Besides, Jake
lost two teeth from his ordeal on Penal Planet #18. He could get
new ones implanted on the St. Mary. They'd have a nice visit. Maybe
pick up some useful news as well.
"You'll never get any useful information
from the St. Mary. When she moves into a solar system everyone is
on their best behavior." Tim snorted in disdain.
Tim had 'other fish to fry.' Now that the
boys were on the mend he pointed his cruiser in the opposite
direction for an Outpost that always had juicy information.
The Mother Ship was impressive from the air.
"There are only ten of them in existence."
Jake explained, as he placed the Calpernia in dock while waiting
for clearance to bring the pod aboard the huge ship. "They each
have a particular territory assigned to them. They're research and
aid vessels, but don't let that fool you they have incredible fire
power."
The ship dwarfed anything Arr had seen
previously.
"The working part of the ship is that thick
disc shaped part at the base." Jake pointed. "That contains the
engines, life support systems, labs, bridge, and crew
quarters."
Jake could see the base was not what was
holding his friends rapt attention. It was the dome on the top of
the disc that fascinated Arr.
"Isn't it incredible? It's totally
impregnable even though it's translucent." Even Jake was impressed
by one of these floating cities.
Under the dome Arr could make out a buzzing
metropolis - a whole city visible to all the cruisers that
surrounded the ship like bees around a queen.
Jake received clearance for them to board.
They left Kay-o on the Calpernia, took the pod and headed down for
Arr's introduction to city life.
The city was wondrous. Fountains and art
work everywhere. Such a variety of beings. Jake explained that
anyone could hire on to a Mother Ship the catch was that the ship
was limited in living space so they were very choosey about who
they accepted. You had to have something they needed.
Jake couldn't get an appointment for his
teeth until the afternoon. So, they wandered the streets and had a
bite to eat in a small cafe with open air seating. Most of the
places Jake took Arr they always fought non-humans. He was the only
accepted alien. Here every other being was an alien. He was so busy
gawking that Jake had to remind him to eat before it got cold.
*****
Jake was getting a kick out of watching Arr.
Those big, blue cat eyes of his were bugged out so far you could
have knocked them off with a stick.
Jake figured he'd leave Arr in the Imaging
Chamber while he was at the dentist. He took Arr down into the base
ship and introduced him to the holograph operators. They went
through the usual spiel they did for the tourists. They told Arr
they could recreate, by his instructions, any place he would care
to experience. They demonstrated by creating a Muldavian sunset one
of the most spectacular sights in the known universe. Jake and Arr
stood in a mountain vineyard overlooking a valley as the sun sank
below the horizon. The sky with its strata cirrus clouds went
through a riot of colors, breathtaking swirls and stripes of
rainbow hues. When the demo was completed the operators asked what
Arr's request would be. Arr was like a kid in a candy store. He
wanted to see all the places his father spoke of, also the ones
Jake told him about.
"Keep an eye on the kid for me fellas, while
I'm at the dentist." Jake slipped them the required ingot of gold
for their services plus an additional one for their troubles. They
were used to such requests, but not such a large tip. They both
smiled pleasantly.
When he picked Arr up two hours later the
operators said he gave them quite a work out. He managed to see and
experience fourteen different holographic scenes.
The kid was usually on the quiet side, but
all during dinner and back aboard the cruiser that night he rattled
on like Tim. Jake found it all very amusing. He was pleased he
could finally do something for the kid after all Arr did for him in
the past few months.
In the morning Arr begged for a return trip
to the St. Mary. There were just a few more images he wanted to see
in the Imaging Chamber and he promised Tim he would get Jake in for
a full physical. Jake was dragging his feet. Arr thought a physical
must be very painful because Jake didn't even act like this before
they went into a battle where they knew they would be out numbered.
He wouldn't have forced the issue, but Tim thought it was very
important for Jake to go. He made Arr promise he would see that he
did. Arr finally struck a bargain over breakfast with Jake. He
would go for a physical too, if Jake would.
*****
Jake knew the kid wouldn't give up. He'd
given his word to Tim and Jake never knew Arr to lie or break a
promise. Besides, he thought it might be a good idea to have a base
medical graph of Arr in case he was ever badly injured. His insides
might be different from humans and it could come in handy for the
doctors.
Margaret was sitting at her desk piled high with
files when one of her physician's assistants poked his head in the
door.
"I have an alien for a physical that hasn't
been cataloged, doctor." The excitement could easily be detected in
the young man's voice.
Ah, it was moments like these that she lived
for. She hadn't seen a new species in over eleven months - almost a
year. The Mother Ships all pooled their computer data so even if
they were new to you they were old hat to someone else. This one
would be new to everyone. She loved a challenge. Margaret jumped up
from her seat, straightened her lab coat and picked up her scanner
from the desk top.
The assistant opened the door to the
examination room for the doctor. "No need for an auto-translator.
He speaks perfect English."