Dadr'Ba (21 page)

Not questioning the safety of the mixture for an instant, he sipped. Instantly, P’Ko felt as if Lu’Gs had just kicked him in the forehead; snapping his head back, P’Ko was just barely able to keep his footing. Mi’Ka stepped forward to grab the cup, keeping P’Ko from dropping it. Then continued, “I guess I made it a little too strong, how’s the flavor?”

P’Ko, speechless, had to wait for the initial shock to wear off, then blinked a couple of times and smacked his lips. He felt wide awake, and the back of his neck tingled. “It tastes like burnt dielectric cooling fluid, but surprisingly good.”

Mi’Ka nodded, as if in agreement, pausing before speaking as if making a mental note or calculation. Then said smiling “you’ll get your bio-mods soon, I want to see them, all of them,” then “look for this, but don’t open it.” And she sent him a mental image of some strange handheld device and some cartridges, and then said aloud, “I mean it, don’t open it” “And one more thing, don’t worry about the Church.” Then she turned and headed back into the kitchen. P’Ko left wondering how many real words she had spoken.

P’Ko made it over to the D’Po and got his work assignment from Lu’Gs, who was happy to see him and congratulated him on his graduation. Then described the strange D’En and her more unusual, and dangerous, request.

P’Ko was up for the challenge and happy to be doing something productive. He went out into the seemingly random maze of modules, vans, cargo units, shipping and storage containers, racks, shelves. He passed piles, and heaps of used, broken, discarded, and outdated equipment parts and pieces tracking down an ancient handheld data reader and prehistoric data cartridges.

P’Ko had relatively little trouble finding what he was looking for. He had grown up poking around this yard and knew it well. As large as it was, covering almost half of Ol’Tn’s zone, P’Ko had a mental map of its contents. The treasure was in a relatively uniformly organized section of the yard there were racks and racks of computer equipment and among them, cabinets containing cartridges like those Mi’Ka showed him.

Off to one side of the organized area of old storage cabinets, and racks were an actual pile of racks and cabinets, some partially buried. P’Ko had to use a portable mechanical hoist to uncover the semi-buried racks and cabinets but found what he was looking for.

Many of the data cartridges in the cabinets appeared to be wiped or had so been marked. But he knew that “sometimes” a tech tasked with the boring job of wiping a huge lot of data cartridges will sometimes “save resources” and just mark them wiped and put them in the reuse or recycle pile. The data recording process automatically wipes and overwrites the data on any cartridge it’s using anyway, so why wipe them?

These older racks and cabinets appeared to have been just dumped haphazardly. P’Ko’s excitement grew, as he noticed a lot of the equipment in the racks seemed scorched and P’Ko wondered if it was damaged from the ToG and the survivors chose to discard entire racks of equipment rather than attempt repairs.

The CA must have thought the ToG had done data wiping for them, which would have undoubtedly been true for all volatile data storage and probably true even for all on-line non-volatile storage, but offline data backups properly stored would be much harder to eradicate, and that was what he was looking for.

Knowing he was in the right spot and having decided what he wanted, it didn’t take P’Ko much longer to find it. In a sealed and locked storage cabinet. P’Ko easily jimmied opened the lock, it was intended to prevent accidental or inadvertent access only. Inside, he found a well-organized and labeled container stacked and filled with data cartridges and along one side a now dead, power charging rack with a row of portable readers installed in a neat row.

P’Ko sorted through the cartridges from several of the containers until he found to his amazement data cartridges appeared to be backups of the school servers that predated the ToG by many years.

Realizing the incredible value, and danger associated with this stuff, P’Ko, took a few of the readers to work with, figuring he may have to use parts from several to get even one to work. Then, went through the data cartridges until he found some that looked like would contain Or’Gn history, and hopefully wasn’t encrypted.

P’Ko closed the data storage cabinet and used the portable hoist to rebury it. He gathered the readers and the data cartridges and headed back home to his room and his desk/workbench to try to get these things working.  The shoulder bag he carried felt hefty, he knew, that he was taking an enormous amount of data, perhaps the whole history of Or’Gn and along with a large part of its technical development and literature.

What he carried could be the entire history of their civilization like an entire civilization was draped over his shoulder. His civilization, his history, his ancestor’s and ancestor’s ancestor’s history.

He felt himself get a little dizzy after he realized that he saw a name that on the cartridges. It must have been the true name of Or’Gn, a name he knew if repeated aloud and overheard by the CASS could result in a death sentence.

P’Ko resolved to deliver the goods to Lu’Gs and not mention that he had any knowledge of what they contained and put it out of his mind until he could discuss it with Mi’Ka, he wouldn’t be able to hide it from her. Mi’Ka told him not to open them, but how else would he be able to tell which cartridge contained data and which didn’t?

Mi’Ka should be able to help decide what to do, if anything, with his newfound knowledge. He shook his head to himself as he realized psychic ability didn’t equivocate with technical expertise, this job was becoming incredibly deep, complicated, and dangerous.

P’Ko spotted Su’Zi near the spot on the beach where they first met; she was as happy to see him as he was of her. She smiled, saying nothing but motioned to him to remain silent, and beckoned for him to follow her.

P’Ko followed Su’Zi down a path through the dry grass that sprouted through the sand along the beach. She pointed out to P’Ko an oddly shaped rock along the trail as they passed, then took two steps pivoted to the right and stepped off the path and disappeared.

At first, it appeared that Su’Zi dropped out of the virtual environment P’Ko hesitated, then followed, two steps passed the rock he pivoted right and stepped.

The room was plain, the walls a light gray, a smart table with a couple of chairs sat in the middle of the chamber. The room seemed to be lit from nowhere and everywhere, with no apparent entry or exit. The spot they entered from was not at the wall, but a meter or so from it and showed no visible sign of it still existing at all.

Su’Zi gave P’Ko a warm embrace, holding it for a moment as she whispered to him how much she missed him, he squeezed her tight telling her that he has missed her too, then they both settled next to each other into the chairs.

P’Ko sat next to Su’Zi, feeling good. Perhaps the good feeling was due to P’Ko’s becoming more comfortable with the virtual environment or due to his growing his psychic abilities, or it could be the result of the bond they were creating together. But whatever the reason he didn’t feel as awkward as the first times they met in Vr’Chm, the physical distance between them didn’t seem as great now, and he could feel her next to him.

P’Ko and Su’Zi had grown closer than P’Ko could have imagined. Ever since they first became aware of each other, in the dream and even before the dream it seemed now thinking of the time before, like they hungered for the other but didn’t know what they hungered for.

P’Ko couldn’t understand why he felt the way he did, he didn’t have his bio-mods yet, bio-mods brought biological and associated psychological baggage that might explain the way he felt, but he had none. He still couldn’t understand that without bio-mods, what could Su’Zi be attracted to? His psyche? He didn’t think his psyche was anything special. If anything he felt his mind was flawed; he possessed all kinds of doubts, thought himself damaged and couldn’t even trust or use his weak psychic abilities very well.

Yet P’Ko felt the desire to be close to Su’Zi to hold and caress her, to be one with her and he sensed or hoped that she wanted the same with him, despite his lack of equipment.  As much as he tried, he couldn’t think through this conundrum and felt frustrated. P’Ko didn’t have the experience, knowledge or equipment to process how becoming physical would impact their relationship and didn’t want to risk altering or losing what they had together by introducing the physical element too soon or the wrong way.

There was no rush; they seemed to have a trust, a non-communicated, non-spoken, mutual understanding that they will eventually move to the next level of an intimate relationship, and there was no need to rush.

P’Ko soon found himself describing to Su’Zi the ToG Ceremony he experienced sharing it in as much detail as he could remember. It’s rare to talk about the ToG Ceremony because it’s such a personal experience, too personal to be shared and because it’s a secret from the uninitiated, punishable by death many people avoid talking about it altogether or only speak of it in analogy or allegory.

Now so excited was P’Ko, sitting side-by-side with Su’Zi that they eagerly shared every intimate detail of their ToG experience. Su’Zi was surprised about the quickness of his ToG recovery, remarking that she too recovered quickly, but had no explanation for it. She wasn’t surprised that he helped the one he did; she was tempted to help the others too, but the elder stopped her. Based on the elder needing warn off or stop people from helping each other it must not be that unusual. Su’Zi didn’t think P’Ko needed to be as worried as he was.

Soon they were discussing bio-mods, Su’Zi’s existing bio-mods and P’Ko’s scheduled bio-mods. Then Su’Zi said what had been on her mind, something that had even crossed her mind when they first met on the beach but she was hesitant until now. “You know,” she said, “I could be your mentor.” “I know you’ve got that other person lined up, but she must be very busy.” “She’d probably welcome the chance to free up her schedule, and her mentoring would probably be rushed, and not as good as it could be or should be.” P’Ko immediately became uneasy, and Su’Zi, sensing it talked faster and more urgently “I could be your mentor, it would be easy to schedule and arrange.” “Pri’Api and Ti’Reso were my mentors they’re well known as excellent mentors, and they taught me very well. I know all the latest techniques” Su’Zi could sense turmoil in P’Ko, this was going very badly. Finally, she trailed off very softly “you won’t be sorry.” The psychic connection between Su’Zi and P’Ko was gone; P’Ko had withdrawn into himself, then still in turmoil, he tried to reach back out to Su’Zi, but she kept her distance.

P’Ko paused a long time before answering. He rolled over the options, and possible impacts. He was taking too long, feeling a stab of guilt, because he’s analyzing the question that had come not from Su’Zi’s intellect, but from her heart. Now his answer was coming from an analysis only slightly modified by his heart.

He truly cares for Su’Zi and is attracted to her. He gave his word to Z’Shi, made a commitment. Z’Shi didn’t have to take him on as his mentor, she’s totally out of his league. He thinks Z’Shi is very attractive and deep down the thought of being Z’Shi’s Lr’Lng excited him. But his feelings for each is different, the feelings for Z’Shi, awe, and respect, for Su’Zi, inexplicably stronger and deeper along with a burning desire to impress her. How could he do that as a Lr’Lng?

Su’Zi is offering something very special and beyond all doubt, it would be. But if he took Su’Zi up on her offer, it would also shape their relationship forever.

P’Ko paused and swallowed. Even through the virtual interface he could see the pain in Su’Zi’s eyes and felt her psychic anguish mixed with his own. He tried to choose his words carefully, but they came out feeling awkward and disingenuous.

P’Ko sought to explain that Z’Shi had already set aside the time for the mentoring and had helped with this bio-mod selections. If he were to cancel, it would be an affront to her. He just couldn’t do that, if word got out, it could impact her reputation, and he didn’t know how she would take it.

Z’Shi is a very wealthy and influential person; all these explanations felt empty, and P’Ko felt like the blood was draining out of his heart, and felt weak. He expressed how much he appreciated Su’Zi’s offer, but he can’t change his pick for a mentor, adding that it in no way changed his feelings about Su’Zi. All the while, trying his best to send psychic messages reinforcing his words.

Finally, he said what he should have said at first, and what was in his heart, “I want us to be equals.”

Their psychic connection restored, P’Ko could feel the hurt in Su’Zi but also sensed her understanding and hope. He cursed the virtual interface; he wanted to embrace Su’Zi and feel her in his arms despite the conflicting messages it would send. He felt trapped, his mind felt heavy, and fog obscured his reasoning. He felt torn, like his insides were being drained and ripped from within him. Could this also be what Su’Zi was feeling? And he was responsible, why did she have to ask?

Su’Zi quietly, sadly, and very softly said, “it’s okay, I understand, it was wrong of me to ask,” then “when will I get to see you again?” And not mentioning that the mentoring immediately followed the bio-mods, “As soon as my bio-mods are complete. I want you to be the first to see me.”

As previously arranged, P’Ko woke from his bio-mods on a soft matt near the same practice platform where they had performed his interview. Soft music was playing in the background. It took P’Ko a moment to realize that he wasn’t dreaming, he was at Z’Shi’s apartment. He looked around to see the display panel ceiling of Z’Shi’s apartment now a pale blue with random lighter colored shapes floating across it. It reminded him of the sky above the beach in Vr’Chm. Realizing that the ceiling too, not just the walls of her apartment could display virtually anything.

Refreshed and clear-minded, with no drowsiness whatsoever P’Ko got up on one elbow and looked around. He spotted Z’Shi at the same low table that they had first had tea as if on cue she motioned him to join her.

When he tried to get up it felt strange, a little dizzy; his limbs felt distant and slow to react, and the gravity changed. This was the first time he could remember not waking up in his room at his parent’s apartment and its gravity level.

The last thing he remembered was he was in the Doctor’s office in Nu’Tn. Now he was in Z’Shi’s apartment high above Nu’Tn nearly the same height as the upper levels of Nu’Tn Stadium a substantial gravity change, not as drastic a change as in zone one, the power production and fusion drive zone. The workers there are in the microgravity near Dadr’Ba’s center, siphoning off energy from and maintaining the nuclear fire coursing down Dadr’Ba’s center line.

P’Ko visited there only one time with his ba when there was a project that needed extra bodies; it was exciting, but there were far too many D’En’s working and in charge, the U’Te’s were not allowed to do anything important, and P’Ko didn’t like it.

P’Ko looked down and saw that he wore a loose fitting sleeved tunic, with long pants, and slippers not the knee length shorts of a To’Ta. He started to feel himself, his arms and legs were thicker, muscled, his head had hair, then, he checked his sexual mods, Z’Shi paid no attention.

The tea was a new flavor which didn’t surprise P’Ko; Z’Shi undoubtedly had hundreds to choose from. As P’Ko drank the tea Z’Shi began to explain what was going to happen, as he listened, he started to feel a little strange, not knowing if it was due to bio-mod recovery or something else.

Z’Shi shared that the tea contained a mild relaxant that would help with what would come later. They would start with a repeat or continuation of his first interview. He needed first, to learn to control his new self, and the biomods he received required to work down in the mines. He was much stronger than he was before and it’s important that he learn a new level of self-control and discipline.

They paired up on the stage and soon they were dancing, very slow at first. P’Ko struggled to maintain control under the influence of the tea and the uncertainty of his new physical capabilities and limitations. P’Ko soon realized that the tea was not just a relaxant, but must have also had some psychoactive/psychotropic properties.

Giddy from his bio-mods and new strength, influenced by the effects of the tea P’Ko tried to rush the training and tried to grab Z’Shi inappropriately. Her speed and agility combined with her martial arts skill left P’Ko embarrassed, incapacitated and in pain. Several times he found himself flat on the floor, Z’Shi standing over him, clearly disappointed.

P’Ko quickly learned his error, while still under the influence of the tea, P’Ko sobered up. Struggling under the effects of the tea, he fought to gain control over his mind and body. As the effects of the tea wore off, he found that he was better able to control his mind and body along with its new bio-modified capabilities without consciously trying.

The training went around the clock resting, eating, and hydrating as necessary. As the training progressed, he and Z’Shi became more comfortable with each other, over time, and after many hours, they moved to a new training site higher up in the building. The gravity was much lower and the temperature much higher, the practice continued in a large, dimly lit room, padded on all sides, with each of them wearing only tight-fitting, lightweight workout clothes.

Their practices grew in intensity. At first, P’Ko struggled to control his strength in the low gravity. Gradually he learned and became comfortable with his new strength and agility, now the training became more suggestive and erotic yet with a focus on form, self-control, and flow, they often spoke, but as practice continued and time passed, they developed a physical and mental language.

P’Ko began to wonder if he was falling in love, Z’Shi sensing his thoughts, replied with words that didn’t register physically, only mentally. This took P’Ko by surprise because he hadn’t vocalized his wonder about falling in love, or had he? Z’Shi tried to reassure P’Ko that what they were experiencing was wonderful and beautiful and should be focused on in the immediate, at the moment.

P’Ko’s thoughts continued, has the connection he and Z’Shi built allowed her to read his mind? Or was it something else? As he wondered about it, he felt a poison seep into his mind, a poison he fought to suppress, but failed.

Had Z’Shi’s “experience” with who knows how many other people, other men, developed in her an innate sense of what her partners are thinking and when they’re thinking it? Was he jealous? Feeling inferior? The thought ate at him and gradually worsened. Then his mind flashed to Su’Zi and that this feeling was probably like what Su’Zi felt when he declined her offer for mentorship.

Suddenly Z’Shi slapped P’Ko, sending him spinning. As P’Ko came to his senses, he found himself on the floor in the dimly lit, low-G room, in an embrace with Z’Shi, he didn’t know how they got there. But as he slowly regained his senses, guessed, that his mental self-interrogation, had once again been the root of the fall.

Z’Shi looked P’Ko straight into the eyes and said, very stern and serious, “P’Ko there are times to think and times to act, too often you spend too much time thinking and analyzing your actions before you act. So far you’ve been lucky, and there haven’t been any serious consequences, but there will come times that thinking instead of acting could cost you your life.”

“First and foremost you must make sure that the present is taken care of, only then worry about the past and the future; you’ll find that you’ll be happier and more alive if you do.”

With that Z’Shi kissed P’Ko, and he allowed himself more than ever before in his entire life to be lost in the present.

The mentorship continued, and P’Ko learned techniques to control himself and to manipulate, to the extent Z’Shi permitted it, the sexual experience.

P’Ko learned the intimate dance on the edge of a precipice, the game of brinksmanship, the various degrees of pleasure, excitement and the feeling of two connected, becoming one. With practice and a little effort, P’Ko could imagine himself as Z’Shi and perform in ways that she would like, and she did the same for him.

P’Ko learned what it was like to be, with another, a single physical being. How to unite and became like neighboring organs within one body, functioning together to achieve a common goal. And that goal, after stripping away all the mechanizations was to become as one.

He imagined that it was like trying to embrace someone while standing tiptoe balancing atop a needle. At first, they never succeeded, then with practice they would come close to balance and for at time dance together as one upon the needle but would always fall in reset. Each time satisfied, but a little frustrated at never succeeding in prolonging the dance as long, or dance as deeply and unified as the longing and desire they felt called to them for.

In this way, P’Ko learned the art and discipline of working with his partner and mentor Z’Shi. He learned the art of reduction, reducing a person’s existence to its simplest and purest forms. Focusing, creating, simplifying and maintaining a kind of bubble, one of nature’s simplest, purest and most fragile forms. The pinnacle of physical pleasure that two people can attain, then, unable to keep it any longer, experience the flood of pleasure. Sometimes experienced as a feeling of falling, sometimes of draining away, at times soaring high, that accompanies some level of reset. Sometimes the reset would be partial and result in only a pause in activity, at times the reset would be total, causing a lapse into involuntary convulsions to varying degrees.

P’Ko knew and accepted that Z’Shi was always in control of her resets and only allowed him to witness them as part of their mentoring. This knowledge only drove him to try harder to satisfy her and feel legitimate pleasure in the knowledge that she shared, relinquished a part of herself to him. Just as he shared and abandoned part of himself to her. She couldn’t hide that she liked what she did and was very, very good at it, and she liked what he did, and enjoyed it even more as P’Ko became more practiced and proficient, gaining confidence, the skill and muscle memory, that like many physical sports separates the novice from the expert.

Sometimes they would reset together, P’Ko liked those best, recovering in each other’s arms, still coupled, then ever so slowly after the other woke, to begin the process again.

The mentoring included slow dances and massage sessions which served as both a break and a prelude.

They practiced pleasuring the other, which taught the technique of total focus on the other, without the distraction of self. How to sense and internalize the other’s experience. Learning the pride and satisfaction of being able to, in a sense, play, interact, manipulate and control the most beautiful and complicated musical instrument ever, another being. P’Ko Learned how to make beautiful, satisfying and profound music, all the more meaningful because it can’t be stored or recorded except in one’s memory. It is the ultimate and most intimate performance art.

With Z’Shi’s help, P’Ko mastered control of his bio-mods and the mentoring became more varied and began to include deep, serious, intense sessions as well as playful tricks and games. Z’Shi even played some of the musical instruments that adorned her apartment and demonstrated her deftness with each one.

P’Ko’s psychic empathic abilities seemed to improve because, as Z’Shi played, he could feel his fingers touching and manipulating the instrument, much like he had learned during their sexual encounters, an ability that dramatically intensified the experience.

They had long discussions about right and wrong uses of sex, recreational sex, the importance of honesty and the distinctions between sex, love and procreation.

Once, as they were recovering from an unusually intense reset, Z’Shi waxed philosophical that long ago, before Dadr’Ba ever launched and left the Or’Gn world system, all people were bio-naturals. There were no radiation resistant, gene-locked, long-lived clones.

People’s bodies grew and aged naturally, only rarely could people expect to live past one-hundred. Then, as today sex was used for recreation and satisfying self-esteem, along with the need and desire for a climaxing reset, pair bonding and sharing intimacy. Back then sex also had a biological function; it was the way most Bio-naturals exchanged genetic material to create a Bo’Ba. Few had psychic abilities and procreation was based solely on the physical sharing of genetic material and not on the psychic union used today to transition self to a Bo’Ba.

P’Ko was amazed to hear Z’Shi speak of this history, discussion of physiology and pre-Touch of God history had been outlawed for hundreds of years. P’Ko wanted to learn more about how exactly people shared genetic material but was afraid to ask; he didn’t want to spoil the moment. He decided instead to keep one the readers and data cartridges he had recovered in the junk yard and study them.

Z’Shi explained that while achieving ultimate unity of physical and psychic, that she and P’Ko danced around where a couple goes on the way to conceiving and bringing life to a Bo’Ba, it’s a challenging and holy thing and should be reserved for and practiced only with your soul-mate, your true love.

P’Ko felt not a deepening of his relationship with Z’Shi but a maturation of it; he realized that they had reached the limit of the depth they would achieve and that knowledge brought along with it a level of trust and understanding. It carried a reminder of teacher, student, even during those times when Z’Shi allowed him the dominant role.

P’Ko learned that the martial arts that Z’Shi had mastered dealt with pressure points, speed, agility, manipulation of joints and exploiting the opponent’s strength and momentum. When she wanted or needed to, she could move incredibly fast. More than once, Z’Shi demonstrated her speed and agility when P’Ko got too carried away or ignored the hints or signals Z’Shi gave him that he was going out of bounds.

Z’Shi never taught him her form of martial arts, saying he had no need, that his specialty should rely more on his own unique capabilities, concentrating on his strength, speed, and momentum. Still P’Ko learned the basic moves from having them used on him.

P’Ko began to sense that the mentoring was coming to an end, finally, Z’Shi announced that he was ready, but mentoring is not a one-time thing, it evolves. P’Ko should not likely need any more sexual mentoring, but there may come other “occasions” and should P’Ko feel the need, he should seek Z’Shi out and not hesitate when the need arises.

Z’Shi took P’Ko home to his parents’ house in her car dropping him off on a blind corner, then after a warm embrace silently disappeared.

P’Ko’s parents could hardly recognize the new P’Ko nearly everything about him had changed. But as he drew near first, his mother, then his father and brother made the psychic connection and anxiously embraced him welcoming him home.