The Farpool (63 page)

They crossed the Serpentines through the
Likte Gap, a rocking, rolling roller coaster ride that briefly
scattered the kip’ts and seemed to loosen the tongues of everybody.
When Kloosee had brought the sled under some semblance of control,
Chase asked how far away was Omsh’pont now?

“A hundred beats, maybe a little more,”
Kloosee said. “Already, we can hear the murmurs of the kelke…it’s
chaos…panic there.”

“You can actually hear sounds from the
city?”

“We can…
ootkeeor
is strong here in this part of the
Omt’orkel Sea. Many voices, distress…anguish…wails and cries…very
sad…we must hurry.”

Chase was left to wonder what a city under
siege and destruction would sound like.

They crossed over a range of hills Pakma had
called Kip’tor and finally came into the great valley of the
Metah’shpont. Right away, though the wavemaker sound was slightly
muted, Chase could see dense clouds of floating debris drifting
over the city. Rubble and rock rained down in a never-ending hail
and he could tell where the broad shoulders of the Metah’shpont had
slumped, losing half its southern promontory, presumably to the
vibration and acoustic assault of the Uman machine. An entire shelf
of rock and half the face of the seamount had collapsed onto the
floatways and pavilions and canopies and burrows below, burying
fully a quarter of the city in mud and silt.

Everywhere, Omtorish kelke clustered in knots
and crowds, some roaming aimlessly, wailing and crying, others
digging through the growing mounds of mud for loved ones, prized
possessions, a favorite scentbulb or pod, some old piece of
furniture.

Kloosee talked by
ootkeeor
with Longsee who was in another kip’t
half a beat behind. They agreed to steer the fleet to the Kelktoo,
the project labs on the side of the seamount opposite the
Metah’shpont. Longsee wanted to see how much damage the labs had
suffered.

Kloosee wanted to find his own em’kel, the
Putektu. Pakma wanted to find hers. But they went on toward Kelktoo
and found it intact.

The two of them headed for the floatway
leading up to the Lab itself, situated under an array of tents and
canopies halfway up the outer flanks of the seamount T’or, the
tallest sentinel in the city, itself undamaged by the tremors and
landslides. Longsee and several others pushed ahead and nosed into
the warren of passages and corridors that made up the Kelktoo.

Inside, all was chaos. Equipment and pieces
of equipment drifted through the floatways and corridors. Longsee
nearly ran into the wreckage of a beatscope as he ducked and
swerved through the debris.

Technicians and engineers and researchers
were gathering their gear, hunting down loose parts, squeaking and
honking and bellowing at each other.

Chase’s echopod couldn’t make sense of all
the jabber…finally, it gave up and started emitting a low monotone.
A nearby technician helped him fix it.

“It’s a disaster,” Longsee said. He darted
about, one way, then another way, agitated, angry, nearly
overwhelmed, fluttering his armfins, squeaking in anguish. “We’ll
never get this fixed—“

Kloosee dived in and helped corral as much of
the drifting gear as he could.

A voice issued up from the outer
platform. “
The Metah’s coming…she’s coming
this way--!”

Longsee, Kloosee and the others went back
down the floatway, dodging wreckage and debris, bumping into one
another in their efforts to slip outside. A huge gathering of the
kelke presaged the arrival of Iltereedah and her entourage.

Outside, the vast grid of Omsh’pont was
nearly obscured by the silt and rain of floating debris. The
collapsed seamount at the far end of the valley was still shedding
rubble and hills of mud lined the farthest districts of the city,
burying homes, shops, gardens, everything. In among the suspended
clumps of wreckage, knots of people moved about, poking and
sniffing, trying to find their own belongings. To Chase, it looked
like a gigantic underwater yard sale.

The Metah cruised silently, grimly inspecting
the damage, surrounded by a phalanx of prodsmen and staff, but
still beset with petitioners and kelke imploring her help, her
prayers, her support. She paused to grieve and commiserate with
everyone who approached.

Angie saw her big chance and without warning,
took off, whipping past Chase, Longsee and Kloosee, diving into the
melee. She pushed and shoved her way through the growing knot of
people, until at last, she came face to face with a determined pair
of guards, prods out and ready to sting.

“Your Majesty…
Your Majesty—“
she called, hoping her pod was
working. With all the bellowing and grunting and whistles and
squeaks and honks, it was hard to tell if she could be heard. “Your
Maj…excuse me, sir…Your Majesty…a word, please…I need to see
you!”

Iltereedah had been sympathizing with a pair
of youngsters, patting them on the head, nuzzling beaks, when her
eye caught the commotion that Angie was causing. Chase and Kloosee
were right behind her, but more prodsmen barred their way.

The Metah waved her hand. “Let her
pass…you are
eekoti
, are you
not?”

Angie came up. She didn’t really know
how to act before the Metah.
Do I bow or
curtsy or what?
She settled on folding her hands into
something like a prayer steeple. The Metah’s voice came through her
echopod as a screeching whine, until Longsee helped her tune it.
The racket of a city on the verge of mass panic had overloaded its
circuits.

“Your Majesty—“
how do I say this?—“
Your Majesty, I am
eekoti
. I’ve enjoyed being here,
meeting so many people, seeing everything…”
Just get on with it, girl, you’re not writing a postcard
here
“… I want to go back to my home world…I want to
go through
em’took
again…be
my old self again—“

She waited while the Metah listened carefully
to what her echopod was producing. Iltereedah’s face was hard to
read, part grandmotherly lines, part quivering mouth, part
sympathetic nurse, part firm monarch.

Finally, she spoke.
“
Eekoti
Angie, what you ask
is not possible. Longsee, come here beside me—“

Longsee was allowed to approach, brushing
past the prodsmen with a half-sneer on his face.

“Tell her, Longsee. The
em’took
is not reversible. Once
done, it cannot be undone.”

Longsee wanted to be careful in what he said.
To contradict the Metah in front of her court—

“Affectionate Metah, this is the truth.
Reversing the
em’took
has
never been successfully accomplished….it is very risky…so many
factors…so many variables. I can’t imagine how it could
succeed.”

Iltereedah seemed convinced. “There, you see?
From the mouth of one of our greatest scientists. This would be
suicide. Shooki would not forgive us if we did this.”

But Angie wasn’t going to be dissuaded. “Your
Majesty, yes…Longsee has said that. Others have said that. But I
must return home. I’m willing to take the risk.”

Now Iltereedah seemed more concerned.
Lines around her eyes and mouth tightened. “We have offended
you,
eekoti
Angie? Is this
what has happened? Yes, conditions are bad, it’s true—“ she swept
her armfins around, indicating the city and the wreckage that
blotted out everything, “but we are a hospitable people. We live
ke’shoo and ke’lee…you say love and life…you are unhappy here, not
treated well?”

Angie waited until the full echopod
translation came through. How could she say this? Iltereedah was
concerned, even upset, that an honored guest had been mistreated,
that her guest did not find life in Omt’or satisfying and
fulfilling. “No, Your Majesty, I’ve been treated well, very well,
no complaints at all. It’s just that…it’s not home, see, and I want
to go home. I want to be like I was before—“

Now Iltereedah nosed right up to Angie,
nuzzling around her face, her neck, her abdomen, reading inner
echoes, pulsing and studying what was there, seeking deceit, other
purposes, the telltale bubbles of doubt. She found none of this.
Iltereedah backed off. “I pulse only loneliness in you,
eekoti
Angie. Sadness,
perhaps…you’re hard to read and there’s so much racket around.
Maybe some melancholy too.”

Angie admitted she felt all these things. “I
can’t hide them, Your Majesty. I miss my family…my kelke.”

Iltereedah seemed to understand. She
had made up her mind. “Longsee, reversing the
em’took
…this has never been tried
before?”

Longsee said, “It
has
been tried before, Affectionate Metah, with
test animals…baby tillet and pal’penk. It wasn’t successful…we
tried different approaches, different mixes of bacteria and
different sequences, different organisms and scans. We couldn’t get
the results we wanted.”

“But this has been tried before?”

“Yes, Affectionate Metah.”

Iltereedah now looked at Angie sternly.
“
Eekoti
Angie, I give my
approval to this effort. Longsee and his scientists will do what
they can. The results—“ she looked around at the gathering, pulsed
questions, doubts, some impatience with this pushy visitor named
Angie—“…the results will be what they are…what Shooki
allows.”

With that, Iltereedah darted off and her
prodsmen hustled to keep up. Like a single-minded organism, the
petitioners that had crowded around her moved along too, continuing
their supplication, their requests and begging.

Kloosee gently pulled Angie out of the way.
They pushed through the crowd and went back to the Kelktoo and its
wrecked labs.

Longsee and Kloosee took Angie aside. “This
is very risky, you know that. Are you sure you want to do
this?”

Angie looked at Chase. Only it wasn’t Chase.
What she saw looking at him was some kind of freak. She convinced
herself it wasn’t Chase.

“I can’t stay here, Chase. I don’t
belong here. You don’t either. But that’s for you to decide. Me…I
have to go home. And I want to be
me
again. I have to try.”

Longsee pulsed her thoroughly, reading and
studying the echoes inside. He decided she was telling the truth.
He turned to an assistant—his name was Klektor.

“Get the
em’took
bed out…put it there.” Longsee indicated
a recessed corner of the lab. “We’ll have to secure the door, to
keep debris from floating in.”

The coffin-like pod was wrestled into the lab
and put into place. Longsee reminded Angie of what the process
would involve. Behind him, Chase hovered nervously.

“After you lie down inside, contractile
fibers will unfurl and extend. They will envelop your body. The
fibers have sharp tips. You won’t feel it but the tips will inject
a potion. You will sleep. And when you wake up, the
em’took
will be undone. If all goes
well—“

Angie shuddered, reached out to touch Chase’s
fingers. “Ugh. If all goes well…I wish he hadn’t said that.”

“I think we understand,” Chase said. He
looked at Angie. Their fingertips touched for a long time. She lay
down inside gingerly.

“Just like going diving,” she said, laughing,
to keep from shivering.

Then, the
em’took
cocoon began squeezing her between its
wall segments, tightening its hold on her sides.

Angie made a face and lay back carefully
inside the pod, wriggling to get more comfortable.

For a long time, nothing happened. She dozed
off, then awoke hearing a faint whistle. She sniffed something, it
smelled like oranges. Then she noticed a faint mist issuing into
the pod.

This is like being in a
coffin
, she thought. The mist thickened. She didn’t
know it but the mist contained the first wave of programmed
bacteria. The bacteria would begin the
em’took
process, penetrating into her nose, her
mouth and eyes, burrowing into her skin, breaking down tissues and
bone and cartilage, rebuilding structures to reverse the original
modification.

She decided to listen again to her echopod
describe the procedure, just to give her brain something else to
focus on.

“The em’took begins with a genetic sequencing
and neural scan. After the sequencing and scan, the bacteria are
altered and ‘tuned’ to match the recipient. The sequencing and
scanning process is known as vish’tu, which in the Seomish language
means a journey or a roam about the sea. The name of the
modification process is also used in the Seomish language to mean
birth or living space, connoting a place of new birth.”

Of course, Angie didn’t know any of this. Her
echopod described the process in detail, but the voice was soft and
staticky and she wasn’t listening. Instead, she grew sleepy.

The last thing she remembered was an image of
her and Chase making out in his bass boat off Half Moon Cove That
and the dancing of waterspouts too numerous to count, all along the
horizon.

As Angie slept, the echopod continued its
explanation, since she had forgotten to turn the thing off. Beneath
the closed hatch of the pod, a gentle voice whispered what was
happening: