Chapter 8: Ann
The next morning was fortunately overcast and cooler, and was a much better day for traveling on the ice sheet for Mark and Walking Stone. The ice was a bit firmer and Walking Stone needed fewer cooling stops. Mark again led the way and avoided dangerous crevices. They were constantly on the watch for flies but encountered no more of them so far. Walking Stone surmised that the flies needed a warm-up period in the morning before they were prepared to fly. Nevertheless as a precaution Mark wore his uncomfortably warm fly-proof leggings and hooded jacket and carried his hatchet on his belt, while Walking Stone made sure to contain within himself a large quantity of water that could be converted to steam-driven ice-projectiles if necessary. By midmorning the pair reached well forested Green Mountain without incident.
Mark was happy to be in wonderful old growth forest: one of the last patches of forest that still survived the encroaching ice sheets. This wooded sanctuary was a favorite place for the Tribe to visit, even before the ice-sheets came. The Tribe and by treaty with them the Stone-Coats preserved this special place as a wildlife sanctuary, and it was the favorite summer camping spot for the Tribe.
Mark was pleased to soon discover that there were still large scattered patches of snow in the forest that Walking Stone could use as cooling stations, such that the pair would not be forced to remain near the ice sheet. That meant that they could camp in the forest spot that was long a favorite campsite for the Tribe. This and being in the forest brightened Mark's mood considerably, though he still grieved over the loss of Red Claw.
The two questers would have Green Mountain to themselves, for the Tribe would avoid the area until the spirit quest was concluded. In accordance with custom Mark had disclosed his intended general location to the Wolf Clan Leader, who in turn ensured that Tribe security patrols and others would avoid Green Mountain for the next two weeks. Since most questers chose Green Mountain as the place where they camped, and most questing happened in early July, restricted access to Green Mountain during early July was common for the Tribe. Mark and Walking Stone had camped here with Grandfather Running Bear in August the previous summer, in preparation for this quest. They hadn't crossed the dangerous ice-sheet on foot to get there however; the Tribe helicopter had flown them to and from the campgrounds, along with several other campers.
While the northern slopes of Green Mountain were now covered in ice year-long, the gentler sun-facing southern slope consisted of jagged rock outcroppings interspersed with patches of old-growth forest. The trees were mostly pine and fir, but the Tribe over thousands of years had ensured that a few patches of Redwood trees also thrived. In the coldest winters Ice Giants historically devastated the forests surrounding Giants' Rest Mountain, and the Tribe replanted those forests using seeds and saplings from Green Mountain. If the ice sheets spared the trees of Green Mountain over the next few hundred years, the Tribe planned to move back from the south to the Reservation and replenish Giants' Rest forests using surviving Green Mountain trees.
Such concerns were far from the mind of Mark Dawn Owl when he and his Stone-Coat companion reached the forests of Green Mountain. Mark was exceedingly weary from his journey but ravenously hungry. It had been almost a full day since his last meal. The teen planned to catch a batch of trout and cook them over a warming fire, stuff himself silly with the yummy fish, and then sleep for however long he felt like sleeping. In fact, eating and sleeping was his over-all plan for his entire quest on Green Mountain. It should be a wonderfully boring time, thought Mark, particularly for Walking Stone.
First things first, however. They had entered the hunting grounds of the Green Mountain wolf pack, and needed to contact them, particularly the alpha pair, Gray Shadow and Long Fang. In fact, Mark was surprised not to have been greeted by the wolves before this, both physically and psychically.
Mark sat down on a nice sunny rock outcropping, while nearby Walking Stone wallowed in a patch of slowly melting snow. Recalling the arduous training sessions that Grandmother Talking Owl had put him through, he closed his eyes and opened his mind to the life around him. Immediately he felt the presence of small animals nearby: moles, voles and others digging below the surface; birds, squirrels, and chipmunks in the trees. Oddly, he sensed no white-tail deer or wolves nearby, and rabbits, raccoons, and other mid-sized animals seemed to be staying in their dens; as if they were spooked by something.
"SHE:KON OKWAHO," he projected many times as a Mohawk greeting to the wolves, but received no answer. "HELLO WOLVES;" he repeated his message in English, but still sensed no reply. Could they all be too far away, or could they be staying mentally silent to aid their hunting? Or to keep from being hunted themselves?
Dressed in his sun-reflecting parka, Walking Stone soon joined his human companion and pointed out to him the possible reason why the forest was so quiet. "On that next higher rock outcropping I see flies," he stated quietly.
"Flint!" swore Mark quietly in return. Indeed through an opening in the tree cover on a particularly prominent rock formation fifty yards away he could see numerous motionless dark shapes. "How many?"
"Dozens, perhaps hundreds," replied the Stone-Coat. "They appear to be sunning themselves. Can you sense them psychically?"
Mark closed his eyes and cleared his mind of thoughts and physical sense-perceptions again. His ability to sense animal thoughts was at the gifted level even by Tribe standards, but his ability to isolate what he sensed to specific species and individuals was not yet fully developed. He couldn't isolate fly thoughts, but he did immediately sense something unexpected.
"There is another human nearby," he told Walking Stone. "Towards my favorite camping site." Mark led the way and his two-ton companion followed as quietly as he could, which was very noisy. Twigs and other objects were crushed and broken by his heavy foot-falls. The Stone-Coat was almost as annoyingly noisy and destructive as one of those 'all terrain vehicles' that the whites used. They had to pause twice to allow Walking Stone to wallow in snow patches. The campsite wasn't far but it was uphill and not an easy climb for the Stone-Coat.
As they got closer the campsite the human thoughts became stronger, but detecting human thought here should have been impossible. The Tribe warriors should have made sure that nobody else was on Green Mountain. But someone was here nevertheless. Mark could sense their pain, fear, and anger, but not cogent thoughts. It was a human female he sensed, a human in serious distress, but she was not a telepath.
In a clearing near the trout stream lay a small tent, almost exactly where Mark had planned to place his own sleeping pad and bag. The camouflage-patterned tent was not set up, but lay on the ground with a person-sized lump in it. Mark motioned Walking Stone to stay back while cautiously he approached closer. The tent was pegged down around its edge, but was mostly collapsed, as though no tent poles were being used. But it looked like someone was lying in the collapsed tent.
"Tanon'onhkani:se?" asked a woman's voice in very poorly pronounced Mohawk.
"Mark Dawn Owl," Mark answered her question. "Tiohrhen:sa sata:ti," he added, requesting that English be used.
"I'm afraid that was my only Mohawk," the woman replied. "I come in peace, by the way, and I'm unarmed."
"Me too, except for my knife and hatchet camping equipment. Who are you?"
"Ann. Ann Richards."
"The news lady from Channel Four Ann Richards?"
"You've heard of me?" she asked, clearly as astonished as Mark. The sound of a zipper could be heard, and the blonde haired and beautiful head of a woman wearing a baseball cap poked out of the tent. Attractive and in her mid-twenties, Mark indeed recognized her to be the popular Albany TV news reporter Ann Richards, despite seriously messed up hair poking out from under the baseball cap and total lack of makeup.
"Sure I've heard of you. Hey, what are you doing here?"
"Right now I'm hiding from giant flies and from your noisy bear friend."
"Bear friend?"
"Didn't I see a bear with you a minute ago?
Wearing a Space Blanket?"
It took a moment for Mark to realize that she must have caught a glimpse of Walking Stone in his parka.
"Just a friend of mine, Miss Richards. Nothing for you to worry about."
"I hope you have other friends nearby? Adult humans I hope?" When she first saw Mark she thought he was an adult; he was as tall as she was, at least. Now she realized he was a teenager no older than fifteen, at most.
"Nope. You and I are the only humans on Green Mountain, and you aren't supposed to be here. What are you doing here Miss Richards?"
"Call me Ann, Mark. I was collecting video footage for an important news story, until the damn flies came. They almost got me yesterday evening; I even broke a leg getting away from them. Nightfall and this tent saved me, I think. Then I heard you and your absurdly noisy bear coming and figured that I was done for. Thought if I played dead I'd stand a chance. I heard that bears are supposed to maybe leave you alone if you play dead. With my broken leg I can do a bang-up job of playing dead."
"This is Reservation land, Ann. You don't belong here."
"OK, young man, you win. You've captured me fair and square. I'm not normally a quitter, but between the flies and this leg, I know when I'm beat. Tell your Reservation cops to come and cart me away. To the nearest hospital, preferably, which happens to be in Albany, I believe."
"Impossible. Reservation Security obviously doesn't know you are here or you wouldn't be here, and since they know that I'm here they won't come here for a couple of weeks."
"But don't you have a radio or something, Mark? Mine is smashed and nobody knows I'm here."
"Sorry Ann. No radio or phone. No Indian smoke signals either. Nothing is available or permitted. I can't get in touch with the Tribe; this is my spirit quest."
"What's a spirit quest?"
"It's where a Tribe guy camps alone in the woods for a couple of weeks and gets all wise and mature. Beautiful blonde reporters with broken legs aren't supposed to figure into it, except maybe in our dreams."
"Really?" She couldn't imagine a society that placed a child into the wilderness alone on purpose. Where was the child welfare agency? There was a news story here! "But you aren't alone; you have a bear."
"We're spirit brothers; that's allowed. News reporters from off-Reservation? Not so much."
"Say, that could make an interesting little boy-meets-world side-story to my big blockbuster main story! A human interest thing!"
"No thanks. I haven't even figured out what to do about you, aside from the moral imperative of somehow saving your life I mean. What's your big blockbuster story, anyway?"
"Sorry, that's a secret. What makes you think that I need my life saved?"
"Let me see: woman with busted leg alone in a forest surrounded by frozen wasteland beset by giant flies. Sounds like a rescue sort of story to me. Maybe even a newsworthy one."
Mark heard the sound of breaking twigs behind him and turned to see Walking Stone moving towards them quickly.
"Holly crap, it's a baby Ice Giant!" Ann said, as she whipped a small camera out from somewhere and started taking photos. "Wearing a parka!"
"The flies come!" Walking Stone voiced, just as Mark began to hear their buzzing.
"And it talks too!" Ann exclaimed, as the Stone-Coat crunched to a halt before them.
"No time for long introductions, but this is Walking Stone," said Mark. "They'll rip that tent to shreds before long but we both might also fit under Walking Stone's fly-proof parka. Help me get it off of him and into the tent."
"What?" Ann asked, as she still tried to come to grips with the fact that a live and deadly looking Ice Giant was standing within arm's reach of her. She of course noted right away that it had huge claws on its oversized fingers and toes, and it probably had big teeth as well. All to tear flesh of course, she incorrectly assumed. The claws were actually for traction on ice and to grasp trees being harvested, and the big beaver-like teeth were to chew through tree trunks.
"Good plan, Mark," said the Stone-Coat, again without moving its mouth, as the boy began to pull apart the Velcro-fastened parka edges. "I will attempt to slow them down." A fly flew straight for Mark but was speared by a steam- powered ice projectile that shot out from Walking Stone's mouth with an audible popping sound. The fly dropped dead a dozen feet from the tent.
The good news was that one fly was dead but the bad news was that it drew the attention of dozens of others that had been swarming above, looking for anything that lived and could die to become fly food. The dead fly was immediately set upon and cannibalized by several other flies.
"With my broken leg I can't stand up to help you," Ann admitted, as she watched Mark help the small Ice Giant remove what looked like a Mylar parka. Plus she wasn't anxious to get within claw-reach of the Ice Giant. Dozens of questions gathered in her reporter-trained mind. What the hell was an Ice Giant doing in company with a human and wearing a parka?
"Pop!" again came a loud sound from the Ice Giant. Did it just spit something at a fly, Ann wondered? Another fly was suddenly lying dead near the first one. What was happening? "Whack!" Using a hatchet the boy skillfully knocked down a third fly that dove for her face. In his other hand he held the parka. "Open the tent further," he told her in a commanding tone of voice.
She was laying with her head out the tent opening. She reluctantly unzipped the tent doorway open further and the boy scrambled in next to her carrying the parka and hatchet, followed by a fat backpack that was pushed in by an enormous clawed Ice Giant hand.
"Close the tent," Mark ordered, though she was already doing that. The sound of flies was getting louder.
"What about your Ice Giant friend?" she asked.
"The flies can't hurt him," Mark explained. "Hopefully your tent will hold back the flies long enough for us to get situated under the parka. I'll spread it above us; maybe it will help obscure their senses if they're looking for food animals using infrared. Then we'll hold still and maybe they won't attack again right away. Wow! This is a really small tent!"
"I wasn't expecting company," Ann replied. "Try not to trample my broken leg, please!" She lay propped up on her left elbow, and held up the tent in the middle using her right hand as she eyed the teen interloper warily. Up close his youthfulness was even more apparent. She revised her estimate of his age down from fifteen to fourteen or even a mature thirteen. The kid didn't seem like an ax-murderer but she felt a bit relieved when she saw him attach his wicked looking hatchet to a loop on his backpack.
Mark's head and shoulders held up the tent near its entrance. He looked down at Ann and saw in the faint light that filtered through the tent fabric a shapely woman's body obscured by loose baggy sweatshirt and shorts, and shapely bare legs. But there were fly jaw sized gashes in the sweatshirt that might have reached through to skin, and several shallow but painful hooking fly leg bites. She lay atop a blood-spattered sleeping bag. Worse of all, her left leg was swollen, discolored, and slightly bent at mid-thigh where it should have been straight. Aluminum tent poles lay next to it, along with several long boot laces and shirts that had been torn into strips. "Your femur is broken," he noted, as he used one of the tent pole to help spread out the parka above them like a second internal tent.
"I noticed that. And it hurts like hell!"
"A broken femur is a very serious injury for humans," stated Walking Stone from outside the tent.
"You were going to set and splint it yourself?" Mark asked.
"No choice," said Ann. "I was going to try, once I gathered enough courage. I should have brought bourbon with me instead of water. It hurts like crazy even when I don't move it. When I do move it I damn near pass-out from the pain. I broke it not far from the tent or I wouldn't have made it here last night. When I did make it here I did pass out until a short time ago. What about the flies?"
"The flies don't seem to sense us here in the tent," Mark noted. "The sound of their buzzing isn't as loud."
"Your lack of movement and
use of the tent as a visual cover and the parka as an additional infrared shield is a good strategy," interjected Walking Stone from outside the tent. "I suggest you continue it. Most of the flies have already withdrawn to hunt elsewhere."
"They must mostly use sight into the infrared range to hunt," Mark said.
"Agreed," replied Walking Stone.
"Your Ice Giant friend is your spirit brother?" Ann asked.
"That's a long story that I don't think I'm free to tell, but I suppose that you should at least be properly introduced to him. His human given name is Walking Stone."
"So you said," noted Ann.
"And yours is Ann Richards," said Walking Stone. "I also recognized you from your newscasts."
"Ice Giants watch newscasts?" she asked.
"They've been doing that sort of thing since radio was invented," said Mark. "That's how they learned English."
"That's crazy!" Ann exclaimed. But was it?
"We are not supposed to speak of Stone-Coats with outsiders," said Mark. "That's a sort of the Prime Directive of the Tribe. But you have to be protected and cared for, so I don't know what else to do."
They waited silent and unmoving for several more minutes until there were no more buzzing sounds outside.
"The flies are all out of my sensing range for now," noted Walking Stone. "And we are in turn hopefully outside of their sensing range."
"Good. We'll have to set the leg then," said Mark.
"We?" Ann exclaimed. "You two? What do you know about setting broken legs?
"We received first aid training," said Mark. "We seem to be the closest things to medics available to you."
"Affirmative," added Walking Stone.
"What's a Stone-Coat?" Ann asked.
"We Mohawk use the name Stone-Coat for Walking Stone and his kin. That's the English translation, anyway. The Mohawk term is Atenenyarhu."
"I'll stick to English, I suspect that my tongue is too lazy to handle Mohawk," she said. "So you and Walking Stone want to set my broken leg? That's your plan?"
"Yes. I also have a medical tick in my pack," said Mark, "though I haven't yet been in contact with the local jants. Together they can reduce pain and greatly accelerate healing."
"OK, I know that the jants claim to be somehow associated with medical ticks," Ann said. "I'm not sure I want a tick attached to me anyway, but if I did would it be required that big ants get involved too? That would at least double the yuck factor! The very thought of intelligent ants creeps me out big-time."
"Certainly they are required. You don't even have to see them but jants need to be within a half-mile. A med-tick without jants is just a big blood-sucking bug."
That made sense with news stories she had heard. She had never personally seen real jants or ticks herself though; it was too cold around Albany nowadays for them to thrive. Sick people left Albany for points south where med-ticks were available. Finding med-ticks and jants here in the frozen wastelands of the Adirondacks was pretty astonishing. "So did you bring some jants with you on your quest too?"
"I can't carry a whole jant colony around, especially in places where they might get frozen! Besides, there's already a modest colony here on Green Mountain. Not as many as at Giants' Rest but enough for sentience and medical aid. I've contacted them and they are already gearing up to help."
"A colony? You need a whole colony?"
"Of course. You don't know a lot about some very basic practical things, do you?"
"I thought that I did," Ann countered. "Apparently I don't. Say, how did you contact them for their help?"
"Telepathically, of course," Mark replied.
"Telepathically?" Ann asked. Was the kid loony?
"Certainly," said Mark. "Walking Stone: do you have medical information about fixing human broken legs?"
"Yes," the Stone-Coat replied. "I can act as a consultant on leg setting and splinting, but I recommend that you perform the physical acts required yourself, Mark. I could too easily break additional human bones accidently."
"Agreed," said Mark. It will also have to be done outside the tent; or half-way out at least. It's too dark inside."
"But the flies!" said Ann.
"We'll just have to watch out for flies," said Mark, as he zipped open the tent.
"I will watch for them," reassured Walking Stone.
Through the open tent doorway Ann stared open-mouthed up at Walking Stone. Standing in the tree-filtered partial sun without his parka, his gem-constructed body was for the first time fully displayed to her. "He's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen in my life! He seems to be made of diamonds!"
"He is largely made of diamonds. His thinking parts are mostly silicone-based, but his scales and claws are diamond; that's why the Tribe calls them Stone-Coats. Nowadays we also apply the European term Ice Giants to the big ones. But just as at least three dozen types of chemical elements are essential for humans, Stone Coats needs are similarly complex."
"Yes, like warm life forms such as yourselves we internally make use of dozens of substances," added Walking Stone. "We use carbon readily in all of its basic forms, including diamond. We use water, but it is not as essential for us as it is for you."
"My Dad is a scientist. He says we are essentially water balloons," said Mark. "Sea water, of course."
"And how does an Ice Giant talk with a closed mouth," Ann asked.
"He talks using his ears," explained Mark, as though that made all the sense in the world. "My Dad suggested that basic design to them decades ago. It isn't as efficient for them as digital communications but we humans don't have digital systems within ourselves. I think that together we can lift you out on your sleeping bag. I'll get the leg end and Walking Stone can lift each corner of the end near your head."
Ann held her breath as the Stone-Coat reached down and with huge claw-tipped fingers grasped two corners of her sleeping bag and gently lifted in concert with Mark.
"Ahhh," she moaned in pain as towards Mark's end of the sleeping bag her broken leg shifted slightly.
"Sorry about that," Mark apologized. "I'm not as strong as a Stone-Coat."
"APPLY THE TICK AND WE CAN ESSENTIALLY SEDATE HER," said a voice in Mark's head. It was the local jant colony fully coming 'on line' at last, just in time. Fortunately their colony was only a hundred yards away and was fully active. "WE ARE AUTHORIZED TO HELP THE HUMAN FEMALE INCLUDING COMMUNICATIONS WITH YOU TO DO SO," the jants further explained. "NOTE HOWEVER THAT IN KEEPING WITH QUEST RULES DISCUSSED WITH YOUR TRIBE WE WILL REFRAIN FROM RELAYING SPECIFIC INFORMATION ABOUT YOU TO GIANTS' REST."
"UNDERSTOOD," Mark replied to them. He reached into his backpack and retrieved a small wooden box. After opening it, he gently retrieved a three-inch long tick, easily the most horrible thing Ann had ever seen, except maybe for giant flies. "Turn over a bit and I'll put it on your back," he said.
"No damn way," she said. "I don't trust those things!"
"Trust that we of the Tribe know more about ticks and jants than outsiders do," Mark reassured her. "The jants will monitor the tick and I will monitor the jants. I'll let you know what's happening and what they are doing every step of the way. You don't have to trust the bugs; just trust me."
"But it's a damn yucky bug!" A couple of years she had done a story on parasites that were being spread throughout the world due to climate change and other interrelated factors. There were dozens of species of worms, fly larva, flies, mites, micro-organisms, and other nasty critters that infected many millions of people: still mostly in third-world countries but increasingly in even the United States. Critters that lived in the gut or under skin or in the brain. Critters that gave Ann nightmares.
"Scientists around the world have studied med-ticks for decades now and have always found them to be free of parasites, pathogens, and so forth. Besides, after you're healed we will remove it, I promise. Come on; we don't have time for this! The flies could return at any time, and Walking Stone will be reduced to steam power in twenty
or thirty minutes, tops. We have to set that leg and heal it as soon as possible. No other choice is available."
"How could you possibly monitor what's going on?"
"I'll listen to their thoughts," Mark explained.
"Listen to the thoughts of the tick and the jants that control it?" Ann asked.
"Sure. I've been able to do that for years. My Grandma can communicate with practically anything through their thoughts and she taught me. Here look! I'll put the tick down here on the tent flap and have the jants instruct it to do something unusual." He sat the tick down on the tent flap facing Ann.
Ann had seen videos of medical ticks, but she had never seen one up-close and personal. Sure, really sick people used them; and they had cured many millions of people of many ailments including even cancer, but nobody seemed to know how they did it, and fortunately she had never needed one. This one was dark brown and spotted and looked deceptively like a big brown beetle, but it had eight legs like its cousins the spiders, instead of six: eight insect-like legs that she would soon feel walking down her back. Worst of all it had a hideous buggy head with bug-eyes and some kind of long pointy mouth thing that it would stick into her spine. "Is it alive?" she asked. It's not even moving."
"It's fine. I'll have it wave its right foreleg at you."
Moments later the tick raised its right front leg and waved it.
"How did that happen? Did it hear us talking?"
"No, jants and ticks don't have ears or voices; they're telepathic. I projected my thoughts to the jants and they commanded the tick. The tick is a medical probe and miniature biological laboratory while the jants act as the medical doctors that control it.
Creepy! Using telepathy? She still didn't know if she could believe that! If she saw the tick dance a jig maybe she still wouldn't believe it. But though Ann had just met this kid, she already liked him and had growing confidence and trust in him. He was very mature for his age and obviously very intelligent. Plus she was already learning so much about Ice Giants and jants and the mysterious Giants' Rest Mohawk Tribe that her head was spinning. There was a huge story here, there had to be.
Plus the kid was right, she had no choice. There was no way she would be able to fix herself up well enough to get out of this jam herself. Plus she was so dizzy from pain she could hardly think straight. She had to surrender her care to the kid and his talking diamond studded friend, she had no choice. "OK, Mark, deal; and thanks in advance. What do I need to do?"
"Not much at all, we're going to do most of the work while you relax. Your body will do most of the heavy lifting for your healing but at a subconscious level that you don't need to worry about. Hold yourself up on your elbow like you were doing before and let's talk together about other things while the tick crawls down your back."
"Sweet Jesus!" she exclaimed, when Mark placed the enormous tick on the shoulder of her sweatshirt and she could feel it crawl slowly towards her neck.
"It won't hurt you," Mark reassured her; "just think of other things. Like why are you here now and not doing newscasts in Albany?"
Albany. Her safe, snug, cluttered little office in Albany seemed like a million miles away. "I've taken an extended break from the studio to work a big story. How long has your Tribe known about Stone-Coats?"
"A very, very long time." Since the last ice age over ten thousand years ago he didn't tell her, as had been confirmed by well calibrated radiocarbon-dating of Tribe artifacts. "Many years."
"And they are friendly?" Ann asked.
"Lately, yes; we are at peace and do very important things for each other."
"We have a treaty between us by which we mutually benefit," added Walking Stone, as he stood watching.
"Why do their trails across the ice lead to Giants' Rest Mountain?" Ann asked.
"That's where they have lived and thrived for a very long time," explained Mark. "Look, let's talk about something else, OK? How did you get here?"
"I paraglided from a low-flying drone airplane yesterday morning at first light."
"So that means you can't get back the way you came. How were you going to get off this Reservation?"
"I was going to radio a buddy for a helicopter pick-up in about a week, assuming I had my story all wrapped up."
"This close to the Reservation a helicopter intrusion would be easily detected. The Reservation is a state and federally recognized no-fly zone. The Tribe could even shoot it down."
"Not if I the pick-up point is beyond the next mountain and they fly in super low. But now it's not happening anyway; my radio is busted and nobody even knows that I'm here."
"Except for me and Walking Stone, and I'm duty bound to turn you in to Tribal Security. For the record I am placing you under citizen's arrest right now."
"What? You can't do that!"
"By federal law I can and have."
"You're pretty pushy for a kid."
"And you're pretty pushy for a trespassing lawbreaker with a broken leg stranded in a frozen wilderness infested with giant flies."
Ann grinned. "I suppose that I am, Mark. OK then, for the record I'm your prisoner, which makes you legally responsible for my welfare, by the way. I demand medical care! When is your tick going to get to work?"
"It already has. Your leg should be starting to feel numb."
"What? Already?" She had been so deeply engaged in talking with Mark that she didn't even notice her pain disappear, but he was right! The pain was gone!
"Already. Other than the broken leg you are in excellent condition, the jants report."
"Good. Will they heal my leg now?"
"After I set the bone they will have the tick get your body to focus on healing itself. Mostly they control your neural and other body networks to get your own body to do things that your body already sort of knows how to do. But Walking Stone and I will do some things that they can't do, just like would be done in a real hospital. For instance Waking Stone will now x-ray your leg as I set it."
"How?"
"Very carefully," Mark replied.
Walking Stone stood next to the broken leg and worked one of his huge feet into the forest moss-covered soil until it was nearly flush with ground level, than Mark gently shifted Ann's broken leg to lie atop it.
"Hey! That didn't hurt at all!" Ann marveled.
"So far so good," noted Mark. "That's the med-tick doing its job."
Walking Stone held the palm of one of his huge hands over the leg to commence x-ray emissions that were received by the foot. A crude image of the bone beak appeared in one of the Stone-Coat's eyes for viewing by Mark. Walking stone moved his hand slightly, changing the angle of incidence and resulting in a sharp 3-D image. The break was clearly shown.
"Luckily it looks close to being set already," Mark announced.
"Yes," agreed Walking Stone; "a seven degree twist and closing of a three millimeter gap will set it. Follow the arrows on my diagram."
Mark followed directions as Walking Stone talked him through the procedure. In only a few minutes they were done. "Continue to hold absolutely still and the cast will be made, he said. Sticks and leaves?" He asked the Stone-Coat.
"Affirmative," said Walking Stone.
"What the hell is going on now?" Ann asked, as Mark gently began to pile leaves and small sticks all over the leg. Sticks and leaves? Was this some sort of ancient Indian treatment? Next would he dump mud on her or something?
"You're doing great," said Mark. "The leg is in place and Walking Stone will fabricate a cast for it using organic carbon rich sticks and leaves. This will take only a few minutes."
"Graphene reinforced diamond pins are recommended at the break by the jants," Mark announced. Five of them with specification 3j. Can you make them, Walking Stone?"
"Yes, in approximately one minute. I have the necessary elements held in reserve. I suggest you lay the pins on the patient's skin before I begin the cast, as that will speed their absorption and application."
"Roger that," said
Mark, as he gently cleared the leaves and sticks from a small area of Ann's leg directly over the break.
"What's happing now?" Ann asked.
"They're going to insert pins into the bone to strengthen the mend," explained Mark.
"Have they done that before?"
"Yes they tell me that they have done this exact thing successfully several times in Florida and Mississippi," said Mark.
"But these local bugs never did it?"
"Jants accurately share thoughts and memories. It's almost the same thing as doing it themselves. Individual Jants are short-lived insects. They have to use their long term hive level memories to do practically everything."
"Get the pins from my mouth now and place them at the fracture," instructed Walking Stone.
Mark retrieved the pins from the lips of the Stone Coat. They weren't as long as toothpicks but they were thicker, and had an irregular shape and surface. He lay them down gently on Ann's swollen leg, where they seemed to immediately melt into the numb swollen skin of the leg. "The rest is up to the jants and the tick," he noted. "Amazingly enough they can have your body move small objects through it. The pins will soon be permanent parts of your leg. Meanwhile Walking Stone will form the cast. It will need to extend for the entire length of the leg including your foot."
"That's going to itch like crazy I bet!" she exclaimed.
"Not with the tick it won't," Mark vowed.
From the palm of the hand that Walking Stone held above her leg Ann saw a wispy cloud of nearly invisible threads descend onto the pile of leaves and sticks that Mark had spread over her leg. The pile of organic materials began to rapidly dissolve and reconsolidate into clear thin shoots and twists of what appeared to be fine fabric.
"That's millions of nanotubes that essentially eat away the organics and convert them into a cast," explained Mark. "The cast will be mostly carbon; a combination of two-dimensional graphene structures and three dimensional diamond fiber that will be much stronger than your original leg."
"I am programming enough sensors and intelligence into it for it to self-adjust to the expected reduction in swelling," said Walking Stone, "as well as short-range communications to allow me to monitor it."
"A smart diamond leg cast!" Ann marveled. Now that the pain was gone she could think clearer.
"While the ticks and jants are masters of healing life, the Stone-Coats are masters of minerals and electronics," said Mark. "They can manipulate crystal structures to make practically anything they want to."
"Maybe that explains persistent rumors of a diamond mine at Giants' Rest Mountain," said Ann.
"Someone thinks that the Tribe actually digs caves to find diamonds?"
"The Mohawk have been selling flawless diamonds all over the East Coast for decades," Ann said. "I helped break that story."
"I remember that silly story," said Mark. "I can't imagine having to dig a mine just to get diamonds, but my dad says that humans off the Reservation don't have Stone-Coats to make things like that for them. I can understand why you came up with the diamond mine idea."
"True enough," said Ann. "Why dig for diamonds if you have Ice Giants to make them for you?" This wasn't just a story, it was a blockbuster series! Diamond making Ice Giants! Telepathy! Tribe secrets! It was overwhelming!
"The cast is complete," announced Walking Stone.
Mark relayed that information to the jants and got status back from them in return. "THE PINS ARE IN PLACE AND ATTACHED BUT THE BROKEN BONE WILL TAKE SEVERAL DAYS TO FULLY STRENGTHEN," said the jants. "LIMITED SELF-MOTION IS POSSIBLE BUT SHOULD BE DONE ONLY IF NECESSARY."
"A potty break is absolutely necessary very soon," Ann informed Mark, after he explained her status. "Then food and sleep, I think, if possible."
"Let Walking Stone cool off for a few minutes and then he can carry you to a nearby potty site," said Mark.
"Cool off?" Ann asked.
"He's damn close to needing to use steam locomotion already. He has to maintain a temperature near freezing for his hydraulic locomotion to function efficiently."
Walking Stone slowly moved to a nearby bank of snow and collapsed into the middle of it, using his arms to mound snow over himself until only part of his head protruded above snow level. It wasn't as cold as the interior of a glacier or a cooling station, but it did the job.
"They have to stay cold to move?" Ann asked.
"Mostly. Not wearing the parka cuts in half how long he can go before needing to cool off that way."
"While he does that, could you get me some food from my tent, Mark?" Ann asked. "I haven't eaten for hours."
"Right," Mark agreed. He fetched a sandwich and canteen from the tent and handed it to her.
"Hey!" Ann said, as she opened the sandwich bag, releasing a smell of fresh bread and mustard that caused Mark's eyes to water and empty stomach to quake. "Are you hungry too? You look hungry! Have half of my sandwich." She held out half of her sandwich to him and was very surprised when he refused and pulled away, shaking his head.
"I don't think that's allowed," he explained. "Quest rules. I have to find my own food. Walking Stone can help, but no other humans or Stone-Coats can."
"Don't be silly!" Ann insisted, as she held the sandwich out to him again. "I have a week's worth of food packed. Can't we do a reciprocity sort of deal? Lunch on me now and dinner on you later? This is damn good chicken, and the last I have. It's all freeze dried meals-ready-to-eat after this sandwich."
"I don't think so," Mark again refused. "But thanks anyway. Besides, you'll need the nourishment to heal."
"When was your last meal?" she asked, as she ate.
"Only a day or so ago. Flies ate my one day supply of food. Right now I have only my vitamin tablets and water."
"How did you plan to find food?"
"Besides taking multiple vitamins I planned on fishing for trout and on having an owl friend and wolf friends to help me hunt, but none of that seems very likely right now." He told her about not being able to contact the wolves and about the tragic loss of Red Claw.
"I'm sorry, Mark," Ann responded. "But you can still fish, can't you?"
"I don't see how. The stream is too far. We would all be too exposed to fly attack."
"But you need to eat so you need to fish," insisted Ann. "We'll move the tent closer to the stream so you can get to it quicker in event of attack. I'll rest in the tent and heal while you fish and Walking Stone stands guard."
"I think that Walking Stone and I are supposed to plan our quest," Mark objected.
"So what's YOUR plan young Chief?"
"What you said," he admitted, as he started to pull-up tent stakes.
****