Chapter 17
Seome
The Northern Ponk’el Sea
Time: 767.9, Epoch of Tekpotu
Halfway to Kinlok Island, the Omtorish expedition was set upon by a scout force from Ponk’et. The attack came on the fourth day, well within the holy waters of the Pillars of Shooki, and it came without warning, from a convoluted series of hills and ravines known as the T’kel Ridge that fronted the great shrine along the northern Ponk’el Sea.
Such violence inside the holy waters in the very shadow of the Pillars was considered the worst apostasy that could be imagined.
The Pillars of Shooki lay at the very top of the world. Surrounded by vast sheets of floating ice, far to the north of the Ponk’el Sea, the shrine sat at the edge of the polar ice cap itself. A swift but narrow current, the Pomt’or, rushed by some two hundred beats to the south, curving across the bleak Northern Hemisphere until it split apart near Kinlok Island.
The Pomt’or was the northern arm of the Pom’tel, and it was the only current that directly approached the Pillars. To get there meant a long tedious trip through the eastern Orkn’tel. The waters there were dense and sluggish, stagnant at the equator, and brimming with foul-tasting and dangerous mah’jeet fields, so thick in patches that no kip’t could get through without clogging its jets. But there was no quicker way to Kinlok Island.
The scout force consisted of twenty Ponkti prodsmen, in formation. They quickly surrounded the small kip’t formation and closed in.
Kloosee turned the kip’t nose on to the closest prodsmen. He accelerated and tried to ram his way through. But the prodsmen were quick and skirted the speeding sleds. Several prodsmen slashed at the kip’t as it went by and the electric charge shot through the sled’s frame. In an instant, Kloosee was stunned into a stupor, Chase too. Pakma, only slightly injured, managed to control the sled and brought them to a halt just before smashing into the side of a cliff.
In moments, the Omtorish had emerged from their sleds and engaged the Ponkti force. Chase shook off the worst effects of the shock.
“Don’t you have weapons?” he yelled into his echopod.
Kloosee produced a ceremonial scimitar from the back of their sled. Another kip’t, this one piloted by an Academy scholar named Lohket had an older prod, one unused for several mah, barely full of charge. He appeared out of the murk, brandishing the thing as if were a seamother’s beak.
“We have these!” Kloosee yelled back.
That’s when Chase figured they were in trouble. “Try to distract them—“ he told Kloosee. “I’ll circle around, see if I can get behind them.”
Kloosee wasn’t buying it. “Eekoti Chase…there are too many…you can’t—“
But Chase was already gone. Kloosee feared for the eekoti’s life. There was no way the human could expect to out-maneuver a squad of ten, maybe more Ponkti prodsmen. It’s was madness. It was suicide. But he had no choice. Kloosee motioned for Lohket and the others to charge at the Ponkti, swinging what they had, in an attempt to give Chase a chance.
They closed the distance in seconds and the melee erupted in a shower of prod zaps and thrashing tails and swinging armfins. The water boiled with fury and combat, made worse by a steady rain of ice shards and chips drifting down from bergs and ice floes at the surface.
Chase found himself on the other side of a large stalactite of ice projecting down from above. An idea suddenly came to him: the ice itself. It was hard. It was sharp. If he could just break off a few pieces…they’d make great weapons themselves.
He tugged and pulled on the shards, until at last one broke off, jagged and cocked. Just in time, he swung around, backpedaling to avoid the Ponkti prod which flashed out and nearly swiped against him.
Can’t let that touch me.
He lunged and managed to spear the side of the Ponkti attacker, drawing a stream of blood. The Ponkti withdrew, recoiled and came at Chase again.
They struggled for leverage. The Ponkti was bigger, quicker, more efficient at moving. But Chase was determined and for each slash of the prod, he managed to make a lunge and strike the larger attacker. Soon, the water was stained with blood and Chase was beginning to find more and more openings. Some of the schoolyard brawls he’d joined in at school came back to him.
Then there was a deafening explosion. The shock wave came like a slap in the head and punch to the gut. Chase reeled, stunned, and found himself momentarily drifting, his head spinning, his ears throbbing. He caught a glimpse of his Ponkti adversary and saw a huge gray mass, barely moving, equally dazed.
Moments later, both combatants had recovered enough to regain the fight. The Ponkti swiped and thrashed with the prod and once managed to brush Chase’s scaly skin. The shock jolted him but somehow, he managed to recover. Just as he was about to lunge again, another explosion thundered in the water, slapping them both with fists of shock waves. Chase and his assailant both went reeling.
That’s when Chase saw what he was sure was a dream…materializing out of the ice-choked debris. An apparition floated before them, tiny and serene, almost petite. Pure white skin and delicate fins that seemed more like tissue. Her beak was knobbed at the point and Chase sensed tingling again—like the k’orpuh, like the Ponkti prod, clearly she carried voltage.
In her tiny hands, she held a small fist-shaped object, oval, with projections at each end. The apparition shook the object and another deafening explosion came, a boil of bubbles and froth and heaving shock waves that flattened Chase and drove him deeper. The Ponkti prodsman was nowhere in sight.
Kloosee’s voice came stuttering over his echopod.
“Eekoti Chase…back away quickly! It’s one of the priestesses. One of the mekli—let go of your weapon--“
The Ponkti had already done likewise, warily drifting at the outer edge of visibility. Chase was dimly aware that the entire fight had stopped and all the fighters were coiled and poised, but no one made any movement.
Kloosee drifted up beside him and physically dragged Chase away, relieving his fingers of the ice daggers he had fashioned. .
His echopod chirped. “This is one of mekli priestesses. We’re inside the holy waters…the Pillars of Shooki. The mekli won’t let the fight continue…we’ve done a terrible thing.”
Chase was still recovering his senses. His ears rang like a bell. “Didn’t they start it?”
“It doesn’t matter. Now the mekli have put a stop to the fight. We’ll have to accompany her…make recompense to Shooki. Look…they’re all around us.”
And Chase saw that Kloosee was right. Dozens of the whitish figures hovered above, below, all around them, each bearing the strange oval suppressors.
“They can detonate the water,” Kloosee explained. “It’s a chemical reaction…closely guarded by the mekli. They enforce the shoo’kel here. The mekli will let nothing disturb these waters. Only the most serene are permitted.”
“But why—“ Chase had about a million questions. “The other guys attacked us—“
But the circle of mekli was already closing in on them, herding both Ponkti, Omtorish and Chase into a tighter group. Kloosee didn’t object. The Ponkti seemed resigned. Chase decided it was expedient to go along.
“Where are they taking us?” he asked Kloosee.
Kloosee seemed a bit nervous. Something came through Chase’s echopod that didn’t translate. Then: “Inside the Pillars, I think.”
“What’s going to happen to us?”
“I don’t know.”
And with that, the circle of mekli priestesses, with their grenades and a line of fearsome-looking spearfish behind them, nudged their captives into motion. Above them, the ice floes groaned and screeched as the bergs bumped against each other. And beyond all of it, the Uman sound droned on.
Chase found the pace easy enough to keep up with, despite his scaly suit and webbed feet. The ice pack played strange tricks with the light. It
coalesced in patches, forming apparitions that frightened and confused them at the same time. Schools of scapet and tooket swirled in the twilight. Thick clouds of sediment rolled along the bottom, obscuring everything.
And the huge floes rained chunks of ice down on them from above.
The captives bore on for what seemed like hours. The sameness was monotony, agony, even misery. They seemed stuck on the same course, wedded by sheer exhausted numbness to a heading that never changed. Beat after beat of frozen tubegrass and ice mounds. Unending hail from above. Nothing living, save for themselves. Only ice and ice and more ice: ice kels, ice kip’ts, ice tillet, ice ompods. The image of it burned in their minds, searing their vision into a gray-white void. For a brief instant, Chase felt himself falling, as if a whirlpool had reached out and grabbed him. He welcomed the giddiness gladly—it was something he could still feel. It washed over him like the great currents themselves, strong, overwhelming, a wonderfully delicious feeling of helplessness.
And then, there it was.
The berg was so large that it blocked a clear view of anything beyond, refracting most of what little light there was off its chalky white slopes. But even with that, the presence of a vast structure, dense and hard, could be felt.
They slowed their approach and came into the holy waters of the Voice with hushed awe. Chase watched the reactions of both the Ponkti and Pakma and Kloosee and the rest of the Omtorish. Guess I’d better act the same way. The Pillars rose up out of the silted bottomland like legs of rock. Cruising near the seafloor, the captives and their guards circled the Pillars completely, gulping in the scented waters voraciously. There seemed to be no way in. After several circuits, they halted and settled in a clump of tubegrass half a beat away.
The mekli seemed to be waiting for something, perhaps a signal.
Then it came. High on the side of the nearest Pillar, a ring of bubbles swirled around the edge. The stream was emanating from a narrow elliptical crevice. One of the mekli separated herself from their guard detail and poked her beak into the crevice.
In that moment, powered by some device Chase couldn’t see, the entire side of the Pillar grated and groaned and started moving to one side. The mekli entered. The captives were herded inside after her.
Kloosee pulsed gently. He had never been here before. Inside, steep ramparts scattered echoes in all directions. Chase hung close by, watching his friend’s amazed reaction. A complex network of chapels, crypts, cells, catacombs and other chambers would be dimly sensed. Above the ramparts, heavy bedrock foundations loomed like a crest, tapering out of sight as they extended upward into the Pillars. It was a tight and uncomfortable wriggle to get inside. Chase hesitated, then squeezed through.
They were in a tiny cave, sectioned by a post in the middle that seemed to have buckled. It was dark—the only light came from glowfish trained to float through the corridors in set patterns, casting their spectral copper light in diffuse ovals in the bare stone walls. They went half a beat or so, then came to an intersection. More corridors merged in the crossing, leading out in every direction, above, below, and beside them.
“Where are they taking us?” Chase whispered into his echopod.
Kloosee’s voice came back hushed, strained. “The Judging Chambers, I suppose. Be quiet.”
They could have taken any of the corridors, but the mekli leading the convoy chose one passageway that angled off on the other side of the post. It was soon apparent that the corridor wasn’t really a corridor at all, rather more like a tunnel, low and cramped. Chase could barely kick his legs. It was quite uncomfortable—he could hear someone behind, maybe one of the Ponkti, grumbling at the effort, hard even to get a full breath in such close confines, but the discomfort was alleviated somewhat by a savory blend of scents that filtered through the waters, an amalgam of smells that would have really been delightful if he had been able to breathe more deeply.
Chase tried a pulse—it sounded more like a bad cough, earning a glare from several of the mekli—and found that the tunnel widened a few beats ahead. There was more light too—glowfish he was sure, since the mekli seemed to abhor anything artificial inside the Pillars. But it was pitch black in the tunnel. Almost like a burrow, hollowed out down through uncounted spans of time, the tunnel sides had been worn completely smooth, for which they were all thankful. Otherwise, they would have skinned themselves badly.
Chase heard Pakma’s voice on his echopod. “The water is so still,” she said.
Kloosee agreed. “It must be the shape of the chamber…pulse how it damps out any currents.” He thrashed an armfin to disturb the water. Sure enough, the waves died out in seconds. The chamber crossing was designed to maintain an imperturbable tranquility.
Indeed, the Pillars pulsed much like a womb. Pakma was the first to notice that and say it. All her life, Pakma had heard stories from pilgrims about the serenity of the place, the warmth, the concord, the strong bond of Ke’shoo that it made with all comers. Nothing was unaffected. That explained the constricted spaces and the pleasant scents: the mekli had re-created the ancient womb of the cave cities here. Like Old Kengtoo, they had preserved in sharp redolence the scents of the first days, down to the most ethereal details. The Pillars mirrored and embodied the timeless aspirations of all Seomish: Ke’shoo and Ke’lee and Shoo’kel, the inward eye blind to anything beyond the immediate concerns of family and kel.
Their mekli guard detail herded them on, through one maze after another, indifferent to the discomforts of the trek. The lead priestess could be heard swooshing well ahead of them, leading them deeper and deeper into the Pillars, into the Quarter of Melodies, where the shape of the caves altered the quality of their sound. There seemed to Chase to be no meter to it, only the vaguest sort of melancholy, yet the water whispered with definite musical tones. Wonder what the Croc Boys would make of this place as a venue? he thought. The tunnels had now widened the deeper they went into the Pillars, making it easier for him to keep up with everybody else.
They traveled an endless and confusing course through the tunnels; all the time, it seemed to Chase, they were ascending. On occasion, the faintest, fleeting tinkle of notes rippled by them, like delicate chimes being gently tapped. There would be voices too, or what seemed like voices, whispers just beyond hearing, though Chase sometimes thought it was no more than the ever-present swish of the water. They were herded through fairly large caverns as they ascended, caverns dimly lit with glowfish and among the shadows, Chase could make out faces: forlorn, sepulchral, and weary.
“Pilgrims, resting after their journey here,” Kloosee told him.
Through narrow tunnels and rock-hewn chambers, the guards and the convoy followed the mekli. Kloosee knew well that the Pillars of Shooki did not stop at the surface; they extended well beyond, far into the Notwater. They were still ascending, traveling the convoluted labyrinth of corridors, occasionally coming upon larger caves and crypts, and he wondered. How far would they go?
Tradition had always said the Judging Chambers were near the pinnacle of the Pillars.
The mekli brought them to the edge of a cliff, at the end of one of the tunnels. Even as they approached, they could pulse through the opening that the cavern beyond was deep and wide, and filled with fast-rising columns of water. It was at the core of one of the Pillars, hollow from its bedrock foundations to its majestic pinnacle high above the surface.
The mekli priestess then lunged from the cliff and caught one of the streams. It whisked her away from the opening and carried her upward. She soon vanished beyond an overhanging ledge.
Prodded by the guards, one by one, the Ponkti and the Omtorish captives launched themselves into the midst of the currents.
The water was both brisk and exhilarating. It carried them rapidly along, past other landings and portals, sweeping them toward the summit of the Pillar. Kloosee and Pakma both tried pulsing in the direction they were heading—seven f
ull beats later, the first echoes returned. A tiny ring of white light capped the heights.
The mekli was somewhere above them, no more than a blip in the pulse. Her tail was dimly silhouetted against the brighter background. Below them, the trunk of the cavern spread out into the vast hills from which the Pillars had been formed. The walls beneath the bottommost shelf of landings widened to an immense grotto, the floor of which was covered in exquisitely sculpted stalagmites.
But as they rose further, the radiance from the top washed out all other detail.
A blinding white blaze enveloped them. The light of Notwater, Kloosee realized. Painful, penetrating, it cascaded down and streaked the water with shafts of luminous blue-green. Kloosee clutched at his eyes; Chase did likewise. They throbbed from the exposure and he found they were useless. Opening them, he saw only a shimmering glow.
He pulsed and found the top of the tower near, a beat or so away. Even as he tried to sort out the confusing echoes, the lifting current slacked off and they drifted aimlessly for a minute, barely touched by the fringe of the current. Other currents dispersed here too; it was a gathering point for entry to the Echopods.
Another tunnel, this one smooth like a pipe, bent around in a wide sweeping curve. They were wriggling straight up and the waters murmured to them with a mischievous stealth. Voices, hushed and furtive, sprinkled the pauses in their own swishing. The tunnel straightened, leveled out and the mekli slowed down, whispering for silence from the captives and guards. Now the voices were clearer, sharper. The Echopods. Distinct accents. Inflections. Someone trilling, arguing. A bass reply, deep and ponderous. An aria. A flurry of oratory, crisp and pointed.
The passageway widened abruptly and suddenly, the voices were everywhere, swelling in unison, falling away, crackling and whistling, a chorus softly floating. In the next moment, the chorus faded and the voices rose again in argument, thousands of them, strident yet gentle, firmly commanding, clashing, conflicting, filling the Chamber with incessant chatter. Kloosee felt Chase and Pakma bump him behind. He opened his eyes.
The glow was dazzling, resplendent in shades of amber, gray and white. It is Notwater, Kloosee breathed. The light streamed into the Chamber from all sides, as if the water itself were ablaze. Despite the intensity, Kloosee held his eyes open to see and wonder.
The Chamber itself was oblong. Panels of some transparent substance wrapped the walls. The floor was arrayed with rows of cells, each of which contained one echopod. More cells lined the walls between the panels. Open holdpods swayed from the ceiling, their bowls carrying scentbulbs. Om’pshoo was the scent predominating, aromatic and sweet. That brought a smile to Pakma. She had worked with this scent before. The waters were litor’kel and shoo’kel, and the Voice of the Echopods steadfast. Shooki’s Voice.
But it was what he saw through the transparent walls that made Kloosee tremble.
They were now above the surface, in this Chamber of Echopods, thrust like a sharp blade right into the very heart of the Notwater. Though the glow of the day was fierce, Kloosee blinked in amazement at the view. Even Chase seemed speechless at the sight before them. Beside them, Pakma and other Omtorish and Ponkti stared in mute fascination. Kloosee had seen Notwater before, the first time was the Circling, when as a midling he had made the great voyage of passage and snuck up to the surface for a peek. He thought himself accustomed to its mutable and marvelous scenery. But this—the Pillars of Shooki revealed aspects of that dry and harsh world he could never have imagined.
All about the Pillars, the bleak and desolate white of the polar icecap stretched to infinity. A solid flat plate, littered with mounds and hillocks and wind-shaped edges, frozen and silent. Above, a hoary sheet of gray clouds scudded by. Kloosee gasped at the sight while Pakma gouged at her eyes. Something moved. The hillocks had legs—a head—a spiked tail—
“Puk’lek,” Pakma whispered.
It was true. The entire convoy stared in wonder as hundreds of seamothers, half-buried in snow, reared themselves and shook the powder off their backs. As one, they marched past the Pillars, honking, bellowing loudly, heading for a fissure in the ice on the other side of the Pillars. It was half-hidden by the snow-dusted bulk of the towers, but even so, the beasts could be seen waddling into the frigid blue waters, wallowing for a few minutes, then submerging in a spray of foam.
There were now several mekli in the Chamber, along with the guards. The mekli were attending the Echopods, listening, arguing their interpretations of the Voice. All the pods seemed active together and the sayings, parables and utterances of pak’to Shooki were at once both confusing and reassuring. Their own mekli beckoned them deeper into the Chamber and slowly, prodded by the guards, they complied.
“This is the Judging Chamber,” she told them. “Listen to the Voice. The Voice will soothe you. Let it enter you and fill you with the right shoo’kel. The waters of this Chamber are the standard. Shoo’kel here is correct for all kelke, everywhere in the world. Now, speak the truth to me…why have you come to the Pillars and disturbed these waters with violence in your hearts?”
The Ponkti spokesman was called Poklu lin, a muscular fellow, with scars along his face and beak. “Ke’mekli, I am free-bound to Loptoheen tu, tukmaster and tekmetah to Lektereenah, Metah of Ponk’et. We have a simple mission: we were commanded to intercept any attempt by Omtorish kelke to negotiate and work with the Tailless…the Umans at Kinlok. We heard this group coming—“ he indicated Kloosee and the rest of the Omtorish “—so we engaged them.”
Kloosee spoke up, without permission. “We have a right to talk with who we want…the Uman machine threatens everybody…we’re offering a way to move the machine elsewhere, so it doesn’t disturb our kels…all our kels,” he emphasized, glaring back at Poklu.
Poklu was ready to respond, but the mekli held up her hands. “Talk no more. Listen to the Voice, instead.”
Poklu held his tongue. “Ke’mekli, what does the Voice say? We can’t hear it here.” He glared at Kloosee with scarcely disguised contempt. “There’s too much noise.”
“O’ my loo’sheen, the most wondrous things.” The mekli pulsed with radiance. “It speaks of love and shoo’kel, the balance of all seas. Of Ke’shoo and Ke’lee and every virtue. The Vish currents and destiny. The Dialogues. The reciting of charms and beatitudes. The Be’shoo’keen of principal ecstasies. The Voice is profound and fluent, for truth is like Seome itself, inexhaustible and imperishable.”
Kloosee wanted to press home his point. “Seome is in danger, ke’mekli. Even Poklu can’t deny that. The Ponkti even have a word for it: akloosh. That’s what we face from the Tailless, the aliens, if we can’t convince them…and help them move their machine.”
Poklu exploded in fury. “Who says the Omtorish are the only ones who can help—“
Kloosee came back. “Your soundshield failed. Your own agents sabotaged it—“
Poklu made to lunge at Kloosee but stopped when he saw the mekli produce a sound grenade in her hands. “Omt’or can’t monopolize the Farpool, ke’mekli. The Umans know things. The Omtorish want to keep that knowledge to themselves…it’s always been like this. Keep the Ponkti in their caves…keep them ignorant. Now, the other kels have a chance…it’s not just Ponk’et. The Sk’ork, the Eep’kostic…they think as we do. Let—“
But the mekli would listen to no more argument. “You’ve both infected the sacred waters. The Voice speaks, even now. Judgment is made…there is no alternative, no middle ground here. Both sides must be consumed…”
Before Kloosee could answer, another mekli intervened, a younger one. She darted forward into the center of the gathering and waved her armfins abruptly, scattering those nearest to her. A few scowled indignantly and sulked at the interruption, but this mekli had prevailed, had heard the Voice more clearly, and assumed the right to address them. She extended herself to full length—she was graced with the most supple
of skins, a polished veneer of milky gray that shone like porcelain in the brilliance of the Notwater light. Kloosee pulsed her and envied her self-control.
“This argument is both curious and troubling,” she began, twitching at Poklu. “We find no solution in the pods that can be deciphered. That doesn’t mean Shooki has no answer—only that he conceals it from us now. That is Vish. But Puk’lek is a different matter. Here, the Voice is ambiguous, telling us in one instance that she is to be feared and respected, a shield against the intrusions of the aliens, and in the other instance, that she may serve us in ways both great and small. There is room for either interpretation. It’s clear, though, that what you desire, Kloosee ank, does exist. The Voice speaks quietly and eloquently of the value of maintaining shoo’kel. Your method, a way of talking and persuading and convincing and even debating, the Voice is convinced that this is the way. Understand me: the Voice is firm in saying that no kel, nor single kelke, may possess what the Umans have. That is Vik’t. But to engage the aliens, to talk with them, offer help to them…this the Voice finds appropriate.” This young mekli now darkened when she addressed Poklu and the Ponkti contingent. “On the other hand, the Voice cannot allow the waters to be disturbed. Poklu lin, what you do, though done through bonding with your superiors, cannot continue. The Pillars are for thought, reflection, tranquility. The Voice cannot be misinterpreted on this: disturbances must be smoothed out, they must be dampened out quickly…or no one will hear anything. Puk’lek will have these kelke now—“she swept her armfins in an arc, indicating all of the Ponkti captives.
Even before Poklu could respond, the guards had moved in and thrown a large mesh netting over the group. Someone shoved Chase out of the way…it was Kloosee, backing away from the circle of mekli which now closed on the doomed Ponkti. There was a swirl of thrashing and struggle but it was useless. Poklu fought briefly but was stung into silence by a mekli who administered a sting from a small creature she kept in her hands. The rest of the Ponkti glared out from behind the mesh, sullen and grim. Guards secured the net and began hauling it toward one of the translucent walls. Beyond and below them, at the foot of the Pillar, seamothers trundled back and forth across the icescape, butting heads, bellowing and honking, feeding, sensing a meal. A light snow began to fall, softening the scene.
Chase hadn’t seen it before, but the wall had a small hatch embedded in it. The guards positioned the netting with all the Ponkti inside in front of the hatch. One of the mekli came up and spoke to the captives.
“Kesh, ke t’shoo’lee opmah…Tekmah puk’lek vish tchuk’te.”
Chase’s echopod tried to translate. “Shhkkrreah…judgment is final…the seamother keeps our waters undisturbed.”
With that, the seams of the hatch split apart and the hatch opened. Water flowed briskly into a small outchamber beyond the wall, almost like a pouch made of rock. The guards shoved the netting with the Ponkti inside through the hatch and into the outchamber. Then the hatch was closed.
“What’s happening?” Chase whispered to Kloosee, who waved him silent. Still mystified, Chase watched as the mekli stuck her beak into a round horn-like opening beside the hatch, whistling and clicking, issuing some kind of strange commands.
At that moment, the outchamber opened to the Notwater. The netting plummeted from view and slid down the outside of the Pillar, rolling and tumbling and bouncing all the way down to the ice below, directly into the gaping mouths and salivating jaws of the seamothers gathered there.
The seamothers flailed and thrashed and bellowed and churned almost as one in their efforts to consume this unexpected dinner. Chase shuddered at the sounds issuing up from the icecap…teeth clicking, claws slashing, cries and screams and then…silence. Only the sounds of ravenous eating.
The seamothers had begun to consume the doomed Ponkti.
The mekli turned back from the hatch. Her face was sad, but set with a hard edge of determination. “So it is that disturbing leads to disturbing. Pak’to Shooki is now satisfied.”
“Jeez, she killed them, dumped them right into the seamothers’ mouths—“ Chase could hardly believe his eyes. “Why did—“
Kloosee murmured to Chase quietly, making sure to show only a pleasant demeanor to the mekli, “They violated the holy waters by attacking us. They disturbed shoo’kel. Keep quiet, eekoti Chase—“
The mekli now took an interest in this unusual creature of the Omtorish. She whipped her tail and came to float directly in front of Chase, then reached out her arms and hands and felt his face. “You are not Omtorish…tell me, talkative one, from what kel do you come?”
Chase looked helplessly at Kloosee and Pakma. He didn’t know what to say. Kloosee tried to intervene.
“He is eekoti, ke mekli. Not of these waters. He visits us through the Farpool. In fact, we were on our way to talk with the Tailless People…their machine is destroying everything…even here, I see the effects. We want to make an offer to the Umans…help them dismantle and relocate their machine.”
This made the mekli sad. “This is true. Shooki tells us that ak’loosh is coming. A great wave will circle the world, and all will be destroyed. Perhaps the Tailless are his instruments.”
Then Chase had an idea. “Hey, maybe the mekli could help us. You know, like talk with the Umans.”
The very mention of the aliens chilled the waters in the Judging Chamber. All the mekli were too disciplined to react carelessly but Kloosee sniffed a distinct odor of dismay at the idea.
The younger mekli hissed at them. “Do not say this before Shooki.” Her tail curled in scarcely controlled anger. “Shoo’kel is the measure of all things. If the currents have brought us visitors, then we are bound by the Voice to extend Ke’shoo to them…” she glanced back at the walls, where below the carnage was continuing “…The Echopods say that all intelligent beings are Seomish, that they are due our respect, even our affection. Yet you speak to disrupt this.”
“The eekoti wants only what’s best for the kels,” Kloosee tried to explain, throwing a dark glance back at Chase. Keep quiet, my friend, before we all get in trouble. “He is Uman himself…we think he can talk with them, explain to them why they must move their machine.”
Now the older mekli weighed in. “It is the aliens who have upset shoo’kel. Yet we are bound here to remain in serenity and dignity. To venture into the Notwater…as you’ve described, to talk with these Tailless People of the Notwater…no, that is proscribed by Shooki. We’re all life-bound here, bound to serve the One Who Makes the Currents Flow. To venture into the Notwater upsets the balance. Yet, to stop these destructive effects, you say you must venture into the Notwater…the Umans are creatures of the Notwater. You would restore balance by upsetting it further…this is a paradox, a flaw of logic. This reasoning is absurd, is it not?”
Her words upset the other mekli and now they were divided on whom and what to believe. One of them went to a niche in the floor and put her head to it; inside, an Echopod murmured its recorded wisdom. She manipulated the knob on the pod head, tuning it, advancing it several tracks. Immediately, the tone of the Voice shifted, fading to nearly inaudible sibilants. The other mekli detected the change and crowded around the pod, straining to ferret meaning from the sounds. They listened for a time, expressionless, then argued over what they had heard. Other parts of the Voice rambled on, discoursing on ethical problems and history, but the mekli ignored them. What they wished to know was there, in that one pod, and they debated it for many minutes.
Finally, the older mekli spoke to Kloosee and Pakma. “We are troubled by all this, as you can see. But we should not detain you any longer. The judging is done, Shoo’kel is maintained…serenity for you and success in your journey. The guards will show you out. We know that in his time, pak’to Shooki will tell us what he wants us to know. In the meantime, we’re confident that Shooki is even now readying the great ak’loosh, the great wave that w
ill re-make everything, change all the waters, destroy all who bring disturbance. From this, in its time, new life will grow.”
At a subtle signal from the mekli, the guards escorted Kloosee, Chase and the entire Omtorish contingent back through the twisting labyrinth of tunnels and caves, spiraling out and down and back to the outer doors of the Pillars. The trip took an hour.
Outside, in numbing ice-flecked waters, Kloosee was finally able to locate their small fleet of kip’ts, strewn about on the seabed. Minor repairs were needed, some adjustments made and provisions laid in from the rich ertleg beds that were abundantly huddled around a hot vent a few beats away from the Pillars.
The expedition got underway, somber at what they had witnessed, grimly determined to reach Kinlok and present an ultimatum to the Umans.
Chase wanted to talk, but both Kloosee and Pakma seemed distant, even sad.
Jeez, just when I thought I had these guys figured out…they talk about balance and tranquility and shoo’kel and all that…but their form of justice is pretty harsh. Tulcheah gets banished to the surface…the Ponkti thrown like meat scraps to those serpents. Angie would probably throw up seeing all this…
Suddenly, Chase was overwhelmed with an aching need to see Angie again. He knew the Farpool was near. Maybe there was a way—
The expedition slowly but steadily made its way on toward Kinlok, not sure of what they would find there…or what really they could do.
Angie’s Journal: Echopod 4
“Well, so here I go again, Gwen…I’m trying this echopod thing…I hope it’s working. Sometimes, this pod thing goes haywire but I think I’ve got the hang of it.
“Oh, Gwen, you won’t believe what’s happened to me. I came back. No, really, I did. I came back through that Farpool…man, that’s better than Space Mountain. Definitely an E-ticket ride. At least I made it.
“Only problem is I wound up in the wrong ocean…and I have no idea what time this is…
“Oh, yeah…one other minor detail…I still look like a frog on steroids. I hope we don’t run into each other. You’ll faint dead away…these scales are worse than any acne we ever had. But it is me…Angela Haley Gilliam.
“Once I landed or splashed down or whatever you call it, I realized I didn’t know where the hell I was…I managed to hook up with some whales…that was cool, and then I ran into a whaling ship. They shot me, Gwen…some kind of stun gun or something. I was their prize catch, can you believe that? Hauled me onboard and I wound up in some aquarium…that’s justice for you…just like Kloosee and Pakma…they’re our friends from Seome.
“So here I am, in a big pool in an aquarium swimming around in circles….BORING. I wish Chase was here. He knows everything…he’d know what to do. I tried to tell ‘em I was a human being---just a real bad case of acne, but they shot me again…I guess that’s what humans do when they find something they don’t understand.
“Their stun guns make you sleep and make your head hurt for like two days. I’m better now. But not really. I’m stuck here. I have no idea how to get out or make them understand me. Every time I try to talk, they shoot me. It’s like they don’t want to know anymore…they made up their minds I’m a monster and that’s that.
“Gwen, I don’t know if you’ll ever get these messages. If there was a way I could drop this echopod off in the ocean, you know like a bottle, maybe you’d get it.
“Hey, that gives me an idea…what if I ‘accidentally’ drop this pod thing on the side of the pool. Maybe one of the staff here will see it and pick it up…maybe that’s how I can communicate with them.
“Hey, thanks Gwen…I’ll get started right away on putting together some kind of message…introduce myself and all. Of course, who knows if they’ll believe me. I don’t believe me myself…when you think about where Chase and me have been, what all we’ve seen.
“By the way, I wonder how the boy genius is doing…probably setting up a T-shirt shop on Seome…that would be just like him…once a beach bum, always a beach bum.
“I do miss him though. Chase…I actually do love you. I had to do this…wait, I’m talking to Gwen, not Chase. Sorry about that.
“Gwen, if you get this message, start googling all the aquariums. One of them has a new star attraction. It’s me.
“I’ll keep this journal going for as long as I can…until next time, girl, see if you can beat my last time in the 440…bet you can’t, you slug…my god, what thunder thighs you have…
“So, okay…this is Angie Gilliam, until next time…uh, over and out.”
End Recording