All the Weyrs of Pern (18 page)

One of the exercises with fire-lizards and dragons in which there had been no success had been getting them to take an object from one place and bring it to another. Telekinesis, Aivas had called it, but the concept—patiently explained—confused the dragons as thoroughly as it did the fire-lizards. They would go
between
to get the required object, but they could not bring it without physically collecting it. Aivas had explained that if the dragons and fire-lizards could transport themselves telekinetically, it logically followed that they ought to be able to use their abilities to
lift
distant items to them.

“Today, Piemur, you are asked to send Farli to the
Yokohama
to manipulate the switches as she had been taught to do. There is no oxygen at present on the bridge, and it is essential that the life-support system be activated before we can take the next step. Another of the toggles will transmit a report on the general condition of the
Yokohama
.

“Oh!” Piemur murmured very softly, then sighed gustily. He stroked Farli, who chirped again, her unblinking eyes still on the screen. “Somehow I thought that’s what you’d say.”

“She has been an excellent pupil, Piemur. There should be no problem, as she is well accustomed to obeying you.”

Piemur took a deep breath. “All right, Farli,” he said. He unwrapped her tail from his neck and held up his arm in the position that indicated she was to take a message.

Carefully walking along his bare arm with her talons sheathed, Farli reached his forearm and turned about to face him, her eyes whirling alertly.

“Now—” Piemur held up his right hand. “This is going to be slightly different, Farli. I want you to go up in the sky, to the place you see in my mind.” He closed his eyes and focused his thoughts tightly on the scene of the bridge and the particular console she was to activate.

Farli chirruped queryingly, looked over her shoulder at the picture on the screen, and burbled once, reclosing her wings on her back.

“
No
, Farli, not into the screen. Get the ‘where’ from my mind.” Piemur closed his eyes again, concentrating on the exact place he wanted her to go, emphasizing the life-support console next to the slumped corpse. When she chirruped again, this time almost impatiently, he sighed and turned to the others in defeat.

“She just doesn’t understand,” he said, trying not to let his disappointment color his voice. Not that he blamed
her
. She had
been
to most of the places he sent her. How could he get across the difference between traveling around the planet and going into space above it? Especially as he could not quite grasp the concept himself.

Farli emphasized this by flitting from his arm to the room in which she had been trained, moments later coming back and trying to fly into the picture on the screen.

Piemur’s grin was weak. “What do you bet she’s gone and done her exercises again? That much she understands!”

Disappointment was palpable in the room. Piemur kept his eyes straight ahead, on the tantalizingly unreachable view on the screen.

“So?” F’lar asked. “What do we do now, Aivas?”

There was a long pause before Aivas spoke. “The mind of the fire-lizard does not function in recorded animal behavioral patterns.”

“That’s not surprising. Your records only cover Terran types,” Piemur remarked, trying not to feel so depressed about his little queen’s failure. She was the best of the whole fair, better even than Menolly’s Beauty, who was certainly very well trained. But he had hoped that she would be able to make this strange variation of flight. “It’s also a long way to ask her to go when no one’s been there before.”

Another silence hung on the room.

“There’s only one dragon in fact,” F’lar said slowly and thoughtfully, breaking the pause, “who’s ever been off the planet.”

“Canth!” Lessa exclaimed.

“F’nor’s brown Canth is too large,” Aivas said.

“It wasn’t his size I was thinking of,” Lessa replied. “It’s his experience in going above this planet. He’s done it, so perhaps he can explain to Farli so that she’ll understand what’s wanted of her.” Her eyes lost their focus as she sought for Canth.

Yes, we can come immediately,
Canth replied to Lessa’s request.

There was a stir of anticipation among those waiting in Aivas’s room. Piemur kept stroking Farli, who had returned to her position on his arm. He murmured softly that she was a marvelous fire-lizard, the best in the world, but that the toggles she was to pull and the buttons she was to press were really not the ones in the next room but, rather, identical ones up on the
Yokohama
, far above their heads in the dark sky. She kept cocking her head this way and that, her throat pulsing as she tried her very best to understand what was wanted of her.

“Ah, they’re here,” Lessa said. “F’nor’s on his way in.”

Looking as if he had dressed in a hurry, F’nor came running into the room. “Canth said it was important,” he said. After a puzzled glance around the room, he regarded Lessa expectantly.

“Aivas needs Farli to get to the bridge on the
Yokohama
,” she explained. “Farli doesn’t understand her directions. You and Canth are the only two on Pern who have left the planet. We thought Canth might be able to clarify the instructions so Farli will know what she is expected to do.”

As she spoke, F’nor pulled off his flight cap and shucked off his heavy riding gear. When she had finished, his expression turned humorously quizzical.

“Well, now, Lessa, that’s a problem. I’ve never been exactly sure how Canth and I managed that abortive flight in the first place.”

“Do you remember what you were thinking?” F’lar asked.

F’nor chuckled. “I was thinking I had to do something to keep you from trying to get to the Red Star.” Then he frowned. “Come to think of it, Meron was there, and he tried to make his fire-lizard go. She disappeared in a flash, and I don’t know if she ever returned to him.”

“Farli’s not afraid,” Piemur said staunchly. “She just doesn’t understand where she’s supposed to perform what she’s been trained to do.”

F’nor spread his hands in a gesture of appeal. “If Farli can’t get the hang of it, I don’t think any of them could.”

“But could Canth explain to her that he went off the planet? Into space?” Lessa asked.

Could you, Canth?
F’nor asked the brown dragon. Canth was in the process of draping himself on the ridge above Landing where the rising sun would warm him.

You showed me where you wanted me to go. I went.

F’nor repeated Canth’s answer. “A planet is a bigger target than a spaceship we can’t see.”

Farli does not understand,
Canth added.
She has done the things she was asked to do in the place where she has always done them.

Canth,
Lessa asked the dragon directly,
do you understand what we’re asking Farli to do?

Yes, you want her to go up to the ship and do the things she has been trained to do there! She doesn’t understand where she is to go. She’s never been there.

Jaxom squirmed a little on the chair. Considering how hard Piemur had worked with Farli, it was a crying shame that the little creature couldn’t grasp the essential point.

Ruth, do you understand?
he asked the white dragon. Sometimes fire-lizards listened to Ruth when they ignored everyone else.

Yes, but it is a cold, long way for a fire-lizard to go if she hasn’t been there before. She’s trying very hard to understand.

A lot of thoughts crowded Jaxom’s mind just then. But the main one was that Ruth was
not
too big to fit on the bridge—if his wings were folded back and he landed precisely on the floor just in front of the lift door. He would also have to remain very still, for Aivas had said there was no gravity on the bridge. Ruth would be in free-fall. Aivas did not see that as a problem for a dragon or a fire-lizard, accustomed as they were to being airborne. Jaxom had known that that was one reason Aivas had grilled him so long and so hard on the layout of the bridge and lectured him on null-gravity conditions. But until Farli had done her exercise on board the
Yokohama
, turning on the bridge’s life-support system, Ruth and Jaxom could not go.

Aivas had had crews searching the Catherine Caves assiduously for “space suits.” They had found two—or, rather, the perished scraps of fabric and the bright plastic shapes that had once serviced it. Oxygen cylinders had been manufactured, being not dissimilar to agenothree tanks. HNO
₃
, Jaxom reminded himself, now that he knew the precise chemical constituents of the flame-producing mixture. But there was no protection for a frail human body in the absolute cold and airless vacuum of the
Yokohama’s
bridge in its present state.

Jaxom thought that manufacturing proper equipment would prove to be Aivas’s alternative. He had already had several long discussions with Masterweaver Zurg. But alternatives would take time, not to mention more experimentation on the part of both Zurg and Hamian’s innovative crew—more time in which the disenchanted Lord Holders could steadily withdraw their support from Landing.

If only Farli could understand, Jaxom thought, searching his own mind for any clues that he, or Ruth, might be able to give her. Ruth had perceived the difference, but he was much smarter than Farli. He understood so much—as much as I do, Jaxom thought with great pride.

As you understand, so do I.
Ruth’s tone was almost accusatory.
It is not really a very long way
between
but it
is
up far.

Although Jaxom leaped to his feet, shouting “No, Ruth, no!” he was too late. For Ruth had already gone
between
.

“Jaxom!” Lessa exclaimed, her face white. “You didn’t send him?”

“I most certainly did not. He just went.” Jaxom was aghast, and Farli began shrieking protests, her wings extended, her eyes whirling with startled, angry red.

Outside, Ramoth and Mnementh bugled their own warnings.

Don’t, Ramoth! Mnementh!
Lessa cried. “We’ll rouse everyone in Landing and they’ll know something’s gone wrong.” Then she turned into F’lar, clutching at him in her fear for Ruth—and for Jaxom.

“Jaxom?”
F’lar bellowed seeing the shock on Jaxom’s face. Mirrim, her tanned cheeks bleached white, had leaped to Jaxom’s side, as had the other green riders, their expressions anxious, ready to support him. Robinton and F’nor were too stunned to react, so there was only Jancis to watch the screen and count.

“He’s all right,” Jaxom managed to say, though his mouth had gone terribly dry. The strong link with Ruth had attenuated to just a faint touch. “He’s still with me.”

“Did you tell him to go?” F’lar demanded, his expression so fierce that even Lessa recoiled.

Jaxom gave the Benden Weyrleader an inscrutable glare. “He bloody just went and did it! Ruth’s got a mind of his own!”

Then Jancis leaped to her feet, gesticulating at the screen.

“There! There! He’s there! On the count of ten.”

There, undeniably on the bridge, wings tucked tight, his whole body flattened, was Ruth. Before their eyes, he drifted upward, peering about him with an expression of astonishment, until his head touched the ceiling.

“Ah! Well done, Ruth! Jaxom!” Aivas’s bellow of triumph cut across the racket of astonishment and surprise that reverberated around the room. “Jaxom, tell Ruth not to be surprised to float. He is in free-fall, with no gravity for up and down. Warn him not to make any energetic movements. Does he understand, Jaxom?”

“I am, I did. He understands,” Jaxom said, staring in fascination at the screen.

“See, Farli!” Piemur pointed excitedly. “Ruth’s led the way for you.” But Farli was so confused by the sudden cheering and shouting in the room that Piemur had to grab her by the cheeks and turn her head toward the screen and Ruth! “Go to Ruth!” The little queen gave a squawk and, launching herself from Piemur’s arm, disappeared.

“Jaxom, you tell Ruth to get back here right now!” Lessa shouted, recovering from her shock. “Mind of his own, indeed! I’ll give him a mind to obey!”

“Restore yourselves to calm observation!” Aivas’s voice once again cut through the furor. “Ruth is unharmed. And . . . Farli has found her way.”

Piemur let out a yelp of surprise, plainly audible in a room suddenly gone very quiet. For Farli had indeed found her way to the bridge of
Yokohama
and, with one talon firmly hooked on the edge of the console, was diligently pulling toggles and pressing buttons. Lights appeared on the board.

“Mission accomplished,” Aivas said. “They may return.”

Farli came and has done her job,
Ruth said, not realizing that Jaxom could see him.
I’m floating. Let go, Farli. It’s not at all like being
between.
A most unusual sensation. Not like swimming, either.

It was also a most unusual sight for those observing Ruth as he drifted gently across the bridge, a handspan above the arc of consoles, ducking his head to keep from scraping the ceiling.

As Fall released her grip, she, too, began to float. Startled, she extended her wings and gently revolved end over end, colliding with Ruth. He reached out to steady her, and both were propelled farther away from their original locations, toward the great plasglas window on the bow of the bridge complex. Suddenly Jancis began to giggle, and the tension in the room evaporated.

I think that’s quite enough clowning about now, Ruth,
Jaxom said, trying to sound stern. But he couldn’t help grinning along with everyone else over the antics of the two creatures.
You scared the life out of me! Now get back down here.

I knew exactly where to go. I showed Farli. I had no problem at all doing it, and this is fun.
With a negligent shove of one wing, Ruth executed a complete turn in the air and began floating back toward the lift.
Will we get to come back again?

Only
if you and Farli get your bodies back on Pern this instant!