Starship Home (13 page)

The sun glinted off the dog teeth decorating his wraparound shades as the tall man, his pack on his back, stepped out of the forest into the clearing in front of the starship. He appeared to be in no hurry as he took the pack from his back and set it down on the ground, then faced the starship. ‘Starship?’ he said.

‘Knowest the word, dost thou?’ Guinevere said.

‘I know many things,’ said Marlowe. ‘I have roamed the world, paid an eye for wisdom and know many things.’

‘Thou art a warlock?’

‘Does a starship believe in warlocks?’

‘I believe there are people who believe they are such.’

The tall man smiled. ‘And I believe,’ he said, with a dry emphasis, ‘that the people who are travelling aboard you are not Slarn. But thieves.’

‘Thou sayest it. Not I.’

‘I’ll help you get rid of them. If you’ll take me back to the stars with you.’

‘
Back
to the stars, is it?
Back
?’

‘I’ll help you.’

There was silence, and then, ‘Who art thou?’ asked Guinevere.

‘A friend of the Slarn.’ He paused. ‘Test me. See that I speak the truth.’

‘Open thy mind to me.’

‘No.’

‘‘tis as if a tight-stopped wall were about thy mind.’

‘I know what starships can do. Test me.’

He walked up to blank side of the starship and a small hatch slid open. ‘Put thy hand within.’ Without hesitation, Marlowe placed his hand within the narrow hatch. There were hatches like this all over the skin of the ship. Through them the ship fed on interstellar dust, sampled atmospheres, tested substances, they were the sensory organs of the starship. On one console of the bridge, a screen came to life with an X-ray image of Marlowe’s forearm and hand, and telltales blinked and quivered as his blood was tested, his DNA sampled, his medical and genetic history read. It took only seconds to accomplish.

There was a sad tone in Guinevere’s voice, as she said, ‘Take out thy hand again.’ Marlowe withdrew his hand from the slot and the small hatch closed. ‘I know thee now, poor wretch that thou art.’

‘I’ll help you get rid of the thieves,’ he said and there was a kind of desperation in his voice.

The desperate edge in his voice was matched by the unshed tears in Guinevere’s as she answered: ‘I know what thou art, and weep for it, but cannot help thee.’

‘Please! Take me with you!’

‘That I cannot.’

He half turned away from her in despair, and then his mood suddenly changed and when he turned back it was in fury.

‘I’ve revealed myself to you!’

‘I can not.’

‘You’ll take me. You’ll take me willing or not,’ he said, and as he moved across the clearing, he picked up his heavy pack by one strap, and was still swinging it onto his back as he strode out of sight.

Back in the village, women had sewn together three wide strips of cream woollen cloth, and now Meg was kneeling on the banner-sized piece of fabric, painting an alphabet on it in Roman letters, both upper and lower case. She wanted her pupils to read books as soon as possible. Cursive writing could wait. As she worked, Zoe, Harold and Zachary helped keep the cloth pulled taut.

They had been working for some time when Maze approached them from Helena’s hut. She was looking up at the western sky. The sun was well below the treetops and it would soon be dark. As Maze reached them, she said: ‘Near sundown. You must go back to your iron castle or stay here tonight.’

‘We’re not afraid of the dark, you know,’ Harold said.

‘Not afraid of dark, Topclass? Then you stupid. Animal eat you. Near full moon. Full moon, Looter eat you.’

‘Looters?’ Meg asked, ‘the ones who ate your last teacher?’

‘Full moon they sacrifice to their Dark One demon-god in Oldtown.’

Meg put her brush back into the clay pot full of the blend of grease and soot which was making do for paint. ‘Well I think I’ll just go right on home now, all this talk of eating’s making me hungry.’ And she stood up. ‘If we can just get this under cover, Maze…?’

The sun was dropping fast by the time they were walking along the track. Zachary and Harold were carrying baskets of fruit and vegetables, payment in advance from the villagers for Meg’s future teaching.

‘They’re exaggerating,’ Zachary was saying. ‘Primitive people, they always exaggerate. You know, there’s always wild animals around, the people in the next village are always cannibals. I mean if you look at it rationally…’ he was saying as a twig suddenly snapped in the bush behind them.

They argued later about who it was that led the rush. Zachary claimed it was the women, and the women claimed it was Zachary, and Harold sat on the sidelines trying to work out whether he could get anything for his vote.

The fact was that, after the twig snapped behind them, they all set what was probably a land speed record from that point on the track to the ramp of the starship. As the hatch opened for them, Zachary said: ‘Just thought I’d lead you all in some aerobics, keep us fit,’ and strode up the ramp waving them to follow. The act did not go down at all well, leading as it did to raucous laughter and allegations of cowardice. ‘I just trust the word of our native allies,’ Zachary said. ‘They’ve been here longer, they know the scene better.’

‘Except when they exaggerate,’ said Zoe as they entered the bridge.

Meg felt the clothes on the line. ‘They’re dry,’ she said to Zoe.

‘I could give you mine to wash tonight,’ Harold said to Meg, trying to be helpful.

She looked at him.

‘My clothes?’ he said. ‘To wash?’

About five minutes later, in the ablutions room, as Zachary and Harold stood side by side washing their clothes, Meg’s eldritch screams of rage and accusation still ringing in their ears, Zachary remarked to Harold: ‘You had to open your big mouth, didn’t you?’

The Wyzen was there helping, playing with the water. ‘I thought I was being helpful,’ said Harold. The Wyzen splashed his dry Slarn longjohns. ‘Cut it out, Wyzen.’

‘Never try to help a woman by asking her to wash your socks. That’s the first law of human survival,’ said Zachary.

‘What’s the second law?’

‘If you don’t know the first, you won’t live long enough to need the second.’

Back on the bridge, the two men hung their clothes over the line. Harold did not appear to have wrung his out. They dripped profusely. Zachary was looking toward the main console, where Zoe and Meg, now back in their original clothes, were putting out a cold meal of fruit and bread. ‘See Tarzan?’ Zachary said to Harold, ‘you do the right thing and wash your clothes, Jane fixes dinner for you.’ Zoe and Meg looked at them. ‘That was a joke,’ Zachary said rapidly but far too late. ‘A joke,’ he repeated, somewhat lamely.

‘Take your foot out of your mouth and tell Tarzan to wring his clothes out better. The floor’s awash,’ Meg said. ‘And if I’m earning the bread, I’m not cleaning the house.’

‘Hear that?’ Zachary asked Harold sharply and winked at him on the side Meg could not see. Then he moved over and looked at the food and smiled his big conman’s smile. ‘That looks absolutely great.’ The Wyzen thought so too. She picked up an apple, sniffed at it, licked it, and bite into it. Then she wrinkled her nose and put down the apple and took a ship’s biscuit instead. ‘It could be worse,’ Zachary told Meg. ‘She could’ve tried all of them.’

Later that night as they bedded down in the school bus, Zachary produced two apples, flicked one across the aisle to Harold, and started munching on the other himself.

‘The way I see it, kid, we got it made,’ said Zachary.

‘What?’ Harold was amazed at this reading of the situation. Ninety years from home, all their relatives taken by aliens, stuck in a new dark age full of wild animals and cannibals, and Zachary thought they had it made?

‘What do rich guys do when they retire or go on holiday?’ Zachary said. ‘They go hunting and fishing. That makes the rest of our lives a rich guy’s holiday.’

‘My idea of a holiday is playing war games, messing round with computers, visiting science museums, and reading about astronomy.’

‘I don’t set much store by the stars,’ said Zachary. ‘Being as I’m a Libra near the cusp of Scorpio I just don’t believe in all that stuff.’

‘Not astrology, astronomy.’

‘Oh.’ Zachary paused. ‘You don’t like it here?’

‘No.’

‘Well one of us has it made then.’ He looked over at Harold. ‘Hey, come on. Clean air, clean water, clean food, where could you get all that when we came from?’

‘Polio? You realize influenza could kill you here? Cholera? Diphtheria? Some of the adults in that village had pock marks. Is smallpox back? I know back in our time they claimed they wiped it out, but were they wrong and is it back again?’

‘On the other hand…’

‘And who were those guys in armor? The ones who grabbed me? Who’s this Don guy?’

‘Police? Maybe he runs the police force.’

‘And the cannibals?’

‘It’s going to be okay. Tell him, Guinevere, it’s going to be okay.’

‘Perhaps,’ said Guinevere.

‘Would you care to try for something a little more positive than that? Like “of course” or “sure thing”, or even “yes”?’

‘Sure thing,’ said Guinevere, trying out what was to her a novel expression, then ‘perhaps,’ she added.

On the bridge, Meg and Zoe were on their couches. The dripping of Harold’s clothes had a homelike sound, like water from a leaking roof. ‘Guinevere?’ Zoe said.

‘Aye?’

‘My sister’s worried the Slarn’ll follow you here.’

‘A wise woman.’

‘She’d like us to leave. To fix you and get out of here so the Slarn won’t come.’

‘There may come a time…’ said Guinevere.

‘Can we do that?’ Meg asked. ‘Is it even possible to get you flying again?’

‘With much labor. For my healing I need metals, water, charcoal. Even then…’

‘If I teach at the village to get food, and the others try and get these things…?’

‘I would that I were healed. I’ sooth, I would that I were well again.’

‘I’m not sure I want to go away,’ Zoe said, ‘I only just found my sister.’

‘But we have to try, don’t we?’ asked Meg. ‘Guinevere got us home, we have to try and get her well again don’t we?’

‘Yes, said Zoe. ‘Yes of course we do.’

As the lights faded out, Meg wondered about her motives. Was it Guinevere she wanted to help? Or did she just want to get to somewhere a little less scary? A bit of both, she decided at last. A bit of both.

The sun was just peering through the lowest branches of the undergrowth when Maze entered the clearing and shouted ‘Giniveer!’ Guinevere opened the hatch for her, and she ran up the ramp to find Harold, Zoe, Meg and Zachary just finishing breakfast. Zoe and Meg had told the men about their conversation the night before, and it had made sense to everyone that Meg should teach for their food while the others explored to find materials that Guinevere might need for her healing process.

“Healing” was the way Guinevere spoke about it. As far as they could make out, the process was much more like feeding and resting a convalescent human than doing an engineering repair job on an automobile or plane. The first thing they decided they had to do was to get a clear idea of what was available in the district, and that was why Harold said to Maze as she entered, ‘Maze do you know what a map is?’

Maze looked at him with utter contempt. ‘You think I stupid, Topclass? Course I know. Map’s in Our Mother’s house.’

‘There’s a map in there?’

‘Tell Topclass wash his ears, he hear better,’ Maze said to Zoe and grinned. ‘School starts soon,’ she added to Meg.

They all went over to the village with Meg and Maze, and while Maze watched Meg finish the alphabet banner, and then add the numbers from 1 to 10 to it, Harold, Zoe and Zachary got permission to enter Our Mother’s hut and copy the map.

The map was on one wall, incorporated into the mural depicting the arrival of the Slarn and the enslaving of the human race, and various other incidents of later Forester history. Zoe thought one painting probably referred to the book-burning Simples. The map was like a map in a storybook or a mediaeval map, for it included pictures of things as well as symbolic indications of mountains, tracks, roads and rivers. Zoe, the only one of them with any artistic ability, was copying the map into the back of one of Harold’s school exercise books that he had taken from his schoolbag in the bus. As Zoe worked, she tried to identify what the map showed.

‘This thing that looks like a castle, Our Mother? What is it?’

‘Trollcastle,’ said the old woman. ‘Seat of Don Robert Costello, by-named The Bold, enforcer of the High Law.’

‘It’s on the hill where the research establishment was,” Zoe said as she added it to her drawing. “And the mark on the village?” Her finger was pointing to a skull and crossbones marking the drawings of buildings which indicated the position of what used to be the village of Dalrymple Ponds.

‘Oldtown. Looters go there,’ said Our Mother.

Deep in the forest, Marlowe had spent the night underground in a secret den whose whereabouts only he knew. Now he had emerged into daylight again and was heading for the nearest Troll watch tower. It was the one where Maze had lured Harold into being captured. As Marlowe neared the tower he shouted: ‘Hello!’

The Troll on watch looked down. ‘Who goes?’ he shouted.

‘Marlowe the Wanderer! I’ve something to show you! Something the Don should know about!’

When the two Trolls saw the starship, they were reduced to silence. Marlowe the Wanderer had said there was an iron castle in the forest and he had said it was big, but nothing he had said had prepared them for the sheer size of the thing. They stared, and then slowly crossed themselves. This was surely the Devil’s work.

‘How did that get there?’ asked the ranking Troll.

‘It flew,’ Marlowe said.

‘Am I a child or a Sullivan to believe such things? Who built this without the Don’s knowledge or permission? King of Vic? Is it his?’

‘It’s been here only a few days,’ Marlowe said. ‘It flew here, from the sky.’ He paused. ‘It’s Slarn work.’

‘Slarn? Are the Slarn returned?’

‘No,’ said Marlowe.

They looked at him. ‘You say the iron castle is Slarn work but the Slarn are not here?’

‘Just so. There are thieves aboard it.’

The ranking Troll looked back at the massive bulk of the starship. ‘You’re right. The Don must be told.’

Under a tree in the village, Meg had her class consisting of Maze and the other Forester girls chanting. ‘A, B, C, D, E, F, G…’ they chanted, as Zoe, Harold and Zachary came from Our Mother’s house. As they passed the class, Zoe said: ‘Going exploring. We have a map now.’

‘Just stay alive will you?’ Meg said. ‘I don’t want to be stuck here doing this for the rest of my life.’

‘I’d always understood,’ Zachary said, ‘that teaching’s the most rewarding career a woman could have. Apart from nursing or washing Harold’s socks of course.’ Meg grinned and stuck her tongue out at him as they moved on, but in fact, underneath, she was happy about what she was doing. It was something that was going to lift a small society to literacy, a giant leap forward, and she felt very good about that.

‘From the beginning,’ she said, ‘A, B, C, D…’

Zoe, Harold and Zachary were heading for the old research station, the building now marked on Our Mother’s map as Trollcastle. Partly, it was just curiosity, but partly they wanted to find out something about this mysterious Don that everyone talked about. He was obviously a powerful person in the district and sooner or later they would probably have to deal with him. Harold’s description of the Trolls, as the Don’s soldiers seemed to be called, indicated that they carried bladed weapons but not firearms. Zachary could not work out how firearm technology could have disappeared in only 90 years. There would have been plenty of guns around, and with decent care a rifle or hand gun could still be fired a century after it is made and ammunition could be reloaded.

He could not work it out, unless it had something to do with the Law and the Promise that Maze had recited. If “Elektrikkity” was no longer for Earth people following the Slarn invasion, maybe the same applied to firearms.

As they moved through the forest, they became aware of a rushing sound in the air behind and above them. They dropped into cover and looked up to see a figure in camouflaged breastplate and backplate swinging from one tall tree to another on ropes. ‘That’s how they caught me,’ Harold whispered. ‘They came out of the trees.’

This was the first sight Zoe and Zachary had had of one of the Trolls. ‘Funny kind of helmet,’ Zachary said. ‘I’ve got one like it at home.’ They looked at him in question. ‘Well it … it’s like a motorcycle helmet,’ he said.