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Sail the Sea of Stars - chapter 13

 
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PostPosted: Thu Dec 01, 2016 8:19 pm    Post subject: Sail the Sea of Stars - chapter 13 Reply with quote



CHAPTER 13

PARADISE FOUND


I stood there with eyes wide and mouth agape, looking like a like a fish out of water — which was very appropriate under the circumstances. Finally I managed to blurt out, 'What are you doing here?"

"I live here!" she imitated me perfectly. I was frozen in a foolish pose, dripping and blushing, mentally correcting all my misconceptions about her previous behavior.

"So that's why you wouldn't tell me where you were from!"

"Right!" she said, vastly amused by my amazement at what had now become so obvious.

"Because everybody would have pestered you to death about Tason!"

"Right!" she was still chuckling and having a great time watching me rewind my memory of the time we'd spent together and the things she'd done which had seemed so odd.

Then I posed the really important question. "And because you wanted to . . . surprise me?" I said hopefully.

Her chuckles changed to a soft smile and a pair of pale green eyes which looked up through lowered eyelashes. "Right again," she replied in a quiet voice.

We stood there for a long moment, an island of calm in a sea madness. The surrounding mob was doing a great deal of handshaking and how-do-you-doing — along with an endless variety of human-meets-nonhuman greetings which challenged the crew's imagination. People were still streaming down the boarding way escalators.

"Come on," said Danceea. "I want you to meet my father. He and the chief administrator will be greeting the captain."

"Maybe I should meet him later. Like, when I'm dry?"

"Aw, don't worry about that. I already told him you were crazy."

"Oh, gee, that’s just great, Sweetheart! Thank you very much! He's a psychologist, right? Why not let him form his own opinions?”

We pushed our way through the rowdy crowd, headed towards the boarding way. The Candlelight loomed overhead, blocking out most of the sky. I noticed that many of the nonhumans wore a small device on a trim strap around their necks (the ones that had necks) or in the general area of their sensory organs. On a hunch I grinned at a shaggy horse-like creature and said, "Hi there!"

"Welcome, David!" said the horse's device. So, my guess had been right: a telepathically activated translator. And the horse had known my name without a second's pause. Amazing.

Danceea kept pulling me along by the hand. I waved at a big, waddling bird who waved back with a thirty-foot-long wing. I shook the paw of a pony-sized, eight-legged dog. I scratched a giant bear behind the ear. I smiled sheepishly at a passing something that I didn't dare touch any part of, for fear of making a terrible social blunder. Whenever I spoke to any Tasonian directly, they would answer me by name with "Hi, David," or "Hello, Mr. Newcastle," or "Great dive, Bird Man!"

We finally reached the boarding way directly beneath the Candlelight just as the last of the crew was getting off. Among them was the captain. He was grinning beneath his Nordic mustache, but he still retained the dignity expected of the captain. As we approached, I saw a robust elderly man with shoulder-length gray hair walked up to the captain and hold out his hand. Captain North grasped it as the man introduced both himself and a man beside him.

"Welcome, Captain North! I am Kahu Naking, chief administrator of the Norado community. This is Carcainon Aberron, my friend and advisor."

The captain shook hands with Danceea's father. Carcainon Aberron was somewhat shorter than the other two men, with a wiry build that seemed to efficiently distribute the available muscles. He had short-cropped gray hair and sharp facial features, caused by an angular bone structure thinly covered by leathery skin. The three men turned to Danceea and I as we joined them. When Carcainon spoke, he had to raise his voice because of the mad bedlam around us.

"Captain, I believe you've already met my daughter."

Captain North was surprised, but he recovered quickly. "Why, yes indeed! Hello again."

Danceea stood close to North as she looked up at him with an impish smile and a twinkle in her green eyes. She spoke two words in a voice so soft it was barely audible amidst the noice of the crowd.

"Fooled ya."

I almost strangled on my laughter.

"Who's the wet one?" said Carcainon with a sly smile.

"He followed me home, Father. Can I keep him?"

"Well, if you insist," said Carcainon. He gave his daughter a faint but knowing smile, then he gripped my hand with hurtful strength.

Kahu Naking had watched all this with barely suppressed amusement, and he finally interrupted the discussion by addressing Captain North.

"Well, Captain, my people are ready to attend to your ship while you enjoy your visit with us. They're all certified by the Alliance Armed Forces for this important task. Would you honor me by accepting the guest quarters in my house?"

"Yes, thank you. Uh, will my crew — "

"They'll all be invited to stay with the residents of Norado. Anyone who prefers to sleep aboard ship may do so. For the next fifteen days, Captain, you are free from the responsibilities which your rank imposes. I urge you to relax and indulge yourself in a well-earned vacation. Shall we go, now?"

"Fine," said North. He looked a little befuddled by the idea of just walking away from his empty ship and his undisciplined crew. He drew a deep breath that swelled his barrel chest, and then he huffed it out as if he were shrugging off the weight of his command. Kahu Naking started leading North through the babbling crowd. As the captain followed, he turned to me and Dancee and said, "Ummm. . . Have fun, you two."

I grinning at him as I replied, "Aye, sir."

Danceea's father turned to us. "We'd like have you stay in our guest quarters, David."

Blast my eyeballs if I didn't actually blush like a little kid — a totally unexpected reaction! Carcainon laughed when he saw my face turn red, and then he turned to his daughter.

"Yeah, you were right. He's okay."

Still chuckling, he turned and walked towards shore, picking his way through varied groups of life forms, shaking hands with the crewmen to whom he was introduced. I looked at Danceea and then slowly pushed my hands down into my wet pockets, glancing around with a look of bored indifference.

"So, this is where you live, huh?"

"Yeap. What do you think of it?"

"Ah, it’s okay, I guess. But is it always this quiet?"

She laughed and shook her lovely head. "David, my friend, you haven't seen anything yet. Come on, I'll walk you to your cabin so you can change clothes and pack a few things." She headed towards the boarding way escalators, and I followed like a loyal puppy.

"Okay, but you have to promise to hide your eyes while I'm changing."

She looked back over her shoulder and gave me a 14 karat gold smirk as she said, "What a dumb expression."

"What expression?"

"Hide your eyes. It sounds like you don’t want the other person to see your eyes.”

All four of the escalators were still moving downward, but they were now completely empty. I used the control panel at the bottom to reverse the direction of one escalator. As we stepped on and started riding up I said, "I'll bet you get that contrary nature from your father."

She turned quickly, looked down at me and said, "I do not have a contrary nature!”

"See? There you go. I rest my case."

And off we went, right back into the same slap-happy relationship we'd established aboard the Candlelight — swapping lies, telling jokes, and absolutely convinced that each of us knew what the other one was talking about. It was that rare kind of friendship that made you feel like you’d been half of something great and wonderful all your life . . . but never knew it until now.

___________ * ___________ * ___________ * ___________

While the rest of the crewmen were making new friends, Chief Alex Sandusky was getting reacquainted with an old one. Sandusky heard his name called as he stood next to the ship-to-shore ramp, talking to a fifteen-foot bear-like creature and a four-foot whatever which looked like a plump praying mantis. The chief turned around to find out who had called his name, but nobody nearby was looking in his direction — except for the crimson head poking out of the water near the edge of the ramp. The head belonged to a dolphin-like creature whose bright red front quarter shaded to jet black in the small section visible above the water line.

"Seearay!" shouted the chief. He squatted at the edge of the grass-covered ramp and ran his hand along the glistening red hide between the creature’s eyes.

“Hello, Alex? Do you feel like playing a little poker?" The voice came from a narrow band of metal webbing that circled its body just behind the head. Most of the band was above the water, but part of it was below, and its vibrations made the water sizzle around it when Seearay spoke.

"You bet . . . no pun intended. Hey, that's a different kind of translator than you wore the last time I was here." The chief's old face was sporting a grin wide it looked like an ad for dental implants.

"Yeap," said the bobbing crimson head of the Tasonian. "What do you think? Clever, huh?"

"Doesn't it tickle?"

"Sure! But I like it!"

Sandusky chuckled. "Really? I thought your sex organs were located further — “

Seearay dipped his head and tossed water into Sandusky's face.

___________ * ___________ * ___________ * ___________

Beth Kellogg pushed her way into a group which surrounded her husband. The group was made up of three humans, two eight-foot dinosaurs, and one pure white flipperless seal/snake which propelled itself in humps like a cartoon inchworm. Beth smiled beautifully as she extracted him from the group and forcefully pulled Samuel along by the hand, She wove her way through the throng, saying a couple of “pardon me's” to the various beings they shouldered passed.

"I've got someone I want you to meet,” she said over her shoulder with barely suppressed excitement. Samual Kellogg knew better than to argue with his lovely bull-headed wife when she was in this mood, so he just allowed himself be lead along.

"You two have a common interest," Beth said. Short giggles were erupting from her every few seconds. She turned around and started walking backwards, holding her husband's hands as she tugged him through the crowd without once running into anyone, proof that her skills as a starship navigator were a gift from God.

"A common interest?" said Samuel. "Uh . . . what common interest?"

"Flying!" said Beth as she turned around and presented Samuel Kellogg’s new friend.

"Hello, Gumjaw!" said the sixteen-foot-high hawk-like creature who stood on the lush grass of the field at the edge of the lake. The huge bird was green and yellow like a tropical parrot, but the head was long and streamlined, with narrow eyes and a hooked beak that could tear open a bull. However, the thing which Samuel Kellog couldn’t take his eyes off of was the saddle which was strapped to the huge bird's back. It was just the right size for a human.

"Uh-oh . . . " Samuel whispered.

___________ * ___________ * ___________ * ___________

Punjaque was a shaggy brown beastie who looked just a bit like two cocker spaniels glued together for the extra legs (eight in all) and the body length (seven feet from nose to tail). Punjaqua was showing Jimmy Lewton and a few of the boys from engineering one of the “flip-flyers”.

"It's nothing new, really," said Punjaqua. "The important thing is who pilots it."

"I can see how that would be crucial," said Jimmy, studying the twenty-foot long, open cockpit aircraft. "But it seems sort of dangerous. Are there any safeties?"

"Of course there are safeties!" said the eight-pawed dog. He climbed into the vehicle, looking like a cross between a centipede and dachshund, and then he straddled the long padded bench in front of the controls. "There are sensing units which detect anything that might hit the passengers. When that happens you’ll hear this alarm.”

Punjaqua pressed a button, and a shrill voice shouted, “Duck, stupid!"

The six men stood there and made valiant effort to keep straight faces. The result was like watching the ushers at a wedding when bride suddenly farts. Finally Jimmy said quietly, "Well, that sounds good enough for me."

They all hopped in and settled themselves into the human-styled seats, calling out to other crewmen nearby to come fill the vacancies. Miriam Hogan, a plump little nurse with a long-running crush on the lanky chief engineer, wiggled down into the seat next to Jimmy, giggling and grinning and hugging his left arm. She beamed like a June bride on her honeymoon.

"Gee, JImmy, where are we going?"

"Oh, just around the valley."

"This is a really cute little sight-seeing flyer!"

Jimmy looked down at the arm she was strangling with such affection, then he reached down and lifted his own hand to his mouth and gave it loud kiss.

Miriam looked puzzled as she said, “Why did you do that, Jimmy?”

Jimmy just smiled and said, “I was kissing that arm good arm good-bye.”

“You did what?”

Jimmy just smiled and said, "You'll see."

The flip-flyer's engines were almost silent as Punjaqua revved them up and turned on the vehicle's artificial gravity. The flip-flyer rose up six feet — and then turned upside down. It sped off over the lake while the artificial gravity held the passengers firmly in their seats, giving them the illusion that the lake hung a few feet above their heads. As the terrified Miriam wrapped both arms around Jimmy's poor arm like a human tourniquet, the dwindling sound of her high-pitched wail was heard by the people under the Candlelight until they lost sight of the vehicle.

___________ * ___________ * ___________ * ___________

The crowd was starting to fragment into smaller groups, heading off in various directions to enjoy the ingenious entertainment activities Tason had to offer. Several of the junior crewmen had formed a quick friendship with a group of young Tasonian humans. A brick-red "horse" that was built roughly like a Clydesdale, with long silky hair on all four legs from the knees down, wandered over to the group of humans. He was introduced as Harahahee (a member of a race called the whylaree) when he joined the conversation, the subject of which concerned a game called polo. The crewmen had never played it, but several of them claimed they could ride a horse.

Harahahee went to get his wife and several other whylaree, along with a few very odd-looking substitutes who were willing to be the “polo ponies” in the game. Among them was one of the "dinosaurs" that Gumjaw had been talking to. Harahahee questioned the blue, eight-foot, bipedal lizard (whose name was Hakthh) about his suitability as a polo pony. Hakthh staunchly maintained that he could turn the mile in less than two minutes. No one felt inclined to voice disbelief of Hakthh's claim, possibly for fear of his long claws and sharp teeth. There was a brief discussion among the crewmen about who would ride Hakthh. None of the Tasonian humans had volunteered. The crewmen finally decided to go by seniority.

And so poor Ernie Fields (ace sharp-shooter among all the gunners mates, but still the junior crewman in the group) headed off with the rest of the odd crowd to see if they could find subtle saddles for their sentient steeds.

___________ * ___________ * ___________ * ___________

Chief Alex Sandusky came down the boarding way escalator dressed in swim trunks, followed by a distinctly troubled-looking Sid McWilliams — an elderly man known affectionately as “Sid the Brick” because of his short, stocky body and wide, square-jawed head. Underwater goggles dangled around the necks of the three men. They were all carrying watertight shoulder bags containing towels and robes. Sid's brick-shaped body looked decidedly un-Olympian in his own swim trunks. The waist band was very close to Sid's armpits because — quite frankly — so were Sid's hips. As he rode down the escalator he was greet by a chorus of unkindly remarks provided by Fernie Mann and Horace Biggs, who were waiting on the grass-covered ramp below.

At the moment, all four men had one thing in common. They were prepared to be taken down to the bottom of the lake so that they could play poker with Seearay and a few of his aquatic friends.

"I never thought I'd say it, but . . . poker may not be worth all of this," grumbled Sid.

"Aw, quit your gripin',” said Sandusky as he led the group to the edge of the ship-to-shore ramp. "All you gotta do is take a deep breath. The fish will do the rest."

"I have an extreme dislike for water," muttered Sid.

"Then ignore it rudely while you're under it," said Fernie Mann.

The four men waited by the waters edge, gazing around Norado valley at the scenery for which Tason was famous.

"Lord, this place is amazing," said Sandusky. "I thought I was remembering it better than it really was."

The mountains that surrounded the valley shot up from the lush green foliage almost like stone skyscrapers. Their height defied all logic. They weren't shaped like normal mountains which ended in sharp, snow capped peaks. Their rough sides were almost vertical.. They varied in height, but none of them were less than five miles high — which was two miles higher than Earth's Mt. Everest when measured from base to summit. This put the summits of even the lowest mountains more than four miles above the drifting cumulus clouds that dotted the sky.






Many of the mountains were decorated with spectacular waterfalls. Some were small, barely reaching above the trees that hugged the mountain's base. Others were so tall the water seemed to move in slow motion in their long plummet to the mist-shrouded lakes below. Amidst the foliage were areas dominated by the dark gray rock that formed the planet's foundation. Above the tree line the gray rock reined supreme, reaching up and up in cracked, faceted cliffs which narrowed into jagged monoliths of stone.

The monumental towers disappeared into the drift clouds, only to reappear above them, still pushing upwards to scrape the blue sky. Several waterfalls could be seen drifting down into the clouds which enveloped the vertical slabs of rock, and then the falling water emerged again from the clouds to continue their plummet to the ground.

Hanging over it all, framed by the deep blue sky, was Dante. It was as big to the naked eye as a china saucer held at arm's length. The blue of Tason's sky turned Dante's red oceans of lava into pale lavender. The volcanic sister world, now in its half moon phase, was straight overhead. The morning sun was just above the more distant mountain peaks at the East end of Norado valley.

Horace, Fernie, Alex, and Sid were lost in awe when four slick shapes suddenly eeled up out of the water and landed belly-down on the grass that covered the ship-to-shore ramp. The men were doused with spray as Seearay and three similar dolphin-like creatures (species name: keeagonka) titled their crimson heads up as the humans in a manner no Earth dolphin could imitate.

"Why you miserable can of cat food!" bellowed Sandusky. "Just for that I'm not gonna cheat to let you win!"

"What are you yelling about?" said Seearay, speaking through the vibrating metal band of thin webbing around his body, six inches behind his eyes. "You wore that silly outfit so you could get wet, right? You certainly didn't wear it to look attractive."

The other keeagonkas chuckled, fanning the air above the water with their black tails which hung over the edge of the ship-to-shore ramp. Unlike Earth dolphins, their tails, flippers, and dorsal fins were ribbed like a true fish. The foremost rib of the flippers had an elbow joint at the end that hinged a pair of black, bony forearms and spidery hands. The flipper-arms were long enough to allow the keeagonka to reach about a foot past their own noses. When the keeagonka were swimming, their forearms lad back against the forward edges of their fins, like a pocket knife folded closed.

"I hope you brought your money with you," said Seearay. "We have plans for it."

"We brought enough money to ante up on the first hand," said Sandusky. "We figure we'll be using your money after that."

"Ooh-hoo," said Seearay. "My ante for the first hand will come out of the seventy credits you owe me from the last time!"

Sandusky let the group's laughter run its course with a smile on his lips and blood in his eye.

"Okay, enough with the fish stories! Could we get on with it, please? We've only got fifteen days."

"Listen to the tuna beggin' for the hook," said Seearay.

"Now there's a phrase I wish I hadn't taught you," said Sandusky.

"Yeah, right — that and the game of poker," said Seearay.

The other three men turned to glare at Sanducky, then Sid blurted out, "Wait a minute. You taught him poker? And you ended up owing him money?"

"Never mind all that!” said Chief Sandusky. “Pay attention or you’ll drown when we go underwater. See that padded cable attached to their speaker webs?" Sandusky pulled a loop of cable up from Seearay's back.

"Yeah, we see 'em," said Fernie Mann. "Hey listen, you mean this fish learned to play poker from you . . . and then you let him beat you out of — "

Sundusky was ignoring Fernie, but nobody was fooled. "All you have to do is grab the cable and take a deep breath. Don't forget to tighten the strap on your shoulder bag. Seearay and his buddies will pull us down to the underwater garden where — “ Suddenly Chief Sandusky stopped and said, “Hey! We forgot the introductions!"

"Oh! Right, sorry," said the Seearay. "Well, my colleagues already know your names, so you guys can say howdy to Pondance, Clydelo, and Ja." Seearay waved his boney hand towards his friends and said to them, "Be friendly and say hello to the boys!"

The three keeagonka sang out like a glee club. "Hello to the boys!"

"So much for formalities," said Seearay. "Now, get wet, suckers! Your money needs a new home!"

Seearay folded his black flippers and his dorsal fin close against his body and rolled himself a few times until he tumbled into the water. The other three keeagonkas then did the same thing, all together, like a practiced group of circus tumblers. The less agile humans lowered themselves carefully to a sitting position on the ramp's edge and then slipped into the water. Seearay popped up in front of Sandusky, his bottle-nosed head nodding yes-yes-yes as his submerged tail worked to keep his speaker web above the water.

"I don’t get it,” said Seearay. “Evolution claims that you guys evolved from sea life, right?"

"Well, that’s one theory," said Alex.

Seearay studied the humans as they all treaded water with visible effort, but very little grace. "Hmmmm," said Seeary. "I'm inclined to doubt it. You just aren’t built for it."

Pondance held himself close to Sid while the elderly man got a good grip on the cable attached to his back. "Put your goggles on, guys. The view is just as good down there as it is up here."

The four humans wrested their goggles into position. Sid couldn't get his on straight until a pair of bony black hands emerged from the water and fixed them for him. He mumbled a quick thanks to Pondance.

"Are you guys ready," Seearay said, the water frizzling around his translator.

"All set," said Horace.

"Ready," said Fernie.

"Ah, I guess," said Sid, looking less than thrilled.

Sandusky took a deep breath and then Seearay slid beneath the water, pulling Sandusky with him. The other three men followed Sandusky's example, and the three keeagonka dove.

The water was crystal clear, and thanks to the goggles they wore, the four humans were treated to an amazing site. Seearay and his three friends pulled the clinging men down towards the bottom of the lake, passing between the massive supports of the three disks which held the Candlelight at the edge of the lake. As they went deeper the three men felt the sharp pain of increasing water pressure stab into their ears. The lake was teeming with aquatic life — from large schools of tiny creatures the size of minnows, all the way up to behemoths the size of whales.

The larger ones tended to wave at the passing group, and the keeagonkas waved back while making noises in their own language which were garbled by the humans’ ears.

The four men had to grip the cables tightly in both hands to keep from being left behind by their swift keeagonka escorts. They were hauling their human passengers along as quickly as possible, knowing that they're lungs were beginning to demand air. Seearay and his three companions pulled the clinging men down to the bottom of the lake and into the opening of a smooth metal tube fifteen feet across. The tube led down under the lake bottom, curving back up to end inside a submerged chamber.

The four keeagonka and their trailing passengers emerged from a pool of water at the end of a long room that stretched away for five hundred feet. The roof of the long room was clear crystalsteel, through which the lake above was visible, an azure blue world which swarmed with swimming creatures of all sizes, both large and small, mingling in the remarkably clear water.

Above them all, the lake's surface distorted the image of the Candlelight and the cloud-filled sky.

The submerged chamber was one long garden, filled with flowers, shrubs, vines, and trees. The trees had been cropped to keep the branches below the fifty-foot high transparent roof. Exotic birds darted among the branches, filling the air with echoed sounds which were both eerie and beautiful.

The keeagonka towed their passengers over to a set of marble stairs which ran down into the water. The men found footing on the stairs and then released their hold on the cables attached to their aquatic companions.

Horace Biggs was the first to climb out of the water, look up, and comment on his amazing surroundings. "Holy Hannah . . . what a lay-out," he said softly.

Chief Sandusky stared down the length of the underwater garden and compared it to his memory from eighteen years ago. With quiet reverence he said, "I should have known."

Sid McWilliams stepped out of the water and stood next to Sandusky, gazing up with the same look of amazement. "Should have known what?"

Sandusky's voice was barely a whisper as he said, "That it would be even better than I remembered it. I guess Tason is only place in the universe that surpasses a person’s fond memories.”

The rest of the men emerge from the water, and they all started walking down the smooth walkway which led straight down the center of garden. The keeagonka swam along beside them in a parallel canal. The canal's water level came right to the edge walkway, and the turbulence of the swimming keeagonka sloshed water across it.

"Where do those side paths go?" said Fernie. He pointed at the walkways which branched off and wandered into the thick foliage on either side of the central canal.

"They just meander around through the garden," said Sandusky. "The main canal here has underwater tunnels that lead up into dozens of little pools all back in there. Most of the pools are connected by a network of smaller canals which parallel the wandering paths.” He chuckled as he said, “On Tason you can actually take a walk with a fish! This garden is made as much for them as it is for us." He pointed at the swimming keeagonka. Seearay raised his head up to get his translator out of the water.

"Sure! We like to smell the flowers, too." He gave a few strong kicks with his tail and shot down the canal. After he had gone a few dozen feet he slid up onto the smooth, wet walkway and skidded across it diagonally on his belly. He glided to a halt on the garden side of the walkway with his nose just a few inches from a large blue flower. With a long audible inhalation, Seearay's midsection swelled as he drew in a lungful of the flower’s fragrance.

"Deee-lightful!" the keeagonka exclaimed, huffing air out through the blowhole in his head.

The four men studied the amazing sight — a sea creature sniffing a flower. Then Horace Biggs lurched like somebody had goosed him in the ribs. "Wait a minute!" he said indignantly. "You don't have any nostrils! How can you smell it?"

Seearay folded his dorsal fin and flippers down flat against his body, then he rolled over onto his back and appeared to break his neck as he raised his head to look across his shiny black belly at Horace.

“The olfactory nerves are in the roof of my mouth. That way they can work underwater."

After a moment of suspicious silence, Horace just said. "Oh . . . right."

"My friend Ja, however, doesn't share my love for flowers," said Seearay, bringing both his spidery hands up to slowly drum his fingers on his belly.

"Really? Why not?" said Horace.

"Because . . . he get's hay fever."

Quickly Seeary folded his flippers back and rolled himself back into the water while the other men exploded with laughed at Horace’s shocked look of disbelief.

Horace glared at his friends with a red face and an indignant look. "Well, how could I have known he was kidding? His face only has one damn expression!"

Sandusky struggled to stop chuckling long enough to deliver his answer. "Right! Now you know why he plays poker so good!"

The sound of the group’s laughter mingled with alien bird calls as the group continued towards the far end of the garden where a lounge area had been designed to accommodate the close association of life forms who lived on both land and in the water. The lounge was also equipped as a game room, and today the name of the game was poker. However, by this time the men had begun to suspect they were in over their heads.

So to speak.

___________ * ___________ * ___________ * ___________

Samuel Kellogg had a different kind of problem. Ever since his childhood days on the planet of his birth, Hinkle's Home, Samuel had piloted various kinds of aircraft. At age eleven he had saved his father's life when the elder Kellogg had suffered a heart attack. Young Samuel had flown the family aircraft through a violent rainstorm, weaving in and out of the ravines and valleys to deliver his father to the hospital.

Gumjaw had been born to fly.

But this was different.

"There's a harness on the saddle, Samuel. I'd feel a lot better if you'd use it," said Ee-yok, the fifteen-foot tall "hawk" (species name jari-cari). Besides his size, the major difference between this large bird and the predatory birds of Earth was his plumage. The feathers were brilliantly colored — green, yellow, and red.

"You bet your tail feathers I'll use the harness," mumbled Samuel as he walked around the huge bird and eyed it suspiciously, doubting the reliability of it's design and construction.

"Now, Sam,” chided Beth Kellogg. "Don't let people see you acting so hesitant."

Samual continued to circle the bird with wary caution. "Honey, you know I always make a preflight inspection of any new aircraft before I fly it." He sounded calm and relaxed, but he was chewing a wad of gum like he was punishing it with this teeth. Beth knew exactly what that meant. Her husband was wearing his treasured Mack truck hat, and it was pulled down low on his forehead, hiding his eye.

The jari-cari waited patiently for Sam to finish his walk-around, then the Ee-yok said, "Stand right there for a second, Sam."

The huge bird started slowly walking around Gumjaw, his brightly colored head bobbing up and down and cocking from side to side in true bird fashion, looking the man over minutely. Kellogg didn’t move from where he stood, but he folded his arms, roll his eyes, and tap his foot.

"What are you doing?" Kellogg said. It was a rhetorical question.

"I always make a preflight inspection of any new passenger before I take him up."

"Why?" said Sam. He flinched as soon as he said it, because he knew what the answer would be.

"To see if he looks green around the gills. I don't want to have you barfing all over the back of my head."

Yax, the other jari-cari, made a strange sound, and both the humans stared at him for a moment.

"Is your brother okay?" said Samuel.

"He's just laughing at you."

Beth was laughing too. "Sam, if you're through stalling, could we please get started."

Looking far less than happy about this whole situation, Sam stuck his right foot into the stirrup below the saddle and swung himself up like Roy Rogers mounting Trigger. He fastened the harness around himself, pulling it a bit tighter than he really needed to, then he tucked his Mack hat into the side pouch of the saddle.



_________


There were no reigns for him to grasp, but there was an inverted U-shaped handle where the saddle horn would have been if Sam had been on a horse — which Sam would have much preferred at the moment. However, he would have stubbornly swallow his on tongue before he'd admit it to this group!

Ee-yok and Yax spread their fifty-foot wings and raised a cloud of dust as they took off from the edge of the lake near the ship-to-shore ramp. Beth's grin was so wide her teeth could be counted, but Samuel Kellogg had an odd look on his face as the jari-cari rose behind the Candlelight and flew over it, heading out over the lake.

Samuel couldn't shake the disturbing feeling that he ought to steering something instead of just sitting there gripping the handle in front of him. He realized he was unconsciously trying to move the handle around like a control yoke. He also found it disturbing that the thing he was riding on kept twisting and flexing and changing shape. He wasn't used to having the wings of his aircraft flap around like this.

"How are you doing back there?" Ee-Eeyok called out, turning his head to look back at his passenger.

"Oh, fine. Just fine," said Kellogg, wishing that the bird would turn back around and watch where he was going.

"Glad to hear it. You really don't have to squeeze the saddle handle so hard, Sam."

Samual pondered the remark for a moment, then he said, "How did you know I was squeezing it?"

"Because your legs are doing the same thing to the flexible saddle . . . which I'm right underneath."

"Oh. Sorry."

Samuel Kellogg made himself relax as Ee-Eeyok and Yax soared over the lake, slowly circling, gaining altitude. He looked down at the clear sparkling water, in which he could see thousands of aquatic creatures. He knew that some of them were intelligent, while others were just there to serve as food and to establish an eco-system. Samuel saw a group of orca-sized creatures with humans riding on their backs. Then he noticed that a second group was approaching the first, and he realized that some sort of team sport was in progress.

"What are they playing down there?" Samuel called out. The jari-cari looked down for a moment just as the opposing teams merged in the middle of the lake.

"It's got several names, depending on who you ask. The doragonka you see down there called it — Ee-Eeyok made a series of long moans that sounded roughly like a whale song, which struck Samuel as ironic since it was coming from a translator device worn by a giant bird.

"The game is basically a relay race between two teams, but the object which is being passed from player to player is actually thrown, rather than being handed off from one to the others. It's a disk that flies a short distance when you throw it. A device on each player’s wrist can be set to attract or repel the disk, depending on whether the player is trying to catch the disk or prevent the opposing team from catching it."

"So the point is to stay in possession of the disk?"

"Well, sort of. But to win, your team has to pass the disk from player to player according to the number on the life jackets. The life jackets are either red or green, depending which team you're on. If player green-one throws it, only green-two is allowed to catch it, then green-three, and so forth.”

"Oh, I get it! Meanwhile the red team tries to intercept the disk." Samuel was leaning to the right and well forward to see over the front edge of the large bird’s wing while he watched the human-mounted whales turn the water to foam.

"Yes, but only the player of the proper number can intercept the disk."

After a pause Samuel said, "Wait a minute . . . say that again."

"Okay. Suppose green-two throws the disk to green-three, who then tries to throw it green-four. But red-four has been covering green-four. If he intercepts the disk, red-four has to throw it to red-one to start their own sequential series of passes, and the green team has to start all over again if they can get the disk back."

Kellogg’s face lit up like a kid on Christmas morning when he suddenly understood the rules. "What a great game! Are there referees to keep everybody honest?"

"Naturally. They hover above the game in small aircraft, and they can pause the game and impose penalties."

Samuel saw four small referee aircraft about forty feet above the water, hovering at the edge of the main cluster of human-mounted whales creatures.

"Hey, that really sounds fun!"

"I suppose so," said Ee-Eeyok. "But since I don't swim very well, let's just do a bit of flying, shall we?"

Suddenly Ee-Eeyok banked and dove at Yax, who banked hard to prevent a collision. Beth and Samuel hung onto their saddle handles and shouted with both fright and joy as the jari-cari engaged in mock-combat, skillfully missing each other by a feather's breadth. After several minutes, the giant birds resumed their slow, circling ascent until they were above the drifting clouds. Gumjaw's appreciation for the height of the surrounding mountains was renewed when he saw that most of the peaks were still high above them, even though the clouds were already far below.

It was chilly this high up and his ears popped from the altitude. Norado now appeared to be a miniature valley, far below, and yet Samuel Kellogg could see through the mountain pass through which the Candlelight had flown, all the way back to the lower region, three thousand feet beyond the amazing waterfall they'd seen.

Samual Kellogg noticed an increasing sense of exhilaration caused by the easy identification he felt with the creature beneath him. The slow, powerful beat of Ee-Eeyok's wings made the bird surge forward rhythmically. The wind in Samuel's face was, ironically, a characteristic of flight that he had never experienced before. He looked down past his own dangling feet and saw the cruising clouds, soaring over the distant land. He knew that even the dome-shaped port of the Candlelight's bridge could not supply a view such as this. And yet, his own view still took second place compared to the view being enjoyed by Ee-Eeyok and Yax, who could not only survey the dwindling landscape below, they could also feel their own outstretched wings bending the air to their will.

It occurred to Samuel that his initial uneasiness had been caused by plain ordinary pride. He had known that as Ee-Eeyok's passenger he would have no control over the act of flying. Yet now he realized that even with his dependent status, the experience was more pure and intense than he'd ever felt before. Clinging to the giant bird's back, watching him turn his head left and right as he surveyed his airy kingdom, Samuel Kellogg was able to imagine what flying — real flying — was like for the jari-cari.

"If God had wanted man to fly . . . " he whispered.

___________ * ___________ * ___________ * ___________

Ernie Fields and his trusty steed, Hakth the reptilian polo pony, came thundering down the side line of the polo field. Hakth's clawed feet tore at the sod while his loping strides made poor Ernie bounce up and down with bone-bruising force.

But behind them, six whylaree-mounted humans galloped in desperate pursuit, unable to keep up as Hakth reached the rolling ball, and Ernie swung the mallet with deadly accuracy. The ball shot forward, and Hakth sent chunks of sod boiling up behind him as his running feet clawed the ground, his leathery legs a blur. The goal was fifty feet away.

Ahead of them, one lone defender reached a position to block the scoring shot. Ernie zeroed his keen eyes on the bouncing ball, instinctively computing speed and direction. Hakth maneuvered perfectly for the shot without needing guidance from his rider. The mallet swung down in a whistling arc, and the air was split with the sound of the ball's wooden impact. It raced over the ground, aimed perfectly at the goal.

But in the last instant it met the mallet of the lone defender. With a crack like the knuckles of Zeus, it reversed course and came rocketing back. Hakth reared back and dug raw furrows in the ground with his clawed feet, halting himself in a split second while Ernie hung on desperately. The fearsome beast swung his long tail in a whip-like motion that caught the ball on a high bounce and sent it flying straight at the lone defender's head. The man ducked, the ball shot past, and the goal was made.

Ernie and Hakth the Magic Dragon became the heroes of the day.





___________ * ___________ * ___________ * ___________

The Tasonian "whales" (species name: doragonka) and their human riders had turned the middle of the lake into a choppy whirlpool as they dove and leaped and nudged each other. The humans wore trim breathing helmets that also contained a device which allowed them to talk to their own individual doragonka partners, and the dorakonka could reply through their telepathic translators. Since the doragonka could talk to each other underwater, this established an indirect means though which the human team members could communicate.

Randy Henson directed his doragonka partner to dive beneath a group of contestants who were locked in a struggle between him and the human/doragonka pair who were in possession of the relay disk. The doragonka agreed with Randy's strategy, and so Randy leaned back against the creature's six-foot dorsal fin just as the water slammed into him. The moment Randy's head was underwater, his ears were assault by the noise of two dozen cetaceans talking to each other in their melodic language of low, mournful tones.

He could feel the powerful movements of the creature's tail as it nose-dived into the depths, and the water pressed Randy firmly against the smooth, sloping, natural backrest provide by the marine mammal's dorsal. A harness held Randy strapped firmly to the saddle while the doragonka ducked beneath the writhing mass of game players and then angled up towards the surface.

"Get ready," said the voice of Randy's partner through the headphones. "Green six knows we're coming."

"Gotcha," said Randy. They slid to the surface within yards of their fellow teammates, a human/doragonka pair recognizable by a large green number pasted on the dorsal fin. The man riding the doragonka pitched the disk as soon as Randy broke the surface. It was a perfect shot, and it wacked Randy on the chest.

"Randy!" said the doragonka. "Green eight is gonna make a high jump on the far side!"

"Then I'll need as much height as you can give me to make the pitch."

"You got it." The huge creature fanned his tail beneath the surface with awesome power and dove down several meters, then he angled back upward and broke the surface, the front half of his body rising above the turbulent water. He rose high up in the air like Hoppalong Cassidy when Topper rear up, and Randy aimed his pitch at the place he thought green eight would come up. His back-handed throw gave the disk a healthy velocity and a rapid spin. The instant his hand released it, the disk lit up with a bright orange glow. The propulsion mechanism inside the disc held it up as it sailed high over the group of blockers and counter blockers.

Suddenly on the far side, a doragonka came bursting straight up out of the water and almost left the surface. Bill Jenkins clung to the back of the huge aquatic missile, surrounded by a hundred gallons of flying spray. The disk passed him four yards to his left, but the "proximity homer" on his wrist caused the airborne object to loop around him three times, spiraling in closer. Bill caught it just as the doragonka came down in a belly-whopping crash that sent white waves rolling out from the impact point. Just as the dented surface came rolling in to engulf Bill, he spotted green nine and whipped his arm out, sending the glowing disk skimming over the choppy water. It passed closely behind green nine, did a hyperbolic orbit, and came back.

"Red-ten is moving in to intercept," Bill said to his partner.

"We just might be able to block him," said the doragonka. His ten-foot tail started churning the water, and they surged forward. Although Bill's head and shoulders were above the surface, their speed caused the water to be scooped across his body, pressing him back against the dorsal fin.

It was like standing in front of a fire hose. When they reached red-ten, Bill switched his proximity homer to "repel". Green-nine made his throw, and the disk sailed by them unwavering as the proximity homers of both Bill and red-ten cancelled each other out. But red-three suddenly reared up in front of the flying object, and he switched on his proximity homer just long enough to loop the disk completely around him. When he switched the device off, the disk came back to red-ten, who swam under it for an admirable catch. Red-ten dove beneath the surface, and the action left Bill Jenkins behind. Bill's partner spoke to him through the headphones.

"Randy Henson sends word that you're a clumsy oaf."

"Tell Randy he's an inept hippo, and his partner is a fat old sea hag."

There was pause, and then doragonka said, "His partner is my wife.”

"Oh . . . I'm sorry. I was just — "

Bill heard a chuckle in his headset. "Never mind. I'll tell her. She swims faster when she's mad."

___________ * ___________ * ___________ * ___________

“The Name of the game is, gentlemen, is five card draw, with two raises.” Seearay picked up the cards he had just dealt himself. “Mr. Sandusky, you now have the option to either open or draw from the deck.”

“A quick question,” said Sandusky, his elbow on the table, his chin on his palm, and patience obviously strained. “Who taught you this game?”

The keeagonka’s expression was a permanent smile that was so similar to an Earth dolphin that they could have been twins if the dolphin’s head was painted crimson. The aquatic alien held Sandusky’s gaze for a long moment, and then he simple said, “Ummm . . . you.”

“Then let’s have more poker and less talk,” said Sandusky.

Seearay held Sandusky’s gaze and then said, “Cards?”

“Ummm . . . gimme . . . one.” Sandusky tossed one card out and laid the rest face down on the table. Seearay’s boney black hand sent the new card sliding across the table, and it almost slipped itself in the chief’s stack. He scowled at the keeagonka and mumbled, “Nobody likes a show-off.”

“Not true. I’m pretty sure she does,” said Seeary, pointing to the red-and-black keeagonka who was swimming slowly around the transparent dome that covered the lounge, obviously watching the game.

Sandusky twisted his head and body as he watched the beautiful creature circle the dome which protruded above the rest of the submerge lake garden’s transparent roof. “Your girl friend?”

“Yeah. Well . . . one of them,” Seeary said half aloud as he studied his cards intently.

“Hey, are we playing cards here or what?” Sid McWilliams complained.

“Well, I am,” said Seeary. “You guys are just giving money away.”

Seeary and Pondance were both laying belly down on bench-shaped marble pedestals at the top of slick ramps which sloped down into a small pool near the game table. Each pedestal had nozzles down both sides which provided a spray to keep the aquatic card players wet. As he studied his cards, Pondance's spidery black hand reached down to tap a handle on the side of the pedestal, and he received a fresh squirt of spray.

Ja, Clydelo, and Horace Biggs were lounging in and around the small pool behind the card players, sipping refreshments and arguing politics, waiting for their turn to take a hand. The entire lounge was designed to allow the water dwellers and the land dwellers to be comfortable together. Underground tunnels lead up into the pool, which was flanked by couches and chairs. Everything was water-proof, of course.

The lounge itself was located at one end of the long, submerged garden. It was thirty-five feet higher than the rest of the garden, and the flat transparent roof had a small dome at this end which covered the raised lounge like a bubble, surrounding it with the underwater world of the lake. Outside the dome, hundreds of aquatic creatures swam around, some of them unbelievably large. Up towards the surface of the lake the card players could see the rambunctious game of “series relay” in progress, filling the sunlit water with bubbles.

Old Fernie Mann studied his cards for a full minute, waving his bulky nose back and forth as if he were reading a book. Sid McWilliams sat next to Fernie, his impatience visibly growing. At last Fernie spoke.

"Gimme three."

Sid looked heavenward and then rubbed a chunky hand over his eyes. "I knew he had garbage," he said wearily. "Okay. Give me one."

"I'll stand pat," said Pondance.

"And the dealer takes two," said Seearay. "Okay, Big Al. It's your show."

“I’ll open with one,” said the chief, tossing a one credit chip into the pot. Fernie surprised everybody with a quick comeback.

“I’ll see that,” he said, “and bump it up two more.” Fernie’s poker face was a gift from God: his eyes were just two droopy slits, revealing nothing.

Sid McWilliam’s wrinkled face was showing a bit more expression. Sid was a notorious cheapskate, which meant he became visibly nervous whenever somebody started raising the stakes. He studied his cards intently like they might reveal the meaning of life. He glanced at the pot like it was King Solomon’s diamonds, then he glanced around at the other players the way a defendant looks at the jury.

Finally he wiped the back of his hand across his mouth, drew a deep breath, and delivered his final verdict like a Supreme Court judge.

“I fold.”

Absolutely nobody was surprised, but the sudden sound of stifled laughter resembled an asthma attack by six people simultaneously.

___________ * ___________ * ___________ * ___________

The open cockpit flyer, with its own artificial gravity, was going parallel up the face a high waterfall, its passenger section facing the plummeting water. The passengers' heads were just a few feet from the falling flood. From the subjective viewpoint of the passengers, who were resting comfortably in their seats, held down by the artificial gravity, the flip-flyer seemed to be in a normal horizontal position. The water, however, appeared to be rushing by overhead. A constant spray was flowing past them between the flyer and the falling water, soaking the hair and clothing of the people in the strange vehicle.






Chief Engineer Jimmy Lewton was practically deaf in his left ear from Miriam Hogan's constant squeals of glee. She had lost her initial fear of the crazy aircraft, and now (as she had told Jimmy a dozen times) she just loved it. Jimmy knew that his arm would be sore and bruised tomorrow from the constant squeezing that the affection young woman was giving it, but he figured it was part of Miriam's subtle plan to get him to come by sickbay so she could play doctor with him.

When the flip-flyer reached the top of the waterfall, Punjaqua turned it upright and resumed their journey along the mountain stream. Several of the shaggy Tasonian's eight dog-like legs were kept busy operating the complex controls. The flip-flyer was an amazing device. Artificial gravity had been around for centuries, but this particular application of the process made it possible for its passengers to get a fresh look at familiar surroundings.

They had been cruising around for over an hour, during which time they had skimmed over the lake in the inverted position. Miriam stuck her hand up to drag it through the water above their heads, causing it to fall down into the passenger section, drenching everybody.

Then the flyer had mingled with the people who were hang-gliding over the valley, so that Punjaqua could startle the hang-gliding crewmen with the disconcerting sight of their shipmates dangling upside-down as they flew past, grinning and waving.

Finally they had wandered up into the foothills to follow an upside-down stream. During the trip, Punjaqua had not flown the aircraft upside-down constantly. Even though the artificial gravity fooled the passenger's sense of balance, it was still disconcerting to see a landscape hanging above their heads, with water clinging to its underside and clouds floating in a bottomless blue sky beneath them. The mind needed a periodic rest.

After reaching the top of the waterfall, Punjaqua spent twenty minutes following the stream up into the foothills without turning the flip-flyer over. Finally, just out of curiosity, Jimmy Lewton called out to their Tasonian pilot.

"Are we headed anyplace in particular, Punjaqua?"

"No, but we can if you like. Are you folks ready for lunch?"

Everybody nodded their heads in answer to the Tasonian' question. The Candlelight had arrived at noon (ship's time), and several hours had passed since their dawn landing in Norado, making it about ten in the morning, local time.

"Okay," said Punjaqua. "Then I'll take you to a great place to eat. Geographically its the lowest place on Tason."

Before anybody could question such a puzzling remark, Punjaqua flipped the aircraft over and picked up speed as they continued following the wandering stream. They were high up in the foothills, getting visibly nearer the clouds which surrounded the impossibly tall mountain peaks. At one point they encountered a little rain shower, but the inverted flip-flyer served as a perfect umbrella. They watched the fat rain drops splatter up into the lush, green forest overhead. It was intoxicating.

The rain ceased just as Punjaqua brought the inverted flip-flyer out under a calm little mountain pool that was surrounded by thick green vegetation. The flyer moved slowly beneath the calm, crystal clear surface of the pool, almost touching it. No one said a word as they gazed up into the water, watching tiny upside-down fish swim peacefully in the shallow pool. Jimmy Lewton was so entranced by the spell of the moment that he unconsciously leaned toward Miriam as she hugged his arm. He even put his hand over hers. Miriam wore the secret smile of woman whose carefully laid trap was slowly closing.

The bright morning sun filtered up through the wind-rustled trees, illuminating the rocky bottom of the upside-down pool. A six-inch long fish with a fin arrangement reminiscent of a rocket ship came drifting down towards the surface of the pool. The sunlight glinted from its shiny scales like burnished metal. It swam right down to the surface and hung there for a moment, obviously both curious and fearless, looking at the people through a quarter inch of invisible water. Then it slowly swam away.

Miriam reached up and put one hand into the suspended liquid above her head. Everybody watched in silence as she cupped her hand slowly and pulled a handful of water down an inch from the rippling surface. Water droplets fell back up into the pool, like tiny glass beads leaping from Miriam's hand.

As if they were in church, Jimmy whispered, "How does it feel?"

"Cold," Miriam said softly. She tilted her head back and opened her mouth as she rose up a little from the seat, yearning to taste the cool, pure water. Her hand came down just a bit too far — and the water was caught by the flip-flyer's artificial gravity. It dropped down from the palm of her hand and broke over her upturned face. Miriam squealed as the cold water ran down her neck and into her blouse.

The group collapsed with laughter, and all the fish in the pool above them shot away in every direction. From the front of the flip-flyer, somebody called the group's attention to the laughing Punjaqua. The sight of the convulsed Tasonian set the crewmen off in a new spasm of laughter. Punjaqua hugged his long belly with three pairs of arms as he rolled about, howling like a hound dog. The group laughter went on and on, with tears filling their eyes, and a growing ache seizing their throats. Finally the mirth subsided and the crewmen started blowing their running noses and wiping their eyes. After a long pause, Jimmy Lewton spoke to Punjaqua with quiet sincerity.

"Brother, do I envy you."

"Why?" said Punjaqua.

"Isn't it obvious? Because you've got all of this." Jimmy waved at the upside-down pool — but what he really meant was Tason in general.

"You think you'd like it here?"

"Who wouldn't?"

"Lots of people," said Punjaqua in a strange, humorless voice. "You'd be surprised. I've brought groups up here who hardly seemed to notice things like this little pool. They just weren't impressed."

"Well, we're impressed," said Miriam. The group nodded in agreement.

Punjaqua smiled in way no actually dog could ever do. "Good. Ready for lunch?"

"Starved!" was the common word in their chorus of agreements.

"Good! I promised you I’d take you to the lowest spot on Tason, so you better hand on tight, because it’s a long fall."

And suddenly they were falling — straight down into a bottomless blue sky while they stared up at the tranquil pool, rapidly dwindling as it shot upwards and disappeared among the retreating forest overhead. Miriam broke her previous record for ear-piercing screams, but she had some serious competition from the rest of the group. Everyone grabbed the edges of their seats and squeezed until their knuckles were bloodless. The wind whistled around them as they plummeted down with frightening speed. Several hundred feet away was the sheer rocky side of an impossibly tall cliff, its craggy face speeding past so quickly it was almost a blur.



Above them, the shrinking view of Norado Valley was suddenly lost from sight when they dropped into a billowing cloud. The cloud shot upward, just as the forest above it had done a moment ago. The cliff still paralleled their descent, punching up into the clouds, hanging onto the underside of the world. The air grew cold as they continued to fall into a blue infinity. To lean sideways and look over the edge of the flip flyer to peer down into that infinite blue void was a serious mistake.

Gradually the cliff next to them narrowed and became the Father of All Stalactites, a gigantic downward-pointing spire of rock that clung to the bottom of the planet, alone in the middle of the sky-blue nothingness. Their plunging descent slowed as they dropped below the end of the blunted projection of gray stone. It hung there, aimed down at them like God's accusing finger, petrified in the act of judgment.



_________________
____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)


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Bud Brewster
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PostPosted: Thu Dec 01, 2016 8:33 pm    Post subject: Sail the Sea of Stars - chapter 13 conclusion Reply with quote

CHAPTER 13 — conclusion

The haze of distance and the floating clouds reduced the rest of the world above them to a misty background. The flip-flyer slowed . . . then stopped . . . and then started back up towards that terrible hanging mass of rock. As they grew nearer to the bottom end they saw a group of buildings hugging the underside of the massive, stony projection. Many windows decorated its sides, as if it were a temple for the worship of Sky Blue.

The flyer rose towards the clinging buildings and approached their lowest extremity. The mind-boggling mass of that titanic column of gray stone hanging over them was frightening. The lowest part of the buildings was a large room made entirely of transparent material. Punjaqua landed the flyer on a transparent platform adjacent to the crystal-clear floor of the room.

"I hope I didn't scare you!" said the Tasonian in a ridiculously cheerful voice. If Jimmy's knees hadn’t been shaking so badly he would have lead the others in an effort to pitch the eight-legged dog over the guard rail.

Wait . . . Over the guard rail?

"Hey, where are we?" Jimmy said, standing next to the flip-flyer . . . and yet still looking down into a bottomless sky-blue void through the transparent platform.

"I told you. This is the lowest spot on Tason." Punjaqua waved a paw at the misty landscape above, which occupied the place where the sky should have been. "See? Tason is up there, and we're down here. Come on, let's eat!"

He led the dazed group across a transparent walkway, through a set of transparent doors, and into an almost invisible room. It was about one hundred feet square, filled with normal-looking tables and chairs which rested on a floor that didn’t seem to exist.

As Punjaqua headed for one of the tables which had a long bench made for him, he addressed the group as they followed him across the room. "I know what you’re thinking, guys. It takes a little getting used to." He lifted one paw and pointed at the transparent floor. "See that grid of thin wires?"

Everybody looked down — which was an effort — and saw a pattern of black wires inside the clear floor material. It gave them something to focus their eyes on, which helped.

"A gravity-grid," said Jimmy.

"Right. And the ceiling is padded, just in case." He pointed at the cushioned ceiling above their heads. "So, relax. You can't really fall that way." He pointed at the blue sky beneath their feet.

The group began to chuckle as sanity seeped back into their overloaded minds, and everybody spent a few moments looking out the windows at the beautiful upside-down landscape and down at —

"Wow!" exclaimed Miriam. "Look at that!"

Dante, the other half of Tason's binary system, floated below their feet, off to one side. The clear Tasonian air at this altitude (depth?) made Dante's mountains and valleys appear remarkably sharp. The lava oceans were a deeper shade of lavender than they normally appeared. Continent-sized clouds of ash moved visibly across the face of the planet, traveling hundreds of miles an hour in the fire-storm winds which were powered by updrafts over the lava oceans.

"It's like looking down at Hell," said Miriam.

Punjaqua chuckled. "We felt it would be a worthy endeavor to put Hell in its proper place . . . at least while one is in this room."

Stewards had entered, and they were setting the tables. The crewmen sat down, still gazing around at the view this astounding room provided of "the lowest spot on Tason". Lunch orders were taken, and soon everybody was laughing and eating and reminiscing about the wild ride. Punjaqua explained that both the flip-flyer and the landing ramp outside were equipped with force fields to keep the air pressure normal at high altitudes.

After several minutes, Jimmy called out to their Tasonian guide, who was seated several tables away.

"Hey, Punjaqua!"

"Yo!"

"How come they gave you the job of flying that crazy contraption?"

"Well now, as ironic as it may seem," Punjaqua said solemnly, "it was a direct result of my nervous fear of heights."

"WHAT?" said ten people at once.

"Yep. They gave me the job of piloting the flip-flyer so that whenever my fear of heights got really unbearable . . . I could just come down here until it went away."

Then he grinned in a way that only an eight-legged alien dog-creature could do.




_________________
____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)


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Gord Green
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PostPosted: Wed Dec 07, 2016 1:44 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Great interlude!

This feels like the mid point of the story, and could be read almost like a story on it's own.

One thing about reading in installments is trying to keep in mind what has gone on before. The carnage and destruction prevelant in the first parts are almost forgotten by now and we're lulled into a most relaxed mood of this planetary paradise.

Kinda like waiting for the snake from under the pretty rock to come out! lol!

More later.......
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