“The fruit,” she whispered to the watching
bird. “It’s the juice, isn’t it? I only tasted a drop or two, and
I’m so relaxed and sleepy I can’t stay awake any longer. What will
it do to Tarik? He drank most of it. I’ve killed him. He was my
responsibility, and I’ve killed him.”
Narisa wakened to find herself huddled
against Tarik. It must be morning. The sun was still low, and a few
shafts of pale orange sunlight filtered through the trees. Beyond
her feet she could see wisps of mist drifting up from the stream.
She stretched, feeling Tarik’s comfortable warmth next to her, and
turned over, pressing her back against his side. She sighed
contentedly, feeling remarkably well for a woman who had trekked
across a burning desert only a day ago.
No, not a day ago. She sat up. She had done
this before, wakened in just this spot, and Tarik had been burning
with fever, and she had tried to help him, and then had given him
something … and killed him.
She looked down at the man beside her. He lay
sleeping peacefully, his straight dark hair tousled, his pale
features untouched by any feverish flush. He looked completely
healthy. His uniform jacket was open and her regulation undershirt
was draped across his abdomen just above his loosened trousers.
She glanced anxiously around the little
clearing. It was empty. Her eyes fell on an uneaten compressed food
wafer and a smooth, yellow-green fruit.
“Narisa?” Tarik was awake.
“Are you - how do you feel?” she asked in a
trembling voice.
“Quite well. Why do you ask?”
“You were sick. You had a terrible fever. I
thought you would die.”
“I don’t remember.” He stretched, then rubbed
his left side. “My ribs ache a little. I do remember you wrapping
them, but that was back at the pod. Why are you undressed?” He was
gazing at her in open admiration, his dark eyes lingering over her
creamy shoulders and softly swelling breasts.
Narisa, who had never felt shame at her own
nakedness before, began to blush. It started somewhere down in her
belly, and she could feel it sweeping upward in a crimson flood
infusing her face and her scalp. Under that surging tide of hot
blood she was powerless to move or speak or even to think clearly.
She could only let him look his fill.
Tarik lifted his right hand and placed it
upon her left breast, cupping it gently, his thumb flicking across
the sensitive nipple. Narisa drew in her breath, still
immobilized.
“How lovely,” Tarik murmured, pressing his
hand a little more firmly against her flesh.
Narisa felt a sweet warmth curling inside
her. She wanted to remain there, sitting beside him, with his hand
on her breast, stroking it. She saw his left hand begin to move and
knew he was going to catch her head and pull her down to him and
kiss her. Her bare breasts would be crushed against his chest, his
mouth would be on hers. The thought frightened her, and with that
fear came release from the inertia that had held her in one spot
while he caressed her.
With an inarticulate cry she leapt to her
feet, snatched up her crumpled undershirt from his abdomen, her
jacket from the base of a nearby tree, and fled the clearing.
Taking long, deep breaths to quiet her pounding heart, she made her
way through the forest to the pool she had found the day
before.
It really had been the day before. She
remembered all of it now. Every detail of that day came rushing
back as she threw cold water onto her face and tried to scrub the
touch of Tarik’s hand off her skin. She was certain the juice from
the mysterious fruit had caused her memory loss. It had apparently
had the same effect on Tarik. Fortunately, the loss was only
temporary, and it seemed the fruit had cured his injuries as well
as his fever.
Having finished her washing, she dressed
hastily, combing her hair with her fingers, tucking her damp
undershirt into her trousers with a determined tug, pulling on and
fastening her jacket with practiced efficiency. Back at the pod she
had pulled off the top clasp at the neckline of the jacket and used
it to fasten the wrapping about Tarik’s ribs, nevertheless she knew
she presented a professional appearance when at last she stepped
into the clearing.
She found Tarik sitting indolently against a
tree trunk, investigating the contents of the food packet. His
jacket was still opened down the front, but she noticed that he had
pulled up and fastened his trousers, and he had obviously washed
his face, for his hair showed wet around the edges.
“Commander Tarik, I must tell you what
happened yesterday,” Narisa announced, standing at rigid
attention.
“Sit down and eat,” he invited, gesturing at
the golden moss beside him.
“I prefer to stand while making a report,”
she stated stiffly.
“If I frightened you before, Lieutenant, I
apologize,” he said gravely. “I do not usually ravish the officers
under my command.”
“I quite understand, sir,” Narisa responded.
“You are still a sick man.”
“Undoubtedly that explains it.” His face was
serious, but there was an odd twinkle in the purplish depths of his
eyes. “Well, then, Lieutenant, make your report so you can
eat.”
Narisa watched him, disturbed. He was so
relaxed and comfortable, munching on a wafer, leaning his head back
against the tree trunk. He wasn’t even looking at her. His eyes
were on a pale blue winged thing that came fluttering across the
stream and began flying around in circles between them. When it got
too close to her, Narisa sidestepped it. Tarik put out one finger,
and the thing perched on it a moment, before flying off into the
bushes behind the tree.
“What is that?” Narisa asked. “I’ve never
seen anything like it before.”
“It’s a butterfly,” Tarik said, bemused.
“There are none on Belta, nor would you have seen any at the
Capital, or on any of the other developed planets. Lovely, isn’t
it? And remarkable, too. It begins life as an insignificant worm,
only later growing into the magnificent creature you just saw.”
“A worm? I’m not sure that’s possible.”
Narisa sounded as confused as she felt. It wasn’t just the
butterfly, it was Tarik, too. He was not behaving like his usual
self, and certainly not like an officer of the Service.
“If I explained it, you wouldn’t believe me.”
Tarik dismissed the butterfly with a shrug. “Let me hear your
report, Lieutenant.”
Standing at attention, using the clipped,
brief phrases she had been taught were the correct form for
official reports, Narisa recited the events of the previous
day.
“Have you finished?” Tarik asked when she
stopped. She had given him the fruit when she talked about it, and
he sat holding it, turning it over and over in his long
fingers.
“Yes, sir.”
“First, I want to thank you for saving my
life a second time. I have no doubt I’d be dead by now if you
hadn’t tended me so well. But do be careful, Lieutenant Narisa.
Save me a third time, and according to Demarian custom, you will
own me. Have you ever been to Demaria? No? It’s an interesting
place.
“Next, will you please sit down? We have a
lot to discuss, and it hurts my neck to keep looking up at you.
Besides, it’s bad for discipline to have you looking down upon your
superior officer. Here, have some food. It tastes awful, but it’s
nourishing.” When Narisa did not move, he added, “Well, what else
have you to say? I thought your report was done.”
“If you will forgive the impertinence, sir, I
must state that your appearance is slovenly. There is a very sharp
knife in the tool kit, surely you could use it to shave yourself.
Then you ought to fasten your jacket. Secondly, your attitude is
most unprofessional. There are Service regulations for situations
like this, when one finds oneself on an unknown world. But you sit
lolling against a tree, joking about discipline. You must recall
that our first duty is to find some way to communicate with the
Capital. Then we must—”
“I liked you better with your jacket off,” he
said.
Narisa stared at him, shocked.
Suddenly, inexplicably, he began to laugh.
Before this day Narisa had never seen Tarik smile or heard him make
a joke, but there he sat, holding his sides and roaring with
laughter. The sound echoed around the clearing, while laughter
continued to pour out of him and tears ran down his cheeks. It was
a long time before he stopped and wiped his eyes.
“Woman,” he said, still chuckling, “you
function like the memory banks of a spaceship. Everything is done
precisely, correctly, according to regulations, and no deviations
are permitted. Ever.”
“Sir.” Narisa’s spine was stiff, her chin
high. She kept her expression blank, not letting her rising anger
show. She told herself she ought not to be angry with him. He had
been sick, and now he was clearly mad, and she would have to cope
with that problem as best she could.
“Lieutenant,” Tarik said, his mirth
apparently under control, “sit down. Here, next to me. That is an
order. Now, take these two wafers and eat them. That is another
order.”
He watched as she silently obeyed him.
“In spite of your
un
-slovenly
appearance and highly professional attitude,” he went on, his lips
twisting into a quickly repressed smile, “I do believe you are
human and not the machine you appear to be. If the story you have
told me is true, you admit to breaking a few rules yourself.”
“Only because I feared you would die.”
“It’s comforting to know you are willing to
bend for my sake. Now, I want you to tell me once more everything
you remember about that bird.”
Narisa went over the story again, including
every detail she could recall.
“The bird made no effort to communicate with
you, no sound at all except for that one cry?”
“That’s right, sir.”
“Yet you knew, it was quite clear to you deep
in your mind, that the creature meant us no harm, and later that
there was juice in the fruit and it was safe for you to give it to
me.”
“Yes, sir.”
“While I, out on the desert, was perfectly
certain, deep in my own mind, that the birds would lead us to
water. What does all this suggest to you, Lieutenant?”
“That we are very fortunate, sir.”
“You disappoint me. I suppose I should have
expected a lack of imagination. You can’t help it; it’s the way you
were trained. I have a different theory. I think the birds have
telepathic power.” He watched her reaction, a glimmer of humor in
his eyes. “Any comment on that, Lieutenant?”
“Are you suggesting those creatures are
intelligent?”
“Haven’t they been acting intelligently?”
“I would say it was instinct.” She was
determined to resist his idea.
“Indeed?” A cynical glint replaced the humor
in his gaze. “Helping an unfamiliar species is instinctive
behavior? Not in any Race I’ve ever encountered. Why do you find it
necessary to resist my theory, lieutenant?”
The question took her by surprise. She could
almost have imagined he had strange powers and had read her
mind.
“Because,” she said, “telepathy is
illegal.”
“I doubt the birds know that,” he responded
dryly. “They have probably never had contact with the Service, or
the Assembly, or any of the idiotic laws of the Jurisdiction.”
“It’s not only illegal, it’s immoral,” Narisa
insisted. “And for very good reason. Telepathy invades the mind of
another being, and that is immoral. All Races practicing telepathy
were outlawed centuries ago and their representatives banished from
the Assembly.”
“Of course,” Tarik countered mildly, “they
had to be banished. Because of their abilities they were too well
aware of what those in power were trying to do. Telepaths would be
dangerous to those regulations you love so much, and which the
Assembly imposes on all of us. And the Service, which was
originally formed solely to keep the peace, too often uses certain
of its branches to repress dissent. Telepaths would understand
that, too, and perhaps protest and insist upon changes. Change is
terribly upsetting to the Assembly.”
“Commander Tarik, I believe you are speaking
treason.”
“I’m talking about freedom, Narisa. The right
to decide the simplest things for yourself. What, when and where to
eat. Or read. Or live. Or work, whether in space or on some planet.
Have you never been free?”
“On Belta, when I was a child, I did as I
pleased.” Narisa was becoming very distressed by this conversation.
Tarik was saying things that had occasionally crossed her mind,
things she had always thrust away from conscious thought, finding
them unworthy of a loyal officer of the Service.
“You were free as a child, yet you left Belta
to join the Service. Why?” Tarik demanded, and Narisa, trained to
truth, answered honestly.
“For my father. He wanted a son, but he had
been assigned to Belta, and on Belta choice of gender for a child
is not permitted. So he had two daughters. I chose to join the
Service, to become a navigator to please him. To make him proud of
me.”
“Was it what you wanted to do? Are you proud
of yourself?”
“Of course.” She could not tell him the
entire truth, that she had not known what she wanted to do and had
never had the chance to think about it. She had obeyed always,
wanting her father’s approval. She obeyed still, following all
regulations to the smallest detail. “I am a good officer,” she
insisted.
“You are the best navigator I have ever met,”
Tarik agreed. “But you do leave something to be desired when you
are faced with totally new circumstances.”
Before Narisa could protest, he raised one
hand. “I’ll call back some of what I just said. You handled
yesterday’s emergencies remarkably well. Perhaps there is hope for
you. Do you know why Belta is called Belta?”