The Faarian Chronicles: Exile (10 page)

Sheesh.
It sure would’ve been nice to know that was
real and still continued to this day, I thought to myself.

The warrior shared with her new partner fears of the growing
conflict between her people and the seemingly all-powerful Greek empire. They
were outnumbered a hundred to one and would soon have to submit and assimilate
or be destroyed, and the warriors would never submit.

The symbiot tiger shared an alternative to inevitable death
at the hands of Alexander the Tyrant: visions of a lush planet with no humans,
full of challenge and opportunity. She offered to take the people of Anme’s
Kindred to this new and unsettled paradise.

After much explanation and negotiation with her clan, Anme
convinced them to leave Earth for Macawi. 

The children’s depiction of the warriors’ chaotic journey
through the wormhole was funny and uncomfortably reminiscent of my own
experience earlier that day, but the secret to normal human survival through
the wormhole had been lost for centuries.

“After this initial immigration,” a little boy intoned
solemnly in his high child’s voice, “the Annunaki offered our ancestors the
opportunity to stay and learn from them, but the price the Annunaki demanded
was too high and our ancestors refused. They fearlessly set out on their own
across unknown lands and perilous mountains to finally settle here in the land
of Afaar.”

A little girl took over. “The Annunaki continued to visit
Earth and recruit other peoples who saw the ancient aliens as gods, and stayed
with them as servants. Some humans saw the truth and chose not to accept the
expensive gifts and loss of freedom the Annunaki offered. They bravely made
their way in small groups across the mountains to join us here in Afaar.”

The final little girl stepped to the front of the stage. “Of
all the different peoples and cultures represented here at the Katje Kindred,
the most important thing we all have in common is that we are all human. And
that is enough. Thank you.”

Despite a serious lack of acting skills, the kids took their
bows to thunderous pounding of boots echoing off the stone floor. 

 I remembered the Robot talking about the Ancient
Sumerians being overtaken by the Babylonians, then the Greeks, and then the
Romans, with some others thrown in there too that I didn’t remember. Their gods
and goddesses all got renamed with each new regime. My favorite was Inanna, the
goddess of love and war, because it was cool that she could be both. She later
became Ishtar, Astarte, Aphrodite and Athena, and Venus and Minerva. To think
she could have been real, one of these Annunaki who ancient humans thought were
gods!

“So are these… Annunaki still here?” I asked my mother.

“No,” she answered. “By all accounts they’ve been extinct
now for hundreds of years. At least, they’re believed to be,” she said. “They
killed themselves off through infighting and the power of their own egos.”

"Oh." I wanted to know more, but didn’t know what
to ask. Instead I excused myself to find a bathroom, but had to quickly come
back. Despite our earlier disagreement, I bent down next to Sensei, since she
would probably be the only one who would understand my question.

“Sensei,” I whispered so no one else would hear, “there’s no
water in the toilet.”

Except that I’d underestimated the amount of ambrosia she’d
consumed. There was now a mostly empty bottle in front of her and a mostly
empty glass in her hand.

“What?” she asked, blinking at me owlishly. I repeated
myself quietly. “Oh, the toilet,” she said loudly then lowered her voice to a
mock whisper. “She doesn’t know how to use the toilet.” She flapped her hand
dismissively. Judging by the laughter that followed, everyone in the vicinity
had heard.

“Here!” I emphasized hurriedly, turning bright red. “I don’t
know how to use the one here! It’s different from the ones at home.” More
laughter accompanied us as Sensei stood and swayed in place for a moment before
starting determinedly down the hall.

I’d never seen Sensei drink so much before, I realized as I
watched her stumble along. People had kept toasting her return and refilling
her glass with something resembling the coconut-pear juice I had. Hers
definitely hadn’t been juice though. Once we were out of sight of the main
hall, she stopped and leaned against the wall.

“Are you okay?” I asked. Maybe I ought to have asked Thal
for help after all.

“Jus gimme a minute for m’head to shtop shpinning, k?” She
rested her head against the wall and hiccupped. “I forgot how po’ent the
ambrosia is here. Why don’ you go on wih-out me?” She waved me forward with one
hand and slumped even more against the wall.

I sighed, “But Sensei, I need your help.”

“Oh righ, the wa-er.” She stumbled as she jerked herself
forward again, running one hand along the wall for balance till we came to the
bathroom. She propped herself up on the counter and pointed to the small pad
above the sink.

“Punsh your thumb dere.”

I did. Nothing happened.

“Oh, neer mind, I’ll do it.” She put her thumb on the pad
and once again, nothing. “Whas wrong?”

“How should I know?” I asked as we heard running footsteps
down the hall outside.

“Sorry, sorry!” Ethem trotted into the open doorway and
stuck out his phone. “Here, give me your thumbprint, Sensei.” She circled her
thumb over the pad, shutting one eye and biting her tongue in concentration.
Finally, her thumb hit the mark.

“Haha!” she chortled in triumph.

“And a link for you, Sunny. Hold your thumb on the pad for
five seconds to initialize it to your thumbprint and brainwave pattern.”

“Link?” I asked, accepting one of the iPhone-like devices
that everyone else had, and pressed my thumb to the squishy, nubby pad at the
bottom.

“Data Link,” he said. “It takes both thought commands and
verbal cues. Okay, you’re set. Now your thumbprint will register on the pad
near any water-using device to allow you to turn it on and off.” I put my thumb
to the pad next to the sink and waved my hand above, below, and around the
water spout with no success.

“The control is on the floor.” He pointed to the button
under the sink. Okay that worked, but what did it have to do with the toilet?
“Use as little per day as possible and you’ll be fine. We are in the desert,
after all!” He gave me a big smile.

“Okay, great, but can you please, please tell me how to use
the toilet?” This was getting painful here. I pointed to the dry bowl. “Does
that even work? There’s no water tank!”

“Yes it works. Why would there be a water tank?” He shook
his head and continued. “The thumb pad is on the wall. And there’s a force
field on the bowl, see?” He tried to put his hand into the toilet bowl, but it
bounced right off an invisible field with a static charge arcing across the
surface where the water would usually be. “Only inanimate objects can enter.
The force field creates a vacuum under it and anything that goes in is sucked
out to compost. After you do your business, press your thumb to the pad to tell
it what you want to finish up.”

“Oh. Okay, thanks.” I herded them out the door.

“Wait. How does it work on Earth?”

“Uh, much differently,” I replied.

“Come on, I’ll exshplain it to you,” Sensei slurred as they
finally left. “Firs, the water shwirls around the bowl and everything gets
pulled out by shi-… shi-… siphon. An’ they have this toilet paper….”

“Paper?” Ethem asked incredulously as I closed the door and
dashed back to the toilet.

“Uh-huh. And it’s dishposable!”

“No!” He sounded shocked as their voices receded down the
hallway. This made me look around from the throne; no toilet paper? What was I
supposed to use then?

Well, too late to stop them and ask. He’d said,
press your thumb to the pad and tell it what you want
to finish up.

 I pressed and said, “toilet paper,” into it, like an
intercom, hoping some might appear from somewhere. Something swiped my bum from
underneath and I shrieked, jumping off the seat to see a spray of water shoot
up into the air at me. Thankfully, I had good reflexes and had jumped out of
the way or it would’ve gotten my clothes all wet.

“Stop, stop!” I yelled at the toilet. It heard and stopped
spraying water across the room at me. Ugh, so it was a voice-activated bidet
too. I sighed in resignation and sat myself back down.

“Continue.”

Chapter 12: Trials

No one remained at the table when I re-entered the dining
room. Everyone was now over at the side of the room where the big cats had been
fighting. Drummers played instruments made from various-sized gourds with dark
animal skins stretched over them, and a few others played vertical xylophones
made from a combination of golden tubes and hollow bones that created an eerie
melody.

Through the gaps in the crowd, I saw two of my mother’s
elite warriors facing off in the middle of the circle, impressively fighting
hand-to-hand with no protective pads, to the beat of the drums. A good kick to
the gut sent one woman sprawling. The crowd cheered.

Thankfully nobody noticed me except the twins, who gave me a
standing O. I tried to ignore them and resisted the urge to send them rude hand
signals.

My mother had waylaid Sensei and Ethem on their way back
into the great hall. They were talking at the edge of the crowd. Myrihn was
there too, gesturing wildly and pantomiming holding her breath and panicking;
talking about me, of course. Lovely. I made my way over and stopped near the
wall several yards away, trying to be unobtrusive.

“What is the girl supposed to do here, Vaeda?” I picked out
Great-Aunt Nico’s voice through the din. “Why bring her here when she’s just
going to be stuck inside all the time?”

“She won’t be stuck inside, Nico,” my mother replied,
glaring at her aunt. “She’s going to go through warrior training like any other
girl.”

“Warrior training?” Nico scoffed. “If you wanted her to be a
warrior, you should have brought her with you when you returned from Earth.
She’s too old to begin training now.”

“She’s had the first levels on Earth,” my mother replied.

“How could she have learned what she needed growing up
outside
the Kindred, with only her
father
for support?” Nico asked.

“That’s why I sent Qian to her.” She gestured exasperatedly
to Sensei, who looked back and forth between them like she was blearily
following a tennis match. “I know it’s not the same as growing up in the
Kindred, but it was the only choice, if you’ll remember. We couldn’t bring her
here without knowing for sure that she could survive.”

“Well, you must be very proud then; she’s still breathing,”
Aunt Nico sneered. “But, she’ll never be a warrior.”

“She will,” my mother ground out.

“No, Mom’s right,” Myrihn put in from Nico’s side. “She
can’t fight for anything. I saw the video of her last competition. She-”

“Don’t interrupt, child,” Nico admonished her. Myrihn glared
sullenly down at the table. “What world are you living in, Vaeda?” Nico
continued, ignoring Myrihn as she got up to leave. “Did you see her hair?
She’ll be lucky if she doesn’t pass out within half an hour on patrol.” Myrihn
spotted me trying to blend into the wall and sent me a glare that would’ve
frozen lava, before stomping off.

“It’s jusht dye, she’ll be…,” Sensei started to slur when
Nico interrupted again.

“You’d better make sure to send extra oxygen with her if you
send her out.”

“Thank you, Aunt Nico,” my mother replied with a deadpan
expression. “Your advice has been noted.” Having heard enough, I turned away to
leave. She wasn’t even defending me. No one was. I’d just gotten here, and I
could too fight! Not that I wanted to. I didn’t want to be a warrior anyway,
but if I did, it would be my choice, not theirs!

“Ah, Veridian,” my mother’s voice called. “You’re up next.”

“No thanks,” I replied. “I’d really prefer not.”

“Yes, you will.” She gave me a steely look. “This is how we
will judge your skill level, Veridian. You will fight. That’s an order.”

I bristled and felt that familiar flash of anger go through
my eyes.

“Veridian! Veridian! Veridian!” the crowd chanted. The
previous combatants were both breathing hard and tending minor wounds off to
one side. Several people grabbed my arms and pushed me through to the center
ring.

“No, no, I don’t need to go,” I protested, but no one
listened.

“Who will challenge my daughter in her first Kindred trial?”
my mother’s voice boomed out. Several people stepped forward immediately.

I saw Myrihn shove one of the twins forward. “Yes, Lyta. You
should be a good challenge for Veridian.”

One of the twins eagerly stepped into the circle. I glared
at her and my mother in turn. As much as I wanted to show this girl up for
getting me lost earlier, knock her around, and bloody her up a bit maybe, I
couldn’t do that. This was my chance to make a statement to my mother. Though
she’d been able to make me come here, I wasn’t going to be her puppet.

A musician struck the largest of the golden pipes and a
gong-like sound reverberated through the hall, signaling the start of the
match. Drums beat out a slow rhythm as Lyta and I crouched and began to circle
one another.

Just like a match back home, I thought. Dodge and weave,
dodge and weave. Except now, disqualification for not engaging my opponent was
the goal.

I gave my mother a sarcastic two-fingered salute right
before Lyta leapt at me. It was odd to be fighting a girl who was taller than
me for a change. Like a lot of bigger people, she relied on her strength to
win, but to be perfectly honest, the last girl I’d sparred at the tournament
fought better. Lyta lacked finesse. I dodged to the side and did a couple of
fast back handsprings away from her, making her avoid my tennis shoes as they
whipped up toward her face. She responded by throwing a high kick at me with
her ugly combat boots, but I ducked under it and gave her a quick jab to the
calf, giving her a charley horse for a few seconds. The crowd booed. Lyta
roared her outrage and charged me like a lumbering bull. I dodged out of her
way at the last second, and we both collided with the crowd circled around us.
They shoved us back in, not allowing for out of bounds.

“Fight, you coward!” Lyta taunted. I felt anger boil through
my veins, but remembered at the last second why I was doing this. A few more
minutes of blocking her punches and flipping away from her kicks and I got what
I wanted: a piercing whistle stopped the so-called fight.

“That’s enough,” my mother said, lowering her fingers from
her mouth. “Lyta wins by default, but will get another opportunity if she
wishes. Apparently my daughter values evasion over actual fighting skill.” She
favored me with a hard stare. “She remains an unranked novice. Perhaps some
experience in the real world will show her what’s important. Next pair.”

The disapproving crowd parted to let me pass as I exited the
ring.
Well good,
I thought,
I made my point.
So why did I feel so lousy?

It was time to get out of here. I hoped I could find my way
back to my room again.

“Hey, Sunny,” Thal said, coming up beside me and patting my
shoulder with a pitying look. “Come over here and watch how it’s done,” he
said, trying to pull me through the crowd again to a spot in the front.

“I know how to do it,” I snapped, then shook my head. “I’m
done in, Thal. Do you think you could show me the way to my room again?”

“Well, sure, okay.” He gave one longing look back at the
crowd and led me out the door.

Great-Aunt Nico was right about one thing. Why had my mother
brought me here? First she abandoned me on Earth as a baby, never even
visiting. Then she couldn’t be bothered to pick me up herself, or even to meet
me at the port. And she couldn’t claim to want to get to know me, since after
we finally met, she didn’t seem excited to have me here, didn’t defend me, and
ordered me to take part in some kind of fight club!

And then, there were the twins who got me lost on purpose,
Nico who thought bringing me here was a pointless waste, and Myrihn who
disliked me as soon as she stepped off the hippie bus-slash-spaceship. Gah! I’m
supposed to give up an incredibly important year of gymnastics for
this?
I had to contact Dad. When he heard how I was being treated, he would have to
bring me home.

“Hey, are you okay?” Thal asked as he led me on a fairly
straightforward route back to my mother’s apartment.

The only people who’d been nice to me were Ethem and Thal. I
gave him a weak smile. “Yeah.” No! I had to get out of here! I ran my hands
into my hair and balled them into fists at the roots, then glanced at Thal from
the corner of my eye. He was looking at me worriedly.

“You don’t really look okay,” he said.

“I… I don’t even know why she brought me here!” I exploded.
All my feelings came rushing out as I explained about my mother. “Parents
shouldn’t do that! They shouldn’t abandon their kids and then suddenly drag
them away from everything they know into a whole other world where nothing
makes sense!”

“Well, when you say it like that, it doesn’t seem very
fair,” he said, tilting his head to the side.

“It’s not.” I ground out the words, unable to believe there
could be another way of looking at the situation.

“But your mom’s a good person, you’ll see. She’s just… the
General. She’s used to people doing what she says.” He shrugged. “She’s bound
to be preoccupied since she’s in charge of the whole Kindred. Plus, with this
whole water rights thing going on right now… she’s our National Council
representative. You know, the planetary government?” I nodded. “That’s the
meeting she had today. If we lose our water, the Kindred’s dead. We’d all have
to move to who-knows-where.”

“Oh.” Well I guess maybe that was understandable, but
couldn’t she have gotten someone to cover for her? I sighed.

“I know this all has to be a huge change for you, but don’t
you think you could give the Kindred a chance – give your mom a chance?” I
squinted at him dubiously. "Okay, okay,” he laughed. “Maybe that’s too
much to ask right now. I guess everything must be really different from what
you’re used to.”

“It is, Thal, it really is. Don’t take this the wrong way,
but this place is really weird.”

“In what way?” he asked curiously.

“Well, people on Earth aren’t ordered to fight each other
after dinner, first of all. And this compound is huge! It takes forever to walk
from one side to the other. And all these people! How do you live with them all,
and how many people are actually here?”

“Oh, about four hundred right now. People always stick
around for a feast.” That was a feast? There was enough for everyone, I
supposed, but the food hadn’t seemed that special or anything.

“Only about two hundred actually live here. Some people came
to visit from other Kindreds and the rest live in the nearby villages and come
here to work. The farm is like, the biggest employer around. Just about the
only employer, too.”

“Huh. Two hundred,” I repeated faintly. I digested that,
then continued with my list. “And the air is so thin, and you have thumbprint
security just to get water! And don’t even get me started on the bizarro
toilet.” I made a face.

“Really? How else would a toilet be?” he asked. I explained
how they worked back home.

“Wow,” he said again. “I’d love to see Earth someday. It
sounds like you have so much of everything. Trees, water, oxygen. It must be
amazing.” I was starting to see that it was.

“It used to be that way here,” he continued, “years and
years ago, before we were born. But then the haratchi came, and the fires….” He
trailed off and shook his head sadly. “Things aren’t as easy as they used to
be. But they’re getting better.” He brightened. “It rained here twice this
summer and even snowed once last winter. A whole inch! It was great.” I thought
of the mountains back home with their hundred-inch snow packs and felt
incredibly sorry for this place.

“Do they keep track? Of the water, I mean. What happens if
you use too much?”

“Oh yeah. If you use more than the limit per week, you get
cut off. When we were little, they had contests for the kids to see who could
use the least. It worked pretty well until
some
stopped showering
altogether.” He wrinkled his nose. “Be glad you weren’t here. Mom had to make a
rule.

“Oooh, these outer apartments are so cool,” he said as we
entered. “You get windows and a fish tank.” He misinterpreted the look I gave
him. “Don’t worry, they’re all coated on the outside so it doesn’t get too
glary in here from the suns,” he assured me.

“Oh. Great,” I replied and changed the subject. “So, do I
need you to tell me how the shower works, then?”

He cocked his head. “Maybe. I’ll show you. So, there’s a
thumb pad here, like over the sink.” He pointed to the wall of the mini shower
stall. “You just stick your thumb there and tell it the amount of time and
temperature you want.”

“Does it ding like a microwave when you’re done?” I asked.

“What’s a microwave?” he asked.

I shook my head. “Never mind. So I tell it say, ten minutes
and the water turns on?”

“Ten minutes! That’s like three whole days worth of your
water allowance!” He shook his head in amazement. “Try ten seconds at first to
wet down. Plug the drain so you can reuse the water as you soap up. Then,
twenty seconds to rinse. That’s what I do.” Fabulous. So much for having that
long, hot shower.

 “But, doesn’t it need time to warm up?”

“No.” He looked confused. “It comes on whatever temperature
you ask for. The heater’s nice,” he added, “if you’re cold at night.” He
flipped a normal old wall switch and a fan whirred to life overhead.

“What,” I said, “don’t we have to give it our thumbprint to
conserve electricity, too?”

“Oh no,” he said. “We have solar panels!” Of course. “Get a
good night’s sleep. This will all look better tomorrow, you’ll see. You just
have to get used to the way things are here.” He patted my shoulder
encouragingly. “I’ll see you at breakfast,” he said on his way out the door.

“See you,” I replied. I grabbed Meowman and my iPhone and
flopped onto the bed without bothering to unpack. A few seconds later I yanked
my ear buds out and ran back to the hallway.