Juno of Taris (12 page)

I was right about the danger. Creen turned from me, withdrawing. It hurt. Nobody had done that for months – it was the only compensation I had for forcing myself to be compliant. But Vima ignored her. She leaned towards me, her whole face alive with interest. ‘Go on.’

I glanced at Creen, sitting hunched and with her back to me. But I so wanted to speak, to tell of the things that whirled in my head. ‘If the crisis here was so bad that the island almost failed, then everyone must have a story. And exactly when was the time of crisis? Nobody tells us. Was it in our grandparents’ lifetime? Or during their grandparents’? We don’t even know what sort of crisis it was.’

‘She’s right, you know,’ Vima said thoughtfully. Then she prodded Creen. ‘Oh, for goodness’ sake! Enough of the withdrawing already! There’s only us here.’

Creen turned back and I wished she hadn’t for her face showed her pain. It was a different sort of pain from Mother’s, but it still hurt to see what my questions had done to her. Too late now. ‘They don’t talk of it because it was so painful. You both know that. You ought to respect their wishes.’

I should have stopped then. I knew it, but I couldn’t. The words kept coming. ‘But did the other stories die with the crisis? Did people forget them? What happened to those stories?’

Vima threw a quick look at Creen. ‘What other stories?’

‘The real stories about what it was like to settle here. Did they like it? Did they want to go back? Did any of them give up and go back while they still could?’ I glanced at Creen and managed not to voice the other questions burning in my mind.
Did
they fight among themselves? Were there divorces, lovers’
quarrels, hate and jealousy? Were there negative emotions
on Taris then?

Vima, I knew, wanted to go on discussing it, but instead she shrugged. ‘Well, we’ll never know. But I tell you this – if I went back, I’d buy a racing car.’

I smiled at her, and had the sense this time to stay with the safe topic. ‘I’d climb a mountain with snow on it, and I’d ski down and down, leaving big, swooping tracks behind me.’

The pain faded from Creen’s face. ‘I’d ride in a glass elevator, and I’d be wearing a strapless dress of lace and satin with a skirt that billowed behind me as I walked.’ She rubbed her hands down her tunic. ‘Same old, same old.’

‘The GCs would put you in a row boat and cast you adrift Outside in a storm,’ Vima remarked.

We spoke no more about the tricky stuff. I sat at the table and wondered how Mother was doing. Perhaps I should have stayed with her; children of my age and even younger often did. I was a coward. I didn’t want to see my sister. I hoped that when the time came I’d be able to appear happy and loving. I couldn’t see a lot of joy ahead and I hoped the time of change the grandparents spoke of would hurry up and get here.

T
he older girls cleared away the meal and tidied up. Well, Creen did most of it. Vima drifted around picking things up and putting them down in the wrong places. Creen pushed her out of the way. ‘Make us a drink, Vima. Cocoa.’

‘Hmm.’ Vima kept drifting.

Creen gave up and made the drink herself. ‘You’re not getting your head into all that history stuff, are you?’

Vima sat down again. ‘I’ve never thought about it before. Always been too busy concentrating on the other stuff.’

‘For good reason,’ Creen snapped. ‘For goodness’ sake, Vima – we’re all depending on you. You haven’t got time to think about unimportant rubbish.’

Vima gave her a grin that reminded me of a cruising shark. ‘But how do we know it’s unimportant, Creen, if we don’t know what it is?’

Creen dumped our mugs in front of us. A drip bounced out of mine and pooled on the table. She scrubbed at, but it was Vima’s arguments she wanted to scrub away. ‘We haven’t needed it for over two hundred years. That should tell you something.’

‘What if we’re making the same mistakes?’ Vima asked. ‘What if we’re heading right on into another crisis – the same crisis?’

Creen slapped her hands together. ‘Leave it! This is a different time. The technology’s different. Use your head, Vima.’ She glared at her. ‘We can’t afford for you, of all people, to put energy into such useless thoughts.’

My eyes flicked between them. I didn’t want to miss a syllable, a nuance of expression. I’d never seen or heard a real live argument before except between kids and that didn’t count – kids will always squabble.

Vima put her elbows on the table and propped her chin in her hands. ‘I think it might help me work out new systems if I knew what really happened to the old ones.’

‘You don’t need to know such stuff!’ Creen almost spat the words.

‘How do you
know
?’ Vima shot the question at her, not challenging, but more asking how Creen could be so certain. It stopped Creen’s anger.

‘Because …’ she faltered, frowning, and her mind clicked through new ideas.

We waited, allowing her time for rational thought.

‘Because,’ she said slowly, ‘those we trust have told us so. They are the ones who’ve guided our lives, who’ve kept us alive in our strange world. Their own wisdom is hard won. Our world is so fragile … the history is dead for good reason.’ She spread her hands. ‘Already it’s distracting you from your work. We don’t have time to play around with stuff that’s not about keeping us alive.’

My eyes zapped back to Vima. Such good reasons.

I saw her wondering whether to say what was in her mind. Oh, how I knew that feeling. She made her decision and spoke the words. ‘Or could it be that they don’t want their power challenged?’

Creen pressed her fists hard against her stomach. ‘When did you get like this?’ she whispered. ‘All our lives, you’ve been my friend.’

Vima reached across and touched Creen’s arm. ‘You are my always friend. But this is me, Creen. It’s who I’ve always been.’ I had to strain to catch the last words. ‘I’ve never felt free to be me.’

Creen’s face … such pain. My heart squeezed. Were our Governance Companions right after all, to create a world that shielded us from such negative emotions?

At last, Vima sighed. ‘I’m sorry, Creen. I’ll not distress you again. I promise.’ She smiled at her.

But Creen shook her head. ‘That’s the trouble, isn’t it? The knowledge is out and you can’t put it back. I’ll always know – always be wondering. And doesn’t that prove that they’re right, that we do need to live in the present? That we do need to keep ourselves balanced and in harmony?’ She grabbed Vima’s hands and gave them a shake. ‘Don’t waste time on it. For all our sakes. Promise me.’

I knew in that instant that Vima couldn’t promise and that it would stay between them forever. I did the first thing that came into my head – I gave a wail of anguish.

They jumped. They’d forgotten me.

Creen slipped from her chair to crouch beside me. ‘Juno, baby! What’s wrong?’

I screwed up my face. ‘I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to interrupt, but I’m so worried about Mother. I couldn’t help it. Oh Creen, do you think she’ll be all right? The pain – it’s awful, I’m never going to have babies. Why won’t Trebe let her have a Caesarean?’ I ran out of things to say, so I put my hands over my face and scrubbed at my eyes.

Creen hugged me and reassured me. She jumped up, told Vima to reheat my untouched drink. ‘I wish it was over,’ I whispered. ‘Do you think my sister will be born yet?’

She took my drink from Vima and set it in front of me. ‘Drink this. And no, she won’t be. Not yet.’

I dropped my head and managed a stifled sob.

‘Look – I’ll run and check, shall I?’

I slumped against her. ‘Oh, Creen, would you? Will you tell her I love her?’

She dropped a kiss on my cheek. ‘Back soon – and you’ll see, all will be well.’

We said nothing until her footsteps faded into silence. Then Vima pointed a finger at me. ‘You,’ she said, ‘are the worst actor ever.’

We stifled our laughter with hands over our mouths. She glanced at the door Creen had run through and her face sobered. ‘But thanks, peanut. Thanks from the bottom of my heartless body.’

‘We’d better drink these.’ I picked up my mug, but Vima dug into the pocket of her tunic.

‘I’ve got something to show you. I was going to show it to Creen, but I think now it’s better I show you instead and say nothing to her. Okay?’

I nodded. ‘What? What is it?’ I felt so alive in that moment. Secrets!

‘Look. I found this in the storeroom at the Techno Centre.’ She held the object where I could see it. ‘It’s an old transponder. Doesn’t have the voice function unfortunately, but it’s interesting all the same.’

I took it. It was smaller than the ones we’d used at the Gene Centre. ‘It looks like one of those early twenty-first-century mobile phones,’ I said, turning it every which way.

‘Push the middle button,’ Vima said. ‘I’ve managed to get it working.’

The screen flashed, shivered then settled into a blue glow. ‘Words!’ I gasped. ‘Real words.’ Without thinking, I read the words on the screen. ‘Directory. Menu. Internet.’

Vima’s head jerked up and she stared at me. ‘You can read,’ she whispered. ‘Juno – nobody can read any longer. But you did. You just read those words.’

I went cold. I felt the blood drain from face. ‘Don’t tell. Don’t tell anyone. It’s a secret. I forgot.’ She held my life in her hands.

‘I promise you, Juno, daughter of Sheen and Zanin, that I will hold your secret in my heart. You have my word.’

I believed her. But more than that, there was some instinct that told me I could trust her in the same way I trusted my grandparents. ‘Thank you.’ I pushed the transponder back to her. ‘Best put it away.’

But she jumped up and came round the table to sit beside me. ‘Read me something. Quick, before Creen gets back.’

I didn’t need persuading. The lure of freeing the secrets locked inside the transponder was too strong.

We found the encyclopedia in the menu.

‘What do you want to know about?’ My voice was squashed flat with excitement and nervousness.

She tapped her fingers impatiently. ‘So much. I want to know so much – but Creen will be back any second.’ Then she gave a sudden laugh. ‘I know, look up your name, see if you’re in the encyclopedia.’

I keyed it in. ‘What if it’s something awful?’

‘That’s the trouble with knowledge, isn’t it?’ she said. ‘Perhaps Creen’s right. We shouldn’t dabble with this stuff.’

I hit ‘Enter’ and didn’t bother replying. We didn’t have a hope, either of us, of not using the transponder for knowledge.

‘What does it say?’ Vima demanded. ‘Read it to me. Quick.’

My throat closed up. It was hard to speak. My name had a meaning. A history. I stumbled through the words. ‘Juno, a Roman goddess. She was important. She looked after women. Her geese cackled, warning of an attack, and her soldiers saved her people.’

Vima shrieked with laughter. ‘Fisa and the other GCs wouldn’t like that at all, young Juno.’ She wagged a finger at me and imitated Fisa. ‘“Names are not used to make us special or different. They are used to identify us.”’

I giggled. ‘I’m a Roman goddess – whatever that is.’ I pushed a button and the writing changed. ‘Listen, there’s more. “Juno closely resembled the Greek Hera …”’

‘Look her up, but be quick.’

I keyed in ‘Hera’, then mouthed the words, trying to work them out. Vima waited, containing her impatience.

‘“Jealous, rancorous and vindictive”. Do you know what those mean?’

Vima shook her head. ‘Not entirely. Jealous is easy, but not the other two. I’m guessing Hera wasn’t the nicest sweet in the box. Anything else?’

‘She’s the same as me – Juno, I mean. She was a goddess and she looked after women.’ I lifted my eyes from the screen. ‘What’s a goddess?’

‘Dunno!’ Vima grinned at me, then grabbed the transponder as we heard running footsteps on the path.

I jumped up and ran to open the door. ‘Creen, what’s the news? Is she born yet? Is Mother all right?’

‘She’s doing well but things have slowed down. Trebe says your sister might come on Monday after all.’

I collapsed into a chair. Could this go on for the entire weekend? How could we bear it?

Vima hauled me up. ‘Bedtime for you, peanut. You never know – it might all be over when you wake up in the morning.’

They came to say goodnight when I was in bed. I couldn’t believe it when Vima pulled my sarong over her head and struck a pose. ‘I’d like to grow my hair. I think my inner self would like it too.’

I expected this to send Creen right back into shock and worry, but it was obviously old news to her. ‘You think Oban would like it too,’ she said slyly.

Vima tossed one end of the fabric over her shoulder. ‘He probably would. But so what?’

‘You like him,’ Creen said. ‘That’s so what.’

Vima shrugged. ‘That was yesterday. Today I think I like Jov.’

Wow! Now the shock and worry did crash back into Creen’s face. She said, ‘But he’s old. And he’s married.’

Vima grinned at her. ‘When did that ever stop people liking each other? And twenty-five isn’t that old.’

‘Does he like you too?’ I asked. ‘Did he tell you?’

She piled the sarong on top of her head. ‘I’d like a proper Outside mirror too.’ She grinned at me. ‘Sure he told me. Not that he needed to. I already knew.’

I didn’t know what to say, and Creen looked as if she’d been socked in the solar plexus. ‘You can’t do that,’ she whispered.

‘Do?’ Vima ripped the sarong off her head. ‘Who said I was going to do anything? You can like without doing anything about it.’ She folded the sarong into an exact square. ‘You know it happens all the time. He’ll probably breed a new variety of gardenia and name it after me. I think I’d like a pink one.’