The Ninth Orb (4 page)

Feeling vaguely disappointed that she hadn’t managed to catch a glimpse of that intriguing male with the dark thatch of hair, Eden turned at last to leave. “When the computer breaks the language down, let me know? I’ll be in my quarters.”

“Will do.”

* * * *

By the time the computer had cracked the language barrier, Eden had come to an immutable conclusion. They could not go forward until they knew where they stood with the aliens on the other side of the valley.

As predicted, Houston gave the project a green light, suggesting she negotiate a treaty with the ‘other colony’. She would’ve been lying if she’d tried to say she wasn’t the least bit unnerved at the prospect, but she knew her duty as the leader of the colony included risking her neck if necessary to barter for peace. Accepting the inevitability of it, she put the electronic technicians to work developing a light weight translator.

It took almost a week, New Georgia time, to perfect the device to something useable, but the finished product was worth the wait. Lightweight, it had a piece that fit firmly across the head of the wearer, an earpiece to translate alien to English, and a mouth piece that translated English to alien.

Ivy volunteered to accompany her.

As grateful as she was to have Ivy’s backing, Eden wasn’t certain that it was best for the colony to risk both their political/administrative and military leader at the same time. Ivy smiled thinly. “I don’t know about you, but I’m planning on making it back in one piece even if they do open fire and you’ll have a better chance of doing so if I’m there to back you up.”

After a rather long winded and occasionally heated discussion among the council members, it was finally decided that three sector leaders would accompany Eden and Ivy--Deb Pugh, Med Techs, Stacy Sessions, Engineers, and Liz Chin, Investigative Sciences--and a squad would go for a show of military strength--just enough fire power to protect the politicians without seeming aggressive--they hoped.

A shuttle was detached from the U.S.S. Plymouth to carry the emissaries to a position close enough to try to begin negotiations in a clearing near the stream that almost perfectly bisected the valley.

Eden’s stomach was in knots long before they reached the agreed upon ‘neutral’ ground. It was a jolt to step from the shuttle into the unprotected climate of the planet, for the city was climate controlled.

Here, nature reigned. Eden hadn’t breathed anything except conditioned air in many years, and never anything quite like the natural air of New Georgia. It had been many, many years since she had felt the heat of a sun, the brush of natural breezes along her skin or the unevenness and yielding of soil and vegetation and natural stones beneath the soles of her feet.

The myriad of sensations that pelted her as she made her way down the gangplank and trod the new world for the first time distracted her momentarily from her anxiety.

After years of strolling around a ship the next thing to naked, the jumpsuit she’d chosen to wear felt as uncomfortably restrictive to her movements as the elements around her and she moved stiffly to stand at the edge of the clearing and lift her head toward the walls of the alien fortress. When the others had assembled behind her, she tested her translator, setting it to a volume she thought they would be able to hear in the alien compound.

“I am Eden Chisholm, leader of the colonists of Earth who have come to settle here. We hope to negotiate a peaceful co-existence with your own colony.”

She saw a long row of faces turned down at her, but none moved, either aggressively or otherwise. “We have come to speak with your leader.”

That comment caused a ripple. The men along the top wall exchanged confused glances. After a few minutes the faces disappeared one by one.

Uneasy, Eden glanced behind her at the other women. “What do you think?”

Ivy was studying the wall, her face impassive, but the tension in her stance was unmistakable. “They haven’t fired. That’s always a good sign.”

A minute passed, then more minutes. Eden shifted uncomfortably, almost sorry she’d bothered to dress for the occasion. As accustomed as she was to the ease of movements without the restriction of clothing, she had to wonder if she could flee weighed down with boots and draped with heavy cloth. She felt moisture pop from her pores, as well, as the minutes dragged past. The cloth began to stick to her.

She had almost reached the point of ordering everyone back into the shuttle when a creak of metal drew her attention. An opening appeared at the base of the wall.

“Ready ladies,” Ivy said quietly.

At her command, the squad took up defensive positions, lifting their weapons.

“Don’t get trigger happy. This is still a truce until I say otherwise,” Ivy reminded them just as Eden was about to comment on their stance.

Almost another minute passed before a handful of soldiers emerged through the opening. Without hesitation, they marched smartly across the clearing, halting when they reached the banks on the opposite side of the stream.

Eden’s heart was beating unpleasantly fast. It leapt into overtime when she saw that the soldier in the forefront was the one that she’d studied so curiously before. “I am Baen.”

It was silly, and poor timing at that, but a thrill went through Eden that was totally feminine and wholly appreciative as his deep voice rolled over her. She felt a blush rising. “You are the leader?”

He looked disconcerted. “We have no leader.”

The comment stunned Eden to silence. She exchanged a questioning look with Ivy. When she returned her attention to the soldiers, she saw that they were staring with unabashed curiosity at her and the women around her. There was something in their eyes that gave her pause--fear and hopefulness. “I don’t understand,” Eden said finally. “This is a colony?” she asked, gesturing toward the walled community behind the soldiers.

Again, the leader looked disconcerted. “It is not. We have no queens.”

Eden felt her jaw sag. No women? Or did he mean no leaders? Obviously, it was going to take more than a language translator to make communications possible. “This is … a military installation?”

Baen frowned and glanced at the others as if he was seeking help. “No,” he responded finally. “We are kzatha.”

The word failed to translate and Eden hadn’t a clue of what it might mean. “What position do you hold?” she asked finally.

“I am dominant soldier.”

That sounded like leader to Eden, but he obviously didn’t interpret it that way. She glanced at the other council members, wishing she dared discuss the matter with them, but she didn’t want to invite the aliens to understand the discussion and she didn’t think it would be a good idea to turn off the translators.

“You are without males?”

The question caught Eden by surprise. Her head whipped around so quickly in response that she felt a bone crack in her neck. “What?”

Baen frowned. His gaze flickered from Eden to Ivy and then to the squad members. “These are female soldiers.”

The concept was obviously boggling his mind. She wasn’t about to tell him anything one way or the other, however. The aliens might decide that the colony would be easy to take if their doubts were removed about the presence of any males.

“We came to negotiate peace,” she said, tightness creeping into her voice. “Our bots have built our city. We do not wish to fight with our neighbors over territory.”

Baen and the others exchanged glances. “Very well,” Baen responded. With that, he turned abruptly and strode toward the fortress once more.

Eden stared after him and the others slack jawed.

“What the hell was that?” Ivy demanded, equally stunned.

Eden dragged her gaze from the retreating backs of the alien soldiers. “I don’t know. Did he say ‘ok, fine?’ or was it just my imagination?”

Med Tech Deborah Pugh spoke. “He seemed to think the discussion has been concluded.”

“Let’s go back. I don’t see any point in standing around here melting,” Stacy Sessions commented.

“Sweating,” Ivy corrected, smiling faintly.

“Whatever. It feels like melting.”

Feeling strangely let down, Eden followed as the other council members filed up the gangplank once more. She paused at the top, studying the aliens along the fortress wall.

Baen was among them again. Even at this distance, Eden recognized him.

Shaking her head, she stepped inside and settled in her seat for the trip back to New Savannah, wondering what they had accomplished in their attempt to form a treaty with the other colonists.

* * * *

“Was the meeting a success?”

Eden exchanged a glance with the women who’d accompanied her. “It was not a failure,” she responded cautiously. “Liz, you’re in behavioral sciences--what did you make of it?”

Liz’s finely arched black brows rose almost to her hairline. “I’m supposed to make an educated evaluation based on that?”

Eden scowled at her. “Take a wild guess then,” she snapped.

Liz considered it and finally shrugged. “Everything about them indicates a civilization that’s fairly advanced--maybe not as advanced technologically as we are, but certainly well beyond a primitive or simple social structure. This is a society that doesn’t seem to correlate with anything I’ve seen before, though, or studied. Their spokesman said they had no leader, but also that the colony they’d established wasn’t military in nature.

“By our standards, it would seem to be just that, though. If he wasn’t lying, and I saw nothing to indicate that he was intentionally doing so, then I’d have to guess that their entire social structure is basically military. And, if they’re not here to make or prevent war, then the colony was constructed as it is merely for security purposes.

“That seems to suggest they’re as alien to this world as we are and aren’t certain what they might come up against--and I’m still confused about his assertion that they have no leader and they’re not here to establish a colony.”

Eden, seated at the head of the council table, leaned back in her seat, tapping her fingers impatiently on the surface of the table. “I’m more interested in a threat assessment at this point.”

Liz studied her for several moments in silence. It was obvious she didn’t like being placed in the position of having to make such an important evaluation on so little. “They don’t appear to represent a threat to our colony. There was nothing overtly hostile in their behavior--as we all saw--nothing that I saw that was sly, or furtive. They seemed more … disconcerted by us than alarmed and I think that’s because our social structure confused them.

“Remember the comment about the female soldiers? I don’t think he was trying to gauge our strength or the threat to them. I think he was just stunned that females would hold such a position in our society.”

“So--theirs would undoubtedly be a male dominated society?”

Liz glanced at Deborah Pugh, but shook her head slowly. “I don’t think so. As I said, from what I’ve seen so far their society doesn’t follow any recognizable patterns, but he was respectful of us. If he hailed from a patriarchal society, I don’t think that would’ve been the case at all even if he was intelligent enough to know we had much more powerful weapons.”

Eden sat up decisively. “Houston’s given us a go. My own instincts tell me these aliens, whatever their reason for being here, have no interest in us. I’m giving the project a green light. We’ll start offloading tomorrow.”

Chapter Four

It was hard to contain the air of jubilation that filled every heart as the colonists began the long and difficult task of offloading the tons of equipment and supplies necessary to establish a successful colony. Eden was no exception, though her position demanded that she leaven her enthusiasm with a healthy dose of caution.

On Major Ivy Sterling’s advice, four squads were dispatched to the colony before the first crates were offloaded. Positioning three of the squads along the valley perimeter of the city, Ivy ordered the final squad to patrol the area of the city along the foot of the mountain range. It seemed unlikely they needed to concern themselves with a threat from that direction, but she saw no sense if tempting fate by leaving the backdoor unwatched.

Some of the smaller crates of equipment and supplies were beamed down via the particle transporters, but they’d brought with them the machinery necessary to produce all the things they would need and want for a reasonably comfortable existence and much of this was beyond the capacity of the transporters. The construction bots, having completed that assignment, were reprogrammed to lift and carry the equipment from ship to shuttle and unload the shuttles once they’d landed.

Although the thrill of finding a new home kept spirits high and the colonists amiably occupied and cooperative throughout much of the first few weeks, squabbles broke out the moment the colonists were allowed to begin the search for their own private ‘nest’. After breaking up a dozen disagreements that ranged from verbal abuse to physical violence, Eden had Ivy round up the colonists and march them to the municipal building. There they drew lots and were assigned housing. No one was particularly happy about the solution, but it ended the fights, temporarily at least.

“You’d think they had enough to do to keep peace,” Eden muttered as she watched the colonists file out of the auditorium again.

Liz sent her a speculative glance. “They’re on edge. As happy as we all are to finally have a place to settle, everyone’s deep down scared. This is all new. We don’t know what’s out there, or what to expect. It’ll take a while to grow accustomed, to feel safe and secure in this world.”

“Umm,” Eden responded non-committally. “We’ll never get settled if we spend this much time squabbling over everything. For christsake, there isn’t a modicum of difference between one domicile and another!”

Liz shrugged. “Location,” she pointed out succinctly.

“Pllleease!” Eden snapped. “Everything is handy enough! At the most nobody is going to be more than fifteen minutes from any place they would need to go--work, home, market, hospital--entertainment center! And we have the automated roadways. It isn’t like they’d have to walk!”