Watcher's Web (9 page)

Jessica drew
back a chair. Once again she was in the body of the strange
man—that’s why she could read the menu.

“How are you,
Wonan?” the man asked, and it was strange to have the sound come
from her mouth.

“You seemed in
a hurry to talk to me.”

“I am—thank
you.” The last words to the woman who deposited a glass on the
table. It contained a vivid blue drink, a trail of vapour rising
from its surface.

Daya picked up
the glass. Jessica felt it as he held his breath and took a large
gulp. His mouth burned, and when he swallowed the feeling tracked
all the way into his stomach. Warmth spread through his body. He
sighed; he needed that.

Wonan blew
steam off his tea. “So, what is the problem?”

“I’d like to
have your thoughts on something. I’ve tried a lot of other things,
but I keep coming back to the same conclusion.” He twirled his
glass. “Say you wanted to fool the Exchange, how would you do
it?”

“Fool the
Exchange?” Wonan leant back in his chair, frowning. “To what
end?”

“To make an
aircraft disappear. A craft that is unaware that it’s being
transferred.”

Yellow eyes
fixed his. “You’re talking about unilateral translocation.”

“Yes.” Daya
cringed. Like the fifth dimension and the eighth sense, unilateral
translocation was one of the subjects philosophers liked discussing
but no researcher in the sciences seriously believed existed.

“That’s
impossible.”

“I know. Yet
it happened. Something fooled the Network into accepting
reciprocity for a craft that had no ability to do so. A craft that
had no Exchange capacity, no anpar control, and no
communication.”

Wonan’s frown
had deepened. “You’re sure?”

“As sure as I
can be.”

“If you’re
right, why has no one made a big fuss about this?”

“They have, on
the craft’s home world. But it’s not a Union world and they have no
idea even of the existence of the Exchange.”

Wonan’s eyes
widened. “Where is the craft now?”

“If I knew
that, I’d be halfway to answering my questions. I need access to
the translocation records.”

The web
crackled and shivered.

Damn, damn,
damn. She couldn’t control it. Just when it was getting
interesting—he was talking about what had happened to her, wasn’t
he?

*     *     *

The restaurant
exploded amidst a blur of images that were not Daya’s, but belonged
to the tailed people. A boat bringing in a huge fish. Tailed and
stripy-skinned people carving it up on the beach. A young male
climbing a tree to pick fruit. The images came faster and faster
until they blurred together in a stream of colour.

Strands of
light flailed and whipped about, until they, too, merged and became
a seething stream of white that flowed through her and eroded the
knot of energy inside her, like a river eats at a sandy bank. When
the light dimmed, all she saw was two large brown eyes that seemed
to swallow her. The blue strands and sparks under her skin were
gone. So was the pain.

Chapter
8

A
SNAP BROUGHT
Jessica back from the trance.

She blinked.
Stared. Blinked again.

Orange light
gilded Ikay’s face, bringing out gold spots in her huge irises.
Behind her some curious females still lingered, but most onlookers
had gone back to work.

Doors were
open at the bottom of the installation’s central pillar. Jessica
could see wire cages inside, with lots of balls that glowed like
radioactive caviar. A group of females were wearing gloves and
loading those balls into bags, which others carried towards the
river.

The air was
humid, heavy with the minty scent from the females’ bodies and the
wet smell of mud. A breeze caressed Jessica’s skin like soft
fingers. The most beautiful thing in the universe. Gone was the
burning, the pain, the madness and the recklessness. Gone was the
web and the man’s voice and the stranger in the restaurant. With
the heat that had fled her body through the web, the anger had
melted away.

How had this
alien female done that? Because when their minds connected, there
had been no doubt: Ikay had done something to drain off the
pressure, something none of the doctors she had visited on Earth
had ever been able to do.

Jessica stared
at Ikay and the remaining onlookers as if, for the first time,
really seeing them.

Yes, they were
the same type of creatures as the ones who had been following her,
the ones who had taken Brian and killed the others. Those men still
stood motionless at the ridge, mere silhouettes against the
darkening sky. A group of hunting females waited halfway between
them and the wall. Why the men should let themselves be stopped
when they had fire-spewing weapons was a question Jessica couldn’t
answer, but the fact was they didn’t come closer and so it seemed
for now she was safe, at least from them. And if these females had
plans to kill her, they could have done so a hundred times
already.

A wave of
fatigue rolled over her.

“I’m sorry to
be so rude, but would you have something to eat?” Jessica mimicked
eating.

Ikay
repeated Jessica’s mimicking, speaking a single word that sounded
something like
okkik,
with
short vowels and deep guttural “k” sounds.

Jessica
nodded, but at Ikay’s blank stare repeated the gesture again.
“Please?”

Ikay beckoned,
and led Jessica away from the wall, waving the last aproned workers
back to their jobs. The two Amazons followed, still looking
wary.

At the gap in
the wall another Amazon waited. This one was much younger, her body
graceful with female curves and supple, striped skin. Large,
long-lashed doe-eyes met Jessica’s in a questioning look. A
gorgeous, feminine creature, even in the way she held her
knife.

Her voice,
young and childish, rang like a bell.

Ikay
pointed at the chest of the black-haired Amazon and said a single
word that sounded like
“Alllll.”

The Amazon’s
name?

Jessica
tried to repeat the word, but couldn’t produce the thick “l” and
said,
“Alla.”

The
Amazon’s glare met hers. Her tail swayed at knee level. It probably
meant
mildly
annoyed.

Ikay
moved to introduce the older woman with the leopard spots. This one
took Jessica’s bastardisation of her name into
Maire
without any emotion, gazing into the
sunset.

On the other
hand, after hearing Jessica call her “Dora”, the young Amazon let
forth a barrage of snorts and gurgles that sounded like she was
choking. It seemed this was their version of laughter. Jessica
chuckled, launching Dora into another set of snorts.

Alla gave her
a cold look, and spoke a few harsh words.

Ikay
waved around the small group and said something that sounded
like,
“Pengali.”

So that’s what
they called themselves, Pengali.

Jessica
repeated, “Pengali.” And then pointed at her own chest. “I’m
Jessica. I’m human.” Well, that sounded stupid.

Ikay raised
her hand and wagged her finger. “Poh-poh-poh-poh—Anmi.”

Whatever. As
long as they gave her something to eat.

A well-worn
path led from the power installation to the river bank. Yellowish
brown water flowed sluggishly past a line of about ten dugout
canoes, tied to each other, into which the working females were
loading their bags of glowing pearls. A delivery of charged
batteries to the island city she had seen?

Another boat
lay on the muddy beach a bit away from the others. The grey-haired
Amazon, Maire, took the rope attached to the bow and heaved,
dragging the canoe into the water. Dora sprang into the bow, picked
up a stick and poked it hard into the sand to keep the boat in
place. Jessica stepped in; Ikay settled behind her.

Alla and Maire
pushed off and the canoe glided into deeper water. They turned
upstream, where the rainforest edged the river like silent walls of
green. Dora splashed the stick with well-trained rhythm. Even from
the back, her figure looked more feminine than that of the other
Amazons. Earlier, Jessica had noticed her full breasts and a curved
belly. She could be pregnant.

Jessica
looked over her shoulder. She wondered where Brian was and how far
upriver these creatures were taking her. She could still hear
Brian’s voice.
We’ll
be fine.
She was
angry for having lost him. Yes, it was his own stupid fault that he
had been left behind. He had probably been caught by the other mob,
the poachers, or whatever they were. He should have come with her,
but still . . . it didn’t feel right, what had happened,
and she should try to go back and find him. By now, the boat had
gone so far upstream that the top of the cliff where she had left
Brian was almost out of sight.

The canoe
entered a lagoon, where the river emerged from a deep gorge in a
large pool of mirror-like water. Images of trees and vines
reflected in the surface. The beach at the lagoon’s edge looked
unnaturally white. A row of boats lay in the shadow of the trees.
There were also racks made from sticks with something that looked
like seaweed hanging on horizontal beams to dry. The dizzying smell
of cooking hung over the water. Jessica’s stomach growled.

As soon as the
bow of the canoe hit the sand, a lone figure strode out of the
forest, clad in a cloak of material that shimmered blue and purple
in the dying rays of daylight. Coloured beads glittered in his
greying hair. His protruding pot-belly hung over a jewelled belt
around his waist, adorned with ornaments made from hair and seeds.
His flaccid penis, the skin dark brown, left no doubt about his
gender.

His eyes met
Jessica’s while he exchanged a few words with Ikay and the Amazons,
during which Alla gestured towards the ridge, where the silhouettes
of Jessica’s pursuers were no longer visible. The male’s voice
sounded angry; his tail waved behind him, causing his dangling
penis to swing from side to side. His pubic hair was white and
straight, hanging down between his sinewy legs like a goatee. His
balls protruded from it like black marbles, the skin shiny and
stretched.

Again, his
eyes met hers and held them for a few seconds during which he
turned aside, giving her a full view of his genitals, the penis no
longer entirely limp.

Jessica
shivered. Oh, no, he had no doubt about her gender.

The Amazons
dragged the canoe up the beach, while Ikay beckoned Jessica into
the forest.

It was dark
under the cover of the huge trees. The smell of decaying leaves
brought back the first escape through the forest after the
crash.

And Brian. She
shouldn’t have left him, she really shouldn’t have, mysterious and
creepy as he was. She should have grabbed him by the arm and
dragged him down that rock slide.

The sound of
many voices talking, children calling, whistling, came from
somewhere between the trees.

Ahead was a
huge structure, as tall as the trees and blending in with them.
Greenish light spilled from an archway entrance. Two sentries stood
on either side, no more than shadows in the gloom. Ikay replied to
the men and they let the group pass into a huge hall made up of
living trees. These trees, in a rough circle, formed the pillars
for a roof at least a couple of floors above.

A second
circle of tree trunks, ghostly green in the eerie light, supported
wooden structures, like balconies surrounding a town square.
Jessica counted at least four levels above ground. Specks of light
dotted the delicately-carved balcony railings, the tree trunks and
ceiling. It took her a while to realise that they were sparkly
reflections from the opal-like floor, smooth as a floor in a
suburban shopping centre.

The greenish
light originated from glowing bulbs suspended from ropes strung
from one tree trunk to another.

People spilled
from every nook and cranny. Small, large-eyed, their shoulders and
backs striped like zebras, or spotted like leopards, all of them
waving and signalling with tails. Young males, old males, young
females, mothers carrying babies, old females, children. In
contrast to the adults, who only had pigment stripes on their
shoulders and backs, the children were striped or spotted all over,
like wild piglets. All stark naked, whispering, pointing at her.
The smell of their musty bodies was so strong that Jessica felt
sick.

Ikay guided
her across the floor, ushering curious onlookers aside. They went
through another archway made from carved wood, where the smell of
sulphur and the press of humidity hung thick in the air. This room
held a large indoor pool.

A few stone
steps led to the edge of the water, dark and murky. Eerie light
shone from balls similar to those in the main hall. The surface
rippled from splashes on the other side of the room, where children
yelled and laughed. Adults stood in the water, talking.

Ikay tugged
Jessica’s shirt up. Jessica grabbed the hem and pulled it back
down.

“I don’t want
to bathe, I’m hungry.”

Ikay shrank
back, her tail curling before her. Children stopped splashing.
Adults stopped talking. Everyone crowded around to watch her.
Shoulders glistened with moisture. Breasts cast small, half-moon
shadows on female chests.

Jessica stared
into Ikay’s huge eyes. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you.”

The tail
lowered; Ikay mimicked eating.

Jessica
nodded, flooded with hope. “Yes, I’m starving.”