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Fledgling
...A Liaden Universe® Adventure
by
Sharon Lee and Steve Miller
...the story of Theo Waitley and how she came to have a "kind of complicated" problem to lay before the delm of Korval.
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Chapter Four
Four Team Three came around the corner into the seminar hall more like a loose gaggle than a team.
Theo cringed, knowing that Professor Appletorn paid
attention to such things, and graded for form. But Lesset's steps
had gotten slower and slower the closer they'd gotten, and Theo had
lagged behind too, showing support for her friend. Supporting
your friends was important, according their Social Engineering
instructor. Even if you privately thought they were being just a
little too sensitive.
Four Team Six was ahead of them, which wasn't
anything unusual; their Ready Room was closer to Advertence by a good
three halls. They shouldn't be showing bonus just for being ahead
– fairness said that such advantage would be factored in.
What was unusual was the fact that they were
standing in front of the seminar room like a bunch of random nonacs
instead of a functioning Learning Team, blinking at the door.
Which was shuttered.
Theo frowned.
"What's wrong?" Lesset asked. "Why are they standing in the hall?"
"The door's closed," Theo said.
"Closed?" Lesset repeated. "But why
would it be closed? We have a class. Professor Appletorn
insists that the door be open until he starts teaching!"
"Did we all miss a schedule jump somehow? Is it
locked?" Kartor asked, as their group joined Six in front of the
shuttered door.
Several people snatched out their mumus, fingers flying.
“Sched clean,” came a mumble, followed by a group sigh of a relief.
“Is it locked?" Kartor asked again, since the crowd of Team Six blocked his view of the status lights.
"No-oo," Vela answered slowly, looking at him over the heads of her team mates.
"Then," Roni said impatiently, "open it!"
"Do you think we should?" That was Simon, Team Six's proceduralist.
Before Estan, Team Three's proceduralist, could
answer, Roni sighed loudly and lunged forward over Vela's shoulder,
smacking her palm against the plate. Somebody on Team Six --
probably Simon, Theo thought uncharitably -- squeaked nervously, but
nothing happened other than the shutter opened, showing the bright,
empty room beyond.
"Was that so hard?" Roni asked, still impatient.
Team Six traded glances.
"No," Vela said quietly. "It wasn't hard. But we didn't have consensus, Roni."
"To open a door?" Roni shook her head in
visible disgust, which, Theo thought, Vela didn't deserve. They should have reached consensus -- or at least let the
proceduralists talk. Roni was weak on consensus-building.
And consensus-reading, too. Consensus was one of the things the
team was supposed to help her with.
"As long as the door's open," Kartor said, "maybe we should go in."
Team Six exchanged grave glances, and Theo didn't
blame them. The instructor always awaited the class. The
seminar room was, after all, the instructor's space, that students only
entered with permission.
On the other hand... Theo heard the muted twitter
from her mumu, the tone she used to warn herself that she was almost in
trouble...
"If we don't get to our stations soon," she said
from the back of the group, "the room will mark us all late – as
teams and as students!"
Simon bit his lip, but he turned to address his team
mates. "She's right," he said. “And they tell us we need to take
responsibility for being on time, no matter the conditions!”
Vela nodded, gathered her team with a glance and
hand-wave of consensus, and entered the room. Roni, Kartor,
Estan, and Anj followed, with Theo and Lesset bringing up the rear.
There was the usual clatter while they got to
stations, adjusted table heights, set up their books, and joined the
Learning Group. Then, it got ...quiet. Theo shifted and
looked around, first at the empty teacher's station where Professor
Appletorn ought to be standing, then at her classmates -- which was
pretty much what everybody else was doing.
"Should we tell somebody?" Naberd asked. "Call the safeties, maybe?"
Simon shrugged, and Estan looked up from his book with a frown.
"I can't find a procedure for what we should do if the instructor is..." his voice dropped, "...missing."
Silence. Then Vela spoke up. "I'm going ask for consensus to call the safeties."
"That won't be necessary, Ms. Poindexter."
There were quick loud steps and a clang and clatter
as an Educator's Rod was tossed haphazardly into the corner, making
everyone jump in startlement.
Professor Appletorn swept into the room, slapped the
autoboard up and spun on the balls of his feet, a frown on his face.
“The correct and studied term would be late, rather than missing, Mr. Vanderpool, and within the bounds of my contract I am neither. ”
The professor stood there for some moments, hands
behind his back, keeping the silent class rapt as he looked from face
to face as if counting them, or verifying that both teams were in full
attendance.
"Perhaps," he said suddenly, "Mr. Vanderpool will be
so kind as to remind this august gathering of scholars of the basic
tenets of Advertence."
Theo held her breath. Estan Vanderpool was a
stolid, solid, meticulous boy who wasn't easily rattled.
Normally. Today, though, wasn't exactly normal.
"Well, Mr. Vanderpool?" Professor Appletorn's
voice was sharp enough to slice cheese, as Father said, and he hadn't
waited the full thirty seconds, either. It was like he was pushing Estan, only of course he wouldn't do that. Not really. Pushing was Physical Intimidation and that was 'way more trouble than just a note in your folder.
Estan took a breath so deep his shoulders lifted, then relaxed as he breathed out.
"Advertence is the quality of being heedful or
attentive. It carries the connotation of consideration and deep
thought. A scholar who practices advertency is a careful
researcher who weighs what she has learned before forming a hypothesis
to lay before her colleagues."
Text perfect, Theo thought with relief, right out of the first lesson.
Professor Appletorn rocked back on his heels, thumbs hooked into the pockets of his coveralls.
"Indeed," he said softly. "And what avenues
are open to the study of an advertent scholar....” He paused,
then stabbed out with a fleshy forefinger. “... Miss Tibbets?"
Theo frowned. Another of her team mates, not
as stolid or as solid as Estan. Sometimes Anj was there, and
sometimes -- she wasn't.
This morning, though, she was home and answering her mail.
"The avenues of study open to the advertent
scholar," she said crisply, "are: text, eyewitness, and primary
source."
"Images?" Professor Appletorn asked, almost mildly.
"Images require an exacting level of observation and
consideration, because they're so easy to manipulate. Primary
source images, or those documented in the texts and which have
provenance, are preferred, but even then the careful scholar will seek
corroboration in another study-set."
Their instructor nodded in silent agreement, lips
pursed, then jerked his head toward row three, toward her...
"And what, Miss Waitley," he snapped, "do we say of
the scholar who depends solely on primary sources, and shuns the
validation of the texts?"
Theo blinked, and stupidly, the first thing she thought was that Professor Appletorn was targeting their team, singling them out one by one.
"Well, Miss Waitley? Have you none of your priceless pearls to cast before us this morning?"
He wasn't just in a bad mood, Theo thought, he was angry.
She took a breath, her fingers touching the keys of her school book,
sending the link into the Learning Group even as she looked up into his
big square face.
"Sir, I propose a textual validation as a starting
point for forming an understanding of such a scholar." Her voice
was cool and crisp, more like her mother's than her own. "I cite
the paper published by Professor Monit Appletorn, an Acknowledged
Authority in the field of research dynamics. Professor Appletorn
tells us that those scholars who seek out the treasure of the primary
source are the cream of scholars, instant Authorities, whose work
validates the work of all those who come after."
Silence. Theo, watching the color drain out of his face, wondered if he was going to faint.
"Am I to understand, Miss Waitley ," Professor
Appletorn said, and his voice wasn't sharp, now; it was soft, almost a
whisper. "Am I to understand that you have read and given
consideration to this paper?"
"Yes, sir," Theo said, which was nothing less than
the truth. Kamele would ground her for a month if she heard Theo
claiming credit for research she hadn't done.
"Have you?" Professor Appletorn whispered. "Why?"
Why? Theo looked at him in amazement.
"I am waiting, Miss Waitley."
"Well, I was doing my research for the course," she
said slowly, trying to figure out how she'd managed to make him even
madder. "And your paper was cited in several of the texts.
I -- it was only what an advertent scholar would do, to pull up and
read the paper."
"I see." More silence while he stared at
her. "You are either very stupid or very clever, Miss Waitley." He said her name as if it tasted bad! He turned his head suddenly. "Which is she, Miss Grinmordi?"
Lesset actually twitched, her mouth forming a
perfect O, her voice surprisingly strong, and then fading suddenly away
-- "I, she, well...evidently..." There was a pause, as if words –
never her firmest friends -- failed her. She threw Theo a
helpless look and then looked back to the professor.
"It, um, depends..." she stammered finally.
The whole class held its breath.
Professor Appletorn seemed to ...deflate. Not
that he became less angry, Theo thought, but that his anger had used up
more energy than he had available.
He sighed.
"That is correct, Miss Grinmordi," he said
temperately. "Evidently, it depends. We do not yet have
sufficient data to make a determination."
He turned and walked to the front of the room,
putting his hand on the control for the autoboard, just as someone's
unmuted mumu chimed the first eighth of the hour.
Surprisingly, Professor Appletorn ignored the sound, apparently giving the autoboard his whole attention.
"Simon Joniger," he said, finally naming somebody
who wasn't one of Theo's team mates. "Please share your links for our
last study assignment."
Class had been interminable, the class' mood not
improved by the amount of “for next time” work in addition to that
outlined in the syllabus. At the end of the session, the two
Teams escaped as a group, silently, with only an exchange of glances in
which relief and puzzlement were equally mixed.
Theo had to hurry to catch up with one of the
victims, who was walking head down, eyes down, and at a dangerous clip.
“Phew. Lessie...” Theo ventured, finally gaining her friend's scowling attention.
"You see?" Lesset moaned as they got on the belt to the maths level together. "I can't think when he snarls at me like that. My mind goes blank and I just want to be someplace else -- "
"But you did fine!" Theo protested. Lesset blinked.
"I did? But he was so angry..."
"He was angry at all of us," Theo said, then shook
her head. "No, he was mad when he came to class. Something
must've happened before -- the reason he was late, maybe. And he
was trying to rattle us -- specifically us, our team." Which was, she thought, weird. What could Four Team Three have done to make Professor Appletorn so mad?
"But you said I did fine?" Lesset persisted. "How?"
Theo sighed.
"It depends was the right answer,"
she said. "It was correct, exactly the thing an advertent scholar
would have said." She gave Lesset a smile. "I wonder how
much data you have to have to decide somebody's a nidj?"
Lesset was off in another direction, looking
vacantly at the walls and people sliding by for a moment before
gathering her words together for a question.
"Did you really read that paper? The one you cited?"
Theo turned to stare at her. "I said so, didn't I?"
Her friend lifted a placating hand. "You did,
and I know you wouldn't ever lie about your research. It's just -- why?"
"Because Professor Appletorn's an Acknowledged
Authority," Theo said patiently, "and I kept coming across cites to his
paper when I was scanning the prelim lit. Reading one more paper wasn't that hard."
"Fact?" Lesset obviously had her doubts.
"Fact," Theo said firmly, and, noticing that her
friend still looked tense, tried a joke. "See what you could be
reading instead of The Faq?"
"Oh!" Lesset's face went white, then
red. "Oh!" she said again. "That's just --
antisocial!"
"It was a joke!" Theo said, staring. "It was supposed to be funny --"
"Funny to you, maybe. But I don't think it's
funny to be laughed at." She took a deep, furious breath, and
turned to walk away -- or tried to, oblivious to the direction of the
belt's travel.
The ultra-safe, grippy surface of the belt would
have assisted her flight, if she'd been properly balanced.
Unfortunately, Lesset had thrown her weight at an angle to the
direction they were traveling in, heedless of inertia. The
resulting resistance knocked her off-balance; she staggered, and her
bag swung forward over her shoulder, unbalancing her even more.
Theo grabbed onto her friend's arm just as Lesset
threw herself backward, and the two of them went down in a heap, Lesset
yelling.
The belt immediately slowed to a stop, and the other
kids surged forward -- then dropped back at the shrill sound of a
whistle and a shout of "Safeties!"
"Stay where you are!" The taller of the two
student officials snapped when Theo tried to get up. "We have to
run a scan."
This they speedily did, while Theo wished Lesset
would get her bag off of her knee, and tried to figure out how late
they were going to be for math.
"All right, you can stand."
Lesset stood first, head hanging. Theo flexed her bruised knee and followed.
"Names?" The shorter one asked, mumu pointed at them, the red 'record' light showing.
"Theo Waitley," she said resignedly, and heard Lesset whisper her name.
"What happened?" The taller one asked.
Theo took a breath. "Lesset stumbled on the
belt. I thought she was going to fall and tried to catch her."
"And instead of catching her, you both
fell down, the belt stopped, and you, your team, and all the rest of
the students on this belt are going to be late for class." The
taller one shook her head and tapped her mumu. "I see you're
flagged as physically challenged, Miss Waitley. Next time, I
suggest you pay attention to your own balance and let your friend help
herself." She gave Theo a stern look. "Unless you were trying to be disorderly?"
Theo gaped at her. "No!"
"Thumb-prints here," the shorter safety said,
presenting his mumu, screen up. "Three downs for Four Team Three,
and a note in your files, Ms. Grinmordi and Ms. Waitley."
The safeties stepped off the belt. "Everybody
face front. Motion beginning on the count of three -- One! Two!
Three!"
The belt started up, slowly, steadily gaining
momentum. Theo faced front, bottom lip firmly caught in her
teeth, and pretended that she didn't notice Lesset's downcast
look, or Roni's loud whisper to her belt-mate.
"Oh, yeah -- Theo Waitley. She's the clumsiest kid in Fourth Form!"
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Base page created December 1, 2006 by Sharon Lee
Chapter updated February 12, 2007
technical revision posted April 7, 2007
Update March 15, 2008, 12:35 p.m. EDT
copyright © 2006-2007 by Sharon Lee and Steve Miller
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