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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 Nineteen
Theo slowly
wandered away from the library. She should, she thought grumpily
have joined Win Ton for the "Antique Recipe Workshop," but "All the
Languages of Space" had sounded so interesting!
It wasn't just that she'd gotten used to having Win Ton's commentary on
things, though he did have a way of making ordinary things more
fun. He also had a knack for picking good lectures. She bet his workshop had been lots of fun, hers had been plain and boring, and shorter than she'd expected, too.
Pffft. If she was ever a teacher she
was going to do better than that librarian. He hadn't been really
good with the norbears and he hadn't been very good at all with
"All The Languages of Space." Not only didn't he speak anything
but what he called "pure Terran," but he'd been using some kind of
promptomatic on his speakeasy display so all he had to do was read
ahead a few seconds to sound like he knew his subject. She could get
better than that off the self-test channel at the Wall any hour of the
day. And he hadn't answered her questions on languages that
weren't written or spoken. It was like he hadn't even heard her!
On top of that, the list of materials for extra
study he'd provided couldn't be directly accessed on the ship, so what
questions she did have would have to wait. Probably all he'd
done, Theo thought darkly, was record someone else's lecture and read
from that. She'd been tempted to open her mumu just to see if it
could find the original on the ship net, but then she remembered that
Kamele had pointed out that there were sometimes info-access fees added
to room charges when you traveled. She'd have to ask Win Ton
about that – it seemed a pretty rude way to run a ship!
She was a little early to meet Win Ton in front of
the Arcade, but not early enough to stop by the stateroom.
Despite watching several crew members vanish through unmarked doors
just outside the library, Theo thought that perhaps now was not
a good time to search for a shortcut. Or a long cut, either.
Instead she took a slow walk toward the Arcade. Win Ton's note
had suggested they not contemplate the dance machines, on suggestion of his Captain.
Captain. Theo wondered if that made Win Ton an
apprentice Captain, or a Sergeant, or what? Well, everyone had a
superior, except maybe Father, and if Captain Cho thought they
needed to do things a little more quietly, then perhaps they could get
some exercise by walking the corridors. Walking was good exercise, and
besides, she thought, brightening, maybe she could walk Win Ton through
the shopping area. She had some credits on her card and she could
ask him about the right kind of leather jacket to wear for the crew
halls.
She picked up speed as she hit the hall leading to
the Arcade, not because she was in a hurry herself but because other
foot-traffic was picking up. What looked to be a bus load of people
rushed off one of the big elevators as she went passed. She
hurried now because the people behind her were all hurrying, all bent
on the Arcade or the shopping areas beyond. It would be
anti-social for her to impede traffic. There were lots of voices
behind her, and mostly speaking Terran, though not many, Theo thought
crankily, "pure Terran. Whatever that was.
From behind, closing, came the voice of a younger passenger.
"Hey, hey, Jumbo. There she is. That cute
Liaden girl you were faunching after all week, she's right there. I
told you she wouldn't be able to stay away. People get addicted to that
dance thing. And her boyfriend's not with her!"
Theo scanned the crowd ahead of her as she
hurried, searching for, and failing to find, the "Liaden girl." A
mumble from behind sounded something like "catch her!" -- or not
– accompanied by overloud footsteps, coming up quick.
You have to stop that, she told herself, just because you and Win Ton don't sound like a herd of birds when you walk....
She startled herself then, and stepped to the side
of the hall to let people go by as she examined that thought, walking
much more slowly now that she was out of the mainstream.
It was true, she decided. Not only didn't Win
Ton and she make a lot of noise when they walked together, they hadn't,
even under the beat, made that much noise in the throes of their
dancing. There'd been more noise coming up from the slowbies on
the lower levels....
The Arcade was in sight, and across the busy hall
she could see Win Ton in the appointed place, wearing his jacket today
-- but no! That was someone else, his hair a lighter
brown, and with him another person also in leather, both on the alert
for someone by the way they scanned the halls.
Chaos Theo thought, as her view of the
jackets was blocked by a group of three young men, maybe the ones
looking for a Liaden, maybe just lost and wanting to ask
directions. They looked familiar, Theo thought. Maybe
she'd seen them at the Arcade, or at lunch. She waited, but they
paused just out of talking range.
Fine, then, she thought. She'd cross the hall
and wait for Win Ton. Maybe ask the two people in leather --
She moved slowly forward, skirting the young men and
trying to see her angle for crossing the hall against all the rushing
people.
The tallest of the three guys – they'd been
dancing lower on the levels, that's where she'd seen them! -- the
tallest stepped half in front of her, with a smile, like he expected her to recognize him.
“Miss, may I offer you congratulations on a great
dance? I've never seen a girl dance like that before.”
Theo slowed, gave a half-smile, and a half-nod.
"Thank you," she said, "it was a lot of fun."
She glanced beyond him, looking for Win Ton but
seeing only the companions of her admirer, who also were also grinning.
"I was wondering..." said the youth, jostled now by
his friends. He bowed a silly kind of an off-centered bow, like
he was fragile; his friends tried to follow suit and looked even
sillier. "...would you care to join us for a dance on level two
or three?"
The traffic down the hall had thinned enough to make
it possible to cross, but the kids were in her way. Theo sighed
to herself, thinking that Win Ton really should be here any moment.
Gathering her manners, she gave the boy who had
invited her to dance one of Father's half-nod/half-bow, because that
was polite, but not stupid, and tried to work out an equally polite
refusal.
"I'm honored," she managed, but, I ..." She
shifted a bit to the right, feeling a bit crowded... "I'm not
sure it would be fair. I'm going to be..."
The leader's smile dropped instantly into hard,
angry line, while his fellows made smirky little faces and snerky
noises. He raised one shoulder and made a fist, which he pumped
in emphasis.
"Not fair to dance with us? Are you that good, do you think? Grizzat's bones, I've heard Liadens are stuck up and ..."
Theo dropped back a half-step, found a dance move
prompting her to turn slightly sidewise, which opened a way to skip by
the three of them, but there was a flicker of motion there and --
“Boyfriend!” came sotto voce from the friend on the left and then...
"I would measure not fair as a polite enough
no,” came Win Ton's welcome voice as he stepped beside her and brought
his shoulder against hers, "Liaden or not. And as our dancer was
waiting for me ... oh, pilots!"
Win Ton bowed an elegant bow to the left of the
cluster of three, at the two leather jacketed persons approaching.
"Win Ton!" exclaimed the light-haired one, bowing in
return, while his companion merely nodded pleasantly, one eye, so it
seemed to Theo on the suddenly nervous young men. "We were told
we might find you here!" He shot an unexpectedly sharp glance at
Theo and bowed again. "Dancer."
The other smiled, and made a subtle hand motion;
Theo felt Win Ton's answer as his shoulder moved against hers.
"Please, young sirs," he said, addressing the three,
now red-faced, boys. "Our party has found us. Necessity requires
our presence elsewhere."
*
“Well, there wasn't really a problem,” Theo said
half-huffily as they strode toward and through a grav-change spot, none
of them commenting on it so she didn't either.
“They just wanted me to dance with them and I was
trying to say that it wouldn't be fair to start a dance when I was
expecting a friend at any moment and would leave. But he took what I
said wrong and wouldn't let me finish...”
Win Ton looked beyond her to the jacketed pilots, a
hand sign directing them and her left at the next intersection.
The gravity changed there, too, feeling a bit lighter. No comment
from any of them.
"Really, it was all the perfect truth, Theo, you
might have stopped with the 'not fair' in good conscience. None
of them will ever be pilots nor dancers, which is not their fault so
they needn't be angry.” Now Win Ton looked past her again,
talking to Cordrey, the light haired man, and his friend Phobai.
"Truly, pilots, Dancer Theo and I went shoulder to
shoulder to level thirty and I expect we could have gone to level fifty
if the machine they have here were capable... and those halflings in
the hallway would not have been able to learn anything from dancing with Theo because, as you could see they only wished to be admired!"
“Your eyesight that bad, Pilot?” Cordrey asked, with
a grin at Win Ton over Theo's head. "Looked to me that what they really
wanted to do was to admire Theo, all to themselves.”
Win Ton tipped his head, then gave an odd little shrug-and-bow on the move. “Point taken.”
Theo felt herself redden slightly. Admired! As if.
"Room Fourteen,” Win Ton said, “though fourteen-B,
I'm told, is the actual entrance we will wish to use, because it looks
a twin of a service door.”
The doors slid by at the rapid pace they were
making, with Theo feeling a comfortable bounce to her step that wasn't
just the light gravity. It did feel good to stretch her legs a
bit, and Win Ton had promised a chance for a bit of exercise.
"This may be fourteen," said Cordrey, "unless I miss
my guess," and they all laughed, since the numerals were blazoned
man-high on the wall beside it, along with the words "Captain's
Ballroom."
Another two dozen steps brought them to 14-B.
"Now, pilots," said Win Ton, producing a slide
key from the small cloth bag slung over his shoulder, "we will have
room to play!”
**
“Really, Kamele, there are only the two of us here. You'd needn't be quite so formal.”
Kamele wished that was the case but as the trip
moved forward she found herself being less, rather than more,
comfortable with Orkan Hafley and her doings. It didn't help that
the Chair's "stateroom" was about the size of Jen Sar's house in the
country, if one assumed that the bed chamber and bath was opulent and
roomy as the public area. That opulence wasn't restricted to
space either: the promised "coffee and pastry" was a spread equal to a
full faculty meeting. Even the absence of Hafley's precious onagrata didn't help Kamele's comfort levels, though it might help explain the plenitude of sweet rolls.
Arranging herself a little more informally into the
bulky tufted armchair while she held her coffee cup with real
gratitude, Kamele nodded.
“Chair, I gathered from your note that you had some
serious things to discuss. I thought perhaps you'd had information from
Melchiza, or maybe Delgado.”
Hafley was pouring a second cup already, which was
never a good sign, and paused to take another finicky bite from
one of the over-filled breads.
She motion with the hand that held the pastry,
preparatory to making a point, which started in the midst of a
swallow.
“Indeed, Kamele, there's information. Far too much
of it for my comfort, and I'd think it too much for yours, as well.”
The pastry deposited, Hafley made do with the coffee
cup as a pointing device, vaguely waving it in Kamele's direction.
“Our good man Crowley has ferreted out that the
woman you have been speaking with, this 'Cho' person, is a pilot.”
Kamele was unsurprised: she'd seen young Win Ton's
jacket, after all, and seen his superior's disapproval of his arriving
in it late for dinner.
“Yes, it seemed likely, given her comments on travel.”
“More than that, it is obvious that this Cho and her accomplice are Liadens.”
Kamele sipped coffee, keeping face and voice calm. "Accomplice, Chair?"
“Pardon, Kamele, I meant, of course, apprentice. And I believe you to have purposefully overlooked the proper subject, which is Liaden."
Hafley took a careful bite of the roll, selecting more of the rather
foamy filling than bread, and washed it quickly down with coffee.
"This meeting of 'Cho' and her assistant, I'm not sure that it is a
good thing for our mission, dear colleague, nor is it perhaps the best
thing for your daughter, who has been seen very much in the company of
the young man."
Kamele tried to keep the surprise out of her voice, but then doubted it mattered.
“I'm not sure I understand what point you're making, Chair.”
Hafley reached forward and poured herself yet another cup of coffee, failing to offer any to Kamale.
“I thought that, Scholar, I thought that. You
must surely understand that your own predilection for Liadens is
something you've but barely managed to survive
academically. Of course, now it's apparent that you have
not only the long view, but the wit and the will to exploit your
resources, with the result that you are largely untouchable. An
admirable plan, and well-executed, though it did mean allowing a man to
support your efforts – still, a success. I admire that. But have
you no understanding that your daughter's career has already been
affected by – shall I say, her irregular situation? Do you think it wise to..."
Kamele was on her feet, and not entirely sure how
she gotten there, though the adrenalin surge might have been the
reason. Carefully, she took a deep breath, stepped forward and refilled
her cup, slowly, before seating herself awkwardly on the front edge of
the overstuffed seat.
“I must say, Chair, that you have my attention. I'm...”
“Kamele, Kamele, can you be indifferent to this?
Could you not have realized that your daughter's class
assignments have been adjusted? I mean, surely, your daughter has
been living in a home with a Liaden! Now that she is not, perhaps
her assignments will improve... but certainly they will not if word
returns to Delgado that your daughter, yet short of her Gigneri, has
been left free to roam, and to perform public exhibitions with a Liaden
boy who has certainly had his coming of age...”
Kamele stood, now, with intent, and placed her cup oh-so-carefully on the table.
“Perhaps we should discontinue this discussion,
Chair. I'm sure there are other more reasonable study
opportunities for both of us...”
Hafley waved her back toward the tufted seat.
"Sit, SubChair. We are not through yet."
She sighed as Kamele, unwilling to embrace open rebellion, sat.
"We need to discuss our protocols and our goals for
the Melchiza project," she said, as if the team hadn't spent hours
forming just those guidelines. "Our personal goals and
protocols," Hafley added. "As for Theo, she might yet be saved
for a life in academia, but really, have you any idea where she is? She
could be doing anything with that Liaden!”
**
"It might be tall enough,” said Phobai, who had shed
her leather and dumped it without preamble against the inner wall, "if
we're careful!"
Cordrey's leather joined it immediately...
"A ballroom?" Theo said uncertainly. "It really is,
and unless the gravity shifts I don't think it'll be too tall for me,
even if i dance real heard!"
The floor reminded her of the floor at the Scavage
ring, though a bit slicker... with an occasional pock or stain of
wear...
Cordrey began tapping at the wall itself, listening,
as Win Ton inspected the floor, scuffing at several spots. Across
the wide room Phobai began a series of warm-up stretches, preparing,
Theo thought, for the coming dance.
Seeing no reason not to, Theo emulated Phobai,
stretching, testing the height of a jump against a gravity she thought
might be light, and then she heard the rhythm in her head and said to
herself “One, two, three, one two three, one two three, four!”
She moved then, swayed, twirled, her arms moving across chest and belly, hands moving to...
At four she turned, and found Win Ton almost shoulder to shoulder with her, and heard him say “Again, one, two....”
And so she started the dance and delightedly found
him dancing beside her, and then they hit four and she halted...while
Win Ton turned, expectantly.
She raised her hands, palm up sure she'd
disappointed Win Ton somehow while on the other side of the room the
other two were testing the walls, or...
“Shall we dance on?” His face was serious, nearly wistful.
"You'll have to teach me," she said apologetically. "That's what I know, Win Ton. That's all I know of that one. We left just as the dance instructor was starting that...”
He stood, flatfooted, poised to move, lips parted.
“That's nearly a crime, you know,” he said, finally.
“To leave a student with only the first four moves of the most basic
self-defense? I...”
It was Theo's turn to be startled.
“But that's just a dance routine we were learning ... something called ... Suwello.”
He stood down, somehow, as if he retracted motion
he'd made in his head and stored it away for some future moment.
“Ah,”he said then, sounding very much like
Father. “Yes, in some places where self-defense is frowned
upon... the start of menfriat may be taught with the Suwello.”
He bowed then, very formally.
“Given time, sweet mystery, we shall attempt to
rectify your incomplete class. However, today we dance a different
dance!” He raised his voice. “Pilots? Menfriat some other day!”
Theo looked at the pair in the far corner, where
they were dancing... but no, they were striking each other, or...
“Pilots!" Win Ton called again. "Tell the tale, pray!”
Cordrey ducked, stopped motion, and his friend did
the same, neatly. They turned, and Theo saw them moving with that
economy of motion that Win Ton had, that Cho had, that Father had....
“The walls are reasonable for light bounces and
such, but not for us, I fear; there are some connectors that might cut
or tear.”
“We are well warned then,” said Win Ton, moving his
foot in an uncharacteristic motion that made a squeal against the solid
panels beneath them. “As for the floor, it needs shoes, but is
well enough for dives if need be -- and if you tuck skin.”
“Warned!” said both pilots in unison, now nearly as close to her as Win Ton.
“Warned for what?” Theo looked about while the pilots grinned expectantly.
“Warned. Just warned.” Win Ton waved his arms
about, pointed at every corner with his chin, and he grinned,
too. “Admit it Theo, you have been warned about the walls, the
ceiling has been mentioned, and you've heard of the floors.”
She laughed. “Warned but not informed!" she
protested, then shrugged into their grins, catching some of their
anticipation. "I guess I have been warned!”
"Sometimes," Phobai said, "all you get is a warning."
"True enough," said Win Ton, reaching into his
bag. "Attend me now. We are going to teach you a game that
will change your life, Theo Waitley.”
She sputtered a laugh at his seriousness while the other pilots nodded, and began backing away.
Out of his bag came Win Ton's hand, clutching
something, which without warning he tossed underhanded to Phobai, who
caught it and flashed it toward Cordrey... who threw it quite hard
toward Win Ton, but it didn't arc quite properly, it danced as it flew
and made a sudden dive which Win Ton managed to catch just above his
foot as he called “Pause!”
Turning, he displayed the object to Theo.
“This, sweet dancer, is a bowli ball. It is
bad form to permit it to touch the ground. There is no set rotation;
you may throw it to whomever seems best. The ball should only
stop motion by mutual agreement. Generally play begins slowly and
builds, and you'll discover it an exquisite dance.”
He came closer, handed it to her, leaned in close to ear, almost as if he were going to .... to kiss her!
Instead, he whispered in her ear.
“Call pause, if you need to stop or be left out of
the circle. The ball is the thing, and all of us wish you to do well.
Once the game starts, there is no quarter, without 'pause' or 'halt',
though since it is a friendly game you may drop the ball thrice before
bowing out. This is the challenge level, Theo.”
He handed her the ball, and backed away quickly,
waving his hand in a motion including the pilots and himself.
“No quarter, Theo! Throw the ball – pilot's choice!”
==============================================================
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Things you should know
Fledgling in serialized format is a draft. This
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should there ever be one. It may be perfect, word for word (though
experience tells us this is not the way the smart money should bet). What we are providing is a rare opportunity to observe the writing process.
We don't know how many chapters there will be. We're free-form writers,
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What are the rules?
What you can do:
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Who are we?
Sharon Lee
and Steve Miller are the authors of a dozen collaborative science
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drop by the Liaden Universe® website.
Base page created December 1, 2006 by Sharon Lee
Chapter updated June 18, 2007
second technical revision posted July 2, 2007
Updated March 15, 2008, 11:58 a.m. EDT
copyright © 2006-2007 by Sharon Lee and Steve Miller
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