Even as she held Kaara's lifeless form in her arms, Kaara and Gray still lived in Chelle's memory...
Kaara and Gray sat across from Chelle and Hankura in the plush circular booth. Their friends, Delmran and Dana, sat to their left with Cran and Luran at their right. They had lingered after their evening meal to socialize over mugs of hot jern tea.
"I can't believe you two are going to leave us and break up the team." Gray looked from Hankura to Chelle and shook his head. "We've been together since Aledus."
"Oh, Gray," Chelle signed, "that's not fair. We don't want to break up the team. We're going to miss you all terribly. But we want to make a home and raise a family. We've waited seven years. Why don't you and Kaara come with us? Remember that world—they called it Demus, but it was really Oltarin---that lost colony with the feuding factions of horsemen? It's a lush Class M with climates ranging from tropical to arctic---and they have the most beautiful horses since Earth. It's just been reopened for settlement. You can purchase land in exchange for technical services, stuff that's second nature to all of us."
“I don't know," Gray hesitated and looked to his mate.
"Couldn't we just go for a visit and then decide?" Kaara asked. "We could still hook up with the Star on Manna Lau.” If we decided not to stay. Kaara added silently.
"Aw, go on," Delmran put in. "You know you want to. I almost stayed myself. It'd be a great place to raise kids."
"What do you know about kids? You wouldn't know what to do if you had one," Cran taunted.
"And you would?" Delmran laughed. "Someday maybe. But I've got a lot of star systems to see before I settle down to just one planet and two or three women."
"Only two or three," Hankura laughed.
"At least I don't have to share with you and Casir anymore."
"Just try it." Hankura retorted only half jokingly.
"Not after your wife thrashed the daylights out of me on the chackrin floor. And I thought I would teach her a few things." Delmran shrugged him off.
"Oh, Delmran, don't joke," Chelle admonished. "I almost killed you."
"But you were only trying to kill the nightmare of the past--- not me, love. Forget about it---no, I guess not," Delmran murmured. "But let's not dwell on it. All is forgiven. Besides, if I'd accidentally hurt you, Hankura would have killed me."
"That would be correct." Hankura grinned.
"What about Zevus Mar?" Cran wanted to know. "What are we going to do on that desert rock?"
"Celebrate!" Delmran raised his mug of jern. "Those miners import the best Aledan yash and carava. We can do a little dancing, place a few wagers, and enjoy the food at Mid-Summer’s Festival. This leave has been a long time coming."
"Our last all together," Kaara said softly. "We'll have to make it one we'll never forget...."
Chelle rocked Kaara in her arms, sobbing softly as Jerry’s last words echoed through her mind. "Never forget...Mishy... never forget...."
She was alone in the dark, more afraid than she had ever been in her five years. The smell the decaying human wastes stung her nose. She could see the people fighting savagely with knives and clubs in the shadows beside the ruin of an ancient skyscraper. Mommy! No, leave Mommy alone!
Her mother, a tall woman with long, dark hair, fought beside a red haired boy, her brother Jerry. Then a man with a club struck her down from behind. The boy couldn't defend them both alone, and the man---big but indistinct in the shadows---clubbed the boy to the ground. The two men grabbed the woman before she could get up again. She struggled and screamed while they ripped off her clothes, but nobody came to help her.
It was following those terrifying moments that Hankura first touched her mind. Thoughts from another human mind spiraled through hers, twisting around her own desperate unhappiness with a different kind of despair.
He was a boy of ten, alone in his darkened cabin aboard the star ship Argus Lu. The passenger freighter was about to put into Earth orbit to take on two more passengers and leave some freight, then it would go to Velran, taking Hankura to the University of Learning.
Stupid laws! Why did he have to go to Velran alone?
Why didn't Trevin and Capra, his brother and sister have to go, too?
It wasn't fair! He didn't want to be alone on this ship with these stupid people who tried to make him like his journey. He just wanted to go home. He wanted his mother ... he wanted his father to love him again.
Someday, he would go back and show them all they were wrong. They would be sorry. Someday.
By then, Mishy or Michelle, as Chelle was known when she was still on Earth, didn't know where the little the boy's despair stopped, and hers began. She felt him fighting against her terrible visions---a nightmare to him---reality to her.
His mother's image became transposed over that of hers. The shadow-men were taking turns laying on top of her mother who from moment to moment alternated to the image of his mother while she cried and screamed, and neither Chelle nor Hankura could do anything to stop the men.
More screams---Chelle's and Hankura's, she was wide eyed awake, and he thought he had awakened from a nightmare, but the vision was still there in his mind. Chelle could feel him crying inside her pain even though he now knew the woman was not his mother. The men had gone, but she was lying very still. The boy---Jerry---groaned.
"Mama?" said Jerry. Relief---the little girl's entwined with Hankura's. He was glad her brother Jerry wasn't dead and glad that the woman wasn't really his mother. "Mama? Oh, no---Mama!" A string of bitter expletives followed. Relief turned to fear. The girl went closer. "Mishy, stay back!"
"I want Mommy! Make her get up," she cried.
"She is never getting up again. She's dead."
"No, she's just sleeping. She'll wake up."
"No, Mishy. She's gonna sleep forever, and I'm gonna kill those goons who did it. They didn't have to kill her."
Back then neither Chelle nor the Hankura really understood death. Could people just go to sleep and never wake up? Could it happen to her? Would it happen to her? No! Chelle pushed the thought away. People don't die for no reason. Those men made her mother die, she was sure of that, but not how. Now, Jerry was going to make them die, too.
It seemed fair to Chelle and to Hankura, too. On Aledus, the Enforcers would have wiped their minds---if they were Psions. Hankura wondered if that was like being dead, but Chelle didn't understand any of that until years later.
At daylight, Jerry took Chelle to Farringay Star Port. Never having been there before, she stared in awe at the huge new buildings inside the wire fence near where they had taken Mommy. She and Jerry put colorful flowers in her cold hands then all around her. She lay on a slab of concrete, wrapped like a goddess in stolen white muslin. When they finished, Jerry knelt with Mishy beside the body.
Chelle started to cry.
"Don't cry, Mishy. I told you. Mommy's gonna be all right. One of these big space ships'll take Mommy to heaven. God'll give her a new life there. Nobody'll ever hurt her again."
"I don't want her to go. She's never coming back. I want her to stay."
She watched Jerry kiss their mother's cheek through tear- filled eyes. "Good bye, Mama. Good journey." Chelle kissed her cool skin and said the same. Then Jerry took her hand and led her away.
The fence at the star port divided the ancient city into two parts, old and new. As Jerry led her away, Chelle took one last look at the clean white buildings, with their shining panes of plasti-glass sparkling in the morning sunlight. Compared to the dark, abandoned basement where they lived, it seemed like heaven.
Jerry led her through a maze of piled up bricks, and junk in the back alleys between tattered ancient buildings. Some of them were abandoned, and others were occupied by people like Jerry and Mishy. Mishy didn't recognize any of them because this was a part of the ruins she hadn't visited before.
None of it looked much different from their territory. Dirty streets and buildings, piled with broken bricks, crumbling concrete, human wastes and trash littering the ground on what was left of the streets and sidewalks. These buildings had no power or running water.
Earth had nearly been destroyed in an interstellar war shortly after the first colonial ships reached Aledus about a thousand years before Hankura was born. The planet had succumbed to barbarism after the Procyon Wars. Recovery and rebuilding was slow. Now there were little pockets of high-tech culture interspersed over all the continents that were left. But most people lived in places like she and Jerry or in the wilderness.
After they said good bye to Mommy, Jerry brought Chelle to hide under the shelter of an abandoned stairway in an unfamiliar alley.
"Just wait," he told her. "I'm gonna get them, Mishy. I'm gonna get them for what they done to Mama. I'll come back as soon as I can. If you don't stay here, I won't be able to find you. Understand?" Chelle nodded to him. "Here, take this knife, and get some rocks to keep the rats away, in case I don't get back before dark."
"No, Jerry, don't go. I'm scared. I don't want to be here when the rats come out."
"I gotta go. Don't be a baby. Just do what I told you!" His harsh tone was enough to keep her from making further protest. Whining would only make him madder than he already was, and he'd just yell at her---even if he weren't really mad at her. Chelle waited until he was gone before she let herself sob quietly in fear and loneliness. Mommy was gone, and now Jerry had left her all alone in this scary place. She didn't understand why she couldn't just go home. Jerry just said it wasn't safe anymore. Chelle didn't feel safe here, either.
She'd sat for hours huddled alone in the corner against the cold brick wall---alone except for the rats. She held them at bay with the sharp knife and pieces of broken pavement that she had gathered into a pile before it got dark. She threw the pieces at the rats when they ventured too close. She even killed one of them with the knife. That kept them back for a while. Her body ached with the cold, and her eyelids kept drooping as she longed for sleep. But the rats were waiting for that. Sleep would mean death---endless sleep just like Mommy.
Some of the rats came closer, and the sound of their claws on the pavement opened her eyes wide with terror. Her scream ended in a sob and tears slid down her cheeks as she slashed desperately with the knife.
Jerry, please come back! Please don't leave me here all alone anymore. Mommy can't be gone forever! God, I want her back. I don't want to be here all alone.
She was sure nobody would hear her silent plea. But her mind had sent the cry with such force that someone did 'hear.' Hankura "heard."
Little girl, don't cry. You're not alone. You don't have to be scared of those rats. You can make them go away with your mind. I can help you. Hankura reached back to her for the first time since her thoughts had filled his dreams.
"What? Who are you? Where are you?" She sniffed, wiping her tears away on the ragged sleeve of her tunic. As she stopped crying, she realized the rain was letting up. But it was still cool and damp.
I'm in a space ship orbiting Earth. I felt your fear and loneliness in my dreams. I'm sorry you're all alone and scared. I am scared, too.
Chelle pressed her fists against the side of her head, shaken by the strange buzzing sensations in her head. She squeezed her eyes shut and tried to make it go away.
It's okay. It feels funny the first time. But I can't hurt you. I don't want to hurt you. Don't be scared.
"What are you doing? Who are you?" she demanded. Why can't I see you?"
I'm Hankura from the Aledan Colony. I'm thinking to you from a space ship.
"I'm Michelle," she said. "Thinking to me? H-how?"
I'm a Psion, and so are you. Anyway, you thought to me first.
"I did?" Chelle frowned. "How? I never did it before."
I'm not sure. Most kids can only think to people who want them to. You just did it---maybe 'cause you're so scared and sad. Maybe 'cause I was asleep, and I wasn't guarding my thoughts very well. Didn't you ever think to anyone before?
"No. I don't know how."
Yes, you do---at least to me. I can be your friend, and you won't really be alone. He offered.
Chelle took her hands away from her head and opened her eyes. It still felt strange to have the thoughts of another person flowing into her mind, but it felt good, too. Hankura was nice, and he seemed to like her. She didn't feel so scared and alone anymore. "You said you'd help me make the rats run away?"
Yes. Think about how scared they make you. Pretend that there is a pipe going into their heads that leads all the way to their brain. Pretend you’re scared feelings are water, and make it run through the pipe into their brain.
Chelle closed her eyes and tried. "I can't."
Think harder. Think of nothing else but piping your fear into their minds. Try again.
She did. The sound of scurrying clawed feet on the concrete made her open her eyes wide. "I did it! I did it!" she cried triumphantly. She laughed aloud. "Can I do that with people---like the men who killed Mommy?"
It's against Aledan Law.
"Overlord Law?"
Aledan Law.
"That doesn't count here. Show me."
I can't. I promised Mother I wouldn't ever do that again. Somebody might hurt you if they ever found out you could do that. Besides, your psi won't be strong enough until you grow up.
"Oh." Chelle was a little disappointed, but her lack left her no worse off than she was. "Are you going to come down here?"
I wish I could. I have to go to school on Velran. My parents don't want me anymore, so they're sending me there.
Michelle looked skyward as his thoughts touched her mind. She could feel that he was scared and alone, too. “My parents are dead," she said aloud. "Jerry's gonna kill the man who did it. When he's done, he's gonna come back and get me. That's why I have to stay here---so he can find me. But this place is scary. Will you think to me until he comes back?"
Okay. Where I'm going is scary, too. There are lots of ugly aliens, and I don't know anybody there.
"Do they have gangs and Overlords?"
No, it's a school. Mother is making me go there to learn the Patterns of Insight---Wholaskan rules guiding the use of psi---so I won't hurt Normals when I think to them.
"But you're not hurting me."
'Cause you're a Psion, too. But, you'd better not let anyone know or they might send you away to Velran, too.
"Could I bring Jerry?"
Probably not. They wouldn't let me bring Trevin and Capra. I have to go alone.
"Well, there are probably other kids like you at Velran. You won't be alone.
Maybe, but the teachers are aliens with ugly fangs and scary faces. My use-to-be friends said they eat people.
"Dead people or live people?"
I don't know. They probably lied anyway. After their parents found out I'm a Psion, they weren't allowed to play with me anymore.
"Rats eat people here, sometimes dead ones and sometimes live ones. They wanted to eat me until you showed me how to make them go away."
You should be able to do it by yourself now. If you knew how to use your powers, you could read people's minds and know if they are looking for you. Then you could hide better so you wouldn't have to make them go away.
"Do they teach you that on Velran?"
They teach everything there, and they have a special school for human Psions.
"I wish I could go to school with you. I wouldn't be scared if you were there, and we would probably make friends with other kids like us."
I wish you could come, but they won't let me come and get you. When I grow up, I'll come back and teach you the things I learn. I promise.
Michelle sighed. She knew he meant it, but she didn't believe it would really happen. Daddy promised he would come back, and he never did. Mommy promised she would come for her, and she never did, either. She didn't believe Jerry would ever return. Why should she believe Hankura? Maybe he wasn't even real.
She raised her eyes to the morning sky, wishing she could go with him.
Someday, I'll take you there---or maybe Aledus. I promise.
"But, how will you find me?"
Psi. I’ll find you with psi.
The sun's rays peeked gradually over the towering ruins of the ancient city through the mist rising from the wet streets. Michelle stirred in her sleep and brushed at the big black fly buzzing over her stringy red hair.
"Mishy? Where are you, kid? Mishy!" The impatient sound of her brother's voice registered in her mind, and she opened her eyes and blinked.
"Here, Jerry. I'm here," she called softly and strained to hear the sound of his footsteps. She sensed his nearness long before he found her hiding place. By then, she had turned her attention elsewhere.
"I have to go, Hankura---and pretty soon, I won't be able to hear your thoughts anymore. But it's okay. Jerry's here, now. I'm not scared anymore."
Vaguely, she saw Jerry frown as he hunkered down under the stairway in front of her and stared at her. After a moment she focused on his face and smiled sheepishly.
"Mishy---who were you talking to? Are you all right?"
"I'm okay. I was just talkin' to Hankura. He's leavin'. His parents sent 'im on a star freighter from Aledus to a school on Velran."
"What?" Jerry raked a bony hand back through his unruly red hair. "How can he be on a star ship when you were just talkin' to 'im?"
"Well---he wasn't here exactly---not like you're here. I heard what he said in my head." Michelle touched her temple. "Psi---he said. He helped me make the rats go away, too."
"Who told you that word---psi?"
"He did."
"And I suppose he killed that rat over there, too."
"'Course not." Michelle chided. "I told you---he wasn't really here. I killed that rat with your knife."
Jerry looked at the dead rat and the bloody dagger on the ground beside her then grinned and pulled Chelle close.
"You did well, kid." He hugged her fiercely. "I'm sorry I left you alone so long, but I had to."
"I wasn't alone. Hankura was here---sorta."
"Ah---sure, kid. If you say so." Jerry crawled further under the stairway with Michelle under one arm. He looked tired. She was tired, too, after staying awake all night. It was a little warmer now that the sun had come up, but she had still felt cold until Jerry cuddled her close to his hard, wiry body.
"Jerry?"
"What?"
"Is Mommy really gone forever? Forever?" Her voice trembled on `forever.’
Jerry's arms suddenly squeezed her too tightly, and she groaned. He loosened his hold, but he was trembling. It was a long time before he answered.
The bittersweet memory only drove the painful reality of Kaara's lifeless body deep into her soul. Chelle wept inconsolably, clutching Kaara tightly. Sweet Mother of Life, how could she be dead when their lives had been so full of promises. How could this be?
Eventually, Chelle sensed Luran and Tira beside her, weeping with her for the gentle Aledan who had only wanted to be free of the restrictions to psi-paths on Aledus. After giving Chelle some time to say good-bye, they gently took Kaara's lifeless body from her arms. Luran covered the body with a ragged blanket while Tira urged Chelle to her pallet. The two women sat there huddled in each others arms until Chelle sobbed herself to exhaustion and drifted into a numb and dreamless sleep.
"Murderers! Filthy murderers!" Luran cried and pounded her fists against the floor beside the body. As she shed bitter tears, two of the others came to comfort her. "They're going to kill us all with their sadistic games. We've got to get out of here. I don't want to die like Kaara and Gem."
"We don't either," murmured Dana. "What can we do? We don't have any weapons."
"Then, we'll get some. Somehow, we have to get some," she vowed.