Cliffs of Utpala (scifi story): Chapter Six

Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Kyra had assumed a fighting stance after she had knocked Arjun into the snow. She did that in part because it was the safest thing to do, being ready to fight back, and also because she half expected Arjun to get up and come at her again. Playfully. In a rough sort of way. She wanted to be ready to flip him in another direction if needs be or block any of his rough but goofy flips he did to her hair.

Except he didn't get up.

He laid there in the snow, face down and unmoving.

Kyra had, in more than one way, knocked him out cold.

She had to admit, she thought he deserved it. Stalking up and surprising someone on an alien planet at night, in the cold, and when alone when virtually no one was out. That earned his kersplat with an commendation. For one hard, cold second, she thought about leaving him there.

Then she sighed and worried he might actually freeze to death. If on the off chance his smart clothing wasn't charged enough and his beacon didn't call a bot and if he was not found by someone else and if he wasn't found in time, he would have died and that, Kyra decided, was not something she wanted on her conscience.

He was, after all, one of the few people on Utpala she felt understood her and causing the death of one of those few people was not what she wanted. However, clearly his understanding of her was less than ideal! Sneaking in the inky frigidity like that! However, he was trying to help her find her way on this weird world.

Besides, if he did die, she would definitely be stuck as the goat girl the rest of her life and then she would have to walk past the spot where he died and then she would have to reflect on it and then...either she would feel horrible for the rest of her life or smirk over his idiocy: he knew she was good at martial arts and still did what he did. Idiocy. And...she didn't want to know if she would be that awful person.

And...she did like him as a person. Even though he was thirty, he seemed to keep a certain youth to him. Not in looks - Utpala wore away at anyone who spent time outdoors like he did - but in attitude. He wasn't - most of the time - immature, but rather he wasn't jaded. He delighted at life. He was delighted to be.

She couldn't be responsible for snuffing that out on Utpala. She synced to his jacket and found he was going to be awake ...soonish. She had been right about the battery. Had she left, he'd have frozen. Apparently, he'd been out without recharging.

She sighed and grabbed a foot. She double checked the jacket and his vitals, she could drag him without hurting him more. He'd get a few more lumps and he deserved them. She commanded his jacket to expand and contract like it had little caterpillar or Caeran shuffle lump feet. It would help her drag him to the warmth of the goat barn.

Once she got there and commanded the doors to open. Open they did and in they went. Americans used implants into the skull, done when a baby was born, to link up directly from their brain to computer hardware. The Chinese and Russians did something similar. The Japanese were more extreme and often implanted whole computers in their bodies. India and Europe, Nigeria and Indonesia, Brazil and Iran had taken a different path: they had an external computer that listened to the brainwaves of the wearer to interpret and then stimulate the brain back. Europeans had a diadem for theirs. India had a small crystal clipped to the ear and the sensors were sprayed on the hair every morning. It wasn't as fast or as flexible as what the Americans and Chinese did. It was not as horrific as the Japanese. However, it gave mental command of technology without compromising the self. Or risking babies to a potentially dangerous operation.

Kyra had met a Japanese researcher once, who had come to Utpala when Kyra was eight. She had nightmares for weeks.

Indian adults could and would get an American booster implant, but that was up to the adult and, honestly, rare. Many were of the Jacker subculture. And they were more pretentiously obnoxious than anything.

She dragged Arjun into her workroom and then considered. She had wanted to leave him initially, but that might have endangered his life. Even so, she wanted more payback: one does not go around terrifying people like that on an alien planet. Everyone had nightmares for a good solid year after xenobiology covered Escheria and what happened to the colonists there. And that fear, worry, doubt never left anyone. Anywhere. Whatever they might say. Arjun deserved a good drubbing still.

And then it hit her.

She dragged him over into the barn. It was warm and pleasant. If stinky. These were goats after all. She dumped him into the fodder for the goats and there she left him. If he was lucky, he was going to be out of reach of the goats. If not, he was going to need to print new ones and the goat pellets were going to have some interesting trace elements.

She all but danced to her work area. Nipped by goats was going to be perfect and he'd be unharmed: not even the old billy goat that was one of the few purebred Beetals would have actually eaten Arjun. Though Goatjira might have actually bitten hard. A few times. Harmlessly. Of course. Arjun wouldn't miss those lumps of ...

She had barely gotten to her workstation when she heard Arjun scream. The sound of scattering goats followed. She leaned back and looked into the barn. He was up, disoriented, but as he figured out where he was and what had probably happened he sent her a death glare that would have killed Shiva. Kyra gave back a wicked grin and slid back slowly to her workstation. She also mentally commanded two more ersatz coffees. One for each.

She mischievously hunched over her console just before Arjun came in the room and then when he entered she spun around and gave him her best impression of her Mom. When she was angry. Like the night before.

"How could you!" she started. "Goatjira saved your life! I was milliseconds away from pounding you, the stranger who accosted me in the dark and assaulted my person, into the next turn of the wheel. But, no, Goatjira dashed between us and told me, scolded me, chastised me for harming you! My best idiot friend! He organized the other goats and stood between us so I could not harm you again. They dragged you inside to warmth and this is the thanks they get! Then you had the audacity to lay there sleeping in their food! Of course, Goatjira bit you. You deserved it! After all that he did for you. lazy and good for nothing. Ungrateful! For shame, Arjun! For shame!"

By the end, Kyra couldn't keep the smile off her face or out of her voice.

Arjun rolled his eyes and smirked. Kyra was still Kyra and Arjun liked that.

She turned back and took the esatz coffees and handed one to him. He shook his head and was about to say something when she lost her goofiness. Just for a moment. She met his eyes with ones of deep seriousness.

"Please, Arjun. Do not do that again."

He nodded and acknowledged perhaps it wasn't such a great idea by rubbing his aching head.

"Or next time," she went on with the smile returning to her voice, "I'll call a sounder of pigs to save you from Utpala, just like they did for old man Ganesh."

Kyra. She'd never change.

But he wanted to talk to her about something. Something he'd seen. Just the night before. In the forest. Something he wanted her to see so much.

And changed the subject from their banter.

"Kyra..." he began.