Chapter 4

On the wrong side of the river on an unknown planet.

It seemed to Ureeblay almost as if the valley of the Toolie, which was spread out down there before him, was getting further away each time he saw it. Now, he was sounding just like a whining child, he rebuked himself.

It appeared to him that at some time huge cross sections of peat underneath the grassy surface of the swale had dropped or slipped an uneven body length or two toward the valley floor. The landscape he was moving through had become a series of small terraces with many small broken rises rimming each terrace before the land dropped down to the next lower level.

The boy had washed the skin of his left thigh clean of the pig blood once already using water from the stream, and was happy that only a little bit had dropped on him since then. He did try to keep the carcass from bouncing against his side by holding on to the flats-pig with his left hand. However, the smell of the blood and the flats-pig itself in the growing heat of the day had greatly hindered his ability at testing the scents on the breeze.

Now it was only when he crested the small grassy rise at the edge of each descending terrace and he stood up in the swifter moving air, that the smell of flats-pig didn’t overwhelm the rest of the scents brought to him on the wind as it flowed down from the high fells far, far, behind his back. He didn’t like the fact that anything coming along from behind him might only be smelled intermittently, and that scent would have to compete with the strong odor of flats-pig for his attention.

He decided that the next time he approached the stream he would stop and gut his kill. He would need to do that soon to assure the meat didn’t go bad from inside. He was debating if he should take the time to gut it carefully and recover as much of the organs, stomach, and intestines as possible, or just gut the thing, clean out the body cavity, and take away the meat.

The stream would let him clean the stomach and intestines thoroughly if he wanted to invest the time, he reminded himself. He could use the cleaned stomach to carry water, of which he had a need. There were many uses for the cleaned intestines, too. And once he found a way across the Toolie, he would still be a hand-and-two fingers of days away from his clan’s camps. It seemed wasteful after killing the flats-pig to just eat the meat. He would need to jerk the meat, or even smoke it soon so it would keep as long as possible. ‘Be wasting nothing and you will be wishing for nothing later, ‘ his mother always said when butchering a kill.

He had just gotten a refreshing scent of peaty water which was coming from his right. He had hopes to reunite with the stream just over the next broken thick green rise facing him when he heard a pitiful yelp come from beyond the small hillock in front of him!

The boy stopped and found himself crouched with his right arm cocked back and his spear-thrower, with his deadly flint-tipped feathered shaft, at the ready. Adrenaline flashed through his young body, his respiration deepened and increased. He could feel his nostrils flare as he tried to grab all the scent information available to him without even really thinking about it. His sight became even more acute with the sunlight making any cast shadows dark. He could hear the stream over to his right somewhere, now that he was still.

He also smelled the tang of flats-pig and clotted pig blood. He smelled his own growing fear-laced excitement on his sweat.

He thought what he’d heard had sounded maybe like the barking-yelp of a foxen when hit in the ribs by a poorly cast sling stone, before the animal bound out of sight. The yelp had come from something small; definitely, he told himself.

There it was again! A definite yelp! A little to his left and below the lip of the terrace he was moving over. Then he heard a growl, and for some reason it seemed to the boy it was a frightened growl, from a small animal. Then he heard something thrashing around from the other side of the rise in front of him.

He’d never heard of foxen growling and didn’t know if they could growl. He wondered what this unseen small animal was growling at?

He slowly and carefully moved to his right toward a grassy trough that cut through the rise before him. The trough he suspected slanted down to the next terrace.

The boy visualized his next actions. By moving to the far right down through the trough, his throwing arm would be the first part of his body to clear the obstruction of the left rim-wall of the upper terrace as he reached the floor of the terrace below.

He could bring his spear to bear rapidly with such a move as he advanced on the animal, which sounded as if it would appear to his left. Part of his brain told him that moving as he planned, he would have more of a flat cast at whatever animal target he found, once he was down on the next terrace. He’d already lost one of his spears early into this dare-become-adventure of his when he’d tried the over-the-top route in an attempt at prey.

He had thought he had trapped a huge babbit between a high creek bank and a creek bed, and he’d badly misjudge the flight of his cast because of the difference in height. His spear ended up in shockingly deep water a body length from the shore. And the precious missile was carried quickly away on the current to be lost down stream. The babbit had rapidly bounded away up stream.

As Ureeblay started down the trough, he told himself, he could do this! He would do this, he decided. His body was tingling all over like he might piss himself at any moment. Still he continued to move down between the grassy little summits on either side of the trough. He quietly and carefully moved down the grassy descending gap between them.

As Ureeblay neared the bottom of the grassy ramp of soil, he did see the return of the streambed crossing the lower terrace ahead of him. He saw and now heard the clear water moving from his right to left at a diagonal to his intended line of travel to the Toolie.

All of his senses were almost vibrating as he focused on the edge of the left rise. His vision took in everything that was being revealed as he slowly advanced down the trough.

A part of his mind registered that the other side of the small wash where the stream flowed was higher than his head. The grassy terrace floor he approached was a hand of strides from him to the peaty low stream bank. The gurgling moving water was quite wide now and a good bit faster than he’d expected to be seeing it flow.

He’d have to wade it now if he wanted to cross; maybe mid-calf if he was lucky, part of his mind automatically estimated. But he saw no animal that might have yelped yet. Just lots of thick grasses and more bushes of no importance, and there was the start of a thicket of gray-blue heather at the top of the rise across the stream.

Ureeblay edged further to his right, almost holding his air inside his lungs. He heard renewed growling, going up a notch. Then he saw one, two, three thick bog apple bushes to his left and then!

There was a small wolf!

And not more than four seasons old, the shocked boy guessed. In a rush of images, Ureeblay saw the animal was struggling to free itself from what looked like a couple of widow-snare vines. The killer plant-life must have popped up from the surrounding ground cover when the young wolf had started investigating the bog apple bushes, looking for a treat to dig up!

Ureeblay was shocked at the appearance of the young wolf! The animal’s coat was the color of dark honey! The boy had never heard any of the hunters of his clan, or even the story tellers, ever mention a wolf with fur that color!

He had only ever seen adult wolves at a distance before; or heard them singing up to the Swongli, or Jaypai, or even Weepai on some nights. Wolves seemed to sing to the heavens especially on nights both moons were full. Sometimes their calls had seemed eerie to the boy, sometimes joyful, sometimes full of sorrow; it was almost as if he could understand the feelings of the wolves he had heard baying their voices up into the night sky.

But this was something else! To be so close to one of the beasts, the boy was thrilled as much as he was on edge now. Bog apples, a young wolf, and the threat of widow-snare vines!

The surprisingly odd-colored small wolf had managed to turn to face the boy, but that only seemed to stimulate the widow-snare vines to tighten the hold on the animal.

The growling honey-colored wolf struggled to remain upright. Firmly wrapped around both back legs and back hips was the first vine. The ensnared wolf had two wraps of a second vine around the barrel of its thin chest. And the end of the third snare vine entangled the wolf’s right front leg, having gone around its neck after first snaring the wolf partly around the muzzle.

The boy knew a widow-snare could kill a full-grown man with three vines in a quarter of a morning if the unfortunate man had both arms pinned and one vine got all the way around his chest. It could happen much faster if another vine strangled his neck. It was a good thing for this particular small bit of prey, Ureeblay thought, that the vine around its neck also was caught up trying to deal with the juvenile’s leg and muzzle. Well, that might put off the end for awhile longer.

The boy knew that compared to other widow-snare vines which maybe were hidden here in the tall grass, this wolf was no kind of a menace at all. The widow-snare vines were always a terrible threat. All the clans killed them on sight.

From a good distance earlier in his flight, he’d even seen three of the Hurstmon begin to destroy a patch of four of the malicious things in a forest glade with the long lances they sometimes carried. Their stopping to dispatch the accursed vines had actually been the reason he’d managed to evade their first attempt to hunt him down.

The small wolf managed to yelp again and fell on its right side on the now beaten-down thick grasses from where the vines had popped up. The small wolf was using its still free front left leg and claws, trying to scratch off the vine on its jaws and around its neck.

The widow-snares rewarded that attempt by jerking tighter at its prey. With that movement of the plant vines, the boy saw where all three joined the main stem which rooted down into the firm peaty ground about five strides from the strong moving water, two strides out from the middle bog apple bush.

The only way to kill the predatory flora was to completely sever it just above the roots so the thick sap would flood out of the deadly vines. Once killed, the ensnared person would need to be cut out of the grip of the only semi-relaxed vines.

There were tales of a man out hunting on his own who, once ensnared by the vines, managed to sever the main stem but who’d dropped his blade out of his reach during the death throes of the plant. And the man then went on to die some long terrible death from thirst or wild beasts—or what ever the story teller could worst imagine at that telling—with the hapless man still wrapped in the vines because he couldn’t cut himself free and there was no one around to hear his pitiful cries for help.

The body of each of the fleshy vines was protected by flexible bark that was almost like tough green-brown hide. In fact, some people in the clans insisted and would argue into the night that a widow-snare wasn’t a plant at all. They said it was some evil land-eel that had learned to put down brain roots in the soil for leverage and protection. Some old wives even said the vines would eventually grown back unless the main stump was topped over deeply with hardwood ashes, or a fresh holly spike was driven down into its center.

A mighty shudder shook the boy’s body at the thought of what would have happened to him if he’d gotten to this spot before the small wolf.

In his mind’s eye he could clearly see it. He would have come over the top of that grassy little summit and would have seen three bog apple bushes in one spot. Then, he’d have been trapped right where the juvenile wolf was at this very instant. Because most likely, the boy realized, he would have put his spear, his spear-thrower, and his quiver down, as well as the flats-pig, before he’d approached in awe at such an unheard of bounty of bog apple bushes. Not that the carcass of the flats-pig would have been of any help once he’d been snared by three of the vines of passing.

The boy very carefully looked all around him between the huge grassy slopes up to the last terrace, now almost behind him, and the rise of the irregularly shaped little summit to his left for the tell-tale rolling humps of loam that would be more of the vines snuggled down into the earth. Seeing none, he felt better. He was trying to decide how to proceed when the juvenile wolf managed another pitiful whining yelp.

He should kill it and put it out of its misery, Ureeblay thought. Nothing, not even a Hurstmon, deserved such a helpless suffocating death. But, that would leave him with only one spear left. And if he were going to harvest the reward of three bog apple bushes, which were the major draw to the prey taken by that damned widow-snare in the first place, he’d have to sever the murderous plant first.

With the snare being as big as it was, Ureeblay’s mind figured, there must be three or even four years of growth on those buried bog apples. That fact in its self was completely beyond anything the boy had ever heard of before. In all his clan’s territory, the location of every bog apple bush was thought to be well known and harvested once a year. Or so it was, according to the women of his clan. But the harvesters always planted one of the small apples away from each bush so more would eventually grow.

So, the boy decided, he had to kill the widow-snare first. Now Ureeblay looked around the terrace his descent had brought him to, making sure there were no other immediate threats of any kind. Across the middle of the terrace floor was the stream. He saw more types of grasses and bushes growing on this side of the water course. On the other side of the stream, going up to an almost unbroken rise running the length of the terrace was a grass-covered lawn.

Further down the stream to his left on this side, he could see a good stand of stunted swamp-willows starting near the bank. That thicket was immediately before the point where the little creek bed turned down and back to the right around the far end of a rise that seemed to mark the edge of this particular terrace.

A few bog wrens hopped around down at the base of the swamp-willows near the bank, Ureeblay noted. But other than the movement of those birds, the boy perceived no new threats under the puffy white clouds up in the clear blue sky.

He took off his quiver and took off his pig. He took his second spear out and put down his spear-caster. He would carefully approach the main stem using the spear in his left hand to probe the peat to trip any other vines. If he found none, or none found him; then, when the root stem was within reach of the spear in his right hand he’d saw through the tough hide, killing the wretched thing. He would have to put his other spear down and use both arms for leverage to saw into the arm-thick trunk, he figured. With the young wolf safely bound as it was, it would be no threat whatsoever while he worked on killing the widow-snare.

With a wolf hide of that color to bring home, the clan would have to believe him when he told of this part of his adventure. And they would be amazed at the treasure of bog apples he would have.

And that was what Ureeblay set out to do. The whole time he carefully approached the widow-snare the trembling young wolf tracked him with its eyes. The boy was shocked to see the eyes were blue!

Third Mission, outbound aboard the space vessel DSE Glenndeavor, 2401

Squared away and dressed in my Class E-1 uniform and new zippered uniform jacket that not only reflected my promotion to G5, but also showed the respect necessary to perform duty watch near or on the Bridge while meeting the Uniform of the Day requirements, I seemed to float down the passageway from small stores. But, toward what—I did not know. Well, I knew I was on my way to report, in good time, to the Officer of the Deck.

My head was spinning with thoughts as I walked along; I’d received not only the promotion I thought I deserved a year ago, but a second one on top of that! Bumped two pay rates in one fell swoop! If I got promoted again, damn, I’d be a Commissioned Grade Five.

What was I thinking? Juliet would kill me! It was against regulations for a commissioned officer to have a sexual relationship with an enlisted crewmember; not that Juliet and I had really had sex yet, but it would be soon. I realized I’d gladly take a rate reduction to be with my lovely, wonderful, girlfriend. My god, she gave me our first partial hand job before I reported to duty, just under four hours ago. Well, she and Anika had done the deed somewhat together. Okay, I told myself, actually it was mostly Anika’s doing; and damn, for a novice did she do it well!

And what was that kiss between the two of them about? It looked so ... touching? Loving? Mind numbingly sexy ... hot? All of the above? We would discuss it, I was sure, since I’d be seeing them both after my duty watch...

Well, if my reporting for detached duty didn’t put me on a completely different watch schedule, I realized... Shit! Was I going to be pulling an eight-hour watch, half and half, once I reported to the Officer of the Deck? Was my duty station going to be in the Bridge Block? I’d have to brush up on all the names of the dinky watches, again.

I hoped my schedule wasn’t going to get turned up-side down. It would be okay, I told myself. Even with a half and half, I’d just call one of the girls or text them both that I’d be late. We’d still have a few hours to be together off shift; and, not including sleep. Heck, Anika might get an extra half-duty shift if she screwed up or had a remedial class, anyway. At least, I’d get to see my loving Juliet.

Maybe the three of us would sleep together again, like Anika wanted. Maybe I would get to sleep with just Juliet; now there was an idea whose time was about to come!

Juliet and I would be fine, as long as my new detached duty didn’t screw my duty shifts up royally, I told myself again. What if my quarters were reassigned nearer my new duty station? And, now that I was a real G5, it would almost certainly be a double occupancy compartment! Wait, I didn’t have any idea, really, of where my new duty station might be. I was just reporting to the Officer of the Deck to receive my new detached duty orders, wasn’t I?

Damn ... I was driving my self into the All Alone. Calm down. Breathe in, I told my self, cycle, and—out; and, again.

I was sure my detached duty had to have something to do with the crap I found helping my new buddy Merch. Or, Acting Lieutenant Commander Merchanni, and Head of the Supply Department as I’d discovered he was really referred to by none other than the Captain.

Merch had dragged me into this, I told myself. And what was that misinformation he’d given me about the true nature of his rank all about? Well, I certainly would not have ever struck up a conversation with him if he’d been in his officer’s uniform, that was certain.

I walked up to a lift station I realized I was passing, and I boarded when the hatch opened; I still had time to report as ordered I reassured myself.

“Going my way?” Acting Lieutenant Commander Merchanni asked me with a big grin as he stood there in the lift car, like he had been waiting to give me a ride all along.

“Up to see the Officer of the Deck? Right?” he asked me.

I noticed he was in proper uniform today. I gave him a text-book salute, which he crisply returned.

“Okay,” he told me, shaking his head. “I see you’re going to be that way about all this. At Ease, then.”

So here I sat at a conference table, with a not-so-bad cup of coffee I’d not really wanted. I’d accepted it reflexively from a Stewards Mate as I followed the Officer of the Deck and ALC Merchanni into the compartment just down the passageway from the Captain’s office. I’d been nervous, but now I was not; and the cup warming the palm and fingers of my right hand was comforting.

While there was only a small portion of the Ship’s various department heads represented at the table, I was now in august company. The officers in the compartment were all dressed with their service-ribbons plate on the left breast of their Uniform of the Day. Most of the officers present were wearing their dark-blue uniform shirt with open collar, with a hint of white tee shirt showing from the front of the partially zippered dark-blue ribbon-plated jacket with name tag opposite, and dark-gray trousers of ExServ. Their officers’ light-gray rings were around their jacket cuffs five centimeters above the two finger width elastic gusset.

But I saw there were two officers wearing the khaki shirt and uniform zippered ribbon-plated jacket with name tag opposite and the gold officers’ rings on the jacket cuffs. Their khaki trousers had the thin red piping running down the outside of each leg. Those two women were Marine Corps officers I’d never seen onboard before. They could be new-faces, but maybe not. I was the only one with no rings on my zippered jacket cuffs as an ExServ enlisted rating. I took another sip of coffee and then looked around the table again.

“Attention!” called out the Executive Officer.

All of us at the table stood up, me putting my coffee down in a real saucer, and came to attention. The compartment hatch opened and the Captain walked in, looking at each of us.

“At ease,” she said, taking her seat. “Please, be seated. And thank you all for your being here at such short notice.”

The rest of us returned to our chairs.

The Captain took her place at the head of the oblong table.

To her left, and my right, was the Executive Officer, Commander Renfro who, as it had turned out, was Officer of the Deck this watch. Next to the Captain on the other side of the table, the Captain’s right, was Major Luce. She was not only the Ship’s Security and Intelligence Department Head, but as her rank indicated, she was an in-the-flesh Marine.

Before the Captain arrived, I had overheard Major Luce being introduced by the ExO, but from this distance, it was easy to read everyone’s nametag on the front of each one of their uniform. I felt naked every time Luce looked at me with her brown, calculating eyes. Next to her was another female Marine officer; a First Lieutenant Shellbee.

When I first saw her as she was sitting down earlier, I was shocked at how she seemed to draw my attention to her; it was almost magnetic. I tried not to gaze at Shellbee’s gray eyes that were framed by her elegant black eye brows and high cheekbones. Especially with her buzz-cut hair, I found her strikingly attractive.

Don’t even think those thoughts, I had told myself at the time, as I took another sip of coffee before I placed the cup on an honest-to-god saucer to my right on the conference table.

Across from Shellbee, and next to Renfro, was an Engineering officer, named Lieutenant Mickelson. He was the only other person at the table who had been drinking coffee. He had been introduced to the other officers who didn’t already know him as the representative for the officers of the general court martial that had recently adjudicated Mr. Trellaway’s trial. For some reason, he struck me as sort of a stuffy, maybe condescending individual.

Then across the table from Mickelson and between Shellbee and me, was the Ship’s JAG, or Judge Advocate General, officer, Lieutenant Cuthbert. He was the Ship’s lawyer. I had met him before several times. He was a truly nice guy. He reminded me of somebody’s jovial uncle, who might stick a digit out toward a little nephew and say, pull my finger, at a family reunion.

Finally, back across the table between Lieutenant Mickelson and me, there was Acting Lieutenant Commander Merchanni, the Supply Department Head. And then last, there was me at the other end of the oblong table from the Captain.

Once in my chair on entering the compartment, I had started-off feeling numb. But I soon realized that as long as I didn’t look at First Lieutenant Shellbee, I would be alright. And now, with the Captain here and the meeting starting, I wasn’t in awe of what was going on in the room. Well, that was what I kept reminding myself.

Then the Captain began addressing us and giving us the reasons she had called this meeting in the first place. As the meeting progressed, I was beginning to see in my mind where what I’d done was fitting into all of this, and how I could continue to make some further contributions to resolve the matter in a satisfactory way, I hoped.

So far, Captain Mowmyier had brought the other offices abreast of this new situation uncovered by the discovery of the data-block in the Supply Department Inventory Database. Acting Lt. Commander Merchanni described the preliminary evidence further incriminating Mr. Trellaway as he pointed to the twenty-four page list of contraband that was in front of each one of the officers around the table and told of the items stashed away around the Ship. During the briefing, the Captain and Merchanni referred to several files and reports that I was not privy to, which had been distributed to the others present before the meeting began; maybe even before Trellaway got himself convicted.

The Captain summarized the latest situation as she saw it. Her chain of reasoning being: that the proven evidence in Mr. Trellaway’s previous trial, along with the new preliminary evidence discovered so far of further crimes, demanded that the officers expand the scope of the previously existing problem to the level of a definite threat to the Ship. This threat had to be investigated, and understood as best as possible, then successfully dealt with onboard the Ship during this Mission.

What else might be discovered with further investigations the Captain felt, would most likely confirm these crimes were part of an ongoing criminal endeavor that implied a much larger organized group outside the Ship as being the true authors of what had been uncovered so far.

Was the criminal activity so far discovered on the Glenndeavor an isolated plot with limited objectives, she asked; or, was this activity happening on other ships in the Service? She told us we must discover what this plot entailed and what goal or goals the perpetrators had.

Mowmyier asked everyone to start developing their own possible scenarios that covered what was known as fact so far. They should try to draw some preliminary arguments that would account for the known facts and the items listed in the twenty-four pages from the inventory database. And the Captain wanted those scenarios hand-delivered to Commander Renfro. She told us, the next meeting of this group would be in one week unless circumstances demanded otherwise.

After the presentation, I discovered from the Captain as we all sat there that I’d been detached to the Security and Intelligence Department. I was to help implement the on-going investigation into the crimes and activities of Mr. Trellaway. I would be under the command of Major Luce, and was to work directly under the supervision of First Lieutenant Shellbee.

So I guessed I was now a detective. I figured Shellbee would make a great bad cop, or would it be bad Marine, if the two of us ever had to interview any suspects.

At that point the Captain passed two pieces of paper down the table just for me, and directed me to carefully read the information before I signed my name in the two indicated areas.

I was somewhat surprised to find I was reading the Federation’s Official Secrets Act as it pertained to the Federation Exploration Service and the Federation Fleet and Marine Corps. I thought the text would be longer and more involved. I already knew the Restricted and Confidential regulations sections by heart, but I read them over anyway. Everyone else sat quietly as I scanned through the text.

And then I pulled out my stylus and finally signed my name in the area that indicated I understood and accepted my responsibilities under the regulations of the Act; and my second signature went in the area that state I understood the punishments and consequences I faced if I screwed the pooch concerning the Act.

The papers were then passed back to the Captain and I realized I now had clearance to see, read, and know about Secret stuff. Very cohesive, I told myself, as the geek in me got a rush from what had just occurred.

The Captain duly checked my signatures to something on the data pad she held and then put the papers to her right on the table and used the data pad like a paper weight.

Now that everyone at the table had secret clearance the Captain presented the meeting with more information about the situation. It seemed from what she told us, almost immediately after I’d been dismissed from the first meeting in her office, the Captain had dispatched four Marine teams to secure the Class One-A Ordnance listed in the twenty-four pages of print-outs officer Merchanni and I had brought to her attention. I figured that was the most deadly stuff, and I’d recognized how dangerous a couple of the things could be when I first read the pages as they came out of the printer unit.