Part 9

December 9th, 2154

Raz awoke because Jena was kissing him. His first sensation was her nuzzling his cheek and for a split second his mind was confused, then she was licking his lips and he realized what he was feeling as he came fully awake. He began kissing her back, and they enjoyed that for a few minutes.

"Good morning, love." he murmured as she pulled back. They opened their eyes and smiled at each other, though her smile looked a little apprehensive.

"Good morning my love." she returned.

Her voice sounded a little apprehensive as well. "Where did you go last night, Raz?" she asked. "I awoke, and you were gone. You were gone far longer than it would take to water the forest. You had not returned when I fell back asleep, yet here you were when I woke this morning. I had many horrible thoughts and dreams about why you were gone."

"Why did you not come find me? I was not far." Raz said.

"Some of my thoughts were unworthy." Jena replied, momentarily unable to meet his gaze. "Petty, jealous thoughts with no factual basis. I did not want it to seem that I did not trust you. And you did not take your screen, so I thought maybe you did not want me to call you while you were gone."

"I am so sorry, Jena. I would not have chosen to worry you. I did not take my screen because I thought I would only be gone a few minutes. I did not consider that I would be gone so long, or that you would wake and miss me before I returned.

"I wished to speak to Naz-Father privately. I must confess I purposely pleasured you as intensely as I could, in hopes that I could have you sleep while I spoke to him, so as not to worry you about what I planned to speak to him about. I wished to surprise you with the results of that conversation, so I would not have told you its subject, and I thought my non-disclosure would trouble you. But I see now that I should have told you that I was going to speak to him about something I wished to surprise you with, or at least left you a note on screen.

"Can you forgive me, Jena?" he asked sincerely.

"No, no! It is I who must ask your forgiveness, for doubting you! I knew my thoughts were unworthy of you, but I could not help it!" Jena cried in relief, hugging him close.

"I love you, Jena!" Raz laughed. "I forgive you anything and everything, always, and it was me who was at fault, for sneaking out on you. You think your thoughts were unworthy, but your actions were entirely honorable, and you know it!"

"Thank you. I love you Raz." she said, and they shared a deep kiss for a few moments.

"So, let us both laugh at our silliness." Raz chuckled. "To think I could have saved you all that worry with five words!"

"Ah! That is not so silly!" Jena laughed. "When I remember my thoughts of last night, and examine them for silliness, well, just say there is a lot there to find."

"Like what?" Raz teased.

"Well, at first I worried that you were sneaking out to enjoy the sex or attention of another female in the group." Jena admitted, embarrassed. "Not that I would care if you did, if I was there to share it with you, but the thought of you sneaking out to suck on Tira's big breasts or lick Tika's tiny flower without me, that made me so angry! But I realized even then that that was just silly, so then I pictured you sneaking to the Adolescent's ground for a secret rendezvous with Sigra..."

"Sigra?!" Raz laughed. "What made you think I would sneak off to Sigra, of all the girls in the zone?"

Jela's answer was a little snappy, as she was a bit defensive. "She is pretty, her blond hair is almost as striking as Tika's whereas mine is just black like almost everyone else, she is crazy for you and spent a long time talking to you the last time we were at the Adolescents' ground, she is younger than you by two months and I know boys prefer that, and her body developed and she was granted her Adolescence a full year ago, younger than any other female from this zone has done it in twenty-five years, and she is not a virgin, and she would fuck you in a blink!"

He was laughing uproariously by the time she finished saying that, and she flashed into anger.

"Well I am sorry, but I did say that I knew they were unworthy thoughts, and you asked!" she snapped.

"I know, please do not think I am laughing at you that way." Raz chuckled, giving her a re-assuring hug. "I only laugh because it was so silly, as you said it would be! But please, let me re-assure you.

"Sure, Sigra is pretty, but not in a way that really attracts me. You are much prettier, and like most I want a mate who looks a lot like me, so that if our children take after their mother, people will not wonder if they are mine. It would certainly not feel right to me to have blond children! It would do me no good to have a mate who is younger than me, if you will forgive me for sounding egotistical, because with rare exceptions only a girl at least three years older than me, such as yourself, could match me in intellect and maturity. And most importantly, there is nothing in Sigra's head but air and sex! She has no ambition and no vision beyond becoming a sex-vid star, and she is a slut! I doubt her attention has strayed outside the zone, or perhaps even outside her own body, in the year she has had her Adolescence! She fucked three males in the time we were at the ground last time, and believe me, I do not find that attractive at all! She does not like me, she considers me to be an intellectual snob, and the only reason she spent so much time talking to me is that she has literally fucked every male on the Adolescent's ground, and though I am still a child, I am on the ground, so she thinks she must fuck me to keep her record complete!"

By this time Jena was laughing uproariously. "Ah, Raz, I am re-assured! Your perception of females is far more complete than I expected to find in any male your age, my love."

"Ah, do not think me so noble. Remember, I am still a child. When I reach full adolescence, the urge will be much stronger in me, and I expect I will be far more tempted to give her the fucking she wants. But I promise you; I would not consider it without your blessing, and your participation.

"Now, I just need to find a way to tell you of what happened when I was out..."

"My beautiful, silly, absent-minded genius." she interrupted, giggling. "You went to sleep with your headband on. I would bet you recorded the entire experience, as you would have forgotten to stop the recording."

"That is right!" Raz agreed, one hand going to his headband. "I did record it, though not because I forgot to turn it off. I have set my screen to record whenever there is movement in the visual field, so I do not have to remember to turn it off at night. I have decided to wear my headband at all times, as a sociological record should be as complete as possible, if it is taken at all. I will show you the recording, so you can understand."

He played the recording from the moment he had entered the den with Jela. He and Jena watched as Naz and Davdan made love.

It seemed Jena felt the same he had. "Davdan must have been very beautiful." she murmured.

"She still is, but it is different now, and harder to see. Though it showed strongly last night." Raz commented.

"That it did." she agreed.

When the recording reached the point where the speaking began, he paused it, and spoke to her.

"I ask that as you watch the rest of this with an bit of impersonal detachment. I ask you to have empathy with us, and to put yourself in the place of the speaker when considering their words, and judging their truth. And I want you to remember that all of us love you and care for you very much. I ask you these things because you were discussed, and not everything said about you was completely complimentary."

"I see." Jena said. "I will try to do as you ask."

He played the rest of the recording.

He stopped the recording as it showed him preparing to leave Davdan's den.

"There was nothing else of relevance said after that." he said as he stopped the playback.

Jena did not speak for a few minutes, and he waited patiently for her to sort out her thoughts.

"I feel bad that Jela-Mother's blessing on my Adolescence was not heartfelt, but she is right, if she had with-held it, I would have gotten my Adolescence anyway. All my tests say I am ready. And it saddens me to hear what she said about my character. I think she exaggerates a bit, but I cannot deny the truth of it, I guess, nor have I ever tried to. I think you all are overly concerned about my well-being, should I give my virginity to Naz, as I specifically asked the Med if it would harm me to lose my virginity to a cock as large as his. I was assured that it would not if I was well prepared and he was patient, though it would hurt a lot.

"But I had no idea that you felt so strongly about this, my love. And it hurts me that you think I may lack the will to keep my word, though I admit there is some basis for it.

"I am touched at your concern for me, and very proud of you, and I am delighted that you will be my first lover! And I suppose Jela-Mother is right, you would almost certainly help keep me out of trouble!

"There is one thing that I think you have not considered, my sweet. I am concerned for Pina. She is insecure, a little, and she feels very competitive with you in some ways. And as you said, she probably cannot get her Adolescence yet, if she lacks the physical development to be safely sexually penetrated. Though you may be surprised. A lot of girls have broken their hymens and experimented with self-penetrations at younger ages than hers, and she is likely mature enough to pass the emotional readiness tests. But if she cannot get it, it will likely hurt her a lot that her twin brother did.

"Since you only want your Adolescence so you can make love with me, and you are otherwise still satisfied to be a Child, I ask you to not formally announce or celebrate your Adolescence, until Pina does. She will realize that you must have it as soon as she knows we are having coitus, but it would not be as hurtful to her that way."

"Yes, you are likely right." Raz nodded as he started working on his screen. "And you are a good friend to her to say so. I will follow your advice, and ask Naz-Father, Jela, and Davdan to keep my impending Adolescence confidential. We will just do the legal minimum for the process now, and do all the fun parts as Pina does. Or even after hers, so as to not dilute her celebrations with mine. We love each other dearly, and being a twin is very special, but sometimes it does chafe at us, having to share so much more than most siblings do."

"At least you do not have to share me!" Jena laughed as she kissed his ear.

"With this plan, I know that I will not." Raz nodded with a smile. "And it is a huge and satisfying load off my mind to know it! And I promise you my love; it will be an incredible and perfect experience when we first make love! Gods, I can hardly wait!"

The others were going about the business of preparing breakfast, except Menak, who was working out on the hydraulic exerciser.

After breakfast Tika and Tira ran to the trading post, and returned with a collapsible video display similar to the one that Raz had purchased, only larger and mottled dark green, this one fully seven feet high and five feet wide. They asked Raz's advice about it's installation, and following his instructions, they mounted it to a tree at the edge of the clearing between Tira's den and the firepit, it's bottom edge almost touching the ground. Positioned in this way it was perfect for playing recordings of fights at life size, especially recordings made with forehead mounted remote cameras. Its mount swiveled so that when the display was collapsed to a cylinder, it could be positioned at an angle to the trunk of the tree it was mounted to, giving a passable illusion that it was a dead branch.

Tika, Tira, and Menak immediately began watching fight recordings on it, and practicing counter moves to the moves they watched.

Raz had not helped them install the display, beyond giving a few moments of advice, because he was at a critical point in his work. He would be helping to break ground on the Enclave House Project the next day. Immediately after kissing Jena goodbye after breakfast he had called the supervisor of the construction crew and began finalizing the changes he wished to make to the plans, an involved discussion that lasted most of the morning.

Jela watched her daughter's video feed and coached her remotely, while doing what physiotherapy exercises she was capable of at this stage in her healing.

Pina left for her customary treetop perch overlooking the meadow, from which she telecommuted to California with her team, where they programmed the great supercomputer with the mass, distance, speed, direction of movement, spectrum, and red-shift of every celestial object for which that information was known. She would then calculate the intensity of the gravity fields that the light from each visible object had passed through. She hoped to prove that the red shift was caused by the light's having lost energy to the gravity fields, at least partly, rather than by the recession of objects due to the expansion of the universe. She called the effect Gravitational Friction. She also hoped to learn something fundamental about the nature of gravity in the process. She was hampered because a measurement of the red shift of an object was often part of the information used to calculate its distance. If she was right, then the shape of the distant universe was different than the accepted view, and galaxies whose light had passed through a higher than average amount of gravity wells would be closer than they had appeared, while galaxies whose light had passed through more empty space would be more distant, and all of their accepted relative motions would be wrong as well. Finding ways to recalculate the data was a hellishly complex task.

All in all, it was an uneventful day.

December 10th, 2154

The next morning they went to the ground breaking for the Enclave House. Construction would begin in the local transport tube that would connect with the enclave house. They all walked to the trading post, slowly as Jela was still in her walking cast. From there they went down the stairs to the transport tube platform. There were two tubes that ran in opposite directions, but the tube that ran northwest was closed due to the construction, and only the construction company's utility cars were permitted to go that way. Travelers who wished access to the next three stations in that direction would have to travel southeast and take a roundabout route that would cost an extra twenty minutes of travel time.

Each tube was a gray concrete cylinder sixteen feet in diameter that emerged from the wall of the tube station, crossed the room, and disappeared into the wall opposite, its bottom slightly sunken into the floor, and they had wide oval doors the same size and shape as the doors on the sides of the cars that rode within it. The car stopped when both sets of doors were perfectly lined up, the side of the car around the door was magnetically and hermetically sealed to the inside of the tube, and both doors opened as one like an elevator.

They boarded a construction car and rode to the construction site, where a temporary airlock blocked the tube. Unlike the regular tube transport cars, a construction car had a large door on each end, as well as on the side. Its crude seats folded flat against the sides for transporting cargo or excavated earth, and it's interior was plain steel, lacking the upholstery and displays of transit cars. The door at the forward end docked with its counterpart in the temporary airlock, and they exited into the air-filled section of the tunnel that was the construction zone.

About half of those who would gather for the groundbreaking ceremony were already there. They were Loral and three other Elders of the zone, and the construction crew. Arrivals over the next ten minutes included the chairman of the region's transit commission and two of his staff, and the management and office staff of the construction company. All told there were twenty-nine people in the well-lit but crowded tunnel section.

It would have seemed strange to people of earlier times that such inconvenience was suffered to dedicate such a minor construction, but global population had been stable for almost a century, and facilities were built to last hundreds of years, so construction was becoming an increasingly rare and novel event. When construction was completed, all these same people and many more would attend the 'ribbon cutting' ceremony at the gathering for the grand opening, the traditional event held to mark the official opening of a facility.

There were short speeches, by Loral welcoming Davdan officially to the Zone, by the chairman of the transit commission expressing pride at this addition to the transportation network, by the president of the construction company expressing pride and gratitude on behalf of her company for being selected to perform this task, and by Davdan, expressing her gratitude to all on behalf of herself, The Council of Elders of the Brahman region who had paid for the project, and The Green Band. It was a strange gathering for everyone there, deep underground in a tunnel with no windows, and footing was tricky due to the narrow and curved floor.

The magnetic drive components on the inside surface of the tube had been removed here by a crew from the transit commission, and would be replaced after the branching of the tunnel had been completed. This new section of tube would run two hundred yards, from where it branched off the local line to pass through the small tube station beneath the Enclave house, and continued on to rejoin the north-west bound tube. A similar branching bypass would be built to connect with the southeast bound tube, which at this point ran directly above the northwest tube. Each would also have a short side tube near the house, at which up to four cars could wait to use the platform, or be stored.

'Ground Breaking', in this case, was accomplished when a concrete cutter, mounted to the wall on the mounting studs that usually secured the magnetic drive equipment, traced a circle a bit less than a foot in diameter on the wall of the tunnel. It made a hellish noise for twenty seconds, though most of the volume was reduced through noise cancellation, and very little dust escaped it's particle control vacuum. The cutter was swung out of the way and a pair of handles were glued to the cylinder it had loosened. It was explained that beside the hole they had just made, which would house cables and piping, the blade of a much larger concrete cutter would begin work on the opening for the tube branching itself. Two husky construction technicians pulled the concrete core out of the foot-thick wall of the tunnel to the cheers of all assembled, and there was much grinning and hand shaking, then the serving of wine, cheese, clear grape juice, and crackers.

Then there was chatting among the reducing number of attendees as everyone gradually left by single carloads of ten or less. Finally none remained save the Green Band and the construction crew.

Then his group said goodbye and congratulations to Raz. Second-last to do so was Naz.

"My son, with most boys I would have to say be careful, work hard, do us proud, but I know with you there is no doubt about those. Instead, my advice is; remember to have fun, and enjoy this great work you do. It will be a fine memory."

"Thank you, Naz-Father. I will remember it." Raz said as they shared a firm hug.

Jena had waited until everyone else had spoken to him. He wore the coveralls, boots, and hard-hat of the construction crew, while she, like all the Tiger People there that day, was naked except for her pack, knife belt, and armbands. This was so because the Enclave House would be Tiger People land. As was generally the case when techs and wild people gathered, the techs sometimes had a difficult time fighting the urge to stare impolitely at the nakedness of their guests. Jena was fully aware of the looks she gathered from the crew, two thirds of whom were men, as she gracefully shuffled around Naz and walked the three paces to Raz. She openly returned their looks with a smile that left no doubt as to her status as a sexually active Adolescent. She melted into Raz's smiling embrace, closing her eyes and kissing him deeply as his hands openly and proudly caressed her body everywhere he could reach. The kiss was a long one, and a pair of men in the crew began giving whistles and cheers and rebel yells of encouragement, and everyone else chuckled.

When their lips finally parted she murmured to him, just loud enough for everyone to hear, her eyes still closed. "Raz my love, tonight I will hunt you a succulent waterfowl, and prepare it with rice and berries and butter and spice."

"Thank you love. Check my upload link any time you wish to know what I am doing. I will return at 17:00." Raz returned.

"Thank you. My link is open to you as well. You will want to mount your remote on your helmet while working." Jena chuckled.

His hand rose to his headband, found it covered by his helmet, and he chuckled abashedly.

Jena glanced around at the construction crew. She saw from their grins that she had succeeded in her objective; to raise Raz's status a notch in their eyes.

"His intellect is not all that is well developed." she told them proudly.

That got laughs, and Raz gave her a light slap on one buttock. "Enough! Go now, so I can think about work!" he told her with an abashed grin.

She yelped and rubbed her cheek, but she was grinning as she gave him another quick kiss on the cheek and danced from his arms. "I hear and obey, love!" she laughed, and waved as she boarded the construction car with the others.

As the door closed a crewman was heard to ask; "Are you an Adolescent, Raz?"

To which he replied; "No, but we are working on it..."

Thereafter Jena's feet took her to the trading post at 5:00 p.m. to meet Raz. She wanted to take a construction car to meet him at the site everyday, but he vetoed that on the grounds that it would take too much time from her schedule, and was a misuse of company vehicles besides. She asked if she could purchase her own construction car, but he refused her that as well. She did not seem to mind.

Jela went to the med for one to four hours of physiotherapy every day for over a month. Nonetheless, she returned to hunting full time only three weeks after having the cast removed.

December 21st, 2154, 12 days later.

It had become the habit of Pina and Tika over the last week to spend the last ninety minutes of each day at the den that had been the home of Baya, and to sometimes sleep there as well. It was tucked into the edge of the forest facing the meadow, and served as a blind to watch the wildlife there. It was only forty yards from the spring, and the first night they had come here they were seeking solitude after bathing.

They would discuss their day, what had gone well and what had not gone so well. They were both satisfied with their progress, Tika in her fight training, Pina with her cosmology project, but their progress had not been without frustration.

Generally, as they spoke, Tika would lead them through slow fight katas, rehearsing their response to a long sequence of attacks. It was a relaxing exercise that served to calm and center them both, and it was something they could do while talking. There was barely room for it in the tiny clearing before the den, behind the row of bushes that screened it from the meadow.

Tika often complained of having to train without sufficient sparring and fighting opponents. She had completely surpassed her mother and Menak, and now it was her familiarity with their fighting that was to their detriment, rather than the reverse. Since her study of strategy had begun, she had become completely unpredictable to them, while she found their fighting to be more and more routine. Now, the hours she spent training with them was time that they both considered a valuable part of their training, while Tika increasingly felt it an interruption of her own. She spent much of her own training with Davdan, whose physical participation continued to increase with her fitness, and the rest working by herself.

Since Menak had brought it, Tika had become a disciple of the hydraulic resistance exerciser. Her build increasingly resembled that of an Olympic gymnast. Her strength limits were something she had stopped sharing with the group. It had not surprised her much when she noticed that her resistance settings were higher than Jena's or Pina's, but it had felt strange when she realized that she had surpassed Raz and Jela's strength levels, and would soon equal her mother's, though they were also gaining strength as they trained.

Pina generally shared her frustration at the lack of teamwork and co-operation among her employees, the grudging, barely respectable way they followed her instructions, and the overly possessive attitudes of the Cray technicians who 'babysat' the supercomputers. Mostly she was frustrated because she felt she could get none of them to share her vision.

Today, eleven days after the ground breaking for Davdan's house, Pina relayed the latest developments and was unable to find the calm that usually came with the katas. As she spoke of her frustrations she had unconsciously been increasing the tempo of today's eighteen-move sequence as the pattern repeated. Tika kept pace and listened patiently.

When Pina finished speaking, Tika considered.

"Is there something else bothering you?" she eventually asked.

"Yes!" Pina barked, a drop of sweat flying from her nose as she spun into the sweep kick. "My damn brother Raz is bothering me! And it is not even his fault; it is just damn green envy! All he has to do is dig a hole; the crew he works with have done it many times, yet they treat him like he is a genius! They treat him with respect, and they are all great friends! Whereas I must wrestle a herd of egomaniacs down a very difficult path that has never been traveled before, and they all think I am wrong, though they can present no evidence that this is so! And, it is unfair that he won Jena's love by doing no more than sniffing her ass, that she should choose to fawn over him like he were a king or something, and give herself to him in every way she can, while I am still seen on the Adolescents' ground as a adult's mind in a child's body, and neither of those states makes any of the cute boys want me!"

"They like you!" Tika said, surprised. "They all like you!"

"Yes, for which I am very glad and grateful. But they do not desire me. They do not seek to hold my hand, or hug me, or kiss me."

"Do you truly wish this?" Tika asked. "I mean, do you desire them? Perhaps, if Raz did not have Jena..."

"It is true!" Pina snapped. "If Raz had not won Jena, it might not matter! But he did win her, and when I see them sharing pleasure ... when I see her lose her mind to the pleasure he gives her ... It stirs things in me. It makes me want that too. Yet, he is my brother, and there is no convenient mate for me in our group."

"I too have felt strange things while thinking about sex lately. Especially when I watch Menak with Tira-Mother." Tika revealed as she turned into the sweep-block. "It makes me wish he would lick me. Perhaps he would. I have not asked."

"It is strange to think that despite our ages, we will go through puberty together." Pina mused. "That you will complete it before me. You know, your breasts are beginning to bud."

"I know. So are yours." Tika giggled.

"I know." Pina agreed.

"We should pick a nice male Adolescent to give us some pleasure sometime." Tika decided with a grin. "That way we can share him, and we will only have to find one good one, instead of two! Perhaps Slin?"

"Why him?" Pina asked.

"Well, I do not know if you think he is cute, but I sure do, and he almost never speaks! I think he could keep a secret better than any Adolescent in the zone! And I know he likes me, though I do not know if he desires me." Tika explained. "If he agrees, great!" Pina laughed. "He is more than cute enough for both of us!"

"Good! Perhaps I will!" Tika responded.

They flowed through the movements without speaking for a minute or two.

"Well, I will help you with your problem with your scientists, my best friend Pina. (Watch the balance on the spin.)" Tika said.

"You will? How?"

"I would rather not say. I am not fully decided yet." Tika said. "I will tell you this. There will be a gathering in two days. There will be a surprise. I have ... overheard things."

"I am not surprised that you have, my friend." Pina chuckled. "Your hearing is acute, and it seems little within its range escapes your attention, no matter how busy you are."

"Yes. I have found I can listen closely enough to three different conversations to be able to remember what was said in each one, while I am sparring with Tira-Mother. Generally, I can find little use for such a skill. Anyone could do it with their screen, if they turned up their recording levels."