Kaas Baichtal: Undertow: 10

U N D E R T O W
_______

10 - Undertow

[read chapter 1][read chapter 2][read chapter 3][read chapter 4][read chapter 5]
[read chapter 6][read chapter 7][read chapter 8][read chapter 9]

"Wait! Make sure he's awake. Don't just move him!"
"Yeah, don't disorient him."
Fingers poked and prodded the black bundle at the bottom of the hamper.
Among the twenty or so people who'd gathered to hunt for Arat, uneasiness gripped the ambient like a fist, along with anxiety and exhaustion from the long day of fear and violence.
It hadn't been difficult to introduce hints that caused one of Mepig's people to guess that Arat would be hidden on the Assembly stage somewhere. But it had taken many hours for the rioters to finally disperse, and then the school and grounds had to be re-secured and all the remaining parents seen safely off. Even after that, the halls and corridors were constantly patrolled by staff.
Because of the added security the students weren't able to Assemble to search for Arat until very late at night, when most Simes and all of the Gens would be asleep. By that time, it had been over twelve hours since the prank.
Deah of course had no choice but to attend. She kept her nager strictly opaque, but wondered if the creeping horror she felt was showing on her face. This had gone beyond a prank. They shouldn't have done it. She couldn't even imagine why she had gone along with it now.
Sorel was absent, off taking part in an official search for her Gen parents who'd never turned up at the school. But Betta was there, and she zlinned even more ill than Deah felt. The prank had been her idea, after all. She had to be regretting coming up with it now.
"Arat? That is you in there, isn't it?" Mepig frowned when the bundle of curtain failed to respond to their proddings. "Stop it, everybody, hands off." Mepig slapped them away and leaned down himself, feeling the thick folds until he'd grasped what seemed to be a shoulder. "Arat, are you OK in there? You're worrying me." He jiggled the shoulder and was rewarded by a muffled moan. "Come on you people," he ordered. "Let's get him out of this thing. He's conscious enough to move."
After a frozen moment, too many people jumped to assist. Deah joined them, avoiding Betta's attempt to hold her back.
They pulled him out of the curtain-hamper and carried him to the very spot on the floor where he'd lain subdued hours before. This time it was not black insulation that made everybody anonymous; it was emotion. They all had the same growing fear and dread in them, the guilty and the innocent alike. For that matter, even the innocent people zlinned guilty; it was the guilt of believing their encouragement had driven Arat to a mistake.
Mepig had a scowl on his face, clearly feeling the sting of personal responsibility as well. He'd been their leader after all. Deah didn't remember him having actually commented during the discussion of the hiding dare, but then again he, like Jeniard, had probably thought Arat's promise was good.
"Let's get some of this off him," Mepig said.
Betta hung back but Deah came forward to assist again, worming between the others to find a place. Arat will be all right, she told herself firmly. He has to be. They'd pull off the insulation and he'd emerge tight-lipped and furious, and refuse to admit what'd happened in order to preserve his own dignity. That was the only way any of this could turn out okay.
But a heavy heat radiated from the bundle even through the folds, and as the first layer of insulation came off Deah could feel that the form underneath was rigid and shaking.
"Don't go too far," Mepig commanded, after all but one of the remaining layers had been removed. "Let me check how he's doing." He picked up the drooping end of the cloth and slid one of his hands inside.
"No, don't touch me!"
Mepig jerked back at the hoarse note of fear and weakness in Arat's voice.
"Arat, it's all right, I'm just going to zlin you," he said.
"Don't touch me. Don't zlin me." The sound of Arat's breaths, a ragged panting, was clearly audible through the last layer of curtain. "Bring... bring Tebithaux Randon."
Mepig's nager registered shock, echoed by the others. Deah clamped down on her own field as fear thrilled through her. He's in trouble, she realized. Her hopes that everything would work out were dashed.
Mepig smoothed the cloth down to close the gap he'd created, and leaned close over the shivering lump underneath.
"Arat," he hissed, trying to whisper although it would have been impossible for the rest of them not to hear. "We're not alone. Everybody is here. Everybody, you understand?"
There was a hush as they all strained to hear the reply, but all that could be heard was the uneven breathing.
"And I can't bring Teb Randon here, you know that. Shen, the trouble we'd be in! Come on, be realistic about this."
More silence, before there did come an answer. It was a small voice, a pleading voice. "I don't care. I can't... I require... please bring him. "
Mepig looked at a loss as to what to do. Everybody began whispering urgently to one another, the ambient running tense and fearful.
"Shidoni, Deah," Betta whispered horrified in her ear. "He's not kidding!"
"I know, I know!"
"But what are we going to do?"
"I don't know!"
"Shut up! Be quiet you people, I'm trying to hear!" said Mepig.
The students fell silent, but there were no more words.
Deah wouldn't have thought Arat capable of begging at all, before today, and even now she didn't think he'd do it unless he had no other choice. After more than twelve hours in the box, who knew what condition he was in? Deah felt sick. "I'll get Teb," she said, and rose to her feet.
Hands grabbed her, several hands, holding her back.
Mepig had leaped to his feet as well. "No!" he exclaimed. "Are you crazy? Do you have any idea how much trouble we'd all get into? And what will our parents say when they find out?" The other students' nagers quickly aligned to agree with his, particularly at the part about their parents.
Deah stared at them all. Her first thought was for her own parents and what their reaction would be. But then she thought of Mepig's parents, and Mepig's reputation. If he were disgraced in this, the consequences would reach much farther than this school. And what would all those militant juncts do if it came out that Arat had been injured?
"But Arat says he requires Teb," she said. "If you think there'd be trouble now, imagine how much trouble there'd be if he - if he died or something because we didn't bring help!"
Some of the other students blanched, and the ambient wavered. But Mepig clearly wasn't ready to give up control of the situation, not yet.
"We'll get Jeniard," he said decisively. He turned to one of his people, a girl named Marina. "Go get him. He's in the Dispensary." He pushed Marina toward the door and she darted out of the auditorium under augmentation.
Deah zlinned a rush of relief and agreement in the other students. Mepig may be only a Third, but he had a firm grasp of what these people wanted: someone else to be in charge, and to keep this disaster a secret from the teachers as long as possible. They were obviously in denial as to how much trouble they were already in.
Deah, on the other hand, was already furious at herself for having gone along with the dare in the first place. She wasn't going to let herself be pushed around now, not when so much might be at stake.
"Jeniard?" she protested. "Mepig, he requires a Donor." She tried to grab him and take him aside, where the others' nagers would feed back on his less. But he pulled away from her and turned to make their relative positions as awkward as possible so she couldn't quite engage his field.
"Jeniard's been working with him." Mepig was sweating, his handsome face set with mulish determination. "Arat trusts Jeniard more than anyone else in the world."
"And if Jeniard says he requires Sosu Randon?"
"Then we'll deal with that when we come to it." Mepig spun away from her, putting even more distance between them, and faced the rest of the students again. "In the meantime, all of you clear out of here. Not all at once! One or two every few minutes, so we're not caught."
A couple of people fled immediately, apparently only having been waiting for an excuse to leave. But more seemed compelled to stay and see what was under the insulation for themselves.
"This is crazy," said Deah.
Unfortunately, it was clear to zlin that the rest of the students agreed with Mepig. Not because he was making any sense, but because they wanted to believe. She couldn't fight that, not without using brute nageric force and Mepig had just demonstrated how easy it was to get around that technique, at least when employed by an amateur. Deah didn't have enough experience at manipulating her fellow channels' opinions intentionally to pull it off against their will.
She thought about simply walking out as if she were leaving, then going to get Teb anyway. But the moment her attention strayed to the stage door some of the other students placed themselves between her and it. She had no doubt they'd practically tackle her to the floor if she tried to leave now.
She had no choice but to wait until Jeniard arrived and see if she could talk sense into him instead. They were both Firsts. Together they should have no difficulty cornering Mepig and changing his mind, experienced or no. …Right?

-----

The Dispensary was quite nearby, being only two buildings over. It would have taken seconds to fetch Jeniard under augmentation, had there been no need for secrecy. But first Marina would have to avoid the security to get there undetected, and then they'd both have to avoid it on the way back.
As the wait grew longer and longer, there was no sound from Arat underneath the curtain. People started glancing at it, then at Mepig. Deah wondered if someone ought to poke Arat and see if he was still conscious. Mepig looked as if he was thinking the same thing. He frowned and took a step toward the pile of black curtain -

- but just then, there was the sound of running feet and Marina burst back onto the stage. "He's coming. He said he'd be here as soon as he -"
Jeniard plowed past her, coming down from hard augmentation. He was wearing a City Sime Center uniform and still had a Dispensary data clipboard forgotten in one hand. He shoved between everybody, unable to zlin Arat, scanning faces until the only place left to look was down between them, down at the floor. "What - Arat, what have you done!"
"He was hiding all wrapped up in insulation in a hamper," said Mepig. "He's been in there for hours, we think. He was barely even conscious when we pulled him out."
"Oh, shen." Jeniard threw himself to his knees and reached instinctively for the black folds, then hesitated.
"Jeniard," Arat whispered. The curtain's folds shifted as one of Arat's hands moved toward Jeniard, as if to reach for him.
Nobody could have missed the fierce loyalty that surged in Jeniard in response.
"Wait," he said, stilling Arat's hand with his own through the cloth. "Let me." He slid his other hand in underneath, then withdrew it quickly looking pale.
"All right," he said, eyes darting from side to side. Deah wondered what he had zlinned inside. "All right. Just stay calm."
"Help me," begged Arat. He sounded rather more desperate than calm. Deah supposed having his request for Donor assistance denied hadn't exactly boosted his confidence in his fellow students.
"We'll help you," Jeniard responded immediately, but it was clear he didn't know exactly how to help just yet. He looked up at the rest of them. "But you're going to have to cooperate with us, can you do that for me?"
He's stalling, Deah thought.
There was a pause where Arat didn't respond, and during those moments Jeniard zlinned the room's occupants, and then searched the auditorium visually, peering between everybody as if in vain hope his nageric inventory had missed someone.
No, there are no professional Donors here, Deah thought glumly.
"I'll… try," said Arat.
"What do we do?" asked Mepig quietly. The difference in his manner was striking. He seemed willing to surrender all control of the situation to Jeniard now.
That's because he wants to get out of this unscathed, thought Deah, and Jeniard is the only way that can happen, long shot though it is.
"He requires Teb Randon," she said, seizing her opportunity. "Jeniard, he asked for a Donor."
But even before she'd finished speaking she realized she'd said the wrong thing. Jeniard came to his feet to face her, his face closed off but jealousy clearly coloring his nager. She remembered too late that Jeniard had once been Teb's helper and guinea pig himself, before Arat had arrived on the scene. Then as soon as Teb discovered Arat, Jeniard got dumped. Surely Jeniard harbored some hard feelings against Teb over that.
And worse, how could she forget Jeniard's peculiar longing to have been a female Gen? For all she knew his protectiveness of Arat was more than just kindness and duty. It might be he really did feel possessive of Arat, in every awful sense of that word.
"He doesn't need a Donor necessarily," said Mepig quickly, stepping forward to place a hand on Jeniard's shoulder. "Jeniard's helped him many times before. Haven't you, Jeniard? You can do it." His nager was insubstantial in the face of theirs, but the touch would increase his ability to focus on Jeniard - and more importantly, he'd once again managed to say exactly what someone wanted to hear. Calmness spread through Jeniard's nager, as if he drew strength from Mepig in a way that had nothing to do with selyn. Deah tried to remember if she'd ever seen Mepig publicly acknowledge Jeniard by name before, much less acknowledge his relationship with Arat and in a positive light, and realized she couldn't. Maybe this was the first time. Maybe Mepig had been holding that card in reserve to be played at just such a critical moment.
"Deah," said Jeniard. "We shouldn't be arguing over this. Arat only requires help stabilizing his fields… he can actually do most of it himself. It's happened before and I've managed to help him."
"It couldn't have been this bad before," said Deah. "He was begging." But even as she said it, she found herself thinking that if Jeniard could pull it off, so that no teachers had to know, then the pranksters might be home free. All they'd need then would be Arat's silence, and surely his pride would take care of that.
"Help me then," said Jeniard. "Get down beside me, and support me, and block for us. It'd make a huge difference."
Everybody knew Deah's nager's immense inertia made an excellent brick wall. And if she tried to make her field resonate with Jeniard's in support of him, they'd theoretically both have to lose their centers before Jeniard could lose his. But a channel was a piss-poor substitute for a Donor when it came to helping another channel, and if she was helping Jeniard help Arat that was just piss-poor times two. And wait a minute… was Jeniard manipulating her feelings?
Mepig had been zlinning her keenly, and though he couldn't have gotten that much intelligence off her field he apparently gathered enough to know when to strike again.
"All you people," he said, "Get behind her on the floor. Don't let your field leak around hers."
"I didn't say I'd do it," began Deah, but Jeniard had knelt down again, speaking to Arat with his hand on him through the curtain.
"Just a few seconds more," he was saying quietly. "We're almost ready. We're just working out the details."
So I'm a detail am I? Deah wanted to say, but now such a retort seemed impossibly petty. Shen and shid, she thought. He is manipulating me, the little rat. He's going to try to guilt me into this.
Jeniard looked back up at her. "Get down next to me," he said. "You'll have to support me, and block for us. Mepig, you're on Arat's other side. Everybody else, stay on the floor behind Deah. Try not to let your field leak around hers. I'll handle Arat."
"This is completely insane," said Deah. "Someone's going to get hurt!"
But still, she couldn't deny a creeping growth of respect for Jeniard's calmness and grim determination in the face of this all too personal disaster. With two doctors as parents, he knew how to handle a medical emergency. Jealousy aside, he might be the one student who could actually pull this off.
"Just get down on your knees, Deah," said Mepig, who'd already assumed his position. "For shen's sake, do your part!"
"All right," she said. "All right, I'm doing it." But you'll owe me for this, she wanted to tell them. But of of course that was not true. Although they did not know it, she owed them, because it was her fault all of this had happened in the first place. Only she would have had the guts to grab Arat by the arms. The others had said as much. If she hadn't agreed, the prank never could have been pulled off. This was what was on her mind as she obeyed, kneeling on the dust-strewn floor. The other students shuffled closer together behind her back, trying to peer over her shoulder without raising their fields above hers.
Jeniard continued. "Nobody even think of engaging Arat's field. You two, keep the immediate ambient steady for us."
Mepig met Deah's eyes across Arat's body. They both knew it would be Deah doing the steadying. Mepig had been chosen for who he was.
Jeniard placed a hand on the fabric where Arat's chest would be.
"I'm going to remove the curtain," he said. "Arat, can you go hypo for me?"
There was a pause, too-long.
He can't do it, thought Deah, even as she wished he could.
"I don't think so," said Arat.
Of course he couldn't. There was no use in pretending. If he was okay, he would have shoved the insulation off and jumped to his feet by himself already. That much was obvious.
Deah hoped her field would be enough to block everybody's growing apprehension from the patient.
"Close your eyes at least," said Jeniard. "I'm going to remove the insulation."
"Yes," said Arat. "They're closed."
Jeniard glanced up at Mepig and Deah one last time. Deah nodded that she was ready; so did Mepig.
Jeniard reached for the last layer of insulation and took it in both hands. "Ready... careful... I'm removing it now."
He pulled. Deah's heart clenched, and breaths drew in around the room. Arat was revealed, lying in a contorted position, arms thrust stiffly down against his belly, head thrown back. He zlinned of fever, dehydration, dizziness, nausea. Fiery pain shot through his forearms with the slightest movement. His uniform was stained with salt and inky black streamers of his hair had found their way out of the braid to plaster against his skin. His eyes were squeezed shut and his field was ragged and uncontrolled, its vast strength making a shivering mess of the bit of the ambient between within Mepig's and Deah's nagers.
Deah grimaced and bolstered her secondary field's support of Jeniard, while insulating the others from Arat as much as the other way around. Nobody was complaining about her nager's obtuse resistance now! Mepig wore a shocked expression. He was so swamped she couldn't zlin he was there at all. After a moment, he abandoned his post and joined the others behind Deah.
Jeniard reached to place his hands on Arat's arms, just above the construction gauntlets. At the touch, Arat's nager, as though he had in fact been exerting some control upon it before, fragmented further into a whirling, shuddering chaos, an overwhelming and catastrophic hazard to the ambient.
Deah weathered the disastrous breakup like she'd weathered sleet and hail on her father's farm. Only this time, she couldn't run for shelter. She was the shelter. Without her support, Jeniard would have been overwhelmed.
We shouldn't be doing this, she knew with a certainty. It should have been Teb. It should have been the teachers.
But it was hardly the time for I-told-you-so's, and speaking was out of the question in any case. All she could do was hunker down and endure it for the many long seconds it took for Arat to find his center again.

-----

When he did, it was without warning; suddenly everything matched up and the entire room resolved into a stunning clarity.
Deah would have staggered, had she been standing; in one stroke she'd been reduced from a wall of strength in a storm to an insignificant speck in a vast and glittering ocean.
A sigh of profound relief went up from all around, but Deah felt a fleeting disappointment that momentarily confounded her. After a moment, though, she was able to identify that unexpected emotion: for that brief time, she'd been Tuib. Now she was not again. Sime instinct rears its ugly head.
Arat struggled against Jeniard's restraint and managed to fight his way up into a sitting position. It seemed very important to him to be able to do so.
"You should lie down," began Jeniard, trying to press him back.
"No," said Arat shortly. He sounded angry, or upset. Well who could blame him? Deah would have been humiliated enough in his position, and she didn't have his stiff pride. She was certain he wanted to put the entire incident behind him as quickly as possible. Everybody was trying not to zlin any more of him than they had to, but they were all standing there staring at him.
"Well, at least hold still long enough for me to get those gauntlets off of you," said Jeniard.
"You can't take them off," said Arat. "They're stuck."
"Nonsense," said Jeniard. "They're just tricky to remove. Let me help you."
"You have to lift the tab on the latch first," said Lazlo. "It's a sort of safety-lock."
"Do the top ones first, then the lower," said Ramy. "That's how the workers always do it, I've seen them."
"Sometimes the two halves jam together," added a student whose name Deah didn't know, one of Mepig's people. "You just have to give it a little twist and they separate."
"I know how to do it," said Jeniard in annoyance, as he proceeded to demonstrate exactly that.
The first of the gauntlets cracked open, and Jeniard started to draw it free, but Arat's breath hissed in and a blinding pain shot up all four laterals, making Deah's own hair and tentacles stand on end.
"Shen!" exclaimed Jeniard, letting go of the arm hastily.
Deah forced herself to zlin directly and realized Arat had meant quite literally stuck… the laterals were glued to the inside of the gauntlets with dried ronaplin, like worms on a sidewalk after rain.
There was a stunned silence. Then cries of horror and disgust broke out as each person in turn realized this, and one student spun away and vomited a dribble of foam all over someone else's shoes.
If there had been anybody in the room to doubt that this was serious, there wasn't anymore.
"Bloody shen Arat, you could have said," said Jeniard.
"I did," Arat pointed out rather coldly. He retrieved his arm and carefully held the gauntlet shut with the fingers of his other hand.
Deah imagined being trapped, crushed under weight, absolutely unable to see or zlin, yet compelled to try, try, and try again. Arat had fallen into utter dependence upon his Sime senses faster than most, and even the five senses of childhood would have been smothered in his prison. Between dehydration and having spent much of it in transfer hours before, there simply hadn't been enough ronaplin to go around.
"Let's get you back to our dorm room," said Jeniard. "We can loosen that up with something… or… something.... Let's just hope there's no serious damage."
"I'm fine," said Arat. He seemed to be the only one out of the lot of them who wasn't half-panicking about the state his laterals. Then again, he probably had many hours of panicking under his belt already. His field was under his control now, and if he could zlin at all then he probably felt he was a good deal better off than he'd been in hours… physically. Maintaining his pride had become the far greater priority.
He moved as if to climb to his feet, but only got halfway up before sliding back down into a rubbery heap.
"Don't try that again," Jeniard ordered him.
"I'm fine," said Arat tersely. "Only a little dizzy."
"Let me help you then," said Mepig, moving forward quickly.
"No, leave him sit," said Jeniard.
But this was Mepig's chance to reassert himself, and he wasn't about to let it drop. "Here, try now," he said, wrapping an arm around Arat's torso and fending Jeniard's protests off with his other hand.
With Mepig's help, Arat managed to scramble to his feet and stay standing. Deah thought he'd throw off Mepig's arm the moment he was upright, but he did not. Mepig alone among them was Arat's social peer. There were some things Mepig would always be able to get away with that none of the rest of them ever would.
Jeniard had moved with them, remaining in a support position for Arat. Deah thought she zlinned jealousy threading its way back through Jeniard's nager, but after a moment he controlled, it, apparently conceding to the necessity of Mepig's role.
"Deah, help us get back," he said instead. His hand reached out behind him, the dorsals catching her wrist and making sure she didn't try to leave her own position.
"I will," she said automatically, even as she tried to figure out if they'd be able to navigate the hallways in a group without getting caught.

----

Most everybody had seen and zlinned enough, between the wild ride given the ambient and then the stuck laterals. They scattered every which way out the doors of the auditorium, their nagers flattened to try to avoid being zlinned.
Therefore by the time the group surrounding Arat was finally managed to reach Jeniard and Arat's dorm room, only five or six additional people remained with them. The core of Mepig's people, and Betta who seemed unable to tear herself away. Of course, she probably wanted to know what Arat was going to say about the curtain incident. If there was anybody second to Deah in blame for what happened, it was definitely her. He could get them both in deep trouble if he chose to spill it all.
Despite the severity of the situation, Deah couldn't help but gawk at the interior of the dorm-room. The whole place stank like a musty herb shop, and it was clear to see why: half the shelves were crammed with odd bottles of leaves floating in oil and other strange substances. The rest of the shelves, as well as most of the floor, were a jumble of books and papers of every description. The window was tightly shut, giving the place an airless closeness.
As Mepig helped Arat to one of the beds, and Jeniard followed in close attendance, Deah was pushed close in after him by the remaining students piling in behind. She was hard put to find anyplace to place her feet, finally bracing herself between a box containing jars, and a big sloppy heap of what looked like legal documents.
"Stay right here," said Jeniard, taking her wrist and keeping her in position to continue supporting him.
"I am," she said.
"You, hand me that bottle on the end of that shelf… the one with the blue ribbon on it," Jeniard continued. One of the other students located the bottle in question and passed it over to him.
"What is all this stuff?" asked Betta.
"They're herbal medicines," said Jeniard. "Family recipes, because of his allergies. Give me your arm again," he added to Arat. "Let's see if this will dissolve it."
Arat was seated on the bed now with his back against the wall; he ignored the other students stolidly and allowed Jeniard to kneel on the bed beside him and take back the arm.
Jeniard used his knee as a support and carefully spread the gauntlet's halves again, just enough to get access. He unstoppered the bottle and the pungent scent of the herbs filled Deah's nostrils.
Everybody watched intently as as Jeniard poured a little of an oily substance onto one of the trapped laterals, enough to coat the organ liberally. He used one of his handling tentacles to guide the stream down into the right location, without touching.
It didn't take too long for the dried ronaplin to soften. The lateral wriggled faintly, then worked itself loose. It licked in and out of its sheath a few times, tentatively. The whole process made Deah queasy just to watch, and she was doing her best not to zlin.
"OK, wait… let me," said Jeniard. He set the bottle aside and placed his hand on Arat's arm, so that he could zlin the area more deeply. Everybody held their breath.
"I don't zlin any permanent damage. If they all turn out this well, you were incredibly lucky." For the first time Jeniard's voice, and nager, hinted at disappointment in what he clearly believed to be a foolish stunt - and a personal betrayal - on Arat's part. Now that the immediate emergency was over, Jeniard's true feelings were beginning to make themselves known.
Arat said nothing, though he couldn't have possibly missed the message Jeniard was sending. Maybe he was deciding exactly what to say in response.
Don't tell, Deah wished. She had absolutely no desire to be thrown out of school because of the curtain incident. Now that it was clear Arat's life wasn't in immediate danger, she didn't want the teachers to hear any more about this than they had to. In that, she was no different from the others.
Arat continued to remain ominously silent as Jeniard worked over the other three laterals and eventually managed to free him from the construction gauntlets completely. Afterward Arat massaged his forearms gingerly.
"Don't do that. Let me zlin you again," ordered Jeniard, setting the bottle aside. He gently separated Arat's arms and twined tentacles with him, zlinning deeply. Arat allowed him to do this.
"I think you're all right," Jeniard said at length. "Of course, those laterals will probably be tender for quite a while, and you should get them checked out by a senior channel as soon as possible."
"Naturally," said Arat, as they disengaged.
There were no thanks, no words of gratitude for the rescue. Maybe Arat found all the other students' presences inhibiting. Or perhaps Arat simply considered Jeniard's help his due, rather than a gift.
After that, Jeniard reached to touch Arat's heart with his fingertips. It looked like he was trying to zlin his vriamic node, only he wasn't zlinning. It was as if he were searching for something else he believed to lay hidden within.
"Arat… why did you do it?" he asked quietly. "Tell me why you broke your promise. I deserve that much."
Arat looked around at the extra people sitting on the other bed, leaning against the walls, watching and zlinning, then back up at Jeniard and Mepig and Deah.
"If I discuss this," he said flatly, "It will not be until later."
"You mean when you've recovered enough to push us around with your nager?" asked Mepig pointedly. "Or did you mean with fewer witnesses?"
"You're going to have to explain yourself to an awful lot of people after that stunt," said Jeniard, a touch of bitterness entering into his voice and nager. "So you may as well get in practice now. Everyone's going to hear it eventually."
Deah was amazed that they would confront Arat about this in front of everybody. But then she realized she and Betta were the only ones left who weren't Mepig's own people - or Arat's. Jeniard had demanded she be there, but Betta didn't have to.
"Betta," she murmured to her friend, "You'd better go. I'll let you know what happens."
"But...." began Betta, before realizing the futility of arguing. She nodded and threaded her way out of the room, closing the door behind her.
When she was gone, the ambient took a definite turn toward the colder and grimmer.
"Well, let's hear it," said Mepig. "Quit messing us around."
Arat's dark eyes lifted to fix on Deah's, and she knew dread. He could zlin things nobody else could zlin. She was sure he could zlin through her best showfield like it was nothing, or at least well enough. He'd be able to zlin she was guilty. But isn't everybody?
"She's staying," said Jeniard. "You'll just have to tell it in front of her."
Deah was sure he couldn't have zlinned who it was who'd attacked him. The insulation was just too good. But who else could it have been, besides students? Just like she'd known the person climbing in her window had to be a prank, surely Arat had known as well.
"I… was going to come back here to change," said Arat slowly. "To wear my dress uniform, for the ceremony."
"What were you thinking?" asked Jeniard. "When you were coming here?"
Arat frowned, as if considering whether to answer that or not. His eyes were still on Deah. She felt increasingly ill under that scrutiny.
"You were thinking about your parents, weren't you?" said Mepig.
"Yes," said Arat.
Somehow, when he said yes like that, looking straight into her eyes, she felt it was her fault his parents were in prison. Her fault for ever having awakened from the Pen-drugs and been raised as a human being. Her fault that things weren't the way they'd been before Unity.
"You were thinking about how they wouldn't have wanted you to cooperate, weren't you?" said Jeniard. "Publicly. In front of all those parents."
"I was thinking about what they would think when they found out," Arat admitted. There was a long pause, and then he finally looked away from Deah's eyes.
"Go on," said Jeniard.
"I took the shortcut, across the stage," Arat continued.
There was another, even longer pause. It was the moment of truth. Would he spill all, or would he fabricate something to preserve his own dignity?
"And that's when you decided," guessed Jeniard, when Arat did not immediately speak again.
"You know your parents can't win," said Mepig, apparently unable to restrain himself any longer. "They're going to die in prison because nobody is ever going to let them out. And all those people out there in New Othwol are going to die too if they try to fight the Tecton. After what happened tonight there'll be troops marching up from Capitol for certain."
"I know that," said Arat. His nostrils flared as his breath came harder. "Don't presume to tell me -"
"Well then tell us what the shen you were thinking!" exploded Jeniard. "You ruined the ceremony and did untold damage to the school and grounds what with those rioters… and that's not even counting the damage to the Tecton's presence here, and the lives of peaceful citizens."
"Of all the worst times to let emotion run away with you," said Mepig. "I know you miss your parents and want to be loyal to them, but that was the stupidest thing I've ever seen anyone do. I thought you were smarter than that, Arat."
"I didn't choose, I was prevented," hissed Arat, his dark eyes flashing. "I was prevented from attending the ceremony."
"Prevented how?" demanded Jeniard.
"I was crossing the stage… I had every intention of attending that ceremony. I was on my way to don my dress uniform as I said. But before I could, this person - a Sime but all covered in insulation so I couldn't tell who it was - jumped out at me from nowhere and seized me by the arms."
There was a burst of surprise all around. None of Mepig's people had probably imagined anything of the sort, and Deah realized that she herself hadn't believed he'd admit it.
Jeniard blinked in astonishment. "What did you say?"
Arat frowned. "You heard me," he said reprovingly. "They seized me, and many other people came out of hiding and seized me and together they forced me into that... that place. I was trapped there until you came."
"I can't believe you'd tell such a baldfaced lie!" exclaimed Jeniard.
A weird mix of offense and confusion whizzed across Arat's face. It had clearly never occurred to him that the truth might not be believed. Deah had to admit the possibility had never occurred to her either. Granted, with his nager Arat would be able to lie successfully to just about anybody if he so chose, assuming he could keep the lie off his face. But why on earth would Arat lie about something like this? Why would anybody?
"I didn't lie," Arat said warily. Anger tinged his voice.
Jeniard stood up abruptly, his nager controlled but his expression absolutely furious.
"More lying isn't going to help you, Arat. You went back on a promise. A promise to me, to Teb, and to the school. Nobody is going to believe anything you say now. Why should they?"
"I thought we had a deal, Arat," said Mepig. "You were going to come to the ceremony and do your part."
"We did," said Arat, who was looking increasingly agitated himself.
"How could you just throw it all away like that?" demanded Mepig. "You know cooperation is the only way. Trying to fight the Tecton is only going to get us crushed under the wheel." He sounded, and zlinned, frustrated.
"I didn't," said Arat furiously. He could have flattened them with that fury, but he kept it reined in. Mostly. His nager was betraying the telltale stress signature of the Audnes family though, like sun on wind-chopped waves. "I told you, I was prevented from cooperating, by -"
"Stop it! Stop it, stop it!" exclaimed Jeniard. "It's bad enough you went back on your promise. But enough with this lying already… do you think we're stupid? I'm going to walk out of here if you lie to us again."
"That's a terrible lie, too," said Mepig. "You should have at least thought of something believable."
Something snapped behind Arat's eyes. His nager seemed to eat itself from the inside out, like snow dashed with water, and the ambient became harsh and clear as frostbite. Deah realized that whatever miserly scrap of friendliness Arat reserved in his showfield was gone. Arat had withdrawn his favor of Mepig and Jeniard. And then she discovered that Jeniard was no longer supporting Arat nagerically at all. So apparently the feeling was mutual.
She dropped her own support of Jeniard, and suddenly they were four in the room, with no allies or truce among them, like four fighting-dogs thrown into a pit.
The door slapped open, and the rest of Mepig's people hurried out one after the other, quite plainly fleeing what looked like it could soon get even uglier.
Without them, Mepig was clearly outclassed by the three Firsts; his distress and loss of confidence at being caught in this predicament was clear to zlin.
"Why should I care what you believe?" Arat demanded. He raised his chin haughtily, his dark gaze daring them to answer.
"Look, nobody is going to believe you," said Jeniard. "Nobody. Not us, not the school staff, and not the Tecton."
"That remains to be seen," said Arat tightly.
"You made a big mistake," said Jeniard. "Admit it."
"You're the ones making a mistake," said Arat, his nager growing even more unfriendly. "Don't think I'll forget this."
Mepig looked nearly as green around the gills as he had when the curtain was pulled off. "Ah, look, I'd better go make sure everything's under control on my floor." He was a dorm monitor for some of the younger students, Deah knew. "And some of the new kids will probably need talking to.... I have to go." He turned and bolted out of the room without waiting for anybody to respond.
"Some help he is," muttered Jeniard. "The coward. I'm going to find someone from staff." He stalked out of the room as well, slamming the door behind him.
Arat stared after them for a moment, then flopped over on the bed and pulled the pillow over his head. He lay there stiff and unmoving as if by hiding his own face he could somehow shut out the entire world. He presented such a bleak picture that Deah wondered if he might be crying - he was still technically post-transfer, after all. His nager was too-even, hiding his true feelings. Even the Audnes effect was controlled now.
After Deah had stared at his inert form for a few minutes longer, he lifted the pillow slightly.
"You don't have to stay," he said.
No, he wasn't crying. His voice was cool, with undertones of what sounded like bitterness.
"Maybe I should, until Jeniard comes back," said Deah.
"Jeniard's gone to tell them where I am," he said. "You'll get caught for curfew violation if you're here when they arrive. You should leave while you still can."
She knew he was right. She'd seen how furious the teachers and the City Controller had been when Arat had failed to show for the presentation. They would come for him, and anyone unfortunate enough to be around when they caught him would pay.
"You're not going to do anything crazy, are you?" she asked apprehensively. "If I leave you alone, you're not going to go outside and - and find your parents' supporters, and.... "
He whipped the pillow aside and sat bolt upright so suddenly he made her jump.
"You had best not suggest that where anyone of importance might hear," he snarled. His nager might have been clear, but his voice was raw with rage and his black eyes were intense and hostile.
"I'm sorry," began Deah. "I just wanted to make sure you're -"
"And I asked you to leave twice. Are you refusing," he demanded, "or are you simply incapable of taking a hint?"
Ack.
"Sorry," said Deah again, waving her hands and tentacles. Just get out of here, she told herself. There's nothing you can say. "Sorry," she muttered a third time, wondering if she was apologizing for the prank, for her question just now, or for life in general. Or maybe all of the above.
She left slinking like a cur, feeling his attention on her back like an accusatory finger pointing her out of a crowd.

----

Afterward she tried to gather a couple hours of sleep in a cold bed stinking of smoke from her open window. But true sleep refused to come. Instead she awoke gasping from nightmare after nightmare.
So many things could have gone wrong. Arat might have suffocated, or suffered permanent brain damage. His laterals could have been badly injured.
And the consequences! What if those rioters had succeeded in destroying the school? What if they came back and attacked again? Never before had Deah found herself in a situation where the actions of mere children could produce such a devastating and public result.
But then, none of them were supposed to be children anymore, were they? And after this, Deah doubted any of them would be under any illusion about that again.

[chapter 11: under construction]
[send and view feedback about this story]
[character name pronunciation guide]
[return to the Undertow index]
[return to Kaas' Art and Writing index]
[return to the Secret Pens]
[B.S.]