22 Athaclena

A large number of chims returned to the Center, drifting in from the forest where they had been sent to hide. Frederick and Benjamin set them to work dismantling and burning the buildings and their contents. Athaclena and her two assistants hurried from site to site, carefully recording everything before it was put to the.torch.

It was hard work. Never in her life as a diplomat’s daughter had Athaclena felt so exhausted. And yet she dared not let any scrap of evidence go undocumented. It was a matter of duty.

About an hour before dusk a contingent of gorillas trooped into the encampment, larger, darker, more crouched and feral-looking than their chim guardians. Under careful direction they took up simple tasks, helping to demolish the only home they had ever known.

The confused creatures watched as their Training and Testing Center and the Clients’ Quarters melted into slag. A few even tried to halt the destruction, stepping in front of the smaller, soot-covered chims and waving vigorous hand signs -- trying to tell them that this was a bad thing.

Athaclena could see how, by their lights, it wasn’t logical. But then, the affairs of patron-class beings often did seem foolish.

Finally, the big pre-clients were left standing amid eddies of smoke with small piles of personal possessions—toys, mementos, and simple tools—piled at their feet. They stared blankly at the wreckage, not knowing what to do.

By dusk Athaclena had been nearly worn down by the emotions that fluxed through the compound. She sat on a tree stump, upwind of the burning clients’ quarters, listening to the great apes’ low, chuffing moans. Her aides slumped nearby with their cameras and bags of samples, staring at the destruction, the whites of their eyes reflecting the flickering flames.

Athaclena withdrew her corona until all she could henn was the Unity Glyph—the coalescence to which all the beings within the forest valley contributed. And even that under-image wavered, flickered. She saw it metaphorically—weepy, drooping, like a sad flag of many colors.

There was honor here, she admitted reluctantly. These scientists had been violating a treaty, but they couldn’t be accused of doing anything truly unnatural.

By any real measure, gorillas were as ready for Uplift as chimpanzees had been, a hundred Earth years before Contact. Humans had been forced to make compromises, back when Contact brought them into the domain of Galactic society. Officially, the tenancy treaty which sanctioned their rights to their homeworld was intended to see to it that Earth’s fallow species list was maintained, so its stock of Potential for sentience would not be used up too quickly.

But everyone knew that, in spite of primitive man’s legendary penchant for genocide, the Earth was still a shining example of genetic diversity, rare in the range of types and forms that had been left untouched by Galactic civilization.

Anyway . . . when a pre-sentient race was ready for Uplift, it was ready!

No, clearly the treaty had been forced on humans while they were weak. They were allowed to claim neo-dolphins and neo-chimps—species already well on the road to sapiency before Contact. But the senior clans weren’t about to let Homo sapiens go uplifting more clients than anybody else around!

Why, that would have given wolflings the status of senior patrons!

Athaclena sighed.

It wasn’t fair, certainly. But that did not matter. Galactic society depended on oaths kept. A treaty was a solemn vow, species to species. Violations could not go unreported.

Athaclena wished her father were here. Uthacalthing would know what to make of the things she had witnessed here—the well-intended work of this illegal center, and the vile but perhaps legal actions of the Gubru.

Uthacalthing was far away, though, too far even to touch within the Empathy Net. All she could tell was that his special rhythm still vibrated faintly on the nahakieri level. And while it was comforting to close her eyes and inner ears and gently kenn it, that faint reminder of him told her little. Nahakieri essences could linger longer after a person left this life, as they had for her dead mother, Mathicluanna. They floated like the songs of Earth-whales, at the edges of what might be known by creatures who lived by hands and fire.

“Excuse me, ma’am.” A voice that was hardly more than a raspy growl broke harshly over the faint under-glyph, dispersing it- Athaclena shook her head. She opened her eyes to see a neo-chimp with soot-covered fur and shoulders stooped from exhaustion.

“Ma’am? You all right?”

“Yes. I am fine. What is it?” Anglic felt harsh in her throat, already irritated from smoke and fatigue.

“Directors wanna see you, ma’am.”

A spendthrift with words, this one. Athaclena slid down from the stump. Her aides groaned, chim-theatrically, as they gathered their tapes and samples and followed behind.

Several lift-lorries stood at the loading dock. Chims and gorillas carried stretchers onto flyers, which then lifted off into the gathering night on softly humming gravities. Their lights faded away into the direction of Port Helenia.

“I thought all the children and elderly were already evacuated. Why are you still loading humans in such a hurry?”

The messenger shrugged. The stresses of the day had robbed many of the chims of much of their accustomed spark. Athaclena was sure that it was only the presence of the gorillas—who had to be set an example—that prevented a mass attack of stress-atavism. In so young a client race it was surprising the chims had done so well.

Orderlies hurried to and from the hospital facility, but they seldom bothered the two human directors directly. The neo-chimp scientist, Dr. Schultz, stood in front of them and seemed to be handling most matters himself. At his side, Chim Frederick had been replaced by Athaclena’s old traveling companion, Benjamin.

On the stage nearby lay a small pile of documents and record cubes containing the genealogy and genetic record of every gorilla who had ever lived here.

“Ah, respected Tymbrimi Athaclena.” Schultz spoke with hardly a trace of the usual chim growl. He bowed, then shook her hand in the manner preferred by his people—a full clasp which emphasized the opposable thumb.

“Please excuse our poor hospitality,” he pleaded. “We had intended to serve a special supper from the main kitchen . . . sort of a grand farewell. But we’ll have to make do with canned rations instead, I’m afraid.”

A small chimmie approached carrying a platter stacked with an array of containers.

“Dr. Elayne Soo is our nutritionist,” Schultz continued. “She tells me you might find these delicacies palatable.”

Athaclena stared at the cans. Koothra! Here, five hundred parsecs from home, to find an instant pastry made in her own hometown! Unable to help it, she laughed aloud.

“We have placed a full load of these, plus other supplies, aboard a flitter for you. We recommend you abandon’ the craft soon after leaving here, of course. It won’t be long before the Gubru have their own satellite network in place, and thereafter air traffic will be impractical.”

“It won’t be dangerous to fly toward Port Helenia,” Athaclena pointed out. “The Gubru will expect an influx for many days, as people seek antidote treatments.” She motioned at the frantic pace of activity. “So why the near-panic I sense here? Why are you evacuating the humans so quickly? Who . . . ?”

Looking as if he feared to interrupt her, Schultz nevertheless cleared his throat and shook his head meaningfully. Benjamin gave Athaclena a pleading look.

“Please, ser,” Schultz implored with a low voice. “Please speak softly. Most of our chims haven’t really guessed ...” He let the sentence hang.

Athaclena felt a cold thrill along her ruff. For the first time she looked closely at the two human directors, Taka and M’Bzwelli. They had remained silent all along, nodding as if understanding and approving everything being said.

The black woman, Dr. Taka, smiled at her, unblinkingly. Athaclena’s corona reached out, then curled back in revulsion.

She whirled on Schultz. “You are killing her!”

Schultz nodded miserably. “Please, ser. Softly. You are right, of course. I have drugged my dear friends, so they can put up a good front until my few good chim administrators can finish here and get our people away without a panic. It was at their own insistence. Dr. Taka and Dr. M’Bzwelli felt they were slipping away too quickly from effects of the gas. ‘ He added sadly, weakly.

“You did not have to obey them! This is murder!”

Benjamin looked stricken. Schultz nodded. “It was not easy. Chim Frederick was unable to bear the shame even this long and has sought his own peace. I, too, would probably take my life soon, were my death not already as inevitable as my human colleagues’.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that the Gubru do not appear to be very good chemists!” The elderly neo-chimp laughed bitterly, finishing with a cough. “Their gas is killing some of the humans. It acts faster than they said it would. Also, it seems to be affecting a few of us chims.”

Athaclena sucked in her breath. “I see.” She wished she did not.

“There is another matter we thought you should know about,” Schultz said. “A news report from the invaders. Unfortunately, it was in Galactic Three; the Gubru spurn Anglic and our translation program is primitive. But we know it regarded your father.”

Athaclena felt removed, as if she were hovering above it all. In this state her numbed senses gathered in random details. She could kenn the simple forest ecosystem—little native animals creeping back into the valley, wrinkling their noses at the pungent dust, avoiding the area near the Center for the fires that still flickered there.

“Yes.” She nodded, a borrowed gesture that all at once felt alien again. “Tell me.”

Schultz cleared his throat. “Well, it seems your father’s star cruiser was sighted leaving the planet. It was chased by warships. The Gubru say that it did not reach the Transfer Point.

“Of course one cannot trust what they say. ...”

Athaclena’s hips rocked slightly out of joint as she swayed from side to side. Tentative mourning—like a trembling of the lips as a human girl might begin to sense desolation.

No. I will not contemplate this now. Later. I will decide later what to feel.

“Of course you may have whatever aid we can offer,” Chim Schultz continued quietly. “Your flitter has weapons, as well as food. You may fly to where your friend, Robert Oneagle, has been taken, if you wish.

“We hope, however, that you will choose to remain with the evacuation for a time, at least until the gorillas are safely hidden in the mountains, under the care of some qualified humans who might have escaped.”

Schultz looked up at her earnestly, his brown eyes harrowed with sadness.

“I know it is a lot to ask, honored Tymbrimi Athaclena, but will you take our children under your care for a time, as they go into exile in the wilderness?”