Summary: One of the adventures the intrepid pair have on their journey
Rating: G
Part: 1 of 2
[thoughts are shown in square brackets]
*****
Prologue
"Planetary system Beta-Draconis 495 is a backwater, lacking in notable biological or mineral deposits. The native sentients of the second planet are stuck in an early Bronze Age analogue, with no hope of advancement. While the biota of the second world bear both male and female within a species, the sentients appear to be solely females. Further studies will have to wait for another day."
"Note: there appear to be highly advanced organic objects of unknown purpose floating in the asteroid ring and near the moons of B-D495, likely constucted by an extremely advanced race, though no other evidence exists for them."
- IPX logs 2/2/2259 AD
*****
Part One - 4/9/2263 AD
Lyta Alexander was looking out the window. Bored.
The past three planets that she and G'kar had visited were okay, if a bit on the uneventful side. The last one, Paolei, had cephalopod natives whose intensely fierce trading formed the background of their entire culture. Oh how G'Kar'd used some of the lessons learned there - mostly trying to keep them from buying her - in that book he was writing.
[Some people], Lyta reflected, [couldn't sit and stare at hyperspace too long like I am; not without risking mental illness of some stripe. Maybe the vorlon part of me helps], she wondered, then filed that thought aside for later. Right now, she was looking for patterns in the shifting colors, rather like clouds.
The console thrice beeped at her, knocking her from her thoughts. Looking over at it, she recoginsed the lit light that told her there was a jump gate present. Grudgingly, Lyta stood up and walked over, tapping out the sequence of buttons that would activate the gate, allowing them passage from hyperspace to normal space. If there was nothing there, then she'd just take them back through; G'Kar didn't need to be woken up at each one, despite what he had told her.
A few minutes at the long-range scanners told her the system might be worth a few hours' notice. She used the computer to turn on the light in G'Kar's bunk to wake him, and set a course for the planet that was ahead of them.
Their ship glided towards, and then down to, the little world she had picked to look at. The files claimed it was harmless, and had a breathable atmosphere. They skimmed low for a few minutes, looking around for something particularily interesting to explore. Then suddenly Lyta stood up to lean over the console, peering down with an expression of concentration.
"What is it? Do you see something?"
"I . . . sense - something down there is trapped - stuck - and I think it's a telepath!"
G'Kar slowed down the speed of the ship and intensified the scanner resolution. "One rescue mission, coming up."
"There," Lyta said, pointing to a spot to one side; G'kar saw where she was aiming, and redirected the shuttle towards there. As they neared, flying over weedy things that had aspirations of being trees, they could make out that someone or something was stuck halfway out of the ground. G'kar landed at a safe distance, and Lyta was out of the craft as soon as the engines were off.
As soon as her feet hit the ground, Lyta got a vague tingling on her skin, and a telepathic sense of unease, of irritation. A quick visual look around reaffirmed what she'd seen in the shuttle: that she, G'kar and the alien she was about to rescue were the only ones in the area. The only other things were the weedtrees and various mosses and lichens which together formed a sort of reptilian-looking surface to this hill. Lyta silently berated herself for taking those precious seconds to look about as she ran to catch up to G'kar, who was already almost to the alien.
It was barely more out than it had been while they were landing, G'kar saw. The head was narrow and long vertically, as though it had been stretched out of shape; with three pairs of gill-shaped holes, and eyes that were a dozen easy. There was a bony plate just under the neck-body junction, but that appeared to be sealed, the jagged edge that locked the two body parts together was getting it stuck in the hole in the side of the hill. The alien saw them and made a deep 'chrrr' sound, trying to get unstuck, but it was simply too big for the passage. G'kar put his arms under the being's armpits and pulled up. The alien began to rise out of it, forelegs kicking against the ground.
Pulling was tricky, as much of the aliens body was covered by a mucus, but pulling helped free it considereably, raising it inch by inch by inch. Lyta hesitated, not entirely sure how to help: she wasn't blessed with G'Kar's narn strength; she only had - Of course! Narrowing her eyes, she extended a tendril of telepathic energy to the alien, pulling it out like a rope, aiding G'kar's efforts.
Within moments, the alien was out, revealing a flag-and-flagpole shaped tail . . . and no visible manipulatory appendages. Each of the four legs ended with a single soft pad. Towering twice the height of either of them, it looked like the database images of a native sentient - but how sentient? Lyta was about to get her unasked question answered, even as G'kar leaned back against the walls of the hole to catch his breath.
[gratitude] Lyta felt in her mind, not the word but a feeling that was external to her own, then, softer: [interesting . . . unlike others] The dozen eyelids closed, the alien body going lax against the ground.
And, before their eyes, they saw the doorway extrude a diamond-pattern trellis, sealing G'kar in like a cage. Through the holes, he watched as the Chur blinked, got up, and walked off.
"What the hell just happened?"
"I have no idea. It just . . . did something. It spoke - kindof - I couldn't get any words - something about you being different - unless it meant us both?" Lyta just stared as the alien strolled out of sight into a small valley.
There was a few seconds of stunned silence, then, "Was that thing telekinetic?" G'kar asked as he tried to push open the bars of the trellis.
Lyta quickly moved to help try to free him. "No, but it triggered some kind of - thing - I think. It was telepathic though, but not with any language I can figure - damn bars!" She stood back a pace and tried to force them with her powers, then searched around the doorway for some kind of trigger mechanism, muttering to herself crossly.
"There's no button in here to be found, either." G'Kar went back to trying to push the bars out of the way, but had less than a minute to try when he looked up and startled. "Look out, there's another one!"
The alien moved in beside Lyta, but showed no sign of attacking her, not even seeming to notice her as she took up a defense posture, hands ready and eyes narrowed. The being was looking at G'kar curiously. The passage behind him opened a little bit wider, just big enough for the narn to go down. Then the lattice began to slowly pull backwards, forcing G'kar to go into the hill as it pressed against him.
"A little help here," he said crossly, taking a step backwards.
Lyta tried to get the attention of the creature, first by waving then sticking at it, then she tried to stop it with telepathic commands, but had no success, G'kar was still being guided downwards. Confused, she tells him, "There's no malice - they don't seem to want to hurt you - it - she - no . . . they . . . are fascinated. You seem completely new to them. Maybe they just want a better look?"
From where he stood a few dozen paces into the hill, he glared at her. "Are you sure they intend no harm?"
"Yes, she feels nothing but extreme curiousity. I can't stop them, G'kar, not yet - I'll try to figure how to get you out, I promise."
"Hah!" He muttered loudly, but he walked a little more willingly, being careful in the trail of slime left by the first alien, and then he had turned a corner and was out of sight.
Lyta turned towards the alien, trying to figure it out. It had two pairs of gills, not three, but Lyta still recognised that it was another of the local sentients. [Why are we being noticed - seperated, even! - when the IPX team that gathered the data was completely ignored by them? What makes us so different?] She wasn't able to understand - when she tried to scan them, she didn't get any recognisable thoughts, but the emotions were there, refined enough to compare with the most sophisticated member of any sentient race. It was almost like the aliens didn't need to think - to think.
Deciding to switch tactics, she stopped trying to actively scan, and instead, pulled back into her own head, then opened her mental shields a crack to listen. Suddenly, she understood. It was not that the creatures words were being misunderstood, it simply did not have any words. But the basic ideas - those, she could understand.
[IPX doesn't have telepaths,] Lyta realised. [That's why these 'Chur' never bothered to talk to any of them. They thought humans were just more animals and ignored them the same as I would have ignored a passing bird or a park squirrel. G'kar isn't a telepath, either, but I am - does that make me a person to these aliens? But wait -] Lyta trimmed her mind away from words, and got down to the same basic level (up to? she wondered) of pure concepts.
[curious: what intention, for gkar and I? Reason kept apart different genders, different species, other? Why?]
[pet of yours, placed in housing, seperate room from other worked ones. most impressive, advances done on it, ask, location source - baseline creature?] fourgill asked [ask, required to preform biological, or, required for social function, or, purely labor beast?] fourgill inquired next, as though she were talking about guard dogs.
[They don't realise he's a person,] she amazed, [They think he's an animal because he's not a telepath. Bizarre!]
Then,
[ . . . or they might have seen him eating.]
Driving away the stray - not to mention useless - thought, she again concentrated. [ask demand when gkar returned to me?]
Fourgill half-turned to gaze down at her. [will be done when is done. inform creature source, inform of other functions?]
She wondered how to explain the complex and unusal relationship she shared with G'kar, but quickly decided against letting the aliens know she was considered an extremely dangerous criminal by most people in the universe. Ignoring the alien for a few minutes, she tried to pass down the same tunnel the narn had been taken down, but the passage had closed up again in the time she'd been arguing and she could not possibly fit inside. She yelled down, but didn't even hear an echo. And when she tried to scan for him, a blinding wave of pain struck, burning into her head from her eyes - whatever the passage might be made of, it wasn't something she could pass her mind down to explore. Frustrated, she climbed back up the few feet to where the alien stood patiently waiting.
[when return?] Lyta pressed, trying to avoid words and concentrate on the unaltered concepts. [return gkar now. none others, not available, I want him back!]
[why? what function,] fourgill repeated her inquiry.
Lyta was quickly getting a splitting headache. "This place was a bad idea," she muttered, feeling like the entire world was an itch that she couldn't reach to scratch. [functions several, gkar not replaceable, not usable for you, return now or soon?]
Fourgill gave off a wave of confusion [what is soon?]
[soon is before later. soon is after now, now is when g'kar needed returned,] Lyta tried.
Fourgill was still confused, and Lyta could now see several more of the same aliens off in the distance, walking over at their leisure. She could soon be outnumbered, and her headache was going to be unbearable if she had to deal with any more of these bizarre creatures. [soon is measure of time,] she broadcast in frustration.
Fourgill stopped, as if she was considering something. She remained considering for several long seconds, then, [what is time?]
That stopped Lyta cold. [time is time is-] she tried to get the concept across, with images and words and memories, but none of the registered with the alien, who merely gave a soft, deep 'chrrr' sound low in it's throat.
"You have no concept of time," Lyta stated in disbelief. "And you cannot fathom that a non telepath can be sentient, or even a person. . . I'm screwed," she remorsed.
[lytabeing strange childbeing,] Fourgill told her. [chur learn what uses gkar beast has. when done will set loose if no use. lytabeing child select new pet - many beasts to choose from.]
"I'm not a child!" She yelled at them, but they either were ignoring her or could not hear. "And I don't want some wild animal! I need G'kar or I lose my freedom!"
A wash of dizziness passed over her, and she staggered for a moment. Her headache was becoming unbearable - she had a tremendous tolerance for pain, but this was incredible - she did not know what was causing it, but she had to retreat to the relative safety of the shuttle before she really did collapse.
****
A few frustrated hours later, she had fallen asleep in a chair, while still trying to scan beneath the surface for any trace of where the narn had been put. She was unable to get more than a few inches deep - if even that far - and the scanner just gave off the same rediculous reading. She'd left it running - she hadn't planned on sleeping - but it hadn't had any success when she moaned and woke up. Her headache was better, but only just. It was still bad, and she somehow knew it would get worse with every use of her powers. She has to get off this planet - but she can't leave G'kar to whatever fate is waiting for him.
[So what do I do now?]
She gave herself an injection of painkillers, even though the doubted they'd have any effect of her vorlon-enhanced biology, and sat down to think. Finally decided to alter a land-probe that's small enough to fit down the corridor - and hopefully climb through any more barriers, and set to work locating a long length of spare sensor cable. It seemed likely that the probe's signal would be no less successful in penetrating the planet's surface than the ship's sensors or her own mind, so she would need as long an antennae as possible. While she worked, she wondered how G'kar was faring.
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