Ivan Cat - The Burning Heart of Night

Colonel Halifax turned red. "Dr. Bigelow, you forget yourself.

The Body cannot be prevented from calling itself to account. I myself am sworn to protect any fair and legal vote!"

"But this vote is impossible!"

"Impossible?" Tesla said, finding his voice. "It is my right!"

Dozens of voices suddenly tried to out shout each other, but Dr. Bigelow eventually shouted the loudest. "It is the Prime Consul's right to call the Body to account? but it is also impossible! Consul Tesla is not present!"

"I'm Consul Tesla!" the Prime Consul said indignantly. Bigelow stood his ground.

"No, Consul Jenette Tesla is not present." He looked at Tesla but his words were aimed for the other humans. "Jenette Tesla was made full Consul. We all received notice of the Prime Consul's edict yesterday."

"It is not necessary to have her present," Tesla said through clenched teeth.

"Only? " Bigelow raised a dainty finger, "? if there is unanimous consent from the rest of the Body.

And I, for one, would like to hear what Consul Jenette Tesla has to say on this matter."

The domestics looked around the table. They had never seen so much human skin displaying so much beautiful red.

Will humans submit?

Or riot?

Not know!

Suddenly Burke Hedren spoke up. "I would too!"

"Yes, and so would we!" proclaimed several scientists.

Dr. Yll nodded nervously.

"Where is Jenette anyway?" Panya, who was a special guest of the Body and held no vote, asked.

"Nobody knows," Bigelow said, pointedly shrugging.

"I thought I saw her leaving the perimeter in a crawler last night," said Alphonse Jeej, a geeky Subconsul in Administration.

"Really?" asked Bragg, confused. "Alone?"

"That's what I saw," said Jeej.

Urrr! wondered Rusty. How Jeej know when domestics not know?

Crash answered. Other humans not like Jeej. He sad. He like walk battlements alone at night. Not even take his domestic with him.

At least Tesla surprised too, Tengen pointed out.

Tesla was looking pale and worried.

Sensing victory, Bigelow pressed his attack. "What is Consul Jenette doing outside the perimeter in a crawler? Or doesn't the Prime Consul know?"

All eyes, human and nonhuman alike, turned to the head of the table. The Prime Consul was supposed to know everything that occurred in the Enclave, anything less was a sign of weakness. But Tesla was not about to admit to weakness. He quickly recovered.

"She is on an official Consular mission, at my request," he said, standing firm, blazing eyes daring anyone to question his explanation.

Tesla mad.

Jenette in big trouble now.

Jenette in big trouble already.

Angry comments began to pass between the two opposing groups of humans. Tempers flared.

Dr. Yll spoke up. "I propose we postpone the vote," he said in a placating manner, "until Jenette returns."

"I second that motion," Bigelow said immediately.

"She won't be back for a day or two," Tesla said nervously.

"That is quite all right," said Yll, relieved. "We will wait."

Pandemonium broke out among the humans. Tesla's hand went to his stomach.

Tesla failed! exclaimed Crash.

Underestimated Jenette's influence, said Patton.

Tesla bad looser, Rusty cautioned. Not make same mistake twice.

Tesla leaned to his left.

"Bragg," the domestics heard Tesla hiss in the bedlam. "Have my skimmer ready in fifteen minutes."

IX

It was a good batch to choose from, raised by her own hand since she now runs the domestic nursery. Every one of the kits was eager to be chosen by her. But what does she pick? A healthy specimen? No. The one with the clubbed foot! True he is large, but the choice of this crippled Arrou can amount to no good. My daughter's soft heart will be the end of her.

? from the private journals of Olin Tesla

Jenette's crawler bobbed in a skirt of ever-growing tube-and-bladder kelp that spread out from the shore of unexplored Feral Island 716, damping lively little waves which played on the open ocean. New Ascension's sun baked down on the crawler's rear deck, where Arrou had captured a buzzer unlucky enough to land beside him. The sun also shone on a rakishly tilted driver's cab and Jenette's legs, which stuck out from the generator compartment underneath.

Arrou pawed his fist-sized captive, idly frustrating its attempts to escape. "New buzzer," he said, plopping a paw across its path. "Pretty colors."

Jenette muttered under the cab. "Yeah, that's great. New buzzer, pretty colors. What about Ferals?"

Arrou looked up at the nearby island, an overgrown profusion of rich greens with a few tall trees towering over the canopy. Strange calls hooted behind the dense foliage and distinctly pungent land breeze, almost fetid in comparison to the fresh air of the open ocean, wafted over the crawler, but there was no sign of life along the shoreline. "No Ferals." Arrou leaned back over the buzzer and whipped his long tongue across its glittering carapace. "Ugh! Stings!" It was coated in acidic glaze. The buzzer reared up, hissing, and lunged at Arrou's paw, but he was too quick. All it got between its impressive mandibles were deck splinters. "Good teeth," Arrou said appreciatively.

A greasy but delicate hand shot out from under the cab. "Give me the big one," Jenette said.

Using his lame paw to block the buzzer's escape, Arrou grabbed a grippy and handed it to Jenette.

Her hand disappeared, but reappeared shaking vigorously. "No, no, the other big one!"

Arrou sighed and rummaged through a small toolkit with both forepaws. He handed Jenette another grippy as the crafty buzzer made a break for it. Arrou tried to corral it with a hind leg, but it beetled over the edge of the deck and plopped out of sight.

Again, Jenette's hand disappeared. There was more muttering, then, "Ouch!" and klink, plink, splash. Jenette squirmed back, hitting her head on the overhanging cab. Sitting beside Arrou, she rubbed both skinned knuckles and bruised head in frustration.

"Told you so," said Arrou.

Jenette scowled at him.

"Told you. Not inertializer. Powerpak dead. Now inertializer broke and powerpak dead."

Jenette scowled harder.

"And buzzer gone," Arrou added. He pursed his teeth into a cone: a sign of consternation.

Jenette wished for the grippy back so that she could throttle him with it, but all she said was, "Arrou, hush."

The alien leaned over the edge of the vehicle and Jenette heard him slurping. She thought he was fishing for the buzzer, but when he pulled back up he took her hand and spat stinging brine on her skinned knuckles.

"Ow." Jenette tried to pull away, but Arrou would not let go.

"Make better." Arrou spat more silvery water to ensure that the wound was clean, then released her.

"Thank you," she begrudged.

Arrou slobbered the last traces of ill-tasting water over the side. "Jenette welcome."

They sat for a while in the sunlight. Jenette's hand began to feel better.

"What now?" asked Arrou.

"We've got to find Ferals," Jenette replied, rising and grabbing hold of the cab, heaved it back down over the generator compartment and locked it into position. She climbed on top. Shading her eyes, she surveyed their predicament. As Arrou had said, the island appeared devoid of Ferals. Jenette turned a full circle. Many more emerald islands dotted the expanse of mirror ocean, and even a few skrag islands, withered and dry. She and Arrou had circled around many of them, but had seen neither hide nor hair of his wild brethren.

"Where are they?" Jenette said.

"Hiding," said Arrou.

Jenette nodded. "Can't blame them for mistrusting humans in vehicles." That was how the raiding parties came. The fact that they used much faster skimmers and not slow, lumbering crawlers might not make much difference to a wary enemy. She looked at nearby FI-716 again. It was overgrown in comparison to the Enclave, but the island was healthy otherwise, with no apparent dead spots, fissures, or cracks that indicated that there must be Ferals present and tending it. "We've got to get over there."