John Hemry - The Rift

“Me, too,” Goldera hastened to add. The others removed the barricade at the front door enough for the two to slip out, then Johansen and Goldera scuttled toward some of the dead Izkop, staying low.

Johansen grabbed some of the spears, watching carefully in case any of the Izkop were playing possum and still able to stab. He passed the spears to Goldera, who kept one eye on the fields beyond the compound. “Hey, corporal,” Goldera whispered.

“Yeah?”

“You scared?”

“Damn right.”

“Me, too,” Goldera confessed. “If you get out of this and I don’t, write my mama and tell her I did okay even though I was scared. Will you do that?”

“Sure.” He picked up a final two spears. “That’s two apiece for all of us. Let’s get back inside.”

“You got anybody you want me to tell anything if you don’t make it?” Goldera asked Johansen.

Johansen didn’t have to think about it. “Nah. Not anymore.” Then they squeezed inside and the door was sealed again in their wake.

Singh had them all try out the spears, which Johansen found to be well balanced for stabbing though far too front-heavy for throwing. Then everyone settled down again, the civilian adults once again all in the front room. “It’s hard being in there with the kids,” Juni complained. “They keep asking what’s happening, when they’re going home, can they talk to their parents. We told them to play and stay quiet.”

“It’s going to be a long afternoon,” Singh observed. “Tell us something about the Izkop,” he asked the civilian researchers.

Scorse grimaced. “I’m a planetary geologist. I never cared about them.”

Juni shrugged. “I’m a planetary ecologist. I don’t study one species, I study the whole system. I received my doctorate at Old Harvard under Professor Haddleton, you know. I know how everything contributes to the whole.”

“Wow,” Adowa commented in a non-committal tone.

That left Ariana, who gave Scorse and Juni cross looks before speaking. “I’m not an expert on them. I study mythic structures.”

“That probably makes you the biggest living expert,” Burgos grumbled.

Ariana winced as Singh and Johansen both pinned Burgos with glares. “That’s true. What do you want to know about the Izkop?”

“We know they’re farmers and herders. That was in the predrop brief.” Singh gestured outward. “Tell us something about how they think. You said something about heroes before. Meeting death with smiles. What kind of heroes have the Izkop got?”

Ariana hesitated. “There’s one hero they call the pass-holder. Their greatest hero. I call him Horatio, after an ancient human hero who held a bridge. The Izkop Horatio held a pass against demons that were trying to wipe out the ancestors of the Izkop. He died holding the pass. I haven’t been able to figure out whether they revere him for saving their ancestors, or for dying while holding the pass. I have a feeling their admiration has at least partly to do with the fact that he died, and would be the same even if he hadn’t succeeded. I mean, presumably there wouldn’t be any Izkop if he’d failed, but what mattered was that he died. Or was willing to die. I think.”

“Hmmm.” Singh blew out a long breath, his eyes still on the outside. “This Horatio was one of the founders of their race?”

“No. He was something separate. That mattered, too. He wasn’t of them but he died saving them. Does that make sense?”

“It does to me,” Goldera commented. “The whole Jesus thing, right?”

“Well, yes, but Horatio wasn’t the son of their God. The Izkop don’t have one God. They have many gods, and each of those gods is many things. The theology is incredibly complex,” Ariana continued, warming to her talk. “Each god can look like anybody or anything. Disguise, concealment, is very big in the Izkop myths and legends. Disguised gods and demons are everywhere, either looking for Izkop to reward for their deeds or trying to corrupt the Izkop with temptations.”

“Like the Prometheus guy you told me about?” Johansen said.

“Prometheus.” Ariana shook her head. “He’s very hard to figure out. I use the name Prometheus for him because he steals the gifts of the gods and tries to give them to the Izkop, like ancient Greek myths say the Titan Prometheus stole fire from the gods and gave it to humans.”

“What did the other gods do to Prometheus for stealing their secrets?” Johansen asked. “In the Greek myths didn’t Prometheus get chained to a mountain?”

“Yes!” Ariana gave Johansen a happy look, clearly pleased to have found a kindred spirit. “He was chained to a mountain and a vulture ate his liver every day. Since he was immortal the liver regrew every night. But the Izkop Prometheus, if I understand it right, hasn’t been punished because the gods can’t catch him.”

“Because he can look like anybody and anything?” Goldera asked.

“Exactly, only Prometheus and the other gods and demons, aren’t really ‘he.’ Each one is ‘they’ because they’re simultaneously different sexes and no sex.”

Goldera squinted at her for a moment. “This isn’t a Garden of Eden type thing?”

“No, for a couple of reasons. Prometheus is always trying to give the gods’ secrets to the Izkop. It’s an ongoing crime or temptation, rather than some ancient act. And also because the gods can’t catch and punish Prometheus. Only the Izkop can identify Prometheus. From what I’ve seen in their mythology, with its emphasis on disguises, the Izkop put a great deal of importance on actions, not appearance.”

“Kind of the opposite of humans?” Adowa remarked dryly.

“In a way, yes. Even though humans don’t look the same as them, the Izkop didn’t seem bothered by that when we landed. I think it’s because the Izkop always cared more about what we did than they do about our appearance. It’s possible,” Ariana continued in a cautious voice, “that the Izkop have as much trouble seeing emotions in each others’ expressions as humans do trying to see feelings in an Izkop. We’re not sure. The emphasis on actions over looks might be the result of them all naturally having what we’d call poker faces.”

Nassar shook his head. “What’d the people in the valley do, then? Are you saying the Izkop are reacting to something the humans did?”

Scorse had fixed a burning gaze on Ariana, who pretended to ignore it. “I think something must have happened which made the Izkop believe that we had done something.”

“They blew up everything,” Archer said. “That tells us something, right? Did they think all of the human equipment had come from this Prometheus guy?”

“They couldn’t have! We didn’t give them anything. That was a firm rule.”

“You said people showed them stuff,” Adowa noted.

“Well… yes,” Ariana conceded. “But there were rules. Let them see things, so they could understand they were just tools, nothing magic or accursed. And the Izkop have gradually shown more interest in our equipment. They know some human words, and the most common ones we hear are probably ‘show us use it.’ So we show them how we use something. They’ve been asking that more, from what I understand, and why would they be doing that if they thought our equipment was the property of the gods?”

“It’s natural curiosity,” Juni said in a low voice. “Universal survival behaviors linked to integrated conceptualization of their environment. Not superstition.”

Ariana sighed. “If the Izkop thought our equipment was something stolen by Prometheus from the gods, if they thought we humans were working for or with Prometheus, why would they keep showing interest in the equipment? And if showing interest in the equipment is okay for them, how could that have triggered a massacre?”