T'chaikrani Dancer

Prologue

Kristina sat alone at the center of the table in the semi-darkened conference room and waited for the two enemies to arrive. She felt apprehension rising within her, but took a deep breath and visualized serenity, feeling the tension flowing out as she exhaled. Though she was only one-fourth T’chaikrani, she had perfected her inherited abilities through years of practice.

At exactly the prescribed time, the door at the north end of the room opened and the T’chaikrani representative entered. He wore his simple yet elegant robes with an air of authority and wisdom. Though she knew he was at least 125 years old according to Earth’s calendar, he could have passed for only fifty on that planet. His distinguished appearance, combined with his obvious serenity and regal bearing, identified him instantly as a leader of his people. He radiated tranquility, and she immediately felt more calm and comfortable in his presence.

He brushed his hand near the control panel, and the room lights brightened. As he glanced in her direction, he stopped and focused intently on her face for a few seconds.

Kristina was petite and beautiful, accustomed to men’s admiring looks. She had large black eyes, a pert nose with freckles dusting her cheeks, and lips which smiled merrily at her own dimples. Her delicate features were framed by abundant hair flowing in black waves around her shoulders and down to her waist.

She knew, however, that T’chaikrani men do not admire women for their beauty. Instead, she knew that she reminded him of another young woman—one he had not seen for twenty years.

With a barely perceptible nod in her direction, he moved on and seated himself at one end of the table.

Almost immediately the door at the south entrance slid open, and the human strode into the room. Though he was wearing an admiral’s uniform, he looked too young for a position of such responsibility. With his blue eyes, sandy hair, and boyish good looks, he was almost a stereotype of the planet he represented. Even apart from his appearance, his obvious enthusiasm and charismatic personality were evident, and that alone would have identified him as human.

With only a quick glance at the T’chaikrani representative, he looked at the slender young woman seated at the table. As he made eye contact with her, he suddenly stopped and gave her his full attention. For that moment, it seemed as though he recognized her and was trying to remember where and when he had seen her. Recovering himself, the moment passed and he seated himself opposite the T’chaikrani representative.

Though she had rehearsed this moment many times in her mind, Kristina was suddenly uncertain how to begin. She considered the two men who sat with her. They were so different and yet in many ways very much the same.

The two men had been on opposite sides of the war for more than fifteen years. Working through the Harala mediators, it had taken her two years to persuade them to meet like this and listen to what she had to say. Now they were at opposite ends of the table, as far apart as they could be while still sharing the same room with her. From at least one end of the table, where the human sat, there was definite tension in the air.

They both watched her, waiting for her to start. She took a deep breath and let it out, quelling the anxiety in her stomach. In spite of her careful training, she was still much more human than T’chaikrani.

When she spoke, her voice was quiet yet forceful, reflecting none of the nervousness she had felt earlier. For most of my life, this senseless war between humans and the Alliance has affected millions of people on a dozen planets. My earliest memories are of this war, and it has ruined my life. By sharing this most unusual story with you, I hope to do my part to bring this nonsense to an end. I thank both of you for giving me this special opportunity.

She looked at each of the men, pausing briefly. I don’t know all the details of the story, and you’ll have to help me by providing your part of it at the right times. Working in harmony, we should be able to piece together the entire history.

She smiled at the human, who was obviously confused, and transmitted a subtle message of encouragement and assurance to his mind. Let’s begin at the beginning, she announced, when my mother was a young woman named T’Ariel. It was the T’chaikrani leader’s turn to be surprised, but she ignored him. Gathering their three minds together into a shallow gestalt, she began her narrative without hesitation.

Part I

T’ariel

Chapter 1

T’Ariel sat stiffly beside her father, grimly determined not to display the turbulent emotions swirling in her mind. She blinked away a tear which threatened to roll down her cheek, grateful for the traditional white veil which hid her face.

With perfect elocution, the Sh’kaish orated the ancient T’chaikrani phrases, unchanged for a hundred generations. T’Ariel had heard it all before, at other ceremonies, but never for someone so close, so beloved. If she had thought about it at all, T’Ariel would not have expected her mother’s funeral for at least another fifty years.

T’Ariel tried to sort out her thoughts and emotions, but everything was jumbled in her mind. She easily identified her strongest emotion—anger. She knew it was irrational and unfair, but she had to admit she was angry at her mother for dying, for deserting her on this harsh and barren planet, for robbing her of the primary source of love and joy in her life.

She stole a glance at her father, hating his perfect composure and untroubled serenity. If her father were human, she could sob in his arms and pour out her grief; but no, he was T’chaikrani, and he would not approve her unseemly display of emotion. She wondered if her father had ever really loved her mother or her. T’Ariel desperately wanted to feel love or tenderness or some other positive emotion for her father, but at the moment she could feel nothing more than keen resentment.

As the Sh’kaish droned on, enunciating the sonorous phrases to ensure her mother’s soul would find a proper birth in some other part of the universe, T’Ariel deliberately turned her thoughts away. She recalled the key events by which her father had brought her to this point in time.

Like all T’chaikrani children, her father’s mate for life had been chosen while he was still quite young, no more than four or five years old. As they grew up together, Karien and Chalini had come to admire and respect each other, and they looked forward to the day when marriage would consummate their relationship.

It was one of their happiest days when they completed T’oliek training and became T’Karien and T’Chalini in an appropriate ceremony.

Then, in a terrible tragedy just one week later, both his father T’Childe and his fiancé T’Chalini had died in a freak accident during a routine shuttle run to an outer planet. After their funeral, T’Karien went into total seclusion, emerging several weeks later with an even stronger, more mature personality. He quietly assumed his father’s position as the Kierk, becoming—at only thirty years old—the youngest ruler in T’chaikrani history.

Among the most difficult problems facing the young Kierk was the continuing conflict between humans and the other races in this sector of the galaxy. T’Karien believed strongly that humans were a valuable addition to the Alliance, and strived for forty years to improve relations. Then, entering the prime of life at age seventy, he astonished both planets by announcing his engagement to a human named Dorothy Williamson. Their marriage did more to strengthen the shaky relations between the races than anything else.

Their first child had been a son, and the races came a little closer together as a result of his birth. Four years later Dorothy became pregnant again, and tests showed this child would be a girl.

But tragedy seemed to haunt the Kierk, and while Dorothy remained on T’chaikrani, T’Karien and his son visited a non-Alliance planet. They both became ill with some exotic virus which baffled physicians. T’Karien was able to shake off the infection, but Ariel’s birth a few weeks later was overshadowed by the death of her brother just hours before she was born.

T’Karien raised his daughter to the very best of his ability, indoctrinating her with T’chaikrani culture, logic, and emotional control, but she always responded best to her human mother, who showered her with love and affection.

Except for having her father’s large black eyes, Ariel looked as human as her mother, and it was totally unexpected when she began showing Kai T’oliek abilities at four years of age.

Though T’oliek—a limited telepathic ability to receive or transmit thoughts and emotions, coupled with logic and emotional control—could be mastered by all T’chaikrani, very few humans were capable telepaths, and almost none cared to control their emotions. Even among the T’chaikrani, the more powerful Kai T’oliek abilities were usually limited to females in the royal line once every four or five generations. Unfortunately, women who inherited Kai T’oliek were always sterile, so as children they were never chosen as mates for T’chaikrani boys.

It was difficult to believe Kai T’oliek abilities could be manifested in a half-human child, and Ariel endured many tests before scientists confirmed and accepted the results.

Because she was strongly empathic and very sensitive to the emotions of those around her, Ariel received special training to help her deal with constant psychic bombardment. Since she could also forcefully project her thoughts, feelings, and emotions into the minds of others, she required even more training to control her spontaneous mental transmissions.

After twelve years of careful training, she had definitely earned the right to be called T’Ariel. In particular, she had refined her Kai T’oliek transmissions to incredible power and precision. In one test, she had transmitted mental images to the entire population of the capital city, and she hadn’t even tried hard. With a strong effort, she might have reached half the planet or more. In another test, she had transmitted her thoughts to a particular person on a planet on the opposite side of the solar system. Her transmission was so narrow and precise it had not affected any other person except the intended recipient.

T’Ariel had learned very well to control or entirely suppress her mental transmissions, but she had been less successful in blocking other people’s thoughts and emotions from her mind. She sometimes felt like a receiver which couldn’t be turned off. Her only real relief was isolation, and her understanding father did what he could to ensure her privacy.

Also, only she and her mother knew there were times when her human side took over, when uncontrolled emotions came raging up and caused her to say exactly what was on her mind.

As the funeral ceremony concluded, this was one of those occasions when the unfairness of her mother’s untimely death threatened to bring anger, grief, resentment, rage, and all her other chaotic emotions boiling to the surface. But she rose from her seat gracefully to follow her father out of the building.

As they stepped outside into the blazing binary suns, T’Ariel lifted her veil just enough to let the hot breeze suck the tears from her brimming eyes. She could hardly wait to get into the waiting vehicle and return to the sanctuary of her own room, but guests were gathering around her father. She knew it would be hours before she could make her escape.

She wanted to scream in frustration, but instead she compressed her lips into a thin white line beneath her veil, determined not to embarrass her father with her human failings.

Though they tried to mask their feelings, the T’chaikrani had always been suspicious of T’Ariel’s human heritage, but after twenty years she had learned to ignore their bigotry. Besides, it was only one week until her toliek at the Academy of Arts, and then she would show them exactly what she thought of their puny prejudices. She almost smiled at the thought, but quickly suppressed it. There would be time for that next week.

Chapter 2

T’Ariel stood in line, waiting for her turn to go on stage. She was next, and butterflies were starting in her stomach, but she savagely curtailed them. She took a deep breath and used the Shekoliel to calm her nerves. She couldn’t allow herself to make even the tiniest mistake.

The T’chaikrani were very proud and very particular, believing only they could perform toliek with the necessary skill and control. Here she was, half-human, trying to break in, trying to be admitted to the most prestigious dance and drama school in the entire sector, the T’chaikrani Academy of Arts. She stole a glance at the three members of the Council of Judges, the ones who would determine the merits of her dance. Their stern faces did nothing to make her feel better. After years of preparation, this was her final hurdle—to perform before the judges a toliek of her own design.

Toliek was named after the all-important discipline of T’oliek, literally, small T’oliek. It was a dance which used body movements and the dancer’s T’oliek ability to project emotions onto an unstable force field tuned to the dancer, producing colorful images and patterns. A good toliek dancer could not only display his or her emotions onto the force field, but project the emotions directly into the minds of the audience as well. For this reason the dance required not only physical precision, but also total mental control.

The dance was composed of shape, form, color, and time. Combining these four parameters, an argument was made. The dance was more than just a beautiful interplay of lights and colors—the argument portrayed and the emotions projected had to be complete and rational. Since this was her final test, her argument had to be one not danced or argued previously.

She was rather proud of the toliek she had designed. She called it Motek, a word implying both conflict and synergy in her father’s language. Her dance tackled the difficult problem of human-T’chaikrani relations. There were many who considered humans to be inferior because they could not master T’oliek. Humans were not telepaths, and they expressed their emotions freely instead of controlling them the way normal beings should. They were almost uncouth. Some people claimed humans should have no part in the Alliance until they could learn proper manners.

Her argument was that humanity added something no other race could, precisely because they were so willing to show their emotions. Although it was upsetting to other races, humans had something which added a vital ingredient to life. Using the T’chaikrani’s own logical methods, she hoped to show that rather than barring them from the Alliance, they should be embraced even more firmly.

She started to smile, but quickly stopped. Though she wasn’t yet on stage, people were watching her, a human among the T’chaikrani.

T’Ariel Aut’Karien had not used her real name for the entry trials, because she wanted to be accepted on her merits and not the merits of her family name. As the only surviving child of the Kierk, he who was the most senior member of the Executive Ruling Council, and being a half-breed, her name was well-known, some might even say infamous. Yet for all the publicity of who and what she was, very few people knew what she even looked like. As a possible heir to her father’s position on the Council, the time would come soon enough when she would lose her anonymity.

Her pseudonym being called brought her out of her thoughts with a start, and she moved to the center of the stage. Her hair normally cascaded in magnificent waves down to her slender athlete’s waist, but for this all-important dance she had it firmly pinned up so it wouldn’t distract from her carefully rehearsed movements. The butterflies were beginning again, but she raised her head proudly, calmed herself, and signaled for the force field to be activated. The technicians activated a force field tuned to the exact frequency of her brain waves, surrounding her with a shimmering rainbow of colors.

The first crucial step in the dance sequence was purely mental—she had to empty her mind of all feeling and emotion, so the force field became totally invisible. She would be graded on how quickly and thoroughly she caused the field to disappear. For a normal human this would have been completely impossible, but within seconds she had caused the field to fade into nothingness. As the force field disappeared, the technicians began playing the music she had composed for this dance.

The music was immediately unsettling to the judges, the audience, the technicians, and the other competitors. It was not T’chaikrani music, but music played only on Earth. This was a total break with toliek traditions formed over hundreds of years.

Standing motionless in the center of the field, she allowed the music to play for several bars, then began her dance in a most unusual way. She formulated a sudden burst of joy in her mind, and the field responded with a brilliant yellow color which blazed forth in a shocking display of emotion. Hidden from her audience by the shimmering golden curtain she had created, she projected her joy directly into the minds of the judges and the audience.

Though the room was filled with T’chaikrani who prided themselves on controlling their emotions, her action was so unexpected that an audible gasp swept the auditorium.

Without giving her audience a chance to recover, she began the movements associated with the first phase of her dance routine. In this phase she was demonstrating the human side of her argument—very emotional, very outgoing. She took the colors and clashed them in ways which, while not unpleasing to the senses, were startlingly different from anything a T’chaikrani would or even could compose. She was symbolizing the emotions and the conflicts which humans had introduced to the other worlds. To reinforce this part of her Motek, she projected confusing jumbles of distinctively human emotions to her audience.

She paused slightly, again clearing the force field into invisibility, then started the second phase of her argument, the T’chaikrani perspective. She danced toliek in its most pristine, its most elegant, its most logical form. Using exactly the traditionally correct