Maria leaves the banned Regions before Darker does. She is happy that he was smiling when she left. He was with Eakran and they both seemed to be smiling more than usual. Their current situation is tough and they all deserve whatever happiness they can find. She thinks about the last real conversation they had in Eakran’s room and he wasn’t wrong to be worried that their time in space was changing her, but Maria doesn’t think that change is for the worst.
On the way to the planet Wiis, Maria copilots the compact ship and sits next to Whadgaf who pilots and listens to her conversation with Sevi.
“You were a patient of Representative Eakran, you witnessed his experimentation on other Earthlings first hand, and yet you lived with him? With the male Darker, who this Consortium organization resurrected from death after he was killed selling dangerous drugs that Representative Eakran made himself?”
“Basically,” Maria says, feeling a little self conscious hearing it all aloud. It made her sound almost subservient to Eakran. “I was gonna kill him,” she adds, “but he’s not the same man, or Druinte I guess, that I witnessed do bad things.”
Sevi shakes her large head slowly in disbelief. The grey pigmentation of her skin swirls in a circular pattern much faster than her head moved and it created something like an optical illusion that Maria couldn’t look at for too long.
“He sounds like Frial,” Sevi says to Whadgaf. “Maybe there is cause for his fugitive status.”
“The Druinte are scientists,” Whadgaf explains. “All of Eakran’s work is sanctioned by the IP and was presumably used in their consideration for Earth’s inclusion into the Panel. He is not a fugitive for anything he did on Earth. They claim that he brought unsanctioned Earthlings from their homeworld and risked contamination of the IP headquarters, like Eakran would be so careless.”
“Are you really ok defending this Druinte?” Sevi asks Whadgaf. “He sounds like everything I swore an oath to fight against. A nurse of universal skill is sworn to protect all life in the universe from harm, but I’m here helping to protect a murderer.”
“It’s complicated,” Maria says. “I didn’t kill him because he can do a lot for Earth. Especially considering that the COHH is keeping most Earthlings in the dark about the universe. No one but them even knows there are aliens or Earthling representatives to them.”
“How can you trust that he is not the same man that you knew on Earth?” Sevi asks.
“You look someone in the eyes, you can see it. I believe that. He used to be a secretive man, but now he’s open and giving. He is different.”
Maria thinks for a second, then says,
“If it turns out that he isn’t, I will kill him.”
Whadgaf laughs and Sevi sighs.
“The life of a child of the center is sacred and you should not be flippant about it.”
“Calm down Sevi,” Whadgaf says. “No one’s killing anybody. And we are protecting Eakran because we believe in the official mission of the IP as a lawmaking entity that protects the dignity of life in the universe. We’re fighting against the petty politics that have put Eakran’s life at risk.”
“Right,” Sevi says.
“We’re closing in,” Whadgaf says. “We’ll rendezvous with Kal in the southern hemisphere.”
There are three large continents in the southern hemisphere of the planet Wiis. They are all tropical with huge swaths of rain forest that covers most of the land and Rhasdwiis live in highly advanced cities that are integrated into the natural habitat. All Rhasdwiis, except those who live in mountainous regions, live in houses constructed high above the ground in the canopy of the trees. There are few mountain dwelling Rhasdwiis in the southern hemisphere because the mountains are harder to settle than the ranges of the northern hemisphere where the population of Rhasdwiis is pretty evenly split between the mountains and the flatlands.
Kal Qor is normally an inhabitant of the Xx Banned Regions having been banned from his homeworld of Wiis after he angered the Mhadswiis First Commander of the Wiis Defense Ministry, Pen Nuren, who is the most important figurehead of the planet Wiis. Kal and First Commander Nuren have a long history that started in their youth, and as they grew older, their love for one another intensified and blurred the lines between love and hate. As a member of the historic Nuren family, Pen was promised to marry the eldest son of another prominent family once she finished her initial military training, but she met Kal while she was stationed on the continent of Waquilwiis that is the largest of the southern hemisphere. Kal was born there, in the city of Waquis, and he trained in medicine assisting a woman who ran the local clinic of his hometown. After a large storm that caused catastrophic damage to the city, the clinic was overrun with patients and the military assisted with the damage in the city. Kal met Pen when she was injured clearing the damaged homes from the forest floor.
“Praise to Wiis that you all are here,” Kal said as he bandaged Pen’s head. A large branch had fallen and she was hit, causing a long gash along her forehead.
“The Ground Command is happy to serve,” Pen said, wincing as Kal worked.
Kal shook his head. He put on his best face when the military came to town to help because they really needed it after the devastation, but Kal was never a fan of the Wiis Defense Ministry and its many branches. His two brothers who shared his birthday were killed during the war with the Fhetat, when the Mhadswiis, or high commanders of the Defense Ministry, decided to sacrifice low level recruits as a distraction tactic that left many young, male military members dead. His mother was proud of the sacrifice her sons had made, and Kal thought that she resented him because he had opted out of military service for medical training. He knew the value of the military, but he knew that the Mhadswiis had no respect for male members and viewed them as cannon fodder.
“You are a healthy male,” Pen said, “you’d make an excellent recruit.”
Kal was instantly offended and the two argued for the rest of the time that it took Kal to tend to Pen’s wounds. And when he was done, Pen stood and grabbed him around the waist and kissed him deeply. Kal was pregnant shortly after with Pen’s first three daughters, but refused to live with her.
As they grew older, Pen’s military rank increased and Kal’s opposition to the ministry intensified to the point that he joined a group that worked to stop forced military conscription. Even though she was married, Pen spent a lot of time with Kal. Their relationship was frowned upon by acquaintances of the two, but Kal eventually became pregnant with the youngest two daughters of Pen. The animosity between them increased after the birth of their youngest daughters when Kal insisted on raising all of their daughters in his hometown. But Pen would not accept that and insisted on raising her family at the extensive estate she owned in the northern hemisphere. Pen had Kal banned from Wiis when he took all of his daughters to his parent’s home in Waquis; he was found guilty of kidnapping and accused of treason for his work to undermine the Defense Ministry. Pen has not lived on Wiis since her daughters reached adulthood, but it is related to her work.
Kal hasn’t been to Wiis, or seen his family, in almost a hundred years RET. He found his way to the Banned Regions and he has lived there as an advocate for the worldless, and he is credited with establishing the safe zone that many of the refugees of the universe call home.
He stands in the mountains of Waquilwiis, not too far from the home where he was born. He has avoided this planet for so long, but the recent state of the universe forced him back. He knows that Pen is up to something in her capacities as the head of the law enforcement unit of the IP. The story of the outlaw representative had spread quickly to the banned Regions and he met with Whadgaf and Eakran shortly after they arrived. Kal received a lot of information about the politics of the universe from the smugglers of IP member cultures who make frequent trips between the regions and their homeworld via IP sanctioned warpways.
He risks his life to return to Wiis. If he is found by the military on the planet, he could be sentenced to death, and he thinks that Pen would probably encourage it. But he could not let whatever secrets Pen was hiding continue to disrupt the fragile balance that the civilizations of the universe had attained; construtction of the Vwrawlian warpway to the Banned Regions had already disturbed refugee settlements in the safe zone. Kal agreed to help Whadgaf on Wiis in exchange for discretion, he was afraid of panic and chaos spreading the Banned Regions and he would not risk that.
Whadgaf’s ship lands shortly after he arrives and he takes a deep breath, hoping things aren’t as bad as they seem to be.
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