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  “We’re coming in too fast,” cried out Dakaru in a panic.

  “Increase the inter-output into the elevator exchange,” Saru ordered, also watching the speed dials with growing concern.

  Saru performed a rapid mental calculation.

  Use the alternative landing site,” he ordered as he extracted the relevant data from the computer banks and transferred it to Dakaru.

  With ponderous might the Limokko veered that infinitesimal amount that would mean she would land on the alternative site, some distance north of the original.

  Saru held his breath and prayed that she would retain enough ‘lift’ to keep her high enough over the mountains.

  ”I hope the lake is a shallow one,” commented a frowning Zahra, analysing the scrolling data on the screen in front of her.

  “The Nahoko reported it to be fourteen kells in depth,” Saru replied, not taking his eyes off his own screen (the ship was twenty kells in height).

  “What’s at the bottom?”

  “It didn’t investigate that deep.”

  “Hope for the best and prepare for the worst,” said Dakaru with some attempt at levity, “escape hatches are primed. We’ll get out, never fear Saru, even if it is a lot deeper and she begins to settle, or sinks for that matter.”

  “In that case we’ll have to leave everything behind,” Saru reminded him.

  “Better that and being alive my old friend,” he replied, “she won’t sink immediately anyway, even if there are a hundred kells of mud and slime at the bottom, she’s airtight.”

  “Your attempt at humour,” said Saru, “is misplaced,” but he didn’t look annoyed, “I agree with you.”

  The Limokko dropped planet wards, juddering on occasion, the hum from her engines growing louder as more and more kinetic energy was transferred to the elevator exchanges.

  “Stop worrying,” said Dakaru, “we’re going to make it. I can feel it in my wings.”

  “I also,” said Zahra as she manipulated the codes for the landing protocols as they descended through some large air pockets.

  The Limokko stopped juddering and continued more smoothly, a steady glide towards the lake.

  She was visibly slowing now, but it was imperative that her momentum was kept going, not too much, in case she should come in too fast and crash, not too little, in case she dropped like a stone.

  It was ten tvans to touchdown, the Limokko was still forty thousand velos up and on the underside of her belly close to the leading edges it was hot enough to melt steel. Plasma flaring had ceased and had been replaced by reactive hypersonic flow. Drag was increasing with the reactive deceleration. Dakaru was preparing himself to take over control as soon as they reached a stable supersonic regime. Her nose pitched forward so that she was pointing downwards.

  The Lai compressed their wings into their sides and braced themselves for landing impact.

  She landed in the lake with a gigantic splash that sent ripples of water over the nearby land by as much as two hundred kells.

  * * * * *

  For better or worse, thought Saru, here we are. Turning to Dakaru he gave his last order as the Limokko’s Susa. “Open all hatches and get the floats away. Ltsctas out. Everylai else grab personal possessions and follow them. Everylai on dry land as soon as possible. We will come back and gather what else we can when we see she is actually going to keep afloat.”

  Afterwards, Saru was very glad he had given that order.

  A bare thirty tvans after the wet and bedraggled Lai had reached the lake shore the Limokko began to sink. She had sustained too much heat damage during entry on her lower hull for it to stay in one piece for long. The Boton’s report to the contrary, the lake was a deep one, it’s inky depths full of thick oozing mud, and with her underbelly damaged the Limokko could not sustain floatability for any length of time.

  Only the prepared items that they had had the foresight to place on the rafts and grav-floats remained to them to remind them of their journey.

  The Lai, some three hundred and so of them, watched as their home sank deeper and deeper into the bubbling water. By night-time even her top frame had disappeared.

  The Lai gathered what items were left to them and picking up their burdens made their way into the forest that would become their new home.

  * * * * *

  From a safe distance the furry native inhabitants had been watching the events with naive inquisitiveness.

  At this stage of their species’ development they might not be able to speak their surprise at what they had seen out loud but they had fair-sized brains and could communicate quite nicely with each other with sight and sound.

  Little did these creatures know that they had just witnessed the catalyst that would bring on their mental development by leaps and bounds.

  Little did the Lai know that their assessment of these creatures’ sentience had been as wrong as wrong could be.

  A partnership based on mutual respect and friendship was not to be long in arriving and would survive and flourish during the generations to come.

  * * * * *

  EPISODE 4 – DAGAN

  SENTIENCE

  Anything you can do we can do better!

  “Saru? May I have a word?” Dakaru peeked his golden head into the leaf roofed daga that belonged to Saru, his mate Sanua and their three ltsctas.

  Saru looked up in a benign fashion. He so enjoyed the tvans sitting on his and Sanua’s hardening eggs. As he was wont to say; the process of laying, hardening then hatching was so much more pleasant and enjoyable now they were no longer on the ship.

  Their family, the ltsctas, Maru, Velua and little Belu had hatched on board the Limokko. Their eggs had been laid in one of the specially designed compartments and the subsequent gestation of the little ones fraught with the difficulties peculiar to space travelling. Gravity levels had been the main problem, not being entirely conducive to successful hatchings. Sanua had laid five eggs on that occasion and only three had developed to full term. This time four had been laid and they were in high hope of four live egg-emergences. Certainly the scratchings and movements he could hear and feel underneath his belly were encouraging.

  So it was with a happy countenance that he turned to Dakaru with the unsuspecting words, “of course you may my friend. Anything wrong?”

  Dakaru rustled his wings.

  “Not wrong exactly,” he said, “unexpected and it will happen soon if I am any judge. Fact is, its already starting.”

  Saru’s interest was caught but he took his time in responding. With a wingtip he touched the egg lying slightly to the right of the others. Satisfied that all was as it should be he gathered in his wing with a rustle of his own and concentrated his gentle gold-glowing eyes on Dakaru.

  “What is it? It’s all going splendidly.”

  The Lai had been resident on Dagan for eleven summers now and nothing had occurred to date to make him concerned about their future here. They had moved out from the lakeside where they had landed and had travelled west to an extensive cave network more suited to their living ethos. After the generations spent aboard the Limokko, none of them had felt comfortable living among the trees and had been more than pleased when after a flyover by Saru and Dakaru they had found out about the existence of the caves.

  Now they had by and large become acclimatised and accustomed to the openness that was planetary life but they still preferred to settle inside the reassuring confines of stone when nightfall beckoned.

  Saru still felt a sensuous pleasure feeling the winds eddying around his body, so much so that he knew he could never get enough of it and the flying; that wasn’t just sensuous, it was pure and undiluted rapture. To be able to fly for as long as he wanted and for as far as he wished was pure heaven, playing in the air currents, even the rain falling as he flew was the most wonderful and stupendous experience.

  The Lai had learned how to survive on the most basic level. They had even found hunting for the food with which to fill their bell
ies more than catered for their natural instincts, submerged as it had been with the highly technological existence of their previous lives. Hunting, Saru had found, gave him a most gorgeous feeling of achievement and absorption as he selected just the right zarova or kura for lunch. The native herbivores he had found, had not that many brains, all they did was try to run away, in most cases unsuccessfully. The striped jezdic were a bit more intelligent and had learned to be wary of the winged death that swooped down from the skies but the zarova and kura panicked and ran, often straight into the paths of their hunters.

  Not that learning how to hunt had been easy. The Lai had learned much from watching the lean and striped four legged carnivores who had watched the first Lai explorations of their world. These creatures were masters of the hunt, working in groups to single out then bear down on their next meal. They were now accustomed to sharing their hunting grounds with the Lai and it didn’t appear to bother them overmuch. They had remained friendly and inquisitive and not frightened in the least. This was in part due to the decision by the Lai not long after their arrival not to hunt these creatures, in their turn, the Lind, as the Lai named them (they resembled a long dead native species that had once inhabited Daiglon), treated the Lai with a healthy respect and during the first season or two had largely kept their distance.

  As Dakaru had said, they were cute, with an appealing inquisitiveness and there were plenty other creatures nearby with far more meat on their bones to fill the empty bellies of the Lai so what was the point of hunting the scrawny Lind?

  However, as the seasons had progressed some of these Lind had lost their initial wariness and their natural inquisitiveness well to the fore, had tentatively approached the domtas of the Lai, tails wagging, furry ears up and tongues lolling.

  Nowadays most Lai family groups kept one or two or three or four around them as pets, feeding them and tending to their wants much as the primitives on a planet the Lai had visited on their way here had co-inhabited their caves with the once wild felines and canines.

  Saru knew that Dakaru had recently taken to taking the two who had adopted him and his family out hunting with him. They were good at flushing out the browsing zarova from the often thick undergrowth and chasing them into the open right into the swooping talons of Dakaru. They were pretty good at sniffing out the hiding jedzic too. Saru had heard Dakaru boasting about their prowess on the hunting grounds.

  “But do they leave what they have killed for you to collect or do they eat it themselves?” had teased Jansu, a young black-golden skinned descendant of Brai and Lai both.

  Dakaru had been most indignant at what he interpreted as a slur on the morals and habits of his well-trained pets and had bristled immediately, shaking his ear knobs, pretending that he could not have possibly heard aright.

  “Yes they so,” he had insisted with mock indignation, “I told you they are well worth training. Strange as it may seem to your black-covered disbelieving ear knobs but it is almost as if they understand what I am telling them.”

  Jansu had laughed as had the others gathered round the bonfire they had lit to celebrate their tenth anniversary of landing on Dagan.

  “Quite impossible,” said another, “they don’t have enough brain power to understand,” he added with a guffaw and an arch look at Dakaru.

  “See you,” said Jansu, shaking his head, “you’re getting your wings all in a tangle my friend, next you’ll be telling us that they’ve begun to talk!”

  Hilarious hilarity was the order of the celebrations after this and an embarrassed Dakaru had remained largely silent for what remained of the evening.

  “So what is it you wish to say?” enquired Saru.

  Now that the moment was upon him Dakaru was finding himself reluctant to begin. He shuffled around on his talons and wrung is digits together with agitated indecision. His wings, instead of sitting relaxed at his sides were tense and quivering, a sure indication for Saru that the information his friend was about to impart must be disturbingly important.

  “I’m listening,” he encouraged and Dakaru began, “do you remember the night of the bonfire?”

  “Sanua would have the wings off me if she though I’d forgotten. Sure, it was the night before the eggs arrived.” He settled his bulk down on them to make his position more comfortable, at this stage of their development the shells were hard and more than hard, they were apt to get most uncomfortable for the sitter if he or she sat on them for too long. Sanua had been out hunting for some time now.

  “They look wonderful!” admired Dakaru regarding the parts of the shells visible to him.

  “They progress well,” answered Saru with pride and realising that this was an attempt by Dakaru to change the subject, added, “all should hatch well and healthy but thanks to your praise we digress. What about that evening?”

  “Not that evening only,” Dakaru answered, shuffling round on his talons again.

  “Then when?” asked Saru in a perplexed voice. “What are you trying to tell me? I do remember the celebration. Sanua couldn’t get comfortable no matter how she tried and the rumbles from her stomach!”

  Saru rolled his expressive eyes.

  “The eggs were making their imminent arrival felt,” agreed Dakaru with a laugh, “do you remember …?”

  “You’re changing the subject again,” chided Saru, “hurry up, Sanua’ll be back soon and you know how touchy she is about others around her precious little ones to be.”

  “She allows the Lind to sit around them though, does she not?” asked Dakaru.

  “Well, yes, she likes having them around and they are expert at keeping the slithering brbstas (snake-like creatures) away. They seem to have an extra sense where they are concerned.”

  “Quite,” said Dakaru.

  “Quite what?”

  “They protect our eggs. They are both protective and fascinated, an interest and fascination which has not abated. I believe that they were most surprised when out of them emerged the ltsctas that first time.”

  Saru cocked an eye at Dakaru, “you’ll be telling me in a tvan that you told us that night is true!” He said the words in jest and was amazed when Dakaru took at step back, his hide glowing more golden than usual.

  “Well …” stuttered Dakaru.

  Saru took a deep breath, all at once remembering exactly the conversation round the bonfire that night.

  “You are telling me,” he enunciated his words with care, “that the Lind have told you about this surprise with the eggs?”

  “Not in so many words no, but I am convinced that they are trying to.”

  Saru let his breath out.

  Now that Dakaru had managed to disclose the initial surprising news, he continued apace, “I’ve been wondering for many moon times now,” his words were tumbling over each other in his haste, “we called the first little Lind who arrived at our daga Andei, he is a male. I knew from the first that he was of above average intelligence for one of his kind, at least the ones we have had interaction with, he only made a mess on the floor of the daga once and him only tiny. Adua,” Adua was Dakaru’s mate, “she said it was a pity to have only the one, he was so good at getting rid of the brbstas so she asked me to go out and catch another. I didn’t even need to go and look, a little female was waiting for me not far away …”

  “Waiting for you!” exclaimed Saru.

  “Now they’re both adult and I’ve been observing them more and more of late. I know they communicate with each other, some sort of mind to mind contact I presume and their barks and whines, well, some individual ones, some appear to repeat themselves and they are being uttered in the same order each time. You might think me foolish but I began to talk to them, sensible talk, not just giving them commands using word and gesture and believe it or not Saru, they began to respond.”

  Saru still looked sceptical.

  “We’ve got a couple of Lind of our own,” he said, “and I’ve noticed nothing.” He snuck a glance over to the corner where the two o
f them were sleeping.

  “Have you tried to talk to them?” asked Dakaru.

  Saru looked highly amused at this. “Hardly!”

  “But haven’t you felt them listening when you talk to others?”

  Saru shrugged his wings but Dakaru was a good friend of his and so he felt he couldn’t dismiss what he was telling him without giving it due consideration. Dakaru was an eminently sensible Lai and not much given to flashes of imagination or speculation.

  “I suppose they do listen,” he conceded, “but Dakaru, they’ve never attempted to talk to me, communicate, yes, possibly. If they had I’ve probably jumped out of my hide with the shock. You must be mistaken.”

  Dakaru looked stubborn.

  “I am not mistaken and Adua agrees with me. Andei and Taya, that’s what we called the little female, they interact with our ltsctas too, sometimes we think that the whole squalling lot of them are holding a conversation which we know nothing about until the mischief they have been planning happens. You must come visit us at our daga Saru, see and listen for yourself.”

  “I will,” replied Saru, “when Sanua gets back and takes over the eggs.”

  But it was the next day before Saru was free to visit the daga of Dakaru and Adua. When Sanua had returned after her successful hunt she had declined the opportunity to sit on the clutch and had insisted Saru continue his egg-sojourn until dawn.

  “I am in need of the time to digest in comfort,” she declared, “and I want to spend some leisure to spend with the ltsctas we already have. They grow so fast these days and will be flying free from the daga before we know it.”