PART TWO OF THREE
Early the next morning, I "shuttled in" which was the simple matter of psychologically expunging Cristex from my mind. I never had to morph him again, and now that I knew that, it seemed as though he was the one image I couldn't keep at bay.
However, feeling the cold comfort of my own hands against the insides of my elbows, twitching my perfect blade with my powerful muscles, and viewing the insides of people without desire or permission made me feel freer than I had since Andal. It was totally permanent now, shameless and unhidden. I was Jennor-Elacable-Barees, personally and professionally.
Trainer expected thanks for his act. I put my hands up against the wall for the first time all week.
At 1300 hours precisely, War-Prince Porrolack came to inspect me. I thought it would be despicably easy to impress him, with the limited information I already knew about him and the clear vision of his mind and heart I could now obtain. He was charmed by my smile, worried by the vague and devastating view of my time in the war, and sympathetic to my obvious vulnerability and femininity, but he still seemed uncomfortable with me. I wasn't sure why. Porrolock wished me luck, and warned me about how difficult it was going to be to fill my predecessor's hooves, and I said, (yes, they were much bigger than mine.)
Probing everyone was easier than it had been before. Coupling people's emotional histories with facial expressions and posture rather than just listening to random echoes inside our scoop like radio static made me great at my personal, shameful art. Trainer noticed this and said I had to be careful not to make my knowledge obvious.
(People with secrets are always vigilant, Jennor. They run statements through their heads more than once, they carefully scrutinize other's reactions to that dialogue. If they see that you can see them, your own secret may be compromised.)
I promised to keep my revelations hidden.
It was time to get to know everyone else.
I didn't quite know how people would react to a female warrior. Immediately, I found that males behave very differently when a female is present. It's not just a change in conversation or posture, but a change in their entire demeanor. A relaxation they maintain in their own presence vanishes. Spines straighten a little, tail postures extend, hooves lift a little higher than usual. They're not necessarily more polite, just more aware of themselves.
I didn't know how long this would last. I was a female, but could I ever become as invisible as before? Would I submerge into their culture silently? Or would something entirely different happen? Would their respect diminish while their awareness of me remained?
After a while, this happened, but not for the reasons I thought.
The older warriors had a mark on them, a respect and dignity from a different time. A time, perhaps, before there was war. Perhaps they still had memories of peace and hope and optimism. Perhaps they could remember the value of life, the reason we fought, the point of the sacrifice.
The younger warriors did not have this. One day, all the old warriors got called away to a system closer to Andal, and more young warriors flew in. They were without this peace, hope, and belief. I was a memory of their limited time on Andal, trying to achieve everything they wanted with females in far too short a time. I was not a life worth protecting.
(Will you curl that ugly thing flankside for me?) one asked, gazing at my tail blade, as I was walking back to the scoop one day. I ventured from the scoop alone as seldom as possible, but sometimes necessity forced me. (No, she would never give something so precious to someone so undeserving!) His friend howled. (As for me, on the other hand…)
It often became a game to them, a game that drew both combatants and spectators. And I was never a participant. Only the prize. They touched me, slapping my haunches or grabbing the small of my back. It took all of my self-control to keep my tail blade straight and unthreatening. Any open threat against another Andalite at base camp was a crime; if I drew free Andalite blood I could be imprisoned. I slipped up a couple of times, twitching it in a certain direction, which many considered a personal threat. It didn't take much for the boys to report it. I credited this to the fact that dainty female as I was, my tail blade was a true warrior's.
I became numb to most of this as well. Better to feel nothing than all of that.
Most, however, were polite. Most were good. All were desperate, and lonely, and on the brink of collapsing from the weight of isolation and bloodshed and terror, but most found the strength to treat me with respect. And even when they did collapse, when they forced me into some dark alleyway and told me to heal them the only they thought I could, I could appeal to their conscience, their Andalite sensibilities. I could tell them that the only thing they have, the only thing that sets them apart from Yeerks, is choice, that they could still make the right one, and then they would let me go. Some even apologized profusely and followed through on promises to watch out for me, to protect me from others who collapsed.
Some, however, were not good. They would force me into dark alleyways. They would hear no entreaty. And they would not let me go.
I knew that was how it was always going to be. And it made me feel empty.
I would have lost everything if not for a terrible and necessary hope I desperately clung to. It was the single glimmer in the fog, the one thing that made it possible to still feel pain.
Father would come for me if I asked.
I always wondered if it was time. If the time had already come and gone. If the time was still ahead of me. At what point would I be a coward? At what point would I be crazy for not doing it sooner? When would it be right? What would he think when I called him?
I was inside of the scoop once again, unclogging the dust from my hooves, idly replaying this argument in my head. Trainer walked in with a friend he'd made in the last arrival of young warriors.
(Aristh, this is Borrifum,) he said. (We won't be long. I need to show him the Shredder I want out of the annual catalog.) I saluted curtly, returning to the inspection of my hooves.
(I hate doing that,) Borrifum said to me as Trainer dug through his personal belongings. (A trick I learned is to drink your leg full and then regurgitate all of the water and mud.)
(I tried that, but it tastes awful,) I responded.
(Makes me long for dirt that doesn't stick to everything,) he sighed. (And grass you can swallow after one bite.)
(I don't remember ever eating grass so tender,) I said.
Trainer reappeared as Borrifum's eyes narrowed. (How old were you when you left the homeworld?)
(Two cycles,) I responded, watching Trainer's eyes.
(Of course,) Borrifum said with a slight bow.
(Look at this. It fits right into the gut of your elbow so you only need one arm to operate it. And it has twice the power of the model fours,) Trainer said, eyeing me and showing the catalog to Borrifum.
(I'll see if I can requisition a couple for us. It was good to meet you, aristh.) He smiled to me. It was genuine and it caught me off-guard.
(Likewise,) I answered, probing into his mind slightly more deeply. There were no dark secrets darkly hidden, unlike Trainer—Borrifum's mind was a relatively open field for me to graze upon. He was as content as anyone in open combat could be, without overabundance of envy or spite or vindictiveness, which were staples in Trainer's mind. He wasn't particularly bright—thought did not transcend normal courses of everyday worry and routine—but those things in his worry and routine seemed benign. He smiled again, noting the depth of my gaze in that selfish way men do, and exited the scoop.
(You didn't want a new Shredder, did you?) Trainer asked. I glanced up at him. His anger was evident without infiltration into his mind.
(I just refilled mine, sir,) I responded.
(Of course.)
(Why are you angry, sir?)
His eyes narrowed and his fists clenched. (Stop reading me, aristh,) he ordered.
(Yes, sir.)
Though Trainer had brought many friends home before, Borrifum was the first I had known entirely as myself. I was impressed that he didn't openly treat me any differently than warriors had before I'd made the permanent switch to female, and even more impressed by the way he thought of me. I was still too young to be an adult, but I was far along enough in my third cycle, typically regarded as the cycle of change, to be viewed as a woman rather than a girl. Most warriors were crude when viewing me. Some were hopeful, others despondent. Borrifum had carnal thoughts, as everyone did, but he deflected them in shame.
Trainer never really saw me. The only way he could keep the guilt and self-hate away were to look past me.
I liked when Borrifum came to visit. I wasn't captive with him. I wasn't an aspiring warrior. For bits of time in our interaction, I felt as unguarded and careless as I'd been with Terenia. He told me jokes, and I laughed, more from need than genuine reaction. He asked me about my past, which I thought was sweet, even though I had to lie. And, most of all, he didn't report our conversations back to Trainer. In a small, convoluted, twisted way, I could be myself around him.
One day, while Trainer was out running a sole errand, Borrifum came to visit me alone.
(Hello, Jennor, I got something I think you may like,) he said, entering with his arm behind his back, a big smile plastered in his stalk eyes. The image of a hoof-cleaning tool completely filled his mind. By this time, I was good at acting surprised.
(That is very kind, Warrior,) I said as he showed me the tool. He approached hesitantly, beginning a risky new plan. He knelt down and lifted one of my front hooves. I felt a sudden surge of fear, but an involuntary whisper of trust quieted it.
(Its operation is very simple,) he said, touching the bristle-covered end of it to the fleshy inside of my hoof. (Open up,) he said, and I obeyed. (Just turn it on, and it draws all the muck down.) I felt prickles of pain followed by cool, satisfying clarity as the tool worked.
(That is wonderful,) I mused as I felt eight years' worth of gunk excavate my hooves. I felt a tingle of something warm and electric come from Borrifum. I looked down, catching him staring at me. His eyes were big and horrifyingly honest.
(You are so beautiful,) he said quietly. I breathed in deeply and shrugged indifferently in response. Borrifum blinked, realizing what he had just done, assaulted with shame. (No, I'm sorry, I shouldn't say that. Not that it's a lie. I just shouldn't say it.)
(Don't worry about it.)
(No, it was disrespectful and rude. Immature. Unprofessional. You're a warrior, and I should treat you with the same dignity I treat my fellow warriors.)
(I'm just an aristh.)
(You're missing the point. It shouldn't be said. I shouldn't see you that way.)
(You can't change the way you see me.)
Borrifum looked away, shaking his head. He pulled the device from my hoof too quickly and I felt it scratch the tender skin within. (I'm sorry. Here.) He handed it to me.
(Borrifum, wait,) I said as he got up to leave. (I'm not upset.)
(It doesn't matter. I'm upset.)
(Don't be,) I said, reaching out towards him from some ridiculous, hidden instinct granted to every sentient species with opposable thumbs. I grabbed his upper arm with both hands and tugged him selfishly back towards me.
He froze instantaneously. Immediately I realized my mistake and snatched my hands away. His stalk eye turned toward me slowly, totally changed, no longer kind and patient but black and delirious with rage.
(I'm sorry,) I breathed, rubbing my frigid hands and blowing hot air from my lungs in them. (I'm sorry, I didn't mean—)
(You Hermilian scum,) he raged quietly in Form Alpha, with more hatred and meaning than any of Trainer's tantrums. (You bewitched me, manipulated me. You planned my unraveling from the beginning!) He raised his tail in attack and I readied mine from sheer instinct. I had no idea what he was talking about.
(Borrifum, please calm down, we can discuss—)
(No more discussions!) He cried as his tail flung through the roof of our scoop and crashed down upon mine. I blocked, and the sound was blunt but loud. I wondered how many people could see it. I parried his blow away from the door and prepared to run for it.
(No you don't, you blood filth, you mar on the good Andalite name,) he reeled, leaping clumsily over the table and rushing toward me. Another blow cut through the top of our scoop and I blocked. Our tail blades were tangled, but mine was longer. I twitched my tail blade around and sliced his clean off.
He was defeated. He was castrated, powerless. Professional tailfighting rules, in either the exhibition or tournament setting, dictate a dismembered tail blade as an automatic win.
But he kept coming at me.
(No true Andalite will suffer you ever again.) He wrapped his hands around my neck as my tail flailed, begging to be used. His grip was uncertain and weak, and I kept pushing his hands away, until finally one of his fingers made its way toward my eye socket and I had to knock him out.
I paced frantically until Trainer returned, going over the events in my mind. Of course I knew it was taboo for Andalites to touch acquaintances with their hands. Of course I knew that Father had always told me to keep my hands warm. Why had I never thought that the two were related?
Why had I never foreseen this?
Trainer returned right after dusk. Borrifum had already begun to stir twice. I didn't know how many more times I could hit him without killing him.
(What did you do?!) He demanded shrilly, dropping to his knees and inspecting his friend.
(He attacked me.)
His stalk eye turned slowly back towards me, filled with fury and panic. (What did you do?) He repeated slowly.
(I touched him. He called me a Hermilian. He tried to choke me after I cut off his tail blade! He tried to kill me with his hands!)
(Then he is as good an Andalite as you suspected,) Trainer spat.
Borrifum's tantrum, Trainer's cold appraisal, and my own terror overwhelmed me. The weight of grief descended on my mind and hearts. I clutched my head at the base of my stalk eyes.
(Stop weeping like an infant, Jennor. Hand me my Shredder.)
I did as instructed and covered my eyes with my cold hands. (What did he mean?)
(By what? Trying to kill you?)
(What's an Hermilian?)
(You are, Jennor.)
(I didn't do anything to him.)
(It's not something you earn. You were born with it.) Trainer twisted a few knobs on his Shredder and nearly loosened the focusing lens. He held the end of the gun against Borrifum's temple, placed a folded thermal blanket over his hand, and pulled the trigger. My gasp was louder than the muted sound it made. He pulled his hand from the blanket. It was covered in blood.