Gulliver's Fugitives - Keith Sharee [46]
But at this moment they were hiding from a one-eye, which hummed and hovered above the rocks, trying to find the humans it had detected from a distance. The Nummo had seen the one-eye coming from far away and had had time to worm their way deep into the dam. Now the Nummo reached a space in the middle, like a beaver lodge, where they could be safe, shielded by the water and the rocks.
While the Nummo twins were forced to hide, the rest of the CS squad passed by the dam and began to set up for their assault on Alastor.
Rhiannon and Lomov led Troi into the cave used for dining.
Around a great round table hewn from stone sat two dozen people eating, laughing, and talking in many languages. They were all clothed in parti-colored, dirty castoffs.
Odysseus sat away from the table, on a step in a rough stairwell, following Troi’s entrance with interest.
The diners fell silent.
Odysseus stood and addressed them.
“This is Deanna,” said Odysseus. “She seems to have arrived in our midst by mistake. I’m afraid we can’t let her leave, but other than that she can be treated like any other Dissenter.”
With that he withdrew to the background and let Troi fend for herself.
Rhiannon motioned Troi toward a rough wooden stool next to a white-haired, ebony-skinned elderly woman. Troi sat.
“My name is Gunabibi,” said the elderly woman, as her face, which Troi recognized as the Australian aboriginal racial type, crinkled in a smile. “Have some of my stew, won’t you?” She pushed a bowl toward Troi.
Troi still felt jumpy inside and wasn’t sure if she could bring herself to partake of the lumpy green and brown stew. She recognized some of the plant leaves in it; she had seen them growing around the sulfur pools farther up the caverns.
Aromatic fragrance from the stew reached her nose and her mouth began to water. She was suddenly hungry. Rationality dictated caution but her stomach seemed an independent unit. Picking up a wooden spoon, Troi tasted the stew.
It was delicious. She ate it all.
After dinner, everyone left the table and sat on stones set around a pile of glowing red embers.
Troi noticed that Odysseus didn’t join them. He stood near the entrance to the dining cave. Staring out, he seemed intensely vigilant, as though he sensed an imminent danger.
He looked at that moment so much like an ancient Greek epic hero that Troi found she had to stop herself from believing that he was one. She remembered the character “exercises” she’d seen him do. Now he was fully in his character.
She approached him.
“You think we’re going to be attacked, don’t you,” she said.
That got his attention. He seemed fascinated at the way she’d guessed his feeling.
“What makes you say that?”
“That’s not important. Is it true?”
“The Nummo never returned from their patrol. That might mean the CS are out there.”
“Then why can’t you let me leave? Why do you want me to be arrested along with you?”
“I don’t. Neither of us is going to be arrested. The CS are stupid, like a cyclops. We’ll protect you from them.”
She didn’t know what to say and couldn’t see how they could protect her.
He seemed to understand her feeling and looked her directly in the eye. “I give you my word as Odysseus, son of Laertes, that I, and my people, will protect you with our lives.”
She mumbled some kind of thanks and walked away, taken aback by the intensity of his determination. At that moment she was caught in ambivalence; on the one hand these Dissenters seemed so idealistic, so caught up in their stories, that she thought she should seek escape and strike out on her own, and on the other hand, she found herself wanting their help and able to believe that they could somehow provide it.
In this frame of mind she went to sit with the other Dissenters near the glowing embers. The old woman named Gunabibi came over and sat next to her, explaining that it was storytelling time. She said that all of the Dissenters were experts in their own myth-heritages.