String Theory_ Cohesion (Book 1) - Jeffrey Lang [96]
“What happened to his followers? Were they destroyed or…assimilated?”
“Neither,” Pad said. “The Fourteenth Tribe was forced out of its lands and they wandered the edges of the civilized areas making a living as best they could. Their enhanced psionic talents made people even more suspicious. Nobody really liked them, especially because of all the troubles that started after Dagan died—earth tremors, tidal waves, changes in weather patterns.”
“People attributed natural disasters to Dagan’s death?”
“No, they attributed the disasters to the Blue Eye turning blue. They attribute the Blue Eye turning blue to Dagan’s death.”
“The Blue Eye has only been blue for twenty-five hundred cycles?” Seven asked. This was intriguing new information.
“Well, a few less than that, but, basically, yeah.”
“What happened to the Key?”
“No one knows exactly,” Pad said. “When Dagan died, they figured it had something to do with his death and the earthquakes and the Eye turning blue, so they stuck it in a box and hid it. Supposedly, it got handed down from sire to child for a long time, but then the Fourteenth Tribe got pretty thinly distributed and it disappeared.”
“And did the Fourteenth Tribe disappear?”
Pad shook his head. “Fortunately, Dagan had emphasized the importance of education, especially language, so a lot of the tribe ended up knowing more about math and languages than almost anyone else. Soon, it got to be that the other thirteen tribes needed them, so they allowed them back into the cities, but never too many and never outside the prescribed areas.”
“And their numbers grew?” Seven asked.
“Yeah. Slowly. Then, round about my great-grandsire’s time, there was even talk of the Dagan followers establishing their own city again. But then something else happened.”
“Which was what?”
“Their rih-hara-tan, a woman named Klyrrhea, got the idea that if they were really serious about their beliefs, if they really believed in Dagan’s visions, they shouldn’t just be hanging around Monorha. Someone, Klyrrhea said, should go out into space and look for Gremadia.”
“Truly?” This was an interesting twist. “Was space travel considered a radical concept?”
Pad shook his head. “Not really. People back then knew that it was possible. We’d even begun launching probes and the first ships. But what Klyrrhea proposed was doing something in a big way. Fortunately for her, she had Gora on her side.”
“Gora?”
“Yeah, Gora. Scientist. Genius. Guy was two hundred cycles ahead of his time. There was no one like him. He knew more about engineering, about rocketry and propulsion systems…” His voice tapered off in awe and envy. “If we had someone like that with us now, Monorha wouldn’t be having the problems we are.”
“Impressive,” Seven said. “So he built a ship for Klyrrhea.”
“The Betasis,” he said. “Big enough to carry ten thousand people. I’ve seen pictures of her. She was a beauty. Too bad Klyrrhea didn’t live to make that journey.”
“Interesting,” Seven said. “But I was under the impression that Monorhans did not name their ships. I believe I heard Captain Ziv say that.”
Pad snorted. “No, we don’t. Not after what happened to the Betasis. She was the first one with a name and the last. After her, naming a ship was considered bad luck.”
“The ship came to a bad end.”
“They managed to make it out of orbit,” Pad said. “But you know I should probably let Kaytok tell you this part.”
“Why?”
“Didn’t I say before?”
“Say what?”
“That Gora was his grandsire.”
The situation on the bridge sorted itself out as quickly as it could, but it was at least half an hour before Janeway felt she had a clear grasp on everything that had been happening. The exhaustion was hitting her hard now, despite the Doctor’s drugs. The drugs…She’d pay for that soon. Never mind that, Janeway thought scoldingly. Keep it together. Keep awake. Work the problems.
But there were so many of them.
Two medics were carefully lifting the Monorhans onto stretchers. Both Sem and Ziv were unconscious, though neither appeared injured. “After the medics have looked her over,