Archive-name: JourEntr/j741-112.txt
Archive-author: Elf Matheiu Sternberg
Archive-title: Decanting Difficulties


Journal Entry 112 / 0741
 
     When things don't go right, I get cranky.  Sounds to me like a
perfectly normal, human reaction.  "How long will she stay down?"

     Derek checked a few displays.  "Hal?  I estimate four hours?"

     "I agree," the AI responded.  "Although with this new cross-
genetic design implementation such estimates are hard to confirm
completely, four hours seems a reasonable estimate."

     "And the rest of the report?" I asked, testily.

     "Ah," Derek replied, looking at his PADD.  "She's clean of the
amniotics in her lungs.  Upper GI tract seems to be most clogged,
followed by the lower.  I vote let natural process take care of her.
Most of it will filter out through her kidneys eventually.  It is
reasonably digestible."

     I nodded.  "Okay, then."  I rubbed my face with my hands, feeling
four-day-old stubble slide along my palms.  "You would say that Vulpins
one and two are okay."

     "I would."

     I smiled.  "Things are looking up.  I scheduled three through ten
to be decanted the day after tomorrow, providing one and two seem viable
when they come to."  I looked across the room where number two lay,
sleeping peacefully.  "At least he didn't seem to be in any distress
when we pulled him out."

     "No.  I can't figure out why her respiratory activation gave her so
much trouble."  Derek's brow knit together in puzzlement as he examined
her readouts.  "I suggest we check the other eight right now, starting
with number six.  He had some developmental trouble in the postfetal
stage."

     "What kind?"

     "Lung trouble."

     "Oh, Hell," I sighed.  "Same as hers?"

     "Could be worse.  Let's go check now."

     I nodded.  "Lead the way, Doctor Placton."  



     Two hours later Derek and I were sitting in the Pindam cafeteria,
the only two people on this airless ball of rock other than the Tleil
Century of Sapienter Vulpes scheduled to come out of their tanks during
the course of the next two weeks.  We each had a glass of ghi in our
hands and were slowly drinking them down when the alarm klaxon went off.

     "Ken!  Derek!"

     "Hal?"

     "Medical, stat.  You've got an emergency I can't control."

     I was in a dead run for the medlab, charging down the halls
unmindful of the one-sixth gravity or the fact that there were several
closed doors.  "She's up and moving, and I don't think she's fully
sentient yet.  You two are much closer than any drone I could get to
her."

     I could hear Derek's feet behind me as we approached Med Lab.
"You've got trouble, Ken, she's just swallowed something I can't
identify.  It came from the bathroom, I haven't got a camera there."

     "Cleaning supplies?"

     "I don't know."

     "Great," I said, reaching out and grabbing one of the many recessed
handholds situated along the corridor, this one by the door to Medical.
I felt the tendons in my shoulder object, ignored them, released the
handhold as I came to a stop and palmed the doorlock.

     The door opened and I looked inside.  There was a loud, yowling
screech as something, the vulpin, struck me at the side.  I reacted with
equal violence, tempering it with the knowledge that she wasn't
responsible for her actions.  Hair-trigger martial arts can be funny
that way.  I felt pain along my left side, ignored it as blocked with
the left, responded with my right in a vicious grab that she dodged.

     She took two blurringly fast steps backwards and then leapt at me.
I prepared to dodge when a high-pitched whine reached my ears from
behind me.  The leap turned into a painfully slow fall as she slumped
unconcious in midair; In the one-fifth gravity she would hit her head on
the far wall.  I jumped between her and the wall and took the the brunt
of her velocity between her shoulders and my arms.  "Ooof!"

     "What happened?" Derek asked as I tried to clear my head from the
impact between the body and the wall.

     "She woke up without us, I guess."  I looked down and heard a
strange gurguling noise coming from her throat.  "Go into the bathroom
and find out what she was going through in there!" I ordered
immediately, picking her up and dropping her on the platform she'd
originally been lying on.  "Derek!  She's having trouble breathing
again!"

     "It's worse than that," he said, running out of the bathroom.  "She
did get into the cleaning supplies.  I think she drank some sodium
hydroxide.  I found it spilled over."

     "Ohmifah," I said, ignoring the self-reference and grabbing
hardware.  "Derek, get me some amniotics, now.  If we flood her system
we can dilute."

     He nodded and ran to get the equipment.  She started convulsing,
and I started praying.



     Thirty hours later, I blinked into the darkened space of Medical.
Although Hal was a sufficient watcher, both Derek and I had agreed to
take up positions on either side of her bed, so we'd moved her platform
into slot number three and I'd taken two, he'd taken four.

     The male half of the first two tleils was also sleeping soundly
according to the readout I could see, but he wasn't in the room anymore.
Hal had assured me he'd alert me when he woke up even though he was in
P'nyssa and Loash's hands now.  They were over in the secondary Medical
center, which had more privatized spaces and access to better
interactive materials.

     I'm not sure what had woken me up.  A sound, maybe, or a smell.  I
don't usually come to full alertness like I had tonight, so I tried to
figure out exactly what had alerted me.

     Then I heard a noise come from her bed.  A shifting sound, like she
was moving again.  It wasn't convulsions, or Hal would have awoken me.
Fitful sleep?  Or was she coming around?

     We had been lucky; she hadn't drunk all that much bleach and we had
gotten to her early.  Between immediate medical attention and the new
generation of blood-borne biomechanicals, she had healed almost
completely before we'd even gone to sleep.  

     And then I heard a whimper.  A painful sound.  I got out of bed
slowly and walked over to where she lay on her side, tossing.  I
examined her in the almost dark of Medical; the only lights came from
displays over her bed or scattered about the room.  She was beautiful in
ways I hadn't anticipated.  I'd almost built the vulpin out of
capitulation to a series of articles asking, out of all the species I
could have worked with, why I hadn't worked with "man's best friend,"
namely, the dog?

     Because dogs are nearly impossible to work with.  Out of all the
species that I find attractive, dogs are very far down on my list and
genetically, dogs are a mess.  I've even used some relevant parts of
their code in my own species, but on their own dogs are a disaster.  So
much pressure has been put on them to rearrange their shape, from breeds
weighing under two kilos to breeds weighing over a hundred, that the
idea of actually trying to fit that mold to a sentient race drove me
buggy.  I refused to go along.

     But after examining foxes, I decided that there was at least on
family of canid I could work with.  I may also end up examining the
Lupus, or wolf family, some day.  But the vulpins appeared to be easy to
work with as a genepool, so I decided to try them instead.

     I ran into trouble when I decided to change my usual method of
engineering and instead attempted to build a unified new form of life
incorporating self-installing nanotech bridging across given
generations.  As it is, earlier species have to have their nanotech
scavengers tuned externally and then installed after birth.

     I reached down and stroked the side of her cheek with the back of
my hand, feeling the soft downy fur and following the curve where her
snout joined skull, smiling at my artwork and hoping, like I always did, 
that this species didn't hate me for what I'd done.  So far, none had.

     I felt her move again, and I felt something come down on my hand.
Her paw.  I smiled down at her and whispered, "Hi.  What's your name?"

     Her eyes opened, blinking and staring up at me.  She was still
holding my hand to the side of her face.  "Hi," I repeated.  "Can you
tell me your name?"

     "Rrrrr...." she growled, releasing my hand and shaking her head.
"Tarsha."

     "Repeat it?" I asked.

     "Tasha," she said, dropping the 'r' I had heard the first time.

     "Again."

     "Tasha," she sighed, sagging back against the cushion she lay on.
"What is... where... what... "

     "Easy," I said softly.  "Calm down.  Do you remember anything
before now?"

     "As what?"

     "Tasha... do you have any memories before right now?"

     She stared up at me, her eyes concentrated.  "No... wait... yes.  I
remember being confused, and feeling bad, and you-- I fought you."  She
started to scoot away from me.  "Are you a... an enemy?"

     "Tasha, do you have any enemies?" I asked.

     She thought for a moment.  "No.  But why was I fighting you?"

     "Because you were confused and sick.  You tried to get some water
and drank bleach instead."

     "Bleach.  That's sodium hydroxide, a caustic agent."

     "Yes."

     "I can understand why I was sick then.  Who are you?"

     I sighed quietly.  "My name is Kennet Shardik.  Please, call me
Ken.  I'm your... father."

     She reached up and touched my face with one hand, caressing her own
face with the other.  "I though families all were the same species."

     "Not with me," I said softly.  "When I have children, I make them
in the shapes I choose."

     "So you... made me, instead of giving birth the way I thought it
was done."  I nodded.  "Why?"

     "Why what?  Why make you?  Because I want children.  Because the
more genetic types there are, the more disease-resistant you are as a
whole.  And because your shape, your species' beauty is something
wonderful that the world was less without."

     "How old am I?"

     "About a day," I smiled.  "Your... brother is being handled by my
coimelin, Dr. Traken."

     "I have a brother?"

     "Yes, sort of.  Tleils are made in pairs, one male, one female.
Although this isn't necessary or efficient-- a species that is female
top-heavy would be better off-- I tend to have some set ideas that, so
far, have worked out pretty well.  He's the male first Vulpin."

     She nodded, but I didn't feel her understanding yet.  "Tasha," I
said softly.  "You're in a state known as incorporation shock.  You're
spending your first day alive, and you don't know how to handle it.  Can
you understand that?"

     She tilted her head slightly to the left, confused.  "I think so."

     "Just think so?"

     "I think I understand what you're telling me, if you're telling me
the truth."

     "You have no reason to doubt me.  But that's about as good an
answer as I could have hoped for, under the circumstances."  I heard a
shuffling over past both of us.  She turned around to look.  "Tasha,
meet Derek.  He helped me with you."

     "Hi," he said gently, reaching down to touch her hand.  "I'm glad
you're alright.  You had us worried there for a while."

     She held his hand.  "I'm glad you were worried for me.  You are
Derek.  Does this mean you're my father too, since you were here?"

     Derek smiled over at me, then down at her.  She was starting to
look less confrontational and more like a lost little girl.  "No," he
said gently.  "Because he's my father."

     I smiled over at the felinzi across the table from me.  "No, I was
father to your great great grandfather.  I'm not taking responsibility
for you, you rakeheart."

     He smiled and reached out with his free hand to beep my nose.  "Oh,
come on.  You take responsibility for everything, Ken, whether you say
you will or not."

     "Yeah," I said, smiling down at Tasha.  "So, are you ready to
stand.  Hal?  Is she ready to meet her brother?"

     "Her brother has chosen the name Theodore.  And yes, he is quite
anxious to meet his sister."

     "Who was that?" Tasha asked.

     "The AI.  Check your memories."

     "An AI is an artificial life form capable of emotion, feeling and
intuition, and is to be given the full accord and respect worthy of a
fellow sentient," she repeated dutifully from her memory.

     "Pretty much," I replied, smiling.  "Ready?"

     "I think so," she replied, still bewildered.  "There so's much you
want me to try and take in at once."

     "That's just because it's all new to you.  Once you've been around
for a while, you start to fit into your suuroundings, and they stop
demanding so much attention of you.  You'll figure it out.  Come on," I
said, reaching a hand out and lowering the protective bars on my side of
the bed.  She nodded and I slowly eased her down from the bed to her
feet.

     "I can stand," she said.

     "Yes you can," I replied, smiling.  "Did you think you couldn't?"

     "I didn't know until now," she replied unsteadily.  "I guessed that
I could, but I didn't know."

     "Well, what do you think?"

     "It feels pretty strange," she admitted, smiling widely.

     "You have a very beautiful smile," I told her softly.  "Come, let's
go meet your brother."  Derek and I led her down the hallway to Theo's
room.  About halfway there she figured out skipping.  At the end of the
hallway she learned, painfully, about stopping.



     The wind whipped through her fur, ruffling it and making it fly
across her body in strangely beautiful patterns that attracted my eye
like little else that day had.  She stared across the great plain that
receded aspin from Marbletop range with eyes that spoke of great
strength and long trial.  I wandered up behind her and hugged her
tightly.  "It's done for you, Tasha.  The others will take over now."

     She reached up and placed her hand on mine, like she had the day
she had first awakened.  "It was a long year, Father."

     "I know, Tasha, but you did well.  You did better than I could have
asked of anyone."

     She sighed gently.  "Only a hundred of us to start out with, and I
had to be responsible for them all."

     "Only ten.  You were supposed to reach one, then ten.  The ten were
supposed to reach the hundred."

     "But somehow they all kept coming back and asking me, Ken.  There
were just so many questions, as if I had any more answers than they
did."

     "You did your best, Tasha, and you held it all together.  I was
impressed.  You did wonderfully."  I slid my hands down her shoulders
and around her waist, holding her against me.  She no longer fought me
as she had once, a year ago.

     She patted my hands as I laced fingers about her waist.  "Do you
think I'm still in IS?" she asked, turning to look at me.

     "I'm not sure.  It's not something I can really, objectively
determine.  I wish I could, but it's something I just feel.  I think in
some ways you are, but for the most part you've got it together."

     She smiled.  "Can we go somewhere, Ken.  Just you and I?"

     "Like where?"

     "North Point.  I like it there."

     I blinked, considering.  There were only two people who I thought
even know of North Point-- me, and Oenone.  Actually, I'm sure there are
many many "North Points" scattered around Pendor, one for every local
map and town.  But for us, Shardik Castle, North Point is just one
place.  One of the two edges of MarbleTop ridge.  "Sure, we can go," I
said finally.  "How do you want to go?"

     "We can Sdisk to Suvrahvain and fly from there.  It shouldn't take
more than an hour."

     "Okay," I said.  "Do you want to pack up the supplies, since this
appears to be a day-long outing?"

     She smiled and nodded.  "Can I meet you at the hanger in twenty
minutes?"

     I glanced at my watch and nodded.  "Of course."



     Marbletop gets its name because that's exactly what it is.
Imagine, if you can, a mountainn range rising up from sealevel, and then
slicing it cleanly off at around 30 meters, disposing of all that rock,
and polishing the exposed surface until it was nearly reflecting, and
you'll have Marbletop.  At it's narrowest Marbletop ridge is six
kilometers wide, at it's widest it's about thirty.  It runs nearly
25,000 kilometers along the Vinyare coastline.  Shardik Castle is nearer
to the southern edge than the northern.

     The northern tip is called, of course, North Point.  It's an apex
point that curls slightly outwards into the water, a spit of rock with
no beach around it.  The ocean isn't that far away... 30 meters, to be
exact.  It still seems like a long fall.

     "So what are we doing here?" I asked her dubiously as I put my
helmet into the seat of my Solo IV flitter.

     "I wanted to take you somewhere where we could be alone.  To talk
with you, ask you questions."

     I looked over her very round, reddish-gold eyes and smiled.
"What's for lunch?"

     "Egg salad sandwiches.  I hope you don't mind."

     "Mind?" I asked.  "I love the things."  She laughed as I spread out
the blanket and handed me one.  "So what are your questions?"

     She finished chewing a mouthful of sandwich before answering.
"Actually, I have just one question."  She rose and walked over to a
spot about fifteen meters from where we had set down.  "What does this
mean?"

     "What does what mean?"

     "This writing.  I asked Dave about it and he said he was unaware it
was even here."

     I stood up and walked over to see something I hadn't seen in
centuries.  I smiled as I knelt to trace the letters with my hands.
"You don't read Anglic, do you?"

     "No," she said, sighing.  "I've barely learned how to speak it.
It's a very complicated language.  What does it say?"

     I traced the letters carved into the Marbletop again, remembering
Oenone say them.

     With no reference point there is no date
     To tell you exactly when I stand
     Upon this bleak and barren stone by sea
     And order life to commence in this land.

     I looked over my shoulder to smile at her, and she stared down at
me.  "It's one thing to terraform a planet and then drop the right kind
of bacteria everywhere.  You program them with the right genetics and
everything should work out fine.  It's quite another to have someone who
can program the ebb and flow of the very sea itself to ensure that those
bacteria have the best of everthing they need to grow up into good
little mammals like you and me."

     She nodded as I stood up, taking another bite from the sandwich I
held in my left hand.  I took her hand and led her back to the blanket,
sitting down.  "How long have those words been there?" she asked.

     "Millions of years," I replied.  "You forget I had a time machine
once."

     "No I didn't.  Why aren't they worn away by the weather?  North
Point has a very poor history for weather."

     "Because Oenone said they won't."  I smiled and shrugged.  "Ask
her."

     "Nobody's heard from her in ages."

     "I know.  The rumors are flying.  I saved her life once, but that
was probably enough, even for her.  Someday soon I'll sail over to her
home and see if she's still around."

     "How soon?"

     "A few months," I smiled, looking over at her.  "Tasha, can I ask
you a question now?"

     "Of course," she replied.

     "Of all the fems that I know, you are the most quiet, the most
reserved, the most... private.  You never raise your voice above the
gentlest of volumes.  You handle everyone who comes to you fairly and
maturely, but I've never seen you really have a strong relationship with
anyone.  Why?"

     She ate quietly for a moment.  "I don't know," she answered.  "I
just haven't had the kind of time I'd need to dedicate to a
relationship."

     "What kind of time?  They just happen, really."

     "For you, they do.  But I'm not so sure that could happen for me.
I'd want to spend a long time with someone, to learn about them.  To
study them, almost."

     "You've spent a lot of time studying me," I replied.  "What kind of
conclusions have you drawn about me?"

     "That you're fair and obstinate.  That to prove to you that you're
wrong takes the facts and to ten decimal places.  Once you've been
proven wrong, you take the countering argument to heart like a zealot.
You're a lousy chess player, a loving parent, and a good bedmate."

     "Wait a second.  What makes 'a good bedmate?'" I asked, suddenly
curious as to who could be talking about me that way.

     "I don't know," she replied fairly.  "I do know that most of the
females I've spoken with who have spent the night in bed with you told
me the experience was a positive one and that they'd like to repeat it."

     "Did you ask them about me, or about that in specific?"

     She smiled and glanced around.  "Females talk about these things in
specific, Ken."

     I laughed.  "Actually, I think it's the subject that causes the
directness of the conversation."

     "How so?"

     "I think when we're talking about men, both sexes get very
specific.  I feel comfortable talking about exactly what my male lovers
do in bed, but my female partners... I just like to say they're
worthwhile."

     She nodded.  "There is a difference in the sexes."

     "Of course there is.  As much as there are certain differences
between different species.  The catch being we're all sentient, so we
all choose the courses of action we take.  I don't excuse anyone, of any
species, for being violent just because he's more capable as an
individiual of violence than any other species."

     She nodded.  "We don't have interspecies violence.  Why do you
think that is?"

     I shrugged.  "People's needs are met here.  People are taught to
respect each other.  Besides, there's always someplace to go to.  We
don't crowd each other."

     "Father?" she asked softly, reaching a slim hand to rest on my arm.
"Do you love me?"

     "Tash... Of course I love you."

     "You've never told me that before," she sighed, turning slowly to
lay back and place her head in my lap.  She curled on her side on the
blanket.

     I ran my hand gently along the curve of her jaw, touching her.  She
murred softly, shifting a little.  "I should say it more, then," I
replied.  "You're very beautiful."

     "Does that make you want to love me?" she asked softly.  "I haven't
figured that part out yet."

     I laughed as I stroked her fur.  "Have you figured out what beauty
is, first?"

     "No," she admitted.  "I used to think there were definitions, but
beauty appears to be different from person to person.  In the eye of the
beholder, I believe the phrase is."

     "That's about it," I said.  "To my eyes, you are very beautiful."

     She murred softly.  "You made me, Father, so of course you'd think
I'm beautiful."

     "I don't know about that," I said, leaning over and kissing her
cheek lightly.  "Some artists hate their work.  Some artists create
beautiful work that they love at first and come to hate later."

     She turned to look up at me, raising her head to kiss me back.
"You wouldn't do that to me, would you?"

     "Never," I whispered.  She reached up and held my face in her
hands, holding me in place while we kissed, warmly, upon that picnic
blanket and that cold place by the sea.

     I ran my fingers along her chest, feeling her fur slide under my
fingertips, my fingertips coming to rest at her nipples.  She pushed up,
rolling me over, rolling on top of me, her muzzle running down my neck
until she was poking her muzzle down my shirt.  "Don't tear the
buttons," I laughed softly, ruffling the fur on top of her head.

     "Why shouldn't I?" she asked, looking up to smile at me.

     "Because I like this shirt."

     "Good enough reason," she announced, slowly undoing each button as
she worked her way down, humming to herself canine fashion.  She pulled
the tails out of my kilt and tossed it open, straddling my hips to run
her hands over my chest.  "Skin is so fascinating," she said.

     "You and Aaden.  Always saying that."

     "It is!" she insisted.  "There's something so interesting about
smooth, hairless skin.  The way fingers slide over it, the way lips can
touch it.  Why do you like fur so much?"

     "Good question, and the answer is 'I don't know.'  I just enjoy the
feeling of it, the silky quality of it."

     "Even of of the heavier mustelakin?" she asked.

     "Even then.  They're fascinating, to use your word, in their own
way."  I reached up to slowly stroke the fur along her thighs and up her
hips.  "I love you, Tasha."

     She smiled then and leaned over.  "I love you, too, Father."  She
parted her muzzle just enough to lick my cheek, then sat back up.  She
giggled slightly, and a quick survey of my extremities revealed what had
been so funny; she'd sat down over my hips to find something poking her
in the rear.

     "Sorry."

     "Don't apologize, father, for a very natural reaction to a very
natural situation."

     I laughed.  "What's natural about this?"

     "Everything," she replied, bending over to run her soft tongue over
one of my nipples.  That familiar almost-choking sensation ran through
my throat, a curious phenomenon I'd actually had mapped once, but had
decided not to remove.  I closed my eyes instead, laced my fingers
behind my head and let out a long, soft sigh.  She nipped at my nipple
softly, and the sudden sensation made my back arch.  "Careful," I said,
smiling.

     The wind had brought clouds overhead, and a sudden roar brought
thunder, and with it lightning, to our attention.  "We should go," I
said.

     "No," she said, holding me down.  "Please, Father... make love to
me in the rain."

     "Are you crazy?" I said.  "Tasha, we're the highest thing for miles
around.  We've also got a better chance of attracting lightning than the
stone around us.  We could get killed out here!"

     "That's part of the excitment, Ken!"  She was pulling at the cord
holding my kilt shut.

     "You really want to make love like this?" I shouted as the winds
began to pick up faster and harder.  Her fur ruffled where it was
exposed, flying about almost completely without control.  Just then the
rain began falling.

     "Yes!" she laughed, almost maniacally, as she tore my kilt off and
left my boots on.  A strange combination, but her fervor was infectious
and when she bent over to kiss me I kissed her back, the heat and light
of her passion reverberating through me.

     I was losing control fast, my hands swirling over the loose-fitting
sweater she wore, tearing at the clasp that held her skirt on.  The
weather was hot today, and the rain, with the lightning, was becoming
hotter.  The sweater came free; only weight of water from the burgeoning
downpour kept it from flying away from the hillside and down to the sea.
Her skirt was gone just as quickly.

     Her muzzle pressed against my mouth, now that we were both
virtually naked.  Her tongue pressed against my lips, and my tongue
attacked hers in kind.  We rolled over on the blanket, the rain coming
down in sheets.  A white slice of lightning crackled seaward to my right
as she pressed herself to me, grinding her crotch against mine.

     I snarled and reached up, pulling her down on top of me and rolling
her over; a split-second of thought made me slide my hand under her head
as we rolled onto the slick stone surface of marbletop, her furry back
pressed against the polished surface.  I slid my erection into her
without pause, feeling her matted fur and slickened body under me as we
began to fuck each other with abandon.  Her claws raked along my sides,
not quite tearing skin, and I looked down into her face to find her
panting along with me, squinting rain from her eyes.

     "Enough!" she shouted, throwing her wait to turn me over onto my
back.  She was on top, grinding her hips against my pubic bone.  I
grabbed her hands; she used my hands for support as stroked herself up
and down along my shaft forcefully, never letting up.  I was getting
close, and I tried to tell her so, but she didn't hear me over the
crackle of lightning so close it made the hair on my arms and the fur on
her face stand on edge.  The air around us sizzled with ozone as I heard
her let loose a howl of pleasure and I came along with her, shooting my
come into her body with such force I barely knew where to begin even
thinking about it.

     The rain kept coming down, even harder than before, as she
collapsed on top of me, holding herself up by her arms to stare down at
me, her eyes still wild.  "You okay, Tasha?"

     "That was great!" she snarled down at me.  Her hips kept grinding
against mine, my shrinking erection threatening to slide out of her with
every rotation.  "You were great!"

     "I'm glad you think so, but we're either going to die of
electrocution or pneumonia before we get back home!"

     She laughed.  "What a way to go, though.  You're right; let's go!"
She rolled over to the side and sheilded her eyes from the falling spray
and rain.  "Get the picnic gear!  Should we dress?"

     "Will it do us any good?" I asked.

     "Probably not!" she shouted back as another thunderclap exploded
overhead.  We collected our clothes, tossed them into the blanket,
bundled it all into a sack and threw it into my Solo.

     We got home in one piece; once the forcefield is up a Solo is
pretty indestructible.  It was coming down even harder at the Castle
than it had been at North Point.  After drying off, I made my way up to
the first floor and a room mislabled Mission Control to take a look at
the map.  Tasha found me after a few minutes.  I heard her coming; she
sneezed.  "Getting that cold I warned you about?"

     "Either that or I've just got lots of water of my nose."

     "Always possible," I said, handing her a warm cup of tea.  "Take a
look.  The winds are getting up around 80 klicks.  I've ordered Dave to
lower the Castle into the lagoon-locks, to get the protection from the
bowl.  It's going to be ugly.  Aaden's not going to like it; summer
gales tear up his gardens a lot."

     Tasha nodded and wrapped her arms around me from the back.  "I
don't think I'll ever understand you, Father," she sighed softly.  "At
least, not as much as P'nyssa or Aaden or Ress do.  But I want you to
know that I love you, and I understand how much you love me, too."

     I turned around to face her; she was wearing a white terrycloth
robe with a big, fuzzy hood that I found suprisingly appealing.  "All
you have to know," I said softly, "is that, whether I need you now or
not, whether I want you now or not, whether I'm even paying attention to
you now or not... no matter how distracted, no matter how disinterested
I seem to be-- when you need me, I'll be there.  I'll do my damnedest
for you."

     She hugged me tight and rested her head on my shoulder.  "I know.
And that's all you need to say."  I hugged her back, running my hand
along the back of her head, holding her to me like the daughter she was
and the lover she had become.

--
"Decanting Difficulties"
The Journal Entries of Kennet R'yal Shardik, et. al. And Related Tales
are (c) 1989, 1992 Elf Mathieu Sternberg.  May be freely distributed by
cybernetic media; hardcopies are limited to single printings for
personal use.