The Ascent

Chapter 3

My minor in Xenology didn't quite prepare me for the sight of a Cack in the flesh. Those Who Dwell Within, sometimes called the Indwellers, stand two and one-half meters tall. They look like a cross between a bipedal praying mantis and a walking saguaro cactus—from which they get their nickname. A green chitinous pseudo-exoskeleton covers their bodies in long vertical strips. These are joined by cartilaginous tissue through which sensory hairs protrude like spines. The one that crawled toward us on its four arms as we pulled our way out of the connecting tube into the Cack ship, triggered all sorts of fight-or-flight responses which I trembled to suppress.

A blast of hot dry air drew beads of sweat across my forehead and evaporated them almost as quickly. The indweller who greeted us hooked its feet under two handholds, anchoring itself to the wall, and chittered, whistled and clacked its mandibles at us. The translating device attached to its shell below its oval-shaped head said, "Forgive this servant being Circling Winds. This servant seeks the lords of He Who Looks Up."

"We are they," Phil said.

It examined us with bulbous black eyes, flapping leaf-like ears as it listed to the translator's chitter.  Somehow, despite the awkwardness of microgravity, it pulled at the anchor points in the passageway with its four arms and bobbed "up" and "down" repeatedly as if bowing at the waist. Clinging to the wall like some large armored green spider, it continued bobbing, moving side to side in quick insect-like jerks and clacked its mandibles. I was glad I had not even been born when we had fought the Cacks.

"Follow this servant leading to the chambers awaiting the lords of He Who Looks Up."

Casting me a glance and a shrug, Phil replied to the crouching Circling Winds, "We will."

Barely waiting to hear the translation, Circling Winds turned and leaped away, shooting down the narrow tube-shaped passage like an arrow. He paused to glance back at us as we drifted along behind before rocketing down a dim side passage into a cylindrical room. Overlarge acceleration couches lined the side of the cylinder. Two Cack workers and a crawdad, each with tools attached to belts around their torsos or appendages, lay strapped in face down. Our guide joined them on an empty couch and turned to us. "Secure yourselves against the growing acceleration to come."

The acceleration couches were not padded; though they were covered in some sort of plasticized surface which imparted a little give. Phil and I lay back against the couches face up. We fiddled with the straps until we got them adjusted then waited, listening to the untranslated conversation between the Cack and an operator in another room. Transparent doors closed, sealing the room at each end, and a warning drum sounded. I braced myself and the room began to spin. In less than a minute of acceleration, a strange trick of perception made the corridor outside the clear doors seem to spin while our room remained stationary. I had only just begun to get used to the "pull" of the centripetal force when the room lurched and began to move "down." It was almost too much for my inner ear to take. I closed my eyes and concentrated on repressing my rising nausea.

Eventually, the elevator came to a stop and an all-clear rhythm drummed from the room's sound system. The other occupants freed themselves from their restraints and left.

Our guide waited just long enough for us to stagger out into a corridor running along the outside edge of the ship's spinning habitat section. We followed Circling Winds to a door where it stopped and whistled and chittered. The door opened into a cooler and brighter room and Circling Winds stood aside. We entered a common room with a half-dozen smaller personal chambers leading off from it.

"You will find the place containing your needs of sustainment. The tool-slaves are taught your speech, though conquering understanding must occur."