“Why don’t you just ask him?”
Ukatonen darkened with frustration. “I did. But right now he is angry at us.”
’Then ask him to be a child again, and find out what he is angry at when he’s a child,” Eerin suggested.
Ukatonen stopped and stared at her.
“Thank you, Eerin, I would not have thought of that.”
He kept forgetting how crucial a human’s childhood was to their eventual development. One chose a bami based on their personality. The willing, honest, and hard-working juvenile tinkas were adopted. SuHen, angry ones were not. Once a tinka became a bami, it was merely a matter of shaping that personality to fit the needs of the village. With humans, a great deal more depended on their childhood.
Patiently, Ukatonen guided Tomas back into his memories of childhood. After several attempts, he managed to make Tomas believe he was a child again. Finally, he was regressed to the age of four; Tomas’s whole demeanor and posture changed. The lines left his face; he seemed younger, happier. Ukatonen’s eyes flicked to Eerin. She nodded. She had seen the change too.
Slowly, Ukatonen eased him forward in time, until his face began to change. Then he took Tomas back, embedding him in that moment of terror and anger, and plunged into the link.
It was like being tumbled into a rapid at flood time. Ukatonen was caught in a maelstrom of powerful emotions that was much more dangerous than anything intentional that Tomas could have thrown at him. He struggled to maintain his equilibrium in the midst of the turmoil. He was powerless to do anything to calm Tomas. Finally he struggled out of the link.
He sat for a moment, stunned. Then, pulling himself out of his daze, he looked at Eerin and Moki.
I need your help,” he said, holding out his arms, deep [[-r~: wn]] with shame. “He’s too strong for me. I can’t calm.
“Rest and eat, en,” Eerin said. “I found some bees; here’s honey and honeycomb.”
“A moment only,” Ukatonen told her. “He is in pain, [[r!‹d ]]we must stop it.”
“After all he and his men have done to us, en, I don’t rally care,” Eerin declared.
Ukatonen was shocked. “But, Eerin— ” Ukatonen, we’ve been sitting here for eight days while you mess around with him.” She gestured contemptuously it Tomas. “My family’s got to be worried sick. I want to £0 home!”
Ukatonen laid a hand on her shoulder. “I’m sorry, Eerin. I’ve been so absorbed with Tomas that I didn’t think about that. We’ll leave first thing tomorrow. I promise.”
“And him?” she asked, gesturing again at Tomas.
“He will come with us. But you must set aside your anger now, and help me end his pain. Unless we do that we cannot bring him into harmony with us.”
Eerin looked down. “I’m not sure that I can, en. I’m too angry about all of the things he has done to us.”
Ukatonen touched her shoulder and she looked back up at him. “I did not say that you must forget what he has done, or how angry it has made you, but for now, you must let it go for long enough to help him. Moki and I can help you shed your anger if you will let us.”
Eerin was silent for a long moment; then she nodded and held out her arms. “All right, en.”
They linked. Moki helped Ukatonen smooth away Eerin’s anger. Then they turned to Tomas.
The emotional storm had exhausted Tomas, and they were able to slow the raging turmoil. Ukatonen pulled partway out of the link, and talked Tomas through his pain, monitoring and quietly reinforcing calmness, happiness, peace, and a sense of forgiveness. Tomas slid into a sweet, peaceful dream state. Then Ukatonen reached into Tomas’s brain and smoothed away the pathways that led to that anger and violence.
Tomas woke about an hour later. He stretched, and there was a relaxed, almost sweet smile on his face. He opened his eyes, and tensed in fear. It saddened Ukatonen to see the lines reappear in the man’s face.
“Good morning,” Eerin said. “Or rather, good afternoon.”
He looked around. “Where am I?”
“In the middle of the jungle,” Eerin told him. “We’re not exactly sure which jungle, though. Are you hungry?”
Tomas nodded. “What did you do to me?” he asked. “How long have I been asleep?”
“About eight days,” Ukatonen replied. “How do you feel?”
“Different,” he said. “Better. What happened?”
“We escaped, and took you with us,” Ukatonen told him. “I needed to understand you. Your cancer is almost gone, by the way.”
“I see. And my men? My wife and family? Where are they?”
“I don’t know,” Ukatonen replied. “We put everyone to sleep in the building you were in. Unless something else happened, they should be all right.”
Tomas hung his head in silence for a few moments, his brow furrowed as though he was puzzled.
“I should be angry with you. No, wait, I am angry with you, but it”—he hesitated—“it’s different somehow. What did you do to me?”
“We helped you forget how to be angry,” Ukatonen explained.
He sat silent for a few moments, looking inward. “Yes, you have. But it was my anger— Who gave you the right to take it away?” His voice was mild, despite his words.
“Who gave you the right to kidnap us?” Eerin asked.
He shook his head. “You don’t understand.”
“None of us do,” Ukatonen said. “Even after all the work I have done on you, I still don’t understand why you have killed so many people.”
“I believe that it’s wrong to tell me how many children I can have.”
“But if we keep having children, humanity itself will die,” Eerin told him.
“And if the state had decided that you couldn’t have your daughter. What then?” Tomas shot back.
“I don’t know,” Eerin admitted. “It would have been terrible. I can’t imagine life without Mariam now.”
“And how is that different from us?” he asked. “We love children. We want to have a lot of them.”
“I would have given up having a child,” Eerin explained. “But your argument doesn’t apply. I was buying a child-right that someone wished to sell. I am not exceeding the population goals. Yes, we restrict the right to have a child, but it is restricted equally for everyone.”
“And what about this place?” Ukatonen asked. “Would you have so many children that this forest would be destroyed to feed them? Is it worth the death of a beautiful, living planet to have as many children as you wish?”
“The government has no right to tell us how many children to have,” Tomas argued.
“You’re right. It isn’t fair, but it’s necessary. But you have a choice. You can emigrate to Mars, if you want to have more children,” Eerin pointed out.
“It’s sterile and cold. You have to pay to breathe there.”
“At least you have a choice, even if it’s a hard one. Someday we’ll have Terra Nova, and room to expand.”
“In two hundred years’ time. What good is that to me? Or to my children and grandchildren and their children?”
“None,” Eerin allowed. “But it’s possible that the Tendu could help us shorten the terraforming. Or give us the ability to adapt to a living world. You have no idea of what humanity risked losing when you kidnapped us. It was stupid, short-term thinking.”
Ukatonen held up his hands. “That’s enough,” he said. “We will not achieve harmony by arguing.”
“Then how will we achieve it?” Moki asked.
“By understanding,” Ukatonen told him.
“We understand each other,” Tomas said. “We understand each other quite well. But we believe very different things. The two beliefs are diametrically opposed to each other. They do not harmonize. It is impossible.”
Ukatonen sat up straight, ears wide, amazed by Tomas’s rigidity.