01 Taxilas Children

TAXILA'S CHILDREN
The voice in his mind sounded warm and sincere. Jabez stretched out his hand and touched
the crown of Steve's head, it was like a benediction. For a moment, he seemed to have
forgotten the exalted position into which he had been placed, then he remembered again and
withdrew his hand quickly. Steve capitalised on the gesture.
"I thank you, Jabez, for the care and attention you and Caela have extended to me, as I also
thank all those who might have assisted to bring me here. I remember so little. There is so
much more I must know."
"My Lord, it grows late and you must rest. You will serve us more than we have served
you. I bid you a restful night."
He was out of the room before Steve could argue. He had seemed almost embarrassed by
his thanks and there was a peculiar mixture of deference mingled with something else which
was hard to define. Steve leaned back and closed his eyes. He knew he needed to keep his
wits about him. So far, these people had gone out of their way to care for him. He had been at
their mercy when he had stumbled out of the vortex. There were no indications that they
intended him any harm and he could see no reason why they should have waited for four
months, if they now intended to start - unless the feline psyche required a conscious victim
for a game of cat and mouse!
He settled down for the night. Just to be on the safe side, he placed the Bole in a
monitoring mode. It had sensors that could hear a pin drop at a hundred paces. He would
know if he had any unexpected visitors whilst he slept.
Jabez had snuffed the lamp as he had left, a pale light softened the darkness of the chamber
to a dark grey. Steve assumed it to be starlight. He would have given a great deal to be able to
see them. He might have been able to get a fix of where he was. It was a long shot. The
mechanics of the vortex might have placed him anywhere in the galaxy - or any other galaxy.
His relative position to that of the Solar System was an unanswerable question. The Bole
might have some ideas, but it wasn't the time to activate his garrulous friend. The answer
would be almost predictable. The net information he possessed was that he had emerged from
the vortex four months earlier, beyond that he didn't know how or why. Such thoughts did not
make for restful sleep, the possibilities churned back and forth in his mind. What was his
future? Steve blinked into the darkness. The thought had woken him. Perhaps he didn't have a
future. Undoubtedly, his enforced journey had been an accident. If someone was still
controlling the mechanism which had brought him wherever he was, they were, no doubt
trying to decide what to do with him. The more he thought about it, the less he liked the
answers. He managed to get some sleep eventually. It wasn't a good sleep but it was better
than nothing.
In the next few days, he started to gain strength. Caela fed him solid food and spared no
effort to entice his appetite. Admittedly, it took her a little time to stop scuttling in and out of
the room without casting fearful glances at the Bole. Steve was careful with his use of the
machine. He confined his conversations to the essentials and always when he knew the house
was empty.
He made new acquaintances - if that was what they could be called. They came and went
with awe written all over their feline features. He couldn't get on intimate terms with any of
them, all of his attempts at pleasant familiarity were one-sided. They almost crawled into the
room and hardly dared to look at him. It was as if they expected to be blasted from the
surface of their planet with one look. The exception was that he had to suffer the indignity of
all those who are bedridden and who have to perform their natural functions and are assisted
by their nurses. The said nurses were burly males who attended to him with a detachment that
was almost stoic and then would remove themselves as if they had melted into the stone walls
of the room.
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