Jarn’s Journal Year 2, Day 355

Year 2, Day 355

Fifteen days it took them to get Meerkat to the place where Storm Cloud’s group was encamped, and by that time most of Storm Cloud’s group had moved on. They’d left a few behind, and everyone seemed to know where they were going, so I didn’t worry too much about leaving them at the old camp site. Lion’s group had reached good grazing and water several days earlier. Everyone was feeding themselves and finding water,  so all I had to do was continue to have Patches track Storm Cloud’s group to the Gather.

The Gather. Patches. Two problems for me to worry about. Do I really want to go to their Gather? Should I, or have I interfered more than enough already? And what am I to do about Patches? How easily the impulse to help can lead us into trouble!

I could have ignored the orphaned and starving puppy. Then I would not be agonizing over the moral problem of just how far I can justify meddling with Patches’ mind. She is not a domesticate, whose mind is adjusted to living with a dominant species. She is a tamed wild animal, and her instincts are telling her she should be part of a pack, challenging the dominant female for the right to breed. But she understands nothing of pack living.

I could free her, easily enough, but she could never survive on her own. No pack would accept her. Any dominant female would kill her on sight. She knows nothing of fighting; I myself have conditioned her against the very things that might keep her alive.

True, she is not a sentient, a creature that is aware of its own mortality, I can modify her mind, deepen her acceptance of humans as her pack, even reduce the instinct to mate. Perhaps that is what I should do? I cannot think of anything else. Perhaps I should not have saved her, but would I myself be alive if I had not?

In case you’re new to Jarn’s Journal it is a Friday feature of this blog, and represents the (fictional) journal of a (fictional) human-like alien stranded in Africa 125,000 years ago. The journal to date is on my author site, and is the remote back story of the setting of my science fiction books.

Jarn’s Journal Year 2, Day 339

Year 2, Day 339

I am beginning to wonder if I may have promised more than I can deliver. At least it keeps me busy!

Yesterday morning was devoted to filling water containers, finding food (for three groups now) and checking on the woman whose name, I have finally discovered, is Meerkat. Then I teleported Patches and myself to the last camp of Lion’s group and had Patches try to track them to their next camp. Patches can move a good deal faster than they can, and they usually stop to hunt well before dark, so I caught them just as they are staring to look for a campsite. Yesterday I spotted a good site ahead of them and guided them to it. By that time, however, Patches was getting tired of tracking. Getting her to follow the hunters from Storm Cloud’s camp toward Meerkat’s took a good deal more mental control than I really like to use, and it was full dark before we found them and delivered their water.

I hoped to break up the tracking by having Patches track the hunters partway in the morning, as they leave as soon as there is any light at all. Then Patches could rest while I took food and water to Meerkat and filled the water containers for Lion’s group. Actually finding the group was as much a matter of guessing as following Patches, who by that time was sore-footed as well as rebellious. When it came to following the hunters from where they’d been around noon, she simply laid down and dared me to drive her on.

I thought that by then they might be getting close to Meerkat’s camp, as after all they had estimated two days to get there. So I teleported their supplies to the camp and then flew back along the route I though they would be using. Luckily there was a full moon tonight, so I was able to find them. Lucky also that they had estimated the time it would take them so well. And I have seen most of the trail they will be returning over, so if they tell me each day where they will camp the next night, I should be able to teleport to those sites, leaving only Lion’s group to depend on Patches’ skill as a reluctant tracker.

Jarn’s Journal Year 2, Day 337 continued

Year 2, Day 337 Continued

To my considerable surprise Songbird, with the authority of the Shaman’s necklace, was actually able to convince Lion that my “godly” powers did not extend to making it rain, though I could transport water-filled containers to a band on the move. They were far more apprehensive about Patches, whom they had not seen before. Songbird laughed and hugged the animal, which seemed to reassure them a little. At least they didn’t totally panic when I had the wild dog get their scent so I could have her track them.

The sun was already low when I teleported Songbird, Patches and myself, along with a ground melon and some groundnuts, to the place where I had left the woman. She, too, was shocked, but chatted freely with Songbird while she kept a wary eye on Patches and I added a few more thorn branches to her barrier. Songbird looked carefully around her before we left. “Could you raise us up, so I can see farther?” she asked. Puzzled, I complied, letting her look around a little before I teleported us all back to Storm Cloud’s camp.

We arrived at sunset, with a hunting bird soaring overhead. “I know where they are,” Songbird told the Shaman as she returned the necklace, “and Jarn will  bring them water as they move North. And I know where your sister’s kinswoman is, too.” She then proceeded to give a series of landmarks I had not even noticed, followed by precise directions for reaching the half-starved woman. How had she known that?

Two of the best hunters listened carefully and then nodded. “We will bring her here, but it will take two days running to reach her, and more to bring her back. Can she walk?” They looked in my direction, though not directly at me.

“She is walking around within the thorn barrier now,” I told them. “But she cannot run. You will set out in the morning? I will bring you water, fish and figs at your night camp.” I would take the same to the woman, I decided. She would need the strength if she was to cover the distance back to Storm Wind’s camp.

It was fully dark by then, and I was eager to get back to the safety of my shelter – but I had one more question to ask. “Songbird,” I said, “how did you know the way to where the woman was?”

She grinned. “Oh, I described where this camp is, she recognized it, and told me how to get to her camp from here. I’ll be able to do it someday, but I don’t know all of the landmarks yet.”

When I was back at my shelter and putting today’s doings into my journal I thought a bit about these people’s ability to move around their landscape, and their ability to follow an unknown trail from a single second-hand description. I could not do that. But to survive as hunters and gatherers, they had to.

Jarn’s Journal is the fictional Journal of a Human-like alien stranded in Africa roughly 125,000 years ago. His story is part of the remote background of the Jarnian Confederation, the setting or both my science fiction novels. The Journal to date is on my author website.

Jarn’s Journal Year 2, Day 337

 Year 2 Day 337

I couldn’t find Storm Cloud’s group yesterday evening, or the evening before! I wasn’t  too worried about them; they were getting into an area where they could find ground melons, if not surface water. But I wanted to talk with Storm Cloud about the other groups I’ve seen, especially about the one with only a single survivor.

Luckily I remembered how easily Patches backtracked the hyena, and this morning I teleported her to the last place I’m sure was on the group’s trail, and asked her to find Songbird. She set off at once, though somewhat puzzled by my wanting her to follow such an old trail. I flew above her, coming back to earth often to rest my mind, and by late in the afternoon we had caught up with the group. Obviously they did not need water; they were camped not far from a lake.

“Storm Cloud,” I said, “I need your advice,” and I poured out my problems: Lion’s group, the lone woman who was regaining her strength but was a magnet for predators, and the three other groups I’d seen. (I’d spotted another while searching for Storm Cloud’s group.)

She was a little shocked at my asking her for advice – she is still more than half convinced I am a god. But she was able to identify all of the other groups I had seen when I described their clothing, and confirm that they should also be heading for the Gather. In fact, it seems the woman who barely survived was her mother’s mate’s cousin’s niece, and Lion was some kind of a relative, too.

Songbird had been listening, and she was wiggling in a way that suggested she had something to say. “Speak, child,” Storm Cloud said.

“You could take me to see Uncle Lion,” she said. “I could tell him how you helped us.”

My doubt must have shown on my face, but Storm Cloud nodded. “I will give you a token.” She took off a shell necklace and handed it to Songbird. “Take great care of this, and bring it back to me safely, but this will tell Lion that you speak for me. When you return, we will speak of the woman.”

Did I have a choice? Songbird was the one person I was sure I could teleport safely, little though I liked reinforcing her love for being moved in this way.

Jarn’s Journal Year 2 Day 335

I think I’ve gotten myself in over my head.

My well supplies far more water than I need, and with counterweighting it is no great problem to teleport the filled containers to Storm Cloud’s group. Filling the containers and finding the group each day takes far more work, though they are marking their trail after a fashion. No doubt their marking method is as obvious to them as it is hardly visible to me. Another two days, and they should be in country with grass and surface water. The herds are only a little beyond them.

Lion’s group is more difficult – they seem unable to accept that I can keep them supplied with water if they leave their mudhole, which is going to dry up soon, and teleporting fresh kills to their site is simply not going to work long term – for one thing, it’s hard on the local predators. And it won’t solve the problem of water. They don’t seem able to understand that I can do some things that they cannot but that I can’t do everything, and they keep trying to argue that it would be much simpler if I just made it rain.

Worst yet, I’ve spotted two more groups of people who speak the language I’ve learned. I was going to leave them alone, since I’ve found Storm Cloud’s group, but because of what I found today I have to rethink that.

I was searching for a fresh kill to take to Lion’s group when I spotted a group of hyenas squabbling over something – and the something turned out to be a human body, emaciated to the point that there was little left even for a hyena. I teleported back to the shelter for Patches, and had her backtrack the hyenas. The trail led to a camp of sorts, with enough of a thorn barrier to slow down the hyenas, but those who had built the barrier were dead or dying of starvation. Only one was still conscious, a woman whose skin, far too large for her body, suggested she had survived this long only because she had once had enormous fat reserves.

The rest were beyond any help I could give them, but I teleported two melons and some figs to her. By evening I though she might survive, though the rest of the group were now dead.

What can I do? She cannot walk far, or survive on her own. Nor can I teleport her without further shock which could well kill her. And will the other groups I saw end in the same way as hers?

Jarn’s Journal Year 2, Day 327

I found them! And they do not look nearly as hungry as Lion’s group, though they have piled thorny branches higher around their camp than I ever saw when they were near my shelter. Storm Cloud seemed delighted to see me, as was Songbird.

“Have you seen water near?” Storm Cloud asked me at once.

I looked at the water hole near their camp. Once it had been a deep scour in a river – I could see the dry bed stretching out in either direction. Now it was little more than a long pool, and from the cracked mud surrounding it, that pool was drying up. There were fish, trapped by the shrinking of the river, but they could not feed this group for much longer. There were also a few animal tracks in the mud, but only a few. And most of those visible were the paw-prints of predators. No wonder the thorn barrier was high and wide.

I thought back to what I had seen, flying over this land while I searched for Storm Cloud’s band. “Do you have water carriers?” I asked, because the nearest water in the direction toward greener land was a good three marches away.

In response she called out, and the people began bringing everything they had that would hold water. Gourds, mostly, and a few animal bladders and skins made into sacks. Not enough, I thought, but I didn’t believe their water hole would last much longer.

I’d about given up not interfering, and I could see only one way to help them reach the next real water source. “Take all the water you can,” I told them. “Go north. Make your trail easy for me to follow, and I will meet you when the sun goes down tomorrow. There I will take your water carriers, and bring them back filled.” I could teleport water to them, even if I could not walk with them. And as we went farther north, there would be more water. Wouldn’t there?

Jarn’s Journal is part of the very early history of the Jarnian Confederation that serves as the background for my science fiction novels. The setting is Africa, roughly 125,000 years ago. Jarn’s Journal to date is on my Author Site.

Jarn’s Journal Year 2, Day 325

Year 2, Day 325

Even the predators are hungry.

Not that I let that stop me from stealing two of their fresh kills and teleporting them to the vicinity of the camp I found yesterday. The shaman, who goes by the name of Lion, begged me to stay, and share my wisdom with them as I had with Storm Cloud’s group. Wisdom? Knowledge perhaps, thanks to the computer library, but it is these people who seem able to adapt that knowledge to their environment. Was it not Songbird who combined her knowledge of basketry with the information in the computer to devise the fish traps?

Well, I could teleport in enough food to keep them from starving from areas where the drought had not been so extreme—but visiting them occasionally would be sufficient for that. I pointed to the half-moon, visible in the daylight sky. “I will return when the moon is full,” I told Lion. “And I will join you at the Gather. But for now, I need to find Storm Cloud’s band.” I was perhaps going too far with the promise to join them at the gather—I still didn’t know were that was! But if I could find Storm Cloud, I could follow that band, no longer constrained by my inability to walk any distance.

Neither Lion nor any member of his band could tell me exactly where to find Storm Cloud’s band. They did, however, have considerable awareness of the regions each band roamed over. Not teleport coordinates, not a map, but a general awareness of landmarks, and distance (in days’ travel) and direction between them. By the time I left Lion’s band, late in the evening, I had a much smaller area to search in hopes of finding Storm Cloud and Songbird.

I can only hope they are in better condition than Lion’s band.

Jarn’s Journal Year 2, Day 324 #IAN1

Year 2, Day 324

It’s now my fourth day of searching, and I still have not found them. I did see a band yesterday—not the people I am looking for, but their ornaments were similar. I thought it over last night and most of today, and decided to contact them. Cautiously. I hid where I could hear them speaking, enough to know they spoke the language I learned from Songbird, and who knew? They might have been at the gather, and be able to tell me where I should look.

Their camp was by a water hole, and I walked in with my hands spread, just before sunset, ready to teleport away at any sign they were hostile—I had not forgotten those others! “Greetings,” I said carefully. “Do you know of the band that has a child called Songbird?”

They looked at each other and the men, their ribs painfully obvious, took a tighter grasp on their spears.

“They call their shaman Storm Cloud,” I went on, and one of the men took off at a run for the center of the camp. The others continued to surround me, their spears held at the ready, but their expressions were more of fear and concern than of hostility. I found myself hoping the fear did not escalate to panic—I didn’t really want to teleport back to the shelter.

The man who had run off returned, accompanied by a panting man whose halo of gray hair was surmounted by something similar to the headdress Storm Cloud wore when she was acting in her capacity as shaman. The headdress was somewhat askew, which made me doubt that he wore it on other than ceremonial occasions.

“Great God Jarn,” he gasped, “forgive us for using your sacred knowledge to keep ourselves fed, but Storm Cloud said the knowledge was to be shared.” And he fell on his face before me. The men with the spears gave me a horrified look and backed away.

Do not interfere. To the hells with that! These people were hungry, and if any knowledge I had shared would prevent that, good!

“It was to be shared,” I said. “And I am pleased if you can use it.” What knowledge was he talking about?

As he led me into their camp, my nose provided the answer. Fish. The band I know had shared their knowledge of the fish traps, and given that game was scarce on the ground, the additional food source had been a boon to this band.

Not enough to make up for the lack of rain, I thought, given that the water hole was small. Could Patches and I drive one of the half-starved antelope I had seen toward them? Not today, perhaps, for it was already getting dark, but in the morning? But “Great God!” How am I to convince them I am merely a castaway?

Jarn’s Journal Year 2 Day 320

 Year 2 Day 320

I don’t think the rains are going to come.

Oh, there have been a couple of showers, but barely enough to lay down the dust. Everything around me seems to be burning, except what is already burned. I am in no danger—the well is providing all of the water I need, and the shelter, built from the remains of the escape capsule, is fireproof. I hunt, fish and gather far to the north, where the rains have fallen and the world is green. But how are the nomads faring? Can they find enough food? Where are they?

I no longer think, or even hope, that they will return this year. What could they find to eat here? The herds have not come, and with the stream dry, there are no fish to be caught. But I cannot stand to be alone much longer, and the only other R’il’nian-like species I have found is hostile.

I have decided to try to find those I know. It won’t be easy. This is a big continent, and all I know is that they should be somewhere to the north where it is green enough they can find game. Probably somewhere north of the rains. They are a rare species—I know that, for I have been watching for them, casually, for fivedays now. It is time to intensify the search. Perhaps with the aid of Patches I can find them, or if not the group I know, some other group of the same people.

I wish I knew where their gather site was.

Jarn’s Journal Year 2, Day 280

Year 2, Day 280

The rains are late. Either that, or they have been early the last two years.

Is it possible that they will not reach this far south, that the nomads will not return? Certainly they follow the herds, and the herds will not come south until the vegetation greens, after the rains have fallen. In the two years I have been here, the rains have come before the summer solstice. But my crude calendar says the solstice is today, and there is no sign of rain. Only of dust and smoke, which forced me to levitate to see the direction in which the sun set. I did not even see cloud tops, or dry lightning.

The stream has gone dry, and I am seeing more and more dead animals on my exploratory flights. To the west are sand dunes – I don’t explore much that way. A day’s flight north, though, it is raining in places. How much longer will the rains move southward? If they reach me, will they last long enough to turn the vegetation green? Should I go farther north, and try to find the nomads?

I have burned off most of the dry vegetation around my shelter. Not that the starving animals left much. Predators were glutted at first, but now they, too, are gaunt and starving. The warnoff has become a necessity if I leave the shelter on foot.

Luckily I can teleport myself and Patches to greener areas where I can fish and she can hunt the small mammals we both prefer as food. The large mammals would be tastier, but without the nomads I am not very good at preparing them.

I hope they come back.

Perhaps I should teleport north of the rains, and try to find them?

This is an excerpt from Jarn’s Journal, the journal kept by a fictional human-like alien, Jarn, who was stranded on Earth roughly 125,000 years ago. He has made friends with one tribe of early humans, but they have followed the grazing herds northward. Jarn’s Journal to date, from the time of his crash landing, is on my author website.