Duty's Call: Flight of the Maita, #41

By C. D. Moulton

Theron is kidnapped! Maita and the crew meet the beings from another galaxy, who came to them in aid of a Maitan colony. There are also IMMINS there! As is always the case where Immins are concerned, there is danger and trouble. Maita and the crew go there to solve the problem. The golems are included.

WHEN will they finally be free of Immins - in either galaxy?

• Language: English
• Publisher: C. D. Moulton
• Release date: Jul 17, 2022
• ISBN: 9798201377229

Book preview

Flight of the Maita

Book 41

Duty's Call

© 1996 & 2019 by C. D. Moulton

all rights reserved: no part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any other information retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright holder/ publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

Immins in another galaxy? You bet your last credit Maita will do something about it?

Contents

About the author

New Zule

Pirated!

Reasons

Contact

Meeting the Maitans

Getting Settled

Tab’s Assignment

Kit’s Assignment

Meanwhile

Second Part

Curtain on Act Two

Mopping Up

Psychology

Perfect Isn’t Realistic

About the author

CD was born in Lakeland, Florida, in 1938. He is educated in genetics and botany. He has traveled over much of the world, particularly when he was in music as a rock rhythm guitarist with some well-known bands in the late sixties and early seventies. He has worked as a high steel worker and as a longshoreman, clerk, orchidist, bar owner, salvage yard manager and landscaper – among other things.

CD began writing fiction in 1984 and has more than 300 books published as of 3/15/16 in SciFi, murder, orchid culture and various other fields.

He now resides in Gualaca, Chiriqui, Panamá, where he continues research into epiphytic plants and plays music with friends. He loves the culture of the indigenous people and counts a majority of his closer friends among that group. Several have adopted him as their father. He funds those he can afford through the universities where they have all excelled. The Indios are very intelligent people, they are simply too poor (in material things and money. Culturally, they are very wealthy) to pursue higher education.

CD loves Panamá and the people, despite horrendous experiences (Free e-book; Fading Paradise). He plans to spend the rest of his life in the paradise that is Panamá

- Estrelita Suarez V. de Jaramillo – 3/15/2016

CD is involved in research of natural cancer cure at this time. It has proven effective in all cases, so far. It is based on a plant that has been in use for thousands of years, is safe, available, and cheap. He has studied botany, and was cured of a serious lymphoma with use of the plant, Ambrosia peruviana.

Information about this cure is free on the FaceBook group, Natural medicine research. CD asks only that all who try it please report on its effectiveness on that group.

New Zule

It was good being Zulian.

The light slightly cool teasing breeze from the west held the promise of rain, though there were few multicolored clouds to disturb the serenely clear blue of the sky at close to noon.

The tall feather trees didn't give much shade, but Teulek had never sought to hide from the light. The air was warm. That was enough.

A bit of cool clean rain would feel good against his smooth opalescent skin. That was enough, too. Teulek was satisfied with life and his station in it.

There was the endless sea before him spreading to the pale lavender-pink halo along the horizon that would slowly spread, becoming a deeper red before the night came with its rich deep purple shadings. Perhaps tonight he would see the silver-green moon and the orange-red one at the same time. That was always a beautiful sight.

Zulians saw far into the ultra-violet and infra-red. The clouds would appear very white to most beings and the hues and shadings of the sunset would lack the fullness Teulek saw.

New Zule was a truly beautiful world. Teulek's hearts were filled to overflowing with deep love for the Great Universal Consciousness and for those three machines and two organic people who had saved his people from extinction just three hundred cycles ago.

All Zulians loved all peoples.

All peoples loved the Zulians.

No one knew what the Zulians were. Not really.

Maybe the tentacled little Mentan.

It would be dark enough later to see the thousands of stars of all colors – after Klo and Jho moved below the horizon.

Teulek was a bit of a loner when he was home. He was also a thinker. He was very artistic, both with statues and the paints. He had tried for years to get exactly the right combination of colors to show how the light at dusk reflected from the myriad hues and shades of the large feather tree fronds, particularly where the spore heads formed at the margins in their brighter shades of blue and somber shades of red.

It was difficult – a challenge. It was a mixture of the ends of the spectrum that left both extremes visible. The eye could see it, but paints were not so easily separated. Teulek loved a real challenge. Zulians loved challenge. How could one hope to mix both ends of the central light spectrum into colors that contained both while not ending up with something between?

Many of the numerous wonderful beings in the Maitan Empire had much-shortened vision in comparison to the Zulians. Some saw very much farther into one end or the other. Some, such as the Mentans, could see more of both ends. Others, such as the Kheth and Terrans, could see only very limited pieces of light's effects.

It was strange the Mentans weren't great artists. They had a great love of beauty and all the natural abilities.

Teulek had once been to Empire Center, where Thing designed and scaped its amazing underwater gardens, so some Mentans were true and competent artists. Perhaps the fact they lived in pressures that would crush most others meant those others simply never saw the art. Even the gardens on EC were as much as three kilometers beneath the surface of the sea near the large island shared by the Terran, the Pluton and the Mentan. The emperor projected the gardens into the huge holovid screen in the Empire Galleries for all to enjoy.

EC was a truly beautiful planoformed world. Parf was perhaps the most naturally beautiful occupied planet in the empire, with its rings and moons.

One could never really know about Menta, thus one couldn't know what they saw from their world. It was a challenge to the mind to have to create beauty from the perceptions completely within that mind.

Resolved: The Mentans are fine artists.

The Parf could see as much as the Zulians. They were artists such as existed nowhere else in the galaxy. Teulek was filled with joy for the strange and wonderful Parf, who had no parallel in any race for their art.

Well, the Woost, though it could be argued (if any Zulian could be induced to argue) that the Parf were best at the more representative art, such as paints and statuary, while the Woost were more talented at demonstrative works such as landscaping, sculpture and buildings.

The Zulians were blessed in having many different talents in many different individuals.

The Parf had superb landscape designers and the Woost had some unsurpassed painters. The Zulians had a few of both.

Music. While the sounds that most affected different beings were generally a matter of rather limited patterns and sonic frequencies, Zulian symphonies were renowned over the galaxy. Operas, too!

The Isliponans were the unsurpassed musicians of the empire. They heard a very wide range and could blend and contrast to perfection.

Poetry was part of music and the Iaft were the masters of imagery who could produce beauty that translated well for many races. Teulek had once heard a work of collaboration among Zulians, Iaft and Isliponans that left the entire audience of many races stunned and awed in its incredible beauty. A Mord, one of that delightful race who communicate with colors, had stood before the crowd translating into shades and hues for all to enjoy. Its amazing beauty brought an ache to Teulek's hearts and to all the others so fortunate as to experience that blending of all good emotions that may never again in all the time in all the universes that make up the omniverse transpire. Each tiniest part of art remains forever unique. The combination was infinity multiplied by each artist and performer to what seemed a statistical impossibility. It was impossible, but it was there.

Then. Never again, but it was enough. It must be. It was.

It was an elite group, the galaxy's artists. It was good to be a part of something so important and productive.

The Zulians also were artists in the production of useful things, something the Parf and Woost weren't exceptional with, though one could well argue that art is the only useful thing.

The Zeenans, K-form mammals, were among the galaxy's most respected craftspeople in the production of fine quality goods. They were a proud people. Zulians seldom made such things as spaceships, but those few things they made were as good as those made at Zeena.

The strange insectoid Freenz were fantastic craftspeople for highly detailed and extremely complicated things such as electronic, positronic and planal interface modalities. The Zulian positronic relays and positioning tunnel diodes were unsurpassed.

Saraj produced the fabulous glasswork that Parf and Zulian artists were so fond of. There was a quality in Saraj glassware found nowhere else. Teulek had used a piece of Saraj psiltripium glass to sculpt a small statue of the famous Feach, Lund. It was displayed at Hospital.

The Feach were the empire's great pharmacists and physicians. New Zule often worked closely with them when there was great need.

Savaraj produced fantastic tapestries and rugs, strange talent indeed when one considered that they produced no other form of exceptional art.

Gnudg and Gaerkt produced art in taste. The food from those two restricted worlds were beyond description in their subtle and unexpected flavorings. The wines of Gnudg were as fantastic as those of Nemeede.

Zule made tapestries and rugs on a par with those, but made no claims as to wines or other foods, though it was known that the foods of New Zule were exceptional.

It was good to be a Zulian. Teulek quite honestly wished it were possible that all peoples could be as the Zulians.

Teulek would go soon aboard the intelligent ship and close friend, Theron, to University. He was a competent mathematician. Mathematics and art were compatible subjects. Zulians were blessed in that many excelled at University.

Theron was visiting with several people from the robot world the Terran, Z, had named Asimov for some reason. Perhaps it was a word with meaning from his home world, but no one expected very much logic from Terrans. There was logic in that the robots stated the name of their world in digitals most people couldn't identify with well.

Z was one of the organic people who had saved the Zulians so many cycles ago. Teulek loved him deeply and respected him. He enjoyed the Terran's sense of humor and careless, even foolish, courage.

Teulek sighed his deep contentment and began to move slowly toward the port and his closest friend, Theron. Teulek would go to University to teach. An honor. A very great honor because less than one tenth of one percent of the students in the empire could hope to qualify for entrance into University. Less than one tenth of one percent of the graduates of University had any small chance whatever to teach there, though anyone who finished even one year of studies could teach anywhere else in the empire.

Being Zulian was a wonderful thing. Only such races as the Feach and the Inktans had many students attending University, many being more than six at one time. New Zule had no less than fourteen this term. That was less than normal, but only fourteen had applied.

The Mentan, Thing, would conduct advanced courses in focal interplanal abstract math that Teulek would attend in his free time.

Mentans could enroll as many students in mathematics and related fields as would apply, but Mentans didn't often leave Menta. Teulek had heard of but one Mentan student at University and that one had revolutionized fractal vector indice correlative confluence projections for all time, making an almost impossibly difficult field reasonably understandable, if not simple.

The Vendan, Segt, would hold classes in planoforming, which interested Teulek. The Vendans were the galaxy's foremost experts at transforming dead or dying worlds into amazing garden planets.

A deep and very real love washed through Teulek for all peoples everywhere. That love was returned at least thousandfold! The Zulians were the most loved and respected race in the empire.

Thing was the Mentan's name. It was a personal adviser to the emperor itself, as was the Terran, Z, and the Pluton, Kurk. So were Tabori R. DeSixtee, TRD-60, Kit and T6.

Tab and Kit were robot detectives designed and built by Maita and TR and T6, their intelligent ships and partners. Few individuals knew they were mechanical people, but the Zulians did. Most knew the ships were also intelligent and independent citizens of the empire. The Zulians also knew the emperor was a mechanical being. Actually, a spaceship.

Theron was an intelligent spaceship. It was a truly close friend to the Zulians and stayed as their private ship by its own choice. Teulek knew a deep love for the ship that was a great deal more personal than his love for many other beings. They had long conversations. They shared a deep intense sense of wonder about the universe.

Theron knew the names of all the Zulians. Few others even knew they had individual names. A Zulian always acted and spoke only as a Zulian. Names really weren't important to anyone other than another Zulian. To use a personal name was an asking for personal recognition, which no Zulian sought.

This applied to Zule and Zulians. No one else. Others needed some personal recognition. Being Zulian was enough. It was also a responsibility.

As Teulek moved up along the entrance ramp into Theron the ship greeted him and sent a servo to meet him with a tray of sweetfruits. It was a standing joke between them that Teulek so loved certain of the tart-and-sweet morsels.

We go to University in a short time, Theron said. "We'll carry two Feach and one of those Kappins! It's going to be an interesting trip, I think. We both enjoy those different peoples and the different processes of their thoughts.

"T Six was here to bring the Feach woman, Gluce. She's been working constantly with Pacek to discover a serum for a virus that's been affecting some amphibian people on Forkum. She's worried that the thing could become a plague.

You seem in an introspective mood!

I was feeling almost proud, Teulek admitted. Being Zulian is such a responsibility!

You should be proud, Theron replied.

I don't mean racially proud. Personally, Teulek said.

So did I, Theron answered. There's nothing wrong with a pride that's deserved, and yours is that!

Wrong? Of course not, Teulek said slowly. The concept of right or wrong needs context, Theron.

"In a context where you've accomplished so much in personal ways you're allowed some personal pride – by every race but the Zulian! Theron said happily. It works well. Those less able or talented may share it for being Zulian."

Ah, but is anyone more or less able or talented? Teulek asked. Isn't it more a matter of area of ability than merely of quantity?

Quantity of ability? Theron replied. Really?

As I once heard the Terran say to the emperor, stick it in your focus coils! Teulek shot back.

He and Theron often teased one another in such a manner. He could sense when Theron was amused.

Have you ever seen those golems the emperor uses? Theron asked (Sudden changes in conversational content and direction were part of the relationship between them).

"Yes and No? Yes. (The amusement Teulek felt at the phrasing couldn't be hidden from his voice.) Kurk had Maita bring them out for us.

Kurk is such a truly amazing being. Even I am always somewhat apprehensive in his company. One can sense a great violence in him.

He's from another plane, Theron agreed. Even the robots admit they've been startled by him. Tab said he knew what the word ‘fear’ means since Kurk laughed right behind him when he didn't know he was there. He said he actually bolted. Ran about four meters before he could control the emotion.

The closeness between Kurk and the Terran seems somewhat incongruous, though the emperor's crew are all strange, Teulek agreed. When one considers, the closeness between you and me would strike many as somewhat odd.

The emperor's crew have so many exciting experiences where so much depends on their caring that would naturally evolve, Theron replied. Thing is holding lectures at University. I'm going to audit its classes while we're there anyhow. I enjoy those odd mathematical things. A one hour session with Thing is as learning an experience as a tenthyear of sessions with anyone else.

You can't understand ten percent of what Thing views as simple! Teulek laughed. I'll also sit in its classes when I can.

So long as I can work with the math it doesn't matter if I understand it, Theron said. "Thing says that.

I think we'll really enjoy this trip!

Pirated!

Thing would appreciate a ride to Feach with us if you will be so kind, Theron, Teulek greeted, coming up the ramp with the little Mentan on his back. We'll take Gluce home and Thing can meet TR at Feach. That will not inconvenience anyone.

We'll take Thing with us to Vendu. We're taking Segt home after we’ve delivered Gluce, Theron replied. "I'm getting a request right now to take Vane on to Zeena and drop Kwest off at Khee on the way back. Zeena isn't far from Gvselt, where Lhorn can meet the Kappin ship. These little side trips aren't much and the people are very good passengers.

It's a good thing we didn't plan on being back home for evemeal!

The empire-famous Mentan, Thing, was an empathic communicator who breathed through osmotic membranes so couldn't directly vocalize. Emperor Maita had at the inception of the empire allotted it a tuning fork tone to be used before and after its speech anywhere in the Maitan Empire. It had a translator device it carried on a belt it wore. When the Terran, Z, started writing of the exploits of the emperor's crew he used brackets ([ – ]) before and after Thing's words instead of quotation marks. The entire crew writes about their little adventures and all of them have continued the system.

Emperor Maita spoke through speakers, as did Theron, and used a bell tone before and after its words that the crew denote with asterisks (*–*).

The fastcoms all