CHAPTER SEVENTEEN – MURDER AND MAYHEM

Not all is peace and harmony in Umbaga's world....

Rains never last for ever, or if they do seem to then great myths and absurd religious purposes get attached to them, and therefore the downpour experienced during the early autumnal rainy season by Umbaga and his guests was over in a matter of days, and the sun returned as brightly as ever to shine on a world that looked thoroughly cleansed.

With it came a change of mood. Idju went straight outside to find other children to play with even though she was little more than a toddler and there were voices outside as Umbaga’s neighbours left the shelter of their caves and the menfolk set out quite urgently on a hunt. Umbaga would have gone with them but he chose to remain with Juju whilst she had visitors, especially visitors so strange and alien as the two that sat in their cave. Neither of them seemed to like the rainy weather, but then they had hardly ever experienced it living as they did on worlds where man had long controlled a great deal of his natural environment, including the worst of the weather.

Melvin shuffled uncomfortably. He was still in considerable pain even though his injuries were showing signs of healing with out any infection setting in. Clearly Juju’s salve had quite wonderful qualities, but then she had quite a lot of wisdom when it came to the healing qualities of this or that plant. At a time when all plants were weeds the opposite was true and no plants were weeds. Any of them might prove to help heal the sick or soothe wounds.

“We get back,” said Aurora to the other three, and despite his insistence that he couldn’t understand a word of the Neanderthal tongue that she was using Melvin nodded vigorously.

It was clear to her that they would have to return to their ship.

The only reason why she had made her the way to the cave in the first place was because Aurora had wanted to assure the two natives that she was in some way related to them. She had taken a sample of Juju’s hair and submitted it to a machine that almost instantly presented her with a DNA read-out, having compared the sample with a huge data-bank it had in its memory. She hadn’t know what to expect when she had switched the machine on and pressed the relevant controls to set it going, but not even dreamed that there would be any comparison with known DNA. That it had come out with the possibility that the primitive woman had a great deal of DNA identified as Neanderthal had shocked her.

So she had set her mind to working it out and she now believed that the two primitives were in actual fact two natives of the home planet. This the one that an age before the humans who now dominated the sector of the Galaxy they called Creation had originated on, had populated with countless billions of people. And she thought that these natives had regressed from being willing and able to visit the stars as their ancestors had done and had reverted back to be one of the original strands of humanity, the Neanderthal people, more recent copies of their genes being repressed over time until all that was left was a primitive starting-point. Their DNA had suggested this and DNA, as Aurora told Melvin more than once, can’t lie.

But it can mislead.

Yet all discoveries of the absolute truth were still in their future. All she had was a theory, but it made sense.

The plan was that Umbaga would accompany Melvin back to the repaired space vessel because he could keep a practised eye open for danger as the two of them went like two wary ghosts through a forest filled with dangers. Their progress would be slow as a consequence of Melvin’s injuries, which still caused him both pain and would certainly slow him down. After a suitable time the two women would follow, and Juju could, in turn, watch for danger as the two of them made their much faster way through the forest.

It made sense, but Umbaga didn’t like it and it would be an exaggeration to suggest that any one of them didn’t have reservations about splitting into two groups, but that was what they ended up doing. When Juju stood in their cave entrance and watched the slow pace that Melvin moved at she found she could understand the decision they had made.

Juju set about tidying the cave. It would be a mistake to suggest that Neanderthals, being primitive, lived dirty and untidy lives, because at least Juju and Umbaga didn’t didn’t. Juju, in particular, believed in neatness and order. She liked to keep things clean, including herself.

Washing usually presented no problem, for there was a river not so far away and they could splash it it. When the weather prevented this they had water available at home, great wooden and leather vessels that held as much as they would need. So before she set about her tidying she washed herself, and Aurora watched, fascinated. Then the child Idju needed to be washed, and Juju attended to that with great care before she raced around the space she called home, cleaning and straightening and checking their bedding for excessive infestation.

It took her the best part of an hour to perform her daily duties, and she with Idju in her arms and Aurora were about to set forth on what would be quite a long march back, through the forest and across the mushroom clearing, when Umbaga staggered back into the cave, clearly distraught. His face was white, a shade that Juju had never seen before, and there were tears forming in his eyes.

“Melvin dead!” he announced suddenly, and he sat on the bed that Juju had just tidied and buried his head in his hands.

“What is?” gasped Juju. She had never seen her man quite this distraught and knew something truly bad must have happened. “Was Old Man Tiger?” she asked.

He shook his head.

“Not Old Man Tiger but other folks,” he moaned.

“Other folks?” demanded Juju.

“Other folks,” he repeated.

“Painted tribesmen from across the river?” asked Juju, struggling to understand what might have gone on.

He shook his head. “Not painted tribesmen,” he choked. “Not them, but man and woman … not of this place….”

“What then?” asked Juju.

All this time Aurora had stood still with a look of shock on her face, trying to make sense of what must have gone on.

“Umbaga kill Melvin?” she asked, suspicion on her face. After all, she thought, if her man had been attacked by what Umbaga described as “other folks” and they weren’t other natives of this primitive planet then it must have been Umbaga himself in collusion with some of the others who lived nearby. She’d seen them and amongst them were some truly frightening individuals, and she could see a forced of them attacking Melvin as he struggled along.

“Umbaga not!” replied Umbaga indignantly. “Umbaga never do!”

What Aurora didn’t realise (and it wasn’t obvious when you looked at them) the locals were far from being murderous thugs. There’s one thing looking as if you might bop a stranger over the head because you thought you had a reason to do so outrageous a thing, but quite another having the kind of mentality to do it.

“What then?” demanded Aurora, and Juju placed one hand gently on her shoulder to comfort her.

Umbaga pointed towards Aurora and then stood up. “People like you,” he whispered, “with shiny hair and soft clothes, man, woman - and stick that went bang!”

And with those words he started shaking as if afflicted by some great incomprehensible shock, which is most likely what had happened.

© Peter Rogerson 01.11.16