I am Chun
A History from the Strength of Old
By Mark VanTassel
Chapter 1
Light seared Chun’s eyes. The air stank like potions brewed in a damp cave. He tried to blink, but his eyes were so dry the lids would not open and close properly. He tried to raise his hand and found that his muscles had turned to sand.
He fought his mind into a semblance of focus. His breath was thin, spread far and neglected for too long. He drew on centuries of discipline and pulled his breath together, organizing and shaping it, but it fought him, refusing to settle in the proper shapes.
His head throbbed. His back spasmed. Every nerve screamed in betrayal. He focused on his screaming nerves and traitorous muscles.
I am Chun. You will obey.
The pain disappeared into a small corner of his mind, and he locked it there, where it could not distract him.
He sat up, and people around him gasped. His body shrieked in agony, and it took him a moment to impose order on himself and reinforce the prison for his pain.
Chun glanced around.
Strangers. That is expected. But they are not like me. Round-eyed, pale, soft. I must be far from home.
They were dressed in bizarre clothing, all made from squares of rough cloth; cotton and wool it appeared.
Savages. But at least they are not Skrit.
He reached out with his breath, touching each one for an instant, then frowned.
They are all children. Perhaps my cradle was given to a school. But where is the teacher?
He pushed his breath out, seeking another wizard, and found nothing.
Perhaps their teacher was called away.
There were eight in white coats, and another nine in green. The first group studied him with a combination of awe and compassion. The second group stood around a tall boy with brass stars on his shoulders. They were clearly his subordinates. They looked wary, unsure if Chun was a threat.
The largest of the white coats removed his coat and handed it to Chun.
They have some manners, then.
He pulled the coat around himself and struggled to stand. Two of the children tried to help, and despite their pathetic weakness he needed them.
“What year is it?” Chun asked. He shrugged his shoulders in the too-tight coat, and the seam in the middle of his back ripped.
“Mingle flirtle plop,” said a gray-haired girl to his right. Chun turned to face her.
“Zribit yin zrib?” she said.
A white coat brought him a glass mug filled with clear liquid. He sensed a desire to help, and the liquid smelled like mineral water. He sipped and fought down the desire to suck the glass dry.
You will make yourself sick.
He sipped again.
Hard, unfiltered, a bit musty, acceptable under the circumstances.
He tried thanking them in universal trade, then western trade, then sea trade. Each time the girl responded in what was clearly another language, but Chun understood nothing.
The boy with brass stars on his shoulders approached the girl and berated her for a moment. He was a bit taller than Chun, but not as heavy.
Bully. Perhaps a ranking student. If so, their master chose poorly.
He quested with his breath again, but found no power in the bully, or any of the others.
What kind of school teaches breathing to no one?
Chun tapped his chest and said, “Chun.”
The girl tapped her chest and said, “Erin.”
The bully stepped in front of her and spat a string of syllables. Chun brushed the bully aside, and a boy with a strange mechanical stick lunged at him, pointing with the stick. Chun took the stick from him and bent it in half, splintering the wood.
The bully roared at him, and Chun drew his breath together.
Killing him is bad diplomacy, but with him here there will be no diplomacy at all.
Erin stepped between them and put her hand on Chun’s chest. “No, powafle?”
Ah. A common word. And she seems polite.
Chun met her eyes and nodded.
An argument broke out between the students in white coats and the students in green. It went on for several minutes, and Chun reconsidered his decision to spare the bully several times. Eventually Erin and a boy she had clearly bonded with persuaded the bully to leave and take his greenies with him.
With the bully out of the way things settled. Questions came one at a time, with Erin taking care to understand what he asked, and making notes on a board covered with layers of yellow paper.
They write left to right. I have heard of that, but from the other side of the world. How far was I taken?
They showed him a page full of squares. It took quite some time for him to figure out that it was a calendar, and the markings on it made no sense at all.
Chun yawned.
The cradle should not have weakened me. Why am I so tired?
Ronal, Erin’s companion, showed Chun a room with a large porcelain bowl hanging on the wall, and a smaller porcelain bowl nearby. Chun sniffed the air.
This is where they defecate, but how does this bowl work?
He frowned at Ronal, who pressed a lever on the side of the bowl. Water rushed into the bowl from the rim and vanished down the hole in the center with a whoosh. A pair of handles on the other bowl brought hot and cold water.
That is quite clever, but I sense no artisanship. How did they make these things without an artisan?
Ronal stepped out, and Chun relieved himself, washed his face and gave himself a towel bath. The coarse paper they used for personal care was strange.
Why would they do this? They are all very soft. Perhaps they are too lazy to wash fabric.
When he finished cleaning up, they brought him a snack. He examined it carefully. The noodles were bland, overdone, and growing cold. The sauce was over-creamed and smelled under-flavored. But when he put it in his mouth hunger overwhelmed culinary training. Chun found it delicious, and cleaned every morsel from his bowl, then smiled and thanked them.
They showed him to a windowless room with a strange little iron-framed bed that sagged under his weight.
It is made for children, but they must have adult clothing and furniture somewhere. Perhaps I can learn more about that tomorrow.
He lay down and Erin smiled at him and flipped a small lever near the door. The lights went out, and when she closed the door Chun found himself in complete darkness.
It’s like a bigger version of my cradle.
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Then he slept.
* * *
“He was going to kill the general,” Erin said.
Ronal shrugged his shoulders. Erin knew he had always been uncomfortable with violence. There was a tension in his gaze that belied the casual body language.
A beautiful trait, but one that can be overdone, Erin thought with a smile.
“Maybe you’re reading too much into it,” Ronal said. “The only violent thing he’s done is bend a rifle in half.”
“Have you tried bending a rifle in half?” Erin asked.
“No, but I presume you have to be abnormally strong,” Ronal said.
“I’ll ask the base armorer,” Erin said, “but I feel like you’d have to lock the barrel in a vice and pull on the other end with both hands.”
“I would believe that,” said Ronal. “Why does that mean he was going to kill the general?”
“The look in his eye said he was going to kill the general,” Erin said. “The bent rifle tells me he could do it.”
“That still doesn’t make him a killer,” Ronal said.
“How many scars does he have?”
“Gosh, maybe hundreds.”
“How do you think he got those?” Erin asked, raising an eyebrow at him.
“That tells me someone tried to kill him,” Ronal said. “It doesn’t mean he tried to kill them.”
“Only one of them is still here,” Erin said.
Ronal squinted at her. “We found him in a coffin, Erin. How do you know they didn’t succeed?”
“I’m telling you Chun has fought for his life dozens of times and survived every time. Trust me, honey. If he sets out to kill someone, they die.”
Ronal swallowed. “Maybe I should put a couple of guards in the room when you talk to him.”
“No, that won’t help. He was surrounded by strangers last night, and he clearly thought he could win any fight Archibald threw his way.”
“He’s never seen guns before,” Ronal said. “He just doesn’t know that if they shoot him a few times, he’ll die like anyone else.” He hugged himself. “God, I hate conversations like this.”
“He’s not a threat to us, honey,” Erin said. “You saw, I stopped him from attacking the general by saying please. We just need to get through the language barrier, and then we can stop guessing about the rest.”
She left Ronal in the office and went to check on Chun. He was sound asleep, so she got him a pitcher of water, a glass, and a pair of ham and cheese sandwiches, which she left on the folding chair in Chun’s room. Then she went to look for clothes that might fit him.
Erin checked on their guest every hour or so throughout the day. She even went so far as to check his pulse and breath rate at one point. He woke very briefly, saw what she was doing, and promptly went back to sleep.
General Archibald stopped by in the late afternoon.
“How is he?”
“He’s still asleep, General,” Ronal said.
“Do you mean he slept all night, and now he’s slept all day?” Archibald asked.
“Yes, sir.”
“Well, wake him up.”
“No,” Erin said.
“Excuse me?” Archibald asked.
“Waking him would be the wrong thing to do,” Erin said. “He is badly dehydrated, he is very hungry, and he is physically exhausted. Dragging him out of a sound sleep will only make him angry.”
“I don’t care if he’s happy. I want to know what he can do, learn what he knows.”
“Learning what he knows will take his cooperation,” Erin said. “Right now, we don’t have a language in common. I’ll keep trying other languages--I have a book of world greetings on order--but I think for now we should assume that I have to teach him Anglish. That is going to take time and trying to rush it will lead to misunderstandings and bad feelings on his part.”
Archibald frowned down at her. “So, you just want me to wait for weeks while you teach him a new language?”
“No, sir. I want you to wait for months while I teach him a new language,” Erin said.
“Months?” Archibald snapped. “You’re not the only linguist I can find, you know.”
“You can replace me if you want to slow things down,” Erin said, “but Ronal and I have already started building a rapport with him. I don’t know if you could tell, but he doesn’t like you. Having us here will smooth things out for him and for you.”
“I don’t need things to be smooth, Doctor. I need them to move. So, make it happen.”
“Sir, we are doing exactly that,” Ronal said. “If you make an enemy out of him you may not get anything useful at all. If you can make an ally out of him, you will be shocked at how much he has to offer.”
Archibald glanced back and forth between them. “You had better be right. Find a way to shave some time off of your program.”
* * *
They slept in the office that night and took turns checking on Chun. A little after midnight Erin found him sound asleep, but the water and food were gone. She refilled the pitcher and found him a generous serving of steak and potatoes.
That morning, a bit after six, Ronal woke her up to say that Chun was missing. Fortunately, after a huge surge of adrenaline and a very short search they found him in the vault. They couldn’t tell how he did it, but the bolts for the locks were sheared through like someone cut them with a razor.
Oddly, General Archibald seemed pleased.
They brought in a technician to replace the locks. “I can’t tell how he cut them, sir,” he said. “There are no metal shavings, and there doesn’t appear to be any material missing from the bolts.”
“Finally, some good news,” Archibald said. “Finish replacing the locks, and make sure you give Chun a key.”
After the general left, Erin turned to Ronal. “He didn’t ask if any of the tahlis are missing.”
“Are they?”
“No.”
Chun joined them. He wore the oversized fatigues she had found, but no shoes. Ronal showed him how to use the keys, and that he needed his own key plus one of theirs to open the doors. He showed some interest in the workings of the locks but did not reenter the vault. It wasn’t clear what Chun wanted, so they walked back toward their office, and he followed.
“It bothers me that he doesn’t want to go back in there,” Erin said
“Why?” Ronal asked.
“He didn’t take anything, which is fine. He’s probably not a thief, or at least not a foolish thief. But he didn’t try to hide the fact that he broke in, and now that we have given him access, he doesn’t seem to care.”
“Maybe he will later,” Ronal said.
“Maybe, but it makes me think he looked at our hoarded treasure and realized it is all trash.”
“Oh,” Ronal said, “I hadn’t considered that.”