{"id":101,"date":"2011-11-17T06:50:21","date_gmt":"2011-11-17T06:50:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/?p=101"},"modified":"2023-11-04T15:06:32","modified_gmt":"2023-11-04T15:06:32","slug":"the-songs-of-eridani-part-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/?p=101","title":{"rendered":"The Songs of Eridani – Part 1"},"content":{"rendered":"

Chapter 1<\/strong><\/p>\n

Things grew large on epsilon Eridani III, but it was the smallest of creatures that brought us down. We were barely two days into the unexplored jungle that lay to the north of S’uval, the riverside port
\nvillage that marked the farthest reach of human colonization on the planet.<\/p>\n

I lay prostrate and sweating on the bedroll inside my tent,
\nhallucinating in the throes of my fever. I was dimly aware of T’aylang,
\nour native guide, bending over me; his massive, cylindrical head filled
\nmy blurry vision. In my delirium, the rainbow of colors refracting off
\nhis eye-hoop mutated into a medieval painting, one that depicted a
\nterrifying, insane vision of damned souls in hell.<\/p>\n

“I’m dying,” I said weakly.<\/p>\n

“Death without redemption is a terrible thing to contemplate, Mr.
\nBishop,” T’aylang replied.<\/p>\n

“The databulb. Make sure it gets to Kline.” I struggled to withdraw
\nthe bulb from underneath my sweat-drenched shirt, where it hung on a
\nlanyard around my neck. Somehow it seemed imperative that I not take it
\ninto hell with me. Perhaps my own redemption depended on it.<\/p>\n

T’aylang reached down and stilled my fumbling hand. “Best to take
\nit to him yourself. You will survive, as will your colleagues. Eridani
\ninsinuates herself into your flesh as we speak. She is harsh, but not
\nalways deadly. It is only the first step of your true journey.”<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\n

There had been no word from Dr. Manfred Kline for nearly a year,
\nand his Church sponsors had grown anxious.<\/p>\n

I figured they’d known at the outset how risky it would be to send
\na missionary into the unexplored regions of Eridani III. Their
\napprehensions were well-justified. It was the most dangerous planet
\nmankind had ever attempted to colonize.<\/p>\n

The six directors of the Church of the Holy Psychological
\nRedemption sat across from me at an expansive mahogany conference table
\nin an inner sanctum of their main temple on Earth. Even the youngest of
\nthem had to be at least twice my age, and my casual field dress clashed
\ndissonantly with their formal business attire. The Chairman, who I
\njudged by the depth and profusion of his wrinkles to be the eldest,
\ncleared his throat.<\/p>\n

“Mr. Bishop, it’s not often that we resort to asking for outside
\nhelp. As you can imagine, we are somewhat . . . out of our league, here,
\nso to say.”<\/p>\n

As I’d learned in the project brief, Kline himself had proposed the
\ndangerous posting, and had convinced the directors to send him there
\nover their objections. It was the Church’s first foray into off-world
\nproselytizing. I let a derisive snort escape me as I reflected on that
\nfact now: Ultimately, you just couldn’t resist sending your own pompous
\nbrand of human enlightenment into the dark, heathen universe around you,
\ncould you?<\/p>\n

I took a moment to compose myself before I replied to the elder.
\n“Out of your league, to be sure. You’re also a bit desperate, if I
\nunderstand your situation correctly. But if it’s any consolation, I
\nthink you’re making the right move by bringing somebody like me into the
\nloop.”<\/p>\n

Somebody like me: an experienced mantracker who wasn’t afraid to
\nget his hands dirty. I looked down at the delicate bone china cup that
\nrested on the table to my right; the eye of its tiny handle was way too
\nsmall to accept the insertion of any but a delicate woman’s finger. I
\nwrapped my large, calloused hand around its body instead and hoisted it
\ninelegantly to my lips. Weak, lukewarm tea. Needless to say, it wasn’t
\nmy preferred afternoon beverage. A sigh left my lips as I clanked the
\ncup back down in its saucer.<\/p>\n

“Gentlemen, I sympathize with your plight,” I said, reflexively
\nrunning my palm over the top of my close-shaved head. “But I’m a
\npragmatic man, and–beside my other talents–a minor student of history.
\nAs I read them, the chronicles of mankind are littered with tales of
\nmissionaries being slaughtered by capricious natives or dangerous
\npredators, succumbing to horrible diseases, poisonous vermin, what have
\nyou. So far as I’m concerned, those folks all had a bit of the
\ndeath-wish in them. I’m curious: What makes you think that Kline, if
\nhe’s still alive, even wants to be found? Why not just chalk him up as a
\nmartyr to your cause and be done with it? You know how hugely expensive
\nmy services will be. Is it really worth it to you?”<\/p>\n

I saw the subordinate directors drop their heads, but the Chairman
\nleaned forward and focused his rheumy, gray eyes on me.<\/p>\n

“We can’t share Dr. Kline’s Church communications with you, owing
\nto their confidentiality. But I can tell you this: We know from his last
\nmessages that he was excited at the progress he was making. His tone was
\nnot that of a man with a death-wish, Mr. Bishop. Kline discovered
\nsomething important about the psychology of the indigenous natives he
\nwas working with. We need to find him and bring him home safely. Or–God
\nforbid–if he’s no longer alive, at least obtain proof of his demise,
\nand retrieve whatever records he left behind. It’s of extreme importance
\nto the Church that we do this.”<\/p>\n

“Well, it’s your money. If you insist on spreading some of it my
\nway, perhaps I shouldn’t protest so strenuously.” Judging from the
\nopulence of the room and its furnishings, it was obvious that money was
\nnot in short supply in this Church. Of course, I knew that its
\nparishioners paid dearly for their spiritual services. I removed a
\npenknife from my pocket and began to clean my fingernails with it.<\/p>\n

“Dr. Manfred Klein is a great man, Mr. Bishop,” the Chairman said.
\n“A fine psychiatrist, and a true witness to our faith. We simply can’t
\nforsake him now in the hour of his greatest need–nor can we afford to
\nlose the fruits of his recent labors.”<\/p>\n

Using the stubborn will that only comes to those who are near to
\nthe end of all things corporeal, the ancient man slowly pushed himself
\nup from his chair with the aid of a cane. A curled topographic map of
\nEridani’s main continent sprawled on the table between us. He bent over
\nit and jabbed a crooked, arthritic finger on the center of an unexplored
\narea. “He’s in there somewhere, and we mean to bring him out. Will you,
\nor will you not help us do that?”<\/p>\n

There was little doubt as to my final decision. Beyond the
\npre-negotiated fee to be paid by the Church, my agent had already
\nsecured a tasty cash advance from one of the major network content
\nproviders, and he had optioned an audio\/video specialist and a producer
\nto document my journey. I would retain half of the media take after
\nproduction expenses, with an even better deal on future off-world
\nsyndication rights. Sure, it would be a dangerous mission. But big
\nrewards always flow to big risk-takers. And I’d already had plenty of
\nexperience traversing the type of terrain we’d be encountering–albeit,
\nnot on Eridani itself.<\/p>\n

“I just had to be sure how committed you are to this venture, and
\nhow far you’ll go to pursue it,” I said. I pocketed the penknife and
\nleaned forward. “I’ll deliver your precious Dr. Kline and his records to
\nyou, gentlemen. Whether or not I present him kicking and screaming in
\nthe living flesh, or stinking inside a body bag–that’s the only thing
\nundetermined at this point.”<\/p>\n

The Director reached into one of his vest pockets and withdrew a
\ntiny encrypted databulb. “If you find him alive, make sure you deliver
\nthis to him. He’ll be more than willing to return here after he reads
\nthe message on it.” He handed it across the table to me while making a
\nunique hand gesture, a physical sigil that represented their Church’s
\nidentity. “God go with you.”<\/p>\n

I rose and strode to the exit of the conference room, turned, and
\nlooked up at the magnificent glass chandelier that hung over the group
\nof doddering old men. “I’ll present your grand Church of the Holy
\nPsychological Redemption with either a living saint or a dead martyr.
\nEither way, I’m sure you’ll come out ahead.”<\/p>\n

As I left the room, I couldn’t help feeling that something stank
\nabout this deal–and it wasn’t the specter of Kline’s rotting corpse. It
\nwas worse than that. It was the kind of smell that clings to insincere
\npeople who are hiding something.<\/p>\n

\n

Chapter 2<\/b><\/p>\n

I teamed up with my assigned A\/V man, Pete Horvack, along with
\nLaura Denning, my field producer, a couple of days later. The three of
\nus boarded the shuttle to the Lagrange-2 wormhole support complex, where
\nwe’d catch the next scheduled skip-ship run to Eridani.<\/p>\n

The next morning after our arrival, we stripped and submitted
\nourselves to the bio-static immersion process that would protect us
\nduring the skip, and hoped that our hangovers from the night before
\nwouldn’t follow us to the other side of the Eridani wormhole. Foolish
\nus. At least I should have known better, since I’d already made a few
\noff-world skips on other assignments.<\/p>\n

\n

“Kill me, Bishop,” Pete Horvack said. He pulled his slightly
\noverweight body out of the stasis chamber next to mine, his long,
\ndirty-blonde hair splashing over his shoulders. “Make it quick, so I
\ndon’t have to suffer any more.”<\/p>\n

The cameraman sat down on the lip of the tank, holding his head. He
\nstared mournfully at his toes, which had begun to revert from the
\npurplish tone that characterized the bio-stasis condition to their
\nnormal pink color.<\/p>\n

“You’re cursed with having to live yet another day, Pete,” I said.
\n“Buck up, man. It’ll soon get worse.” This had been Pete’s first
\nexperience passing through the looking glass.<\/p>\n

I suffered a series of racking coughs, then turned and watched the
\nnaked form of Laura Denning, our young producer, slowly make its way out
\nof her chamber. She retched, brushed a few wet locks of short black hair
\naway from her cheeks, and puked stringy phlegm onto the floor. Following
\nthis noisy bit of purging, she looked over at me with pouting,
\nstill-blue lips; she had a blanched, pleading expression on her face
\nthat would have melted the heart of any man who didn’t know her.<\/p>\n

But I did know her, so my own heart stayed quite solid. Laura was
\nyoung, pretty and ambitious. On the last count, overly so; she used any
\nadvantage at her disposal to get ahead in the business. I had to hand it
\nto her, though: She didn’t mind paying her dues–as evidenced by this
\nassignment.<\/p>\n

“Was it everything you’d hoped it would be, darling?” I asked her,
\nsmiling.<\/p>\n

In response, she scowled, bent her head down and dry-retched some more.<\/p>\n

A cheery skip-ship attendant reached us, passing out clean
\nbathrobes, towels and plastic sandals, and we walked unsteadily to the
\nlavatory area to clean up and become human again. We showered, dressed
\nand moved through the ship’s disembarkation sphincter, out into the
\ninterglobal terminal at M’bassa, the main port of entry into Eridani III.<\/p>\n

It was not a large spaceport by any means, and was quaintly rustic
\nin its construction. A cloyingly sweet aroma of local orchids wafted
\nthrough the terminal from open veranda doors. Arching structural timbers
\nsupported the building; they were crafted from a dark local wood, carved
\nin a meandering, exotic style. The floors were covered with wood parquet
\ntiles. I remembered having had a similar impression when I passed
\nthrough the international airport on Tahiti once. That place had smelled
\nlike the mother of all funeral homes; this one had to be the grandmother.<\/p>\n

Customs procedures here were perfunctory, at best. I knew that
\nEridani’s biosphere had an effective way of protecting itself from
\nforeign organisms: it either killed them outright, or quickly rendered
\nthem innocuous. There was little danger of contaminating this planet
\nwith non-indigenous, opportunistic flora or fauna; the natural selection
\nprocess here was simply too complex, too unforgiving. The number of
\nbiological niches on Eridani was easily ten times greater than what
\nexisted on Earth, and every one of them was occupied by an organism set
\non defending its claim to the death by whatever nasty means it had at
\nits disposal–tooth or claw, strangling vine, beak or painful stinger.<\/p>\n

This made the place particularly interesting to both scientists and
\ntourists alike–that is, those who could tolerate the myriad
\ninoculations requisite to obtaining an entry visa. A significant
\nproportion of the tourist category was comprised of filthy-rich big-game
\nhunters. It seemed that almost everything on the planet grew big. It had
\nsomething to do with the high oxygen content of the atmosphere.<\/p>\n

To my mind, that made for a fairer game here. True, I was also a
\nhunter, so I should have appreciated the challenge. The difference was,
\nI always tried to bring my prey back alive.<\/p>\n

Tourism was a big draw, but certain basic industries were also
\nbeing developed. A number of open-pit mines and ore processing
\nfacilities had been established on the planet, and that industrial
\nsector was rapidly expanding; the lack of any colonial environmental
\ncontrol regulations made mining and smelting a very profitable
\ncommercial enterprise here. Earth still needed its heavy metals–lots of
\nthem–and this was a place to get them without bearing the burden of
\nfurther environmental repercussions. Human civilizations had always been
\nadept at exporting their seamier problems that way.<\/p>\n

“Where are the natives?” I asked the Customs agent while he
\ntransacted my entry visa. “I don’t see any of them in the terminal area.”<\/p>\n

The man sniggered as I withdrew my left wrist with its ID embed
\nfrom under his scanner. “The donnies? They don’t come here. Pretty much
\nkeep to themselves. An unresponsive lot, generally. Useless as workers.
\nNot much good for anything. You’ll find that out for yourself, soon enough.”<\/p>\n

I had looked forward to seeing the Eridanis firsthand. I knew it’d
\nbe in our best interests to find a native guide to lead us to our
\ndestination. And a few paid porters wouldn’t hurt, either. Laura was in
\npretty good physical shape, but I worried about Pete. It was obvious to
\nme that he didn’t spend much time in the gym–if any at all. We would be
\ncarrying all our provisions with us on our trek, since most of the local
\nfood was poisonous to humans; what wasn’t poisonous hadn’t been
\ncompletely sorted out yet by the biologists. The ecology of Eridani was
\ncomplex enough that it would take another few decades before that happened.<\/p>\n

The customs agent waved me on. While I waited for my colleagues to
\npass through, I authorized the release of a few entangled electrons from
\nmy wrist embed. Using a series of finger movements, I kinesthetically
\ninduced their consecutive spin values to code an instantaneous text
\nmessage in the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen quantum trap back at the temple
\nof the Church of Psychological Redemption: “Arrival at Eridani
\nconfirmed.” The EPR technology was good for simple text messages, but
\nway too expensive for broadband signals. Nonetheless, it provided the
\nultimate in data security: only the electron pair-mates retained at the
\nreceiving location could reflect the instantaneously resolved spin
\nvalues of their distant brothers.<\/p>\n

We were ten and a half light-years from Earth, and our journey had
\nhardly begun.<\/p>\n

\n

Chapter 3<\/strong><\/p>\n

“We have to get some local color in the can today, Bishop.” Laura
\nlifted a piece of a pink omelet from her breakfast plate and daintily
\nplaced it between her lips.<\/p>\n

What sort of egg it had come from, I didn’t care to know–but I’d
\nalready shoveled most of the one on my plate into my own pie-hole. It
\ntasted close enough to Terran eggs, I thought.<\/p>\n

“Local bazaars,” she continued. “Eridani buildings, unique
\narchitecture. Colorful crafts. Natives moving around, talking, relating
\nto you as a foreign visitor. Elders drinking tea around tables and
\npontificating upon pontificatious things. Dancers and musicians blowing
\non their flutes, or whatever it is they blow on here. That sort of thing.”<\/p>\n

To this point, we’d not seen a single native, ensconced as we were
\nin the main resort enclave. None of the hotel employees were Eridani,
\nnor did any natives lurk outside, begging or hawking wares, offering
\ntaxi rides to off-the-beaten-track places, or soliciting trysts with
\nyoung virgin daughters. It seemed. . . unnatural. Foreign to my normal
\nforeign experience–even including the other three colonized worlds I’d
\nworked on before.<\/p>\n

“I so agree,” I said. “Let’s go find ’em. You fully plugged, Pete?”<\/p>\n

He tapped his A\/V headset, connected to a socket surgically
\nimplanted in the back of his skull. “Does the Pope shit in the woods?”<\/p>\n

We finished our breakfast and marched out of the front hotel
\nentrance, toward the gate that marked the enclave’s perimeter. A hotel
\nemployee decked out thematically in full British colonial regalia, down
\nto the white pith helmet, saluted and handed each of us a four-color
\nbrochure, a tourist’s map of the town and surrounding area. I knew that
\nwe’d be seeing a lot more of that intentionally wrought Victorian
\ncolonial ambiance during our time on Eridani. The tourists loved it.<\/p>\n

“Have a great day in M’bassa,” he said. “Be sure not to miss
\nvisiting the Roman Catholic cathedral in the main square. And don’t
\nmistreat the donnies, please.”<\/p>\n

He said this like we were carrying whips and chains with us. We’d
\nalready assimilated all the available data on Eridani. From my research,
\nI knew everything mankind knew about this place and its inhabitants. The
\nnatives were obviously sentient, judging from the known, tangible
\nevidence of their simple civilization. But they seemed indifferent to
\nour encroachment into their world. They mostly reacted as though we
\ndidn’t exist. There had been no resistance, no response to our
\ncolonization. The Eridanis had simply sidled aside and gone about their
\nbusiness as if humans had never arrived three decades ago. They’d react
\nto direct physical contact, but rarely acknowledged any attempts at
\ncommunication. It was as if they thought: If we ignore you long enough,
\nmaybe you’ll just go away.<\/p>\n

And so I appreciated, all the more, the challenge of Dr. Kline’s
\nministry. The Church of the Holy Psychological Redemption figured that a
\nperson had to absolve himself for his sins, before being absolved by
\nGod. Dr. Kline had adopted traditional Jungian psychoanalytical methods
\ntoward this end, but his Church wasn’t hung up about the precise mode of
\nperfecting the spirit. It considered any psychiatric method that
\nunlocked the suppressed layers of the mind to be appropriate for its
\npurposes–anything short of the use of psychotropic drugs or nanoagents.
\nThese, in their book, were anathema–unholy in the extreme.<\/p>\n

I wondered why Kline would have chosen this world, these people, to
\nproselytize his religion. To me, it seemed a fool’s choice; the Eridanis
\nwere too uncommunicative, too enigmatic, too closed to understanding.
\nAnd what kind of sins could they possibly harbor? Judging by the
\nrudimentary artifacts of their culture and their dull natures, they
\nseemed scarcely more intelligent than socialized sloths. They were
\nperfectly adapted and attuned to their environment, and obviously stood
\nat the apex of the evolutionary tree here–but they were sloths
\nnonetheless. Surely sin is reserved for human beings, I thought–thanks
\nto that damnable serpent back in the Garden of Eden.<\/p>\n

We walked through the resort’s gate, and the smooth asphalt drive
\nbecame a dusty dirt road. Dense green vegetation towered on both sides
\nof us. I noticed blood-red silken webs strung here and there between the
\ntrees, each dominated by a single spider-like creature with a bunch of
\nlong legs and a body bigger than my fist; the pseudoarachnids pulsed
\ntheir webs in and out menacingly as we passed by them. Sharp little eyes
\nthey had, I thought.<\/p>\n

We continued walking and came upon something that had the proximate
\nappearance of a very large guinea fowl, pecking at the ground along the
\nedge of the lane. It looked like a turkey raised on massive doses of
\nsteroids–except for its longer, birefringent tail feathers and
\nprominent sharp teeth. Pete, who was walking on that side, caught sight
\nof it, uttered an expletive, and swerved over to the opposite edge of
\nthe road.<\/p>\n

It was only early morning, and already it was hot.<\/p>\n

“I have to tell you something, Laura,” I said while we walked. “I
\nnever would’ve expected you to take on another assignment with me.”<\/p>\n

Laura laughed in a way that hinted more at disdain than humor. She
\npulled up short, turned and glared at me. “Bangkok happened a long time
\nago, Bishop. Thanks not very much for reminding me about that
\nexperience, but since you did, we might as well get it out of the way. I
\nreally didn’t know what I wanted out of life back then. However, I can
\nthank you for setting me straight on that.”<\/p>\n

“It was innocent enough. An exotic assignment, two young people in
\nthe middle of it, a thrilling moment in time. It was never anything
\nreal. Surely you knew that.”<\/p>\n

“Real. Of course. None of what we do is real; it’s all for the
\nshow, for the entertainment. I came to grips with that, in the end. It’s
\nwhat we are, it’s what we do. Whores to the slavering masses, providing
\ntheir media fix. No apologies necessary, Bishop. I’m a true professional
\nnow–and this project can be my ticket to bigger and better things.”<\/p>\n

“Glad you see it that way. I’d hate to think of all that messy
\nbackground stuff regurgitating itself at the wrong moment.”<\/p>\n

Pete was dutifully capturing all this. He could never know whether
\nor not it was part of the show. Nor was it his job to decide.<\/p>\n

\n

Chapter 4<\/strong><\/p>\n

We soon came upon mud brick buildings on the outskirts of M’bassa,
\nand saw our first Eridani in the flesh–leathery as it was. The native
\nkneeled in the dirt outside the entrance to one of the crude structures,
\npounding a blunt wooden mallet onto some kind of plant material that lay
\non a stone metate.<\/p>\n

The word “kneeled” was a simplification; the multiple joints of the
\nEridani’s bipedal legs were way too complicated to describe that
\nconfiguration in one word–the subtleties of their intricate bending
\nsurfaces and folding planes would have driven a mathematical topologist
\ninsane. Fully erect and unfolded, the adult female would have stood well
\nover seven feet tall.<\/p>\n

The tough skin of the Eridani had a deep copper hue, highlighted by
\nlighter verdigris tones at the edges of its many wrinkles and folds.
\nPerhaps that color change was merely a trick of the light. To me, it
\nmade her look ancient–like a cast metal sculpture that had weathered
\nfor centuries, then had magically come to life for my aesthetic
\nappreciation.<\/p>\n

I knew this one was a female by the twin rows of dugs that depended
\nfrom her chest. That, and the tiny infant that was affixed to one of
\nthem, suckling. From the guidebooks we’d studied, we knew that the
\ndonnies rarely wore any clothing other than a simple loincloth; in this
\noppressive heat, I could well understand why. The native used two of her
\nfour upper appendages to wield the mallet, and the other pair to
\noccasionally scoop out the mashed material from the metate, put it into
\na terracotta bowl, and pluck fresh plants from a large woven basket that
\nsat next to her. She didn’t react in any noticeable way to us standing
\nthere, gawking at her and her child.<\/p>\n

It would have been hard to know if she had even registered our
\npresence, since the eyes of the Eridanis were not discretely focusing,
\nmovable organs. Rather, a thick band of fixed tissue containing
\nlight-sensitive cells encircled their cylindrical heads. According to
\nthe exo-anatomy texts I had researched, I knew that the basal cells of
\ntheir eye bands aligned themselves in tightly adjacent vertical columns.
\nThat caused the organ to act like diffraction grating, refracting
\nincoming light and reflecting it back out in every color of the visible
\nspectrum. We’d all seen videos of this, of course, but it was still
\nfascinating to watch the ever-changing waves of color roll across the
\narc of the Eridani’s eye-hoop, varying according to the angle of the
\nambient light and the viewing aspect of the onlooker. Every color of the
\nrainbow was represented there–as well as other colors and wavelengths
\non either side of the visible spectrum.<\/p>\n

Pete approached the woman to get a closer shot. “‘Scuse me, mama,”
\nhe said. “Comin’ in on ya, here. Cute little tyke you got there. Hey
\nkid, you wanna get your fifteen minutes of fame?”<\/p>\n

The Eridani continued to pound, unperturbed. Her child continued to
\nsuckle.<\/p>\n

“Very heartwarming,” Laura said. “But world-class material, it is
\nnot. We can use ten seconds of it, tops. This kind of crap is jejune by
\nnow. Let’s push on.”<\/p>\n

Pete got too close and brushed one of the woman’s rising and
\nfalling arms. She suddenly went rock solid, frozen in mid-motion.
\n“Oops,” he said. “My bad.”<\/p>\n

“Pete, we need to motor,” I said.<\/p>\n

“Okay, Bishop,” he replied. “So long, cutie-pie.” He reached over
\nto stroke the infant.<\/p>\n

The mother issued a tone, a single long, keening note. Pete’s
\nfingers stopped an inch away from her infant, and he got a puzzled
\nexpression on his face.<\/p>\n

“C’mon, Pete, let’s go. Sometime this century.”<\/p>\n

He retracted his hand and backed away from the Eridani.<\/p>\n

“Odd,” he said.<\/p>\n

“Yes, you certainly are,” Laura countered. She strode off toward
\nthe town.<\/p>\n

\n

“We can certainly outfit you, sir. No problem with that. But as far
\nas native guides and porters . . . that’s going to be somewhat of a
\nproblem.” Mr. Percy, the safari stationmaster, looked nervously at me,
\nthen over at Laura and Pete. “And so far as I know, all available human
\ncontract laborers are already out in the field, previously committed.”<\/p>\n

I pounded the replica antique desk in frustration and stared at my
\ndusty boots.<\/p>\n

“Slipshod planning. This is not starting off well at all. Hadn’t
\nthis all been pre-arranged?”<\/p>\n

“But of course,” the agent said. “All the supplies and equipment
\nfor your excursion have been dutifully reserved and are sitting now in
\nthe warehouse. But arranging porterage is the customer’s responsibility,
\nnot ours.”<\/p>\n

I sighed in resignation. “Never mind. No sense beating you to a
\nbloody pulp over it.”<\/p>\n

I waved to my colleagues and we turned to leave.<\/p>\n

“Hold onto the stuff, Percy,” I told the agent. “We’ll figure
\nsomething out.”<\/p>\n

We exited the station and stood on the covered wooden porch outside
\nit, staring at each other.<\/p>\n

“Balls,” I said.<\/p>\n

“If I had ’em, I’d be king,” Laura replied.<\/p>\n

“Maybe we can just go bowling,” Pete suggested.<\/p>\n

I chuckled at that, and stared out at the dirt road. A tall Eridani
\nambled past, moving with uncanny grace for his size, as if he was
\nstalking some sort of prey just beyond the reach of my vision. The
\ndonnie stopped, turned to us, and made a subtle hand gesture that I
\nvaguely remembered from my meeting with the Church directors.<\/p>\n

“Might not be a bad idea, Pete,” I said. “Let’s find out what these
\ncritters like to do for diversion. That’ll probably be the best place to
\nsolicit some help.”<\/p>\n

We followed the donnie, walking further down the road into the main
\npart of town, passing the garishly ornate but slowly decomposing Roman
\nCatholic mission cathedral in the central square. A few human-run gift
\nshops constructed in a colonial style were interposed with indigenous
\nstructures. The Eridani ahead of us finally paused at a native mud brick
\nestablishment that was larger than any we’d previously seen. Several
\nother adult Eridanis loitered outside its entrance.<\/p>\n

We entered the building, leaving the bright Eridani sun, leaving
\nour comfortable human world behind.<\/p>\n

\n

Chapter 5<\/strong><\/p>\n

The relative darkness inside the building plunged me into momentary
\nperceptual confusion. At first, all I could see were the refracted,
\nmulticolored sparkles from several dozen Eridani eye-hoops, lining
\neither side of the long axis of the room. They stretched like perfectly
\naligned landing lights alongside an airport runway. As my eyes adapted,
\nI resolved the bodies of the donnies they belonged to, lying prostrate
\non individual woven mats facing a central aisle like huge grasshoppers
\nsitting on leaves. In front of each one was a flat, fibrous board, about
\na foot square, with a small clay cup to one side of it and a pile of
\npebbles to the other. A juvenile Eridani moved down the long ranks,
\ntopping up the cups from a large pitcher it carried.<\/p>\n

At the end of the aisle, at the head of the room, a single Eridani
\nknelt, facing us. We watched as he reached into a bowl on his right
\nside, lifted something out of it and held it in front of his eye-hoop,
\nthen issued a noise that sounded to me like something between a cough
\nand a dog’s bark. From somewhere in the depths of the room, I heard an
\nanswering bark.<\/p>\n

“Christ, we’ve stumbled into a fucking Eridani Bingo Parlor,” Laura
\nsaid.<\/p>\n

Pete’s reactive laughter echoed through the hall. The juvenile
\ndonnie strode to the front of the room, plucked some sort of small
\nterracotta object from a pile, and carried it over to, presumably, the
\nwinner’s mat. In a distinctly higher tone, it issued a series of noises
\nas it cleared the board there, pebble by pebble. We heard a general
\nchittering sound from the crowd assembled in the room.<\/p>\n

None of the Eridanis seemed to notice our presence in their gaming
\nhouse. I walked forward toward the head of the room and the gaming
\nmaster who knelt there.<\/p>\n

“Greetings to you, sir,” I said. “Perhaps you can help us. We’re
\nlooking for a guide and some porters. We’ll pay very well.”<\/p>\n

There was no reaction from him. The donnie moved the retracted
\nnumber tokens back into the bowl to his right side and shook them in
\npreparation for the next round. I found myself wondering how in the hell
\nthis race of beings could have possibly survived on the planet, as
\npassive and unresponsive as they were. On Earth, they’d be gobbled up in
\nno time at all. And here, on Eridani, with its even more aggressive
\necology–it made little sense to me how they were even able to exist,
\nmuch less become the most evolved species on the planet.<\/p>\n

“We’re searching for a lost human, a man named Dr. Kline.”<\/p>\n

The background chittering stopped, and the gaming master froze.<\/p>\n

The sudden silence in the room produced a feeling of total
\nexposure, and I sensed the hairs on the back of my neck rise in
\nresponse. I knew that the eye-hoop of an Eridani simply refracted the
\navailable ambient light, but I could have sworn that the master’s hoop
\nblazed forth with some sort of internal energy.<\/p>\n

“Kline,” the donnie uttered.<\/p>\n

“Yes. Dr. Kline. We want to find him. Can you help us do that?”<\/p>\n

The gamemaster slowly unfolded himself and stood aright. His form
\ntowered over me.<\/p>\n

“You are his . . . associates?” he asked in near-perfect English,
\nhis mandibles contorting in complicated shapes to annunciate the words
\nproperly.<\/p>\n

“Yes! Yes, we’re friends of his. We wish to visit him. But we need
\na guide to lead us there. And some help to carry our things.”<\/p>\n

The donnie raised both pairs of his arms and held them
\noutstretched. “Kline recently proclaimed that new humans would come
\nseeking him, and they would be carrying the weight of their world with
\nthem. He said the Eridani must help them in their quest. It is meet that
\nwe do so.”<\/p>\n

He barked out some rough consonants and a half dozen of the Eridani
\nplayers rose from their mats and assembled behind us. One of them strode
\nforward and stood next to me.<\/p>\n

“Call me T’aylang,” he said. “I will lead. Those behind me will
\nhelp carry your burdens.”<\/p>\n

From their command of our language, it became apparent to me that
\nthe Eridanis hadn’t been completely ignoring our intrusion into their
\nworld for the last thirty years. I wasn’t sure if shaking hands was the
\nproper protocol, but I held my hand out anyway. The donnie looked down
\nat it for a long moment, then took it in one of his leathery,
\nfour-fingered appendages and gave it a light wag.<\/p>\n

“T’aylang. Right. I’m Bishop. To the stationhouse, then.” I smiled
\nback at Pete and Laura. “That went pretty well, don’t you think?”<\/p>\n

We all turned to leave the gaming house.<\/p>\n

“Heck,” Pete said. “I wanted to stick around at least long enough
\nto play a card or two.”<\/p>\n

Laura rolled her eyes and shook her head as she trudged along the
\naisle to the front door.<\/p>\n

\n

The stationmaster’s eyeballs threatened to exit his skull when the
\nline of donnies marched into his office.<\/p>\n

“Mr. Bishop!” he sputtered. “I . . . I’m at a loss for words, sir.
\nTotally unprecedented, this.”<\/p>\n

I smiled, probably a bit too smugly. “Show ’em to our supplies in
\nthe back, Percy. Time is money. Chop, chop, man.”<\/p>\n

The portly man waddled into the rear warehouse, followed by the
\nfive Eridani porters. T’aylang stayed with us in the front office. He
\nleaned his head back slightly and appeared to study the ceiling fan that
\nrotated slowly overhead.<\/p>\n

“Human tech seems a bit mystifying to you, eh, Big Fella?” I said.<\/p>\n

The donnie’s mandibles moved without sound. Finally, he lowered his
\nhead and said, “The device seems . . . in some way poignant to me.
\nChurning time, to no end purpose. Most of your machines seem to do the
\nsame.”<\/p>\n

I laughed. “We make do. We humans did manage to find enough purpose
\nto travel here, after all.”<\/p>\n

“Your purposes matter little to us,” T’aylang said. “They are not
\nwell-aligned to the primary axis of life. Dr. Kline recognized this.”<\/p>\n

T’aylang folded his arms tightly over his chest in a series of
\ncomplex geometrical transformations, the multiple joints blending
\nsequentially and inexorably into a least-energy configuration. Their
\nfinal state represented, in unmistakable graphical terms, the end of his
\nside of the conversation.<\/p>\n

\n

Chapter 6<\/strong><\/p>\n

Dense morning fog shrouded the river, and the droning chug of the
\nboat’s ancient diesel engine made it hard for us to stay awake. Our six
\ndonnies sat quietly on benches lining the canvas-sheltered foredeck.
\nOccasionally, one or the other of them leaned over the railing and
\ndisgorged a vile-looking, ropy liquid into the water, followed by an
\ninterminable round of mandible grooming.<\/p>\n

Their normally deep copper tones had paled significantly since
\ngetting onboard the craft. I felt sorry for them. When or if we ever
\nfigured out what tangible things the Eridani valued, I’d make sure to
\npay them well for their discomfort.<\/p>\n

I rose and went into the enclosed pilothouse.<\/p>\n

“Things seem pretty calm on this part of the river, Cap,” I said.
\n“Does it stay this wide and smooth all the way to S’uval?”<\/p>\n

The ship’s owner and pilot, a grizzled man named Moynahan, grunted
\nand shifted his chew to the other side of his jaw. “Smooth enough,
\nalthough it gets tight aways ahead. We’ll have to watch close for
\nsandbars. And, of course, the pseudohippos.”<\/p>\n

“Those critters dangerous?”<\/p>\n

The Captain turned his head and spat towards a bucket in the
\ncorner, missing it wide right. The wiry, gray beard surrounding his
\nmouth was stained an unappetizing shade of yellowish brown. “Everything’s dangerous out here, Mr. Bishop. But I keep sufficient firepower on hand, if it comes to that.” He jerked his head backwards, toward a gun rack on the wall behind him. Two rifles hung there, one a carbine and the other a more robust automatic assault weapon. Both were military issue–but neither was of recent vintage.<\/p>\n

“We do appreciate the charter, you know. I’m glad you were available.”<\/p>\n

“Well, I have to tell ya: I didn’t feature carryin’ them locusts
\nalong with. Bad for business–and except for the premium, I’d not have
\nagreed to it.” The old man looked at me with narrowed eyes. “Just keep
\nyour eye on ’em so long as they’re on my boat, ya hear? Just keep ’em
\nouta my way.” He reached into a pocket, pulled out a worn tin flask,
\nuncapped it and took a long swig from it.<\/p>\n

I nodded to Moynahan and went back out on deck.<\/p>\n

“Everyone peachy?” I asked.<\/p>\n

Pete slapped his neck. “Son of a–this damned bug repellent stuff
\nisn’t doing squat.” His face and neck were considerably lumpier than
\nthey’d been the day before.<\/p>\n

“They like you, Pete,” Laura said. “Maybe it’s got something to do
\nwith your rotten breath. They don’t seem to be bothering our help over
\nthere.” She nodded at the donnies.<\/p>\n

“Skin’s probably too tough for the bugs to get through it,” I said.
\n“Hey, this is really not any worse than summertime in the Yukon. That
\nwasn’t a pleasant assignment. You should have been there, Pete. It would
\nhave put things into perspective.”<\/p>\n

“How about you perspect this, Bishop.” Pete shot me a rude gesture
\nand reached into his bag for more repellent gunk.<\/p>\n

\n

Morning turned into afternoon, and we all dozed fitfully. I was
\nroused by the sound of the boat’s engine revving, simultaneous with the
\nloud clank of transmission gears below deck. I lifted my head and saw a
\ngroup of huge animals bobbing in the water dead ahead of our bow.<\/p>\n

Except for their considerably larger size, scaly hides and multiple
\nrows of teeth, they might well have passed for Earth hippopotamuses.
\nThey blocked our passage around a sandbar that extruded from the shore
\non our port side. The donnies chittered and swiveled their frames toward
\nthe front of the boat. Their reaction made me think that the
\nlight-sensitive cells located on the front side of their eye-hoops were
\nmore discriminating than those on the other radial sections.<\/p>\n

Moynahan, carrying the carbine, exited the pilothouse and strode
\nforward to the bow. He aimed the weapon down at the nearest pseudohippo.
\nA donnie next to him raised one of his upper appendages and knocked the
\nmuzzle of the gun upwards just as Moynahan pulled the trigger, sending
\nthe round into the air.<\/p>\n

“Bastard!” the boatman said. He rammed the stock of the carbine
\nhard into the side of the donnie’s head.<\/p>\n

I lurched forward to Moynahan and grabbed his shoulder. “Hold on,
\nCap. Take it easy. Let’s have a minute to sort things out.”<\/p>\n

“Only thing to sort out is yer lousy locust trash, Bishop,” he
\nsnapped. “I told ya to keep ’em away from me.”<\/p>\n

The injured donnie lay prostrate on the deck, several of his mates
\nministering to him. A thick greenish fluid oozed from the wound on the
\nside of his head. It appeared that Moynahan had caught him squarely in
\nthe eye-hoop with the butt end of the stock.<\/p>\n

T’aylang suddenly appeared at my side. “It will not be necessary to
\ndestroy these animals to obtain passage through this section, Captain.
\nPlease permit us to deal with them. You may return to your cabin to
\nprepare the vessel to move forward again.”<\/p>\n

Moynahan spat over the side of the railing. “And what’re you gonna
\ndo, plughead? Ask ’em pretty please-like to move aside?” He snorted and
\nglared down at the wounded Eridani.<\/p>\n

“Precisely.” T’aylang moved to the bow and began to chant, a sound
\nthat reminded me slightly of the polyphonous singing I had once heard
\nBuddhist monks do in Tibet. Except that there seemed to be more than two
\nvoices sounding; each note of the song sounded like a fuller chord, rich
\nin overtones. I watched T’aylang’s mandibles quiver as he effected the
\naudial progression of the strange canticle.<\/p>\n

In front of us, the pseudohippos reacted, parted and cleared a path
\nfor the boat.<\/p>\n

“Well, I’ll be dipped in shit,” Moynahan said, lowering his
\ncarbine. He made for the pilothouse, got the boat back into gear and
\nmoved it slowly ahead, through the gap the herd of beasts had made for us.<\/p>\n

Behind me, I heard Laura’s breathy voice ask Pete, “Did you get all
\nthat?”<\/p>\n

“Is a bear Catholic?” Pete replied.<\/p>\n

I turned to T’aylang. “Will he be okay?” I asked, nodding toward
\nthe stricken donnie.<\/p>\n

“His physical agony will soon pass, and the wound will heal. A
\nportion of his sight may be lost. But the memory of the Captain’s
\nharmful intention will remain ever painful to him.” T’aylang swiveled
\nhis huge form to face me. “We Eridani cannot always react quickly enough
\nto protect ourselves from aggression when it comes without forethought,
\nas Moynahan’s did. It is a thing about you humans that we . . . cannot
\nfully comprehend.”<\/p>\n

“T’aylang, I won’t try to make a global apology for the behavior of
\nmy species. It’s what we are. But in future: Let me be the one to
\nintercede with any humans. Do you understand? Make sure your people know
\nthat, too.”<\/p>\n

The Eridani nodded–or, I convinced myself, made a gesture near
\nenough to that. I sat back down on the bench, trying to parse the
\nmeaning behind the donnie’s words.<\/p>\n

\n

Chapter 7<\/strong><\/p>\n

A week passed before we reached S’uval, a small port perched at the
\nfarthest navigable point on the river. The unexplored territory
\nstretched on for several hundred kilometers to the north of us, beyond
\nthe river’s fall line. The rest of our journey would be by land.<\/p>\n

Beyond a stationhouse, a modest lodge, and a scattering of mud
\nbrick structures, there was little else to describe the place. We tied
\nup to a rickety wooden pier, and one of the Eridani porters scrambled up
\nto the roof of the pilothouse where our baggage had been tied. He began
\nto pass the parcels down to his donnie colleagues, who formed a
\nwell-ordered brigade to receive them and shuttle them onto the dock.<\/p>\n

“I’ll make the run again six weeks from today, Bishop,” the boatman
\nsaid. “Be ready. I won’t wait for you.”<\/p>\n

“We’ll be here, Moynahan,” I said. “And hopefully, we’ll have an
\nextra passenger to carry back to M’bassa with us.”<\/p>\n

I waved to him perfunctorily and stepped out onto the pier, hearing
\nthe boat’s noisy engine start up behind me. We gathered up our supplies
\nand headed in a line toward the stationhouse at the end of the pier to
\ncheck in with the S’uval agent there. Young Eridanis had gathered by the
\nedge of the river to watch us; it seemed obvious that the arrival of
\nvisitors was a rare event here. No adults had joined them, I noticed.<\/p>\n

The agent greeted us at the door to the stationhouse.<\/p>\n

“Welcome, Mr. Bishop! Miss Denning, Mr. Horvack, good day to you
\nall. We’ve been expecting you since the EPR message from M’bassa station
\ncame through. My name is Percy. Come in, come in! Uh . . . donnies will
\nstay outside, please.”<\/p>\n

I looked back to T’aylang, and then nodded at the covered porch
\noutside the station. He nodded back.<\/p>\n

“I thought your features looked familiar, Mr. Percy,” I said,
\nentering the large front room of the stationhouse. “Related to the Percy
\nback in M’bassa, I gather?”<\/p>\n

“Yes,” the man said. “Younger brother, am I. Edgar Percy.
\nMortimer’s got the M’bassa posting. We had a rather large family, and
\nall of us ended up in civil service. Curious thing, is it not? Have a
\nseat here.” He laughed heartily and went to a cupboard behind his desk,
\nretrieved some dusty glasses from it, and carried them over to a table
\nnear the front door.<\/p>\n

“Iced tea, or something stronger, perhaps?” he asked. “I have some
\nfairly wicked distilled spirits, a local product. You might like it.
\nTastes a bit like absinthe . . . although, with not as many green
\nfairies in it.” He roared at his own joke.<\/p>\n

Pete held up his hand. “I’ll take a fairy or two.”<\/p>\n

Laura said, “My rule is to never to drink the water in places like
\nthis. Make mine the same.”<\/p>\n

“Three’s a charm, Percy,” I said.<\/p>\n

The agent grinned and pulled a half-full bottle of green liquor out
\nof the bottom drawer of his desk, sat down at the table, and poured a
\nfew fingers into each of our glasses. He included his own in the bargain.<\/p>\n

“You must know where we’re headed, Mr. Percy. North, to try to
\nlocate Dr. Manfred Kline. Do you know of him?”<\/p>\n

The agent, himself almost as portly as his older brother back in
\nM’bassa, leaned back in his chair and stroked his muttonchop whiskers.
\n“Oh, yes. Kline came through here three years ago, alone. No one travels
\nin this territory alone, and I tried to talk him out of heading into the
\nunexplored region. But he was committed; one o’ them missionary types.
\nI’ve seen ’em before. To be more precise, I’ve mostly seen ’em going
\nout–not coming back. And the few who do come back . . . well, I doubt
\nthey stay on the planet. Not judging from the terrified look in their
\neyes when they stumble back out of the jungle.”<\/p>\n

“Did you have any further contact with him?” I asked.<\/p>\n

“Not directly. But an Eridani native came in about a year ago,
\nasking for some particular articles on behalf of Dr. Kline. Very
\nunusual, that, for a donnie to communicate directly to a human. The
\ndonnie paid in cold cash, and I ordered the goods from M’bassa. Isn’t
\nthat weird?”<\/p>\n

“What did Kline order?”<\/p>\n

“Well, that was the strange part. Not survival stuff. Books. Quite
\na number of them. Books on biology, virology, genetics, zoology. Nothing
\non psychology, though. He was a psychologist, right?”<\/p>\n

“A psychologist, and a psychiatrist,” I answered.<\/p>\n

“Right. But here’s the thing: He didn’t want downloaded versions on
\na databulb. He wanted old-fashioned, printed-out paper books. But if the
\npower sources for his EPR terminal had failed, or if his stock of
\nentanglements had run dry, why didn’t he just order more of those? It
\ndidn’t make any sense. He could’ve had the book files sent by EPR link
\nfrom his sponsors, directly to him in the field.”<\/p>\n

“His Church hasn’t heard from him in almost a year. We have the
\nrough coordinates of his last known position. Hard to say what’s going
\non with him out there. We mean to find out, though.”<\/p>\n

“I expect you’re getting paid pretty well for this, Mr. Bishop.” He
\nlooked over at Laura and Pete, and he seemed to study Pete’s A\/V headset
\nclosely.<\/p>\n

I nodded my head.<\/p>\n

“Hope you can live long enough to spend it, sir.” Percy raised his
\nglass to me, drained it, and poured himself another. “Mrs. Percy up at
\nthe lodge will have your rooms ready. I hope you enjoy your short stay.
\nAnd I hope I see you again, Mr. Bishop. I sincerely do.”<\/p>\n

\n

We checked into the lodge, and Edgar Percy’s wife, Martha, fussed
\nover us as if we had been long-lost relatives. Two smaller Percys,
\nlikely more civil servants in the making, helped carry our personal bags
\nto our rooms. T’aylang and the other Eridanis secured lodging in the
\nneighboring village; it had been made clear to us that donnies were not
\nwelcome inside the human lodge. I doubted that they would have wanted to
\njoin us there, anyway.<\/p>\n

Dinner was a treat after days of eating pouched field meals onboard
\nthe boat: fresh trout analog that, we were proudly informed, had been
\nharvested that morning in the aquafarm pools above the rapids. It was
\nserved alongside a small cut of tender, grilled meat that, while
\nsomewhat gamy, tasted a little like beef. A large communal dish of
\npurplish plantlike material supported the meal in an obtrusive fashion;
\nit reminded me of broccoli. We all took some, but mostly toyed with it
\non our plates. Dessert consisted of a whipped custard dish, sweet and
\nvery tasty.<\/p>\n

A touch more of the absinthe-like liquor after dinner made
\neverything settle nicely. We pushed our sluggish bodies away from the
\ntable, thanked Mrs. Percy effusively for the chance to gorge ourselves
\none last time, and waddled off to a small lounge, where one of the Percy
\nboys plucked spiritedly at a banjo for our entertainment.<\/p>\n

Later, after transmitting a status message to the Church, I lay
\nback in my featherbed and slept, full of vivid dreams.<\/p>\n

Continue on to read The Songs of Eridani<\/em> – Part 2<\/a> by clicking here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Gary Cuba’s stories have appeared in Jim Baen’s Universe, Flash Fiction Online, Abyss & Apex, Andromeda Spaceways and more than two dozen other speculative fiction publications. He lives in South Carolina with his wife and way too many cats and dogs.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Chapter 1 Things grew large on epsilon Eridani III, but it was the smallest of creatures that brought us down. We were barely two days into the unexplored jungle that lay to the north of S’uval, the riverside port village that marked the farthest reach of human colonization on the planet. I lay prostrate and …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,12,15],"tags":[1337,1341,16],"class_list":["post-101","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fiction","category-science-fiction","category-tcl-1-autumn-2011","tag-fiction","tag-science-fiction","tag-the-colored-lens-1-autumn-2011","entry entry-center"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=101"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":139730,"href":"https:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101\/revisions\/139730"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=101"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=101"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thecoloredlens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=101"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}