Jarn’s Journal Year 11 Day 132 #sffsat

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Year 11 Day 232

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Well, I spent the day yesterday flying as far north as I could get in one day. Nothing but sea ice, and since it was (for a change) a clear day, I was able to hop from latitude to latitude as long as I could see there was no high ground. By the time I tired, I had confirmed floating ice reached to the pole.

Two things are clear already. I am far enough north that the day is continuous. And this ice, like that on the west side of the northern continent, is inhabited. So far I am sure of the white bears and foxes, the seals, and some creatures a bit larger than seals with massive tusks. All live on ice floes, though the ones with tusks seem mainly found where the bottom is shallow.

I have seen the ones with tusks before, but rarely, I think they need shallow bottoms and ice floes in open water. They showed up occasionally on the north coast of the large land northern land mass, but that area does not have much open water in the winter. There are also some on the east coast of the large ice-covered island or continent. But while there is plenty of water there, the sea floor is only rarely shallow.

This shallow sea north and south of the strait seems to be an ideal habitat. Their tusks, when I found a skeleton, seem remarkably similar to elephant ivory. I wonder if it can also be carved and worked into ornaments?

Jarn is a human-like alien who was stranded in Africa some 125,000 years ago when his experimental starship crashed. He has made contact with our remote ancestors, and is currently trying to determine why (and if) our planet has ice caps. His Journal to date is at my author website.

Jarn’s Journal Year 11 Day 130 #sffsat

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Year 11 Day 130

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I’ve come to a sea water strait that may or may not end this continent. It’s not very wide; I can levitate high enough to see land beyond. And it’s not very deep either. In fact, the whole sea water expanse between the northern continent and this land mass farther east is so shallow that it wouldn’t take much drop in sea level – no more that a buildup of the ice sheets – to make this new land continuous with the coast I’ve been following.

It’s not as wide as the strait separating the tideless sea from the tidal sea to  the west, but a good deal shallower. More like a flooded low area of a continent.

Go on eastward, or follow the strait to the south? Since my main question is why this planet seems to have ice caps at both poles, I think I’ll assume that this strait is too narrow to allow much warm sea water in to melt the ice, and continue along the north coast of this new land mass. Right now the ice is within easy sight of the shore, but that may change as the season advances. At any rate, this will allow me to encircle the floating ice, and perhaps take an occasional side trip to the north.

Jarn’s Journal Year 11 Day 106 #sffsat

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Year 11 Day 106

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I am going to have to start paying more attention to what I say, even casually.

I had to dispose of Patches’ body, and I was a little worried that the People would in fact take it as an insult if I buried her as if she were one of them. Sending her to the stars seemed a good way to comfort WildDog.

I forgot anything I said would be taken as the pronouncements of a god.

WildDog did not forget. He studied the stars, and decided the brightest star he could see must be Patches’ heart. He then informed anyone who would listen (which included most of the folk at the Gather) that the god Jarn had rewarded Patches for her faithfulness by putting her in the sky, where he happily pointed out her heart, her head and her feet.

What was really annoying was that most of them could see the outline he pointed out, and by the time the People left to follow the game, the bright star was the dog star, the group of stars was being referred to as the great dog, and there was a buzz of speculation as to what I would next put in the Heavens.

It’s a good thing I have a project: the Northern ice cap. It should be the right time of year to finish exploring its edge.

I’ll be at the Alaska Writers’ Guild conference this weekend, so I’ll be a little late commenting on blogs and responding to comments on mine.

Jarn’s Journal Year 11 Day 45 #sffsat

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Year 11 Day 45

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Some images stay in your head forever.

I think I will always remember WildDog, sitting on the ground next to the snowfield I teleported in for the Gather, with Patches’ head in his lap. I knew she was failing, but she so obviously wanted to go with WildDog that I didn’t even think to object. I don’t think WildDog encouraged her to overdo, it, either. It was just that her time had come.

Death is nothing new or strange to the children of the People, and WildDog looked up at me with tears running down his face, but with complete understanding that his companion was gone. “She just laid her head in my lap and died,” he said.

“She was old,” I told him. “I think she hung on to see you again, and I believe her last moments were happy.”

He looked down at Patches’ head, and gently stroked her half-bald ears. “Can we bury her?” he asked. “Or is burial just for people? Because she’s sort of people too.”

Yes, the People buried their dead, but my own people teleported their dead into the sun. I couldn’t manage that; my esper skills weren’t up to it. But I could wait until night fell and send her body toward the stars, and that somehow felt right.

So I told WildDog to look for Patches in the stars, where she would be guarding him as she had done since his birth.

Jarn’s Journal is the journal of a human-like alien stranded in Africa some 125,000 years ago. Patches is an African Wild Dog he adopted as a very young puppy before he even know the People (our ancestors) existed. The Journal tells part of the remote back story of the Jarnian Confederation, in which my science fiction is set. The Journal to date is on my author website.

Jarn’s Journal Year 10 Day 345 #sffsat

Year 10 Day 345

Credit: Kevin Schafer/UC Davis photo

It’s a good thing I’ve learned to check the weather at a teleport destination, and set an automatic “return home” if I feel any danger. In nine fivedays I’ve actually managed to fly all day southward on no more than a handful of days.

Other days? Well, Patches has good days and bad, and when she has good days and her memories of favorite places touch my mind, I take her to those places. She doesn’t do much but lie in the sun, but she feels happy.

I never teleport into a lightning storm. That’s a lesson I learned years ago. But I decided that if I never teleported into cloud or wind, I’d never get very far south. Yes, the northern oceans are stormy, but not like this!

I’ve reached about 50° South, and with no sign of ice or land. I did, amazingly enough, see a bird today. It was soaring, rather than pumping its wings in flight, and it didn’t look as if it needed to land very often. It seemed to be getting its food from the water, which was teeming with life. Could it really be that far from land?

Jarn’s Journal ‘year 10 Day 300 #IAN1

Year 10 Day 300

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I can’t explore to the north this time of year. Not only is it bitterly cold, there is no sunlight. But in studying the images the ship captured as we crashed, there appear to be ice caps at both poles. And at this time of year, a little after the southern solstice, the southern polar regions should be at their warmest and brightest.

Granted, this continent I am on does not extend very far south – barely 35°. I can see nothing but ocean south of it, no matter how high I levitate. The images, which were taken at nearly this point in the seasonal cycle, are not much help, as there are too many clouds to tell whether I am looking at land or ocean.

That many clouds, of course, translates to stormy. After a day of flying due south from the southernmost cape, I was soaking wet and exhausted. I considered teleporting to the pole, which I could have done – I’ve learned that much. But what if this south pole is not water? What if it is high, perhaps even as high as the snow-capped mountains I have seen? Teleporting myself into sold rock, or even solid ice, is not a good idea. Even I know that!

So I will teleport each day to the coordinates I left the evening before, fly southward until I am soaked and cold, and then teleport back to my home. If I teleport into a region of thunder and lightning I will leave, but so far these clouds seem not to belong to that kind of storm.

Jarn’s Journal Year 10 Day 298 #sffsat

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Year 10 Day 298

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I’ve wondered before how long wild dogs live, but now it has become a matter of some urgency. I think Patches is dying.

Her appetite has not been good the last couple of weeks. It’s even hard to get her to drink water. I am not much of a healer, but when I try to feel what is going wrong with her, I think her blood cleaning system is shutting down. She’s lost interest in swimming, in chasing game, in all of the other things that used to be her consuming interest.

It’s strange to remember her as the orphan pup that came into my life even before I knew the People were here. She has become very much a part of my life. I remember how destructive she was, yet at the same time, how adorable.

She is an animal, I tell myself. So are the People, some part of me answers. They, too will grow old and die. Is it my fate to live on, alone?

Jarn’s Journal is the remote back story of the universe in which I write my science fiction. For all the the Journal to date, check out my author site.

Jarn’s Journal Year 10 Day 213 #sffsat

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Year 10 day 213

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I couldn’t get the taste of that pig out of my memory.

My people do eat meat, though they make sure the animals live a happy life first, and are killed quickly and without fear. The People follow an animal to its exhaustion – hardly a death without fear, but I do eat the meat they bring in. Still, I cannot bring myself to hunt a healthy animal.

If one is attacking me, or injured so badly that I know it will die soon, I feel justified in using my abilities to give it a swift, painless death and then eat it. But hunting? My skills as a hunter are not up to giving a clean death, and I cannot help but feel it would be a misuse of my mental talents to kill a healthy animal that means me no harm.

That leaves scavenging, usually a sick, old, or very young animal, as these are what most wild predators target.

Jarn’s Journal is the journal of a human-like alien who was stranded in Africa some 125,000 years ago. He has met a group of our ancestors, the People. His story is part of the remote back story of the universe in which my science fiction is set. (See the sidebar: all books are on Amazon.) For all of Jarn’s Journal to date, see my author site.

Perhaps a very young pig?

I teleported to one of the areas where I knew the wild pigs were common, on the northern continent. The acorns and pistachios are ripe and abundant, and the pigs are eating them greedily. I opened my mind to pig, alert also for any feeling of pain or fear. There – for an instant I was paralyzed, feeling the leopard’s fangs at my neck. The years must have hardened me, for I came out of the paralysis almost at once, to end the young pig’s life and teleport it to me. It would not have lived long, I saw, the leopard’s fangs had almost pierced its spinal cord.

Jarn’s Journal Year 10 Day 211 #SFFSAT

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Year 10, Day 211

I’ve added my observations of the shore of the northern ocean and its floating ice cap to the world map I’m building up in the computer. I find I’ve mapped more that a third of the way around this world. The eastern coast of the ice-covered mountains is a good 55° west of the lake where I live; the spot where I decided it was too cold to continue this year is nearly 105° east. Close to halfway, and while there were a number of river mouths and deep inlets, the only though connection to the ocean so far is the relatively narrow strait broken by the volcanic island. Perhaps the isolation of this northern ocean is the answer.

The proof will have to wait for next year. For right now, Rainbow is hinting she would like another of the wild pigs from the northern continent, not to mention the nuts I found last year as well as dates and figs. The fruit and nuts are no problem. The pig ….

They’re mostly eating acorns now—I checked. If they taste like what they eat, as the warthogs do, they should be quite tasty. But I will kill one only in self-defense, like the first time, or if it is badly injured. Perhaps I could rob a predator of its kill?

Jarn is a human-like alien, stranded in Africa 125,000 years ago. Most recently he has been trying to understand how a floating ice cap is possible. His Journal to day is on my author site.

Jarn’s Journal Year 10 Day 195 #sffsat

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Year 10 Day 195

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I am beginning to think this polar ocean may very well be landlocked, or nearly so.

Now and then I fly north, and find drift ice. Sometimes I don’t even need to fly north; ice extends to the shore. If I fly south I can find stunted trees. But mostly I find low vegetation: low bushes, sedge, grass, and bog. Occasionally I see reindeer, huge hairy elephants, animals like buffalo or other really strange ones with large noses, but they are relatively rare. Nothing that looks like the People.

Frankly, it is even more boring than the desert coast I was exploring a few years back.

Today is the southward equinox, the start of autumn here. The sun is setting at the North Pole; I teleported there to see the sun roll around the horizon. I’ve come more than a third of the way around the planet, and it’s getting cold. Already I’ve seen one snowstorm. At least I now know that the mountains far to the west are on a peninsula, rather than an island.

I think I’ll wait until the northward equinox to continue mapping this coast.

Jarn is a human-like alien who was stranded in Africa 125,000 years ago. His Journal to date is on my author site, and give some of the remote background of my science fiction novels.