After the introspection of the previous chapter, the action resumes in chapter 17. We’re also back with privileged third person narrative as Marta embarks on her long-threatened escape from the suffocating embrace of the Mission…
Disobedient child is self explanatory as a title; although sixteen, Marta still is a child, and even though she’s faced many dangers, she has, in a very real sense, been protected and cosseted by her minders! But rebellion is part of growing up, learning self-reliance and gaining independence; so we have to see her disobedience in this context…
Marta finally confronts one of the fearsome pseudo-crustaceans face to face in this chapter, and her ambivalence about doing so finds an echo in the different terms used to describe the Alphanian in the text. The extreme action she takes, in defying her protectors and risking her life in this way is indicative, not only of her alienation, but also of her wilful nature. Miss Fernandes knows she is right, and is prepared to risk her personal safety to progress her research and prove a point!
The chapter is deliberately episodic, and the sub-headings are designed to emphasize this (as well as being another nice narrative variation!); Disobedient child takes the form of a quest, and indeed Marta refers to her progress as an ‘odyssey’ just before she links to the pseudo-plant at the chapter’s close.
Her final comment before she loses consciousness is testament to both her self-absorption, and her nascent victim complex… She’s not called Marta for nothing!
I also wanted to describe Alpha 5 more fully, and convey a sense of how beautiful the world is, and how much Miss Fernandes loves the place of her birth… A5 is essentially Eden (you’ll not be too surprised to hear!), but it is an eden with both a past, and an uncertain future! The characterization of the planet in this way is essentially canonical, and a tribute to my influences…
There’s also a mythic, almost folkloric aspect to Marta’s quest, illustrated by the language used to describe her alien encounter. Obviously I’m aiming for lyricism in the prose; as well as psychological depth, and that old SF staple, ‘a sense of wonder’! As these qualities are by nature subjective, I’ll leave it to others to decide if I achieve this.
Marta engages in an exercise in Cartesian doubt when she questions her own conclusions regarding the vaIidity of the exchange between her and the pseudo-crustacean; but she decides that true communication (in the sense of a meeting of minds and an exchange of ideas) has taken place between a human being, and a member of another intelligent (and truly alien) species…
Incidentally the comment about true communication only being possible between equals was made by Friedrich Nietzsche!
Re-reading the chapter it’s clear that I owe a small debt to Quatermass and the Pit, and a slightly larger one to the short story The Sound by AE van Vogt.