Service Goat

by Piers Anthony

  She projected her awareness, seeking such a mind. One that was not only competent, but available. She knew that such minds existed here, because that was the reason for the current survey: to map the sapient or potentially sapient life forms of this sector of the galaxy. There were cautions; she needed to remain anonymous, her alien origin unknown to the creatures of this planet. If her nature were discovered, she might have to activate her own self destruct circuit, which would rapidly dissolve her to her component molecules. Suicide. But she would not do that unless it became necessary. She was a valuable creature with extensive capacities, and should not be wasted.

  *

  Caladia was terrified. They were driving right into the storm, and she hated storms, ever since she had been caught outside and a close crack of thunder had nearly deafened her. She was seven years old, shy and nervous, and loud things had always frightened her, no matter what other kids said. She wished Dad would pull into a parking garage or something to wait out the storm.

  A buffet of wind jammed the car sidewise and the wheels skidded on the slick pavement as Dad fought to maintain control. She tried to stifle her shriek, but a whimper escaped.

  “We'll be home soon, Callie,” Mom called back to her. “Don't worry. It's just a little weather.”

  Then the howling sound came. Dust enveloped the car, and the brightness of day became the awful darkness of threatening night. “Damn!” Dad exclaimed. “It's a tornado! Hang on!”

  Callie clutched her seat belt as the car sailed up and off the road, whirling around like a top. Then it crashed into a tree. A branch jammed through the window right into her face. There was horrible pain.

  *

  Doe was shaken by an abrupt flash of distress. There was a mind nearby, a juvenile, but quite competent, and it needed her as much as she needed it. The creature was in severe pain, blinded, and would soon perish if not quickly supported. That meant it should accept her help, and keep her secret. This was ideal.

  She moved toward the mind at a run, her attention sifting her assortment of roles to find the most appropriate one. Not nurse, though some of that would be needed. Not guardian, though some of that too might be required. Not parent, though the absence of parental minds in the vicinity of the child indicated that it was a sudden orphan. What particular role would fill all the needed styles?

  As she got closer, she picked up the answer from the injured juvenile: Service Animal. That was the role that fit.

  Then she discovered something shocking: the young creature was not an ordinary one. It was an ape. Of all the animals that might have offered, this was the worst. Apes were physically ludicrous and mentally awkward, and she was strongly repelled by the notion of actually touching one. But for this purpose it had to be touched.

  What could she do? Her mission was in the balance. She activated a non-aversion circuit and tuned in on the ape. She would do what she had to do.

  She set out in the indicated direction. The terrain was swampy, so that her small hooves tended to sink into the land, hindering her progress. So she expanded them to flat pads that held their place better.

  Then she encountered something menacing. She sifted through her data bank of local creatures. It was an alligator, a predator species. A hungry one.

  She issued a warning bleat, but the gator only came on faster. It had mistaken her for prey! She did not want to delay her progress toward the ape child, and did not want to kill any local creature unnecessarily. So she compromised.

  The gator came at her, its huge jaws snapping. She braced herself on three hooves, and formed the fourth one into a spike. It plunged down beside the animal's head, spearing through the thick skin of the neck with deadly force. It pinned the animal's head to the ground. Then as the gator squirmed, she oriented her flexible horns, moving them near to the animal's eye. She could readily stab that eye, and on into the brain behind it, killing the creature. She wanted it to understand that.

  Then she sent a thought of purest terror and withdrew the spike, freeing the gator. It promptly fled, terrified. That saved its life, as its injury was not serious. If she ever encountered it in the future, her bleat of warning would be effective. Predators quickly learned, or they died.

  She converted the spike back to the broadened foot, and resumed her trek. The ape child was now close. She tried to reach out to it with her mind, though that was relatively ineffective. She needed direct touch to establish a relationship.

  *

  Callie woke an instant or an hour later, in absolute darkness and agony. “Mommy!” she cried desperately. “Daddy!” But there was no answer, only the horrible silence and pain. She knew with a deadly certainty that she was alone.

  Then something approached; she felt it somehow in her mind. It wasn't friendly or unfriendly, but it was orienting on her. A rescue worker? No, it felt more like an animal. One of her friends had a body weakening illness and had a Service Dog who helped him stay upright and not fall, and generally protected him; the bullies had learned not to try to mess with him. She had not been allowed to pet the animal because it was working. She admired that. She had thought it might be nice to have such a dog herself, but of course she didn't need it.

  The thing came to the car. It put its head through the broken window, sniffing the interior. She couldn't see it, but she heard it, and felt its mind. She was oddly not afraid, because of its nonthreatening mind. Then it touched her hand.

  It was like stepping into Heaven, with everything amazingly nice. Suddenly her pain faded back and she felt secure. And she could see. Only not in a sensible way.

  Because she saw herself. Her arm was reaching forward, her hand touching the dog's nose. Beyond it was her shoulder, her neck, her head, and her awful blood-covered face. Her eyes were gone! Yet she was seeing. How could this be?

  She was not alarmed; that quiet reassurance continued. As she thought the question, the answer came to her. /She was seeing from the eyes of the dog. Only it wasn't exactly a dog. It was--

  A picture of it flashed in her mind. It was a goat! A brown and white doe, a nanny goat, with hooves and horns and mobile ears and tail and a little beard and wattles. A nanny goat. But how could a goat be helping her to see?

  Again the answer came: /Callie needed serious help, to stop the pain of her body and her loss of her family, and to see again. The goat needed help too, because it wasn't really a goat, but a creature from another world who happened to look like a goat so it could blend in with the local animals. Well, not exactly that, but something like it. Who had a job to do but required sapient level assistance. Like a person. Like her.

  “But why?” she asked, perplexed despite the thought's background clarification of the unfamiliar term “sapient”; it meant really smart in a special way, the way people were. “Why come to me? I'm just a little girl, and I hardly know anything, and nobody listens to me anyway.” She wasn't sure whether the goat was hearing and understanding her voice, or reading her meaning directly from her mind, and wasn't sure it mattered anyway.

  /Two reasons: because her mind, though not yet fully formed, had enormous potential, well beyond that of the alien goat, who was a data collector, not a sapient. And because as a human creature she was accepted by others of her kind, and if she needed a Service Animal, that would be accepted also. It was a cover for a creature among dangerous other creatures.

  It was making sense. “But mostly it's just dogs who do it. I never heard of a Service Goat. Would they accept you?”

  /They would if she told them to. And, if there were a bit of mental encouragement. All she had to do was touch a person while also touching the goat, and the goat's mind would connect and make it seem reasonable. It did not need sapience to do that much; the person's own mind would formulate a rationale. But it had to be secret: she must not tell anyone about the alien nature of her companion, unless there were extraordinary reason, lest that lead to the goat's destruction.

  “A secret!” she said. Callie liked secrets, especially impor
tant ones. “I can do that.” In fact it might even be fun.

  Fun? Now it was the goat's turn to be confused by a term. So Callie clarified it: something that was enjoyable, like eating candy, rather than unpleasant, like eating broccoli. She felt the goat's appreciation of this expansion of her understanding. She had not been exposed to it before.

  Still, she was in doubt. “I'd have to tell my folks. I can't keep secrets from them. It wouldn't be right.”

  This made the goat pause again, assimilating the concepts Right and Wrong. Then the clarification came: this was not wrong because it was hurting no one. She was here only to gather data on the inhabitants of this planet, after which she would depart without changing the world in any significant way. Meanwhile she was saving Callie's life.

  “I guess it's okay,” the girl agreed, seeing the way of it. “But my life is okay anyway. I can make it on my own.”

  /No. Her life was not okay, and she could not make it on her own.

  “Huh?”

  Now the goat had to be more forceful. She would separate from the girl just long enough for the girl to understand, painful as that would be. Callie needed to remove her hand from goat's nose.

  Callie removed her hand.

  And was stricken by overwhelming pain and horror. Her folks were dead and she was blind and bleeding to death. She couldn't abide any part of it.

  The goat's nose touched her hand again. Callie relaxed. The situation was unchanged, but now she could handle it. Her physical pain was stifled. Her folks were dead, but though she recognized that and mourned them, she could put that awful awareness in a sort of compartment, like a closed book, and not let it interfere with the rest of her life. Her own eyes were gone, but she could see well enough through the goat's eyes. Also, signals sent by the goat's service oriented mind were constricting the blood vessels of Callie's face and stopping the leaking of blood as well as fighting off infections. She would not die from this injury.

  “That was horrible,” Callie said. “You're right; I do need you. I need to be touching you all the time.”

  And the goat needed her, because her powers could be properly used only when she had access to the human girl's mind. Only then was the goat truly sapient. Apart, she was just an animal.

  “I'll call you Nanny,” Callie said. “Because that's what you are, I think. I mean, you're a goat, but you're also my nanny, taking care of me.”

  /I will be called Nanny, the goat agreed.

  Chapter 3: Conspiracy of Silence

  The mystery of the origin of the goat remained intractable. It had been in the storm at the same time as the girl, obviously, and they had gotten together and seemed to be doing each other some good. It was clear where the child had come from, but there was no prior indication of the goat. Had there been an Unidentified Flying Object--a UFO or flying saucer--that delivered the animal and departed? That would explain it, to a degree. But why would an alien craft deliver not a combat robot or an extermination bomb, or a Bug-Eyed Monster (a BEM) lusting after lovely human maidens, but a goat? It just didn't make sense.

  Worse, why do it in the middle of a storm that could have wrecked the effort? But that one he could solve: if it was a saucer visit, it had to be hidden from the prying eyes of the natives. There would be no such eyes in such a storm. Just maybe an orphan child. Who was not summarily dispatched, but embraced. A soft hearted BEM? As alien invasions went, this was a failure.

  “I know I wronged you, and ruined your career,” Venus said, distracting Ben from his reverie. He couldn't fault her for that; they were, at the moment, naked in bed together, her perfect thigh crossing over his. “I'm excruciatingly sorry about that. You've got a right to be mad at me. I'm trying to make it up to you in about the only way I can, hoping that some day you'll forgive me. But you've got to cooperate at least a little.” She set his hand on her bare breast.

  “I'm not mad at you. You did what the gang wanted. You don't need forgiveness.”

  “Yes I do. I'm trying as hard as I can to earn it.”

  “I'm just distracted by the goat. It seems to have come from nowhere, yet become very special to the girl. There seems to be no sense in this.”

  “So maybe play it forward some, hoping for a hint. Meanwhile--” She hesitated.

  “Meanwhile I should handle this distraction, so I can focus on the other,” he agreed, clasping her and rolling her on top of him so he could fondle her plush buttocks.

  “That too.” She twitched them provocatively under his hands.

  “There's something else?”

  “It's—well, I know I'm supposed to keep the passion high so you don't mind having me around. That's what a girl's for. It's just a business relationship. I know better than to expect anything more. But--” She broke off again.

  “Out with it, girl. If I'm wearing you out, maybe I can ease up some. I can see how it could get hard on you physically. I'm three times your weight. You've been great. You've never even hinted it's ever too much. Tell me.”

  “Two and a half times my weight. It's not that. I like making out with muscle, and you've been careful not to crush me. Like right now, when you put me on top.” She took a wonderful breath, her evocative breasts pressing against his chest. “It's never too much. You're good to me in little ways. You're a good guy. I think—I think I'm falling in love with you.”

  There was a silence as he digested this news. She was right about it being a relationship of convenience. He had assumed that her passion was largely simulated. She was after all a former gang moll. She was looking for a larger commitment?

  “I'm sorry,” she said. “You're just such a great guy, and I'm just a body. I'll try not to bother you with my feeling again.”

  The idea of love had not occurred to him before, but he realized he could do worse than this. So Venus wasn't educated or trained in any profession other than the erotic, the opposite of his wife. She could learn, and her passion was a distinct contrast to his wife's indifference. “I won't say I love you back,” he said carefully. “But maybe it wouldn't be a disaster if I did. Certainly your feeling doesn't turn me off. So if you want to—to court me, okay. Maybe I'll get there, in time.”

  “You're not rejecting it out of hand?”

  “I am not,” he agreed.

  “Oh!” Suddenly her tears were flowing. He had never seen her cry before. Then she started madly kissing him. It seemed that she had really been concerned that her emotion would be considered illicit. A turnoff. He realized that love had not been part of her makeup before; she wasn't used to it.

  They proceeded into a love session that was a fair experience in its own right. There was a difference between the simulation of passion and the reality. Yes, he could come to love her, in time. She picked up on that, and was glad.

  After that their relationship subtly changed. Venus started acting in little ways less like a cynical mistress and more like a passionate wife. Ben realized that he could live with that.

  *

  They played it forward. Girl and goat had been picked up by an EMT unit and transported together to the local hospital, where one Doctor Sterling Stevenson had taken over. He had prescribed surgery for her, the complete removal of her ruined eyeballs. And--

  Ben stared at the report. “Where is the anesthetic?”

  “What anesthetic?” Venus asked, reading over his shoulder.

  “She had major surgery, but there's no listing of either local or general anesthesia. Why is this report incomplete?”

  “Hospitals make mistakes. Lawsuits result.”

  He checked it another way, via the medical records, but still found no indication. In fact her recovery from the operation was quite abbreviated, as though there were no sedative to sleep off. How could that be?

  “Could she be one of those oddballs who feel no pain?” Venus asked.

  He checked that. “No. Her prior history shows she was as pained as any child. She was a completely ordinary girl.”

  “Maybe I can find o
ut.”

  “It's not in the records,” he said. “You can't find out what isn't there.”

  “But there were surgical nurses, attendants,” she said. “People talk. I could infiltrate, pick up on the rumors.”

  “How?”

  “I could impersonate a nurse. I've done that kind of thing before. A borrowed uniform, a name tag.” She smiled. “People look at my body, for some reason, and don't question my legitimacy.”

  “It's not worth the risk. You're officially dead in that fireball. You don't want to come alive again.”

  “I'll take any risk, for you. I love you.”

  She was serious. His investigation was balked again, whatever the reason. Could she really help? “Damn it, Venus, I don't want to put you in danger. You—I--” He finally got it out. “I care for you.”

  “Golden words. Just for that, I'll do it.”

  She did it. She was good at it, perhaps for the reason she said: her body distracted sensible attention. Still, he was uncomfortably nervous as he waited for her outside the hospital in the car. It was a huge relief when he saw the petite shapely nurse return. She had entered the hospital via the back way, emerged as a nurse complete with a distinctive cap, because caps identified the training centers. Hers was far away. Now she efficiently changed back in the car, then sneaked back in to return the uniform to storage. Finally back out, no one knowing the wiser.

  “Damn you're good!” Ben said as they drove home.

  “For that, I'll let you get into my pants as soon as we're home.” It had become a joke between them. They had sex several times a day, and nobody “let” anybody; it was mutual eagerness.

  “And your report?”