Foster, Alan Dean - Humanx 03

by Alan Dean Foster

  "The Nurse Falmiensazex had nothing to do with the disappearance." He had to hesitate before he could go on. "She lies in a comasleep. That was my fault. It was also necessary." The Elder was watching him shrewdly. "You call it necessary, yet you show signs of remorse." "She iswasmy premate." "Ah." The council member was trying to sort events in his mind. "And the larvae?" "All are well, healthy, and maturing." In areas you can't begin to imagine, he added silently.

  "There will have to be an adjudication, of course," murmured the Elder.

  "Of course." "What are they talking about?" Bonnie asked him.

  "My most recent crimes. I will have to surrender myself soon to confinement." Bonnie hefted her rifle. "Not if you don't want to, you won't. You're too valuable, too important to the Project to languish in some cell while we try and muddle through first contact without you, Ryo." "I assure you everything will turn out all right." He put first a truhand and then a foothand on her arm. "A society functions because its citizens choose to abide by its laws." "That sounds funny coming from you." "So I am selective." There was no accompanying gesture of humor. Bonnie wondered if that was for the benefit of the watchful Elder.

  "The matter must be discussed, Bonnie. It will take time." As it turned out, it did not.

  An echo of the thunder they'd hidden from earlier now rose out of the south. It grew to deafening proportions as half a dozen sleek shuttlecraft passed low overhead. They commenced a wide turn that would bring them circling back toward Paszex.

  Bonnie and the other humans had a bad moment until they noticed the loud and clearly celebratory reaction of the hivefolk. "Our ships," Ryo told her in response to the unasked question.

  "Late again," muttered the Elder Kerarilzex, "but at least in force this time. I hope others caught the command ship before it could flee orbit. Words will be composed," he added darkly. "This is the fifth time in the last seventy years.

  Other hives endure worse. I do not believe the people will stand for it much longer." "And well you shouldn't," Bonnie agreed in passable Low Humanx.

  The Humanx commanding officer, of the fifteenth rank, had stared through his compensating viewer as his modest armada passed low over the site of Paszex. He made mental note of the two ruined AAnn warshuttles, the cluster of AAnn prisoners, the armed hivefolk, and the astonishing aliens in their midst.

  There was no immediate way of ascertaining which side the horrific bipeds were on. He could not fire on them since they were mixed in with the hivefolk. It was very frustrating.

  The military of both species were livid. The bureaucrats were most upset. The politicians were confused and angry. The scientists were disturbed.

  Each group had dreamed of holding center, stage when an intelligent, spacetraversing race was contacted. Instead, the moment of glory had been usurped by some secretive researchers, a mutinous human crew, and an outcast alien agriculturalist.

  There were pains and problems. The parents of the boys and girls who'd traveled to Willowwane as part of the Project did their best to muster a feeling of betrayal. True, they had agreed to commit their children to Project control in return for a year of free room, board, and education, but to some of them the whole business still seemed like kidnaping. None had thought to inquire as to the precise location of the Project school or its distance from their homes.

  The idea of lifting a group of impressionable youngsters and then plunking them down among a bunch of pale wormlike monsters grated against the public conscience. No one, of course, gave a thought to the effect the children might have had on the impressionable Humanx larvae.

  The Humanx populace had an advantage because it had already been exposed to two semiintelligent species and the AAnn. It was their highly developed sense of propriety that suffered most. Events had not unfolded according to carefully prepared procedures. When procedure was violated well, the Humanx were very strong on organization and rather less so at improvisation, and you simply did not improvise first contact with an alien race.

  There was also the matter of larval abduction. Unlike the humans, Ryo did not have the permission of parents to enroll their offspring in the Project school.

  His action was kidnapping, whatever the motives.

  Ryo didn't care. He agreed with everything the adjudicators said. All that mattered was the Project. Its apparent success was vindication enough for him.

  None of the larvae had been harmed, physically or mentally, by their experience. The Nursery supervisors who attended them could attest to that.

  It's very hard to rouse public opinion against someone who politely agrees with everything his prosecutors say while patiently awaiting martyrdom.

  His strongest condemnation carne not from government or public but from Fal.

  Under proper care she recovered rapidly from her comasleep, whereupon she laid into him far more devastatingly than any hivemother. Against her list of outrages he could offer only one thought in his defense the fact that he had succeeded.

  As to the avowed success of the Project, even the most jingoistic member of either species could not deny the evidence. Not only did the Humanx larvae and human children tolerate each other, they had grown nearly inseparable. Monster played happily alongside monster.

  Recordings showing human children gamboling with their Humanx counterparts rapidly dispelled the initial outcry that had arisen on Earth and her colonies.

  How can something be considered a monster when a sevenyearold girl with pigtails can ride it bareback, or a couple of boys can tussle with it in a sandpile and all three are obviously having a wonderful time?

  Reaction among the Humanx was, in accord with their nature, somewhat slower in forming. Grudging acceptance began to appear when chips revealed that the horribly flexible alien adolescents had no intention of butchering and barbecuing their larval companions.

  A major ticklish problem was partially resolved when the Radical Agnostic theologians of Earth discovered their exact counterparts among the Aesthetic Philosopher sect of Hivehom. They answered the nervous and awkward question raised by many as to which side the Deity might be on by proclaiming that he was most likely sitting back and watching the whole business with considerable amusement.

  Twenty years would pass before the first treaties were drawn and more than that before the boldest among both species brought up the specter of Amalgamation.

  For the time being, preliminary agreements were sufficient. They were attested to and duly recorded by wary officials on both sides whose hands had been forced, not by strength of arms or superior intellectual power, but by children cavorting in a playroom.

  Ryo was formally relieved of his longneglected agricultural duties and assigned to the permanent contact group. This was placed outside Paszex, which now assumed an importance beyond the export of vegetable products and handicrafts. Many of the latter, incidentally, were traded to the humans of the Project. Once again the pioneers had stolen a march on the official planners.

  Trade had begun.

  The airfield was hastily enlarged so it could handle shuttlecraft. First official visitors were exchanged, and as a few handicrafts and mechanisms traversed the gulf between the stars, it was discovered that the profit motive was another characteristic human and Humanx shared.

  So it was that contact was not forged so much as hastily cobbled together. But it was a beginning, the most important part of understanding.

  Even Fal eventually reconciled with her now famous premate, though he was still regarded as a traitor among some of his own kind and an enemy spy in certain unrelentingly paranoid human circles. Wuuzelansem was brought from Ciccikalk, still suspicious of humankind but more flexible than most Humanx. His conversion came rapidly when some of the humans became fluent enough to admire his poetry.

  "I don't know how we did without them for so long," he once muttered to Ryo after a recital. "Their appreciation of true art seems as boundless as their enthusiasm. The government may acquire an ally, but I have acquired something far more va
luable." "Which is?" "A new audience!" and Wuu returned to the display chamber to acknowledge the humans' peculiar form of applause.

  Ten years passed. A day arrived when several of the original Project members had to return to their homes. Two would travel to Centaurus, one to New Riviera, and several to Earth.

  Jahan Bhadravati was one of them. Bonnie was another. They stood next to the Paszex shuttleport's humanservice area, still clad in Willowwane duty uniform, which was to say practically nothing, and waited for departure call. It was a lovely rnidseason day. The temperature was 35 C and the humidity hovered near 92 percent.

  No officials saw them off with speeches. In the intervening decade the coming and going of humans at Paszex had ceased to be worthy of special notice. There was a farewell party, however. Ryozenzuzex was there, accompanied by a young Humanx adult named Qul and a tall, skinny human named Wilson Asambi. They were working together to help develop gentler strains of a hybrid fruit.

  Bonnie took a last look around the surface of Willow-wane. The distant lines of orchard and jungle, the little thickets of airintake stacks, the shuttleway, all were old friends to be left behind but retained in memory. She looked much the same as she had when she'd first set foot on Willowwane ten years before.

  The world was a fine place for keeping fit. There was gray in her hair now, and contentment in her expression.

  "I suppose you'll continue at your post," she said to Ryo.

  He shrugged, a human gesture that was becoming quite popular among Humanx, and uttered a confirmatory whistle of agreement. He reflected on the gesture and its meaning. We give so much to each other, he thought. Gesture as well as science, habit as well as art. Especially poetry. He smiled inwardly. Two years ago, old Wuuzelansem had fled to wherever it was old poets retreated to, fighting and kicking and disparaging the state of the universe all the way, but not before he'd seen his poetry wildly praised by the very monsters he'd once sought to avoid contact with.

  Ryo missed Wuu. Even if they hadn't seen ommatidia to ommatidia all the time.

  A highpitched whistle sounded from behind. Fal was waiting near the entryway to Paszex She still would not have close contact with humans. Her trauma was understandable, since they'd been responsible for luring her premate away and forcing him to strike her. She would barely tolerate them.

  Toleration first, he told himself. Friendship later. If anything, progress on the latter was ahead of schedule.

  To his surprise, he noticed that Bonnie was making eye moisture. Ryo waited to find out whether it was significant of happiness or distress. Water of delight, water of depression, Wuu had called it in one of his poems.

  "I'm crying out of both," she told him. "I'm glad that things have turned out so well and I'm sad that after all these years it's finally time to leave. I just can't turn down a university position on Earth. LooLoo would have liked the way things have turned out." "There's still a lot of work to be done," Ryo said. "I'll retain my position as long as I'm able to help." Bhadravati shuffled his feet and said nothing. Conversation had never been the scientist's strong point, Ryo knew. He felt a great sadness within himself at the coming departure of two of his oldest human friends.

  "There is no reason to cry, my friend," Ryo told Bonnie. "We have nothing but reason for happiness. We shall meet again someday." Bonnie was too much of a realist to believe that. Circumstance and distance, the ancient enemies of acquaintance, would conspire to prevent it.

  Nevertheless she replied with a smiling, "I hope so, Ryo," as she reached out both hands to touch the tips of his proffered antennae. The interspecies gesture was now as automatic as a handshake. Ryo repeated the gesture with Bhadravati.

  "These youngsters here," he said, indicating Asambi and Qul, "will be taking on the truly important work now. Nothing can prevent the deepening of our friendship." She was still crying and he made a gesture of gentle thirddegree admonishment.

  "Please, friend, let there be no more tears at this parting. Not water tears from you nor crystal tears from me, would that I were able to manufacture them.

  It's a gesture I envy you. A small but intriguing physical difference." "The only significant differences between us anymore are physical," said Bhadravati.

  "Only physical," Ryo agreed, "and that means less each day. Shape and composition mean nothing when understanding is present." "I thought old Wuu was the poet and not you," Bonnie said.

  "A little of everything you admire eventually rubs off on you. I'm sure you'll be happy to live for a while now with less weighty matters on your mind." "Well, I will have my classes," she admitted, "and Jahan his research and his books to compose." From the way they gazed at one another Ryo thought Bonnie might mate after all. The soft beeping sounded from around them. Other passengers began to move toward the waiting shuttle. Not all of them were human.

  "We should board." Bhadravati put a hand on her shoulder. She nodded, didn'tspeak, looked back down at Ryo. Then she reached out and hugged him.

  Bluegreen chiton slid against soft flesh. It was another gesture Ryo had learned but which he'd always observed performed by two humans. It was much too rough to be civilized, but he politely said nothing.

  As they moved toward the shuttle he made the human gesture of farewell, waving two hands at them. He followed with the far more complex and subtle fourhanded gesture of Humanx goodbye. At the base of the ramp Bonnie imitated it as best she could with only two hands. Then they disappeared into the ship.

  He started toward the burrow entryway that led down into the busy terminal. The impatient Fal had withdrawn into the comforting confines below.

  Bonnie and Dr. Bhadravati appeared content, and that thought made him happy.

  Everyone deserved contentment. They'd worked hard and long and deserved their share of mental peace.

  The fruit he'd struggled so hard to plant had taken root. It had done more than survive. In ten years it prospered enormously and now showed signs of flowering into something far more than he'd ever dreamed of, more than mere friendship.

  The relationship between human and thranx was becoming more than deep. There were signs, signs and portents, that someday in the far future it could become truly symbiotic.

  And there was another benefit, one Ryo had not considered. One he hadn't thought much about during the last busy, exciting ten years. The realization came as a shock.

  He found something useful to do with his life after all.

  The End