A fourth wolfen came and took the leg, drawing one last shriek from the dollie as its teeth sheared through the structure of its hip. The bite was a little high, carrying away part of the pelvic girdle, and the dollie’s colon, if that’s what they have, bulged out through the hole, dragging in the dirt.
The Kapellmeister said, “Though it should not have, the arrival of human beings in the Salieran system came as a bit of a shock. After four hundred million years, we thought perhaps no star-faring civilization would ever arise again in this galaxy.”
A fifth wolfen took its share now, biting off the rest of the pelvis, internal organs streaming out, quickly licked up, while the dying dollie made its last horrible little mewling noises, over which we could hear the soft whisper of the other dollies, chanting in unison.
The Kapellmeister said, “Some greeted the appearance of you humans with pleasure, for we long missed the heady days of old. Others were afraid, imagining that what had happened before not only could, but would happen again. It caused the first... uproar we’d had, amongst ourselves, since the time of deep memory.”
A sixth wolfen came and ate the dollie’s chest, leaving only the head behind, a silent round thing, covered in shadows, resting in a small pool of black blood.
I said, “What does all this have to do with your being... alone?”
A seventh wolfen snapped up the head, crunch. The instant it vanished the dollies’ prayers ceased. In the silence that followed, the crackling of the Arousians’ cooking fires seemed awfully loud.
The Kapellmeister said, “As you know, by the time the first human fleet decelerated into our star system, we’d had time to find our old fleet of warships, dust them off, and send a few out to greet you.”
“The ships were four hundred million years old? And still in working order?”
“More or less.”
“Why warships?”
“With your coming, two... call them political parties, formed. The larger of the two factions, currently in the ascendant, wishes to, let things go for now, watch and listen, intervene where possible, behind the scenes, risking nothing. Their ascendancy is jeopardized because all attempts to prevent humanity from acquiring faster-than-light travel have failed. Bribing of researchers and corporate officials. The introduction of incorrect scientific data. All useless. Berens and Vataro escaped our notice and now you have it.”
“Why would you want to keep us from FTL travel?”
“Without it, you can only go so far. Without it, in time your civilization would have turned on itself and, most likely, been destroyed, eventually reviving the status quo ante.”
“Jesus.”
The Kapellmeister said, “The smaller faction, now rapidly gaining adherents, believes the danger to be acute. It wishes to launch a quick strike against your worlds, using the safest of the old weapons. We estimate a fleet of no more than two dozen scoutcraft could sterilize the Earth and all its colonies.”
Holy shit. “We do have weapons of our own.”
The Kapellmeister said, “Gaetan du Cheyne, you have no idea what energies were deployed during the Shock War. If the fleet were launched tonight, by sunrise tomorrow you would be the only terrestrial organism to survive. You and your commensal bacteria.”
“Me?”
“You are the only human being who has one of us for a friend.”
o0o
I was standing by the tall grass, not far from the dollies’ baarbij bush, pissing when they came. Holding my dick and feeling the faint vibration of the urine’s passage transmitted through a spongy wall of tissue, incredibly, thinking not about what the Kapellmeister had just said, but about the dollies nearby, dollies huddled for night.
You want them now, don’t you Gaetan? You’d like to grab a dollie or two, hustle them away into the darkness, lay them out on the warm, soft grass and fuck the living shit out of them, wouldn’t you Gaetan? No idea why I’d want to hustle them away from the light. Nobody here who could really judge me. Kapellmeister? Wolfen? Arousians? Not a one of them even remotely human. If I don’t care how the dollies feel about being raped by an alien monster, why should I care about how some other alien monsters feel about it?
No one cares how whores feel about being fucked for money, do they? Why should they? Whores are being paid, just like anyone who does a job.
Vast shadow reaching toward me from the fire. A stirring from the camp. Dollies not so far from, reeking of wonderful, odorless pheromones, rising up, eyes aglitter in the firelight, turned toward the shadow.
Dollies drawing closer to one another, as though afraid.
One of the dollies abruptly turned, plucked a dark leaf from the baarbij bush, held it to its breast, murmuring softly. Another one did likewise, then another and another.
I put my dick away and started walking back toward the fire, peering at the shapes that made the shadows. Wolfen? Black shapes in silhouette very much like wolfen, but...
The Kapellmeister’s ersatz voice, strangely hushed, as though trying to whisper, “Gaetan. Please be still.” The Kapellmeister, I saw, was crouching beside my warm rock, flattened out to the ground, legs folded away, arms retracted, wandering eyes settled down onto its back.
I stood still, not knowing what to do. Back by the fire, the Arousians were standing still as well, but they’d had their cameras set up, ready and waiting apparently. As I watched, one of them slowly reached out and touched a control, data feed, presumably, beginning to roll.
What the hell is going on?
The library said, The Orikhalkan data net contains precious little about wolfen husbandry, but there is some material. These wolfen, as you see, are larger than the others. One of them much larger.
That much was obvious. One very big white wolfen, twice the size of the one’s I’d gotten used to, a maned, toadlike carnivore the size of a small elephant, casting the giant shadow that’d first caught my attention, lurking in the background, completely motionless.
How the hell had that thing crept up on us without making nay noise?
The library whispered, The largest one will be the male. The medium-sized wolfen will be the fertile females. The smallest sort are, of course, the neuter females who make up the bulk of wolfen society.
Like so many God-damned bees?
Library: Not quite. Apparently, the wolfen, like terragenic mammals, have breeding limitations, especially since the fertile females are required to retain lifelong mobility. Thus, the standard “family” setup appears to be one male, who services the fructival needs of several females. Each fertile female lays a clutch of eggs every seven years. Each clutch gives rise to a “pride” of neuter female “sisters,” who live together for the rest of their lives.
Now, the neuter wolfen were creeping forward, bellies close to the ground, making some sort of tiny glink-like barks, almost whimpers. They seemed to focus on only one female, sliding under her muzzle, sort of licking upward like so many self-effacing dogs.
Library: Their mother, perhaps. Kalyx’ biologists theorized that, when a fertile female dollie reaches a certain advanced age, she begins laying eggs which can develop into a new generation of... mothers and fathers.
Something being communicated. As I watched, the female wolfen turned to look at the Arousians, who stood still, as though turned into the plants they vaguely resembled, wolfen looking at one, then another.
Glink, glink, glink.
Wolfen turning to peer at the spot where the Kapellmeister huddled.
Glink, glink.
Giant wolfen turning to look at me, as my bowels turned to water.
In the background, unnoticed, apparently, by anyone but me, the dollies knelt and chanted in whispers, just like the other times’ I’d... well, no. Something different now. Unison broken by dollies who faltered. And those two over there, seeming to hold hands. To one side of the pack, a dollie had fallen prone, seeming to cry, a succession of soft, high chirps, unable to say it prayers...
The Kapellmeister said,
“I think it’s safe for us to come forward now, Gaetan.”
Safe? What the hell danger were we in? I looked at the big male, big enough to take me down in two quick bites, but it was still motionless, staring at the Arousians’ fire, as though uninterested in the goings on.
When the Kapellmeister trotted forward into the firelight, I followed it reluctantly, feeling the wolfen’s mottled eyes on me, conscious of the Arousians, still motionless in the background, quietly making their filmed record, conscious of the dollies’ choked whispering, mingled with the sound of little girls’ tears.
Stood by the campfire, before the foremost female wolfen, the mother, who stood looming over me, looking down, inspecting me, breathing on me, breath with a stink like burnt-up candy.
Quite likely, whispered the library AI, a gravid, fertile female will have a substantially different biochemistry than one of the more normal neuter females, as a child’s prepubescent body odor is so different from an adult’s.
Right, In any case... I imagined myself a dollie, imagined that great head leaning down, mouth open in a horrid grin, breath like a jet of steam in my face, Our Father, who art in...
The Kapellmeister said, “She is called Belovèd Light of Her Daughters, Walking in Dry Sand.”
Inanely, I stammered, “How do you do, uh...”
The Kapellmeister’s box make a series of clipped, metallic barks, nothing at all like words. Belovèd Light jerked, seemed to peer at the box on the Kapellmeister’s back, made a little sidewise yip out of the corner of her mouth. Sat tall on her haunches then, eyes boring down at me. Barked once, twice, thrice, so loud it hurt my ears, faint echo coming back out of the wilderness.
The Kapellmeister said, “She is happy to see you, Gaetan du Cheyne.”
Happy to see me? “Um. Why?”
The Kapellmeister said, “Though early researchers, in the days of Kalyx, investigated the intelligence and life-cycle of the wolfen, no human has ever... spoken to them.”
“Oh.”
The Kapellmeister said, “Word of your presence here has spread quickly, Gaetan.”
“Why should they care? They’ve had... endless contact with humans.”
“No one talks to the wolfen in the killpits.”
“Are they interested in the Arousians, too?”
“Of course.”
“What do they want?”
The Kapellmeister said, “I think I know, I think you do too. Shall we find out?”
Do I know? What would I want, walking in the wolfen’s... paws? I looked down at the Kapellmeister, saw that its talking/listening hand was extended, tentacles spread, extended toward me. Christ, I... “Aren’t you going to use it on... them?” A quick nod toward the big female wolfen looming over us, eyes bright with... whatever brightens the eyes of a monstrous alien carnivore.
The Kapellmeister said, “Perhaps you misunderstand what’s going on here, Gaetan.”
Do I? I glanced over at the Arousians. Still motionless, huddled around their instruments, but with an... air of expectant waiting? How the hell would I know a thing like that?
The translator AI whispered, The Kapellmeister has made rapport with you. Just so, it has made rapport with the Arousians. And the wolfen.
I looked back at the wolfen, then down at the Kapellmeister, saw it read my face, saw happiness bloom in the float of its eyes. I sighed, slowly sank into tailor’s seat on the grass by its side. Said, “All right, Miss Belovèd Light. Let’s talk.”
The Kapellmeister said, “Mrs. Light, please.” Just a trace of mirth in its generated voice.
Then the black hand engulfed the back of my head.
Click.
Soft voices, the sweet voices of girl children, chanting in unison, praying together: “Holy Mother, Belovèd Light, She Who Walks in Majesty Before Us All, You Who Have Chosen to Take Us unto Your Bosom: grant us the wisdom to accept the Your Grace, grant us the courage to face Passage through the Jaws, grant us...”
Sudden, stark memory of myself, stripped naked, tied to the Wheel of Men’s Repentance, in the dim shadows of the Hall of Kali Meitner’s Grace, whispering the prayer they’d taught me, Kali Meitner, belovèd of God, who suffered for our sins, lend me the grace to suffer as you suffered at the dirty hands of...
I remember the priestess slapping me across the face, fingernails raking my skin, making me bleed, shocking me back to there and then: “We’ll have none of that, filthy, polluting boy!”
Even though I knew, I don’t think I expected the whip.
Certainly hadn’t anticipated the reality of its pain.
Over the chanted dollie prayers, I heard a girl’s voice sob, “Oh, Goddess, why? Now I’ll never see the egg...”
Another: “Shhh. Courage. Your egg will be hatched in a better place.”
I felt anger sizzle.
The translator AI whispered, There is no way of knowing, Gaetan, how much of this is being supplied by the Salieran pod software. How likely is it the dollie’s cultural symbolism would so closely match your own?
Um. Not very. The little girls’ tears...
The wolfen loomed over me, mottled eyes rolling slowly in their sockets, still unreadable but no longer so... empty. Looking at me. Seeing... no way to know what. The great jaws moved, articulations flexing, a quick sequence of metallic barks. Understood: “I cannot bid you welcome, human being.”
So. I struggled to speak, but my larynx seemed paralyzed, muscular tissues bunching and twisting, but... the box on the Kapellmeister’s back began to bark, and I understood that I’d said, “Oh? Why not?” Great. Trust the likes of me to come out with some inane...
The wolfen’s head rolled to one side with what appeared to be mirth. Then she said, “Well. I think even you must understand that we don’t like what’s happening to us, to our world.”
I tried to think of something to say. Nothing, really. What do they expect? No way for me to... I felt myself try to nod, listening as the pod made a short yap I understood to be the verbal equivalent of a nod. So. Trust the software?
The wolfen said, “We know perfectly well, have known for a long time, that as the human presence grows, our own must diminish. We understand that, one day, fairly soon as these things go, there will be no more wolfen.”
Is that a hard thing for a being to know? I said, “Extinction is... difficult to face.”
That amused roll again. She said, “My daughters tell me that among your kind, even personal extinction is feared. It surprises us you’d so casually let another species slip away.”
Much less send it packing, hmh? All I could do was feed a shrug into the Kapellmeister’s pod.
She said, “My daughters tell me that not all humans are like the ones who rule here on what you choose to call Green Heaven.” It seemed to glance at the Arousians, still frozen behind their camera tripods. “My daughters tell me these stick-bug things are... protected somehow. Perhaps even nurtured.”
I thought about what Mace Electrodynamics was doing in the Sigma Draconis system. Nurturing? Maybe you can call it that, keeping other humans away, helping the little stick-bugs out just a bit. While pillaging their star system of all its wealth. I said, “Is that what you want? To be... nurtured?”
“We’d like you to leave, of course. This is our world.”
I nodded again, listening to the dollies pray. What do they think is going to happen to them next? What do they know? I said, “Fat chance.”
The wolfen’s head rolled slowly, side to side. “We understand. Perhaps this... nurturing?”
Another wolfen leaned slowly forward, stretching out its neck, seeming to sniff me the way a dog sniffs an uncertain dinner. Then she said, “We understand the stick-bug people are trying to escape from human nurturance.”
I started to shrug, felt something interrupt, then the Kapellmeister’s generated voice said, “In their travels, Arousian students have learned much about human legal systems, Gaetan. They contemplate moving against MEI through the courts.”
The Kapellmeister said, “Are they better off as they are?”
How the hell should I know?
The first wolfen said, “At first, we wondered if the stick-bugs were to humans as dollies are to us, but it is manifestly not so. We know so very little about your worlds beyond the stars. In our ignorance, we merely thought you’d come from... somewhere beyond the sea. Some unknown land.”
I sighed, but the translator pod was silent. Finally, I said, “You know we won’t leave. You know the humans who live here won’t lift a finger to save you. Maybe you’ll breed in the zoos and survive that way...” There are dolphins in the oceans of Kent, round Alpha Centauri, even now, though they’re long gone from Earth.
The wolfen said, “That is not survival. Best then for us to die.”
I felt the anger sizzle again. “How noble.” I turned and looked at the dollies. “What about them?”
“They have no way to survive on their own. When we go, they go.”
“Maybe not.”
The wolfen seemed to peer into my eyes. “We’ve seen what you do to the ones you capture. It’s not something we’ve been able to understand.” She sat back on her haunches, tilted her head back and seemed to look up at the stars. Finally: “When we heard about the coming of the stick-bug people, when we heard about a human wandering the veldt, in the company of a peculiar beast that could talk through a box and weave magic with its paw...”
I tried to image what they must have thought. Failing, I said, “If there was a realistic way you could be saved...” No more than a useless expression of sympathy. Done my best already, you see.
She looked back at me. “Tell me true, human being: How many worlds are there, in the land beyond the sky?”
I thought, A hundred billion stars in each of a hundred billion galaxies...
The Kapellmeister’s voice said, “They have no concept of those sorts of numbers, Gaetan. In any case, human scientific knowledge about the scale of the universe is incorrect.”
Interesting. “By how much have we undercounted?”
“Your culture hasn’t defined such numerical concepts yet.”
Acts of Conscience Page 31