by Audrey Faye
“Are you going to stop us, Noa?” one of Hsissh’s tormentors goaded.
Dipping its chin, the smaller one said, “Yeah!”
“Pfft! You’re a girl.”
One of the others whispered, “She wants to be a pilot … she doesn’t know the Luddeccean Guard doesn’t take girls!”
The one that must be Noa snarled, “I’m going to be in the Galactic Fleet. It’s better than the stupid Guard, and they take girls!”
One of Hsissh’s tormentors picked up a clump of dirt and tossed it at her. His other friends followed suit. Hsissh’s would-be protector sensibly retreated into the forest that surrounded the embankment.
“Ooooo! The brave pilot retreats!” one of the tormentors hooted before turning back to Hsissh. They huffed air out in staccato bursts of sound. “What are we going to do with the werfle?” one of them asked, swinging a stick.
Resuming his slow, steady slip into the wave, Hsissh had a moment between panic and curiosity. If he was hit hard enough in the head, and life seeped slowly from his body, would he become waveless, like his third parent? Energy could not be created or destroyed. Perhaps the waveless like Third went some place … else?
His rumination was interrupted by a frenzied vocalization he did not understand. “Arrrrrggghhhhhh!”
In his in-between state, Hsissh felt the girl swinging a branch thicker than his girth and longer than her body above her head. Her lips were curled, and her flat white teeth were bared.
The boy with the stick danced over Hsissh’s body and cried, “Are you crazy?” right before the branch connected with his jaw. In his bodyless state, Hsissh felt the Newcomer’s pain. The shock sent a ripple through the wave, Hsissh lost his concentration, and he found himself back in his body, staring up at the Newcomer known as Noa. She was panting, holding the branch in front of her chest with two hands. His body, perhaps trying to avoid its inevitable passing, slipped into unconsciousness.
A Nice Nest
Hsissh awoke next to a wall of immense, deadly, roaring flames. He might have immediately bolted, but he hurt too much; his body felt tight and alien. It was definitely time to leave.
Closing his eyes, Hsissh slipped from his body. Floating away, carried on the waves again, he saw that his shell had been wrapped up in some sort of plant fiber, and was cradled by a soft square of a similar fiber. He abruptly slipped back into his “werfle” form with a shocking realization. They’d made him a nest. He sniffed. More accurately, Noa had made him a nest. He smelled her all over it.
Ever so gently, he flexed his claws. It was a nice nest, he could tell that, despite his pain. It was almost as soft as the one made by Third of ptery scales and her belly fluff. The fire was a nice touch; bigger than he would ever light on a cold night, but he supposed that the nearly naked Newcomers might need more to ward off the chill. And now that he studied it, he realized it was well contained.
“He’s awake!”
He heard a rush of footsteps and looked up to see Noa, his rescuer, leaning over him, forelimb outstretched. He drew back and another Newcomer said, “Be careful, Noa.” This Newcomer was larger than Noa, and tan like most Newcomers, with black hair and golden eyes. By smell, Hsissh identified her as a female member of the dual-sexed species, probably Noa’s mother. In spite of himself, he felt sympathy for her. How difficult would it be to raise a litter with only two adults? How would Third ever have managed without First and Second to hunt and protect her, Hsissh, Shissh, and their brothers and sisters?
“But the veterinarian milked his venom, Mom.”
Whiskers trembling in alarm, Hsissh slipped his tongue beneath the sharp tips of his fangs and gently pressed. There was no swell of poison. He hunched into the nest, feeling violated.
“Yes, the veterinarian did,” said Mom, and Hsissh entertained visions of killing Veterinarian once his venom returned.
“... but the veterinarian also said that it would take a while for his ribs to heal. You have to be gentle, Noa.”
Heal ribs? Whatever for? It was easier to leave a shell and find the body of an unclaimed member of one of The One’s host species. He blinked. But of course, the Newcomers were wave-ignorant—like Third had been at the end. They couldn’t slip out of their shells and so had become resilient to injury and disease. They’d overcome the three plagues The One had let loose among them with “nanos” and “antibiotics.” And he’d heard that, even when they lost limbs or organs, they replaced them with mechanical parts. Those who had such parts were called “augments.”
Noa, who Hsissh was beginning to suspect was an adolescent among her kind, gently touched Hsissh’s head. He thought of delivering a non-venomous bite out of spite for letting Veterinarian milk his venom; but her touch wasn’t unpleasant, and he was too exhausted to bother. And then she scratched him behind his ears, and he couldn’t help purring.
“Can we keep him as a pet?” Noa asked.
Hsissh’s eyes snapped open at the unfamiliar word and the implications of “keep.” Something to be eaten later?
Another voice, deeper than even Mom’s, rumbled, “You know that we shouldn’t do that.” Hsissh’s nose twitched. A male of the species, also tan skin with dark brown hair, who smelled like Noa, but not like Mom. Perhaps the other parent?
“But why, Dad?” said Noa.
“Because he is a wild animal,” Mom said. The round metal plate in the side of her skull glinted dully in the light. At the center of it was an opening … and then darkness. Hsissh could smell no blood, bone, or other gore from the gaping hole. “And it wouldn’t be fair,” Mom continued. “You heard what the veterinarian said. These creatures die in cages; it would be wrong to keep him.”
Maybe he wouldn’t kill Veterinarian … but what was this “keeping” business? They didn’t seem to want to eat him.
Mom continued, “We don’t know why they die in captivity, but we do know they are intelligent, and social. They probably need to be with their own kind to remain healthy.”
Hsissh’s nose twitched. He’d become rather solitary since Third died the true death. He could go months without contact with his kind. Still, even a non-claimed member of The One’s favorite host species, the “werfles,” would leave its shell, too, if caught in a cage out of sheer humiliation. But it was a well-considered hypothesis.
“And they help us kill rats!” Noa interjected.
The deep-voiced one, Dad, muttered, “Damn rats, invading this pristine ecosystem.” Hsissh’s mind tripped over the word “damn,” but he had the impression that Dad was angry. Whatever for?
Noa stroked Hsissh’s head and the two adult Newcomers walked away. Another smaller, though still enormous, Newcomer came over and gazed down at Hsissh. He smelled like Noa, Mom, and Dad—a blood kin. His skin was tan, with dark brown fur on top of his head, like Mom and Dad, and his eyes were light in color.
“I wonder if he has a name, Kenji?” Noa whispered, scratching Hsissh behind the ears and under his chin, evoking a helpless purr.
“There are three sexes among werfles; I don’t think it is a ‘him,’” Kenji said. He idly played with the metal disk in the side of his head with the long, slender appendage of a paw.
Hsissh's whiskers twitched. In point of fact the werfles had males, females, and females that had matured to Thirds, nursing adults who passed on genetic information through their milk. “Him” and “her” worked well enough for members of the species not in a breeding triad.
“I’m not calling him an ‘it,’” Noa said, increasing the intensity of the ear scratching. The Newcomers had curiously ineffectual claws; they were short, stubby, and thin. However, Hsissh was discovering they were perfect for grooming without the worry of shedding blood.
“And he needs a name,” she continued, lowering her head so Hsissh was able to look into her dark eyes. Maybe he was becoming fond of this Newcomer because he didn’t find her general furlessness disturbing. Or maybe it was the color of her skin. It didn’t look as though her fur had sloughed o
ff from illness. It was the same rich brown as the bark of a healthy red nut tree, and twice as smooth.
“A name,” Noa whispered. “He has to have one.”
And he did. It was against the rules of The One to communicate with the Newcomers, lest they know they were being scrutinized. Like sub-atomic particles whose behavior changed when observed, research subjects behaved differently when they knew they were being watched. But suddenly he wanted her to know. He concentrated and tugged at the waves that coursed between Noa, Kenji, and himself. “Hsissh,” he sent along the wave. “Hsissh, I am Hsissh.”
“Hsissccchhh!” said Kenji, the sound erupting not just from his mouth but also his nose.
Hsissh squeaked in joy and wonder. He’d been told that the Newcomers were incapable of wave riding, but Ish had hypothesized that they were on the verge of it—and Ish was right! The Newcomers were truly an intelligent species!
“God bless you,” Noa said, eyes set on Hsissh. She nodded. “Fluffy, I think I’ll name him Fluffy.”
Kenji wiped his nose with a forelimb and touched Hsissh’s fur gingerly with the other. “That is a good name; he’s very soft.”
Or maybe they weren’t quite so bright.
The Gathering Place
In the dark, cavernous space that was the human attic, Hsissh sighed with pleasure. His stomach was filled with fresh rat, and his mouth was still flavored with its blood. Exalting in the feeling of all being right with the world, he rolled onto his back … and all was not right anymore. The attic was made of wood slats that were hard and had splinters that poked through his fur. Rolling back over, he scanned the room. A “box” in the corner caught his eye. The box was filled with faux fur humans used for colder temperatures. Rats enjoyed nesting in it; perhaps he would, too?
Trundling over, he slid inside, kneaded the soft material with his claws, and curled into a ball. It was very comfortable and, as a plus, smelled like his favorite prey. He closed his eyes. Rain was pattering on the roof and the single attic window. Downstairs, he could hear the family eating, their “silverware” clinking on their “plates.” He still didn’t understand why they used “dinnerware,” but the clinks were pleasant. The sounds, his full belly, and the warmth of the “fur” lulled him into a doze almost immediately. As sometimes happened, his mind slipped slightly from his body and he felt the rain, the cold air outside, and the children and their parents in the dining room below.
A loud clacking almost woke him. And then he realized the clacking was coming from the wave. More specifically, from an aquatic organism not as tall as Hsissh’s shoulder, ovoid, with a brilliant green, luminescent exoskeleton to protect it from the pressure of the ice-crusted oceans of the moon it evolved on seventeen billion light years away. It was Shissh, snapping two pincers at the front of her carapace, sending her consciousness to interrupt his nap and heckle him for not slipping out of his body. He almost woke up just to spite her; but seeing her, even in this new form, caused his body to release a flood of bonding hormones. He purred with familial love. Did she still feel the bond in that hard, cold shell? Did she still think of Third—the only member of their three parents whose werfle body had been inhabited by The One?
Shissh spoke into his mind. “Are you coming to The Gathering … Fluffy?”
Betrayed by familial love. He never should have told her that name. “No, of course not. Go away and let me sleep.” He tried to burrow deeper into the furs.
Shissh clicked her pincers and waved her eye stalks. “If you want to keep your warm human nest, you’d better come now. Misch is pushing for a fourth plague and—”
A vision of Noa’s eyes dulled by death permeated Hsissh’s dream. Hsissh sent his thoughts into The Gathering before Shissh had finished.
Shissh’s crustacean dream-self emerged beside him, eye stalks pointed in his direction. “Mighty fast entrance, Hsissh.”
“I’ve got a good thing going,” Hsissh grumbled, looking out at The Gathering. It was held in a cavern with an opening directly above that let in the sparkle of the stars—but not the glow of the time gate or human satellites. The cavern had been destroyed thousands of cycles ago, and this was only the memory of a memory that The One all shared. It was crowded with dream versions of The One. Most were in the form of werfles, but there were exotic creatures from several dozen worlds scattered among them.
“I’ve been to Earth!” one of The One’s consciousnesses roared. It was Misch. He wore the form of a “cat,” one of the few species on the human home world that was a compatible host and could tolerate living in close quarters with humans. The One had tried to inhabit humans; it didn’t work. Human bodies rebelled and were inevitably drugged for “schizophrenia” and often “institutionalized.” But cats were easy enough to possess. Pacing on his four feet, Misch said, “The humans have no fur, no claws, no speed, and no natural armor. They can’t see in the dark, and they are more ignorant of the waves than a cat … and I can tell you, cats are short on brains.”
Hsissh’s whiskers twitched. His host species, the werfle, weren’t particularly “long on brains” either, but The One outsourced their big thinking to the collective consciousness of the waves.
Swishing his feline tail, Misch declared, “They have stripped and poisoned their home world of natural resources to make up for their inadequacies. Introduce the Fourth Plague before it happens here!”
Hsissh had seen the results of the Third Plague in holos with Noa. He had seen orphaned human children too weak to defend themselves from rats feasting on their flesh. Hsissh’s two hearts beat faster as he stretched his mind out to all who were in The Gathering. “But they are wave aware!”
He felt the focus of the room shift to him.
“Impossible!”
Misch sat down and swished his tail. “Hsissh, what are you doing here?”
Someone else said, “Shouldn’t you be napping?”
A member of The One, wearing the same species host as Hsissh, stood up on her hind legs. “We know the humans don’t use waves.”
Ish, wearing a werfle body, said, “They do.”
There were hisses and grumbles among The One.
Hopping up and down with the excitement of his own recent epiphany, Hsissh explained. “The circular metal devices affixed to the sides of their skulls enable humans to talk mind-to-mind. Every human with the metal implant has nanos—tiny machines—in their brains. They are awakened in later adolescence.” Noa was too young, but her “data port” and “neural interface” had been checked by a “physician” at her yearly “checkup.” She’d taken Hsissh to the visit as a “security blanket.” A bit of the memory of the enclosed doctor’s exam room slipped into the wave and some of the werfles hissed in fear. Hsissh rushed on. “The nanos turn their thoughts to waves, and allow them to interface mind-to-mind via light beams, radio, and microwaves—they call it ‘the ethernet.’”
Misch’s mind hissed, “Primitive and barbaric! Even a lizzar can hear and see, and a “nano interface” is not much better!”
Hsissh’s chest tightened, and he couldn’t help thinking of rats feasting on Noa’s flesh.
“But they are wave aware!” Ish said.
At Ish’s opening, Hsissh said, “Yes, yes! They know that all matter is made of waves.” Hsissh shared the memory of a lesson he’d studied with Noa, a history of physics from Isaac Newton to the current ethernet age. Humans were aware of the subatomic world, but they couldn’t feel it and barely used it; they hadn’t found a way to do so practically. “But they are on the verge!” Hsissh said, as his memory of the holo documentary ended. “Lizzars aren’t wave aware! Nor were the creatures we eradicated at the end of the last Epoch.”
Shissh clacked, “Interesting … ” very slowly, the way she did when Hsissh had said something stupid.
There was a collective silence from The One.
And then a thought, so soft he almost missed it, entered his consciousness. “Hsissh’s Third died the true death ten cycles ago, it’s left
him addled.”
From the collective consciousness rose an unmistakable feeling of pity. In Noa’s attic, his physical body shivered … he’d failed.
Ish stood on his back four hind limbs and waved his paws. “The humans, as they call themselves, are wave aware—in the truest sense of the word!”
Thoughts rose in The Gathering like swirling mist.
Misch swished his tail. “I know nothing of this!”
“Because you haven’t been to their places of worship,” Ish said. “It is my understanding that on their home world the practice is all but forgotten; it was one of the reasons we have humans on our planet. The ones here were seeking enlightenment and to escape the material, non-wave focused cultures of Earth.”
“Worship?” the question rose from Hsissh and all in attendance.
Ish clasped his top two claw pairs behind his back and strode through the Gathering Place on his back four legs. His middle pair of paws waved. “They enter states of profound meditation in group settings.”
Misch hissed. “They don’t feel the waves!”
Ish bowed his head, and said, “They feel closer to ‘God’ in their meditative state, a being they believe is responsible for all creation and is all powerful. That is the waves from which all matter is derived, obviously.” Stopping his pacing, he raised his head and faced the crowd. “They have a concept of the oneness of everything.”
There were soft noises of awe from around the cavern.
“Humans brought the rats,” someone else thought. “They’re everywhere.”
Nearly everyone in attendance licked their lips; even Misch’s feline form did. “We should reward them for that,” said another werfle.
Clacking her pincers, Shissh drew the audience’s attention. “If they could join the waves, they could become useful allies.”