Fuzzy Ergo Sum

by Diehr Wolfgang

  “Work-exchange?”

  “Yeah. You sign on with an off-world company and they pay your tuition, then you have to work on a colony world for so many years. The Chartered Zzarathustra Company paid for my schooling, so I have to work here for seven years before I can go back to Terra.” Akira took another drink then said, “Your parents must have been rich to send you to Mars from Freya.”

  The Freyan’s face took on a serious mien. “Actually, I never knew my parents. I was raised by my mother’s brother. He was fairly wealthy and saw to my education even though he didn’t approve of my leaving Freya. I received a generous allowance while in college.” John finished his drink and signaled for another before changing the topic of conversation. “When will you be going back to Terra?”

  “Well, I have three years left on my contract, but I think I’ll stay here. Zarathustra is my home now. All my friends are here and my parents are thinking of immigrating now that Zarathustra is a Class IV planet, subject to Federation law.” Something caught Akira’s eye and she waved. A woman at the bar waved back then started over to the table. “That’s Betty Kanazawa from accounting.”

  Betty was a statuesque woman with glossy black hair, full lips, semi- Asiatic eyes and olive skin. When the light hit her navy blue blouse just right it became transparent. “Akira, who’s the hunk?” Betty asked, as she took a seat. She turned to John. “You must be new here. I’m Betty.”

  “John.” Morgan made a concerted effort to keep his gaze upon the woman’s face. “I just arrived on Zarathustra.”

  Betty gave Morgan a visual once-over then said, “Welcome to Fuzzyworld, John.”

  Morgan looked at Akira with a raised eyebrow.

  “That’s what some people are calling Zarathustra. It’s a slang-thing.”

  Morgan turned back to Betty. “Are you here with your date?” Betty nodded. “Why not have him join us?”

  “We already have a table with some friends.” Betty pointed to a table on the other side of the dance floor.

  Morgan looked where Betty pointed. “Which one is yours?”

  “The redhead, Frank Patel from administration.”

  “I thought you were still with Manuel.” Akira glanced at the other table. “Although, Frank isn’t bad looking. Snappy dresser, too.”

  “Manuel is back with his ex, again.” Betty glanced at John. “Better be careful or I’ll come after the stud, here. Nice to meet you, John.”

  John stood and bowed slightly before remembering that such niceties were rarely observed in Terran society…at least not in bars and lounges. “It has been a pleasure, Lady Kanazawa.”

  Betty smiled and bowed back before returning to her table. John took his seat and turned to Akira. “What is a ‘stud’ and a ‘hunk’? I assume these to be slang-things, as well.”

  “Oh, right, Terrangelo is your second language, isn’t it? You speak it so naturally I forgot. Well, those are archaic terms applied to particularly attractive men, usually.”

  John appeared slightly embarrassed and changed the subject. “I’ll have to get a new primer on Terrangelo. I guess I am not as conversant as I had thought.”

  “Say, how many languages do you speak?” Akira asked. “I speak some Fuzzy and a little college Latin.”

  “Well, there is Terrangelo, Sosti, which is the Freyan language, ancient Martian, which was a requirement at Mars U, Khooghra, Barsoomian…”

  “Barsoomian?”

  John laughed. “Yes. It was an artificial language based on Burroughs’ Mars stories created by my fraternity. Pledges were expected to learn it or they weren’t accepted into the frat. Let’s see, there is also Latin, Ullerian, Thoran and most recently some Fuzzy.”

  “Wow! You must have a real ear for linguistics.”

  “Well, if you speak the local tongue, you get more respect from the natives.”

  “I just remembered. Freyan women are supposed to be more beautiful than Terran women.” Akira feigned a pout. “I must seem very plain to you.”

  John was taken by surprise at the sudden topic shift, but gamely rose to the challenge. “On the contrary, you would be considered attractive on any world,” he said, smiling. “Would you be interested in teaching me some of the local dance steps?”

  “How could I deny such a slick talking, not to mention fast thinking, man?”

  VII

  Miguel Courland ran a tight ship and everybody who worked for or above him knew it. Except for Bill Tuning. Tuning thought that on his show everything should be run his way. At most stations he would be right, but not on CZCN, a subsidiary of the Charterless Zarathustra Company. On CZCN, Courland was the final word on all telecasts answerable only to Victor Grego himself. So naturally when Tuning swapped the planned interview with a local celebrity for that of an unknown, at least locally, college professor at the last minute, Courland hit the roof.

  “Miguel, the man has an interesting theory about the Fuzzies,” Tuning argued. “Fuzzies are still a hot topic with the ratings. Would you rather we run another bit about a vapid actress trying to deny her latest cosmetic procedure, or an interview with a scientist with a new slant on the natives?”

  Courland was no fool even though ratings were the Holy Grail of broadcast television. “What’s this new slant, Bill?”

  “He only says this will turn everything we think we know about Fuzzies on its ear,” Tuning replied. “Look, even if he’s a crackpot, Ghu knows we get plenty of those, he should be more interesting than that has-been Darla Cross. We can put her on tomorrow if you want to. She won’t dare kick up a fuss.”

  “No, she needs all the exposure she can get,” Courland agreed. “Rumor has it she’s up for the part of Ruth Ortheris in that documentary, um, ‘First Contact’ or something like that.” The station manager drew a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Fine, run the professor. I just wish these things weren’t live.”

  “Relax, I can handle this guy,” he said with a smile.

  “You’d better. I’ll go smooth things over with Ms. Cross.” Courland glanced at his watch. “Two hours and twenty-five minutes. Go get ready.”

  * * * * * * * * *

  Jan Christiaan Hoenveld was arguably the premier scientist on Zarathustra. His ego very nearly matched his scientific qualifications. As such, he was a difficult man to work for. Nobody worked with Dr. Hoenveld as he acknowledged no equals, at least on Zarathustra. As such, he was equally difficult to supervise. More than once Juan Jimenez found it necessary to remind the man exactly who worked for whom.

  Jimenez mentally girded himself for battle as he entered Dr. Hoenveld’s office. Not surprisingly the scientist was in his blindingly white lab coat. He believed the scientist bleached it twice a day to keep it that clean.

  Juan Jimenez made his greeting and got right to the point. “Chris, I have a new project I would like you to work on.”

  Hoenveld looked up from whatever was on the computer screen with his normal expression, a look of annoyance. “And what would that be, Mr. Jimenez?”

  Jimenez actually held a doctorate in his field but decided to forgo the correction. “We have a Fuzzy—”

  “Almost everybody has a Fuzzy, these days,” Hoenveld interrupted.

  “Who chooses not to eat Extee-Three?” Jimenez finished as if nothing happened.

  “I don’t blame him,” Hoenveld put in. “I tried the stuff once myself. Horrible thing to feed anyone.”

  “Chris, you do know that every Fuzzy to date has consumed as much Extee-Three as they could without exploding.”

  “A certain amount of deviation from the norm is to be expected in any species, Mr. Jimenez.”

  “He also passes on land-prawn,” He added.

  “Well, that’s to be…” Hoenveld stopped in mid-sentence. “Landprawn? Hmph…is he allergic, somehow?”

  “Actually, we hadn’t considered that possibility…”

  “I’ll need to run some tests, draw some blood, get stool samples… mmm…how soon can you get this Fuzzy here?
”

  He was almost stunned at Hoenveld’s reaction, having expected a battle. “I’ll call Mrs. Van Riebeek after lunch. If she can’t bring Zorro in directly, I’ll send an aircar for him.”

  “Yes, that will be fine,” the scientist replied. “Zorro, eh? Well, I’ll get everything ready by then.”

  “Don’t hurt him, Chris.”

  “Mr. Jimenez, in addition to my various degrees, I possess an MD.” Hoenveld actually looked indignant at the suggestion that he would injure a Fuzzy. “The first rule of medicine is ‘do no harm.’ I wouldn’t even think of hurting another sapient being.”

  “My apologies, doctor. Zorro will be here as soon as possible.”

  * * * * * * * * *

  The Fuzzies all gathered around as the large machine floating in the air scooped out large chunks of earth. They were careful not to get too close as they had been warned many times about the dangers of such things, but they were curious as to what it was doing. Little Fuzzy spotted Pappy Jack and ran over to him.

  “Pappy Jack! Pappy Jack!” the Fuzzy yelled emphatically as he pointed at the earthmover. “What make do?”

  Holloway patiently explained that the machine was digging a big hole. Little Fuzzy looked at his Pappy with an expression that said I can see that. “Why make big hole?”

  Holloway puffed on his pipe for a moment as he considered his answer then said, “That is where we will put the new septic tank.” As expected, Little Fuzzy inquired what a sep-tik tank was.

  “You know what a commode is, right?”

  Little Fuzzy explained that it was the made-thing that took Big Ones’ bad smells away. To the Fuzzies it seemed both amazing and silly. It was a lot of trouble to go all the way to a special room to take care of one’s business, but then there was no need to dig a new hole every time, either.

  “Well, the bad smells don’t just vanish, they are washed down into a big…um…box under the ground where they are broken down and returned to the ground.”

  Little Fuzzy looked dubious, at first. It seemed like a roundabout way to put something into the ground when Fuzzies did it in a more direct manner. Then Jack explained that the Fuzzies had used up most of the area burying their bad smells and had to walk further from the Reservation every day. With the new septic system and mini-toilets there would be no need for that. Little Fuzzy accepted this explanation and shared it with the other Fuzzies.

  The Fuzzies were still debating the pros and cons when Holloway saw Gus Brannhard arrive. Gus set his aircar down well away from the Fuzzies and the digging. Holloway walked over to greet him.

  “Heyo, Pappy Jack!” Allan and Natty yelled.

  “Heyo, Allan, Natty. Should I be expecting a couple of hospital orderlies, too?” Jack called to Gus.

  “Orderlies?” Gus lifted out Allan and Natty then turned to Jack.

  “Yeah. You made a break for it, didn’t you?”

  Gus laughed then stopped himself and rubbed his torso over his surgical scar. “Nah, the sawbones cut me loose. He said something about my disturbing the other patients. I had to swear on my honor that I’d behave for the next few weeks, though.” Gus glanced at the earthmover. “Putting in a swimming pool for the kids?”

  Jack explained about the new waste disposal unit for the Fuzzies. “Why didn’t you just requisition a matter converter for all that?”

  “Because an M/E conversion unit costs about a hundred times as much,” Jack explained. “Even my home still uses an atomic battery cartridge. Besides, we still don’t know what a Fuzzy’s tolerance for radioactivity is and even the most ecologically sound unit raises the background radiation a few milli-rads. This will work just as well, and the Fuzzies could learn how to make their own outhouses and whatnot for use in the villages.”

  “I think they’re a long way from making a working septic system, but an outhouse wouldn’t be out of the question, I guess.”

  Jack watched as Gus’s Fuzzies scampered off to join the crowd. “Don’t kid yourself. We have a few blacksmiths in the crowd and Henry Stenson’s bunch can repair simple electronics.”

  “Humph.” Gus looked back over at the crowd of Fuzzies and wondered how soon it might be before they started using everything Big Ones used. “Grego was right; no bet on what a Fuzzy couldn’t do is safe.”

  Jack agreed, then asked, “So what brings you out here?”

  “Oh, just figured Allan and Natty needed a little face time with their friends,” said the big man with a dismissive wave. “They’ve been cooped up watching over me and I decided they needed a break. It’s too soon for me to go hunting with them so I was hoping they could tag along with some of your crowd.”

  “Good idea,”Jack said. “I’ll fix up the spare room for you and the kids. Gerd, Ruth and Ben are coming out later tonight.”

  “Sounds like a party,” Gus said. “Before they get here I want to talk with you about those provisions for the future you mentioned back at the hospital.”

  Jack was taken a bit by surprise. “Sure. Let’s walk to my house and have some coffee while we talk.”

  The two men took seats at the kitchen table while they waited for the coffee to perk. Jack refused to use instant or microwave brands preferring it the old-fashioned way.

  “Jack, after what happened with my liver I got to thinking how I won’t be around forever,” Gus started. “If something happens to me I need to be sure that Allan and Natty will be taken care of.”

  “Sound thinking,” Jack agreed. “My bunch will be well provided for when I’m gone.”

  “But who’s going to be the provider?”

  “What? Oh. I guess I should appoint a guardian.” Jack leaned back in his chair and reached for his pipe, only to remember Gus was still recovering.

  The coffee pot buzzed and Jack poured two cups.

  “My thoughts exactly,” Gus said. He started to take the cup in front of him then remembered that caffeine was also verboten while he was on the mend. Damned doctors! “That’s why I want to make you Allan and Natty’s godfather.”

  “What? Gus, I’ve got, what, a good ten or twenty years on you? What makes you think I have even half a chance of outliving you?”

  Gus shrugged. “If you don’t, and I very much doubt that, then I’ll appoint someone else. But, these days, your line of work is safer than mine.”

  “Ah, well, what the hell. Who’s your second choice?”

  “Ben, of course. He’s younger than we are and I’ve seen how he treats Flora and Fauna.” Gus threw a glance at the Fuzzies. “He’d be a good Pappy to them. What about you?”

  “Me? Oh, I guess I would go with Gerd and Ruth.” Jack checked his watch. “I’ll drop that bomb on them later tonight when they come out for dinner.”

  * * * * * * * * *

  “…So, professor, you are saying that the Fuzzies might actually be alien to this world,” the interviewer asked.

  “That is a very real possibility,” the elder man replied. “The fact that Fuzzy Sapiens Zarathustra is the only known bipedal mammalian life form prior to our own incursion on Zarathustra makes them a zoological oddity. Take Terrans, for example; we come from a widely divergent family of primates.”

  The professor pontificated at length about how all life forms on any given planet tend to develop in accordance to their environment, splitting off into divergent species citing that wolves, dogs, coyotes, bears, foxes, etc, all shared a common ancestor. The Fuzzies were genetic orphans having no known kindred species…at least on Zarathustra.

  “I think I’ve heard enough of this foolishness,” Jack said, as he thumbed a button and shut off the vid. “Fuzzy astronauts for Ghu’s sake.” He leaned back and took a sip of water from his glass.

  With him were Colonial Governor Ben Rainsford, Colonial Chief Prosecutor Gus Brannhard and the van Riebeeks. Out of respect for Gus, who was still recovering from his liver transplant, the gang was having soft drinks instead of their usual cocktails. Nobody wanted a run-in with Allan Quatermain and Natty Bumppo,
especially after having heard of the hospital orderly that nearly became a patient.

  The Fuzzies were all outside playing in the Reservation or hunting land-prawn so it was just Terran-type people for a change. Fuzzies were a lot of fun to have around but as any parent of active children knows; sometimes it is necessary to get away and enjoy the company of adults.

  “Actually, that Professor Darloss brought up some interesting points,” Ruth noted from the couch where she sat next to Gerd. “The Fuzzy’s dependency on a substance that is not plentiful makes you wonder.”

  “Maybe they just used up all the titanium at some point,” Gus suggested. He absently rubbed the right side of his abdomen, where the liver is located.

  “Not possible, Gus,” Ben said. “Titanium isn’t altered in the body into something else the way organic compounds can be. It’s an element and elements simply don’t become something else. Well, granted, there are a few exceptions, like those produced in a cyclotron, but that’s a whole other thing. It goes in as titanium and comes out as titanium. And even if it stayed in the body—which I very much doubt, it would turn toxic. When a Fuzzy dies, his body eventually breaks down and returns the titanium to the ground. It’s an endless cycle.”

  “Well, maybe there was a plant or something that the Fuzzies would eat that provided something very similar to the long-chain titanium molecule but without the titanium,” Gus argued. His litigious nature automatically spurred him on to win any argument.

  “Now that is entirely possible. The environment might have had a dramatic alteration, causing this plant to die out,” the Colonial Governor agreed. “However, it was far more likely that the NFMp countered some naturally occurring toxin in the environment. Whatever created the toxin might have died out leaving the NFMp nothing to counter, so it turned destructive.”

  “You said that titanium would turn toxic if it built-up in the body,” Gus pointed out. “Maybe land-prawn and Extee-Three act like a poison that the NFMp counters.”

  “There’s a thought,” Gerd said. “But it doesn’t explain everything.”

  “Did I mention that we found one Fuzzy that refuses to eat Extee-Three or land-prawn?” Ruth said. Everybody except Gerd expressed disbelief. A Fuzzy refusing Extee-Three was like the sun rising from the west. “It’s true. Doctors Mallin and Hoenveld are checking him out. We don’t know what to make of it yet.”