by Robin Roseau
"I don't know," I whispered.
"Yes, you do."
"You could tell me Mom's thirty years cost me a hundred. And I'd want you to do both parents, and you could tell me that was two hundred."
"One child each," she said. "You would be paid after you bear the corresponding child."
"One child each," I said, "Paid after I bear the first, but I still owe you the second. Do them together."
"That would be a fair arrangement," she said.
"Please tell me this is a hypothetical conversation. I didn't just agree to something, did I?"
"So far."
"So, hypothetically speaking... Am I just a surrogate mother?"
"No. There is more. Let's come back to that. You have a bigger question. Do you know what it is?"
"How many children do you really want from me, and how long do you intend to keep me? And what happens afterwards?"
"Ah, yes. There we go. I don't know. If you stayed for two children and left, then I would find another third for more children. I do not know if I could keep you bought. If I could, and I were pleased with you, I would potentially keep you for a very long time, if you let me."
"Decades?"
"Centuries. But you could leave, if you were unhappy."
"Would you drug me like an Octal queen?"
"No. Nothing like that."
"How many children?"
"I don't know. Dozens."
"You want dozens of kids?" I asked, doing my own squeaking. "Weren't you the one disparaging humanity for reaching seven billion?"
"Ah, but I do not want seven billion. Kitsune are rare in this region of space. Humans seem to be willing to share. There is room for some of us on this planet. There is more room away from this planet. And there are other stars in this region. It would take countless millennia to fill them."
"To the best of my knowledge none of the nearby stars have habitable planets."
"Several have planets. They may not be in the habitable range, but that is a small problem to solve."
"Wait. You can move planets?"
"It is not hard. Humans know how."
"I don't think so."
"Of course you do. You use the same concept when you send your probes into space."
"What concept?"
She paused. "All right. We'll come back to our discussion of thirds. There are two categorizations of energy: kinetic and potential."
"Kinetic is when something is moving."
"Yes. You can think of it as energy actually doing something. A planet is moving and so has a great deal of kinetic energy. An automobile on the road is moving. And heat is a form of kinetic energy."
"All right."
"Potential energy is due to a difference in two states. For this conversation, we will use altitude. If I take, oh, say this glass." She reached and picked up her water glass. "If I drop it from this height, just a few centimeters, it will make a noise, and if I am not careful, it may tip over." Then she lifted it much higher. "If I drop it from this height, it will make a great deal of noise. It will certainly tip over and if it were a breakable material, easily break. It may also damage the tabletop, and if it bounces off the table, it could land on your foot, causing damage."
"Right."
"This is potential energy caused by altitude. Or more exactly, caused by gravitational pull."
"All right."
"A planet is in orbit around its sun. That is kinetic energy. A planet is also at a distance from the sun, and the two exhibit gravitational attraction. A planet in a higher orbit has a greater potential energy. However, to maintain the orbit, it actually is traveling slower, so it carries less kinetic energy."
"Okay," I said slowly.
"Now, when you send your probes deep into space, you do a gravity slingshot. You send the probe towards another planet. That planet's gravity pulls on the probe, causing it to accelerate."
"Okay, but then after it passes, the reverse happens."
"Except you can do it in such a way that the probe leaves the planet much faster than it approached, and so the distance falls off. What happens is that the probe speeds up and the planet slows down by a microscopic amount. A portion of the planet's orbital velocity is transferred into the probe."
"Okay," I said slowly.
"You can also do the same thing in reverse. You can slow down the probe and speed up the planet."
"All right."
"Well, let us say that I came to this solar system. And let us say, for the sake of this discussion, Earth did not exist, but the other planets did. Let us say I wished to make a home here. I have several possibilities, but if I want a comfortable planet, I really only have two. That's not entirely true, but for this conversation, let us discuss two."
"You could move Venus or Mars."
"Right. I could lift Venus further from the sun, putting it into a more comfortable orbit, or lower Mars. To do so, I would shoot asteroids at the planet I choose. I would send as massive of asteroids as I could control. I would do this over and over, and each one would change the orbital velocity of whichever planet I chose. Let us say I chose Venus. I would bend Venus's orbit so it began moving away. As it did so, it would slow down, eventually settling into a new, far more elliptical orbit. But if I sped it up just a little at the right point, I could settle Venus into an orbit where Earth is. It would take time, a fairly large amount of time. But I could do it."
"Wow."
"Now, I'm not sure I'd use Venus. I do not care for the atmosphere that Venus carries. I am more likely to use Mars. Once Mars is where I want it, or maybe as part of getting it where I want it, I would also select asteroids, and maybe a few comets or other objects, and bombard Mars, giving it water and oxygen."
"How long are we talking?"
"Millennia. But I can do it."
"You said 400 years."
"I wouldn't see the end of the project. But I could start it. I could start it tomorrow. Humans could start it sometime this century or early in the next, although it will be longer than that before you are traveling to the nearby stars."
She let me think about that, too.
"All that being said, it is easier to colonize planets that are already receptive to life. You can move in much sooner. You need to deal with the atmosphere, which is probably poisonous, if there is any at all. But that is easier than moving a planet."
She caressed my back. "There are stars not too far that could be colonized. We have not decided if we are going to do it or leave them for humanity. Your current methods of detecting planets is to watch for a planet to transit its sun. You detect the decrease in emitted light. But that means if the axial tilt is not right, you may never find a planet in even the closest star systems. There are planets nearby you have not found."
"Are you going to tell us where?"
"Not yet."
"Our system?"
"It is possible there are large bodies far outside the orbit of Pluto, but if so, we'll leave you to discover them."
"Why not just tell us?"
"You have a right to make these discoveries about the world about you. We would not steal that from you."
"So, the reasons for humanity to control our population do not apply when discussing the hundreds of children you want me to mother for you."
"We manage our population on planets where we are many. We are not many here. And I do not know if I want hundreds. I want more than two."
"You said you have children."
"I have a daughter living in the system. I have a daughter and a son who immigrated off our home world, I believe to put as much distance from me as they could. The joke is on them, because now I am here, and it would be difficult to be much further away. Of course, it would have been an even bigger joke if either of them had come along on this mission."
"Your children didn't think being on the other side of the same planet was far enough away?"
"My two oldest didn't. I am more mature now, and my youngest daughter has a very diffe
rent outlook. I learned to let her grow up."
"Humans can have that problem."
"Not as much as Tutors."
I laughed. "So I understand."
"I was almost as bad as a Tutor with the first two. When they left, with some hateful words, I took the lesson to heart."
"How old is your youngest?"
"A little older than you. In Earth years, hmm. Not yet 40. I'm not sure exactly. We tend to stop counting, and then I would have to translate besides."
"So, we're still having a hypothetical conversation."
"Yes."
"If it weren't hypothetical, I would want to meet your daughter before making a decision."
"And if your mother were sick, and I offered this price, and no one else were offering?"
"Do you know something I don't?"
"About your mother? No. This is hypothetical."
"Well, you're right. If Mom were sick, I'd do what was necessary. What would be the price?"
"One child to cure something that was going to kill her."
"That actually seems cheap," I said. "You can find surrogate mothers for far less than curing my mother of cancer. For instance."
"You are forgetting I must modify your reproductive system."
"Oh. Right."
"This would be the price I would demand, and then later I might ask for more than a child. I might ask for five years. And then we would see. I may want to keep you, or I may not care for you. You are not always charming."
"No, but no one is."
"I am." She squeaked. "Especially when I grow testy and leave you bound in the wall. That was especially charming."
"That was the word I was using. But I spelled it with a B."
"You didn't."
"Of course I did, but I used the same word for Periwinkle."
"Now, that's not fair. For Periwinkle, the word begins with D."
"D?"
"Ditz."
I laughed. "So you know some slang. You said there is more. You are married. How does your third become pregnant? And if you tell me 'in the usual fashion', I might suggest that child costs a cure for Mom plus roll both their ages back."
"If I do not wish to use any of your DNA, then artificial insemination."
"You have a husband. And you're touching me a lot."
"Both true," she said. "My husband and I have what might be called a marriage of convenience. It didn't used to be, but we have been married a very, very long time. We are fond of each other, but we have our own lives."
"And so, a Kitsune third is quite close to a Tutor third?"
"Yes."
"I would not want to be touched by your husband in the fashion you are touching me, and I don't know how I feel about any of this. As I've said, you can readily find women to agree to this."
"I can get you to agree, Andromeda, but I wouldn't necessarily want you if you were only agreeing because of what I paid you."
I turned to look at her. She was gazing at me intently. "Is this conversation truly hypothetical?"
"For now."
"For now?"
"For now," she said. "I have not decided if I wish to make it less hypothetical. I want to know something else. What if I didn't offer to pay you at all?"
"Become your lover, your surrogate mother. What else?"
"You would accept my dominance."
"The clothes."
"Yes, the clothes. You are dressed in my colors. You would wear other clothes such as these. You said they are comfortable, and you enjoy my touch."
"Now you aren't offering to help my parents?"
"That isn't what I said. I am asking if that's what it would take."
I looked at her. "Would there be others? Would you touch others like you touch me? Would you have other thirds? Other lovers? Are you still lovers with your husband?"
"Does your answer depend on those questions?"
"If you're not helping my parents it does."
"What other criteria would you have?"
"I'd want to know you better. Frankly, we got off to a bad start. I know you are willing to punish me for being emotional."
"I did not punish you."
"You did. You knew I was suffering. I told you I was suffering. But you dismissed me and walked away when you could have released me with less effort than a wave of your fingers. You punished me for being upset and insufficiently charming."
"I did not punish you. Jasmine Brighteyes did. I simply didn't rescue you from her punishment."
I thought about that. "Perhaps," I said. "But both you and Periwinkle contributed to my poor mood. How do you think I felt when you both walked away, leaving me there? That was emotional punishment. I would have been better off if neither of you had approached me in the first place than to leave me there the way you did."
She paused, and her hand grew still.
"But regardless, you left me there when it would have cost nothing to ease my suffering. I understand you were frustrated with me. But the entire event makes me leery. I am not saying you are cruel, but I am suggesting that I am not always charming, and I don't know how well we would get along if you are so judgmental because I was struggling emotionally during a difficult situation for me."
I turned away. I'd worked myself into a snit, which was annoying. But then she said, "Those are fair concerns. Will we agree the situation was complicated?"
"Yes," I said softly.
"So there is room to recover from our start, but it might take more trust building."
I turned to her. "Yes, that is fair to say."
She nodded. "You care for my appearance?"
"Yes, but I believe you are suggesting there is a sexual element to being a Kitsune third."
"Yes. Are you suggesting you are uninterested?"
"No. Human women, when meeting someone of their preferred gender -- for me, that is women -- tend to fairly quickly categorize them into one of two groups. Yes, or no."
"And I am in the No category."
"I have a Maybe category."
"Ah."
"And it is a fairly wide category," I added. "Ardent females are near the far end, not quite a no."
"Ardent women are not interested in female pairings."
"I met one who might have been, but then wasn't. Wookies are also in the Maybe category. Implacs are firmly in the Hell No category."
She squeaked. "Even male Implacs think that," she said.
"They must not or we wouldn't need to deal with them any further."
"So, where am I?"
"You are in the Maybe category. I like your looks. But I do not know if you raise my passions. Although what your hand has been doing for the last hour moved you up several notches."
More squeaking.
"What would it take to move fully into the Yes category?"
"Time. Trust. I am leery of you, but we discussed that. And then, and only then, your hands becoming more bold than they've been. I would need to know the relationship was more than sex, more than being your surrogate mother. I would need to feel valued, like my opinion mattered. I'm not sure it does."
"And yet, we've been talking all evening. I have devoted significant attention to you. And I could just buy someone if I wanted a lesser human. I could buy you if I didn't care about how you felt about it.
"All right. That helps with the trust issue." I smiled. "But this is still a hypothetical conversation. There are at least three species in addition to humans I already know who are firmly in the Yes category."
"Your future choices will not include a human mate. You know that, don't you?"
I sighed. "We'll see."
"Jasmine won't let you go. She'll never let you go, unless it is to a mate, and not just any mate, either."
"She'd let you have me?"
"If you asked her to. Possibly if I demanded, regardless of how you felt, but I wouldn't want that battle. I'd rather ask her for someone else, if you weren't willing."
"Your touch feels nice. I am now asking a qu
estion, and I don't want a hypothetical answer. Did you invite me here to seduce me?"
"I don't intend to seduce you tonight. I haven't decided what I want."
"I have made promises to Jasmine Brighteyes. I am to accept dates. I do not believe you would be happy sharing my social calendar, once you make up your mind."
"If I make up my mind, you will not be dating anyone else, Andromeda."
"Unless you are buying me, I'm also not making long term promises just because you ask. Human women don't do that."
"In other words you expect us to date."
"Yes, if this conversation turns non-hypothetical."
"You wish trust to build."
"And attraction determined. Yes. I want to know how you're going to treat me. And I won't make long term promises without meeting your daughter."
"Unless I pay what you feel is a significant price."
"Then it becomes business, and I don't know what happens to a warm relationship."
"Which is why I would rather you came willingly without a price."
I nodded.
"I have another hypothetical topic. Well, it's not entirely hypothetical. I have a daughter. She is not hypothetical. She is unmated, and there are no nearby Kitsune with whom she shares mutual attraction."
"Are you about to pimp me out to your daughter?"
"I do not know this phase."
"It's very crude," I said. "Are you about to ask me to date your daughter? And you're asking that after the previous conversation?"
"Well, so far, they are both hypothetical," she replied.
I shook my head. "All right. You have a daughter. She is single. She doesn't have any immediate prospects because the pickings are slim. Um."
"I know that phrase," she said.
"She might be interested in a human. She might be interested in a female. I will tell you flat out, I am not interested in any relationship that involves me sharing a household with an adult male."
"What if, hypothetically speaking, she lives in my household along with her male cousin?"
"Does she?"
"She might."
"Fine. I'm not interested in a relationship where the male has amorous intentions on either of us. I am not interested in sharing a household that contains a male who is going to look at me like he wants me. I am not interested if there is any chance he's going to touch me in a fashion I don't care for."