Homeward Bound Part 17

Those were important points. Certain males and females here on Home had realized as much years earlier. Nothing had been done about that realization, though. No one seemed to know when or if anything would be taken care of. Nothing moved quickly here. Nothing had had to, not for millennia.

But anyone who delayed while dealing with the Big Uglies would be sorry, and in short order. Atvar knew that. He made the point whenever he could, and as forcefully as he could. Hardly anybody seemed to want to listen to him.

And he had trouble listening to Sam Yeager right now. The scales on his crest kept twitching up. They were not under his conscious control. He had pheromones in the scent receptors on his tongue. Next to that, ordinary business, even important ordinary business, seemed pallid stuff.

At last, when he realized he hadn't heard the last three points the wild Big Ugly had brought up, he raised a hand. "I am sorry, Amba.s.sador," he said. "I am very sorry indeed. But even for an old male like me, mating season is here. I cannot keep my mind on business while I smell females. We can take this up again when the madness subsides, if that is all right with you."

Sam Yeager laughed in the loud, barking Tosevite way. "And we can take it up again when the madness subsides even if that is not all right with me," he said. "The Race may not have mating on its mind most of the year, but you sure make up for lost time when you do."

Ruefully, Atvar made the affirmative gesture. "That is a truth, Amba.s.sador. It is not a truth we are particularly proud of, but it is a truth."

"You do not offend me. You are what you are," the Big Ugly said. "I will remind you that you needed much longer to say the same thing about us."

"That is also a truth," Atvar admitted. "And it is a truth that your habits still strike us as unhealthy and repulsive. But your biology has made you what you are, as ours has done with us. We can accept that. What is particularly unhealthy and repulsive to us is the way ginger has made us begin to imitate your s.e.xual patterns. Our biology has not adapted us to be continuously interested in mating."

"Well, you can borrow some of our forms from us," Sam Yeager replied. "Back on Tosev 3, you already seem to have discovered the idea of marriage-and the idea of prost.i.tution." The two key words were in English; the language of the Race had no short, exact term for either.

Atvar had heard both English words often enough before going into cold sleep to know what they meant. He despised the words and the concepts behind them. The Race had brought civilization to the Rabotevs and the Hallessi-and to the Tosevites. What could be more humiliating than borrowing ways to live from barbarians? Nothing he could think of.

But right now he could hardly think at all-and he did not much want to, either. "If you will excuse me . . ." he said, and rose from his chair and hurried out of the conference chamber.

Somewhere not far away, a female was ready to mate. That was all he needed to know. He turned his head now this way, now that, seeking the source of that wonderful, alluring odor. It was stronger that way. . . . He hurried down a corridor. His hands spread, stretching out his fingerclaws as far as they would go. Males often brawled during mating season. Some of the brawls were fatal. Penalties for such affrays were always light, and often suspended. Everyone understood that such things happened under the influence of pheromones. It was too bad, but what could you do?

There! There she was! And there was another male-a miserable creature, by his body paint a hotel nutritionist, second cla.s.s-headed for her. Atvar hissed furiously. Of their own accord, the scales that made up his crest lifted themselves from the top of his head. That was partly display for the female's sake, partly a threat gesture aimed at the hotel nutritionist.

"Go away!" the nutritionist said, hissing angrily.

Instead of answering with words, Atvar leaped at him, ready to claw and bite and do whatever he had to do to make his rival retreat. The hotel nutritionist was much younger, but not very spirited. He snapped halfheartedly as Atvar came forward, but then turned and fled without making a real fight of it.

Atvar let out a triumphant snort. He turned back to the female. "Now," he said urgently.

And now it was. She bent before him. Her tailstump twisted to one side, out of the way. He poised himself above and behind her. Their cloacas joined. Pleasure shot through him.

Still driven by the pheromones in the air, Atvar would have coupled again. But the female skittered away. "Enough!" she said. "You have done what you needed to do."

"I have not yet done everything I want to do," Atvar said. The female ignored him. He hadn't expected anything different. He might have hoped, but he hadn't expected. And his own mating drive was less urgent than it had been in his younger days. He trotted off. If that hotel nutritionist, second cla.s.s, made a sufficiently aggressive display to this female, he might yet get a chance to mate with her. But my sperm are still in the lead, But my sperm are still in the lead, Atvar thought smugly. Atvar thought smugly.

He went out into the street. It was chaos there, as he'd thought it would be. Males and females coupled on the sidewalk and even in the middle of traffic. Sometimes, males overwhelmed by pheromones would leap out of their vehicles and join females. Or females in cars and trucks would see a mating display and be so stimulated that they would stop their machines, get out, and a.s.sume the mating position in the middle of the road.

Accidents always skyrocketed at this time of year, along with the brawls. It was no wonder that the Race didn't care to think about the mating season when it finally ended. Males and females simply were not themselves, and they knew it. Who would want to remember a time like this, let alone celebrate the mating urge the way the Big Uglies did? Incomprehensible.

Atvar coupled with another female out in front of the hotel. Then, sated for the moment, he watched the show all around him. It was interesting for the time being, but he knew he was pheromone-addled. When the pheromones wore off, so would the appeal of the spectacle.

Overhead, a pair of squazeffi flew by. They were conjoined. A lot of creatures mated at this time of year. That way, the eggs the females laid would hatch in the springtime, when the chance for hatchlings' survival was highest. Like other flying creatures on Home, they had long necks, beaky mouths full of teeth, and bare, membranous wings with claws on the forward margin. Their hides were a safe, sensible green-brown, not much different from the color of his own skin.

Tosev 3 had nothing like squazeffi. Similar animals had once existed there, but were millions of years extinct. Instead, the dominant fliers there were gaudy creatures with feathers. Atvar had never got used to birds, not in all the time he'd spent on the Big Uglies' homeworld. They looked more like something a gifted but strange video-game designer might imagine than anything real or natural.

He wondered what the Tosevites thought of squazeffi and other proper flying things. If he still remembered to ask after mating season-by no means certain, not with the pheromones addling him-he would have to ask them. In the meantime . . .

In the meantime, he ambled back into the hotel. A Big Ugly-the dark brown one named Coffey-walked past him. Like Rabotevs and Hallessi, the Tosevite was oblivious to the pheromones filling the air around him. He said, "I greet you, Exalted Fleetlord," as if Atvar weren't thinking more of females than of anything else.

The fleetlord managed to reply, "And I greet you." Frank Coffey smelled like a Tosevite-a strange odor to a male of the Race, but not one to which to pay much attention during mating season.

Then Atvar spotted Trir. The guide saw him at the same time. His crest flared erect. He straightened into a display a male used only at this time of year. Trir might not have intended to mate with him. But the visual cues from his display had the same effect on her as females' pheromones had on him. She bent into the mating posture. He hurried around behind her and completed the act. After his hiss of pleasure, she hurried away.

Frank Coffey had paused to watch the brief coupling. "May I ask you a question, Exalted Fleetlord?" he said.

"Ask." Still feeling some of the delight he'd known during the mating act, Atvar was inclined to be magnanimous.

"How does the Race get anything anything done during mating season?" the wild Big Ugly inquired. done during mating season?" the wild Big Ugly inquired.

"That is a good question," Atvar answered. "Females too old to lay eggs help keep things going, and there are a few males who, poor fellows, do not respond to pheromones. Rabotevs and Hallessi are useful in this role, too, now that we can bring them back here. They have mating seasons of their own, of course, but we do not need to take those into account here as much as we do on their home planets."

"I suppose not," Coffey said, and then, thoughtfully, "I wonder how many intelligent species have mating seasons and how many mate all through the year."

"Until we got to know about you Tosevites, we thought all such species were like the Race," Atvar said. "The first two we came to know certainly were, so we thought it was a rule. Now, though, the tally stands at three species with seasons and one without. I would have to say this sample is too small to be statistically significant."

"I would say you are bound to be right." The Tosevite looked up toward the ceiling-no, up beyond the ceiling, as his next words proved: "I wonder how many intelligent species the galaxy holds."

"Who can guess?" Atvar said. "We have probed several stars like Home with no planets at all, and one other with a world that supports life but is even colder and less pleasant for us than Tosev 3: not worth colonizing, in our judgment. One of these days, we will find another inhabited world and conquer it."

"Suppose someone else finds the Empire?" Coffey asked.

Atvar shrugged. "That has not happened in all the history of the Race, and by now our radio signals have spread across most of the galaxy. No one from beyond has come looking for us yet." He swung his eye turrets toward the wild Big Ugly. "I think we would do better to worry about the species with which we are already acquainted." Coffey did not presume to disagree with him.

Most of the time, the Race mocked Tosevite s.e.xuality. For a small stretch of each year, though, males and females here far outdid the wildest of wild Big Uglies in sheer carnality. Ka.s.squit had seen two mating seasons before this one. They astonished and appalled her. The creatures she'd thought she knew turned into altogether different beings for a little while.

She had seen mating behavior in the starship orbiting Tosev 3 after the colonization fleet brought females to her homeworld. Some of those females had come into season on their own. Others, ginger-tasters, had had chemical help. That was disruptive enough, as their pheromones sent males all over the ship into heat. But this . . . this was a world gone mad.

And it was a madness of which she had no part. The Race scorned Tosevite s.e.xuality, yes. Ka.s.squit knew that only too well. She'd been on the receiving end of such comments more times than she could count back in the starship orbiting Tosev 3. She hadn't heard so many since waking up on Home. It wasn't that males and females here were more polite. If anything, the reverse was true. But a lot of them were simply ignorant of how Big Uglies worked.

For the time being, Ka.s.squit could have done the mocking. Males and females coupled on the streets. They coupled in the middle of the streets. Males brawling over females clawed and bit one another till they bled. Yes, Ka.s.squit could have done the mocking-had she found anyone to listen to her.

The Race paid no attention. Right now, males and females were too busy joining to worry about anything else. Later, once the females' pheromones wore off, everyone would try to pretend the mating season had never happened. Ka.s.squit had already seen that. And, once the females' pheromones had worn off, males and females would go back to disparaging the Tosevites for their lascivious and disgusting habits. She'd seen that, too.

Now, though, she could talk with the American Big Uglies. They hadn't come down to the surface of Home when she watched the two previous mating seasons. The server in the hotel refectory was a female. She skittered about as if she'd tasted too much ginger, but Ka.s.squit did not think that was the problem. Unless she was wrong, the female had to hurry to get her work done before some male interrupted her.

To Frank Coffey, Ka.s.squit said, "This is a difficult time."

"Truth." The wild Big Ugly laughed. "We Tosevites do not do things like this. The Race must think about nothing but mating. What a perverse and depraved s.e.xuality its males and females must have."

For a moment, Ka.s.squit thought he was serious in spite of that laugh. He sounded exactly like a pompous male grumbling about the Big Uglies. Then she realized he had to be joking, no matter how serious he sounded. That made the jest all the more delicious. She laughed, too, at first the way the Race did and then noisily, like any other Tosevite. She did that only when she thought something was very funny.

Frank Coffey raised an eyebrow. "Do you disagree with me? How can you possibly disagree with me? I wonder how we Big Uglies can hope to deal with creatures so constantly obsessed with mating."

That only made Ka.s.squit laugh harder. "Do you have any idea how much you sound like some kind of self-important fool of a male pontificating about Tosevites?"

"Why, no," Coffey said.

Again, Ka.s.squit needed a couple of heartbeats to be sure he was kidding. Again, the brief doubt made the joke funnier. She got out of her seat and bent into the full posture of respect. "I thank you," she said.

"For what?" Now the brown Big Ugly seemed genuinely confused, rather than playing at confusion as he had a little while before.

"For what?" Ka.s.squit echoed. "I will tell you for what. For puncturing the pretensions of the Race, that is for what."

"You are grateful for that?" Coffey asked. Was his surprise here genuine or affected? Ka.s.squit couldn't tell. The wild Big Ugly went on, "Since you are a citizen of the Empire, I would have thought that you would be angry at me for poking fun at the Race."

Ka.s.squit made the negative gesture. "No," she said, and added an emphatic cough. "The Race can be foolish. The Race can be very foolish. Sometimes they realize it, sometimes they do not. But being a citizen of the Empire is more, much more, than being a member of the Race."

"That is not how it has seemed to us Tosevites," Coffey said.

"Well, no," Ka.s.squit admitted. "But that is because of the special circ.u.mstances surrounding the occupation of Tosev 3."

"Special circ.u.mstances?" Now Frank Coffey did the echoing. "I should say so!"

"I have never denied them," Ka.s.squit said. "I could not very well, could I? But you will have seen, I think, that the Empire treats all its citizens alike, regardless of their species. And we all have the spirits of Emperors past looking after our spirits when we pa.s.s from this world to the next."

She looked down for a moment when she mentioned the spirits of Emperors past. Coffey didn't. None of the wild Big Uglies did. He said, "I will admit you are better at treating all your citizens alike than we are, though we do improve. But you will understand we have different opinions about what happens after death."

The Tosevite opinions Ka.s.squit had studied left her convinced they were nothing but superst.i.tion. How could a being like a male Big Ugly with preposterous powers have created the entire universe? The idea was ridiculous. And even if such a being had done such a thing, why had he not seen fit to tell the Big Uglies about the Race and the Empire before the conquest fleet arrived? No, the notion fell apart the moment it was examined closely.

But mocking Tosevite superst.i.tions only hatched hatred and enmity. Ka.s.squit said, "In this case, I think we will have to agree to disagree."

"Fair enough," Coffey replied. "That is an idiom in English. I did not know the Race's language also used it."

For her part, Ka.s.squit was surprised the Big Uglies could come up with such a civilized concept. She did not say that, either, for fear of causing offense. She did say, "You wild Tosevites have proved less savage than many here on Home expected."

That set Frank Coffey laughing. "By our standards, we are civilized, you know. We may not be part of the Empire, but we are convinced we deserve to stand alongside it."

"Yes, I know you are," Ka.s.squit replied, which kept her from having to state her own opinion about American convictions.

Evidently, though, she did not need to, for the wild Big Ugly said, "You do not think we are right."

"No, I do not. Home has been unified for a hundred thousand years. The Race has been traveling between the stars for twenty-eight thousand years. When the Race came to Tosev 3, you Tosevites were fighting an enormous war among yourselves. You are still not a unified species. All this being true, how do you presume to claim equality with the Empire?"

"Because we have won it," the wild Big Ugly answered, and used an emphatic cough. "I do not care how old the Race is. In America, the question to ask is, what have you done yourself? No one cares what your ancient ancestor did. Here is what we did in the United States: when the Race attacked us without warning, we fought the invaders to a standstill. We won our independence, and we deserve it. You said as much yourself to Trir down by the South Pole. I admired you for your honesty, for I know we are not altogether your folk."

"Admired . . . me?" Ka.s.squit wasn't used to hearing such praise. Home had plants that always turned toward the sun. She turned toward compliments in much the same way. "I thank you. I thank you very much."

"You are welcome," Frank Coffey said. "And I will tell you one other reason why we deserve to stand alongside the Empire." He waited. Ka.s.squit made the affirmative gesture, urging him to go on. He did: "Because you and I are sitting here in the refectory of a medium-good hotel in Sitneff, on Home, and I, at least, did not come here on a starship the Race built. Is that not reason enough?"

I am proud of the Empire, Ka.s.squit thought, Ka.s.squit thought, but the wild Big Uglies have their pride, too, even if it is for smaller achievements. but the wild Big Uglies have their pride, too, even if it is for smaller achievements. "Perhaps it is-for you, at any rate," she said. She would not admit the Tosevites' deeds matched those of the Race. That would have gone too far. "Perhaps it is-for you, at any rate," she said. She would not admit the Tosevites' deeds matched those of the Race. That would have gone too far.

"All right. I suspect we are also agreeing to disagree here." Coffey shrugged. "That too is part of diplomacy."

"I suppose it is." Ka.s.squit hesitated, then said, "There are times when I wish I did not have to deal with my own species as if it were made up of aliens. But, to me, it is. I do not know what to do about that."

"You have a real problem there," Frank Coffey said gravely. "I have had some trouble with some part of my own species, because I am dark in a not-empire dominated by pale Tosevites. That was more true when I was young than it is now." He laughed at himself. "Than it was when I went into cold sleep, I should say. I would expect it to be better still now, but I have no data. And I was never as cut off from my own kind as you are."

"No. You have a common language with other American Tosevites, a common set of beliefs, a common history. All I share with Tosevites are my looks and my biochemistry. There are times when I wish we could meet halfway: I could become more like a wild Big Ugly and you wild Tosevites could become more like citizens of the Empire."

"We have changed a good deal since the Race came to Tosev 3," Coffey said. "Maybe we will change more. But maybe the whole Empire-not just you-will need to change some to accommodate us." The sheer arrogance of that made Ka.s.squit start to flare up. Coffey held up a hand to forestall her. "You know that the Race has done this on Tosev 3. I admit ginger has driven some of the change, but it is no less real on account of that."

Males and females of the Race did act differently there from the way they did here on Home. Ka.s.squit had seen that. It wasn't just ginger, either. On Tosev 3, the Race moved faster than it did here. It had to, to try to keep up with the surging Big Uglies.

"You may have spoken a truth," Ka.s.squit said slowly. "That is most interesting."

"If you do not mind my saying so, you are most interesting," Coffey said. "You balance between the Race and us Tosevites. I know you are loyal to the Empire. But have you ever wondered what living as an ordinary Big Ugly would be like?"

"I should say I have!" Ka.s.squit added an emphatic cough. "I thank you for thinking to ask. I thank you very much. Sometimes, perhaps, biology can more readily lead to empathy than culture can."

"Perhaps that is so," Frank Coffey said.

Mating season distracted Ttomalss no less than Atvar. If anything, it distracted the psychologist more. He was younger than the fleetlord, and so more able and more inclined to distribute his genes as widely as he could. He knew he should have paid more attention to the wild Big Uglies and to Ka.s.squit, but everything went to the befflem during mating season. The Race understood that. So did the Hallessi and Rabotevs, who had mating seasons of their own. If the Tosevites couldn't figure it out, well, too bad for them.

At supper one day, Linda de la Rosa asked Ttomalss, "Our guide will regain her usual disposition after mating season is over?"

"Yes, yes," he answered distractedly; pheromones in the air still left him half addled.

"Well, that is good," the wild Tosevite said, "because Trir turned into a first-cla.s.s b.i.t.c.h b.i.t.c.h once it started." She added an emphatic cough. The key word was not in the language of the Race, but from its tone Ttomalss had no trouble realizing that it was imperfectly complimentary. once it started." She added an emphatic cough. The key word was not in the language of the Race, but from its tone Ttomalss had no trouble realizing that it was imperfectly complimentary.

He shrugged. "Hormonal changes can produce mood swings among us. Do you Tosevites know nothing similar?"

Tom de la Rosa looked up from his zisuili chop in herbs. "Oh, no, Senior Researcher, we are altogether unfamiliar with such things." He laughed a raucous Tosevite laugh. His mate poked him in the ribs with her elbow. That only made him laugh harder.

The byplay puzzled Ttomalss. He studied a videotape of it several times. Only when his wits sharpened with the end of the mating season did he figure it out. Ka.s.squit's mood could swing considerably during her fertility cycle, and swing in a fairly regular way. The alterations were less extreme than the ones the Race went through during mating season, but they were there. (The Race's physicians never had figured out why Tosevite females bled about once every twenty-eight days. Had that not been universal, they would have thought it pathological.) Linda de la Rosa asked, "How much longer will your mating season last? How much longer until we can get down to serious business again?"

"Or even serious sightseeing?" Tom de la Rosa added. "As things are now, Trir is useless, and I do not suppose any other guide, male or female, would be much better."

"About another ten days," Ttomalss answered. "Already, things are less frenzied than they were when the season began."

"If you say so," Tom de la Rosa replied. Was that agreement or sarcasm? Ttomalss couldn't tell. Being unable to tell annoyed him.

He went upstairs to his room. The air there was fairly free of pheromones. He could think, after a fashion. He knew from experience he would have to redo half the work he did at this season of the year. But if he didn't do anything, he would have even more to catch up on once the mating madness ebbed.

When he checked his computer for messages and new data, he let out an interested hiss. A report from Senior Researcher Felless had just come in from Tosev 3. Felless had imagined herself an expert on Big Uglies before ever setting foot on their home planet. Once there, she'd promptly got addicted to ginger. She'd mated with Ttomalss, and once, in a scandalous scene, with the Race's amba.s.sador to the Deutsche and several officials who were visiting him.

Little by little, she had acquired real expertise on the Big Uglies. Ttomalss noted that she hadn't been recalled to Home, though. Males and females trusted his judgment more than hers. He wondered how much she resented being stuck on a world whose only redeeming feature for her was a drug.

Of course, Felless was a contrarian by nature. Not liking a place might help set up a perverse attraction for it in her. And she was truly addicted to ginger. Here on Home, the herb was scarce and, because it was scarce, expensive. Not on Tosev 3. On the Big Uglies' homeworld, Ttomalss sometimes thought it easier to taste ginger than not to. Felless would have agreed with him; he was sure of that.

Ginger-taster or not, though, Felless had become a keen observer of the Tosevite scene. Here was her image, with a little static hashing it from the journey across the light-years. She was saying, "I wish we would have brought more scientists with the colonization fleet, but who would have thought we would have needed them? Those we do have here are nearly unanimous in saying the wild Big Uglies have surpa.s.sed us in electronics, and are on their way to doing so in physics and the mathematics relating to physics."

The camera cut away to a picture of a Tosevite journal, presumably one dealing with some science. Felless' voice continued in the background: "I am also informed that the problem may be even more severe than was realized until quite recently. Our scientists have not kept close watch on the Big Uglies' scientific and mathematical publications, not least because the Tosevites use mathematical notation different from ours. Our experts say the Big Uglies' symbology is for the most part neither better nor worse than ours, simply different. But, because few of our experts have become familiar with their notation, some of their advances were not noted until years after they occurred."