It’s all relative, he told himself. What mattered was not size or shape or color or number of limbs, or whether one breathed twenty-one percent oxygen, or thirty, or pure methane. What was important in a galaxy full of intelligence was how one related to one’s fellow sentients. Discrimination existed, but had nothing to do with appearance. While discouraging to learn that it existed beyond the boundaries of Earth, at least it was based on something other than one’s outer shell.
Having been forcibly torn from his homeworld, he wanted only to return there. Since then, circumstances had conspired to place him in a position to have an effect on the destiny of others. It was something he had not sought. At least his former profession had schooled him in dealing with important decisions, even if they had only involved money. How trite that seemed now. How utterly insignificant and unimportant. Nickel prices. Cocoa futures. How severely a lingering drought might affect the soybean harvest in central Brazil. Before his abduction, he had lived a life dominated by inconsequentialities and trivial pursuits. As did the great majority of human beings. But at least he had an excuse.
He hadn’t known any better.
Now he had to participate in a discussion that would decide whether or not he and his friends ought to risk their lives to aid a people whose very existence they had been unaware of up until a short while ago. To try to help, or to continue on their course. For better or worse, they now had a destination: a real vector that should lead them to the stellar vicinity of the home of one of his now closest friends: Braouk’s homeworld of Tuuqalia. It seemed an easy choice.
Certainly George thought so. The dog spoke up without waiting to be prompted.
“We’ve come a long way from months lost as captives on the Vilenjji ship,” the dog declared to the assembled group. “We lost more time on Seremathenn, pleasant as our stay there might have been. Then there was our little diversion on Niyu.” He nodded in the direction of Gerlla-hyn, the Commander-Captain’s first assistant Berred-imr, and the astronomer Sobj-oes. “The flow of time is continuous, don’tcha know. The universe makes no exceptions for individual biological clocks.” Turning, he peered up at his human, eyes wide, and rested his front paws on the seated man’s knees.
“Don’t look at me like that,” Walker warned him. “I know that look. It won’t work. You’re no puppy anymore, and neither am I.”
“All right then.” With a bound, George jumped up onto the conference table and began to pace purposefully. “Consider this. I’m ten years old. With luck and care, I might have another ten or so in me.” Turning, he strode back to Walker, nearly at eye level with him now. “You’ve probably got half a century, bonobo-bro, maybe more. So excuse me if I seem like I’m in more of a hurry to get home. I know I’ll be food for worms one day, but I’d like them to be familiar, homey, terrestrial-type worms. Not some slithering alien glop whose shape is more twisted than its DNA.” He smiled thinly. “Call me traditional.”
“That something we can all understand.” Gerlla-hyn spoke from the far side of the circular, double-topped table. “As you know, tradition is of great importance among my kind.” The Commander-Captain’s huge yellow-gold eyes focused on the only human in the room. “But sometime, tradition must make space for improvisation. Question before us remains: Is this one of those times? I know what matter to me. But I am, within reason, at disposal of yous.” His frill lying perfectly flat against his neck, he leaned forward slightly. “How now wish yous proceed?” Clasped together, the two fingers of one hand indicated George, presently recumbent on the upper tabletop. “Already know, I believe, opinion of small quadruped on this matter.”
Having already struggled with the question, Walker was ready with an answer. “If we decide to try to help, we first need to determine if it’s even feasible. That’s a matter for military analysts, not us. Gerlla-hyn, your staff has had a chance to study the accounts compiled by the Hyfft. What do they portend?”
The Commander-Captain turned to the elderly female seated on his left. Berred-imr promptly consulted a portable readout. “Unless unforeseen technological developments present selves, is possible effective defense might be concocted. As in many potential clashes between opposing forces, much depend on intangibles such as tactics. Of these Hyfft know nothing, since historically all fighting take place on surface of Hyff or at least within planetary atmosphere. Hyfft can provide no information on type of Iollth strategies and weapons systems designed for use in free space.” She lowered the readout. “Any proposed action on our part must take these unknowns into consideration.”
A response that might have been anticipated, Walker realized. Also not an especially encouraging one.
From the far side of the table, Sque emerged from between the two tops to wave a trio of tentacles. “Do you want my opinion, or do you all still remain so low on the intelligence scale that it does not occur to you to ask?”
“Yes, Sque,” Walker replied with a measured sigh, “we want your opinion. As always.”
Mollified no more or less than usual, the K’eremu clambered up onto the upper tabletop. “Leaving aside for the moment the ethics of this situation and focusing solely on matters military, you are all obsessed with capabilities these Iollth—another inferior species, I have no doubt—may or may not possess. I should like to point out that irrespective of these unknowns, we already have one advantage over them.”
“What that be?” a curious Berred-imr demanded to know.
“We know far more about them than they know about us,” the K’eremu reminded her matter-of-factly. “Even if they have detected our presence here, they do not know if the technology available to us is superior to theirs or inferior. They do not know if these three ships represent harmless visitors or aggressive warcraft. Their ignorance exceeds ours.”
“They’ll find out, though,” George pointed out from the other end of the table. “The Hyfft will tell them—after we’ve left.”
“That is one possibility.” Sque continued to wave several tentacles, apparently under the impression that the constant undulating motion somehow kept her audience in a state of enduring fascination. “Another is that we do not leave, but that we remain to render what assistance we can to our recent hosts.”
George lifted his head in surprise. Walker was openly astonished. From the back of the room, hunched low against the ceiling, Braouk thrust both eyestalks toward the table.
“Not like Sque, this sudden unexpected declaration, of help. Is most refreshing, to hear something unselfish, from you.”
The K’eremu flashed metallic gray eyes at the hulking Tuuqalian. “I agree. But I have reasons. Perhaps one is that I’m in no hurry to get to your world, which I know from all too much experience is nothing if not aurally polluted.” Pivoting on her tentacles, she turned to face Gerlla-hyn and Berred-imr. “Among my kind the ready acceptance of the observably superior, be it collective or individual, is recognized as a sign of high intelligence. As the Hyfft accorded me that status early on in our relationship, I would find it bad-mannered to flee precipitously while they are so grievously threatened.”
A slow grin began to spread across Walker’s face. “Why, Sque—you like them.”
“I do not ‘like,’” she corrected him coolly. “I appreciate the Hyfft. They demonstrate the kind of courtesy and respect that is all too often lacking among the inferior species.” Her stare left the commodities trader in no doubt to whom she was referring.
It didn’t bother him. With an effort, he fought back the smile that threatened to spread across his face. “However you wish to define it.” He returned his attention to the two Niyyuu. “They’ve got five ships; we’ve got three. We know little about them; they know nothing about us.”
“Sounds like a good recipe for leaving,” an increasingly glum George ventured hopefully. He could tell which way the wind was starting to blow, and it wasn’t toward him.
The Commander-Captain and his first assistant conferred. When they had concluded their brief private c
onversation, Gerlla-hyn looked back at his guests. His frill remained flat and his tails stilled. Not a good sign, Walker felt.
“While we are at yous disposal in yous attempt return home,” he informed them, “I still charged with safety of many hundreds of my people. All else being equal, where ‘else’ remains unknown quantity, three against five not good odds—and we not know if all is being equal. In absence of additional information as to Iollth capabilities, I compelled to urge against remaining here, much less participating in any active defense of this pleasant but unallied, unaligned world.”
“Out of the mouths of aliens, sanity.” Relieved, George let his head slump back down onto the table.
“That could be taken as an insult by some,” an increasingly confrontational Sque shot back.
“Please to understand, friend Sque,” the Commander-Captain pointed out, “that in military situation, superior individual intelligence no substitute for lack of same about potential enemy. Cannot risk fighting blind. Not three against five.” Respectful of the K’eremu’s acumen but in nowise intimidated by it, he thrust all four tail tips in her direction. “Unless can find way change this assessment, I must order departure from this system.”
“The Hyfft have survived these incursions before,” Berred-imr added. “Will survive again.”
“But will Ussakk the Astronomer?” Walker asked pointedly. “Or Mardalm the Linguist? Yoracc the Historian? And all the others with whom we became good friends, who gave of themselves on our behalf without having hardly to be asked?” Turning slightly in his too-narrow chair, he peered across the room at Braouk. “Can we just abandon those who helped find a vector to the vicinity of Tuuqalia?”
The Tuuqalian bestirred himself, and for a moment, the Commander-Captain and his first assistant looked suddenly uneasy. But all Braouk flailed them with was words.
“We are divided, on this contentious issue, between selves. In such situations, is often much better, query others. Put decision making, to those who require, danger chancing. They will insist, that we stay here, to help.”
Gerlla-hyn’s mouth contracted visibly as his tail tips twitched. Walker frowned while Sque looked on impatiently. Even George, who had already made up his mind, was newly intrigued.
“And who might that be?” the dog asked curtly.
Eyes the size of soccer balls swung around on their flexible stalks to focus on him. “The Niyyuuan media,” Braouk reminded them all, this time eschewing verse.
Ki-ru-vad turned from his position at the Gathering station to contemplate the rest of the Dominion chamber. Among the Iollth there was no captain, no commanding individual. Decisions were made communally and rendered by instantaneous collective vote.
“New information has come available regarding the three strange vessels that were detected in orbit around Hyff upon our emergence into this system.”
“Show us,” chorused his fellow operators from their positions on the inside circumference of the circular chamber.
Obediently, Ki-ru-vad turned back to the ethereal instrumentation hovering before him and swept his tiny hands through it as he sat back on his powerful haunches. Occasionally, the long, flexible toes of one unshod foot would adjust the lower set of controls, their actions coordinating smoothly with the fingers of his much smaller hands. As the Iollth had no need of chairs, there were none in the Dominion chamber.
Dozens of repetitive images formed, one in front of each of the operators present. Each image was identical to the one that hovered in front of Ki-ru-vad, so that each ship’s technician could simultaneously evaluate the same information and imagery for him or herself.
The images provided icons for the three ships that had been orbiting Hyff. Had been, because indicators now showed them heading outsystem, packed as close together as drive fields would safely allow. Their identity was a mystery, and would doubtless remain so. They did not originate from Hyff, of course. The Hyfft had no ships.
Everyone in the Dominion chamber was able to follow the progress of the departing vessels until they made the Jump. Once the indicators signifying the locations of the strange craft vanished, in concert with their Jump, speculation abounded as to their origin.
“The Hyfft could have bought ships,” one operator pointed out.
“One does not just buy a starship from another species and instantly make use of it,” another operator argued. “Much education in its functions and maintenance is required. One certainly does not buy three.”
“It does not matter.” Ki-ru-vad was already putting the brief appearance of the unexpected vessels out of his mind. “If they were Hyfft, they have fled, as all Hyfft would doubtless wish to do when we arrive. No matter what they may be carrying away, a whole world awaits us. An amenable world, where we shall relax and sate ourselves, in accordance with ritual.” The small, sharp teeth that lined the interior of his wide, flat mouth glistened in the dim light of the Dominion chamber.
“I suspect they were most likely visiting traders, or possibly explorers.” Another operator spoke with confidence as she worked at her own instrumentation. Narrow dark eyes reflected back the light from hovering devices. “It may have been time for them to leave. Their departure need not have been sparked by our arrival, and may be wholly coincidental. Or they may have been warned away by the Hyfft. Or, detecting our approach, they may simply have decided against socializing with the unknown.” The latter, she knew, would reflect a wise decision on the part of the recently fled. Her kind were not above appropriating the occasional alien vessel and its contents.
“No matter,” commented Ki-ru-vad. “Whoever they were and whatever their purpose, they are gone.” Leaning back, he used one foot to adjust a readout that was shading toward an unacceptable green. “Dear Hyff lies before us. Its productive and submissive people await our arrival, though not with raised feet.”
The soft, sharply modulated whispering that was the Iollth equivalent of laughter passed around the Dominion chamber. Da-ni-wol spoke up. “It is proposed that since it has been longer than usual since our last visit, we should stay longer this time, the better to lavish our attentions upon the sorely neglected Hyfft. It is not meet that they should forget us.”
“That is unlikely,” responded another operator, without a hint of sarcasm. “Even though additional time has passed, there is not one visit in our history that has been less than memorable.” Tiny, thumb-sized ears twitched at the sides of the oval, hairless skull.
Ki-ru-vad indicated agreement. “We should strive to ensure that our forthcoming visit is no less so, and that it lives up to the criterion established by those who have preceded us here in The Work. I myself am looking forward to equaling if not surpassing the labors of my ancestors.”
A chorus of approval issued from the circle of operators. Elsewhere within the ship, their contemporaries were preparing for the arrival. All five ships would go into close orbit around Hyff. Advanced weapons activated, landing troops at the ready, they would first contact the authorities, the so-called “Great Government” on the ground, and issue the traditional list of demands. Once the government responded, landing parties would go down, to begin The Work. Any resistance would be met with the customary ruthless and overpowering force.
Though he did not show it outwardly, Ki-ru-vad felt the excitement rising within him. Like all his equals on the five ships, he had already killed and plundered elsewhere. Hyff lay at the farthest limit of their traditional prowling. Once they were finished with The Work here, it would be time to return home. All of them had been away from Ioll for nearly two years now, and were anxious to return, though none begrudged the individual expenditure involved. To do The Work properly required time. Every Iollth knew that.
Only rarely did they encounter any kind of resistance. Their reputation was usually enough to smooth The Work among the lesser species. Personally, he looked forward to such exceptions. The Work was much more stimulating when actual fighting, as opposed to the token ritual slaughter, was involved.
He slowed his respiration. They were unlikely to encounter any such from the Hyfft. They were not a warlike people. Even their boring history was largely devoid of actual war. Like the rest of his colleagues, he would have to satisfy his personal desires through the exercise of ritual.
Though with luck, an atypical Hyfft or two might dare to raise an objection to the forthcoming depredations, and that would allow him the pleasure of engaging in formal butchery outside custom.
The good feelings he had been experiencing ever since they had arrived in the Hyff system were confirmed when he was among the fortunate ones whose identity was randomly pulled to participate in the initial landing party. Though no resistance other than the usual nonviolent protests was expected, every member of the landing team drew fully powered sidearms from stores. History had shown that crazed and foolhardy individuals, and more rarely, organized groups of rogue citizens, occasionally attempted to extract revenge on the visitors from Ioll. One had to be equipped for the unexpected.
When the last of final preparations was concluded, five landing vessels broke simultaneously from their orbiting mother ships and descended toward the beckoning surface below, each heading separately for one of the five largest Hyfftian communities. As it had in the history texts, Hyff appeared inviting. Not all the worlds visited by the Iollth were so pleasant. Like everyone on board, Ki-ru-vad wore a mask designed to filter out potentially harmful gases and particulate matter, as well as to reduce his oxygen intake. Used to an atmosphere that was sixteen percent oxygen, any Iollth who breathed Hyff’s twenty-three percent for very long would suffer the effects of oxygen poisoning. That which gives life can also take it away, he mused as the landing ship made first contact with the outer atmosphere. Just like his own kind.