. . . Even among those rare and tragic cases, wolfling species, there have existed crude versions of these techniques. While primitive, their methods also involved rituals of “combat-of-honor,” and by such means kept aggressiveness and warfare under some degree of restraint.
Take, for example, the.most recent clan ofwolflings—the “humans” of Sol HI. Before their discovery by Galactic culture, their primitive “tribes” often used ritual to hold in check the cycles of ever-increasing violence normally to be expected from such an unguided species. (No doubt these traditions derived from warped memories of their long lost patron race.)
Among the simple but effective methods used by pre-Contact humans (see citations) were the method of counting coup for honor among the “american indians,” trial by champion among the “medieval europeans,” and deterrence by mutual assured destruction, among the “continental tribal states.”
Of course, these techniques lacked the subtlety, the delicate balance and homeostasis, of the modern rules of behavior laid out by the Institute for Civilized Warfare . . .
“That’s it. Break time. I’m puttin’ a T on it. Enough.”
Gailet blinked, her eyes unfocusing as the rude voice drew her back out of her reading trance. The library unit sensed this and froze the text in front of her.
She looked to her left. Sprawled in the beanbag, her new “partner” threw his datawell aside and yawned, stretching his lanky, powerful frame. “Time for a drink,” he said lazily.
“You haven’t even made it through the first edited summary,” Gailet said.
He grinned. “Aw, I don’t know why we’ve got to study this shit. The Eatees will be surprised if we remember to bow and recite our own species-name. They don’t expect neo-chimps to be geniuses, y’know.”
“Apparently not. And your comprehension scores will certainly reinforce the impression.”
That made him frown momentarily. He forced a grin again. “You, on the other hand, are tryin’ so hard—I’m sure the Eatees will find it terribly cute.”
louche, Gailet thought. It hadn’t taken the two of them very long to learn how to cut each other where it hurt.
Maybe this is yet another test. They are seeing how far my patience can be stretched before it snaps.
Maybe . . . but not very likely. She had not seen the Suzerain of Propriety for more than a week. Instead, she had been dealing with a committee of three pastel-tinged Gubru, one from each faction. And it was the blue-tinted Talon Soldier who strutted foremost at these meetings.
Yesterday they had all gone down to the ceremonial site for a “rehearsal.” Although she was still undecided whether to cooperate in the final event, Gailet had come to realize that it might already be too late to change her mind.
The seaside hill had been sculpted and landscaped so that the giant power plants were no longer visible. The terraced slopes led elegantly upward, one after another, marred only by bits of debris brought in by the steady autumnal winds. Already, bright banners flapped in the easterlies, marking the stations where the neo-chimp representatives would be asked to recite, or answer questions, or submit to intense scrutiny.
There at the site, with the Gubru standing close by, Irongrip had been to all outward appearances a model student. And perhaps it had been more than a wish to curry favor that had made him so uncharacteristically studious. After all, these were facts that had direct bearing upon his ambitions. That afternoon, his quick intelligence had shone.
Now though, with them alone together under the vast vault of the New Library, other aspects of his nature came to the fore. “So how ‘bout it?” Irongrip said, as he leaned over her chair and gave her a cyprian leer. “Want to step outside for some air? We could slip into the eucalyptus grove and—“
“There are two chances of that,” she snapped. “Fat and slim.”
He laughed. “Put it off until the ceremony, then, if you like it public. Then it’ll be you an’ me, babe, with the whole Five Galaxies watchin’.” He grinned and flexed his powerful hands. His knuckles cracked.
Gailet turned away and closed her eyes. She had to concentrate to keep her lower lip from trembling. Rescue me, she wished against all hope or reason.
Logic chided her for even thinking it. After all, her white knight was only an ape, and almost certainly dead.
Still, she couldn’t help crying inside. Fiben, I need you. Fiben, come back.
His blood sang.
After months in the mountains—living as his ancestors had, on wits and his own sweat, his toughened skin growing used to the sun and the scratchy rub of native fibers—Robert still had not yet realized the changes in himself, not until he puffed up the last few meters of the narrow, rocky trail and crossed in ten long strides from one watershed to another.
The top of Rwanda Pass. . . . I’ve climbed a thousand meters in two hours, and my heart is scarcely beating fast.
He did not really feel any need to rest, however Robert made himself stow down to a walk. Anyway, the view was worth lingering over.
He stood atop the very spine of the Mulun range. Behind him, to the north, the mountains stretched eastward in a thickening band, and westward toward the sea, where they continued in an archipelago of fat, towering islands.
It had taken him a day and a half of running to get here from the caves, and now he saw ahead of him the panorama he would have yet to cross to reach his destination.
I’m not even sure how to find what I’m looking for! Athaclena’s instructions had been as vague as her own impressions of where to send him.
More mountains stretched ahead of him, dropping away sharply toward a dun-colored steppe partially obscured by haze. Before he reached those plains there would be still more rise and fall over narrow trails that had only felt a few score feet even during peacetime. Robert was probably the first to- come this way since the outbreak of war.
The hardest part was over, though. He didn’t enjoy downhill running, but Robert knew how to take the jolting, fall-stepping so as to avoid damaging his knees. And there would be water lower down.
He shook his leather canteen and took a sparing swallow. Only a few deciliters remained, but he was sure they’d do.
He shaded his eyes and looked beyond the nearest purple peaks to the high slopes where he would have to make his camp tonight. There would be streams all right, but no lush rain forests like on the wet northern side of the Mulun. And he would have to think about hunting for food soon, before’ he sallied forth onto the dry savannah.
Apache braves could run from TQOS to the Pacific in a few days and not eat anything but a handful of parched corn along the way.
He wasn’t an Apache brave, of course. He did have a few grams of vitamin concentrate with him, but for the sake of speed he had chosen to travel light. For now, quickness counted more than his grumbling stomach.
He skirted aside where a recent landslide had broken the path. Then he set a slightly faster pace as the trail dropped into a set of tight switchbacks.
That night Robert slept in a moss-filled notch just above a trickling spring, wrapped in a thin silk blanket. His dreams were slow and as quiet as he imagined space might be, if one ever got away from the constant humming of machines.
Mostly, it was the stillness in the empathy net, after months living in the riot of the rain forest, that lent a soft loneliness to his slumber. One might kenn far in an empty land such as this—even with senses as crude as his.
And for the first time there was not the harsh—metaphorically almost metallic—hint of alien minds to be felt off in the northwest. He was shielded from the Gubru, and from the humans and chims for that matter. Solitude was a strange sensation.
The strangeness did not evaporate by the dawn’s light. He filled his canteen from the spring and drank deeply to take the edge off his hunger. Then the run began anew.
On this steeper slope the descent was wearing, but the miles did go by quickly. Before the sun was more than halfway toward the zenith the high steppe had opened up around him. He ran across rolling foothills now—kilometers falling behind him like thoughts barely contemplated and then forgotten. And as he ran, Robert probed the countryside. Soon he felt certain that the expanse held odd entities, somewhere out there beyond or among the tall grasses.
If only kenning were more of a localizing sense! Perhaps it was this very imprecision that had kept humans from ever developing their own crude abilities.
Instead, we concentrated on other things.
There was a game that was often played both on Earth and among interested Galactics. It consisted of trying to reconstruct the fabled “lost patrons of humanity,” the half-mythical starfarers who supposedly began the Uplift of human beings perhaps fifty thousand years ago and then departed in mystery, leaving the job “only half done.”
Of course there were a few bold heretics—even among the Galactics—who held that the old Earthling theories were actually true, that it was somehow possible for a race to Uplift itself... to evolve starfaring intelligence and pull itself up by its bootstraps out of darkness and into knowledge and maturity.
But even on Earth most now thought the idea quaint. Patrons uplifted clients, who later took their own turn uplifting newer pre-sentients. It was the way and had been ever since the days of the .Progenitors, so long ago.
There was a real dearth of clues. Whoever the patrons of Man might have been, they had hidden their traces well, and for good reason. A patron race who abandoned a client was generally branded as an outlaw.
Still, the guessing game went on.
Certain patron clans were ruled out because they would never have chosen an omnivorous species to raise. Others were unsuited to living on Earth even for short visits—because of gravity or atmosphere or a host of other reasons.
Most agreed that it couldn’t have been a clan which believed in specialization either. Some uplifted their clients with very specific goals in mind. The Uplift Institute demanded that any new sapient race be able to pilot starships, exercise judgment and logic and be capable of patron status itself someday. But beyond that the Institute put few constraints on the types of niches into which client species might be made to fit. Some were destined to become skilled craftsmen, some philosophers, and some mighty warrior castes.
But humanity’s mysterious patrons had to have been generalists. For Man, the animal, was very much a flexible beast.
Yes, and for all of the vaunted flexibility of the Tymbrimi, there were some things not even those masters of adaptation could even think of doing.
Such as this, Robert thought.
A covey of native birds exploded into the air in a flurry of beating wings as Robert ran across their feeding grounds. Small, skittering things felt the rumble of his approach and took cover.
A herd of animals, long-legged and fleet like small deer, darted away, easily outdistancing him. They happened to flee southward, the direction he was going anyway, so he followed them. Soon Robert was approaching where they had stopped to feed again.
Once more they bolted, opened a wide berth behind them, then settled down again to browse.
The sun was getting high. It was a time of the day when all the plains animals, both the hunters and the hunted, tended to seek shelter from the heat. Where there were no trees, they scraped the soil in narrow runnels to find cooler layers and lay down in what shade there was to wait out the blazing sun.
But on this day one creature did not stop. It kept coming. The pseudo-deer blinked in consternation as Robert approached again. Once more, they arose and took flight, leaving him behind. This time they put a little more distance in back of them. They stood atop a small hill, panting and staring unbelievingly.
The thing on two legs just kept coming!
An uneasy stir riffled through the herd. A premonition that this just might be serious. ‘ Still panting, they fled once more.
Perspiration shone like oil on Robert’s olive skin. It glistened in the sunlight, quivering in droplets that sometimes shook loose with the constant drumming of his footsteps.
Mostly, though, the sweat spread out and coated his skin and evaporated in the rushing wind of his own passage. A dry, southeasterly breeze helped it change state into vapor, sucking up latent heat in the process. He maintained a steady, even pace, not even trying to match the sprints of the deerlike creatures. At intervals he walked and took sparing swigs from his water bag, then he resumed the chase.
His bow lay strapped across his back. But for some reason Robert did not even think of using it. Under the noonday sun he ran on and on. Mad dogs and Englishmen, he thought.
And Apache . . . and Bantu . . . and so many others. . . .
Humans were accustomed to thinking that it was their brains which distinguished them so from the other members of Earth’s animal kingdom. And it was true that weapons and fire and speech had made them the lords of their homeworld long before they ever learned about ecology, or the duty of senior species to care for those less able to understand. During those dark millennia, intelligent but ignorant men and women had used fires to drive entire herds of mammoths and sloths and so many other species over cliffs, killing hundreds for the meat contained in one or two. They shot down millions of birds so the feathers might adorn their ladies. They chopped down forests to grow opium.
Yes, intelligence in the hands of ignorant children was a dangerous weapon. But Robert knew a secret.
We did not really need all these brains in order to rule our world.
He approached the herd again, and while hunger drove him, he also contemplated the beauty of the native creatures. No doubt they were growing rapidly in stature with each passing generation. Already they were far larger than their ancestors had been back when the Bururalli slew all the great ungulates which used to roam these plains. Someday they might fill some of those empty niches. Even now they were already far swifter than a man.
Speed was one thing. But endurance was quite another matter. As they turned to flee him again, Robert saw that the herd members had begun to look a little panicky. The pseudo-deer now wore flecks of foam around their mouths. Their tongues hung out, and their rib cages heaved in rapid tempo.
The sun beat down. Perspiration beaded and covered him in a thin sheen. This evaporated, leaving him cool. Robert paced himself.
Tools and fire and speech gave us the surplus. They gave us what we needed to begin culture. But were they all we had?
A song had begun to play in the network of fine sinuses behind his eyes, in the gentle squish of fluid that damped his brain against the hard, driving accelerations of every footstep. The throbbing of his heartbeat carried him along like a faithful bass rhythm. The tendons of his legs were like taut, humming bows . . . like violin strings.
He could smell them now, his hunger accentuating the atavistic thrill. He identified with his intended prey. In an odd way Robert knew a fulfillment he had never experienced before. He was alive.
He barely noticed as he began overtaking deer who had collapsed to the ground. Mothers and their fawns blinked in dull surprise as he ran past them without a glance. Robert had spotted his target, and he projected a simple glyph to tell the others to relax, to slip aside, while he chased a big male buck at the head of the herd.
You are the one, he thought. You have lived well, passed on your genes. Your species does not need you anymore, not as much as I da.
Perhaps his ancestors actually used empathy-sense quite a bit more than modern man. For now he saw a real function for it. He could kenn the growing dread of the buck as, one by one, its overheated companions dropped aside. The buck put in a desperate burst of speed and leaped far ahead. But then it had to rest, panting miserably to try to cool off, its sides heaving as it watched Robert come on.
Foaming, it turned to flee again.
Now it was just the two of them.
Gimelhai blazed. Robert bore on.
A little while later he brought his left hand to his belt as he ran, and loosened the sheath of his knife. Even that tool he chose with some reluctance. What decided him to use it, instead of his bare hands, was empathy with his prey, and a sense of mercy.
It was some hours later, his stomach no longer growling urgently, that Robert felt his first glimmerings of a clue. He had begun making his way southwestward, in the direction Athaclena had hoped would lead him to his goal. As the day aged, Robert shaded his eyes against the late afternoon glare. Then he closed them and reached forth with other senses.
Yes, something was close enough to kenn. If he thought of it metaphorically, it came as a very familiar flavor.
He headed forth at a jog, following traces that came and went, sometimes cool and sentient and sometimes as wild as the buck who had shared its life with Robert so recently.
When the traces grew quite strong, Robert found himself near a vast thicket of ugly thorn bush. Soon it would be sunset, and there was no way he would be able to chase down the thing emanating those vibrations, not in this dense, hurtful undergrowth. Anyway, he did not want to “hunt” this creature. He wanted to talk to it.
He was sure the being was aware of him now. Robert halted. He closed his eyes again and cast forth a simple glyph. It darted left, right, then plunged into the vegetation. There came a rustle.
He opened his eyes. Two dark, glittering pools blinked back at him. “All right,” he said, softly. “Please come on out now. We had better talk.”
There was another moment’s hesitation. Then there shambled forth a long-armed chim, hairier than most, with thick brows and a heavy jaw. He was dirty, and totally naked.
There were a few stains that Robert was sure came from caked blood, and it had not come from the chim’s own minor scratches. Well, we are cousins, after all. And vegetarians don’t live long on a steppe.
When he sensed that the comate chim was reluctant to make eye contact, Robert did not insist. “Hello, Jo-Jo,” he said softly, and with sincere gentleness. “I’ve come a long way to bring a message to your employer.”
Its occupant—naked, unshaven, and looking very much the wolfling—stared down at Athaclena with an expression that would have burned even without the loathing he radiated. To Athaclena it felt as if the little glade were saturated with the prisoner’s hatred. She planned to keep her visit as short as possible.
“I thought you would want to know. The Gubru Triumvirate has declared a protocol truce under the Rules of War,” she told Major Prathachulthorn. “The ceremonial site is now sacrosanct, and no armed force on Garth can act except in self-defense for the duration.”
Prathachulthorn spat through the bars. “So? If we’d attacked when I planned, we’d have made it before this.”
“I find it doubtful. Even the best plans are seldom executed perfectly. And if we were forced to abort the mission at the last minute, every secret we had would have been revealed for nothing.”
“That’s your opinion,” Prathachulthorn snorted.
Athaclena shook her head. “But that is not the only or even the most important reason.” She had grown tired of fruitlessly explaining the nuances of Galactic punctilio to the Marine officer, but somehow she found the will to try one more time. “I told you before, major. Wars are known to feature cycles of what you humans sometimes call ‘tit-for-tat’ where one side punishes the other side for its last insult, and then that other side retaliates in turn. Left unconstrained, this can escalate forever! Since the days of the Progenitors, there have been developed rules which help keep such exchanges from growing out of all proportion.”
Prathachulthorn cursed. “Damn it, you admitted that our raid would’ve been legal if done in time!”
She nodded. “Legal, perhaps. But it also would have served the enemy well. Because it would have been the last action before the truce!”
“What difference does that make?”
Patiently, she tried to explain. “The Gubru have declared a truce while still in an overpowering position of strength, major. That is considered honorable. You might say they ‘win points’ for that.
“But their gain is multiplied if they do so immediately after taking damage. If they show restraint by not retaliating, the Gubru are then performing an act of forbearance. They gather credit—“
“Ha!” Prathachulthorn laughed. “Fat lot of good it’d do them, with their ceremonial site in ruins!”
Athaclena inclined her head. She really did not have time for this. If she spent too long here, Lieutenant McCue might suspect that this was where her missing commander was being hidden. The Marines had already swooped down on several possible hiding places.
“The upshot might have been to force Earth to finance a new site as a replacement,” she said.
Prathachulthorn stared at her. “But—but we’re at warl”
She nodded, misunderstanding him. “Exactly. One cannot allow war without rules, and powerful neutral forces to enforce them. The alternative would be barbarism.”
The man’s sour look was her only answer.
“Besides, to destroy the site would have implied that humans do not want to see their clients tested and judged for promotion! But now it is the Gubru who must pay honor-gild for this truce. Your clan has gained a segment of status by being the aggrieved party, unavenged. This sliver of propriety could turn out to be crucial in the days ahead.”
Prathachulthorn frowned. For a moment he seemed to concentrate, as if a thread of her logic hung almost within reach. She felt his attention shimmer as he tried . . . but then it faded. He grimaced and spat again. “What a load of crap. Show me dead birds. That’s currency I can count. Pile them up to the level of this cage, little Miss Ambassador’s Daughter, and maybe, just maybe I’ll let you live when I finally break out of here.”
Athaclena shivered. She knew how futile it was to try to hold a man such as this prisoner. He should have been kept drugged. He should have been killed. But she could not bring herself to do either, or to further- prejudice the fate of the chims in her cabal by involving them in such crimes.
“Good day, major,” she said. And turned to go.
He did not shout as she left. In a way, the parsimonious use he made of his threats made those few seem all the more menacing and believable.
She took a hidden trail from the secret glade over a shoulder of the mountain, past warm springs that hissed and steamed uncertainly. At the ridge crest Athaclena had to draw in her tendrils to keep them from being battered in the autumn wind. Few clouds could be seen in the sky, but the air was hazy with dust blowing in from faraway deserts.
Hanging from a nearby branch she encountered one of the parachutelike kite and spore pod combinations blown up here from some field of plate ivy. The autumn dispersal was fully under way now. Fortunately, it had begun in earnest more than two days ago, before the Gubru announced their truce. That fact might turn out to be very important indeed.
The day felt odd, more so than any time since that night of terrible dreams, shortly before she climbed this mountain to wrestle with her parents’ fierce legacy.
Perhaps the Gubru are warming up their hyperwave shunt, again.
She had since learned that her fit of dreams on that fateful night had coincided with the invaders’ first test of their huge new facility. Their experiments had let surges of unallocated probability loose in all directions, and those who were psychically sensitive reported bizarre mixtures of deathly dread and hilarity.
That sort of mistake did not sound like.the normally meticulous Gubru, and it seemed to be validation of Fiben Bolger’s report, that the enemy had serious leadership problems.
Was that why tutsunucann collapsed so suddenly and violently that evening? Was all that loose energy responsible for the terrific power of her s’ustru’thoon rapport with Uthacal thing?
Could that and the subsequent tests of those great engines explain why the gorillas had begun behaving so very strangely?
All Athaclena knew for certain was that she felt nervous and afraid. Soon, she thought. It will all approach climax very soon.
She had descended halfway down the trail leading back to her tent when a pair of breathless chims emerged from the forest, hurrying^ uphill toward her. “Miss . . . miss ...” one of them breathed. The other held his side, panting audibly.
Her initial reading of their panic triggered a brief hormone rush, which only subsided slightly when she traced their fear and kenned that it did not come from an enemy attack. Something else had them terrified half out of their wits.
“Miss Ath-Athaclena,” the first chim gasped. “You gotta come quick!”
“What is it, Petri? What’s happening?”
He swallowed. “It’s the Villas. We can’t control ‘em anymore!”
So, she thought. For more than a week the gorillas’ low, atonal music had been driving their chim guardians to nervous fits. “What are they doing now?”
“They’re leaving!” the second messenger wailed plaintively.
She blinked. “What did’you say?”
Petri’s brown eyes were filled with bewilderment. “They’re leaving. They just got up and left! They’re headin’ for the Sind, an’ there doesn’t seem t’be anythin’ we can do to stop “em!”
Their progress toward the mountains had slackened considerably recently. More and more of Kault’s time seemed to be spent laboring over his makeshift instruments . . . and in arguing with his Tymbrimi companion.
How quickly things change, Uthacalthing thought. He had labored long and hard to bring Kault to this fever pitch of suspicion and excitement. And now he found himself recalling with fondness their earlier peaceful comradeship—the long, lazy days of gossip and reminiscences and common exile—however frustrating they had seemed at the time.
Of course that had been when Uthacalthing was_whole, when he had been able to look upon the world through Tymbrimi eyes, and the softening veil of whimsy.
Now? Uthacalthing knew that he had been considered dour and serious by others of his race. Now, though, they would surely think him crippled. Perhaps better off dead.
Too much was taken from me, he thought, while Kault muttered to himself in the corner of their shelter. Outside, heavy gusts blew through the veldt grasses. Moonlight brushed long hillcrests that resembled sluggish ocean waves, locked amid a rolling storm.
Did she actually have to tear away so much? he wondered, without really being able to feel or care very much.
Of course Athaclena had hardly known what she was doing, that night when she decided in her need to call in the pledge her parents had made. S’ustru’thoon was not something one trained for. A recourse so drastic and used so seldom could not be well described by science. And by its very nature, s’ustru’thoon was something one could do but once in one’s lifetime.
Anyway, now that he looked back upon it, Uthacalthing remembered something he hadn’t noticed at the time.
That evening had been one of great tension. Hours beforehand he had felt disturbing waves of energy, as if ghostly half-glyphs of immense power were throbbing against the mountains. Perhaps that explained why his daughter’s call had carried such strength. She had been tapping some outside source!
And he remembered something else. In the s’ustru’thoon storm Athaclena triggered, not everything torn from him had gone to her!
Strange that he had not thought of it until now. But Uthacalthing now seemed vaguely to recall some of his essences flying past her. But where they had actually been bound he could not even imagine. Perhaps to the source of those energies he had felt earlier. Perhaps . . .
Uthacalthing was too tired to come up with rational theories. Who knows? Maybe they were drawn in by Garth lings. It was a poor joke. Not even worth a tiny smile. And yet, the irony was encouraging. It showed that he had not lost absolutely everything.
“I am certain of it now, Uthacalthing.” Kault’s voice was low and confident as the Thennanin turned to face him. He put aside the instrument he had constructed out of odd items salvaged from the wrecked pinnace.
“Certain of what, colleague?”
“Certain that our separate suspicions are focusing in on a probable fact! See here. The data you showed me—your private spools regarding these ‘Garthling’ creatures—allowed me to tune my detector until I am now sure that I have found the resonance I was seeking.”
“You are?” Uthacalthing didn’t know what to make of this. He had never expected Kault to find actual confirmation of mythical beasts.
“I know what concerns you, my friend,” Kault said, raising one massive, leather-plated hand. “You fear that my experiments will draw down upon us the attention of the Cubru. But rest assured. I am using a very narrow band and am reflecting my beam off the nearer moon. It is very unlikely they would ever be able to localize the source of my puny little probe.”
“But ...” Uthacalthing shook his head. “What are you looking for?”
Kault’s breathing slits puffed. “A certain type of cerebral resonance. It is quite technical,” he said. “It has to do with something I read in your tapes about these Garthling creatures. What little data you had seemed to indicate that these pre-sentient beings might have brains not too dissimilar to those of Earthlings, or Tymbrimi.”
Uthacalthing was amazed by the way Kault used his faked data with such celerity and enthusiasm. His former self would have been delighted. “So?” he asked.
“So ... let me see if I can explain with an example. Take humans—“
Please, Uthacalthing inserted, without much enthusiasm, more out of habit.
“—Earthlings represent one of many paths which can be taken to arrive eventually at intelligence. Theirs involved the use of two brains that later became one.”
Uthacalthing blinked. His own mind was working so slowly. “You . . . you are speaking of the fact that their brains have two partially independent hemispheres?”
“Aye. And while these halves are similar and redundant in some ways, in others they divide the labor. The split is even more pronounced among their neo-dolphin clients.
“Before the Gubru arrived, I was studying data on neo-chimpanzees, which are similar to their patrons in many respects. One of the things the humans had to do, early in their Uplift program, was find ways to unite the functions of the two halves of pre-sentient chimpanzee brains comfortably into one consciousness. Until that was done neo-chimpanzees would suffer from a condition called ‘bicamerality.’ . . .”
Kault droned on, gradually letting his jargon grow more and more technical, eventually leaving Uthacalthing far behind. The arcana of cerebral function seemed to fill their shelter, as if in thick smoke. Uthacalthing felt almost tempted to craft a glyph to commemorate his own boredom, but he lacked the energy even to stir his tendrils.
“. . .so the resonance appears to indicate that there are, indeed, bicameral minds within the range of my instrument!”
Ah, yes, Uthacalthing thought. Back in Port Helenia, at a time when he had still been a clever crafter of complex schemes, he had suspected that Kault might turn out to be resourceful. That was one reason why Uthacalthing chose for a confederate an atavistic chim. Kault was probably picking up traces from poor Jo-Jo, whose throwback brain was in many ways similar to fallow, non-uplifted chimpanzees of centuries ago. Jo-Jo no doubt retained some of this “bicame-rality” characteristic Kault spoke of.
Finally Kault concluded. “I am therefore quite convinced, from your evidence and my own, that we cannot delay any longer. We must somehow get to and use a facility for sending interstellar messages!”
“How do you expect to do that?” Uthacalthing asked in mild curiosity.
Kault’s breathing slits pulsed in obvious, rare excitement. “Perhaps we can sneak or bluff or fight our way to the Planetary Branch Library, claim sanctuary, and then invoke every priority under the fifty suns of Thennan. Perhaps there is another way. I do not care if it means stealing a Gubru starship. Somehow we must get word to my clan!”
Was this the same creature who had been so anxious to flee Port Helenia before the invaders arrived? Kault seemed as changed outwardly as Uthacalthing felt inwardly. The Thennanin’s enthusiasm was a hot flame, while Uthacalthing had to stoke his own carefully.
“You wish to establish a claim on the pre-sentients before the Gubru manage it?” he asked.
“Aye, and why not? To save them from such horrible patrons I would lay down my life! But there may be need for much haste. If what we have overheard on our receiver is true, emissaries from the Institutes may already be on their way to Garth. I believe the Gubru are planning something big. Perhaps they have made the same discovery. We must act quickly if we are not to be too late!”
Uthacalthing nodded. “One more question then, distinguished colleague.” He paused. “Why should I help you?”
Kault’s breath sighed like a punctured balloon, and his ridge crest collapsed rapidly. He looked at Uthacalthing with an expression as emotion-laden as any the Tymbrimi had ever seen upon the face of a dour Thennanin.
“It would greatly benefit the pre-sentients,” he hissed. “Their destiny would be far happier.”
“Perhaps. Arguable. Is that it, though? Are you relying on my altruism alone?”
“Errr. Hrm.” Outwardly Kault seemed offended that anything more should be asked. Still, could he really- be surprised? He was, after all, a diplomat, and understood that the best and firmest deals are based on open self-interest. “It would ... It would greatly help my own political party if I delivered such a treasure. We would probably win government,” he suggested.
“A slight improvement over the intolerable is not enough to get excited about.” Uthacalthing shook his head. “You still haven’t explained to me why I should not stake a claim for my own clan. I was investigating these rumors before you. We Tymbrimi would make excellent patrons for these creatures.”
“You. You . . . K’ph mimpher’rrengi?” The phrase stood for something vaguely equivalent to “juvenile delinquents.” It was almost enough to make Uthacalthing smile again. Kault shifted uncomfortably. He made a visible effort to retain diplomatic composure.
“You Tymbrimi have not the strength, the power to back up such a claim,” he muttered.
At last, Uthacalthing thought. Truth.
In times like this, under circumstances as muddy as these, it would take more than mere priority of application to settle an adoption claim on a pre-sentient race. Many other factors would officially be considered by the Uplift Institute. And the humans had a saying that was especially appropriate. “Possession is nine points of the law.” It certainly applied here.
“So we are back to question number one.” Uthacalthing nodded. “If neither we Tymbrimi nor the Terrans can have the Garthlings, why should we help you get them?”
Kault rocked from one side to the other, as if he were trying to work his way off a hot seat. His misery was blatantly obvious, as was his desperation. Finally, he blurted forth, “I can almost certainly guarantee a cessation of all hostilities by my clan against yours.”
“Not enough,” Uthacalthing came back quickly.
“What more could you ask of me!” Kault exploded.
“An actual alliance. A promise of Thennanin aid against those now laying siege upon Tymbrim.”
“But—“
“And the guarantee must be firm. In advance. To take effect whether or not these pre-sentients of yours actually turn out to exist.”
Kault stammered. “You cannot expect—“
“Oh, but I can. Why should I believe in these ‘Garthling’ creatures? To me they have only been intriguing rumors. I never told you I believed in them. And yet you want me to risk my life to get you to message facilities! Why should I do that without a guarantee of benefit for my people?”
“This . . . this is unheard of!”
“Nevertheless, it is my price. Take it or leave it.”
For a moment Uthacalthing felt a thrilled suspicion he was about to witness the unexpected. It seemed as if Kault might lose control . . . might actually burst forth into violence. At the sight of those massive fists, clenching and unclenching rapidly, Uthacalthing actually felt his blood stir with change enzymes. A surge of nervous fear made him feel more alive than he had in days.
“It... it shall be as you demand,” Kault growled at last.
“Good.” Uthacalthing sighed as he relaxed. He drew forth his datawell. “Let us work out together how to parse this for a contract.”
It took more than an hour to get the wording right. After it was finished, and when they had both signified their affirmation on each copy, Uthacalthing gave Kault one record pellet and kept the second for himself.
Amazing, he thought at that point. He had planned and schemed to bring about this day. This was the second half of his grand jest, fulfilled at last. To have fooled the Gubru was wonderful. This was simply unbelievable.
And yet, right now Uthacalthing found himself feeling numb rather than triumphant. He did not look forward to the climb ahead, a furious race into the steep towers of the Mukm range, followed by a desperate attempt that would, no doubt, result only in the two of them dying side by side.
“You know of course, Uthacalthing, that my people will not carry out this bargain if I turn out to be mistaken. If there are no Garthlings after all, the Thennanin will repudiate me. They will pay diplomatic gild to buy out this contract, and I will be ruined.”
Uthacalthing did not look at Kault. This was another reason for his sense of depressed detachment, certainly. A great jokester is not supposed to feel guilt, he told himself. Perhaps I have spent too much time around humans.
The silence stretched on for a while longer, each of them brooding in his own thoughts.
Of course Kault would be repudiated. Of course the Thennanin were not about to be drawn into an alliance, or even peace with the Earth-Tymbrimi entente. All Uthacalthing had ever hoped to accomplish was to sow confusion among his enemies. If Kault should by some miracle manage to get his message off and truly draw Thennanin armadas to this backwater system, then two great foes of his people would be drawn into a battle that would drain them ... a battle over nothing. Over a nonexistent species. Over the ghosts of creatures murdered fifty thousand years ago.
Such a great jest! I should be happy. Thrilled.
Sadly, he knew that he could not even blame s’ustru’thoon for his inability to take pleasure out of this. It was not Athaclena’s fault that the feeling clung to him . . . the feeling that he had just betrayed a friend.
Ah, well, Uthacalthing consoled himself. It is all probably moot, anyway. To get Kault the kind of message facilities he needs now will take seven more miracles, each greater than the last.
It seemed fitting that they would probably die together in the attempt, uselessly.
In his sadness, Uthacalthing found the energy to lift his tendrils slightly. They fashioned a simple glyph of regret as he raised his head to face Kault.
He was about to speak when something very surprising suddenly happened. Uthacalthing felt a presence wing past in the night. He started. But no sooner had it been there than it was gone.
Did I imagine it? Am I falling apart?
Then it was back! He gasped in surprise, kenning as it circled the tent in an ever-tightening spiral, brushing at last against the fringes of his indrawn aura. He looked up, trying to spot something that whirled just beyond the fringe of their shelter.
What am I doing? Trying to see a glyph?
He closed his eyes and let the un-thing approach. Uthacalthing opened a kenning.
“Puyr’iturumbul!” he cried.
Kault swiveled. “What is it, my friend? What . . . ?”
But Uthacalthing had risen. As if drawn up by a string he stepped out into the cool night.
The breeze brought odors to his nostrils as he sniffed, using all his senses to seek in the acherontic darkness. “Where are you?” Uthacalthing called. “Who is there?”
Two figures stepped forward into a dim pool of moonlight. So it is true! Uthacalthing thought. A human had sought him out with an empathy sending, one so skillful it might have come from a young Tymbrimi.
And that was not the end to surprises. He blinked at the tall, bronzed, bearded warrior—who looked like nothing but one of the heroes of those pre-Contact Earthling barbarian epics—and let out another cry of amazement as he suddenly recognized Robert Oneagle, the playboy son of the Planetary Coordinator!
“Good evening, sir,” Robert said as he stopped a few meters away and bowed.
Standing a little behind Robert, the neo-chimpanzee, Jo-Jo, wrung his hands nervously. This, certainly, was not according to the original plan. He did not meet Uthacalthing’s eyes.
“V’hooman’ph? Idatess!” Kault exclaimed in Galactic Six. “Uthacalthing, what is a human doing here?”
Robert bowed again. Enunciating carefully, he made formal greetings to both of them, including their full species-names. Then he went on in Galactic Seven.
“I have come a long way, honored gentlebeings, in order to invite you all to a party.”
“Easy, Tycho. Easy!”
The normally placid animal bucked and pulled at its reins. Fiben, who had never been much of a horseman, was forced to dismount hurriedly and grab the animal’s halter.
“There now. Relax,” he soothed. “It’s just another transport going by. We’ve heard ‘em all day. It’ll be gone soon.”
As he promised, the shrieking whine faded as the flying machine passed quickly overhead and disappeared beyond the nearby trees, traveling in the direction of Port Helenia.
A lot had changed since Fiben had first come this way, mere weeks after the invasion. Then he had walked in sunshine down a busy highway, surrounded by spring’s verdant colors. Now he felt blustery winds at his back as he passed through a valley showing all the early signs of a bitter winter. Half the trees had already dropped their leaves, leaving them in drifts across meadows and lanes. Orchards were bare of fruit, and the back roads devoid of traffic.
Surface traffic, that is. Overhead the swarm of transports seemed incessant. Gravities teased his peripheral nerves as Gubru machines zoomed past. The first few times, his hackles had risen from more than just the pulsing fields. He had expected to be challenged, to be stopped, perhaps to be shot on sight.
But in fact the Galactics had ignored him altogether, apparently not deigning to distinguish one lonely chim from others who had been sent out to help with the harvest, or the specialists who had begun staffing a few of the ecological management stations once again Fiben had spoken with a few of the latter, many of them old acquaintances. They told of how they had given their parole in exchange for freedom and low-level support to resume their work. There wasn’t much to be done, of course, with winter coming on. But at least there was a program again, and the Gubru seemed quite satisfied to leave them alone to do their work.
The invaders were, indeed, preoccupied elsewhere. The real focus of Galactic activity seemed to be over to the southwest, toward the spaceport.
And the ceremonial site, Fiben reminded himself. He didn’t really know what he was going to do in the unlikely event he actually made it through to town. What would happen if he just marched right up to the shabby house that had been his former prison? Would the Suzerain of Propriety take him back?
Would Gailet?
Would she even be there?
He passed a few chims dressed in muffled cloaks, who desultorily picked through the stubble in a recently harvested field. They did not greet him, nor did he expect them to. Gleaning was a job generally given the poorest sort of Probationer. Still, he felt their gaze as he walked Tycho toward Port Helehia. After the animal had calmed a bit, Fiben clambered back onto the saddle and rode.
He had considered trying to reenter Port Helenia the way he left it, over the wall, at night. After all, if it had worked once, why not a second time? Anyway, he had no wish to meet up with the followers of the Suzerain of Cost and Caution.
It was tempting. Somehow, though, he figured that once was lucky. Twice would be simple stupidity.
Anyway, the choice was made for him when he rounded a bend and found himself staring at a Gubru guard post. Two battle robots of sophisticated design whirled and focused upon him.
“Easy does it, guys.” Fiben said it more for his own benefit than theirs. If they were programmed to shoot on sight, he never would have seen them in the first place.
In front of the blockhouse there sat a squat armored hover craft, propped up on blocks. Two pairs of three-toed feet stuck out from underneath, and it did not take much knowledge of Galactic Three to tell that the chirped mutter-ings were expressing frustration. When the robots’ warning whistled forth there came a sharp bang under the hover, followed by an indignant squawk.
Soon a pair of hooked beaks poked out of the shadows. Yellow eyes watched him unblinkingly. One of the disheveled Gubru rubbed its dented head frill.
Fiben pressed his lips together to fight back a smile. He dismounted and approached until he was even with the bunker, puzzled when neither the aliens nor the machines spoke to him.
He stopped before the two Gubru and bowed low.
They looked at each other and twittered irritably to each other. From one there came something that sounded like a resigned moan. The two Talon Soldiers emerged from under the disabled machine and stood up. Each of them returned a very slight but noticeable nod.
Silence stretched.
One of the Gubru whistled another faint sigh and brushed dust from its feathers. The other simply glared at Fiben.
Now what? he tried to think, but what was he supposed to do? Fiben’s toes itched.
He bowed again. Then, with a dry mouth, he backed away and took the horse’s tether. With affected nonchalance he started walking toward the dark fence surrounding Port Helenia, now visible just a kilometer ahead.
Tycho nickered, swished his tail, and cut loose an aromatic crepidation.
Tycho, pu-lease! Fiben thought. When a bend in the road at last cut off all view of the Gubru, Fiben sank to the ground. He just sat and shook for a few moments.
“Well,” he said at last. “I guess there really is a truce after all.”
After that, the guard post at the town gate was almost anticlimactic. Fiben actually enjoyed making the Talon Soldiers acknowledge his bow. He remembered some of what Gailet had taught him about Galactic protocol. Grudging acknowledgment from the client-class Kwackoo had been vital to achieve. To get it from the Gubru was delicious.
It also clearly meant that the Suzerain of Propriety was holding out. It had not yet given in.
Fiben left a trail of startled chims behind him as he rode Tycho at a gallop through the back streets of Port Helenia. One or two of them shouted at him, but at that moment he had no thought except to hurry toward the site of his former imprisonment.
When he arrived, however, he found the iron gate open and untended. The watch globes had vanished from the stone wall. He left Tycho to graze in the unkempt garden and beat aside a couple of limp plate ivy parachutes that festooned the open doorway.
“Gailet!” he shouted.
The Probationer guards were gone too. Dustballs and scraps of paper blew in through the open door and rolled down the hall. When he came to the room he had shared with Gailet, Fiben stopped and stared.
It was a mess.
Most of the furnishings were still there, but the expensive sound system and holo-wall had been torn out, no doubt taken by the departing Probies. On the other hand, Fiben saw his personal datawell sitting right where he had left it that night.
Gailet’s was gone.
He checked the closet. Most of their clothes still hung there. Clearly she hadn’t packed. He took down the shiny ceremonial robe he had been given by the Suzerain’s staff. The silky material was almost glass-smooth under his fingers.
Gailet’s robe was missing.
“Oh, Goodall,” Fiben moaned. He spun about and dashed down the hall. It took only a second to leap into the saddle, but Tycho barely looked up from his feeding. Fiben had to kick and yell until the beast began to comprehend some of the urgency of the situation. With a yellow sunflower still hanging from his mouth, the horse turned and clomped through the gate and back onto the street. Once there, Tycho brought his head down and gamely gathered momentum.
They made quite a sight, galloping down the silent, almost empty streets, the robe and the flower flapping like banners in the wind. But few witnessed the wild ride until they finally approached the crowded wharves.
It seemed as if nearly every chim in town was there. They swarmed along the waterfront, a churning mass of brown, callipose bodies dressed in autumn parkas, their heads bobbing like the waters of the bay just beyond. More chims leaned precariously over the rooftops, and some even hung from drainage spouts.
It was a good thing Fiben wasn’t on foot. Tycho was really quite helpful as he snorted and nudged startled chims aside with his nose. From his perch on the horse’s back, Fiben soon was able to spy what some of the commotion was about.
About half a kilometer out into the bay, a dozen fishing vessels could be seen operating under neo-chimpanzee crews. A cluster of them jostled and bumped near a sleek white craft that glistened in cliquant contrast to the battered trawlers.
The Gubru vessel was dead in the water. Two of the avian crew members stood atop its cockpit, twittering and waving their arms, offering instructions which the chim seamen politely ignored as they tied hausers to the crippled craft and began gradually towing it toward the shore.
So what? Big deal, Fiben thought. So a Gubru patrol boat suffered a breakdown. For this all the chims in town had spilled out into the streets? The citizens of Port Helenia really must be hard up for entertainment.
Then he realized that only a few of the townfolk were actually watching the minor rescue in the harbor. The vast majority stared southward, out across the bay.
Oh. Fiben’s breath escaped in’a sigh, and he, too, was momentarily struck speechless.
New, shining towers stood atop the far mesa where the colonial spaceport lay. The lambemV monoliths looked nothing like Gubru transports, or their hulking, globular battleships. Instead, these resembled glimmering steeples—spires which towered high and confident, manifesting a faith and tradition more ancient than life on Earth.
Tiny winklings of light lifted from the tall starships -- carrying Galactic dignitaries, Fiben guessed—and cruised westward, drawing nearer along the arc of the bay. At last the aircraft joined a spiral of traffic descending over South Point. That was where everyone in Port Helenia seemed to sense that something special was going on.
Unconsciously Fiben guided Tycho through the crowd until he arrived at the edge of the main wharf. There a chain of chims wearing oval badges held back the crowd. So there are proctors again, Fiben realized. The Probationers proved unreliable, so the Gubru had to reinstate civil authority.
A chen wearing the brassard of a proctor corporal grabbed Tycho’s halter and started to speak. “Hey, bub! You can’t ...” Then he blinked. “Ifni! Is that you, Fiben?”
Fiben recognized Barnaby Fulton, one of the chims who had been involved in Gailet’s early urban undergound. He smiled, though his thoughts were far across the choppy waters. “Hello, Barnaby. Haven’t seen you since the valley uprising. Glad to see you still scratchin’.”
Now that attention had been drawn his way, chens and chimmies started nudging each other and whispering in hushed voices. He heard his own name repeated. The susurration of the crowd ebbed as a circle of silence spread around him. Two or three of the staring chims reached out to touch Tycho’s heavy flanks, or Fiben’s leg, as if to verify that they were real.
Barnaby made a visible effort to match Fiben’s insouciance. “Whenever it itches, Fiben. Uh, one rumor had it you were s’pozed to be over there.” He gestured toward the monumental activity taking place across the harbor. “Another said you’d busted out an’ taken to the hills. A third ...”
“What did the third say?”
Barnaby swallowed. “Some said your number’d come
up’”..
“Hmph,” Fiben commented softly. “I guess all of them
were right.”
He saw that the trawlers had dragged the crippled Gubru patrol boat nearly to the dock. A number of other chim-crewed vessels cruised farther out, but none of them crossed a line of buoys that could be seen stretching all the way across the bay.
Barnaby looked left and right, then spoke in a low voice. “Uh, Fiben, there are quite a few chims in town who . . . well, who’ve been reorganizing. I had to give parole when I got my brassard back, but I can get word to Professor Oakes that you’re in town. I’m sure he’d want to get together a meetin’ tonight. ...”
Fiben shook his head. “No time. I’ve got to get over there.” He motioned to where the bright aircraft were alighting on the far headlands.
Barnaby’s lips drew back. “I dunno, Fiben. Those watch buoys. They’ve kept everybody back.”
“Have they actually burned anybody?”
“Well, no. Not that I’ve seen. But—“
Barnaby stopped as Fiben shook the reins and nudged with his heels. “Thanks, Barnaby. That’s all I needed to know,” he said.
The proctors stood aside as Tycho stepped along the wharf. Farther out the little rescue flotilla had just come to dock and were even now tying up the prim white Gubru warcraft. The chim sailors did a lot of bowing and moved in uncomfortable crouched postures under the glare of the irritated Talon Soldiers and their fearsome battle drones.
In contrast, Fiben steered his steed just outside of the range that would have required him to acknowledge the aliens. His posture was erect, and he ignored them completely as he rode past the patrol boat to the far end of the pier, where the smallest of the fishing boats had just come to rest.
He swung his feet over the saddle and hopped down. “Are you good to animals?” he asked the startled sailor, who looked up from securing his craft. When he nodded, Fiben handed the dumbfounded chim Tycho’s reins. “Then we’ll swap.”
He leaped aboard the little craft and stepped behind the cockpit. “Send a bill for the difference to the Suzerain for Propriety. You got that? The Gubru Suzerain of Propriety.”
The wide-eyed chen seemed to notice that his jaw was hanging open. He closed it with an audible clack.
Fiben switched the ignition on and felt satisfied with the engine’s throaty roar. “Cast off,” he said. Then he smiled. “And thanks. Take good care of Tycho!”
The sailor blinked. He seemed about to decide to get angry when some of the chims who had followed Fiben caught up. One whispered in the boatman’s ear. The fisherman then grinned. He hurried to untie the boat’s tether and threw the rope back onto the foredeck. When Fiben awkwardly hit the pier backing up, the chim only winced slightly. “G-good luck,’ he managed to say.
“Yeah. Luck, Fiben,” Barnaby shouted.
Fiben waved and shifted the impellers into forward. He swung about in a wide arc, passing almost under the duraplast sides of the Gubru patrol craft. Up close it did not look quite so glistening white. In fact, the armored hull looked pitted and corroded. High, indignant chirps from the other side of the vessel indicated the frustration of the Talon Soldier crew.
Fiben spared them not a thought as he turned about and got his borrowed boat headed southward, toward the line of buoys that split the bay and kept the chims of Port Helenia away from the high, patron-level doings on the opposite shore.
Foamed and choppy from the wind, the water was cinerescent with the usual garbage the easterlies always brought in, this time of year—everything from leaves to almost transparent plate ivy parachutes to the feathers of molting birds. Fiben had to slow to avoid clots of debris as well as battered boats of all description crowded with chim sightseers.
He approached the barrier line at low speed and felt thousands of eyes watching him as he passed the last shipload, containing the most daring and curious of the Port Helenians.
Goodall, do I really know what I’m doing? he wondered. He had been acting almost on automatic so far. But now it came to him that he really was out of his depth here. What did he hope to accomplish by charging off this way? What was he going to do? Crash the ceremony? He looked at the towering starships across the bay, glistening in power and splendor.
As if he had any business sticking his half-uplifted nose into the affairs of beings from great and ancient clans! All he’d accomplish would be to embarrass himself, and probably his whole race for that matter.
“Gotta think about this,” he muttered. Fiben brought the boat’s engine down to idle as the line of buoys neared. He thought about how many people were watching him right now.
My people, he recalled. I ... I was supposed to represent them.
Yes, but I ducked out, obviously the Suzerain realized its mistake and made other arrangements. Or the other Suzerain’s won, and I’d simply be dead meat if I showed up!
He wondered what they would think if they knew that, only days ago, he had manhandled and helped kidnap one of his own patrons, and his legal commander at that. Some race-representative!
Gailet doesn’t need the likes of me. She’s better off without me.
Fiben twisted the wheel, causing the boat to come about just short of one of the white buoys. He watched it go by as he turned.
It, too, looked less than new on close examination -- somewhat corroded, in fact. But then, from his own lowly state, who was he to judge?
Fiben blinked at that thought. Now that was laying it on too thick!
He stared at the buoy, and slowly his lips curled back. Why . . . why you devious sons of bitches....
Fiben cut the impellers and let the engine drop back to idle. He closed his eyes and pressed his hands against his temples, trying to concentrate.
I was girding myself against another fear barrier . . .like the one at the city fence, that night. But this one is more subtle! It plays on my sense of my own unworthiness. It trades on my humility. ‘
He opened his eyes and looked back at the buoy. Finally, he grinned.
“What humility?” Fiben asked aloud. He laughed and turned the wheel as he set the craft in motion again. This time when he headed for the barrier he did not hesitate, or listen to the doubts that the machines tried to cram into his head.
“After all,” he muttered, “what can they do to shake the confidence of a fellow who’s got delusions of adequacy?” The enemy had made a serious mistake here, Fiben knew as he left the buoys behind him and, with them, their artificially induced doubts. The resolution that flowed back into him now was fortified by its very contrast to the earlier depths. He approached the opposite headland wearing a fierce scowl of determination.
Something flapped against his knee. Fiben glanced down and saw the silvery ceremonial robe—the one he had found in the closet back at the old prison. He had crammed it under his belt, apparently, just before leaping atop Tycho and riding, pell-mell, for the harbor. No wonder people had been staring at him, back at the docks!
Fiben laughed. Holding onto the wheel with one hand, he wriggled into the silky garment as he headed toward a silent stretch of beach. The bluffs cut off any view of what was going on over on the sea side of the narrow peninsula. But the drone of still-descending aircraft was—he hoped—a sign that he might not be too late.
He ran the boat aground on a shelf of sparkling white sand, now made unattractive under a tidal wash of flotsam. Fiben was about to leap into the knee-high surf when he glanced back and noticed that something seemed to be going on back in Port Helenia. Faint cries of excitement carried over the water. The churning mass of brown forms at the dockside was now surging to the right.
He plucked up the pair of binoculars that hung by the capstan and focused them on the wharf area.
Chims ran about, many of them pointing excitedly eastward, toward the main entrance to town. Some were still running in that direction. But now more and more seemed to be heading the other way . . . apparently not so much in fear as in confusion. Some of the more excitable chims capered about. A few even fell into the water and had to be rescued by the more level-headed.
Whatever was happening did not seem to be causing panic so much as acute, near total bewilderment.
Fiben did not have time to hang around and piece to-
fether this added puzzle. By now he thought he understood is own modest powers of concentration.
Focus on just one problem at a time, he told himself. Get to Gailet. Tell her you’re sorry you ever left her. Tell her you’II never ever do it again.
That was easy enough even for him to understand.
Fiben found a narrow trail leading up from the beach. It was crumbling and dangerous, especially in the gusting winds. Still, he hurried. And his pace was held down only by the amount of oxygen his limited lungs and heart could pump.
The four of them made a strange-looking group, hurrying northward under overcast skies. Perhaps some little native animals looked up and stared at them, blinking in momentary astonishment before they ducked back into their burrows and swore off the eating of overripe seeds ever again.
To Uthacalthing, though, the forced inarch was something of a humiliation. Each of the others, it seemed, had advantages over him.
Kault puffed and huffed and obviously did not like the rugged ground. But once the hulking Thennanin got moving he kept up a momentum that seemed unstoppable.
As for Jo-Jo, well, the little chim seemed by now to be a creature of this environment. He was under strict orders from Uthacalthing never to knuckle-walk within sight of Kault—no sense in taking a chance with arousing the Thennanin’s suspicions—but when the terrain got too rugged he sometimes just scrambled over an obstacle rather than going around it. And over the long flat stretches, Jo-Jo simply rode Robert’s back.
Robert had insisted on carrying the chim, whatever the official gulf in status between them. The human lad was impatient enough as it was. Clearly, he would rather have run all’ the way.
The change in Robert Oneagle was astonishing, and far more than physical. Last night, when Kault asked him to explain part of his story for the third time, Robert clearly and unself-consciously manifested a simple version of teev’nus over his head. Uthacalthing could kenn how the human deftly used the glyph to contain his frustration, so that none of it would spill over into outward discourtesy to the Thennanin.
Uthacalthing could see that there was much Robert was not telling. But what he said was enough.
I knew that Megan underestimated her son. But of this I had no expectation.
Clearly, he had underrated his own daughter as well.
Clearly. Uthacalthing tried not to resent his flesh and blood for her power, the power to rob him of more than he had thought he could ever lose.
He struggled to keep up with the others, but Uthacalthing’s change nodes already throbbed tiredly. It wasn’t just that Tymbrimi were more talented at adaptability than endurance. It was also a fault in his will. The others had purpose, even enthusiasm.
He had only duty to keep him going.
Kault stopped at the top of a rise, where the- looming mountains towered near and imposing. Already they were entering a forest of scrub trees that gained stature as they ascended. Uthacalthing looked up at the steep slopes ahead, already misted in what might be snow clouds, and hoped they would not have to climb much farther.
Kault’s massive hand closed around his as the Thennanin helped him up the final few meters. He waited patiently as Uthacalthing rested, breathing heavily through wide-open nostrils.
“I still can scarcely believe what I have been told,” Kault said. “Something about the Earthling’s story does not ring true, my colleague.”
“Tfunatu . . .” Uthacalthing switched to Anglic, which seemed to take less air. “What—what do you find hard to believe, Kault? Do you think Robert is lying?”
Kault waved his hands in front of himself. His ridgecrest inflated indignantly. “Certainly not! I only believe that the young fellow is naive.”
“Naive? In what way?” Uthacalthing could look up now without his vision splitting into two separate images in his cortex. Robert and Jo-Jo weren’t in sight. They must have gone on ahead.
“I mean that the Gubru are obviously up to much more than they claim. The deal they are offering—peace with Earth in exchange for tenancy on some Garthian islands and minor genetic purchase rights from neo-chimpanzee stock—such a deal seems barely worth the cost of an interstellar ceremony. It is my suspicion that they are after something else on the sly, my friend.”
“What do you think thsy want?”
Kault swung his almost neckless head left and right, as if looking to make sure no one else was within listening range. His voice dropped in both volume and timbre.
“I suspect that they intend to perform a snap-adoption.”
“Adoption? Oh . . . you mean—“
“Garthlings,” Kault finished for him. “This is why it is so fortunate your Earthling allies brought us this news. We can only hope that they will be able to provide transport, as they promised, or we will never be in time to prevent a terrible tragedy!”
Uthacalthing mourned all that he had lost. For Kault had raised a perplexing question, one well worth a well-crafted glyph of delicate wryness.
He had been successful, of course, beyond his wildest expectations. According to Robert, the Gubru had swallowed the “Garthling” myth “hook, line, and sinker.” At least for long enough to cause them harm and embarrassment.
Kault, too, had come to believe in the ghostly fable. But what was one to make of Kault’s claim that his own instruments verified the story?
Incredible.
And now, the Gubru seemed to be behaving as if they, too, had more to go on than the fabricated clues he had left. They, too, acted as if there were confirmation!
The old Uthacalthing would have crafted syulff-kuonn to commemorate such amazing turns. At this moment, though, all he felt was confused, and very tired.
A shout caused them both to turn. Uthacalthing squinted, wishing right then that he could trade some of his unwanted empathy sense for better eyesight.
Atop the next ridge he made out the form of Robert Oneagle. Seated atop the young human’s shoulders, Jo-Jo waved at them. And something else was there, too. A blue glimmering that seemed to spin next to the two Earth creatures and radiate all of the good will of a perfect prankster.
It was the beacon, the light that had led Uthacalthing ever onward, since the crash months before.
“What are they saying?” Kault asked. “I cannot quite make out the words.”
Neither could Uthacalthing. But he knew what the Ter-rans were saying. “I believe they are telling us that we don’t have very much farther to go,” he said with some relief. “They are saying that they have found our transport.”
The Thennanin’s breathing slits puffed in satisfaction. “Good. Now if only we can trust the Gubru to follow custom and proper truce behavior when we appear and offer correct diplomatic treatment to accredited envoys.”
Uthacalthing nodded. But as they began marching uphill together again, he knew that that was only one of their worries.
She tried to suppress her feelings. To the others, this was serious, even tragic.
But there was just no way to keep it in; her delight would not be contained. Subtle, ornate glyphs spun off from her waving tendrils and diffracted away through the trees, filling the glades with her hilarity. Athaclena’s eyes were at their widest divergence, and she covered her mouth with her hand so the dour chims would not see her human-style smile as well.
The portable holo unit had been set up on a ridgetop overlooking the Sind to the northwest in order to improve reception. It showed the scene being broadcast just then from Port Helenia. Under the truce, censorship had been lifted. And even without humans the capital had plenty of chim “newshounds” on the spot with mobile cameras to show all the debris in stunning detail.
“I can’t stand it,” Benjamin moaned. Elayne Soo muttered helplessly as she watched. “That tears it.”
The chimmie spoke volumes, indeed. For the holo-tank displayed what was left of the fancy wall the invaders had thrown around Port Helenia . . . now literally ripped down and torn to shreds. Stunned chim citizens milled about a scene that looked as if a cyclone had hit it. They stared around in amazement, picking through the shattered remnants. A few of those who were more exuberant than thoughtful threw pieces of fence material into the air jubilantly. Some even made chest-thumping motions in honor of the unstoppable wave that had crested there only minutes before, then surged onward into the town itself.
On most of the stations the voice-over was computer generated, but on Channel Two a chim announcer was able to speak over his excitement.
“At—at first we all thought it was a nightmare come true. You know . . . like an archetype out of an old TwenCen flatmovie. Nothing would stop them! They crashed through the Gubru barrier as if it was made of tish-tissue paper. I don’t know about anybody else, but at any moment I expected the biggest of them to go around grabbing our prettiest chimmies and drag them screaming all the way to the top of the Terragens Tower. ...”
Athaclena clapped her hand tigher over her mouth in order to keep from laughing out loud. She fought for self-control, and she was not alone, for one of the chims—Fiben’s friend, Sylvie—let out a high chirp of laughter. Most of the others frowned at her in disapproval. After all, this was serious! But Athaclena met the chimmie’s eyes and recognized the light in them.
“But it—it appears that these creatures aren’t complete kongs, after all. They—after their demolishment of the fence, they don’t seem to have done much more damage in their s-sudden invasion of Port Helenia. Mostly, right now, they’re just milling around, opening doors, eating fruit, going wherever ‘they want to. After all, where does a four-hundred-pound gar ... oh, never mind.”
This time, another chim joined Sylvie. Athaclena’s vision blurred and she shook her head. The announcer went on.
“They seem completely unaffected by the Gubru’s psi-drones, which apparently aren’t tuned to their brain patterns. . . .”
Actually, Athaclena and the mountain fighters had known for more than two days where the gorillas were headed. After their first frantic attempts to divert the powerful pre-sentients, they gave up the effort as useless. The gorillas politely pushed aside or stepped over anybody who got in their way. There had simply been no stopping them.
Not even April Wu. The little blond girl had apparently made up her mind to go and find her parents, and short of risking injury to her, there was no way anybody would be able to pry her off the shoulders of one of the giant, silver-backed males.
Anyway, April had told the chims quite matter-of-factly, somebody had to go along and supervise the Villas, or they might get into trouble!
Athaclena remembered little April’s words as she looked at the mess the pre-sentients had made of the Gubru wall. I’d hate to see the trouble they could cause if they weren’t supervised!
Anyway, with the secret out, there was no reason the human child should not be reunited with her family. Nothing she said could hurt anybody now.
So much for the last secrecy of the Howletts Center Project. Now Athaclena might as well just toss away all the evidence she had so dutifully gathered, that first, fateful evening so many months ago. Soon the entire Five Galaxies would know about these creatures. And by some measures that was, indeed, a tragedy. And yet . . .
Athaclena remembered that day in early spring, when she had been so shocked and indignant to come upon the illegal Uplift experiment hidden in the forest. Now she could scarcely believe she had actually been like that. Was I really such a serious, officious little prig?
Now, syulff-kuonn was only the simplest, most serious of the glyphs she sparked off, casually, tirelessly, in joy over a simply marvelous joke. Even the chims could not help being affected by her profligate aura. Two more laughed when one of the channels showed an alien staff car, manned by squawking irate Kwackoo, in the process of being peeled back by gorillas who seemed passionately interested in how it would taste. Then another chim chuckled. The laughter spread.
Yes, she thought. It is a wonderful jest. To a Tymbrimi, the best jokes were those that caught the joker, as well as everybody else. And ihis fit the bill beautifully. It was, in truth, a religious experience. For her people believed in a Universe that was more than mere clockwork physics, more than even Ifni’s capricious flux of chance and luck.
It was when something like this happened—the Tymbrimi sages said—that one really knew that God, Himself, was still in charge.
Was I, then, also an agnostic before? How silly of me. Thank you then, Lord, and thank you too, father, for this miracle.
The scene shifted to the dock area, where milling chims danced in the streets and stroked the fur of their giant, patient cousins. In spite of the likely tragic consequences of all this, Athaclena and her warriors could not help but smile at the delight the brown-furred relations obviously took in each other. For now, at least, their pride was shared by all the chims of Port Helenia.
Even Lieutenant Lydia McCue and her wary corporal could not help but laugh when a gorilla baby danced past the cameras, wearing necklace made of broken Gubru psi-globes. They caught a glimpse of little April, riding in triumph through the streets, and the sight of a human child seemed to galvanize the crowds.
By now the glade was saturated with her glyphs. Athaclena turned and walked away, leaving the others to resonate in the wry joy. She moved up a forest trail until she came to a place with a clear view of the mountains to the west. There she stood, reaching and kenning with her tendrils.
It was there that a chim messenger found her. He hurried up and saluted before handing her a slip of paper. Athaclena thanked him and opened it, though she thought she already knew what it would say.
“With’tanna, Uthacalthing,” she said, softly. Her father was back in touch with the world again. For all of the events of the past few months, there was a solid, practical part of her, still, who was relieved to have this confirmation by radio.
She had had faith that Robert would succeed, of course. That was why she had not gone to Port Helenia with Fiben, or after that with the gorillas. What could she accomplish there, with her poor expertise, that her father could not do a thousand times better? If anyone could help turn their slim hopes into more and still greater miracles, it would be Uthacalthing.
No, her job was to remain here. For even in the event of miracles, the Infinite expected mortals to provide their own insurance.
She shaded her eyes. Although she had no hope of personally sighting a little aircraft against the bright clouds, she kept looking for a tiny dot that would be carrying all her love and all her prayers.
Gay pavilions dotted the manicured hillside, occasionally billowing and flapping in the gusting breeze. Quick robots hurried to pluck up any debris brought in by the wind. Others fetched and carried refreshments to the gathered dignitaries.
Galactics of many shapes and colors milled in small groups that merged and separated in an elegant pavane of diplomacy. Courteous bows and flattenings and tentacle wavings conveyed complex nuances of status and protocol. A knowledgeable observer might tell a great deal from such subtleties -- .and there were many knowledgeable observers present on this day.
Informal exchanges abounded as well. Here a squat, bearlike Pila conversed in clipped, ultrasonic tones with a gangling Linten gardener. A little upslope, three Jophur ring-priests keened in harmonious complaint to an official from the War Institute over some alleged violation out among the starlanes.
It was often said that much more practical diplomacy was accomplished at these Uplift Ceremonies than at formal negotiation conferences. More than one new alliance might be made today, and more than one broken.
Only a few of the Galactic visitors spared more than passing attention to those being honored here today—a caravan of small, brown forms which had taken the entire morning to labor halfway up the mound, circling it four times along the way.
By now nearly a third of the neo-chimpanzee candidates had failed one test or another. Those rejected were already trooping back down the sloping path, in downcast ones and twos.
The remaining forty or so continued their ascent, symbolically reiterating the process of Uplift that had brought their race to this stage in its history, but ignored, for the most part, by the bright crowds on the slopes.
Not all of the observers were inattentive, of course. Near the pinnacle, the Commissioners from the Galactic Uplift Institute paid close attention to the results relayed up by each test station. And nearby, from beneath their own pavilion, a party of the neo-chimpanzees’ human patrons watched, glumly.
Looking somewhat lost and helpless, they had been brought out from Cilmar Island only this morning—a few mayors, professors, and a member of the local Uplift Board. The delegation had put forward a procedural protest over the irregular way the ceremony had come about. But when pressed, none of the humans actually claimed a right to cancel it altogether. The possible consequences were potentially just too drastic.
Besides, what if this were the real thing? Earth had been agitating to be allowed to hold just such a ceremony for neo-chimpanzees for two hundred years.
The human observers definitely looked unhappy. For they had no idea what to do, and few of the grand Galactic envoys present even deigned to acknowledge them amid the flurry of informal diplomacy.
On the opposite side of the Evaluators’ pavilion sat the elegant Sponsors’ Tent. Many Gubru and Kwackoo stood just outside, nervously hopping from time to time, watching every detail with unblinking, critical eyes.
Until moments ago, the Gubru Triumvirate had been visible also, two of them strutting about with their Molt colorings already starting to show and the third still obsti-
nately perched upon its pedestal.
Then one of them received a message, and all three disappeared into the tent for an urgent parlay. That had been some time ago. They still had not emerged.
The Suzerain of Cost and Caution fluttered and spat as it let the message drop to the floor.
“I protest! I protest this interference! This interference and intolerable betrayal!”
The Suzerain of Propriety stared down from its perch, totally at a loss. The Suzerain of Cost and Caution had proved to be a crafty opponent, but never had it been purposely obtuse. Obviously something had happened to upset it terribly.
Crouching Kwackoo servitors hurriedly plucked up the message pellet it had dropped, duplicated the capsule, and brought copies to the other two Gubru lords. When the Suzerain of Propriety viewed the data, it could scarcely believe what it saw.
It was a solitary neo-chimpanzee, climbing the lower slopes of the towering Ceremonial Mound, passing rapidly through the automatic first-stage screens and gradually beginning to close the wide gap separating it from the official party, higher on the hillside.
The neo-chimp moved with an erect determination, a clearness of purpose that could be read in its very posture. Those of its con-specifics who had already failed—and who were spiraling slowly down the long trail again—first stared, then grinned and reached out to touch the newcomer’s robe as he passed. They offered words of encouragement.
“This was not, cannot have been rehearsed!” the Suzerain of Beam and Talon hissed. The military commander cried out, “It is an interloper, and I shall have it burned down!”
“You should not, must not, shall not!” the Suzerain of Propriety squawked back in anger. “There has not yet been a coalescence! No complete molting! You do not yet have a queen’s wisdom!
“Ceremonies are run, governed, ruled by traditions of honor! All members of a client race may approach and be tried, tested, evaluated!”
The third Gubru lord snapped its beak open and shut in agitation. Finally, the Suzerain of Cost and Caution fluffed its ragged feathers and agreed. “We would be charged reparations. The Institute officials might leave, depart, lay sanctions. . . . The cost ...” It turned away in a downy huff. “Let it proceed, then. For now. Alone, solitary, in isolation it can do no harm.”
But the Suzerain of Propriety was not so sure. Once, it had set great store in this particular client. When it seemed to have been stolen, the Suzerain of Propriety suffered a serious setback.
Now, however^ it realized the truth. The neo-chimp male had not been stolen and eliminated by its rivals, the other Suzerains. Instead, the chimp had actually escaped!
And now it was back, alone. How? And what did it hope to accomplish? Without guidance, without the aid of a group, how far did it think it could go?
At first, on seeing the creature, the Suzerain of Propriety had felt joyful amazement—an unusual sensation for a Gubru. Now its emotion was something even more uncomfortable ... a worry that this was only the beginning of surprise.
So far so good. He made it around the first circuit in what had to be record speed.
Oh, a few times they asked him some questions. What was his earliest memory? Did he enjoy his profession? Was he satisfied with the physical form of this generation of neo-chimpanzee, or might it be improved somehow? Would a prehensile tail be a convenient aid in tool use, for instance?
Gailet would have been proud of the way he remained polite, even then. Or at least he hoped she’d be proud of him.
Of course the Galactic officials had his entire record -- genetic, scholastic, military—and were able to access it the moment he passed a group of startled Talon Soldiers on the bayside bluffs and strode through the outer barriers to meet his first test.
When a tall, treelike Kanten asked him about the note he had left, that night when he “escaped” from imprisonment, it was clear that the Institute was capable of subpoenaing the invaders’ records as well. He answered truthfully that Gailet had worded the document but that he had understood its purpose and concurred.
The Kanten’s foliage tinkled in the chiming of tiny, silvery bells. The semi-vegetable Galactic sounded pleased and amused as it shuffled aside to let him pass.
The intermittent wind helped keep Fiben cool as long as he was on the eastward slopes, but the westward side faced the afternoon sun and was sheltered from the breeze. The effort of maintaining his rapid pace made him feel as if he were wearing a thick coat, even though a chim’s sparse covering of body hair was technically not fur at all.
The parklike hill was neatly landscaped, and the trail paved with a soft, resilient surface. Nevertheless, through his toes he sensed a faint trembling, as if the entire artificial mountain were throbbing in harmonies far, far below the level of hearing. Fiben, who had seen the massive power plants before they were buried, knew that it was not his imagination.
At the next station a Pring technician with huge, glowing eyes and bulging lips looked him up and down and noted something in a datawell before allowing him to proceed. Now some of the dignitaries dotting the slopes seemed to have begun to notice him. A few drifted nearer and accessed his test results in curiosity. Fiben bowed courteously to those nearby
So far it had been a piece of cake. Fiben wondered what all the fuss was about.
He had feared they would ask him to solve calculus problems in his head—or recite like Demosthenes, with marbles in his mouth. But at first there had only been a series of force-screen barriers that peeled back for him automatically. And after that there were only more of those funny-looking instruments he had seen the Gubru techs use weeks, months ago—now wielded by even funnier-looking aliens.
So far so good. He made it around the first circuit in what had to be record speed.
Oh, a few times they asked him some questions. What was his earliest memory? Did he enjoy his profession? Was he satisfied with the physical form of this generation of neo-chimpanzee, or might it be improved somehow? Would a prehensile tail be a convenient aid in tool use, for instance?
Gailet would have been proud of the way he remained polite, even then. Or at least he hoped she’d be proud of him.
Of course the Galactic officials had his entire record -- genetic, scholastic, military—and were able to access it the moment he passed a group of startled Talon Soldiers on the bayside bluffs and strode through the outer barriers to meet his first test.
When a tall, treelike Kanten asked him about the note he had left, that night when he “escaped” from imprisonment, it was clear that the Institute was capable of subpoenaing the invaders’ records as well. He answered truthfully that Gailet had worded the document but that he had understood its purpose and concurred.
The Kanten’s foliage tinkled in the chiming of tiny, silvery bells. The semi-vegetable Galactic sounded pleased and amused as it shuffled aside to let him pass.
The intermittent wind helped keep Fiben cool as long as he was on the eastward slopes, but the westward side faced the afternoon sun and was sheltered from the breeze. The effort of maintaining his rapid pace made him feel as if he were wearing a thick coat, even though a chim’s sparse covering of body hair was technically not fur at all.
The parklike hill was neatly landscaped, and the trail paved with a soft, resilient surface. Nevertheless, through his toes he sensed a faint trembling, as if the entire artificial mountain were throbbing in harmonies far, far below the level of hearing. Fiben, who had seen the massive power plants before they were buried, knew that it was not his imagination.
At the next station a Pring technician with huge, glowing eyes and bulging lips looked him up and down and noted something in a datawell before allowing him to proceed. Now some of the dignitaries dotting the slopes seemed to have begun to notice him. A few drifted nearer and accessed his test results in curiosity. Fiben bowed courteously to those nearby and tried not to think about all the different kinds of eyes that were watching him like some sort of specimen.
Once their ancestors had to go through something like this, he consoled himself.
Twice Fiben passed a few spirals below the party of official candidates, a gradually dwindling band of brownish creatures in short, silvery robes. The first time he hurried by, none of the chims noticed him. On the second occasion, though, he had to stand under the scrutiny of instruments held by a being whose species he could not even identify. That time he was able to make out a few figures among those up above. And some of the chims noticed him as well. One nudged a companion and pointed. But then they all disappeared around the corner again.
He had not seen Gailet, but then, she would likely be at the head of the party, wouldn’t she? “Come on,” Fiben muttered impatiently, concerned over the time this creature was taking. Then he considered that the machines focused on him might read either his words or his mood, and he concentrated on preserving discipline. He smiled sweetly and bowed as the alien technician indicated a passing score with a few terse, computer-mediated words.
Fiben hurried on. He grew more and more irritated with the long distances between the stations and wondered if there wasn’t any dignified way he could run, in order to cut down on the gap even faster.
Instead though, things only started going slower as the tests grew more serious, calling for deeper learning and more complex thought. Soon he met more chims on their way back down. Apparently these were now forbidden to talk to him, but a few rolled their eyes meaningfully, and their bodies were damp with perspiration.
He recognized several of these dropouts. Two were professors at the college in Port Helenia. Others were scientists with the Garth Ecological Recovery Program. Fiben began to grow worried. All of these chims were blue-card types—among the brightest! If they were failing, something had to be very wrong here. Certainly this ceremony wasn’t perfunctory, as that celebration for the Tytlal, which Athaclena had told him about.
Perhaps the rules were stacked against Earthlings!
That was when he approached a station manned by a tall Gubru. It did not help that the avian wore the colors of the Uplift Institute and was supposedly sworn to impartiality. Fiben had seen too many of that clan wearing Institute livery today to satisfy him.
The birdlike creature used a vodor and asked him a simple question of protocol, then let him proceed.
A thought suddenly occurred to Fiben as he quickly left that test site. What if the Suzerain of Propriety had been completely defeated by its peers? Whatever its real agenda, that Suzerain had, at least, been sincere about wanting to run a real ceremony. A promise made had to be kept. But what of the others? The admiral and the bureaucrat? Certainly they would have different priorities.
Could the whole thing be rigged so that neo-chimps could not win, no matter how ready they were for advancement? Was that possible?
Could such a result be of real benefit to the Gubru in some way?
Filled with such troubling thoughts, Fiben barely passed a test that involved juggling several complex motor functions while having to solve an intricate three-dimensional puzzle. As he left that station, with the waters of Aspinal Bay falling under late afternoon shadows to his left, he almost failed to notice a new commotion far below. At the last moment he turned to see where a growing sound was coming from.
“What in Ifni’s incontinence?” He blinked and stared.
He was not alone in that. By now half of the Galactic dignitaries seemed to be drifting down that way, attracted by a brown tide that was just then spilling up to the foot of the Ceremonial Mound.
Fiben tried to see what was happening, but patches of sunlight, reflected by still-bright water, made it hard to make out anything in the shadows just below. What he could tell was that the bay appeared to be covered with boats, and many were now emptying their passengers onto the isolated beach where he had landed, hours before.
So, more of the city chims had come out to get a better look after all. He hoped none of them misbehaved, but he doubted any harm would be done. The Galactics surely knew that monkey curiosity was a basic chimp trait, and this was only acting true to form. Probably the chims’d be given a lower portion of the slope from which to watch, as was their right by Galactic Law.
He couldn’t afford to waste any more time dawdling, though. Fiben turned to hurry onward. And although he passed the next test on Galactic History, he also knew that his score had not helped his cumulative total much.
Now he was glad when he arrived on the westward slope. As the sun sank lower, this was the side on which the wind did not bite quite as fiercely. Fiben shivered as he plodded on, slowly gaining on the diminishing crowd above him.
“Slow down, Gailet,” he muttered. “Can’t you drag your feet or somethin’? You don’t haveta answer every damn question the very second it’s asked. Can’t you tell I’m comin’?”
A dismal part of him wondered if she already knew, and maybe didn’t care.
She found it increasingly hard to feel that it mattered. And the cause of her depression was more than just the fatigue of a long, hard day, or the burden of all these bewildered chims relying upon her to lead them ever onward and upward through a maze of ever more demanding trials.
Nor was it the constant presence of the tall chen named Irongrip. It certainly was frustrating to see him breeze through tests that other, better chims failed. And as the other Sponsors’ -Choice, he was usually right behind her, wearing an infuriating, smug grin. Still, Gailet could grit her teeth and ignore him most of the time.
Nor, even, did the examinations themselves bother her much. Hell, they were the-best part of the day! Who was the ancient human sage who had said that the purest pleasure, and the greatest force in the ascent of Mankind, had been the skilled worker’s joy in her craft? While Gailet was concentrating she could block out nearly everything, the world, the Five Galaxies, all but the challenge to show her skill. Underneath all the crises and murky questions of honor and duty, there was always a clean sense of satisfaction whenever she finished a task and knew she had done well even before the Institute examiners told her so.
No, the tests weren’t what disturbed her. What bothered Gailet most was the growing suspicion that she had made the wrong choice after all.
I should have refused to participate, she thought. I should have simply said no.
Oh, the logic was the same as before. By protocol and all of the rules, the Gubru had put her in a position where she simply had no choice, for her own good and the good of her race and clan.
And yet, she also knew she was being used. It made her feel defiled.
During that last week of study at the Library she had found herself repeatedly dozing off under the screens, bright with arcane data. Her dreams were always disturbed, featuring birds holding threatening instruments. Images of Max and Fiben and so many others lingered, thickening her thoughts every time she jerked awake again.
Then the Day arrived. She had donned her robe almost with a sense of relief that now, at least, it was all finally approaching an end. But what end?
A slight chimmie emerged from the most recent test booth, mopped her forehead with the sleeve of her silvery tunic, and walked tiredly over to join Gailet. Michaela Nod-dings was only an elementary school teacher, and a green card, but she had proven more adaptable and enduring than quite a few blues, who were now walking the lonely spiral back down again. Gailet felt deep relief on seeing her new friend still among the candidates. She reached out to take the other chimmie’s hand.
“I almost flunked that one, Gailet,” Michaela said. Her fingers trembled in Gailet’s grasp.
“Now, don’t you dare flake out on me, Michaela,” Gailet said soothingly. She brushed her companion’s sweaty locks. “You’re my strength. I couldn’t go on if you weren’t here.”
In Michaela’s brown eyes was a soft gratitude, mixed with irony. “You’re a liar, Gailet. That’s sweet of you to say, but you don’t need any of us, let alone little me. Whatever I can pass, you take at a breeze.”
Of course that wasn’t strictly true. Gailet had figured out that the examinations offered by the Uplift Institute were scaled somehow, in order to measure not only how intelligent the subject was but also how hard he or she was trying. Sure, Gailet had advantages over most of the other chims, in training and perhaps in IQV but at each stage her own trials got harder, too.
Another chim—a Probationer known as Weasel—emerged from the booth and sauntered over to where Irongrip waited with a third member of their band. Weasel did not seem to be much put out. In fact, all three of the surviving Probationers looked relaxed, confident. Irongrip noticed Gailet’s glance and winked at her. She turned away quickly.
One last chim came out then and shook his head. “That’s it,” he said.
“Then Professor Simmins . . . ?”
When he shrugged, Gailet sighed. This just did not make sense. Something was wrong when fine, erudite chims were failing, and yet the tests did not cull out Irongrip’s bunch from the very start.
Of course, the Uplift Institute might judge “advancement” differently than the human-led Earthclan did. Irongrip and Weasel and Steelbar were intelligent, after all. The Ga-lactics might not view the Probationers’ various character flaws as all that terrible, loathsome as they were to Terrans.
But no, that wasn’t the reason at all, Gailet realized, as she and Michaela stepped past the remaining twenty or so to lead the way upward again. Gailet knew that something else had to be behind this. The Probies were just too cocky. Somehow they knew that a fix was in.
It was shocking. The Galactic Institutes were supposed to be above reproach. But there it was. She wondered what, if anything, could be done about it.
As they approached the next station—this one manned by a plump, leathery Soro inspector and six robots—Gailet looked around and noticed something for the first time, that nearly all of the brightly dressed Galactic observers—the aliens unaffiliated with the Institute who had come to watch and engage in informal diplomacy—nearly all of them had drifted away. A few could still be seen, moving swiftly downslope and to the east, as if drawn by something interesting happening off that way.
Of course they won’t bother telling us what’s going on, she thought bitterly.
“Okay, Gailet,” Michaela sighed. “Yo’ti first again. Show ‘em we can talk real good.”
So, even a prim schoolteacher will use grunt dialect as an affectation, a bond. Gailet sighed. “Yeah. Me go do that thing.”
Irongrip grinned at her, but Gailet ignored him as she stepped up to bow to the Soro and submit to the attentions of the robots.
The Suzerain of Beam and Talon strutted back and forth under the flapping fabric of the Uplift Institute pavilion. The Gubru admiral’s voice throbbed with a vibrato of outrage.
“Intolerable! Unbelievable! Impermissible! This invasion must be stopped, held back, put into abeyance!”
The smooth routine of a normal Uplift Ceremony had been shattered. Officials and examiners of the Institute -- Galactics of many shapes and sizes—now rushed about under the great canopy, hurriedly consulting portable Libraries, seeking precedents for an event none of them had ever witnessed or imagined before. An unexpected disturbance had triggered chaos everywhere, and especially in the corner where the Suzerain danced its outrage before a spiderlike being.
The Grand Examiner, an arachnoid Serentini, stood relaxed in a circle of datatanks, listening attentively to the Gubru officer’s complaint.
“Let it be ruled a violation, an infraction, a capital of-fense! My soldiers shall enforce propriety severely!” The Suzerain fluffed its down to display the pinkish tint already visible under the outer feathers—as if the Serentini would be impressed to see that the admiral was nearly female, almost a queen.
But the sight failed to impress the Grand Examiner. Serentini were all female, after all. So what was the big deal?
The Grand Examiner kept her amusement hidden, however. “The new arrivals fit all of the criteria for being allowed to participate in this ceremony,” she replied patiently in Galactic Three. “They have caused consternation, of course, and will be much discussed long after this day is done. Still, they are only one of many features of this ceremony which are, well, unconventional.”
The Gubru’s beak opened, then shut. “What do you mean by that?”
“I mean that this is the most irregular Uplift Ceremony in megayears. I have several times considered canceling it altogether.”
“You dare not! We should appeal, seek redress, seek compensation ...”
“Oh, you would love that, wouldn’t you?” The Grand Examiner sighed. “Everyone knows the Gubru are overextended now. But a judgment against one of the Institutes could cover some of your costs, no?”
This time, the Gubru was silent. The Grand Examiner used two feelers to scratch a crease in her carapace. “Several of my associates believe that that was your plan all along. There are so many irregularities in this ceremony you’ve arranged. But on close examination each one seems to stop just short of illegality. You have been clever at finding precedents and loopholes.
“For instance, there is the matter of human approval of a ceremony for their own clients. It is unclear these hostage officials of yours understood what they were agreeing to when they signed the documents you showed me.”
“They were—had been—offered Library access.”
“A skill for which wolflings are not renowned. There is suspicion of coercion.”
“We have a message of acceptance from Earth! From their homeworld! From their nest-mothers!”
“Aye,” the Serentini agreed. “They accepted your offer of peace and a free ceremony. What poor wolfling race in their dire circumstances could turn down such a proposal? But semantic analysis shows that they thought they were only agreeing to discuss the matter further! They obviously did not understand that you had purchased liberation of their old applications, some made more than fifty paktaars ago! This allowed the waiting period to be waived.”
“Their misunderstandings are not pur concern,” clipped the Suzerain of Beam and Talon.
“Indeed. And does the Suzerain of Propriety hold with this view?”
This time there was only silence. Finally, the Grand Examiner lifted both forelegs and crossed them in a formal bow. “Your protest is acknowledged. The ceremony shall continue, under the ancient rules set down by the Progenitors.”
The Gubru commander had no choice. It bowed in return. Then it swiveled and flounced outside, angrily pushing aside a crowd of its guards and aides, leaving them cackling, disturbed, in its wake.
The Examiner turned to a robot assistant. “What were we discussing before the Suzerain arrived?”
“An approaching craft whose occupants claim diplomatic protection and observer status,” the thing replied in Galactic One.
“Ah, yes. Those.”
“They are growing quite perturbed, as Gubru interceptors now seem about to cut them off, and may do them harm.”
The Examiner hesitated only a moment. “Please inform the approaching envoys that we will be only too happy to grant their request. They should come directly to the Mount, under the protection of the Uplift Institute.”
The robot hurried off to pass on the order. Other aides then approached, waving readouts and picting preliminary reports on still more anomalies. One after another of the holo-screens lit up to show the crowd that had arrived at the base of the hill, tumbling out of rusty boats and surging up the unguarded slopes.
“This event grows ever more interesting,” the Grand Examiner sighed reflectively. “I wonder, what will happen next?”
It was after sunset and Gimelhai had already sunk below a western horizon turbid with dark clouds by the time the worn-down survivors finally passed through the last examination screen to collapse in exhaustion upon a grassy knoll. Six chens and six chimmies lay quietly close to each other for warmth. They were too tired to engage in the grooming all felt they needed.
“Momma, why didn’t they choose dogs to uplift, instead? Or pigs?” One of them moaned.
“Baboons,” another voice suggested, and there was a murmur of agreement. Such creatures deserved this kind of treatment.
“Anybody but us,” a third voice summarized, succinctly.
Ex exaltavit humilis, Gailet thought silently. They have lifted up the humble of origins. The motto of the Terragens Uplift Board had its origins in the Christian Bible. To Gailet it had always carried the unfortunate implication that someone, somewhere, was going to get crucified.
Her eyes closed and she felt a light sleep close in immediately. Just a catnap, she thought. But it did not last long. Gailet felt a sudden return of that dream—the one in which a Gubru stood over her, peering down the barrel of a malevolent machine. She shivered and opened her eyes again.
The last shreds of twilight were fading. Bitterly clear, the stars twinkled as if through something more refracting than mere atmosphere.
She and the others stood up quickly as a brightly lit floater car approached and settled down in front of them. Out stepped three figures, a tall, downy-white Gubru, a spiderlike Galactic, and a pudgy human mel whose official gown hung on him like a potato sack. As she and the other chims bowed, Gailet recognized Cordwainer Appelbe, the head of Garth’s local Uplift Board.
The man looked bewildered. Certainly he must be overawed to be taking part in all this. Still, Gailet also wondered whether Appelbe was drugged.
“Urn, I want to congratulate you all,” he said, stepping just ahead of the other two. “You should know how proud we are of all of you. I’ve been told that, while there are certain test scores that are still in dispute, the overall judgment of the Uplift Institute is that Pan argonostes—the neo-chim-panzees of Earthclan—are, or, well, actually have been ready for stage three for quite some time.”
The arachnoid official stepped forward then. “That is true. In fact, I can promise that the Institute will favorably consider any future applications by Earthclan for further examinations.”
Thank you, Gailet thought as she and the others bowed again. But please, don’t bother picking me for the next one.
Now the Grand Examiner launched into a lengthy speech about the rights and duties of client races. She spoke of the long-departed Progenitors, who began Galactic civilization so long ago, and the procedures they set down for all succeeding generations of intelligent life to follow.
The Examiner used Galactic Seven, which most of the chims could at least follow. Gailet tried to pay attention, but within her troubled thoughts kept turning to what was certainly to come after this.
She was sure she felt underfoot an increase in the faint trembling which had accompanied them all the way up the mountain. It filled the air with a low, barely audible rumbling. Gailet swayed as a wave of unreality seemed to pass through her. She looked up and saw that several of the evening stars appeared to flare suddenly brighter. Others’ fled laterally as an oval distortion inserted itself directly overhead. A blackness began to gather there.
The Examiner’s aeolian speech droned on. Cordwainer Appelbe listened raptly, a bemused expression on his face. But the white-plumed Gubru grew visibly impatient with each passing moment. Gailet could well understand why. Now that the hyperspace shunt was warmed up and ready, every passing minute was costing the invaders. When she realized this, Gailet felt warmer toward the droning Serentini official. She nudged Michaela when her friend seemed about to doze off, and put on an attentive expression.
Several times the Gubru opened its beak as if about to commit the ungraceful act of interrupting the Examiner. Finally, when the spiderlike being stopped briefly for a breath, the avian cut in sharply. Gailet, who had been studying hard for months, easily understood the clipped words in Galactic Three.
, “—delaying, dawdling, stalling! Your motives are in doubt, incredible, suspect! I insist that you proceed, move along, get on with it!”
But the Examiner scarcely missed a beat, continuing in Galactic Seven.
“In passing the formidable gauntlet you faced today, more rigorous than any testing I have heretofore witnessed, you have demonstrated your worthiness as junior citizens of our civilization, and bring credit to your clan.
“What you receive today, you have earned—the right to reaffirm your love of your patrons, and to choose a stage consort. The latter decision is an important one. As consort you must select a known, oxygen-breathing, starfaring race, one that is not a member of your own clan. This race will defend your interests and impartially intercede in disputes between you and your patrons. If you wish, you may select the Tymbrimi, of the Clan of the Krallnith, who have been your consort-advisors up until now. Or you may make a change.
“Or, you may choose yet another option—to end your participation in Galactic civilization, and ask that the meddling of Uplift be reversed. Even this drastic step was prescribed by the Progenitors, as insurance of the fundamental rights of living things.”
Could we? Could we really do that? Gailet felt numb at the very idea. Even though she knew that it was almost never allowed in practice, the option was there!
She shuddered and refocused her attention as the Grand Examiner lifted two arms in a benediction. “In the name of the Institute of Uplift, and before all of Galactic civilization, I therefore pronounce you, the representatives of your race, qualified and capable of choosing and bearing witness. Go forth, and do all living things proud.”
The Serentini stepped back. And at last it was the turn of the ceremony sponsor. Normally, this would have been a human, or perhaps a Tymbrimi, but not this time. The Gubru emissary did a little dance of impatience. Quickly, it barked into a vodor, and words in Galactic Seven boomed forth.
“Ten of you shall accompany the final representatives to the shunt and offer witness. The selected pair shall carry the burden of choice and honor. These two I shall name now.
“Doctor Gailet Jones, female, citizen of Garth, Terragens Federation, Clan of Earth.”
Gailet did not want to move, but Michaela, her friend, betrayed her by planting a hand in the small of her back and gently urging her forward. She stepped a few paces toward the dignitaries and bowed. The vodor boomed again.
“Irongrip Hansen, male, citizen of Garth, Terragens Federation, Clan of Earth.”
Most of the chims behind her gasped in shock and dismay. But Gailet only closed her eyes as her worst fears were confirmed. Up until now she had clung to a hope that the Suzerain of Propriety might still be a force among the Gubru. That it might yet compel the Triumvirate to play fair. But now . . .
She felt him step up next to her and knew the chen she hated most was wearing that grin.
Enough! I’ve stood for this long enough! Surely the Grand Examiner suspects something. If I tell her . . .
But she did not move. Her mouth did not open to speak.
Suddenly, and with brutal clarity, Gailet realized the real reason why she had gone along with this farce for so long!
They’ve fooled with my mind!
It all made sense. She recalled the dreams . . . nightmares of helplessness under the subtle, adamant coercion of machines held in ruthless talons.
The Uplift Institute wouldn’t be equipped to test for that.
Of course they wouldn’t! Uplift Ceremonies were invariably joyous occasions, celebrated by patron and client alike. Who ever heard of a race-representative having to be conditioned or forced to participate?
It must’ve been done after Fiben was taken away. The Suzerain of Propriety couldn’t have agreed to such a thing. If the Grand Examiner only knew, we could squeeze a planet’s worth of reparation gild from the Gubru!
Gailet opened her mouth. “I ...” She tried to make words come. The Grand Examiner looked at her.
Perspiration condensed on Gailet’s brow. All she had to do was make the accusation. Even hint at it!
But her brain was frozen. It felt as if she had forgotten how to make words!
Speechlock. Of course. The Gubru had learned how easy it was to impose on a neo-chimpanzee. A human, perhaps, might have been able to break the hold, but Gailet recognized how futile it was in her case.
She could not read arthropoid expressions, but it seemed somehow as if the Serentini looked disappointed. The Examiner stepped back. “Proceed to the hyperspace shunt,” she said.
No! Gailet wanted to cry. But all that escaped was a faint sigh as she felt her right hand lift of its own accord and meet Irongrip’s left. He held on and she could not let go.
That was when she felt an image begin to form in her mind—an avian face with a yellow beak and cold, unblinking eyes. No effort could rid her of the picture. Gailet knew with terrible certainty that she was about to carry that image with her to the top of the ceremonial mound, and once there she and Irongrip would send it upward, into the oval of warped space overhead, for all to see, here and on a thousand other worlds.
The part of her mind that still belonged to her—the logical entity, now cut off and isolated—saw the cold covinous logic of the plan.
Oh, humans were sure to claim that the choice made today had been rigged. And probably more than half of the clans in the Five Galaxies would believe it. But that wouldn’t change anything. The choice would still stand! The alternative would be to discredit the entire system. Stellar civilization was under such pressure, right now, that it could not stand much further strain.
In fact, quite a few clans might decide that there had already been quite enough trouble over one little tribe of wolflings. Whatever the rights and wrongs, there would be substantial sentiment for ending the problem, once and for all.
It came to Gailet all in a rush. The Gubru did not merely want to become chims’ new stage consort “protectors.” They meant to bring about the extinction of humanity. Once that was accomplished, her own people would be up for adoption, and she had little doubt how that would go!
Gailet’s heart pounded. She struggled not to turn in the direction Irongrip was guiding her, but to no avail. She prayed that she would have a stroke.
Let me die!
Her life hardly mattered. They certainly planned to have her “disappear” immediately after the ceremony anyway, to dispose of the evidence. Oh, Goodall and Ifni, strike me down now! She wanted to scream.
At that moment, words came. The words . . . but it was not her voice that spoke them.
“Stop! An injustice is being done, and I demand a hearing!”
Gailet had not thought her heart could beat any quicker, but now tachycardia made her feel faint. Oh God, let it be . . .
She heard Irongrip curse and let go of her hand. That alone brought her joy. There was the sound of squawking Gubru anger, and high “eeps” of chim surprise. Someone -- Michaela, she realized—took her arm and turned her around.
It was full night now. Scattered clouds were underlit by the bright beacons of the mound, and by the turbulent, lambent tunnel of energy now taking form above the artificial mountain. Into the stark light of the floater car’s headlamps a solitary neo-chimpanzee in a dust-coated formal robe approached from the last test station. He wiped sweat from his brow and strode purposefully toward the three surprised officials.
Fiben, Gailet thought. Dazed, she found that old habits were the first to reassert themselves. Oh, Fiben, don’t swagger! Try to remember your protocol. . . .
When she realized what she was doing, Gailet suddenly giggled in a brief wave of hysteria. It shook her partially free of her immobility, and she managed to lift her hand to cover her mouth. “Oh, Fiben,” she sighed.
Irongrip growled, but the new arrival only ignored the Probationer. Fiben caught her eye and winked. It struck Gailet how the gesture that had once so infuriated her now made her knees feel weak with joy.
He stepped before the three officials and bowed low. Then, with hands clasped respectfully, Fiben awaited permission to speak.
“—dishonorable, incorrigible, impermissible interruptions—“ the Gubru’s vodor boomed. “We demand immediate
removal and sanction, punishment—“
The noise suddenly cut off as the Grand Examiner used one of her forward arms to reach up and switch the vodor off. She stepped daintily forward and addressed Fiben.
“Young one, I congratulate you on making your way up to this place all alone. Your ascent provided much of the excitement and unconventionality that is making this one of the most memorable of all ceremonies on record. By virtue of your test scores and other accomplishments, you have earned a place on this pinnacle.” The Serentini crossed two arms and lowered her forebody. “Now,” she said as she rose again, “can we assume that you have a complaint to voice? One important enough to explain such abruptness of tone?”
Gailet tensed. The Grand Examiner might be sympathetic, but there was a veiled threat implied in those words. Fiben had better make this good. One mistake and he could make matters even worse than before.
Fiben bowed again. “I—I respectfully request an explanation of . . . of how the race-representatives were chosen.”
Not too bad. Still, Gailet struggled against her conditioning. If only she could step forward and help!,
For some time the dim slopes beyond the circle of lights had begun to fill with the Galactic dignitaries—those who had departed earlier to watch unknown events downslope. Now they were all hushed, watching a humble client from one of the newest of all species demand answers from a lord of the Institute.
The Grand Examiner’s voice was patient when she answered. “It is traditional for the ceremony sponsors to select a pair from among those who pass all trials. While it is true that the sponsors are, on this occasion, declared enemies of your clan, their enmity will officially end upon completion of the rites. Peace will exist between the clan of Terrans and that of Gooksyu-Gubru. Do you object to this, young one?”
“No.” Fiben shook his head. “Not to that. I just want to know this: Do we absolutely have to accept the sponsors’ choice as our representatives?”
The Gubru emissary immediately squawked indignantly. The chims looked at one another in surprise. Irongrip muttered, “When this is over, I’m gonna take that little frat boy an’...”
The Examiner waved for silence. Its many-faceted eyes focused upon Fiben. “Young one, what would you do, were it up to you? Would you have us put it to a vote of your peers?”
Fiben bowed. “I would, your honor.”
This time the Gubru’s shriek was positively painful to the ear. Gailet tried once again to step forward, but Irongrip held her arm tightly. She was forced to stand there, listening to the Probationer’s muttered curses.
The Serentini official spoke at last. “Although I am sympathetic, I cannot see how I can allow your request. Without precedent—“
“But there is precedent!”
It was a new, deep voice, coming from the dim slope behind the officials. From the crowd of Galactic visitors four figures now emerged into the light, and if Gailet had felt surprise before, now she could only stare in disbelief.
Uthacalthing!
The slender Tymbrimi was accompanied by a bearded human mel whose ill-fitting formal robe had probably been borrowed from some bipedal but not quite humanoid Galactic and was thrown over what seemed to be animal skins. Beside the young man walked a neo-chimp who had obvious trouble standing completely erect and who bore many of the stigmata of atavism. The chim hung back when they approached the clearing, as if he knew he did not belong on this ground.
It was the fourth being—a towering figure whose bright, inflated crest ballooned upward in dignity—who bowed casually and addressed the Grand Examiner.
“I see you, Cough*Quinn’3 of the Uplift Institute.”
The Serentini bowed back. “I see you, honored Ambassador Kault of the Thennanin, and you, Uthacalthing of the Tymbrimi, and your companions. It is pleasant to witness your safe arrival.”
The big Thennanin spread his arms apart. “I thank your honor for allowing me to use your transmitting facilities to contact my clan, after so long an enforced isolation.”
“This is neutral ground,” the Uplift official said. “I also know that there are serious matters regarding this planet which you wish to press with the Institute, once this ceremony is at an end.
“But for now, I must insist we maintain pertinence. Will you please explain the remark you made on your arrival?”
Kault gestured toward Uthacalthing. “This respected envoy represents the race which has served as stage consort and protector to the neo-chimpanzees ever since their wolfling patrons encountered Galactic society. I shall let him tell you.”
All at once Gailet noticed how tired Uthacalthing looked. The tym’s usually expressive tendrils lay flat, and his eyes were set close together. It was with obvious effort that he stepped forward and offered a small, black cube. “Here are the references,” he began.
A robot came forward and plucked the data out of his hand. From that instant the Institute’s staff would be inspecting the citations. The Examiner herself listened attentively to Uthacalthing.
“The references will show that, very early in Galactic history, Uplift Ceremonies evolved out of the Progenitors’ desire to protect themselves from moral fault. They who began the process we now know as Uplift frequently consulted with their client races, as humans do with theirs, today. And the clients’ representatives were never imposed upon them.”
Uthacalthing gestured toward the assembled chims.
“Strictly speaking, the ceremonial sponsors are making a suggestion, when they make their selection. The clients, having passed all the tests appropriate to their stage, are legally permitted to ignore the choice. In the purest sense, this plateau is their territory. We are here as their guests.”
Gailet saw that the Galactic observers were agitated. Many consulted their own datawells, accessing the precedents Uthacalthing had provided. Polylingual chatter spread around the periphery. A new floater arrived, carrying several Gubru and a portable communications unit. Obviously, the invaders were doing furious research of their own.
All this time the power of the hyperspace shunt could be felt building just upsjope. The low rumbling was now omnipresent, making Gailet’s tendons quiver in imposed rhythm.
The Grand Examiner turned to the nominal human official, Cordwainer Appelbe. “In the name of your clan, do you support this request for a departure from normal procedure?”
Appelbe bit his lower lip. He looked at Uthacalthing, then at Fiben, then back at the Tymbrimi Ambassador. Then, for the first time, the man actually smiled. “Hell, yes! I sure do!” he said in Anglic. Then he blushed and switched to carefully phrased Galactic Seven. “In the name of my clan, I support Ambassador Uthacalthing’s request.”
The Examiner turned away to hear a report from her staff. When she came back the entire hillside was hushed. Suspense held them all riveted until she bowed to Fiben.
“Precedent is, indeed, interpretable in favor of your request. Shall I ask your comrades to indicate their choice by hand? Or by secret ballot?”
“Right!” came an Anglic whisper. The young human who had accompanied Uthacalthing grinned and gave Fiben a thumbs-up sign. Fortunately, none of the Gajactics were looking that way to witness the impertinence.
Fiben forced a serious expression and bowed again. “Oh, a hand vote will do nicely, your honor. Thank you.”
Gailet was more bemused than anything as the election was held. She tried hard to decline her own nomination, but the same captation, the same implacable force that had kept her from speaking earlier made her unable to withdraw her name. She was chosen unanimously.
The contest for male representative was straightforward as well. Fiben faced Irongrip, looking calmly up into the tall Probationer’s fierce eyes. Gailet found that the best she could make herself do was abstain, causing several of the others to look at her in surprise.
Nevertheless, she almost sobbed with relief when the poll came in nine to three ... in favor of Fiben Bolger. When he finally approached, Gailet sagged into his arms and sobbed.
“There. There,” he said. And it wasn’t so much the cliche as the sound of his voice that comforted her. “I told you I’d come back, didn’t I?”
She sniffed and rubbed away tears as she nodded. One cliche deserved another. She touched his cheek, and her voice was only slightly sardonic as she said, “My hero.”
The other chims—all except the outnumbered Probies -- gathered around, pressing close in a jubilant mass. For the first time it began to look as if the ceremony just might turn into a celebration after all.
They formed ranks, two by two, behind Fiben and Gailet, and started forth along the final path toward the pinnacle where, quite soon, there would be a physical link from this world to spaces far, far away.
That was when a shrill whistle echoed over the small plateau. A new hover car landed in front of the chims, blocking their path. “Oh, no,” Fiben groaned. For he instantly recognized the barge carrying the three Suzerains of the Gubru invasion force.
The Suzerain of Propriety looked dejected. It drooped on its perch, unable to lift its head even to look down at them. The other two rulers, however, hopped nimbly onto the ground and tersely addressed the Examiner.
“We, as well, wish to present, offer, bring forward ... a precedent!”
How easily is defeat snatched from the jaws of victory?
Fiben wondered about that as he stripped out of his formal robe and allowed two of the chims to rub oil into his shoulders. He stretched and tried to hope that he would remember enough from his old wrestling days to make a difference.
I’m too old for this, he thought. And it’s been a long, hard day.
The Gubru hadn’t been kidding when they gleefully announced that they had found an out. Gailet tried to explain it to him while he got ready. As usual, it all seemed to have to do with an abstraction,
“As I see it, Fiben, the Galactics don’t reject the idea of evolution itself, just evolution of intelligence. They believe in something like what we used to call “Darwinism” for creatures all the way up to pre-sentients. What’s more, it’s assumed that nature is wise in the way she forces every species to demonstrate its fitness in the wild.”
Fiben sighed. “Please get to the point, Gailet. Just tell me why I have to go face to face against that momzer. Isn’t trial-by-combat pretty silly, even by Eatee standards?”
She shook her head. For a little while she had seemed to suffer from speechlock. But that had disappeared as her mind slipped into the familiar pedantic mode.
“No, it isn’t. Not if you look at it carefully. You see, one of the risks a patron race runs in uplifting a new client species all the way to starfaring intelligence is that by meddling too much it may deprive the client of its essence, of the very fitness that made it a candidate for Uplift in the first place.”
“You mean—“
“I mean that the Gubru can accuse humans of doing this to chims, and the only way to disprove it is by showing that we can still be passionate, and tough, and physically strong.”
“But I thought all those tests—“
Gailet shook her head. “They showed that everyone on this plateau meets the criteria for Stage Three. Even” -- Gailet grimaced as she seemed to have to fight for the words -- “even those Probies are superior, at least in most of the ways Institute regulations test for. They’re only deficient by our own, quaint, Earth standards.”
“Such as decency and body odor. Yeah. But I still don’t get—“
“Fiben, the Institute really doesn’t care who actually steps into the shunt, not once we’ve passed all its tests. If the Gubru want our male race-representative to prove he’s better by one more criterion—that of ‘fitness’—well it’s precedented all right. In fact, it’s been done more often than voting.”
Across the small clearing, Irongrip flexed and grinned back at Fiben, backed up by his two confederates. Weasel and Steelbar joked with the powerful Probationer chief, laughing confidently over this sudden swerve in their favor.
Now it was Fiben’s turn to shake his head and mutter lowly. “Goodall, what a way to run a galaxy. Maybe Pratha-chulthorn was right after all.”
“What was that, Fiben?”
“Nothin’,” he said as he saw the referee, a Pila Institute official, approach the center of the ring. Fiben turned to meet Gailet’s eyes. “Just tell me you’ll marry me if I win.”
“But—“ She blinked, then nodded. Gailet seemed about to say something else, but that look came over her again, as if she simply could not find the phrases. She shivered, and in a strange, distant voice she managed to choke out five words.
“Kill—him—for—me, Fiben.”
It was not feral bloodlust, that look in her eyes, but something much deeper. Desperation.
Fiben nodded- He suffered no illusions over what Irongrip intended for him.
The referee called them forward. There would be no weapons. There would be no rules. Underground the rumbling had turned into a hard, angry growl, and the zone of “nonspace overhead flickered at the edges, as if with deadly lightning.
It began with a slow circling as Fiben and his opponent faced each other warily, sidestepping a complete circuit of the arena. Nine of the other chims stood on the upslope side, alongside Uthacalthing and Kault and Robert Oneagle. Opposite them, the Gubru and Irongrip’s two compatriots watched. The various Galactic observers and officials of the Uplift Institute took up the intervening arcs.
Weasel and Steelbar made fist signs to their leader and bared their teeth. “Go get ‘im, Fiben,” one of the other chims urged. All of the ornate ritual, all of the arcane and ancient tradition and science had come to this, then. This was the way Mother Nature finally got to cast the tie-breaking vote.
“Be-gin!” The Pila referee’s sudden shout struck Fiben’s ears as an ultrasonic squeal an instant before the vodor boomed.
Irongrip was quick. He charged straight ahead, and Fiben almost decided too late that the maneuver was a feint. He started to dodge to the left, and at barely the last moment changed directions, striking out with his trailing foot.
The blow did not finish in the satisfying crunch he’d hoped for, but Irongrip did cry out and reel away, holding his ribs. Unfortunately, Fiben was thrown off balance and could not follow up his brief opportunity. In seconds it was gone as Irongrip moved forward again, more warily this time, with murder written in his eyes.
Some days it just doesn’t pay to get out of bed, Fiben thought as they resumed circling.
Actually, today had begun when he awoke in the notch of a tree, a few miles outside the walls of Port Helenia, where plate ivy parachutes festooned the stripped branches of a winter-barren orchard. . . .
Irongrip jabbed, then punched out with a hard right. Fiben ducked under his opponent’s arm and riposted with a backhand blow. It was blocked, and the bones of their forearms made a loud crack as they met.
. . . The Talon Soldiers had shown grudging courtesy, so he rode Tycho hard until he arrived at the old prison. . . .
A fist whistled past Fiben’s ear like a cannonball. Fiben stepped inside the outstretched arm and swiveled to plant his elbow into his enemy’s exposed stomach.
. . . Staring at the abandoned room, he had known that there was very little time left. Tycho had galloped through the deserted streets, a flower dangling from his mouth. . . .
The jab wasn’t hard enough. Worse, he was too slow to duck aside as Irongrip’s arm folded fast to come around to cross his throat.
. . . and the docks had been filled with chims—they lined the wharves, the buildings, the streets, staring. . . .
A crushing constriction threatened to cut off his breath. Fiben crouched, dropping his right foot backward between his opponent’s legs. He tensed in one direction until Irongrip counterbalanced, then Fiben whirled and threw his weight the other way while he kicked out. Irongrip’s right leg slipped out from under him, and his own straining overbalance threw Fiben up and over. The Probationer’s incredible grasp held for an astonishing instant, tearing loose only along with shreds of Fiben’s flesh.
... He traded his horse for a boat, and headed across the bay, toward the barrier buoys. . . .
Blood streamed from Fiben’s torn throat. The gash had missed his jugular vein by half an inch. He backed away when he saw how quickly Irongrip found his feet again. It was downright intimidating how fast the chen could move.
. . . He fought a mental battle with the buoys, earning -- through reason—the right to pass through. . . .
Irongrip bared his teeth, spread his long arms, and let out a blood-curdling shriek. The sight and sound seemed to pierce Fiben like a memory of battles fought long, long before chims ever flew starships, when intimidation had been half of any victory.
“You can do it, Fiben!” Robert Oneagle cried, countering Irongrip’s threat magic. “Come on, guy! Do it for Simon.”
Shit, Fiben thought. Typical human trick, guilt-tripping me!
Still, he managed to wipe away the momentary wave of doubt and grinned back at his enemy. “Sure, you can scream, but can you do this?”
Fiben thumbed his nose. Then he had to dive aside quickly as Irongrip charged. This time both of them landed clear blows that sounded like beaten drums. Both chims staggered to opposite ends of the arena before managing to turn around again, panting hard and baring their teeth.
. . . The beach had been littered, and the trail up the bluffs was long and hard. But that turned out to be only the beginning. The surprised Institute officials had already started disassembling their machines when he suddenly appeared, forcing them to remain and test just one more. They assumed it would not take long to send him home again. . . .
The next time they came together, Fiben endured several hard blows to the side of his face in order to step inside and throw his opponent to the ground. It wasn’t the most elegant example of jiu-jitsu. Forcing it, he felt a sudden tearing sensation in his leg.
For an instant, Irongrip was rolling, helpless. But when Fiben tried to pounce his leg nearly collapsed.
The Probationer was on his feet again in an instant. Fiben tried not to show a limp, but something must have betrayed him, for this time Irongrip charged his right side, and when Fiben tried to backpedal, the left leg gave way.
. . . grueling tests, hostile stares, the tension of wondering if he would ever make it in time....
As he fell backward, he kicked out, but all that earned him was a grip that seized his ankle like a roller-press. Fiben scrambled for leverage, but his fingers clawed in the loose soil. He tried to slip aside as his opponent hauled him back and then fell upon him.
. . . And he had gone through all of that just to arrive here? Yeah. All in all, it had been one hell of a day. . . .
There are certain tricks a wrestler can try against a stronger opponent in a much heavier weight class. Some of these came back to Fiben as he struggled to get free. Had he been a little less close to utter exhaustion, one or two of them might even have worked.
As it was, he managed to reach a point of quasi-equilibrium. He attained a small advantage of leverage which just counterbalanced Irongrip’s horrendous strength. Their bodies strained and tugged as hands clutched, probing for the smallest opening. Their faces were pressed near the ground and close enough together to smell each other’s hot breath.
The crowd had been silent for some time. No more shouts of encouragement came, from one side or the other. As he and his enemy rocked gradually back and forth in a deadly serious battle of deceptive slowness, Fiben found himself with a clear view of the downward slope of the Ceremonial Mound. With a small corner of his awareness, he realized that the crowd was gone now. Where there had been a dense gathering of multiformed Galactics, now there was only an empty stretch of trampled grass.
The remnants could be seen hurrying downhill and eastward, shouting and gesticulating excitedly in a variety of tongues. Fiben caught a glimpse of the arachnoid Serentini, the Grand Examiner, standing amid a cluster of her aides, paying no attention any longer to the two chims’ fight. Even the Pila referee had turned away to face some growing tumult downslope.
This, after talking as if the fate of everything in the Universe depended upon a battle to the death between two chims? That same detached part of Fiben felt insulted.
Curiosity betrayed him, even here and now. He wondered. What in th’ ivorld are they up to?
Lifting his eyes even an inch in an attempt to see was enough to do it. He missed by milliseconds an opening Irongrip created as the Probationer shifted his weight slightly. Then, as Fiben followed through too late, Irongrip took advantage in a sudden slip and hold. He began applying pressure.
“Fiben!” It was Gailet’s voice, thick with emotion. So he knew that at least somebody was still paying attention, if only to watch his final humiliation and end.
Fiben fought hard. He used tricks dragged up out of the well of memory. But the best of them required strength he no longer had. Slowly he was forced back.
Irongrip grinned as he managed to lay his forearm against Fiben’s windpipe. Suddenly breath came in hard, high whistles. Air was very dear, and his struggles took on new desperation.
Irongrip held on just as urgently. His bared canines reflected bitter highlights as he panted in an open-mouthed grin over Fiben.
Then the glints faded as something occulted the lights, casting a dark shadow over both of them. Irongrip blinked, and all at once seemed to notice that something bulky had appeared next to Fiben’s head. A hairy black foot. The attached brown leg was short, as stout as a tree trunk, and led upwards to a mountain of fur. . . .
For Fiben the world, which had started to spin and go dim, came slowly back into focus as the pressure on his airpipe eased somewhat. He sucked air through the constricted passage and tried to look to see why he was still alive.
The first thing he saw was a pair of mild brown eyes, which stared back in friendly openness from a jet black .face set at the top of a hill of muscle.
The mountain also had a smile. With an arm the length of a small chimpanzee, the creature reached out and touched Fiben, curiously. Irongrip shuddered and rocked back in amazement, or maybe fear. When the creature’s hand closed on Irongrip’s arm, it only squeezed hard enough to test the chim’s strength.
Obviously, there was no comparison. The big male gorilla chuffed, satisfied. It actually seemed to laugh.
Then, using one knuckle to help it walk, it turned and rejoined the dark band that was even then trooping past the’ amazed rank of chims. Gailet stared in disbelief, and Utha-calthing’s wide eyes blinked rapidly at the sight.
Robert Oneagle seemed to be talking to himself, and the Gubru gabbled and squawked.
But it was Kault who was the focus of the gorillas’ attention for a long moment. Four females and three males clustered around the big Thennanin, reaching up to touch him. He responded by speaking to them, slowly, joyfully.
Fiben refused to make the same mistake twice. What gorillas were doing here, here atop the Ceremonial Mound the Gubru invaders had built, was beyond his ability to guess, and he wasn’t even about to try. His concentration returned just a split instant sooner than his opponent’s. When Irongrip looked back down, the Probie’s eyes betrayed instantaneous dismay as he recognized the looming shape of Fiben’s fist.
The small plateau was a cacophony, a mad scene devoid of any vestige of order. The boundaries of the combat arena did not seem to matter anymore as Fiben and his enemy rolled about under the legs of chims and gorillas and Gubru and whatever else could walk or bounce or slither about. Hardly anybody seemed to be paying them any attention, and Fiben did not really care. All that mattered to him was that he had a promise that he had to keep.
He pummeled Irongrip, not allowing him to regain balance until the chen roared and in desperation threw Fiben off like an old cloak. As he landed in a painful jolt, Fiben caught a glimpse of motion behind him and turned his head to see the Probationer called Weasel lifting his leg, preparing to strike down with his foot. But the blow missed as the Probie was grabbed up by an affectionate gorilla, who lifted him into a crushing embrace.
Irongrip’s other comrade was held back by Robert Oneagle—or, rather, held up. The male chim might have vastly greater strength than most humans, but it did him no good suspended in midair. Robert raised Steelbar high overhead, like Hercules subduing Anteus. The young man nodded to Fiben.
“Watch out, old son.”
Fiben rolled aside as Irongrip hit the ground where he had lain, sending dust plumes flying. Without delay Fiben leaped onto his opponent’s back and slipped into a half-Nelson hold.
The world spun as he seemed to ride a bucking bronco. Fiben tasted blood, and the dust seemed to fill his lungs with clogging, searing pain. His tired arms throbbed and threatened to cramp. But when he heard his enemy’s labored breathing he knew he could stand it for a little while longer.
Down, down Irongrip’s head went. Fiben got his feet around the chim and kicked the other’s legs out from under him.
The Probationer’s solar plexus landed on Fiben’s heel. And while a flash of pain probably meant several of Fiben’s toes were broken, there was also no mistaking the whistling squeak as Irongrip’s diaphragm momentarily spasmed, stopping all flow of air.
Somewhere he found the energy. In a whirl he had his foe turned over. Gripping in a tight scissors lock, he brought his forearm around and applied the same illegal-but-who-cares strangulation hold that had earlier been used on him.
Bone ground against gristle. The ground beneath them seemed to throb and the sky rumbled and growled. Alien feet shuffled on all sides, and there was the incessant squawking and chatter of a dozen jabbering tongues. Still, Fiben listened only for the breath that did not flow through his enemy’s throat . . . and felt only for the throbbing pulse he so desperately had to silence. . . .
That was when something seemed to explode inside his skull.
It was as if something had broken open within him, spilling what seemed a brilliant light outward from his cortex. Dazzled, Fiben first thought a Probationer or a Gubru must-have struck him a blow to the head from behind. But the luminance was not the sort coming from a concussion. It hurt, but not in that way.
Fiben concentrated on first priorities—holding tightly to his steadily weakening opponent. But he could not ignore this strange occurrence. His mind sought something to compare it to, but there was no correct metaphor. The soundless outburst felt somehow simultaneously alien and eerily familiar.
All at once Fiben remembered a blue light which danced in hilarity as it fired infuriating bolts at his feet. He remembered a “stink bomb” that had sent a pompous, furry little diplomat scurrying off in abandoned dignity. He remembered stories told at night by the general. The connections made him suspect . . .
All around the plateau, Galactics had ceased their multi-tongued babble and stared upslope. Fiben would have to lift his head a bit to see what so captivated them. Before he did so, however, he made certain of his foe. When Irongrip managed to drag in a few thin, desperate breaths, Fiben restored just enough pressure to keep the big chen balanced on the edge of consciousness. That accomplished, he raised his eyes.
“Uthacalthing,” Fiben whispered, realizing the source of his mental confusion.
The Tymbrimi stood a little uphill from the others. His arms opened wide and the capelike folds of his formal robe flapped in the cyclone winds circling the gaping hyperspace shunt. His eyes were set far apart.
Uthacalthing’s corona tendrils waved, and over his head something whirled.
A chim moaned and pressed her palms against her temples. Somewhere a Pring’s tooth-mashies clattered. To many of those present, the glyph was barely detectable. But for the first time in his life, Fiben actually kenned. And what he kenned named itself tutsunucann.
The glyph was a monster—titanic with long-pent energy. The essence of delayed indeterminacy, it danced and whirled. And then, without warning, it blew apart. Fiben felt it sweep around and through him—nothing more or less than distilled, unadulterated joy.
Uthacalthing poured the emotion forth as if a dam had burst. “N’ha s’urustuannu, k’hammin’t Athaclena w’thtanna!” he cried. “Daughter, do you send these to me, and so return what I had lent you? Oh, what interest compounded and multiplied! What a fine jest to pull upon your proud parent!”
His intensity affected those standing nearby. Chims blinked and stared. Robert Oneagle wiped away tears.
Uthacalthing turned and pointed up the trail leading toward the Site of Choosing. There, at the pinnacle of the Ceremony Mound, everyone could see that the shunt was connected at last. The deeply buried engines had done their job, and now a tunnel gaped overhead, one whose edges glistened but whose interior contained a color emptier than blackness.
It seemed to suck away light, making it difficult even to recognize that the opening was there. And yet Fiben knew that this was a link in real time, from this place to countless others where witnesses had gathered to observe and commemorate the evening’s events.
I hope the Five Galaxies are enjoying the show. When Irongrip showed signs of reviving, Fiben gave the Probie a whack to the side of the head and looked up again.
Halfway up the narrow trail leading to the pinnacle there stood three ill-matched figures. The first was a small neo-chimpanzee whose arms seemed too long and whose ill-formed legs were bowed and short. Jo-Jo held onto one hand of Kault, the huge Thennanin, ambassador. Kault’s other massive paw was grasped by a tiny human girl, whose blond hair flapped like a bright banner in the whirling breeze.
Together, the unlikely trio watched the pinnacle itself, where an unusual band had gathered.
A dozen gorillas, males and females, stood in a circle directly under the half-invisible hole in space. They rocked back and forth, staring up into the yawning emptiness overhead, and crooned a low, atonal melody.
“I believe ...” said the awed Serentini Grand Examiner of the Uplift Institute. “... I believe this has happened before . . . once or twice . . . but not in more than a thousand aeons.”
Another voice muttered, this time in gruff, emotion-drenched Anglic. “It’s no fair. This was s’pozed t’be our time!” Fiben saw tears streaming down the cheeks of several of the chims. Some held each other and sobbed.
Gailet’s eyes welled also, but Fiben could tell that she saw what the others did not. Hers were tears of relief, of joy.
From all sides there were heard other expressions of amazement.
“—But what sort of creatures, entities, beings can they be?” One of the Gubru Suzerains asked.
“. . . pre-sentients,” another voice answered in Galactic Three.
“. . . They passed through all the test stations, so they had to be ready for a stage ceremony of some sort,” mumbled Cordwainer Appelbe. “But how in the world did goril—“
Robert Oneagle interrupted his fellow human with an upraised hand. “Don’t use the old name anymore. Those, my friend, are Garthlings”
lonization filled the air with the smell of lightning. Uthacalthing chanted his pleasure at the symmetry of this magnificent surprise, this great jest, and in his Tymbrimi voice it was a rich, unearthly sound. Caught up in the moment, Fiben did not even notice climbing to his feet, standing to get a better view.
Along with everyone else he saw the coalescence that took place above the giant apes, humming and swaying on the hilltop. Over the gorillas’ heads a milkiness swirled and began to thicken with the promise of shapes.
“In the memory of no living race has this happened,” the Grand Examiner said in awe. “Client races have had countless Uplift Ceremonies, over the last billion years. They have graduated levels and chosen Uplift consorts to assist them. A few have even used the occasion to request an end of Uplift ... to return to what they had been before. ...”
The filminess assumed an oval outline. And within, dark forms grew more distinct, as if emerging slowly from a deep fog.
“. . . But only in the ancient sagas has it been told of a new species coming forth of its own will, surprising all Galac-
tic society, and demanding the right to select its own patrons.”
Fiben heard a moan and looked down to see Irongrip beginning to rise, trembling, to his elbows. A cruor of blood-tinted dust covered the battered chen from face to foot.
Got to hand it to him. He’s got stamina. But then, Fiben did not imagine he himself looked a whole lot better.
He raised his foot. It would be so easy. ... He glanced aside and saw Gailet watching him.
Irongrip rolled over onto his back. He looked up at Fiben in blank resignation.
Aw, hell. Instead he reached down and offered his hand to his former foe. I don’t know what we were fighting over. Somebody else got the brass ring, anyway.
A moan of surprise rippled through the crowd. From the Gubru came grating wails of dismay. Fiben finished hauling Irongrip to his feet, got him stable, then looked up to see what the gorillas had wrought to cause such consternation.
It was the face of a Thennanin. Giant, clear as anything, the image hovering in the focus of the hyperspace shunt looked enough like Kault to be his brother.
Such a sober, serious, earnest expression, Fiben thought. So typically Thennanin.
A few of the assembled Galactics chattered in amazement, but most acted as if they had been frozen in place. All except Uthacalthing, whose delighted astonishment still sparked in all directions like a Roman candle.
“Z’wurtin’s’tatta. . . . I worked for this, and never knew!”
The titanic image of the Thennanin drifted backward in the milky oval. All could see the thick, slitted neck, and then the creature’s powerful torso. But when its arms came into view, it became clear that two figures stood on either side of it, holding its hands.
“Duly noted,” the Grand Examiner said to her aides. “The unnamed Stage One client species tentatively called Garthlings have selected, as their patrons, the Thennanin. And as their consorts and protectors, they have jointly chosen the neo-chimpanzees and humans of Earth.”
Robert Oneagle shouted. Cordwainer Appelbe fell to his knees in shock. The sound of renewed Gubru screeching was quite deafening.
Fiben felt a hand slip into his. Gailet looked up at him, the poignancy in her eyes now mixed with pride.
“Oh, well,” he sighed. “They wouldn’t have let us keep ‘em, anyway. At least, this way, we get visitation rights. And I hear the Thennanin aren’t too bad as Eatees go.”
She shook her head. “You knew something about these creatures and didn’t tell me?”
He shrugged. “It was supposed to be a secret. You were busy. I didn’t want to bother you with unimportant details. I forgot. Mea culpa. Don’t hit, please.”
Briefly, her eyes seemed to flash. Then she, too, sighed and looked back up the hill. “It won’t take them long to realize these aren’t really Garthlings, but creatures of Earth.”
“What’ll happen then?”
It was her turn to shrug. “Nothing, I guess. Wherever they come from, they’re obviously ready for Uplift. Humans signed a treaty—unfair as it was—forbidding Earthclan to raise ‘em, so I guess this’ll stand. Fait accompli. At least we can play a role. Help see the job’s done right.”
Already, the rumbling beneath their feet had begun to diminish. Nearby, the cacophony of Gubru squawking rose in strident tones to replace it. But the Grand Examiner appeared unmoved. Already she was busy with her assistants, ordering records gathered, detailing followup tests to be made, and dictating urgent messages to Institute headquarters.
“And we must help Kault inform his clan,” she added. “They will no doubt be surprised at this news.”
Fiben saw the Suzerain of Beam and Talon stalk off to a nearby Gubru flyer and depart at top speed. The boom of displaced air ruffled the feathers of the avians who “remained behind.
It happened then that Fiben’s gaze met that of the Suzerain of Propriety, staring down from its lonely perch. The alien stood more erect now. It ignored the babbling of its fellows and watched Fiben with a steady, unblinking yellow eye.
Fiben bowed. After a moment, the alien politely inclined its head in return.
Above the pinnacle and the crooning gorillas—now officially the youngest citizens of the Civilization of the Five Galaxies—the opalescent oval shrank back into the narrowing funnel. It diminished, but not before those present were treated to yet one more sight none had ever seen before . . . one they were not likely ever to see again.
Up there in the sky, the image of the Thennanin and those of the chim and human all looked at each other. Then the Thennanin’s head rocked back and he actually laughed.
Richly, deeply, sharing hilarity with its diminutive partners, the leathery figure chortled. It roared.
Among the stunned onlookers, only Uthacalthing and Robert Oneagle felt like joining in as the ghostly creature above did what Thennanin were never known to do. The image kept right on laughing even as it faded back, back, to be swallowed up at last by the closing hole in space and covered by the returning stars.