“Vess reminded me that there are certain trees and mosses and other plants that make a kind of herbicide in their roots or leaves, and this chemical keeps other trees or bushes or mosses from growing in their immediate vicinity. Sometimes it keeps all growth away, sometimes only certain growths. You have such trees on Earth, dear Benita. The black walnut tree, I believe is one. Such a compound would not be something one would look for when seeking pollutants or poisons.
“So, we sent for moss samples from the flissits of the Empresses in the neighborhood. We found that each moss was slightly different, each exuding a slightly different pheromone, each one lethal to the male sperm in any vlasiput except that of the local empress. We sent for samples of the moss in the wild and found it exuded no pheromones at all.
“This was interesting. We obtained samples of skin and flesh and fluids from the empresses and immediately hit, as you say, pay dirt. The empresses have highly individual attractant odors that are produced during their first mating flights and continue to exude during their lives, a kind of olfactory fingerprint. During the mating flights, the particular scent is fixated upon by the males. Thereafter, a mated male cannot be utilized by any other empress. It would do no good, as that empress would not have the proper pheromone.
“The odors emanate, we found, from waxy secretions created by bacteria living in pores in the empresses’ skins. The bacteria are subject to constant mutation, and thus each population of bacteria is unique. The bacteria rub off on the moss, the moss incorporates them into its own structure where they reproduce and spread radially, creating an area that is recognizable to all as the territory of that particular Empress because it smells like her.
“However, when empresses are crowded together, one empress’s scent actually abuts and interpenetrates the moss spread of one or more neighboring empresses. Inimical scents are picked up by worker Flibotsi and carried into the vicinity of the empress and the male sperm in the vlasiput are affected.
“Once we were sure how it happened, we didn’t take time to investigate the biology of the situation. It was enough to know where the problem lay, and we had no wish to infringe further upon the privacy of the Flibotsi empresses.”
“They needed to move farther apart,” suggested Chad.
Chiddy nodded. “As you saw, however, when we were orbiting the planet, the forest lands cover only a small portion of Flibotsia. The Flibotsi cannot live in the sea or on the deserts or even in the great prairies which, so we were told, had been forested until several centuries ago, when the Flibotsi sold the timber to alien lumbermen in return for transport to new colonies.”
“So there was no room for them to separate, was there?” said Benita.
“You are correct. In order to make more room between empresses, new empresses could not be allowed to mature until several old empresses had died, opening up a space. Any new empresses for which there was no vacant slot had to settle off planet, no matter how traumatic they found the journey. We also suggested that they begin reforestation of the plains to provide for future living space. Until this is well underway, the population must be very strictly controlled.
“We also suggested the immediate retirement of the more aged empresses and the roll-back of their mosses.”
“Did it work?” asked Chad.
“As you saw,” said Chiddy, “they have reduced the number of empresses by half. Each time we return, they thank us again and again for our intervention.”
The next planet was Vixbotine, a desert world full of dunes and tormented stone, interrupted here and there by fertile oases and permeated by caverns which were cool, moist, and sheltered from the sun and everlasting winds. They landed near one such cavern, were welcomed by several small, slender persons who seemed to be hollow. Their living parts, so Chiddy informed the humans in an aside, were just beneath the skin, as in a tree on Earth, while the center portion was a sound box that grew longer and larger as the Vixbot aged.
“They are, I suppose, as much vegetable as animal,” Vess said. “Those lacy things around their heads are not quite ovaries—the eggs are in the fringe—and the long leafy part on top is the flower that sheds not-quite pollen into the wind. When the pollen hits the ovary, it makes seeds, of course, and the ripened seeds have little wings that let the wind spread them to some welcoming cavern entrance. That is, unless the Vixbot wishes to plant them somewhere in particular, as many do. Between the inner cavity and the outer integument there are pump chambers which suck air in and direct it through various openings to the sound cavity, thus making both single tones and harmonics.
“The young ones are supersonic, but they are merely high pitched by the age of two, becoming soprano, alto, tenor, baritone and finally basso profundo as they age and become less and less mobile. The very oldest ones have taken root and grown long, leafy hair, so most of the truly great chorales are built around a copse of aged Vixbot who sing down to your subsonic range.”
“Will we get to hear them?” Benita asked, amazed.
“Oh, indeed. That’s why we landed here. Those great huge tree-looking things over there at the edge of the cavern are bassos profundissimos. You may not even hear the tones they sing, but you’ll feel them through your feet.”
Chad fussed with the sound recorder, setting it to record even the subsonics, and they sat in awed astonishment, not moving, barely breathing, while the concert took place. They were treated to everything from what Chiddy called a simple summer pastoral song, rather fluty, to a lament on the fall of a great ancestor, extremely profound, full of aching chords and fleeting dissonances. At various points during the music, the Vixbot struck themselves with their arms, accompanying their harmonies with percussion in complex rhythms. Chiddy had said the Vixbot choirs created the universe’s most marvelous sounds, and when Benita managed to achieve some degree of self-awareness once more—which was long after the ship had taken off again—she knew ai was right.
Chiddy gave them the choice of visiting the Thwakians or the Oumfuz, or both, explaining rather apologetically that since the Oumfuz were swamp livers, visiting them entailed unavoidable exposure to muck and fetid aromas. They chose the Thwakians, and were next plunged deep into a violet ocean dotted with verdant islands. Through the view screen they were shown the undersea tunnels, accretions like vast cables of sand netting the bottoms of the planetary sea, outside the portals of which were gardens of seaweed and small, immobile creatures. They followed one of the tunnels to its emergence on an island, where Benita and Chad were introduced to two Thwakians who emerged only partially from the tunnel, rather in the manner of hermit crabs emerging partially from their borrowed shells.
Their foreparts seemed armored, though what could be seen of the nether parts seemed naked and fragile. Chiddy explained that they ate both flora and fauna of the ocean, going out through sea locks to harvest their crops and flocks. The Thwakians explained, through Vess, that the only time they were endangered was when they emerged onto dry land, which was necessary only at the time of egg laying. Since the ocean-living form had descended from a land-living one, the young still had to hatch in the sands, under the orange sun. Once hatched, they skittered into the nearest tunnel and were thereafter quite safe.
“What danger is there?” Chad asked.
Chiddy said, “A large winged thing, analogous to your osprey or albatross. It spends most of its life in the air, coming to ground only when it, too, needs to feed or reproduce. Usually it eats fish, but it is also willing to dine on a Thwakian or a clutch of Thwaki eggs.”
The two representatives of their race were thanked for their time and trouble, and the visitors returned to their ship. “No trouble admitting them to the Confederation,” Chiddy remarked. “They are the single intelligent race on the planet, they inhabit the entire planet, and except for recurrent arguments over nest space, they are almost totally peaceable.”
Their final stop was Pistach-home, swimming in air, with its own green oceans and greener mountains and chains of silve
r lakes and vast ocher prairies and sparkling little cities.
“Beautiful,” breathed Benita, Chad nodding seriously at her side. Even from this distance, it was attractive, and as they came closer, it was obvious that it was consistently lovely. They saw deserts but no desolations, and nowhere did any fog of despoilment spew from chimneys to hang loathsomely over the land.
When they were quite near the surface on the night side, they saw three moons, one largish silvery one, two much smaller greenish-blue ones, all more or less spherical, all bearing clusters of domes, like drops of dew. Chiddy mentioned that there were also three other occupied planets in the system, one very warm and fertile farm planet in the next orbit toward the sun, one completely domed laboratory and light industry planet so far from the sun the atmosphere was frozen, and one dead rock planet, even farther out, on which all system heavy industry and asteroid smelters were located. Since all work was done by robots and no one lived there except temporary supervisors and inspectors, and since they had completely enclosed quarters with gardens attached and even a little aviary and zoo, so as not to lose track of their place in the natural world, the need for extensive antipollution programs was lessened. There were such programs, Chiddy said, even there, but they were concerned with storing dangerous substances so they should never threaten living things. Each inbound ship carried a load of disposables which was at some point released on a trajectory that would carry it into the sun.
Carlos would, so Chiddy informed them, be awakened when they were ready to leave the ship, and in the meantime he suggested that Chad and Benita should change into the appropriate caste clothing. Then they could have coffee and watch the scenery. While they were so employed, Chiddy and Vess talked unintelligibly to the authorities on their planet. It was the first time Benita had heard Pistach spoken at length, and she thought it an interesting language, full of sibilant stretches and lots of Kwa and Wak and Foum sounds. She heard their names, Benita Alvarez and Chad Riley, coupled with the terms nootch and proffe, and assumed they were being introduced prior to arrival.
Came a hiatus, during which they ate breakfast, taking their time about it, and then the conversation with the ground began again, being conducted this time, evidently, with ultimate authority.
Benita and Chad both detected concern in Chiddy’s voice, as though he did not know or recognize the voice or person he was dealing with. Benita asked Vess if anything was wrong, and he shrugged, insofar as his normal shape could shrug. The Pistach didn’t have shoulders that could go up and down. Their pseudo shrug was a kind of sideways nod accompanied by a slightly raised upper limb on that side.
As Chiddy spoke, more and more worriedly, his color betraying increasing concern, Vess, with an equally worried expression, unpacked clothing they had prepared for Carlos. He suggested that Benita get him up and dressed, which she did, though awkwardly, and with bad grace and much complaint on Carlos’s part. This ship was not as tiny as the first one she had seen—one they called a quimish, a word that means, so said Vess, to scoot or buzz about—but still tiny so far as crew space went. Chad remarked that it was a good thing trips didn’t last very long, because one could severely injure oneself trying to change trousers.
By the time Carlos was dressed, permission had been granted for the ship to land near the little community where Chiddy’s family had lived for generations. Benita asked who was meeting them, and Chiddy replied that the Pistach regarded it as the height of arrogance and rudeness to confront a newly arrived person, or one who has just been given news of a possibly disrupting happening, or one who has suffered loss. “Your newsmen on Earth,” said Chiddy, making a face, “would be regressed and reselected here on Pistach-home. I have seen them sticking their microphones into the faces of the bereaved and of the assaulted and of persons just arrested or survivors of disasters asking them how they feel, as though that were news! It is incivility of the worst sort. We would not tolerate it. One should be met, of course, and welcomed, but quietly, discreetly.”
48
on pistach home
They expected modest if any greeting, in keeping with Chiddy’s explanations of Pistach manners. Chiddy blanked the view ports and set down. They arranged themselves to depart. The outer hull split vertically, the opening widened, and they walked out into a numerous assembly: a double rank of large Pistach in an arc around the ship, several even larger ones standing close, one particularly large one coming forward, his pincers extended. Chiddy stopped dead in his tracks, staring, his mouth parts slightly agape, and murmured in a shocked voice, “T’Fees!”
Chad gave Benita a quick look. They had heard much about T’Fees. His being here, at this time, with this number of quite large and able-looking Pistach did not bode well for their mission.
T’Fees spoke. Chiddy spoke. Vess murmured to the humans:
“T’Fees is telling him not to be frightened, he intends no harm. Chiddy is asking if T’Fees will respect your status as visitors to whom hospitality is due. T’Fees says he is a rebel, not a barbarian, of course he will.”
T’Fees came forward and bowed, announcing his name, which sounded just as Chiddy had said it, Tuh-FEEZ. Without prompting, Chad pronounced Benita’s name, gesturing toward her, then introduced Carlos, then himself. As the highest caste among the three, this was proper etiquette, according to instructions before landing, given by Vess, who now suggested they bow, which they did, Chad dragging Carlos down by the arm.
T’Fees spoke, evidently questioning. Vess said he asked what the humans hoped to see while on Pistach.
Chad said they hoped to see the Fresco and the people of Pistach-home.
T’Fees spoke again, at length, and Chiddy turned pale. Pallor among the Pistach was a very light and sickish sort of green and was quite unmistakable. Chiddy was shaken.
“What?” Benita demanded of Vess.
“He says it is a good time for you to see the Fresco, for he and his people have come to clean it!”
Benita looked helplessly at Chad and he at her. At first it meant nothing to either of them, but then the words fresco and cleaning clicked in Benita’s mind, reminding her of how Chiddy had reacted when she had spoken of cleaning the Sistine Chapel, removing, in the process, interpolations that Michelangelo had never put there.
She whispered to Chad, telling him about it. “Chiddy turned quite pale at the time. Could this threatened cleaning bode something similar? Some unexpected change?”
“How long,” Chad murmured to Vess, “since the Fresco has been cleaned?”
“It has never been cleaned,” he gargled, looking down toward his lower appendages. “It is too holy to clean.”
“And do the people light candles before it?” Benita asked, still with the Sistine Chapel in mind.
“Oh,” he moaned. “Yes. Yes. Quiria of candles; veritable jecaloms of candles, over ocalecs and ocalecs of years.”
Chad didn’t get it. He bent toward her, and she whispered again. He straightened up, looking stern. “If it cleans up saying something different than they’ve always thought…?”
“Chiddy and Vess evidently think something like that could happen,” Benita muttered. “Remember the fuss over the Dead Sea Scrolls? There was all that secrecy and tabooing, remember? Because the orthodox religions were scared to death the scrolls might say something contrary to accepted theology!”
“I remember,” he muttered out of the side of his mouth. “It might be taken as a desecration. Remember what happened to Indira Gandhi after the attack on the Sikh Temple. And all the recent Moslem–Hindu riots…”
“I know,” she murmured.
T’Fees spoke again. Chiddy approached him, and the two of them moved away, talking together. Vess told the humans to stay where they were, beside the ship, as details of the visit were being worked out, then he went to join the discussion. Carlos had been standing mulishly between Chad and Benita, thus far silent but glowering with evident distaste at everyone and everything.
“I’m not going
to waste my time standing around here,” he muttered at his mother. “All these bugs can just stuff it.”
Chad turned toward him, saying almost in a whisper, “The big one is a rebel, Carlos. The other big ones are soldiers. I’m sure they have weapons. If you do something out of hand, they will probably kill you.”
Carlos tried to sneer, swiveling his eyes between Benita and Chad. Though Benita saw no reason for T’Fees to kill him, she knew the temptation. “He’s right, Carlos. If we play it cool, nobody gets hurt and we’ll be going home in a few days.” She swallowed, hoping she was right.
“All this is your fault,” he snarled angrily. “If you hadn’t gotten me mixed up in this, I wouldn’t even be here.”
Benita moved to put herself between Carlos and the multitude, keeping her voice low. “Carlos, listen. We’re not in control here. The people in control are the people you’re getting ready to insult. You can be charming when you choose to be. It would be a good idea to be charming now.”
“Or what?” he growled.
Chad said quietly, over her shoulder, “When we return, those of us on this trip will be very important people. The TV shows will be bidding for us. The publishers will want to ghostwrite books for us. If you’re smart, if you play it right and get in good with these people, you’ll end up making a lot of money.”
Carlos’s face slowly changed, and Benita kept her face perfectly empty. Why hadn’t she thought of that? Being a VIP would suit Carlos to a tee. Couple that with money, and it would be his idea of paradise! Being important, being first in line, had been on Carlos’s agenda since he learned to walk and talk.
Benita turned her face away to hide her expression. Chad reached out and squeezed her hand.
Chiddy and Vess returned. The welcoming party gathered around the tall figure of T’fees and then they strolled off, in no particular order.
The Fresco Page 38
