Beetle Juice

by Piers Anthony

She took one look and screamed.

  What?

  “I can’t do it!” she cried. “I thought I could, I wanted to, I want to get a baby, but I can’t!”

  It was the virgin syndrome. In his eagerness he had let it slip his mind: virgins were not eager for sex with him. They had to be wooed, cajoled, persuaded, seduced, and then it wasn’t certain. The process normally took days or weeks. No such time was available here.

  “Damn,” he muttered, turning away.

  “Wait!” Pisa cried. “I can’t do it, but you can! Jump on me, hold me down, do it!”

  “I can’t do that. It’s rape.”

  “But men do that all the time to women. Some of our villagers have been raped. I really want my baby. Make me have it.”

  “I can’t,” he repeated. “Neither morally nor physically. Because it would be wrong, and because I can’t force any woman, let alone a virgin.”

  “But can’t a virgin make you do anything she wants?”

  “Yes. But you don’t want this.”

  “Yes I do! My spirit is willing. It’s my body that’s weak. My bees know it. See, they’re not angry.” She was right; the bees were resting on and in the hive.

  “You want a baby,” Wetzel said. “You know you have to have sex to get it. But you don’t want sex with me. You are not willing. That stops me, as you can see.” He stood there with his penis limp.

  “Oh, fudge!” Now she wept, her tears flowing copiously. “Please, I beg you. Can’t you try?”

  “No more than you can.”

  “I’ll try!” she said. “I’ll close my eyes and pretend you’re a doctor.”

  “No.”

  “Or we can make it a game. The girls have rape fantasies. They want to be taken against their seeming will, but they really love it. Let me be the captive maiden and you the ardent hero. Come kiss me hard, and press against me, and I will melt.”

  Would that work? The pretense of a game? “All right.”

  He joined her on the bed, embraced her, and kissed her. She kissed him back, savagely. She pressed her lovely bare body against him.

  His member swelled. It nudged her cleft.

  She felt it and screamed.

  So much for that. “I’ll take you back to the village,” he said.

  “Yes,” she agreed, sobbing. She put on her dress. “Why did you have to be a unicorn?”

  “It’s my curse,” Wetzel said. “I could readily have made it with a non-virgin.”

  “You’re a decent guy,” she said as they went outside. “Too decent. If you had just forced me a little—”

  “Impossible.”

  She paused. “Or could I force you? Suppose you just lie there, and I take the initiative.”

  “It wouldn’t work.”

  “Come on. Let’s try anyway.”

  Wetzel sighed inwardly. She would have to be shown.

  They went back inside, and she stripped again. He lay on the bed on his back. She sat beside him and played with his member, making it respond. He was surprised she could do that. It seemed it wasn’t the body that repelled her, but the act.

  When she had him stiff, she mounted him. But the moment her cleft touched his member, she screamed again. His member sagged. She wasn’t conscious of making a turn-off signal, but was doing it naturally. “I can’t do it!” she wailed.

  “You can’t do it,” he agreed. “Neither can I. It’s the way it is, with a virgin and a unicorn. If we had a week it would be possible. I have done it with other virgins, when there was time. But never in hours, let alone minutes.”

  “Maybe your mission will take a week.”

  “Maybe it will.”

  “I’ll keep trying.”

  “That’s fine.”

  They went back outside, he transformed, she mounted, and he carried her back to the village. By then her bees had mopped up her tears and made her face presentable. They reentered the hall, where the dancing continued.

  Wetzel saw Pinkie glance their way, nodding. He read it in her mind: The woman had known when they left, and that this would happen. She had let the girl learn the way she had to.

  Another girl approached him. “I’m not a virgin,” she murmured. “I too want a baby.” Her red ants were not alarmed.

  But Wetzel had had enough for this night. “Some other time.”

  “Squish it,” she swore, turning away.

  In due course the dance concluded, and they returned to their house to sleep.

  “You fools passed up more hot chances,” Vanja said. “If they were men, I’d have taken them all on.”

  “I would not,” Veee said.

  “Which is why I didn’t,” Tod said.

  Wetzel felt the feather touch again. He touched his head with a finger, warning the others. They all put dangerous thoughts into their storm cellars.

  The men had depended on a mechanical bug, and a door alarm. The women were using neither of these things—the team had quietly checked—but evidently had their own way to keep track. But they didn’t know about Wetzel’s telepathy. That was perhaps just as well. They were no more to be trusted than the men.

  “Tomorrow we commune with the insects,” Tod said. “Let’s hope it gets us farther than before.”

  “Let’s hope,” Wizard agreed. “Pinkie said the insects are mildly telepathic. I presume that goes for the scarabs too. So they may indeed verify that we are here to help them.”

  “If we can,” Tod said.

  “The Amoeba sent us. That indicates that we can.”

  But could they really? Wetzel wasn’t sure, and knew the others shared his doubt. This was a totally different mission from the last, requiring untested capacities. He had not been on the last one, but understood it had been a serious physical threat to animals and villagers alike, from a protoplasmic pool. Telepathy seemed to be the key this time, which meant it depended on Wetzel. He was not at all sure he was up to it.

  Meanwhile his paradoxical private quest to find a marriageable permanent virgin remained stymied. He couldn’t help himself; how could he help anyone else?

  Discouraged, he slept.

  Chapter 6

  LadyBug

  In the morning they went to commune with the bugs. Pinkie showed them to a quiet glade in the forest, and they sat or lay on the soft moss, spread moderately apart. “You may talk, rest, or sleep, as you choose,” Pinkie said. “The point is to let the bugs come to you. It may take a few minutes, or an hour, or a day. You need to stay in place until each of you has a bug.” She was not speaking facetiously or dismissively; the term “bug” included more than insects and spiders. “You will know when it happens.”

  “Thank you,” Tod said somewhat tersely.

  Pinkie departed, leaving them to their communing. “I wonder what kind of bug I’ll get?” Vanja said. “Maybe hornets. Then I could sic them on anyone who annoyed me.”

  “Or scorpions,” Wizard said. “They can be beautiful and deadly.”

  “You’re right,” Vanja said. “My type.”

  “I’d prefer butterflies,” Veee said. “They are artistic.”

  “I’d settle for the scarab,” Tod said.

  “Wouldn’t we all,” Wizard agreed. “Then we could address the next stage: how to save it from extinction.”

  “I have been thinking about that,” Veee said. “I think what it needs is a refuge somewhere in the natural universe, where it can breed without being in danger from the poachers.”

  “Poachers can get anywhere anyone else can,” Tod said.

  “That’s the problem,” Wizard said. “We need either to mask the scarab’s home planet so that the poachers can’t find it, which I strongly suspect is beyond our powers to accomplish, or locate another world that will do. Then the problem would be finding that world, and verifying that it is suitable.”

  “We can find it through the Amoeba,” Tod said. “And verify it if we have a scarab along.”

  “Which nicely validates our present quest,” Wizard said. �
�One of us must befriend a scarab.”

  “Or be befriended by it,” Veee said.

  “And what if it doesn’t choose to befriend any of us?” Vanja asked.

  They lapsed into silence, unable to answer. Wetzel lay on his back and gazed at the sky, letting his mind go blank.

  “Well, now,” Tod said.

  “You have a contact?” Veee asked.

  “Yes. I have been befriended.”

  “Out with it!” Vanja said. “By what?”

  “By ants.”

  “Ants!”

  “Specifically, fire ants. I know them from my home frame. Small, reddish, and their bite burns for hours.”

  Vanja laughed. “They find you compatible? That must say something about your nature.”

  “Actually they are hard workers, and fair protection. Pinkie is right: they seem to have a bit of telepathy, so I know their sentiment. They do find me compatible. And, actually, I find them compatible, now that I know them.”

  “It’s hilarious,” Vanja said. Then: “Oh.”

  “You’ve found your bug?” Veee said.

  “Mosquitoes.”

  They all laughed. Of course bloodsuckers would like the vampire. It did seem to serve her right.

  Then Wizard spoke. “My turn. I have been adopted by a spider. I believe it is the brown recluse, one of the most poisonous known.”

  “That figures,” Tod said. “You can use that poison in a potion.”

  “I’m not that kind of wizard. I do magic, not concoctions.”

  “But you see, now you are that kind,” Vanja said. “You have what you lack. It may be useful.”

  “Just as your mosquitoes may be useful,” Wizard retorted.”

  “Oh, my.” It was Veee. “Flies.”

  “Well, as long as we’re being brought low,” Vanja said, “join the throng.”

  “Actually, they’re rather pretty.” Veee held one up on a finger. It was bright red and black. There were different colored ones on her hair.

  “I know that kind,” Tod said. “Flower flies. Maybe the prettiest of all flies. They don’t sting; they visit flowers, like bees or butterflies.”

  “Yes,” Veee agreed. “I like them.”

  “One to go,” Vanja said. “How are you doing, Wetz? Find any grubs yet?”

  Then Wetzel felt a feather mind touch. He had a sudden revelation. It wasn’t human, it was insect! Could this be the scarab? “Give me a moment,” he said. “This may be important.”

  The others were silent, giving him that moment.

  “Who are you?” he sub-vocalized to focus his thought.

  There was no direct answer, merely an awareness of his query. It did not seem to be avoidance so much as incapacity, as though the other mind was muzzled.

  Maybe he could help. “Are you the scarab?” he asked.

  That brought a faint answer. Maybe.

  So far so good. “Have you come to join me?”

  Now there was just uncertainty.

  “Do you need to know me better?”

  Yes.

  “How can I help you to know me better?”

  Help me.

  That confused him. Maybe the bug could not answer directly. It might be complicated.

  “I am Wetzel Were-Unicorn. I am telepathic.”

  Name me.

  This remained odd, but seemed to be progress. “LadyBug.” He flashed a picture of a pretty ladybug. That was not a scarab, but perhaps they were distantly related, being flying beetles.

  There was an impression almost of humor. Forelimb.

  Wetzel considered, then lifted his right hand to hover over his face as he lay.

  A small insect flew to perch on his hand. A lovely ladybug. Exactly the kind he had pictured. Not a scarab.

  “LadyBug,” he said, addressing her. He knew she was a her; faint as it was, her mindset was female.

  Wetzel. The thought was stronger now.

  He buried his disappointment that she was not a scarab. She was his contact insect. That was what counted. “You are beautiful.”

  Look at me.

  He looked more closely, bringing her near his face. Her outline fuzzed. She was not after all a ladybug. That was merely an emulation, honoring his mental picture. He focused more intently, trying to fathom her actual shape, but the fuzz remained. “You must help me,” he said. “I can’t see you clearly.”

  Open mind.

  Oh. He had kept his mind guarded, but this was no enemy. He wanted her trust, so would have to extend his own. He released his guard, letting her in, as it were.

  Then her outline clarified. She was a bug, globular, with rounded appendages and a snout. But not just any bug. She was—

  His mind refocused, amazed.

  This was THE bug. The fractal basis. The outline of the Mandelbrot set Tod had described.

  Then he was plunging closer with his mind’s eye, seeing not just the outline, but the phenomenally intricate extensions of it in two and a half dimensions. The closer he looked the more complicated it became. It was like descending to a planet and discovering ever more of its detail as the magnification multiplied. He realized that it was no longer really his eyes that were seeing it, but his mind, his telepathic rapport. LadyBug was showing him her true form.

  Those were not hairs on the bug. They were rows of projections, each in the shape of a smaller bug, each twisting outward, forming ever-finer filaments. The bug was surrounded by jewel-like shapes composed of yet smaller and more intricate contours. They formed chains of twists, each delicately linked to the next. The connections between them were pinned by more bugs like the first one, only infinitely smaller. There seemed to be no end to it; the sequence was infinite. All of it was alive, pulsing with its own processes, shifting its finely meshing colors even as he focused. They made jewelry from the dead scarabs? They had only the crudest shell of its true éclat.

  He was lost in the sheer wonder of it.

  Wetzel.

  She was calling him. He reluctantly shut his mental gaze and returned to the macroscopic realm. “LadyBug,” he replied, gazing at his hand with the ladybug on it.

  Now you know me as no other creature not of my own kind has. You have seen me nude.

  “Thank you for that vision.” He understood perfectly what she meant. “I was lost in your beauty.”

  You lent me your mind. Then I could show you.

  “You showed me,” he agreed. “LadyBug, you are the most fascinating creature I have ever seen.”

  You are the only one of your kind to see me thus.

  “I am immensely privileged.”

  No one else must see.

  Because any human being who saw her would want to possess her, squeezing the juice from her and making the empty shell into jewelry. That could not be tolerated. But there was a question. “What of my associates? They too want to rescue you.”

  They may know of me as LadyBug, but not see my true form.

  “And how is it we are now communicating so much more effectively?”

  You are lending me your huge mind and telepathy, amplifying my own. Alone I have little mind; with you I have enough. I owe it to you.

  “Welcome to it, LadyBug.”

  Now I will perch on your head, where the contact will be strongest. I will show your associates only the ladybug form. She flew from his hand to his head as he sat up. He wasn’t sure how she flew, because her real form seemed to have no wings. For that matter, he was similarly ignorant about how she walked, because she lacked legs. Did she even have eyes to see? Ears to hear?

  I move my extensions. They are invisibly small to your gaze, but there are many, and they suffice. I can perceive the flexes in my surroundings that you refer to as light and sound. I can see and hear you well enough. My finer extensions reach into the realm of thought, enabling telepathy. Now tell your companions.

  “I will introduce you,” he agreed.

  That is good. Now the thought was remarkably strong and clear. Remember to warn them
not to reveal my presence to others. It could cost me my life.

  It could indeed. “Folks,” Wetzel said. “I want to introduce my contact, LadyBug. She is not as she appears, but must hide her true form for the sake of safety. She is a scarab, but we will refer to her only as LadyBug. We will not tell anyone else her identity, because no one else can be trusted to truly preserve her.”

  The others came to him, peering at his head. “Oh, she really is a ladybug!” Veee said. “From what I see.”

  “If I could see her as she is,” Tod asked, “would I see the Mandlebrot set?”

  “Yes, in all its infinite detail, extending from the physical basis to the nuances of thought. LadyBug is that shape, alive.”

  “I am awed.”

  I like him, as I see him reflected in your mind. I will make an exception.

  “Look closely at her,” Wetzel told Tod.

  Tod looked. His face went slack. Wetzel knew from his mind that he was falling onto the planet, appreciating its marvelous detail. He was a fan of the Mandlebrot set, and this was a spirited version.

  Enough.

  Wetzel put his hand up, interrupting Tod’s view of LadyBug. Tod’s face resumed animation. “She really is,” he breathed. “The most beautiful creature in the universe.”

  “She is,” Wetzel agreed.

  “It seems our roster is complete,” Wizard said. “Now we can organize for the mission.”

  They returned to the village. “We have been befriended,” Tod told Pinkie. “Each of us has a bug.”

  Each of them stepped before her, showing off their companions: ants, flower flies, mosquitoes, spider, and ladybug.

  “Very nice,” Pinkie said. “But no scarab.”

  “We are now able to contact the scarabs when we need to, via our friends,” Tod said. “That should suffice.”

  “I suppose it should.” She was plainly disappointed. “What is your next step?”

  “We must ponder that,” Tod said. “We are thinking of locating a secure retreat where the scarabs can mate and grow safely. This may not be easy to find.”

  “Not easy at all,” Pinkie agreed.

  They retreated to their house. “We shall need to clarify aspects with our associates,” Wizard said. “Such as can we safely take showers when they are with us?” He looked at Wetzel.