Migration: Species Imperative #2

by Julie E. Czerneda

  Blackmail—very civil and reasonable—blackmail. Was Mudge worth it? Mac didn’t hesitate. “I agree, of course. I’ll let him know.” Then, more as a test than anything else: “If I think of anyone else who might be of help, what should I do?”

  “By all means, let me know at once, Mac. I will consider every suggestion.” If there was a hint of irony in the voice, Mac was willing to ignore it. “If there is nothing else? Then I will leave you to your preparations, Mac. Arslithissiangee Yip the Fourteenth.” Her long-toed feet made virtually no sound on the tiled terrace, less on the sand.

  Fourteen went back to the table. “Idiot.”

  “Me?” Mac joined him, eyeing the complex of workscreens still displayed over the pair of imps he’d laid out. “Why?”

  He gave his vest a proud tug. “You didn’t check the clothing before she left. What if it doesn’t fit?”

  She grinned. “Irrelevant. I’ll walk beside you and no one will notice me.” Fourteen barked his laugh. “So what’s all this?” asked Mac, waving at the displays but careful to keep her fingers out of them.

  “This,” he slid one of the imps closer to her, “is for you. I accessed your messages—oh, don’t rumple your face. I didn’t read them.”

  “I didn’t rumple—” Mac began.

  Another laugh. “I’ve loaded it with schematics for the consulate—at least those areas for which the Sinzi provide schematics. You will find the latest list of attendees—again, those the Sinzi wish known to all, as well as some information about each. Our number is presently four hundred and thirteen beings. I counted Anchen as one. Hmm. Four hundred and twenty-three, if you count the Nerban translators who travel with each of the Umlar delegates. Their mouthparts can’t handle Instella. Idiots refuse to use appliances.”

  Never put a Nerban and a Frow in the same taxi . . . Mac shook off the memory of Emily’s voice. “Any external genitalia I should know about?”

  That sly look. “Didn’t you bring your drugs?”

  She grinned. “I see you’re back to normal. Thanks for this.” Mac picked up the imp. She turned it over in her hands. Not much to see on the outside. A palm-length dark cylinder, stubbier than the Human version, but otherwise plain. She spotted what should be the activation pad and looked inquiringly at Fourteen.

  “Your first entry locks in your code,” he assured her. “Do it once, then repeat.”

  Automatically, Mac tapped in the code from her imp at Base. She almost changed her mind, then shrugged and repeated it. Odds were good she’d forget a new one anyway.

  The workscreen was crisper than hers, but either the Myg used the Human interface or he’d preset this one to suit her vision. And hers, Mac admitted to herself, had been in the water more than a few times, let alone its trips with her through no-space to the Dhryn worlds. Mac put the device on the table, then drew a finger through its display to lift it to vertical from horizontal. No problem accessing the data Fourteen had provided. Mac held her breath.

  The consulate schematics were visual representations of rooms and corridors. Furniture was absent—reasonable enough, furniture was often moved—but there were symbols showing each room’s function floating within it. Mac was entranced. Someone, more likely several someones, had gone to a great deal of trouble to design symbolic representations of functions not necessarily shared—or done the same way—by different species. The washroom symbol alone was a master-piece of tactful suggestion.

  The rest?

  Text. Text. Text. None of it more legible than the IU’s letter. Mac poked through the ’screen until she found the audio option. A selection began reading itself to her. In Fourteen’s distinctive, somewhat gravelly voice. Stopping it, she looked through the display at him. The Myg appeared remarkably smug. “My entire family adores my reading voice,” he proclaimed.

  “No offense, but since I’m neither a relative nor a Myg, how do I change it?”

  His generous lips actually pouted. As likely mimicry as a shared expression, Mac decided. “We’d need a recording of another voice. Does it matter? Who uses audio anyway?”

  She hadn’t told him about having trouble reading. Or Kay. Or Mudge. Or anyone who didn’t already know or have to know, for that matter.

  It had been possible to hide it at Base, where Mac knew everything and everyone.

  Here?

  She needed help.

  Might as well start asking now.

  “I suffered more damage than losing an arm and hand, last fall.” As she spoke, Mac focused on the display, finding a visual list of delegates and starting to scroll through their faces—or what corresponded to a face. “My language center was affected. You heard me telling Oversight that I can speak and read Dhryn. That’s true. What I didn’t tell him—” Mac considered the possibility others were listening and nodded to herself. They’d have to take her as she was. Bent. A bit scuffed. But capable. “—I didn’t tell him it’s now very difficult for me to read anything else. I can muddle through English and Instella. Sometimes. Others, the words fragment in front of my eyes.” She was startled by her own face in the list and closed the display. “So you see, it does matter. I find it less—frustrating—if it’s my voice reading to me.”

  “Who have you consulted about this? Other than Humans.”

  Mac blinked at Fourteen. He seemed serious. “Who else would I consult?” The Ro? “Besides, with all that happened—is happening—my own government wasn’t about to let me wander too far.”

  “They no longer have jurisdiction over you. Discuss this problem with Noad. The Sinzi, as you might gather, are exceptional neurologists.”

  There was an idea that qualified as terrifying, Em. “I’ll think about it.” Mac stood. “First things first. I need to get ready to meet the masses, Fourteen, not to mention talk to Oversight.” A conversation she wasn’t looking forward to.

  “I will help you choose appropriate clothing.”

  Mr. Paisley Shorts? Mac shook her head. “Out. I can manage. I need you to check in with Oversight—make sure he’s ready for this. Please.”

  “Of course.” Fourteen stood, then gave a bow from the waist, deep and prolonged. When he straightened, Mac was surprised to see moisture beading his thick eyelids, and his mouth working with some emotion. “What’s wrong?” she asked.

  “Noad has assured me that, with my wounds, I would not have survived that night alone. I’d set the temperature too low in my panic; I was too weak to voluntarily awake from torpor. By warming me, you saved my life.”

  “Lucky guess, believe me.”

  “It was not a guess when you continued to protect my life with yours, even when injured yourself. You could have left immediately. You could have left in the morning and sought safety for yourself. You didn’t.” He stopped and placed both hands over his eyes. “I, Arslithissiangee Yip the Fourteenth, cannot thank you, Mackenzie Connor of Little Misty Lake, for saving my valued life,” he said formally, lowering his hands again to look at her. “Twice.”

  “I don’t need—”

  He frowned at her and she closed her mouth. Not done.

  Hands over his eyes. “I, Arslithissiangee Yip the Fourteenth, can only offer my firstborn offspring to you, Mackenzie Connor of Little Misty Lake, in return for saving my valued life.”

  Mac’s eyes widened in shock. “No, I—”

  Hands down. Another, sterner look. She closed her mouth again.

  Hands up. “But since I, Arslithissiangee Yip the Fourteenth, have not yet produced an offspring and do not, in fact, ever intend to do so unless forced by my grandsires or in a weak moment under the influence of illicit drugs, I can only offer you my allegiance, flesh, mind, and spirit, so long as I may live, in return for saving my valued life.”

  Mac waited.

  Hands down. “That’s all of it,” advised Fourteen, sounding normal again. “Tradition. Sorry about that.”

  She lifted one eyebrow. “A simple ‘thank you’ would have sufficed.”

  The Myg tucked his i
mp back in its case. “Idiot,” he commented fondly. “Of course not. Within my sect, only ethical acts can move a lineage into the highest possible strobis. You do know the word?” Mac shook her head. “The closest Instella equivalent is ‘class.’ Irrelevant. To all Myg, strobis is the measure of a life’s value to the whole. Actions determine that value. We act according to the allegiances we hold, to ideals, to others of our kind, very rarely to an alien. Allegiance must flow toward greater value; it is thus not given lightly.” That sly look. “Though there is a recent trend, much deplored by my grandsires, to offer allegiance to favorite sports teams.”

  In a Human, thought Mac, she’d assume he was trying to lighten the moment. For her sake or his? Regardless of species, this was obviously a significant commitment for the Myg.

  She just wasn’t sure what to do about it.

  Fourteen reached out and tapped her nose. “It was a joke.”

  “I got that,” Mac said dryly. “I’m honored, Fourteen, by your allegiance. I don’t see how I deserve it.”

  “Irrelevant. It’s for me to give, not you to deserve. Enough. Traditions waste time. I try to tell my grandsires, but they never listen to me. You, Mac, must dress. I will go and see if the valued Mudge has done the same.”

  “Tell him I’ll be right over.”

  After Mac closed the doors behind Fourteen, she ran her fingers along what felt to be painted wood and frosted glass. No guarantees about the materials, but the style was vintage Human. Nice to be reminded the transfer of culture and knowledge went both ways.

  She took out her new imp and sank into the jelly-chair. Messages. Setting her ’screen hovering above her, Mac hunted until she found the very short list. Three—she squinted—likely meeting announcements. One that seemed intended for someone named Recko San. Mac deleted that, having enough to struggle with as it was. And one more.

  The source was marked ‘personal,’ with no return. A recording, not text. Her hand trembled slightly as she activated it.

  “Hello, Mac.” Nik’s voice.

  She stopped it immediately.

  Coward.

  Emily’s judgment or her own?

  Mac restarted the recording. “Hello, Mac. The complete text of your letter from the IU follows. I’ve indicated the clauses I feel you need to pay particular attention to, but the overall gist is that you’ve accepted citizenship within the IU for the purposes and duration of the Gathering. Within that framework, you are protected and governed by intersystem law . . .”

  Eyes closed, Mac lay back in the chair to listen, feet tucked up. His voice flowed over her, as intimate a caress as the warm waves that kissed her toes in summer. The words didn’t matter, not right now. She’d pay attention to meanings later. For now, she relaxed and let herself own this, own the sounds that had left his mouth, come from his throat, sounds meant for her.

  All too soon, it was done. Mac resisted the temptation to listen again. Instead, she put away her imp and went to stand where she could see the distant horizon, a line of deepest blue against the sky, a hint of cloud marring its edge. She wrapped her arms around herself. It could be land. She’d have to see a map to know for sure.

  As for Fourteen?

  Here we go again, Em, she thought.

  If she’d understood Fourteen correctly, an alien she’d come to view as a friend had just sworn to be her ally for life. It was a promise that didn’t always work out well.

  Her lips moved silently. “Lamisah.”

  As daunting settings went, Mac decided, the consulate’s “greeting arena” wasn’t as bad as say, the busy loading docks of an orbiting way station.

  The noise level and utter confusion to the unfamiliar was, however, even worse.

  “Where do we go from here?” Mudge shouted in her ear.

  Mac pointed helplessly at Fourteen, who was pushing his way though the throng clogging the ramp. “Follow him.”

  “I still haven’t agreed to all this, Norcoast,” another shout.

  She nodded. Mudge had been predictably reluctant to commit himself. This was, after all, the man who routinely took six long months to renew a research proposal he’d approved for the previous three years’ running. Accepting an invitation to leave his work and join an alien conference? She’d allow him a little time for that decision, even if the outcome was, as far as she was concerned, never in doubt. With Oversight, a push always produced the opposite reaction.

  That he was willing to come along this morning without being dragged was, Mac judged, a significant accomplishment for their first day. Given the Ministry somehow had him under surveillance, probably a device in his clothing, she only hoped Mudge would watch his tongue.

  Suggesting he do so? She shuddered at the likely consequences.

  The consulate’s greeting arena wasn’t a room or hall. They’d followed Fourteen outside to where a sequence of gardens connected the protected east side of the complex to the true wilderness of the mountains behind, manicured slopes merging into the massive upward steps of the rising hills. The plantings had the tired, proud look of fall, more seed heads than buds, those leaves intending to drop rattling and loose on the trees. The air was warmer than crisp, but not by much. The building itself protected them from the rising wind, but if the sun hadn’t been shining, they’d all need coats.

  Those without a natural version, anyway. “This,” Mac decided after her first incredulous look at the host of beings spread over the patio below them, “is a caterer’s nightmare.”

  There were so many different aliens milling in front of them, and so many different types of the same aliens, Mac didn’t attempt to dredge up the names of any she might have studied. It’s a masquerade ball, Em. With her and Mudge the only ones not in costume, from their viewpoint anyway.

  Although she was well-dressed. Mac smoothed the front of the jacket that had been one of the choices hanging on the rack she’d found in the sitting room. Midnight blue, knee-length, tailored to perfection. With, she was delighted to discover, pockets. There’d been pants to match, flat shoes, and everything else, including a comb, to make her comfortable—and ready for inspection.

  Her clothes from the cabin lay clean and folded on a counter in the washroom itself. She’d found the invitation from the IU in her shirt where she’d stuffed it, no worse for whatever laundry technique the consulate staff used. Or they’d taken the envelope out and replaced it. The owl pellet was gone. Just as well.

  Mac patted her left jacket pocket. Both envelope and the imp from Fourteen were there.

  An elbow dug into her back. “He’s getting ahead of us,” Mudge fussed. Mac barely avoided stepping on someone’s flipper but stayed in place.

  “Don’t worry. I still see him. Hang on,” she ordered.

  The central consular building, itself a mammoth warren of halls and varied internal environments, sprawled behind them. Where they stood, at the top of the ramp leading to the gardens, was high enough to afford a good view of the grounds.

  Although it had seemed a kaleidoscope of moving, fragmented colors, Mac gradually made sense of what she was seeing. The main arena was a sunken patio, irregular in shape and bordered by stately trees to the left and right. Several shaded paths led off to either side. Farthest from them was a set of broad terraces cut from the granite, rising like giant stairs to another garden above this one. The result was a bowllike space, capable of holding, barely, what appeared to be far more than four hundred and something delegates.

  Within that space were three main clusters of activity. The first, to the left, focused around a series of clear bubblelike structures. Ah, Mac decided, intrigued. Non-oxy-breathers . Clever.

  The next was in the center, around a series of curved, elaborate fountains. Mac took a closer look. The fountains themselves overflowed with delegates.

  Made sense. There were several aquatic species in the IU. First group she wanted to meet, Mac decided.

  Last and the most popular area, judging by the sea of heads, was near the first terr
ace, to the right. Mac didn’t need to glimpse the long tables in the shade of the trees to know this was where food and beverages were being provided. She smiled. Never met an academic who couldn’t find the bar, Em.

  The noise—and the smell—at close range? Mac began to suspect at least one reason the Sinzi held these mass meetings outside.

  “There he is, Norcoast. He’s waving to us. Can we go now?”

  Looking ahead at the crowd, Mac put her arm through Mudge’s. “Lead on.”

  After making their way through a bewildering mixture of body forms, they reached Fourteen, who was standing under the first of the great trees. Mac noticed Mudge sneaking looks into its branches, despite the truly fascinating aliens to every side, muttering to himself: “Silver beech. Southern species . . . bigger than the ones I saw in Argentina. More podocarps—rimu, I’d say—aha!” Mudge tugged at her arm and exclaimed. “Tui!”

  Mac guessed this wasn’t a sneeze. “Pardon?”

  “Look, up there.”

  Obediently, she craned her neck back. The lowermost branch, just above a group of intensely debating delegates, contained a fairly large, albeit nondescript bird, with white feathers at its throat. “Tui?” she guessed.

  “Shhh. Listen.”

  As that seemed improbable, given the volume from all sides, Mac shook her head, but tried anyway. Nothing. Then, she noticed delegates under the bird suddenly looking up as well, which in their case, being Frow, meant unfolding their neck ridges and leaning left.

  Then she heard it and grinned. The bird was mimicking Frow laughter, something like rattling coins in a bucket. The delegates were not impressed.

  Welcome to Earth.

  “Trees. Birds. Idiots. Wasting time,” Fourteen said impatiently. “Come. The first of those you should meet is over there.”

  At that moment, a large group of brown-cloaked furry somethings stampeded by everyone else, as if it had been announced the bar was about to close for the day. Doing her best not to be swept along, trampled, or pushed into the already testy Frow, Mac dodged to one side.