Alien Tongues (35 page)

Ed nodded and moved on.  Something struck me.  Though we all suspected what the doctor said was true, no one really liked to hear it.  It made the mals seem more like us.  And it was much better for our peace of mind to see them as quite insensitive creatures.  Outside of the Sperm Bank scientists, most people other than a certain portion of single fems knew very little about what mals could do.   Those single fems wanted to keep that knowledge in the privacy of their own homes, and everyone else had no wish to change that.

Finally, viewers were treated to the spectacular firing of the trailer rockets.  "Oh, Galax!" Ed remarked, "We really need to have music with that, don't we?  Mo, you have it?  Let's give it a whirl…"  The huge arcs of fire were accompanied by "My Homeland 'Cross the Void" which is a stirring anthem by itself.  Together with these visuals and the idea of some frail fem bravely fighting her way out of a death-spiral would have brought tears to many a commuter than morning.  Maybe when Al had said "heroine" he might just not have been joking…

The video switched to a feed from the tractor which had been ejected at right angles to the trailer and cabin.  Its camera had a perfect view of huge trailer and tiny cabin, drifting apart and rotating slowly in opposite directions.  It was perfect choreography with the anthem.  The enormous plume of rocket energy rotated along with the trailer and headed for the cabin.  There were muffled gasps from people in the studio as the fiery plume struck the cabin and drove it out of view.

"Professor Joy," Ed said, the studio camera showing the anchor staring, transfixed, at the still-rotating trailer with its spiral of flame.  "Can you possibly explain why Pilot Moon was not incinerated by that blast?"

"In almost any other part of the Galaxy, she would have been," the Professor replied.  "But for a long time now, some mathematics have suggested that extreme temperatures are impossible in such a gravitational field.  Instead, the surplus energy tends to become mono-directional.  In place of random motion associated with heat, it becomes linear motion parallel to the gravity field.  As a result, the energy released by combustion is dissipated more in the form of accelerating matter away from the gravity source, rather than in higher temperatures.  Hence the abnormally strong thrusts that drove the cabin to safety.  It's been nicknamed "cold propulsion" but until today we weren't sure it could exist."

"So we've just discovered a new law of physics?" Ed asked.

The Professor paused for emphasis.  "More than that.  We've just discovered how to escape quick-matter.  Interstellar travel has suddenly become much safer.  With a little bit more engineering now, these accidents will now become a thing of the past."

I turned off the program.  I had gone from fear of ridicule, to relief, to amusement, to a sneaking sense of pride, and now to unbearable guilt.  I was being lauded as a pioneer of safer space travel and it was a complete fake.  I called Al back.

"It's unbelievable," I told him.  "I just watched the Ed Row Breakfast Special."

"Not bad, was it?"  Al smirked.  "But it does get even better.  They've since discovered that you could have taken a safer route to save yourself, but it would have destroyed the information feed back to home.  So they're now saying you greatly risked your life to gain new knowledge to keep us all safe."

"Oh, stop it!"  If I heard more I was going to scream.  "Al, I need to tell you something.  It was all just an accident.  I really did nothing to save myself at all."

Al didn't even look surprised.  "Honey, I know that's how it must feel.  They can't stop analyzing Brain Bangs on the chat shows today.  Everyone who's had one says the same as you."

I wanted to say it was Ben's Brain Bang, but I knew Al had a lower opinion on mals than most people, and would only conclude I had thought of the dumbest way to avoid fame.  I needed to speak with Jo, whose analytical mind I suddenly needed for a change.  I found an excuse to end the call with Al and reached Jo.  After the expected expressions of concern and my insistence I was fine, I explained exactly what I recalled of events.  He listened without interruption, no judgment showing on his face.  When I had finished he left a few seconds' pause and then asked, "Meg, how are your feelings for Ben these days?"

I didn't like the question but I respected Jo's way of thinking.  I replied, "He's warm and cuddly.  He's gorgeous looking.  He helps me clean up stuff, and he can fix a reasonable meal.  I haven't fallen in love with him, if that's what you mean.  I am not one of those dopey fems on the afternoon chat shows."

"Oh, now you tell me," Jo said teasingly.  "Meg, you heard that Professor talking about cold propulsion.  Weird things happen inside quick-matter.  Who knows what happened to your brain function?  You say you felt exhausted and slept for twelve hours.  Let's say that in your dreams you replayed the nightmare, but with Ben acting as hero instead of you.  Somehow, the dream stuck in your long-term memory and your short-term recollection of actual events faded.  I know it sounds unlikely, but let's say it's one-thousand-to-one.  Let's say the chances of Ben having the Brain Bang is a million-to-one.   These are the only two possibilities.  That means there is a 99.9% chance that what you heard on the news is true, Meg.  That's pure math."

"Can't we clear all this up?"  I asked.  "Get a better analysis of the sounds and lip movements on the feed?"

Jo shook his head.  "Unlikely.  The feed came live from the death-spiral.  It's badly corrupted.  What little they can actually make out supports everything you've heard – and believe me they would like to know more because they'll use it in training courses for the next millennium."

"And the black box?"

"Under your feet, and incinerated.  Despite the name cold propulsion, you were still within a whisker of becoming toast yourself."

"Gal!"  Suddenly everything I took for granted about my memory was turned upside down.  I swung round in my chair.  Ben had taken the breakfast trolley but left me with more coffee.  "Jo, tell me what I should do."

"My advice is, accept the 99.9% as the truth." One corner of his mouth turned up in a small grin.  "Meg, you have some uncanny abilities.  The way you can read the aggregate thinking of ten billion fems is stranger to me than digging yourself out of quick-matter and forgetting you did it.  Now, sheer fortune has made you a star and the public want to play with you for a while.  Let them.  It's a good-news story and everyone feels a little happier.  And you'll never have to worry again about the price of a pair of shoes.  Your biography alone will make you rich."

Ben was back on the other side of the cabin, sketching just as he had done before the death-spiral.  He had walked past several times while I watched the news but had shown no interest in the video.  It seemed as if he just lived in the moment, his thoughts wholly unconnected with past events.  If I failed to acknowledge his role, what was the damage?  Certainly, Ben didn't seem to care.  Was it at all possible something like that mattered to him?  Could he even remember what he did?

"Another thing," Jo was saying.  "If you repeat the story you told me, a lot of croses are not going to like it at all.  They will be convinced it's invented, and can only assume you are some radical, half-crazy fem with an agenda to create some kind of mal equality.  You may go from hero to demon in a very short time.  And someone will file a petition to have Ben put down.  There are enough crazy laws out there to get that passed in some district, then he'll be kidnapped and taken there to the local Bank."

Truth and reality.  In one sense, they were opposites.  After talking to Jo I began sifting through my overloaded mailbox.  Some very famous names reaching out to me personally.  Some were very eligible croses.  A new, glittering world beckoned me.  Why did it make me feel such a fraud?  I hadn't told any lies.  Maybe I should just refuse to comment on what happened, let people believe what they wanted to believe.  Why was that wrong?  I looked over at Ben as be sketched busily.  Above all I had to protect him.  When I took him from the Bank I had promised myself I would help him live as long as he could.  For me, having a pet mal creates a guilty feeling anyway, like I am using him.  I have to feel I am giving something back in return.

I had doubled my vow of protecting Ben when I had discovered that Ben was so good at protecting me.  On our first trip together, I had had to stop in some forsaken fueling station which was busting at the seams with fem truckers.  Most were the short-haul variety who never strayed too far away from anywhere with a saloon in it.  Some of the fems were half my size again, with muscles that most mals wouldn't be ashamed of (if they could feel shame!)  It was a fabulous pick-up location for croses who could stomach the noise and dirt.  You could see how horny some of those fems were acting, trying to persuade the few decent-looking croses to go back to their hotel rooms with them.

I walked around one saloon with Ben, trying to find a table where we could sit and eat.   The only table with enough space was already occupied by a middle-aged cros, reading a book while he ate dinner with a knife and fork.  I asked him if it was OK if we sat at the table.  He glanced at Ben, and I could tell he wasn't very comfortable with mals, but I think he was too polite to say anything and acquiesced with a wave of his hand.  I was very tired, so decided that was good enough for us.  I was reading the menu when a large fem strode up to the table carrying two drinks.  "Hey, Sister," she said to me, "You're in my seat."

"I don't think so," I told her.  "This gentle-cros here just gave us permission to sit down." I looked at him for confirmation, then realized from his expression what must have happened.  She had been trying to chat him up, gone to get a drink, and he had been hoping she would not return – our presence being a disincentive to her, or so he thought.  Now that he was faced with her determination, he caved in cowardly fashion.

"I didn't say anything," was his pathetic response.

"Sir," I said with appropriate sarcasm, "I think your hand gesture was eloquent enough, and now it seems that this trucker-girl wasn't exactly welcome back."  I turned to her.  "Love, if he had wanted your ass in this chair, he would have made a point of saving it for you.  The fact that I'm reading the menu while he's quietly reading his book tells you something about his enthusiasm, doesn't it?"

I regretted my words the moment I said them.  I had simply been too tired to judge the mood of the fem.  She handed the drinks to some friend who had arrived beside her and then started to take a swing at me.  I was preparing to block the punch but it never arrived.  Ben was holding her arm fast.  She tried to hit him with her other hand, but he grasped that arm too.  She struggled for a moment, but realized the strength behind the holds was far more than she could handle.  Her friends clearly decided this was not worth escalating.  They all seemed shocked not only by Ben's swiftness, but the fact that nothing at all registered in his expression.  It gave the impression that he could have been capable of doing anything at that moment, and no one wanted to test just what.

The fem took a step backwards as a signal of retreat and Ben let go.  "Mals should be banned from saloons," she muttered.  "Who knows when one starts going crazy and kills someone?  And as for fems who sleep with mals…" She looked at me.  "Should be a law against such perversion.  Disgusting, it is!"

That night after my conversations with Al and Jo, as I again lay in Ben's arms, the woman's words came back to me.  There were cases of mals attacking people, but they were rare and far fewer than even among croses.  It was true that, because of their sheer strength, the results of such attacks were more serious and had very occasionally led to death.  But many people had an exaggerated sense of the danger simply because it was impossible to know at any time what a mal was thinking.  That patient, thoughtful look could mask any intention.  The powerful arms around me as I lay there could have strangled me with ease at any time.  Yet I had always felt entirely safe with my mals, because I felt I understood them.  They simply saw other humans as either caring for them or not, or threatening them or not.  They protected their carers and dealt decisively with threats.  In a world where so much human activity was contrived and ulterior, the very simplicity of mal motivation was perhaps what confused people.

I realized just then that I was not yet in the mood for sleep.  I had obviously chosen to go to bed at that time just to feel Ben's arms around me.  I sensed he had already fallen asleep.  I turned around, carefully so as not to wake him, and looked at him.  As always, like me, he was dressed in a simple night-shirt that was body-length.  I could put my hand inside the shirt and run it from the top of his shoulders down his back to his legs.  It was a wonderful contour of graceful muscle, downy hair at the small of his back and the back of his thighs.  I stared at his young face, untroubled by a single line, perfectly symmetrical in feature.  He wore a light stubble on his chin, the way I liked it.  Sometimes I would get him to massage my back with the sides of his face, giving me goose-bumps all over.

But the pleasure was wholly innocent.  The fem in the saloon couldn't have been more misinformed about a sister's relationship with her mal.  A mal had neither the power nor the knowledge to offer sexual gratification.  Those fems who thought they could get mals to perform certain tricks were quickly disabused of the notion – mals were strictly trained not to touch certain parts of the fem anatomy.  Personally, I could agree with the saloon fem that any such behavior would have felt perverted.  Despite his size and near-maturity, I was quite a bit older than Ben and felt like I was much older.  Yes, alright, there was something maternal in my attitude towards him, hardened fem trucker that I was.