The Rebel Worlds

“I see,” Flandry drawled. “Playboys versus puritans.”

She blinked, then gri

She glanced skyward. “I think Cave Discoverer’s ’bout to be created for us,” she said.

Two krippos circled down. One presumably belonged to Master Of Songs, the other to Cave Discoverer, though Flandry couldn’t tell them apart. Master Of Songs and Cave Discoverer apparently had a noga and ruka in

common.

The bird shape in the lead took stance on the platform. The companion flew off to find a noga for itself. More krippos were appearing over the trees, more rukas scampering from the woods or the house. We’ll have a regular town meeting here in a minute, Flandry anticipated.

He directed his awareness back to Kathryn and Cave Discoverer. A dialogue had commenced between them. It went haltingly at first, neither party having encountered pidgin for some years and the language of this neighborhood not being precisely identical with that which was spoken around Port Frederiksen. After a while, discourse gained momentum.

The rest of the communion arrived to watch, listen, and have the talk interpreted for them — aside from those who were out hunting or gathering, as Flandry learned later. An entity moved close to him. The ruka sprang off and approached, trailing the noga’s thick “umbilicus” across a shoulder. Blue fingers plucked at Flandry’s clothes and tried to unsheath his blaster for examination. The man didn’t want to allow that, even if he put the weapon on safety, but Kathryn might disapprove of outright refusal. Removing his homemade packsack, he spread its contents on the ground. That served to keep the rukas of several curious entities occupied. After he saw they were not stealing or damaging, Flandry sat down and let his mind wander until it got to Kathryn. There it stayed.

An hour or so had passed, the brief day was drawing to a close, when she summoned him with a wave. “They’re glad to meet us, willin’ to offer hospitality,” she said, “but dubious ’bout helpin’ us across the mountains. The dwellers yonder are dangerous. Also, this is a busy season in the forest as well as the plowland. At the same time, the communion ’ud surely like the payment I promise, things like firearms and proper steel tools. They’ll create one they call Many Thoughts and let heesh ponder the question. Meanwhile we’re invited to stay.”

Lieutenant Kapunan was especially pleased with that. Such medicines as he had were keeping his patients from getting worse, but the stress of travel hadn’t let them improve much. If he could remain here with them while the rest went after help — Flandry agreed. The march might produce casualties of its own, but if so, they ought to be fewer.

Everyone took off for the house. The humans felt dwarfed by the lumbering bulks around them: all but Kathryn. She laughed and chattered the whole way. “Kind of a homecomin’ for me, this,” she told her companions. “I’d ’most forgotten how ’scitin’ ’tis, field work on Dido, and how I, well, yes, love them.”

You have a lot of capacity to love, Flandry thought. He recognized it as a pleasing remark that he would have used on any other girl; but he felt shy about flattering this one.

When they topped the ridge, they had a view of the farther slope. It dropped a way, then rose again, forming a shelter for the dwelling place. Artificial cha

The homestead consisted of turf-roofed log buildings and a rude corral, enclosing a yard cobbled against the frequent mudmaking rains. Most of the structures were sheds and cribs. The biggest was the longhouse, impressive in workmanship and carved ornamentation as well as sheer size. Flandry paid more heed at first to the corral. Juveniles of all three species occupied it, together with four adults of each kind. The grownups formed pairs in different combinations, with immature third units. Other young wandered about, dozed, or took nourishment. The cows nursed the noga calves — two adults were lactating females, one was dry, one was male — and were in turn tapped by fuzzy little rukas and fledgling krippos.

“School?” Flandry asked.

“You might say so,” Kathryn answered. “Primary stages of learnin’ and development. Too important to interrupt for us; not that a partial entity ’ud care anyway. While they grow, the young’ll partner ’mong themselves also. But in the end, as a rule, they’ll replace units that’ve died out of established entities.”

“Heh! “If youth knew, if age could.’ The Didonians appear to have solved that problem.”

“And conquered death, in a way. ’Course, over several generations, a given personality ’ull fade into an altogether new one, and most of the earlier memories ’ull be lost. Still, the continuity — D’ you see why they fascinate us?”

“Indeed. I haven’t the temperament for being a scientist, but you make me wish I did.”

She regarded him seriously. “In your fashion, Dominic, you’re as much a filosof as anybody I’ve known.”

My men are a gallant crew, he thought, and they’re entitled to my loyalty as well as my leadership, but at the moment I’d prefer them and their big flapping ears ten parsecs hence.

The doors and window shutters of the lodge stood open, making its interior more bright and cool than he had awaited. The floor was fire-hardened clay strewn with fresh boughs. Fantastically carved pillars and rafters upheld the roof. The walls were hung with skins, crudely woven tapestries, tools, weapons, and objects that Kathryn guessed were sacred. Built in along them were stalls for nogas, perches for krippos, benches for rukas. Above were sconced torches for night illumination. Fires burned in pits; hoods, of leather stretched on wooden frames, helped draw smoke out through ventholes. Cubs, calves, and chicks, too small for education, bumbled about like the pet animals they were. Units that must be too aged or ill for daily toil waited quietly near the middle of the house. It was all one enormous room. Privacy was surely an idea which Didonians were literally incapable of entertaining. But what ideas did they have that were forever beyond human reach?

Flandry gestured at a pelt. “If they’re herbivorous, the big chaps, I mean, why do they hunt?” he wondered.

“Animal products,” Kathryn said. “Leather, bone, sinew, grease … sh!”

The procession drew up before a perch whereon sat an old krippo. Gaunt, lame in one wing, he nevertheless reminded Flandry of eagles. Every noga lowered the horn to him. The flyer belonging to Cave Discoverer let go and flapped off to a place of his (?) own. That noga offered his vacated tentacle. The ancient made union. His eyes turned on the humans and fairly blazed.

“Many Thoughts,” Kathryn whispered to Flandry. “Their wisest. Heesh’ll take a minute to absorb what the units can convey.”

“Do that fowl’s partners belong to every prominent citizen?”

“Sh, not so loud. I don’t know local customs, but they seem to have special respect for Many Thoughts … Well, you’d ’spect the units with the best genetic heritage to be in the best entities, wouldn’t you? I gather Cave Discoverer’s an explorer and adventurer. Heesh first met humans by seekin’ out a xenological camp 200 kilometers from here. Many Thoughts gets the vigor and boldness of the same noga and ruka, but heesh’s own journeys are of the spirit … Ah, I think heesh’s ready now. I’ll have to repeat whatever information went away with the former krippo.”