The Uplift War

“Think! How did humans win their status? Remember how it happened, back in the twenty-second century? The fanatics were outvoted when it came to accepting neo-chimps and neo-dolphins as sapient.” Fiben waved his arm. “It was a diplomatic coup pulled off by the Kanten and Tymbrimi and other moderates before humans even knew what the issues were!”

Gailet’s expression was sardonic, and he recalled that her area of expertise was Galactic sociology. “Of course, but—”

“It became a. fait accompli. But the Gubru and the Soro and the other fanatics didn’t have to like it. They still think we’re little better than animals. They have to believe that, otherwise humans have earned a place in Galactic society equal to most, and better than many!”

“I still don’t see what you’re—”

“Look down there.” Fiben pointed. “Look with Gubru eyes, and tell me what you see!”

Gailet Jones glared at Fiben narrowly. At last, she sighed. “Oh, if you insist,” and she swiveled to gaze down into the courtyard again.

She was silent for a long time.

“I don’t like it,” she said at last. Fiben could barely hear her. He moved to stand closer.

“Tell me what you see.”

She looked away, so he put it into words for her. “What you see are bright, well-trained animals, creatures mimicking the behavior of their masters. Isn’t that it? Through the eyes of a Galactic, you see clever imitations of human professors and human students… replicas of better times, reenacted superstitiously by loyal—”

“Stop it!” Gailet shouted, covering her ears. She whirled on Fiben, eyes ablaze. “I hate you!”

Fiben wondered. This was hard on her. Was he simply getting even for the hurt and humiliation he had suffered over the last three days, partly at her hands?

But no. She had to be shown how her people were looked on by the enemy! How else would she ever learn how to fight them?

Oh, he was justified, all right. Still, Fiben thought. It’s never pleasant being loathed by a pretty girl.

Gailet Jones sagged against one of the pillars supporting the roof of the bell tower. “Oh Ifni and Goodall,” she cried into her hands. “What if they are right! What if it’s true?”

34

Athaclena

The glyph paraphrenll hovered above the sleeping girl, a floating cloud of uncertainty that quivered in the darkened chamber.

It was one of the Glyphs of Doom. Better than any living creature could predict its own fate, paraphrenll knew what the future held for it — what was unavoidable.

And yet it tried to escape. It could do nothing else. Such was the simple, pure, ineluctable nature of paraphrenll.

The glyph wafted upward in the dream smoke of Athaclena’s fitful slumber, rising until its nervous fringe barely touched the rocky ceiling. That instant the glyph quailed from the burning reality of the damp stone, dropping quickly back toward where it had been born.

Athaclena’s head shook slightly on the pillow, and her breathing quickened. Paraphrenll flickered in suppressed panic just above.

The shapeless dream glyph began to resolve itself, its amorphous shimmering starting to assume the symmetrical outlines of a face.

Paraphrenll was an essence — a distillation. Resistance to inevitability was its theme. It writhed and shuddered to hold off the change, and the face vanished for a time.

Here, above the Source, its danger was greatest. Paraphrenll darted away toward the curtained exit, only to be drawn short suddenly, as if held in leash by taut threads.

The glyph stretched thin, straining for release. Above the sleeping girl, slender tendrils waved after the desperate capsule of psychic energy, drawing it back, back.

Athaclena sighed tremulously. Her pale, almost translucent skin throbbed as her body perceived an emergency of some sort and prepared to make adjustments. But no orders came. There was no plan. The hormones and enzymes had no theme to build around.

Tendrils reached out, pulling paraphrenll, hauling it in. They gathered around the struggling symbol, like fingers caressing clay, fashioning decisiveness out of uncertainty, form out of raw terror.

At last they dropped away, revealing what paraphrenll had become … A face, gri

Athaclena moaned.

A crack appeared. The face divided down the middle, and the halves separated. Then there were two of them!

Her breath came in rapid strokes.

The two figures split longitudinally, and there were four. It happened again, eight… and again… sixteen. Faces multiplied, laughing soundlessly but uproariously.

“Ah-ah!” Athaclena’s eyes opened. They shone with an opalescent, chemical fear-light. Panting, clutching the blankets, she sat up and stared in the small subterranean chamber, desperate for the sight of real things — her desk, the faint light of the hall bulb filtering through the entrance curtain. She could still feel the thing that paraphrenll had hatched. It was dissipating, now that she was awake, but slowly, too slowly! Its laughter seemed to rock with the beating of her heart, and Athaclena knew there would be no good in covering her ears.

What was it humans called their sleep-terror? Nightmare. But Athaclena had heard that they were pale things, dreamed events and warped scenes taken from daily life, generally forgotten simply by awakening.

The sights and sensations of the room slowly took on solidity. But the laughter did not merely vanish, defeated. It faded into the walls, embedding there, she knew. Waiting to return.

“Tutsunaca

The laughing man glyph, Tutsunaca

And to a Tymbrimi, jokes were not always fu

Athaclena sat still while rippling motions under her skin settled down — the unasked-for gheer activity dissipating gradually. You are not needed, she told the enzymes. There is no emergency. Go and leave me alone.

Ever since she had been little, the tiny change-nodes had been a part of her life — occasionally inconveniences, often indispensable. Only since coming to Garth had she begun to picture the little fluid organs as tiny, mouselike creatures, or busy little gnomes, which hurried abou’t making sudden alterations within her body whenever the need arose.

What a bizarre way of looking at a natural, organic function! Many of the animals of Tymbrim shared the ability. It had evolved in the forests of homeworld long before the starfaring Caltmour had arrived to give her ancestors speech and law.

That was it, of course… the reason why she had never likened the nodes to busy little creatures before coming to Garth. Prior to Uplift, her pre-sentient ancestors would have been incapable of making baroque comparisons. And after Uplift, they knew the scientific truth.

Ah, but humans… the Terran wolflings… had come into intelligence without guidance. They were not handed answers, as a child is given knowledge by its parents and teachers. They had emerged ignorant into awareness and spent long mille

Needing explanations and having none available, they got into the habit of inventing their own! Athaclena remembered when she had been amused… amused reading about some of them.

Disease was caused by “vapors,” or excess bile, or an enemy’s curse… The Sun rode across the sky in a great chariot… The course of history was determined by economics…

And inside the body, there resided animus…

Athaclena touched a throbbing knot behind her jaw and started as the small bulge seemed to skitter away, like some small, shy creature. It was a terrifying image, that metaphor, more frightening than tutsunaca