Ringworld's Children

Roxa

Louis picked up a melon, broke it on his knee — tanj, why not? — and followed her. He had hoped to court Roxa

She turned and waited; looked down, gri

Then she stepped into him, on tiptoe, half a head taller than he, and slid the length of her down his body until she was kneeling.

With a hoarse shout, Louis pushed her into the grass and entered her.

It was not the way he would ever have treated a woman. Roxa

When he came to himself again, he was babbling, and he wondered if he had blurted secrets. Roxa

And the Hinsh had moved to surround them.

The women knelt to rish. When they mated with their men, both knelt. The men watched the strangers with their women and made graphic half-translated commentary. They found short men fu

"Im sorry, Roxa

She patted his cheek. "Refreshing. Nine years to go on my implant, and its a tanj good thing."

"Im fertile," Louis said.

" Course you are." She stood up, her back to him, fists on hips. "I didnt buy it. Rishathra? You havent told me every last bit of the truth, Luis. But… shall we join them?"

What? "Were mated! Youd shock them!"

Roxa

The elf was shocked. Then he laughed, knelt, and swept her against him. Louis flushed… and picked up a melon.

By dusklight — too dark to tell which fruits were perfectly ripe — the Hinsh broke off eating and rishing and mating to introduce themselves: an odd reversal of order. Their names were long and formidable.

Wembleth took Louis aside and said, "The Hinsh are like others where I have traveled. If strangers plan to stay a short time, they use short names, quick to learn. This can mean, go away soon. But do you see all this fruit? The wind shook hundreds of manweights of fruit to the ground. Every stranger eating means less fruit left to rot. We are welcome."

Louis felt welcome. But rishathra was not sex. His body knew. His body wanted Roxa

And Claus wanted his blood.

Night on the Ringworld was rarely too dark to see. The Hinsh didnt want sleep; they conversed. The ARMs mostly listened.

Louis asked about the horned beasts. "The grass eaters? They dont bother us, we dont bother them," a man said. Of the sky he said, "The stars used to hold their course. We could use them to tell time, if we wished. Now theyre loose, wandering across the sky. Only the Vashneesht know why." They spoke of the crops theyd left behind, and of the weather. Dull people, really.

They talked about the sudden wild winds.

"The climate will change," Louis told his lady companion, whose name hed memorized as Szeblinda. His translator would fish out all eight syllables. "You may have to follow the pufftop forests as they die off to antispin. Carry melons and drop the seeds where you want more. Other folk may be ru

"Will you stay with us, to advise?"

"We have to move faster than that. Were trying to solve it all," Louis told her.

CHAPTER 13

Gray Nurse

In the morning Louis found himself on a grassy hill. He stood to look about him.

The flycycles hadnt been moved from their place on the rivers shore. Acolyte slept between them. Hanuman and the Earth folk were nowhere visible. The Hinsh had departed. Downslope toward the river were melon trees and broken melon shells. A puddle of orange-and-chocolate fur beside the pool had to be Acolyte.

He walked on down.

He expected the Kzin to wake as he approached, but Acolyte didnt move. His sides moved. Good: the Kzin was breathing. Now, what mischief were the ARMs up to?

Louis took a flycycle aloft.

Claus and Roxa

Wembleth and Hanuman were peering past them into the hologram display. Roxa

That didnt look like they were keeping secrets. Louis returned to the pool.

Acolyte was sitting up, stretching. He looked around him. "Where is everyone?"

"Across the river. Are you all right?"

"Well fed and well slept out. I found a small deer or something. Louis, nobody told me not to gorge. We should have arranged to stand watch."

Louis stretched. "I wondered if theyd stu

They took a flycycle across.

Claus awaited their descent. He said, "Luis, Acolyte, I want to interview both of you as to what you saw at the puncture. Any objection?"

Louis thought of objections, but none that Luis could back up. "Show us how it works," he said.

"Just the Kzin first," Claus said.

"Well help each other," Louis said, and Acolyte rumbled agreement. Then Wembleth too wanted to participate. That allowed the three to play off each other in an interview that became an animated conversation.

Louis gambled that the ARMs didnt have equipment to detect lies in the tremor of a voice. Gray Nurse or another in the ARM fleet might.

As to what "Luis" had seen, Louis stuck close to the truth. They had been indoors: theyd missed the explosion (and Luis knew nothing of industrial antimatter). As he and Acolyte arrived from… somewhere… a great light had appeared, not much brighter than the sun, but huge. Then a glare-yellow doughnut the size of a mountain range lay blocking the region they had come to see.

He was asked about his background. He invented, but kept it terse. A twenty-year-old wouldnt have centuries of memories; he wouldnt tell stories well, and hed be a bit shy around elders. Acolyte, who really was only twelve, was able to stick to his own memories, because Chiron (Luis said) had never confronted the half-grown Kzin. Luis speculated aloud whether the puppeteer was afraid.

And the library fascinated all three interviewees.

Protector — 1) Adult stage of the Pak species, where the line runs from child to breeder to adult. 2) Hominids in general are descended from Pak. They too have a breeder stage, at which they usually spend their lives, and an adult stage rarely achieved. 3 Archaic -

If Claus or Roxa

There were hot buttons everywhere in the text.

Piersons puppeteers — A species of great industrial power and sophistication, once common through known space and beyond, now thought to be fleeing the galactic core explosion. See General Products company. Physiology…

Core explosion — Thought to be a rash of supernovae… due to reach Earth in twenty thousand years. Inadequately studied.