The Nblyterian's Tale

11 

The Nblyterian’s Tale 

 

    “Right,” said BrTl Captain’s voice. “You can report, because all I got from it was a load of intergalactic mok shit.”

    Two and a half days had passed, during which Jhl hadn't got back to them about the mind-exercises she’d ordered BrTl to do, or about Trff mucking round with some other captain’s blobs, which didn’t mean she would have forgotten about either matter.

    “Uh—yeah. The you-know-whats are still, um, simmering out there,” he offered.

    “I know. Have you been doing your mind-exercises?”

    “Some,” he muttered.

    “When?” demanded his Captain immediately. “Before breakfast?”

    “Not before breakfast!” he gasped in horror. “After breakfast. Um, well, I did a lot yesterday because there was no being to talk to—Anyway, I remembered this morning I ought to do some so I came back to the pod and did some. Until almost lunchtime, honest!”

    “Better than nothing, I suppose,” she said with a sniff. “Well? Any improvement?”

    “I didn’t really see any being to practise on, Jhl. I think that DorAvenian’s avoiding us. Well, me. No, us. Well, definitely Dohra.”

    “Eh? Oh, the pink being—right. What was that mok shit Trff gave me about Storytellers?”

    “It reckons she is one. Well, I wouldn’t know. But Forty-Four thinks so, too.”

    There was a short silence. Then Jhl said cautiously: “This wouldn’t be a Thwurbullerian from Fztpttcxh’owüst-ptch y’Ggwlrpstchç, would it?”

    “Ow! Must you do that?”

    “Try stopping me from overriding your translator, BrTl,” she said sweetly.

    “Hah, hah. If that’s something like, loosely speaking, Untranslatable Shade of Mauve Sector, Yes. Don’t tell me you were culture-pod cognates with it as well as that avian!”

    “No! Do I look as old as a mature Thwurbullerian? –Don’t answer that. No, but I have heard of Forty-Four from Fztpttcxh’—sorry, loosely speaking, There, that trundles round the two galaxies collecting stories.”

    “Sounds like it,” he said indifferently.

    “Yes, well, in that case it’s an expert on stories and storytelling from the Intergalactic University. Got innumerable Third and Fourth School Degrees in Group Psychology, and Sociology, and Inter-Species Cultural Transference, and that sort of intergalactic mok shit. So it would know a Storyteller when it found one. And listen: just in case you haven’t been keeping an eye on the pink being like I told you to, do so.”

    “Yeah. Well, Trff seems to have adopted it, I mean her, so she’s all right for a bit, but—Yeah, I will. It could easily get so involved with the you-know-whats that it forgets her very—Ahead of me by a megazillion light-years—’course you are. Can I ask why?” he said glumly.

    “Just in case,” said Jhl slowly, “this friendly Thwurbullerian who’s undoubtedly been right through that mush between your thick ears and out the other side fancies taking that pink being back to the vacuum-frozen Intergalactic University on Intergalactica as a… trophy, is the only word I can think of. Nothing to do with Lost Causes, BrTl, and it’ll undoubtedly keep it, Federation, I mean her, in comfort, in fact luxury, if all they say about full professors’ salaries at the dump is even half true, but… Well, it may well make her think she wants it, but will she want it?”

    There was a long silence. Jhl didn’t interrupt, she could feel him thinking it over.

    Then he said glumly: “I thought that Thwurbullerian was too good to be true.”

    “Mm. A little too friendly to be true, I think, BrTl, though they are a well-mannered race. Pity Fweee-ah didn’t stay on for a bit: his opinion would have been worth getting. –I won’t say ask Trff, because I don’t want you to end on Mullgon’ya,” she added kindly.

    “Thanks. It hasn’t been too bad, though. Um… I wouldn’t say Dohra wants to go off to Intergalactica at all. Well, what being does? The dump’s full of Federation Reppos and F Senators, and those ones that grease their appendages—right, lobbyists,” he agreed, “and Space Fleet top sparf,”—he shuddered slightly—“and like you say, professors. Not to say that kind of head office of the Full College of You-Know-Whats!” 

 

    “Exactly. An intergalactic dump. From the sound of her, she’d hate it.”

    “Yeah. As far as I can make out she wants a dwelling with a mammalian bond-partner in it—male, would that be? –Yes,” he answered himself, “and some pups.” He waited but Jhl didn’t say anything. “That sound likely?” he ventured.

    “Eh? Oh, two galaxies, yes! –Federation, that took me back!” she said in a shaken voice. “Sounded just like my Mum when I was making my mind up to shake the dust of Bluellia for good. Bond-partnership, nice house, and kids—yep. And which of the males, or shouldn’t I ask, would be your pick, BrTl?”

    “Didg would like it to be him,” he said cautiously.

    “Mm. It sounds quite promising, even if they are having a momentary spat. Well, especially if they are! And the Friyrian captain? –They have their attraction,” she said drily to his shudder.

    “She seems to approve of him because he’s got standards,” he fumbled. “Well, can standards be bad, Jhl?”

    “When they belong to a very old-fashioned and, if I’m getting the right picture, not particularly young Friyrian that wears the traditional gill-collar, I wouldn’t say they were entirely good. Put it like this: I don’t think he’ll offer her bond-partnership. Other things—yes.”

    “I have got it right, haven’t I? The bond-partnership’s the important thing?”

    “To her: yeah. Well, and to a being like him—even more so. That’s why I don’t think he’ll offer it. And talking of Didg—yeah, I know you like him!—weren’t chiefs of DorAven mentioned?”

    “Yes, but can they be as bad as Friyrian lordships?” he said wildly.

    “Dunno, I don’t know much about DorAven. My guess’d be Yes. How—um—Vvlvanian curses, you aren’t gonna be able to answer this, BrTl. I was gonna say how liberated is Didg’s attitude towards female humanoids, but—uh—forget I spoke.”

    “I can tell you what he thinks they should be like,” he offered.

    “Really? Go on, then!”

    “Little and round and with yellow head-fur like Dohra’s, only very long, hers isn’t very long. Um, those bumps have to be what he calls big. He thinks Dohra’s are quite big. And he thinks she should wear Pleasure Girl garments and live in his castle and look after his culture-pans and be there every time he lands his ship,” he finished proudly. 

 

    “Flaming Federation! Well, I guess that’s promising, in her terms!”

    BrTl was silent.

    “No?” she croaked.

    “There’s an awful lot in there, and I get terribly mixed up with most mammalians, they’re… messier than you,” he finished glumly.

    “Thanks,” said Jhl simply.

    “Um, well, there’s her house-picture and the, um, can grass be a garden? It’s a nice green. Yes, a garden. Um, but there’s a picture of her on his ship as well. Sitting in my seat, I mean the co-pilot’s seat. I tried it out: quite comfortable.”

    “Uh-huh. Doing what?”

    “I don’t think she knows, Jhl.”

    “No, of course not—silly question.”

    BrTl waited but she didn’t say anything more. “You don’t want me to stop her, do you?” he said glumly.

    “Great splintered shards of quog! You are the xathpyroid that let Fweee-ah hyper right through your mush and out the other side, BrTl, just how good do you imagine you are?”

    “Not that good,” he said meekly. “But I could tell Trff what needed doing.”

    “And then it could really muck it up. Right,” she said coldly.

    “Something like that,” BrTl admitted glumly.

    “Anyway, I don’t want you to stop her, exactly. I’d just like to feel that you were ready to stop Forty-Four persuading her into something that inside,” said Jhl carefully, “she doesn’t really want to do. How soon is she due to go back to her ship?”

    “Not for ages, her transfer’s due about the time you are: she said it was an awful waste of her leave, but she had to take the only available ferry from Gr’mmeaya.”

    “Steaming Vvlvanian magma pits,” said Jhl in a hollow voice.

    “It is keeping her away from the turquoise one,” he offered.

    “Yes, but don’t you see, that could well be the opportunity for a slight note of realism to creep into this fantasy of hers about stiff-necked Friyrian captains offering bond-partnership to dim little pink humanoid beings! In which case she could well be open to an offer from the Thwurbullerian!”

    “Ugh,” he said in dismay.

    Jhl sighed. “Yeah. Well, none of our business, of course…”

    “It’s your responsibility hang-up,” he offered gloomily.

    “Something like that,” she said with another sigh. “Yeah.”

    “All right, and my propensity to make pets of unlikely beings. But it’s nothing like that time with the limping Bdeeg! I mean, she’s got six good legs! Uh—two,” he said lamely. “Two. –Speech-habit,” he said unconvincingly.

    “BrTl, at one point you were sure that Bdeeg was as like as any non-xathpyroid being could be to— Forget it. Wind down the moogletube. –You haven’t?” she gasped.

    “She likes it now. I wrap her up well in a pseudopod and then I put my arm over her as well. And my neck-hair helps her to breathe. Well, you like it!”

    “Yeah. There must be more to her—slightly more—than your mind-picture so far has conveyed,” she said drily. “Well, take care, that’s all. And watch out for the Thwurbullerian—be on your guard. This Storyteller thing sounds rather like the thin end of the wedge.”

    “Ye-ah. I don’t think Dohra likes the idea that she is one, though.”

    “Good. Try and keep it that way.”

    “Me?” he quavered.

    “You. It’ll back up those mind-exercises nicely,” said Jhl drily. “How’s the food?”

    “Reasonable,” he said cautiously. “For ISLA cafeteria food.”

    She sighed. “The igs have got to last until I’m back and the ship’s refitted and we’ve got a cargo. I hope you don’t need reminding how many jobs this little do’s lost us.”

    “No. –I keep having these fantasies,” he said sourly, “of winning a huge IG lawsuit for Intergalactic Criminal Negligence While In Hyperspace against that Huyajhangwanian.”

    “Me, too,” admitted Jhl heavily. “Oh, well. Dream on, eh?”

    “Yeah. No justice in the Known Universe—right.”

    “You said it. I’d better go, I’ve got to go and watch a certain sparf-laden Whtyllian,” said Jhl through her teeth, “putting on a lovely fly-past this afternoon.”

    “Flaming Vvlvanian magma pits!”

    “Puts it well. See ya. Captain out.”

    “See ya,” said BrTl sadly to empty space. 

 

    Dohra was sitting by herself in the huge cafeteria. Didg went up to her cautiously. He hadn’t seen her for several days and he wasn’t sure whether this was just because, frankly, after his accusations in the wake of her story-telling he’d lost his nerve and had been avoiding her, or because she’d been avoiding him, too.

    “Gidday,” he said casually. “Where’s the crowd? Usually all here at dinnertime, aren’t they?”

    She came out of a daze with a jump, and pinkened and smiled. “Hullo, Didg.”

    Well, that was possibly promising. He sat down and looked sideways at her plate while she explained that Forty-Four and the Feeny-Argyllians were trying out the T-Class tourist cafeteria, just for a change, and that BrTl had met another xathpyroid and gone up to Level Blue with him because there was some xathpyroid food up there that they hadn’t had for ages. And—pinkening—she thought blndreL might have taken Budg up to Level Red, for a treat, because, um, something about what he breathed.

    “Yeah, I know. At least she had the sense to check with me before she took him. But that tourist cafeteria’ll cost her a megaraft of super-igs, especially with the amount he eats.” He looked at her pink and doubtful face. “They’re getting on okay. Ya won’t want the details,”—“No!” she gasped, turning puce—“but let’s just say, far from him being too rough, she’s been bossing the fangs off him.”

    “Oh,” said Dohra, sagging. “What a relief! We say ‘bossing the boots off him,’” she revealed, smiling.

    “Uh-huh. Uh, Dohra, did you let the servo-mech con you again, or didja mean to choose poodly noodles?”

    “I meant to,” said Dohra sadly, looking at her plate. “I thought they might be a bit like Joddum noodles, only for o-breathers—and not alive, of course! And, um, if those Joddum noodles hadn’t of been alive I thought they looked sort of tasty, and I might figure out a recipe that was a bit like them… But these aren’t tasty at all.”

    Didg cleared his throat. “No. The word around the two galaxies is that ISLA cafeteria poodly noodles are actually made from recycled mato-meat.” 

 

    “Oops!” she gasped, going into a gale of giggles.

    “Yeah,” he said, grinning. “Go and chuck them out: ya might get that one-tenth-ig credit disc ba—”

    “Stop—it!” gasped Dohra, in agony. “Oh, dear, that did me good,” she admitted, grabbing a bunch of senso-tissues and mopping her eyes.

    “Good. Uh, you been brooding about this Storyteller stuff?”

    “Mm,” she said, biting her lip.

    “I wouldn’t worry: how often are ya gonna tell stories, once you’re off this dump?” he said, trying to sound both kindly and bracing.

    “Well, um… I thought P.O. Bates’s younger kids might like me to tell them stories, like if I was staying with them and sitting them while W’ndii took the bubble-boat to town. It’s like a bubble but it doesn’t fly, it zips round the water between all the islands,” she explained to his blank look.

    “Primmo,” said Didg with a slight sniff.

    Dohra’s mouth tightened. “It takes them,” she said grimly, “to the terminus, and they get the public bubble-train from there, and it flies like any bubble-train! And why do you always assume other beings’ worlds are more primmo than yours?”

    Didg was now very red. “I don’t,” he said shortly.

    “Much!” said Dohra fiercely.

    “Well, all right, if I did, I’m sorry. Oh—Novatroonia? Yeah, very pretty, all that blue water. Are you gonna be going there much?”

    “Um, well, not much, only I was sort of hoping I might manage it for my next leave.”

    “I see. Well, who else would ya tell stories to?”

    “Um… J’nno’s kids, when he has some.”

    “Which if I’m reading you right, won’t be for at least another five IG years, going by C’T’rean averages. And then they’d have to be old enough to take an interest in stories—make that seven IG years.”

    Dohra glared at him. “So?”

    “Well, nothing, but I’d definitely stop brooding about it, in that case!”

    “Um, yeah. There’s Jojo’s lorpies, too,” she added on a hopeful note. “He’s invited me to visit. You might think, with two bond-partners, they’d take turns at the sitting, and of course they do, but lorpoids like doing things in threes.”

    “Yeah. Um, Dohra, this is the being that wanted to sell ya,” he pointed out.

    “Yes, but that’s his job.”

    Didg gave up. All right, she wanted to visit the lorpoid’s home and sit the lorpies—so be it. “Well, I’d say that your P.O.’s kids and your nephews and nieces that won’t be born for five IG years or so and them lorpies aren’t gonna read anything more into your stories than you want them to. Less, probably: immature beings haven’t got the notions to relate anything to.”

    “Yes,” agreed Dohra, reflecting that he was really very intelligent—and of course, he was a qualified Pilot, that was an IG-equivalent of a Third School degree—so why did he make a point of trying to sound like an Ordinary Spacer?

    “The DorAvenian male dialect comes over like that in Intergalactic,” said Didg flatly, getting up and taking her plate. “Stay there, I’ll recycle it for ya.” He walked off to the recycler, frowning. Last time he’d been home Ma had said he was getting really coarse: he sounded like a cottager’s son— Oh, to Blerrinbrig’s with it! Women were all the same: nag, nag, nag, criticise, criticise, criticise, wipe ya boots and sit up nice and eat the vacuum-frozen afternoon tea without spilling the jam on your clothes!

    When he got back to the table Trff had turned up and they were giggling together—hooting in its case—over the way the ISLA spoon successfully foiled one’s attempts to spoon the agar-agar onto the table… Oh, well. Probably just as well: Ma’d throw ten thousand fits if he turned up with an off-worlder. If only Gidg could have had some sons, or agreed to get an IG-legal divorce from Swadg and remarried, or at least agreed to have one of the foetus’s chromosomes tinkered with to make sure it’d be a male, it was IG millennia since that had been illegal on DorAven, but he was so plasmo-blasted old-fashioned… And if only he, Didgeonfyllewend fy Tidgeonfyllewend np Afftn do’ DorAven, had been the youngest son, not the second… 

 

    The evening was spent quietly in the sim-lounge. First she wanted to watch a comedy, well, that wasn’t too bad. True, all the beings gathered round their sim-receiver thought it much funnier than he did. Then she wanted to watch a Drama Service. Didg just hated dramas, they were worse than the Romances that Gidg’s Swadg and her seven daughters followed so slavishly. In this drama a being was agonising over whether to give up its intended bond-partners for its job or give up its job and take another, much more boring job that would allow it to stay on their world and be bond-partnered, and why in Federation the trio of silly beings didn’t just give the whole lot away and GO OFF-WORLD— Trff appeared to be actually enjoying the load of space garbage. It was certainly emanating enjoyment. Didg stuck it out for as long as he could, then went off to join a group of spacers and business-beings watching the Match of the IG Day. By the time it was over—it went into Extra Time, it had been a really good match—her and it had gone, presumably back to the pod. Well, mok shit!

    In spite of his thoughts about his mother’s reaction to the sight of Dohra on his arm, he turned up to breakfast good and early the next morning—only to find a whole bunch of them already sitting with her. The Thwurbullerian was urging blndreL to tell them a story. The Nblyterian was due to ship out that evening, so as to get home for Federation Day, which was the IG day after tomorrow—though a fair proportion of the beings observed in the spaceport of Pkqwrd’s third moon had clearly been celebrating the event for some time. In particular the Rorfs and Kollias, whose planet, Kol-Rorfo, was the nearest inhabited world to Pkqwrd. Much to Didg’s relief, blndreL seemed quite content to leave Budg behind: he’d been afraid she might make an offer for him: he’d known female Nblyterians to keep males of various species as pets or s-beings. He wouldn’t have accepted the offer, of course, but it could have turned nasty.

    “It doesn’t have to be a Romance,” the Thwurbullerian was assuring her kindly.

    “Just as well,” she muttered. “HEY!” she shouted as a drunken Kollia staggered against her chair. “Get on back to Level Orange, where ya belong!”

    Dohra gasped: Level Orange’s atmosphere was helium, and according to the Encyclopaedia, that made Kollias explode.

    It gave a very squeaky hiccup. “Jus’-been-up-there!” it squeaked in a high, funny voice.

    “Ya don’t say,” replied blndreL drily as it staggered off. “Calm down, Budg, swiller, it’s gone,” she said as he growled and bared his fangs at it. “It’s the helium that does that,” she explained to Dohra’s sagging jaw. “Their voices aren’t like that, really. They’re addicted to it: nip up to Level Orange for a quick snort every so often.”

    “Kol-Rorfo’s atmosphere is just slightly helium-enriched,” explained Forty-Four.

    “It gives you the hiccups!” tootled the Feeny-Argyllians. “My FW-pack didn’t cope at all well!”—“ My FW-pack didn’t cope at all well!”

    “I had the hiccups, too!” squeaked S-Fl’Chuyilleea.

    Dreadful ones, they sent with a mental shudder or two. I had to take it to a Full Surgeon, in the end!

    Their s-being? And a Flppu, at that? Didg would have wrung its—well, whatever was the Flppu equivalent of a neck.

    I wouldn’t broadcast that, swiller, she likes the being, noted BrTl, coming up with a basin of Oononian spring water. “Hullo,” he groaned.

    The company looked with interest at the equally large uniformed xathpyroid accompanying him, as he sat down very cautiously.

    “Oh,” he said. “This is ZrMl. Uh—Commander ZrMl. You don’t mind if he joins us, do you?”

    “Please do, Commander,” said Forty-Four politely.

    “Please do!” agreed the Feeny-Argyllians. “Is that Fleet Commander, may I ask?”

    “Blerrinbrig’s, no!” he said, cautiously sitting down beside BrTl. “Squadron Commander. See the bars on the shoulder-flaps?” He leaned back, sighing. “Federation! Sorry,” he muttered as the Flppu toppled off its chair. “Yours, is it?” he said to the Feeny-Argyllians. “Ya don’t need to let it get away with the chair mok shit.”

    “It’s happy like that,” they said. Two got up and assisted it back onto the chair, and tenderly dusted off its yellow fluff. “It’s happy like that,” it confirmed, rejoining One.

    “It’s a pet; don’t ask,” groaned BrTl. He drank Oononian spring water thirstily.

    Commander ZrMl raised and lowered his eyelids experimentally a couple of times, and also drank Oononian spring water thirstily.

    “I won’t ask how much you two beings drank last night, but what did ya drink?” said blndreL with her loud, cheery laugh.

    “It was his fault,” groaned the Commander.

    “You do surprise me!”

    “Chontigaumian Super-Duper Zapper-Whappers?” asked Didg, grinning. 

 

    “Close,” admitted BrTl, closing his eyes. “Nnru juice was definitely in there somewhere.”

    “There was a BonkoDong in the bar,” admitted the Commander.

    “Ooh, awake?” cried Dohra.

    “Yes. Still with ears,” sighed BrTl with his eyes shut.

    “Those beings can drink,” explained the Commander, rubbing his temples.

    “Yeah,” acknowledged Didg. “Lemme get you a pick-me-up.”

    “ISLA cafeterias don’t sell anything that will,” said the Commander, raising and lowering his eyelids very slowly several times. “Dare say they might have something that’ll pick you up, humanoid, but whatever it is, I can assure you that even a basinful of it won’t.”

    “It is suited to the metabolism,” reported Trff.

    “No,” said BrTl definitely, drinking spring water thirstily. “Thanks, but no thanks, swiller.”

    “I’ve got a recipe, too,” ventured Dohra.

    “Whtyllian, and it won’t work,” said the Commander, allowing his eyelids to sink and stay like that.

    “Um, I don’t think it’s Whtyllian,” she said dubiously.

    “Hot pepper sauce, raw eggs—boo-bird eggs or Whtyllian duck eggs, the principle’s the same—and ground blasterberries?” he retorted with his eyes shut.

    “Whtyllian,” all the beings present except Budg affirmed, even the Flppu.

    “It could help,” offered Trff.

    “Right, and then it could admit it to Jhl,” noted BrTl.

    “All right, suffer!” it hooted crossly.

    “I will, thanks,” he groaned.

    Didg rubbed his chin. “There is a theory—” He got the message, and winced. “All right, all right, protein’s out. Chemo-blob?”

    “He could, yeah,” admitted BrTl. “Dare say there may not be any full captain in the particular office that checks the reports from his credit account, and if he’s told the account to make it look like a lovely Oononian feverfew chemo-blob all those lesser beings in said office probably will be fooled—yeah. But I can assure you nothing’s gonna fool my Captain.” Dohra was nodding trustingly, the yellow Flppu was trying to copy her, Didg was nodding sardonically, and ZrMl had his eyes shut—and Budg was trying to eat his ISLA cafeteria spoon—but Forty-Four, blndreL and the Feeny-Argyllians were looking sideways at Trff, so he groaned: “No. Not for a minute.”

    “It could do it,” Trff admitted. “The account’d be convincing to any being up to—well, full admiral, certainly. But she-it wouldn’t believe it for a minute.”

    “It’s sunk in!” discovered BrTl in amazement, actually sitting forward for a moment. “Ooh, my head,” he muttered, slumping.

    “Of course it’s sunk in,” said Trff mildly. “It admits now that it was a great mistake to make your-its bulk purchase of nymbo cheese look like a debit for a course of Oononian Third-Stomach Fibre-Glo-Go-Go. Though it was completely convincing,” it added quickly.

    “Then how did she spot it?” asked Dohra in bewilderment. “Oh, haven’t you got a third stomach, BrTl?”

    “Of course I have, how thick do you think I am? –Don’t answer that,” he sighed.

    “Nothing in the Known Universe would persuade him to embark on a course of Third-Stomach Fibre-Glo-Go-Go,” explained ZrMl, brightening to the extent of opening both eyes and emanating faint amusement.

    Dohra gulped. “I see.”

    “Added to which,” noted BrTl, rolling an eye in Trff’s direction, “it made the elementary mistake of choosing something that cost the exact same amount as the nymbo cheese. So—”

    “She only had to blob onto a Shopping Service and ask it what it listed at that price!” gulped Dohra.

    “Yeah. Well, theoretically, yeah. Actually she asked it what foods with an extremely high sugar content—Yeah, hah, hah,” he said as the audience collapsed in yelps, giggles, whistles or tootles. Even ZrMl emitted a faint bark of laughter.

    “I was gonna ask why not use your own account, rather than the ship’s, swiller, but given the combination of sore heads and a BonkoDong, I won’t,” said Didg, grinning. “3-D whim-wham, was it?”

    “Pkwr,” he sighed. “Cleaned me out within an IG hour. Then I just drank.”

    “In my case it was 3-D whim-wham,” admitted ZrMl. “And since you’re wondering, humanoid,” he said, suddenly looking straight at Dohra, “I’m not due to rejoin my squadron for an IG week, and yeah, by the time I get back I will be fit to lead it.”

    “I’m sorry!” she gasped.

    Doesn’t know—Ow! “Doesn’t know she’s doing it,” said BrTl, essaying a faint cough. It shot up the length of his neck and right into his head bone, so coughing was out for the next IG millennium. “If you beings have finished your breakfasts, shall we adjourn very slowly and gently to the bar?”

    All beings had finished, so once blndreL had forcibly removed the spoon from Budg, they did that. And after BrTl and ZrMl had both refused very firmly to go anywhere near revivifying basins of feverfew anything, and other beings had been provided with mild beverages suited to the early hour, blndreL cleared her mammalian throat and said feebly: “Are you sure you want a story?”

    “Yeah, tell us a story!” growled Budg eagerly.

    It’ll be on about his level, she warned generally.

    Nevertheless, all beings urged her to go on. So she cleared her mammalian throat again and warned: “It’s kind of a legend, back home: it’s the story of the first wondreL.”

    “Ooh!” cried Dohra.

    “Yeah. It’s a very common name on Nblyteria. Um, well, all our legends are in rhyme, but I dunno how that's gonna come over.”

    “Depends entirely on the quality of the translators, I should say,” said ZrMl kindly. BURP! “That’s better! –Pardon me. We were experimenting with fluorogas and qwlot—You don't wanna know. What I was gonna say, BrTl won’t pick up a thing.”

    “It’ll reinforce your-its translator, BrTl,” his ship-companion offered.

    “Does you-it speak Nblyterian?”

    There was a split IG microsecond’s pause and then it said: “This it-being doesn’t, no.”

    “Forget I asked. –I’m gonna get it filtered through the joint mind of the it-beings, blndreL, so if I appear not to have understood a blind word—! Well, that’ll be where the expression ‘blind word’ comes from.” BURP! “Sorry,” he ended lamely.

    “Feeling better now?” she asked solicitously.

    Lamely both xathpyroids admitted they did feel slightly better. So blndreL, ignoring both Dohra’s anxious emanations about the quality of her translator and Trff’s assurance that it’d reinforce hers, too, embarked on her story. 

Poor little wondreR, he lost his brother,

And he began to cry:

“Oh, Mumma dear, see here, see here,

Our paxeR I have lost!”

“What, lost our paxeR, you naughty wondreR,

Then you shall have no pie!” 

Poor little wondreR went after his brother,

Off into the great by and by.

Oh, now what’ll happen, the poor little siblin’,

His paxeR he has lost!

Only a male, how can he prevail,

Setting out with a tear in his eye? 

    The balladeer paused in order to pass Dohra a bunch of senso-tissues so as she could wipe the tear in her eye and to send somewhat crossly to Forty-Four: No, it isn’t a regeneration myth, and if that’s how it’s coming over, I’m sorry! And to say soothingly to Budg: “Yeah, everybody gets pie later, you’ll see.” And to say resignedly to the Feeny-Argyllians and their Flppu, since the latter was becoming agitated: “It’ll be all right in the end.”

    “Of course it will, S-Fl’Chuyilleea, didn’t I say so?” they cried.

    Strangle it, sent ZrMl heavily to his fellow-xathpyroid.

    No, Dohra’d do more of the water-out-of-the—Oh, the wondreR being! Yeah, too right! 

Poor little wondreR, he wandered for ages,

And he began to cry:

“Oh, Mumma dear, come here, come here,

Of paxeR there ain’t no traces!

“Up, down and round, I’ve looked all around,

And still not a trace can I spy!” 

Poor little wondreR: no sign of his brother,

So he began to wail.

Oh, what can he do, he’s not brave like you,

’Cos remember, he’s only a male.

Well, cry like a boy, no more use than a toy,

A male will never prevail! 

Poor little wondreR went home to his mother,

And all he could do was cry:

“Oh, Mumma dear, come here, come here,

Our paxeR I can’t find!”

“I’ll help you to find him, the poor little siblin’,

And then we can all have pie!” 

“Poor little wondreR, now think like a sister,

And you won’t have to cry.

Oh, wondreR, dear, now have no fear,

Our paxeR must be found.

Now, take this dagger, and you’ll be a sister,

And soon it will all come right!” 

Poor little wondreR set forth with the dagger

And he began to smile.

“Oh, Mumma, dear, I have no fear,

And I’ll search all around!”

Up, down and round, he looked all around,

And then the trace he espied! 

Poor little sibling, he’d lost his bearing,

’Cos of course he was only a male.

“Oh, paxeR, dear, see here, see here!

You’re safe and sound and found!

Fear not, dear brother! ’Tis I, your Big Sister!”

“Then wondreL you shall be!” 

Big brave wondreL had found little paxeR,

And back they went for pie.

“Oh, Mumma dear, see here, see here,

Our paxeR I have found!”

“What, found our paxeR? You brave wondreL!

Now we shall all have pie!” 

    “Pie!” shouted Budg. “Hurray!”

    Resignedly blndreL passed Dohra some more tissues, accepting the company’s congratulations and thanks, and trying to ignore the fact that Forty-Four was sending: A very interesting myth. I’ve often wondered how such beings explain the change from one gender to another to their immature ones, that the Feeny-Argyllians were broadcasting: So the Sister found the Brother and rejoined it! Very satisfactory! and that Didg, BrTl, ZrMl and the Flppu were all wondering: What sort of pie was it? Well, so was Dohra, under the mixed tears and smiles.

    “Nymbo cheese pie!” shouted Budg.

    “No, we don’t have that back home. It was quoshy pie. It’s a vegetable, really, but, um, I dunno. Somehow you make it sweet and it gets into pie. Well, we just tell the culture-pan ‘quoshy pie’ and it gets on with it.”

    “Ooh, there’s a Bluellian recipe for Bluellian squash pie, I wonder if it’s like that?” said Dohra eagerly.

    “Dunno. Aren’t they yellow? Quoshy’s kind of dark red and it grows in the ground. Um, I mean it’s the root part that you eat.”

    Disgusting, sent BrTl to his fellow-xathpyroid.

    You sent it. Was there a point to that story?

    They did all get pie.

    Whatever blobs you up, concluded ZrMl, sending for another basin of spring water.