The Yellow Flppu's Tale

8 

The Yellow Flppu’s Tale

 

    The company congratulated BrTl sincerely on his story, even blndreL, Didg and Lu Rullan, once they were over the violent shaking, spluttering, yelping and hooing. And even Dohra admitted that it probably did serve those silly beings right—though the company could all see she was still feeling sorry for Fat Being. And, since it wasn’t nearly dinnertime yet, the Meanker proposed a game of pkwr.

    Forty-Four surged slowly upright. “No, thank you, Patroller. Some other time, perhaps. There’s an affine from Another Different Untranslatable Shade of Mauve Sector on that ferry from Ortrey-Omibwa that’s just docked: I think I’ll go and see if it needs help with its luggage. Dohra, would you like to come and help me?”

    Dohra got uncertainly to her feet. “Me, Forty-Four? Of course, if you think I can help.”

    “Oh, definitely; there’s a mammalian being at the gate it has to come through.”

    “Can I help?”—“Can I help?”

    “No, thank you very much, One and Two,” said the Thwurbullerian graciously.

    “Are you sure?” they chorused. “In that case, I think I might have some afternoon tea in the A-Class Tourist Cafeteria.”

    “Can you have tea in the afternoon?” asked BrTl with interest. He’d never heard of it. Though it wasn’t a bad idea. Well, not the snu cakes and similar lady-being fare the Feeny-Argyllians were broadcasting images of—no. But in principle.

    “Certainly!” they replied with a kind tootle.

    “Jhl won’t be too pleased if she-it finds out you-it’s added another meal to your-its schedule,” warned Trff. “–It uses the concept ‘not too pleased’ loosely.”

    “All right, I won’t!” he said huffily.

    “It wouldn’t,” it agreed. “Seven-card stud, admirals and lesser sparf wild,” it said mildly to the Meanker.

    “Don’t play with it,” warned BrTl, swallowing a sigh, as Lu Rullan brightened. “It does its best not to look, but there’s no way it won’t pick up what your cards are.”

    “It likes pkwr,” it said sadly.

    “It likes calculating the odds,” corrected BrTl heavily. “Well, the odds you’ll lose.” He could now feel Didg, Lu Rullan and blndreL all exchanging mind messages to the effect that the Ju’ukrterian was gonna relay their hands to him, BrTl. Not pointing out that it could do that wherever it was in the spaceport, or even if it wasn’t in the spaceport, he said: “Why not trot along with Forty-Four and Dohra, Trff? If there’s anything they can’t handle, it’ll probably be something you-it’ll be able to fix.” Fake you-know-whats, he explained.

    You-it can send “ID discs”, BrTl: that Space Patroller can’t pick you-it up, because it’s put a Ju’ukrterian shield round you-it.

    Gee, thanks, comrade. Uh—sorry, Trff, didn't mean to send that. Look, go, eh? These beings think you’ll help me to cheat if you stay.

    Yeah, unaware that you-it won’t need its help! it sent jauntily. “Yes, it’ll come and help, Forty-Four,” it said.

    “Many thanks, Great It-Being,” said the Thwurbullerian with a formal waggle of its frontal lobes. “Shall we all meet up at dinner, then?”

    Everyone agreeing to meet up at dinner, the Feeny-Argyllians removed themselves and their Flppu, pointing out to it that pkwr was out of the question since it only had half an ig and a Home Planet public transport token to its name, and the Thwurbullerian surged slowly away, Dohra trotting and Trff bobbing at its side, in the direction of the gates.

    And Lu Rullan slapped down a pack of cards and said briskly: “Cut.”

    After a while Didg admitted limply: “I wouldn’t mind being a Ybbertullian spy-symb at that encounter.”

    BrTl concentrated briefly. “They haven’t got there yet. They’ve stopped to look at some sort of space junk. Uh—a boutique?”

    “Are you two playing or NOT?” shouted blndreL.

    Didg shrugged and got up. “Not.” He threw down his cards and strolled off.

    “Is he mad?” croaked blndreL, gaping at his hand.

    Lu Rullan shrugged. “Got it bad for that little humanoid. Well, she’s a tasty little morsel, I’ll give ya that.” He must have caught some sort of emanation from the Nblyterian, for he added quickly: “Who gives a cptt-rvvr’s fart? I’ll see ya, BrTl.”

    As it was now obvious that no-one could hold very high cards, BrTl displayed his quite—well, almost—confidently.

    “Hah!” said the Meanker, making a grab at the pot. “Bluffing! Thought so. Typical xathpyroid!”

    “Oy, hang on,” he said weakly. “Show us your cards first!”

    The Nblyterian had half-risen, her hand going automatically to her blaster. “If this is some sort of meankoid idea of a blu—Oh. No,” she said weakly, sitting down again. “Sorry.”

    “See?” said the Meanker smugly. “Three, four, five, and six of circles.”

    “Luck of the Friyrians,” said blndreL sourly. “And if I can make the suggestion without provoking any being, could someone else deal?”

    “Not to say, shuffle,” agreed BrTl mildly.

    The cards rippled through the Meanker’s six-fingered hands. “Shuffle all ya like. Cut all ya like. Ya both rotten, it won’t make no difference!”

    They cut, shuffled, re-cut, re-cut and finally dealt. BrTl had exactly the same hand as last time! “Whose pack is this?” he wondered through the crunchers.

    The Nblyterian was goggling disbelievingly at her hand. “Yeah, whose?”

    “Look, it dealt that DorAvenian a handful of admirals!” Lu Rullan reminded them heatedly.

    “Two IG microseconds before he chucked his cards down,” noted blndreL.

    “Yeah,” agreed BrTl. Fresh pack of pkwr cards! A servo-mech slid up with them and, unwarrantable price though it was, he paid it. Real cards. Sealed, too. Wait! The servo-mech waited while BrTl scoured it for the ISLA spaceport bar definition of “pack of pkwr cards” but it was the IG-legal definition, not a trick meankoid pack with extra circles for the Meanker or extra admirals to trick other beings into thinking— “You’re right, blndreL, it probably is my xathpyroid paranoia, but nevertheless, let’s play with these nice new shiny sealed cards.”

    “Yeah, let’s,” she said with a hard look at Lu Rullan.

    “All right, let’s,” he said amiably as his own pack fluttered into his hands.

    They played. BrTl’s luck was still rotten… 

 

    Didg caught up with Forty-Four, Dohra and Trff just as they reached the huge array of blob signs, lift-blobs, other forms of porto-blobs, trains of tran-blobs, bubbles for hire, and parked servo-mechs waiting for the message Porter which marked the section of the concourse where disembarking passengers could be met. From it you could clearly see the baggage-claim area on the far side of the gates, with its two lonely parked servo-mechs, and its array of IG C&E Decontam. units. No disembarking passengers were yet visible, in spite of the message displayed by one of the blob signs.

    “I’ve always thought,” he said mildly, “given we’re all here to trans-ship—given that no sentient being above Class 10,992 would want to flat-world on Pkqwrd or any of its moons—that it seems pointless to make beings trail through IG C&E.”

    “Yes: why can’t the baggage be automatically trans-shipped?” asked Dohra eagerly.

    “Well, yeah: that, too. No, but can it matter what stuff any being’s IG-illegally carrying in its baggage, Dohra? Given that they’re not gonna go anywhere except onto another ship that’ll dump them at another spaceport where they’ll have to go through IG C&E if they wanna go anywh—” He didn’t bother to finish, as she’d collapsed in helpless giggles.

    “One of the great unsolved mysteries of sentient life as we know it!” concluded the Thwurbullerian with a merry waggle of its frontal lobes. “Here they come! Now, look for a tallish Thwurbullerian with distinctive Rumdellan veining on its frontal lobes.”

    “So it’s from Rumdella, not Luqulla like you, Forty-Four?” ventured Dohra, tiptoeing and peering.

    “Originally, yes, but it lives on Luqulla now,” it said, peering.

    Didg didn’t bother to peer, those beings coming off were manifestly all wmboids from Kaibfurstenh’g: they were about as tall and bulky as Thwurbullerians but the four stumpy legs under the distinctive garments were a give-away. Their four arms were stumpy, too, and they were clearly all having difficulty with their luggage.

    “Look at them all!” said Dohra dazedly.

    “What in Federation is it?” croaked Didg as even more of them surfaced from the tunnel, and other beings’ auditory senses were nigh deafened by the clack-clack-clack of the wmboid dialects. “A conference?”

    “It will be,” said Trff mildly.

    “Yes, they’re all headed for the big Full Surgeons’ conference on Mullgon’ya,” agreed Forty-Four.

    “They can’t all be Full Surgeons!” gasped Dohra, goggling.

    “They could be, Dohra, but they’re not all yet,” said Trff helpfully.

    “No,” agreed Forty-Four. “Some of them are Assistant Surgeons and some are Assistant Surgeons’ Assistants.” –It’s all right, Didg: I’ve put a shield round her, just in case, it sent kindly.

    He sagged. Thanks, Forty-Four. Not that she’s got much in there that’d be of use to them.

    One never knows, it replied darkly.

    On second thoughts, it was so right! Automatically he re-checked his own shield.

    It’s fine!

    Didg jumped ten IG fluh where he stood. The it-being shouldn’t even to be able to tell he had a shield up, much less check how it was!

    Ho, ho, ho and Many Happy Galaxy Days to you-it, too! sent Trff pleasedly.

    I suppose you can’t tell what these plasmo-blasted Full Surgeons are thinking, can you?

    You-it supposes wrong. It began to tell him but it got so boring—stuff about innards and psychology and that sort of intergalactic space garbage—that Didg had to beg it to stop.

    “Ooh, here come some Thwurbullerians!” gasped Dohra at long last.

    “From Jishowulla,” Forty-Four explained. “See the veining on their frontal lobes?”

    “Ye-es. Ooh, look: some of them have got little ones with them!”

    “Jishowullans usually take the immature affines when they go to a holiday world,” said Forty-Four.

    Didg eyed it sideways; he couldn’t for the life of him tell if it approved or not.

    “I do approve in theory, Didg,” it said. “But Jishowullans are far too lax with their immature affines.”

    “Yeah!” he gasped, fending off a flying lump of chewing-taffy. “I see whatcha mean!” 

 

    “The tidy-blobs are tidying it away,” Trff reassured him.

    “Uh—yeah. But that’s not the point, Trff.”

    “It knows. Sticky-pawed pups, BrTl would call them.”

    “Puts it well.” Didg watched limply as two immature affines struggled over a lubolyon Whammer-Bammer Mark VI blaster, and the blaster flew into the air, narrowly missing an eye of a nearby mature affine. The fight went on. A tidy-blob scurried to tidy the fallen toy away—

    “Ow!” he gasped, clutching his ears, as the blaster’s owner emitted a piercing whine.

    Dohra was also clutching her ears, and Trff had retracted all its antennae.

    “Yes,” agreed Forty-Four with a certain satisfaction, as a mature Jishowullan affine was seen to chide the whining young one, and the noise stopped. “Sensible beings ensure the young affines are taught not to do that, before they take them off-world.”

    “Yeah,” he croaked, rubbing his ears.

    “Pardon?” said Dohra dazedly, rubbing her ears. “Has it stopped? –Thank goodness!”

    They watched numbly as Thwurbullerian after Thwurbullerian was turned away from the gate and went glumly over to join the queues in front of the IG C&E Decontam. units. “What can they be carrying?” wondered Dohra. “They all look so—so ordinary! I mean, not like smugglers, or anything!”

    “My bet’d be they’re not carrying anything IG-illegal,” admitted Didg. “The Decontam. units are just gonna get rid of the chewing-taffy and used senso-tissues, and so forth.”

    “And the mwopplell sticks,” admitted Forty-Four heavily. “Typical Jishowullans. They do know they’re not supposed to transport it between worlds without a mwopplell permit, but they will do it.”

    “They’re exactly like DorAvenian bond-partners travelling with their kids, then!” said Didg with a chuckle.

    “Yeah,” said Dohra weakly. “When me and J'nno went on that tour-lifter trip to Mount Veruba, the families with kids all brought incredible amounts of extra food and drink, even though we were told there’d be stops for lunch, and for morning and afternoon snacks.”

    “Yes, but that was a tourist lifter, wasn’t it?” said Forty-Four on a severe note. “One expects that sort of thing. But these Jishowullans came on the ferry. –It’s a regular service between the Thwurbullerian worlds,” it explained. “Two calls per IG year: quite convenient, really. But it’s scarcely a tourist facility: one can’t bring more than one S/IG suitcase.” It looked hard at the nearest Jishowullan, struggling to manage three brightly-coloured suitcases, an even more brightly-coloured lubolyon bag that gave every indication of being about to burst asunder, and a small Kernarvian balloon. “Or pets,” it noted pointedly. “And it certainly won’t get that balloon through the gate!”

    Dohra stared hard. “Is it a balloon or a pet?”

    “Both,” said Forty-Four definitely.

    “I wish I had one!” she gasped.

    “Inadvisable,” replied Forty-Four drily. “They eat a lot and grow to a considerable size. Though not big enough to carry a Thwurbullerian affine, even an immature one, so what, you may well ask, is the point of having one at all?”

    “Just to hold on a string?” suggested Dohra meekly.

    “Yeah. Don’t bother to explain, you beings!” said Didg, shaking slightly. “She thinks it’s good just as it is: see?”

    “Oh, so she-it does! Yes, a being can also hold them by a string, Dohra,” said Trff kindly.

    “Pointless,” murmured Forty-Four under its breath. “Oh, dear: I’m afraid this is going to take longer than I expected,” it admitted as six Jishowullans in succession were sent off to a Decontam. unit and the Space Patroller in humanoid person detached a sticky lubolyon toy from the clutch of a small and very sticky Jishowullan affine and disposed of it in the— “Look out!”

    Too late, the humanoids clapped their hands to their ears again.

    After a bit Dohra ventured, not taking her hands away: “Is it safe?”

    Yes, agreed Forty-Four.

   “That Space Patroller didn’t even seem to notice the noise,” she said, cautiously lowering her hands and looking at the man in awe.

    “That was his helmet, not him,” said Didg tolerantly. “Any sign of your friend, Forty-Four?”

    “It’s still on the ferry,” it admitted.

    “Yeah. Well, it’s gonna take some time for this lot to get through: shall we go and grab a mug of steaming-spaceport-muck or something?”

    “Yes; I’ll just send it a message. Done,” it said, waggling its frontal lobes at them. “Come along: shall we try that little beverage boutique we passed, Dohra?”

    “Ooh, yes! Let’s!”

    “Was this Bevvi’s Bevvies?” asked Didg neutrally.

    “Yes! It looked lovely!” she beamed.

    Tourist trap, sent Trff laconically.

    Too right, swiller! Added to which the owner’s an ISLA licensed Bdeeg, so LOOK OUT!

    It will! it agreed fervently.

    And they all set off happily for Bevvi’s Bevvies.

    Bevvi’s Bevvies was decked with lubolyon fruits which were possibly meant to represent the contents of the muck it sold, though this was carefully not stated anywhere. They had light-blobs in them and Dohra was thrilled by the effect. The prices were outrageous, of course, and the cups and glasses very visibly—once one had lowered one’s shades—not S/IG anything. But as Forty-Four insisted on paying for everyone it didn’t really matter.

    Dohra had something brown and glutinous that Bevvi’s menu claimed was Whtyllian something-or-other that none of them had ever heard of—not k’fi. She pronounced it to be galaxious, but not one of her companions would have touched it with a Space Patroller’s impermi-glove. Trff had laa, after a certain amount of readjustment of the menu. Forty-Four had Oononian spring water and reported it was reconstituted but not bad, though certainly not Oononian. Didg tried the Whtyllian k’fi, since it was listed, but although it looked almost convincing, it wasn’t. 

 

    They were just deciding they’d better get back when Bevvi itself came up to them and asked very subserviently if Trff was a Ju’ukrterian it-being.

    “Yes,” it said.

    “Please, Great One, have these drinks on me!” the Bdeeg gasped.

    Trff pointed a cautious antenna at it. “Why?”

    “No reason, Great One!” it gasped, falling flat on the polished lubolyon floor.

    “Did it once get on, uh, the wrong side of an it-being?” asked Didg, poking it with a cautious toe. Since it was a cylindrical being, it rolled slightly until stopped by an appendage.

    “No, the we-it doesn’t have a wrong side,” replied Trff simply.

    “Uh—right. Tried to smuggle something on or off Zll?” he groped. “Pinched something from an it-being?”

    “No, and no.”

    They stared at the fallen Bdeeg in bewilderment.

    At last Forty-Four said cautiously: “It’s very kind of you, Bevvi, but actually, I was paying, not this it-being.”

    “I insist!” it gasped.

    Didg rubbed his chin. “Hang on; I can’t spot anything—well, that ISLA licence explains a lot—but can you see anything up the whistle, Trff?”

    “Yes.”

    Somewhat belatedly he realised that it was being literal and said: “Well, what?”

    “This it-being’ll send it,” it decided. One pink-tinted quog rock, two uncut black Willunian diamonds, one piece of deep blue Faindorgean glass, and a Ybbertullian spy-symb that belongs to ISLA and that it doesn’t think the being knows it’s got.

    Sounds painful! conceded Didg, shaking slightly. Aloud he said: “Well, I think that settles it. Shall we go?”

    “Come back any time!” gasped the Bdeeg, still flat out. “On the house!”

    “Yeah, we’ll do that!” conceded Didg, grabbing Dohra’s elbow and steering her out. Don’t ask what that Ybbertullian spy-symb’s for, Sweet Cheese!

    “I’m not that dumb!” she retorted indignantly.

    No, she wasn’t. Just deliciously naïve. And soft, of course.

    Back at the gate the intergalactic dust had cleared slightly, though over by the Decontam. units a Space Patroller and a servo-mech could be seen supervising a small army of tidy-blobs which were heaving muck into a giant disposal.

    “I thought they recycled everything?” said Dohra, watching this operation with interest.

    “Recycle the immature affines’ used senso-tissues?” replied Forty-Four with distaste. “I should hope not!”

    Didg refrained from saying they probably would: that disposal looked to him like an Intergalactic Customs and Excise Grade-A, super-deluxe, maxi-galaxy-type disposal that’d be more than capable of making use of any substance in the Known Universe, even if it had to reduce it to its essential atoms first.

    Yes, agreed Trff. Or to its essential electrons, protons and neutrons. But in the case of immature affines’ used senso-tissues it doesn’t need to go that far.

    Didg eyed it sideways but it just stood there like an imperturbable ball of pale green fluff, not to be anything-ist. Can you actually read it?

    Yes. It’s only a blob. “This it-being would be happy to take a look at your-its ship’s blobs, Didg,” it added to his less-than-half-formed thought.

    “Uh—would you really? Thanks very much! Um, sorry, should I address you as it?”

    “No, it understands the concept ‘you’. Shall it start soon?” it asked on a wistful note.

    “Yuh—Uh, do you have to get permission or anything, Trff?”

    “BrTl won’t mind. And our ship has to…”

    “Don’t tell us if you’d rather not!” he said quickly.

    “No, it’s searching for the concept nearest to it in your-its mind, Didg. Simmer.”

    “Eh?” croaked the DorAvenian.

    “Like a culture-pan?” ventured Dohra. 

 

    “Yes. That,” it agreed, pointing an antenna at Didg.

    He gulped. “All right: simmer.”

    “I suppose culture-pans are blobs,” offered Dohra dubiously.

    “Yeah, but hardly capable of taking off into hyperspace, Dohra! But if you say so, Trff, simmer it is. We’d better just see if Forty-Four’s swiller needs a hand with its luggage, okay?”

    “Okay!” Trff agreed happily. “Or a tentacle!”

    It came to just above his knee, for Federation’s sake, what possible use did it imagine—Forget it. They waited, and after a few moments another bunch of Thwurbullerians appeared from the tunnel. They looked very like the Jishowullans, but Forty-Four said pleasedly: “There, now! See the Rumdellan veining?” And Dohra cried: “Of course! Quite distinctive, isn’t it?” So presumably they weren’t.

    The affine from Another Different Untranslatable Shade of Mauve Sector was carrying, with some difficulty, a brightly-coloured suitcase, a bulging brightly-coloured lubolyon bag that looked as if it was about to burst asunder at any moment, and an even larger lubolyon bag that bore the legend: DUTY-FREE MWOPPLELL BAG. FOR MWOPPLELL ONLY. MWOP’ SHOPS LIMITED. A JOINT SERVICE OF ISLA & Thwurbullerian FERRIES LIMITED. And another legend in an elaborate script full of little circles above, dots above and below, and hooks below the character that was possibly Thwurbullerian. Immediately Dohra pointed out pleasedly that it had brought some mwopplell! How thoughtful!

    “If they let it through,” said Forty-Four glumly, looking hard at the humanoid Space Patroller by the gate.

    “Go and charm him, Sweet Cheese,” suggested Didg sardonically.

    “Me? Whuh-what could I say?” she faltered.

    “Just tell him-it the truth, Dohra,” said Trff.

    “Well, all right, if you say so, Trff,” she said trustingly. Forthwith she went up to the gate.

    “You can’t come through,” said the Space Patroller from the far side.

    “I know. –It’s all right, Gate, I’m not coming through.”

    You’re welcome. Have a nice day.

    “They always say that, don’t they?” said Dohra to the Space Patroller with a happy laugh.

    “Uh—yeah,” he croaked. “Not usually if ya haven’t been through them, though.”

    “Really? I think they’ve always said to it to me. Um, see that Thwurbullerian over there? It’s from Rumdella, you can tell by the veining on its frontal lobes, it’s quite different from Luqullans or Jishowullans.”

    The Space Patroller blinked at it. “Its ticket says it’s come from Luqulla.”

    “I expect it does: ’cos see, it’s living there now. It’s a friend of our friend Forty-Four: that’s it, see? Next to the, um, small green fluffy being, not to be anything-ist, and the DorAvenian.”

    “Hard to miss it,” conceded the Space Patroller.

    “They are big, not to be anything-ist, aren’t they? But Forty-Four’s a lovely being! Very kind. And very respectable, of course. It doesn’t drink qwlot or anything like that, and it wouldn’t let me sleep in the sim-lounge. Even though I’ve never met any but very respectable beings in spaceport sim-lounges.”

    “Uh—ya lucky, then.”

    “Yes, that’s just what it says! –I just wanted to say that its friend’s got some duty-free mwopplell, that’s their favourite food, and if the gate thinks it’s all right, please could you let it through? Because it’s really harmless, I think they make it of leaves. And you can’t get it here, Forty-Four really misses it.” 

 

    “Duty-free leaves?” The Space Patroller blinked at the large duty-free bag the affine from Another Different Untranslatable Shade of Mauve Sector was carrying. “Duty-free leaves,” he confirmed dazedly. “Whatever blobs you up. –Oy, YOU!”

    The affine from Another Different Untranslatable Shade of Mauve Sector hurried over to him. “Yes, Patroller?”

    “Whatcha got in that duty-free bag?”

    “Best quality dried mwopplell,” it said politely, not asking him if he could read.

    “What’s it made of?”

    Perhaps no being had ever asked the affine this question: it gave an uncertain waggle of its frontal lobes. “It comes from the mwopplell plant, Patroller. A succulent plant, with very fat, juicy leaves. We don’t eat them fresh, though: they have to be dried very slowly. Then they can be used to make a sustaining mush, or a broth, or compressed into sticks—”

    “Yeah, yeah. Go through,” he said in a bored voice.

    “Thank you so much!” it replied, waggling its frontal lobes happily, and going through the gate.

    You’re welcome. Have a nice day.

    “Blow me out beyond the last black hole,” invited the Space Patroller limply. “Yeah, all right, Third Cook W’t, Dohra B’Jn, IG ID CT00002578-1345872/684005-90B-W47259/­00000044/02-F, ya friend’s friend’s clean. Enjoy your stay on the third moon of Pkqwrd. If ya can.”

    “Thank you so much! Bye-bye!” she beamed. “Bye-bye, Gate!”

    You’re welcome. Have a nice day.

    “They always say that, don’t they?” said the affine affably.

    “That’s just what I was saying! Um, I’m with Forty-Four from Untranslatable Shade of Mauve Sector.”—It waggled its frontal lobes in acknowledgement and sent: I know.—“Can I help you with one of those bags?”

    “Thank you!” said the affine in relief, handing her the brightly-coloured lubolyon bag. Dohra staggered under its weight, but grasped it firmly.

    “She did it,” noted Didg limply as the two approached them.

    “Of course. Even Space Patrollers can tell when a being is truly innocent,” said Trff complacently. “Why else would Forty-Four have brought her-it?”

    “Er—yes,” said Forty-Four quickly, with an uneasy waggle of its frontal lobes. “The thing is, that is a genuine mwopplell bag, and it is genuine mwopplell in it.”

    “Uh—if you say so. Not a need-to-know,” said Didg quickly.

    “Yes. Dried leaves,” the it-being confirmed placidly.

    “Mm. –There you are at last, Three Hundred And Two! We thought those Jishowullans would never clear IG C&E!”

    “Yes: the trip was unbelievable, Forty-Four: they had the immature ones with them—well, you can imagine!” it said with a happy waggle of its frontal lobes. “What with that and those crowds of wmboids, all assuming they had a right to be first off—! Well, never mind that, here I am at last! This is for you, with the very best wishes of Another Different Untranslatable Shade of Mauve Sector affinity group!”

    “You shouldn’t have! Thank you so much! And thanks to the affinity group!” Forty-Four took the duty-free bag eagerly and broke its blob-seal with a quick mind-command.

    “Mmm! That smells wonderful!” cried Dohra.

    “Pungent,” agreed Trff politely.

    “It’s like a spice we have on DorAven,” said Didg dazedly. “It’s a berry, though. We call it sour abrecoc berry.”

    “Taste,” said Forty-Four generously, withdrawing a dark orange withered-looking thing.

    “It’s quite suited to our metabolisms, Didg,” said Dohra reassuringly, biting into it. “Ooh, yum!”

    “Thanks,” said Didg weakly, taking a piece. He bit into cautiously. “Galloping grqwary gizzards,” he said limply. “It is like sour abrecoc berries! But much sweeter!”

    “And this is a staple food on your world?” said Dohra dazedly.

    “On all the Thwurbullerian worlds—yes,” Forty-Four agreed happily.

    “I wish I was a Thwurbullerian!” said Dohra fervently.

    The two affines waggled their frontal lobes pleasedly and said: “Understandable!”

    “It isn’t suited to the it-being’s metabolism,” reported Trff. “And if it could ask a favour, Forty-Four—”

    “Of course, Trff! Anything!”

    “This dried-leaf mwopplell food has a very, very high sugar content. Necessary to sustain the Thwurbullerian metabolism, of course,” it said politely. “But please don’t offer any to BrTl.”

    “Er—no,” said Forty-Four, rather taken aback.

    “So he’s a xathpyroid!” said the other affine with interest. “I did once see one that had eaten mwopplell. Highly inadvisable, Forty-Four.”

    “I see!” said Forty-Four in shaken tones. “Thank you so much for the warning, Trff. But I’m forgetting my manners in all this excitement! Do let me introduce Three Hundred And Two from Another Different Untranslatable Shade of Mauve Sector.”

    After everyone had been introduced and Forty-Four’s friend had urged them all to call it Three Hundred And Two, they adjourned to the bar, Forty-Four insisting on sending for a servo-mech for its friend’s suitcase and Didg forcibly taking the lubolyon carrier bag off Dohra.

    “I'm only in transit, of course,” said Three Hundred And Two with a sigh, sitting down in their corner.

    “Everyone is,” agreed Dohra, looking round uncertainly for the others.

    “This DorAvenian isn’t, as the concept’s generally understood, and neither is this it-being,” objected Trff. “And nor is BrTl: where is he-it? Oh, it sees!” it hooted happily. “In the cells.”

    “What?” gasped Dohra.

    “He-it’s quite comfortable. It suggests we leave him-it there, Dohra; only a paranoid xathpyroid that’s drunk too much qwlot tells a meankoid Space Patroller the being’s cheating at pkwr and expects to get away with it.” 

 

    “But this is terrible! Where’s blndreL? Why didn’t she stop them?” she cried.

    “She-it and that Meanker are in a bed in a room, Dohra, doing repro stuff together,” explained Trff.

    Dohra swallowed, though somehow, when Trff said it, it didn’t sound all that bad. Quite natural. Or did she mean normal?

    You-it means ‘not rude’, it sent.

    “Yuh—Um, she shouldn’t have let them take BrTl to the cells,” she said weakly.

    “To be fair, once the Patroller’s swillers had rushed in with their blasters drawn, she wouldn’t have been able to stop them. He can keep Budg company,” drawled Didg.

    “He’s not still there?” cried Dohra in horror.

    “Yeah, ’course he is.”

    “I’m gonna go down there and see if I can get BrTl out. And poor Budg, too!” she said, glaring at him. She transferred the glare to the it-being, but it just stood there like a ball of pale green fluff. “All right, be like that! I’m going!”

    “Hang on, I’ll come with ya,” said Didg heavily. “I s’pose Budg— Well, not learned his lesson, too much to hope for. And he doesn’t deserve to get out. But I s’pose he’s spent enough time down there, this time round. Coming, Trff? We can get on over to the ship after that, there’s time before dinner for you to take a look at it.”

    “Yes. Good,” it agreed simply.

    “Just tell me one thing before we go, Forty-Four,” said Didg, trying not to grin. “Exactly what was the problem with that bagful of duty-free mwopplell?”

    “Oh, well, I suppose it doesn’t make much difference, now: I mean, it’s through and we’ve opened it… No, well, it’s home-grown, you see.”

    Three Hundred And Two waggled its frontal lobes in agreement. “Home-grown!” it echoed smugly.

    The two humanoids stared blankly. Eventually Didg said limply: “Aren’tcha allowed to— I mean, is it like zuff weed? We can grow it for home consumption, one plant per household, or cottage—that’d be a slot to you, Sweet Cheese,” he reminded Dohra—“but we’re not allowed to grow it in bulk, and it’s a proscribed export.”

    “It’s nothing like zuff weed, and you don't need to know about that horrid weed, Dohra,” said Forty-Four on a severe note, “but the regulations are similar. An affinity group can grow as much mwopplell as it cares to—though many don’t: it’s a time-consuming business, and then the drying takes so long—but of course one has to have a commercial licence to transport it between worlds, and only the big companies have those. Such a silly regulation, I’ve always thought,” it ended on a complacent note.

    “Oh, exactly!” agreed Three Hundred And Two. “Very silly indeed.”

    Didg found he was cringing all over. “Come on,” he said hoarsely, grabbing Dohra’s arm. “See you at dinnertime!”

    Barely were they out of the bar than she said: “Aren’t they funny? As if anyone could mind about bringing in a bagful of chewy dried leaves that taste like sweet spicy apricots!”

    “Shut up!” hissed Didg madly.

    It’s all right, it’s got a shield round her-it, the it-being sent placidly.

    Really? Thanks, Trff, swiller, I owe you several, replied Didg, sagging. “Listen,” he said very, very quietly to Dohra, “never mind what the stuff is, see? If there’s an IG Reg against it, those two ‘funny’ beings could have ended in the cells.”

    “Ten IG years,” agreed Trff. “Though they might not have got the max.”

    “See?”

    “Oh, pooh!” she said gaily.

    “Yes!” After a moment he noted sourly: “Though come to think of it, you may well scoff: Forty-Four wouldn’t’ve ended up anywhere near a cell—”

    “No, of course—”

    “Because,” said Didg through the fangs, “it made plasmo-blasted sure it was you that went over to the gate and spoke to the Space Patroller and got its swiller through!”

    “It noticed that,” agreed Trff.

    Dohra was very flushed. “Don’t you dare to say it did it on purpose! And the whole thing was completely harmless! It’s their staple food: they eat it like—um—wholegrain mulg bread!”

    Didg took a very deep breath and managed not to reply. Never mind WHAT wholegrain mulg bread is! he sent to Trff.

    It can see what it is, but not why it’s a staple in their diet. The being doesn’t even like it.

    “Look, topic closed, okay?” he said heatedly. “I’ll just say this, Dohra: possibly Forty-Four realised you were safe dealing with that humanoid at the gate. And now I don't wanna hear—or sense—another syllable on the subject! Goddit?”

    “Yes,” agreed Trff meekly.

    “It wasn’t me that went on and on about it,” said Dohra with dignity, trying to pull her elbow out of his grasp. “I certainly don’t wish to discuss it.”

    Didg held on. “Good. And don’t imagine I’m gonna let go of you in the plasmo-blasted concourse! The cells are this way, and just start thinking of some really good reason why they have to let BrTl go!”

    She glared, but started thinking.

    “This is it,” said Didg as they stood before a large lift-blob labelled “Public Lift-Blob. FREE Inter-Level Transport. (IG. Reg. Approved. ISLA Standard.) Choose Your Level Before Entering. Entry Onto This Blob Constitutes a Waiver of Your Personal/Group Rights under the Intergalactic Personal/Group Being Physical Safety Rights Act. Available Levels.”

    “It can’t be: there aren’t any available levels,” objected Dohra.

    “None that you can see, Sweet Cheese, no. Come on, if ya wanna get down to the cells.”

    Dohra looked at Trff but it was just standing there, imperturbably pale green and fluffy. “Have you chosen a level, Didg?” she said in a small voice.

    “Yeah.”

    Reflecting that at least it had a door and sides, Dohra stepped on. The other two followed suit. Nothing happened.

    “Don’t tell me it’s waiting for a minimum load,” groaned Didg.

    Yes, the lift-blob agreed.

    “Great steaming piles of mok droppings!” 

 

    “Those would make it up to a minimum load,” agreed Trff mildly.

    “Was that a joke?” he said dangerously through the fangs.

    “Yes. Hah, hah, hah,” it replied placidly, pointing an antenna at him.

    Dohra collapsed in helpless giggles, and Trff gave a pleased hoot down one of its tubes.

    “Well—uh—” Didg looked around desperately but no other beings approached the lift-blob. Possibly because it wasn’t visibly advertising any available levels. “For Federation’s sake! Think heavy, or something, then, Trff!”

    There was an IG microsecond’s pause. “It sees: figure of speech,” it said, and the lift-blob began s-l-o-w-l-y to descend, while its door and walls closed protectively round them.

    “Ugh, it feels like clingo-jamas!” discovered Dohra in startled distaste.

    “Yeah. It’s doing its best: not used to coping with loads of this—uh, size,” Didg excused it, clearing his throat slightly.

    “Of course! Thank you, Lift.”

    You’re welcome. Have a nice day.

    “Don’t roll your eyes, Didg,” warned Dohra. “You’re not BrTl, it’s not funny on you.”

    As there was no possible answer to this one but a mad rolling of the eyes, he refrained from reacting. “Here we are,” he said on a note of mad resignation.

    “Yes,” agreed Trff. “Is some being sending Close? Because it’s sending Open.”

    “So am I,” agreed Didg grimly, “and that leaves one contender, doesn’t it? Oy, we’re here!” he said loudly, bending down to Dohra’s ear. “Unless you want Trff to forcibly remove that thought from you, stop thinking Close and start thinking Open!”

    “Forcibly’s an exaggeration,” it reproved him.

    Dohra gulped. “I’m trying to, but the lift-blob knows I’m scared, I think!”

    “Look, do it!” he said to the it-being.

    “Ooh!” she gasped as the lift-blob opened to nothingness.

    “What a lovely freight area!” said Didg loudly. “Look at that charming Service Issue spaceport flooring! Grade B, or I’m a Friyrian lordship with his gill-collar on!”

    “Is it?” she said limply.

    “Yeah. I could carry you, if you prefer.” He stepped out. “Come on.”

    Level Grey, the lift-blob contributed helpfully. Please exit this public lift.

    “It does look sort of grey,” admitted Dohra, very, very gingerly stretching out a foot into a greyish mist… “Ooh!” she gasped as Didg pulled her onto solid flooring and she suddenly saw they were in a vast hangar-like area which was, indeed, coloured a dull grey all over. Apart from its blob-signs, of course. There was one facing them, in fact.

LEVEL GREY. PROSCRIBED FREIGHT AREA (IG. Reg. 17,642,898,755-B Para. (a) Sub-Para. 231.) NO ADMITTANCE TO TOURISTS, TRANSIT PASSENGERS AND NON-AUTHORISED SPACEPORT PERSONNEL. VIPS MUST SHOW PASSES. Have a nice day

    Trff got out, to the lift-blob’s You’re welcome. Have a nice day.

    “There’s no being here to check the passes,” noted Dohra after a moment.

    “No, but there are no VIPs here, either,” Trff explained.

    “And they wouldn’t want to come here anyway,” said Didg firmly. “Come on, it’s quite safe.” As he spoke, a train of tran-blobs carrying baggage zipped across the huge grey space at about the level of his ear. Dohra gasped, and shrank.

    “Relatively safe,” amended Didg weakly.

    “Quite safe,” corrected Trff placidly.

    “Really? Thanks, Trff, swiller,” he said feebly. “Come on, it’s this way.” He took Dohra’s elbow and then waited while she held out her hand to Trff and it placed a tentacle-tip in it. It is an adult being, he mentioned as they set off.

    So am I! retorted Dohra with spirit.

    Didg just smiled a little as he led the way to the freight lift-blob. It wasn’t shielded: presumably the assumption was, if you were a being that had got this far you were entitled to see it. In all its near-colourless glory.

    “On thuh-that?” faltered Dohra.

    “Yeah. See?” He pointed at its lumo-blob sign. The cheap, blue-white sort: there were no frills in spaceport freight areas.

FREIGHT Lift-Blob. (IG. Reg. Approved. ISLA Standard.) NON-SENTIENT FREIGHT ONLY. Choose Level Before LOADING. Entry Onto This Blob Constitutes a VIOLATION OF the Intergalactic Personal/Group Being Physical Safety Rights Act. Available Levels: GOLD-b, PURPLE-b, INDIGO-b, GREY, WHITE, BLACK, GROUND, SUB-GROUND 1, SUB-GROUND 2, SUB-GROUND 3, SUB-GROUND 4, BASEMENT

    “Yes, um, which is our level?” she said weakly. She'd never realised there were levels below ground.

    “Black, of course: Level White’s got the cells for non-o-breathers, don’t you know anything?” said Didg tolerantly.

    “Not all that much about silly old spaceports on dusty old moons, no!” retorted Dohra with some vigour. “And aren’t Levels Gold and Purple and Indigo all VIP levels?”

    “Yeah; this here is a Grade-A, super-duper, VIP-luggage-carrying lift-bl— Vvlvanian curses!” he ended as it shot up.

    “It’s gone to get the VIP luggage from that Gorbachian Lines Limited’s Rhyzwollo Pleasure Cruiser Mark VII that's just docked on Level Indigo,” explained Trff. “Sorry. From Star-Flash Cluster II.”

    “I see,” said Dohra, rubbing her head. She thought she’d caught an emanation of Thank you, but there was no other being here.

    “If you picked up what I think I picked up,” noted Didg drily, “that’ll have been Pleasure Cruiser Star-Flash Cluster II itself.”

    “Yes,” confirmed Trff placidly as Dohra’s jaw dropped. “Quite a pleasant ship. Although not as fast as Gorbachian Lines Limited claims. All the Rhyzwollo models are— This female humanoid doesn’t want to know,” it said sadly to Didg. “Shall it send it to you-it?”

    “No; I’m sorry, Trff!” gasped Dohra. “Do tell us!”

    It emanated uncertainty but said: “If you-it says so, Dohra. All the Rhyzwollo models are just adapted Seekers.” 

 

    “Seekers?” gasped Dohra. “Like in Space Fleet?”

    “Very like those, only adapted to take numbers of VIP passengers and numbers of s-beings to serve them,” it confirmed placidly. “They don’t carry weaponry, that allows them to fit more VIPs in. But you-it’s wrong, they’re not nearly as fast as Seekers. They’re not licensed for the number of hyperblobs a Seeker’s hyperdrive has. –Now she-it sees,” it said to Didg.

    “Uh—yeah. Well, we both do," he agreed somewhat feebly. “And to think I almost believed the space garbage Gorbachian Lines Limited dishes out about them!”

    “Yeah. Them and Rhyzwollo WF Hypergalactic Incorporated,” it agreed. “Yes, Dohra, it’s a Whtyllian-Friyrian consortium, like the Silver WF Line. Oh, the space garbage? Just the usual company lies about their products, really. Didg is thinking about the particular lie they dish out about the speed of their Rhyzwollos. Oh, yes; and the implied lie—that is an implication, isn’t it?” it added to him. “Yes. –The implied lie about the number of hyperblobs they have,” it reported pleasedly to Dohra. “Sorry, Didg,” it added.

    “That’s all right, Trff, I realise you can’t help reading every last flicker of a half-formed thought that passes through my poor mammalian humanoid brain.”

    “No, it can’t. And the other ones, that aren’t thoughts, it uses the concept ‘thoughts’ loosely.” –Didg winced, but nodded.—“But Jhl says it makes it too obvious,” it ended glumly.

    “No, of course you don’t!” cried Dohra warmly.

    “It sees: a kind lie. Thank you-it, Dohra.”

    Dohra was still holding its tentacle tip. She gave it a cautious little squeeze. After a moment the tentacle flexed and squeezed her hand firmly. Then the it-being said pleasedly: “Yes, its tentacles are quite wiry, what an excellent figure of speech! But an it-being wouldn’t want to be a pet, Dohra.”

    At this point Didg of DorAven was heard to gulp loudly.

    “I can't help what I’m thinking,” said Dohra with dignity. “And if you had any mind-powers above those of a Mulravian worm, you’d of stopped that blob from going up!”

    “Mulravian worms are Class 214 beings,” he replied weakly, “and you're only class 216.”

    “Then I'm thinking of some other worms, and I apologise to them!” retorted Dohra swiftly.

    “It should’ve stopped that lift-blob from going up, too, Dohra,” Trff admitted. “Only it wasn’t… Loosely speaking, it wasn’t paying attention. –You-it’s right, Didg: Jhl often says that!” it hooted happily. “But it’s paying attention now: here it comes!”

    Didg and Dohra both looked blankly at the empty space where the lift-blob had been.

    “In ten IG seconds,” said Trff placidly.

    “Ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, t—Ooh!” gasped Dohra.

    Didg could see she hadn’t been checking up on it: quite the contrary. He smiled, and drew her gently onto the lift-blob. It suddenly sank, their FW packs switched to FULL ON, and Dohra gulped and shut her eyes.

    “Here we are,” he said mildly.

    Dohra opened her eyes cautiously. Fuzzy greyish nothingness. “You can get off first,” she said firmly.

    “Uh—better all get off together,” he admitted. “Now!” He pulled her off bodily. Trff was off a few seconds in front of him: anticipating the thought, or reading the half-formed thought, or reading the not-th— Never mind, it was off safely.

    Dohra was looking dubiously at the lumo-blob sign—blue-white, of course.

LEVEL BLACK. PROSCRIBED INTERNMENT AREA (IG. Reg. 10,982,431 Para. (a).) NO ADMITTANCE EXCEPT TO AUTHORISED IG CUSTOMS & EXCISE, IG SPACEPORT LICENSING AUTHORITY, IG SPACE PATROL, AND IG MILITIA PERSONNEL

    She turned from it, frowning. “I notice they’re not wishing any being a nice day any more.” She looked around. “Ugh! It’s very black.”

    “Yeah.”—I wouldn't worry about concepts which are supposed to be absolute in mammalian terms, Trff, old swiller, he sent to the puzzled emanations. Just take it as a figure of speech, okay? In fact, take it she’s a being that uses lots of them!—“Black is claimed by ISLA to be very restful to the o-breather eye,” he said drily. “In fact, I think claimed by ISLA to be a claim of the Full College of Full Surgeons.”––Paid off, sent Trff.—Uh-huh, he agreed.

    “Maybe,” said Dohra on a sour note. “Though I never met an o-breather being that came from a black world!”

    “Me, neither. Special Offer lubolyon sheeting’d be my guess.”

    Dohra poked the nearest wall cautiously. “Yes,” she said grimly. “Typical! All right, Didg: lead on.”

    Managing not to raise his eyebrows, the DorAvenian led the way down a wide black tunnel, barely illuminated by a scattering of blue-white lumo-blobs…

    “This,” noted Dohra grimly, “is a gate. How are we supposed to get through it?”

    “Just walk through.”

    “That isn’t funny!” she hissed.

    “Wasn’t meant to be. Okay, if ya don't believe me—” He walked through. Nothing happened. He grinned at her from the far side of the gate.

    Trff bobbed through in his wake, though Dohra recognised grimly that that probably didn’t prove a thing. “Come on, Dohra!” it encouraged her. “It’s a one-way gate!”

    One-way gate? Space garbage! There was no such thing! But if they weren’t scared, nor was she! Taking a deep breath, Dohra walked through.

    She looked around her dazedly at the wide black tunnel they were still in, and the mingy scattering of lumo-blobs the tunnel still featured. “I’m alive.”

    “Yeah,” agreed Didg. “One-way: see?” He pointed at the blob-sign on this side of the gate.

    Dohra looked at it dazedly.

YOU ARE NOW ENTERING A PROSCRIBED INTERNMENT AREA (IG. Reg. 10,982,431 Para. (a).) NO ADMITTANCE EXCEPT TO AUTHORISED IG CUSTOMS & EXCISE, IG SPACEPORT LICENSING AUTHORITY, IG SPACE PATROL, AND IG MILITIA PERSONNEL. ENTRY THROUGH THIS GATE Constitutes a Waiver of Your Personal/Group Rights under the Intergalactic Personal/Group Being Physical Safety Rights Act

    “Like, if we go back through it, it’ll zap us?” she croaked.

    “Yeah.”

    Dohra looked around wildly. “But how are we gonna get back?”

    “Not through this gate, for sure!” he said with a loud laugh. “You’ll see. Come on, it’s this way—and we’re IG-legal now, you can relax.”

    “Yes, this side of the gate is approved for non-authorised beings,” agreed Trff placidly.

    Numbly Dohra accompanied them down the tunnel and into a wide, black-walled, black-ceilinged and black-floored area sparsely lit with blue-white lumo-blobs… “Oh!” she cried indignantly. “You are the ultimate Outer Limit, Didg!”

    To their right, the black wall was almost entirely occupied by a series of lift-blobs bearing blob-signs which read, admittedly in cheap blue-white and in plain capitals, not the fancier scripts observable on the public levels:

Public Lift-Blob. ENTRY: 15 IGS. (IG. Reg. Approved. ISLA Standard.) Choose Your Level Before Entering. Entry Onto This Blob Constitutes a Waiver of Your Personal/Group Rights under the Intergalactic Personal/Group Being Physical Safety Rights Act. Available Levels: XRILLION (VIPS ONLY), PLATInUM-MEZZANINE (TRANSFER CHARGES APPLY), GOLD, PURPLE, INDIGO, SILVER, BLUE, TURQUOISE, Red, PINK, APRICOT, GREEN, BLACK

    “Didja wanna pay fifteen igs to get here?” he drawled, as Dohra ascertained angrily that all the lift-blobs did go to Level Pink, where they’d come from.

    “No, but I didn’t want to be scared out of my wits, either!” she replied crossly.

    “Look, we’ll have to pay to get Budg and BrTl out, and I hate to admit it, but these here lift-blobs are the only way out. I’m not gonna chuck igs away if I don’t have to.”

    “No. it cost him several rafts of super-igs to have his ship’s hold decontaminated,” noted Trff. “It sees: a being has to pay fifty super-igs and then go through the Platinum-Mezzanine level to get onto Level Platinum,” it acknowledged placidly.

    “What in the two galaxies is up there?” asked Dohra on a scornful note.

 

    “Cafeterias? There is another word. Some beverage bars, too. It thinks you-it’d call them fancier than Bevvi’s Bevvies, Dohra.”

    “Restaurants,” said Didg heavily. “Fancy restaurants with, so the story runs, super-maxi-galaxy views of incoming and outgoing pleasure-cruisers with a backdrop of space featuring a nice view of the Third Galaxy. So the story runs.”

    Dohra’s mouth tightened. “It’s really unfair!”

    “What, life? Pretty much—yeah. Dare say that being with the fancy turban,” he said sourly, not admitting he could see perfectly well he was the Meagraw of Gr’mmeaya, “could afford to take you there any time you wanted.”

    “Also that turquoise being with the chased xrillion gill-collar,” noted Trff.

    Dohra was very red but she stuck her chin in the air. “I know you’re both reading me, but you might at least have the manners to pretend you’re not!”

    “Uh—yeah,” said Didg lamely. “Sorry, Sweet Cheese.”

    “Sorry, Dohra,” hooted Trff sadly. “It forgot. It’s spent too long in space tinkering with the blobs.”

    “Yes, well, that’s your excuse,” said Dohra, taking its tentacle again. “I’m not gonna ask what his is, because I know he hasn’t got one! Come on: we follow the arrows, see?”

    Glumly they accompanied her in the direction of the string of lumo-blob arrows leading off from the lumo-blob message “TO THE CELLS.”

    “Hullo,” said Dohra politely to the black-uniformed ISLA Warder on duty at the reception desk “We’ve come to get BrTl, he’s a xathpyroid, he’s only been down here since earlier this afternoon, and Budg, he’s sort of a DorAvenian and he’s been down here for days, poor being. –Oh, dear, it’s not a very cheerful environment for you, is it?” she added before the being could utter. “Unless you like black?”

    “No, I don’t,” he said on a sour note.

    “I didn’t think you could do: I’ve never heard of a being that did. Aren’t they mean, not to give you a nice sim-picture on the wall, or anything! Do you need to see our IDs?”

    “Uh—yeah, I can,” he admitted. After a moment he raised the visor of his helmet.

    “Oh, hullo!” beamed Dohra. “You’re a Meanker, aren’t you? We know a Meanker, in fact our friend BrTl was playing cards with him, and he said Lu Rullan—that’s his name, isn’t it pretty?—he said he’d been cheating, but I’m afraid that was because he’d been drinking a lot of qwlot. Well, a xathpyroid probably can drink a lot, because they’re quite big, not to be anything-ist, aren’t they? Only he drinks it by the basinful!”

    “Uh—yeah, they do,” he said, consulting his list-blob.

    BrTl. Xathpyroid cognate. Br-cognate. IG ID SF9887124355784277099-X684761235992-BR/000177947/17-M(t). Rank: Lieutenant-Pilot. Status: Space Fleet Reserve. Reason for resignation/discharge: Surplus to requirements in the present megaclimate. Last Performance Grade: CCCC. Previous convictions—

    “Never mind those, we’ll be here for the next IG month!” said the ISLA Warder with a certain dry humour. “Yeah, well, that’s him. Has he been convicted yet?”—No, supplied the list obligingly.—“Okay: that’ll be sixty igs to get him out.” He noticed Dohra was looking at the small lumo-blob sign on his counter which said MAXIMUM FINE WITHOUT CONVICTION, 50 IGS. “You wanna argue, little humanoid?”

    “No, um, but I haven’t got sixty igs!” she gasped.

    “It has,” admitted Trff glumly. “Well, the ship’s account has. But Jhl won’t be pleased.”

    “Ya want him or not?” said the ISLA Warder heavily.

    “Yes. No,” it said.

    “I’m so sorry!” apologised Dohra quickly. “It does that, ’cos see, it’s been out in space, tuh— Ooh, ’scuse me! I’ve got a horrid tickle in my throat! It’s been out in space for ages, poor little being, with no being to talk to. I think it means it would like to take him now, but if it had its druthers he’d stay in for a bit to teach him a lesson, only not with a conviction, of course!”

    “He’d be lucky,” owned the ISLA Warder. “Sixty igs, then. Who’s the other being, again?”

    “Budg. Um, sort of a DorAvenian,” she said.

    “Mutant,” said Didg heavily as the Meanker blinked his emerald eye at the list.

    Budg. Mutant humanoid var. Fanged. IG ID SF15654421996698006132-M02367198771-B/43209/01-M(m). Rank: Ordinary Spacer. Status: Space Fleet Reserve. Reason for resignation/discharge: Surplus to requirements in the present megaclimate. Last Performance Grade: DFFF. Previous convictions—

    “Blow me out beyond the last black hole,” said the Warder weakly. “Ya want this one back?”

    “Yeah. Go on, what’s the damage?” said Didg heavily.

    “Three hundred igs. And the being busted up its dinner plate a couple of times, that’ll be three hundred and sixty igs all up to you, DorAvenian. Take it or—”

    “I’ll take it,” he said heavily.

    “Good. Sixty igs for the xathpyroid and seventy for the mutant humanoid into this account,” he said blandly. “–Thanks,” he said as the credits transferred. “And two-ninety into this account for the mutant. –Good, that’s it. And you’re welcome to the pair of them. And oy! Green Fluffy! Don’t you expect to get your ship-companion out so cheap next time!”

    “Thank you so much!” beamed Dohra. “So do we go in and get them?”

    “Asteroids of Hhum: she’s genuine, isn’t she?” croaked the Meanker, having blinked his emerald eye several times at her.

    “Yeah,” said Didg with a little sigh. “She is, actually, Warder. I guess ya don't see many of those down here, eh?”

    “No. Well, none,” he said dazedly. “It explains the sim-picture stuff, though.”

    “Uh-huh. Wait here, Dohra,” said Didg, grabbing her elbow.

    “I can see that now,” said Dohra with dignity, lifting the chin.

    “They’re coming,” the Meanker explained tolerantly.

    “Yes; thank you very much!” she beamed. “I see, they have to come down a long tunnel. I’m sure all this black can’t be good for any of you. I think you must be from Gheaudarraine, is that right?”

    “Yeah.”

    “Yes, Lu Rullan is, too, and we met such a nice female Meanker on duty upstairs, she’s from there, too! She has to stay on duty at her gate, but at least she can see the windows of the boutiques from there.”

    “Ya don’t mean Mu Sellan?” he croaked.

    “We never got her name, did we, Didg? But she had a beautiful emerald eye, just like yours, if you don’t mind me mentioning it, and now I know that means you’re from Gheaudarraine!”

    “Yeah. A megazillion, megazillion light-years from Gheaudarraine,” the Warder said glumly, leaning heavily on his counter.

    “I know how you feel, though of course it must be worse for you with all this black. I’m from C’T’rea, that feels as if it’s a megazillion, megazillion light-years away, too. Look, I’ll try and show you. …See? Isn’t it pretty?”

    “Not bad,” he admitted, brightening fractionally. “Look into my eye.”

    No, DON’T! sent Didg and Trff frantically.

    Too late, Dohra was looking.

    “Oh!” she cried, staggering backwards. Hastily Didg leapt to support her. “Oh, it’s beautiful! Oh, Didg, did you see?”

    No, thank the Federation. “No,” he said grimly.

    “Did you, Trff?”

    “Of course. Very, um, emerald. Swirly?”

    “Yes! The sky’s all emerald and swirly, Didg, just like their eyes, you never saw anything so wonderful!” she cried. “And they’ve got marvellous buildings with coloured spires and towers, and the flowers are just like coloured lumo-blobs only better! And the fields are all bright blue and twinkly!”

    “Yeah,” said the meankoid Warder smugly, but with a certain wistfulness about him. “Now ya come to mention it, little humanoid, I wouldn’t mind a sim-picture of home on the wall, just over there.” He looked sadly at the stark blue-white lumo-blob sign on the wall.

ALL VISITORS REPORT TO RECEPTION. THIS IS A PROSCRIBED INTERNMENT AREA (IG. Reg. 10,982,431 Para. (a).) NO ADMITTANCE TO THE CELLS WITHOUT AUTHORITY. WARNING! AUTHORISED PERSONNEL MAY BE REQUIRED TO ACT IN A WaY WHICH COULD INFRINGE YOur Personal/Group Rights under the Intergalactic Personal/Group Being Physical Safety Rights Act

    There was another copy of the sign on the wall behind him. And another on the ceiling. Set into the floor just in front of the desk was another: a being could hardly claim to have missed the warning.

    Dohra was elaborating: “Well, the boutiques have got some pretty ones, even on Level Pink where we were. Though the tourist ones over near your friend—Mu Sellan, was that it? Yes; near where she has to stand, they’ve got nicer ones, but of course they’re terribly dear.”

    “She’d think I was ready for Mullgon’ya if I asked her to get one for me,” he admitted gloomily.

    “I could do it! Um, only I’m afraid you’d have to give me the igs in advance,” said Dohra, blushing, apparently impervious to Didg’s and Trff’s frantic mind-messages of NO! Stop!

    “You pair of vacuum-frozen intergalactic blob-heads can stop that,” said the Meanker almost genially. “I'll give you a credit disc, W’t, Dohra B’Jn, okay? Go to Gheaudie Goodies, Mu Sellan’ll point you in the right direction, and mind ya choose one that’s got an emerald sky!”

    “Of course! And please, call me Dohra!” she beamed, accepting the being’s credit disc without a blink.

    “I’m Ku Fellan,” the Meanker was telling her.

    It’s blinked at it, Trff reassured Didg. It’s good. Also she-it can’t spend it anywhere but at Gheaudie Goodies.—Didg sagged in relief.—Added to which the being’s added a lift-blob pass, it reported dazedly. Only good once she-it’s got the sim-pic, but still!

    Trff, do you honestly think she’s gonna be safe jauntering up and down on that plasmo-blasted lift-blob and coming in to see that Meanker by herself? 

 

    Yes. Lift-blobs are very reliable blobs. Oh! That Meanker hasn’t got any evil intentions towards her-it.

    Didg’s nostrils flared. Not at this precise instant, is this?

    Yes.

    He ground his fangs slightly.

    That does remind it of— Oh, there you-it is! it sent happily as BrTl and a chastened-looking Budg appeared at the gate to the cells.

    Where have you BEEN? replied BrTl aggrievedly. Don’t answer that, I don't want any of your literal-minded space garbage, thanks! And that DorAvenian’s fangs are nothing like my CRUNCHERS!

   “We’ll have no emanations about crunchers, thanks, xathpyroid, or you’ll go back in the cells,” noted the ISLA Warder as the gate opened and the two shuffled towards them. Dohra gasped, as it dawned that BrTl was wearing three sets of anklets, cross-wise, and two double sets, length-wise, and Budg was wearing one, cross-wise. “It’s still drunk,” the Meanker added as the two shuffled up to his counter.

    “I am not!” growled Budg.

    “Not you, Smelly. This great furry hulk here. Ya both out. Sign here, if ya can write.”

    “Of course they can write!” cried Dohra.

    “I can, yeah,” noted BrTl, signing.

    Faithfully the list-blob reported: Verified: BrTl, IG ID SF9887124355784277099-X684761235992-BR/000177947/17-M(t). Warning: still drunk.

    “We know,” agreed the Warder. “I’m unlocking you, xathpyroid, but make one false move and the restraints’ll go on again before you can say magma pits of Vvlvania.”—As he spoke BrTl’s leg-irons came off and a set of tidy-blobs scurried up to tidy them away.—“Oy! Smelly!” he said loudly to Budg. “If ya can’t write, put ya digit here!”

    “I can write my name!” he growled. “B,U,G, ‘Budg’, see?”

    Verified: Budg, his mark. Budg, IG ID SF15654421996698006132-M02367198771-B/43209/01-M(m).

    Doha sagged visibly. Isn’t it thoughtful? she sent approvingly to Didg.

    Uh—something like that, he agreed, as Budg’s leg-irons fell off. “Those are tidy-blobs, Budg, not Gervaynian toe-slugs, don’t stamp on them!” he said loudly. “This is Dohra. She’s not for you,” he said clearly, also sending it clearly, though without all that much hope. “Say hullo to her.”

    “Hullo, Dohra,” growled Budg, with a horrible display of his fangs.

    “And give over with the fangs,” said Didg with a sigh. “We’re not on DorAven now.”

    “I know that, swiller!” he growled indignantly.

    Yeah, something like that. “And this is Trff. It’s an it and it’s not to eat, geddit?”

    “Yeah.”

    “Hullo, Budg,” said Trff politely.

    “Say hullo,” said Didg with a sigh to his so-called Chief Engineer.

    “Hullo, Trff,” he growled.

    At this point—though admittedly Didg had been expecting it for some time, after all there were few beings so xenophobic as your average Meanker—the Warder collapsed in a horrible fit of hoos. “Hoo-hoo-hoo! Hoo-hoo-hoo!”

    “Yeah,” he said, grabbing his comrade’s hefty, hairy arm. “Come on, before he changes his mind and throws you in again.”

    “I want my helmet!” growled Budg with a terrific display of fangs.

    “Don’t DO that! How many times I gotta tell ya, spaceport beings don’t wanna see your fangs! –If that three hundred and sixty igs covers his helmet, I’ll have it back, thanks,” he said with a sigh to the hooing Meanker.

    “Eh?” the being said weakly. “Uh—no, it doesn’t. Ya can have it back for ten igs.”

    “Keep it,” decided Didg brutally. “Come, on, we’re going.”

    “Wait: I’ve got something to collect,” said BrTl in a confused voice.

    “Beside your wits, xathpyroid cognate? It’ll be his change-purse, Warder,” said Didg with a sigh. “Ask the list.”

    BrTl, IG ID SF9887124355784277099-X684761235992-BR/000177947/17-M(t). Checked in: 1 change-purse with blob-lock, poor quality, agreed the list. Contents: nothing.

    “What?” cried BrTl indignantly.

    “Ya lost everything to Lu Rullan, or has that slipped ya memory?” asked the Warder. “Here, take it, it’s worth less than half an ig.”

    “But what about their blasters, Ku Fellan?” asked Dohra timidly.

    “Confiscated,” he replied smugly.

    “Oh, I see, they’re not allowed to have them back. It serves you right for misbehaving,” she said severely to the pair of them. “I think you’d better go back to the pod and sleep it off, BrTl. Trff’ll take you, won’t you, Trff?”

    “It—Um, yes,” it said meekly.

    “Come on, Didg,” said Dohra firmly. “We’ll go and get Ku Fellan’s sim-picture, shall we? You can come with us, Budg,” she said with a nice smile.

    “I want my helmet!” he growled.

    “Could he possibly have it back? I could give you an ig for it," said Dohra nicely to Ku Fellan. “The thing is, they’re very proud of them on DorAven, and, um, well, you can imagine what else he’s got to be proud of.”

    “Not much,” replied the Warder promptly. “Eh? Oh! Look, he’s only a mutant, ya wasting ya sympathy on him, Dohra, but have the thing back, if ya must.” Forthwith he produced it and Budg, growling horribly, grabbed it and put it on. The effect was frightful, but possibly there was some slight excuse, or at least reason, for the Warder’s then noting: “Shoulda given it back IG hours ago: it improves the view no end. I'll see you in a bit, then, Dohra?”

    “Yes, of course!” she beamed. “Thank you so much! Come on, everyone!”

    And off they went to the public lift-blobs. One was waiting so they got onto it, paying out inordinate amounts of igs as they did so. And up they went, Trff and BrTl, at Dohra’s prompting, meekly getting off at Level Green, and the rest of them carrying on to Level Pink.

    “Now listen,” said Didg firmly to his swiller. “Whatever happens, don't say a thing, okay? She’s gonna talk to a Space Patroller.” Budg backed off in alarm, growling horribly. “There’s nothing in it. Trust me.” Budg showed no signs of trusting him, in fact the growling got worse, so he slapped a mind-lock on him. And off they went.

    The meankoid Space Patroller, now revealed as Mu Sellan, was again on duty at her gate. “Shopping?” she said drily to Didg.

    “Ask her,” he said with a sigh.

    “I know. Go through. Gheaudie Goodies is that way, and don’t choose anything with anything that looks like a snow-orchid in it, he’ll take it as an insult to his ability to—” She paused, the emerald eye on Dohra. “Reproduce his horrible kind, the vacuum-frozen intergalactic blob-head that he is.” 

 

    “Thank you very much, Patroller,” said Dohra politely.

    “Call me Mu Sellan,” said the Patroller resignedly, as Dohra went through the gate, thanking it politely, and the gate responded in the usual way. “Go on, ya both clean, and keep that mind-lock on that, wouldja?”

    Meekly Didg went through with his swiller in tow.

    The first thing the being in charge of Gheaudie Goodies did was try to sell Dohra a picture with a bunch of snow-orchids in it, but Didg was ready for that. Next it tried to sell her the next most expensive picture in the boutique but he was ready for that, too. Finally she chose a lovely one, her expression. The sales-being tried to take the credit disc off her, but Didg was ready for that, too. And after the right number of igs had been deducted from the specified account, back they went.

    Budg broke his mind-lock and threw a fit as Didg chose Level Black going back down but he was almost ready for that. And fortunately the lift-blob was nice and roomy.

    Amazingly enough after the picture had been presented to the Meanker and he’d insisted that Dohra had to help him to choose a spot to hang it, her credit was still good for the ride back up. Didg didn't point out that the excursion had cost him, Didg, sixty igs all up.

    “This isn’t our level!” she said as they emerged on Level Turquoise.

    “It’s handier for the ship. Unless ya wanna go back to the bar on Level Pink and listen to the Thwurbullerians exchanging affinity group gossip?”

    “No!” she said with a laugh. “Let’s leave them to it! This is exciting: what sort of level is it?” She looked round with bright-eyed interest at the myriads of tiny boutiques and beverage bars and the ranks of public food dispensers.

    “Turkuz,” growled Budg. “It’s not green, and it’s not blue.”

    “Yes, that’s right, Budg!” she said encouragingly. “I meant, what sort of beings use it?”

    After a moment Didg’s swiller replied: “Ya not allowed to eat them.” Well, at least it had sunk in.

    “It’s a transit level, strictly speaking: that’s why the layers of bubble-trains and tran-blob trains up there—see?”—Dohra looked up in awe at the myriads of bubble-trains and tran-blob trains criss-crossing the immense turquoise atrium, hundreds of IG fluh above their mammalian heads.—“But it’s used mainly by tourists: it’s the level where a lot of the ferries for the holiday worlds dock. We’ll most likely see those Jishowullans, with luck.”

    “Hah, hah!” she said grinning.

    Didg smiled and took her arm, even though Level Turquoise was about the safest level there was. “Well, they were heading for Mollyjollyholly, and according to that blob-sign over there the ferry’s due to leave in half an IG hour.”

    “I been there!” growled Budg unexpectedly.

    Jumping slightly, Didg admitted: “Yeah, he has. Mollyjollyhollies Incorporated hired us to haul a cargo of Grade C pink Carnuvese sand there, and we gave ourselves the treat of flat-worlding for a couple of days.”

    “They got good Fro-Glos there,” growled Budg.

    “Yeah; and great Icy Froths, and Grade-A Dreamy-Creamies!” agreed Didg with a laugh.

    “Dreamy-Creamies! Hey, yeah!” he agreed, licking his lips with a horrible smacking sound.

    “It sounds super!” beamed Dohra. “What about their maxi-galaxy shakes?”

    “Out of this universe!” said Didg, rolling his eyes.

    “Yeah,” growled Budg. “They put real Dreamy-Creamies in them!”

    “Help! Aren’t they awfully expensive?”

    “Well, tourist prices—yeah,” agreed Didg, helping her onto a lift-blob.

    Dohra got on without apparently noticing that it had no levels displayed and in fact wasn’t a public lift-blob at all. “Can you get nymbo cheese there?”

    “Sure,” he said, sending Level Yellow and hoping she wouldn’t notice there were no walls or door and the thing was gonna go—express! He suppressed the urge to grab at his stomach as the bottom dropped out of it. “Now get this: they put it in their Dreamy-Creamies!”

    “Yeah! Galaxious!” agreed Budg. “Hey, are we here, swiller?”

    “Yeah: blink,” replied Didg automatically.

    “Hey, yeah! We’re here! It’s yellow, see?” he said to Dohra, stepping off.

    Dohra followed him without apparently noticing she was stepping off into greyish nothingness or that her FW pack was in hyperdrive. “It’s yellow, all right,” she agreed, glancing at the large lumo-blob sign on the yellow wall.

LEVEL YELLOW. ISLA SERVICE AREA (IG. Reg. 82,657,985,820,594-G Para. (d).) NO ADMITTANCE EXCEPT TO AUTHORISED IG SPACEPORT LICENSING AUTHORITY PERSONNEL. WARNING! Entry Onto This LEVEL Constitutes a Waiver of Your Personal/Group Rights under the Intergalactic Personal/Group Being Physical Safety Rights Act. ALL VISORS MUST BE LOWERED. NEXT ISLA EMERGENCY EXIT: 5 GLPS

    “We haven’t got any visors to lower,” she added detachedly.

    “No,” agreed Didg, grinning. “Come on: down this tube. If ya get a bit out of breath, for Federation’s sake tell me, okay?”

    “Sure,” said Dohra amiably, following him trustingly.

    About two glps away, over half an IG hour at Dohra’s pace, at the junction of the tube with two other tubes, a useful ISLA tran-blob train was waiting.

    Greetings, Master, it announced as Didg approached.

    “My swiller done that,” Budg explained proudly to Dohra.

    “Uh—yeah,” he agreed with a weak grin. “Overdid it, see? Never mind, at least it's waited for us. Hop aboard.”

    And off they went, at the speed of—Well, at the speed of an ISLA freight tran-blob train that had had an IG-illegal jab of hyperblob, actually. Didn’t take long at all.

    “Welcome to the ship, Sweet Cheese,” grinned Didg. “Don’t expect it to pipe you aboard, or anything.”

    “It can, only its blobs are sick,” explained Budg.

    “Something like that. –Vvlvanian curses, thought Trff might’ve got here before us. Never mind—come aboard, we’ll show ya round. And, uh, ya might find it a bit dark.”

    “We got restrainos, too,” agreed Budg, boarding.

    “Yeah. Don’t think I’ll examine that train of thought too closely,” admitted Didg, helping Dohra in. “Sorry: it is a bit steep. Uh—yeah, well, xrillion,” he said feebly as she gaped around her at the smooth, featureless xrillion entrance-tube of his ship.

    “It’s very workmanlike,” she said firmly.

    Something like that—yeah. “Yeah. Come on, wanna see the bridge?”

    “Ooh, yes, please!”

    They went to the bridge. She couldn’t see much, but she thought it was galaxious anyway. For some reason Budg was really keen to show her where he sat. Oh well, at least he didn’t seem inclined to want to eat her. Then he offered to show her the hyperdrive, great splintered shards of quog! 

 

    “NO,” said Didg clearly. “We don’t show beings the hyperdrive—geddit?”

    “That’s all right, Budg!” said Dohra quickly. “I don't mind!”

    “But the hyperdrive’s the best!” he objected. “See, when ya put ya head down it”—Didg shut his eyes—“it goes all kinda fuzzy.”

    “No, ya can’t, Dohra,” Didg said heavily to her hopeful emanations, opening his eyes. “No being’s been able to explain why, but where all other sentient beings experience total mind melt-down after placing the head down the hyperdrive, and are only fit for consignment to the plasmo-blasted Full Surgeons’ revolting experimental section, he just feels—well, ya heard it for yaself. Fuzzy. Uh—a mild buzz?”

    “I like blobs,” said Budg comfortably.

    “Yeah, he does. Some have claimed that he goes into a mind-symb with them, possibly because his mental functions are very similar to theirs—don’t frown, if ya took a good look you’d see that’s flattering him—and he’s not a bad Ship’s Engineer, for everyday functions like conserving the drive, and even helping maintain hyper-hop.”

    “I can do hyper-hop: ’s’easy,” said Budg to Dohra. “Ya just go ‘hyper-hop’ in ya head.”

    “I’m sure it’s easy for you, Budg, but I couldn’t do it,” she said admiringly.

    “Ya can’t be a Chief Engineer, then, like me.”

    “Wavey-Spacey rank of Ordinary Spacer, but he fulfils—uh, some of the functions— Well, why the Federation not?” ended Didg, hoping he didn't sound as foolish as he felt.

    “I understand,” she said with a lovely smile. “He’s your swiller.”

    “Yeah, we’re swillers!” agreed Budg. “I gotta go an’ look at the blobs.”

    “Mm-hm, off ya go,” agreed Didg.

    “You can sit in my seat, if ya like,” he said generously to Dohra, going.

    “I think he likes you. Without perceiving you as food,” admitted Didg dazedly.

    “Good.” Composedly Dohra sat in the co-pilot’s seat. “Ooh, very comfortable!”

    “Uh—yeah,” he said, not pointing out that neither the seat nor the ship would trust her as far as they could throw her without benefit of blobs. 

 

    Not that most of the functions weren’t firmly Off, on Budg’s seat. Emergency flight commands only—in the case the Pilot was out of it, that kind of thing. Only one course allowed: home to DorAven. And if the Old Ones of DorAven smiled upon them, the swiller’d never have to find out if he could make it. Because even with that course set in, Didg sincerely doubted that he’d be able to. For quite some years now Didg had had a sickeningly clear picture of what’d happen to Budg if he, Didg, was out of it. First off he’d zap, or attempt to zap, the being or ship or whatever, that was responsible for it. Then, if that worked, he wouldn’t sit down in his seat and give the Go command, he’d go and stick his head down the drive and commune with the plasmo-blasted blobs while his brain went “fuzzy”, that was what he’d do! For IG years Didg had barrelled round the two galaxies with the swiller without a second thought. He’d been a lot younger in those days. A lot younger…

    “What?” said Dohra anxiously.

    He jumped. “Huh? Oh—sorry, just thinking. There’s old swillers of mine back on DorAven—kids I grew up with, ya know—that are grandparents now.”

    After a startled moment Dohra said: “They must’ve started their families very young.”

    “Thanks!” he said with a grin. “Uh, no, well, village kids, ya know? They do, I s’pose. Tend to pair off at around eleven-twelve IG years.”

    Dohra’s jaw sagged. J’nno was about that IG age!

    “That’d be fourteen to sixteen, in DorAvenian years. Uh—’tisn’t IG-illegal, Dohra,” he ended uncertainly.

    “It’s illegal on C’T’rea!” she gasped.

    “That’d be a World Reg.”

    After a moment Dohra said: “Were you a village kid?”

    “Uh—no.” Didg scratched his jaw slowly. “No. Country boy, though. Oh—magma pits, what’s it matter? Look, I’ll show ya.” He sent her a clear picture of his parents: Pa with his plasmo-blasted ceremonial half-armour on and Ma in something hugely unlikely from one of the lady-being boutiques in Silver City, sitting on their ceremonial chairs out on the turquoise lawn before the castle, receiving tenants on Quarter Day. In the background, gay tents and a carousel and the shrieks of village kids riding on the carousel and falling off the donkeys and just generally enjoying the fair.

    “It’s a fair!” said Dohra. “Like the Ballunder!”

    “Huh?”

    “Sorry. We call them shows. I see, your father’s a chief.”

    “Yeah. That’s a Quarter Day fair: the tenants get what the Feeny-Argyllians’d call afternoon tea.” She was giving him a suspicious look so he admitted: “Ma calls it that, too: it usually features jolly-berry jam. It’s the day they pay what we call their shares to the castle.”

    “Oh, yes, the feudal system, like you told us. And who are those beings next to your parents?”

    “Oh—them.” He hadn’t meant to include them. “The tall swiller’s my eldest brother, Gidg. All right,” he said, though she hadn’t said anything: “Gidgeonfyllewend fy Tidgeonfyllewend np Afftn do’ DorAven. Tidgeonfyllewend is his patronymic—our father’s name’s Tidgeonfyllewend, Tidg to his swillers, right? Afftn do’ DorAven means ‘Afftn of DorAven’, and it’s our family name. All the chiefs’ families have names like that.”

    “I see. What are the ‘fy’ and ‘np’ bits, then?”

    “Fy is just what you put before a patronymic. Um, it’s not a current word, but in Old DorAvenian it meant ‘son of’ or ‘daughter of’:  see?”

    “Um, yes.”

    “And the ‘np’ doesn’t mean anything, much, except that we’re a chief’s family.”

    “So is the slim boy with the black curls that looks a lot like you another brother?”

    “Yeah: my younger brother, Lidgeonfyllewend.”

    “Lidgeonfyllewend np Afftn do’ DorAven,” said Dohra carefully.

    “That’s it—you goddit. The girl with the long black curls and the very silly hat is one of my older sisters: Madg.”

    “Ooh, we’ve got that name on C’T’rea!” she cried pleasedly.

    Gee, Madg’d be thrilled to know that. “Yeah?” he said, smiling nicely. “Well, we are all humanoids, of course! There is a fuller form, but she never uses it.”

    “What?” said Dohra eagerly.

    “Madgeanalland np Afftn do’ DorAven a np Gruentt.”

    “She’s got an extra name! Is she bond-partnered?”

    “Uh—not in the picture, Dohra,” he said feebly. “Don’t ask me why, but on DorAven girls tack on their mother’s family name—at least until they’re bond-partnered.”

    “On C’T’rea, when a girl’s bond-partnered they add their bond-partner’s family name,” said Dohra eagerly.

    “Yeah? So let’s say you were BrTl’s bond-partner,”—she gave a startled giggle—“given his family name, loosely speaking, is Br, what’d you be?”

    “I’d be W’t Br, Dohra B’Jn!” She collapsed in giggles.

    “Sounds funny, all right,” he agreed.

    “So is your sister Madg bond-partnered now?”

    “Yeah. To a real soggy kog pudding. –Uh, sorry, Sweet Cheese, that's one of our sayings.” He could see she wanted the recipe. “It’s a meat pudding, the cottagers make it a lot in winter. Um, well, ya grind up the kog meat, and, um, do you know hu grain? No. Um, be a bit like that stuff that wholegrain bread of yours is made of. The hu’s mixed in with the meat and some spices—sour abrecoc berries if they’re lucky. That’s the filling. Then they make a sort of um, blanket of hu-flour dough, wrap it round the meat, and, uh, cook it!” he said with a laugh. “They cook over a fire. They put the pudding in a pot of hot water and boil it up for a couple of hours.”—Dohra had recoiled, he saw with a certain resignation, at the picture of the naked flame. Most humanoids from the urbanised worlds like C’T’rea or New Rthfrdia did.—“Anyway, the result’s pretty dull and soggy, and Madg’s bond-partner’s just like that!”

    “I see,” she smiled. “And is the girl with the long black plaits another sister?”

    “Yeah, the youngest. Padg. And if ya call her Padgeanalland np Afftn do DorAven a np Gruentt she goes for ya with that shin-knife she’s wearing in spite of all Ma can do!” He laughed and then sighed. “That was IG years back. Padg is grown up now.”

    Dohra looked at him uncertainly.

    Didg sighed again. “They bond-partnered her to one of the sons of the Grand Prince of DorAven—no, it wasn’t exciting, Dohra, he was a thoroughly worthless little Gervaynian worm. She didn’t want him, but being Padg, she thought it was her duty to take him.”

    “Ugh! How terrible!” said the C’T’rean sincerely. 

  

    “Yeah. Well, fortunately he died not long after the ceremony—racing his lifter with another Gervaynian worm—so she’s rid of him.”

    “Good! She could come on your ship with you and Budg!”

    Over Pa’s and Ma’s and her father-in-law’s dead bodies—maybe. Didgeonfyllewend fy Tidgeonfyllewend np Afftn do’ DorAven just looked at her limply.

    “All right,” said Dohra with dignity, going very pink: “I’ve got no idea.”

    “Well, C’T’rea’s a very different world. There may not be much opportunity there, but at least ya don’t have—uh, gender rôles, like we do,” he ended feebly, not sure that she’d understand.

    “Not in theory, no,” said Dohra on a very dry note. “But it was always Mum that was in charge of the culture-pan, just like in every other C’T’rean slot all over the world!”

    “Maybe we’re not all that different underneath, then,” he admitted, grinning at her, “because the average male cottager back home wouldn't know what to do with a bowl of hu flour and a basin of ground kog meat any more than that Dad you’re broadcasting the picture of woulda been capable of controlling the culture-pan!”

    “Right. Only sometimes the surface things,” said Dohra slowly, “count for rather a lot, don't they?”

     “Mm,” he said, grimacing. “Sometimes they do, Sweet Cheese.”

    “Um, could I ask you about Budg?” she said timidly.

    “Sure!” replied Didg heartily, very glad that they were off the topic of his plasmo-blasted family. “Ask away!”

    “Well, um,” she said licking her lips uncertainly, “I know he’s a mutant but, um, what is he? Was he a DorAvenian to, um, start with?”

    “Sort of. You wouldn’t’ve heard of it, but quite a while back there was an experiment with a germplasm collection that went wrong. Some plasmo-blasted rich company was gonna make a killing out of growing warrior-beings to order. Only marginally IG-legal, I think, but they did it just beyond the Outer Rim to be on the safe side. The world was called Mbsh II,” he said, eyeing her uneasily.

    “Um, haven’t they turned that into a holiday world?”

    “And renamed it Bollyjolly II, after a huge IG lawsuit with Mollyjollyhollies Incorporated because they wanted to call it Bollyjollyholly—yeah. It’s popular with beings that have young ones: full of water slides and boo-long tubes and similar space garbage. Floating gribble-ball courts, Kernarvian balloon rides—that sorta junk. About half the price of Mollyjollyholly but you have to sign up for a specified period, and there’s less choice of whatever ya care to name. But way back when, there was nothing there but intergalactic dust and a very little bit of water that this Vvlvanian-cursed company thought was enough. Turned out it wasn’t, quite, and it also turned out that the Special Offer Meteo they put in did something real nasty to the atmosphere, so all the germplasm they’d seeded the dump with got mutated. Budg was meant to be a DorAvenian, but he isn’t fully Human var. Fanged. He’s got the fangs, all right, but a double helping, and his DNA’s got quite a few kinks in it, so to speak and, uh, if ya look at his feet, not that you’d wanna do that, you’d see they’re webbed, and so were his hands before he”—Didg winced—“fixed ’em.”

    “But lots of humanoid varieties have webbed hands!” she cried.

    “Yeah. You know that, and I know that, but he didn’t. Thing was, the IG Militia came down on the place like a megazillion tons of mok shit, once the Full College of Full Surgeons had found an IG Reg that gave them an excuse to do it, and the whole lot of them, um, those that were viable,” he admitted, looking sick, “were taken off to Mullgon’ya and dumped in orphanages, so-called, according to what germplasm they had in the first place. And Budg was the only one in his orphanage to have webbed hands, so—” He shrugged and grimaced.

    “The poor little boy! But how in Federation did he escape from Mullgon’ya?” said Dohra in awe.

    “You may well ask. And try not to mention the word ‘Mullgon’ya’ in front of him, won’t ya? As far as I can make out, the plasmo-blasted lot of Friyrians and Whtyllians that run the joint declared him to be surplus to requirements and not a humanoid within the Meaning, and not anything else within the Meaning, so they slapped a bracelet on him and sold him.”

    Dohra was rigid with horror. “What?” she whispered.

    “Yeah.” Senso-tissues! he ordered crossly. There was a discernible pause and then the ship produced some.

    “Thanks,” said Dohra as they floated into her hands. She blew her nose hard and said grimly: “I’m too angry to cry. Go on, Didg.”

    Didg scratched his chin. “It was some years later, when he was about eleven IG years old, about my age—dunno what happened in the interval, he’s never been able to say—that Pa and Gidg and me found him acting as s-being to a Slgr bar-keeper on some joint on the Outer Rim. Ma had dragged us to some plasmo-blasted lady-being get-together: by the time it was over Pa was desperate for a real drink, so he claimed he hadda stop over to get the blobs checked on this dirty little dump of a planet barely above the level of a dust world. Ma was so disgusted she wouldn’t set foot outside the lifter. Pa and Gidg wouldn’t’ve taken me into a bar, but she said I needed to stretch my legs, and they didn’t want to ruin their cover-story. Anyway, we spotted that Budg—that wasn’t his name, he didn’t have a name, the vacuum-frozen Slgr had given him a number, if ya please—we spotted he was part DorAvenian and that was enough for Pa. We brought him home with us. Ma threw ten fits but Pa just ignored her. We had a bit of trouble getting him on-world but finally Pa greased the right palms. Then we hadda give him a name and—uh, you won’t get it, but there are very strict World Regs about names on DorAven. If you don’t belong to a recognised family you don’t get a humanoid name. It was Padg that came up with ‘Budg.’ Well, sounds almost DorAvenian, eh?”

    Dohra nodded fiercely, and blew her nose again. 

 

    “Yeah,” said Didg a trifle wryly. “None of us could figure out how to get the plasmo-blasted bracelet off him, mind you. So I started madly swotting up stuff about blobs—we don’t go in for mind-control much on DorAven, driving a semi-automatic lifter’s usually considered pretty good—and got real interested in piloting and that sorta stuff. By the time I was old enough to apply for Space Fleet Academy I sort of thought I could do it without killing the poor swiller. I hadda bring him along to the interview—he’d kind of attached himself to me. The panel was a DorAvenian Lieutenant-Commander that had been off-world so long he’d forgotten what it was like, a vacuum-frozen Friyrian Commander that kept looking at his chrono-blob and sniffing his chemo-blob, and a real tough old female Nblyterian full Captain. I’d passed the written Entrance Exam with really high marks—very stiff maths, mostly,” he explained. “And I was pretty sure of myself. So I almost passed out when the Nblyterian said I wasn’t officer material but they’d accept me if I could get that bracelet off my ‘s-being,’ so-called. So I told the old Gervaynian kryy pretty clearly that he wasn’t an s-being. All she said was: ‘All the more reason to get that bracelet off him.’ Then the Friyrian looked down his long turquoise nose and drawled: ‘We’ll monitor his safety, if you’d prefer, Candidate.’ So I snarled: ‘Monitor yaself, Bluey!’ and did it.”

    “Wonderful!” cried Dohra, clapping her hands madly.

    “Yeah. It wasn’t until years later that it dawned that all three of them had been monitoring, and that they’d never have let me get anywhere near killing the swiller.”

    “Oh. But you did it nevertheless!”

    “Yeah. Well, came in for a lecture from the Nblyterian Captain on respect for one's betters and the meaning of Space Fleet rank, but yeah, I did it. So I was in. When I got to the Academy I found half the beings in my class didn't have nearly enough maths to pass the plasmo-blasted written exam, but they were all real magma-pit hot at blob control and mind-control!” He laughed.

    “Help,” said Dohra in awe.

    “Yeah, that was pretty much their cry when they found out how much maths ya gotta learn to pass out of the Academy!”

     Dohra looked at him rather shyly. “I see. You enjoyed it.”

    “Not the discipline!” he said with another laugh. “But yeah, I did. Worked hard—played hard.”

    “So, um, why didn’t you stay on in Space Fleet?”

    Didg shrugged. “Not officer material: that tough old Nblyterian was right, curse her vacuum-frozen sharp mind. Oh, I can dish out orders, all right, Sweet Cheese, but I don’t like taking them. And I don’t like sparf—uh, all the formalities of the Service. Saluting and spit and polish, and the assumption that if a swiller’s a lower rank than you he doesn’t have the right to speak up—geddit?” 

 

    “Mm,” she said, nodding hard.

    He could see she was thinking of Silver-Ash Flyer, and of the vacuum-frozen Friyrian Captain in particular. “Yeah,” he agreed sardonically: “Space Service is full of them. Anyway, they court-martialled me for disobeying a direct order: taking the moon the squadron hadn’t been able to take for ten IG days—ya might say winning the skirmish that won the battle—and bringing what was left of my flight home safe.—I was a Wing-Commander, there’s six wings to a flight, see? Three ships to each wing in a fighter squadron. And six flights to a squadron.—The Squadron Commander didn’t want to court-martial me, it was a decent being, but the Flight-Leader that had lost half our flight insisted. The court-martial panel commended me for bravery and presence of mind, so that put him in his place. But they couldn’t let me off, I’d disobeyed a direct order, see? That’s Space Fleet for ya. So they gave me the option of a step down in rank and flying a desk as equerry to a plasmo-blasted diplo, or a discharge as surplus to requirements. So I took the discharge.” He shrugged. “If the Third Galaxy invades us I may be called into active service, but I can’t envisage anything else that’d make them do it.”

    “It’s very sad,” said Dohra soggily.

    “No, it isn’t, I’d had a bucketful of it!” he said with a grin. “Me and Budg have had a good time since. He likes being able to come everywhere with me.” He got up. “That’s Trff at the hatch. Wanna come and let it in?”

    Dohra got up and accompanied him silently. She’d been wishing for the chance to be alone with him for quite some time, but now that she’d had it— She didn’t quite know what to think of him. Or, in fact, what she felt about him. 

 

    On their return to the bar after dinner, which had been enlivened, possibly not the word, by the Feeny-Argyllians’ kind enquires after BrTl and detailed description of the nice beings they’d met at afternoon tea, by a considerable amount of Thwurbullerian gossip, and by the yellow Flppu’s panics at the first sight of Budg and again when he began to eat, the Feeny-Argyllians, insisting on ordering what every being would like, admitted: “S-Fl’Chuyilleea would very much like to tell a story.” You’ll have to excuse it!—You’ll have to excuse it!

    “Of course it can tell a story,” said Dohra, smiling warmly at it. “Can’t it, Forty-Four?”

    To her surprise the kindly Thwurbullerian hesitated. “Er—of course.”

    “Play cards!” urged Budg.

    “No cards,” said Didg firmly, even though the meankoid Space Patroller wasn't with them and neither was BrTl. He can’t play, don’t get your hopes up, blndreL.

    Oh, nor he can. That cuts that out, then. “Go on, tell us a story, S-Fl’Chuyilleea,” she said tolerantly.

    For a fleeting moment Didg contemplated warning Dohra. Then he decided it’d be much more enjoyable if he didn’t.

    “Ooh, shall I?” squeaked the yellow Flppu.

    “Yes, please,” said everybody politely except Budg, who was sneakily trying some of the n’nk salt without benefit of jing-jing nuts.

    So, with a huge intake of o-breather mixture, the yellow Flppu began its story. 

 

    Once upon a time there was a beautiful yellow paired being. It lived in a castle high on a turquoise lawn with warriors and armour and fighting! In the pink sky two nga’a-nga’a birds were singing. The it-being was drinking laa. Praise the Great It-Being! I praise the Great United Being who brought united beingness to Home Planet!

    Then came a dire and dreadful day. Oh, woe and doom! The Great Madam Dohra was separated from the Brother! Look, united beings and other beings, she’s waving a flower, high in her tower! Oh, woe and doom!

    Everybody lay down in the shadow of their boulders and a great battle raged! Where is the separated One? Where is the separated Fat Being? Sprinkle the n’nk salt, oh you people! –Stop that naughty being, it’s eating our n’nk salt!

    And the silver sun came out and the crystals melted on the frozen plain and the Great Madam Dohra came down from her tower and jumped on the four-legged being with the Two! Soon they’ll be using the little tubes! And look, now the beautiful yellow paired being is together again! And it’ll have nettle juice for its afternoon tea!

    I praise the Great United Being who brought united beingness to Home Planet! Oh, beautiful yellow paired being!  

 

    Oh, dear, it was worse than I thought! Please— Oh, thank you! the Feeny-Argyllians sent fervently as everyone applauded.

    Didg gave a deep sigh. “Yes,” he said softly. “Yes.”