Colonization_ Down To Earth Part 6

"Did he say which man he was?" Drucker asked. Claudia shook her head. Drucker scratched his. That eliminated everyone military, and most of his civilian friends, too-though his daughter would have recognized their voices. Still scratching, he said, "All right, I'm coming." He slammed down the Volkswagen's boot lid and went inside.

He'd shed his overcoat by the time he got to the phone; the furnace kept the house toasty warm. Picking up the handset, he spoke briskly: "Johannes Drucker here."

"h.e.l.lo, Hans, you old son of a b.i.t.c.h," said the voice on the other end of the line. "How the h.e.l.l are you? Been a G.o.dd.a.m.n long time, hasn't it?"

"Who is this?" Drucker demanded. Whoever he was, he sounded not only coa.r.s.e but more than a little drunk. Drucker couldn't place his voice, but couldn't swear he'd never heard it before, either.

Harsh, raucous laughter dinned in his right ear. "That's how it is, all right," the-stranger?-said "People go up in the world, they forget their old pals. I didn't think it would happen with you, but f.u.c.k me if I'm too surprised, either."

"Who is is this?" Drucker repeated. He was beginning to be sure this fellow was looking for some other Hans. Drucker had given his last name, but how often did drunks bother to listen? this?" Drucker repeated. He was beginning to be sure this fellow was looking for some other Hans. Drucker had given his last name, but how often did drunks bother to listen?

He turned out to be wrong again. The other fellow said, "How many Lizard panzers did we blow to h.e.l.l and gone in Poland, you driving and me at the gun?"

No wonder the voice seemed as if he might have known it before. "Grillparzer," he said in slow wonder. "Gunther Grillparzer. Christ, man, it's been close to twenty years."

"Too G.o.dd.a.m.n long," agreed the gunner with whom Drucker had shared a Panther panzer through the most desperate fighting he'd ever known. "Well, we'll make up for lost time, you and me. We're going to be buddies again, d.a.m.ned if we're not. Just like the old days, Hans-except maybe not quite." His laugh was almost a giggle.

Drunk, all right, Drucker thought. "What do you mean?" he asked sharply. When Grillparzer didn't answer right away, he found another, more innocuous, question: "What have you been doing since the fighting stopped?" Kathe was giving him a curious look. "Old army pal," he mouthed, and she nodded and went away. Drucker thought. "What do you mean?" he asked sharply. When Grillparzer didn't answer right away, he found another, more innocuous, question: "What have you been doing since the fighting stopped?" Kathe was giving him a curious look. "Old army pal," he mouthed, and she nodded and went away.

"What have I been doing?" Grillparzer echoed. "Oh, this and that, old son. Yeah, that's about right-a little of this, a little of that, a little of something else now and again, too."

Drucker sighed. That meant the panzer gunner was a b.u.m or a petty criminal these days. Too bad. "So what can I do for you?" he asked. He owed Grillparzer his neck. He wouldn't begrudge him five hundred or even a thousand marks. He could afford it, and Gunther was plainly down on his luck.

"Like I say, you've come up in the world," the gunner said. "Me, I wasn't so lucky." His voice turned into a self-pitying whine.

"How much do you need?" Drucker asked patiently. "I'm not what you'd call rich-n.o.body with three kids is likely to be-but I'll do what I can for you."

He'd expected-he'd certainly hoped-Grillparzer would babble in sodden grat.i.tude. That didn't happen, either; it wasn't his day for guessing right. Instead, the ex-gunner said, "Do you remember the night we went after those black-s.h.i.+rted pigdogs with our knives?"

Ice p.r.i.c.kled up Drucker's back. "Yes, I remember that," he said. Toward the end of the fighting, the SS had arrested the regimental commander, Colonel Heinrich Jager, in whose panzer Drucker and Grillparzer had both served. The panzer crew had rescued him before he got taken away from the front, and had bundled him into the airplane of a Red Air Force senior lieutenant-a pretty woman, Drucker recalled-bound for Poland. No one but the panzer crew knew what had happened to those SS men. Drucker wanted to keep it that way. "Don't talk about it on the phone. You never know who might be listening."

"You're right-I don't," Grillparzer agreed with good humor that struck Johannes Drucker as put on. "I might lose my meal ticket if people start hearing things before I want 'em to. Can't have that, can we, Hans?" He laughed out loud.

Drucker was feeling anything but cheerful. "What do you want from me?" he asked, hoping against hope it wasn't what he thought.

But it was. "Whatever you've got, and then another fifty pfennigs besides," Grillparzer answered. "You've lived high on the hog these past twenty years. You're an officer and everything, after all. Now it'll be my turn."

After a look around the living room to make sure n.o.body in his family could hear, Drucker pressed his mouth against the phone and spoke in a low, urgent voice. "My a.r.s.e. If you bring me down, I'll sure as h.e.l.l take you with me. If you don't think I'll sing when they start working me over, you're out of your G.o.dd.a.m.n mind."

But Gunther Grillparzer laughed again. "Good luck," he said. "You're the first fellow who's called me Gunther in a devil of a long time. Name got too hot for me to keep wearing it. The papers I've got with this one are d.a.m.n good, too. All I have to do is write the Gestapo Gestapo a letter. I don't even have to sign it-you know how those things go." a letter. I don't even have to sign it-you know how those things go."

That Drucker did, only too well. The Reich Reich ran on anonymous accusations. And he was already in a bad odor with the ran on anonymous accusations. And he was already in a bad odor with the Gestapo Gestapo and with his own higher-ups because of the accusations against Kathe. Regardless of whether there was any truth in Grillparzer's letter, Drucker couldn't stand another investigation. It would mean his neck, and no mistake-and probably his wife's neck, too, after he couldn't protect her any more. and with his own higher-ups because of the accusations against Kathe. Regardless of whether there was any truth in Grillparzer's letter, Drucker couldn't stand another investigation. It would mean his neck, and no mistake-and probably his wife's neck, too, after he couldn't protect her any more.

He licked his lips. "How much do you want?" he whispered.

"Now you're talking like a smart boy," Grillparzer said with another nasty chuckle. "I like smart boys. Five thousand for starters. We'll see where it goes from there."

Drucker let out a silent sigh of relief. He could make the first payment. Maybe Grillparzer aimed to bleed him to death a little at a time, not all at once. After that first payment... He'd worry about that later. "How do I get you the money?" he asked.

"I'll let you know," the ex-gunner answered.

"I'm going up next week," Drucker warned. "My wife doesn't know anything about this, and I don't want her to. Don't mix her up in this, Grillparzer, or you'll get trouble from me, not cash."

"I'm not afraid of you, Hans old boy," Grillparzer said, but that might not have been altogether true, for he went on, "All right, we'll play that your way-for now. You'll hear from me." He hung up.

Kathe chose that moment to come into the living room. "And how is your old army buddy?" she asked indulgently.

"Fine," Drucker answered, and the lie survived his wife's long and intimate acquaintance with him. He nodded, ever so slightly. Now he had a little stretch of time in which to plan how best to commit a murder.

Ttomalss had been studying the Big Uglies ever since the conquest fleet came to Tosev 3. Sometimes he thought he understood this world's strange inhabitants as well as anyone not hatched among them could. He certainly had that reputation among the Race. He was, after all, the only male who'd ever successfully reared a Tosevite hatchling from its earliest days to the approach of maturity. He was, so far as he knew, the only male addled enough even to try such a mad venture.

But, despite that success, despite endless other research, despite endless study of others' research on the Big Uglies and even their research on themselves, he sometimes thought he didn't understand them at all. He'd had a lot of those moments since coming to the Greater German Reich. Reich. Now he found himself facing another one. Now he found himself facing another one.

A Big Ugly named Rascher, who called himself a physician-by Tosevite standards, maybe he was one, but Tosevite standards were low, low-spoke in the tones of calm reason that so often characterized officials of the Reich Reich at their most outrageous: "Of course these individuals deserve death, Senior Researcher. They are a weakness in the fabric of the Aryan race, and so must be plucked from it without mercy." at their most outrageous: "Of course these individuals deserve death, Senior Researcher. They are a weakness in the fabric of the Aryan race, and so must be plucked from it without mercy."

He used the language of the Race. As far as Ttomalss was concerned, that only made the horror underlying his words worse. The researcher said, "I do not understand the logic behind your statement." I ought to learn that phrase in the language of the Deutsche, I ought to learn that phrase in the language of the Deutsche, Ttomalss thought. Ttomalss thought. Spirits of Emperors past know I use it often enough. Spirits of Emperors past know I use it often enough.

"Is it not obvious?" Dr. Rascher said. "Does the Race not also punish males who mate with other males?"

Ttomalss shrugged; that was a gesture the Race and Tosevites shared. "I have heard of such matings happening among us," he admitted. "During the mating season, we are apt to become rather frantic. But the occurrences are rare and accidental, so what point to making a fuss, let alone punis.h.i.+ng the behavior?"

"It is not rare and accidental among us," the Big Ugly said. "Some misguided males deliberately pursue it. They must be rooted out, exterminated, lest they pollute us with this unnatural behavior."

"I do not understand," Ttomalss said again. "If they mate among themselves, they cannot have hatchlings. This in itself eliminates them from your gene pool. Where is the need to root out and exterminate?"

"Mating among males is filthy and degenerate," Dr. Rascher declared. "It corrupts the young in the Reich Reich."

"Even if what you say is true-and I have seen no evidence to that effect-do you not believe the problem to be self-correcting?" Ttomalss asked. "I repeat, these males are unlikely to breed, and so, except for new mutations-a.s.suming this trait to be genetically induced, about which I have seen no evidence either for or against-will in the course of centuries gradually tend to diminish. You Deutsch Tosevites, if you will forgive me for saying so, have always struck the Race as being impatient even for your species."

He had been around Big Uglies long enough to recognize Dr. Rascher's glower for what it was. The Deutsch physician snapped, "And the Race has always struck us Aryans as being insanely tolerant. If you are daft enough to put up with degeneracy in your own kind for centuries or millennia on end, that is your affair. If we choose to take direct action in uprooting it, that is ours."

Plainly, Ttomalss wouldn't get anywhere with this line. The Race, to its dismay, had got nowhere in attempting to dissuade the Deutsche from slaughtering the Jews in their not-empire for no other reason than that they were were Jews. Since they were as determined to slaughter males with different mating habits, they would go on doing that, too. Males... That sparked a thought in Ttomalss' mind. "Have you also females who mate with females? If so, what do you do with them?" Jews. Since they were as determined to slaughter males with different mating habits, they would go on doing that, too. Males... That sparked a thought in Ttomalss' mind. "Have you also females who mate with females? If so, what do you do with them?"

"Exterminate them when we catch them, of course," Dr. Rascher replied. "We are consistent. Did you expect anything different?"

"Not really," Ttomalss said with a sigh. Unless he was mistaken, Rascher's face bore an expression of smug self-satisfaction. The researcher hadn't been familiar with that expression in his work in China, but had seen it on a great many Deutsch officials. They are ideology-mad, They are ideology-mad, he thought. he thought. Too many Big Uglies are ideology-mad. They are as drunk on their ideologies as they are on their s.e.xuality. Too many Big Uglies are ideology-mad. They are as drunk on their ideologies as they are on their s.e.xuality.

"You should not have," Dr. Rascher said, and added an emphatic cough. "It is most important for the Aryan race to preserve its purity and to prevent its defilement by such elements as these."

"I have heard you Deutsche use this term 'Aryan' before," Ttomalss said. "Sometimes you seem to use it to refer to yourselves and yourselves alone, but sometimes you seem to use it in a different way. Please define it for me." He knew how important precise definitions were. The Deutsche, all too often, preferred arguing in a circle to precision, though they vehemently denied that was the case.

Dr. Rascher said, "I will define it with great pleasure, taking the definition from the words of our great Leader, Adolf Hitler. Aryans have been and are the race which is the bearer of Tosevite cultural development. It is no accident that the first cultures arose in places where the Aryan, in his encounters with lower races, subjugated them and bent them to his will. As a conqueror, he regulated their practical activity, according to his will and for his aims. As long as he ruthlessly upheld the master att.i.tude, not only did he really remain master, but also the preserver and increaser of culture, which was based on his abilities. When he gives up his purity of blood, he loses his place in the wonderful world which he has made for himself. This is why we so oppose the idea of mingling races."

"You Deutsche see yourselves as Aryans, then, but not all Aryans are necessarily Deutsche-is that correct?" Ttomalss asked.

"It is, although we are the most perfect representatives of the Aryan race anywhere on Tosev 3," Rascher replied.

"Fascinating," Ttomalss said. "Most fascinating indeed. And what is your evidence for these a.s.sertions?"

"Why, I told you," Dr. Rascher said. "In his writings, Hitler sets forth the doctrine of the Aryans in great detail."

"Yes, you did tell me that," Ttomalss agreed. "But what was. .h.i.tler's evidence? Did he have any? What do Tosevite historians say about these questions? What does archaeology say about them? Why do you accept Hitler's word and not the statements of those who disagree with him, if there are any?"

Behind corrective lenses that magnified them, Dr. Rascher's eyes-they were of a washed-out gray, a very ugly color to Ttomalss-grew larger still, a token of astonishment. "Hitler was the Leader of the Reich Reich," the Deutsch physician exclaimed. "But naturally, his writings on any subject are authoritative."

"Why?" Ttomalss asked in genuine puzzlement. "He must have known something about leading, of course, or he would not have led your not empire, but how much did he understand about these other things? How much could he have understood? He spent most of his time leading or getting ready to lead, did he not? What chance did he have to study these other issues in any sort of detail?"

"He was the Leader," Dr. Rascher replied. "He knew the truth because because he was the Leader." He tacked on another emphatic cough. he was the Leader." He tacked on another emphatic cough.

Ttomalss and he stared at each other in perfect mutual incomprehension. After a long, long pause, Ttomalss let out another sigh. He'd had a lot of these moments with Big Uglies. Trying to get past this one, he said, "You claim this as revealed belief, then, not as scientific knowledge. You hold it as a superst.i.tious opinion, like the ones expressed in... what is the local one here? Ah, Christianity, yes." He was pleased he'd remembered the name.

But Rascher shook his head. "This is scientific truth. Christianity, on the other fork of the tongue, is a belief similar to your veneration of the spirits of Emperors past."

He might know the idioms of the Race's language, but he was an ignorant, barbarous Big Ugly, and did not cast down his eyes when mentioning the Emperors. And he mentioned them in insulting fas.h.i.+on, too. "You have no business speaking of that which you are too foolish to comprehend," Ttomalss snapped. Dr. Rascher laughed a yipping Tosevite laugh, which further infuriated the researcher.

"Neither have you," the Big Ugly retorted.

Now Ttomalss and he stared at each other in perfect mutual loathing. "Whatever the veneration of the spirits of Emperors past may be"-Ttomalss lowered his eye turrets toward the ground; he he was no ignorant barbarian-"we do not shape the policy of the Empire around it." was no ignorant barbarian-"we do not shape the policy of the Empire around it."

Even as he spoke, he realized that wasn't completely true. After its first two planetary conquests, the Race had encouraged Emperor-veneration among the Rabotevs and Hallessi, using it as one means of binding the subject peoples to the Empire. Plans had been developed to do the same here on Tosev 3. So far, however, none of those plans had come to anything.

Dr. Rascher said, "Whether the Race lives according to its principles is of no concern to me. The Reich Reich, I am proud to say, does."

"These principles seem to include slaughtering anyone your famous Leader happened to dislike." Ttomalss was too nettled to stay anywhere close to diplomatic. "How fortunate for you that his dislikes did not include doctors."

He'd succeeded in making the Big Ugly as angry as he was. Rascher sprang to his feet and pointed toward the door. "Get out!" he shouted. "Get out, and never show your ugly snouted face outside your emba.s.sy again!" He punctuated that with another emphatic cough. "Your kind deserves extermination far more than any Tosevites."

Ttomalss also rose, with more than a little relief: he found the Big Uglystyle chair in which he'd been sitting imperfectly comfortable. "I never thought any intelligent race or subgroup deserved extermination," he said. "You Deutsche, though, tempt me to believe I may have been mistaken."

Having got the last word, he returned to the Race's emba.s.sy in something approaching triumph. He was still studying his recorded notes, trying to find anything resembling sense in the Reich Reich's policies, when the telephone circuitry in his computer hissed for attention. On activating the telephone, he found himself looking into Veffani's face. The amba.s.sador said, "I have received a complaint of you from the Deutsche."

"It could be, superior sir," Ttomalss said. "I have a good many complaints against them, too." He summarized his conversation with Dr. Rascher, including the Big Ugly's revolting comments about the veneration of the spirits of Emperors past.

"They are are revolting," Veffani agreed. "But you have insulted them to such a degree that they insist you leave the revolting," Veffani agreed. "But you have insulted them to such a degree that they insist you leave the Reich Reich immediately. By the usages of diplomacy on Tosev 3, they are within their rights to make such a demand." immediately. By the usages of diplomacy on Tosev 3, they are within their rights to make such a demand."

"It shall be done." Ttomalss did his best to sound as if he were obeying an order he didn't care for. Inside, though, he felt like skittering for joy, mad and carefree as a hatchling.

"I want you to know one thing, Senior Researcher," Veffani said.

"What is that, superior sir?" Ttomalss asked, as he knew he should.

"It is very simple: by the Emperor, how I envy you!"

Ka.s.squit pa.s.sed Tessrek in a corridor of the orbiting stars.h.i.+p where she'd spent almost her entire life. Tessrek, she knew, loathed her for what she was and for what she had so nearly become. But the male was a colleague of Ttomalss, and so Ka.s.squit bent into the best posture of respect she could and said, "I greet you, superior sir."

"I greet you," Tessrek replied, and went on his way without so much as turning an eye turret back in her direction. It was the minimum possible politeness, but Ka.s.squit did not feel insulted. On the contrary: most of what she'd had from Tessrek over the years were insults. He'd given them to Ttomalss, too; he was a thoroughly bad-tempered male. After she'd insulted him in return, though, he'd become a lot more wary-she'd gone from target to possibly dangerous foe.

"That will do," Ka.s.squit murmured as she let herself into her own cubicle. "Let him hate me, so long as he fears me a little, too."

Once inside, she went over to the computer terminal and sat down in front of it. Before she began to use it, she took a set of artificial fingerclaws from a drawer below the keyboard and put them on. She could not use voice commands; as she'd seen time and again, the machine stubbornly refused to understand her.

A glance at her reflection in the computer screen told her why, as if she hadn't known. No way around it: though Ttomalss had raised her as a hatchling and then as a female of the Race, she was a Big Ugly. The computer knew-it couldn't follow the mushy way in which she p.r.o.nounced the language of the Race. It was the only language she knew, and she couldn't speak it properly. That struck her as most unfair.

She shaved the hair on her head. Since her body matured, she'd shaved the hair under her arms and between her legs, too. Having the stuff at all disgusted her. Getting rid of it didn't make her soft, smooth hide much like the scaly skin a female of the Race should have had. Even her color was wrong: she was golden, not a proper greenish brown.

Her eyes were too small and too narrow and did not lie in moving turrets. She had no proper snout. She had no tailstump, either, and when she stood, she stood far too erect. She'd tried leaning forward all the time like a proper member of the Race, but it made her back hurt. She'd had to give it up.

"I am not a proper member of the Race," she said, rubbing it in. "I am very ugly. But I am civilized. I would rather be what I am-and what I almost am-than a wild Big Ugly down on Tosev 3."

As she turned on the computer and colors filled the screen, she let out a sigh of relief. For one thing, those colors made her own reflection harder to see, which made it easier to imagine she really was a female of the Race. For another, the computer gave her access to the Race's information and opinion network. There, she might as well have been a female of the Race. No one could tell otherwise, not by the way she wrote. Her views were worth as much as anyone else's-sometimes more than someone else's, if she could argue better.

She wondered what males and females of the Race would think if they knew the person who challenged their views was in fact an overtall, overstraight, soft-skinned, small-eyed Big Ugly. Actually, she didn't wonder. She knew. Whatever respect she'd earned for her brains would vanish, dissolved in the scorn and suspicion the Race felt toward Tosevites.

She felt the same scorn and suspicion toward Tosevites herself. She'd learned it from Ttomalss, who'd raised her since hatchlinghood; from every other male-and, since the coming of the colonization fleet, female-of the Race she'd met in person; and from every bit of video and writing the Race had produced about Tosev 3.

But having it aimed at her hurt almost too much to bear.

She checked for new comments and speculations about which independent Tosevite not-empire had attacked and destroyed more than ten s.h.i.+ps from the colonization fleet not long after they took up their orbits around this world. The Race had delivered token punishments to each of the three suspects-the SSSR, the USA, and the Reich Reich-because it could not prove which of them had done the murderous deed. That didn't stop males and females from speculating endlessly, but the speculations, as far as Ka.s.squit could see, had reached the point of diminis.h.i.+ng returns. And the less the speculators knew, the more strident they were about advancing their ill-informed claims.

With more than a little relief, she escaped that area and went to one nearby: one where the Race discussed the American s.p.a.cecraft known, for no reason she could fathom, as the Lewis and Flark. Lewis and Flark. No. She corrected herself: the No. She corrected herself: the Lewis and Clark Lewis and Clark. Changing the name made it no more meaningful to her.

Here, too, discussion had died down. The Lewis and Clark Lewis and Clark had been a mystery when the American Big Uglies were fitting out their former s.p.a.ce station to travel through this solar system. They'd done so in such ostentatious secrecy that they'd aroused everyone's suspicion and alarm. Most males and females had feared they were turning it into some immense, and immensely dangerous, orbital fortress. had been a mystery when the American Big Uglies were fitting out their former s.p.a.ce station to travel through this solar system. They'd done so in such ostentatious secrecy that they'd aroused everyone's suspicion and alarm. Most males and females had feared they were turning it into some immense, and immensely dangerous, orbital fortress.

It had even aroused the Big Uglies' suspicions. Somehow or other, a Tosevite going by the name of Regeya had wormed his way onto the Race's network, to learn what he could of what the Race thought and had learned about the s.p.a.ce station. No one had recognized him for what he was till Ka.s.squit did.

I should be proud of that, she thought. she thought. I got him expelled from areas of the network where he had no right to go. I got him expelled from areas of the network where he had no right to go.

With a sigh, Ka.s.squit made the negative hand gesture. She was proud... but then again, she wasn't. The Tosevite who called himself Regeya had had a more interesting way of looking at things and expressing himself than most of the males and females with whose opinions she'd become all too familiar. The network was a duller place without him on it.

It is a more secure place without him on it, Ka.s.squit told herself. That consoled the part of her which devoted itself to duty: a very large part, thanks to Ttomalss' training. But it wasn't all of her. The rest craved fun and amus.e.m.e.nt. She sometimes wished it wouldn't, but it did. Ka.s.squit told herself. That consoled the part of her which devoted itself to duty: a very large part, thanks to Ttomalss' training. But it wasn't all of her. The rest craved fun and amus.e.m.e.nt. She sometimes wished it wouldn't, but it did.

Some of the curious part of her also wished Regeya remained on the network. Before she'd recognized him as a Big Ugly, he'd come close to doing the same in reverse. She didn't know how; her command of the Race's written language was perfect, which his wasn't quite. But he had. He'd asked to talk to her by telephone. She couldn't do that, not without giving away what she was.

"Fun," she said aloud. "Amus.e.m.e.nt." She went to a new area on the network, one that offered both of those: the area devoted to discussion of the best ways to nurture hatchlings. The conquest fleet had been all-male; not till the colonization fleet arrived did that area become necessary.

How do you make hatchlings not bite when you feed them? someone-a hara.s.sed someone-had written since Ka.s.squit last checked there. someone-a hara.s.sed someone-had written since Ka.s.squit last checked there.

Someone else, evidently a voice of experience, had given a three-word reply to that: You do not. You do not. The responder had also added the Race's conventional symbol for an emphatic cough. The responder had also added the Race's conventional symbol for an emphatic cough.

The next message was a glyph of an open mouth, the conventional symbol for laughter. Ka.s.squit's mouth fell open, too. She laughed like that when she remembered to. Sometimes, though, amus.e.m.e.nt made her yip the way a Big Ugly was biologically programmed to do.