Chess With a Dragon (7 page)

Yake looked to Madja now. “It really doesn't matter what I feel, or what any of us feel about these offers. If we accept
any
of these options, we will be saying to the rest of the membership of the InterChange that we are not worthy of respect, because we too see ourselves as nothing better than food or guinea pigs or zoo animals. I never thought I would say this, but I think Madja is right. All of these options are unacceptable, because in the long run, they will damage us much more than they can possibly help us in the short term.”

Yake sat down again.

Madja Poparov looked surprised.

Madja Poparov looked
very
surprised.

Yake was very pleased with himself.

The Old Man himself was wearing a thoughtful expression. He did not look happy; but neither did he look angry. Merely . . . thoughtful.

At last he cleared his throat and said, “Thank you, Yake. You've raised several points that I think all of us need to keep in mind. Yes. The situation is a complex one. Um. What you and Ms. Poparov have pointed out is quite true. From a philosophical point of view, the solutions before us are indeed very difficult ones. Unfortunately, they're the only solutions available to us. Hm. Let me suggest something here. Suppose you and Madja Poparov and—how about Anne Larson too? And Nori as well—constitute yourselves as an
ad hoc
committee to explore what, if any, acceptable alternatives may be available to us, while the regular staff continues to evaluate the options we've discussed today. Yes, I think that will work. All right. Any comments?” There were none.

Yake and Madja exchanged unhappy glances, but neither voiced an objection. Anne Larson looked stricken. Even Nori Kasahara looked unhappier than usual.

The Ambassador added then, “I've ordered the kitchen to stay open all night. Full meal service until two ayem, then sandwiches and coffee until breakfast. The staff secretaries are already letting your wives and husbands, girlfriends and boyfriends and others, know that you will be working late. We will reconvene at ten hundred hours tomorrow. Any questions? None? Good. Thank you all.”

As the great red sun rose into the sky, it turned the day into a bright pink bath of light. All across the valleys, the Fn-rr were turning their broad leaves to its warming rays. Soon, they would be walking again.

It was not a pleasant thought.

K!rikkl realized that too many of the Fn-rr had survived the dream-time. Despite the ever increasing ravages of the brain-eating vermin, most of the orchards on the southern continent had still come through the winter relatively unscathed by the parasites—and more than half of the new crop of Fn-rr had survived. This meant much more pressure on the Ki! very soon. There would be many more pavilions built, and that meant far fewer swarming grounds. Already, many Ki! lived their entire lives without ever having the opportunity to swarm.

It could be a bad time for the Ki! on this world, K!rikkl thought; it would be well to be allied with the Trrrl-t nest.

“You were considering something?” Hnaxx asked, coming up to join K!rikkl on the high branch.

“Ahh, just some idle musings about the possibilities for the future.”

“Yes, the view from here is quite lovely.” Hnaxx looked out over the valley. “The Fn-rr are such beautiful beings. It is too bad that they are ravaged so by these vermin. It is quite to our benefit—and theirs—that we can make such good use of the terrible grubs.”

“Quite,” agreed K!rikkl. “But it is too bad that they were even on this world in the first place.”

“Agreement on that as well,” nodded Hnaxx. “Let me ask you something. Don't you find it odd that creatures as ugly and distasteful as these vermin can occupy so much of our attention?”

“Odd, no. Unfortunate, yes. It is a well-known fact that intelligent beings tend to focus too much on their own diseases and dysfunctions. It is one of the primary curses of sentience.”

“Ahh, you are a wit as well,” rattled Hnaxx gaily. “That is a skill that will be much appreciated at the table.” The older Ki! put a claw on K!rikkl's forelimb. “But, let me be impatient now—as long as we are discussing such an unfortunate subject, let us carry it to its conclusion and be done with it once and for all. You were going to instruct me on the training of the grubs.”

“A pitiful discussion really. There is not that much to tell.”

“I am interested in it nonetheless.”

“The creatures are disappointingly simple,” said K!rikkl. “Really, they are not much good for anything. They taste too gamey to be good food and they are inefficient larval incubators; it
takes too long for one to grow large enough to hold more than a few eggs. They die too easy during implantation and give off fearful stenches when they decompose.”

“Yes, that is well known to all of us, dear K!rikkl,” chided Hnaxx. “But you promised to tell us things we did not know.”

“Truly, my Lord. I just wanted to point out what a useless species these grubs may be, even for the most common purposes we use them for. Despite their prevalence on this world, they are really quite an affront to nature as we know it. The skin is too thin, it punctures too easily; the flesh is too warm, and too soft for good eating; they are not much more than warm bags of salt and ichor.” K!rikkl lowered its voice and added, “Indeed, there is even a theory among some breeders that a Ki! hatched in the body of one of these grubs has been insufficiently nourished during its larval stage and may perhaps be mentally deficient.”

“I was hatched in one of these grubs,” remarked Hnaxx dryly.

“Ah, well . . . then that theory is clearly disproven. I am truly glad to know that. I will stop the spread of this pernicious rumor wherever I hear it.”

“It is of no importance,” replied Hnaxx. “It is well known that the Trrrl-t Nest hatches all of its larva in specially selected grubs. That should be proof enough of the falsity of such malicious gossip.”

K!rikkl hesitated as it considered the portent of Hnaxx's words. Had it stepped in something sticky here? Probably? Was the situation irreversibly damaged? Possibly. But perhaps not. K!rikkl hoped not. Indeed, K!rikkl could only proceed as if it had not committed an irretrievable offense. It polished its fore claws politely and continued, “The point is, my Lord, that despite all of the many purposes to which we put these animals, these creatures are overrated in their usefulness.”

Hnaxx nodded its agreement. “This is well known to many Ki! The grubs are vermin. Oh, they are occasionally useful as pack animals and you can see many of them on the road pulling lorries. I must admit that they are at least wonderful for the disposal of garbage, and the youngsters delight in riding them for sport; they are also quite suited for heavy labor and even for the simplest of routine chores—but aside from these few minimal purposes, it would be a blessing for all of us if they were to be exterminated completely. There are far more useful creatures available to us for all of these tasks, and certainly, the Fn-rr would have no objection to the extinction of a life form that has been known to prey on the Drecmers of Winter.”

“Certainly not.”

“Well, there you have it,” said Hnaxx. “That is why it was so clever of you to train one. They are so useless that no one would suspect.”

K!rikkl nodded in modest acceptance of the compliment. “I did nothing that could not have been done by any careful and persevering Ki!. I must confess though that these creatures can be quite tiresome. Training one is no task for a Ki! with an impatient disposition.”

“I can well imagine, dear K!rikkl—but please elucidate.”

K!rikkl barked a command to its grub; it came scuttling across the floor and sat up before him. “A simple command, do you see? I make a specific sound and it performs a simple action. It looks too easy, but I tell you that it truly takes a great deal of time and patience to train one, and one cannot depend that the training will take. Beyond a certain size, the males are too hard to control and the females think of nothing but rutting. The creatures have great hormonal difficulties. It is amazing to me that they survive at all. Do you know that the female can only bear one young at a time? It crawls out of the belly completely helpless and must be cared for
completely while it grows toward usefulness. During much of this time, the female is useless for further breeding. I truly do not understand why these creatures are not already extinct.”

“Nor can I,” said Hnaxx blandly. “But, please, K!rikkl, tell me how you trained it?”

“Of course, my Lord. In principle it is quite easy. A simple system of reward and punishment. I tie a rope to its neck. I rattle, ‘Come,' and pull the rope until it comes. Then I give it a tender root to chew. Soon it learns that if it wants a tender root it should come when I say, ‘Come.' After that, the rest is details.”

“It is that simple?” Hnaxx seemed astonished.

“Truly. All of the training is based on the same principle. If I hold up the game marker for a Knrkt and make it touch its toes, very soon it learns to touch its toes whenever it sees a Knrkt marker. Later, I train it to wait until I rattle my mandibles in annoyance. Then it touches its toes if it has seen a Knrkt marker only on my command. The rest of you think I am only grumbling in disgust—the grub tells me what it has seen and you think it is a distasteful creature. Poor G!ligglix never had a chance.”

“Ayee—what an ingenious ploy, dear K!rikkl. I am delighted that you were so diplomatic in your play.”

“It is bad manners to dine on the host,” K!rikkl acknowledged.

“Your manners, dear K!rikkl, are as impeccable as your deceitfulness.”

“Thank you, my Lord.”

“But I cannot get over how . . . simple it all seems.”

“Simple indeed, Lord Hnaxx. But it does require patience—that is why there are not many grubs this well trained.”

“That is lucky for us—or we might have to change the rules of the game. As it is, I foresee great possibilities inherent in this knowledge.”

“Indeed?”

“Indeed.”

Madja Poparov could swear in six different languages.

At least that was how many Yake could identify before he lost count. There were several he couldn't identify. He simply listened in rapt admiration for several minutes before he attempted to interrupt.

“Excuse me,” he said politely, “—I may be mistaken, but I think you repeated yourself there.”

“I did not!”

“I think so, yes. The derogatory comparison between the breeding habits of pigs and capitalists; I think that parallels the statement you made about the copulatory practices of politicians and goats—”

Madja frowned as she attempted to recall what she had said several minutes earlier. “Is possible,” she admitted. “I was being very enthusiastic.”

Yake grinned. “Would you care to boil that communication down to its essential points?”

“Hmp. Is simple.
Ad hoc
committee is not a committee at all, Mr. Yake Singh Browne. The ‘Old Man' as you so lovingly refer to him is acting like the consummate politician he is. You and I, we are trouble-makers—I more than you. I raise unpleasant point in meeting. You make mistake of agreeing with me—”

“You were right—”

“Is still mistake. You agree, no? No matter. Ambassador does not want disagreement, but must demonstrate—in case there is trial later—that all points of view were fairly heard. He listens to you and I, then makes us special committee. Larson and Kasahara are here to give committee credibility, no?”

“No—” said Larson.

Poparov ignored her. “If just you and I, Yake, then it looks like he is removing all his bad eggs from the same basket. But by putting other person here too, he invests committee with hair of credibility. Very smart. If you and I come up with something, we get to be heroes; if we don't come up with something, we are—what? What is expression for empty-handed idealist?”

“Empty-handed idealist.”

“Yes. You and I, we have been put where we cannot cause any trouble. I am sorry I take you down with me. You are good manager. Not a good leader, but a good manager. Is two different things. I am good leader.”

“And modest too.”

“Yes. Thank you for noticing.”

Yake blinked. Was that a serious response—or had she topped his own gibe. Sometimes with Madja Poparov it was hard to tell. He rubbed his hand through his bristly hair and scratched his head in puzzlement.

“You know,” Kasahara interrupted. “You guys are both missing something. There might be another possibility here too.”

“What?” Anne Larson looked up for the first time.

“Maybe, just
maybe
, the Ambassador thinks we're smart enough to come up with something that nobody else can; a solution that isn't so damned
insulting
.”

“Is good point, Kasahara. I owe you apology. I make mistake of not seeing that possibility.”

“Hm,” said Yake. “Out of the mouths of babes.”

“I must admit—” said Madja, “—It does not seem a very likely possibility to me, but it is the only possibility that we can accept that is not insulting to us—hmm? Is same problem, right? So! All right. Let us snatch victory from mouth of deceit, right? Right! If we solve it here, we solve it anywhere.” She looked around the room for agreement.

Anne Larson nodded cautiously. Kasahara allowed himself a tiny smile of hope.

Yake thought about it for half a second, then looked Madja directly in the eyes. “Okay, right. Let's try it.” He took a sip of his coffee. It was going to be a long night. He sighed and began: “Let me throw this out as a . . . a working assumption. A place to start from. What would an acceptable solution look like? What are the particles of it?”

“Honor,” suggested Kasahara in a quiet voice. “It would have to be honorable.