I Was An Alien Cat Toy (25 page)

He was too wound up for sex that night, and Gredar accepted that, content to lie with Temin and pet

him until he fell asleep. As Temin dozed off, he had the thought that maybe it was because they still couldn’t

talk much that they got on so well. Hard to have an argument with your lover when the worst insult in your

vocabulary was ‘silly day-neh’. But he didn’t want to argue with Gredar. The big guy was too sweet.

The concert changed things in small ways—he had no way of knowing how significant they were,

and no way of asking. Some of the day-neh actually spoke to him directly in the house—in the kitchen, in the

breakfast room—and Gredar’s sister, J’len, now acknowledged him, and even asked how he was a couple of

times. It wasn’t like he’d become their favourite person overnight or anything. He was now more like a

houseguest who hadn’t started to get on their nerves too badly, and less of a pet, although the distinction was

a fine one when he was only as tall as a child day-neh, and sounded about as smart.

Finding out Temin could sing sent Martek into ecstasy, and Temin found himself having to perform

his planetary anthem over and over until the historian had written it down to his satisfaction. It was surreal to

think a strangled form of the song might end up being sung by day-neh long after Temin was bones and dust,

but it was sort of nice too, to leave some kind of mark on the clan. Martek wanted to learn other songs too,

and all Temin could dredge up about human society from memory. They spent hours, Temin talking, Martek

asking questions and scribbling down his answers. But Temin was also left to his own devices for large parts

of the day because Martek and his apprentice had a lot more work than two people could handle—teaching,

writing texts which would be printed at some later date (it wasn’t done in the village, apparently) and making

illustrations for books used within the village, or on texts obtained previously. Martek wrote nearly all the

instructional songs, Temin learned, and even if the songs sounded like the most raucous howling to his ears,

musicality was highly valued in this culture. It meant Martek had a status higher than his male gender would

normally give him, and nearly all the day-neh bowed to him as their superior.

It took Temin more than a month to figure this stuff out, and that after spending almost every single

day with the guy. He rarely saw Gredar during daylight hours now, and had little idea what he got up to. His

pottery, Temin supposed, and other duties. Maybe trying to make it clear to his mother and sister that Temin

wasn’t taking up his time. Temin never discussed it with him.

For sure, they talked in the evenings. Gredar had taken to making sketches of him, nude and stretched

out on the furs. Temin asked him what he was going to do with the drawings—Gredar claimed he couldn’t

explain it properly. Gredar couldn’t lie for shit, so Temin just had to trust it wouldn’t end up being something

embarrassing or dangerous.

What they did talk about was families, and culture, and the nature of love, which was a tricky subject

because there was no analogue in day-neh culture for romantic love at all. Gredar understood loyalty, and

friendship, and the bond between siblings, parent and child. Fuck buddies, they called ‘grooming mates’, like

Filwui had been—someone Gredar slept with more often than most, but not exclusively. In fact, monogamy

was a concept Gredar could see no sense in at all. Fathers played no role in raising children, and the females

needed no one to protect or support them outside their family, being stronger and taller than the males in

most cases.

“Female pick male, male move on,” Gredar explained.

“But...female like male best thing? Keep him?”

Gredar chuckled. “Female like male best? Why? Males paznit.”

‘Paznit’ was the same thing as ‘shefting bad’ or ‘nuisance’ apparently. “Gredar no is paznit,” Temin

objected.

“Gredar smart,” he said, tapping his head. “Smart male, no paznit. Help females, mother, sister. Is

no....” He made a ‘throw away’ gesture. “Bad day-neh, paznit male, go away.”

“Filwui is paznit.”

Gredar stopped chuckling, and his tail swished. “Maybe. No go away
now
.” Which meant it might be

an option in the future.

Temin wondered what it was like for males who weren’t smart enough to make themselves useful to

their females. He asked Martek about it.

“Males go here, and there,” Martek explained. “This clan, this clan, this clan.” He mimed hopping

between the different settlements. “No home. Always walking. Hunt, sell things. Steal, maybe. Fuck females.

Then go.”

Wandering sperm donors.
“Is sad, male have no home.”

Martek shrugged. “Is bad, too many males. Make trouble. Males no make kitlings. Clan need

kitlings.”

A pretty lousy way to judge a person’s worth, Temin thought, just on whether they could have babies

or not. So that was three black marks against him—he was male, he couldn’t produce any more of his kind,

and he wasn’t contributing anything to the welfare of the clan. Since he couldn’t change the first two, he

needed to find a way to remedy the third, if he wasn’t to become one of the wandering males—or just killed

as superfluous to requirements. No wonder Gredar worked so hard to be well-liked and useful.

But no one made any moves against him, and six weeks after that weird concert, he felt he was fitting

in as well as he could hope. Gredar’s mother continued to be friendly, if distant, no one made any move to

attack him, and no one said anything hostile or mocking to Gredar when they were together. He still took the

pulse pistol with him wherever he went. He didn’t trust Filwui, and he was damned if he was going to be

backed up against a wall again with no way of defending himself.

Martek began to gear up for the next concert, and several adult day-neh, including Gredar’s sister,

Wilna, the metal-worker, were in and out of the house learning their pieces. Temin was slowly getting used

to the weird sound of day-neh singing, but he doubted he’d ever like it much. He’d amused Jaijair for a day

or two, teaching him human songs to beat on the set of tuned pipes they used in counterpoint to the drums. It

had apparently never occurred to Jaijair that he could possibly actually reproduce a tune on the pipes

themselves, though day-neh songs didn’t really lend themselves to that. Martek came in as they were making

a row and attempting to duet, and said they should perform it for the village. Temin was worried he might

end up being the regular party piece and declined. Martek agreed, but Temin thought the old bastard was

probably still plotting. He was like that.

Now he knew what the ‘singing’ involved, he was somewhat less apprehensive about going, though

he didn’t expect to enjoy it much. The heat of the hall from hundreds of close packed bodies, the presence of

hundreds of strange day-neh, and the cacophony of sound hadn’t been a lot of fun for Temin last time, but

he’d been through a lot worse. He did, however, tug on Gredar’s tail as they were getting ready to go out into

the night, and make his friend look at him. “Temin
no
sing. Understand?
No
sing.”

Gredar chuckled and, whipping his tail out of Temin’s grasp, tapped him on the nose with the tip of it.

“Temin no sing. Gredar understand. Is pity.”

“Too bad.”

“Ye-ess. Come on.”

Scary as the day-neh were individually, in a group they were utterly terrifying. For once, Temin was

glad he was on Gredar’s broad shoulders, high above the heads of the mass of milling day-neh and their

lamps. The hall was huge, even once the larger size of the residents was taken into account—the only thing

Temin had to compare it with was the State Concert hall in Xixan, and even that wasn’t as lavishly decorated

or colourful as this place. Even though it was only lit by lamps, the day-neh had an ingenious way with

reflectors that threw a bright, even light over the stage, and the shape of the building was pretty acoustically

sophisticated for a pre-technological society. He’d have to find a way to sneak back and get some images of

it for his records. Historians back on Venshu would have their minds blown by all this, if he could just get

them the data.

Gredar sat well to the back this time, as did all the males—only the females and their youngest

children sat forward, Gredar’s mother and family at the very front, with plenty of space around them. The

day-neh status system in physical form. Fitting for such a literal minded people.

It wasn’t much different from before, though the songs were shorter and more of them. Temin, too

short to be seated and still see, stood in front of Gredar and leaned back on his broad chest, Gredar’s tail

wrapped cosily around Temin’s waist. The singing itself had little interest for Temin, since he had no idea

what most of it was about and he’d heard the songs a dozen times or more at Martek’s. Instead, he scanned

the audience, searching for faces he could now recognise, seeing if he was any better at picking up body

language now he’d been around the day-neh for a while. He was getting better at tails—he could pretty much

guess whether someone was happy or irritated or worried by their tail carriage—and the ears were obvious

enough even the first time around. The really subtle stuff like tones of growls he was only starting to

distinguish. Gredar, he could work out, Martek about half the time, and someone like J’len, not a chance. He

was beginning to suspect that as well as having superior vision and smell to humans, the day-neh could hear

a much wider range of sounds too. To them, he was probably as disabled as a deaf man in human society—so

he’d have to compensate.

But even watching the audience had limited appeal, and after an hour, he sat down in Gredar’s lap and

thought he’d try and sleep, even through the din. Gredar wrapped his arms around Temin, not at all bothered

by his lack of interest, and Temin snuggled into the deep fur, amusing himself by combing his fingers

through it, and thinking he’d have to give Gredar a brushing tonight, because he loved that, and Temin

adored touching him that way. He smiled to himself.
And which one of us is the pet now?

A crash, heavy wood against solid walls. Temin jerked up and was thrust aside as Gredar leapt to his

feet. Temin yanked his pistol out of his pack, ready to act, but found himself in a dense, panicking crowd of

huge furry people, and only holding onto Gredar’s leg stopped him being swept away. An anguished scream

came from the stage, and then Gredar was running—no,
leaping
—across the crowd, vaulting over bodies

towards the front of the room. Temin, suddenly abandoned, and at real risk of being crushed in the melee,

dropped and scuttled through the gaps between legs, trying very hard not to get kicked in the head. He could

see
nothing
except legs and feet, but the sounds were terrifying—screams and growls and unbelievably loud

hissing, coming from all around him.

And suddenly he was clear—and in the middle of a battlefield. Fighting, brawling, screaming day-neh

were everywhere, and for a moment or two, he couldn’t tell who was attacking, who defending. Then he

spotted him—Filwui! Filwui and maybe a dozen males, tearing into Gredar’s family. One of the day-neh was

down—who, he couldn’t tell—and several of the females were badly injured, blood dripping down torn and

gaping fur, muzzles clawed, ears ripped. Why the sheft wasn’t anyone helping them? He ran forward,

skidding a little in the blood on the stones, his pistol held in front of him. Filwui had Gredar cornered, backed

up against two cowering youngsters and his mother, while his sisters fought against the intruders. J’len,

holding one of the males at bay, leapt suddenly, knocking him down and wrestling with him, but it became

quickly obvious she was getting the worst of it. Gredar was in trouble too, serious trouble—Filwui had

clawed his face, sliced him, flaying his left arm and across the gut, and was still pressing forward as Gredar

crouched back, ear flattened and mane fully erect, hissing and swiping futilely with claws Filwui easily

dodged.

Temin only took long enough to make sure he had a clean shot, drew a bead and fired. The pulse

knocked Filwui clean off his feet and halfway across the floor, a smoking hole in his chest. Temin fired

again, this time at the male pinning J’len to the floor, and as the day-neh fell sideways, Temin screamed,

“
Stop!
All stop now!”

All sounds ceased, except for the whimpering of the injured and the smallest kits. The smell of blood

and burned fur was cloying in the air, sickening. J’len sprang forward, at him, teeth and claws bared. He

swung the pistol towards her. “No! Stop. No hurt Temin. Temin no hurt J’len. Gredar hurt! Help.”
Don’t

make me do it, girl.

She growled, ears flat, claws extended. He wondered if she was even hearing his words. “Gredar

hurt
,” he insisted. “Please, J’len. Help.”

Her tail swished, but suddenly she turned and ran back to her family—first to her mother and the

children, and then to check on Gredar, who’d slumped forward, clutching his gut. How bad was he hurt?

Temin didn’t dare go look at his friend himself—around him, the females were still in defence postures,