Larry Goes To Space (18 page)

Veronica laughed. Larry recognized the sound without the translator. A few of the newer members of the group squealed and ran a short distance away. They didn’t go far before stopping and turning around.

Larry was sure a kiss would be misinterpreted, but he hugged Veronica again and kissed her on her cheek or the approximate area of a cheek, although he was not sure what Teumessians called the area on the side of their face. He set her down and picked up Betty and Ginger. He spun around, holding them both tightly. He continued to hold them as they walked toward the spaceport buildings.

“Scooter,” he said, “Veronica isn’t insane any more. Neither are you, Betty, Ginger, Jughead, or Bob. They are friends now. Friends aren’t family, but they aren’t insane either. There isn’t any reason I know of that two friends cannot start their own family. How did families get started in the first place?”

Scooter looked thoughtfully at Veronica.

Bob answered Larry’s question. “Families start when a family group grows too big. It then splits and becomes two families. Everyone knows that.”

Larry said, “Yes, everyone but me. How did the first family get started?”

Bob started to speak, then shut his muzzle with a snap. A little voice in the back of Larry’s head supplied the musical word “chocolate” when Bob’s muzzle snapped shut. He laughed at how effective and affective advertizing could be even after all of these years. He could remember the tagline to the television commercial, but he couldn’t actually remember what chocolate mix it went with. He remembered the dog-like character, Farfel. The commercial was way before his time, actually from his father’s generation, but he had still seen it enough times to imprint the tagline in his head.

Jughead spoke for the first time ever, “Maybe the first family was just created this way?” He looked around at the new individuals hovering near their spaceship crew. His eyes wrinkled as if the thought was too new to dispute, but he was daring the new guys to dispute it anyway.

Larry said, “Whoa there, little guy. Speculation like that is how religions get started. Maybe some Teumessians will believe there were always families from the first day and then others will believe all Teumessians were insane at one time until two individual Teumessians met and started the first family. Pretty soon you’ll have two groups arguing about who is more right. Learn a lesson from humans; more wars were started over religion than anything else.” He didn’t know if that was true or not, but it sounded like a good thing to say at the time.

Bob signaled assent with his hands. “War is bad. We know this from humans. Humans should have learned this from humans. Then how do the Teumess answer your question? We don’t know how the first family came to be.”

Larry said, “I’ve always been a firm believer in saying, that if you don’t know, then you don’t know. That’s the answer: we don’t know.”

Bob signaled ascent. “This is a good thing. We don’t know how the first family started, and we don’t know why another family cannot start now.”

Veronica sniffed the air. “When I went insane I stopped using my DNA receptors.”

“You can shut them off?” Larry asked in surprise.

He was still holding Ginger and Betty. They weren’t too heavy, so he hadn’t bothered to put them down. It wasn’t a long walk to the buildings and his legs were much longer than theirs.

Betty grabbed his ear, giving it a small affectionate tweak. “Of course we can shut them down, silly. Why would you smell for the odor of food if you weren’t hungry? Why would you smell for the odor of a dust wallow if you weren’t dirty? Why would you smell for the odor of an acceptable DNA match if you weren’t able to have kits again?”

Larry laughed. “Humans can’t shut our sense of smell off except by pinching our nose shut.”

Betty reached over and pinched his nose shut. She laughed.

They were almost at the spaceport buildings when Veronica stopped walking. She spun about and sniffed Scooter. She turned her back to him and lifted her tail signaling her willingness to accept a fertilized egg from him.

Scooter started to turn his back to her but Larry stopped him.

“Dude! Really? Now?” Larry laughed and pointed at the building. “We’re here. Don’t you have time to do this later?”

Veronica shrugged and dropped her tail. “The DNA match is good now. It will be good later.”

Scooter imitated her shrug. “The egg hasn’t been fertilized yet. It will wait, but I’m anxious to start a new family with Veronica. I will no longer be insane.”

Larry said, “Scooter, you aren’t insane. That is what we’ve been saying. You’re a friend now.”

Scooter reached out to touch the door, but stayed his hand. “Can a friend and a family coexist? Can a Teumessian be a friend and in a family at the same time?”

Hugging Larry, Betty reached across and stroked the side of Ginger’s face. She said, “I wouldn’t give up my friends and go back to being just part of a family.”

Larry said, “Humans are both at the same time. It remains to be seen whether the Teumess can be both. However, I’m asking Scooter and Veronica to hold off until we see if I can help you with the Almas problem or not. I may need either one of you as a friend or I may need you both.”

A large number of insane Teumessians clustered around the buildings—or as clustered as Teumessians could be while insane. No individual was close enough to touch another, yet a hand grenade would get more than half dozen Teumessians at a time. Most of these Teumessians were crew from the other ships, since they carried belongings with them.

The other insane Teumessians who had joined the newly forming Teumess Friends Society didn’t have any belongings with them. Larry wondered if they didn’t have personal possessions or if they’d stashed them somewhere before coming down to the spaceport. He wondered if somewhere in one of the buildings was a long row of rental lockers, just like the bus depot in Wichita. Of course, none of them had any pockets, or any clothes for that matter, so there wasn’t anywhere to stash a key. Maybe they used combination locks, a smell-o-lock, or even DNA scanning biometric security devices.

Scooter tapped the building wall and a door melted open.

Larry cursed. Here was another place where there was no way he could see the place to press to open or close the door. He put Betty and Ginger on the ground and pulled out his marker. He put a small dot on the wall where Scooter had touched it. He wasn’t about to go into any building that he couldn’t at least try and figure a way to get out of.

He looked around at the other buildings. Most of them looked like they were made of local materials using local construction methods. They had doorways and open windows much like Earth buildings, except much smaller. The buildings blended so well with the local terrain they could almost pass for naturally occurring hillsides.

A few buildings, like the one before them, looked as if the same species who manufactured the spaceships prefabricated them. That would be fine, except whom or whatever made them had no consideration for the diminutive stature of the end users.

It would be exactly like a carmaker who only builds his vehicles to fit professional basketball players, not taking into account that the majority of its customers couldn’t reach the pedals. It was exactly like an airplane seat manufacturer who builds smaller and smaller seats without regard to the expanding backsides of the airline’s customer base. Except that the airlines based their decision to make smaller seats on greed, not on apathy or on the lack of marketing skills.

Scooter had said they got their spacecraft from the Union for a couple of tons of gold. If gold was a galactic standard, then greed was easily a component in the seller’s thinking.

Larry could picture intergalactic used car salesmen selling hillbilly-reconditioned used spaceships to unwary races all across the stars. The Teumess bought the used spaceships and were happy to get them. He imagined humans would leap at the chance if that was all that was available.

Of course, with humans it didn’t take long for them to go from the Model A to Mars. It wouldn’t take humans long to reengineer, remodel, remake, recondition, and remanufacture any spacecraft that fell into their hands, especially if private industry had a hand in it and not governments.

In fact, he could even picture the reality television show some desperate cable channel would air about an enterprising urban family of misfits who convert used spaceships into fancy interstellar recreational vehicles for people who have more money than sense. He could even see the Teumessians getting their money’s worth for such a conversion, with or without reality television show rights.

He wasn’t sure whether the Teumessians had private industry or much of a government beyond the Tetra. No one had mentioned it and he hadn’t asked. From what he’d seen, the Teumess weren’t much for remaking things.

The Teumessians weren’t much at decorating either. Larry looked around the large room. It could have been the lobby in any building of comparable size on Earth. On the Teumessian home world of Plenty, it was a large room considering the inhabitants of this planet didn’t spread out from each other. On Earth, the room would have been filled with a reception desk, chairs, couches, tables, and a statue of some kind of art that no one “got” except the strange woman with orange and blue streaked hair in the Human Relations Department who ordered it to pretty up the place. On Plenty, the room was just large and empty.

On Earth, the walls would have artwork comparable to the company’s function; airplanes for aerospace companies, students in classrooms and at play for educational organizations, buildings for architectural firms, and pictures of pristine, untouched wilderness for oil companies. On Plenty, the room was large and empty with uncovered walls painted various of shades of green.

He moved into the center of the room. A couple of dozen Teumessians followed him. Only his original crew would come within touching distance. He looked around but couldn’t see any purpose to the building. His assumption was that Scooter had led him here for a reason.

“Well, Scooter?” he asked. “What’s next?”

Scooter shrugged. “We wait.”

“Wait?” Larry said. “I came — however far away I came — to help. I say let’s get this show on the road. Who do I have to talk to around here? Do you want me to go talk to the Almas now? I still don’t know what you want me to do.”

Scooter shrugged. “The Tetra wish to speak to you first. They will explain our relationship with the Almas. They will explain why we desire to change the relationship. Even though you are here, the Tetra must prepare to meet with you. They aren’t insane nor are they friends and they are…” His voice trailed away in embarrassment.

Larry laughed. “They are afraid that I might go crazy and eat them.”

Larry had long since figured out the Teumessians generally ruled by family consensus. Without a family structure, there was no way for a Teumessian to get things done. Of course, on Earth it was reversed. Getting anything done in a family setting was harder than titanium.

Even the Tetra were non-functioning unless they gained family consensus. That meant he could wait for a long time since four families were involved.

He had a question.

He looked at Scooter. “How long did the Tetra deliberate before deciding to bypass Earth in favor of the Almas? How long did they have to think about it?”

Scooter shrugged. “We became aware of Earth from your television and radio broadcasts. We didn’t go looking for you. The Tetra was almost a hundred of your Earth years in deciding between the Almas and the humans of Earth. They don’t resolve issues quickly especially since various Tetra members have died over the years. Appointing replacements to the Tetra takes time. Meeting with me, who they consider insane, to ask me to go and visit your world, didn’t happen quickly. Meeting you face-to-face won’t even happen that fast.”

“Oh, hell no!” Larry said, shaking his head emphatically. He switched to waving his hand in front of his face in the Teumessian negative. “We aren’t sitting around here for who knows how long waiting for some half-pint, petty paper pusher to untwist his panties. I’m going to tell you what we’re going to do.”

I have been a stranger in a strange land.
(Exodus 2:22)

CHAPTER ELEVEN

LARRY looked at the Teumessians standing around. “Jughead, can you find me a monitor? Not the lizard, but the television screen?”

When the Teumessian turned to go, Larry added, “Hold on a minute, don’t go yet. What we want to do is get a closed circuit video conference set up where I can talk to the Tetra. One monitor here for me. We want one for each of them. Put the monitor in a place where they feel safe from me. That way, they don’t even have to get close to each other’s families to conference in together. Then we can blank out the picture from our side so they don’t even have to look at me. Can we do this?”

Jughead shrugged. “I can access a screen, but I’m not sure how to split the signal.”

Larry looked around the room. “Is there anybody here able to help out with this project? Look,” he raised his hand, “if you can help Jughead, you just raise your hand like this.”

A couple of crewmen from the Earth expedition raised their hands.

“Good. You two Teumessians are great and shining examples of your species. Please help Jughead. He’s in charge so do what he says, but just get us rigged up.” He hoped the translator unit could keep up with his English. He wasn’t sure if rigged up was in its database.

Larry looked around. There wasn’t a cow in sight and he was getting hungry. Not that he would gnaw on a T-bone in front of this crowd. That would be exactly like slaughtering a cow to make hamburgers in downtown New Dehli. “Okay, my friends. We need food and water brought in here. Who can do this?”

Ginger raised her hand. “No food remains on our spaceship, but there is food on the other ships we can bring in.” She pointed at a bare wall. “There’s a room like our cabin on the ship.” She touched the wall and a door melted open. The room looked exactly like the cabin he’d been in on the spaceship. Except here, just off the lobby of the spaceport waiting room, it looked an awful lot like a bathroom.

Maybe Larry had just crossed interstellar space in the bathroom of a used spacecraft.

Larry dotted the melt-unmelt spot on the wall with his marker. He tossed his backpack in the room.

He looked at Betty, “Can you put our stuff away in the cabinets?”

She nodded and took his marker away from him. “I’ll mark the spots so even you, with your puny little human eyes can tell where to open and close the tables and chairs. I’ll put our friend’s stuff in here and put it away as well.” She dropped her stuff next to his and grabbed Jughead’s bundle.

Ginger selected half a dozen space crew by pointing at them and gesturing. She bolted out the door at a ground eating run. Larry realized that instead of his long legs being an asset on the walk from the spaceships to the building, he’d slowed the Teumessians down. He almost slapped his forehead with the palm of his hand. Ol’ Bucky had legs much shorter than his, but he couldn’t keep up with the old mutt even on his best days.

“Everyone select a space on the floor for you and your stuff,” he shouted. “Find somewhere to sit down where you won’t get stepped on.”

He saw Bob and Veronica speaking to other Teumessians. The translator wasn’t picking up every voice in the room, but it looked like the two were explaining to the insane ones about the concept of friends.

He felt a tug at his sleeve. Jughead was pointing at a wall. There was a huge row of monitors already in place. Larry hadn’t been able to see where to push the wall buttons to expose the monitors. It looked like the departure board at the Kansas City airport. The monitors were on, but there was nothing but static. Jughead’s two assistants were gesturing wildly.

It didn’t look like the monitors cared for being gestured at anymore than Larry’s cows did. Maybe the monitors were apathetic about being gestured at. Not that it mattered, the outcome would be the same whether they liked it or not.

Jughead said, “The monitors are here. They’re functional, designed for data, but they can be made more stupid for video and sound, if you wish. We can hook them to monitors for the Tetra, but they won’t want us to access those monitors without their family’s permission. They are in separate rooms elsewhere in the building.”

Larry said, “So how do we get in contact with them?”

Jughead said, “We will access monitors in other rooms. Then we will tell them to move. They won’t like it.”

Larry laughed, “No government functionary likes it when a member of the governed body tells it what to do. Remember that the Tetra work for you, you don’t work for them.”

Jughead gave a little bark of laughter. “You don’t understand the Teumess at all, friend Larry, but it will be as you instruct.”

“What if they don’t move?” Larry asked.

Jughead shrugged. “I’ll tell them you’re hungry and you’re in search of food. I’ll tell them their room is next to be searched. Even a family will accept such a warning from an insane one.”

Larry started to speak, but Jughead said, “I know I’m not insane. I’m a friend. But, they don’t know that…yet.”

It didn’t take long before they were seated on the floor and everyone else was scattered about. They were halfway through a meal of some kind of fresh fruit salad when four monitors on the top row popped on, one by one. Jughead and his assistants joined them, looking pleased with themselves.

Jughead needed to jiggle the controls on the two of the monitors. His assistants had to boost him up to reach. When they were finished, the three sat down, comfortably touching one another and began to share a salad.

Scooter raised his hand and looked questioningly at Larry.

Larry nodded and pointed at the monitors.

“This is Scooter. I and the other insane ones have done as needed and as you have instructed. We have gone to Earth. We brought back one even more insane than I. He’s here with me now. He’s promised me he will eat me first if he becomes hungry, so as long as I’m alive you’re safe.”

The four Tetra stared back through the monitors, although the camera on Larry’s side was disabled. There was one Teumessian standing in front of the camera for each monitor and it showed each Teumess’s family spread out behind him or her.

Suddenly a whole row of monitors flashed on showing scenes from all over the spaceport. Each video camera was picking up a family or a group of families gathered around other monitors and cameras. Larry looked over at Jughead. The Teumessian looked delighted with himself.

Scooter nodded and grinned with his fox-like lips. “We have turned all of the spaceport monitors on so that all of Plenty may know and learn of what we do here. The Tetra, as wise as you are, made a mistake in inviting the Almas to a place in the civilization and the Union. We have one and only one opportunity to bring a civilization into the Union, yet you rushed to bring in a civilization that will destroy us all. The Tetra has been too ashamed to tell the Union of our mistake and ask for help. Yet, you sent a mission of insane ones to Earth, to bring an even more deadly creature here, that we may fight fire with fire.”

Larry was surprised to hear the Teumess only had one opportunity to bring another civilization into the Union. That must be Union rules to keep their numbers more manageable. He wondered why the Tetra rushed to the decision. So, he decided to ask.

“Hey, Scooter? Why did the Tetra rush?”

Scooter pointed at the monitors.

One of the Tetra looked around at his family. He harrumphed as good as any Earth politician. Larry laughed. If the little Teumessian had clothes, he would have hooked his thumbs in his suspenders. Larry couldn’t see from this angle, but he bet the Tetra had a little pot belly as well.

The Tetra said, “The Teumess of Plenty remained second class members of the Union until we submitted a valid candidate for membership. The Teumess of Plenty have been part of the Union for thirty generations. We didn’t wish to be second class members any more.”

“So what other benefits will you gain by being first class members?” Larry asked.

“Who is this speaking?” one of the Tetra asked.

“We cannot see you,” another added.

“I am Larry. I’m the crazy, meat-eating human that Scooter and his crew brought back from Earth.”

That announcement was greeted with cries and screams from a dozen different monitors. The Tetra monitors showed them staring back at what, for them, must have been a blank screen.

Larry said, “Jughead, can they turn on their monitors to see us if they want?”

“They just need to push the @#&%^ red button. Then push it again.” Jughead’s words didn’t clear the translator. “We can see who has done this by this little light.” He ran up to a monitor and pointed at a little flashing orange light.

Scooter said, “For those of you brave enough to view a human, you can see him here. He is only slightly ugly and although I’ve told him that he may nourish his body with mine, I’m here after many days time with him.” He walked over, reached up, and stuck a finger in Larry’s mouth. “He is dangerous, though. He has killed and eaten more creatures than I have eaten quislandden berries. Yet, he is slow; even a two-year-old can out run him. You may view him without danger to your families.”

Three unlit monitors on the bottom row flashed. Jughead put down his salad and walked to the wall of monitors. The buttons were high enough to be a reach for him, but he punched a series of buttons.

A Teumessian appeared in each one.

“We are from Gilandrian Lake province. May we view your broadcast?” One Teumessian asked.

“We are from Allarian Mines.”

“And we are from Hoomain.”

Larry looked at Jughead and Scooter, “Television broadcasts?”

Jughead laughed, “Nothing so messy, friend Larry. It is point-to-point secure transmission. I didn’t wish to let the Almas know of your arrival. Scooter said that would not be…prudent at this point.”

Scooter said, “Jughead, please transmit to anyone who wants to listen in.”

“I object,” a Tetra said. “This is Tetra business and—”

Larry stood up and said, “The Tetra business is everyone’s business. All of the Teumessians might have been able to object to your contacting the Almas if you hadn’t hidden behind closed doors. They might have cautioned you to wait.” The whole Teumess Tetra attitude was just like a lot of Earth governments who believed they knew what was better for the governed than the governed knew for themselves.

“The question remains,” Larry said, “what did the Teumess have to gain by becoming first class members of the Union?”

The Tetra responded all at the same time.

“We do not know—”

“We would find out when—”

“Becoming first class is always better.”

“The Teumess would have access—”

“—more access—”

“—maybe—”

“—probably—”

Larry shouted them down. “Hey Bob. What did we decide was good for the Teumess Friends Society?”

Bob laughed, catching the drift of the conversation quite quickly, “To say we don’t know if we don’t know. Guessing only causes conflict.”

Larry pointed at the monitors. “Lesson learned. I hope the Tetra can apply that lesson.”

Scooter asked, “Why have the Tetra not contacted the Union for help?”

Again, the Tetra responded all at the same time.

“Embarrassed about our mistake—”

“Carnivores and danger already among the Union and—”

“—not want to be told to leave the Union—”

“—wanted to redust our own wallow—”

The Tetra’s inability to speak in turn was just like a congressional hearing that Larry had once watched on C-Span. Everyone was trying to talk at the same time and everyone was trying to not say anything. Why someone would want to talk and not say anything was beyond Larry. He supposed it was like that kid in school. Every school had at least one; the kid who wanted to ask a question, even though he or she knew the answer, just to hear themselves talk.

The last comment confused Larry only for a second. Redust your own wallow must be a typical Teumess saying, like mending your own fences, taking care of business, chew your own breakfast, and you made your bed, now lie in it. All of the English phrases, or any one, might have been confusing to a Teumessian no matter how clearly the translator broke down the sentence word for word.

“Okay,” Larry said, “that’s water under the bridge.” That’ll teach ‘em. “Where’s the Almas spaceship?”

Scooter said, “Very near. We’re in danger if we go too far from this building toward the east.”

Larry nodded and said to the Tetra, “Give me an update on how the Almas are hurting you.”

“They have issued instructions to us that we cannot follow.”

“They gather and kill us at random—”

“—entertainment and nourishment.”

“They give us this.”

“—kill us with this and broadcast the results to their world.”

“Take our dead, liquefy the protein, and take it to their home.”

“—dead cannot return and replenish our soil.”