golden, just the way I had liked and Adam hated. Interesting.
“Go join the others, Kav. There are plenty of goods left to distribute. These poor sentients barely know how to use a stick, if you can believe that.”
Kav paused, about to speak again, but departed, apparently thinking better of it. I wondered what the neuter’s last question had been, and how long it would be before Kav was back to ask me more. I turned my attention to the Captain.
“You know, their lack of tool use has allowed them to develop a sophisticated rhetoric that’s quite fascinating,” I said.
“You mean that they’re so bored for lack of toys that all they do is sit around and bullshit?”
I nodded—another odd gesture after having no neck for so long. “That would be the U.P. way of seeing things.”
“The only way worth seeing things,” she said. “Bertie, you’re uglier than ever.”
“Thanks for noticing.”
“You’re not going to take this seriously at all, are you?” she asked.
I continued my practice of not answering questions to which she already knew the answer.
“What are you doing out here?”
“Studying,” I said.
Lewyana sighed. I liked the way it made her breasts heave. My human biology was definitely dominant once again; the motion would have been repulsive to a Humpty. “Adam thought that you were playing ‘Little Emperor.’”
“If that was the case, you would not have caught me running through the muck. I would have been sitting atop a golden throne, surrounded by my adoring people.” I looked past her, into the passageway. Two Redshirts loitered nearby, blocking any possible escape attempt. So she
“Besides, I would have to be a much smoother talker to convince the Humpties that I’m a god.”
“You don’t give yourself nearly enough credit. You almost convinced me of something equally ridiculous once,” she said.
“Almost only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades.”
“What?”
“Forget it. An expression I picked up from a friend of mine.”
“I don’t believe it.”
“What, the expression, or that I have friends?”
She laughed at that finally. I felt a previously unnoticed tension in my new muscles relax. “Both, I guess,” she said.
“Look, let’s stop tiptoeing around this. What happens next?”
She put on her professional face, stern, commanding. Sexy. “The natives have two planetary rotations to affirm their citizenship in the U.P. At which point we’ll direct the celebrations, seed the atmosphere with swarms, and depart for our next mission. Dropping you off at a U.P. Central Court along the way. Or.”
“Or?”
“Or, we ‘lose’ Adam’s mind-store, copy you in his place, and you ride around in his old looks until people forget about him. And you come back to me.”
I smiled and ignored the second option for now. “What if they don’t affirm?”
Scowling, she barked, “You know exactly what.”
“But I want to hear you say it,” I said before I could stop myself. She slapped me hard across my 85% human face, her swarm giving the blow just a little extra pain juice. The temperature in the room dropped a couple degrees Kelvin.
She pressed her hands against her upper thighs and pushed down, smoothing her unitard. It was a nervous habit I had seen thousands of times, a lifetime ago.
“By rejecting citizenship, they identify themselves as a threat to peace among all sentients, and they will be treated as such.” Standard operating line. It sounded the same as the first time I heard it.
“Better get the bombs ready,” I said. “The Humpties aren’t going to go for it.”
“Bertie, I can count the number of sentient species that have not affirmed on one hand.”
“You’ll need two hands after tomorrow,” I said with a sigh. “You’ll be damned lucky if they can even come to a consensus by then. They debate the names of their children for two years after hatching.”
“We’re persuasive,” she said, sounding almost defeatist in tone. I had won most of the arguments and that hadn’t changed. She had won the fistfights.
“Oh, I know that. Now you’re telling
“Think about my offer,” she said. Her eyes pleaded in a way her voice could not. She slipped away leaving me to think about those eyes more than I wanted to at the moment.
I settled into my crate as the Redshirts marched back in to take up the guard. My energy reserves were running dangerously low thanks to the cellular restructuring, so I did what comes naturally in such situations. I took a nap.
I was awakened by a brutal kick to my now fully human ribs. I felt one of them break, and then the tingling as my swarm jumped into action, knitting bone back together. I had been tipped out of the crate onto the bay floor. Adam was standing over me.
“So are you the Ghost of Christmas Future?” I asked, groaning.
“Shut up,” he said, and kicked me again. Enough of that and my crippled swarm would not be able to keep up.
“I know she was in here. What did you talk about? Don’t lie. I’ll know if you’re lying.”
“How bad you are in the sack,” I said, just barely bracing myself in time for the boot. The pain, while severe, was worth it. In the good old days, there were few things I took more pleasure in than needling Cadet Adam. Perhaps in retrospect not the greatest of habits.
“You have no idea what you’re talking about.” He abruptly slumped to the floor beside me. I tried to calculate my speed versus his, and whether I could grab his neck and snap it before he could call for aid, but the math was not in my favor, something my swarm helpfully confirmed.
“She orders me to wear your face sometimes,” he whispered.
Hmm. Kinky.
“There’s this empty space in her bed and I can’t fill it no matter what shape I take. I’ve tried everything. Toys. Enhancements. I even decanted into doubles and had a threesome with myself.”
“She’s never satisfied,” he continued.
“Why are you telling me this?” I asked.
“Because I can’t tell anyone else.” He shrugged. “And you’re a dead man walking.”
Something took over me, some impulse that was so unfamiliar I had forgotten the word for it at first. Pity, is that you? Can’t say that I’ve missed you. Your sister Self-pity has kept me plenty company, thanks.
I proceeded to explain the peculiarities of Lewyana’s g-spot and several sexual techniques that I had developed over the course of a dozen relative years in her bed. He listened with a kind of dull eagerness, like he didn’t want to admit I was teaching him anything useful.
“All you’re lacking is time,” I said. “In some ways, you’re a better match for her than me.”
“How so?” he asked, his eyes narrowing.
“You don’t ask too many questions,” I said, squeezing my eyes shut and preparing myself for another blow, but it never came. When I opened them, he was gone.
I waited, ticking off the hours until the affirmation deadline. Instead of screaming wordlessly and flailing about uselessly, I passed the time asking the Redshirts questions I knew they couldn’t answer. I attempted to teach them how to play gin rummy. It would have been easier if I had had a deck of cards, I suppose. Also, if the Redshirts had more than a pea’s worth of brain cells.
Just when I was beginning to doubt my people skills, and a few minutes after the deadline had passed, the
