“My friend,” I made him repeat in Italian as I held his claw and arm upraised, “We are reborn.”
We prayed together, there on the damp, green mud; a strange crustacean and a failed priest, repeating words whose origins were centuries old and hundreds of light-years distant.
I rejoiced in my eager convert, imagining that he would carry religion back to the godless civilization that spawned him. I fantasized that Ttch*lok would be my first missionary; that he would carry the message of redemption and spirituality to the needful and unknowing souls of this horrid world.
I would have a flock of believers at last! Strange though they might appear to others of my faith. I relished the souls that were to be saved.
One evening I noted that the pail seemed rather full to overflowing. Choice scraps were evident. “Was this a reward?” I asked innocently for today’s session had gone extremely well, with hardly an error in understanding.
“No,” Ttch*lok responded with no hint of sadness. “They are feeding me to make sure that I am full when my time comes.”
“I don’t understand. What time is this? Are you going to return to your masters?” The emissaries had mentioned nothing of their departure.
Ttch*lok clicked his feelers together nervously. “I am at my limit, father. I have learned so much that I feel that I will burst if relief does not come soon.”
Startled at his remark I peered closer. Yes, the signs were unmistakable; there was a cloudy appearance in the eyes, the shell had taken on a milky sheen, and the movement of all appendages were languorous and weak. “The softening is coming,” I said in sudden understanding.
“Yes,” Ttch*lok replied. “And they will eat me for my knowledge when that happens.”
I was rocked back on my heels. Eat their translator? Why would they… Then it dawned on me: By eating him they would gain facility with our language. With that core of knowledge they could more easily gain fluency. Yes, and then they would no longer have to suffer the laborious and demeaning process of translation through a captive animal.
It made perfectly good sense. Ed would no doubt think it a “clever ploy.”
I thought that it was horrible.
All through the night I tossed and fidgeted in my bunk, wondering what my moral obligation was in this case. On the one hand the feeding of Ttch*lok to the three emissaries would materially enhance our process of learning more about their civilization and this world. I had a sworn obligation to aid and support that process.
On the other hand, if I did nothing I would lose my single convert. I would allow a Christian to be sacrificed on the altar of expediency. Not only that, but a living, thinking, feeling being of no little intelligence would be consumed as fodder, with little ceremony or remorse on the part of his masters. To them he was simply a convenient animal whose substance could be harvested with dispatch.
Did I not have a higher obligation to save his soul, if not his material being? I had baptized this child and therefore had a debt to protect him.
The conflict of the two obligations wore on me through the long night hours.
In the steamy dawn I crept from the dome to where Ttch*lok lay sleeping. “Quiet,” I whispered as I cut the tether that bound him to the staff. The line was surprisingly weak. Ttch*lok could have sundered it in a moment with his claw, had he so chosen.
“Come with me, my friend,” I said and led him away from the dome and into the dark vegetation surrounding the campsite. He resisted weakly at first, as if unwilling to move. I assumed he was early in the stage of stupor that preceded the softening.
Finally he stirred, albeit slowly. I had momentarily feared that the progression of the softening had already reached the point where he was unable to move. That would be a serious problem since I doubted that I could bear his weight in addition to the hard suit.
For hours we trudged through the dark foliage and sucking mud, ever away from the dome and those who would misuse Ttch*lok. When gray dawn lay upon the sky we were kilometers away, heading up the peninsula toward the swamps of the mainland.
Ttch*lok stumbled frequently as if his limbs were not strong enough to maintain the pace. I gave him such help as I could, supporting his weight whenever it seemed he was losing strength.
The signs of his forthcoming change were more apparent in the morning light. A small crack had formed, extending from the base of his tail to a point halfway along his back. It had not yet separated, for I could see no white flesh between the sides of the crack.
I prayed that there was still enough time for us to find a safe place to hide.
I discovered a sheltered spot. It was a simple overhang of dirt on the side of a ridge covered with feathery shrubs. I dragged him in as far as I could and lay beside him, exhausted.
We could not be spotted from the outside, I was certain of that.
“Is there anything that I can do?” I asked, wondering what needs Ttch*lok might have and if I were capable of providing whatever might be requested.
“You should not have taken me,” he whispered so softly that I strained to hear him. “I was not made to live beyond my purpose.”
“Nonsense,” I responded at once. “No one deserves to die needlessly. I have an obligation to save you for your own sake, for the sake of your soul.”
“I have no need for this body, father,” he responded weakly. “My soul will go on.”
“Yes, it will,” I responded. “But at a time and place of your own choosing.” “My soul is eternal,” he said. “I live in others,” and with those words my friend, my convert was gone.
He slumped in my arms, surrendering his material self to my embrace, just as I would some day relinquish myself to my redeemer.
I did not know whether his last words were question or statement.
As the day progressed the process of Ttch*lok’s softening accelerated. The crack on his back finally extended the entire length of his body. As it began to widen, a rich, redolent fluid spilled out. Ttch*lok’s body writhed and squirmed in small random motions that twitched his exoskeleton this way and that. His strength claw jerked upwards at one point and then fell limply to one side. There was no resistance when I lifted it; the muscles had loosened completely.
Heat radiated from his body as the process accelerated. I watched the firm exoskeleton split and easily peel away. The oily fluid that oozed from the cracks must lubricate the shell and permit it to peel so easily, I surmised. As pieces of the shell fell away the white flesh beneath was revealed.
Metaphorically I wondered if, when my own mortal sheath had to be sloughed, it would expose the soft white purity of my soul? Just what were the similarities between us, the parallels in our spirituality? Clearly the mores of this world were at odds with the civilized processes of my own, as I had observed many times in these past weeks. Still, couldn’t there be some grace in all of this predation, some salvation from “nature, red in tooth and claw?”
Couldn’t the Word of God be brought to these beings?
The smell of the lubricating fluid and the heat radiating from the process began to attract visitors. The small flying insectoids were the first to arrive and landed on Ttch*lok’s white flesh, ready to feed. I swatted them away with a branch of
The crawling things were harder to deal with. I finally took a few moments to roll a large stone in front of the opening and scooped out a moat in the gray-green mud behind it. The moat immediately filled with water and formed a secondary barrier behind the stone. I used the back of my glove to squish those few crawlers and scurriers who squeezed by the boulder and managed to ford the moat.
