“For students, the importance of this report lies less in what it tells us about this race than in what it tells us about language. We believe that at one time, this creature had language formed and ramified by experience. Brought to a world with no inimical organisms and plentiful food, it expanded endlessly until it occupied the entire land surface of the planet. As food became scarce, the creatures became progressively smaller, eventually reaching the stage we see now.
“Along the way, all meaning was lost except for verbal signals, the kind of signals any animal species develops in order to stay in touch with its own kind, call others to a feeding spot, or alert others to danger. Every linguist should know that language must be used to be retained, and the compilers of this report have warned that human language on Earth is also being reduced. As humans become more crowded, they become less tolerant of variety. To fit into a crowd, people must be similar, and Earth’s population today is a vat of homogeneity with only a pretense of choice remaining. One may pick model x with one curlicue or model y with three, the tasteless brown cracker or the tasteless yellow cracker, the actual difference in either case being nil. Any real choice among things of unlike value might lead to disparity, which leads to conflict. Ideas also contribute to disparity, and therefore in crowded populations, ideas must be restricted to the least controversial, the least interesting. Children all receive the same grades in school. Workers all receive the same pay. Clothing is similar; foods are identical; and with the passage of all distinctions, the words for them also pass. Who now knows of oranges, whale blubber, corsets, chopsticks, panty hose, nutmeg? What is a cable knit? Where might one find a T-bone?…”
I pushed the stop and reversed, listening to this last bit again. What was a cable knit? Or a T-bone? I had known for years that people didn’t say anything, but I had never considered that they might actually be losing language! Suddenly interested in this, avid to learn more, I keyed the machine to play it over. My intention was interrupted by a crash as the rear door of the classroom was banged open.
Around me the whispers fell into silence. The man in the door was a black-clad proctor. During the last ten years, proctors had become both ubiquitous and universally dreaded. He spent only a moment scanning the room before striding directly toward me. He leaned down, spoke quietly, waited while I stood and started to gather up my study materials.
“Leave them,” he said. “You won’t need them.”
I saw a dozen pairs of eyes on me, some of them curious. I shrugged, hands out, obviously as ignorant as they were, trying desperately to look nonchalant. What had I done? Or more likely, what did they think I had done? Did this have anything to do with that meeting? Did they think I was involved in what my fellow students had said…
The monitor spoke from the front of the room. “Settle down. Get on with your lessons, please.”
Outside in the hall, I asked, “Where are we going.”
“To the Provost’s office,” the proctor replied, not breaking his lengthy stride. “Stupid woman insists on seeing you.” I trotted to keep up with him, readying myself for a considerable walk, only to be surprised that a car driven by one of the security staff awaited us at the main corridor.
Cars were silent and fast. The driver, an expressionless woman with her clearance code tattooed on her forehead, left us at the Provost’s office, where I stood just inside the anteroom door, watching the car dwindle down the hallway, trying not to huddle under the watchful eyes of the proctor.
“Do you know what she wants me for?” I asked.
“I don’t answer questions,” said the proctor.
It was a threat. There was just time to realize that before the Provost’s aide came for me and took me to into her office.
The Provost looked up. “Margaret.”
“Yes, Provost.”
She rose. “Margaret, I’m sorry about this. If you were not a party to this deception, you will be shocked at this news.” She walked around the desk.
“A party to what? I have no idea…”
“You are seemingly a student here under false pretenses.” She shut the door between us and the proctor.
My mouth dropped open momentarily, before shame and anger snapped it shut. “I am a four, Provost. I am my mother’s first and my father’s third child.”
The Provost nodded, saying more softly, “That was thought to be true ten years ago when you received citizen’s approval at age twelve. Two years ago, however, as you are no doubt aware, it became apparent the planned population cuts had not been deep enough, and the selection criterion was moved back another generation. Only twos to fours from two to four parents are now approved.”
“Yes, ma’am. Of course I know that.”
“All over-fours were instructed to report to the local emigration office?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Interesting, because it appears that your mother’s older brother was born as a twin. Your mother is, therefore, at least the third child of both her mother and her father, a six.”
“I don’t understand! My mother didn’t have an older brother. She had an uncle almost as young as she was, but…”
“The medical records establish that your mother had two older brothers. Twin boys were born to your maternal grandparents.”
“Uncle Hy?” I murmured, completely lost. “He’s Mother’s uncle, and he lives on Luna!”
She shook her head. “He may well live on the moon, if he chooses, but he and
