Starplex

of various designs.

Starplex was currently 368 light-years due galactic south of Flatland, exploring the vicinity of a recently activated shortcut.

The closest star was an F-class subgiant a quarter-light-year away. It was surrounded by four asteroid belts, but no planets. An uneventful mission so far — nothing remarkable astronomically, and no alien radio signals detected. Starplex's staff was busy winding down its explorations. In seven days, another boomerang was due to reach its designated shortcut target, this one 376 light-years away from Rehbollo.

Starplex's next scheduled assignment was to investigate that sector.

Everything seemed so peaceful, until — 'Lansing, you will hear me out.'

Keith Lansing stopped walking down the cold corridor, sighed, and rubbed his temples. Jag's untranslated voice sounded like a dog barking, with occasional hisses and snarls thrown in for good measure.

His translated voice — rendered in-an old-fashioned Brooklyn accent — wasn't much better: harsh, sharp, nasty.

'What is it, Jag?'

'The apportioning of resources aboard Starplex,' barked the being, 'is all wrong — and you are to blame for that.

Before we move to the next shortcut, I demand you rectify this. You consistently shortchange the physics division and give preferential treatment to life sciences.'

Jag was a Waldahud, a shaggy piglike creature with six limbs. After the last ice age ended on Rehbollo, the polar caps had melted, flooding much of the land and crisscrossing what remained with rivers. The Waldahudin's ancestors adapted to a semiaquatic lifestyle, their bodies becoming well insulated with fat overlain by brown fur to keep out the chill of the river waters they lived in. Keith took a deep breath and looked at Jag. He's an alien, remember. Different ways, different manners. He tried to keep his tone even. 'I don't think that's quite fair.'

More dog barks. 'You give special treatment to life sciences because your spouse heads that division.'

Keith forced a small laugh, although his heart was pounding with repressed anger. 'Rissa sometimes says the opposite — that I don't give her enough resources, that I'm bending over backward to appease you.'

'She manipulates you, Lansing. She — what is the human metaphor? She has you wrapped around her little finger.'

Keith thought about showing Jag a different finger.

They're all like this, he thought. An entire planet of quarrelsome, bickering, argumentative pigs. He tried not to sound weary. 'What exactly is it that you want, Jag?'

The Waldahud raised his upper left hand, and ticked off stubby, hairy fingers with his upper right. 'Two more probeships assigned exclusively to physical-sciences missions.

An additional Central Computer bank dedicated to astrophysics. Twenty more staff members.'

'The staff additions are impossible,' said Keith. 'We don't have apartments to house them. I'll see what I can do about your other requests, though.' He paused for a second, and then: 'But in the future, Jag, I think you'll find that I'm easier to convince when you don't bring my private life into the discussion.'

Jag barked harshly. 'I knew it!' said the translated voice.

'You make your decisions based on personal feelings, not on the merit of the argument. You are truly unfit to hold the post of director.'

Keith felt his anger about to boil over. He tried to calm himself, and closed his eyes, hoping to summon a tranquil image. He expected to see his wife's face, but the picture that came to him was of an Asian beauty two decades younger than Rissa — and that just made Keith madder at himself. He opened his eyes. 'Look,' he said, a quaver in his voice, 'I don't give a damn whether you approve of the choice of me as Starplex director or not. The fact is that I am director, and will be for another three years. Even if you could somehow get me replaced before my term is over, the agreed-to rotation calls for a human to hold this post at this time. If you get rid of me — or if I quit because I'm fed the hell up with you — you're still going to be reporting to a human. And some of us don't like you' — he stopped himself before he said 'you pigs' — 'at all.'

'Your posturing does you no credit, Lansing. The resources I am demanding are for the good of our mission.'

Keith sighed again. He was getting too old for this. 'I'm not going to argue anymore, Jag. You've made your request; I'll give it all the consideration it is due.'

The Waldahud's four square nostrils flared. 'I am amazed,' said Jag, 'that Queen Truth ever thought we could work with humans.' He rotated on his black hooves, and headed down the corridor without another word.

Keith stood there for two minutes, doing calming breathing exercises, then headed along the chilly corridor toward the elevator station.

Keith Lansing and his wife, Rissa Cervantes, shared a standard human apartment aboard Starplex: L-shaped living room, a bedroom, a small office with two desks, one bathroom with human fixtures, and a second with multispecies fixtures. There was no kitchen, but Keith, who liked to cook, had rigged up a small oven so that he could indulge his hobby.

The main door to the apartment slid open, and Keith stormed in. Rissa must have arrived a few minutes earlier; she came out of the bedroom naked, obviously preparing for her midday shower.

'Hi, Chesterton,' she said, smiling. But the smile faded away, and Keith imagined that she could see the tension in his face, his forehead creased, his mouth downturned.

'What's wrong?'

Keith flopped himself onto the couch. From this angle, he was facing the dartboard Rissa had mounted on one wall.

The three darts were clustered in the tiny sixty-point part of the triple-scoring band — Rissa was shipboard champion.

'Another run-in with Jag,' said Keith.

Rissa nodded. 'It's his way,' she said. 'It's their way'

'I know. I know. But, Christ, it's hard to take sometimes.'

They had a large rear window on one wall, showing the starfield outside the ship, dominated by the bright F-class star nearby. Two other walls were capable of displaying holograms. Keith was from Calgary, Alberta; Rissa had been born in Spain. One wall showed glacier-fed Lake Louise, with the glorious Canadian Rockies rising up behind it; the other a long view of downtown Madrid, with its appealing mixture of sixteenthand twenty — century architecture.

'I thought you'd show up here around now,' said Rissa.

'I was waiting to shower with you.' Keith was pleasantly surprised.

They'd showered together a lot when they'd first gotten married, almost twenty years ago, but had gotten out of the habit as the years wore on.

The necessity of showering twice a day to minimize the human body odor Waldahudin found so offensive had turned the cleansing ritual into an irritating bore, but maybe their impending anniversary had Rissa feeling more romantic than usual.

Keith smiled at her and began to undress. Rissa headed into the main bathroom and began running the water. Starplex was such a contrast to the ships of Keith's youth, like the Lester B. Pearson he'd traveled on back when first contact with the Waldahudin had been made. In those days, he'd had to be content with sonic showers. There was something to be said for carrying a miniature ocean around as part of your ship.

He followed her into the bathroom. She was already in the shower, soaking down her long, black hair. Once she'd moved out from under the shower head, Keith jockeyed into position, enjoying the sensation of her wet body sliding past his. He'd lost half his hair over the years, and what was left he kept short. Still, he massaged his scalp vigorously, trying to work out his anger with Jag in doing so.

He scrubbed Rissa's back for her, and she scrubbed his in turn. They rinsed, then he turned off the water. If he hadn't been so angry, perhaps they'd have made love, but…

Dammit. He began to towel off.

'I hate this,' Keith said.

Rissa nodded. 'I know.'

'It's not that I hate Jag — not really. I hate… hate myself.