Ascending

'Oh, this and that. We feed her a mix of simple hydrocarbons, calcium nitrate, small quantities of heavier elements. She doesn’t have much of a digestive system for breaking down complex nutrients, so you need to keep the diet pretty basic.'

'I am not so much interested in what she can digest as what she might swallow—'

'Well, as to that…'

Uclod walked farmer around the base of the Zarett, then reached up to touch a bleached-out spot on the creature’s skin. He planted his palm firmly and began to rub with strong circular motions, the way one scours hard at one’s body when one has slipped and got grass stains. The goop beneath Uclod’s fingers made soft slurpy rounds as his hand moved; slowly, the sounds grew louder, until he pulled back and the slurping continued without him. The skin bulged in and out, like a person’s jaw as she chews. Moments later, an enormous patch of the Zarett’s gooey exterior opened wide to reveal a dark throat leading into a darker gullet.

A giant mouth loomed before me, big enough to gobble me up!

Facing A Hellish Maw

The Zarett’s breath smelled exactly like the breath of an animal that eats simple hydrocarbons, calcium nitrate, and small quantities of heavier elements. It was particularly hydrocarbons… and I suspect many of those hydrocarbons had not been sufficiently fresh. Starbiter’s breath was, in short, quite the Fetid Reek. My stomach lurched at the odor, and the only thing that prevented a regurgitory incident was that I had not eaten solid food in the past four years.

Uclod gestured to the creature’s mouth. 'After you, toots.'

'You wish me to go inside?'

'There’s plenty of room. A big girl like you should scrunch down going past the epiglottis; but it’ll be clear sailing after that.'

As far as I could see, he was telling the truth: the Zarett’s mouth was big enough for me to enter, provided I ducked under the lips. The throat was very large too — pink and gummy-looking, but with ample room to let me pass. On the other hand, I was not such a one as would calmly proceed into a large creature’s stomach on the invitation of a man who admitted to being a criminal.

'You first,' I said.

Uclod shrugged. 'If you want.' He moved to the creature’s lower lip, which was level with his own waist. Planting his hands on the edge, he hopped up and half- twisted, so that he ended sitting on Starbiter’s bottom palate with his legs dangling out of the mouth. The little man swung his feet around and stood up; his backside was damp with saliva. He held out his hand to me. 'Coming?'

'To be consumed by this creature?' I asked. 'I am not such a fool as you think.'

'Look, missy,' he said, squatting on the Zarett’s lip so his eyes were on my level, 'there’s no way my sweet baby can hurt you. She’s engineered to the last little enzyme, perfectly safe and harmless. Here on Melaquin, I guess you’re used to gadgets being electronic or mechanical; but we Divians have a long history of going the organic route. Back where I live, my home is a macro vegetable pod, kind of like a big Terran cucumber; its lighting comes from fireflies and its air-conditioning comes from a friendly old worm the size of a tree trunk, whose innards are designed to exhale cool air into the house and fart out hot through a hole in the wall.

'So you see,' be continued, 'riding in Starbiter is perfectly natural to me. She’s a lovable little gal who won’t hurt a hair on your head. And if you don’t believe me, believe the League of Peoples. They let her come to your planet, didn’t they? Which means she can’t be dangerous. And even if she was dangerous, I’d be crazy to feed you to her… because if I deliberately tricked you into becoming dinner, the League would get after me.'

I stared at him as I thought very hard. Festina had spoken of this League of Peoples: a group of aliens millions of years advanced beyond human technology. These aliens were too lofty to bother themselves with the affairs of lesser species, but they did enforce a single law throughout the galaxy. They never let murderous beings travel from one star system to another; if any such creature made the attempt, it simply died as soon as it left its home system. Festina did not know how the League managed such executions, but she assured me no one ever avoided this death sentence when it was deserved.

Since the League infallibly exterminated 'pests' trying to spread into other people’s homes, this small Uclod person (who had just traveled through space without dying) might be an awful lawbreaker, but he was not so wicked as to kill me in cold blood.

'Very well,' I told him. 'I shall see what this Zarett looks like inside. But if she does not behave, I shall kick her hard in the stomach. Or wherever I happen to be.'

'Starbiter is always a perfect lady,' Uclod said. He gave me a look that implied he could not say the same about me.

Hmph!

A Question Of Sentience

I was still carrying the Explorer jacket and my lovely silver ax. I laid them inside the Zarett’s mouth, preparing to jump in myself… but Uclod said, 'Leave the ax behind.'

'I do not wish to leave the ax behind. I wish to bring it with me, in case there are trees to clear or evil persons to behead.'

The little man sucked in his breath. 'You can’t take a lethal weapon into space — the League of Peoples will fricassee us both as soon we go interstellar.'

'My ax is not a lethal weapon. It is a useful tool for chopping wood.'

Uclod made a face. 'If you truly thought that, you could probably keep it: the League are such bloody great mindreaders, they can tell peaceful intentions from nasty ones. Good thing, too — otherwise, nobody could take so much as a toothpick from one system to another. A weapon is only a weapon if you think it’s a weapon.' His eyes narrowed. 'And since you just mentioned beheading evildoers, we all know what’s on your mind.' With the annoying air of someone taking the role of your mother, Uclod pointed sternly toward the pavement at my feet. 'Sorry, toots. You gotta leave the hatchet.'

I wanted to argue with the little man; but it occurred to me, this was not just about my ax. This was a pivotal test of my civilization-hood. The League of Peoples would not want me venturing into space if I was such a one as enjoyed hacking others into small screaming pieces… and if I was prone to fits of violence, Uclod would get into serious trouble for transporting a person possessed of homicidal impulses.

Therefore, this small orange criminal was waiting to see whether I was moral enough to set my ax aside. If not, he would consider me a Dangerous Non- Sentient, unfit to mingle with more polite species. He would say, 'Oar, I have reconsidered, and have decided you would be happier remaining on Melaquin.'

But I Would Not Be Happier

I did not wish to remain on Melaquin.

My planet was the most beautiful place in the universe, but it had become exceedingly lonely. There was nobody here except Tired-Brain sleepyheads, and not one of them would be your friend, no matter how desperately you begged them.

In my whole life, I had only known two awake persons of my own kind. One was my mother, who forced dozy men to couple with her until she got pregnant, in the hope that children would keep her from Fading Into Indifference… but her stratagem did not work. By the time I reached my teens, Mother spent all her days in an Ancestral Tower, impossible to rouse with any, 'Mommy, please look, please listen to me!' The last time she had stirred was many years ago, when the first Explorers arrived at our village; and even the appearance of aliens only held her interest for a few hours. Then she went back into hibernation.

The other person I had known on Melaquin was my sister, Eel. She was several years older than I, born from another of my mother’s desperate attempts to keep her brain from the Glassy Sleep. Eel was my best friend, my teacher and my second mother… until the Explorers came. Then she became my rival, always clamoring for their attention and ignoring me.

It is strange how the presence of additional people can make you feel more alone.

But Eel was gone now, murdered by a wicked Explorer — so there was nothing to keep me on Melaquin. Why should I not accompany Uclod to opaque lands, where I could astonish those worlds with my crystalline beauty? And what about my dear friend Festina? She must have been devastated believing me to be dead. Should I not go to her and lift her from the depths of despair?

Yet it was still very hard to leave my home… and to leave my ax as well. It was only an object, but it was mine: my sole possession, the thing I had held in my hands through many solitary nights of chopping trees, hoping someone would notice how I cleared land in the manner of civilized persons.

Now the test of civilization was not using my ax but abandoning it. This sounded very much like what humans call 'irony'… and I do not like irony at all.

With great reluctance, I removed my ax from Starbiter’s mouth and laid it on the pavement. A snowflake fell on the blade. I did not brush it off.

'There,' I said… speaking loudly and firmly, so no one could claim my voice trembled. 'I am going now; and I shall willingly leave behind my ax, though it is my sole belonging — because I am a person of peace and never kill others unless they really truly deserve it.'

Uclod rubbed his eyes as if they pained him. 'You scare me, toots. You honestly do.' Then he reached to help me into the ship.

Fondling The Inner Cheek

Since my skin was already damp with snow, I could not feel the wetness of the Zarett’s mouth. However, I could see it glistening moistly beneath my feet — and it looked very slippery indeed. I resolved to walk most carefully, for fear of sliding on a slick patch and Falling Precipitously. (The fall would not damage me, but it might make Uclod think I was clumsy. I did not want that, not even a little bit)

So I stood unmoving on the ribbed floor of Starbiter’s mouth, staling forward at the creature’s yawning throat.[2] Since we had entered the Zarett at ground level, the throat ran upward, further into the center of the ball. Proceeding forward would require a difficult ascent, all slippy and slidy like scrabbling up a muddy riverbank; but the throat was too dark to see how steep the slope might truly be.

[2] — I do not mean Starbiter was yawning as a bored person, does. She could not have been bored at all — it must be very interesting to have a beautiful glass woman enter your mouth. But it is a time-honored figure of English speech to say that darkened cavities 'yawn'… and I am excellent at reproducing others’ cliches.

'What do we do now?' I asked Uclod.

I turned and saw the little man had gone to the side of Starbiter’s mouth, where he was rubbing a patch of the Zarett’s inner cheek. Most of the tissue around us was pale pink, but the patch he touched showed a redder tinge. I remembered the way he had massaged the creature to get it to open its lips; apparently, one communicated with Zaretts through fondling.

This struck me as most inefficient 'When a machine has buttons,' I told Uclod, 'you press a button and something happens right away. That is how machines ought to work. I do not think much of a spaceship you must rub to get its attention.'