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“I do not intend to deviate,” Nesseref answered. “The Reich will be responsible for any aggression, as I am sure you know.”
“Do not threaten me,” the Tosevite said, and used an emphatic cough. “Do not threaten my not-empire, either. We are seeking our legitimate rights, nothing more, and we will have them. You cannot prevent it. You had better not try to prevent it.”
Silence seemed the best response to that, and silence was what Nesseref gave it. Despite bluster, the Deutsch Big Uglies did not seek to attack the shuttlecraft. Nesseref let out a long sigh of relief as she landed at the port between Warsaw and Lodz whose construction she’d supervised.
“This is the first time in a while I have heard anyone be glad to return to Poland,” a male in the control center said as she arranged ground transportation to her home. “Many males and females are looking for the chance to escape.”
“If war comes, who knows which places will be safe?” Nesseref said. “Weapons can land anywhere.”
“That is a truth, superior female,” the males said. “Weapons can land anywhere. But if war comes, weapons will land on Poland.”
And that was also a truth, even if one Nesseref didn’t care to contemplate. She also didn’t care to discover that no male or female of the Race was heading toward the new town in which she lived. The only driver available was a scrawny Big Ugly with an ancient, decrepit motorcar of Tosevite manufacture. Nesseref was anything but eager to entrust herself to it.
That must have shown, for the Big Ugly let loose one of the barking laughs of his kind and spoke in the language of the Race: “You flew between the stars. Are you afraid to drive to your apartment?”
“When I flew between the stars, I was in cold sleep,” Nesseref replied with dignity. “I will be awake to experience this, worse luck.”
The Tosevite laughed again. “That is funny. But come, get in. I have not killed anyone yet, even myself.”
Nesseref found that a dubious recommendation, but did climb into the motorcar, which had the right-side front seat modified to fit a posterior of the sort the Race had. But the motorcar boasted no safety straps of any kind. And, she rapidly discovered, the Big Ugly drove as if he labored under the delusion of being a killercraft pilot. Traveling a relatively short distance along a narrow, asphalt-topped road proved more terrifying than all the shuttlecraft flying Nesseref had ever done.
In the shuttlecraft, of course, she had radar and collision avoidance alarms and radio to talk with the ground and with other pilots in the neighborhood. Here she and the driver had no aids whatever. All the other Big Uglies on the road drove with the same reckless disregard for life and limb as he displayed.
“Madness!” Nesseref exclaimed as he passed a lorry and then swung back into his lane so that another lorry, this one oncoming, missed him by a scale’s thickness. She was too rattled even to bother appending an emphatic cough.
“You want to get home as soon as you can: is that not a truth?” the driver asked.
“I want to get there alive,” Nesseref answered. This time, she did use an emphatic cough. It felt very emphatic, in fact.
“Is that really so important?” the Big Ugly said. “In the end, what difference will it make? When the war comes, you will be dead either way.”
“Do you want to die sooner than you must?” Nesseref returned. She thought she would die in the next instant, when an animal-drawn wagon blithely started to cross the road on which she was traveling. But the Tosevite lunatic handling the motorcar had quick reflexes, even if he had no sense. Its suspension swaying, the motorcar dodged the wagon.
“That fellow is a fool,” the driver said; Nesseref was convinced he said so because he had no trouble recognizing others of his own kind. After a moment, he went on, “I am a Jew. Do you know what the Deutsche did to Jews when they held Poland?” He didn’t wait for her answer, but continued, “They could not kill me then. And I do not think they or anyone else will have an easy time killing me now.”
If the way he drove hadn’t killed him, Nesseref doubted explosive-metal bombs or poison gases could do the trick. But she asked, “If war does come, what will you do?”
He hesitated there no more than he did on the roadway: “Fight the Deutsche as long as I can. I have a rifle. I know what to do with it. If they want me, they will have to pay a high price for me.”
With a squeal from his overworked, underpowered brakes, he pulled to a stop in front of Nesseref’s building. She got out of his motorcar with so much relief, she almost forgot the bag in which she carried her personal belongings. The Big Ugly called her back to get it. He might be maniacal, but he wasn’t larcenous.
When she got up to her apartment, Orbit greeted her with a yawn that displayed his mouthful of sharply pointed teeth. It was hard to impress a tsiongi. Had she bought a beffel, it would have danced around her and jumped up on her, squeaking wildly all the time. But a beffel would have wrecked the apartment while she was gone. Orbit didn’t do things like that.
One of the pieces of mail she’d picked up was a flyer that began, IN CASE OF EMERGENCY. The emergency it was talking about was a Deutsch attack. Nesseref began to wonder if she should have been glad to come home.
Every step Sam Yeager took out from the hub of the starship made him feel heavier. Every step he took also made him hotter; the Race favored temperatures like those of a very hot day in Los Angeles. Turning to his son, he said, “You’re dressed for the weather better than I am, that’s for sure.”
As at his previous meeting with Kassquit, Jonathan wore only a pair of shorts. He nodded and said, “You must be dying in that uniform.”
“I’ll get by.” Sam chuckled. “Kassquit’ll be better dressed for it than either one of us.
” Jonathan didn’t answer that; Sam suspected he’d embarrassed his son by implying that he noticed what a woman was or wasn’t wearing.
Somewhat to his surprise, the Lizard leading them to Kassquit turned out to speak English. He said, “The whole notion of wrappings, except to protect yourselves from the nasty cold on Tosev 3, is nothing but foolishness.”
“No.” Sam made the negative hand gesture. He thought about going into the language of the Race, but decided not to; English was better suited to the subject matter. “Clothes are also part of our sexual display. Sometimes they keep us from thinking about mating, but sometimes they make us think about it.”
Had their guide been a human being, he would have sniffed. As things were, he waggled his eye turrets and spoke one dismissive word: “Foolishness.”
“Do you think so?” Jonathan Yeager asked in the language of the Race. “Would you say the same thing after you smell the pheromones of a female who has just tasted ginger?” The Lizard didn’t answer. In fact, he didn’t say another word till he’d led Sam and Jonathan to the chamber in which Kassquit sat waiting for them.
“I greet you, superior female,” Sam said in the language of the Race. His son echoed him. They both briefly assumed the posture of respect.
Kassquit got up from her seat and politely returned it. She was smoother at it than either of them, having no doubt had much more practice. “I greet you, Sam Yeager, Jonathan Yeager,” she said, and sat down again.
“It is good to see you once more,” Sam said. It was disconcerting to see so much of her; he had to work to keep his eyes on her face and not on her small, firm breasts or the slit between her legs, which looked all the more naked for being shaved. She made no move to conceal herself; she had no idea that she ought to conceal herself. Jonathan’s right, Sam thought. I’m not as used to skin as he is.
“And it is good to see both of you,” she answered seriously, innocent in her nakedness. “I shall remember your visits all the days of my life, for they are so different from anything I have known before.”
