Guest Night on Union Station Read online

  “What have they done?” Kelly asked.

  “What haven’t they done?” Crute replied in disgust. “My wives are at me constantly not to let Timba near them with that filthy trunk of his. And he expected me to put up his family when they arrived, including his second and third cousins. I told him that if I see another Nangor on our deck, I’m going to have it shredded for fertilizer and sell it to the Frunge.”

  “I hate to pile on, but I regret inviting the Nangor emissary for dinner,” Bork said. “He spent the whole meal cracking tentacle jokes, as if an overgrown nose makes him an expert. I doubt he could even hang from that trunk without breaking his own neck.”

  “I’d pay to see it,” Crute muttered.

  “Geed seems very nice,” Kelly interjected, hoping to salvage the situation. “I haven’t heard any complaints from Grenouthian quarters.”

  “Then hear them now,” the Grenouthian ambassador stated flatly. “The Tzvim is spying on us.”

  “Maybe she’s just very curious about everything,” Kelly suggested.

  “Our studio engineers were able to crack her in-eye recorder encryption. It turns out she’s been copying everything she could get her hands on, including a highly confidential report about the rates for commercial time on our networks which I accidentally left in the bathroom. I should have known something was wrong when she was in there so long, but I assumed she was having trouble using the facilities with that turtle shell of hers.”

  “What were your engineers doing trying to break into her head?” Kelly asked. The other ambassadors favored her with looks ranging from incredulous to pitying. “Never mind. How about your guest, Ambassador Ortha?”

  “Guest?” Ortha said. “Albatross is more like it, if there’s a comparable term in your meager language. From the moment that feathered maniac set foot in my home, I haven’t had a moment’s peace. My children have started taking off their clothes and changing their skin colors to blend in with the furniture when Tarngol is present. I would have sat on my little daughter the other day if she hadn’t screamed at the last second.”

  “Happens in my house all the time,” the Chert ambassador commented.

  “We are asking the wrong question,” the Verlock ambassador rumbled. “Knowing what’s at stake, why would they behave so badly?”

  “Are you suggesting that they don’t want to join the tunnel network anymore than we want them to?” Aluria was obviously taken aback by Srythlan’s hypothesis, and her beautiful face did nothing to hide the calculations taking place behind the perfect skin. “It makes sense, unless it’s a feint, and they just want us to think they don’t want to join so that we won’t work to stop them.”

  “Before somebody takes that logic to the next level of what they think that we think that they think, let me summarize the possibilities,” Czeros said. “Either they are acting the way they do because that’s how they always act, or they’re acting unnaturally because they’re trying to pull the vines over our eyes. It’s also possible that the Cayl Empire emissaries and their people are reading from different scripts.”

  “How is it living with the Cayl?” the Chert ambassador inquired.

  “Brynt has been the perfect houseguest,” Kelly practically gushed. “He eats our food without any problems, he’s patient with my nine-year-old boy, and he even plays with the dog. My stepson, Paul, who is a champion Nova player, said that as soon as the Cayl learned the rules, he played like a grandmaster. And when I left home for this meeting, Brynt was helping my husband rebuild a Sharf engine for a small trader.”

  “Maybe you can get the emperor interested in visiting the hotel district and training the open house guests how to behave,” Crute replied sourly.

  “He doesn’t show any hesitation about disciplining the emissaries when we’re together, but Brynt would never do anything that he thought could be interpreted as a criticism of Gryph’s management of the station. I recently learned that the Cayl Empire has been sending out colonizing expeditions for millions of years, but they don’t keep in touch because they think it could be taken to imply that they doubt the abilities of their emigrants. Their code of honor has evolved to the point that their behavior is frequently irrational and perhaps even self-destructive.”

  “For a species that knows so little of honor, that’s an astute observation,” Aluria said grudgingly. “I requested a write-up on the Cayl from the Vergallian Military College, as their academics are the only people I could think of who are interested in species with which we have so little contact. They sent me a one-word answer.”

  “Are you waiting for a drum-roll?” Bork asked, stealing the thunder from her dramatic pause.

  “Selfless,” Aluria pronounced, looking rather glum.

  “We didn’t need to hear that,” the Dollnick ambassador said.

  “Such was also our assessment,” the Grenouthian ambassador concurred.

  “Back to the drawing board,” Ortha grumbled.

  “What’s wrong with being selfless?” Kelly asked. “I mean, I wouldn’t want my children becoming martyrs, but for the military government of an empire, they could do a lot worse.”

  “A selfless man is not for sale,” the Verlock explained succinctly.

  “But the Cayl aren’t the ones looking to join the tunnel network,” Kelly said. “Oh, wait. Were some of you planning on pooling your resources and bribing the Cayl to keep their empire together?”

  “If you had a Shuga sleeping in your home, you’d be thinking the same thing,” Ortha said heatedly. “If we thought we could bribe the Stryx not to accept them, we could have kept our business local, but now it’s going to come down to what those insufferable emissaries decide to do.”

  “Why not buy them off?” Kelly inquired sarcastically. “Nobody could accuse the emissaries of being selfless.”

  “We don’t even know if they want to join yet,” the Grenouthian ambassador pointed out. “If we show what’s in our pouches too early, their price will go up.”

  “And none of you care that the Stryx believe that getting these species signed up is the right thing to do?”

  “Who knows what the Stryx believe,” Aluria said dismissively. “If you’d been around as long as the rest of us, you’d have more sense than to take them at their word. If the Stryx really want those species on the tunnel network, they’ll get them no matter what anybody does.”

  “I still think it could all be a giant misunderstanding,” Kelly said. “Maybe I’m the only one who sees this because I’ve been taking the emperor and the four emissaries on outings every day, but the Cayl treats them like overgrown children. He’s quick to let them know when they get out of line, but he’s just as quick to forgive them.”

  “So the EarthCent ambassador knows more about the emissaries than those of us who have been hosting them in our homes,” Aluria said, a cold smile playing across her face. “I was just thinking that we should approach the emissaries and ask them directly what their intentions are, but I don’t feel myself on good enough terms with the Lood to undertake the task.

  “I don’t have a clue what the Nangor is thinking, if it thinks at all,” Crute grunted.

  “The Shuga’s intentions are impenetrable to me,” Ortha added.

  “It does seem silly not to employ the services of an expert on the psychology of Cayl Empire species when we have one available,” the Grenouthian ambassador added sarcastically.

  Kelly groaned inwardly and wondered why she ever opened her mouth in emergency sessions.

  “I fail to see the point of sending the EarthCent ambassador to ask the emissaries about their plans,” Bork said, coming to the rescue. “Should she also ask them if they’re telling the truth? Based on my brief experience with the Nangor, I can see how hosting these alleged diplomats in your homes can be stressful, and clearly it’s not giving you the strategic advantage you had counted on. Now that the official open house is underway and the station is flooded with guests, why not tell your temporary lodgers that their
presence is needed in the hotels to calm the situation?”

  “You mean kick them out?” Ortha mused. “I’m willing.”

  “Does anybody mind if I consult with the Stryx for a moment?” Kelly asked. She decided to take the look of disgust from Aluria as a sign of acquiescence and spoke out loud. “Libby?”

  “Yes, Ambassador,” the Stryx librarian responded.

  “Now that the official open house is underway, the ambassadors were wondering if it’s necessary to continue hosting the emissaries in their homes.”

  “Union Station is not a penal institution,” Libby replied. “If the ambassadors who volunteered to take the emissaries into their homes have run out of patience, I will inform those guests that we are moving them into hotels.”

  “Without prejudice, Stryx?” the Grenouthian asked.

  “We appreciate the work you have done and will consider ourselves in your debt,” Libby replied.

  “Thank you,” Kelly said. “I’m afraid you’ll need to find rooms for all four emissaries in that case, but I’d like to continue hosting Emperor Brynt.”

  “I’ve been dreaming about evicting Timba since the first day, but I didn’t want to get on the wrong side of the Stryx,” Crute said. He stretched out one of his lower arms for a bottle of the mediocre Vergallian wine Aluria had supplied, grabbed a corkscrew with the upper arm on the same side, and a glass with the lower arm on the other side. “This calls for a celebration.”

  “You didn’t think of asking because you suffer from the same tunnel vision as the Cayl,” Gwendolyn declared suddenly. The Gem ambassador had appeared to be lost in her own thoughts throughout the emergency meeting, but apparently she had been paying attention after all. “The four of you are so pleased with yourselves for not requesting help from the Stryx that you act like idiots. No, don’t stop me,” she said, as Kelly put a hand on her friend’s shoulder to calm her. “If hosting those nasty emissaries failed to open the eyes of our colleagues, somebody should do it for them.”

  “Somebody whose species overthrew their rightful government with the help of the Stryx?” Aluria inquired.

  “Oh, stuff it, Aluria,” Gwendolyn replied. “Everybody here knows that the Stryx gifted us the money we needed to stage our revolution and buy back our genetic lines from the Farlings. Everybody here also knows that the only reason the Farlings didn’t attack the Vergallians in retaliation for your rogue captain’s raid on Farling Pharmaceutical’s orbital three years ago was because you’re part of the tunnel network.”

  Aluria sniffed loudly, but didn’t contradict the angry clone.

  “And you,” the Gem ambassador continued, pointing at the Horten. “How much of your economy depends on laundering pirated goods, something the Stryx choose to ignore since you all swear that those Hortens are outcasts. And where would your precious networks be without the Stryxnet for real-time broadcasts,” she added, turning on the giant bunny.

  “We pay heavy fees for those services,” the Grenouthian protested.

  “And you charge even heavier fees for commercial time,” Gwendolyn fired back. “And who, if not the Dollnick merchant princes, have accumulated one of the great fortunes in the galaxy without having to spend it all on military assets to prevent somebody bigger and meaner from coming and taking it away? So the Humans didn’t develop their own faster-than-light drive. Big deal. At least they know better than complain about their benefactors.”

  “Is there some point to your digression?” Ambassador Ortha inquired.

  “I also believe that the behavior we’re seeing from the guests is due to culture shock. If the Cayl are as paternal in the management of their empire as Ambassador McAllister suggests, the societies of their empire must have adapted to the approach. Maybe they simply don’t know how to behave without Cayl supervision.”

  “Whereas the Stryx expect tunnel species to police themselves, but act with overwhelming force when it’s required,” Bork said. “It’s as if both the Cayl and the Stryx run their domains like families, but with radically different parenting philosophies.”

  “The species of the Cayl Empire are a mismatch for the tunnel network,” Srythlan boomed. “Our statisticians reached this conclusion based on the data, but they struggled to develop a theoretical model to explain the incompatibility.”

  “Then what are the Stryx up to?” the Grenouthian pondered out loud.

  “And when is the catering going to arrive?” Czeros added.

  “I thought she was taking care of it,” Kelly said at the same time as Aluria.

  The Frunge pushed away his wine in disgust, rose to his feet, and stalked out of the embassy. Bork shrugged and followed him, and the Chert vanished in the blink of an eye. The Verlock ambassador was much slower than the others, but once he began moving towards the exit, it was clear the meeting was concluded. Kelly offered to walk Gwendolyn back to the Gem embassy.

  “I really am sick and tired of these scheming aliens,” Gwendolyn said, clearly referring to the ambassadors who ostentatiously remained behind in the Vergallian embassy. “I’ll bet Aluria even has food for just the four of them.”

  “You seem to be a bit on edge today,” Kelly replied, trying not to sound critical. “Is something wrong?”

  “Nothing is wrong, but I talked our options over with Mist and she decided on stasis,” the Gem ambassador replied. “I think that Dorothy getting a boyfriend is what did it. I’ll bring Mist back to our home world, she’ll go to sleep, and when she wakes up in twelve or thirteen years, the first generation of cloned male Gems will be her age. I’m thinking of staying to help raise them.”

  “You mean you won’t come back?”

  “Probably not,” Gwendolyn replied sadly. “I’ll miss you and your family terribly, and I suppose I’ll also miss Srythlan and Bork, even Czeros. But my sisters back home are trying to bring up a generation of boys without ever having seen a male of any species in their lives. At least I’ve babysat for Samuel and watched him growing up, and half of the sentients I deal with on the station are male. Compared to most of my people, I’m an expert in the opposite sex.”

  The only thing Kelly could think to offer in response was a going-away party.

  Seventeen

  “Have you developed a gold mask phobia?” Flazint asked Dorothy during a rare break in the action. The Frunge girl was wearing her hair vines straight up, which gave her the appearance of a child impersonating a tree in a school play. It was fortunate she had gone with the towering updo, because the two girls were working together behind the counter and there just wasn’t room for a more elaborate horizontal arrangement.

  “It’s no big deal,” Dorothy said. “I had a bit of a run-in with some of those Lood creeps on the Physics Ride last week.”

  “During your big date?” Flazint asked. “How was it?”

  “It was nice. Well, we got into a fight with the Loods, and later, when I thought David was reaching for my hand on the way home, the dog decided to walk between us. But David invited me to dinner at Pub Haggis next weekend, and he’s going to cook it himself.”

  “Wow, you’re so lucky. Frunge guys don’t enter the kitchen unless it’s to drink out of the liquid fertilizer jar without using a cup.”

  “I’ve caught my dad and older brother doing that with the juice when they thought nobody was looking,” Dorothy said in commiseration. “Anyway, David started shooting the Loods after they insulted me, even though he doesn’t have an implant and couldn’t tell what they were saying. And I sort of lost my temper and told them where I work.”

  “Oh, well. At least with the lost-and-found so busy now they won’t catch you alone. I’m going to ask for a raise if the bots start bringing us baby Shugas or Nangors. Those aliens can’t seem to leave a room without forgetting something.”

  “They’re pretty lame,” Dorothy agreed. “My mom says it’s because the Cayl enforce strict rules against littering. When those aliens are at home, if they put something down and forgot it, they’d probably be f
ined, or eaten or something. Mom thinks that without a Cayl garrison to make their local authorities enforce the rules, the guests don’t know how to behave.”

  “Excuse me,” a Tzvim said, sidling up to the counter. “I seem to have mislaid a collection of Grenouthian documentaries I purchased earlier this morning.”

  “Holo-cubes or permanent storage?” the Frunge girl inquired.

  “The collection was zapped onto the permanent memory of my—oh, no. This means I’ve lost my open ticket as well. Just look for a small, blue sphere with a slot in the center. I don’t know if they’ll let me back on the ship without it.”

  “Trust me. We’ll do everything we can to see you on your way,” the Frunge girl said, rolling her eyes at Dorothy. “I’ll check the overflow bins.”

  “I’ll check the belt,” Dorothy replied, as she began rummaging through the recently arrived objects under the intake end of the counter.

  The system was bogging down under the sheer volume of stuff the bots had been finding abandoned since the guests arrived for the open house, necessitating double staffing. Fortunately, the aliens from the Cayl Empire were turning up at the lost-and-found almost as fast as the bots were bringing in new finds.

  “I think I found it,” Dorothy called out, holding up a blue sphere. “We just need to confirm it’s yours and we’ll release it.”

  “Of course it’s mine,” the Tzvim declared, making a grab for it over the counter and missing. “Where are you going with that?”

  “Just to the end here, to put it through the scanner. The bots take a recording of every object where they find it, so the filing system can keep track of the items that haven’t been moved to shelf storage.”