The Butcher looked confused.
“It has to do with their reproductive process,” Rydra explained. “When the temperature is below six degrees they’re sterile. They can only conceive when the temperature is between six and ninety-three, but to actually give birth, they have to be above ninety-three.”
The Çiribian ship moved like floppy feathers across the screen.
“Maybe I can explain something to you this way; with all nine species of galaxy-hopping life forms, each as widespread as our own, each as technically intelligent, with as complicated an economy, seven of them engaged in the same war we are, still we hardly ever run into them; and they run into us or each other about as frequently: so infrequently, that even when an experienced spaceman like Tarik passes alongside one of their ships, he can’t identify it. Wonder why?”
“Why?”
“Because compatibility factors for communication are incredibly low. Take the Çiribians, who have enough knowledge to sail their triple-yolked poached eggs from star to star: they have no word for ‘house,’ ‘home,’ or ‘dwelling.’ ‘We must protect our families and our homes.’ When we were preparing the treaty between the Çiribians and ourselves at the Court of Outer Worlds, I remember that sentence took forty-five minutes to say in Çiribian. Their whole culture is based on heat and changes in temperature. We’re just lucky that they do know what a ‘family’ is, because they’re the only ones beside humans who have them. But for ‘house’ you have to end up describing ‘…an enclosure that creates a temperature discrepancy with the outside environment of so many degrees, capable of keeping comfortable a creature with a uniform body temperature of ninety-eight-point-six, the same enclosure being able to lower the temperature during the months of the warm season and raise it during the cold season, providing a location where organic sustenance can be refrigerated in order to be preserved, or warmed well above the boiling point of water to pamper the taste mechanism, of the indigenous habitants who, through customs that go back through millions of hot and cold seasons, have habitually sought out this temperature changing device…’ and so forth and so on. At the end you have given them some idea of what a ‘home’ is and why it is worth protecting. Give them a schematic of the air-conditioning and central heating system, and things begin to get through. Now: there is a huge solar-energy conversion plant that supplies all the electrical energy for the Court. The heat amplifying and reducing components take up an area a little bigger than Jebel. One Çiribian can slither through that plant and then go describe it to another Çiribian who never saw it before so that the second can build an exact duplicate, even to the color the walls are painted—and this actually happened, because they thought we’d done something ingenious with one of the circuits and wanted to try it themselves—where each piece is located, how big it is, in short completely describe the whole business, in nine words. Nine very small words, too.”
The Butcher shook his head. “No. A solar-heat conversion system is too complicated. These hands dismantle one, not too long ago. Too big. Not—”
“Yep, Butcher, nine words. In English it would take a couple of books full of schematics and electrical and architectural specifications. They have the proper nine words. We don’t.”
“Impossible.”
“So’s that.” She pointed toward the Çiribian ship. “But it’s there and flying.” She watched the brain, both intelligent and injured, thinking. “If you have the right words,” she said, “it saves a lot of time and makes things easier.”
After a while he asked, “What is I?”
She grinned. “First of all it’s very important. A good deal more important than anything else. The brain will let any number of things go to pot as long as ‘I’ stay alive. That’s because the brain is part of I. Look. A book is, a ship is, Tarik is, the universe is; but, as you must have noticed, I am.”
The Butcher nodded. “Yes. But I am what?”
Fog closed over the view-port, misting stars, and the Çiribian ship. “That’s a question only you can answer.”
“You must be important too,” the Butcher mused, “because the brain has overheard that you are.”
“Good boy!”
Suddenly he put his hand on her cheek. The cock spur rested lightly on her lower lip. “You and I,” the Butcher said. He moved his face close to hers. “Nobody else is here. Just you and I. But which is which?”
She nodded, cheek moving on his fingers. “You’re getting the idea.” His chest had been cool; his hand was warm. She put her hand on top of his. “Sometimes you frightened me.”
“I and me,” the Butcher said. “Only a morphological distinction, yes? The brain figure that out before. Why does you frighten me sometimes?”
“Do frighten. A morphological correction. You frighten me because you rob banks and put knife handles in people’s heads, Butcher!”
“You do?” Then his surprise left. “Yes, you do, don’t you. You forgot.”
“But I didn’t,” Rydra said.
“Why does that frighten I?…correction, me. Overhear that too.”
“Because it’s something I’ve never done, never wanted to do, never could do. And I like you, I like your hand on my cheek, so that if you suddenly decided to put a knife handle in my eye, well…”
“Oh. You never would put a knife handle in my eye,” the Butcher said. “I don’t have to worry.”
“You could change your mind.”
“You won’t.” He looked at her closely. “I don’t really think you’re going to kill me. You know that. I know that. It’s something else. Why don’t I tell you something else that frightened me? Maybe you can see some pattern and you will understand then. The brain is not stupid.”
His hand slid to her neck, and there was concern in his puzzled eyes. She had seen it before the moment he’d turned from the dead fetus in the biology theater. “Once…” she began slowly, “…well, there was a bird.”
“Birds frighten me?”
“No. But this bird did. I was just a kid. You don’t remember being a kid, do you? In most people what you were as a kid has a lot to do with what you are now.”
“And what I am too?”
“Yes, me too. My doctor had gotten this bird for me as a present. It was a myna bird, which can talk. But it doesn’t know what it’s saying. It just repeats like a tape recorder. Only I didn’t know that. A lot of times I know what people are trying to say to me, Butcher. I never understood it before, but since I’ve been on Jebel, I’ve realized it’s got something to do with telepathy. Anyway, this myna bird had been trained to talk by feeding it earthworms when it said the right thing. Do you know how big an earthworm is?”
“Like so?”
“That’s right. And some of them even run a few inches longer. And a myna bird is about eight or nine inches long. In other words an earthworm can be about five-sixths as long as a myna bird, which is what’s important. The bird had been trained to say: Hello, Rydra, it’s a fine day out and I’m happy. But the only thing this meant in the bird’s mind was a rough combination of visual and olfactory sensations that translated loosely, There’s another earthworm coming. So when I walked into the greenhouse and said hello to this myna bird, and it replied, ‘Hello, Rydra, it’s a fine day and I’m happy,’ I knew immediately it was lying. There was another earthworm coming, that I could see and smell, and it was this thick and five-sixths as long as I was tall. And I was supposed to eat it. I got a little hysterical. I never told my doctor, because I never could figure exactly what happened until now. But when I remember, I still get shaky.”
The Butcher nodded. “When you left Rhea with the money, you eventually holed up in a cave in the ice-hells of Dis. You were attacked by worms, twelve-foot ones. They burrowed up out of the rocks with acid slime on their skins. You were scared, but you killed them. You rigged up an electric net from your hop-sled power source. You killed them, and when you knew you could beat them, you weren’t afraid anymore. The only reason you didn’t eat them
was because the acid made their flesh toxic. But you hadn’t eaten anything for three days.”
“I did? I mean…you did?”
“You are not frightened of the things I am frightened of. I am not frightened of the things you are frightened of. That’s good, isn’t it?”
“I guess so.”
Gently he leaned his face against hers, then pulled away, and searched her face for a response.
“What is it that you’re frightened of?” she asked.
He shook his head, not in negation but in confusion, as she saw him trying to articulate. “The baby, the baby that died,” he said. “The brain afraid, afraid for you, that you would be alone.”
“How afraid that you would be alone, Butcher?”
He shook his head again.
“Loneliness is not good.”
She nodded.
“The brain knows that. For a long time it didn’t know, but after a while it learned. Lonely on Rhea, you were, even with all the money. Lonelier on Dis; and in Titin, even with the other prisoners, you were loneliest of all. No one really understood you when you spoke to them. You did not really understand them. Maybe because they said I and you so much, and you just now are beginning to learn how important you are and I am.”
“You wanted to raise the baby yourself so he would grow up and…speak the same language you speak? Or at any rate speak English the same way you speak it?”
“Then both not be alone.”
“I see.”
“It died,” Butcher said. He grunted once again. “But now you are not quite so alone. I teach you to understand the others, a little. You’re not stupid, and you learn fast.” Now he turned fully toward her, rested his fists on her shoulder and spoke gravely. “You like me. Even when I first came on Jebel, there was something about me that you liked. I saw you do things I thought were bad, but you liked me. I told you how to destroy the Invaders’ defensive net, and you destroyed it, for me. I told you I wanted to go to the tip of the Dragon’s Tongue, and you saw that I get there. You will do anything I ask. It’s important that I know that.”
“Thank you, Butcher,” she said wonderingly.
“If you ever rob another bank, you will give me all the money.”
Rydra laughed. “Why, thank you. Nobody ever wanted to do that for me. But I hope you don’t have to rob—”
“You will kill anyone that tries to hurt me, kill them a lot worse than you ever killed anyone before.”
“But you don’t have to—”
“You will kill all of Jebel if it tries to take you and me apart and keep us alone.”
“Oh, Butcher—” She turned from him and put her fist against her mouth. “One hell of a teacher I am! You don’t understand a thing—I—I am talking about.”
The voice, astonished and slow: “I don’t understand you, you think.”
She turned back to him. “But I do, Butcher! I do understand you. Please believe that. But trust me that you have a little more to learn.”
“You trust me,” he said firmly.
“Then listen. Right now we’ve met each other halfway. I haven’t really taught you about I and you. We’ve made up our own language, and that’s what we’re talking now.”
“But—”
“Look, every time you’ve said you in the last ten minutes, you should have said I. Every time you’ve said I, you meant you.”
He dropped his eyes to the floor, then raised them again, still without answer.
“What I talk about as I, you must speak of as you. And the other way around, don’t you see?”
“Are they the same word for the same thing, that they are interchangeable?”
“No, just…yes! They both mean the same sort of thing. In a way they’re the same.”
“Then you and I are the same.”
Risking confusion, she nodded.
“I suspect it. But you—” he pointed to her—“have taught me.” He touched himself.
“And that’s why you can’t go around killing people. At least you better do a hell of a lot of thinking before you do. When you talk to Tarik, I and you still exist. With anyone you look at on the ship, or even through a view-screen, I and you are still there.”
“The brain must think about that.”
“You must think about that, with more than your brain.”
“If I must then I will. But we are one, more than others.” He touched her face again. “Because you taught me. Because with me you do not have to be afraid of anything. I have just learned, and I may make mistakes with other people; for an I to kill a you without a lot of thought is a mistake, isn’t it? Do I use the words correctly now?”
She nodded.
“I will make no mistakes with you. That would be too terrible. I will make as few mistakes as I possibly can. And someday I will learn completely.” Then he smiled. “Let’s hope nobody tries to make any mistakes with me, though. I am sorry for them if they do, because I will probably make a mistake with them very quickly and with very little thought.”
“That’s fair enough for now, I guess,” Rydra said. She took his arms in her hands. “I’m glad you and I are together, Butcher.” Then his arms came up and caught her against his body, and she pressed her face on his shoulder.
“I thank you,” he whispered. “I thank you and thank you.”
“You’re warm,” she said into his shoulder. “Don’t let go for a little while.”
When he did, she blinked up at his face through blue mist and turned all cold. “What is it, Butcher?”
He took her face between his hands and bent his head till amber hair brushed her forehead.
“Butcher, remember I told you I can tell what people are thinking? Well, I can tell something’s wrong—now. You said I didn’t have to be afraid of you, but you’re scaring me now.”
She raised his face. There were tears on it.
“Look, just the way something wrong with me would scare you, one thing that’s going to scare hell out of me for a long time is something wrong with you. Tell me what it is.”
“I can’t,” he said hoarsely. “I can’t. I can’t tell you.’ ” And the one thing she understood immediately was that it was the most horrible thing he could conceive with his new knowledge.
She watched him fight, and fought herself: “Maybe I can help, Butcher! There’s a way I can go into the brain and find out what it is.”
He backed away and shook his head. “ ‘You mustn’t do that to me. Please.”
“Butcher, I w-won’t.” She was confused. “Th-then I…I won’t.” Confusion hurt. “Butcher…I-I won’t!” Her adolescent stutter staggered in her mouth.
“I—” he began, breath hard, but becoming softer, “I have been alone and not I for a long time. I must be alone for a little while longer.”
“I s-see.” Suspicion, very small and easily dealt with, came now. When he had backed away, it entered the space between them. But that was human, too. “Butcher? Can you read my mind?”
He looked surprised. “No. I don’t even understand how you can read mine.”
“All right. I thought maybe there was something in my head that you might be picking up that makes you afraid of me.”
He shook his head.
“That’s good. Hell, I wouldn’t want somebody prying under my scalp. I think I understand.”
“I tell you now,” he said, coming toward her again. “I and you are one; but I and you are very different. I have seen a lot you will never know. You know of things that I will never see. You have made me not alone, a little. There is a lot in the brain, my brain, about hurting and running and fighting and, even though I was in Titin, a lot about winning. If you are ever in danger, but a real danger where someone might make a mistake with you, then go into the brain, see what is there. Use whatever you need. I ask you, only, to wait until you have done everything else first.”
“I’ll wait, Butcher,” she said.
He held out his hand. “Come.”
She took
his hand, avoiding the cock spurs.
“No need to see the stasis currents about the alien ship if it is friendly to the Alliance. You and I will stay together awhile.”
She walked with her shoulder against his arm. “Friend or enemy,” she said as they passed through the twilight, heavy with ghosts. “This whole Invasion—sometimes it seems so stupid. That’s something they don’t allow you to think back where I come from. Here on Jebel Tarik you more or less avoid the question. I envy you that.”
“You are going to Administrative Alliance Headquarters because of the Invasion, yes?”
“That’s right. But after I go, don’t be surprised if I come back.” Steps later she looked up again. “That’s another thing I wish I could get straight in my head. The Invaders killed my parents, and the second embargo almost killed me. Two of my Navigators lost their wife to the Invaders. Still, Ron could wonder about just how right the War Yards were. Nobody likes the Invasion, but it goes on. It’s so big I never really thought about trying to get out of it before. It’s funny to see a whole bunch of people in their odd, and perhaps destructive, way doing just that. Maybe I should simply not bother to go to Headquarters, tell Tarik to turn around and head toward the densest part of the Snap.”
“The Invaders,” the Butcher said, almost musingly, “they hurt lots of people, you, me. They hurt me too.”
“They did?”
“The brain sick, I told you. Invaders did that.”
“What did they do?”
The Butcher shrugged. “First thing I remember is escaping from Nuevanueva York.”
“That’s the huge port terminal for the Cancer cluster.”
“That’s right.”
“The Invaders had captured you?”
He nodded. “And did something. Maybe experiment, maybe torture.” He shrugged. “It doesn’t matter. I can’t remember. But when I escaped, I escaped with nothing: no memory, voice, words, name.”
“Perhaps you were a prisoner of war, or maybe even somebody important before they captured—”
He bent and put his cheek against her lips to stop her talking. When he rose, he smiled, sadly she saw. “There are some things the brain may not know, but it can guess: I was always a thief, a murderer, a criminal. And I was no I. The Invaders caught me once. I escaped. The Alliance caught me later at Titin. I escaped—”