and ventured out to hunt for game would need much in the way of smarts. On the other hand, he reflected,
humans had holed up in caves a lot, or so Isaac said. What made a creature develop intelligence was a deep question. After
all, mechs came to have quick minds and nobody remembered when or how. Not even Isaac.
But the real reason Toby thought Quath should be outside was that Toby now had no excuse to go hull-walking himself. He felt
an itchy, restless energy that he couldn’t erase with workouts in zero-grav. At least when he did visit Quath, it was in spaces
so big that Toby could practice his low-grav skills.
At the moment Quath was in the abandoned agro dome. The high arch reflected back Toby’s huffing and puffing as he did rebounds
off the walls. He would coast across the dome, maybe try to bank a little in the ventilator winds. Zooming toward the opposite
wall, he pinwheeled his arms in mid-flight to bring his legs around, so that they could absorb momentum and rebound like coiled
springs. A lot more fun than lifting dead weights, like some kind of demented machine.
Quath stood at the dome floor’s center, eyes swiveling to follow Toby’s ricocheting. She sent a hissing note of derision:
“I wouldn’t expect a giant cockroach to understand.”
“You eat stuff that would gag any self-respecting pest.”
This startled Toby. He grabbed a steel strut and clung to it, panting. “Really?”
“Were they, well, like us?”
and their spines, heated long over a fire, snapped open to emit a famous blue odor. To suck the thick, crisp marrow from the
blackened bones was a great delicacy.>
“Ugh. I’m trying hard to think of you as a buddy, big-bug, but if you go on like this—”
Toby could sense the capitals in Quath’s hissing mind-voice and decided to not pursue the matter. Quath was serious. Maybe
it was common for intelligent beings anywhere to think of themselves as the crown of creation—The People—and everybody else
as a smart animal at best. Savvy smarts and egomania went hand in hand. Or pincer in pincer.
After all, suppose Quath had been a thousand times smaller. It wouldn’t matter that she was supersmart—if Toby shook her out
of his bedroll, he would step on her without a thought. He certainly wouldn’t inquire into what she thought about the nature
of life.
“I think I could pass up honors like that. Anyway, many-eyes, you seem to have settled in here okay.”
“So generous of you. Look, I was sent here to see if you can figure what your own folks are doing in their ships.”
“They’re still hauling that huge ring. Only it’s glowing more, a kind of ivory.”
“It sure seems to keep them away, all right. But why are your people gaining on us?”
“Uh, what’s a cusp?”
“More geometry. Between Isaac and his numbers and you with your always using math talk, I don’t know—”
humans had holed up in caves a lot, or so Isaac said. What made a creature develop intelligence was a deep question. After
all, mechs came to have quick minds and nobody remembered when or how. Not even Isaac.
But the real reason Toby thought Quath should be outside was that Toby now had no excuse to go hull-walking himself. He felt
an itchy, restless energy that he couldn’t erase with workouts in zero-grav. At least when he did visit Quath, it was in spaces
so big that Toby could practice his low-grav skills.
At the moment Quath was in the abandoned agro dome. The high arch reflected back Toby’s huffing and puffing as he did rebounds
off the walls. He would coast across the dome, maybe try to bank a little in the ventilator winds. Zooming toward the opposite
wall, he pinwheeled his arms in mid-flight to bring his legs around, so that they could absorb momentum and rebound like coiled
springs. A lot more fun than lifting dead weights, like some kind of demented machine.
Quath stood at the dome floor’s center, eyes swiveling to follow Toby’s ricocheting. She sent a hissing note of derision:
“I wouldn’t expect a giant cockroach to understand.”
“You eat stuff that would gag any self-respecting pest.”
This startled Toby. He grabbed a steel strut and clung to it, panting. “Really?”
“Were they, well, like us?”
and their spines, heated long over a fire, snapped open to emit a famous blue odor. To suck the thick, crisp marrow from the
blackened bones was a great delicacy.>
“Ugh. I’m trying hard to think of you as a buddy, big-bug, but if you go on like this—”
Toby could sense the capitals in Quath’s hissing mind-voice and decided to not pursue the matter. Quath was serious. Maybe
it was common for intelligent beings anywhere to think of themselves as the crown of creation—The People—and everybody else
as a smart animal at best. Savvy smarts and egomania went hand in hand. Or pincer in pincer.
After all, suppose Quath had been a thousand times smaller. It wouldn’t matter that she was supersmart—if Toby shook her out
of his bedroll, he would step on her without a thought. He certainly wouldn’t inquire into what she thought about the nature
of life.
“I think I could pass up honors like that. Anyway, many-eyes, you seem to have settled in here okay.”
“So generous of you. Look, I was sent here to see if you can figure what your own folks are doing in their ships.”
“They’re still hauling that huge ring. Only it’s glowing more, a kind of ivory.”
“It sure seems to keep them away, all right. But why are your people gaining on us?”
“Uh, what’s a cusp?”
“More geometry. Between Isaac and his numbers and you with your always using math talk, I don’t know—”
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