Flight of the Maita Supercollection 3: Solving Galactic Problems Collector's Edition (122 page)

The holovid
screen split with a picture of what looked like a brownish orchid
on one side and what looked like an undersea volcanic flume on the
other.

"Good lord!" Z
cried. "That looks like a Laelia tenebrosa! Exactly! Plant and
all!"

*It's a
species, an extract from whose ripened seeds are used in flavoring
sweets if I understand correctly. Thing will note the animal and
plant life around the fumaroles being shown. If I understand those
fumaroles are at a great depth and the object of these studies is
to show that life can derive energy from sources other than the
sun. It's a very interesting study. They deduce life on large
worlds that are far from the primary. They're a very intelligent
people. We may go aground now, I think. I can ask for a volunteer.
Z can spend a few days looking for orchids, Thing can examine the
deep sea bottoms and Happ can enjoy these people. They're
pleasure-responders and are an open and rather free society
sexually to more of an extent than are the Krofpth, though I
wouldn't know if your races will prove to be attractive to one
another. You're compatible, though I will have to test to be sure
you aren't chemically incompatible. You shouldn't enter into such
intimate relations if you may prove to be allergic to one another
or even poisonous.*

This sort of
discussion always embarrassed Z, though he knew from personal
experience that his centuries-old inhibitions were just plain
silly.

Happ didn't
share such taboos.

"They are not
physically attractive to me," he replied. "I won't know until I
meet them if they have other qualities that will prove seductive. I
have noticed the artworks on some of those dramas and am
interested. I think their tastes will be much like my own in the
visual arts. I also find the background music to my liking. We will
share body rhythms, too.

"What do you
think of their music, Z? Thing?"

[ I find it too
relaxing. It tends to lull the senses and to take the excitement to
a lower level. It's restful and would tend to be a boon to sleep or
to background other quiet activities. ]

"The beat's
invariant but the melodies are intricate," Z said. "I like it, but
I'd get tired of it in no time."

*The beat's a
bit slower than your heartbeat rate, Thing, so slows your
metabolism and lulls your senses. Z's heartbeat rate varies
constantly to outside stimulations so an unbroken beat is boring to
him. Thing's rate takes rather strong stimulation to affect it at
all. You like it because the beat is based on the heartbeat rate of
your people at the most pleasant of temperatures, as it is to these
people. You'll have more in common with them than you think, Happ.
We're here.*

[ Really? I
thought we were THERE! ]

Z started
laughing, and had to explain the time they landed on a planet
called Heer and the confusion it caused with a passenger when Maita
used that idiom from Earth.

In that
language Maita had said "Du es largh" (We are here), but Largh was
also the name of the planet.

The passenger
had said, "Du KO es Largh. Largh dee voscht. Du KESCHT Largh!"
which means, "We are ON Largh. Largh is a world. We CANNOT BE
Largh!"

It had gone
downhill from there until they were all laughing like fools. It had
started a game with sound-alike words they still sometimes
played.

Maita contacted
the spaceport communications officer and was able to get across
that they would like to meet the people of the world and would like
a volunteer for the probe. It took some time, but a group finally
came out to stare at the ship. Thing went out on a floater and Z
and Happ walked out on the ramp to invite them aboard. Eight of
them finally came slowly forward and to the ramp. Thing used its
empathy, then explained they were a little afraid and curious at
the same time and the curiosity was overtaking the fear. They
reacted most positively to Happ, of course, who was most like
them.

Happ led the
eight inside while Thing came to Z's shoulder from the hovering
floater. It was a demonstration they were, indeed, friends –
regardless of physical differences.

Maita kept up a
question and answer routine with the floater in broken language.
When it made a particularly bad gaff it simulated laughter and
apologized.

That tipped Z
and Thing the mistake was deliberate and the old cliche’ was true.
"Nothing is more friendly than laughter" – so long as it's shared,
of course.

The ruse got a
giggle from some of them and later Maita made a really hilarious
one, which showed them the probe was complete and ready. Everyone
laughed at that one so it couldn't have been accidental – and it
was idiomatic, not structural, so Maita had to know exactly how to
use the language to make that particular gaff.

They waited
until Happ came out to hand Z a crystal, which he placed in his ear
socket. He had the language and customs of the Gorn, as they called
themselves, immediately. He made it a point to remember the last
gaff Maita made and was able to laugh at it himself. The intonation
and position of the accent of the words had changed the meaning
from "the sun is bright and warm at this time of day, isn't it?" to
"the sun sits in my ass and really burns, doesn't it?"

Such small
things relax peoples meeting for the first time. They show that the
party speaking is capable of the same mistakes as those to whom the
words are addressed. They call to mind old incidents when the
listener said or did some embarrassing thing at the time, but later
found it was funny.

"It humanizes
the speaker," Z had once said and Thing had quickly responded, [
How disgusting! Yugh! ]

They had then
chased one another all over Maita playing silly tricks. It was
great fun. It had worked well here. The Gorn were relaxing a bit
and were coming closer. The eight exited from Maita chattering and
joking among themselves. Happ, Thing and Z were invited to come
into the city to meet with scientists and politicians. The
politician part was meant as a joke so Z was able to relax a bit,
too. So far as he was concerned politicians WERE a joke.

They were able
to speak with the people. The medical scientists were permitted to
examine them minutely (Something that once embarrassed Z terribly,
but which he now accepted as routine and expected) and question
them.

The politicians
were able to ask them about empire government. They were, of
course, horrified there was almost no military, the traders guild
ran the empire and, sin of sins, there were no taxes in the empire!
They couldn't picture a system where there were no taxes, and
worse, no politicians! Heresy! On the other hand they were in awe
of the emperor and the actual power he could command. They couldn't
understand why there was no organic bureaucracy and how machines
kept all the records and rules. They were aghast to learn that the
emperor would allow his subject worlds to ignore the judge machines
if they so chose. There were no penalties if the "subjects" told
the emperor to jump in a black hole? Even if they went so far as to
tell him he wasn't to step foot on their planet? THEIR planet?!

[ Whose planet
would it be? He rules best who rules least. That saying is millions
of years older than the empire. It has always proven to be true.
Every rule a leader imposes means he must add another level of
people to watch to enforce the rule, which takes monies to pay the
watchers, which means taxes of one sort or another, which means tax
collectors who have to be paid, which means more taxes. It never
stops once it starts. Before long the system collapses from
internal friction. Don't make the rules and the rest is avoided.
That very simple and obvious platitude seems to be beyond the
understanding of very few truly advanced peoples. ]

"The thing
people have to understand is more about themselves than about their
governing authority," Happ explained. "The selection of rulers,
whether it be through a vote or force of arms, is a futile attempt
to displace blame and responsibility. A mature society realizes
that blame is on the individual and not on the emperor or
legislature or what have you. No individual is responsible for
anything somebody else does, whether that somebody else is an
ancestor, relative or perfect stranger. The failure of the idea is
that one selects or delegates the authority to another in order to
lay blame elsewhere, but he or she then becomes responsible for all
wrong choices. The difference in the Maitan Empire is that full
responsibility is accepted from the first by the individual citizen
and not as a secondary result of a bad choice.

"From what I
understand from speaking often and long with Emperor Maita,
becoming a part of the Maitan Empire is a choice the people of a
world must make and they will not make that choice if they are not
yet mature enough to accept that simple premise."

Maita and Thing had known for some time that Happ had that
in him. Z was pleasantly amazed at the speech. Thing was able to
use a modified set of the speeches it used with the politicians on
Terra (Book thirteen,
Return To Earth
) and to the people there. These
politicians didn't care for that any more than the Terrans had, but
these had little power so didn't respond in nearly the same
ways.

Finally Z was
able to get away for ten pleasant days of exploring. He got special
permits from the government of Gorn to remove pieces of the
orchid-like plants which he collected for Maita to use meristem
culture on back at EC. He also soon learned that the flavoring
substance in the orchid he had seen on the holovid was vanilla,
also extracted from an orchid on Earth if a very different kind of
orchid. These kinds of parallel evolutions were more common than
one would imagine, though the actual genetic chains were quite
different. Vanillin was a compound that many plants could produce,
if few did.

Maita had
explained, *Certain combinations of chemicals are bound to crop up
on worlds that aren't much different that themselves aren't much
different. Great exploding galaxies! I sound like Z! Certain like
combinations of chemicals will evolve on worlds of similar
conditions and structures!*

Thing was able
to spend less time in the oceans than it would have liked, but it
did get some samples of plant and animal life it wanted to take
home to EC. Happ traveled all over the planet, learning about
these, his first close contact with a whole race of alien people.
All his earlier ones lacked a sort of intimacy he felt on Gorn.
This was the first time he was on another world where he was
actually free.

Maita arranged
for a number of machines to be placed on the world and for the
traders guild to go there. The people wanted very much to meet
others and to expand into the empire. They felt they could colonize
some of the empty worlds in various areas of the galaxy that would
be opened to them. Maita assured them the worlds were there for the
use of anyone who could benefit from them. Restricted worlds had
beacons and worlds in use were registered through Empire Center.
Thousands of other planets were there. Use them! Planoform those
suitable for your race or share them with many other compatible
races. Expand and learn. That was what the Maitan Empire was
about!

That was
another lesson to Happ. Most peoples will want to go to other
worlds and will want to meet as many other peoples as possible, but
will still always call one world their own. A very few actually
want to migrate to other worlds. Thing experienced its worst
psychological problems upon leaving Menta permanently while Z
enjoyed getting away from a polluted and screwed-up Earth, though
he was perfectly well aware he would be in a minority.

Earth had all
types. That was its strength – and its weakness.

The Kheth
resided on Khee for the most part while the Bentans were
everywhere. The Bentans wanted to share worlds with others while
the Swaz wanted worlds mainly to themselves and perhaps one other
race. The Zeenans mostly stayed home and the Zulians stayed home
while the Mord spread, much as the Bentans did.

The Jornians
traveled and took up residence on many worlds, but bred mainly on
Jorn while their most common companions, the Zurn, were content on
any kind of world where they could survive and made small colonies,
though always with other races.

Every race and
every world was different from every other in some ways and all
were alike in others. Few races were what would be considered to be
"all good" by galactic standards – the Zulians, for instance – or
all bad by those standards, as the Immins had been. Good and bad
are relative terms so the empire was extremely liberal in its
assessments of such things.

When the crew
were all again in space they held a meeting before proceeding to
their next stop. They sometimes voted on the next stop and
sometimes left it up to Maita to decide.

*I will,
without objection, merely go to those worlds that were in the same
stages at or slightly before that of Nichtale, or Gorn as it is
properly now called, when Library was established. I think we
should find a lot of them will be emerging into the same stages or
will be just before those stages. It will be most interesting to
study linear evolution on that scale.*

[ Unless there
are communications or such that would lead us to a re-evolved
society such as Julpit, I agree. I can use the information from
Library to study societal imperatives. Perhaps I can determine
something about racial steering factors. ]

*Granted. Very
good point. We can all do extrapolative studies in our own
specialties and interests.*

"I vote yes,"
Happ said. "I want to meet as many different people as I can."

“
I vote
yes, too," Z threw in.