Authors: Marla Therron
Sometimes there are fights over who will be leader. Sometimes, someone becomes a leader and then decides the herd will fight other herds, for resources or because they don't like each other. But that doesn't happen very often anymore, because the biggest herds have all decided to make peace and cooperate. Almost all of my team came from different big herds, which we call countries, because all of those countries agreed on wanting to follow your signal and find out what your species was like."
"How strange," Tau frowned as he listened, and Penny feared much of it was going over his head, "And inefficient. Why do they fight over leadership? It should be obvious who the most fit leader is. And why do the countries remain separate if they aren't fighting anymore? Wouldn't it be easier to just make all your species into one country?"
"It probably would be," Penny agreed, "But we would lose something as well. Every country is made of smaller groups, which are in turn made up of families, and every country and every group and every family has cultures and traditions and ways of living that are completely unique.
For humans, things that are rare and different are very special. We want to preserve all of these different ways of living, so that every person can look back and say- This is what my family does. This is how my people have done things for generations.
This is the art and music and food and lifestyle that shapes who I am. Like this, every single person's life becomes a unique experience, and therefore rare and special and valued. If we all became one country, it might be harder to hold on to those differences that we value."
Tau's frown was growing. Penny could tell he was having trouble understanding.
"How do you manage to do anything," he muttered, "How can you get anything done, when you are all different? You cannot be of one mind. You cannot work as a unit."
"We can," Penny tried to explain, "We can be unique and still cooperate."
He shook his head like that idea was ludicrous and there must be some other explanation.
"Tell me about your castes," he said, "You are an ambassador. Are the others on your team ambassadors as well? They look the same. What is the class that can become leaders? Is it similar to how the winged males can become regents in the absence of a mature Queen?"
Penny shook her head.
"I think you've misunderstood," she said, "We don't have castes. Any human can be an ambassador or a leader or a worker. And at any time they can stop being any of those things and become something else. Biologically, all humans are more or less the same."
"But if you don't have a leader caste, how can you know a human is suited to be a leader? How can a worker have any of the skills necessary to- Your species does not make sense, Penny Allyn."
He seemed frustrated.
"That's probably true," Penny laughed, "But that's how it works."
Tau was quiet for a long moment, thinking.
"So, you have large groups with a leader," he said, piecing things together, "Like a hive. And you have many hives on your planet, as different from each other as we are from the Wasp-kind. And sometimes they fight."
"Yes," Penny agreed, "Close enough anyway."
"Is it possible then," he said, staring at her hard, "That another human hive could do something, and you... Would not know of it? Is this possible?"
"Yes, very," Penny agreed, "Humans do things without other humans knowing all the time."
Tau sat back, eyes wide, like an antique peasant who'd just learned the Earth revolved around the sun. He took a deep breath, shirt tightening over his chest.
"I will not have your team separated," he said after a long thoughtful moment, "But I will not send you back to them. I will go and tell them myself where you are, tomorrow, so that they will not attempt anything unwise."
Penny supposed that was as close to a victory as she was going to get. She nodded.
"Thank you."
There was a chime from somewhere above and the lights dimmed.
"It is the appointed rest hour," Tau observed, standing with a sigh, "We resume tomorrow. Is there anything you require before we sleep?"
Penny looked down at the hard floor of the cage, realizing he was expecting her to sleep here. At least she had lots of pillows. And she'd always liked her mattresses firm.
"A blanket would be nice?"
He nodded, then turned to one of the hidden wall cabinets and removed a blanket, handing it to her through the bars. She pulled it around her shoulders gratefully.
"Good night, Tau." she said as she lay down in the pillows.
He'd already been turning to go to his bed. He paused as she spoke.
"Good night, Penny Allyn."
He didn't look at her as he spoke, and climbed in his bed immediately, saying nothing more. The lights dimmed further into darkness. Penny's long nap earlier and the many stressful things she currently had to think about kept sleep at a distance. But after a while she finally drifted off.
She woke to another chime, clear and bright, and the lights rose at once to half brightness. She sat up, rubbing her eyes in a groggy, half asleep fog.
She could see Tau already climbing out of bed. He disappeared into the washroom for a moment, then returned and fetched two more of the meal spheres from the kitchen, handing one to Penny.
"Good morning," she mumbled, accepting it.
"How is it good yet?" he said, sounding more tired than concerned, "It has not yet begun."
"It's shortened," Penny explained, yawning, "From, 'I hope you have a good morning.' Humans use it as a greeting."
"A very kind greeting," Tau murmured, nibbling on his breakfast, "I must see to my work this eighth-cycle. I will return shortly."
"Eighth-cycle?"
Tau smiled.
"It's shortened," he said, "An eighth of a cycle. It is the morning."
Penny's eyes widened.
"Did you just make a joke?"
"I don't know this word."
Penny had a feeling he knew what she meant regardless, but she let it go. She was still feeling slugging and barely awake, her stomach twisting, from hunger she assumed. She bit into her sphere.
Tau opened the armor cabinet and began dressing with impressive speed, the pieces of his armor snapping together efficiently. He was finished quickly and heading for the door. As he reached it he paused, then turned and smiled at Penny.
"Good morning, Penny Allyn." he said.
"Good eighth-cycle, Aiten Tau." Penny replied, and saw a curious shiver pass through the commander in response to hearing his full name. He put his helmet on quickly and vanished through the door, leaving Penny alone.
The first thing she set about doing was trying to find a way out of the cage. She felt for locks or catches and kicked at the bars for a good while but she couldn't even figure out where the door was supposed to be.
The cage was as seamless as Tau's hidden doors. Eventually she gave up and, with nothing else to do, went back to sleep for a few hours, dozing in the cage.
She woke with stomach pains, like gas but worse. Her stomach felt hard as a rock. She tried to ignore it for a while, but it only got worse. Eventually, all she could do was lie on the floor of the cage and shake, wracked with pain, pale and sweating.
Tau returned after a few hours, by which point Penny was barely cognizant enough to notice him panicking and pulling her out of the cage, calling for help in a high, shrill alarm buzz.
What she could only assume was a doctor or something like it was called to examine her. Something was injected and the pain stopped, as did she. The world went black.
She woke much later that night, back in the cage, half sure she'd imagined the entire ordeal. Tau was sitting outside her cage, only his helmet off, his expression grave. She saw relief in his eyes as she sat up, shaking her head.
"How are you feeling?" he asked, concern apparent.
"Sore," she replied, "Kind of like I've been beaten with a stick."
"We made a mistake with your food," he said, expression so guilty Penny almost felt bad for him, "Your system was not digesting the wax. We had to give you an enzyme to dissolve it, but you reacted badly and your respiratory system shut down. For a moment we did not think you would make it."
"That explains it," Penny croaked, shivering at the thought of how close she'd come to dying because the aliens didn't understand her anatomy.
"They think you will be fine now," he continued, "But we will be reformulating your nutritional supplements. In the meantime, I brought you these."
He gestured to a stack of foil food packets and water bottles beside her cage.
"I told your hive mates where you were, and about the medical difficulties," he stood, coming closer to kneel by the cage, "They have volunteered to test the new food supplements before they are given to you. They said all their lives rely on you, as ambassador, and so it is more important for you to remain safe."
Penny sighed, just relieved that they were alright and knew where she was.
"My whole job as ambassador is to protect them," she said, "I'm supposed to try things like that first so the team doesn't suffer. They're being kind, but don't let them endanger themselves for me."
"I believe they are correct," Tau frowned, close enough to the bars for Penny to see the iridescent glitter of his eyes, "You said your species doesn't have castes, but you have a queen's voice, and they follow your decisions. It is natural for a hive to want to protect its queen."
"I'm not their queen," Penny sighed, uncomfortable and frustrated, "I told you. Rivera is more in charge than I am."
"I think your life is valuable," Tau said suddenly, surprising her, "And you are in my care. So the decision is mine."
Penny was taken aback for a moment, but then she nodded in acceptance.
"Fine," she agreed, "You're the boss."
He nodded sharply, then stood.
"You should rest," he said, "You came close to death today."
"I've had enough resting to last me a life time," Penny said, though she was tired and sore from the ordeal, "I can't even stand up in this cage. Is there any chance I could get out and stretch my legs?"
"No," he answered, leaving no room for debate. Penny sighed again.
"We will continue the interrogation," he said instead, "You will tell me more about earth."
It sounded like the last thing Penny wanted to do, but she was a diplomat. Fostering understanding was what she was good at. She could do this.
She spent the next hour or so doing her best to stretch and work out within the confines of her cage, just for something to do, and answering all Tau's questions about earth.
"But what is its purpose?"
"To be funny, I suppose, though to be honest, I am more of a Calvin and Hobbes fan."
"But why is it funny? These things, these comics and shows and movies, what purpose do they serve?"
Penny thought about it for a long moment, trying to figure out how to explain the concept of entertainment.
"You don't have anything here you do just for fun?" she asked as she thought.
"Of course," he confirmed, "We have games, and sports. The winged males amuse themselves with fashion and certain crafts. But we have nothing like the novels and films you have described."
"I suppose it goes back to what I said before," she said after a moment, "About humans valuing things that are unique. Stories, the kind we tell in books and movies, are an expression of that. There's nothing more unique than the experience of a human life. Stories allow us to convey that unique experience to others, allow us to see life through another person's eyes, and to reflect on what our own life would look like to someone else."
"Doesn't that make it less unique?" Tau asked, "Once so many people have experienced it?"
"I don't think so," Penny shrugged, "And it gives people who otherwise might have no shared experiences something in common. Once we have something in common we can begin to understand each other and work together."
"Don't you already have much in common?" Tau frowned thoughtfully, "You are all human, and have parents, and have seen sunrises and been happy and sad. Is that not enough?"
"It should be," Penny agreed, looking away, "But for some people the differences are more important. It can be hard to remind them that one big difference doesn't erase all the similarities. If you aren't careful, those kind of people can forget that people different from them are people at all. And once a group of people start regarding another group as not being people, war is inevitable."
"That does not make sense," Tau huffed, frustrated by trying to understand her. Penny agreed, the behavior of Earth's recent history didn't make any sense. But it was true all the same.
Tau was quiet, thinking about something, his hand over his mouth as he pondered.
"Humans and the Hive," he took his hand from his mouth to look at her, "Me and you. We are very different. We are not the same species. I did not have parents like you. You have never seen the sunset I know. I don't think you even experience happiness and sadness like I do. Is it possible that humans could forget we of the Hive are people? Could they come to hate us and want to destroy us, like the wars you spoke of?"
Penny was shocked by the question. She looked away, thinking about how certain people on Earth would react to learning the human exploratory crew had been imprisoned and put on trial here.
"Yes," she said, "It's possible. But it won't happen. That's what Ambassadors like me are for. We help even people who are very different find a way to cooperate. I'll find a way for us too."
She smiled, but Tau still looked worried. Penny scooted forward and reached through the bars to touch his hand and he jumped.
"Hey, we're not that different," she said lightly, "You and me. We're both ambassadors. We're both shaped a lot alike. And I know there are a lot of other things too. We'll figure them out together. Deep down, we are the same."
He smiled back at her, placing his hand over hers.
"We are the same." he agreed, squeezing her hand, "Now, tell me more of comics."
It had been past quarter day when Penny woke, and she'd more or less figured out that days here were 48 hours, divided into eight portions. Tau, built for 48-hour days, did not need a rest in between, but Penny did.
They talked until nearly the sixth-eighth of the day, and then he went out to deal with work and his ongoing investigation into the death of the queen while Penny napped, still recovering from her medical emergency.
When she woke from her nap, she realized it had been nearly two full 'days' since her trial. She only had five 48 hour days left to prove her innocence. And she was stuck in a cage, telling an alien about a lasagna loving cat.
The anxious desperation that caused inspired her to kick and struggle with her cage some more, but she still couldn't get it to budge. Frustration turned to boredom as the hours passed with nothing to do but work out or kick uselessly at the bars of her cage.
Eventually, just for something to do, she started singing. Some pop song that had been in her head, then things she'd learned taking choir in school, then half remembered musical numbers from movies she'd watched as a kid. She was half way through her favorite song when Tau burst through the door.
"Stop doing that!" he shouted, and Penny's mouth snapped shut immediately as he dropped something by the door, yanked his helmet off and hurried to kneel by her cage, leaving the door open behind him.
"Are you hurt?" he asked, expression lined with concerned concentration, "Are you ill again?"
"No," Penny stared at him, confused and startled, "I was just bored. Why are you freaking out?"
"That thing you were doing with your voice," he stared back at her in slightly worried wonderment now that he was no longer afraid she was dying, "What was that?"
"Singing," Penny replied, "It's normal. Every human can do it. I guess it makes sense you wouldn't have it, since most of your population doesn't communicate vocally."
"Every worker and drone for blocks around this cell has stopped working," Tau explained, "They just froze, listening. You shut down an entire section of the hive."
Penny paled in realization of what she'd done, and cleared her throat.
"Well," she squeaked, "And here I never thought I was that good."
"You do not understand the power of the Queen's speech," Tau said seriously, "The workers and drones, they cannot help but obey it. It is a compulsion for them. Even if they can't understand what you're saying, they must listen. You can physically hurt them with it if you try."
Penny, stunned, looked past him towards the open door, where a cluster of gold carapaced workers was clustered, staring in at her. She couldn't read emotion on their insectoid faces, but they seemed excited, chittering and jostling to see. Tau stood and hurried to close the door.
"You must not do that again," he insisted, "It's dangerous. It will make the regents think you and other humans are dangerous."
"I won't sing anymore," Penny agreed, holding up her hands in surrender, "But you have to give me something else to do. Maybe it's different for you, but a human can't just sit in one place for hours doing nothing. It'll drive us crazy. My team has books. Ask for one or two of them."
Tau sighed and nodded.
"I will do this," he said, returning to the front of the cage, "Just please do not make that sound anymore."
Penny nodded and Tau, shaking his head, went to remove his armor.
"Tau?" Penny asked as he was closing the armor cabinet a few minutes later, "Why doesn't my voice affect you?"
Tau paused for a moment before answering. Penny saw the tension in his shoulders before he turned and wondered if she shouldn't have asked.
"Because I am not a drone," he said at last.
"What are you then?" she asked, curious, "I assumed all the drones were like you under their armor."
"They are not," he replied, "They are more like the workers."
"I don't understand," Penny frowned, curious. Tau frowned, brows furrowed in an expression of keen discomfort.
"There are three castes, below the Queen," he explained, turning his back on her to go to the kitchen are and fetch his dinner, "The workers, the drone, and the winged males. The workers are all sterile females. The drones are all sterile males.
Both of them are... Mindless is not the word. They are of one mind. They lack a 'self' as you know it. When the queen or a winged male speaks, they become the self that drives the workers and the drones. The only functions a worker or drone will attempt if removed from the queen is to try and foster a new queen. If it is impossible to do so, they will only wait to die."
Penny resisted the urge to comment on how awful that sounded. It was just a fact of biology here and it wouldn't do to insult it.
"So are you a winged male then?" Penny asked, curious.
"No," Tau answered, staring into his food rather than at her, "The winged males are rare. They have a 'self' and can use the queen's speech. They carry out the Queen's will, manage the hive and the workers. But their most important duty is to accompany the Queen on her nuptial flights, once every few years, and contribute their lives to the laying of more eggs, for the continuance of the hive."
Penny nodded, realizing it was the same as earth bees. The males died immediately after copulating to prevent being a drain on resources. The breeding done, they had no more purpose. Here though, where they were individuals with other duties to perform, it seemed crueler.
"But what about you?" Penny asked again, "If you're not a winged male, then what are you?"
Tau turned his head away, ashamed.
"I am un-caste," he answered at last, "Defective. A mutant. Somewhere in between drone and winged male. Un-caste happen from time to time. Once we were destroyed on sight. Now, we are seen as useful. I can lead the drones, but I am not a threat to the power games of the true winged males. I will never join a nuptial flight or risk passing on my defective genes. I will command the Queen's armies until I die."
Penny felt a pang of pity for the alien. She couldn't hope to understand his life, being born wrong in a society with such rigid roles. But she could sympathize with feeling imperfect and unwanted.
"I'm sorry, Tau," she said, wishing she could reach him through the bars.
"I'm not," he replied, and smiled at her with a kind of distant affection. At that moment, watching him through the bars of the cage, she felt like so much more than just this prison separated them. There were lightyears of difference between them.
"I have brought you something," he said after a moment, filling the silence. She had forgotten the thing he dropped by the door in all the commotion, but he brought it over now. It was a black, hexagonal panel, the top reflective like glass.
"This is surveillance footage of the attack," he explained, and with a touch the top of the panel lit up, a screen, and a video began to play, "I promised to explain to you why the regency blames you for the Queen's death. I have watched this video many times, and seen the wreckage in person. This is why they do not believe when you tell them you are innocent."
He passed the device to Penny through the bars of the cage and she frowned as she saw the film was of the city skyline, the cathedral rising in the center.
It was undamaged, the ragged hole she'd seen when they had not landed there yet. But there was something in the sky, falling fast, leaving a trail of fire in its wake. It arced towards the surface like a meteor and, as Penny watched, smashed through the cathedral roof.
"I don't understand," she said, frowning and offering him the panel back, "That wasn't us. We couldn't have done that."
He didn't take the panel, pushing it back to her.
"Please, continue watching."
She frowned, but did so, staring at the screen as the footage changed, moving inside the cathedral, still full of smoke and weird insect cries. The dais where the infant Queen had sat during Penny's trial was at center of a maelstrom of twisted, burning debris.
A vast corpse, unrecognizable to Penny's eyes, twitched and spasmed in its death throes, burned and shattered into a thousand pieces. And then the camera panned over a charred panel still bearing recognizable lettering.
"The Hermes," Penny covered her mouth in horror, tears welling in her eyes as she realized what that wreckage was, "My god, it's the Hermes."
"Bodies were recovered," Tau elaborated as the video continued to crawl over the debris, the scattered technology and belongings, the shattered cryo pods, "Their apparent biology is a match for your species. This is proof that the attack was Human."
"But it wasn't!" Penny sobbed, horror and despair overwhelming her at the thought of the Hermes crew scattered over that disaster area, "It wasn't an attack! They were our sister ship. We lost them during the journey here. A navigational error. We never thought they could have made it here before us!"
"But then why did they attack?"
"They didn't!" Penny put her face in her hands, shaking as she tried to comprehend how this could have happened, "They drifted off course. They must have passed something with weird gravity, or just encountered less gravitational bodies than us. Somehow they ended up ahead of us. Ended up in this solar system way ahead of schedule, before their cryo pods were even programmed to wake them up. With no one awake to correct the course, the ship just kept flying towards the source of the broadcasts..."
"You are certain," Tau pressed, "Certain this other group of humans may not have acted intentionally? Because of the human way of dividing and fighting each other?"