Angry Young Spaceman (37 page)

He beamed and pulled his lips out with six tentacles and crossed his eyes.

I laughed. It
was
funny. I explained to Kevin briefly who he was and he was appropriately impressed.

Around us, the set was being cleaned up and taken apart. The director hustled in, patted me on the back. “
You were right about the charliebot. It was more realistic.
” He had originally wanted to use an Octavian bartender, but I convinced him otherwise. He was big on realism, this director — except for the fact that there were no spaceport bars with atmosphere where an Octavian could stand upright. But unless Octavian action-comedies became a big export, I figured we’d get away with it.

Kevin was shaking hands with the director. “Very good,” the director dredged up, and Kevin stuttered out an Octavian thank-you.

“
With an accent like that you don’t have to worry about your job, even if he is better-looking,
” the director told me as he zipped off.

Kevin looked at me. “He’s always on some stimulant,” I said, in lieu of translating. “They get black dots in their eyes. That’s how you tell. Never trust an Octavian with pupils.”

“Well, thanks for getting me the job,” he said. “It was fun.”

We walked over to the food table. “The part was actually written with you in mind,” I said. “I work with the scriptwriter, and when I found out there was gonna be another human on the planet I figured...”

“So you have some say in the part you play?” he asked.

“It’s the only way I’ll work on a project,” I said, feeding my face. Getting beat up made me famished!

“So why don’t you give yourself a better part?” he said.

I munched on, a smile growing on my face. “Why indeed?” I said cryptically.

Kevin waited, his eyebrows raised.

“Let’s go,” I said finally. “Drinking all that fake beer made me thirsty. Let me buy you a bladder of the real stuff.”

***

We stopped at my place first, to wash up. When I was in the washroom, Kevin said he liked my apartment.

“It’s OK,” I said. “I have my eye on this traditional house on the outskirts of town, though.”

“Oh, I’ve seen those. They’re beautiful,” called Kevin.

“Yeah,” I said,
everyone but the Octavians think so.
I thought back to the fight Jinya and I had had over it, and sighed.

I left the washroom. Kevin was peering at the decor which mostly consisted of a bunch of pictures of Octavian landscapes and my glass jetpack. “That’s an unusual clock,” he cracked, nodding at my aggrometer wristwatch. It had been pinned to the wall ever since the strap broke.

“Yup,” I said as I checked to make sure I had everything.

We left, Kevin looking at Matthew’s jetpack again but not asking any more questions. I was kind of glad. I had thought that I was beginning to feel OK about the whole incident until I was at an offworld party a few weeks ago. It was one of the first times I’d hung out with a bunch of Earthlings for almost a year — it was a year since it happened — and at first I was having a good time. But then, in the dim light of the bar, I saw Matthew’s silhouette. But of course it wasn’t really Matthew — didn’t even look like him — but the lurch in my chest showed that I was still expecting him to show up. Show up with his evil grin and make fun of what I was drinking, or ask me about my students, or tell me how much he needed to get laid...

Kevin sensed my mood, and we walked in silence to the place just around the corner. “Hello, Sam,” said the owner, a woman in her late forties. Her handkerchief was bright yellow, which was like her. “
You bring me new customers, eh? Doesn’t he like the Earthling bar?
”

The Crossed Snakes was a no-frills eatery, unless you counted the owner, which I did. “
The Earthling bar is too expensive,
” I said, although actually it was the way they liked me to sit up near the window, a living model, that put me off it.

She cackled, and took our order. I got my usual — vegetables wrapped in a fried rice paste — and the same for Kevin. “
And two regular beers,
” I added, not wanting to presumptuously order large.

“Handsomebloy,” said the owner, holding Kevin’s shoulders. “Where you?”

“
Blusan I am hometown Octavia
,” he pushed out in a rush, looking at the owner for understanding. Some of the patrons laughed.

“Bloosan,” she said, nodding.

“Bloosan,” he repeated gamely.

She left us, and Kevin exhaled. “Man, I feel like an idiot. Everyone’s watching.”

I didn’t bother looking around. “Everyone’s always watching,” I said.

Kevin wasn’t listening. He was staring at what I assumed to be a group of giggling schoolgirls. I glanced back. It was a group of giggling secretaries.

Kevin’s trance broke. “Was I staring?” he said. He ran his fingers through his hair. “I mean, they’re not wearing any pants!” he said, desperately. He looked back again. “There’s no one like that in Blusan. All we got are noisy little boys and sitting-disks.”

“Sitting-disks?” I said. The food arrived, clattered down by the surly daughter of the owner.

“Yeah. ‘Blusan is famous for sitting-disks.’”

I nodded. “My town was famed for its grey cucumbers.” I dug in, eating with my fingers. Kevin used his fork.

He looked back at the girls.

“Best thing to remember,” I said, doling out advice despite my better impulse, “is that any relationship is going to affect them a lot more than it affects you. You probably won’t live here all your life. She will.” The dumplings were hot and good, and I dosed one mouthful with a squeeze of beer.

Kevin took a pull at his beer and nodded. “That makes sense. They weren’t very up front about that stuff at the orientation. What have... I mean, have you —”

I cut off his struggles with a merciful raised hand. “Yeah.” I was glad he was unsure, unbalanced — he should be. I had been worried that I would finally get an Earthling neighbour and he would be a bonehead. I looked at him, decided to tell him the story.

“Hello Sambreen,” said one of the pretty girls, her light blue eyes shining with mischief, which was my favourite shade of light blue. I waved as they passed out the door, and my attention caused one to collapse on the girl in front of her. She said something as the door closed.

Kevin looked at me quickly. I knew how he felt, every incomprehensible phrase seemed to promise the code to understanding Octavians. “She said, ‘He’s famous.’” I stretched out against the wall. “Everyone human’s a superstar here,” I said. “Even worse if you can speak Octavian.”

He shook his head. “They said that you’re really gifted, the people at orientation.”

That was gratifying, in an entirely unexpected way. “Well, you don’t see them getting me to speak at orientation, do you?”

Wonneel walked in with some guy in a toque, talking out the side of his mouth as was his perpetual habit. He spat his tobacco in a stream out the door before it closed. The owner nodded to him.

I raised a hand to Wonneel and he gave me a wan smile.

“Yeah,” I said looking back at him. “They’re not exactly proud of me. I was a better student than teacher.” I smiled, more at myself for being so vague. But when you had a year to get to know each other, what was the rush?

Wonneel came and sat down beside me. “
Who’s the new kid,
” he grunted, eyeing Kevin. “
Can he speak?
”

“
Nope.
Kevin, Wonneel. Wonneel, Kevin.”

Kevin looked a little freaked, and I saw him scrambling through his mental drawers for the Octavian greeting. “Hello,” he said finally.

Wonneel stared at him for another few seconds then turned away, the embodiment of dismissal. He was the only person I knew who wouldn’t return a “Hello!” and I loved him for it.

“
You get home all right last week?
” Wonneel said, aiming a stream of tobacco juice at a dish we’d emptied.

“
I heard I left just in time,
” I said.

He gave a rueful shrug. An old man in the back was kicking up a fuss, cursing out the daughter. “
I want wallen, you brat!
”

My lip curled. The owner whisked by our table. With an eye on her back, Wonneel pulled a small container out of his bag and passed it to me.

“
You know it’s illegal, sir,
” the owner said to the man, her yellow kerchief bobbing.

“
Thanks,
” I said to Wonneel, who was watching the fight. “
Get you back later.
”

“
This is a modern place. That’s old-time food. Unhealthy!
” she said.

He waved them away, disgusted, went back to his cups.

Wonneel shook his head. “
There’s no respect for the old,
” he tutted.

I raised my eyebrows on this selective reverence. Wonneel would sooner lose an eye than his seat on the bus to an oldster.

“
Can’t refuse an old man his meat,
” he said, and got up and went over to the old guy.

“How do you know him?” Kevin asked.

“He was an extra on a film I was working on,” I said, watching as Wonneel said something to the old man. The old man listened and then, after throwing back his ujos and throwing down his beeds, unsteadily followed Wonneel’s slim figure out of the restaurant.

“Yeah, he played an Octavian gangster,” I said, finishing my beer.

“He kind of looks like a gangster,” said Kevin. “Sharp features, dark eyes...”

“Uh huh,” I said. I yelled for the waitress. The daughter poked her reluctant head out, and I ordered more beer.

“So do you always act in action films?” he asked.

“Not always... comedies, too,” I said, thinking about how Wonneel was always disappointing, but at least he was consistent. Also, less seriously, that I should get a cut of his new business, since I was the one responsible for the demand.

“What did you play in the last comedy?” he said.

“Um... That was
Loafer’s Revenge
. I played Loafer’s Earthling sidekick.” I smiled, remembering it. “I had this thing that I hated black noodles, but I kept getting served huge heaping dishes of it.”

Kevin looked at me, confused.

“Well, black noodles have a kind of sexual connotation... it’s a bit of a pun...” I said, shrugging. “It’s funny to Octavians.”

“Huh,” Kevin said. Then he leaned forward and poked the table as if trying to pin down his point, a particularly human gesture. “But isn’t there any chance to play a part that isn’t a bad guy or a sidekick?”

“Sure there is,” I said. “One script I saw last week had a part for a charismatic and earnest rocketship captain from Earth who has an affair with the daughter of a prominent Octavian family. Leading man stuff.”

“But...” Kevin spread his hands. “What? You didn’t get the part?”

I chuckled. “The part was written with me in mind. They can’t afford offworld actor rates. When I turned it down they just made it a Squidollian captain — less controversial that way, anyway.”

“Was that what put you off? The controversy?”

I corralled my thoughts. I wanted to make this good. “One of the reasons I left Earth was that I didn’t like it there, especially the way society revolved around money. But when I got here I realized how much Earth had already infected Octavian culture — its come to symbolize modern life and progress — and I realized I was kind of a representative of the whole planet.”

Kevin nodded sombrely. “It’s a big responsibility.”

“Now, my first inclination was to play parts that were heroic and noble, but I realized that that was just me wanting to be liked. And Octavia’s already got enough of that crap beamed at them. So I decided I was going to play parts that evened out that singular view of humans-as-heroes by playing the exact opposite.” I paused for a squeeze of beer. “Greedy bullies and idiots.”

Kevin’s jaw literally dropped.

I had a long laugh. He was a great audience.

“So... you’re doing it... deliberately?” he said.

I raised an eyebrow. “Crazy, huh?”

“Well...” he said, looking into middlespace, brow furrowed. “I mean, I think
I’ve
got problems with the Earth Council...”

I nodded, let him talk for a while.

“But it’s like... sometimes it’s necessary. I mean Octavians were still eating other sentient beings until a couple of months ago.”

I smiled ruefully. Yeah, the Earth Council had got a lot of mileage out of that. Someday I’d tell him the whole story. “There’s lots of good things about Earth,” I said, picking at the food. “And Earth culture. But the problem with it replacing alien cultures — beyond the fact that it makes for a boring universe —”

Kevin nodded at that.

“— is that, after a generation, no one even remembers how those other societies were run. So there’s only one template for a society, and there’s little room for debate or change when there’s no real-life examples of people doing things differently.”

Kevin nodded, raising his eyebrows in a kind of
maybe you’re right
way. He squeezed the remainder of his beer into his mouth with a frothy squirt.

It was unsatisfying — I’d have preferred he argued. I filled the glass with beeds and got up. “Octavian tradition. Never stay in one place for more than a drink.”

He got ready to go and I grabbed my precious container. “Almost forgot,” I said. “If you ever get desperate enough for coffee to trade a week’s wages for one of these,” I said as we walked to the door, “Let me know.”

It was already dark outside, but not dark enough to hide the owner’s daughter in the clutches of a young tough-looking boy. Tentacles retracted guiltily. “
Boyfriend?
” I asked.

She denied it.

“
You’re kissing a stranger?
” I enquired mildly as we walked away.

“
Keep your jokes to your movies,
” said the boy to my back.

I smiled, but was a little stung. Not everyone accepted that my asshole Earthling personas in the movies weren’t my own. Of course, the slight venom a few Octavians felt for me was nothing in comparison to what it may have been had my part in the “modernization drive” been revealed.