The Tribulations of Tompa Lee

By Edward Hoornaert

Goddess or Madwoman?
Even she isn’t sure.

A Woman
Tompa Lee serves as ambassador to the Shons’ planet and is hailed as their goddess ... but she has a dead man living in her head, distrusts fellow humans, and fears an imminent attack by Klicks, mankind's greatest enemy.

A Man
Ming Mengliev is posing as a mere musician when Klicks destroy the Terran embassy ... but although he strives to win Tompa's trust—and her heart—whose side is this secret agent really on?

An Alien
Lord Keevie, the leader of warlike Klick missionaries, wants to drive humans off Zee Shode ... but above all he wants to eviscerate Tompa in person, because killing a goddess will surely make him a god.

A Park Crammed with Carnivores
Can Tompa survive Keevie’s pursuit, the onset of divine madness, the predators of Palla Pelly Park ... and conquer her mistrust of humans long enough to shepherd a ragtag group of Shon and human refugees to safety?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Edward Hoornaert
• Release date: Feb 19, 2014
• ISBN: 9781310643088

Edward Hoornaert

Edward Hoornaert is not only a science fiction and romance writer, he's also a certifiable Harlequin Hero, having inspired NYT best-selling author Vicki Lewis Thompson to write Mr. Valentine, which was dedicated to him. From this comes his online alter ego, "Mr. Valentine."These days, Hoornaert mostly writes science fiction—either sf romances, or sf with elements of romance. After living at 26 different addresses in his first 27 years, the rolling stone slowed in the Canadian Rockies and finally came to rest in Tucson, Arizona. Amongst other things, he has been a teacher, technical writer, and symphonic oboist. He married his high school sweetheart a week after graduation and is still in love ... which is probably why he can write romance.

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Praise for The Trial of Tompa Lee

(Book one in The Trilogy of Tompa Lee)

Ed Hoornaert is a marvelous writer: a terrific, engrossing storyteller and a consummate stylist. - Robert J. Sawyer, Hugo-Award winning author

Hold a tissue ready, as Mr. Hoornaert knows how to squeeze the heart of the reader. - Love Romances

The humor that comes from mistranslations and cultural differences contributes to Hoornaert's delightful voice … a rollicking romp on a distant planet, full of adventure and heart. – Amber Belldene, author of the Blood Vine series

Tompa Lee is an attractive, ambitious vagabond. - Arizona Daily Star

Classic science fiction, but with enough character development to interest non-science fiction readers. - Romance Reviews Today

… A style that’s three parts Anne McCaffrey mixed with one part Robert Heinlein and two parts Gene Roddenberry. One of my all-time favorite books is The Trial of Tompa Lee. - Pamela Keyes, author of The Jumbee

Reminiscent of the best of classic Star Trek. - TheBestReviews.com

This story gripped me within the first chapter and did not let go until I read the last page. Correction, it still has a hold on me. – Kara Ashley Dey, author of Stealing Sky

The Tribulations of Tompa Lee

Edward Hoornaert

Copyright 2014 by Edward Hoornaert

Smashwords Edition

All rights reserved

eahoornaert.com

This novel is a work of fiction.

Names, characters, places and incidents are either

the product of the author’s imagination, or, if real, used fictitiously.

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please purchase your own copy.

Thank you for respecting the author’s hard work.

Table of Contents

Prelude

1 The Forbidden Statue

2 Scars

3 Thousands of Murdering Klicks

4 Dirty Old Man

5 Ming the Merciless

6 Of Death and Oboes

7 The Blasted Statue

8 Planet-Bound Ignoramuses

9..Soonly

10 Palla Pelly Park

11 Peaches and Brimstone

12 Divine Mysteries

13 Ming's Mission

14 Alpha Male

15 Killer Trees

16 Taking Care of Baby

17 The Petals of a Demented Flower

18 The Orgy

19 Stampeding Camels

20 A Wind so Strong

21 The New Enemy

22 A Forest of Teeth

23 Frying Pan or Flames

24 Ancient Rules, Buried 100,000 Years

25 The Love Thing

26 Ferocity, Compassion, and Love

Coda

Some Thank Yous from the Author

Coming Attractions

Dedication and Acknowledgements

Prelude

The goddess from outer space moaned in her sleep and thrashed from side to side. Another nightmare. The third one tonight.

Awmit’s toes ached with pity and affection, but he could do nothing. Waking the graceful human from a nightmare was dangerous, as tender bruises attested. Although his alien friend loved him as much as he loved her, she might lash out in her sleep if he crept from the sleeping palette guarding the door to her bedroom. He would gladly sacrifice himself if it would help—but it wouldn’t. And so Awmit remained motionless, his nerves raw with compassion, staring into the troubled night with eyes twice as large as an earthling’s.

No, she moaned in her sleep. Don’t!

A tiny device in Awmit’s ear rendered her words into his language. He wished it wouldn’t. Wished he didn’t know her pain.

Don’t make me kill you, she whimpered. Please don’t.

Graceful human’s agony was profound, yet incompre¬hensible. Certainly she had killed some of his people, but only because they sought to kill her. Her immense valor had saved her life—and his. How could guilt arise from such robust righteousness? And what possible purpose did it serve humans to store guilt and pain, rather than letting the past slumber peacefully in its grave? Awmit loved graceful human, but he feared he would never understand her.

No. Stop.

Awmit was old and humble and nowhere near as smart as most of the goddess’s followers, yet an idea blossomed like the fragrant, orange and white petals of a tattinbush flower.

A statue.

Every goddess needed a statue. If her adorers constructed a likeness of her to show their love and respect, perhaps her guilt would wither and her sleep stretch peacefully across the night like a warm blanket. Just a small effigy, no more than three times life size. Given the many hands eager to shape the clay, a rough sculpture might be thrown together in the span that humans called a week—but only if a week had eight days, not seven; he could never remember which.

No, she cried in her sleep. No!

Yes, he would do it. When day rose from its couch, he would petition the dwarain to sculpt a statue so his beloved friend and goddess, Tompa Lee, could sleep.

1 The Forbidden Statue

Sorry, ma’am, you aren’t allowed out, the sentry said.

Tompa Lee squinted at the guard from under her ridiculous new hat. Sombreros were being issued to all personnel as quickly as they could be made.

It’s okay, she said. I’m the ambassador.

Tompa stepped around the sentry, heading for a wrought-iron gate that was barred like a jail cell. To her surprise, he raised his rifle and blocked her way.

I know who you are, ma’am. My orders say you can’t go outside the embassy walls.

Orders? But—

Sorry, ma’am.

Rattled by peppery surprise and shock, Tompa stared at the sentry’s impassive face. He was her age, early-to-mid twenties. He was handsome, in a Space Navy sort of way: athletic and fit, with heroic, chiseled features suitable for a poster that would lure impressionable girls into an adventure movie about the Navy. Rivulets of sweat ran down his temple to a long scar on his cheek, then crawled along the angry red line and dripped off the jaw-end of the scar.

But Tompa didn’t care about his tough-guy good looks. Move, sailor.

He didn’t.

Tompa tried to stare him down, but he was tall and she was short. Looking up, the sun of this planet’s equator rendered him a halo-fringed silhouette, a featureless nightmare of every authority figure that had ever bullied her.

She looked away. A squat alien tree languished near the wall surrounding the embassy in a caricature of safety. Last week sailors had bounced a soccer ball off the wall and knocked down a six-foot stretch of concrete. The building the natives of this world had supplied for the new Terran Embassy couldn’t handle such large, strong creatures as humans.

But I’m the ambassador to this whole flickin’ planet, she said.The sentry said nothing. A name was hand-embroidered on his beige uniform in non-standard red and gold lettering. It read Commerce Space Navy, Associate Alphonse Figueroa.

I’m your boss, Associate Figueroa. Top dog. You, on the other hand, are a bottom dog. So, woof. She made a shooing motion. Woof, woof.

Associate Figueroa neither smiled nor budged. Sorry, ma’am. I have my orders. Letting you out would pose a risk.

I’m not trying to escape!

Too late, Tompa clamped her mouth shut. She’d love to escape, if there were anywhere to escape to—but she sure as sewer water shouldn’t be bringing it up to a guard from Security. A breeze drifted through the gate, carrying hints of hay, pollution from nearby factories, and other indefinable smells. She gazed longingly toward the knoll that hid the statue, beyond a dusty field dotted with fuzzy, grass-like weeds baked by the sun to a crispy brown.

Her native friend, Awmit, told her the Shons considered the weeds nutritious but foul, suitable for only the lowest classes. Well, Tompa sprang from the lowest class of humans: She had been a homeless street meat. Maybe she should eat the weeds. Graze on them like a scrawny, undersized cow.

She edged away from the sentry. Dante, she whispered, what should I do?

Pardon, ma’am? asked Figueroa.

She waved an angry hand. I wasn’t talking to you.

But there’s no one else out here, ma’am.

Maggot-filled roach crap. Now yet another human would think she was crazy.

Well, tough. Dante Roussel, who was dead, lived inside her head. She hadn’t planned it that way, but it had happened, so she made the best of it. She kind of liked it, actually. Dante was smarter than she was.

If you really want to know, she said, I’m talking to Dante Roussel.

For the first time, the sentry lost his military deadpan. His eyes widened. His brow knit in a tight frown. The Associate VP of Security who sacrificed himself to save your life?

Tompa decided she liked Figueroa’s looks better like this, when he showed emotion. He stared at her long enough for three drops of sweat to plunge, lemming-like, off his jaw. Then he snapped back to expressionless robot.

I see, ma’am. And does AVP Roussel … does he answer you?

Requisition a camera for Awmit, said a voice inside her head. The smooth, sexy baritone carried a faint Montreal accent. Dante had lived in that city before he lived in her head.

Surely they’ll let natives like Awmit outside the walls, he continued. Have him take pictures of the statue. Simple, eh?

Tompa refrained from answering. He couldn’t hear her thoughts, so she would have to speak out loud … which meant the sentry would hear. And disapprove.

Dante answers sometimes. Her voice hardened into shards of flint, each word sparking off the next. From your expression, I see you’ve already heard that I’m crazy. That I’m under a psychiatrist’s care. Her voice grew louder. That John Ingler wants me declared incompetent so he can become ambassador. You’ve heard all sorts of nasty rumors, haven’t you? Well, haven’t you?

Figueroa’s throat bobbed, but his straight-ahead gaze didn’t waver. No, Madam Ambassador. I hadn’t heard any of that.

Oh. Tompa felt about five inches tall, rather than five feet. Really?

Don’t give up what you came out here for, Dante said. Focus, woman.

Easy for him to say. He wasn’t the one who’d just made an idiot of himself.

Buying time, she removed the sombrero and wiped sweat off her brow with the sleeve of her white blouse. She took her time balancing the hat on her head once more.

Look, sailor, today my friend Awmit told me the Shons made a statue of me on the other side of that knoll. It’s only a quarter mile from here.

Knowing the Shon-Wod-Zee better than any other human, she guessed the statue showed her clubbing Shons to death during her three-day trial-by-combat two months ago. Or maybe she perched gleefully atop a pile of broken bodies, her mouth open to screech a bloodthirsty battle cry. The Shons admired ferocity, but killing was ugly, the stuff of the nightmares that gripped her heart and shook her awake every flickin’ night.

I just want to see the statue of me. It would remind her that she wasn’t only a killer, but also a hero—to Shons, at least. Awmit told me it’s made of clay, with details painted on, right down to my eyelashes. I’m wearing a Navy dress uniform. All whites, you know. Pleated skirt, epaulets, the whole deal. I grew up yearning to be in the Space Navy, so I want to see myself actually wearing that uniform. Just once, okay?

The guard stared ahead, not looking at her. Sorry, ma’am. You aren’t allowed outside.

She waited a few seconds, but he said nothing more. The breeze died along with her hopes. Trying to hide her disappointment, she pushed back the stupid sombrero and headed toward the dreary, cave-like Terran Embassy.

But as she neared the windowless door, the guard cleared his throat. The uniform looks fine on you, ma’am.

Tompa turned. Figueroa was still staring straight ahead.

The Shons got human proportions wrong, but still, you look good. Downright beautiful, if you don’t mind me saying so. You look powerful, too—a credit to the uniform. To the human race. The Shons put fresh flowers around the statue every day. They smell like shit, begging your pardon ma’am, but you’re always surrounded by a sea of fresh, orange-and-white flowers.

Tompa closed her eyes, picturing the scene. Elusive emotions danced along her nerves. Pride? Disgust?

No: embarrassment. The Shons think I’m a goddess because I survived their maggoty trial by combat, she apologized.

Goddess? Hah! Humans held the opposite opinion of her. Figueroa probably thought she was an insane street meat with no conscience and no soul. A low-class slut who should never, ever have been named ambassador by the dying words of the rightful ambassador.

I’m not a goddess. She hated the whiny desperation in her voice, but she couldn’t help it. Really, I’m not.

Sorry, ma’am, I can’t let you out. Orders.

But why?

I’m just a bottom dog, remember? But … well, there are rumors. The Klicks are furious that we—you, I mean—convinced the Shons to tear up their exclusive trading agreement and trade with us, instead. Maybe they’re about to try something.

Klicks? Oh, God.

As though dropped from three floors high into ice water, Tompa shivered. Breath failed her. The seven-foot Kalikinikis were the fiercest enemies humans had found out in the stars. A Klick had killed Dante, buried a four-inch, razor-sharp tail spike in his neck. And they were back?

Or were they—meaning her human jailers—just saying that to keep her under control? Possibly. They were all her enemies.

Well, she’d outsmart them. She headed inside to requisition a camera.

***

The windowless, concrete hallway was so dark Tompa couldn’t see at first. She tripped over a scrub brush wielded by a Shon cleaning the floor. The four-foot-tall native was shaped sort of like a pear, with wide hips, two short arms and legs, and no neck. Her eyes weren’t adjusted well enough to see it, but she knew that green-tinged skin completed the resemblance to a cute, cartoon pear.

The Shon rose and bowed.

Tompa gave a hiss of displeasure. Sure, she liked Shons better than humans, but she didn’t like the reason this guy was here. All the embassy workers worshipped Bez Tompa Lee—Goddess Tompa Lee—and she wished he worked for money, rather than worship. She was no flickin’ goddess.

But she returned the bow, even though a Bez wasn’t supposed to bow to anyone.

Tompa hurried down the hall, heading toward Stores. The five arms of this building resembled caves that wandered back and forth with no respect for geometry. The arms met in the center of the building, which was blessed with a glass rotunda. Most of the Consortium Earth workers had desks in its light, while sailors had windowless little caves.

That arrangement mirrored the pecking order. Consortium Earth owned the Commerce Space Navy, and appropriated the best for itself. Of the three levels of humans on Zee Shode, CE workers were at the top. Sailors in the middle. And Tompa squatted alone at the bottom, despite being the ambassador.

When she got to the rotunda, the brightness made her blink. Usually this large, sunny room was her favorite part of the embassy. Not today, though. John Ingler, the skinny, aristocratic Assistant Ambassador, stood at his aide’s desk, supposedly looking at paperwork. From her experience, though, he was probably peeking down the woman’s blouse.

Along with Klicks, John Ingler was Tompa’s least favorite life form. The maggot wore starched shirts, old-fashioned bow ties and, when he went out, a bowler hat, like a bloody Victorian Englishman from three centuries ago. What a pretentious creep.

Ah, Miss Lee. John smoothed his full, brown moustache. How fortuitous. I need to impart some important news.

Not now, John. Not ever, she meant.

Tompa tried to walk around him, but his administrative assistant, a blonde, bosomy bimbo, hopped to her feet and blocked the passage between desks. Tompa zigged. So did the aide, barring her with a pillowy wall of boobs. Tompa zagged. Same result.

John closed in for the kill. My news is very important, Miss Lee. You’re having a visitor the day after tomorrow, and I need to ensure that you behave with proper decorum.

No, you just want another blouse to peek down.

The admin flattened her hand across the top of her dress and looked at him, wide-eyed. Mr. Ingler!

You’re a bad actress. Tompa tried to remember the woman’s name. Natasha D’Arbanville, right? Everybody knows you’re screwing your boss here, trying to get ahead. Or is that give head?

The blonde stood straighter. For a moment, she looked not like a bimbo, but like a dignified professional. Her English accent added to the illusion. You may not believe it, Miss Lee, but I’m on your side.

Tompa opened her mouth to apologize, but then closed it. John would pounce on any admission of weakness. She couldn’t even express her contrition with a look. Being in jail, even wearing the fancy title of ambassador, was a flickin’ pile of ratcrap.

My office, Miss Lee, John said.

I’m busy, John. I need a camera.

You’re having a visitor, he said in a sing-song voice, as though talking to a child.

What does he want to sell us? Fancy-grained wood? Medicines that might or might not work on humans? Tompa sighed, but in truth Shon salesmen were a welcome distraction from her dreary and overwhelming routine.

It isn’t a Shon.

Tompa frowned. Not a Shon? But…

But indeed, Dante said. The only sentient beings on Zee Shode are a few billion Shons and a couple hundred humans. Or is it a Klick, perhaps?

Tompa shivered.

It’s not a Shon, John repeated. Come into my office and I’ll explain. With lordly gait, he strode down the corridor leading to his private office, waggling his finger to urge her to follow—again, as though she were a child. Or worse, a dog. What a manipulative son of a bitch.

Before Tompa followed, she mouthed a silent apology to Natasha D’Arbanville, but the woman had turned back to her desk.

John’s office, unlike Tompa’s, looked lived in. One whole wall was devoted to diplomas and certificates. Another, to pictures of him in exotic locations on earth. Angkor Watt. Consortium Earth Headquarters in British Columbia. Ayers Rock. The Great Pyramid. Brasilia’s Triple Towers, each a mile high.

Behind his desk stood the best display: a six-foot square, three-dimensional, moving hologram of Zee Shode, taken from the Commerce Space Navy Ship Vance when the cruiser had orbited the planet. Zee Shode was a sparkling blue jewel against a velvet background, with touches of white, brown, and green. It looked like earth except for the shape of the continents, a reminder of how similar the planets were.

Sit. Another doggy command.

Tompa remained standing.

John’s desk had just the right amount of clutter to show how important he was, but not enough to hint at disorganization. Folding his hands, he leaned forward and waited, saying nothing.

Tompa remained still as long as she could. Then she fidgeted. Finally, hating that she’d been manipulated into breaking the silence, she asked, Well?

Our visitor, John intoned, is from the Galactic Trading Council delegation.

I thought those guys were only going to monitor the transition from orbit.

The Council’s Inspectors aren’t on our side, John said sourly.

That was an understatement. When the CSNS Vance had first arrived at Zee Shode, the Klicks demanded the Council send Inspectors to witness and punish the human intrusion into their exclusive trading territory. The stratagem had backfired, though. The Inspectors’ presence had forced the Klicks to honor the Shon’s decision to transfer their trade to humans. Otherwise, the Klicks probably would’ve just killed Tompa and vaporized the Vance.

But in theory, the Council followed its own rules. In theory, the Council believed in voluntary trade with non-spacefaring species. In theory, the Council frowned on its member species strong-arming helpless natives.

Great theories, all of them. In practice, the Council didn’t like that the little guys, humans and Shons, had dared to disrupt their precious status quo.

Nonetheless, the Inspectors were supposed to observe from orbit, not browbeat the human ambassador in person. Some races on the Council were hideous, foul-smelling, contemptuous of humans, and intimidating. Tompa dreaded facing them.

What species? she asked, a tremor in her voice.

Detchvilli. John leaned back, obviously expecting a reaction.

Detchvilli? Tompa knew the name, of course, but John made her so nervous she remembered nothing.

She couldn’t ask Dante without making a fool of herself, so she tried to remember which show the Detches had been in. The authorities in Manhattan had provided free shows to keep the street meats pacified. Growing up, she had watched them all.

Buddha’s belly, Miss Lee, you do know who the Detchvilli are, don’t you?

Tompa’s neck grew warm. Ingler already thought she was an idiot; he didn’t need proof. Of course I know.

And she did, just in time. The show was Confrontation at Kamloops, starring Jesus Ali and Patsy Patsilla.

They’re the alien race, Tompa said, who scared the crap out of the world by landing on a Canadian hillside on Galaxy Day, June fifteenth, 2048. The Detchvilli just wanted to trade, but the stupid governments were all set to attack. Then Patsy Patsilla’s little daughter toddled through the police line and was given a hug and a galactic lollipop. The Detchvilli also gave us three Ginglyform-String drives and the specifications to build our own deep-space ships.

A sissty? John’s moustache quivered as he gave a haughty grimace. All you know about the Detchvilli is from that stupid sissty?

Tompa sunk into a chair. ‘Sissty’ was a fancy name for show surrounds: Sight, Sound, Smell, Touch. But only gordos—rich fat cats like John—called them that.

Making his moustache dance in an expressive moue of distaste, John assumed a professorial air. The Detchvilli gave us the space drives not because they’re galactic sugar daddies, but in exchange for a symphony orchestra. Our music propels them to religious ecstasy. It was a business deal, nothing more—but the Detches have mythologized the incident as proof they’re the most selfless of all races. I suppose there’s a seed of truth to it, too. If they’d signed us to an exclusive trading agreement, you and I wouldn’t be here. Exclusives are the highway to wealth for the spacefaring race, but a footpath to second-class citizenship for planet-bound sods.

But we have an exclusive with the Shons, Tompa pointed out. Are we going to do the same thing? Make them second-class?

Ingler sighed and shook his head, conveying a world of contempt. Miss Lee. He made her name sound like ‘stupid maggoty cockroach.’ "Rule numero uno in life is that it’s never the same thing when you’re on the dishing end as opposed to the receiving end."

That makes me feel dirty.

So take a shower. With one eyebrow raised, his gaze raked her with a weird combination of condescension and lust. The truth is that we’re incredibly lucky. If the Detches didn’t adore human music, we’d be among the exploited, second-class citizens of the galaxy.

Like the Shons.

We’ll treat them better than the Klicks did.

Will we?

With you as our Shon-loving ambassador? His mous¬tache twitched in sarcasm. Of course we will.

Memories sprang to life: helmeted policemen patrolling the escape routes off Manhattan, keeping street meats safely inside their ghetto jail. On Zee Shode, cops would herd Shons instead of street meats. Otherwise, it was the same thing.

Now that we have this planet, John continued, humans will no longer be the poorest member of the Galactic Council.

No, the Klicks will.

And that is a good thing.

Not if the Klicks are willing to fight to escape poverty. Remembering her own fierce struggles, Tompa almost sympathized with the lizards.

Back to business. John pushed a five-inch stack of printouts toward her. "This details how you need to treat the Detchvilli Inspector when he arrives the day after tomorrow. I’ll hit a few of the most important points. Numero uno: Speak only Standard English. None of your trashy street-meat slang, please. The use of dialects is discussed in detail in Volume III of Field Regulations for Dealing with Alien Races for Senior Consortium Earth Agents, chapter 2, section T, paragraphs 18 through 1024. It’s all in there." He stabbed a finger at the printouts.

I’ve already read Volume III. And I, II, and IV.

He arched an eyebrow that was just short of laughing in disbelief. "Numero due: Review the instructions for reporting the visit. They’re in chapter 5, section 47, paragraphs 935 through 1042. Also section 48, paragraphs 12, 13, 240, and 371."

John rattled on and on about his beloved Regulation manuals. Tompa tried to pay attention. Failed. Too busy remembering her days on the streets. Then the memories transformed into the more horrible moments of her trial, like Dante’s blood pumping across her white uniform.

Trying to dispel the memories, she stared at the hologram of Zee Shode from space. The mountains ringing the Plateau of Ravenous Beasts and Palla Pelly Park were visible. One of these days, she hoped to visit the sacred wildlife preserve and see some of its fearsome carnivores.

Will you remember all that? John concluded.

Tompa jerked back to the present. Sure. No problem.

He shook his head in disbelief. It’s vitally important, Miss Lee. If Sir Charles is our vigorous ally—

Who the flick was Sir Charles? Damn, she should have paid attention. When had John veered away from Regs into reality?

—we’ll all be safer. In my professional opinion, Sir Charles wants to see how worthy we—meaning you—are. If he decides our attempt to adopt the Klick’s trading territory is an amateurish bit of stupidity that is doomed to fail, he won’t defend us against the other Inspectors. The Inspectors all cringe, you know, at the thought that this could happen to them, that they might lose a lucrative monopoly. They’d love to find excuses to ignore the Shons’ wishes.

Democracy is bad for business, Tompa observed cynically.

John inclined his head, which was as close as he came to showing approval. I’m glad you understand. If Sir Charles is on our side, we have a chance. So act like an ambassador.

Tompa sat straight and stiff, her muscles tight. I told you, no problem.

Detchvillis are sticklers for protocol and formality. John closed his eyes as though praying. Please, please, I beg you. Don’t screw up.

2 Scars

Tompa called the desk in her office ‘Adolf.’ As in Hitler.

Which was an exaggeration, of course. Hitler had tortured and killed millions of people. Adolf the Desk tortured only her.

As for killing her … well, the computerized desk could do everything from contacting people to making a hot lunch, so yeah, Ingler might be able to program it to zap her with a fatal bolt of electricity. Or maybe paper-cut her a million times until she was a quivering blob of raw hamburger, unrecognizable as human.

Unless I get you first, Tompa muttered to the desk’s cloudwood, imported from some alien world. The milky grain was indistinctly visible through the mid-air holographic display shimmering over the desktop. I’ll chop you into kindling if you don’t show me the files I want.

The embassy’s staff had grown up with Galactic Era technology. For them, the desk was toddler’s play. Street meats, however, inhabited the rotting carcass of a city built to serve an obsolete, pre-Galactic world. Tompa had little experience operating modern gizmos.

She’d been working at the snooty desk since skimming the useless stack of regulations John had given her. She was determined to ferret out information about possible Klick counterattacks. After an hour, she discovered a three-dimensional list of reports from Security. The report floated in the air inches above the desktop. Success.

She swooped her index finger over to the command dock’s right sensory strip to create a slide show of the list of reports. As ambassador, she had access to all files. Hundreds of them. Thousands. Enough to bury a person alive … which would make Adolf chuckle.

The report in slot G36/82/128 sounded promising: Inspection Tour of Secondary Installations Abandoned by Kalikiniki Trade Missionaries. With infinite care, Tompa edged her middle finger through the command slot, trying to draw the report out of the stack.

Someone scratched on her door.

Tompa jerked—which wiped away not only the report but the entire array that had taken hours to find. She was swearing when the visitor scratched again and entered unbidden. Snarling, she prepared to give the intruder an earful of the street meat vocabulary she wasn’t supposed to use with Sir Charles.

But it was Awmit, the best friend she’d ever had. Maybe the only friend. Grinning, she pushed her squeaky chair away from Adolf. Come on in.

Awmit padded toward her with age-slowed steps. His hips were wider than most Shons’, and his greenish skin hung in folds where a human would have a neck. Distinctive kidney-shaped patches of auburn hair marked where a human’s ears would be. Even for a Shon, he wasn’t handsome—but to her, he was beautiful.

Tompa stretched and sighed. Boy, am I ever glad to see you.

Awmit sat on the concrete floor in front of her chair and rubbed his head. The awkward gesture—his arms were too short to easily reach the top of his head—was an attempt to ape human gestures. This one exists negatively as youth, but as old man.

His voice was a mellifluous series of sheep-like bleats, but she’d grown accustomed to ignoring it. She heeded only on the translation whispered in her ear by a tiny, Shon-made device.

The word ‘boy’ was a figure of speech, she said.

Untranslatable, then. Awmit nodded—another human mannerism. This one carries delightedly good news.

I sure could use some. Tell me.

New members have been accepted blissfully for Bez Tompa’s dwarain.

Oh. She’d hoped for better news than that. She didn’t want more Shons who thought she was a goddess. Ignored? Yes, she wanted that. Adored? No. And members of her herd adored her.

Shons were descended from herd creatures, and they called their herds dwarains. A dwarain might form around a theater group, or around a factory that built any of the early-industrial products of Shon society—or around the