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Stories from the Verse
A Dozen Verses
Chapter 48: Cooper 88
Table of Contents
Previous chapter: Kondor 271
Noon came, and Litel, the Venusian, arrived in a giant sheep-drawn two-wheeled cart. The sheep proved more energetic than the ones hauling the heavily laden carts. As they rattled down the tunnels into the plateau, Litel spoke.
“I race the monthly sheep cart circuit, although my primary job is as a manufacturer.” Cooper cleared his throat as they went around a tight corner in the tunnel on one wheel.
“Yes, I rarely go topside, but I was getting some special grade gears from Saturn. Very expensive, but useful for fine work, with extreme tolerances for heat and precision. Miners use them to ‘fish’ for crystals near volcanic vents in volcanic tubes below the surface. Drop a cord down fifty yards or more, and snip off a crystal just a couple yards from moving magma. Way too hot to get close to, and too much work really to dig down too, but you can easily drop a crystal snapper down a tube to it on a set of chains.”
“So you make crystal snappers?”
“And other things.”
The cart stopped in a small cave to the side, and a whole horde of small turquoise little ones came swarming out of a crack in the wall of the cave. Half took the sheep and cart away, and the other half climbed up on ‘Papa!” They started babbling questions on where he had been, what took him so long, and what did he get, and were there any presents, and when was dinner, and what did the spaceships look like, and could they buy a Cerian mini-puppy, and suddenly they all stopped, and looked at Cooper.
The questions changed. Is he safe? What planet is he from? Is he a spaceman? What did he do? Did he own his own starship? If so, could he give them a ride? Did he have presents? Did he know any stories? What planets had he been too? The questions poured on, and Cooper did his best to keep answering them as the whole flock of them moved slowly into the crack to the shut door, and into the house with a circular pit in the middle of which was a round stone the size of a table which radiated warmth.
A beautiful turquoise lady came out and welcomed him to her house, and the other kids came in as well which redoubled the volume of the questions. Food in a wrapper of some thin baked plant with beans and meat inside was placed in his hand, and a prayer was made by the lady of the house to the Silent Light. This caused a cessation of questions for ten seconds, during which time Cooper got a bite.
And so it went for most of the rest of the night. He was able to eat two ‘burritos’ as he called them, although the exterior was more like a cooked corn sheath than a tortilla. Meanwhile, the two adult Venusians ate a leisurely meal and chatted quietly to each other. He got the feeling he had been tricked into serving as a meal’s diversion for the adults to have a spare moment from endless questions, but he found it hard to blame them. Also, the kids were so unabashedly cheerful and inquisitive that it was hard to be mad at them.
Finally the meal ended, and the last two dozen questions were asked as he tried to escape in the cart, and then they were off. Doing some calculations he figured he had answered somewhere between seven hundred fifty and eight hundred questions in the last three hours. As they drove back up, with his head swimming, Litel grunted.
“I--I want to apologize. I--we figured to let you have a bit of what it's like to raise a litter of Venusian spawnlings, but you were doing so well, and--”
“You rarely get a chance to talk to your wife undisturbed?”
“Yes.”
“It is not a problem, Litel. Besides, I learned a lot too.”
“How? You were mostly just answering questions.”
“The questions someone asks tells you a lot about the asker. I was asked, for example, if I was a hunter for the giant beasts. Also, what was my favorite size of shot in a braced shotgun--which I gather is that huge thing over your shoulder.” It was to Cooper’s eye too long for the Venusian, and it had an oddly curved shoulder stock, and hints of other shapes not clearly seen unless he got up and examined it closely. Cooper wonder if a Venusian had made it or some other race of beings.
“Huh. Yes, this is Defender. Passed down for generations. It’s spelled to never misfire, but the recoil is savage. It's like getting head butted by a charging giant sheep, which is why you put a brace down on the ground before you fire it. I only hunt with a mass party when we get a mankiller, or some giant beast wanders where it's not supposed to, but yes, hunting expeditions do go into the jungle, even as far as the ancient runes of Tudysis Glysov. Myself, I get my thrills from chariot racing, but some like to hunt the giant beasts.”
“I’m not much of a hunter,” Cooper admitted. He had nothing against it, but it was not his thing. He eyed the huge-mouthed ‘shotgun’, but no obvious signs of ‘spells’ or magic appeared to his eyes.
With that, they rode in silence back to the spaceship.
As to the old stories that have long been here:
