"I'm not sure. What's the point?"
"The point is, you're a monkey. You are-or at least, you think you are-the dominant species on this planet. That may be a conceit. It's ultimately irrelevant. You can't go out there thinking that. You can't go out there being anything but a monkey, because that's all you are. A monkey. You are not a representative of all humankind. Most humanity doesn't even know you exist, and if it did know, it probably wouldn't want you as its representative."
"You have a great way of pumping me up."
"Listen, you have to operate in the real world. Out there it will be a circle and some bunnydogs. And you are a monkey. A naked monkey. You have to go out there and be a monkey meeting a bunnydog. That's all you can be. You can't speak for any other monkey on this planet. Are you getting this?"
"Yes, I think so."
"Good." She looked at me. "So what are you?"
"A monkey." I scratched myself in a monkey gesture and made an "eee eee" sound.
She grinned. "Mates and bananas, James. That's the bottom line. Remember that. There's not a lot much else for monkeys."
"So, do I eat the bunnydogs or screw them?"
"That's up to you," she said. "Now-look, you need to be clear about what monkeys do. What happens when a monkey comes up against something new, something outside of its experience-what's the very first thing that happens?"
"Um... it shrieks. I shriek."
"Yeah -startlement. That's where the human race has been with the infestation. We're still running around startled. What comes after startlement?"
"Fear. Obviously."
"Mm hm. Good-you did your reading. A monkey has only two responses, James. Yipe and Goody. There aren't any others. Everything is variations on that. There isn't an animal on this planet that doesn't have that basic mechanism hard-wired into its cerebral cortex. That's your machinery. You can't not react with yipe or goody. And most of the time, just to be on the safe side, you react with yipe. So you spend ninety-nine percent of your life running your yipe machine. And it doesn't matter how much intelligence you've superimposed on it, James. The intelligence doesn't control the machine, it serves the machine. The intelligence only expresses the yipe on a higher level."
She pointed forward. "Those creatures out there-those bunnydogs-no matter what kind of animals they are, no matter what kind of culture they operate in, no matter who they pretend to be-they have the same machinery. Or equivalent machinery. Or they wouldn't be there. I'm talking about basic survival machinery. If you don't have a yipe machine you don't survive. Evolution automatically produces a yipe machine. So, what you need to know is that those creatures out there are as scared of you as you are of them."
I nodded my agreement.
She continued, "What comes after fear?"
I thought about it. "Running?"
"No-let's say you can't run from the thing you're afraid of. What do you do next?"
"Um-I get angry?"
"Are you asking me or telling me? What happens when someone threatens you and threatens you and threatens you-?"
"I get angry."
"Right. Anger. After fear comes anger. How do you act out anger?"
I bared my teeth at her. I growled.
She grinned. "Right. You counterattack. You start by baring your teeth and growling and making terrible faces. If that doesn't work, you start screaming and shrieking. And if that doesn't work, you start throwing coconuts. In other words, you put on a performance of rage. All monkeys do. You do it when your survival is threatened-or the survival of anything you identify with, anything you consider as part of your identity.
"It's all part of the automatic machinery. If you scare away the thing that you're angry at, then the machinery worked; you survived. At the very worst, you might have to fight-but most of the time, though, a good performance of anger can prevent a fight. I've just told you everything you need to know to understand international politics."
She let me appreciate the truth of that joke for a moment, then she continued, "That may be fine for monkeys, James. It may even be fine for human beings, though I doubt it. It is definitely not fine for dealing with worms. That's what you need to know.
"Some of us are moving through fear and are starting to move into anger toward the Chtorrans. It could be a fatal mistake. Our monkey machinery is stuck in yipe. There's no escape. Running doesn't help. And there are no goodies. So, the next step is rage."
"I know-I've seen it-"
"Go on. Tell me, what's rage."
"Rage is the fighting machine gearing up."
"Right," she said. "And we know we can't fight the worms, can we? They've already demonstrated that we can't outfight them. So, what comes next, James?"
"Uh-"
"What comes after rage, James?"
"I don't know-"
"Come on, what happens after you've been arguing the same argument for a week?"
"I don't know about you, but I get bored-"
"Right. Boredom." She nodded with satisfaction. "After you've raged and raged and raged and used up all your energy and frustration, suppose the thing you're frightened of, angry at, raging at, is still sitting there picking its teeth and grinning at you. That's when you get tired of being angry. We call that boredom. Or annoyance. But now that you've given up being angry, there's room for you to actually become interested in that thing-whatever it is-that scared you in the first place. That's how the machinery works. It isn't until you let go of the yipe that you have room for the goody, right?"
"Right."
"That's the machinery, James. That's what you're operating on top of. You can't stop it from running. You never could. Now, why do you think I'm telling you all this?"
"So, I can-uh ... well, the object of this is to establish communication, so this is about not letting the monkey machinery get in the way of the communication ... right?" I grinned, I knew it was.
"Right." She grinned right back. "I want you to finish being afraid and angry and bored in here. Don't take that into the circle or that's what the circle will be about. When you give up all that stuff-what can you do?"
I shrugged. "Nothing, I think."
"Don't be flip. What can you do after you give up all those monkey-machine reactions?"
I shrugged again. "Have a party?"
"That's exactly right. After all that other stuff is taken care of, there's nothing left to do but play together. You make up a gamecall it business or marriage or United States Congress-but it's still only a very fancy game played by very fancy monkeys. So ... do you know what you have to do in that circle?"
"Make up a game for monkeys and bunnies."
"You got it. That's all you have to do. If you're fun to play with, the communication will take care of itself."
"Yes, I see-I really do." I was marveling at the simplicity of it. "I have to leave my rifle behind. I have to leave my military mind-set behind. I have to even leave my scientist act behind. I have to just-I see it!-I have to just go in there as a monkey who wants to play, don't I?"
"Congratulations." She beamed at me and shook my hand. "As Chief Medical Officer of this operation, I hereby pronounce you fit for duty. You are the best chimpanzee in the United States Army." She handed me a banana.
"Only a banana?" I asked. "I don't get a mate?"
"That, James, is part of the graduate course."
FIFTY-ONE
THE FINAL meeting of the presentation team took place at eighteen hundred hours.
Colonel Tirelli, Dr. Fletcher, Dr. Larson, three staff members I didn't recognize, the two women on the audio-video team, five observers, three mission specialists, six pilots, two programmers, two spider handlers, and the weapons team. I almost felt crowded.