The answer, of course, is that the laws of biology are nearly impossible to test, and scientists hate that. We can launch probes to test theories of gravity and space-time. We can put rocks in pressure cookers and split atoms in classrooms. But how does one test a process as lengthy and multifaceted as evolution? There are labs today that struggle to find the funding to keep a project running for three standards—imagine the funding needed to run a project for millenia! As it stands, there is no way for us to efficiently test the conditions that produce specific biological adaptations, beyond the most rudimentary observations (aquatic climates produce fins, cold climates produce fur or blubber, and so on). There have been bold attempts at creating software that could accurately predict evolutionary paths, such as the Aeluon-funded Tep Preem Project (which, though well-intentioned, has yet to unravel the mysteries of biological law). The problem with such endeavors is that there are too many variables to consider, many of which we remain ignorant of. We simply don’t have enough data, and the data that we do possess is still beyond our understanding.
We are experts of the physical galaxy. We live on terraformed worlds and in massive orbital habitats. We tunnel through the sublayer to hop between stellar systems. We escape planetary gravity with the ease of walking out the front door. But when it comes to evolution, we are hatchlings, fumbling with toys. I believe this is why many of my peers still cling to theories of genetic material scattered by asteroids and supernovae. In many ways, the idea of a shared stock of genes drifting through the galaxy is far easier to accept than the daunting notion that none of us may ever have the intellectual capacity to understand how life truly works.
Day 245, GC Standard 306
INTRO TO HARMAGIAN COLONIAL HISTORY
Sissix peeked around the doorframe. The hallway was empty. If she moved fast, she might make it to the med bay before anybody saw her.
She hugged a bathrobe—borrowed from a pile of Kizzy’s clean laundry—around herself and hurried forward. As she moved, the itch spread up from her thighs and over her belly. She rubbed her palms against it through the fabric, barely resisting the urge to dig in with her claws. She wanted to throw off the robe and roll around against the metal floor, against a rough-barked tree, against a sanding block, anything, so long as she could rid herself of this dry burning aching shallow hateful itch.
“Whoa, Sis,” Jenks said, skidding to a halt as she rounded a corner. “You almost ran me—” His words stopped once he got a look at her. “Holy shit, you look terrible.”
“Thanks, Jenks, you’re such a help,” she said, continuing on her way. She wasn’t embarrassed, she told herself, just angry. Yes, angry that this had happened at all, angry at how many times in her life she’d had to put up with it, angry at people not just leaving her the hell alone.
“Sissix, hey,” Rosemary said, appearing from behind a door, scrib in hand. “I was coming to see—oh.” Her dumb, wet mammal eyes widened. She brought a hand to her mouth.
“I’m fine,” Sissix said, never pausing for a moment. With as big as the ship was, you’d think it possible for a person to get from point A to point B without constantly running into—“Fuck off, Corbin,” Sissix said to the pink Human, who had just ascended from the lower decks. He froze at the top of the staircase, looking stupid and confused as she hurried past.
She burst into the med bay, shutting the door as soon as she was through. Dr. Chef looked up from his work station. He rumbled sympathetically.
“Oh, poor girl,” he said. “You’re molting.”
“I’m early, too.” She glanced at herself in the mirror. Blistering pockets of dead skin had separated from her face, tearing raggedly at the edges. “I didn’t think I’d start for another three tendays, and I haven’t—aargh!” The itch started up again, though it had never really stopped. Her whole face felt like it was crawling with flies. She gave in to the impulse and clawed.
“Hey, now, none of that,” Dr. Chef said, coming forward to take her wrists. “You’ll hurt yourself.”
“No, I won’t,” Sissix said. She was acting childish, but she didn’t care. Her face was about to fall off. She had a right to be petulant.
Dr. Chef pushed up her sleeve. “Really,” he said. He lifted her arm so she could see the light claw marks on her flaking skin. A faint crust of blood lingered where her claws had scratched too deep during the night.
“Stars, you’re parental sometimes,” Sissix mumbled.
“I feed you and heal you, how else am I supposed to be? Take off that robe. Let’s sort you out.”
“Thank you.” She took off her robe as Dr. Chef opened a storage panel. He took out a misting bottle and a riksith—a small, flat board with a rough coating on one side. Kizzy had once called it “a nail file for your entire self.”
“Where’s worst?” Dr. Chef asked.
Sissix lay back on the examination table. “Everywhere.” She sighed. “My arms, I guess.”
Dr. Chef gently took her right arm, the one with the bloody patch, and sprayed medicated mist over it. The dry skin went translucent, lifting at the edges. He went to work with the riksith, rubbing the wet pieces away. Sissix breathed a little easier, urging the rest of her body to be patient. Dr. Chef took one of her fingers between his own, examining it. “How’s the skin feel here?”
“Tight. It’s not ready to come up.”
“Oh, I think it is. It just doesn’t know it yet.” He moistened her skin, and with steady pressure, massaged her hand from wrist to claws. After a few minutes, she could feel an edge come loose near her wrist. Dr. Chef worked his fingers underneath, carefully, gripping it between two fingerpads. In one swift motion, he tore the dead skin free from her entire hand, like pulling off a glove.
Sissix yelped, then moaned. The new skin was sensitive, but the itch there was gone. She exhaled. “Stars, you’re good at that.”
“I’ve had some practice,” he said, continuing up her arm with the riksith.
Sissix craned her neck up to make sure the door was fully closed. “Do you ever get tired of Humans?”
“On occasion. I think that’s normal for anyone living with people other than their own. I’m sure they get tired of us, too.”
“I’m definitely tired of them today,” Sissix said, laying her head back. “I’m tired of their fleshy faces. I’m tired of their smooth fingertips. I’m tired of how they pronounce their Rs. I’m tired of their inability to smell anything. I’m tired of how clingy they get around kids that don’t even belong to them. I’m tired of how neurotic they are about being naked. I want to smack every single one of them around until they realize how needlessly complicated they make their families and their social lives and their—their everything.”
Dr. Chef nodded. “You love them and you understand them, but sometimes you wish they—and me and Ohan, too, I’m sure—could be more like ordinary people.”