Bruce enfolded one of her hands in his. “Thank you, Juna. That means a lot to me.”
Juna smiled despite the sudden stab of longing in her heart. “I’m glad,” she said. “I should go. Moki’s waiting for me.”
“I’ll let you know if I find someone willing to help,” Bruce told her.
Juna nodded her thanks as she started to dress, unable to speak past the sudden lump in her throat. She dressed quickly, fleeing the hungers that Bruce had stirred up. In the safe privacy of her cabin, she threw herself down on the bed and gave in to pent-up tears of loneliness.
A soft touch on her shoulder interrupted her. It was Moki. Wiping her eyes, Juna sat up.
“What’s the matter, siti?” Moki asked.
Juna forced a thin smile. “I’m just tired, bai.”
Moki sat beside her on the bed and held out his spurs. They linked. Juna relaxed in the bami’s gentle presence. She might never have children of her own, but she had Moki. She floated in Mold’s love and caring, letting her own love for him rise up and flow out of her until they drifted in a dark, silent pool of warmth and safety. The two of them rested there, savoring the harmony of allu-a for a while, before emerging from the link. Juna opened her eyes and sat up. Her pain and loneliness had been eased for the moment, though she knew it would return again.
’Thank you, Moki. I feel much better.”
He touched her arm. “What is the matter, siti? This is a human sadness; allu-a cannot wash it away. Please explain it to me.”
“Oh, bai,” Juna said, taking Moki’s slender hands in hers, “you are a good bami, but this is an old sadness. Nothing can be done about it.”
“Please tell me what it is anyway, siti.”
Juna closed her eyes and rubbed her face with her hands.
“Sometimes— ” She paused, unsure of how to go on. “Sometimes I wish I was married and had family and a child of my own. It has nothing to do with you, Moki, please understand that. In fact you make things easier, because in so many ways you fill the need I have for a child. I was married once, to a nice family, but it didn’t last. I was away too much. Eventually, they divorced me.”
She sighed sadly, remembering how lost and alone she had felt then. Her father had taken her back, had been glad to see her. She had moped around the house, avoiding Toivo, who was surrounded by his happy family and bursting with pride over his newborn son, Danan. As soon as she could, Juna fled back into space. Two years later, the pain had diminished, and she spent most of her next leave getting to know Danan, who was a boisterous toddler. Toivo’s family, busy with two more youngsters and a new spouse, was grateful to Juna for looking after him. Her six months of leave had been over too quickly. Danan cried when she left, and, much to her surprise, had flung himself into her arms with a joyful bellow when she returned two and a half years later. He showed her over the whole farm, his treasures, and his hiding places. It was like being a child again. She had missed him keenly during her years away.
“Why don’t you just go ahead and have a baby?” Moki asked.
“A human baby isn’t like a Tendu bami,” Juna explained. “They’re completely helpless. They need constant supervision and care for the first several years of their lives. It’s very difficult to do alone. You need people to help you. That’s why we have families. Besides, I can’t have a baby all by myself. I need to have sex with someone to get pregnant.”
“You’re having sex with Bruce. Is he going to make you pregnant?”
Juna wasn’t in the mood to discuss complex issues like contraception and population control. “No,” she said. “I’ve taken steps to keep from getting pregnant. Actually, I’m much more worried about getting off this ship and going home again. I’m sad that I don’t have a baby, but I’ll get over it. I always have before. I appreciate your worrying about it, but this is not a problem you need to solve.”
“Forgive me, siti,” Moki said, deepening to brown in shame, his delicate, fanlike ears drooping.
“Oh, Moki,” Juna said, putting her arm around him, “it’s all right. You were trying to help, and you have. Thank you, bai.”
Moki brightened at her praise.
“I have some work to do now. Why don’t you check on Ukatonen?”
Obedient as always, Moki left her to her work. Juna smiled a little sadly. He was more independent than a human child. Sometimes she wished that he needed her more. He slipped out of her grasp like a breeze floating out through an open window.
Juna sighed and woke her computer. She scanned the jjewsnet files, downloading all the articles she could find on the Tendu. The popular response to the Tendu was divided into two camps. There was the fear camp, which immediately began trying to determine what kind of a threat the Tendu posed. And there was the somewhat smaller, but no less avid, awe camp, which spoke of how the Tendu had come to heal the human race, and exalted them as noble savages. Several of the gushier articles gave Juna the giggles; the rest just made her feel vaguely queasy.
A small group of net reporters held the middle ground, dispensing informative and objective articles about the Tendu. They were, most of them, cautiously optimistic, but were waiting for further details.
Among the latter group of reporters, Analin Goudrian’s work stood out. She had a deeper insight than most of the other journalists, and the glimmerings of a sense of humor filtered through the objective prose. She seemed genuinely interested and curious about the Tendu for themselves, not in terms of what they meant to humanity. Juna created a file of her stories to look through the next morning, shut down the computer, and went to bed.
The next morning, before breakfast, she read through Goudrian’s story file, then downloaded as much background material as she could about the reporter. Goudrian was in her thirties, only four years younger than Juna. Juna could not help smiling back at the slender, dark-haired reporter’s photograph. She was from the Nederlands, in northern Europe, which was a good sign. Juna had always admired the Dutch people’s history of tolerance. Goudrian had been a stringer for WorldNet for six years. Before that, she’d had several vastly different jobs, ranging from Ecorps worker to tour guide to net gofer. She had graduated from the University of Amsterdam with advanced degrees in anthropology and cultural preservation. That explained a great deal. Anthropologists, unlike the Alien Contact people, actually got some practice in their discipline.
Juna realized that she had made up her mind. She copied out the background information on Goudrian and headed off for a well-earned breakfast.
“How’s it going?” Bruce asked.
“I’m about ready to contact someone,” Juna said.
“I’ll let my friend know,” Bruce told her.
After breakfast, Juna found Moki sitting beside the pile of moist leaves that concealed Ukatonen’s sleeping form. She told the bami about her plans, and showed him her file on the reporter. Moki read it over, his skin a pensive dark blue.
“What do you think, bai?” she said when he was done reading.
Moki studied Goudrian’s photograph carefully. “She looks like a nice human, siti. But you are my sitik. You must find the best way to get us off this ship.”
Juna squatted down beside the bami. “I know, but this is risky. I could get us quarantined here forever by contacting this woman. I have only a little control over what kind of story she chooses to tell, and even less control over whether this works.” She glanced down at Ukato-nen’s leaf-shrouded form. “I wish Ukatonen was awake.”
Moki laid a hand on her arm. “What is making you hesitate, siti?”
Juna sighed. “I don’t want to make things worse. I don’t want to fail.”
“It is your decision, siti,” Moki said. “But I think there is little you can do to make this situation worse.”