The strain of spinning these tales sometimes gave Blade sleepless hours. He didn't want to lie to Riyannah. He was sure he wouldn't have to, if everything was up to the two of them. But neither of them was their own master. If he told Riyannah the truth, could he trust her not to tell other Kananites who might take advantage of the information? Probably not. Then what would happen to him if the Kananites decided they should try ripping the Dimension X secret out of him?
Blade had still another reason for leaving out some of the uglier details of Home Dimension Earth. Riyannah said that the Kananites had outlawed war a thousand years ago. What would she think of an account of World War II? She might understand why Blade was willing to help stop Loyun Chard, the Hitler of Targa. She might also think Blade came from a race of bloodthirsty maniacs. What would happen then?
On the tenth day they picked up a radio signal that Riyannah said came from a patrol ship. On the twelfth day they were able to reply and exchange messages. Two days after that a Menel-crewed patrol ship matched courses with them and took them aboard. There was no way to salvage their crippled ship, so she was allowed to continue on course. In time she would leave the Targan system entirely and become another derelict wandering endlessly through the freezing emptiness of interstellar space.
Three days more traveling brought them to the asteroid base.
Chapter 13
It took Blade quite a while to get used to the sights at the asteroid base.
The base took up most of the asteroid, an oval chunk of rock about twenty miles long and twelve miles thick. Most of it was a mass of workshops, spaceship hangars, laboratories and observatories, and living quarters. Everything was connected by a maze of tunnels and elevators. About two-thirds of the asteroid was strictly out of bounds to Blade.
In the very center of the asteroid was an artificial cave a mile and a half wide and a thousand feet high. The floor of the cave was a carefully tended park, with flowers, lawns, full-sized trees, and even a small lake.
Scattered through the park were dozens of buildings of as many different shapes, sizes, and uses. Blade saw buildings made of brick, metal, wood, and plastic. He saw a few whose walls weren't even solid matter, but shimmering golden force fields. He saw shops, restaurants, public baths, athletic fields, and secluded vine-grown pavilions for open-air lovemaking.
Everywhere he saw both Kananites and Menel moving about and mingling freely, with less strain than he'd seen between tourists and local people in Paris or London. Kananites drifted into Menel-owned shops and came out with small bottles of brown powder that Riyannah said were spices. Menel either stood at tables or lay on couches since they could not sit in Kananite-owned restaurants-using three-tined forks to demolish huge plates of fried vegetables and emptying copper steins of what looked like pink beer.
Eventually Blade got used to ducking flying claws when Menel got into particularly heated arguments. He got used to pointing out items on a menu to a waiter who looked like an eight-foot stalk of asparagus and held a computerized notepad in a foot-long claw like a lobster's. He even got used to telling when one of the Menel had drunk more than he could handle.
«It doesn't happen very often,» said Riyannah. «Their systems can absorb so much alcohol that they usually get indigestion before they get drunk. But sometimes one has a-a 'cast-iron stomach,' you call it?»
«Yes.»
«Then it-«
«It?»
«Yes. The Menel are neuter except when they want to reproduce, and they never do that except on their home planet.»
«Do they avoid sex when they're neuter?»
«Oh no, the external organs still function. They just have a different set of rituals and techniques.» Riyannah hesitated. «In fact, their organs are physically compatible with Kananite sex organs. Some of the more-curious-of both races have developed methods for sex with each other.»
Blade tried hard to imagine what that must look like and failed completely. He also hoped he wouldn't have to try interspecies sex in order to be accepted among either the Kananites or the Menel. He was a fairly broad-minded and experienced man, but he did have his limits.
«I think we were talking about liquor, not sex,» he said to Riyannah. «So the Menel sometimes get drunk. Then what happens?»
«Sometimes they just fall asleep. The rest of the time-if you ever see a Menel walking and holding himself absolutely straight and rigid, keep out of its way. When they drink they stop swaying.»
«Unlike my people, who start swaying when they've had too much to drink,» said Blade. They were sitting in an outdoor cafe, and he divided the last of a bottle of wine between his cup and Riyannah's.
«Kananites too,» said Riyannah, running her hand up his arm to his shoulder. «Shall we sway off somewhere together and find a nice quiet patch of grass?»
«Sounds like a damned good idea,» said Blade. That was the end of a serious conversation for several hours.
The Menel and the Kananites seemed to have worked out a fairly complete system of sign language, allowing for the physical differences between them. The Menel had no fingers, but they did have two extra arms. Blade saw entire meals ordered and large purchases made in shops without a single word or sound.
Every so often, though, Menel and Kananites wanted to conduct more detailed conversations, for business or pleasure or simple curiosity. Then they needed help.
Every hundred yards or so all over the central cave were clusters of red globes perched on green poles. Each globe had a set of dials and buttons on each side, as well as earplugs and microphones hung on hooks. When a Menel and a Kananite wanted to talk, they found a vacant globe, stepped up to opposite sides, and put on the earplugs and microphones. Then they would settle down for anything from a few minutes to a few hours, taking turns listening and talking.
Some of the globes stood alone. Most were in clusters of four to six, and in the shopping centers there were a few clusters with as many as fifteen or twenty globes. Blade saw one group of thirteen Menel and twelve Kananites take over one of the large clusters and settle down for a long conference. In fact, the conference went on so long that somebody eventually ordered dinner and a swarm of Menel and robot waiters brought out a dozen carts loaded with food and drink.
«That's the first dinner party I've ever seen where all the conversation has to go through a computerized translator,» said Blade. «It might be a good idea to apply back home to fight bores. Somebody gets drunk or tries to monopolize the conversation, you pull the plug, and that's the last of him for the rest of the evening!»
Riyannah laughed. «I've been tempted to do that a few times myself. Some of the Menel take themselves so seriously. The Goran of Scientists are about the worst. But it's considered very bad manners to cut somebody off unless they've actually gone to sleep, turned violet, or started making love.
«The content and structure of the two languages aren't too far apart,» Riyannah went on. «In fact they're amazingly close together, considering how physically different we and the Menel are.»
«I know what you mean,» Blade said. «Our own scientists have sometimes argued that two races from different worlds could only understand each other if they were physically alike. Perhaps that's why I found it so easy to learn Targan.»
«Perhaps,» said Riyannah. They were both silent for a moment, remembering that Blade's similarity to the Targans had already caused some trouble and might cause more.