15.2. Sixty-Forty Denton Wyle

Denton rolled away from the Sapphian female, breathing hard. He stretched and yawned.

“I bring you food now,” she said.

“Thank you,” he responded in Sapphian.

She got up, tying her little skirt in place, and left him to bathe with the bowl of warm water she’d brought earlier.

He’d been in the village for, jeez, it had to be a couple of months now, and so far they’d sent a different female every morning. He did a few calisthenics, idly wondering if they considered it an insult to send a repeat and hoping that he wouldn’t be stuck doing the very old and the very young eventually out of some bizarre hospitality requirements.

Not that he had to worry anytime soon. There were several thousand Sapphians living in the horseshoe gorge, and lots and lots of them were nubile females. Yes, lots and lots.

Whistling, he walked to the basin. The air was warm and soft on his skin. He splashed some water around on his body and shaved his face with a primitive knife. A sharp, flintlike stone served as the blade. The iron age had evidently not yet put in an appearance. The shaving sucked, but there was no way he was doing a Tom Hanks. The Sapphians didn’t grow beards, and he had a hard-enough time fitting in as it was.

He put his own clothes back on. Fitting in was one thing, but wearing those little Sapphian skirts was just not going to happen.

They’d given him his own hut. It was like all the others—a one-room structure made of dried mud with a roof woven from huge rubbery fronds. It was cozy, in a me-Tarzan-you-Jane kind of way. It was not a suite at the Ritz. His mother would have a cow or maybe even a whole herd. He wondered if she knew he was missing by now. He wondered if she had penciled ten minutes into her busy routine to shed a freaking tear.

“Your breakfast.” The female returned with a wooden bowl of cut fruit and a sticky tapiocalike grain.

“Thank you, Gertrude.” He smiled.

The female gave him a typically blank Sapphian smile, her eyes on his cheek, and left.

The Sapphian village was spread throughout the horseshoe gorge, paths connecting clusters of huts, each cluster designed around a center circle. His hut was on the largest community circle, the place where everyone ate the evening meal and enjoyed the subsequent dancing and carousing. It was, you might say, prime real estate. During the afternoon siesta the circle was used for lounging and visiting, and in the mornings it was filled with women and children. The women soaked and dyed the silky husks they used to make clothing, while the young children clambered about like sleek little rats.

It wasn’t that Denton disliked children. He didn’t have an opinion one way or the other. But these weren’t exactly children, were they? And anyway, he’d be damned if he was going to spend another morning watching husks turn red. At this early hour, with the Sapphian sky a fresh, light aqua, the men and boys were gathering to form work committees. Denton walked over and joined a group of men.

“Allook saheed does not need to work,” one of the men said to him, motioning him away oh, so politely.

“I know.” Denton smiled. “But I want to work.”

The man looked surprised, as if Denton had said he’d like to join a chain gang. “If allook saheed wishes?”

“Yes, thank you, but I want to work.”

The man took Denton to join a group of young males. They greeted him like he was the second coming. He bobbed his head and said hello to each of them in turn, “Ta zhecta. Ta zhecta. Ta zhecta.” His neck had grown stiff from all the bobbing. He had probably dislocated a disk or two.

The eight of them headed down a path into the jungle. Denton found himself paired with a young male he’d noticed before. “Hey, John.”

The boy looked at him in confusion. “Zhohn?”

“I can’t say your name. Can I? What is it?”

The boy rattled off something with at least three k’s. Denton had learned basic Sapphian, because there was no way he could live without being able to wheedle. But the names were harder than everyday speech and, anyway, calling them by human names was a small-enough illusion.

“See? I cannot say that. I say ‘John,’ okay?”

“Zhohn,” the boy repeated, looking pleased. “I like this name.”

Like all the Sapphians, John was a beautiful creature. His feet were long and thin, inhuman-looking, with those sticky gecko toes. They reminded Denton of angel’s feet—except for the dirt and the rough red inner edge where the skin had calloused. John was only now coming into manhood, and he looked like Peter Pan or Puck, the eternal boy. Well, sort of. He might have looked like that if not for a birth defect, a withered right hand. Denton had noticed him before because such things were rare among the Sapphians. It was a surprise that it was rare, actually, given that there wasn’t a plastic surgeon for a couple of million light-years.

“What are we doing today?” Denton asked him.

“We pick fruit.”

“Is that right?” It didn’t sound too difficult. Not breathtakingly exciting, either.

“The true way is: I pick. You catch.” John’s eyes twinkled.

“That is how it works, eh?”

“Yes.”

“Are you good at picking fruit?”

“So good the fruit comes to me. I don’t even climb the tree.”

Denton realized he was being teased. And John was looking directly into his eyes. Denton felt ridiculously grateful at being treated like, well, like a person. A lump clogged his throat. “I want to see that.”

“You will see. I am Mighty John.” The boy struck his chest in a machismo gesture. His own use of the fake name made him giggle childishly. Denton laughed, too.

The vista as they walked was a pretty one. They passed a stream where the water sparkled, reflecting the green of the jungle in glints of emeralds. A delicate fernlike moss covered the banks of the stream like lace. They passed a tree that was curved like a woman and had a climbing vine up its length with bright red flowers the size of Denton’s head.

Jesus, it was beautiful. It was not LA and never would be. The lump in his throat throbbed.

“Listen, John? Are there other things to see away from here? Maybe…” Denton wracked his brain for vocabulary. “Maybe big water? Or other villages? Other people?”

John looked away into the distance as they walked, the smile fading from his face. “Away from here? I have never left the gorge in my life.”

“No? Maybe you heard stories?”

“No person leaves the gorge. Never.” John’s tone indicated that the very idea was inconceivable. His eyes went nervously to the others.

Denton got the idea that this was not a welcome topic of conversation, but he found the whole thing perplexing. The gorge was a gorgeous place, sure. But what kind of a people would not explore their own planet? Out of sheer boredom if nothing else.

“Why, John? Why do people never leave the gorge?”

John turned and met his eyes. He looked frightened and his words were quiet and urgent. “It is not safe. It is very dangerous out there. You must not go out there, friend.”

“Oh,” Denton said. “Okay.”

John had not been bragging by much. Of the eight of them, he was the only one who climbed the trees, the job apparently being his specialty. He chose a paava tree first, its trunk smooth and straight and covered with tough, needlelike spines. John wrapped rags around his wrists and feet and mounted the tree, agile as a circus performer.

Denton worked with two of the other males handling a large net. They manipulated it to catch the fruit as John tossed it down. Every few minutes they swooped the contents of the net to the ground and the remaining males gathered the fruit into bundles.