Chapter 14

Aboard his ship, Captain Beac was busy considering his next actions. So far he had met the beasts and come away from the meeting convinced that the beasts didn't represent an immediate threat despite how dangerous the beasts ranked on the Gnord scale. He took into account the fact that other Quatyl had adopted them as pets. He assumed that there was at least a modicum of control over the beasts. It was inconceivable to him that they would have absolutely no control over them.

The concerns that had been the foundation for the Gnord's solution didn't apply to what he had discovered during the course of his investigation. He wasn't entirely sure what the situation was and that bothered him. Although he was in overall command of the mission, he felt the need for more advice. Using a Slathern, he commanded, 'Have one of the reserve ships come here.'

Before relaying the order, Teac asked, 'Will the Humans feel threatened if another ship approaches?'

The question took Captain Beac by surprise. In the past, the ability to mentally control the occupants of other ships meant that they didn't have to worry about the reaction of the alien species. He said, 'Inform the beasts that another of our ships will be joining us.'

'They call themselves Humans, ' Teac answered. He had been spending all of his time trying to learn the language used by the individuals aboard the alien ship. He had learned that the term beast was not viewed too favorably by the humans.

'Inform the Humans that another of our ships will be joining us, ' Captain Beac said. He couldn't decide if Human sounded beastly enough to describe the species.

'Maybe we should ask them if it would be okay, ' Teac said feeling a little nervous. The more he learned about the humans, the more he feared them. The Quatyl from Earth had warned him that humans didn't react too well to surprises. He said, 'We can't really order them around.'

'Okay, ask them, ' Captain Beac said feeling a little uncomfortable. He was finding it difficult dealing with the beasts. It was strange having to take into account their feelings.

Aboard the Earth ship, James turned off the alarm he had set on the two ships just as the one ship headed towards them. It had gone from sitting in space to moving towards them almost instantaneously. As he watched the speed of the ship climb, he said, "Wow. This one is really approaching very fast."

Captain Klein asked, "How fast?"

"Eighty times light speed," James answered double checking the numbers that appeared on his computer monitor.

"Eighty times light speed?" Captain Klein asked incredulously. He had thought that the earlier approach of twenty times light speed had been fast.

"That's right," James answered. It was still difficult for him to understand just how big space was. The nearest star to the sun, Proxima Centuri, is over four light years away. Even at eighty times the speed of light, the trip would take twenty days. His fingers flew across the keyboard and he said, "At that rate, they'll be here in less than ten days. Of course, they'll have to slow down as they approach us. There is too much space junk around us."

"I'm impressed," Captain Klein said watching the progress of the ship on the monitor. It was moving in a corkscrew manner as it avoided obstacles in space.

James watched the ship maneuver around the bodies in the space. It seemed to him that they were making corrections for the next obstacle even before they passed the current obstacle. He said, "They must have some killer navigation software. It looks like I've got some work cut out for me."

Sitting back in his chair, Captain Klein turned to James and said, "At least they asked permission for their other ship to approach."

"That's true. They are a very cute and polite species. They kind of remind me of me," James said.

Captain Klein thought he was going to choke.

Ken and James were relaxing in the dining hall. Anticipating a long story about having naked women performing outrageous obscene acts upon his body, Ken asked, "What would you do if you could control minds?"

"Get into trouble," James answered with a grin. Seeing how Ken had rolled his eyes, he said, "Okay, I'd get into more trouble than usual."

"I'm serious," Ken said looking over at James.

"So am I," James said.

Ken said, "You wouldn't be tempted by the chance to control a woman or two?"

James looked over at Ken and said, "What do you think my wife would do when I started controlling the minds of women? She'd filet me."

"You could control her mind," Ken said looking over at James.

James snorted and said, "She's not a woman, she's my wife! Women become wives when they get married. Don't you know that wives are immune to mind control?"

"I didn't think about it like that," Ken said imagining Kim catching him trying to get a horde of women to do something really kinky with him. He couldn't imagine any degree of mind control that could save him from her wrath. It would require an entire horde of women to stand between him and her for him to have any chances of surviving. If the horde of women were busy protecting him, there wouldn't be any women left over for his fantasies. Horrified by the images invoked, he said, "You're right."

"So why do you ask?"

Shrugging his shoulders, Ken said, "I've been thinking about mind control a lot lately. I was thinking about how I wouldn't have to work another day of my life."

James had been thinking about mind control as well. He wondered if Ken's thoughts were along the same lines as his. He asked, "So why are you so interested in mind control?"

"Well, I keep asking myself how the Quatyl came to be captains of space ships. There's no way they can physically build and operate a space ship," Ken said. They couldn't even talk to each other without use of the Slathern. It really did make the question of how the Quatyl reached space a very interesting subject for discussion.

"You're right. They can't use tools," James said. "I suggested to Starman that we superglue some tools to his feet to see if he could use a wrench, but the little fellow objected strongly to the suggestion."

Ken laughed at the mental image that suggested. He said, "I imagine that he was quite upset over the idea."

"You could say that. I didn't know that Quatyl knew how to swear," James said shaking his head.

"I had no idea," Ken said with a laugh.

James said, "There is one thing that I know for sure; they can't use tools."

Ken nodded his head and said, "They could if they were controlling another species using mind control."

James said, "You know, I've been thinking the same thing. When ever I've tried to get some information out of Starman about how it was that the Quatyl managed to reach space he changes the subject."

"So does Fire," Ken said. They weren't the only ones wondering about the Quatyl. A lot of people were asking how the Quatyl managed to make it into space.

"So which one of us is going to confront the Quatyl with the accusation that they control minds?" James asked. One glance at Ken gave him the feeling that he wasn't going to like the answer. Holding up his hands in protest, he said, "Not me."

"You're the perfect person," Ken said.

"Why me?" James asked with a frown.

"The general consensus on board the ship is that you're the least stable of all of us. I imagine that makes you the most difficult to control. If you can't control your thoughts, then who can?" Ken said.

"I would argue with that, but I doubt I would win that argument," James said.

"Argue with what? That you are the least stable person on board the ship or that your lack of stability makes you difficult to control?" Ken asked with a grin.

"I'm not difficult to control," James said.

Shaking his head, Ken said, "I've got to hear this. What makes you think that you aren't difficult to control?"

"Experience. I do everything Ann tells me to do. Her control over me is absolute," James said with a vigorous nod of his head.

"That argument won't stand up for a minute. You forget that I know just how well you listen to her," Ken said with a laugh.

James shrugged his shoulders and said, "Okay. I'm a little difficult to control."

"So that makes you the logical choice to deal with the Quatyl," Ken said. Elsewhere on the ship, Kim, Ann, Captain Klein, and the rest of the crew had come to the same conclusion. It didn't take long for the Quatyl to learn about it.

Captain Beac listened to the report from the Quatyl aboard the other ship with a growing sense of horror. He didn't fully understand the full scope of the Human prejudice against slavery. The only thing that he did understand was that they were likely to have a very dangerous enemy once the beasts became aware of how the Quatyl had achieved space faring status.

The servant races listened to the same report with a sense of hope. They wondered if the Quatyl would have to release them from almost continuous mental control in order to avoid the wrath of the Earth beasts. There was a real sense that their misery was about to come to an end.

Their euphoria took a downward spiral when they finally tapped into the entertainment being broadcast from Earth. It was rather unfortunate that the first broadcast that they managed to unscramble was a movie about Roman gladiators. Everyone sentient being on the space ship watched the screen in horror as men fought men in front of cheering crowds. It was hard to say what was most disturbing about the entire movie. Not one species represented on the ship had ever produced anything comparable as entertainment.

About midway through the movie, Bear turned to her mate and said, "Beac, I think that we are in trouble."

"I agree," Beac said watching the screen as lions were released into the coliseum. It boggled his mind that the cheers of the crowd were just as loud when the people died as when the lions were killed.

With a real sense of growing fear, Bear asked, "What should we do?"

"I guess we should send this to Quatyl Space Command," Beac said. He could only imagine how they would react to it.

"What do you think they'll do with this information?" Bear asked.

"They'll give the problem to a Gnord, but I fear that the Humans will wipe us out before it has a chance to come up with an answer," Beac said watching a human lying on the ground in submission and then being killed while the crowd roared.

Looking at James, Captain Klein asked, "Whose bright idea was it to put balloons in the airlock?"

A number of people on the bridge started chuckling. Anke, the Captain's wife, had gone into one of the airlocks to repair a solar panel. When the air had been removed, the partially filled balloons that had been taped to the ceiling had expanded to many times their original size. As she had discovered the hard way, fifty balloons were enough to completely fill the space in the airlock.