A Web Serial by M.C.A. Hogarth
| 85. Empathy, Unexpected. | 87. Reunions. |
|---|
86. Spots is Dancing(2)
Conference Room. Platoon Leader Big Lion, the tall woman with epicanthic folds and bronze hair, is showing the new rounds to the squad leaders and talking. The sergeants pick up the tranks assigned to them as they listen.
Sickbay. Peaches leaning over a tray and pointing to Avril's display. He zooms in on the new traps installed by the Seabees, tags them and starts typing notes into the field as she explains them. They start going back and forth over a tactical plan while Peaches's food grows cold.
Engineering. Drones upside down on tables, their chipsets missing, frowning men and women around them.
Technician 1: ****, that's the fourth one they've gotten. At this rate we're going to have to send the ****ing vacuums.
Avril in the lieutenant's office typing.
Captain:
We urgently request the assignment of a new intelligence officer to replace the one we recently lost to a crab playing dead...
Two days later, the Test Facility. Fang2 has already left and Fang1 is just out the door, mopping the sweat off the back of her neck.
Claws. "You ready?"
Spots. "Actually, I have an appointment to keep with Samuel-Colt."
Claws. "What's this now?"
Spots. "Remember I promised him music?"
Claws. "Ohhhh, yeah. Guess I'm escortin', eh?"
Spots. "I don't know that you have to, but you can."
Claws. "At your service then, Mom."
Spots smiles at him and heads for the Fiddler's room. When they announce themselves, Samuel-Colt bids them enter. He is... reading a book.
Claws. "You read, too?" Checks the ratty cover. "Aw, hell. A romance novel? You're into the base stash."
Samuel-Colt, amused rising arpeggio. "Yes? Should we not check them out?"
Claws. "Well, if you're gonna, not that one. That one sucked powerful bad. I wanted to face-punch Cindy by page 40. Go for the 'Simmerin' Desire' series if you're down to the romance novels."
Spots is staring at him.
Claws. "What? You get friggin' bored enough you'll read anything. And I do mean anything."
Samuel-Colt, still amused. "What brings the Mother-soldier and her escort here?"
Spots. "I promised music..."
Samuel-Colt, sudden note, rising, leaping. "Ah! Yes!"
Spots looks around. "You have a terminal...?"
"There, by the desk. Would you like refreshment? I have made tea."
While Spots loads a playlist, Claws says: "You drink tea?"
Samuel-Colt rises and comes back with a tray with iron cups and a teapot decorated with a meadow in relief. One of its blowing grasses forms the handle, another the spout. "It is a long story."
Claws. "Lemme guess. Some Japanese bigwig taught you the tea ceremony."
Samuel-Colt saws a pained note. "No. Someone thought we looked like the sort of creature who would appreciate a tea ceremony and attempted to re-enact one to impress us."
Claws, laughing. "Ouch. 'You seem alien! You might like the Japanese!' "
Samuel-Colt. "Just so. We have since forgotten as much of the situation as possible. The beverage was blameless, so we still drink it."
Spots joins them as her music starts playing.
Samuel-Colt, curious. "What have you brought me?"
Spots. "Everything I like to dance to." A grin. "We won't get through all of it tonight."
Samuel-Colt, holding tea-cup. "This song has vocalists."
Spots. "Yes...? I notice you're usually listening to orchestral work. Do the Violinists prefer their music without words?"
Samuel-Colt. "Ahh... actually, the first music we ever heard was a cappella." At their glances, he finishes, "We learned music from our ocean's great sea mammals. Much like your whales, they sing."
Claws. "No **—kiddin'! Whales?"
Samuel-Colt. "Yes. They are larger and more numerous than the Earth equivalent, and their songs are part of the ocean, like the texture of water and the color of light through waves. We were always aware of music. We always danced. But we did not realize that someone made the song until we grew older. And then... ah, everything changed."
Spots, whispered. "Wow."
Samuel-Colt. "For generations, we followed the singers. They allowed us to cling to their sides as they traversed their great migration paths, journeys they undertook each season but that lasted several of our generations. We learned a great deal from them, living and dying and being born among them. Some of our theologians believe music taught us to order our thoughts." Listening. "This music has a very active bass line. It is not unlike our racial memories of those first songs."
Claws. "Crap! You—of course. You can remember that far back, can't you. You can't not remember that far back."
Samuel-Colt inclines his head.
Spots, looking at her tea-cup. "Huh. So that means... well, no wonder you're so good with us. You've been working alongside mammals since time out of mind."
Samuel-Colt. "Just so, Mother. We give it a name, in fact. 'Warmblood view,' maybe, I would translate it. The perspective of creatures like you."
Spots. "So you dance. And you sing!"
Samuel-Colt. "We do, Mother. To honor our teachers."
Spots. "Do you?"
Samuel-Colt. "Honor our teachers?"
Spots, laughing. "No, dance."
Samuel-Colt hesitates. "Mother-soldier, our dancing is a thing in the water, and we—we, that is, I and my embodied lineage—are creatures of this earth."
Spots. "Well, so am I and I can dance. That's no reason to give it up!"
Samuel-Colt. "..."
Samuel-Colt. "We would not even begin to know how."
Claws. "Aw, geez. I know where this is goin'. Someone cue the montage."
Spots glares at him. He lifts his hands. "Don't look at me. This white boy ain't gonna teach an alien to dance."
Samuel-Colt to Spots. "You would do this? Teach us?"
Spots. "Yes! Music belongs to everyone. And everyone should be allowed to dance, poorly or not." She stands up. "Would you like to try?"
Samuel-Colt. "We would like some time to... to grow accustomed to the idea...!"
Spots. "Nu-uh. That's just a way to talk yourself into never trying. Come on." She offers her hands. "Up."
Samuel-Colt's rising somehow conveys uncertainty. He spreads his upper hands. "And now?"
Spots. "And now... you move." And she demonstrates. Claws pushes back until he's against the wall, watching with tea-cup in hand. As the music scrolls from trance to electronica to classical guitar, from folk songs to alternative, Spots dances, stops, shows the alien a movement until he copies it... and continues.
...and at some point, though exactly when none of them can tell, Samuel-Colt is dancing.
| 85. Empathy, Unexpected. | 87. Reunions. |
|---|
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