Part 1

THE PRICE OF EGGS

By RANDALL GARRETT

ILLUSTRATED by SUMMERS

_Royal babies were pretty important on Dynak, even if they did hatch out of eggs. So when Boccaccio di Vino mated with the Shannil, everyone held their breath. Especially di Vino. He might not have much more of it._

[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Fantastic Science Fiction Stories December 1959. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]

"You'll find things a lot different out here, Lieutenant," said Colonel Hastings as he eyed the newly-arrived officer in a manner which was intended to be detached, and which failed by a narrow margin to do quite that. He levelled his gaze.

Lieutenant Donald John Newhouse nodded his head just the slightest and said, "Yes, sir."

"I appreciate the fact that you have been specially trained for this work," the colonel went on, "and I appreciate that Sector Headquarters must think very highly of you to send you out on something like this. But it is my own personal opinion that it takes more than theoretical work to understand the situation on an alien planet that one has never visited. You've got to live with it."

"Yes, sir," said Lieutenant Newhouse again. There was little else he could say; there was no point in arguing with the colonel. He was well aware that Colonel Hastings was angry because he had been unable to solve the problem that was facing him here on Dynak, and because Sector Headquarters had sent in a new man to do it--and a fresh-faced junior officer, at that. Logically, the colonel should have been angry with himself, not with Newhouse, but man does not function by logic alone.

Colonel Hastings toyed with a pink paperweight with one hand and scratched his button nose with the other, while his eyes remained steadily on Newhouse. "I also appreciate the fact that you...."

Newhouse listened respectfully to what the colonel had to say, mentally making a note to the effect that Colonel Hastings, on his own word, was a very appreciative man. He seemed to appreciate everything.

"... And I assure you that you will have every bit of data which we have so far obtained at your disposal."

He paused, and Newhouse, sensing that he should make some reply, said: "Thank you, sir; that will be very helpful."

The colonel sighed. "Very well. Don't hesitate to call on me for anything, Lieutenant. And--uh--" He paused suddenly looking wistful, like a kicked collie.

"Yes, sir?" said Newhouse respectfully.

"--uh--I trust you will keep me informed--ah--for my own information."

"As much as possible, sir," said Newhouse, trying hard not to feel sorry for the colonel.

"Very well," Colonel Hastings said morosely. "Unless there are any questions, you may go."

Newhouse detected the hopeful note in the other man's voice and responded. "I really don't think I can ask any intelligent questions until I've studied the problem thoroughly, sir."

The colonel looked gratified. "Very well. I appreciate your concern, Lieutenant. Thank you."

"Thank _you_, sir," Lieutenant Newhouse said saluting. Then he turned on his heel and left the office.

* * * * *

He moseyed over to the broad swath of green park that had been left as a relaxation spot when the base had been built. It wasn't crowded; there were only two or three men sitting on the benches, smoking and talking quietly. Newhouse found a bench to himself and sat down to mull things over.

There was nothing totally new in the situation here on Dynak. Newhouse, as a trouble-shooter, knew that, even if Colonel Hastings didn't. Dynak was one of the many worlds which Man had decided not to colonize in spite of its inviting appearance. The biochemistry of the plants and animals was just a little too different to be compatible with Man, which meant that the planet would have to be wiped clean and started over in order to provide a suitable environment for human beings. And, aside from the fact that such a step would mean destroying millions of species that would better be preserved for study, it would mean the death of the several million humanoid natives of the planet--something that Man had no desire to be responsible for.

Dynak Base was not a military establishment; the Space Force as a whole used only a minor part of its energies for military purposes. Most of its activities were scientific in nature. Nonetheless, any base such as this had to be fortified to a certain extent. There were tribes of humanoids in the immediate vicinity which were, like all such cultural units at that stage of development, intensely hostile to anything strange. Right now, the majority of them were warily friendly with the Earthmen, but there was no way of knowing how long that uneasy peace might last. Meanwhile, they were doing useful work--bringing in samples of various types of fauna and flora for the labs to work on.

It all sounded fine so far, Newhouse thought grumpily. But the catch lay in the word "humanoid." Any reasonably intelligent race was classified as "humanoid" if they were erect, bifurcate animals--a definition which covered a multitude of variations. Most of them you wouldn't want to meet alone in a dark alley, and if you did, it would be a toss-up as to which of you would be the most frightened. Oddly-colored skins, three-eyed faces, and other _outré_ features were not at all uncommon among them.

Dynak was different. The humanoids were near human. The brown-yellow pigment in their skins wasn't melanin, and it was another pigment that gave them the intensely blue-violet eye coloring; they had different kinds of glands inside, arranged differently; they were almost entirely hairless, except for soft patches of down on the top of the head; and they averaged about four feet seven in height. Not human, no. Definitely not _homo sapiens_.

But they certainly _looked_ human. And, to top the whole thing off, the females were, to an Earthman's eyes, as pretty as little dolls. Except that dolls are normally not built so enticingly.

They weren't _all_ beautiful, true, but there were enough beauties to tempt the weary Earthman. And those who weren't weary were even more tempted.

Their body chemistries were incompatible, of course; off-spring from such a union were impossible. But the union itself was certainly possible.

Even so, there hadn't been too much trouble. For one thing, there were plenty of human women on Dynak Base; for another, the semi-savage tribes which occupied the territory around Dynak Base had a rather _laissez faire_ attitude, and a female's over-friendliness, even with alien giants from the sky, wasn't frowned upon. And, for a third, the savage women usually didn't come up to the standards of a fastidious Earthman, as far as general cleanliness was concerned.

But the women of the semi-barbaric city-state of Oassi, a hundred miles to the north, were a different matter entirely. Newhouse had never actually seen any of the native females, but the trimensional, full color, motion recordings had been graphic enough.

Newhouse could understand perfectly well why Boccaccio di Vino had managed to get himself into the jam he was in.

* * * * *

A man in civilian clothing had been approaching the bench Newhouse was seated on, but the lieutenant didn't pay much attention until the man stopped by the bench and said: "Lieutenant Newhouse?"

Newhouse started to rise. "Yes?"

"Sit down, Lieutenant," the other said, sitting down beside Newhouse. He was a lean, elderly man, with graying hair and a long-jawed, bony face that managed to show a strong sense of humor in spite of its saturnine construction. "I'm Bruce MacAuliffe; Colonel Hastings said you wanted to talk to me."

Newhouse swallowed. "Well, yes, sir; I did. But you didn't have to--"

MacAuliffe raised a hand. "That's all right. Hastings has his own way of doing things. There's no point in raising a fuss. And besides, I imagine you want to get things started. Something has to be done about di Vino."

MacAuliffe was the head of the Diplomatic Section on Dynak, and an outstanding expert on anthropology and xenology; Newhouse felt flattered that the man had taken the trouble to seek him out.

"Something has to be done, all right," Newhouse agreed, "but I'm not quite sure what at this point. In spite of the reports, I still don't have the whole picture."

MacAuliffe lifted a thin eye brow. "No? I thought my reports were comprehensive enough." But there was a definite twinkle in his eyes.

Newhouse grinned. "Hastings thinks the job can't be done till I've spent six months here because it's impossible to learn from reports; you think I can hop off immediately and get di Vino out of this jam, because everything can be learned from reports. It's a rough life we lead."

The diplomat grinned back. "Just what is it you want to know, Lieutenant?"

Newhouse then scratched thoughtfully at the area just behind his right ear. "Details, mostly, I guess. You and di Vino and the others went to Oassi to square away the details of this contract with the local government, and di Vino managed to get himself married. All as plain as my Aunt Millie's face. But I don't quite get a picture of Boccaccio di Vino the man nor of the personalities of the women involved."

MacAuliffe said: "I see. Well, di Vino himself is a very personable young man; good conversationalist and a fine diplomat--for a young man. He shows promise of getting somewhere in the field."

"Won't this caper sort of put a black mark on his record?"

MacAuliffe rubbed his long, thin nose sadly. "I'm afraid it will, yes. Shame, too. Mr. di Vino acted with the impetuosity of youth, and it'll probably follow him well into his old age."

"By then," said Newhouse, "he'll be bragging about it."

"Probably. He's just the type, though, who's a push-over for a set-up like that; pretty faces and figures go to his head. He and the Shannil, for instance, were...."

Newhouse listened while MacAuliffe talked.

* * * * *

The cultural level of the city-state of Oassi was similar in many ways to that of Egypt in the fifteenth century B.C., or that of pre-classical Athens or Sparta. It differed strongly, however, in that it was essentially a matriarchy. Since the natives of Dynak were oviparous, the women were freed from the temporary disability that child-bearing brought to viviparous species. In the more savage tribes, the females suckled the young and cared for them from hatching until they were old enough to fend for themselves; in Oassi, however, most of the care of the young had been handed over to the males while the females ran the state. The fighters were of both sexes, carefully segregated into male and female battalions, but the top officers were all females.

Dynak Base had been built well away from Oassi; one of the strict rules of Earth was that no indigenous culture should be subjugated or influenced any more than necessary. Before any contact was made, a study of the more savage tribes had to be made.

Nonetheless, rumors had come out of the jungle that a strange group of aliens had built a fortress near the banks of the Ngong River, and the people of Oassi were aware of the presence of the Earthmen long before any contact had been made by the Earthmen themselves.

* * * * *

Eventually, diplomatic relations between the Earthmen and the Oassi people had been established simply because the Oassi army had sent an expeditionary force to find out the intentions of the strangers. There had been no actual fighting; the female general in charge of the troops had decided that it would be futile to attack Dynak Base and had asked, instead, for a parley.

The upshot of the whole incident was a decision to send a diplomatic party to Oassi itself. And Boccaccio di Vino had been a member of that party.

The trouble was that, at that time, di Vino and the others didn't know a great deal about the customs and mores of the Oassi. More exactly, di Vino didn't know that just holding hands with an Oassi girl was tantamount to a formal engagement. And di Vino hadn't just stopped with holding hands. After the party had been in the city sixty-three days, di Vino found himself legally married to Oanella, the daughter of the Shann and Shanni of Oassi, and heir to the throne. When the old Shanni died, Oanella would become Shanni, and di Vino, as her consort, would become Shann whether he liked it or not.

It might sound like a good position to be in, and, in a human society, it could have been just fine. But Oassi was not a human city, and di Vino wanted desperately to get out and go back to Dynak Base--even farther away, if possible.

Oassi had a pleasant little law regarding the crown princess and the Shanni. If no fertile eggs were laid within the first two hundred days of marriage, it was the duty of the royal personage to get herself another husband. But since monogamy was strictly enforced, and since no one, not even the Shanni, could re-marry while the spouse remained alive, the only way out for her highness was the obvious one. Consequently, Boccaccio di Vino had found himself facing death.

"The big trouble," said MacAuliffe, "is that the young Shannil seems to be actually proud of di Vino; her 'giant' is something for the lesser nobles to envy." His face darkened. "She'll probably miss him very much."

"We can't let them kill him," Newhouse said flatly.

"I hope not," MacAuliffe said, "but, outside of storming their city, I don't see how we can get him out of the citadel."

"I'll think of a way," Newhouse said grimly. "I'm going into the city with the next food convoy."

* * * * *

"Sometimes," said Master Sergeant Pemberton in a low voice, "I think this whole thing is a waste of time." He turned the wheel of the car a trifle to avoid a tree, then twisted it back to avoid another.

Newhouse stuck a cigarette in his mouth, fired it. "What? You mean, taking di Vino food? He might get pretty hungry."

"I didn't mean that, Lieutenant; I wouldn't want to let him starve. But driving in all this chow every so often, over a hundred miles of jungle, isn't my idea of an efficient way to run an outfit."

"What would you do, if it were your job to decide policy?" Newhouse asked, genuinely curious.

"Just what the colonel's doing now," Pemberton said. "I realize it's the only sensible way. But there are times when I wish we could just walk in there, pull out our guns, and tell them to hand him over or else."

"Sure," said Newhouse, "but who'd raise _gakgaks_ for us then? You want to raise a whole herd and milk 'em yourself?"

"My mother didn't raise her little Willie to be a herdsman for alien critters," the sergeant said virtuously. "Besides, I wouldn't know how, and I'm not anxious to learn. Those things smell worse than a herd of sick hogs."

"Same thing I'd say," Newhouse agreed. "But Earth would scream so loud they could be heard in Messier 31 if their only supply of anti-cancer serum were to be cut off, or even reduced. And if you know of any way to get it except from _gakgak_ milk, a grateful galaxy will prostrate itself at your feet."

"I'd feel pretty silly if they did," said Pemberton, wrenching the wheel around to avoid another tree. "But it's a hell of a note that Dr. Chung had to find the stuff in _gakgak_ milk at all. Why couldn't he have been sensible and found it in tree leaves or something? Then we wouldn't have to stay on good terms with a bunch of high-handed female dictators."

"No," said Newhouse, "probably not. But we'd probably have to stay on good terms with the savages around the base so they'd go out and gather leaves for us. What's the difference?"

"The difference," Pemberton said triumphantly, "is that we wouldn't have to worry about the care and feeding of our boy, di Vino."

"Um," said Newhouse, realizing when he'd been beaten.

* * * * *

Pemberton glanced in his rear view mirror. "They having trouble back there? No, I guess not; they just slowed down a little."

Newhouse swiveled his head around and peered at the second car, which was following them. Like their own, it floated a foot off the ground on its antigravs as it moved through the jungle. It didn't seem to be having any trouble.

"There's another thing, Lieutenant," Pemberton said. "I don't like the idea of carrying a dame along. Not that she's any trouble, but she might get hurt. This isn't exactly the cornfields of Iowa, you know."

"I think Captain Smith can take care of herself," Newhouse said. "She's a pretty tough gal."

"I'd rather have her on my side than against me, that's for sure," the sergeant admitted, "but my protective instincts always rise when I see a woman out in the wilds like this. Even if she is an officer."

Newhouse started to answer, but there was a pounding on the roof of the car. Pemberton slowed, rolled down the window, stuck out his head, and said something in a language Newhouse didn't understand.

Ksitka, a hunter from one of the tribes near Dynak Base, jabbered something back in the same tongue. Pemberton pulled his head back in.

"He says he smells trouble. There's a group of those lizard-like carnivores up ahead--two or three, he says. We'll have to go around 'em; I don't want to get tangled up with those babies." He turned the wheel, and the car angled to the right. "Can't go to the left," he explained. "There's a cliff there that we couldn't make."

For a long minute, he was silent. Then: "And that's another thing, Lieutenant; we have to keep these cars close to the ground. If we could fly 'em, we'd have been to Oassi hours ago. But no, just because we're not to reveal our strength to the natives, we have to go creeping along like snails. Why, when I...."

Newhouse folded his arms across his chest and closed his eyes. Sergeant Pemberton was a compulsive griper, but his droning voice made a nice lullaby.

* * * * *

When they hove into sight of the city gates of Oassi, Pemberton shook the lieutenant. "We're here, sir. Their scouts spotted us twenty miles back, and the guard of honor is lined up, waiting for us."

Newhouse shoved himself into a more upright position and looked out at the pygmy-sized natives lined up in gorgeous array, in brightly-colored kilts and feathers. They looked, Newhouse opined, like a cross between a regiment of Scottish Highlanders and a group of Zulu warriors in full battle array. Each man had a longbow and a quiver of arrows slung across the back of his shoulders, and each was carrying a seven-foot, metal-tipped spear in his right hand.

"Very impressive," said Newhouse. "Okay, Sergeant; let's get our own show on the road."

Both men got out of the car and marched solemnly back to the second car. Ksitka slid off the top of the car and marched back with them, looking very proud and haughty in his resplendent Earth-designed uniform, which was even gaudier than those of the Oassi forces.

At the door of the rear car, they paused. Newhouse opened it, and all three bowed low as Captain Virginia Smith emerged.

She was not in uniform, as the other spacemen were; she wore an array of robes and jewels that would have looked pretentious at a British Coronation. She was a tall woman; a full six feet in height; broad in proportion, she was a thirty-six year old career officer who could look both commanding and matronly.

Ksitka, who had been carefully coached in his role, ran around behind her and lifted the train of her robes so that they would not drag the ground. Then the four of them marched solemnly up to the honor guard, Newhouse and Pemberton in the lead, with Captain Smith and Ksitka trailing behind, leaving the cars in charge of the driver of the second vehicle.

The Oassi guard, trying very hard not to look impressed, closed ranks and marched to the city gates with them. Newhouse had already noticed the effect that had been produced, however. The Oassi could see that Virginia Smith was obviously a woman, and a very powerful one at that. Thus, she commanded a respect that mere males could not have hoped for.

At the gate, the procession was met by a trio of Oassi females whose dress, impressive though it was, couldn't even compare with that of Captain Smith. Even little Ksitka's uniform was flashier.

Ksitka himself was in absolute ecstasy, in spite of the fact that his face was as stony and expressionless as an Easter Island idol's. His tribe had been looked down on and sneered at by the city-dwellers since time immemorial. And now, he, Ksitka the Hunter, was superior to the Oassi. It was a good feeling, and Ksitka was revelling in it.

The three Oassi bowed low as the Earthmen approached, and one of them said: "Her Splendor, the Shanni, awaits you at the citadel. May I inquire as to the rank of our honored guest?"

Newhouse had studied the Oassi language, and, although his accent was a bit heavy, he was perfectly lucid. "This is Her Supremacy, the Captain," he said with dignity.

"_Kepteen?_" the Oassi woman repeated. "An exalted rank, no doubt."

"No doubt at all," Newhouse agreed rather ambiguously. "She has come to pay her respects to her sister, the Shanni."

* * * * *

That made Captain Smith's rank perfectly clear; as a "sister", she was obviously the equal of the Shanni.

"Come this way," the officer said. "Transportation has been provided. I am afraid, however, that we must apologize to Her Supremacy for the inadequacy of the sedan chair we provided; we were not prepared for the visit of so exalted a personage."

"I will speak to Her Supremacy," Newhouse said. He turned to Captain Smith. "They want to apologize because they haven't got a sedan chair fancy enough for you," he said in English. "They're really impressed."

"I thought that's what the gal said," replied the captain, keeping her face haughty. "I can understand the language better than I can speak it. What should I say?"

"Anything you like; you're doing fine. Say something to me, and look as condescending as possible."

"Very well," she said, complying, "convey my compliments and tell them they can all go stick their noses in their ears and blow their brains out."

"Thank you," said Newhouse, bowing low. "I'll tell them, but it may lose something in translation."

He turned to the officer and reverted to Oassi. "Her Supremacy understands your lack of proper transportation perfectly, and she will convey her apologies to the Shanni for this unexpected visit. Her Supremacy realizes that you are not at all to blame for not providing a sedan chair suitable for her rank, and she has therefore graciously condescended to wait until a chair of suitable dignity is provided for the remainder of the way."

"Her Supremacy is most gracious," said the diminutive officer, gazing up at the towering captain in awe. "There will be as little delay as possible."

* * * * *