Politics of the Deep
Once there was a planet called Earth, whose dominant creatures were humans. They were technologically advanced, with colonies on neighbouring planets, and had learned how to increase their lifespan with antioxidants. The minerals necessary for this process could be obtained on their seventh colony planet, where ancestors of the humans had long ago planted life forms from Earth. Some of these had already evolved into species vaguely resembling their own.
The project was approved, a mining operation was established, and workers were transported to the colony planet. The mineshaft on land was connected to a huge undersea tunnel teeming with workers. The core of this tunnel was a natural gas pipeline feeding fuel to the machinery in the mine.
The board of directors residing in the colony were fifty in number. The mine was managed by a man named Matt who was chairman of the board. The undersea tunnel was managed by Matt's younger brother Al, who was assisted by his two sons, Ian and Eli. Ian, who was renowned for his wisdom and fairness, performed all judiciary functions for the duration of the project. This included enforcing the rules and guidelines regarding conditions of labour, for no one wanted to work in the depths. Matt, Al, Ian and Eli were commanders.
At first, production went smoothly. But when emissaries arrived from Earth, there was an incident. It was a petty thing, really. Al had been partying late one evening, disturbing their sleep. They had said something about 'young people these days' (only not nearly so polite) and Al had made a few comments of his own. The pampered emissaries were not used to equal treatment, and they spoke privately to Matt about taking Al off the project.
Matt was tempted by the idea of being in charge of both the mine and the tunnel, but he knew Al wouldn't give up the tunnel without a fight. The emissaries convened with Matt and all his supervisors at the mine. Soon it was arranged that next time Al visited the mineshaft he would have a carefully planned 'accident' which would require his retirement from the project. The tunnel workers knew what was happening, but did not want to get involved.
Al's son Ian discovered the plot. Thinking that the planned 'accident' was an assassination, he flooded the mine to get the workers all in the same place, then gassed them into a stupor. They were arrested and sent in chains to a prison colony. Matt was arrested with them, but his high-ranking accomplices were not suspected.
Al became chairman of the board. Ian became manager of the mine, and members of the board worked the mineshaft themselves. Not long ago, Matt had introduced a giant saw that cut through the rock with unprecedented power and speed, and this compensated for the shortage of workers. Ian lived on the mine site with his wife Gaye. His two sons, Mark and Zeke, were born and raised on the premises. Everyone loved Mark, who grew into a strong warrior as the years went by, eclipsing his younger brother. For this reason, Ian made sure that Zeke was trained in his own profession, as a physician.
Work continued in the tunnel. Al introduced a method of natural gas extraction involving explosives which battered the walls. The invention of the giant saw necessitated an increased supply of fuel to the mine, and more work in the tunnel. The emissaries from Earth who still wanted Al's resignation arranged that agitators be included among the latest supply of tunnel workers flown in from Earth. The agitators were sent to organize a strike which would lead to Al's dismissal.
The tunnel workers knew that the saw had become necessary because Ian had sent away the mine workers. True, the saw was the most efficient method of mineral extraction, but for that very reason those same mine workers could have been released from the mine. Had they not been sent away, they would be helping the tunnel workers right now. True, the mine workers had been deported for insurrection, but insurrection was not such a bad idea: had the tunnel workers joined the mine workers, both groups would be living in much better conditions.
The agitators added these opinions to the lunchtime conversations. "You said nothing to the mine workers when they told you of their plans," they pointed out. "Now you're here alone, with more work and fewer people." To this they added further that the tunnel workers were more numerous than the mine workers had been, and that they could succeed where the mine workers had failed. They had no idea how far their words would go.
How Anna Became Seventh Commander
One of the tunnel workers was a man named Guy. Coarse and clumsy, he was nevertheless a natural military leader. And he was not without resources, for eleven species of subterranean creatures worked in the deepest crevasses of the mine. They were hardly ever seen, but could be called upon if necessary.
Guy organized a group of rebels and took possession of the tunnel, thus severing communications with the mining operation and bringing the project to a standstill. This was far more than the agitators had intended, but it was too late to undo the damage. When they tried to talk some sense into Guy their lives were threatened, and they fell into the rebel ranks. Al was forcibly expelled from his office by the rebels and was stripped of his many decorations and medals, which Guy wore in an act of defiance, looking every inch the fool that he was.
The commanders convened and sent an emissary, a brave and ambitious young woman named Anna. She had fallen in love with one of the workers, a handsome young man named Tom whom she had brought up from the tunnel to live with her. Everyone remembered the happy day when she had married him. With shining eyes she had linked arms with him, and proudly she had introduced the overwhelmed young man to the world she lived in. Her father, Neil, had been so angry that he had severed communication for years. But Anna would have done anything for Tom. Now she ventured into the tunnel to negotiate with the rebels, on the promise that as reward she would become a commander, the first woman to hold the coveted title.
Tom had a sister named Kim who was among the rebels. During an early skirmish, Kim's husband had been killed. Anna, venturing inside on her mission, intended to express her regrets over this tragedy to her angry sister in law. She had been chosen as emissary because she was related by marriage to Kim's husband, and for this reason the rebels might be willing to negotiate with her.
In the tunnel, she was met by workers who accompanied her to the rebel stronghold. There were seven gates through which she had to pass, and at each one she was forced to remove an item of clothing before she could proceed. This was calculated to demean her, but Anna refused to be affected. By the time she stood in front of her sister in law she was naked. Kim, assuming the airs of a queen, was incensed by the fact that she could not touch Anna's dignity. Even when this young woman had not a stitch of clothing, the sister in law felt inadequate in her presence.
Yet Kim was determined to make the best of the moment. "What? No fine clothes? Why, you look like one of us! You who thought yourself so grand."
"The supervisors send their condolences on the death of your husband."
"Their condolences! How touching!"
"This is the sort of situation that happens when things get out of control. If there had been peaceful negotiation, it would not have occurred. Our regrets are sincere, and we wish to reach a peaceful agreement with you. That's why I'm here."
"I see you brought nothing with you. And that, my dear, is how we all face our deaths."
"I realize that you're mourning the loss of your husband. A strike would have been more appropriate than this unnecessary violence. Surely you must see what it has brought."
"Still trying to work out an agreement. You really are amazing. You're stripped to the skin. You're in my power now."
"It seems that's not enough for you, since you're so perturbed."
"Is there no end to your impertinence? She is insufferable! Hang her this instant!"
Kim had been hoping to afflict Anna with her own mental disease. Brought up to believe that her worth was dependent upon riches and power, seeing herself as an inadequate object, she had relished the idea that Anna would suffer the same feeling. She might have chastised Anna for ignoring the earlier complaints of the tunnel workers. That would have been effective, for Anna was already contrite. But to Kim, this was not the issue. In the past the sight of Anna, finely dressed, had shattered her mind. She could not bear the sight of this impenetrable being who denied her revenge.
Desperate for control over Anna's mind, Kim circled her victim, inflicting an escalating series of mutilations which brought her no relief. Al, Eli and Ian, knowing the danger of Anna's mission, had promised that if the young woman did not return promptly they would lead a search party into the tunnel to retrieve her. They found Anna's naked body, hacked and charred, hanging from a hook. Too late, Neil regretted his estrangement from his courageous daughter and wished he had gone in for her.
Ever the master physician, Ian managed to revive her. The reunion with Neil was a tearful one. But when Anna returned home she received a shock. Her husband Tom was celebrating her demise with the servants of her household. As she walked through the party that was taking place in her house, Anna thought he must have learned of her recovery –until she heard his voice.
"The bitch is dead," he was laughing gleefully, "and I'm left with the real estate. What could be better?" Too late, he noticed that something was wrong. Turning around, he saw Anna's face as the realization dawned that her husband had never loved her.
Anna's face crumpled. "Go to hell," she whispered. And Tom, much against his will, was brought into the tunnel to join his sister. Never again would he see the light of day.
What Happened Next
There were now seven commanders –Al, Eli, Ian, Mark, Anna, her father Neil and her brother Udo. As chairman of the board Al had executive power over all other commanders. He was also manager of tunnel operations, and Ian was manager of mining operations. Al's other son, Ian's half brother Eli, was his right-hand man. Ian greatly resented this, especially since he was older than Eli. But he was the son of Al's former mistress, while Eli was the son of Al's wife.
Eli was a stern man who did what he believed to be right, harsh though it often was, and he stood by his promises. According to the humans' strict traditions Gaye had been promised to Eli, but she had rejected his marriage suit. Perceiving this as a violation, Eli had ordered her taken by force, and she had been artificially inseminated.
As judiciary agent Ian had possessed the power to punish even the future chairman of the board. Thus it was that for many long years Eli had found himself a worker in the tunnel, issued the standard uniform and rations, with no exceptions made on his behalf. His punishment had been no worse than the situation in which all the other workers had been living since the beginning of the mining project, but he had emerged from the tunnel long afterward a chastened and humbled man. In the meantime his crime had been fruitful, for Neil had been its result. Udo was Neil's son, and Anna was his daughter. In the meantime Gaye had become the beloved wife of Ian, whose gentleness had nursed her shattered soul.
After the assault on Anna, Mark volunteered to lead the attack upon the rebel forces. It was resolved that explosives would be used. A giant safety bar which sealed off the main tunnel kept it intact, but the far passage where the rebel stronghold was located exploded into a million pieces. Fragments flew into the sky –fully half the tunnel, it was said. In the middle of the chaos which ensued, no one remembered the eleven subterranean species.
Six hundred of the rebels escaped. Caught in energy nets as they fled through the exits, they survived to surrender, and Guy was among them. The agitators had perished, and so had Kim. Mark's ankle was injured, and for the rest of his life he walked with a limp. There was a massive trial that lasted for months. Emissaries came from Earth, concerned about the future of the mine. A town was built for them to live in and roughly half the rebels, who had been pardoned, performed various functions there. The others were found guilty of insurrection and were shipped off to the penal colony where Matt and the mine workers had been sent. Guy was sentenced to be executed.
Tired from all the scrutiny, Al took the long journey back to Earth and temporarily left the mining operation to Eli, who decided that it was too risky to have intelligent workers in the depths; obviously the environment made them too miserable. A developing species on the planet, the closest relatives to humans, would be bioengineered to a point at which they could understand simple instructions. Ian, the great physician, was to accomplish this feat. The things were idiots and they looked like walking mud, but everyone had faith in Ian's ability. The necessary genetic material would come from Guy's corpse.
The morning of Guy's execution, Gaye woke Ian early, and together they set to work taking characteristics of the dead rebel leader and adding them to these creatures of the soil. The basic work was completed in one day, but Ian's creatures had to develop, and that would take months. Eli insisted that they must be incomplete. The AO (antioxidant) and HP (haploid production) factors would have to be left out, so that they would not live long and would be unable to reproduce their own kind.
Ian's creatures proved a success. Everyone called them trogs. They were quite appealing really, in a coarse sort of way. As production resumed, everyone was glad of the work they did. Few gave much thought to their feelings. But Ian regarded them as his children, and looked out for their welfare.
Eli insisted that everyone treat the trogs with respect. There was a little ceremony in which the first trogs were introduced to the human workers, and everyone was required to bow politely. Some of the humans muttered among themselves over this, for they regarded the trogs as inferior objects, but Eli would tolerate no disobedience in this matter.
He was angry, however, when the first successful trogs, who had been ordered to tend farmland, suddenly started having babies. Ian had been instructed to make trogs only as they were needed, and now look what was happening. The creatures were grilled on the subject, and it turned out that Ian had given them an HP supplement.
So Eli fired him and took away his company aircar. One of the trogs retaliated by stealing the wings off the car. Eli still trusted Mark, who was given surveillance work, watching the trogs in case they planned any more bad behaviour. Out of work and unable to travel, Ian stayed at home with the faithful Gaye and started a school for his beloved trogs, supported by their contributions, for they were becoming quite self sufficient. The trog which had sabotaged the aircar was given a pill that looked like an AO supplement, but Ian had warned it to refuse anything the commanders offered. They were hardly going to reward it, after all. The creature was let go with a warning. Ian never found out what had been in the pill.
Eli was concerned at the trogs' sudden fertility. It had not been part of the plan to have them reproducing. And to make matters worse, in their bioengineered form they had a certain charm. Some of the male human workers started having sex with helpless female trogs. The workers were fired, of course.
Ian took them in to assist at his school, but he regretted his kindness. Their overseer, one of the workers who hadn't wanted to bow to the original trogs, found Zeke's study notes and decided he would improve the species with a few genetic experiments. After the sexual assaults continued on a new generation of female trogs, half-human offspring started coming out. The overseer claimed he was creating new, improved trogs. The fired workers taught genetic science to their half-and-half children, and of course the stupid creatures couldn't handle it. Every time they had a petty dispute they invented diseases for each other. They exterminated old species and introduced new ones, threatening the entire planet. Mark was dismissed for failing to prevent the scandal. Everyone involved was kicked out of Ian's school, but it was too late.
Eli was convinced Ian and Gaye should never have made the creatures in the first place. As the mining project drew to a close Eli decided that the whole lot of them would have to be flooded out. The creatures lived on low land, and it would be easy to arrange. All the humans were sworn to secrecy on the matter, including those who had been fired. Any human who disobeyed would be left on the planet when everyone else went back to Earth.
Trog in a Million
One of the trogs, a cheerful little thing that worked in the school cafeteria, was a favourite of Ian's. It had never shown anything but the greatest respect, and Ian was determined that it must be spared. He managed to warn the trog one afternoon by talking to the cafeteria wall, speaking of the impending disaster. Technically he was not telling the trog anything. He must have looked psychotic, but the trog understood and followed his instructions on how to save its family. The industrious little creature even managed to preserve plant and animal species which had not been genetically manipulated.
When Ian was called into Eli's office after the flood, he regarded his brother with a sardonic eye.
"So a few trogs managed to escape. Have a heart. Don't you feel a bit guilty? You were flooding them out because you were finished with them."
"Did you see them? They were not worth saving."
"Take a look at the ones I saved. What's so terrible about them?"
"You are incapable of objectivity because they're your creations."
There was a silence, and Ian sighed. "I have hopes for them," he admitted.
The brothers looked at each other, and Ian added, "I'm still haunted by what happened in the mine."
"So are we all."
"I was supposed to be in charge of working conditions."
"You did your best. Nobody likes that kind of work, and it had to be done. The workers knew that as much as we did. And it's not as though we were standing around twiddling our thumbs. Every one of us had been down there."
"It was different for the workers. They weren't in charge."
There was a heavy silence. Eli sighed. "It's almost over. All those people who died in the explosion would be getting ready to go home right now. Wouldn't that have been great?"
"I really think working conditions were not the only issue. They felt alienated from us. I remember what Anna said about Kim. If they hated us that much then they had the impression we thought ourselves superior."
"People like Kim must always be kept down, for the sake of all the people they'd victimize."
"Oh, I agree with you about Kim. Nothing would have made her happy anyway. If all her ambitions had been fulfilled she'd have gone crazy."
"Some people never learn."
"But Eli, don't tell me that all the rebels were like her. We must have been giving them the wrong impression."
"Half the survivors don't seem to have had the wrong impression, and they're still with us. They have light tasks, and we'll all be going home soon. I refuse to be typecast as some sort of tyrant."
"But the others hated us so much that they wouldn't even negotiate. We did something wrong, Eli. People don't resort to violence that easily; it's dangerous for them. Whoever turned the workers against us had a powerful weapon, and that weapon was the truth."
"Can we stop rehashing the past and get to the present? I called you in to tell you this is twice now that you've directly undermined my authority, and it sets a very bad example."
"Just meet the trog that I saved. I think you'll realize your death sentence was really over the top."
"I saw what was going on."
"So you condemn the whole bunch?"
"I didn't see a decent one among the lot of them."
"But there always are some. And they died with the others."
"All right, I'll see your trog. Maybe I'll be sorry."
Eli did see the trog, and he was sorry. He promised the trog (who was wide eyed at being called into a real office) that he would cause no more catastrophes. The trogs would live on the planet without any interference from Eli.
And Eli kept his promise. With the completion of the mining project, the trogs were left on their planet. Some say that the three hundred surviving rebels remained, and the fired workers also, but all humans associated with the mine returned to Earth. Ian and Gaye stayed on at their school with Mark and Zeke.
From Bad to Worse
Only a few trog families attended the school now. The others thought they knew everything there was to know. Only a faithful few remembered that whatever the other humans had thought of them, Ian had loved them. It was true that when he had created their ancestors, he had not done it from love. He had done it because they would be useful. But when he had saved a few trogs from the flood, those few trogs had outgrown their usefulness. They had possessed nothing to offer him. And they had held no power over him. No repercussions would have fallen upon Ian had he simply let them die. In fact, he was stranded on this planet because he had saved them. He had stuck his neck out for them, and had bent the rules. There was only one possible reason, and the faithful trogs knew it. And they never forgot the day when Ian had talked to the cafeteria wall.
Before long, the fired workers who had been kicked out of Ian's school set up a command base of their own. They just had to see whether this species could still be improved. They took aside the most humanlike trogs and convinced the stupid creatures that they were somehow more deserving than others. A breeding program was introduced to maximize human genes in their descendants.
A few years passed, and the five remaining commanders returned for an update on the trogs. Eventually it was decided that the creatures must be separated into groups. Each of the commanders was to keep an eye on his or her group. Otherwise, the trogs' ambition would lead them into all kinds of trouble, for they thought they knew how to manage their planet, and it was obvious they had no idea what they were doing.
For the most part, they behaved badly. Anna did nothing to help. On one visit, she went so far as to reproduce with one of the trogs. It was a special project in genetic manipulation, and resulted in the birth of a sweet little baby named Luke. The experiment was a great success, but she was going against Eli's direct instructions. She even applied to have this special baby receive an AO supplement. Eli flatly refused, and Anna handed in her resignation. Some sharp words were exchanged ('slut' was one of them) and she went straight to Ian. Eli threw up his hands, and everyone at the mine tried to think of something else.
Anna became a teacher at Ian's school. It was stressful for Ian and Gaye to put her up, since she kept undermining their authority. At the earliest opportunity she plied Ian with wine, and persuaded him to give her enough syllabus books to start a school of her own. Ian had a tendency to be jealous where his beloved trogs were concerned, and wanted to have the only school, so there was a bit of resentment. But this did not prevent Ian's son Mark from admiring Anna's courage, and after the death of her trog husband, Mark asked for her hand in marriage. Anna refused. Finding his parents' home intolerable, Mark moved into the fired workers' new command base. There, his disappointment became channelled into a longstanding resentment at the way his father had been treated. He gathered the fired workers to him, and together they plotted to overthrow Eli.
Meanwhile, Ian approached his brother regarding the trogs. "They're not as bad as you think," he said.
"Show me one trog do a genuinely unselfish thing!" snapped Eli. "One trog!"
"They do unselfish things quite frequently. You just aren't around them enough to notice."
"And I'm not going to be!" was the reply. Then Eli reflected. Ian knew the trogs better than he, after all.
"I'm going to set something up," he said. "I'm going to select one trog, and I want that trog to do something really great."
"You're toying with them," said Ian.
"Tell me something I don't know," said Eli curtly. "This is a deal, take it or leave it. Pending Al's approval. You want AO supplements for your trogs? Fine. If the, er, selected trog comes through... IF... then next time we visit, the best behaved trogs will get AO supplements. They'll get a half dose. After a few years I'll take another look and see which ones deserve the full dose."
"What about the descendants of those who failed the test?"
"Don't push me."
"I don't want you to choose a bad trog for this. Let me make one for you."
"But there's nothing left of Guy."
"It's easy to make one trog. Gaye and I have been working on a female."
"No, make it a male. They're less docile. I want to see how well a male can behave."
"We'll clone the female and add a Y chromosone. How about that?"
"Bit of a cheat."
"It would still be a trog, though," said Ian. "And if you chose just any trog chances are too great you'd get a bad one. It wouldn't be a fair deal."
"All right, but I'm doing you a favour here. I want one in return."
"What's that?"
"No more teaching them to make AO supplements. I know you're planning on starting a factory, and I can't allow it. They have to abandon the project; they haven't the faintest idea what they're doing. If I let them be, I think you should too. It's got to be a hands off relationship from now on."
"I think you might allow for one or two exceptions."
"No, Ian, you're an incorrigible meddler, and it isn't good for the trogs. They can't handle anything they've learned. You've only made them unhappy with your school."
It was true, and Ian knew it.
"I see that now," he sighed.
Eli looked hard at his brother. He saw that Ian had swallowed all pride to come here and plead for these creatures. He concentrated very hard on a small nick in the corner of his desk.
"You were always so sure I'd never give the trogs anything. At every turn you've cut in ahead of me."
There was a pause. "You kept stalling," said Ian.
"That's my prerogative."
"Tell me something. If I hadn't intervened, would you ever have given them the supplements?"
"That's for you to guess, isn't it? But guessing just wasn't good enough for you."
"No," said Ian. "It wasn't."
Dawning of a New Day
Al gave his approval, and the bet was on. I don't know what happened with the trog Ian made, but it came through. It was given an AO supplement and went to work in the office. This sort of thing had happened before –three times in fact. Eli did recognize exceptional cases. He was true to his agreement with Ian, and promised that all trogs who genuinely tried to behave also would get AO supplements and office work. But this was a matter so important that Al would have to judge which deserved the prize, and they still would not be many. The others would be permitted to live out their lives in peace for the time being, but the mine and the tunnel would have to be reopened at some point, and trog workers would be needed. Until that time Ian was not to intervene, for Al would want to know just how bad the trogs could be. How else to choose which ones were to get the AO supplements and which ones were to do mine work?
The commanders left –including Anna, who had been reinstated with great generosity upon Al's insistence, upon condition that she have nothing to do with the trogs' education. She had been secretly teaching some of them to make AO supplements. From now on all AO supplements were to be under Al's direct supervision, and the trogs would be able to evolve naturally.
This time Ian and Gaye left too, taking Zeke along, after a tearful farewell to their trog students, and after an even more tearful farewell to Mark. His plot had been discovered, and all hangars at the fired workers command base had been bombed upon Eli's orders. Neither Mark nor the fired workers had any means of transport off the planets surface. They stayed where they were, banished, hating the planet, hating their lives.
Honouring the agreement with Eli, Ian had destroyed his plans for an AO factory. The fired workers were furious when they heard of this. To their favoured 'elite' trogs they gave Zeke's old study notes, and eventually the idiots learned the same genetic science that had moved Eli to flood the planet years earlier. As before, the dangerous science was used horribly in petty disputes. Mark let it all happen, even against Al's orders. He felt he had nothing to live for.
Ian looked forward to the day when he could return to his beloved trogs, and to his son. During a season of seismic disruption, the office worker who had won him the bet with Eli was sent to herd the trogs into a wormhole and to supervise them until Al arrived for the reopening of the mine. Ian went along, with more than the trogs in mind. He knew that Mark would be intent on a last-ditch confrontation. His plan was to kidnap Mark and get him off the planet's surface.
When there was some delay in activating the wormhole Ian was immediately suspicious of Eli, who was deeply offended. "You're testing them!" Ian shouted. "This is just like the time you told that trog to kill its child, just to see whether it would."
"I had given it the child," Eli reminded him.
"It was pure, heartless manipulation."
"You call me manipulative! I liked that line of trogs, and you snuck in and took them away. Pretending to be me, as I recall. One of your tackier tricks."
"You liked them, did you? Ever love any of them? Ever care about their feelings?"
"Of course I did. I saved the child. I had to know what they were like. Even then I had in mind exactly what you've been pushing for all these years. But they're not getting it until they're ready. And we'll save every single trog that wants to go, every single trog that's not with Mark. The wormhole will be ready today. For heaven's sake, Ian, what do you think I am? I don't want them to die."
"Not this time," said Ian bitterly.
"Not this time. Promise."
"So they'll be set to work when the mine is started up again," added Ian spitefully, "most of them for something which they aren't going to use themselves."
"If they have any decent gratitude they'll want to do it. We're saving their lives."
There was a moment's stubborn silence. "You realize," said Eli, "that they have absolutely no gratitude toward you. Even the ones who still know your name think you're me. They'd run from you if they saw you. They're that primitive."
Eli sighed. Eli often sighed. "You have the tags for the children?" Al had agreed to let Ian keep some of the young trogs to start up a new school.
There was a battle on the planet's surface. It was a fiasco. Mark lost miserably. He awaited Al's arrival humiliatingly trapped in a damaged aircar while the eleven subterranean species, unearthed by the quakes, roamed around looking for a place to hide. The wormhole operation was superbly done, and the heroic little trog in charge of it beamed with pride as he supervised the reconstruction of the mine. Mark escaped from his aircar just in time to round up a few trogs who didn't want to work in the mine, to hijack the ship that had been used for the airlift. But he was captured, this time for good, and Al would decide what to do with him.
Eli looked forward to getting the trog-judging business over with. Ian's mistrust over this business of AO supplements had been an insult to both his authority and his honour. He supervised the entire involved process of Al's arrival in one of the finest ships that had ever left Earth. On the big day, Al and the entire staff of the mining operation landed gloriously with equipment in tow, causing a sensation among the trogs. It was payback time for the airlift, but they didn't mind. Things had been worse under Mark, and they were still grateful for the airlift. Everyone crowded into Al's old office to see the first trogs selected for AO supplements as they were brought up to be introduced.
The creatures were far less dimwitted than their ancestors. They had come a long way. But they were shy and obviously embarrassed. Their spokesman took off a spectacularly grubby and shapeless hat and nodded nervously until the humans thought its head would fall off. Al was surprised to find that the trogs knew all about the tunnel rebellion.
"Who told you this?" he asked.
"I did," a voice spoke from behind him.
"Not a strategic move, Anna," came her father's voice from the crowd.
"I wasn't working here at the time," she replied coolly. Upon Anna's insistence, Al asked the trogs whether they thought the rebels had been right, all those years ago.
"They had a point," said the trog slowly. "They were fighting because things were bad. But there was no trust."
"Sometimes it's right not to trust."
"Yes, sir. But that time it would have been better."
"No trust," said Al. "That's always been everyone's problem. And do you have trust?"
The spokesman turned its hat around and around in long muddy fingers. Its companions looked as though they all knew what it was thinking and wanted it to speak up. The spokesman reached into the pocket of its oversized shift and pulled out a grubby little book from Ian's school. As if they were one body, the other trogs did the same.
Clumsy beings that they were, huddled uncomfortably by the door, at that moment they seemed to possess an inner grace. They were all gazing at Ian, their eyes shining with a light that moved the humans to a grudging admiration.
"We trust him, sir," said the trog in a voice that was little more than a whisper. "And he said we could trust you."
There was dead silence in the room. "All right, then," said Al gently. "I guess the pharmacy is your next stop. But before you go, I want you all to understand me." He fixed a severe eye on the trogs.
"You can love Ian all you want, you know. I'm not the jealous type. But he mismanaged a lot of things here. I am the manager of this colony, and you're working for me. Remember that." And then he smiled. Suddenly everyone remembered what it had been like, years ago, when they had first arrived on the planet. How much hope there had been. Gaye and Anna covered their eyes.
"Off you go, then," Al said gently. "Have a good time."
The big interview was over. The trogs filed quietly out of Al's office. Before going through the door, one of the creatures turned around and held up its arms toward Ian in their traditional gesture of devotion. This little person who had so little to offer was emboldened by a simple love born of gratitude. And in that brief moment, strange to say, its homely features were almost beautiful.
graphic courtesy of The Discovery Channel
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