The Third Sex - Nina Kiriki Hoffman, ebook
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Figment #9
, Spring 1992
"I want to keep it," said Moira, cuddling the creature. A
triangle of sunlight from an open roofpanel fell across her and
the animal she held, making them the most vivid images in the
dimness of the dome. Even here, in the center of my universe,
she was the one Lokia's sun shone on. The planet accepted her.
I loved my teenage daughter dearly, and I knew her well;
I never ventured out of our home dome if I could help it, but
she came home for meals and sleep and education -- I saw her
every day. Our relationship was not as intimate as it would be
if we were on board a ship like the one I grew up on, where
everyone lived in each other's pockets, but it was the best I
could manage when she spent so much time out under the open
sky, which was the barrier that kept me indoors. I didn't like air
that went on forever and ground that didn't have a decent wall
every few meters. It just wasn't right.
I loved Moira, and I knew this was going to be a major
argument, because the stray she'd brought home this time was
even cuter than the one she found the previous week, and that
had been a twenty-minute discussion. With a mental sigh, I sat
forward in my comfichair and started my lines again. "Moira,
that thing probably hasn't even been classified yet. Nobody
by Nina Kiriki Hoffman
knows what it does. Suppose it has venom in its teeth or claws?
What if its digestive enzymes work on furniture? What if it's
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, Spring 1992
untrainable? Please, take it back outside before it bites us or
"Let's wait and ask him," said Moira. She grinned. When
makes a mess."
I reached the wonder-what-your-father-will-say stage, she knew
"Oh, Mom. It's small. I'll keep it in my room. Then if it
I was inclining toward a yes. "Would you like to hold Susu?"
makes a mess, you'll never know the difference."
she asked.
"What if it's carrying a disease?" I asked, but I could feel
I sat back in my chair and held out my arms, hoping the
myself weakening. The creature had large serene blue eyes, and
creature wouldn't wet on me. I hadn't had a wet lap since Moira
it was staring at me with a kindly expression.
was a baby. She set the creature in my lap. It was six-limbed,
Moira tightened her arm around it. "Aw, Mom, you
like most Lokia animal life-forms, and it had hand-like processes
know we're genetically incompatible with Lokia germs. Susu
on its foremost limbs, delicate long fingers. Its back hair was
couldn't give me anything if she wanted to, could you, Susu?"
long and silky, brown stippled with green, save for the creamy
She scratched the creamy patch of fur under its chin. It blinked
patch under its chin. It had a round head, small earflaps, large
and made a low trilling sound, like a smoothly running
round eyes set for binocular vision, and a dark muzzle with a
appliance.
tiny nose and mouth.
"You don't know what it eats."
I stroked its fur, and it caught my hand in one of its own.
"I do too. I found her in a beetleberry bush. She was
Its fingers were tipped with suction discs, except for the third on
wolfing them down. I bet she could help you clear out the
the left hand, which was longer than the other four by two
backyard -- she eats, you chop."
joints, and had a specialized tip it kept curled closed. It held my
"Ugh." How could anything eat those noxious berries,
hand long enough to inspect my wedding ring. It leaned
which had a chitonous cell wall and smelled pungent and
forward, and a thin, pointed red tongue darted out of its mouth
unpleasant? "Maybe you're right," I said. Brad had been
to touch my diamond before I could jerk away. And even when
encouraging me to make a garden in back of the dome;
I tried, a slightly delayed reaction, its grip was too strong to
beetleberries and the open sky had been my two main obstacles.
break. Brad had talked about myofilament arrangement in Lokia
"What will your father say?"
life-forms, how their muscles were generally stronger and
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, Spring 1992
smaller than ours. I was just beginning to get alarmed when it
was.
let go of my hand, turned around twice in my lap, and settled
"What do you think, Mom?" asked Moira.
down, closing its eyes and trilling.
I watched my hand as it traveled along the creature's fur.
Susu made a warm, lightly scented lapful. How could anything
Moira smiled at me. "See? Her digestive enzymes don't
that ate beetleberries smell like hyacinths? "I like it," I said,
hurt. She tasted my hand, my fingernail, my cheek, and my
surprising myself. On shipboard, we were always fighting
hair, and she didn't hurt me at all."
stowaway planetary life-forms; if they weren't some form of
I stroked the thing, mesmerized by its fur's softness.
produce, they were a menace to our supplies. This was the first
Brad and I had deliberated a lot before deciding we might as
non-human planetary indigene I had ever felt attracted to.
well let Moira run off into the bush. She would probably spend
"Maybe I can find another one, and we could each have
the rest of her life on Lokia; she might as well get used to the
one. I bet you never had a pet before, Mom."
planet. She was lonely. There wasn't another child her age at
"No, I never did."
the base, only toddlers and babes in arms. Brad had gotten
"I've never seen anything quite like it," said Brad that
special dispensation to bring her, since he was one of the best
night. "How did you find this when all our exploratory people
xenobiologists available when Lokia needed a good one.
missed it, Moira? It looks like it has the cranial capacity of a
We knew we could lose Moira out there. Every new
small child. I wish I could scan its brain, see if it has a complex
planet could surprise you, though Lokia seemed more
cortex, though that wouldn't necessarily tell us anything. Hey!"
benevolent than most, hosting no large predators and nothing
Susu licked his watch.
yet identified as poisonous. Brad had trained Moira in self-
"It's all right, Daddy. She's safe."
defense, taught her how to aim and shoot a stunner, inoculated
"I don't think she's a she, honey. She's the third sex."
her against everything he could. He gave her a kit to take with
"Well, nobody has a pronoun for that yet. I'll call her she.
her which included a communicator, a compass, a distance
Her name's Susu."
meter and a distress beeper. We knew if we kept her indoors
she would go crazy. She wasn't bred to indoor living the way I
"All right. Would you mind if I took her to the lab
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tomorrow?"
stirred.
"Yes! I don't want you running tests on her. I don't want
Moira came home late for lunch the next day. Brad had
her to get a bad opinion of humans."
not been able to find Susu to take her to the lab with him; later
"I'll be as kind to her as if she was my own child," he
she turned up in the laundry cubby, and Moira took her and
said, grinning.
went out, leaving me, as usual, to my crafts. I was working on
a video visualization -- an abstract; I was trying to incorporate a
"I remember some of those experiments you performed on
three-dimensionality. If it turned out well, I would send it in to
me. That depth perception one where the floor dropped out
the Culture Club, and if they liked it, they'd transmit it to
from under the glass? Not that one, and no injections, and no
everyone on the local net and give me credits towards new
bright lights, okay? You want to be mean, you have to find your
pletware.
own Susu. I'm going to find one for Mom."
When Moira came in, she had three Susus clinging to her
-- one in her arms, one on each shoulder. Her own was the one
"You think you can just walk outside and pick up another
in her arms, easy to distinguish by color and by shape, plumper
one, huh?"
and chunkier than Susu's slender siblings. "This one's Shisu --
"Yep."
she's for you," Moira said, presenting me with the animal on her
That night I woke up when something warm and flower-
left shoulder, the smallest, with dark, steely gray fur aside from
scented cuddled up next to me. Despite her promise, Moira
the creamy patch under her chin. Her fur too was stippled with
hadn't kept Susu in her room. We had taught Susu how to
green, and her eyes were pale green. "This one's for Daddy,"
operate the toilet, and she seemed enthusiastic about using it.
said Moira. "Hisu. Now we have a matched set."
Moira gave her a bath and both of them emerged radiant and
Hisu was the largest, with the lightest fur, and dark blue
unbitten. I touched Susu's clean, soft fur, felt her warmth,
eyes. Shisu and Hisu came to me, touching tongues to my
smelled her scent, and heard the thinnest thread of her trill. I
diamond, the fabric of my coverall, my hair, my hands.
lifted the covers and she crept in next to me, curling up against
my back. Her trilling lulled me to sleep. Brad never even
Shisu climbed up into my lap and settled there. I stroked
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, Spring 1992
her, feeling such a yearning for her, such a painful pleasure at
Brad twinkled at her. "Have you had that how-humans-
having her there. "Oh, Moira," I said, leaning over and hugging
make-babies lecture yet, honey?"
Shisu. "Thank you. Thank you."
"Oh, Daddy, ages ago. Mom told me. I'd already found
"Maybe she'll make you feel more at home outside," said
info on it in the teacher, anyway."
Moira. "When the sky looks too wide, you could hug her. Of
"Oh. Hmm. In that case, I guess you're old enough to
course, she doesn't smell as nice as Susu."
hear about Lokia. We haven't gotten all the details down, but it
Shisu smelled like jasmine, one of my favorite scents. I
looks like this: The male, or minus, like Hisu, and the female,
laid my cheek against her back. Yes, she would need to go
or plus, like Shisu, produce the gametes. Susu, the third sex.
outside to feed, and if I let her out without going with her,
acts as a facilitator and incubator. She arranges the fertilization,
maybe she'd never come back. I would have to face the open
usually getting the group together. Then she ends up with the
sky, and all the terrors of going suitless under it. I closed my
zygote, the fertilized egg, inside her until it's ready to be born.
eyes and savored Shisu's scent. Brad had wanted me to get
The courtship rituals and mating processes vary from species to
psych adjustments for years. Maybe I could cure myself, with
species, but the roles the sexes play seem to be consistent.
Shisu's help.
Stimson thinks the incubator gives the zygote some genes, but
"This is wonderful, Moira," Brad said that evening. "I had
they're free-floating in the cytoplasm, not inside the nuclear
people out scouting for these creatures all day, but we didn't
envelope. It isn't a form of triploidy we understand yet; we
find a single one, let alone a bonded set. Maybe the lab will
don't know the mechanism that determines sexual
have to hire you as help. With any luck, this set will be making
differentiation. Any questions?"
babies soon; that seems to be a traditional Lokia response to
"Uh," said Moira. "I think I need to expand my
captivity and an unlimited food supply." Hisu tugged at the
vocabulary first. Thanks for trying, though, Dad."
sticktite holding his shirt closed, and he laughed.
There was some debate among members of the colony,
"How do they make babies with three sexes, anyway?"
but I decided that the species Moira discovered possessed
asked Moira.
enough sentience to be persons. Brad took Hisu to the
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