Out of the Dark (40 page)

“What, precisely, did you wish to see me about, Ground Base Commander?” he asked after a moment.
And why,
he did not ask aloud,
did you wish to see me about it in
private
?

“I’ve made substantial progress with my initial psychological profile of these humans, Sir. As I’d said in my last personal report to you, that project had been badly delayed by the more pressing emergencies which had to be dealt with immediately. In fact, I still haven’t completed my full analysis of the results, but certain clear differences between Shongair and human psychology have already emerged. On the basis of those differences,
unfortunately”—she met his gaze unwaveringly—“I’ve been forced to the conclusion that our initial hopes for this planet were . . . rather badly misplaced.”

Thikair sat very still. It was a testimony to her inner strength that she’d spoken so calmly, he thought. It was clear from her expression and tone that she was
not
referring to any of the manifold problems they’d already experienced, which meant she’d discovered something even more disastrous. Not many subordinates could have brought that word to an imperial colonizing expedition’s supreme commander without flinching . . . particularly when the hopes in question had been not “our” initial hopes, but
his
initial hopes.

He drew a deep breath, feeling his ears fold back against his skull, and closed his eyes while he considered how much those hopes had cost his expedition in just three local months. Of course, he reflected grimly, it had cost the humans even more. Yet no matter what he did, the insane creatures
refused
to submit.

Perhaps Shairez was about to explain that obstinacy of theirs to him. Odd to discover that he suddenly had so much less desire to have that riddle solved after all. Yet. . . .

“
How
badly misplaced?” he asked without opening his eyes.

“The problem, Sir,” she replied a bit obliquely, “is that we’ve never before encountered a species like this one. Their psychology is . . . unlike anything in our previous experience.”

“That much I’d already surmised,” Thikair said with poison-dry humor. “Should I conclude you now have a better grasp of how it differs?”

“Yes, Sir.”

Even the redoubtable Shairez hesitated for a moment, however, and it was her turn to inhale deeply before she resumed.

“First, Sir,” she began then, “you must understand that there are huge local variations in their psychologies. That’s inevitable, of course, given the fashion in which they’ve retained so many separate nation-states this late into their societal development. I confess, however, that even now I hadn’t realized they retained so many bewilderingly different cultural and
societal
templates, as well. I’m afraid the degree to which their planetary communication net—and their entertainment media, in particular—had . . . cross-pollinated thanks to their communications satellites, Internet, and mass dissemination of ‘movies’ and recorded music helped me to
underestimate their . . . profound diversity.” Her ears flicked a shrug. “I’ve attempted throughout to remind myself that these creatures aren’t
us,
that their developmental and evolutionary history bears no resemblance to our own. Yet I continue to find my own cultural experiences insisting that anyone with this level of technology must have developed some sort of common, worldwide culture. Except very superficially, however, that most definitely is
not
the case.

“There are, however, certain common
strands
. And one of those, Fleet Commander, is that, essentially, they have no submission mechanism as we understand the term.”

“I beg your pardon?” Thikair’s eyes popped open. Despite all their experience with this perverse, irrational, illogical species, that
couldn’t
be true, could it? The very idea was preposterous!

“No
submission
mechanism?” he repeated, trying to be certain he’d actually understood her correctly.
“None?”

Shairez seemed unsurprised by his reaction. She simply let her ears droop in an expression of weary, exhausted unhappiness and sighed.

“None, Sir,” she confirmed heavily. “There are a few—a very few—other races of the Hegemony which perhaps approach the humans’ psychology, but I can think of no more than two or three. All of them, like the humans, are omnivores, but none—not even the Kreptu—come close to this species’ . . . level of perversity. Frankly, any Shongair psychologist would pronounce all humans insane, Sir, and in this case even the weed-eaters would probably agree with us!”

Of course they would
, Thikair thought bleakly.
Trust the Cainharn-cursed humans to be the first species
every
race of the Hegemony would proclaim mad!

“Unlike herbivores,” Shairez continued, using the technical term this time, instead of the customary pejorative, almost as if the precision of her language could protect her from what she was saying, “or even the overwhelming majority of omnivores, for that matter, they have a streak of very Shongair-like ferocity, yet their sense of self is almost invariably greater than their sense of the pack.”

She was obviously groping for a way to describe something outside any understood racial psychology, Thikair thought.

“Almost all herbivores have a very strong herd instinct,” she said. “While they may, under some circumstances, fight ferociously, their first and overwhelming instinct is to
avoid
conflict, and their basic psychology
subordinates the individual’s good—even his very survival—to the good of the ‘herd.’ Most of them now define that ‘herd’ in terms of entire planetary populations or star nations, but it remains the platform from which all of their decisions and policies proceed.

“Most of the Hegemony’s omnivores share that orientation to a greater or a lesser degree, although a handful approach our own psychological stance, which emphasizes not the herd, but the
pack
. None of them approach it very
closely,
however, because for all of them the urge to seek prey is secondary—part of their survival imperatives, yes, but not
primary
to their race’s early survival. None of them were at the top of their planetary food chains in their prehistoric, pretechnic periods. Indeed, most of them became tool users and eventually developed civilizations primarily because they were so poorly suited by nature as predators. They required tools and technology to overcome their inherent weakness and to protect themselves against
other
predators, and like the herbivores, flight from danger was more important in their evolutionary history, more central to their development, than the pursuit of prey.

“Our species, however, unlike any of the Hegemony’s other member races, evolved primarily as
hunters,
not prey. Prior to our own tool-using period, we
were
at or near the very top of our planetary food chain, and so we evolved a social structure and psychology oriented around that primary function rather than a template designed to protect us from
other
predators. Unlike virtually all herbivores and the vast majority of omnivores, Shongairi’s pride in our personal accomplishments—the proof of our ability—all relates to the ancient, primal importance of the individual hunter’s prowess as the definer of his status within the pack.

“Yet the pack is still greater than the individual. Our sense of self-worth, of accomplishment, is validated only within the context of the pack. And the submission of the weaker to the stronger, of the follower to the leader—of the beta or the gamma to the alpha—comes from that same context. It isn’t simply the basis of our honor code and our philosophy, Fleet Commander; it’s bred into our very
genes
to submit to the pack leader. To defer to the individual whose strength dominates all about him. Of course our people, and especially our males, have always
challenged
our leaders, as well, for that was how the ancient pack ensured that its leadership remained strong. Yet within our psychology and culture, there have always been properly defined channels—customs, mores, and traditions—which defined how and when that challenge could be presented. And once a leader has reaffirmed his
dominance, his strength—his right to lead—the challenger submits once more. Our entire philosophy, our ethics, our societal expectations and our considerations of honor, all proceed from that fundamental starting point: the weaker and the less capable, for the good of all,
always
submits to his legitimately stronger, more capable superior.”

“Of course,” Thikair said, just a bit impatiently. “How else could a society such as ours survive? For that matter, we’ve seen the same response in every other alien species I can think of! Even the weed-eaters—perhaps
especially
the weed-eaters!”

“Sir, while the outcome may
appear
to be the same, the response to which you’re referring proceeds from completely different psychological bases. The herbivore or the omnivore submits not out of honor expectations or as an individual submitting to the leader of his pack. Oh, some of the herbivores—and even more of the omnivores—do have superficially similar psychological inclinations, yielding place to those who have demonstrated by whatever standards a given species may apply, which may include ritual combat between individuals, that he or she is better suited to lead. And, for that matter, more entitled on the basis of that demonstrated superiority—once again, for the overall good of the herd—to pass on his or her genetic heritage. Our own psychology incorporates its own shadow of that same thinking. But when an herbivore or omnivore submits to demonstrated strength from
outside
the herd, it’s a combination of fear response and the individual’s subordination to the well-being of the herd as a whole, not an acknowledgment of natural, demonstrated superiority. He—or she—submits both to prevent his or her own destruction and to avoid provoking attacks from the enemy upon the rest of the herd. That’s why in extreme circumstances individuals will allow themselves to be killed—often without even token resistance—in order to deflect threat from the rest of the herd.

“But humans don’t think that way. In fact, you’re correct; a society such as ours could
not
survive among humans. Their instinct to submit is enormously weaker than our own, and it’s far superseded by the individual’s drive to defeat threats to his primary loyalty group—which is neither the pack nor the herd.”

“What?” Thikair blinked at her, and her ears waved in a grimace.

“A human’s primary loyalty is to his
family grouping
, Sir. Not to the herd, of which the family forms only a small part. And not to the pack, where the emphasis is on strength and value
to
the pack. There are exceptions, but
that orientation forms the bedrock of human motivation. You might think of them almost as . . . as a herd composed of
individual
packs of predators. Humans are capable of extending that sense of loyalty beyond the family grouping—to organizations, communities, to nation-states or philosophies—but the fundamental motivating mechanism of the individual family is as hardwired into them as submission to the stronger is hardwired into us.”

She paused for a moment, looking at him, as if giving him an opportunity to digest that incomprehensible concept, then cleared her throat and continued in a harsher voice.

“That fundamental difference is bad enough, Sir, yet I’m afraid there’s worse. Most human cultures I’ve so far been able to study lack even the same sort of fear-coupled pseudo-submission response we’ve observed in the vast majority of the Hegemony’s herbivores and omnivores. They share the same fight-or-flight auto response, and the majority of them will usually choose to flee from an opponent they believe they cannot defeat or which they believe has the capacity to injure them badly even if they might triumph in the end. Even that response is trumped by that loyalty to the family group, however. Unlike herbivores who will abandon the individual to protect the whole, humans will run enormous risks—even to large numbers of their ‘herd’ or extra-family societal groupings—to save individuals. Thousands of them will turn out to search for a single lost individual, especially a lost cub, even in conditions which place the searchers themselves at grave risk, and even when the searchers
know
the likelihood of finding the one for whom they search alive is effectively nonexistent. They will send enormous parties of rescuers into collapsing mines in efforts to rescue far smaller numbers of trapped workers who are almost certainly dead before the effort is even mounted.

“Sir, I realize how bizarre this all sounds, yet I’ve compiled
hundreds
of cases of human beings running into burning buildings or other deadly peril to rescue cubs who have as yet made no demonstrated contribution whatsoever to their society—to their herd or their pack. Indeed, total strangers will voluntarily put their own lives in peril to rescue
other
parents’ young. Worse, my research indicates that a very large percentage of humans will attack
any
foe, regardless of its strength or power, in defense of their own mates or young. And they will do it with
no regard whatsoever
for the implications to the rest of their pack or herd. They simply don’t care. It never even
occurs
to them to think in those terms. Indeed, these humans are so
mad by our standards that they consider other humans who are
not
willing to run such risks for their own mates and young insane, or at least so cowardly as to be beneath the contempt of any ‘right-thinking’ human.”

Thikair felt as if someone had just hit him over the head with a club. He looked at her, trying to wrap his mind around the bizarre psychology she was trying to explain. Intellectually, he could grasp it, at least imperfectly; emotionally, it made no sense at all.