William Tenn - Venus and the Seven Sexes

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Venus and the Seven Sexes

William Tenn

It is written in the Book of Sevens:

When Plookh meets Plookh, they discuss sex. A convention is held, a coordinator selected, and,

amid cheers and rejoicing, they enter the wholesome state of matrimony. The square of seven is

forty-nine.

This, my dear children—my own meager, variable brood—was the notation I ex-tracted after

receiving word from the nzred nzredd that the first humans to encoun-ter us on Venus had at last

remembered their promise to our ancestors and sent a cultural emissary to guide us on the difficult path to

civilization.

Let the remaining barbarians among us cavil at the choice of this quotation; let them say it represents

the Golden Age of Plookhdom; let them sneer that it shows how far we are fallen since the introduction

of The Old Switcheroo by the gifted Hogan Shlestertrap of Hollywood California U.S.A. Earth.

The memory of Hogan Shlestertrap lives on while they disappear. Unfortunately—ah, well.

Please recall, when you go forth into the world to coordinate your own families, that at this point I

had no idea of the kind of help the Earthman wanted. I suspected I had been honored because of my

interest in literary numerals and because it was my ancestor—and yours, my dear children, your ancestor,

too!—the nzred fanobrel, to whom those first Earthmen on Venus had made the wonderful promise of

cultural aid.

A tkan it was, a tkan of my own family, who flew to bring me the message of the nzred nzredd. I

was in hiding at the time—this was the Season of Wind-Driven Rains and the great spotted snakes had

come south for their annual Plookh feed; only a swift-flying tkan could have found me in the high grasses

of the marsh where we nzredd hide at this season.

The tkan gave me the message in a few moments. It was possible to do this, be-cause we had not

yet been civilized and were still using our ancestral language in-stead of the cultivated English.

"Last night, a flame ship landed on the tenth highest mountain," the tkan told me. "It contained the

long-promised emissary from Earth: a Hogan of the Shlestertrapp."

"Hogan Shlestertrap," I corrected. "Their names are not like ours; these are civi-lized creatures

beyond our fumbling comprehension. The equivalent of what you called him would be 'a man of the

Shlestertraps.' "

"Let that be," the tkan replied. "I am no erudite nzred to hide lowly in the marshes and apply

numbers categorically; I am a tkan who has flown far and been useful in the chain of many families. This

Hogan Shlestertrap, then, emerged from his ship and had a dwelling prepared for him by his—what did

the nzred nzredd call them?"

"Women?" I suggested, remembering my Book of Twos.

"No, not women—robots. Strange creatures these robots: they participate in no chain, as I

understand it, and yet are reproduced. After the dwelling was completed, the nzred nzredd called upon

this—this Hogan Earthman and was informed that the Hogan, who feeds and hatches in a place called

Hollywood California U.S.A. Earth, had been assigned to Venus on our behalf. It seems that Hollywood

California U.S.A. Earth is considered the greatest source of civilizing influence in the universe by the

Terran Government. They civilize by means of something called stereo-movies."

"They send us their best," I murmured, "their very best. How correctly did my ancestor describe

them when he said their unselfish greatness made dismal mockery of comparison! We are such

inconsequential creatures, we Plookhh: small of size, bereft of most useful knowledge, desired prey of all

the monsters of our planet who consider us transcendentally delicious morsels—and these soaring

adventurers send us a cultural missionary from no less than Hollywood California U.S.A. Earth!"

"Will the Hogan Shlestertrap teach us to build flame ships and dwellings upon mountains in which we

may be secure?"

"More, much more. We will learn to use the very soil of our planet for fuel; we will learn how to

build ships to carry us through emptiness to the planet Earth so that we can express our gratitude; instead

of merely twelve books of numbers we shall have thousands, and the numbers themselves will be made

to work for us in Terran pursuits like electricity and politics. Of course, we will learn slowly in the

begin-ning. But your message?"

The tkan flapped his wings experimentally. He was a good tkan: he had three fully developed wings

and four rudimentary ones—a very high variable-potential. "That is all. The Earthman wants help from

one of us whose knowledge is great and whose books are full. This one will act as what is known as

'technical adviser' to him in the process of civilizing the Plookhh. Now the nzred nzredd's small tentacle is

stiff with age and badly adjusted for the speaking of English; he has therefore decided that it is you who

must advise this Hogan technically."

"I leave immediately," I promised. "Any more?"

"Nothing that is important. But we will need a new nzred nzredd. As he was giving me the last of the

message outside the dwelling of the Earthman, he was noticed by a herd of tricephalops and devoured.

He was old and crusty; I do not think they found him very good to eat."

"A nzred is always tasty," I told the winged Plookh proudly. "He alone among the Plookhh

possesses tentacles, and the spice of our tentacles, it would seem, is beyond compare. Now the nzred

tinoslep will become nzred nzredd—he has grown feeble lately and done much faulty coordination."

Flapping his wings, the tkan rose rapidly. "Beware of the tricephalops," he cried. "The herd still

grazes outside the Hogan's dwelling, and you are a plump and easily swallowed tidbit. This will be a

difficult time for the family to find another nzred."

A lizard-bird, attracted by his voice, plummeted down suddenly. The tkan turned sharply and

attempted to gain altitude. Too late! The long neck of the lizard-bird extended, the fearful beak opened

and—

The lizard-bird flew on, gurgling pleasurably to itself.

Truly it is written in the Book of Ones: Pride goeth before a gobble.

He was a good tkan, as I said, and had a high variable-potential. Fortunately, a cycle had just

completed—he was carrying no eggs. And tkann were plentiful that season.

This conversation lasted a much shorter period than it seems to have in my repeti-tion. At the time,

only a few nzredd had learned the English that the first human explorers had taught my ancestor, nzred

fanobrel; and the rest of the Plookhh used the picturesque language of our uncivilized ancestors. This

language had certain small advantages, it is true. For one thing, fewer of us were eaten while conversing

with each other, since the ancient Plookh dialect transmitted the maximum infor-mation in the minimum

time. Then again, I was not reduced to describing Plookhh in terms of "he," "she" or "it"; this English,

while admittedly the magnificent speech of civilized beings, is woefully deficient in pronouns.

I uncoiled my tentacles from the grasses about me and prepared to roll. The mlenb, over whose

burrow I was resting, felt the decreased pressure as my body ceased to push upon the mud above him.

He churned to the surface, his flippers soggy and quivering.

"Can it be," the foolish fellow whispered, "that the Season of Wind-Driven Rains is over and the

great spotted snakes have departed? The nzred is about to leave the marsh."

"Go back," I told him. "I have an errand to perform. The spotted snakes are raven-ous as ever, and

now there are lizard-birds come into the marsh."

"Oh!" He turned and began to dig himself back into the mud. I know it is ungra-cious to mock

mlenbb, but the wet little creatures are so frantic and slow-moving at the same time that it is all I can do

to keep a straight tentacle in their presence.

"Any news?" he asked, all but one third of him into the mud.

"Our tkan was just eaten, so keep your flippers alert for an unattached tkan of good variation. It is

not pressing; a new cycle will not begin for our family until the end of this season. Oh—and the nzred

nzredd has been eaten, too—but that does not concern you, little muddy mlenb."

That does not, but have you heard the mlenb mlenbb also is gone? He was caught on the surface last

night by a spotted snake. Never was there such a Season of Wind-Driven Rains: the great of the Plookhh

fall on all sides."

"To a mlenb all seasons are 'never was there such a season,' " I mocked. "Wait until the Reason of

Early Floods, and then tell me which you like better. Many mlenbb will go with the coming of the early

floods, and our family may have to find a new mlenb as well."

He shivered, spattering me with mud, and disappeared completely underground.

Ah, but those were the carefree times, the happy childhood days of our race! Little indeed there was

to trouble us then.

I ate a few grasses and began rolling up and out of the marsh. In a little while, my churning tentacles

had attained such speed that I had no reason to fear any but the largest of the great spotted snakes.

Once, a tremendous reptile leaped at me and it seemed that the shafalon family would require a new

nzred as well as a new tkan, but I have a helical nineteenth ten-tacle and this stood me in good stead. I

uncoiled it vigorously and with an enormous bound soared over the slavering mouth of the spotted snake

and on to solid ground.

This helical tentacle—I regret deeply that none of you dear little nzredd have in-herited it from me.

My consolation is that it will reappear in your descendants though in modified form; it unfortunately does

not seem to be a dominant trait. But you all—all of this cycle, at any rate—have the extremely active

small tentacle which I acquired from the nzred fanobrel.

Yes, I said your descendants. Please do not interrupt with the callow thoughts of the recently

hatched. I tell you a tale of the great early days and how we came to this present state. The solution is for

you to discover—there must be a solution; I am old and ripe for the gullet.

Once on solid ground, I had to move much faster, of course: here the great spotted snakes were

larger and more plentiful. They were also hungrier.

Time and again I was forced to use the power latent in my helical tentacle. Several times as I leaped

into the air, a lizard-bird or a swarm of gridniks swooped down at me; now and again, as I streaked for

the ground, I was barely able to avoid the lolling tongue of a giant toad.

Shortly, however, I reached the top of the tenth highest mountain, having experi-enced no real

adventure. There, for the first time, I beheld a human habitation.

It was a dome, transparent, yet colored with the bodies of many creatures who crawled on its

surface in an attempt to reach the living meat within.

Do you know what a dome is? Think of half the body of a newly hatched nzred, divorced of its

tentacles, expanded to a thousand times its size. Think of this as trans-parent instead of darkly colorful,

and imagine the cut-away portion resting on its base while the still rounded part becomes the top. Of

course, this dome had none of the knobs and hollows we use for various organic purposes. It was really

quite bald.

Near it the flame ship stood upright. I cannot possibly describe the flame ship to you, except to say

that it looked partly like a mlenb without the flippers and partly like a vineless guur.

The tricephalops discovered me and trampled each other in an attempt to get to me first. I was

rather busy for a while evading the three-headed monsters, even grow-ing slightly impatient with our

savior, Hogan Shlestertrap, for keeping me outside his dwelling so long. I have always felt that, of all the

innumerable ways for a Plookh to depart from life, the most unpleasant is to be torn into three unequal

pieces and masticated slowly by a tricephalops. But, then, I have always been considered some-thing of

a wistful aesthete: most Plookhh dislike the gridnik more.

Fortunately, before I could be caught, the herd came upon a small patch of guurr who had taken

root in the neighborhood and fell to grazing upon them. I made cer-tain that none of the guurr were of our

family and concentrated once more upon attracting the attention of Shlestertrap.

At long last, a section of the dome opened outward, a force seemed to pluck at my tentacles and I

was carried swiftly through the air and into the dome. The section closed behind me, leaving me in a small

compartment near the outside, my visible presence naturally exciting the beasts around me to scrabble

frenziedly upon the transparent stuff of the dwelling.

A robot entered—answering perfectly to the description of such things by nzred fanobrel—and, with

the aid of a small tubular weapon, quickly destroyed the myriad creatures and fragments of creatures

who had been sucked in with my humble person.

Then—my variegated descendants—then, I was conducted into the presence of Hogan Shlestertrap

himself!

How shall I describe this illustrious scion of a far-flung race? From what I could see of him, he had

two pairs of major tentacles (call them flippers, vines, wings, fins, claws, talons or what you will),

classified respectively as arms and legs. There was a fifth visible tentacle referred to as the head—at the

top of the edifice, profusely knobbed and hollowed for sensory purposes. The entire animal, except for

extremi-ties of the tentacles, was covered with a blue and yellow striped substance which, I have since

learned, is not secreted by it at all but supplied it by other humans in a complicated chain I do not fully

understand. Each of the four major tentacles was further divided into five small tentacles somewhat in the

manner of a blap's talons; fingers, they are known as. The body proper of this Hogan Shlestertrap was

flat in the rear and exhibited a pleasing dome-like protuberance in the front, much like a nzred about to

lay eggs.

Conceive, if you can, that this human differed in no respect from those described by my ancestor

nzred fanobrel over six generations ago! One of the great boons of civilization is that continual variation is

not necessary in offspring; these creatures may preserve the same general appearance for as many as ten

or even twelve generations!

Of course, with every boon there is a price to be paid. That is what the dissidents among us fail to

understand...

Hogan Shlestertrap was occupying a chair when I entered. A chair is like—well, possibly I shall

discuss that another time. In his hand (that part of the arm where the fingers originate) he held a bottle

(shaped like a srob without fins) of whiskey. Every once in a while, he and the bottle of whiskey

performed what nzred fanobrel called an act of conjugation. I, who have seen the act, assure you that

there is no other way to describe the process. Only I fail to see just what benefit the bottle of whiskey

de-rives from the act.

"Will you have a chair?" Shlestertrap requested, dismissing the robot with a finger undulation.

I rolled up into the chair, only too happy to observe human protocol, but found some difficulty in

retaining my position as there were no graspable extremities anywhere in the object. I finally settled into a

somewhat strained posture by keeping all my tentacles stiff against the sides and bottom.

"You look like some spiders I've seen after an all-night binge," Shlestertrap re-marked graciously.

Since much of human thought is beyond our puny minds, I have been careful to record all remarks

made by the Great Civilizer, whether or not I found them compre-hensible at the time. Thus—"spider"?

"all-night binge"?

"You are Hogan Shlestertrap of Hollywood California U.S.A. Earth, come to bring us out of the

dark maw of ignorance, into the bright hatchery of knowledge. I am nzred shafalon, descended from

nzred fanobrel who met your ancestors when they first landed on this planet, appointed by the late nzred

nzredd to be your technical adviser."

He sat perfectly still, the little opening in his head—mouth, they call it—showing every moment a

wider and wider orifice.

Feeling flattered and encouraged by his evident interest, I continued into my most valuable piece of

information. How valuable it was, I did not then suspect:

"It is written in the Book of Sevens:

"When Plookh meets Plookh, they discuss sex. A convention is held, a coordinator se-lected, and

amid cheers and rejoicing, they enter the wholesome state of matrimony. The square of seven is

forty-nine."

Silence. Hogan Shlestertrap conjugated rapidly with his bottle.

"Pensioned off," he muttered after a while. "The great Hogan Shlestertrap, the pro-ducer and

director of 'Lunar Love Song,' 'Fissions of 2109,' 'We Took to the Asteroids,' pensioned off in a nutty

fruitcake of a world! Doomed to spend his remaining years among gabby mathematical spiders and

hungry whatchamacallits."

He rose and began pacing, an act accomplished with the lower tentacles. "I gave them saga after

saga, the greatest stereos that Hollywood ever saw or felt, and just because my remake of 'Quest to

Mars' came out merely as an epic, they say I'm through. Did they have the decency—those people I

picked out of the gutter and made into household names—did they have the decency to get me a job

with the distribu-tion end on a place like Titan or Ganymede? No! If they had to send me to Venus, did

they even try to salve their consciences by sending me to the Polar Continent where a guy can find a bar

or two and have a little human conversation? Oho, they wouldn't dare—I might make a comeback if I

had half a chance. That Sonny Galenhooper—my friend, he called himself!—gets me a crummy job with

the Interplanetary Cul-tural Mission and I find myself plopped down in the steaming Macro Continent

with a mess of equipment to make stereos for an animal that half the biologists of the system claim is

impossible. Big deal! But Shlestertrap Productions will be back yet, bigger and better than ever!"

These were his memorable words: I report them faithfully. Possibly in times to come, when

civilization among us shall have advanced to a higher level—always assuming that the present problem

will be solved—these words will be fully under-stood and appreciated by a generation of as yet unborn

but much more intellectualized Plookhh. To them, therefore, I dedicate this speech of the Great Civilizer.

"Now," he said, turning to me. "You know what stereos are?"

"No, not quite. You see only one of us has ever conversed with humans before this, and we know

little of their glorious ways. Our Book of Twos is almost bare of useful information, being devoted chiefly

to a description of your first six explorers, their ship and robots, by the nzred fanobrel. I deduce,

however, that stereos are an essential concomitant of an industrial civilization."

He waved the bottle. "Exactly. At the base of everything. Take your literature, your music, your

painting—"

"Pardon me," I interposed. "But we have been able to build none of these things as yet. We are

chased by so many—"

"I was just spitballing," he roared. "Don't interrupt my train of thought. I'm build-ing! Now, where

was I? Oh, yes—take your literature, music and painting and you know what you can do with them. The

stereos comprise everything in art; they present to the masses, in one colossal little package, the whole

stirring history of human endeavor. They are not a substitute for art in the twenty-second century—they

are the art of the twenty-second century. And without art, where are you?"

"Where?" I asked, for I will admit the question intrigued me.

"Nowhere. Nowhere at all. Oh, you might be able to get by in the sticks, but class will tell

eventually. You've got to romp home with an Oscar now and then to show the reviewers that you're

interested in fine things as well as money-making potboilers."

I concentrated on memorizing, deciding to reserve interpretation for later. Per-haps this was my

mistake, perhaps I should have asked more questions. But it was all so bewildering, so stimulating...

"The stereos have gone a long way since the pioneering sound movies of medieval times," he

continued. "Solid images that appeal to all five senses in gorgeous panora-mas of perception."

Hogan Shlestertrap paused and went on with even more passion. "And wasn't it said that

Shlestertrap Productions had their special niche, their special technique among the senses? Yes, sir! No

greater accolade could be accorded a stereo than to say it had the authentic Shlestertrap Odor. The

Shlestertrap smell—how I used to slave to get that in just right! And I almost always succeeded. Oh,

well, they say you're just as good as your last stereo."

I took advantage of the brooding silence that followed to clack my small tentacle hesitantly.

The emissary looked up. "Sorry, fella. What we've got to do here is turn out a stereo based on your

life, your hopes and spiritual aspirations. Something that will make 'em sit up and take notice way out in

Peoria. Something that will give you guys a culture."

"We need one badly. Particularly a culture to defend us against—"

"All right. Let me carry the ball. Understand I'm only talking off the top of my mind right now; I

never make a decision until I've slept on it and let the good old subconscious take a couple of whacks at

the idea. Now that you understand the tech-nical side of stereo-making, we can start working on a story.

Now, religion and politics are dandy weenies, but for a good successful piece of art I always say give me

the old-fashioned love story. What's the lowdown on your love-life?"

"That question is a trifle difficult to answer," I replied slowly. "We had the gravest communicative

difficulties with the first explorers of your race over this question. They seemed to find it complicated."

"A-ah," he waved a contemptuous hand. "Those scientific bunnies are always look-ing for trouble.

Takes a businessman, who's also an artist, mind you—first and last an artist—to get to the roots of a

problem. Let me put it this way, what do you call your two sexes?"

"That is the difficulty. We don't have two sexes."

"Oh. One of those a-something animals. Not too much conflict possible in that situation, I guess.

No-o-o. Not in one sex."

I was unhappy: he had evidently misunderstood me. "I meant we have more than two sexes."

"More than two sexes? Like the bees, you mean? Workers, drones and queens? But that's really

only two. The workers are—"

"We Plookhh have seven sexes."

"Seven sexes. Well, that makes it a little more complicated. We'll have to work our story from

a—SEVEN SEXES?" he shrieked.

He dropped back into the chair where he sat very loosely, regarding me with opti-cal organs that

seemed to quiver like tentacles.

"They are, to use the order stated in the Book of Sevens, srob, mlenb, tkan, guur—"

"Hold it, hold it," he commanded. He conjugated with his bottle and called to a robot to bring him

another. He sighed finally and said: "Why in the name of all the options that were ever dropped do you

need seven sexes?"

"Well, at one time, we thought that all creatures required seven sexes as a mini-mum. After your

explorers arrived, however, we investigated and found that this was not true even of the animals here on

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摘要：

VenusandtheSevenSexesWilliamTennItiswrittenintheBookofSevens:WhenPlookhmeetsPlookh,theydiscusssex.Aconventionisheld,acoordinatorselected,and,amidcheersandrejoicing,theyenterthewholesomestateofmatrimony.Thesquareofsevenisforty-nine.This,mydearchildren—myownmeager,variablebrood—wasthenotationIextract...

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William Tenn - Venus and the Seven Sexes

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