Christopher Anvil - The Trouble with Humans

This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book
are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental.
Copyright 2007 by Christopher Anvil.
"We From Arcturus" was first published in Worlds of Tomorrow in August, 1964.
"The Underhandler" was first published in Analog in November, 1990.
"Duel to the Death" was first published in Analog in June, 1965.
"Shotgun Wedding" was first published in Astounding in March, 1960.
"The Law Breakers" was first published in Astounding in October, 1959.
"Compensation" was first published in Astounding in October, 1957.
"Merry Christmas From Outer Space" was first published in Fantastic in December, 1964
"The Plateau" was first published in Amazing in March, 1965.
"Captive Leaven" was first published in Astounding in September, 1959.
"Sinful City" was first published in Future SF #32 in 1957.
"Behind the Sandrat Hoax" was first published in Galaxy in October, 1968.
"Nerves" was first published in Fantastic Universe in November, 1958.
"The Gentle Earth" was first published in Astounding in November, 1957.
A Baen Book Original
Baen Publishing Enterprises
P.O. Box 1403
Riverdale, NY 10471
www.baen.com
ISBN 10: 1-4165-2142-9
ISBN 13: 978-4165-2142-6
Cover art by Bob Eggleton
First Baen printing, August 2007
Distributed by Simon & Schuster
1230 Avenue of the Americas
New York, NY 10020
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Anvil, Christopher.
The trouble with humans / by Christopher Anvil ; edited by
Eric Flint.
p. cm.
"A Baen Books original"T.p. verso.
ISBN 1-4165-2142-9
1. Life on other planetsFiction. 2. Space
warfareFiction. I. Flint, Eric. II. Title.
PS3551.N9T77 2007
813'.54dc22
2007018797
Printed in the United States of America

Boglis Kamm stood at the edge of the woods and squinted at the factories, the whizzing cars and the shiny aircraft slanting down toward the rich valley spread out before him. Unconsciously, he licked his lips.

"There are so many loose ends and unprotected flanks," he said, "You hardly know where to start to eat them up."

Slint, Kamm's companion in Test Infiltration #6, sank the hooks of the Sirian camouflage cloth into the sod around the little Arcturan-made personal-spacer.

"It looks easy," said Slint. "But what happened to Test Infiltrations 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5? They came down around here, too, you know. All in the last ninety days. And not a peep from any of them."

Kamm scowled, and cast around through various telepathic communications channels. "Nothing but static," he said. "And we've seen their transport and building techniques. All physical."

Slint picked up a crude shovelmade by his own race: with a ragged edge, no bend for leverage where the blade joined the handle, the blade braced by a pair of crisscrossed mending plates and the handle wrapped in a yard of tape at a weak point. Slint looked at the shovel with distaste, then shoved it under the camouflage cloth and straightened up.

"Let's hope this planet has a few mechanized hand tools. Every time we hit a rock too big to teleport, we end up working on it with a crowbar and that miserable shovel."

Kamm nodded. "The thing takes up altogether too much room. It's bad enough, having to convert to Arcturan form to use the spacer. But to have to ooze around that shovel and the damned crowbar every time you want to move is just too much."

A low rumble interrupted their conversation. Kamm glanced apprehensively at the big gray clouds gliding overhead.

Slint said, "How do I look? Okay for a native?"

Kamm critically studied Slint's regular human features, the hang of his arms and set of his head on his neck, the action of arms and legs as he walked, his quiet gray suit, white shirt and blue tie. He checked to be sure Slint had four fingers and one thumb on each hand.

"Look satisfactory."

"Okay. I'll check you."

Kamm strode briskly across the clearing and back again, till he was again looking down the hill.

Slint nodded. "Good. Matches the 'color TV' and what we've been able to pick up telepathically."

"Fine. A few more details and we can go."

Kamm reached into a side pocket, pulled out his Aldeberanian protoplasm-coagulator, checked it carefully and slid it back in his pocket.

Slint glanced at the sky, and hesitated. "Should we just go now, while there's time? Or do we have to"

"Hmm," Kamm squinted at a formidable black cloud sliding across the sky in their direction. "But what if we get back and they question us on procedure?"

Slint groaned. "I'll get it out, and we can go through it out here. When it lets fly full-blast in that little constricted cabin"

There was a heavy rumble of thunder.

Kamm nodded. "Okay. Nobody's around to overhear it, and they couldn't understand it anyway. Maybe the thunder will even drown it out for us."

"No such luck," growled Slint. He vanished as he teleported himself into the personnel spacer, then reappeared a moment later holding a small recorder of Centauran make, which he hung on a dead lower branch of a sizeable pine tree about twenty feet back from the edge of the clearing. He threw a switch.

"Citizens!" roared a voice from the recorder box, speaking their native tongue.

The Sirian camouflage cloth over the Arcturan spacer had now adapted itself to its surroundings, and looked like a gentle mossy swell of ground.

"Soldiers!" shouted the recorder.

There was a rumble of thunder.

Slint growled. "I hope it gets it over with quick."

"It never does," said Kamm.

"Conquerors!" screamed the box.

"Ho-hum," said Kamm.

"You go forth," bellowed the recorder, "to glory and to triumph! To rend another glowing jewel from the violet orb of space! To place it in the diadem of the Only True Race! Victory and glory are yours! Yours the triumph! Yours the splendor! Of the greatest race of conquerors ever to span the stars!"

"If," murmured Slint, "your gravitor doesn't conk out."

"Or your heat-control," said Kamm.

A heavy crash of thunder providentially drowned out the next part. When they could hear again, the recorder had finished off its opening generalities and got down to details.

"That," it intoned, "which distinguishes Us from all other known life-forms is Our adaptability.

"Anyone can strut and glory in mere physical force.

"Hundreds of races take pride in puny intellect.

"Scores boast the power of telepathic and clairvoyant communications, the telekinetic ability to exert force at a distance.

"Only we, of all known races, can also take the form, and reproduce the structure, of all the rest, and thus conquer silently, efficiently, destroying even the telepathic by our temporary assumption of identity with them!

"Such supernal capacity is not bought without a price.

"Magnificent protoplasm-condition must be rigidly maintained. Clean living is essential. Healthful conditions must be upheld or our unparalleled protoplasmic control is impaired. This is the only requirement. This is all. There is nothing more. But it is essential.

"You, as you go forth upon your mission, can, must and will maintain yourselves uncontaminated, for the glory of conquest!

"For the triumph of the race!

"For the"

There was a blinding flash of light, and a crack of thunder that made the earth shake. Rain poured down, drenching them in an instant.

Slint ran to get the recorder, now blaring martial music through the downpour. Kamm and Slint teleported themselves into the little spacer, where they fit as uncomfortably as two sardines in a pea-pod. From overhead, the rain drummed on the camouflage cloth and gurgled as it ran down under the cloth and filled up the spaces between the spacer and the dirt it sat in. The recorder, after an instant of impressive silence, let go with a final crashing crescendo that left them all but deaf.