The bigger they are, the harder they step on a nail.
“Why was there a nail lying around in the first place?” demanded Vivian as she ducked a swinging tentacle. She couldn’t blame the octophant for being cranky. She’d feel the same way if she had a two-inch piece of steel embedded in her foot. “Everything on the station is self-assembling!”
“My husband’s wild about DIY,” said the owner, and he had the decency to droop his gills apologetically.
Vivian added “home carpentry gone wrong” to her mental list of perils to domestic animals and tried to figure out how to get close to the octophant. It was eight feet long from nose to tail and the thrashing tentacles dangling from its face were thicker than her leg. There was no way that thing was going to let her pick up its foot.
“We’re going to need to anesthetize it,” she said.
“You will not!” the owner protested. “I’m taking her to the big show on Hephaestus 7 tomorrow and I won’t have her all groggy from chemicals. Octophants are extremely sensitive creatures.”
“I could put a liter of morphine in her bloodstream and she wouldn’t even feel it,” said Vivian. “She’ll be fine. Unless you want to try pulling that nail out yourself?”
The owner scowled, but allowed Vivian to escort him out of the examination room. She sealed the room and flooded it with anesthetic gas. It took three doses before the massive beast finally swayed on its tree-trunk legs and went down.
She purged the anesthetic and opened the door, not without a hint of trepidation. Air hissed past the door’s rubber seal, laden with the astringent smell of chemicals.
The beast twitched, making her flinch back, but she approached and lay a hand on its flank. It was out. At last she could get close and truly appreciate its beauty. Its eight tentacles splayed across the examination room’s white plastic floor, each one strong enough to constrict a horse, yet delicate enough to pick a flower. Its skin was not gnarled like an elephant’s, but smooth and velvety, spangled with an intricate pattern of russet-brown rings and zigzags that camouflaged it among the rocky canyons of its native habitat, for massive as it was, there were still creatures on its home planet that hunted it.
Luckily for Vivian, no one had yet tried to keep any of those creatures as a pet, or if they had, at least they hadn’t brought it to Tau Station.
Removing the nail turned out to be a trivial affair. She pulled it out with pliers and injected the octophant’s red, swollen foot with antimicrobial nanites.
“The nanite spray you got on the way in should have decontaminated everything, but I’m sending you home with another dose just to be safe,” she explained. “I’m also giving her a nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory to bring the swelling down. She should know to stay off that foot on her own; just don’t let her do anything strenuous. She’ll be all right in a couple of days.”
“I can’t have her limping for the show,” said the owner. “Give her a stronger local anesthetic so she’ll be able to walk properly.”
“I will not,” said Vivian. “She’ll hurt herself if she can’t feel the pain. Her need to heal is more important than your need to win a medal.”
The owner puffed up his throat sac and looked daggers at her. “Are you telling me how to care for my own animal? Do you know how difficult it was to even get the permits to transport her? If I miss this show —”
Vivian didn’t hear the rest of the speech, because at that moment she felt a tentacle snaking around her leg.
The anesthetic was wearing off.
She held still, trying not to spook the octophant. It was groggy and disoriented and was just trying to get its bearings. Unfortunately, it also wrapped a tentacle around its owner’s waist. He cried out, the startled octophant dragged him to the ground, and the room became a chaos of striped and spotted limbs.
Vivian slipped her leg free — octophant tentacles had no suckers, so a quick counterclockwise twist was enough — and rushed over to the beast.
“Forget about her! Help me!” protested the owner as he tried to pull off the tentacle threatening to bisect his abdomen.
She ignored him. Instead, she stroked the top of the octophant’s head. “Shh, shh, it’s all right. No one’s going to hurt you. The procedure is already done.”
The beast continued to struggle. It struck Vivian in the back of the shin with one knee, nearly knocking her off balance and promising to leave a nasty bruise.
Vivian remembered a trick she’d heard from another octophant owner and felt the crease along the creature’s neck. There it was: a patch of smoother skin. She ran her hand along the crease, clicking her tongue. “There. That’s a good octophant. Just lie still.”
At last the creature relaxed. Its tentacle slid off the owner’s waist.
“What was that you just did?” asked the owner once they were safely outside the examination room.
“Octophants are social,” Vivian explained. “They bond with each other by rubbing their tentacles along that patch of skin. It’s their version of a hug.”
The owner looked at her blankly.
“You’re not very experienced with octophants, are you?” she asked. “Do you have any experience at all working with large animals?”
He replied, “That’s none of your business.”
An hour later, the octophant was properly awake and her owner led her away, grumbling about bad service.
“Feel free to take her to the other large animal vet on Tau Station,” Vivian couldn’t resist calling after him.
Vivian’s receptionist pinged her com box. “Are you ready for your next patient? There’s a kid here with a hamster.”
Vivian slumped against the wall. “Oh, thank goodness.”
• • •
Back in her hab, Vivian made green tea in her lacquerware teapot and put a fresh bandage on her thumb. The hamster had gotten its fur tangled in its exercise wheel. It had bitten Vivian’s thumb when she tried to extricate it. All in all, it had not been the best day.
While the tea steeped, she picked up her com box. “Station wardens? I need a check on Hab 2024. There’s an exotic pet owner there who doesn’t know a quagga from a quokka. Can you go make sure his permits and licenses are in order?”
That done, she sank into her armchair. Her pet greenling, May, left her spot under the grow light and jumped into Vivian’s lap, the leaves on her back rustling contentedly. August the decapede curled around her stocking feet, his many legs sprawled out in every direction, while January occupied her usual spot in a glass bowl on top of the fridge, a rime of frost forming on the rim of the bowl as she slept.
Vivian poured the tea and took a sip, glancing regretfully at the three other cups sitting in their spots in the velvet-lined box. She put on a soap opera and watched it half-attentively, not bothering to push August down when he raised his serpentine body to get a peek. Her com box pinged. Vivian’s face lit up when she saw her elder daughter.
“Cindy!” she cried, picking up the call. “What a nice surprise. It’s been … what, two months? Nothing’s wrong, is it?”
“Everything’s great! I just wanted to tell you that I got the gallery space.”
“For the cardboard sculptures? That’s great!”
“The opening’s in a little over a year, and I was thinking …” Cindy scratched her neck. “… Would you like to come out and see it?”
“What, to Brightsun Colony?” Vivian unwound August, who was trying to wrap his rough body around her arm.
“Why not? I haven’t seen you in ages.”
“No, no, it would be lovely to see you! But you haven’t visited Tau Station in six years, and …”
Cindy groaned. “This is why I don’t call more often. It always comes back to your kids abandoned you and moved to terra firma and never even learned the family recipe for scallion pancakes.”
“You don’t have to be so defensive. I just think you girls could have learned a little about our own culture before you ran off to live with aliens.”
“Well, you can take it up with Amy when you see her.”
“Seeing Amy?” Vivian frowned. “What are you talking about?”
“Oh, hasn’t she told you yet? She’s coming out to Tau Station in July, and she’s bringing Arykh and Ilykh. You’ll finally get to meet your grandkid!”
“And she talked to you first? She hasn’t said anything to me about …” Another ping on her com box. It was Amy. Vivian hurriedly took the call.
“Hi Mom,” said Amy, smiling brightly. “I’ve got great news! You know how you’re always telling us we should take a vacation?”
• • •
Vivian watched through the curved window as the transport pulled its ungainly, sprawling bulk into the docking bay. She’d been begging Amy to visit for eleven years, yet now she felt a twinge of trepidation.
People poured out of the vessel and into the airlock, where misters sprayed them down with antimicrobial nanites. The first-time travelers twitched and wrinkled their noses at the unfamiliar sensation. Then they all came pouring out in the awkward half-walk, half-bounce of people unused to low gravity. A hubbub of excited voices filled the station.
And then there were the three of them, waving at her from across the terminal.
Amy had hardly changed: same bright smile, same sensibly bobbed black hair.
Next to her was Arykh, half a head above the rest of the crowd. As a species, Vivian had to concede, the Taroczi were striking, with four glossy horns, long, tapered faces, and skin fading from russet brown to creamy white. Yet there was something unsettling about their too-large hands and the way their mouths were slightly downturned at the corners, as though constantly disapproving.
Trailing a few steps behind them came Ilykh, who lacked horns (for which Vivian was secretly grateful), but shared Arykh’s face shape and countershaded skin. The kid had one hand on their com and the other buried in an animal’s shaggy brown fur. Their dzacta? They brought it along?
“Mom!” said Amy, setting down her luggage to give Vivian a hug. “It’s so good to see you. It’s been way too long!”
“It’s so nice of you to finally come out to visit,” said Vivian, and then wondered if that had come out meaner than she meant.
Arykh bowed and pressed the curved sides of their horns into Vivian’s hands.
“Oh! That’s … so chivalrous,” said Vivian, pulling away a little too fast.
“It is a traditional Taroczi greeting for elders,” said Arykh.
Vivian laughed awkwardly. “I hope I’m not as old as all that.”
“And here’s Ilykh,” said Amy, waving the child forward. “Come and meet your grandmother!”
Ilykh ambled forward, their eyes still on the com video they were watching, the dzacta trotting close by their side.
“Goodness, you’re getting big!” said Vivian, realizing that she sounded like one of those dull adult relatives she’d always disliked as a child. When she was a little girl, she hated comments about how she kept growing, as if she had any option to do otherwise. But Ilykh really was quite tall and sturdy for an eleven-year-old, even considering that they were half Taroczi.
Ilykh turned to Amy and asked her something in a rapid-fire language full of consonants.
Vivian frowned. “You speak Taroczi together?”
“Well, of course,” said Amy, but there was tenseness in her smile. “That’s what all their friends at school speak.”
“It’s just … I didn’t know,” said Vivian.
“Ilykh says they thought they’d be able to feel the nanites walking around on them,” Amy translated.
“Oh, nanites are much too small for that,” said Vivian, relieved to be back on familiar territory. “They’re really quite amazing inventions. They can tell the difference between harmful bacteria and beneficial bacteria, and they hunt down and destroy the harmful kind.”
“We wouldn’t need that on Tarocz,” said Ilykh. “Hardly anyone gets sick there.” And then they turned back to Amy and said something else in Taroczi.
“Speak English,” Amy scolded them. “It’s rude to speak a language your grandmother can’t understand.”
The dzacta bumped Vivian with his broad, soft nose. Everyone laughed.
“What a handsome fellow!” said Vivian.
“His name’s Ushk-Ushk,” said Ilykh, still not looking up from their com.
At Vivian’s blank look, Amy explained, “It’s a noise they make with their noses.”
“Like a snuffle,” said Vivian. “And you brought him along? Even on vacation?”
“It’s the custom,” said Arykh. “Every Taroczi baby is given a dzacta when they’re born, and it goes with them everywhere. Even at school, there’s a pen where the dzactas graze while the children are in class.”
But they’re not a Taroczi, Vivian wanted to say. Not a full-blood Taroczi, anyway. Dzactas were fine — they were lovely animals, actually, shaggy mastiff-sized puffballs with wide-toed feet like geckos — but it hurt her how wholeheartedly Amy had embraced Taroczi customs. Did she really have to give her kid a Taroczi name? What was wrong with human names?
“Besides,” said Amy, “We thought you’d like to meet him.”
“You have me there,” Vivian admitted, scratching the beast’s ears. “Who’s a good dzacta? I never see them at the clinic. Taroczis aren’t big travelers, are they?”
That was a nice way of saying that Tarocz was a backwater. If Amy hadn’t gone there on that interplanetary tree survey as an undergrad, surely she would never have ended up living there.
“If you’d seen the woods of Tarocz, you wouldn’t want to travel either,” said Arykh.
Vivian forced a smile. “I suppose everyone’s home seems like paradise if you’ve never seen anything else. Well, perhaps Tau Station will change your mind. Come, let me show you around.”
Touring the station didn’t take long, and soon they retired to Vivian’s hab for tea. The tiny living room was crammed full: Amy and Vivian sat on the loveseat, Arykh occupied the easy chair with their horns poking the upholstery, and Ilykh sat on the floor leaning against Ushk-Ushk, still absorbed by the show on their com box. May, August, and January crept around, trying to squeeze their way into any inch of available space.
“She’s cold!” Ilykh exclaimed when January sets a delicate paw on their knee.
“She’s a frost ferret,” said Vivian. “She works just like the compressor in an air conditioner. See those long pipes coming out of her back? They vent the hot air. Hold your hand over them; you’ll feel how warm it is.”
Ilykh gave it a try and a look of surprise crossed their face. “That’s so weird! What about that one?” They pointed to May.
“She’s photosynthetic,” Vivian explained. “Those things on her back aren’t really leaves, they’re flaps of skin filled with symbiotic algae. She can use them to convert light and carbon dioxide into sugars. As long as she spends enough time under the grow lights, she doesn’t need to eat.”
“Does that mean she doesn’t poop, either?”
“That’s right.”
Ilykh snickered.
“That’s why I love working with animals,” said Vivian. “You’re always learning something new.”
She told a few stories about the curious animals she’d treated at the clinic, and Arykh and Amy talked about their encounters with Taroczi wildlife. With all four cups of the tea set in use, Vivian felt keenly that this was how her life should have been.
At last, Ilykh began to nod off with their head cradled in Ushk-Ushk’s fur. Arykh took them back to their quarters. Amy stayed behind to keep catching up with Vivian.
“Are you happy?” Vivian asked her.
“What do you mean?” asked Amy, her fingers tracing the irises painted on the lacquer cup. “I couldn’t be happier. Arykh is wonderful, and Ilykh … they’re a miracle.”
Vivian had seen enough ectopic pregnancies and prolapsed uteruses that she’d decided to have both her babies artificially incubated, but Amy wanted to have a baby the old-fashioned way. It wasn’t easy — the single-sex Taroczis were very biologically different from humans. Three pregnancies had failed. Ilykh was the fourth.
“They’re a great kid,” said Vivian. “But don’t you ever want more from life? You were so bright in school. Your sister is off becoming a famous artist. And you …”
Amy sighed and set down her cup. “See, this is why I left Tau Station. No matter what I do, it’s never enough for you. I like my life. Can’t you just accept that?”
“I only meant that you could —” began Vivian, but Amy was already heading for the door.
“Forget it,” she said. “Just forget it.”
• • •
At the clinic the next day, Vivian found herself having trouble focusing on the spine-covered felid anesthetized on the exam table.
“She’s having a difficult pregnancy,” said the owner.
“I’m surprised these things ever have an easy pregnancy,” said Vivian, looking at the thorny protrusions that covered the catawampus.
She ran the ultrasound wand over the creature’s belly, the only smooth spot on its skin.
“Yep. That’s what I thought. The kittens have become entangled. We’ll have to do a C-section.”
But as she shaved the catawampus’ swollen belly and marked where she was going to make the incision, her mind was on Amy, Ilykh, and Arykh. They were spending the day on an asteroid cruise. Amy had demurred when Vivian offered to take the day off from the clinic so she could go with them.
“No, no, I’m sure you’ve done these cruises lots of times,” she’d said. “I’m sure they need you at the clinic.”
Their first visit to the station, and Vivian had done her best to make it their last. Well. There was still dinner tonight.
The kittens came out as sharp and thorny as their mother, screaming their displeasure as Vivian untangled them. There were eight altogether, fat and feisty. She nestled them next to a heating pad while she sewed up the mother.
A ping on her com box interrupted her just as she finished stitching. She grabbed the box from the counter. There was a text from Amy. “Sorry — we won’t be able to see you for dinner. Ushk-Ushk is sick.”
• • •
“You didn’t have to come over,” said Amy. “I’m sure it’s nothing. Just a little case of the blahs.”
Vivian said, “Nonsense. I’m a vet and I’m here. Now let’s have a look.”
She had to give the Taroczis credit: The bonds they formed with their animals were incredible. Ushk-Ushk lolled listlessly on a cushion, his eyes dull. Ilykh knelt beside him, petting his fur and offering him dried sweetgrass, which he refused.
“He’s never like this,” said Ilykh, their brows furrowed anxiously.
“I’ll get to the bottom of it,” said Vivian.
But the examination was inconclusive. Ushk-Ushk’s pulse was slow and his blood oxygen levels were low, but his temperature was normal and the rapid blood test didn’t show any toxins or antibodies. There was no sign of injury. She swabbed his nose and throat, but in the end, she left, shaking her head.
“I’ll culture these back at the lab,” she told the others. “It must be a bug he brought from Tarocz. He couldn’t have caught it on the station — the nanites would have taken care of it.”
“Impossible,” said Arykh. “Dzactas never get sick back on Tarocz. They’re very rugged creatures.”
“Well, it came from somewhere,” said Vivian. “At least let me take blood samples from the three of you. If he picked something up from anywhere, one of you is the most likely.”
Ilykh flinched as she pricked their finger. They asked, “Will this help you treat Ushk-Ushk?”
“I hope so,” said Vivian. “But it’s probably nothing serious anyway. He’ll probably be fine in a day or two.”
He was not fine.
By the next day, Ushk-Ushk couldn’t stand. He lay on one side, huffing for breath, his thick black tongue hanging out of his mouth.
Vivian brought him into the clinic. His blood pressure was dropping. Five pounds had melted off him impossibly fast. She began a saline drip and began a full battery of tests. Scans showed no tumors or internal damage. The bacterial cultures she’d taken must have been contaminated; they grew into an indecipherable mass and she had to throw them away.
The blood tests from Amy, Arykh, and Ilykh were another matter. “Now this is strange,” she said as she looked over the results. “Amy, your blood is normal. But Arykh and Ilykh — you two are swimming in antibodies. You can’t possibly have been exposed to all these diseases.”
Arykh took a look at the monitor. “Those numbers are normal for Taroczi. We have strong immune systems. It’s why we have so few illnesses, especially as children.”
“Interesting,” said Vivian. Taroczi must have very unusual biology. But that didn’t help her diagnose the dzacta.
“Who cares?” Ilykh said, raising their face from where they had pressed it into the thick brown fur. Tears stained the dark stripes across their cheekbones. “I just want to know what’s wrong with Ushk-Ushk!”
“I don’t know,” Vivian had to admit. “But I promise, I’ll give him the best treatment possible. He’ll pull through. You’ll see.”
“Do you know that or are you just saying that?”
Perceptive kid. Vivian dodged the question. She ruffled Ilykh’s hair and said, “I’ve treated thousands of animals with every possible condition. This isn’t the worst I’ve seen. Let’s go do something to take your mind off him. This is still a vacation, after all.”
Ilykh shoved her away and clung tighter to the dzacta. “I’m not leaving him.”
“Staying with him won’t help him get better any faster,” said Vivian. “Now come on. Your parents and I were going to get sodas. And Tau Station has a great VR space.”
“Go without me,” said Ilykh.
When even their parents couldn’t convince them, Vivian had to give up and leave Ilykh by the sick beast’s side. To occupy them, she left them in charge of the second set of cultures.
“If anything grows in those Petri dishes, you ping my com box,” she instructed them.
They nodded solemnly.
The three adults went for drinks in the observation dome, which commanded a 180-degree view of the Milky Way. Amy and Arykh got purple Taroczi cocktails; Vivian had unfiltered sake. But the creamy, sweet wine didn’t do much to brighten Vivian’s mood. She cursed herself for not being able to help the one creature that belonged to someone she truly cared about. Why hadn’t she studied dzacta biology? Why couldn’t more Taroczis have traveled through Tau Station and given her more experience?
“I’m sorry,” she finally said to break the lingering silence that had grown between the three of them. “This is not the vacation hoped for your first visit to Tau Station.”
“It’s not your fault,” said Amy.
Vivian shook her head and studied the flecks in the terrazzo-patterned floor. “I’ve put pets to sleep lots of times. It’s the worst part of my job. I’ve seen lots of heartbroken kids. But Ilykh … I’m worried about whether they’ll be okay. I’ve never seen anyone so attached to an animal. If Ushk-Ushk dies, I don’t know if they’ll get over it.”
“They will,” said Arykh. “Sooner or later, everyone has to experience the death of their dzacta. It’s our first heartbreak. The dzacta is the first thing we learn to love and the first thing we must let go of.”
“Pardon me if I don’t want their pet to die as an object lesson,” snapped Vivian. She didn’t need a Taroczi to lecture her about the bonds between people and animals. “This is the only thing they’re going to remember about this visit.”
Her com box pinged. She checked it and saw Ilykh’s face.
“Mrs. Yi?” they asked.
“You can call me Grandma,” she said.
“I watched the Petri dishes like you said, and they’re covered with blobs of fuzz.”
“How much fuzz?”
Ilykh sent her a photo. Once again, the petri dishes were completely covered with bacterial colonies: white, orange, green, black.
Vivian made sure to mute her com before venting her frustration. “Don’t tell me I contaminated the cultures again! Even if he’s got an infection, there’s no way there can be that much bacteria in his body. And yet … no antibodies. Not low levels. None. Even if he were perfectly healthy, he should still have antibodies.”
“What does that mean?” asked Amy.
“I have no idea,” said Vivian. Turning her com back on, she told Ilykh, “I’m coming back to the clinic.”
• • •
At a loss for what else to try, Vivian took a biopsy. Ushk-Ushk was too weak to do more than flinch. She prepared the slide while Amy and Arykh tried to calm Ilykh, who was barely keeping themself together.
“I have to be missing something,” Vivian muttered to herself as she put the cover slip on the slide. She asked, “Arykh, your people have been living with dzactas for a long time, haven’t they?”
“Since our prehistory,” they replied. “We used to use them as pack animals, guard beasts — everything except for food. Dzacta meat is inedible; it turns to mush.”
“So your two species have truly coevolved. Like humans and dogs, but even more so.” That was interesting, but she didn’t see how it helped. There had to be something else about dzacta biology she wasn’t yet grasping.
As Vivian brought the slide into focus, her jaw dropped. Instead of the usual patchwork sheet of round, blobby cells, the dzacta’s cells formed a spongy latticework. The empty spaces were full of some kind of pulpy mass.
“What? What is it?” asked Ilykh, grabbing her arm.
“It’s like nothing I’ve ever seen,” said Vivian. “I can’t quite tell with this microscope — the magnification isn’t high enough — but it almost looks like …”
“Like what?”
“Like a bacterial colony.” Vivian grabbed her com box. “Get me the station wardens. You’re the ones who administer the nanite spray? Is there any way to deactivate the nanites?”
• • •
Purple-blue water washed over the pebbles of the Taroczi shore. Away from the water, a feathery cushion of fungus covered the rocks until it vanished into the looping fractal trees. Arykh was right: Tarocz was gorgeous. Vivian sat on the fungus with Amy and Arykh, sipping a cold Taroczi cocktail. She should have visited long ago.
Ilykh raced alongside the sea, Ushk-Ushk by their side. The dzacta’s eyes were bright and his coat glossy again, and thanks to all the extra sweetgrass Ilykh had fed him while he recovered, he’d put on a good ten pounds more than he’d started with.
“Well, are you glad you came out?” Amy asked Vivian.
Vivian sighed. “I needed a break! If I never have to talk to another news vulture, it’ll be too soon.”
“Imagine all that fuss over something the Taroczi have been doing for ages!” chuckled Arykh.
“There’s more to your customs than I realized,” Vivian admitted.
Dzactas, it turned out, were not single organisms at all, but complex colonies that played host to enormous colonies of virulent bacteria and viruses. Proteins in their blood entered the bacteria and altered their DNA, rendering them harmless. Dzactas built their entire bodies out of the very organisms that tried to kill them — but spraying them with antimicrobial nanites caused the whole system to collapse.
Ilykh shrieked with laughter as Ushk-Ushk licked their face. Vivian now saw that this was an age-old way that the Taroczi protected their children. As the child and the beast touched each other, Ushk-Ushk absorbed microorganisms from Ilykh’s skin. Meanwhile, Ilykh was exposed to harmless versions of countless viruses and bacteria. No wonder the Taroczi got sick so rarely.
“So what now?” asked Amy. “I hear you’ve gotten a lot of offers to help develop new therapies based on dzacta biology. They’re saying it could revolutionize medicine.” She smiles to herself, as if she’s remembering all the times Vivian asked her why she wanted to live in a place like Tarocz.
Vivian waved her off. “And spend six months holed up in a lab with racks of test tubes? Leave that to someone else. I’m a vet, not a researcher. I was thinking I’d like to stay here for another week or two, actually. The people on Tau Station can pull nails out of their own octophants’ feet for a little while. Maybe we could get Cindy to join us. Look at this gorgeous landscape! Surely it could inspire an artist.”
Ilykh ran up to Vivian, holding a squirming six-legged salamander by the tail. “Have you ever seen one of these? They eat rocks and they poop out mud.”
“Neat!” said Vivian, taking the salamander. “Maybe I’ll bring him home with me. I could call him September. You like animals, don’t you?”
Ilykh nodded.
“Do you know we have internships on Tau Station? You could learn to be a vet.”
Ilykh broke into a grin. “Really?”
“You can apply when you’re fourteen. But be warned: An internship isn’t a vacation. It’s hard work, and they’re very selective.”
“I can work hard,” said Ilykh.
“Show me,” said Vivian. “There’s a lot we still don’t know about the animals of Tarocz. Help me collect and catalog them. Who knows what else we might discover?”
Ilykh didn’t need any encouragement. They set off down the beach, turning over every rock and bit of driftwood and crouching to look underneath. Their brown-and-white skin stood out against the purple sea.
Vivian stretched out on the soft fungus and watched her grandchild with a smile.