Chap. 425 The Naming Game

A crowd of children were standing just outside the library.

“Good morning, sir!” they called to K’ndar as he approached. Behind him, Raventh had landed in the commons fronting the library, joining Motanith. Francie’s fire lizards were atop the green.

“Good morning!” he returned.

Francie was already there.

“Good morning, Chief Elene,” he said, courteously.

“And to you, sir. Thank you for coming. I have two children here who have won the Name the Mystery Animal contest.”

A young girl of about 8 and a boy perhaps a year older, stepped forward.

K’ndar said, “I will admit that I haven’t had the time to research the animal, so please, tell me, what IS that tiny little beast?”

The whole crowd started shouting, so many that he didn’t catch it.

He laughed. “Okay, one at a time? Lassie?”

“It’s a pygmy shrew. The smallest mammal known on Earth.”

“A pygmy shrew. I have no idea what a shrew is.”

“I do! It’s a member of the mustelid family, it eats constantly, they are carnivorous and weigh no more than two or three grams. If they don’t eat every fifteen minutes to an hour, they die,” the boy called out.

“And, sir, in the mural, it’s next to the largest animal to ever live on Earth, the blue whale,” the girl said.

“That is astonishing,” he said, and he truly meant it. “It looks in the mural to be no bigger than an eyelash on the whale.”

“Whales didn’t have eyelashes,” a boy cried from the crowd, “They were hairless even though they were mammals.”

Obviously, one had studied whales in depth.

“Now, then, kids, we have two winners of naming that mysterious little animal. The prize is a dragon ride! Francie has green Motanith, and K’ndar has brown Raventh. You can see both dragons are waiting in the commons in front of the Library. They are ready to take you on a ride.”

Despite not having won a ride, the rest of the children cheered. Elene had impressed on them that, they may not have won the contest, but they did win knowledge through their own efforts. K’ndar noticed that they all had ribbons, the same sort of award given at horse shows.

Hmm, Elene, thought, now how do I choose who rides who?

“Do you have any choices in dragons?” she asked.

“I want the brown,” the boy said, quickly.

The girl realized that left the green.

“Um,” she said, resentful that the boy had been so quick to choose Raventh.

“Oh, good,” Francie said, seeing her consternation, “Motanith LOVES taking girls on a ride. You know that green dragons were the most important dragon when we fought Thread. Do you know why?”

“Because they’re pretty?” the girl answered.

The adults laughed.

“I will say yes, because I happen to have the prettiest dragon on Pern,” Francie said, not lying, “but it’s because they are the fastest of all the dragons. In a race, no dragon can beat a green except another green.”

“Oh, no,” the girl moaned, “What if I fall off? Like I did when the pony ran away with me?”

“Don’t you worry!” Francie said, shaking her head, “Motanith would NEVER let that happen. She is very careful with passengers, especially smart girls like you. And you will be harnessed in. So, all you need to do is hold on and tell me how fast or slow you want to go.”

Suddenly the boy felt as if he’d made a bad choice. He looked at K’ndar.

“Browns don’t go fast?”

K’ndar shook his head. “Not as fast as a green. Francie is right, green dragons were the most important part of a fighting wing. But browns make up for it in that they have more stamina. That means they can fly farther and for longer than the greens. But it doesn’t matter. We can go fast, we can go slow, it’s up to you.”

“Can we go between? Like you did when you were fighting Thread?”

K’ndar shot a look at Elene, who’d arranged with the parents of the two kids before hand. She shook her head.

“Not this time,” K’ndar said, relieved. “It’s not dangerous, and it doesn’t hurt, but you need some real training before ever going between.”

The boy was mollified.

“Now I hope you brought a jacket? Because it does get cold up in the sky,” Francie said to the girl.

The boy was already wearing one, one several years of growth too large for him. But it would do, K’ndar thought.

The girl held hers out. “And mum gave me a helmet to wear. Will I need it?”

Francie shrugged. “I always wear a helmet, it’s mostly to keep the wind out of my ears. It’s just the smart thing to do, like wearing a helmet when you’re riding a horse.”

The girl tugged it on.  “There,” Francie said, “You look like a proper dragonrider. Maybe someday you’ll Impress one?”

She will, Motanith said, I can tell she has the gift from here.

“I don’t know how. I don’t know if I can,” the girl said.

“You might,” Francie said, smiling, “Motanith says you have the gift of  hearing dragons. You’re a bit too young to have it developed yet, but trust me, you will, and then you’ll be able to Impress a dragon, like me!”

The boy looked at K’ndar, hopefully.

“What does your dragon say about me?”

“Um,” K’ndar said, put on the spot, “We’ll have to ask him. But don’t worry, in some people, particularly boys, it takes a while longer to learn if you have the gift. I didn’t know I had it until I was almost seventeen. How old are you?”

“I’m nine going on ten, sir.”

“Plenty of time, lad. Now let’s put you up on the best dragon on Pern, the mighty Raventh!”

Raventh provided a knee for the lad. Siskin looked at him curiously from his perch behind Raventh’s head.

K’ndar buckled the boy in. He sat up straight, as if willing the dragon to launch.

Motanith reached down and snuffled the girl’s helmeted head.

The girl reflexively backed up. “Can I, uh, can I pet her?”

“Of course. Give her a little scratch under her chin.”

The girl hesitantly did so. “Oh! She’s warm! Her skin is soft!”

“Yes. They’re not reptiles, like snakes. And she LOVES chin scritches.”

The girl hesitantly began to scratch, to which Motanith gave a soft purr.

Yes. She has the gift  Motanith said.

Knowing you, she can scratch you until her arm falls off.

Yes.

Francie laughed. “She says you can do that until your arm falls off. But I know you want to go flying. So, are you ready?”

“Ready!!”

Francie’s three fire lizards were already arrayed on the green’s neck.

“Do they go with you all the time?” the girl asked, comfortably harnessed in.

“They do. They love flying, just like you will.”

“Where can we go?”

“Where would you like to go?”

“Can we go to the sea? I’ve never been there.”

“Ah, lassie, that’s exactly what I wanted to do. Maybe we’ll see dolphins? Let’s go! And remember, if you get tired, just let me know and we’ll come back home.”

“Me too,” the boy said, having heard their destination, “I want to see dolphins!”

The two dragons launched simultaneously and flew, side by side, to the sea. The girl was shouting in joy, so amazed at how different everything looked from the air. They were gone for more than an hour, but to the children, it was as if they’d been only a minute.

Both kids were entranced when they finally returned to Landing. Their parents were waiting.

Of course, K’ndar and Raventh waited until Motanith had landed and moved aside to allow Raventh to land.

The boy’s mother came up to Raventh. “Thank you, K’ndar,” she said. “I’m Weyr bred, sir and I must say, Raventh is possibly the most refined brown I’ve ever seen. Everything fits on him. He’s more like a raptor than a dragon.”

K’ndar, dismounting, bowed slightly. “Thank you, ma’am, I happen to agree with you.” He turned to unbuckle the boy, but the lad had already done so. Yet he didn’t make a move to dismount.

“Mum, we saw dolphins! We flew out to Cove Hold, there were three dolphins, they were jumping way high out of the water!”

“One of these days, when I’m not at work, maybe we’ll rent a cart and drive out there to see them again,” she said. “Um, are you going to come down, now?”

It was obvious the boy didn’t want to. I can see forever, even from here, he thought. I really hope to impress a dragon. This was the most incredible feeling.

“Uh, I could stay up here forever,” he said, but bowed to the inevitable and dismounted. He patted Raventh’s shoulder. “Thank you, Raventh.”

“And?????” his mother said,

The boy turned and bumped K’ndar’s fist. “Thank you, sir, for the ride. I hope I get a dragon of my own someday.”

The girl, once she had dismounted, wrapped her arms around the base of Motaniths’ neck. “Thank you, Motanith. You are the bestest dragon.”

 Motanith, who seldom ever interacted with humans other than her rider and Raylan, gurgled softly. Francie laughed. “She says, you’re welcome, you were the best passenger ever.”

Then, tearing off her helmet, the girl ran to her mother. “Mum! Mum, we were so high up, I could see the moons!” the girl cried, “And I’m going to impress a green when I’m old enough!”   

_________________________________________________________

“I feel so stupid,” he said out loud, resting his head on his fists.  A couple of kids did their research and identified the pygmy shrew. And my copy of Walker’s “Mammals of the Galaxy” has several pages on shrews. How in the world could such a small creature survive a night without eating? I’ve had months to research the spikenecked beast and forgotten all about it, he thought.

Jansen came up behind K’ndar at his work station. Instead of accessing his computer, he had a large book opened in front of him.

“You shouldn’t,” she said, startling him.

“Shouldn’t what?”

“Feel stupid. You’re not.”

“Thanks, but I do. Two kids showed me up by identifying that tiny little creature in the mural. I’m trying to research the creature we brought back from the survey of the Southern steppe, and keep getting distracted by all the amazing animals in the book. Not that it matters, I haven’t seen anything remotely like the spike necked animal in this book. I have no idea where to look.”

“That spikenecked beast?” I’m sorry to say this, but I’ve been so busy I forgot you brought a skeleton back,” she said.

“That makes two of us. It was Francie who jogged my memory, we went out this morning to see if L’ichen stole that boulder from the first expedition.”

“Yes, I remember the note from his handler saying how nice it looks in his quarters. Did he?”

K’ndar growled. “Yes. It’s gone.”

“That jerk. I’m glad he’s dead, but I’m afraid to think there might be others like him coming here. Now.”

“Me, too. If I knew how, I’d make a note in the database that starts out, “To the council fifty years from this date, you have thieves coming back to our time to steal artifacts.” And I would name the Lords who bought stuff from L’ichen.”

Jansen laughed. “Our council is way ahead of you, K’ndar. They and Lytol, too, all created a document that says pretty much that. Whether the future Council reads and acts on it, we’ll never know.”

“Well, if nothing else, we know, now, to keep an eye out for strangers.”

“We can’t be too wary, K’ndar. Landing is the center of our world, people come from all over.”

He nodded. “Aye. Well, I wonder if there’s a way I can keep locations of things I find secret?”

“But that doesn’t help, either. We all want that information, it’s part of our history.”

“Argggh, this whole thing is just getting too thick and chewy,” he said, aggravated.

“I know. But, K’ndar, don’t let it keep you from doing what you’re best at-finding artifacts, pulling away the rock wall that’s so far kept our history hidden. So much of it has been lost because it was kept on hides, because what was recorded on hides was only the most important things, like a hurricane or a warlord like Fax. They didn’t have the time or the ability to go nomading about like you do. Believe me, there are a hundred people who’d give their best boots to have the job you do and the dragon to do it with.”

He nodded. “And the boss who lets me do it and the computer tech who turns my scribbles into actual data.”

She laughed. “So, you are working with a book rather than the database on that spikeneck, as you call it?”

He turned to the book. “Yes. I am more comfortable with a book than with a computer. But right now, I feel stupid.”

“You should be used to that, by now,” she snarked.

He swatted at her, grinning. “You’re just jealous.”

She laughed.

“Seriously, I am. I AM jealous, well, no, envious, that you DO have the right characteristics for this job, I’m no biologist. And I never impressed a dragon. I just didn’t hear them.”

He shrugged. “I didn’t know I was a biologist until I heard the definition, here. Impressing a dragon was, well, a gift.”

“So why are you saying you’re stupid? Because you’re not.”

“Okay, I’m…lazy. No, that’s not it. I’ve been so busy I didn’t research that animal until a pair of kids worked their tails off identifying that little animal in the museum’s mural.”

“I heard it’s something called a ‘pygmy shrew”.

“Yes, and it’s not in the database. Most of Earth’s animals aren’t. I don’t know if it’s because they were all extinct by the time the database was created or there just wasn’t any room in the database to include what is, basically, useless data. Why have pictures and information on animals that are as extinct as that T.rex dinosaur. For that matter, why even bother with information about dinosaurs.”

“You are talking to a woman who has suddenly realized that she wants to know EVERYTHING about Earth’s dinosaurs,” Jansen said, “I have never in my life been so consumed with wanting to know everything about them. I am a bit sorry that we never had them, or if we did, we’ve not found them. So I’m enjoying the vicarious research, grateful that I don’t have to worry about a predator forty feet tall and capable of eating me without even chewing.”

She sighed in resignation. “There was just so much information that the creators of the database brought here with the colonists that they had to um, cull a lot of Earth’s history in order to make room, even with qubit memory.”

“Qubit memory-I am NOT going to ask what that is.”

“Don’t. It’s particle physics and I can barely grasp Newtonian subatomic physics. Even the database can’t make me grasp what it is and how it works. But now I see why you’re looking in a book.”

“I am, because the skeleton of the spike neck has hair, Jansen, and this is “Walker’s “Mammals of the Galaxy”. Up til now, the only hairy animals here on Pern are mammals, and we’re not native. This spikeneck-I’m going to ask Miklos if he collected its DNA. I don’t think it’s saurian, it’s not strictly a mammal, it’s not a reptile and certainly not a bird or a wherry. It’s an entirely new class of Pern natives. A whole Class!”

“That’s HUGE, K’ndar. Huge.”

“Yes,” he said, the thought thrilling him, “But this book is so huge, too, it will take me some time, going through it picture by picture.”

She gasped. “K’ndar. Don’t do that.”

“Why not? The kids did.”

“Did they?”

“Uhhh, I don’t know.”

“Well, I do. They didn’t. Remember, I can see what people are doing with the database. Elene asked me to help. There were two kids who searched the database strategically. She said her one and only copy of “Mammals of the Galaxy” was being mobbed, all those kids wanted to go through her one and only copy of Earth’s mammals. She had to schedule time for each kid, or teams, as they sometimes formed, to have a crack at it.

The two kids who won the contest, though, did so by using their brains and the database. They measured the size of the animal in the mural-individually, mind you, they didn’t work together. They annotated the appearance, and even more importantly, where the animal was in the lineup and against the other animals. Then they put their data into the database and let Turing find it.”

“Whoa.”

“Yes. The only thing they assumed was that it was a Terran mammal. Some of the other creatures in the mural are definitely NOT mammalian. Even so, it took a while, because while Pern doesn’t have any mammals, Vulcan does, Aldebaran 4 does, Earth had thousands, several of the colonies reported them but didn’t have any data other than they were ‘hairy’, and that’s because they were like us, working their tails off trying to make a go of a colony.”

“Hmm. That does make it easier, because I keep getting distracted, looking through Mammals. There were so many fascinating beasts on Earth, never mind other planets. I want to read about all of them. Like one creature, called an aardvark, just the name is so weird, it just begs to be researched.”

“Let me help with the spikeneck. Move over.”

She sat down at his terminal and looked expectantly at him.
“Now. Tell me what it looked like.”

“Would a photo of the skeleton help?”

She looked at his book. “I don’t see skeletons in Mammals.”

“No, but…okay. Let’s do it this way.”

He pulled his notebook out of his backpack. “I’ve got it in my mind, but my notebook will keep me on track. We saw a large herd of them this morning! They’re actually quite lovely beasts, if oddly shaped. Seeing them alive today and acting like normal beasts has given me a much better idea of what to tell you.”

“I don’t know how long it will take,” she said, “That book looks awfully thick.”

“It’s one of five volumes, Jan. I just brought one, covering Terra’s mammals because that’s what I am more familiar with. The other four are in my quarters.” He didn’t tell her each one had cost him a months’ pay. But I’m not using the money, books are more valuable to me than money, he thought.

She smiled, feeling a surge of confidence.

“And it also is in my database, now. Every book the printers issued, Elene also insisted be scanned into the database.”

She typed as she spoke. “Is that all?” when he ran out of descriptions.

“I think so, as much as I noted and saw this morning. How long until Turing finds it?”

She smiled, smugly. “Probably a minute?”

The database pinged.

“Ooops, I was wrong. He’s got it. Is this your beast?”

The picture of a male spikeneck appeared on the screen. Underneath it, a caption related some data-but the letters weren’t in Global, the worldwide language of Pern.

“Yes! That’s it!”

“Okay, here’s the information.”

Translate from Vulcan? appeared on the screen.

K’ndar felt his pride deflate like a balloon.

“It’s…not native?”

She shook her head. “Probably not. These letters? if you can call them that, they’re Vulcan. Turing says the original data is in Vulcan, and so it’s undoubtedly a Vulcan native, or from one of their colonies. So no, it’s not a native beast. We all know that there were several beasts brought here as embryos from Vulcan and Aldebaran 4. Like those boatheads up north, or that lovely flying fox.”

“Yeah. And here I was going to make a mark in science with discovering an entire class of Pern’s animals. Oh, well. Let’s see what it is,” he said, mastering his disappointment.

She hit ‘Yes’.

Closest similarity to Terran animals; ones found throughout the galaxy; or confined to Vulcan?

She looked at him. He shrugged. She typed “Terran.”

The screen displayed a photo of an okapi in what appeared to be a zoo enclosure, along with text.

MAMMALIA; ARTIODACTYLA; GIRAFFIDAE; closest to Terran Genus: Okapi.

Terran Okapis consisted of a single species, Okapi johnsoni.  Very little is recorded in this database of the Terran okapi due to its rapid extinction in Terra’s 21^st century, due to poaching, habitat loss, killed for its meat, and climate change. It was an ungulate found in the deep forests of north Africa.  

Display okapi chapter from Walker’s “Mammals of the Galaxy”?

Jansen clicked “No.”

“No?” K’ndar asked.

“You have the book right there, K’ndar. Let’s find out what the Vulcans did with THEIR okapi,” as she typed ‘display Vulcan okapi”.

“That’s it!” K’ndar exclaimed as a series of pictures displayed, “That’s the spike neck!”

Unlike Terra’s single species of okapi, Vulcan has ten extant and fourteen extinct species. The one displayed, O. vulcani, is considered an antelope, in the same family as the ‘boathead’ ungulate established in the Northern forests of Pern. This and several other Vulcan species were transported aboard the Buenos Aires. Very little has been recorded of the Vulcan Okapi’s introduction to Pern, other than approximately forty were released on Southern Continent after successful raising from embryonic stage. No other information has been recorded since then. Is the data entered this date accurate and to be included in the data base?

She looked at him.

“I know it’s not a native, K’ndar, but it’s a new animal for us and deserves to be in the database.”

“Of course, why do you ask me?”

She smiled. “Because it’s going to ask you to name it.”

“Me?”

“You discovered it, you brought it here, you did the research.”

“NOT BY MYSELF, I had help! It was on a survey with D’mitran, Risal and B’rost, you remember?  We were to survey how far south Lord Dorn’s Hold extends. Francie sent a friend out to collect the bones after cataloging them, that hopefully is in the database, and I..”

“K’ndar. Shut up. I know it’s not a new ‘class’. I guess that’s important to a biologist. But come on, don’t be so humble. The others on the survey aren’t biologists. You’ve advanced biology almost singlehanded since you began working here. You’ve discovered other animals: the musk lizard, for instance, and let someone else name it. Give it a name, there’s no way a Vulcan name is going to make sense to us. I don’t know anyone who can even speak Vulcan, it’s not necessary. Do you know the scientific name for boatheads? I can find out, but I’m betting there won’t be any data from Pern, just Vulcan.”

“I don’t. All I know is that the Holders up north just call them ‘boatheads”. It’s hard to believe they’re related to the spikenecks, they’re relatively ugly beasts, but they’re friendly to humans and have the most luxurious fur.  Their skull looks like an upside down boat, hence the name boathead.”

He didn’t say that they terrified dragons, as their defense against predators was ultrasonic screaming.

“Which sounds rather derogatory, given that Francie grew up at the Hold they’re living at, and she insists they’re sweet animals other than they don’t like dragons. Personally, I am going to research if anyone on Pern has properly classified them and given them a proper name that we can read and pronounce. They just dubbed it ‘boathead’,” he said.

“Or, if they were a colonist, which is pretty certain, couldn’t pronounce or spell it in Vulcan. For instance, see the caption under the spike neck’s picture? That’s the Vulcan name for your new beast.” She moved her cursor to underline the symbols.

 8meochkkiliannat

“Eight? It’s starts with 8?”

“Well, that’s Turing’s interpretation for a letter, you could call it, that has no similar letter in Global. And I can ask Turing to have it pronounced, but for now, I think you should consider a name for the spikeneck. Because, honestly, I think ‘spikeneck’ is, well, stupid. If you keep finding new animals and people want to give them dumb names, eventually we’ll run out of pejoratives. Like ‘boathead’. Or speartooth.”

“But they are descriptive. And some kid from over two thousand years ago dubbed them ‘spikeneck.” By rights, it should be kept as that.”

“It’s something I’d expect from a kid.  Giving him first dibs just doesn’t sit right with me, and K’ndar, who’s to prove it? Eh? There’s not a jot of information as to what it was, where it was, and how the kid saw it in the first place. For all we know, he heard someone else describe it. Give this beast a decent name. Don’t you horsemen have a saying, every good horse deserves a good name? This is no different.”

“Well, yes,” he said, feeling that pang of love anytime horses came up in the conversation. I might be a dragonrider, but my first love was and will always be horses, he thought.

“I’m surprised he even reported it because, according to the legend, he was lost,” K’ndar said, laughing. “He was a Weyrling who made a navigation mistake. Any dragon rider who says he’s never made the same mistake is a liar. Getting lost is how I found the smandas! That Weyrling was out skyhooting around, I’m sure he ‘forgot’ to tell his mentor or his wingleader he was going out on his own. Only because we get our home Weyr dragonstones virtually tattooed onto our brains did he make it back alive.  I’ve done that once or twice, broke curfew or restriction to the Weyr, and boy, didn’t I pay the price when I was found out.”

“Extra duty?”

“Oh, yeahhhhhh,” he said, grinning.

“So think of a name, eh?”

“Now?”

“Can you think of a better time? Spikeneck is too simple.  I have the data all here, I expect you to input today’s data, and it’ll be more professional when you have a true scientific name for it. And if you don’t, I will make one up instead.”

“Hmm, I don’t like being upstaged AGAIN. It was bad enough two kids beat me to the shrew’s identity.”

He thought for several moments, thinking of a defining characteristic that would also serve as a name. It resembles Earth’s okapi in the high front end and lower back end, and the slightly elongated neck. And that it having six limbs, not four like Earth’s beast. The coloration is almost the same save that our spikeneck’s stripes are vertical along the body rather than Earth’s beast with the hindquarter stripes horizontal.  The spikes, though..ah. No spikes on Earth’s okapi. The spikes on the herd male’s neck rise up and display a pulsating red membrane. Once seen, you’d never forget it. It’s the crest that accentuates the male’s status, and really defines the animal. I like it.

“Okay. How about ‘Crested okapi’?

“Yes, I like it. A lot.”

It thrilled him when her typing came on the screen

Pernese name “Crested Okapi”.

“What about the Latin name?”

“Jansennnnnnnnnn, it’s hard enough trying to classify a hairy animal that’s not a mammal. I haven’t any idea what to call a class of animal that’s not what we have here.  And it’s a Vulcan animal. No one has tried to create a name that designates animals not native to the planet they’re on. We don’t even know if the Vulcan’s classify their animals like we do, in Latin.”

“It can’t be that difficult.” She called up the translator.

“Define ‘crest’ in regards to an animal” she typed.

From the Latin?

“Of course, Turing, don’t be so obtuse,” she snapped at the computer as she typed.

“He can’t be that obtuse, Jan, if he knows you want it in Latin.”

“I know, but it’s not that he knows when I’m asking something about biology that he’s going to be asked for the Latin. It’s just that he’s so smug about it. That and only biologists have anything to do with Latin.”

The screen opened.

Jubatus (adj) 1. Of a bird or other animal having a comb, a mane or tuft of feathers, fur, skin or bone on or adjoined to the head.

Continue with other uses of jubatus not related to animals?

She typed ‘no”.

“That’s it in a nutshell, K’ndar. That crest is the signifier.”

“Yes.”

Classify ‘Crested okapi’ as Okapi jubatus?

She held one finger up for a moment, then clicked “Yes.”

She sat back, triumphantly. “Crested okapi. Now that’s a noble name if I ever heard one,” she said.