Toshio stopped at the edge of the village clearing. The sunshine filtered through the trees, revealing a conclave of races.

The Kiqui Nest-Mother chattered, waving her paws in a queer up-and-down pattern that Dennie had said connoted happy emphasis. If the oldest female had been angry, her gestures would have been crosswise. It was a blissfully simple expression pattern. The rest of the tribe repeated her sounds, sometimes anticipating her in a rising and falling chant of consensus.

Ignacio Metz nodded excitedly, cupping one hand over an earphone as he listened to the translation computer. When the chant died down he spoke a few words into a microphone. A long series of high-pitched repetitive squeaks came out of the machine's speaker.

Dennie's expression was one of relief. She had dreaded the uplift specialist's first meeting with the Kiqui. But Metz had not, apparently, muffed her long and careful negotiations with the pre-sentients. The meeting seemed to be coming to a satisfactory conclusion.

Dennie caught sight of Toshio, and smiled brilliantly. Without ceremony she stood up and left the circle. She hurried over to where he waited at the edge of the village clearing.

"How's it going?" he asked.

"Wonderfully! It turns out he's read every word I sent back! He understands their pack protocol, their physical manifestations of sex and age, and he thought my behavioral analysis was 'exemplary'! Exemplary!"

Toshio smiled, sharing her pleasure.

"He's talking about getting me an appointment as a fellow at the Uplift Center! Can you imagine that?" Dennie couldn't help bouncing up and down excitedly.

"What about the treaty?"

"Oh they're ready any time. If Hikahi makes it here in the skiff we'll take a dozen Kiqui back to Streaker with us. Otherwise a few will go back to Earth with Metz in the longboat. It's all settled."

Toshio looked back at the happy villagers and tried not to show his misgivings.

Of course, it was for the good of the Kiqui as a species. They would fare far better under the patronage of Mankind than under almost any other starfaring race. And Earth geneticists had to have living beings to examine before any sort of adoption claim could be made.

Every attempt would be made to keep the first group of aboriginals healthy. Half of Dennie's job had been to analyze their bodily requirements, including needed trace elements. But it was still unlikely any of the first group would survive. Even if they did, Toshio doubted the Kiqui had a notion of the strangeness they were about to embark upon.

They're not sentients yet, he reminded himself. By Galactic law they're still animals. And, unlike anyone else in the Five Galaxies, we'll at least try to explain to their limited understanding, and ask permission.

But he remembered a stormy night, with driving rain and flashing lightning, when the little amphibians had huddled around him and an injured dolphin who was his friend, keeping them warm and warding off despair with their company.

He turned away from the sun-washed clearing.

"Then there's nothing keeping you here any longer?" He asked Dennie.

She shook her head. "I'd rather stay a while longer, of course. Now that I'm finished with the Kiqui I can really work on the problem of the metal-mound. That's why I was so grouchy a couple of days ago. Besides being so tired trying to do two major jobs, I was also frustrated. But now we're a step closer to solving that problem. And did you know the core of the metal-mound is still alive? It's…"

Toshio had to interrupt to stop the flow of words. "Dennie! Stop it for a minute, please. Answer my question. Are you ready to leave now?"

Dennie blinked. She changed tracks, frowning. "Is it Streaker? Has something gone wrong?"

"They began the move a few hours ago. I want you to gather all of your notes and samples and secure them to your sled. You and Sah'ot are leaving in the morning."

She looked at him, his words slowly sinking in. "You mean you, me, and Sah'ot, don't you?"

"No. I'm staying for another day. I have to."

"But why?"

"Look, Dennie, I can't talk about it now. Just do as I ask, please."

As he turned to walk back toward the drill-tree pool she grabbed his arm. Holding on, she was forced to follow.

"But we were going to go together! If you have things to do here, I'll wait for you!"

He walked along without answering. He couldn't think of anything to say. It was bitter to win her respect and affection at last, only to lose her within hours.

If this is what being grown up means, they can have it, he thought. It sucks.

As they approached the pool, sounds of loud argument came from that direction. Toshio hurried. Dennie trotted alongside until they burst into the clearing.

Charles Dart screamed and clutched at a slender cylinder that was gripped at the other end by the manipulator arm of Takkata-Jim's spider. Charlie strained against the pull of the waldo-machine. Takkata-Jim grinned open-mouthed.

The tug of war lasted for a few seconds as the neochimp's powerful muscles strained, then the cylinder popped out of his hands. He fell back to the dust and barely stopped before rolling into the pool. He hopped up and shrieked his anger.

Toshio saw three other Stenos-controlled spiders trooping off toward the longboat. Each carried another of the thin cylinders. Toshio stopped in his tracks when he got a good look at the one Takkata-Jim had taken. His eyes went wide.

"There is no longer any danger," Takkata-Jim told him. His voice carried insouciance. "I have conflssscated these. They'll be kept safe aboard my boat, and there will be no harm."

"They're mine, you thief!" Charles Dart hopped angrily, and his hands fluttered. "You criminal!" he growled. "You think I don't know you tried to m-murder Creideiki? We all know you did! You wrecked the buoys to destroy the evidence! And n-now you steal the tools of m-my trade!"

"Which you stole from Streakers armory, no doubt. Or do you wish to call Dr. Baskin for confirmation that they truly are yoursss?"

Dart growled and showed an impressive display of teeth. He whirled away from the neo-dolphin and sat down in the dust in front of a complex diving robot, freshly unpacked on the verge of the pool.

Takkata-Jim's spider started to turn, but the fin noticed Toshio looking at him. For just a moment, Takkata-Jim's cool reserve broke under the youth's fierce gaze. He looked away, and then back at Toshio.

"Don't-t believe everything you hear, boy-human," he said. "Much I have done, and will do, and I'm convinced I am right. But it wasss not I who hurt Creideiki."

"Did you destroy the buoys?" Toshio could sense Dennie standing close behind him, watching the large dolphin silently over his shoulder.

"Yesss. But it was not I who ssset the trap. Like King Henry with Beckett-t, I only found out about it after. Tell this, on Earth, if by some strange chance you should escape and I don't. Another took the initiative."

"Who did it, then?" Toshio's fists were tight balls.

A long sigh escaped Takkata-Jim's blowmouth.

"Our Dr. Metz wrung from the Survey Board berths for some who shouldn't have been on this voyage. He was impatient. A few of his Stenos had… unusual family trees."

"The Stenos…"

"A few Stenos! I am not one of Metz's experiments! I am a starship officer. I earned my place!" The dolphin's voice was defiant.

"When the pressure built to the breaking point, some of them turned to me. I thought I could control them. But there was one who turned out to be more than even I could manage. Tell them if you get home, Toshio Iwashika. Tell them on Earth that it'sss possible to turn a dolphin into a monster. They should be warned."

Takkata-Jim gave him one long, intent look, then his spider turned away and followed his crew back to the longboat.