a Thanatosian ‘eat or be eaten’ ecology, we should be able to create an Erosian ecology, in which all living things love each other. Being pacifists, the original colonists must surely have been convinced of that. Considering the dubious nature of Freud’s dualist theory in his later years, even I have started to think that this erotic ecology may more closely warrant the title of orthodoxy in our cosmos.”
“Well, I don’t know where they came from. But I’ve no doubt they must have learnt a lot from the egregious errors of their home planet,” said Mogamigawa, waxing oddly lyrical. “Perhaps that planet surprisingly resembled the earth.”
I felt the same. We looked at each other and laughed with one voice.
“Isn’t it about time we contacted Yohachi?” I said as I finished my coffee and took out the telecall. “He may have done it so much that he’s forgotten what he’s there for.”
“That sounds likely,” said Mogamigawa.
“Yo!” Yohachi’s voice as he answered the telecall was bounding with cheerful energy. In the background, I could hear the spirited sound of five-beat music.
“So you got in all right? It sounds very lively there. Are you in a dance hall?”
“I’m at an open-air arena. They’re doing ballet on the stage. I’ve never seen anything so fantastic in all my life!”
“Idle bugger!” Mogamigawa snatched the telecall from my hand and bellowed into it. “Have you asked them how to contracept pregnancy by widow’s incubus and abort the fetus, man?”
“Yeah. I’ve asked.”
“Well, come straight back here then!”
“Can’t I watch this a bit longer? You see it’s… well… it’s just fantastic!”
“No you may not!” bawled Mogamigawa. “Or do you mean to keep two eminent scientists such as ourselves waiting idly by in a place like this? That would be the biggest mistake in the history of science, I can tell you. Though I can’t expect you to take responsibility for that.”
“I can’t quite hear what you’re saying, but anyway, yeah, OK, I’ll be on my way soon,” said Yohachi, and with that he terminated the telecall from his end.
Night fell once more. When it was starting to grow light again, Yohachi at last returned. After his carnal excesses, I was fully expecting him to look completely spent – but on the contrary, he appeared utterly exhilarated. He strolled up from the river with a relaxed gait, water dripping from his naked body. Even the look in his eyes had changed.
“Seems you were well-received!” I said with a grin.
Yohachi shook his head with an expression of sincerity, though still with a look of elation on his face. “I wasn’t particularly well-received, but I wasn’t driven away either. We always go on about ‘entering’ their country, but there was no border of any sort, and it was at night. So I just walked in amongst them, and was soon surrounded by a lot of naked men and women who were trying to ask me something. The moment I tried to speak, they seemed to know immediately what I wanted to say, which saved me a lot of trouble, I can tell you. They even started to take words out of my head and put them together until they could speak earth language themselves. They seemed to know straight away what I was there for, and soon they were all laughing their heads off.”
“And did they tell you what we asked?”
Yohachi nodded at Mogamigawa. “I don’t know if you’d call it ‘telling’, but one of the men just said this: ‘Ah. Well, all you have to do is have sex with the women here, then go back and have sex with the one who’s pregnant’.”
Mogamigawa turned to me with a look of bewilderment. “What on earth can he mean?”
“And what happened then?” I asked, leaning towards Yohachi with mounting curiosity. “Did you have sex with the women?”
“Oh yeah,” Yohachi replied with the same earnest expression on his face. “The men quickly lost interest and buggered off. But the women hung around for a bit. They were all so beautiful. And naked. I just couldn’t wait to get stuck in. I already had a hard-on and was chomping at the bit. Then one of the women led me to a nearby park and let me do it with her on the grass. After that I did it with, oh, God knows how many. Twelve or thirteen? But I still didn’t forget why I was there in the first place, all right? ‘I mustn’t forget what they tell me,’ I thought, ‘I must