Free The End of the Matter by Alan Dean Foster

shook his left arm. There was an audible popping sound as joints rearranged themselves. When he spoke it was without panting, and in the same reassuring tone as that used by the watching thranx: “I have not injured him. He will wake soon, after we have finished.”
    Mormis’s left eyelid twitched uncontrollably. His fingers quivered.
    “You would not reach the beamer,” the thranx told him, in a voice so confident that Mormis lost all hope. “Please be so kind as to refrain from such irrational hostilities and listen to what we have to ask.”
    The slaver considered. Then he slowly slid his hand away from the concealed weapon within his shirt. He consoled himself with the fact that this odd pair, whatever their intentions, looked neither brutal nor immune to some common-sense reasoning. So he tried to calm himself as the elderly thranx moved toward him. The slim human, he noted with relief, remained next to the motionless body of his servant.
    The thranx was tall for one of his kind, Mormis observed, tall enough so that the rainbow-hued compound eyes were nearly level with the slaver’s own. The thranx was bundled tightly against the chill, though Mormis knew the dampness was to the insect’s liking. They were hothouse-world creatures. He could hear the soft puffing as air moved through the insect’s spicules.
    “You have me at a disadvantage,” he declared, dropping his hands to his sides. “I can do nothing but what you wish.” Meanwhile he searched for identifying signs. Both sets of vestigial wings were present, protruding from shiny wing cases on the thranx’s back. A never-mated bachelor, then.
    The insect noted the slaver’s gaze, “No, you do not know me. We have never met before, Char Mormis.” An impressed Mormis realized that his questioner was speaking perfect Terranglo instead of the galactic lingua franca, symbospeech. Few thranx could master the smooth vowels of mankind’s principal language. For the first time a little of the tenseness left him. Violent beings were usually not this well educated.
    “You have the advantage of me, sir.”
    “We require some information,” the insect responded, showing no inclination to reveal either his name or that of his human associate. Mormis masked his disappointment. “We have learned that earlier today you had a visitor.”
    “I’ve had many visitors,” Mormis countered, stalling.
    “This one was a young man. Or an old boy, depending on your perceptiveness. The boy had as companion a small, dangerous flying reptile and an alien of peculiar type.”
    Since the thranx already knew this, Mormis saw no sense in denying it. “I admit to receiving the person you describe.”
    In an oddly human gesture, the thranx cocked its valentine-shaped head to one side. “What did the boy want of you?”
    Natural caution took over for Mormis, and he replied without hesitation. “I said I remembered the boy,” he declared slowly, finding apparent fascination in the patterns water made on the street. “But I also had many other visitors. It’s impossible to remember the details of every conversation. My days are hectic, and talk tends to run together.”
    The tall human took several steps forward. “We are wasting time with this one.” He extended a hand and flexed long, skilled fingers in a way Mormis didn’t like. “I could always—”
    “No, no complications,” the thranx interrupted, much to the slaver’s relief. “But, as you say, we waste time. Rather than debate morality . . .” He reached into his thorax vest and brought forth a credit cube of fair size. A glance assured Mormis it was genuine.
    “Still,” Mormis said smoothly, “in my business it is necessary from time to time to reconstruct certain conversations. Odd, but suddenly I find the one you mention coming back to me.”
    “A remarkable surprise,” the tall man commented sardonically.
    Anxious now that he had managed to turn a dangerous situation into an opportunity for