Sozont found another rabbit. A youngster, perhaps foraging solo for
the first time.
—"Hello, what's your name?" said Sozont.
—"I'm Venus Fly Trap" was the reply. "I've seen
you before, Sozont the Tigri-Hippo-Strich."
—"Venus Fly Trap? That's not a Lapine
name!"
—"Yeah, well, I guess my parents were sort of hippies
in their day."
—"Well, um, what do you think of computers?"
—"Oh, they're great! I can send emails to all
my friends, and get weather reports without going outside, and look up stuff
for my school reports, and —"
Sozont bit Venus Fly Trap's head off. "Useless
Luser,"
he thought. "Wait, maybe I should have had sex with her first? Oh
well." Munch, bite, shred, chew, wipe muzzle with paws.
While he ate, Sozont thought about Niven's Man-Kzin Wars
and how few stories in that series were really any good. "Eater-of-Grass,
indeed!" he said, chewing on a plaintain leaf to cleanse his palate.
But thoughts of reproduction refused to stay away.
It was almost rutting season. Last year that had been a bad time
for Sozont. "Am I the only Tigger?" he said morosely, for sometimes
he secretly thought of himself as being just an animated Disney character,
transmogrified from the classic Milne stuffie, inside.
Silly Sozont! Someday you'll understand that
you're not really a tigrihippostrich. You're an anthro fur, and all
anthro furs are mating-compatible. So he's a bacterium and she's a
blue whale? No problem! All it takes is a little imagination.
But returning to our story...