Randoms by David Liss Page A

said, flicking her fingers impatiently. “Your mother won’t forbid you from helping all of humanity because she doesn’t want to miss out on a year of baking cookies and tucking you in for night-night kisses.”
    â€œDo you have children?” I asked.
    She scowled. “What do you think?”
    â€œI think you haven’t been around this many people under eighteen since you graduated from high school.”
    â€œCorrect.”
    â€œI’ll try not to get on your nerves,” I told her, giving her my best smile. It was more polite than saying You are both intense and super scary.
    She sighed. “I wish we had better material to work with, but you’re what we’ve got.”
    â€œThanks,” I said. I packed up the smile and put it away.
    â€œI’ve read your school records. You seem to get into a lot of trouble.”
    â€œI never cause those incidents,” I told her, hating how defensive I sounded.
    She flicked an indifferent hand upward. She could not trouble herself to care. “The president exerted a lot of influence to make certain the United States provided the adult permitted to accompany the delegation. We had to promise all kinds of beneficial trade deals with India and South Korea, and offer a great deal of aid to Uganda.”
    â€œWelcome aboard?” I offered.
    Her facial tic suggested I was, once again, too slow to get the point. “It’s also worth pointing out that the other species are not sending any sort of chaperone. Only Earth.”
    â€œWhy?”
    â€œBecause the other species didn’t think to ask,” Ms. Price said. “And that is my point. Dr. Roop has allowed me to review certain data about the Confederation in advance of our departure, and I find some things both interesting and troubling. More than eighty percent of the member species evolved from herbivores. Almost none of the species eat primarily meat, and most of those that are omnivores eat mostly insects or other small, harmless creatures.”
    â€œWhat are you telling me? That I should order a hamburger before I go?”
    She sighed at my failure to understand her point. “Do you know what the symbol of the Confederation is? It’s a gas giant, like Jupiter. Do you know why?”
    I took a moment to consider what I knew about planets of that sort. “Maybe there’s a gas giant in the outer solar system of every inhabited planet,” I proposed.
    She squinted at me, maybe impressed, maybe suspicious. “How could you know that?”
    â€œI’m into this stuff,” I said. “Gas giants are supposed to be a possible precondition for intelligent life. The gravity pulls bigstuff into the planet’s orbit. If we didn’t have Jupiter to protect us, the Earth would constantly be getting smashed by asteroids and comets, like the one that killed the dinosaurs.”
    She nodded. “Correct, and their symbol is this thing that exists to protect them, not a thing they have done to protect themselves. They’re passive. They’re sheep .” Her voice grew quiet. “They are nice and orderly and calm and helpful, but they are not innovators or inventors like we are. All of their technology comes from these ancient aliens, these Formers, and they’ve been recycling their old technology for centuries. They have very little crime, and even less violent crime, not because they’ve solved those problems but because they never had them in the first place. I don’t know why they asked us to apply—we’re much more aggressive than most member species. So my point is that you are going to have to be on your best behavior. I’m less worried about your average intellect and lack of useful skills than I am about your adolescent rebelliousness. You need to keep it in check. No fighting, no troublemaking, no rule breaking.”
    â€œI am not a troublemaker,” I said. I didn’t want to tell her