As the Captain shook his head, Dick pulled out his trump card. “I am—ostensibly—going to do the same for SKitty. As long as we ‘find’ her a BioTech mate that she approves of, BioTech will be happy. And we need more kittens for the Lacu’un; we have no reason to buy them when we have a potential breeder of our own.”
“But we got mates for her kittens,” the Captain protested. “Won’t BioTech think there’s something odd going on?”
Dick shook his head. “You’re thinking of house-cats. Shipscats aren’t fertile until they’re four or five. At that rate, the kittens won’t be old enough to breed for four years, and the Lacu’un are going to want more cats before then. So I’ll be searching the BioTech breeding records for a tom of the right age and appearance. Solid black is recessive—there can’t be that many black toms of the right age.”
“And once you’ve found your group of candidates—?” Singh asked, both eyebrows arching. “You look for the one that’s missing?” He did not ask how Dick was supposed to have found out that SKitty “preferred” a black tom; shipscats were more than intelligent enough to choose a color from a set of holos.
Dick shrugged. “The information may be in the records. Once I know where SCat’s from, we can open negotiations to add him to our manifest with BioTech’s backing. They won’t pass up a chance to make SKitty half of a breeding pair, and I don’t think there’s a captain willing to go on BioTech’s record as opposing a shipscat’s choice of mate.”
“I won’t
“But we got mates for her kittens,” the Captain protested. “Won’t BioTech think there’s something odd going on?”
Dick shook his head. “You’re thinking of house-cats. Shipscats aren’t fertile until they’re four or five. At that rate, the kittens won’t be old enough to breed for four years, and the Lacu’un are going to want more cats before then. So I’ll be searching the BioTech breeding records for a tom of the right age and appearance. Solid black is recessive—there can’t be that many black toms of the right age.”
“And once you’ve found your group of candidates—?” Singh asked, both eyebrows arching. “You look for the one that’s missing?” He did not ask how Dick was supposed to have found out that SKitty “preferred” a black tom; shipscats were more than intelligent enough to choose a color from a set of holos.
Dick shrugged. “The information may be in the records. Once I know where SCat’s from, we can open negotiations to add him to our manifest with BioTech’s backing. They won’t pass up a chance to make SKitty half of a breeding pair, and I don’t think there’s a captain willing to go on BioTech’s record as opposing a shipscat’s choice of mate.”
“I won’t