Final Review

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It was all Monitor Commander Drinnil’ib could do to keep his only slightly overweight mass of Do’utian muscle and blubber calm on his reserved pad in the cozy, by Do’utian standards, Trimus University auditorium. Everyone said that his “Memoirs of a Planet Monitor” was a solid, if unexciting, favorite for the non-fiction award, but his tail would grow no longer with a display of eagerness.

The Human master of ceremonies, Richard Moon, was a bright new humorist with a bushy blond mane around his head who’d won the nonfiction award last year. He, Drin remembered, won it for “The Flying Whale,” an account of balloon-borne anthropologist Doglosha’idn’s gargantuan adventures above the Kleth-set-tled outer pole of Trimus. Richard Moon was saying something intended to be funny, but Drin’s attention was elsewhere.

His friend and frequent partner, Monitor Lieutenant Mary Pearce, sat on the edge of his pad, and playfully nudged his head back and forth to distract him. Was his agitation that obvious?

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