8. Bertram
Bertram
The first thing they did on morning one of the in situ owl-bear behavior study was go over paperwork.
Bertram knew he would have to try incredibly hard to keep his mind from wandering as his mother recounted the mind-numbing details of the various permits they were working under. What was even worse is that Helena was going to love every second of it.
She was a true pervert like that.
Last night, Helena had said she was “excited about owl-bears sometimes,” and Bertram had to force down the smile that very nearly sprang to his lips. Helena was excited about owl-bears all the time. She probably cataloged wing feathers in her sleep.
He stared across the table at her and saw, as expected, her eyes gleaming with joy.
She had her laptop in front of her, as well as two different spiral notebooks, and five pencils.
In moments like this, it was easy to see her as the eager, ambitious young scientist he had fallen for, rather than the snake she had turned out to be.
With no offense to snakes, who were a vital part of the ecosystem.
Helena was practically salivating as Jennie rattled off all the forms she had filled out, all the committees she appealed to.
Bertram had always teased Helena that she had an academia kink.
He once surprised her with a report card of her attractiveness and sexual prowess (all A’s, of course) and what ensued was arguably the most passionate and best sex he had with Helena.
If he were honest with himself, it was the best and most passionate sex he had had with anyone.
But being honest with himself could leave the door open for missing Helena, and that was a door best slammed shut, locked, alarmed, and set on fire for good measure.
Bertram glanced around the lab, which required more permits than any other structure on their research site.
The few trees on the basecamp’s rocky plateau had been built around, rather than chopped down.
That was a given. Their three tents were pop-up structures, easily taken down when the study finished.
The solar-powered lab in which Jennie was holding the kick-off was the only semi-permanent structure.
It contained several computers, a digital tablet, various analytic tools such as microscopes, and a printer.
It also had a small kitchen area and two separate bathrooms, one of which even had a shower.
“Yes, Helena?” said Jennie, as though she were calling on her in class.
When Bertram turned back, he saw why.
“Why are you raising your hand?” Bertram asked. “There are only two of us.”
“I was being polite,” Helena snapped, in a tone that was anything but.
Jennie ignored them. “You wanted to say something, Helena?”
Helena nodded. “So, it seems like once we have data proving owl-bear activity in the area, the first priority would be permanently abolishing any commercial development of the mountain by humans, but I think it’s almost equally important that we keep pushing to build the otherfolk crossing to enable the owl-bear to expand her range, if desired, and eliminate the threat of vehicular strikes from magically enhanced freighters.
The stretch of the 394 around the Folio Mountains has been a hotspot for vehicular collisions with wildlife from day one. So, if we build an otherfolk crossing—”
“Why do you keep calling it that?” Bertram asked. “It would be a standard wildlife crossing. Just wider.”
“Therefore making it an otherfolk crossing,” Helena said. “Why wouldn’t we just propose it as an otherfolk crossing?”
Bertram huffed. “Because there are limited studies on ‘otherfolk crossings,’ but there’s a precedence for the efficacy of wildlife crossings. Plenty of research demonstrates the benefits of building overpass roads for wildlife, with proof it reduces collisions with mundane animals—”
“Yes, but the human population is completely desensitized to mundane animal death,” Helena said, with her usual air of superiority. “The idea of hitting and killing a deer or a raccoon is far less upsetting to humans than hitting and killing a unicorn or an owl-bear—”
“You’re acting like this isn’t something I think about,” Bertram said. “You’re the one who left the field. I’ve been doing the conservation work on the ground this whole time. I’ve been tracking animals and publishing studies—”
“Tool usage in Peacoquerel’s Sifaka in Primates in Nature,” Helena said, quietly. “The giant anteater and lemon migranteater shared habitat survey in The Journal of Magizoological Naturalism. Most recently, mother-offspring dyads in lunarwhals in the same. I know.”
“I . . .”
He didn’t want to be pleased that she had read all of his studies. He didn’t want to be strangely flattered that she knew all of them off the top of her head.
And he shouldn’t be, Bertram reminded himself.
That was just how Helena’s mind worked, always had.
She could have simply glanced at his bibliography the night before arriving and she would have it memorized.
It didn’t mean anything. And even if it did mean something, he didn’t care.
And even if he did care, no, he didn’t. He didn’t care, so it didn’t matter.
“Perhaps we’ll call it the ‘Insert Name of Donor Here Otherfolk-Wildlife Crossing,’ ” Jennie said, diplomatically, “and side-step this issue entirely.”
Helena nodded. “Perfect.”
Bertram rolled his eyes. There was no doubt in his mind that Helena would have brushed this suggestion off if it came from him.
Jennie continued. “We’re operating under the assumption that the Folio Mountains are home to at least one owl-bear, a female, likely presenting with a wing injury.
She will—goddess willing—be tagged V-1, being our first focal animal in this long-term Varia ursus strix study.
We’ll be using tracking spells administered via modified dart gun, as approved by the Otherfolk Ethics Review Committee at Imperial Cock . . .”
Bertram missed the rest of the sentence. He was too distracted by the feel of Helena’s eyes boring into the back of his skull.
Jennie’s alma mater, the University of Sylvania Imperial (Cock) School of Magizoological and Veterinary Studies, was one of the most prestigious in the world.
It also was unfortunately named for Sir William Hancock Armington, who went by “Cock” several centuries before the word had another meaning in common parlance.
That meant that one of the greatest magizoological institutions in the world was usually referred to, with no irony or wink, as “the Cock Vet” or “Imperial Cock.” He wasn’t sure if the school’s official punctuating of parentheticals around the (Cock) was supposed to make it less obtrusive. If so, it backfired.
Bertram could sense Helena staring at him, trying to catch his eye.
He would absolutely not give her the satisfaction. There was a dangerously high chance that if they locked eyes while Jennie was going on about prestigious Imperial Cock, he would end up laughing.
Bertram could think of nothing worse, nothing more dangerous to his heart, than allowing himself to laugh with Helena.
“I was hoping to commence the study back in spring.” Jennie sighed. “But when it comes to granting permissions, Imperial Cock is infamously slow and difficult to deal with.”
“It’s always very hard when Imperial Cock is too rigid,” Helena agreed.
Bertram would not look at Helena. He would not laugh. She would not win.
“That said,” Jennie went on, “this is a long-term study, so if V-1 does have a mate, we may witness copulation this next spring. Or, if she had mated with her partner this past spring, we would expect her to lay an egg relatively soon. If we’re able to witness any parent-offspring interactions .
. .” Jennie sighed dreamily, before snapping back to focus.
“Of course, any observation of owl-bear behavior is going to be novel and important. If we find stool samples, we’ll analyze those for hormones that may indicate pregnancy—yes, Helena? ”
“Stop raising your hand!” Bertram hissed.
Helena ignored him. “Dr. J, assuming that V-1 is carrying a fertilized egg . . . is she pregnant, or is she gravid?”
Bertram sighed in exasperation. “As long as we agree she has an egg, who cares what we call it?”
A horrified, insulted gasp hit Bertram in surround sound, and he remembered that the “who” in “who cares” was absolutely Jennie as well as Helena.
“First of all,” Helena said, her tone both reproachful and scandalized, “we’re looking toward publication, so there’s no reason to put off refining terminology. Second of all, it’s vital we have absolute clarity in language just amongst the research team.”
“Great points, Helena,” said Jennie.
“And on the topic of term sets,” Helena began, with a thirst in her eye that would have caused Bertram to make some filthy jokes in a different era, “I wanted to go over my initial proposal for an ethogram, since no standardized term set exists for owl-bear behavior.”
Bertram groaned internally.
“Bertram, do you have a problem with that?” Jennie asked.
Oh. Apparently, Bertram had groaned externally.
“No problem,” said Bertram, and steeled himself for the next incredibly tedious phase of preparation.
Helena, on the other hand, was practically rabid with glee.
“I pulled standardized ethograms describing nesting behavior in birds of prey, with particular focus on barred owls. I know there’s no evidence that owl-bears share behavioral patterns with barred owls in particular, I mean, obviously, there’s very little evidence of owl-bear behavior, I mean, that’s why we’re here, but I figured that if one considers the idea of convergent evolution implying that animals with similar phenotypical features may have similar survival strategies, then it’s possible that the similarity in feather pattern between barred owls and owl-bears may imply some overlap?
I’ve also pulled several Ursidae ethograms, which can give us a template for some of their terrestrial ambulatory behavior—but obviously there’s the physiological difference between owl-bear talons and bear claws, since an owl-bear has zygodactyl feet with four claws just like an owl’s rather than a bear paw, so do we want to create a term set that may account for this?
For example, ‘walk with weight on talons’ coded differently than a ‘standard walk with weight distributed toward the middle or back of paw?’ And do we account for the direction of the zygodactyl toes swiveling?
Do we think we’ll be able to appropriately gauge at distance? ”
Bertram only half-listened as Helena and his mother excitedly brainstormed every minuscule variation of “walk.” By the time the conversation was finished, the following terms had been proposed, abbreviated, and defined:
Walk, beak up
Walk, beak down
Walk, three toes forward one toe back
Walk, two toes forward two toes back
Walk, wings extended
As well as how to catalog when terms overlapped.
And that was just the term set for “walk.”
“Do we want to create a term set for mating behavior?” Helena asked. “Just in case we’re wrong about when owl-bear breeding season is?”
“A thorough ethogram never hurt anyone,” Jennie said.
Bertram sighed. This was not true. The tediousness of this ethogram was hurting him, this very minute. He couldn’t stop his mind from drifting elsewhere, until—
“And,” Helena said with excitement, “sexual behavior in owl-bears may not even be limited to penetrative sex for the purpose of procreation.”
Bertram did not like where this was going, for an entirely different reason than the tediousness of micromanaging the word “walk.”
“There’s a peer-review report on fellatio in brown bears published by Zoo Biology,” Helena reminded everyone, which wasn’t great for Bertram, because he didn’t want to be reminded of anything related to fellatio and Helena.
“I always felt like there was something oddly humanoid about the term ‘fellatio’ as applied to mundane animals or otherfolk,” Helena mused.
“So perhaps we just write down ‘oral stimulation of genitals’ to make it more neutral? And then we can specify which focal animal is instigating the oral stimulation, and which is being acted upon.”
Something was wrong with Bertram, he thought. Surely “oral stimulation of genitals” should be the least sexy way to describe any sex act. It was so clinical, so scientific, and, unfortunately, so Helena.
And as much as he hated to admit it, Bertram still found the single sexiest quality in the world to be “Helena.”
All the sultry-voiced dirty talk in the world couldn’t do to Bertram what hearing Helena flatly say “oral stimulation of genitals” did.
How was Bertram still this hopeless after all these years?
And how could he rid himself of images of past encounters with Helena involving oral stimulation of genitals?
Just focus on the mind-numbing tedium of behavior lists, Bertram told himself.
“We have ‘presenting the rear,’ ‘mounting,’ ‘vaginal penetration,’ ” Helena began.
Fuck fuck fuck, Bertram thought.
No, wait. That’s the opposite of what he should be thinking about.
No fucking. Never fucking. The absence of fucking, past, present, and future.
No memories of Helena’s rear, or of mounting Helena, and certainly no memories of vaginal penetration. None. This was a very serious scientific conversation and there was nothing sexual about it.
“Do we think that covers all sexual behaviors?” Helena asked and then went through and listed all of them again, slowly considering abbreviations for each one.
Bertram thought he might combust.
Thankfully they moved on to the next ethogram subsets, from aerial motion to preening, eating, drinking, sleeping, defecating, and mother-offspring dyad behaviors.
Bertram ceased finding the ethogram torturous due to Helena’s sexually charged language and returned to finding the ethogram torturous due to the mind-numbing monotony of accounting for minuscule variations in behavior and defining those within an inch of their lives.
He had never been so relieved to feel bored.