6/11/2023 0 Comments Bluegriffon no aria role![]() But Cuff himself is still in danger from the pursuing Fene Abantu, led by the offended Indlovu. The creatures of the region are now safe from further mutation. On the back of Soga, Cuff succeeds in reaching Hickey's old headquarters and turning off his machine. He also tells him where he can find Hickey's machine. Accordingly, Cukata spirits Cuff out and provides him transportation in the form of Soga, one of a herd of mutated crocodiles the tribe retains as mounts. Convincing Cukata he has no wish to come between them, Cuff persuades the creature to help him escape instead. His succor comes in the form of Cukata, Ingwamza's former lover, who sneaks into Cuff's hut by night intending to kill his rival. Not only is he trapped in the baboon people's village until he recovers, but Indlovu has decided to honor him by marrying him to Ingwamza. Simultaneously, Cuff learns he has a personal problem. He deduces that Hickey must have been experimenting on the animals with radiation, and his device, never deactivated, has continued to affect the germ plasm of any who wander near it, until their altered descendants have finally attracted outside notice. ![]() ![]() ![]() The Fene Abantu have lived in the delta ever since.Ĭuff realizes "Heeky" must have been Hickey, a scientist known to have disappeared in the region back in the 1940s. When Heeky died, Mqhavi tried leading Indlovu and his progeny back towards civilization, but became lost in the delta and died after admonishing his charges never to go near the machine. Heeky was called the machine man for some sort of device he had built and operated at the edge of the Chobe Swamp. Mqhavi, who worked for "the machine man", a white man named Heeky. His first memories are of the black man who taught him to speak, Stanley H. He was the first of their race the others of the tribe are all his descendants. The chief explains what he knows about himself and his people. There, Cuff is introduced to their chief, Ingwamza's father Indlovu. They soon arrive at the village of the Fene Abantu, or baboon people. Now dependent on Ingwamza for survival, Cuff allows her to lead him onward despite his horror. Startled, he accidentally shoots himself in the foot. When daylight comes and Cuff can finally see her clearly, he discovers Ingwamza too is a mutation despite her generally human proportions, she has greenish-yellow hair, a short tail, and the head of a baboon. The woman, Ingwamza, undertakes to lead him back to her village. He finds the woman treed by a buffalo and rescues her, only to realize he has now lost his way and cannot relocate the camp. Other creatures are so mutated their very survival is threatened, and Mtengeni is concerned about the long-term prospects of the animal population.Įstablishing camp in the bush, the two are separated when the warden goes out into the night for firewood and Cuff, hearing what he takes for a native woman's scream from another direction, heads off to investigate. Together with Mtengeni, he observes not just the animal in question but another giraffe with a goat-like beard, only six feet long, a green hippopotamus with pink spots, and a two-headed rhinoceros. Once on the scene, he learns that the mystery extends far deeper. He is called to a wildlife preserve in the Okavango River Delta by George Mtengeni, the local warden, to investigate the sighting of a strange blue giraffe. In 1976, before coming to America, Cuff is a park official in southern Africa. He reassures the boy that it makes no difference, and at Peter's urging explains why he never had natural children. Plot summary Īthelstan Cuff, an English immigrant to America, finds his son, Peter, distraught on having learned he is adopted. The story has been translated into Italian, French and German. It appeared in book form in the anthology Adventures in Time and Space (Random House, 1946) and later in the anthologies World of Wonder (Twayne, 1951), The Science Fiction Bestiary (Thomas Nelson, 1971), Androids, Time Machines and Blue Giraffes (Follett, 1973), Isaac Asimov Presents the Great Science Fiction Stories: Vol(DAW Books, 1979), Isaac Asimov Presents The Golden Years of Science Fiction (Bonanza Books, 1983), and An Anthropomorphic Century (FurPlanet Productions, 2015). It was first published in the magazine Astounding Science-Fiction for August, 1939. "The Blue Giraffe" is a science fiction story on the concept of mutation by American writer L.
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