Bloodchild and Other Stories

Unfertilized Tlic eggs are fed to humans to increase vitality, longevity, and to induce a state of calm. Eggs are a universal symbol of life and rebirth and are literally vessels for new life. In “Bloodchild,” Tlic eggs are both a great privilege and a symbol of the unequal power relationship between the Tlic and the Terrans on the preserve. Eggs are bestowed as rewards, but they can also be a way to ensure compliance. Gan is fed more than the normal share of egg the closer it gets to T’Gatoi impregnating him. He is thus symbolically fed life as he prepares to sacrifice his body in order to give life to an alien species.

Gan’s mother has stopped eating the Tlich eggs because she sees them as a payoff for her son’s life. As such, the egg is also a symbol of the conflict between the two mothers, Lien and T’Gatoi, whose respective maternal instincts lead them to want to preserve their children’s lives at all costs. The egg is unfertilized, as it is not yet clear whose brood will prevail, and whether only one species can survive at the expensive of another. In the end, the alien egg sustains Gan as he decides to be a vessel, or type of egg, for the Tlic, suggesting that two radically-different species can indeed coexist, but that doing so requires trust, sacrifice and mutual respect.