The Demon Breed is a science fiction novel by James H. Schmitz, set in the Federation of the Hub. It was serialized in Analog in 1968 under the title "The Tuvela", and published in book form the same year. More recently it has been published as part of the omnibus The Hub: Dangerous Territory.
The setting is a remote island on the ocean world of Nandy-Cline, where biologist Dr. Nile Etland is coming to make one of her periodic check-in visits to a research station run by her colleague and friend Dr. Ticos Cay. Something is wrong; when she attempts to radio that she's coming, nobody answers.
The island has been secretly taken as an outpost by the alien Parahuans, who are planning to invade the Federation. Their first attempt, decades ago, resulted in them getting curb-stomped, so this time around Nandy-Cline has been selected as a test case, a chance for the pro-invasion Parahuans to prove that the humans aren't that tough. Some of the Parahuan leaders, unwilling to believe themselves inferior to humans, have postulated that the Federation has a secret caste of superhuman warriors; the captive Dr. Cay has been playing on that belief in an attempt to persuade them to abandon the invasion without a fight — or at least to make them worried enough not to kill the great Guardian Etland outright when she arrives.
Thanks to Dr. Cay, Nile arrives on the island alive. What happens next depends on the sharpness of her wits — and her extensive knowledge of the island's exotic and dangerous ecosystem.
The Demon Breed contains examples of:
- Action Girl: Nile Etland.
- Badass Bookworm: Nile Etland is a research scientist primarily, but her career is not without hazards and she's well able to hold her own in a fight.
- Awakening the Sleeping Giant: The aftermath of The Demon Breed has the alien leaders concluding that a) the Parahuans had almost done exactly this, and b) that the human authorities know this too.
- Bluffing the Advance Scout: The aliens suspect that humanity may be secretly protected by a caste of superhuman Guardians, and plan to invade the world of Nandy-Cline to put this theory to the test. The protagonist has to pose as a Guardian and convince them that she really is that dangerous. (She is.)
- Born Under the Sail: The sled-men of Nandy-Cline live on enormous rafts that sail the planet's oceans, and rarely if ever go to shore. It's mentioned that their ancestors were Space Nomads before they settled on the planet.
- Fantastic Slurs: The Parahuans have 'Hulon' for humans (at least, the ones they don't believe to be super-powered Tuvelas). One of them explains it was originally the name of a race that they wiped out.
- The Federation: The Federation of the Hub.
- Giant Mook: The Parahuans' tarm — a 'most efficiently destructive giant beast'. The viewpoint humans aren't sure if it was engineered from a Parahuan sea creature, or from the Parahuans themselves.
- Heel–Face Turn: Mook Lieutenant Moga wants to avoid a war between the Parahuans and humanity, because unlike the rest of his race he knows the Parahuans will eventually lose. He does what he can to give the protagonists covert support, eventually sacrificing his life to help them escape.
- Humans Are Warriors: The alien leaders in the epilogue conclude that Humans Are Dangerous, Leave Them Alone.Lord Toshin: There remains, as the Lord Gulhad indicated, a third possibility. I find it perhaps more disquieting than the two we have considered. It is, of course, that Dr. Etland is precisely what she seems to be—an exceptionally capable human, but one with no abnormal qualities and no mysterious authority.note
- Immortality Seeker: Ticos Cay's studies are aimed at finding ways to expand the human lifespan (he tells Nile he'd consider one thousand years a good start) — and his own, specifically. This makes him a rarity among Hub citizens, who are mostly affected by Who Wants to Live Forever?.
- Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: One of the rare plants in Ticos Cay's laboratory is known as a Harpooneer. It's harmless for as long as it's kept in suspended animation — and not a second longer. Ticos keeps it next to the platform where his interrogators stand.
- Impeded Communication: The Parahuans have the ability to jam human communicators. They've been gradually building up the interference for months, to make people think it's a natural phenomenon.
- Klingon Promotion: Practised by the Parahuans.
- Longevity Treatment: The Hub has widely-available methods for extending the human lifespan to around 200 years before decrepitude sets in. Ticos Cay is approaching the limit and appears to be a well-preserved 60.
- Man-Eating Plant: The Harpooneer plant has a taste for the flesh of anyone who stands too close to it.
- Mister Big: Parahuan leaders are much smaller than their underlings; the physical changes they undergo are part of their advancement towards what they consider to be the ultimate form of life. Parahuans soldiers a hulking brutes, but a Great Palach is small enough to be carried by a human without much effort.
- Mook Horror Show: The epilogue retells the story from the aliens' point of view.I must emphasize strongly the oppressively accumulating effect these events produced on the Parahuans during the relatively short period in which they occurred. As related by the survivors, there was a growing sense of shock and dismay, the conviction finally of having challenged something like an indestructible supernatural power. At the time they were questioned, the survivors still seemed more disturbed by this experience than by the practical fact of their own impending demise on orders of Porad Anz, of which they were aware.
- Nature Hero: Nile Etland is able to evade and survive the Parahuans through superior knowledge and understanding of the floatwood forests, including using the natural inhabitants of the forest to destroy the giant tarm.
- One Riot, One Ranger: Well, one invasion / one Guardian, is the Parahuans' conclusion from their debacle on Nandy-Cline. "Guardians" being their hypothesized superhumans who secretly rule the Federation.Evidently the Guardians had considered it unnecessary to employ one of their more formidable members to dispose of the invasion forces; and evidently their judgement was sound.
- But other aliens think — correctly — that the ratio is even worse: one invasion / two more-or-less ordinary humans.
- Past Victim Showcase: Great Palach Koll has a room filled with the taxidermied corpses of the humans he has captured and interrogated.
- Right for the Wrong Reasons: The Parahuans theorize that they could only have been defeated by humans because humanity is protected by a secret caste of superpowered immortal Tuvelas. Within the story, their reasoning is proved to be completely wrong; Nile Etland and Ticos Cay aren't in the least superhuman, just competent and knowledgeable, and the Parahuans' alien allies dismiss the Tuvela Theory as nonsense. But in other stories, we learn that the Federation really does have secret, ageless defenders with mysterious powers — the one we meet is Pilch.
- Seriously Scruffy: The Parahuan leaders wear elaborate outfits — except for Great Palach Koll, the principal antagonist, who's so focused on conquest (possibly to the detriment of his sanity) that he takes no trouble over his appearance.
- Spare a Messenger: Federation Council Deputy Gilennic, in charge of the Federation fleet that mops up the remains of the Parahuan invasion force, orders the fleet not to destroy the two Parahuan ships most likely to contain high-ranking officers, so that they can give a first-hand account of their defeat when they return home.
- Superweapon Surprise: Militaristic aliens land a scouting force on a quiet ocean world on the periphery of the Federation — and are handed a stinging defeat by Ticos Cay's and Nile Etland's abilities to weaponize the local lifeforms.
- Taking You with Me: Ticos Cay's collection of biological specimens was assembled with this in mind, if he ever outlived his usefulness to the alien invaders.
- Tempting Fate: The leader of a firing squad addresses the heroine: "And now, if it is within the power of a Tuvela to defy our purpose, show what you can do." Thirty seconds later, the heroine and the person she's trying to rescue are the only living people left in the room. And it was a really crowded room.
- Too Important to Walk: The Great Palachs, the leaders of the Parahuans, ride around on the back of one of their hulking attendants.
- Uplifted Animal: Nile Etland's hunting otters.
- World of Badass: This is a deliberate policy of the federation government, which permits private wars to keep the people prepared for outside menaces.
- You No Take Candle: The otter characters speak a pidgin version of human language, without such things as verb tenses.
