I felt a surge of sympathy for the lonely traveller as he lay there, still, silent, non-emitting. Anyway, I mused, even if we couldn’t restore him to self-knowing, an analysis of his construction might give us the secret of the power he had used to achieve the velocity to escape his planet’s gravity.
In shape and size he was not unlike Swen—or Swen Two, as he called himself after his conversion—who failed so disastrously to reach our satellite, using chemical fuels. But where Swen Two had placed his tubes, the stranger had a curious helical construction studded at irregular intervals with small crystals.
He was thirty-five feet tall, a gracefully tapering cylinder. Standing at his head, I could find no sign of exterior vision cells, so I assumed he had some kind of vrulling sense. There seemed to be no exterior markings at all, except the long, shallow grooves dented in his skin by scraping to a stop along the hard surface of our planet.
I am a reporter with warm current in my wires, not a cold-thinking scientist, so I hesitated before using my own vrulling sense. Even though the stranger was non-aware—perhaps permanently—I felt it would be a presumption, an invasion of privacy. There was nothing else I could do, though, of course.
I started to vrull, gently at first, then harder, until I was positively glowing with effort. It was incredible; his skin seemed absolutely impermeable.
The sudden realisation that metal could be so alien nearly fused something inside me. I found myself backing away in horror, my self-preservation relay working overtime.
Imagine watching one of the beautiful cone-rod-and-cylinder assemblies performing the Dance of the Seven Spanners, as he’s conditioned to do, and then suddenly refusing to do anything except stump around unattractively, or even becoming obstinately motionless, unresponsive. That might give you an idea of how I felt in that dreadful moment.
Then I remembered Dak-whirr’s words—there could be no such thing as an “unintelligent manufacture.” And a product so beautiful could surely not be evil. I overcame my repugðnance and approached again.
I halted as an open transmission came from someone near at hand.
“Who gave that squeaking reporter permission to snoop around here?”
I had forgotten the museum board. Five of them were standing in the doorway of the shed, radiating anger. I recognised Chirik, the chairman, and addressed myself to him. I explained that I’d interfered with nothing and pleaded for permission on behalf of my subscribers to watch their investigation of the stranger. After some argument, they allowed me to stay.
I watched in silence and amusement as one by one they tried to vrull the silent being from space. Each showed the same reaction as myself when they failed to penetrate the skin.
Chirik, who is wheeled—and inordinately vain about his suspension system—flung himself back on his supports and pretended to be thinking.
“Fetch Fiff-fiff,” he said at last. “The creature may still be aware, but unable to communicate on our standard freðquencies.”
Fiff-fiff can detect anything in any spectrum. Fortunately he was at work in the museum that day and soon arrived in answer to the call. He stood silently near the stranger for some moments, testing and adjusting himself, then slid up the electromagnetic band.
“He’s emitting,” he said.
“Why can’t we get him?” asked Chirik.
“It’s a curious signal on an unusual band.”
“Well, what does he say?”
“Sounds like utter nonsense to me. Wait, I’ll relay and convert it to standard.”
I made a direct recording naturally, like any good reporter.
“—after planetfall,” the stranger was saying. “Last dribble of power. If you don’t pick this up, my name is Entropy. Other instruments knocked to hell, airlock jammed and I’m too weak to open it manually. Becoming delirious, too, I guess. Getting strong undirectional ultra-wave reception in Inglish, craziest stuff you ever heard, like goblins muttering, and I know we were the only ship in this sector. If you pick this up, but can’t get a fix in time, give my love to the boys in the mess. Signing off for another couple of hours, but keeping this channel open and hoping . . .”
“The fall must have deranged him,” said Chirik, gazing at the stranger. “Can’t he see us or hear us?”
“He couldn’t hear you properly before, but he can now, through me,” Fiff-fiff,” pointed out. “Say something to him, Chirik.”
“Hello,” said Chirik doubtfully. “Er—welcome to our planet. We are sorry you were hurt by your fall. We offer you the hospitality of our assembly shops. You will feel better when you are repaired and repowered. If you will indicate how we can assist you—”
“What the hell! What ship is that? Where are you?”
“We’re here,” said Chirik. “Can’t you see us or vrull us? Your vision circuit is impaired, perhaps? Or do you depend entirely on vrulling? We can’t find your eyes and assumed either that you protected them in some way during flight, or dispensed with vision cells altogether in your conversion.”
Chirik hesitated, continued apologetically: “But we cannot understand how you vrull, either. While we thought that you were unaware, or even completely fused, we tried to vrull you. Your skin is quite impervious to us, however.”
The stranger said: “I don’t know if you’re batty or I am. What distance are you from me?”
Chirik measured quickly. “One meter, two-point-five centimeters from my eyes to your nearest point. Within touching distance, in fact.” Chirik tentatively put out his hand. “Can you not feel me, or has your contact sense also been affected?”
It became obvious that the stranger had been pitifully deranged. I reproduce his words phonetically from my record, although some of them make little sense. Emphasis, puncðtuative pauses and spelling of unknown terms are mere guesswork, of course.
He said : “For godsakemann stop talking nonsense, whoever you are. If you’re outside, can’t you see the airlock is jammed? Can’t shift it myself. I’m badly hurt. Get me out of here, please.”
“Get you out of where?” Chirik looked around, puzzled. “We brought you into an open shed near our museum for a preliminary examination. Now that we know you’re intelliðgent, we shall immediately take you to our assembly shops for healing and recuperation. Rest assured that you’ll have the best possible attention.”
There was a lengthy pause before the stranger spoke again, and his words were slow and deliberate. His bewilderment is understandable, I believe, if we remember that he could not see, vrull or feel.
He asked: “What manner of creature are you? Describe yourself.”
Chirik turned to us and made a significant gesture toward his thinking part, indicating gently that the injured stranger had to be humoured.
“Certainly,” he replied. “I am an unspecialised bipedal manufacture of standard proportions, lately self-converted to wheeled traction, with a hydraulic suspension system of my own devising which I’m sure will interest you when we resðtore your sense circuits.”
There was an even longer silence.
“You are robots,” the stranger said at last. “Crise knows how you got here or why you speak Inglish, but you must try to understand me. I am mann. I am a friend of your master, your maker. You must fetch him to me at once.”
“You are not well,” said Chirik firmly. “Your speech is incoherent and without meaning. Your fall has obviously caused several serious feedbacks, of a very serious nature. Please lower your voltage. We are taking you to our shops immediately. Reserve your strength to assist our specialists as best you can in diagnosing your troubles.”