Rand switched the converter on and pointed it toward the aliens. “Say a few words, friends,” he told them. “Give us some talk-talk, so we can analyze what you’re telling us.”
The aliens didn’t understand what he was saying, of course. The converter hadn’t learned their language yet. But they replied to Rand’s words with a series of loud buzzes and clicks and booms.
“That’s it,” Rand said. “Keep chattering, fellows!”
He made rapid adjustments on the dial of the Thorson converter as they spoke. He slid the guide panel up and down the indicator until he hit the right range. The converter’s speaker was giving forth the alien language without a translation. But the converter was starting to figure out some meanings now.
In mid-buzz, the alien language came clear. The converter said:
“Buzzbuz mumbleclick danger hostile-animal stranger-type buzzbuz clickmumble surround with many swords buzzbuz if hostile KILL.”
Rand chewed uneasily at his lip. Into the mouthpiece of the converter he said, “We are not hostile. We are friends.”
The converter translated that for the alien. “Buzz-click mumble-mumble mumblemumble?”
The aliens looked puzzled. They didn’t sound any more peaceful. They kept on saying, “Surround with swords. Do they threaten us? Strange creatures. We kill?”
Rand searched his mind for some way to prove to the drum-shaped creatures that he and Dombey and Leswick meant no harm. He said, pointing to the sky, “We are from up there. We have fallen from above.”
“Strange ones. Dangerous.”
“We have no weapons. See, we are without swords!”
“Buzzbuzzbuz. Clickclickclick.”
The converter couldn’t translate that one. But it sounded unfriendly.
Rand said, “We were riding a great shining bird. The bird died. We fell from the sky. We want to go back to our homes.”
“Buzzclick! Clickbuzz!”
“We mean no harm to you,” Rand went on. “Buzz! Click! Boom! BOOM!”
Rand twisted the converter’s dial. He tuned it in a little better.
He said, “We come in peace! We are your friends from Earth!”
“Hostile. Threat. Danger. KILL. KILL. KILL.”
Chapter 12
The aliens hadn’t budged from their places. They still stood in a half circle, facing the Earthmen. But they were starting to look restless. Some of them were swinging their swords back and forth impatiently.
It looked as though they might charge at any moment. And that cry of “KILL. KILL. KILL.” coming out of the converter wasn’t exactly encouraging.
Rand saw that Dombey looked pretty restless too. The big jetmonkey seemed to be getting ready for a fight. His huge hands were clenching into fists, unclenching, clenching again.
Shutting off the converter for a moment, Rand said, “Relax, Tarzan. Stop looking so fierce.”
“We got to defend ourselves.”
“They have swords and we don’t,” Rand said. “And they outnumber us ten or fifteen to one. Muscle won’t help us now, Dombey. This is something we have to talk our way out of.”
The aliens were starting to move closer.
Rand turned the converter on again. “We are heading east to find our friends,” he said desperately. He pointed to the east. “When we find them, we will leave your world and never return. Do you understand? We want nothing from you. We’re not hostile. We want to leave as soon as we find our friends. We want to leave. We are not your enemies.”
The buzzing noises continued. They grew louder and sounded more menacing.
Rand tuned the converter again. It gave this translation:
“We are not able to decide what to do with you, strangers. We must ask a higher authority who decides for us. Make no more words, but come with us to our village.”
“Very well,” Rand said. “Take us to your village.”
He turned the converter off. The aliens moved in on them, forming a tight, buzzing circle. Dombey looked as if he wanted to push the aliens away from him.
Rand said, “Do everything they tell us to do, Dombey. Don’t complain, don’t refuse. Above all, don’t touch any of them or look like you want to hit them. Otherwise they’ll kill us. KILL. You understand that, Dombey?”
The jetmonkey nodded slowly. “Yeah. Yeah, boss, I won’t start no fight. But I don’t like them. They’re no good.”
“I don’t like them much either, but there are too many of them to fight. They’re armed and we aren’t. They can kill us, Dombey. Go where they tell you. Do what they want you to do.”
“Okay,” Dombey said agreeably. “You’re the boss, boss.”
Rand looked at Leswick. The metaphysician had said nothing at all for the past five minutes. He had hardly moved through the whole conversation with the aliens. Now he was permitting himself to be shoved along, scarcely noticing. His eyes looked dreamy. He seemed lost in his thoughts.
“What’s the matter with you, professor?” Rand asked. “You synthesizing some new cultural phenomena?”
Leswick didn’t reply.
“Hey, Leswick! I’m talking to you!”
“Will you keep quiet, Rand?” the metaphysician snapped. Rand had never heard him speak so sharply before. “Let me think this out, will you?”
“You’re going to save us through Metaphysical Synthesis?” Rand said sarcastically.
Leswick just glared at him.
“I beg your pardon for interrupting your thoughts,” Rand said. “Sorry! Terribly sorry!” The tone of his voice left no doubt how sorry he really was.
The aliens marched them onward through the jungle.
As they neared the village, Rand began to do some heavy thinking himself. There had to be some way out of this! There had to be some way he could show these suspicious aliens that the three Earthmen were no threat to them.
Maybe there was some way of drawing pictures for them, he thought. Show them the blowup of the ship, show them the crash landing of the lifeship, show them the location of the rescue beacon. Make it clear that we just want to hike to the beacon and signal for help so we can go home.
Another possibility was not to try to explain anything. Let them put us in their jail. Or what passes for a jail among them. And then, in the middle of the night, break out and slip away.
We ought to be able to do it. They look like simple sorts—they wouldn’t guard us too closely. Dombey can lead us in the dark. That would be easier than trying to explain ourselves to them. Even with the converter, we don’t seem to be able to get our ideas across. They’re alien. They don’t think the way we do. They can’t even begin to understand us. And we can’t figure them out, either.
What if they do guard us closely, though?
Then we’ll just have to figure out a logical way of dealing with them, Rand told himself. But nothing logical came into his mind. And now they were at the alien village.
The village was set in a broad clearing. Trees had been chopped down for a great distance on all sides, and bright sunlight came through the opening in the jungle. A small stream ran along one side of the settlement.
The place was fantastically busy. Hundreds more of the barrel-shaped aliens were bustling around in a tremendous hurry, every one of them hard at work. Here, four of them were pounding grain. There, eight of them were putting up a new hut. Over there, six others were trimming logs.
The village consisted of row on row of wooden huts, each one just like all the rest. Every hut was about six feet high and five feet wide. That was big enough to hold one alien, no more. Didn’t they have families, Rand wondered? Furniture? Possessions? How could they live in such tiny cabins?