“Yes.”
“We got anything left?”
I walked out where I could see. There was a blackened hull, and pieces of wreckage scattered around. “It isn’t going to fly again.”
“Okay. We’ll manage. How’d you get me out here?”
“We had some help. One of the locals.”
“Really?”
“Yes.”
“He didn’t try to shoot us?”
“No. Fortunately not.”
He was quiet for a minute. The air was filled with the acrid smell of burning plastene. “Where’d he go?”
“For help, I think.”
“I hope so.” Alex shook his head. Then he remembered something. “Chase—?”
“Yes?”
“Tell me we didn’t forget the scramblers? That we didn’t leave them in the lander?”
I ran my hands along my belt. No weapon. I didn’t customarily wear it while on board, but I recalled grabbing it when our visitor began pounding on the hatch. I had no idea where Alex’s scrambler was, but I could see he wasn’t wearing it, either, although he still had the holster. “Wait,” I said.
I went back toward the wreckage, searching the ground. One of them, mine, was lying in the grass.
Gradually, the chirp and buzz of insects penetrated the late afternoon. Despite the vast differences between living worlds, the harmony of the forest never changes. Woodlands may differ in the tone of howls and snorts and screeches, but there are always insects, and they always sound the same.
We waited. I used my jacket to make a pillow for Alex, and he commented that he’d enjoyed the ride. “One of your smoother landings.” Then: “What’s he like?” He meant our rescuer.
“He seems reasonable enough.”
“He is coming back?”
“I hope so.”
Almost an hour later, he walked out of the trees, accompanied by two others. At about the same moment, my link sounded. It was Belle. The ship. “Are you all right?” she asked.
“Alex has a broken leg. Otherwise, we’re okay.”
“Are you in any immediate danger?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Well, I’m glad to hear you got out of the lander safely. You pushed it too far, Chase. I warned you.”
“It wasn’t her fault,” said Alex. “How long before we can expect help?”
“Twelve days, at the earliest.”
Alex traded smiles with Faloon. “We’ve been rescued by locals,” he said.
“They are not a threat?”
“No. We’ll keep the links active. I want you to listen in and try to pick up the language. Can you do that?”
“I can try, Alex.”
Our rescuers had brought a pallet, consisting of a couple of blankets stretched across two tree limbs. They talked among themselves and delivered reassuring sounds to us. One carried a gun in his belt. It was like the ones used against us at the fishing camp. Primitive but effective. We kept the links on, but the receivers were in our ears so that Belle’s voice wouldn’t be overheard. “By the way,” she said, “be aware that I’ll be out of range again in a few minutes.”
“How much time will we get?” Alex asked.
“About eleven minutes on each pass. I’ll let you know,” Belle said, “when I’m in the zone, and I’ll warn you when you are about to lose contact.”
They all wore animal-skin leggings and jackets. And they had straggly beards. One of them had brought the makings of a splint. Another carried a flagon. I approached the one who’d rescued us and pointed at myself. “Chase,” I said.
He nodded. “Turam.” (I found out later that “faloon” was indeed the standard greeting.) We shook hands. The others were Dex and Seepah.
They looked at Alex’s leg, talked to one another, and they knelt around him. Seepah, the tallest of the three, applied ointment, then said something to Alex. We didn’t have to speak the language to translate: This will hurt a little bit. They held the flagon out for him and signified he should drink.
He tried it. Looked at me like a trapped animal. You think these guys know what they’re doing?
When he attempted to return the flagon, Dex shook his head, and said one word. There was no mistaking the meaning: More.
Belle notified me she was losing the signal. “Good luck,” she added.
They handed the flagon to me. It was lemon-colored, and it smelled all right, so I tried it. “That’s not bad,” I said. A couple of minutes later, I was out.
When I recovered, they’d finished setting Alex’s leg and were lifting him carefully onto the pallet. Two of them picked him up and started for the woods. Turam came back to me, smiled, and asked something. Was I all right? I nodded. He helped me up, and we followed the others.
A boat was waiting for the river crossing. The group of structures I’d seen from the air occupied the opposite bank. We got in and pushed off. Dex and Turam rowed while Seepah stayed close to Alex.
I hadn’t been aware how wide the river was. It was peaceful and quiet, but we needed twenty minutes of furious rowing to get to the other side.
Several people were waiting when we docked. They looked at us curiously, asked questions of everyone, including Alex and me, and relieved those who’d been carrying the pallet. I recorded the conversations for analysis by Belle.
At the center of the cluster lay a two-story building that might have been a hotel in another era. It was a three-sided structure, U-shaped, with the open end in the rear. It had a covered deck, which was liberally supplied with chairs, tables, and potted plants. Houses, sheds, and barns surrounded it. I thought I heard animals somewhere. And two other, smaller, buildings, which appeared to be greenhouses, stood off by themselves. Except for a narrow open space that ran from the front doors of the long building to the river, the entire compound was sealed off by forest.
By the time we arrived, dusk was settling in. Lights burned in a number of windows, both in the houses and in the long building. A few front doors opened as we approached, and more people, including a few children, came out and looked.
“I guess,” I told Alex, “they don’t get many visitors.”
“Maybe,” he said, “but I’ll bet the real issue is that they saw us pass overhead in the lander. I doubt they’ve seen much antigrav technology.”
Seepah took us inside, where still more people waited. He led us down a hallway into a room illuminated by a half dozen oil lamps. A long table stood in the center. There were a couple of cabinets, a desk, and a scattering of chairs. They cleared the chairs out of the way, threw a sheet over the table, and transferred Alex to it.
Seepah checked him again. Removed a windup clock from a bag and took Alex’s pulse. The result brought a frown. He said something to Alex. Then to Turam. It looked like bad news, but there was no sign of a bullet wound anywhere. “You okay?” I asked Alex. “Other than the leg?”
“I’m a little out of it. But yeah, I’m fine.”
Seepah pointed at his wrist. Feel the pulse. I tried his forehead first. I’m not a medic, but he didn’t seem warm. I checked his pulse against the timer in the link, and it was normal. I shrugged. Told Alex he was fine.
They apparently assumed we were a couple and assigned us to quarters near the far end of the building. There were two rooms, one with a sofa and three chairs. The other was a bedroom with a double bed. They got Alex into it, his leg wrapped and immobilized. He didn’t wake up during any part of the process. Then, I’m pretty sure, they told us to let them know if we needed anything.
One of the women showed me where the ladies’ washroom was located. The men’s was immediately next door.
When it was over, and they’d left, I collapsed on the sofa. I’m not sure how long I was out. Eventually, I was awakened by a knock at the door. Someone delivering crutches.
I thanked him and put them in the bedroom.
The apartment, if you could call it that, was spare. But it beat living in the woods. We had thick curtains to mai
ntain some privacy. Carpets in both rooms. The walls could have used a restorative, but they were okay. There was a sketch near the door, of an angel, or a goddess, a woman with spreading wings, clothed in a flowing garment, one breast exposed.
Turam came by to see how we were doing. He brought with him a tall, thin, scholarly woman with intense eyes. Her name was Viscenda, and it was fairly clear that she was the person in charge. The director or mayor of the community. Or maybe the queen. I could also see that she wasn’t excited about having people from outside interrupting the routine. She went through the motions of making us feel welcome. Then she left.
Turam stayed behind to try to determine how we were doing. He asked about Alex’s leg. Alex was explaining it was coming along nicely when Belle became active. “I need direct interaction with these people,” she said, “if you expect me to become conversant.”
“Not right now, Belle,” Alex said. “Let’s give it a little time.”
We indicated to Turam, as best we could, that we wanted to learn the names of things. I pointed at the river. What do you call it? And what were those that hung on the windows and kept the sun out?
He understood, and seemed anxious to help. He pointed out objects in the room, the windows and curtains and books. We figured out how to ask for a book, how to describe the act of either opening or reading it (we couldn’t be sure which), and how to ask for a pen. The only writing instruments they had were long, metal-tipped instruments that had to be dipped into a bottle of ink. But that gave us translations for “ink” and “bottle.” When Belle passed out of range, it didn’t matter. We kept going.
In the midst of the conversation, a woman arrived, carrying a tray with cups and bowls, something that looked like bread, a pitcher filled with a cherry-colored liquid, and a covered tureen trailing a wisp of steam.
There were utensils for each of us, a spoon, a knife, and something I can only describe as a set of needles.
Alex’s eyes caught mine. Was the food safe?
It smelled good. Like beef stew. With lots of onions.
“It’s probably okay,” I said. Turam looked at us, trying to figure out why we were hesitating. “Let’s not offend the host,” I added.
The woman filled two bowls with the stew and showed us the accompanying condiments. I nodded. This one, please. It looked like pepper.
She set Alex’s food on a tray, and Turam helped him sit up. Alex tried his before mine arrived. “Only thinking of your safety,” he said with a smile.
There were several types of meat in the mix. I had to assume it was real off-the-bone animal meat, but I put that out of my mind. Alex was thinking the same thing, and we exchanged shrugs. Any port in a storm.
I tried the gravy first. It didn’t taste like anything I’d had before. Closest I could come would be pork with maybe a twist of lemon brewed in. It was good. The liquid in the cup was brewed, but it also had a unique flavor. A tea with some sort of fruit additive? And the bread had a rye flavoring.
It was good.
“Chase.” Belle was overhead again. “How are you doing?”
“We’re fine, thanks,” I said.
“I’m glad to hear it. Can we conduct some conversations with the natives?”
“There’s no one here at the moment except Alex.”
“Okay. May I suggest that, on the next pass, you arrange to be out in some public area? I’ll be content just to listen, if you prefer. But the more exposure I have, the quicker I’ll be able to grasp the language.”
THIRTY-EIGHT
The real threat implied by the arrival of a visitor from, say, Andromeda, is not that he might be the point man for an invading force. Rather, it is that he might embody a new perspective. We feel secure with viewpoints that have been around awhile. We like them, and we don’t want anybody messing with them. Most of us are still trying to hang on to the sixty-seventh century.
—Arkham of Chao Cyra, from an address to the graduates at Korva University, class of 6703
Alex had a bad first night. He didn’t complain, but he was hurting. I tried sitting with him until he told me I was making him nervous, and I should please go to sleep. He seemed to be running a slight fever, so I kept a damp cloth on his forehead.
Seepah came during the night, administered medication for both of us, more of the stuff that had knocked me out earlier, except probably in a diminished dose. He drew the curtains while he was there, shutting out the moonlight. He checked Alex’s pulse again. Shook his head. Looked puzzled.
In the morning, they brought us a pitcher of water and a plate of hard bread, with a jar of the local substitute for grape jelly to smear on it.
We were still munching when Turam showed up.
He made himself comfortable, watched curiously while we ate, and managed to ask questions that did not require a knowledge of the language. For example, he waved his hands and imitated something going down and crashing. Then a quizzical look.
I did an impression of a guy with a rifle. He nodded.
Okay. What about that thing we’d ridden down out of the sky? What was that?
Where were we from?
We’d put together a schedule of times when Belle would be available. She was, at that moment, almost directly overhead. I looked at Alex.
“Go ahead,” he said. “See what happens.”
So I showed Turam my bracelet and asked Belle to say hello. He was looking at it, puzzled, when it spoke to him. “Faloon, Turam.”
I thought he was going to fall off his chair. But he got the message. We came from very far away.
“I’ve been listening,” she said to Alex and me. “And watching. I believe I have acquired some facility with the language.” So they went back and forth, Turam and the bracelet, in the local language. Turam’s eyes jumped back and forth between me and the link. He looked stunned. He smiled. He made faces. He squeezed his temples with his fingertips.
“What are you telling him?” I asked.
“Just that we appreciate their help. I’m beginning to pass out of range.”
“Tell him you won’t be able to speak to him for a while.”
“I already have. Unfortunately, I don’t have the capability to tell him why, or how long it will take before we can resume the conversation, because I have no idea yet how these people measure time. By the way, you should be aware that it was a productive session.”
Moments later, she faded out. Turam stared at the bracelet. He looked like a guy who’d just experienced a divine visitation.
Seepah returned a few hours later to examine Alex again. The first thing he did was to take his pulse. He still didn’t like the result. Then he checked the leg. Finally, he produced a thermometer and waited for him to open his mouth.
Alex hesitated. Looked toward me. “You think they sterilize these things?”
“Sure,” I said.
He opened up, and Seepah inserted the device. After a minute or so, the doctor—he was clearly the local medical practitioner—produced a notebook and recorded the result. I don’t think he liked that either. They brought more food and liquids, hot and cold. And another pitcher of water.
When they were gone, Alex felt his forehead, frowned, and asked me to try. “Feels okay,” I said.
“I hope he knows what he’s doing,” Alex said. “He seems worried about something.”
On her next orbit, Belle, speaking only to me, reiterated that her time with Turam had been fruitful. “We should not waste opportunities. I should talk with him some more, or with someone, every time we can. And there’s something else: We’ve received transmissions from Audree and Robin, which I’ve downloaded to your respective links.”
The closest thing to an available private place was the washroom. I’d have preferred to go outside, but the image of Robin flickering on the grass might have upset the locals. So I retreated down the hall and waited until it was empty.
Robin looked good. He was sitting on his front deck, sipping lemonade, wearing a broad-brimmed h
at to keep the sun off. “Chase,” he said, “I just wanted you to know I miss you. Nothing here is the same without you.
“There’s not much happening. My uncle Allen will be in town tomorrow, and I’ll have to take him sightseeing. It’ll be a long day. He’s a nice guy, but he never stops talking. Always about either sports or the family. Anyhow, I’m counting the hours till you get back. Hope everything’s okay.”
It would, of course, be several days before he heard about our incident.
The main building housed approximately fifteen families. There were as many more scattered across the grounds in the individual homes, all of modest dimensions and purely utilitarian. Turam took me on a tour.
The compound extended over a large piece of farmland. It occupied almost a kilometer of riverfront and included two docks, a boathouse, and a waterwheel. Crops were everywhere.
The community had a manually operated printing press, ran a supply center in the main building, and they had a school. I noticed two more greenhouses in back, but they seemed underused. They were growing flowers in them. The two I’d seen originally appeared to be shut down completely.
Food was served at regular hours in a large dining hall. Apparently everyone was welcome, and almost everyone gathered—everybody who wasn’t working—for the evening meal. During the time we were there, I never walked past the dining hall during the day and saw it empty. If people weren’t eating, they were sitting around talking or playing cards. When Belle made her next pass, I grabbed a chair and sat in, with the link on so she could watch, and participate in, the conversation.
The news about the bracelet that talked spread quickly, and everybody wanted to see it. Most were skeptical, of course, especially when Belle was out of range. See: I told you they were making it up.
There was a play area for kids out back. Alex, on his crutches, hobbled outside, found a bench, and sat down to watch. When Belle reentered the zone a few minutes later, she commented that the locals did not understand why we seemed so weak.
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