Planet Of No Return

7: First Contact

Now that peaceful contact had been established it seemed as though all fear had been drained from the hunter. Brion was empathetically aware of this, though he found it hard to believe at first. This was a grown man — yet his reactions seemed oddly childish. His first fear at seeing a stranger had been held at bay by his later curiosity. Then, instead of seeking escape he had stayed to watch Brion’s arrival, had even remained the night. First greed, then fear again — as though he could not feel more than one strong emotion at a time. Childlike. Now he chattered happily to himself as he examined Brion’s clothes and boots, drank water noisily from the bottle, chewed on the dried rations — then spat them out with distaste. All of this done with an unquestioning and childlike acceptance of the novel situation.

There had not even been a trace of apprehension when Brion, during the course of showing the man the contents of the bag, had idly picked up his knife and slipped it back into its sheath. The hunter had not even noticed the action. He was too fascinated by everything that Brion possessed to take even minimal safety precautions.

It did not take Brion long to realize that this man’s culture appeared to be as primitive as his simple and unquestioning acceptance of their new relationship. His artefacts were crude stone age. The spearpoint was a sharp flake of glassy volcanic rock tied crudely onto the end of the shaft. The hunter’s knife was shaped from stone as well. The lizard skins he wore for clothing were completely uncured — that was obvious from their smell — and the only decoration or non-utilitarian item he possessed was the saurian skull. This repulsive object, with its decaying skin still in place, was worn as a helmet.

When the man’s first curiosity had been satisfied, Brion made an attempt to communicate with him. It was almost completely unsuccessful. After endlessly pointing at himself and speaking his name, then pointing at the hunter and making enquiring noises, Brion did discover that the man was called Vjer. Or Vjr, a single explosive sound completely lacking in vowels. He pronounced Brion more like ‘Bran’ or ‘Brrn’, again free of vowel sounds. And this was the limit of their communication. Vjer soon lost interest in words and refused to learn any more of Brion’s, or to speak any of his own for Brion to learn. His attention span was very limited. He grew thirsty and emptied the water bottle, spilling more than he drank. Later, when he became hungry he hacked off some of the green lizard flesh, ignoring the fact it was already infested with blowflies, chewing and swallowing it raw with noisy satisfaction. Brion found everything about the man difficult to understand.

Vjer was a primitive, nothing more. With his empathetic sense, Brion could tell that he was not simulating. He was exactly what he appeared to be; an unimaginative and simple stone age primitive. Yet this planet was dominated by two warring forces who were locked in what appeared to be a continuous battle, using the most sophisticated weaponry. Where did Vjer fit into all this? Was he an outcast of some kind? A refugee from the fighting? There was no way of telling without opening some channel of communication. Was he alone or was he part of a group? What was the next step to be?

It was Vjer who decided that. He had quietly dozed off after finishing the bloody gobbet of meat. Squatting on his heels, he was instantly and deeply asleep, his actions more like those of an animal than a human being. He woke up just as suddenly, squinting up at the sky and muttering something incomprehensible. He must have reached a decision of some kind because he used his crude knife to hack a length of tough vine from one of the trees. With this he lashed the two haunches of meat together, then grunted as he hoisted them to his shoulder. With the knife in one hand, the spear in the other, he started down the path — then stopped as though he had remembered something.

“Brrn,” he said, chuckling to himself. “Brrn, Brrn!” Then he turned back and continued on his way.

“Wait,” Brion called out. “I want to come with you.”

He started to follow the man — and stopped at the sudden wave of fear that washed over him. Vjer was shivering, his spear shaking in his hand so great was his panic. He backed slowly away, then halted again when Brion made as if to follow, radiating unhappiness, great tears forming in his eyes.

“Well I guess you don’t want me to go with you,” Brion said, in what he hoped was a soothing tone. “But we’ll meet again. You’ll be up in these hills somewhere and shouldn’t be hard to find.”

Vjer’s panic faded when Brion made no move to follow him a second time. He backed away among the trees, then turned and hurried off as fast as he could under the burden of the meat. When he was well out of sight Brion turned and went in the opposite direction, back to the plain. He made a quick detour to refill his waterbottle then began trotting back along the track he had taken the previous day. He had a fixed objective in mind now. The visit to the battlefield could wait — the longer that he put off personal contact with the deadly enemy the better. There would be time enough to do that after he had managed to communicate with Vjer. It might be possible, though it was surely a long shot, that Vjer could tell him enough about the war so he would not have to make the dangerous journey.

The crater was clearly visible in the open plain and he made his way towards it, stopping when he was about a hundred yards distant. He then trampled in a circle to flatten the grass, so that his signal panels could be seen. It was only a few minutes before the area was flat enough to enable him to spread out the pieces of thin cloth. He used chunks of dirt that had been blasted from the crater to hold them in place. After laying out the ‘X’ he paused and counted slowly to one hundred. This should give the lifeship’s computer, in orbit high above, enough time to identify and zero in on his signal.

When he was sure he was being observed, Brion spelled out a ‘V and another ‘X’, followed by two Ts’. Then he sat back, sipped at his waterbottle, and waited.

The signal was clear enough. Land. At this place. Soonest. Right now the lifeship should be computing its orbit. Considering its present altitude, the ship should be on the ground within an hour, two at the most. Brion waited a few minutes, then gathered up all of the signal panels, except for the ‘X’, and stowed them away. When this task was finished he walked off for a quarter of a mile and sat down to wait. Computers were very literal and the ship would land precisely where it had been instructed to. He had no intention of being on that spot.

But the longer he sat there, thinking about the situation, the more concerned he became. This mission was suddenly becoming very dangerous again. The lifeship would have to set down some time, there was no way to avoid that. And this spot was about the safest that could be found, the farthest away from any of the battle sites. Doubly safe because if there were metal detectors at work they might be confused by the wing of the destroyed aircraft. If the computers kept track of such things they would have logged this location as harmless. But all of this was just speculation. They would have to rely on a little luck as well.

He needed just a single piece of equipment. If he worked fast he could board, find what he needed, then get out — and have Lea and the ship spaceborne again within two minutes. He hoped that it would be enough time. Once the lifeship was safely away he would leave the equipment under the shattered metal wing and beat a quick retreat himself. If the equipment were still undisturbed by morning he would retrieve it, then go looking for Vjer.

By the time he first heard the distant rumble of jets overhead the sun had dropped close to the horizon, where it glowed ruddily through a thin bank of cloud. He looked up to see a tiny point of light burning down. It was far brighter than the setting sun, and grew rapidly into a tower of flame that dropped the lifeship safely to the ground. It touched down, right onto the ‘X’, incinerating it neatly, and he was running towards it even as the motors were still cutting out. The airlock ground open and a flexible ladder rattled down to the ground just as he reached its side.

Brion seized the rungs and began pulling himself up, hand over hand, not wasting time trying to set his boots into place on the flapping length of ladder. His arms worked as smoothly as pistons to haul him up the side of the ship and into the airlock. Lea was just turning from the controls when he appeared behind her, seizing her in his solid embrace, kissing her soundly before releasing her.

“It’s wonderful to see you he said,” turning and diving towards the storage racks. “It’s been interesting but lonely, I want the HLP — here it is! Goodbye. Get this ship back into orbit as soon as I am clear.”

He skidded to a stop because she was standing in front of the lock barring his exit. Blazing with anger.

“That’s enough, my lightning lover. It’s time we had a chat — “

“There is no time. You must get out of the way, get back into orbit, we could be attacked at any instant.”

“Shut up. Go get a remote controller. I’ll wait for you on the ground.”

Lea had picked up a heavy bag, turned and started down the ladder while he was still trying to think of an answer. Should he order her back, force her inside if she refused, try to argue with her, convince her that what she was doing was dangerous? All these thoughts rushed through his mind, to be replaced by the realization that none of them would do any good. They must breed for firm-mindedness on Earth because once she had decided what to do there was no altering the course of events. He bowed to the inevitable, even admitting to himself that having her with him was infinitely superior to being alone …

This was taking too much time! He jumped to the control panel and tore the remote controller from its socket; its ready light switching on automatically. He clipped it onto his belt next to the HLP as he dived into the airlock and dropped headlong down the ladder, jumping the last few yards to the ground. Stabbing at the buttons on the controller. He could hear the inner door of the lock slam shut as the ladder clattered back up into the ship. He ran.

Lea had not waited for him, knowing his superior turn of speed. Though she was running as fast as she could he overhauled her quickly, going two yards to her one. He scooped her up in passing and thundered on, not slowing in the slightest. When he heard the jets ignite he dropped to the ground, his body between her and the blast. Putting his arm around her as the ground rumbled and shook and a heated cloud of dust enveloped them. Lea sat up, coughing, wiping at her eyes.

“You stupid, musclebound caveman — do you realize that you almost cooked us with that lightning takeoff?”

“Not really,” he said, smiling, rolling onto his back with his head cradled in his arms looking up at the receding flame of the lifeship. They were safe, at least for the moment. “I knew I could be clear of the blast with at least three seconds to spare. Allowing seven seconds for the lock mechanism … I felt that!”

“How wonderful!” Lea said, kicking him in the side again, just as hard as she could. The toe of her boot merely bounced off his rock-hard muscle, but the moment of protest gave her immense satisfaction. Brion grunted with surprise, then rolled over and sprang to his feet. Lea smiled up at him sweetly. “Well here we are, alone at last on this strange planet. What do we do next?”

Brion started to protest — then burst out laughing. She would never cease to amaze him. He unclipped the two instruments from his belt. “Are you wearing anything metallic — or is there any metal in that pack?”

“Negative to both. I planned this little expedition with care.”

“Very good. There is a stand of heavy grass concealing a ditch, just over there. Go to it and I’ll join you as soon as I get rid of these.”

He loped back to the crater and jumped into it, carefully putting the two pieces of equipment under the twisted metal of the wing, whistling happily through his teeth. Almost done. It looked like they were getting away with it.

Lea was already under cover when he dropped down into concealment beside her. “Isn’t it about time you told me just what is happening?” she said.

“You should not have done this. You should have remained safely in the ship.”

“Why? The thing can fly itself as you have just proved. And two heads will be better than one now that you have found some of the natives. There is no other reason to want a Heuristic Language Processor in such a hurry, is there? In any case, the deed has been done. I’m here, our transportation is back in orbit — so what do we do next?”

She was right. What was done was done; Brion had trained himself to always accept the reality of a situation that could not be changed. He pointed towards the tree-covered hills that bordered the plain.

“We stay under cover here until we’re sure that there is no military interest in us. Then we go up into those hills and look for a simple-minded and filthy primitive whom I met. If we are lucky maybe we can find some of his friends as well. Once he has located them we are going to talk to them with the HPL to see if we can’t get some answers to all those questions we have about this planet.”