Rabbits Have LONG Ears
BY LAWRENCE F. WILLARD
The computer classified it
"rabbit" and Montresig was not
one to argue, long ears or not!
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Worlds of If Science Fiction, August 1958.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
Commander Losure gave orders to his navigator to bring the ship in onthe satellite out of sight of the prying telescopes which no doubtexisted on such an invitingly green planet. He was a cautious man anddidn't intend to lose any more crew members if he could help it. Hecould tell by the unusually poor handling of the ship that the crew wasstill demoralized from the brush with the high I.Q. slugs on that lastplanet which they had approached so directly. They'd lost three men inthat scrap, one of them a highly-valued anthropologist. There were onlytwo more of those left in the freeze locker. Too bad it couldn't havebeen a radio operator, there were plenty of those on ice.
The Commander's thoughts were interrupted by his second officer whoentered without the customary military burp.
"I'll forgive you this time, Montresig," said the Commander, "but wecan't relax regulations now, can we. Anything new to report on thisplanet?"
"No, Your Loftiness," said Montresig, after giving a belated burp,"there's nothing to add to what we already know, but then we've justcome to rest on this clinker of a moon. I don't imagine, however, thatwe've located our long lost ancestors or our mythical home planet.There doesn't seem to be a race in this galaxy that walks upright ontwo good legs with two arms, two eyes, nose, mouth and other standardequipment."
"Could be we'll find one this time," said the Commander. "We know it'san oxygen planet, and that there are intelligent beings there, judgingfrom the cities we can see and their use of radio."
"Maybe," grumbled Montresig, "but they won't be men. If they're notslugs they'll be talking fish or intellectual spiders, or somethingequally repulsive. And I can tell you one thing, whatever we find, ifit has brains it will want to fight."
"Now Montresig, don't be bitter. We've only examined a couple hundredplanets. There are many more and you know we'll have to take a look atas many as we can. I tell you, however, we won't take any more chances.Unless we find out they're pretty much like us we won't go near thedamn planet."
"How do you propose to find that out, Your Loftiness? We can't seeanything that small by telescope, we haven't learned much so farby listening to them, and it's pretty dangerous business using thedredge...."
"Ah, my dear Montresig, the crux of the matter is that we can tellabout them, I believe, from listening to them. Judging from the reportsI got from Communications, this is the talkingest planet in the galaxy.They are utilizing the entire radio spectrum we know and, I suspect,some portions of it we don't know. All they do is talk. There must bemillions of individuals on that planet jabbering in a dozen differentlanguages. Our language technicians have decoded two of the majortongues already and have fed the information to the main computer. Allradio signals in those languages are now being fed directly to thecomputer and the information is being classified and cross-referenced."
Montresig's furry countenance brightened. "Then we won't have to senddown the dredge?"
"I hope not, Montresig, I do not like to bring strange life formsaboard the ship. R