ILLUSTRATOR MARTINEZ
The problem of separating thefriends from the enemies wasa major one in the conquest ofspace as many a dead spacercould have testified. A toughjob when you could see analien and judge appearances;far tougher when they wereonly whispers on the wind.
A smile of friendship is a baringof the teeth. So is a snarl ofmenace. It can be fatal to mistakethe latter for the former.
Harm an alien being only undercircumstances of self-defense.
TRUST NO ALIEN BEINGUNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES.
—From Exploration Ship's Handbook.
He listened in the silenceof the Exploration ship'scontrol room. He heard nothingbut that was what botheredhim; an ominous quiet whenthere should have been a multitudeof sounds from the nearbyvillage for the viewscreen's audio-pickupsto transmit. And itwas more than six hours pastthe time when the native,Throon, should have come to sitwith him outside the ship asthey resumed the laborious attemptto learn each other's language.
The viewscreen was black inthe light of the control room,even though it was high noonoutside. The dull red sun wasalways invisible through theworld's thick atmosphere and tohuman eyes full day was nomore than a red-tinged darkness.
He switched on the ship'soutside floodlights and the viewscreencame to bright white life,showing the empty glades reachingaway between groves ofpurple alien trees. He noticed,absently, that the trees seemedto have changed a little in colorsince his arrival.
The village was hidden fromview by the outer trees butthere should have been some activityin the broad area visibleto him. There was none, noteven along the distant segmentof what should have been a busyroad. The natives were up tosomething and he knew, fromhard experience on other alienworlds, that it would be nothinggood. It would be another misunderstandingof some kind andhe didn't know enough of theirincomprehensible language toask them what it was—
Suddenly, as it always came,he felt someone or somethingstanding close behind him andpeering over his shoulder. Hedropped his hand to the blasterhe had taken to wearing at alltimes and whirled.
Nothing was behind him.There never was. The controlroom was empty, with no hidingplace for anything, and the doorwas closed, locked by the remote-controlbutton beside him. Therewas nothing.
The sensation of being watchedfaded, as though the watcherhad withdrawn to a greater distance.It was perhaps the hundredthtime within six days thathe had felt the sensation. Andwhen he slept at night somethingcame to nuzzle at hismind; faceless, formless, utterlyalien. For the past three nightshe had not let the blaster getbeyond quick reach of his hand,even when in bed.
But whatever it was, it couldnot be on the ship. He hadsearched the ship twice, a methodicalcompartment-by-compartmentsearch that had foundnothing. It had to be the workof the natives from outside theship. Except....
Why, if the natives weretelepathic, did the one calledThroon go through the wearypretense of trying to learn a mutuallyunderstandable form ofcommunication?
There was one other explanation,which he could not accept:that he was following in thefoo