Yngve, AR - Alien Beach Page 5

  "Sorry, I forgot. Could you send me some money for the trip? I'll pay you back, but I don't have enough for the flight ticket right now."

  The voice at the other end paused, yawning or sighing, then answered: "Tourist class. But if you booze away the money this time, I'll never do it again, y'hear? This is the last time!"

  "Yeah. I promise."

  "I love you, dear."

  "Love you too, Mom."

  The soldier hung up and faced his captors with a nonplussed grin.

  "Where do I sign?"

  After some procedure and receiving a court order, the soldier was free and walked out to the gate of the U.S. military base. He swore to himself that as soon as the money arrived in his bank account, he would buy a ticket. Not home, wherever that was.

  A ticket to the South Pacific.

  Night fell, and the Sirian group surfaced a second time - all twelve of them. This time, the amphibians were wearing the Bermuda shorts they had received earlier. The scientists saw a new awkwardness in the Sirians' walk, as they came to greet them. Another series of handshakes followed, and the extraterrestrials were urged to sit in the palmtree grove with their hosts.

  Ranmotanii was the first one to sit down, flanked by the younger Namonnae - and another aged male, who called himself Oanorrn. He had not been present before, and seemed much weaker and paler than Ranmotanii; his skin was thin and wrinkled, and he supported himself on Namonnae's strong shoulder. Carl made some conversation with them, slowly explaining the occasion.

  Other, younger Sirians carried loaded sacks, which they emptied before them onto wide, silvery plates brought by their comrades. The plates turned out to be some kind of serving-machines, which scurried across the ground on scores of knobby black "legs," much to the amusement of the human hosts. The mobile plates served loads of freshly captured fish from the surrounding sea, together with assorted seafood from the floor of the lagoon. Ann Meadbouré could name several of the captured species by looking at them; some were still stirring, the occasional fishtail flapping reflexively. When all amphibians and humans had settled around the bonfire, Carl turned to Ranmotanii and made welcoming phrases.

  "To share food and music in peace," he declared loudly to all, "is the best thing there is. We want you to feel this too, and hope it is your way of things, as it is ours. We will play our music first, but we also want to hear your music later. Now eat, drink, and be happy!"

  The scientists applauded, and the Sirians did too - only it sounded off-key, with the aliens' near absence of palms to clap. The scientist with the tapedeck played the Beatles tape on a pleasantly low volume, while the guests partook of the food. A male gave Ann a large, raw, fresh fish to eat - she smiled, hiding her embarrassment the best she could.

  "Thank you," she said painstakingly, holding the fish with unsteady hands. "You can have half the fish... I cannot eat all of it. Please?"

  "Thaaank yyyou," the amphibian said, his voice a youngish, singing bass tone.

  On his cone-shaped head was no hair at all, nor a wrinkle of age. But he was big, a little over two meters tall - much due to the oblong head, almost twice as high as a human head. With one arm, he grasped the fish in the middle and squeezed - it split as if a cut by a dull knife, leaving Ann with the tail half. The Sirian gave Ann a curious look, saw no obvious fear in her face, and bit into his half. He had single rows of small, separated, cylindrical teeth, vaguely similar to those of dolphins; he made a crunching sound when he bit off a fist-sized bite of raw fish and swallowed it. Then he looked at Ann again, blinked rapidly several times, and seemed to wait for her turn.

  She smiled, and explained in a slow voice: "I must... cook the fish... before I eat it. In the fire."

  She pointed to the barbecue chef Stone Pound, who was frying food by the bonfire.

  The alien sang: "I seee thiiis beforrre... frommm yourrr telllevisssion transmiiiitterrrs. Manyyy hummmans whhen eeeat fisssh nooot burrrn iiit firrrst. Aaand mmmany humaaans burrrn foood firssst."

  He pointed toward a nearby couple of guests, and with amazement Ann saw what Takeru Otomo was doing. With a knife, the engineer was slicing fish into bite-size chunks and served it raw to humans and Sirians alike. The other Sirians ate the sushi as quickly as Takeru could serve them.

  "Not me," Ann said, shaking her head. "Wait here."

  She brought her piece over to the chef, who happily accepted it; he was singing along with the music, probably the merriest cook she had ever seen. Ann heard the multilingual conversation soar about her - scattered phrases in simple English, singing slow English, and the strange, singsong tones and clicks of Sirian-to-Sirian speech. A sense of intoxication, of wondrous insight filled her; she wanted to cry with excitement. After spending most of her younger years trying to communicate with dolphins, this confirmed what she had learned: when everything else seemed vague and difficult to convey, the simple things in life could be understood by all species. Food. Warmth. Music. She was partaking in primal communion.

  And she thought: if it can work with beings from another world, as different from us as we are different from dolphins... then it should work among humans too! It really is so simple, all over the universe it is as simple! The world must see it!

  Her head pivoted from side to side, and she caught sight of a man with a camera. It wasn't being broadcast live - but it would do. There was yet hope for the outside world. Stone Pound called out for Ann and gave her a paper plate with her fried fish. She brought it over to the male Sirian, sat down and cut a piece for him. She had to goad him a little, but he accepted it. After a first, cautious taste, he swallowed the piece, closed his eyes fully, and savored the taste for a full four seconds.

  "Thaaank yooou. Goood, alllso fisssh coooked," he said finally.

  "My name is Ann." She pointed at her forehead.

  "Annn." The amphibian cocked his tall head to the side, narrowed his eyes to slits, and made a smiling face.

  "Easssy sayyy Annn. Easssy, also goood." He pointed a finger at the spot between his eyes. "Mmmy lannd-naaame iiis Oanss."

  "Oanss. Oanss! A good name."

  They studied each other's faces with equal curiosity. Their facial proportions were so different, yet all the details were equal in numbers: two eyes, two nostrils, one mouth, two ear-openings... it seemed to Ann that life was drawn up after a universal plan. Once when the Earth was young, there had been life forms in the oceans that were asymmetric or shaped like absurd nonsensical shapes... but those had soon died out. Maybe the simple symmetry of the Sirians was - though she knew it to be her own vanity - what humans would look like in a million years. All the rough edges and odd clumps of hair polished away by eons of time, until only the essence was left...

  A sudden outburst of louder music interrupted their searching. The tapedeck was on, playing the Beatles song All Together Now . The beat was simple, and the refrain couldn't be easier to get into - yet the Sirians were reluctant to join the humans in singing. Their voices were much too different. Only when Carl and the others started clapping their hands to the beat, the guests caught on. Humans sang, and aliens clapped what passed for hands among their race.

  The party lasted a few hours, food and drink being shared generously; for security reasons, alcohol was banned. Then, in the middle of the night, the oldest Sirian Oanorrn was suddenly forced to return to the lagoon; Ranmotanii and Namonnae escorted him back to the ship. Underwater lights from their submerged vessel started to illuminate the dark waters, forming an eerie halo around its streamlined shape. Now the ship could be discerned better than during the day, resting on the coral-bed twenty meters below the sea: a manta-shape three times larger than a blue whale; the top of its hull nearly touched the surface. The lights were attracting all sorts of fish, yet the retreating Sirians made no attempt to catch any as they swam past - maybe they were just too stuffed.

  Other amphibians began to follow. They made polite gestures of goodbye, and croaked promises of return the next morning. Carl took this as unsurpri
sing; he sensed the Sirians weren't "sleepy" in the same sense humans were; the amphibians didn't yawn or walk slower when they left. Within twenty minutes' time, the last young Sirian had dived into the waters and disappeared under the keel of the submerged ship.

  Carl bid the other scientists goodnight, and remembered the mind-recorders they had received from their visitors. Should he use his device? He thought of calling his family as he entered his barrack, but he suddenly felt completely exhausted. It was getting to be too much already, and he thought: God, they're still going to be here tomorrow... and the day after... a whole year. I'm too old to lead this circus. It should be Ann doing it... she seems to get along so well with them. He slumped down on his bed, too tired to put the alien device onto his head, and fell asleep.

  Meanwhile, three houses farther north, Ann was in her own little room that took up half a barrack - the other half, separated by a flimsy wall, held the quarters of the biologist Andrea MacClintock, a reclusive Nobel Prize winner of sixty-two years' age. Ann was tired now, yet full of energy; she almost knocked on the flimsy wall, hoping that MacClintock would chat with her about the Sirians. But she knew she shouldn't - she ought to sit down and take notes on her computer...

  Then she recalled the gifts. She bent down and pulled out the box from under her bed, unlocked it, and picked up her mind-recorder. It felt smooth and soft in her hands... no hum from electronics there, no heat from internal power-sources. How the hell did this thing work? Her friend Arthur back on Sri Lanka had a saying: "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."

  "Ah!"

  Suddenly she started, and almost dropped the apparatus. For a moment it had felt as if the machine had... moved in her hands, or its smooth texture had changed. She looked at the inside of the thick metal bands, probed the surface with her fingers. Yes, the texture was changing ever so slightly as she touched it... like the scales of a fish, only the scales must be microscopic. Ann brought the device over to her small worktable and put a part of it under her optical, low-resolution microscope. Magnified a hundred times, the silvery surface of the apparatus really did resemble fish scales. She put a finger to it... and now she saw the metal palpitate minutely, reacting to the touch or the heat of her flesh. What had the machine done when Takeru put it on his head? Had it sent out tiny needles into his head, without him feeling it, or...?

  Ann recognized two drives in her body: fear in her skin, and shame in her gut. It would all boil down to a matter of trust, she thought. Put in on while you sleep, and prove to yourself your trust in the aliens. Or never use it on yourself, and always know you had never really trusted those slick, inscrutable deceivers from another world. If she trusted Oanss...

  Ten minutes later, she lay in her bed with the sheets pulled up to her neck, the device resting around her head. It cut into her hair, creating an uncomfortable sensation - perhaps, she thought, it would only work on crewcut or bald persons - but she could manage the pressure. She reached up and squeezed the switch knob...

  The device spoke in a pre-recorded, small voice: "Chiiik!"

  At once she felt a sudden heat in the headband as it tightened around her scalp - it receded quickly, and she felt nothing more. She spent one hour turning and twisting, listening to the air-conditioner, until she fell asleep.

  And with sleep came the dreams.

  DAY 52

  The next morning, failing to recall what she had been dreaming, Ann Meadbouré put the machine back on her head and replayed. She saw the first dream, as clearly as if she had been asleep - and gasped. She could withstand fifteen seconds of it, before she tore off the machine and locked it up. No one, she swore, no one was going to see that dream again. She rushed into the shower and tried to scrub the shame off her skin...

  While washing down his last piece of breakfast with fresh pineapple juice, Carl walked out of his barrack, talking to the U.S. President over his cell-phone.

  "No, sir, there was no trouble. The Navy boat came over and picked up the videotape of the party this morning. You'll receive it later... didn't the air surveillance pick up the singing? They did? Thank you, sir. It was a great success. The Sirians are marvelously civilized. But there was one thing... our historian passed out, as you may have heard.

  "Yes, the German guy. I'm going to check his health now, but I'm thinking of replacing him with someone else and let him go home. So there will be a vacancy... we need a history expert - or a great communicator... yes, we will inform the universities as soon as I've made the decision... it's all set then. Till next time then. Goodbye, Mr. President."

  Carl put away the phone, and cast a glance at the boat leaving the lagoon for the distant aircraft carrier. Another boat came in, loaded with fresh supplies from a nearby, inhabited island. Carl waved to the military personnel unloading the supplies, and knocked on Lazar's door. The dark-skinned, thin-haired Egyptian opened; he was already dressed in shorts and a shirt like Carl. Lazar gave him a brief smile, and started talking very rapidly.

  "I did it, Carl. I had the machine on my head while I slept, and played it up the first I did when I woke up. Of course I was afraid, but..."

  Carl asked him to explain on their way to the hospital-barracks; they had to check out the German's health.

  Around them, the little community was up and moving. Andrea MacClintock the biologist and Ann Meadbouré the biologist-anthropologist were jogging across the white sand, talking to each other. Takeru, the engineer, and two other scientists were setting up antennas and what might be camera equipment on poles around the area. Lazar understood nothing of electronics. He was carrying his Sirian mind-recorder in a small case with him - and he understood nothing of that either. All he cared about were the implications, and those were vast.

  "Carl, I dreamt with total self-consciousness. While asleep, I mean. I have proof. It was amazing. Knowing that my thoughts were being recorded, my super-ego stepped in and - and supervised my dreams. I dreamt all sorts of things... obscene things, silly things, profound things, but all the while reasoning about it... and it was wonderful! Even when I replayed it!

  "When you can hide nothing, how can there be shame or sublimation? Never before in history has this happened. Always when humans recount their thoughts, they have been filtered, softened down, interpreted, censored... now, perhaps, total self-reflection is available. The most private sphere, that everybody thought sacred, is an open book. People will be able to really communicate feelings, dreams, thoughts. What will happen? Is this the key to universal communion?"

  Carl smiled wearily at his excited colleague, and said: "Maybe our patient can help us find out. Now please don't ask him all that much at once."

  The Swedish physician had seen them coming and opened the door to greet them.

  "Good morning, Mats. Slept well?"

  The Swede's face was alert but expressionless.

  "Yes, but I didn't use my... helmet. Our patient just woke up, and I have his mind-recorder here. He refuses to let me use it without you hearing him out first..."

  The German historian, his hair and beard frizzled, was sitting on the edge of his bed and gestured wildly at the physician.

  "Give me that infernal machine! It's mine, they gave each of us a copy! Dr. Sayers, tell him he has no right to read my mind!"

  Carl sighed, and sat down next to the German.

  "Bruno, this might come hard on you, but please stay calm."

  Pause. Bruno sat still, his eyes flicking now to Carl's face, now to the mind-recording device in Mats' hands, as if he refused to let go of it for a moment.

  "I know what you're going to say," he croaked. "You want to send me home and replace me. My health is endangering the mission, is it not?"

  Carl nodded slowly, deliberately.

  "I'm afraid so, Bruno. I just talked to the President on the phone, and he has no objections against replacing you with another historian..."

  The German's head sunk down, and he knotted his fingers so tightly together they
whitened. Some great inner tension kept him on edge, something he was deathly afraid of revealing... except maybe in his dreams. Lazar had to make an effort not to ask Bruno directly, and let Carl do the talking.

  "Bruno," Carl asked softly, "what was recorded from your dreams? What caused you to pass out when that Sirian tried to shake your hand?"

  The man's entire body shivered with his sigh.

  "I'd rather tell you everything, than let you see my dreams. Give me my machine, and I'll tell you."

  Carl nodded toward Mats, who handed Bruno his mind-recorder. The German hugged the device tightly; with his eyes fixed on the floor, voice receding practically to a whisper, he explained.

  "I was born in 1945, in West Germany... my parents were card-carrying members of the Nazi Party during the war, but they pretended otherwise... all through my childhood, they kept telling me the Jews were to blame for our defeat... the global conspiracy against us, the real Germans... and I, growing up and seeing the country growing rich again, I believed them...

  "I joined the Social Democratic Party when every other teenager did... but it was a lie... secretly, I hated all foreigners and Jews just as much as my parents did, even more... I thought East Germany was ruled by Communist Jews... I made a career in history, and I never mentioned my real views in public... nobody accused me of being hateful, I was always looked upon as a paragon of impartiality... respected, dignified, loved... even Jewish academics commended me...

  "Then the Berlin Wall fell, and I rejoiced... I also rejoiced when the Neo-Nazis began to attack immigrants more boldly... I hoped it was the beginning of an awakening... but then these aliens came! Now there were not only Jews among Germans, among my colleagues... but Jews from space as well, more powerful than ever! Trying to infiltrate our culture from within! They know what my parents did, they know about the war from television... And they can read our dreams too... when they find out what I have done, they will... will -"

  Carl and Mats stood listening, speechless. There was nothing to do but to send this psychotic away. Lazar was also listening, and thinking: There's your "total self-reflection," Lazar! Bruno realized his innermost self was open for everyone to see, and it destroyed him. And if Bruno's case was any indication of the "collective dreams" Lazar had once mentioned as so important - then the backlash against the alien visit was just beginning. And it was going to get worse before it ended.