"Do not be sorry." He put a hand on her shoulder. "Shall we knock off
for the night?"
She put her hand over his, shook her head. "No. Let's look at the
latest films from the ship."
"As you wish." Ohashi pulled away, threaded a new film into the
projector.
Presently, the screen came alive to a blue-grey alcove filled with
pale light: one of the "class" rooms in the spaceship. A squat,
green-skinned figure stood in the center of the room. Beside the
Galactic was the pedestal-footed projection board that all five used to
illustrate their "lectures". The board displayed a scene of a wide blue
lake, reeds along the shore stirring to a breeze.
The Galactic swayed. His face moved like a ripple of water. He said:
"Ahon'atu'uklah'shoginai'eástruru." The green arms moved up and
down, undulating. The webbed hands came out, palms facing and almost
touching, began chopping from the wrists: up, down, up, down, up,
down....
On the projection board the scene switched to an under-water view:
myriad swimming shapes coming closer, closer--large-eyed fish creatures
with long ridged tails.
"Five will get you ten," said Ohashi. "Those are the young of this
Galactic race. Notice the ridge."
"Tadpoles," said Francine.
The swimming shapes darted through orange shadows and into a space
of cold green--then up to splash on the surface, and again down into
the cool green. It was a choreographic swinging, lifting, dipping,
swaying--lovely in its synchronized symmetry.
"Chiruru'uklia'a'agudav'iaá," said the Galactic. His body undulated
like the movements of the swimming creatures. The green hands touched
his thighs, slipped upward until elbows were level with shoulders.
"The maiden in the Oriental dance," said Francine.
Now, the hands came out, palms up, in a gesture curiously suggestive of
giving. The Galactic said: "Pluainumiuri!" in a single burst of sound
that fell on their ears like an explosion.
"It's like a distorted version of the ritual dances we've been
watching," said Ohashi.
"I've a hunch," said Francine. "Feminine intuition. The repeated
vowels: they could be an adverbial emphasis, like our word _very_.
Where it says '_a-a-a_' note the more intense gestures."
She followed another passage, nodding her head to the gestures. "Hiko,
could this be a constructed language? Artificial?"
"The thought has occurred to me," said Ohashi.
* * * * *
Abruptly, the projector light dimmed, the action slowed. All lights
went out. They heard a dull, booming roar in the distance, a staccato
rattling of shots. Feet pounded along the corridor outside the room.
Francine sat in stunned silence.
Ohashi said: "Stay here, please. I will have a look around to see
what...."
The door banged open and a flashlight beam stabbed into the room,
momentarily blinding them.
"Everything all right in here?" boomed a masculine voice.
They made out a white MP helmet visible behind the light.
"Yes," said Ohashi. "What is happening?"
"Somebody blew up a tower to the main transmission line from McNary
Dam. Then there was an attempt to breach our security blockade on the
south. Everything will be back to normal shortly." The light turned
away.
"Who?" asked Francine.
"Some crazy civilians," said the MP. "We'll have the emergency power on
in a minute. Just stay in this room until we give the all clear." He
left, closing the door.
They heard a rattle of machinegun fire. Another explosion shook the
building. Voices shouted.
"We are witnessing the end of a world," said Ohashi.
"Our world ended when that spaceship set down here," she said.
Abruptly, the lights came on: glowing dimly, then brighter. The
projector resumed its whirring. Ohashi turned it off.
Somebody walked down the corridor outside, rapped on the door, said:
"All clear." The footsteps receded down the hall, and they heard
another rapping, a fainter "All clear."
"Civilians," she said. "What do you suppose they wanted so desperately
to do a thing like that?"
"They are a symptom of the general sickness," said Ohashi. "One way to
remove a threat is to destroy it--even if you destroy yourself in the
process. These civilians are only a minor symptom."
"The Russians are the big symptom then," she said.
"Every major government is a _big_ symptom right now," he said.
"I ... I think I'll get back to my room," she said. "Let's take up
again tomorrow morning. Eight o'clock all right?"
"Quite agreeable," said Ohashi. "If there is a tomorrow."
"Don't _you_ get that way, too," she said, and she took a quavering
breath. "I refuse to give up."
Ohashi bowed. He was suddenly very Oriental. "There is a primitive
saying of the Ainu," he said: "_The world ends every night ... and
begins anew every morning._"
* * * * *
It was a room dug far underground beneath the Ordnance Depot,
originally for storage of atomics. The walls were lead. It was an
oblong space: about thirty by fifteen feet, with a very low ceiling.
Two trestle tables had been butted end-to-end in the center of the
room to form a single long surface. A series of green-shaded lights
suspended above this table gave the scene an odd resemblance to a
gambling room. The effect was heightened by the set look to the
shoulders of the men sitting in spring bottom chairs around the table.
There were a scattering of uniforms: Air Force, Army, Marines; plus
hard-faced civilians in expensive suits.
Dr. Langsmith occupied a space at the middle of one of the table's
sides and directly across from the room's only door. His gnome features
were locked in a frown of concentration. He puffed rhythmically at the
stubby pipe like a witchman creating an oracle smoke.
A civilian across the table from Langsmith addressed a two-star general
seated beside the team chief: "General Speidel, I still think this is
too delicate a spot to risk a woman."
Speidel grunted. He was a thin man with a high, narrow face: an
aristocratic face that radiated granite convictions and stubborn pride.
There was an air about him of spring steel under tension and vibrating
to a chord that dominated the room.
"Our choice is limited," said Langsmith. "Very few of our personnel
have consistently taken wheeled carts into the ship _and_ consistently
taken a position close to that force barrier or whatever it is."