New Earth (11 page)

Jordan moved beside Adri, who paced along leisurely. The glossy-furred animal peeked out from the robe, big round eyes glittering, then ducked back inside again. Meek came up on Adri’s other side, and de Falla trailed a few paces behind.

“By the way,” Adri said, “you really don’t need those protective coverings
you’re wearing. There’s nothing in the air here that can harm you.”

Jordan felt his brows knitting. “How can you know that? How can you be so sure?”

Pointing to Brandon, still jabbering excitedly with Thornberry, Adri replied, “He’s breathing the air.”

“He’s an impetuous young man,” said Jordan.

“But he’s unharmed.”

Jordan stared at the alien for a long, wordless moment, thinking, Can we
trust him? Does he know what he’s talking about? Is he telling us the truth?

Turning to Meek, Jordan asked, “Harmon, what do you think? Would it be all right to get out of the biosuits?”

Glancing toward Brandon, Meek answered, “Let your brother be our guinea pig. He’s volunteered for the honor.”

Jordan asked Adri to sit beside Brandon so that Thornberry and the others aboard the ship could
see him. On the smallish display screen their expressions were almost comical as they crowded around Thornberry: wonder, surprise, open-jawed awe. That must be what I looked like a few minutes ago, Jordan thought.

They were all talking at once. Thornberry began to look irritated as the rest of the team jostled him.

“I am pleased to meet you all,” Adri said, his voice suddenly strong enough to
cut through their jabber. “I am delighted that you made the journey here, and I wish you well.”

Literally pushing the others away, Thornberry admitted, “To say that we’re surprised would be a grand understatement.”

“I understand,” said Adri.

Standing outside the buggy at Adri’s side, Jordan wondered, “Why aren’t you surprised? You seem almost to have been expecting us.”

Adri turned to him
with his patient smile. “We’ve been observing you for a long time: watching your video broadcasts, monitoring your radio emissions. We detected your ship taking up an orbit around this planet. We projected a laser beacon to inform you of our presence. You quickly grasped its significance and sent your pair of machines here.”

“And you conked them out,” said Thornberry’s image on the comm screen,
almost accusingly.

Adri looked slightly embarrassed. “Yes, I’m afraid we did disable them. We wanted you to come here yourselves. Making our first contact through your machines would have been … awkward.”

“Can you turn the rovers back on?” Thornberry asked.

“Oh yes, of course. You’ll find that they are both in perfect working order now.”

Thornberry glanced down; Jordan concluded he was working
his console screen.

“Well I’ll be dipped in sheep droppings,” he muttered. “They’re both humming as if they’d never been off.”

“It’s been a pleasure to meet all of you,” Adri said, in his gentle, genial tone. Then he slipped out of the seat to stand beside Jordan. “Now, if you’re willing, I would like to show you our community.” Pointing deeper into the forest, Adri said, “It’s only a few kilometers,
in that direction.”

“Why don’t you sit up front, with Brandon,” said Jordan.

“Oh, that’s not necessary. I can sit behind you.”

“No, no. I insist. You know the way. You can be Bran’s navigator.”

Adri seemed to think it over briefly, then made a polite little bow. “Thank you.”

He climbed into the right-hand seat. Jordan stashed his rifle, then sat with Meek in the second row while de Falla
climbed into the rearmost row, empty since the robots were still with the reactivated rovers.

As the buggy started up, Jordan marveled at how fantastic this all was. It’s impossible, he told himself. I must be dreaming.

Yet he opened the neck seal of his biosuit and pulled the deflated plastic helmet down off his head.

THE CITY

Brandon drove a good deal faster than de Falla had, pushing through the forest at Adri’s direction along what appeared to be a fairly well-defined track that wound among the trees. Jordan leaned between them and asked for a report from Longyear on the quality of the air.

The biologist’s lean, somber face appeared on the comm screen. “The bio program’s still analyzing the sampling
data you’ve beamed up. Nothing toxic, apparently. But the analysis isn’t finished yet.”

Jordan nodded. “Brandon and I have removed our suit helmets.”

Longyear’s dark eyes widened. “That’s premature, Jordan. There could be—”

“We’ve volunteered to be experimental subjects. So far, so good.”

Looking unhappy, the biologist muttered, “What’s done is done.”

“Can’t argue with that,” Jordan said,
feeling somehow cheerful, buoyant.

They rode on for another few minutes, and then Jordan saw stone buildings standing among the trees. Large buildings, several stories high, with flat roofs green with lush gardens. A small crowd of people was clustered in front of the nearest building.

“It’s a regular city!” Brandon cried out.

And indeed it was. Adri directed them down a central street, flanked
on either side by handsome stone buildings. Brandon drove slowly now, gaping at the buildings and people they were passing. There were animals among the people, too: four-footed creatures that looked vaguely like miniature horses, about the size of a Shetland pony. Apparently they were used as beasts of burden. He could see no vehicles of any sort, not even a bicycle. Most of the ponies were
a plain dun color, although a few of them were deeper shades of brown.

At the end of the street, Jordan saw, stood an imposing multistoried structure with a long stone stairway leading to a veranda that seemed to run completely around the building.

How could our sensors have missed all this? Jordan asked himself. All right, the roofs might appear to be natural greenery and the stone is probably
local material, so the cameras and multispectral sensors might have concluded it’s all natural formations. But the straight streets? That should have been an immediate tipoff that this is artificial. Straight lines don’t appear in nature. Not gridworks of city streets.

As if he was reading Jordan’s thoughts, Adri turned slightly in his seat and said, “I’m afraid we disguised our little community
from your orbiting cameras.”

“How could you do that?” Jordan asked. “And why?”

“We were very fearful of shocking you, you must realize. We wanted our first contact to be as gentle as possible. As nonthreatening as possible.”

“Nonthreatening,” Jordan echoed.

“Despite the guns you were carrying,” Adri chided softly.

The people walking along the streets were perfectly human-looking men and women.
Some wore ankle-length robes, as Adri did, but there were plenty of other styles of clothing, some of them very colorful. Small doglike animals scampered among them, apparently free to scurry wherever they wished. Many of the people turned to stare in curiosity at their buggy rolling past, although others seemed to ignore it. New Yorkers, said a cynical voice in Jordan’s head.

As they approached
the broad stairway at the end of the street, Adri said to Brandon, “You can stop at the bottom of the stairs.”

Jordan tapped his brother’s shoulder. “Are we beaming all this up to the others?”

Nodding without taking his eyes from his driving, Brandon said, “Automatic feed. Thornberry’s getting everything our cameras see.”

“Good,” said Jordan.

They glided to a stop at the base of the stairs.
A dozen or so people were coming down the stairs toward them.

“A reception committee?” Jordan asked as he swung his legs over the side of the buggy and got to his feet.

“A welcoming committee,” said Adri. He got up too, more slowly, stiffly. “We have decided to speak English to you. I hope that is agreeable.”

“That’s fine,” said Jordan.

As Brandon, Meek, and de Falla got off the buggy, Adri
went on, “I believe that English is the lingua franca of your people.”

A pun? Jordan asked himself. A multilingual pun from an alien?

The others came down the steps and arranged themselves around Adri and the four men from Earth. Looking them over, Jordan saw that there were six women and six men, their hair and skin coloring ranging from pale Nordic to dark African. It’s as though some politician
put together a group to represent every possible type of human being on Earth.

But we’re not on Earth, he reminded himself. These people may look human, but they are aliens.

One of the women, a pretty, pert redhead with short-cropped hair and smiling brown eyes, took a step forward and said, “Welcome to our city. We hope you make yourselves comfortable here.” She was wearing a short-sleeved
light tan blouse and dark brown slacks.

“Thank you,” said Jordan, with a suggestion of a bow. “My name is Jordan Kell. You are…?”

She looked puzzled for a moment, then seemed to grasp what Jordan was asking her. “Oh! My name is Aditi.”

“A charming name,” said Jordan. “And may I ask, what do you call your city?”

Again she looked perplexed. Adri said, “We merely call it the city.”

“And this
planet?” Brandon asked. “When we first met you, you called it New Earth.”

“Yes,” said Adri. “Isn’t that what you call this world?”

“That’s right. But what do
you
call it?”

“And how did you know that was the name we used?” Meek added.

Adri smiled placatingly. “This planet’s name in our language is very similar to your term, New Earth.”

Meek’s lean face took on a suspicious scowl. “And just
what is your language, may I ask?”

Adri stood silent for a moment, then uttered an indecipherable sound, a combination of a fluting whistle and an undulating low moan. Meek’s jaw dropped open and Jordan fought down an urge to laugh at the astrobiologist’s consternation.

“I’m sorry,” Adri said. “Our language has very different roots than yours. I believe it will be much easier if we communicate
in English. At least for the time being.”

“I agree,” said Jordan. “At least for the time being.”

Aditi gestured toward the stairs and said, “Would you like to see our…” She hesitated, looked at Adri.

“Our administrative center,” Adri finished for her.

“City hall?” Jordan asked, with a smile.

“Oh, it’s more than that, Mr. Kell. Much more.”

THE ADMINISTRATIVE CENTER

With Aditi on one side of him and Adri on the other, Jordan climbed the steps of the impressive building. He felt somehow eager, excited by these strange yet familiar surroundings. It’s as though I’ve come home, he thought. Home, to a place I’ve never been to before.

Brandon, Meek, and de Falla were behind him, Brandon chatting with the welcoming committee as they
made their way up the stairs, while Meek and de Falla kept a guarded silence. Jordan opened the front of his biosuit and fished his phone from his shirt pocket.

Hazzard’s dark face appeared on the tiny screen. “We’re tracking you, Jordan, no problem,” said the astronaut.

“Where’s Thornberry?” Jordan asked.

“He’s running the remote console, packing the rovers into the ship they flew in on,”
Hazzard replied. “Wants to move them to other regions now that they’re working okay.”

“And the robots?”

“They’re back at your plane, standing by.”

Nodding, Jordan said, “We’re going into what appears to be their main building. Reception might not be so good once we’re inside.”

Lowering his voice, Hazzard asked, “You trust these aliens?”

Jordan glanced at Adri, climbing the stairs beside him,
then Aditi, on his other side. “Yes,” he answered. “I do. At any rate, we won’t learn much by keeping our distance from them.”

“Maybe,” Hazzard granted. “Just stay in touch with me.”

“Of course.” He flicked the phone shut and stuffed it back in his pocket.

Adri said, “I’m afraid I couldn’t help overhearing your conversation.”

Jordan shrugged. “That’s all right.”

“You’ll find that electromagnetic
reception inside our buildings is quite clear.”

“Good.”

“I can understand your teammate’s concern. Xenophobia is a survival trait that must have been important in your earlier evolution.”

“I suppose it was,” said Jordan. “But I think it’s time we got past it.”

“Oh yes,” Adri agreed, beaming. “Long past time, I should think.”

Adri led them through an imposing entry, high double doors of some
dark wood, and into the building. Out of the corner of his eye, Jordan noticed Aditi eying him curiously. This must be just as exciting for her as it is for us, he realized. And he felt glad of it.

Escorted by the little band of aliens, Jordan and the three other Earthmen followed Adri through stately corridors and large rooms that appeared to be offices where men and women sitting at desks were
working away industriously. He felt impressed with the size of the offices and the apparent efficiency of these people.

“Just what are they doing?” he asked Adri.

“Oh … administrative tasks, for the most part. We have a sizeable community here.”

“I can see that.”

They entered a smaller room, where a long table was set with dishes and glassware.

“You must be hungry,” said Adri. “We’ve prepared
something of a luncheon for you. I hope—”

Brandon interrupted, “You’ve prepared food we can eat?”

Again that patient smile curved Adri’s thin lips. “You and we can digest the same foods, I assure you. We’re just as human as you are.”

“That’s not possible,” Meek objected. “By all we know of biology, it’s impossible for two species from two different star systems to share identical biochemistries.”

“By all you know of biology,” Adri retorted, patiently. “You are about to learn much more than you currently know.”

Trying to stop an argument from developing, Jordan said, “Well, I’m rather hungry, aren’t you? If Adri says we can digest the food, why not take him at his word and give it a try?”

“That’s a good way to poison ourselves,” de Falla blurted.

Adri extended a hand to his shoulder
but the geologist flinched back.