Harry Harrison - Star Smashers of the Galaxy Rangers

"Perfectly reasonable request under the circumstances. Look, I'll switch this call to one of the Hagg-Loos in the bandits on my tail. You chat with them and let me know what they say. Over and out." Instantly a dreadful change came over Jerry. He writhed in the implacable embrace of the Garnishee while his face twisted with incredible fury and from his lips burst a filthy torrent of abuse.

"Tentacled soft-limbed scum of the universe, how dare you invade holy space of Hagg-Loos, filthy democratic republican perverts, we allies of peace-loving Lortonoi will destroy-"

"Enough of that," Slug-Togath said, slapping the mind shield back on Jerry's skull. "Seems pretty obvious."

"Seems even more obvious if you have one of those repulsive creatures stamping through your gray matter," Jerry grated, aligning the cheddite projector in its weapon mode and quickly pressing the activator button three times. On the instant the three enemy spacers vanished and reappeared just above the surface of the burning hot blue sun, and we pretty well know what happened to them then. Jerry took off the mind shield again and instantly spoke in the rounded tones of Lord Prrsi.

"I say, that is a neat way of letting me know what they said to you. Whisk – and they're gone. You must show me that trick. Listen, we ought to have this conversation at closer quarters. That is oxygen you're breathing? I thought so, real wizard. Why don't we just match velocity, and I'll join you in your ship. Airlock to airlock, you know the old bit."

As the two voyagers of the space lanes drew close all aboard the Pleasantville Eagle could see that Lord Prrsi's ship had not come through the battle unscathed. It was a black dart, almost as long as the 747, but much thinner and without wings. Here and there the skin was seared as though by a blast of heat, and pieces had been bitten out of various parts there and here. Yet the pilot was still smoothly in control and eased up under their wing, and there was only the slightest bump as the newcomer sealed against their newly built airlock. Jerry set the automatic pilot, and they all went back to the cabin to welcome the valiant fighter. There was the hissing of air and a great thumping whumping within the lock, and then, finally, the inner door opened, and the pilot started to come in. Sally screamed and screamed again, and some of the others felt like joining her.

Lord Prrsi, for all his calm and civilized voice when he had spoken through Jerry's body, was a monster. Imagine if you can a twenty-foot-long coal-black chitin-armored, barb-tailed, and claw-rattling scorpion. If you can imagine that, you will have about half an idea of what this alien life form looked like. Not only that, but he was hot.

"Rather cold in here," the creature said with a nasal voice. "But I can bear it for a bit. Whom might I have the pleasure?" It turned to face them now, and they realized it had backed into the cabin. Two fiercely glowing red eyes burned down at them from the hideous black head, one of the eyes swollen and distorted by a circular lens the size of a manhole lid that was bolted to supports drilled in the creature's impervious hide. Jerry, no coward he, stepped forward and introduced them all.

"My pleasure," the creature murmured and adjusted the lens before its eye to look at them better.

"You speak pretty good English for a thing that's hot as a brick kiln and looks like a twenty-foot-long black scorpion," John spoke up bravely.

"How nice of you to say that," Lord Prrsi said. "If truth be known, I rather pride myself on my linguistic ability; in fact, I led the movement to adopt this new language in place of our old one which was just too clumsy for civilized use. You see we have powerful radio receivers, and we picked up broadcasts from an insignificant little yellow star out in that direction." He waved a great clattering claw. "Oh, I say, I am sorry. Should have realized. It is rather a nice star, for a yellow one, I mean. Since you speak the language, I may assume you come from there? Yes, thought so. Dreadfully rude of me. But I wander. In any case we heard this language emanating from a country named BBC Third Program, and it seemed to fit our needs so we adopted it."

"Could we offer you some refreshment?" Sally asked, ever the perfect little hostess.

"How exceedingly kind of you. I could do with a glass of water if it is not too much trouble. I had a drink of water about four months ago, and I'm sure I will be needing more soon so, why not be piggy, have one now, a celebration and all that. Thank you very much, such a big one! Enough for five of my people. Well, cheers." He drained the glass in an instant, then wiped his mouth orifice with a clattering, razor-edged claw.

"Could you tell us something about what is happening on your planet and why the fighting and all that?" Jerry asked.

"Indeed I can, and a dreadful story it is. It goes back a long time, and if I bore you, please speak up. My race is called the Haggis, and we evolved on the third planet of the sun you see out there. The planet is also called Haggis, which, I suppose, is where our name comes from. In any case the sun is rather bright and hot, and the surface temperature of Haggis is above the boiling point of water over most of the surface, which is one of the reasons why we value this precious fluid so. But I digress. It seems that the incredible burning radiation of the sun produced mutations at a galloping rate, and my people, the Hagg-Inder, developed black chitin to shield us from the sun's rays. But here the race divided, and a subrace, that calls itself the Hagg-Loos in their degenerate tongue, stayed white. Now, aside from the fact that black is beautiful-"

"Keep the faith, baby," John said.

"-it is also good for blocking off radiation. But the white is transparent to the radiation so that the Hagg-Loos had their brains almost cooked out of their sockets after a while. This has produced a race that I can say, without exaggeration, is nuttier than a goober farm. They are insane, evil, degenerate, deprived, depraved, destructful, and desultory. We fought them, but they breed like rabbits in the spring, so in self-defense, we Hagg-Inder emigrated to the fourth planet to get away from them. But they enjoy an evil genius and developed space travel as well, so that a space war has now been going on for over nine thousand years."

"Our war lasted over ten thousand," Slug-Togath said offhandedly.

"How very nice for you," Lord Prrsi intoned cuttingly.

"Not to interrupt, but I was saying that right bang in the middle of this war the loathsome Lortonoi arrived and were received by the Hagg-Loos with open claws. They really are made for each other, vying for bottom in a loathsomeness contest one might say. They are the only race that has ever willingly joined forces with these interstellar brain leaches. The war intensified then and has been going on at a great rate ever since, and that is about all there is to tell. We trade information with other intelligent, moral, class-ridden societies like our own who fight the Lortonoi, and we can just about hold our own with the new weapons and all that sort of thing. But I talk too much and must be boring you! Please tell me what brings you to our neck of the galaxy, but first, excuse my beastly manners in not mentioning it earlier, but please accept my heartiest thanks for pulling me out of that fix. I bear important messages for our king which I know he will appreciate having."

"Our pleasure," Jerry said. "Our history, in ways, is much like yours. We do come from that yellow sun you mentioned, which we call Sun, and our friends here are from Proxima Centauri back there a ways. We have joined together to do what we can to wipe out the degenerate Lortonoi-"

"Hear! Hear!"

"-and to rescue our friend, Chuck van Chider, who has been captured by them."