Mike Resnick - I, Alien

I hung up and looked at Doc. “Okay, now it’s your turn. Can you write something that I could have written?”

“Well, I’m not sure if I can rein in my abilities to that extent, but I’m willing to take a stab at it.”

“You have to let people see the pain, the inner torment, of being a bug-eyed monster, a freak, cut off from everything and everyone he’s ever known.”

“Okay,” he said, in an entirely too off-handed manner for my taste.

“I’m serious, Doc.”

“Relax, E. You’re going to be famous again.”

And so I am. In a few minutes, a limo is picking me up to take me to the television studio to tape another talk show. This afternoon, I’m giving a lecture to some college kids. We’re on our fifth book, all bestsellers.

We’ve got money. Doc is happy because he feels like he’s screwing the publishers that wouldn’t buy his manuscripts when he used his own name. He loves the way the critics and the academics gush over the books. His favorite was, “Eyul gives voice to that inchoate longing, that ineffable desire to belong in each of us. He reminds us that, whatever planet we are from, we are all aliens.” Sooner or later, we’ll “collaborate” on a couple of books to get his name out, then he can have his own writing career, too.

As for me, I finally found my calling. I still don’t do anything, not really. I’m just there. But it turns out, if you do it right, sometimes that’s all you have to be.

THE MOMENT I WALKED into the classroom, the first thing I noticed were all the differences. To begin with, I had to duck to keep my head from hitting the top of the doorway. The classroom itself felt much smaller than the classrooms I was used to back home, and not just because I towered over humans. This classroom was packed with students; I counted twenty of them, sitting at individual desks, each with its own terminal.

The students had been talking just before I entered the room, but as I walked over to the screenboard, they quieted down quickly.

I walked over to the front desk, which sat right next to the screenboard. I took the stylus out of the top drawer and turned to the students.

“Greetings, Earth children,” I said.

Before I had a chance to say anything else, one of the students spoke. “You look like a lizard,” he said.

The other students made an odd sound which I recognized as their version of laughter. I tried not to look disconcerted, as I had heard this sort of thing from other Earth people, even adults. But the interruption did surprise me. I looked at the boy who had spoken and checked the name on the display screen; it read John Palmer.

“John,” I said. “It is rude to interrupt when your teacher is speaking.”

“You’re the teacher? Who are you?”

“My name is Xerpers Fromlilo.” I paused, taking a moment to remember the teacher-student protocols I had been taught. “You may call me Mr. Fromlilo.”

The students laughed again, which puzzled me.

“Why do your words come out of your neck?” John asked.

“I am wearing a translator pendant. As my ability to speak your Earth languages is limited, I speak softly in my own language and the pendant renders it into yours.”

I waited a moment. There were no more interruptions, so I said, “Let us begin.”

I turned around to start writing on the screenboard. “Everyone please turn on your machines—”

Something hit me on the back, and I turned around. I found a piece of paper sitting on the floor, folded into the shape of a glider.

I bent over to pick it up, and I examined it.

“What is the meaning of this?” I asked, holding the glider aloft and looking from student to student.

“You’re the teacher,” John replied. “Don’t you know?”

I turned one of my eyes directly at him, while the other continued to look around at the other students. “I do know. I am asking what its purpose was.”

“You’re our science teacher, aren’t you?” He pointed at the glider. “This is science.”

“It does not matter if the glider illustrates principles of science, young man. It is inappropriate to throw it at your teacher. I would suggest—”

Suddenly, John stood up and began walking toward the back wall, where there was a cabinet containing school supplies.

“John, what are you doing? I was talking to you.”

He stopped short and looked back at me. “I get distracted. All the teachers know that.”

Some of the other students giggled. I walked over to John and looked down at him.

“Please return to your seat.”

John laughed, but walked back to his desk and sat down. I returned to the front of the room and tried to start my lesson again. However, I could never get more than a few minutes into the material before John Palmer would either interrupt me, begin wandering around the room, or start fiddling with a pair of scissors and some paper.

Somehow, I managed to make it through the remaining forty-five minutes of the class.

That afternoon, Robby Greenberger, the principal of the school, called me into his office to discuss my first day.

He sat at his desk and at first I stood at attention. But then, when he looked up at me, the corners of his mouth turned down, and he pulled at his beard.

“I can barely see your face from here,” he said. “Sit on the floor.”

All of the Tenjant had dealt with this issue before, given the fact that our average height was approximately one and a half times that of the average human. I reluctantly lowered myself onto my knees so that Greenberger and I faced each other comfortably.

“I don’t know if you realize this, but I was majorly opposed to this Interspecies Teacher Training program.”

I had not expected Mr. Greenberger to start from there. I tried to formulate a response. Finally, I asked, “What made you change your mind?”

He snorted, an odd sound to my ears. “I didn’t. But what with the shortage of teachers, it was the only way to get someone qualified to handle science.” He paused and looked over my shoulder. “Although I have no idea how we’re going to handle the sex education part of the curriculum.”

My mind focused on the first comment. “You could not find a human teacher qualified to teach your science classes?”

He shook his head, the human way of-signifying negation. “Nope.”

Although I did not want to appear judgmental of my host race, I gently said, “It is not rational for a race to neglect the education of their children.”

He expelled air from his lungs. “Tell me something I don’t know.”

“I would be happy to do so, but I thought I was here to educate your young.”

“No, no, I meant—never mind.” He looked around the room, then back at me. “Tell me about what happened today.”

“I wish I understood. But your students are not like ours.”

“Back up, Xerpers. Start from the beginning.”

He had mispronounced my name, but I ignored that. Instead, I said, “From the beginning.”

“Yes.”

“From the beginning, I had prepared my lesson in detail.” I took out my handheld computer and showed it to him. “As you can see, my preparation was more than adequate.”

Greenberger took my computer from me and scanned through my lesson plan. Again, as before, he expelled air from his lungs. “Did you expect the children to just sit there while you read aloud from your computer?”

“Of course,” I said. “But they would also be able to read along as I wrote the words on the screen-board.”

“You see, this is why I was opposed to this program.” Greenberger leaned forward. “Look, Xerpers. Human children are not like Tenjant children. You can’t just read aloud to them. You have to reach out to them, to engage them with your teaching.”