Arthur Clarke: Trouble with the Natives

The flying saucer came down vertically through the clouds, braked to a halt about fifty feet from the ground, and settled with a considerable bump on a patch of heather-strewn moorland.

“That,” said Captain Wyxtpthll, “was a lousy landing.” He did not, of course, use precisely these words. To human ears his remarks would have sounded rather like the clucking of an angry hen. Master Pilot Krtclugg unwound three of his tentacles from the control panel, stretched all four of his legs, and relaxed comfortably.

“Not my fault the automatics have packed up again,” he grumbled. “But what do you expect with a ship that should have been scrapped five thousand years ago? If those cheeseparing form-fillers back at Base Planet—”

“Oh, all right! We’re down in one piece, which is more than I expected. Tell Crysteel and Danstor to come in here. I want a word with them before they go.”

Crysteel and Danstor were, very obviously, of a different species from the rest of the crew. They had only one pair of legs and arms, no eyes at the back of the head, and other physical deficiencies which their colleagues did their best to overlook. These very defects, however, had made them the obvious choice for this particular mission, for it had needed only a minimum of disguise to let them pass as human beings under all but the closest scrutiny.

“Now you’re perfectly sure,” said the Captain, “that you understand your instructions?”

“Of course,” said Crysteel, slightly huffed. “This isn’t the first time I’ve made contact with a primitive race. My training in anthropology—”

“Good. And the language?”

“Well, that’s Danstor’s business, but I can speak it reasonably fluently now. It’s a very simple language and after all we’ve been studying their radio programmes for a couple of years.”

“Any other points before you go?”

“Er—there’s just one matter.” Crysteel hesitated slightly. “It’s quite obvious from their broadcasts that the social system is very primitive, and that crime and lawlessness are widespread. Many of the wealthier citizens have to use what are called ‘detectives’ or ‘special agents’ to protect their lives and property. Now we know it’s against regulations, but we were wondering…”

“What?”

“Well, we’d feel much safer if we could take a couple of Mark III disrupters with us.”

“Not on your life! I’d be court-martialled if they heard about it at the Base. Suppose you killed some of the natives—then I’d have the Bureau of Interstellar politics, the Aborignes Conservancy Board, and half a dozen others after me.”

“There’d be just as much trouble if we got killed,” Crysteel pointed out with considerable emotion. “After all, you’re responsible for our safety. Remember that radio play I was telling you about? It described a typical household, but there were two murders in the first half hour!”

“Oh, very well. But only a Mark II—we don’t want you to do too much damage if there is trouble.”

“Thanks a lot; that’s a great relief. I’ll report every thirty minutes as arranged. We shouldn’t be gone more than a couple of hours.”

Captain Wyxtpthll watched them disappear over the brow of the hill. He sighed deeply.

“Why,” he said, “of all the people in the ship did it have to be those two?”

“It couldn’t be helped,” answered the pilot. “All these primitive races are terrified of anything strange. If they saw us coming, there’d be general panic and before we knew where we were the bombs would be falling on top of us. You just can’t rush these things.”

Captain Wyxtpthll was absentmindedly making a cat’s cradle out of his tentacles in the way he did when he was worried.

“Of course,” he said, “if they don’t come back I can always go away and report the place dangerous.” He brightened considerably. “Yes, that would save a lot of trouble.”

“And waste all the months we’ve spent studying it?” said the pilot, scandalized.

“They won’t be wasted,” replied the captain, unravelling himself with a flick that no human eye could have followed. “Our report will be useful for the next survey ship. I’ll suggest that we make another visit in — oh, let’s say five thousand years. By then the place may be civilized—though frankly, I doubt it.”

Samuel Higginsbotham was settling down to a snack of cheese and cider when he saw the two figures approaching along the lane. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, put the bottle carefully down beside his hedge-trimming tools, and stared with mild surprise at the couple as they came into range.

“Mornin’,” he said cheerfully between mouthfuls of cheese.

The strangers paused. One was surreptitiously ruffling through a small book which, if Sam only knew, was packed with such common phrases and expressions as: “Before the weather forecast, here is a gale warning,” “Stick ’em up—I’ve got you covered!”, and “Calling all cars!” Danstor, who had no needs for these aids to memory, replied promptly enough.

“Good morning my man,” he said in his best B.B.C. accent. “Could you direct us to the nearest hamlet, village, small town or other such civilized community?”

“Eh?” said Sam. He peered suspiciously at the strangers, aware for the first time that there was something very odd about their clothes. One did not, he realized dimly, normally wear a roll-top sweater with a smart pin-striped suit of the pattern fancied by city gents. And the fellow who was still fussing with the little book was actually wearing full evening dress which would have been faultless but for the lurid green and red tie, the hob-nailed boots and the cloth cap. Crysteel and Danstor had done their best, but they had seen too many television plays. When one considers that they had no other source of information, their sartorial aberrations were at least understandable.

Sam scratched his head. Furriners, I suppose, he told himself. Not even the townsfolk got themselves up like this.

He pointed down the road and gave them explicit directions in an accent so broad that no one residing outside the range of the B.B.C’s West Regional transmitter could have understood more than one word in three. Crysteel and Danstor, whose home planet was so far away that Marconi’s first signals couldn’t possibly have reached it yet, did even worse than this. But they managed to get the general idea and retired in good order, both wondering if their knowledge of English was as good as they had believed.

So came and passed, quite uneventfully and without record in the history books, the first meeting between humanity and beings from Outside.

“I suppose,” said Danstor thoughtfully, but without much conviction, “that he wouldn’t have done? It would have saved us a lot of trouble.”

“I’m afraid not. Judging by his clothes, and the work he was obviously engaged upon, he could not have been a very intelligent or valuable citizen. I doubt if he could even have understood who we were.”

“Here’s another one!” said Danstor, pointing ahead.

“Don’t make sudden movements that might cause alarm. Just walk along naturally, and let him speak first.”

The man ahead strode purposefully towards them, showed not the slightest signs of recognition, and before they had recovered was already disappearing into the distance.

“Well!” said Danstor.

“It doesn’t matter,” replied Crysteel philosophically. “He probably wouldn’t have been any use either.”

“That’s no excuse for bad manners!”

They gazed with some indignation at the retreating back of Professor Fitzsimmons as, wearing his oldest hiking outfit and engrossed in a difficult piece of atomic theory, he dwindled down the lane. For the first time, Crysteel began to suspect uneasily that it might not be as simple to make contact as he had optimistically believed.