The City And The Stars - Arthur C. Clarke [60]
Despite its size and their initial doubts, neither Alvin nor Hilvar felt the slightest nervousness once they had had a clear look at the dweller in the lake. There was an engaging clumsiness about the creature which made it quite impossible to regard it as a serious menace, even if there was any reason to suppose it might be dangerous. The human race had long ago overcome its childhood terror of the merely alien in appearance. That was a fear which could no longer survive after the first contact with friendly extraterrestrial races.
‘Let me deal with this,’ said Hilvar quietly. ‘I’m used to handling animals.’
‘But this isn’t an animal,’ whispered Alvin in return. ‘I’m sure it’s intelligent, and owns that robot.’
‘The robot may own it. In any case, its mentality must be very strange. I can still detect no sign of thought. Hello—what’s happening?’
The monster had not moved from its half-raised position at the water’s edge, which it seemed to be maintaining with considerable effort. But a semi-transparent membrane had begun to form at the centre of the triangle of eyes—a membrane which pulsed and quivered and presently started to emit audible sounds. They were low-pitched, resonant boomings which created no intelligible words, though it was obvious that the creature was trying to speak to them.
It was painful to watch this desperate attempt at communication. For several minutes the creature struggled in vain; then, quite suddenly, it seemed to realise that it had made a mistake. The throbbing membrane contracted in size, and the sounds it emitted rose several octaves in frequency until they entered the spectrum of normal speech. Recognisable words began to form, though they were still interspersed with gibberish. It was as if the creature was remembering a vocabulary it had known long ago but had had no occasion to use for many years.
Hilvar tried to give what assistance he could.
‘We can understand you now,’ he said, speaking slowly and distinctly. ‘Can we help you? We saw the light you made. It brought us here from Lys.’
At the word ‘Lys’ the creature seemed to droop as if it had suffered some bitter disappointment.
‘Lys,’ it repeated; it could not manage the ‘s’ very well, so that the word sounded like ‘Lyd’. ‘Always from Lys. No one else ever comes. We call the Great Ones, but they do not hear.’
‘Who are the Great Ones?’ asked Alvin, leaning forward eagerly. The delicate, ever-moving palps waved briefly towards the sky.
‘The Great Ones,’ he said. ‘From the planets of eternal day. They will come. The Master promised us.’
This did not seem to make matters any clearer. Before Alvin could continue his cross-examination, Hilvar intervened again. His questioning was so patient, so sympathetic and yet so penetrating that Alvin knew better than to interrupt, despite his eagerness. He did not like to admit that Hilvar was his superior in intelligence, but there was no doubt that his flair for handling animals extended even to this fantastic being. What was more, it seemed to respond to him. Its speech be came more distinct as the conversation proceeded, and where at first it had been brusque to the point of rudeness, it presently elaborated its answers and volunteered information on its own.
Alvin lost all consciousness of the passage of time as Hilvar pieced together the incredible story. They could not discover the whole truth; there was endless room for conjecture and debate. As the creature answered Hilvar’s questions ever more and more willingly, its appearance began to change. It slumped back into the lake, and the stubby legs that had been supporting it seemed to dissolve into the rest of its body. Presently a still more extraordinary change occurred; the three huge eyes slowly closed, shrank to pinpoints, and vanished