Star Ship on Saddle Mountain (6 page)
I am Dondee
, said the tentative and somewhat uncertain thought
wave.
What is your name,
Primitive?
Charlie puzzled over this first
question, wondering which one of the three aliens was contacting
him. His first fears gone, he felt a little bit annoyed at the
mental picture of a wild man, a
primitive
. But he was sure that's
what the impulse meant. About to shout back and tell the alien to
let him alone, to let him go home, Charlie frowned as he
reconsidered.
particular impulse wasn't as strong or impersonal as the impulses
from the three aliens earlier. Though he wasn't used to telepathy,
he felt sure the other three aliens had a much stronger impulse, a
different tone from this last impulse. In this one he thought he
recognized a certain friendliness, a curiosity. Whoever this alien
was, he was not one of the other three who had captured him.
"Can—can you hear me?" Charlie said aloud, "when I
talk like this now?"
"No, Primitive, I cannot hear you. But I can read
your impulses clearly, since you think what you speak aloud. I am
in the central tier above you, so I must read your impulses, even
as you speak them also. But that is all right. They still register
on the mental lanes, Primitive."
For the first time, Charlie felt
he was really
talking
to an alien, even though it was done by telepathic impulse,
in answer to his own spoken words.
words, what I say, shows up on the mental lanes?"
Charlie realized that those other
three aliens had
heard
his thoughts, even though he hadn't spoken, as when he was
back inside the Shack.
"Yes?" Charlie replied, though he didn't much care
for the name.
"I can also read the thoughts of your animal, since
they register on the mental lanes, too."
"They
do
?" Charlie said, glancing at
Navajo.
"Yes. The animal is now thinking
of something called
apples"
the old horse sighed lightly and continued on with his own personal
thoughts.
"You mean, you're
really
using telepathy,
to talk to me from another deck—and you're not around here
somewhere, where I can't see you?"
"Yes, Primitive, if telepathy is
what you term the mental interplanetary tongue. From my own
understanding of your tongue, I believe you mean, when you
say
telepathy
,
what we call the Interplanetary language. Do you not?"
"What did you say your name is?"
"Dondee," replied the impulse promptly. "Dondee
Bin."
"Mine is Charlie. Charles Holt."
"How many periods are you, Prim—I mean,
Charles?"
"Periods? I don't know—"
"Oh," came the flash impulse, "I
meant your
time
,
what you call your years of age?" "I'm going on fourteen, Dondee.
I'm thirteen now." "That makes us about the same number of
periods—I mean,
I have the period of fourteen years already! I'm older than you,
Charles." "Well, you don't have to rub it in," Charlie said under
his breath. "That last thought, Charles," Dondee said, "wasn't
clear to me." "I'm glad it wasn't," Charlie said, already sorry
about it. "Just forget it, Dondee. It doesn't matter."
"We are about the same age, almost exactly,
Charles."
"I'm glad of that," Charlie agreed. "A few months
is nothing anyway. Or periods, as you say." Charlie felt much
better now, glad that Dondee wasn't going to push the fact that he
was a little bit older.
"Do you," he asked, "come from pretty far
away?"
"Yes," came the immediate response, "from the
Barrier
World. Or as your island calls
ours, Charles, the Planet
Saturn."
"Did you just laugh?" he asked. "I
know it sounds crazy and all, to
hear
a laugh in your mind, but—well,
I just got the feeling that you laughed, Dondee."
astonishment at how far away my home is. I thought it surprised,
you!"
"It sure did! But I don't see how—" Charlie said,
"just how I can understand your telepathy, since I never even tried
to use it before."
"That is easy, Charles. All members of the human
species are physically equipped with the mental gland. But some
world islands have grown away from it, or stuck to their primitive
forms of communication and never learned it. The gland, Charles, is
the mental reserve cell in you, the cell that provides the
extra-sensory power which activates your brain, especially the part
of your brain which many races know very little about, such as your
own world's race, Charles. But I am glad your cells in the gland
are working fairly well. Otherwise we would not be able to talk
like this now."
"I never knew about that gland. Maybe I'll have to
quit talking soon. My throat—my tonsils, I guess, they're getting
pretty sore."
"Tonsils?"
"Sure," Charlie said, "you know,
the glands you got in—" he stopped abruptly, feeling his throat
very carefully now, even as he thought of the word
glands.
"Dondee—just
where are those mental reserve glands, the ones you use for
telepathy?"
either side of your neck, right beneath your right and left
jaw."
For some moments Charlie couldn't reply. All he
could do was tenderly feel about his neck, and wonder at the
amazing thing he had just learned. He remembered
Miss Tisdale, back in school, and how she once told science class
that the tonsils, like the appendix, had long outgrown their use.
They were parts of the body which appeared to have no use any
longer, as far as medical science could tell. Good old Miss
Tisdale, Charlie thought. I wish I could tell her this now! About
this other world's science.
"Charles?"
"Oh—I'm still here," he replied. "You know, I was
just thinking, Dondee. I wouldn't be able to talk to you now at
all, if I'd had my tonsils out last year. That was when they
swelled up a lot. But Uncle John said there was no use rushing to
get an operation, and I didn't have to have them out right away.
Only if they got worse. But then they got better."
"You mean, Charles," came the startled impulse,
"some primitives actually have their glands cut out? Have them
removed?"
"They sure do. Because we always figured they were
useless, anyhow."
Charlie got another amazed impulse from Dondee on
the upper tier, and his wonder that anybody would ever consider
having his finest speech organ removed from his body!
"I am glad," came the reply from Dondee finally,
"that you still have yours, Charles. It would be terrible to be
condemned to use only one third of your mind. Surely your world
must have known of the use for the glands, Charles?" "No, Dondee.
We don't. I didn't, till just now, when you l told me."
"But your world did once use the glands, Charles.
We have it in our recordings of your past history, your past fifty
thousand periods, or years rather, Charles."
"I don't much believe our folks on this world ever
could use telepathy," Charlie said. "And specially not back in the
early days when there were cave men, Dondee."
"Oh yes, Charles. And that is exactly the time they
used it most, until they found it more effective to roar and shout,
and make noises in competition with lower animals. If you think
hard, Charles, I can prove it to you, maybe. Have you noticed on
your world today, that the people usually most given to the mental
language—the psychic use of it—are usually, or very often, without
education, and even primitive?"
"Maybe you are right, Dondee. I sure don't
know."
"Your tonsils—as you call them,
Charles, they were commonly used and understood in ancient times,
as the source of the mind reserve cell fluid, the hyper power of
communication. According to our recordings of the past, some people
of your world gave the Interplanetary language the term
visions
. When the use of
the mental language was dying out, people would say back in those
days,
a vision came to me"
"as far back as about seven thousand years."
"That is regrettable, Charles. For it is a known
fact, your world once used the Interplanetary language widely—or
telepathy, as you term this science."
"Boy, if I could be back at school now—and tell
everybody about tonsils."
"What did you say, Charles?"
"Oh, nothing, Dondee. I was just thinking out loud.
To myself." “I thought you sent that thought to me."
"No. I guess I've still got to get used to talking
in this Interplanetary language, Dondee. Talking with my mind, I
mean."
"You are doing quite well,
Charles. For a Primitive." "I'm
not
a primitive! Doggone, I wish you'd quit calling
me that." For moment there was some confusion among Dondee's mental
waves. Charlie received varying impulses, and then once more the
impulse came clear to him.
send such an impulse, after having learned your proper name.
Charles?"
"I heard you the first time."
"It was only because of the stage
at which your civilization now stands, Charles. That is why I
called you a primitive. It is the way my world island talks back
home, Charles." "Forget it, Dondee. I didn't mean to get sore about
it. I guess you didn't mean it the way it sounded. Hey—I get the
feeling, the impulse, just as if you
didn't
call me Charlie. It's more
like you say everything perfectly, the regular way, and use my
proper name when you send the impulse?" "Yes, Charles. That is
correct. In our world we do not use
sub-names, since in the
Interplanetary tongue all thoughts are easily expressed. That is
why I've had the picture you gave me, your correct name, as you
first
thought
it
to me. \ There is no slang as such, in the Interplanetary tongue,
Charles, for when thought impulses are sent
as
slang, they are the result of
intention and not due to carelessness. No matter how faltering a
thought is given, the mental picture is always true and correct.
The only difference comes later, in: the highly developed mental
planes, when one mind at high speed is able to convey the finer
rhythmic tones, and speak on this delicate and distinguished level,
Charles. It is not something everybody can do, for I can't yet do
it."
I use telepathy from here on out, I'll know I'll be right!"
"You will be, Charles. But what is most surprising
to me, is that you are able at this early point, to distinguish
and' understand that I am using your name correctly, Charles. That
is truly amazing. Other world primitives—that is,, peoples of lower
level civilizations, have great difficulty getting their glands to
react and flow freely, and supply the hyper sensitive fluid needed
by the second third of the brain. That is why your accomplishment
is so amazing, Charles."
"People everywhere, you mean, have the
Interplanetary language, and can use it, Dondee?"
"Yes, Charles. I believe I can prove it to you
right now. You have used it often before with other primitives of
your world."
Charlie laughed, intrigued by the
challenge from the alien boy, and he didn't even mind being
referred to as
primitive.
"I'd like to know just when I ever
used telepathy before."
"All right. Charles, have you ever had study periods?"
"You mean, at school?"
"Yes. I believe that is how you term it."
"I sure did. Up to last year, when I graduated. Just
before
"Then," came Dondee's impulse, "do
you recall sitting some distance from someone,
thinking
something,
anything
—about that
person, while you looked straight at him?"
"Then," the alien boy went on, "have you ever had
it happen, that without your making any sound at all, no movement
other than your thought impulses, the other person stopped what he
or she was doing—and looked up at you, as though you had
called?"
"Yeah, sure, Dondee! Sure—that's happened. Many
times. In school, and at home with Uncle John. And sometimes I've
looked up from doing something, for no darn reason, and saw
somebody looking my way."
"Then you've proved my contention, Charles. That is
one of the early stages of Interplanetary speaking, the first
perception, or way of sending thoughts, even though they're just
stray thoughts of the mind working on its own, unconsciously and
subconsciously, to some other person. All humans have this power to
do that, Charles, and anyone can prove it."
"Boy—" Charlie exclaimed, "I could have used it all
along and didn't even know it! I could have been practicing and
might have been real good by now."