| | FICTION: JUVENILEWORKS |
BAROON — Part 5 BY J. ROBINSON WHEELER | Introduction | Part 6 |
And then he made an offhandcomment—THE commment, as it was later to be known — about beingat the center of the Universe. It was just a meaningless saying, and mainlyhad more to do with arrogance than the spot Baroon occupied in the Universalscheme of things. "Die, heretic!"they shouted. "You Baroonians aresoooo naive," said Ohnja as he was carted off by the angry mob. Needless to say, it did nothelp the situation any. Radio broadcasts (having come into greater use forthe sole purpose of slandering the Dialans with that "live, on-the-spot"feeling) and newspapers told everyone to start burning their books, posters,magazines, and other Dialan visitor paraphernalia. "If you you own somethingwith their picture," came the hostile commands, "burn it. If youhave a haircut like theirs, shave it off. If you look like them by chance,get plastic surgery." Later that same week, theDialans were loaded into their spacecraft and ready to launch, regardlessof weather or atmospheric conditions. An hour before liftoff, they broadcastedone last message to the Baroonian people from inside. "I only said what Idid about your being at the center of the Universe because it's true. Ididn't mean anything by it. I assumed it was common knowledge on the planet.I mean, surely the signs are all there. I said what I did and I'm sorry."The voice faded from the radios of the world for fully 20 seconds, onlyto reappear with the message, "All you people of Baroon are IDIOTS!" And then, less than an hourbefore the actual launch, the Dialans seemed out of their lives, possiblyforever. It was the end of an era. This was particularly upsetting newsfor the entire global population of historians (referred to in part 2 ofthis saga), who had devoted their lives to studying this particular partof history, surely Baroon at its most interesting, and now seemed to beout of a job. The history of the human race on the planet seemed to be mindbogglingly dull, even for one interested in such things. Nothing happened,literally, for generations, except for the occasional population shift.Times were desperate. Nobody wanted to read about the past, they wantedinteresting facts. Things to read. Besides, many of them were contractedto write some educational books and scrawl things for future textbooks,and this particular chapter, as it were, had closed much too quickly. Theaftermath, though important, nobody would want to read about. They had 200more pages of manuscript due. Something had to be done, and something drastic. The five leading historians(3 of whom were the original set before the explosion) paced gloomily aboutthe telephone, doubtful, insecure, afraid. In a word, they were all weenies.Yet, they were weenies with a purpose. After thirty-five minutes of gloweringat the phone, picking up the receiver, putting it down again, lifting it,dialing all but the last digit, hanging up, and resuming the inane pacingabout the circular stand it rested on, finally, one of them, known to hiscolleagues as "Neb", picked up the phone with determined fervor,dialed all of the numbers in the right sequence, waited until the line hadrung once, and then hung up. Five minutes later, Neb'sfriend Tod dialed, waited until someone had answered, and then promptlyhanded the receiver to Dag, who stammered into the phone for a minute, andsaid, "We volunteer to go along with the Dialans." A brief interview was done,on the phone, with each historian, and they were all termed more-or-lessfit for the journey, and taken to the launch site.
Needless to say, this extrapreparation fostered an 8-hour delay, giving the Dialans several last opportunitiesto donate to the urological sciences research department. A cursory glance at eachother was all the contact made between the historians and Dialans beforethe take-off. They would have plenty of chances to talk, the historiansassumed, and the launch was pressed for time. Squeezed into the form-fittingseats at the back of the cabin, the historian group hastily buckled andstrapped themselves in. As the crew prepared fortake-off, there was a buzz of communication between them, in their nativelanguage. The historians realized, at this moment, that nothing in all thistime had been learned of Dialan culture or language in any way. Questionswere asked but avoided, it seemed. Neb leaned over to Tod and mentionedsomething about this, and for a moment it seemed that the astronauts allpaused in their conversation a split second before resuming their discussion.Paranoia spread through the historians' minds as they realized that theDialans could understand anything they said, but they had littleor no exposure to the Dialan language, apart from a few choice phrases thathad slipped into vogue, and, as were popular with young Baroonians, theswear words. It was a dangerous situation,since they were not at all prepared to endure escape-velocity speeds, andwith all the political strife between the cultures of late... The next occurence was thelaunching of the spacecraft. It was a fairly non-descript takeoff, so thedetails will be skipped. Minutes later, the crew seemedto relax again, physically and in their uptight mood. Maybe it was merelydue to homesickness, and now they were relieved to be getting back homeagain. The crushing pressure of the G-forces was gone, replaced by the easy,drifting feel of essentially null-gravity. Laupo unstrapped himself andfloated to the back of the cabin, followed by the others, save Ohnja. Heseemed to be busy with a notepad and recording the operation of severalpanels of blinking lights. "Well, as long as we'vegot a breather," said Laupo, casually, "we might as well get toknow each other. You're all historians, then?" "Yes, that's right,"said Bal. "Oh, then you must knowall about us already? From research?" "Essentially so, yes.We've assimilated about as much as there is to know," Tod put in. "Didyou say something about a breather?" "Yes, we'll be in orbitfor about 2 days, I imagine." "Orbit? But...supposing the orbit decays and we crash on the planet!" "Or drift into the sun!" "Yes, what is the purpose?" "Well, we were in sucha rush to leave the planet that the moon is not in proper sync with ourpresent location. We have to stay here in the meantime until it lines up.Don't worry, we have enough fuel, food, and air to last." The historians seemed, superficially,to be relieved, but underneath they were all in the grip of an unfoundedand somewhat naïve fear of the unknown. Neb stared uneasily out ofthe viewport, into the inky blackness of space.
|