Heinlein, Robert A – Have Space Suit will Travel

The first words I had with the Mother Thing were things like “hello” and “good-bye” and “thank you” and “where are we going?” She could project her meaning with those-shucks, you can talk to a strange dog that much. Later I began to understand her speech as speech. She picked up meanings of English words even faster; she had this great talent, and she and Peewee had talked for days while they were prisoners.

But while this is easy for “you’re welcome” and “I’m hungry” and “let’s hurry,” it gets harder for ideas like “heterodyning” and “amino acid” even when both are familiar with the concept. When one party doesn’t even have the concept, it breaks down. That’s the trouble I had understanding those veterinarians. If we had all spoken English I still would not have understood.

An oscillating circuit sending out a radio signal produces dead silence unless there is another circuit capable of oscillating in the same way to receive it. I wasn’t on the right frequency.

Nevertheless I understood them when the talk was not highbrow. They were nice people; they talked and laughed a lot and seemed to like each other. I had trouble telling them apart, except the Mother Thing. (I learned that the only marked difference to them between Peewee and myself was that I was ill and she wasn’t.) They had no trouble telling each other apart; their conversations were interlarded with musical names, until you felt that you were caught in Peter and the Wolf or a Wagnerian opera. They even had a leit-motif for me. Their talk was cheerful and gay, like the sounds of a bright summer dawn.

The next time I meet a canary I’ll know what he is saying even if he doesn’t.

I picked up some of this from Peewee-a hospital bed is not a good place from which to study a planet. Vega Five has Earth-surface gravity, near enough, with an oxygen, carbon dioxide, and water life cycle. The planet would not suit humans, not only because the noonday “sun” would strike you dead with its jolt of ultraviolet but also the air has poisonous amounts of ozone-a trace of ozone is stimulating but a trifle more-well, you might as well sniff prussic acid. There was something else, too, nitrous oxide I think, which was ungood for humans if breathed too long. My quarters were air-conditioned; the Vegans could breathe what I used but they considered it tasteless.

I learned a bit as a by-product of something else; the Mother Thing asked me to dictate how I got mixed up in these things. When I finished, she asked me to dictate everything I knew about Earth, its history, and how we work and live together. This is a tall order-I’m not still dictating because I found out I don’t know much. Take ancient Babylonia-how is it related to early Egyptian civilizations? I had only vague notions.

Maybe Peewee did better, since she remembers everything she has heard or read or seen the way Dad does. But they probably didn’t get her to hold still long, whereas I had to. The Mother Thing wanted this for the reasons we study Australian aborigines and also as a record of our language. There was another reason, too.

The job wasn’t easy but there was a Vegan to help me whenever I felt like it, willing to stop if I tired. Call him Professor Josephus Egghead; “Professor” is close enough and his name can’t be spelled. I called him Joe and he called me the leitmotif that meant “Clifford Russell, the monster with the frostbite.” Joe had almost as much gift for understanding as the Mother Thing. But how do you put over ideas like “tariffs” and “kings” to a person whose people have never had either? The English words were just noise.

But Joe knew histories of many peoples and planets and could call up scenes, in moving stereo and color, until we agreed on what I meant. We jogged along, with me dictating to a silvery ball floating near my mouth and with Joe curled up like a cat on a platform raised to my level, while he dictated to another microphone, making running notes on what I said. His mike had a gimmick that made it a hush-phone; I did not hear him unless he spoke to me.