Chapter 6
It had been a testing several months for both scientist and Xeno, but with little progress. While No-Tongue showed it now understood him, he still couldn't understand the telepathic sendings from No-Tongue beyond the emotional and basic premises of the message. Without a sure means of understanding the Xeno speech, people will think it was just trained like an animal could be. He did determine the hisses were used as further empathesis behind the message for those in earshot and possibly as simple messages by themselves, but he couldn't be sure without No-Tongue confirming it. It was starting to seem that one had to be a telepath to truly understand telepathy.
"Doesn't look like I'll ever understand you..." Arthur moaned one day while sitting in his usual spot behind the force field. "I just don't have the knack for your means of speech."
No-Tongue tilted it's head at him, then suddenly slapped the force field, the resulting flash causing Arthur to fall over backward. -Don't give up!- It hissed angrily.
Arthur blinked in shock, did he just...?
"I understood that..." He said quietly, righting himself. "You told me not to give up..."
-But which part did you understand?- It asked, the vocal questioning hiss along with it.
"This part..." Arthur tapped his head. "But how..."
-I only just figured out how to...convert...the mind speech into a form you would understand.- It replied.
"So it wasn't me all along that was holding this up..."
-Hey...it's hard to learn a new 'language' when you grew up only knowing one your whole life.-
"Point. I could never get anywhere in foreign language courses."
-Then how could you have hoped to learn mine?- Arthur could have sworn the Alien had a little grin on it's face.
"Great...the first Alien I've learned to communicate with has a sarcastic streak..."
No-Tongue made that stuttering hissing sound: it was laughing at him.
"That's not funny..." Arthur paused a moment before asking. "Do you have a name?"
No-Tongue's lips folded over it's teeth and it turned it's head away. -A lowly drone like me don't usually get names: only the guard and the Queen are privileged with them. Some did dub me with a name though, more to poke fun at me then anything else. I can't think of how it would be pronounced in your speech, but it means 'No tongue'.-
"How...ironic..." Arthur said, now feeling guilty.
-What...you refer to me as 'no tongue' too?- Arthur couldn't detect any emotion.
"Uh...I didn't dub you as such to be offensive..."
No-Tongue laughed. -Don't worry about it. I actually like the name: marks me as different from every other drone. Conformists...all of them. No fun.-
"With an attitude like that I imagine you didn't get along with your Queen."
-Oh I behaved myself when it comes to Her and Her guards, it's the drones I loved to drive crazy. I especially liked to annoy Switcher...the old coot.-
"Switcher? Was that..." Arthur didn't feel it would be right to refer to No-Tongue or any other Alien as an 'it' now. "'his' name?"
-Not officially. That's just what I dubbed him: can't make up his mind on how to walk. I wonder what happened to him: he was with me when I was captured...-
Arthur rubbed his head nervously, not sure how No-Tongue will take the news. "He's alive, but not taking the separation from the hive very well. I think he may be going slowly insane..."
What had to be the Alien equivalent of a frown formed on No-Tongue's face. -Why didn't you just return him home then?-
"I couldn't." Arthur explained. "There's no home for him to go back to anymore."
No-Tongue gave a short screech and took a step back in shock. -My hive...is...gone?- It was evident that No-Tongue had thought of the likely hood, but was hoping it hadn't been true.
"I'm sorry." Arthur said sorrowfully. "The only way I was able to obtain one of you to learn how to communicate with your kind was to join an agency that specialized in hunting you down. No other agency wanted anything to do with research that could put a 'human face' on you and even this agency I am with now only agreed as long as the information I discovered could be used against you."
-So...my capture was indeed so you could learn to kill my people better.- No-Tongue said bitterly.
"That wasn't my intent." Arthur insisted. "I couldn't obtain you safely on my own: your people would have killed me on sight, never mind trying to talk to me. If there had been a different way, I would have taken it."
No-Tongue hissed in disgust, walked to the far side of the room and laid down.
"No-Tongue...I'm sorry, I can only help that what we learn from you we can use to stop the slaughter of your people."
-Just leave me alone...- Came the sharp response.
Arthur sighed and stood up to leave: there was no point in trying communicate any more with him for today and he could only hope the Alien would chose to talk to him again. In the meantime he needed to make a report on his findings.