Across a Billion Years by Robert Silverberg Page B

knew before: the way they looked and moved, the shape of their cities, something of their customs. And they don’t seem like Just Plain Folks at all. They seem tremendously alien, far stranger than Shilamakka or Dinamonians or Thhhians or any of the alien beings we encounter in our own lives. We may have difficulty understanding Dinamonian theology or the Shilamakkan craze for replacing perfectly good limbs with machinery, but we can still get along with them on a business basis. I don’t think we could ever have gotten along with the High Ones, even if they weren’t separated from us by a billion-year gap. Not only because of their immense technological superiority, either. They way they think would always be unintelligible.
    Consider the cultures of Earth before communications satellites and rocket transport helped everybody to live just like everybody else. Consider the world-outlooks of Eskimos, Polynesians, Bedouins, Belgian businessmen, Pueblo Indians, and Tibetans. Not a whole lot in common there. Pretty alien to one another, matter of fact, and all native to the same planet. Okay, eventually they all died out or became smoodged together into “Earthmen,” but now we were part of a galaxy full of other intelligent species, each one with its own various cultures, and each one different from us … and so on. Huge gulfs between peoples of the same world, and huger gulfs between peoples of different worlds, yet all these golfs were bridgeable.
    The hugest gulf of all seems to be the one between us and the High Ones. Forget my romantic ideas about finding them still alive somewhere. I don’t want to find them any more. I think it would be pretty frightening if we did.
    After an hour of viewing the globe, 408b shut it off and we had a Discussion. The eleven of us sat around trying to interpret what we had just seen. Jan carefully positioned herself as far from Leroy Chang as she could get, but Leroy seemed to be going out of his way not to look at her. He seemed twitchy and ill at ease, more so than usual; I guess he was scared that Jan was going to rise up and denounce him as a rapist. A bungling rapist, at that. (Question: Is a man more loathsome if he succeeds in Having His Way with a woman, or if he’s such a spinless vidj that he botches the job? Don’t bother answering.)
    Dr. Schein acted as chairman. He said, “It’s apparent that the whole scope of High Ones archaeology has changed overnight. For the first time we know something of what their living culture was like, as a result of Tom Rice’s fine discovery.”
    I glowed nicely and nodded to acknowledge the cheers of a multitude of admirers.
    Dr. Horkkk dampened my furnace a little by saying crisply, “Let it be noted that as a result of careless excavation technique this miraculous artifact nearly was destroyed.”
    I looked at the floor in shame and counted my toes for lack of anything else to do. Dr. Horkkk tacked on a few more criticisms in his neat Teutonic way and I tried to shrink out of sight. Jan, who was sitting next to me, whispered, “Don’t let him get you quonked. You did find it. And you didn’t damage it.” I should have added that Jan had chosen to sit next to me instead of Saul Shahmoon. Interesting. Is she trying to awaken his slumbering jealousies, or do Jan and I have something going?
    When Dr. Horkkk finished flaying me, 408b said, “It is questionable that this instrument represents a view of the living culture of these beings. Perhaps it is an entertainment device, providing pure fantasy.”
    “Good point,” said Dr. Schein. “But I don’t go for it.”
    Pilazinool took off one hand and waved it in the other to get the floor. The mechanical man said, “On the basis of a quick analysis, I too doubt that 408b is correct. I feel that we’ve got an authentic look at High Ones life, here. I can’t say what purpose this globe was meant to serve, but I do believe that those were genuine scenes of daily life, as Dr. Schein