This is boring.

  Boring means it's not exciting. Exciting is bad when we're talking about possible violence with aliens. Boring is good. We like boring.

  Nick considered just going home and talking to the fuakalas from there. But he wasn't sure if something weird would come up, so he hung around. He listened in on the language lessons a little more to pass the time, and played a few games on his cloned phone. Finally it was close to sunset, and Nick turned on his transmitter and waited for a pause in the conversation.

  “Hello, this is Nick.”

  “Ello, Ik!eh. Tell Ktheg!lik Ik!eh is here,” Jenkins said in Kthufu. Nick was proud of himself for understanding that much. “Ik!eh, you ah heeya?”

  “I give gifts.” He turned on video, and started drawing on the tablet, Petra sending the pictures live. “You...here...gifts...here.”

  Jenkins asked a question that Petra didn't know how to translate into English. When he realized that, Jenkins didn't know how to convey whatever it was. Probably some version of 'why' since he's likely wondering why I didn't just bring it to the door again.

  “No...sick. I no give sick.” Nick had decided on that for his excuse. “I no get sick.”

  Jerry seemed to look around, then leaned closer to the camera and spoke quietly. With Petra translating, Jenkins asked, “Nick...you give sun bad?”

  Nick blinked. “What? No! No! Sun give you sick. Sun give me sick. I no like bad sun.” He thought. “You sun get sick three years, you say. I go here...three months? Four months.” Nick was losing track.

  Kathy showed up before that private conversation could continue. “Nick! You give food?” Petra translated. “You give food printer?”

  “Yes and yes.” Nick went over the drawing again. He checked, and the Death Star had just set. “You go now, you get gifts.”

  “Yezz, we go. Ank you, Ik!eh,” Kathy answered. In the background, Nick got a sense of activity; several people were probably headed out to grab the supplies. This time Kathy leaned closer to the camera and lowered her voice.

  “Ik!eh, you gi gif. We gi gif? We gi eh eh men forty-seven?” Kathy managed most of that herself, but Petra translated the number.

  “Petra, how much silver do we have?”

  This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

  “Forty-three percent, Nick. 389 units.”

  Nick scratched his nose a moment, thinking. Kathy wants to feel useful. She doesn't just want charity. “Petra, how much silver do we need to build that big communication station?”

  “We need 4,199 units.”

  Nick nodded. “Yes, Kathy, you have element forty-seven, you no need? Yes. Thank you.”

  “Goo. We gi eh eh men forty-seven. You gi foo. Ank you, Ik!eh. Ank you.”

  “You're welcome.”

  Kathy seemed to shift a bit. Nick wasn't sure if that was a sigh or a shrug or what. Then, she asked, “Ik!eh, you zee twenty-seven fuak!a. You zee more fuak!a?”

  “No.”

  Again the shift. “Ik!eh, you go, you zee more fuak!a?”

  Nick shrugged. “I don't know. I don't know if there are more of you. I...oh, wait.” Nick got it. “You want me to search for more fuak!a?” Nick stared at the ceiling, one hand on his chin. “I don't want to travel all over in Rockhunter. What I need is some kind of search robot. Like... a scanning drone! Petra, I need a device.”

  “What kind of device do you need?” Petra asked.

  “I need a small, flying drone with a scanner.”

  “I don't understand, Nick.”

  Nick groaned. “Um...fly...go up a thousand centimeters. Ten thousand centimeters. In air. Go fast. And scan.”

  Petra popped up a menu, and Nick started going through blueprints. “No...no...no...smaller. It doesn't have to carry cargo. I just need to find people...” He kept flipping through options and refining the search. “Range...range...where is it...? Could this work?”

  Nick stopped and studied the blueprint in detail. “Top speed about double Rockhunter's. Scanning range...they're going to be underground, it's got to be the prospecting scanner just like Rockhunter's, right? Or does it?”

  Kathy was watching him curiously. Nick noticed and held up a finger for patience. “What would it be under...? Search and rescue! Petra, rescue.”

  “I don't understand, Nick.”

  “Rescue is...Nick hurt. Uh, Nick take damage. Go, get Nick, Nick go home, Nick get health. That is 'rescue.' Do you understand?”

  Petra responded with a word.

  “Rescue.” Nick hoped he was getting it right; Petra added it to her vocabulary. “I want to rescue more fuakalas.”

  Petra started showing him what might be evacuation helicopters or the alien equivalent. They were big and expensive. “Um...before I rescue, I want to find them. Um...scan see fuakalas underground.” It took a few more tries, but Nick got across the kind of scanner he wanted. Then he explained that all he wanted to do was transport one of those scanners and have it report back.

  “Search and rescue,” Petra answered. “Blueprints for search, part of search and rescue.”

  Now we're talking. Nick looked over the options and picked one that seemed decent and cheap in materials. “Petra, how long to make this one?”

  “Eight parts, six hours twelve minutes. Assembly, unknown.”

  “Printing queue?”

  “Eight cans of chicken noodle soup, four cans of tuna, five bags of chips, two snack bars, air purifier, water purifier.”

  “All right, change the queue. Two cans of soup, two cans of tuna, three bags of chips, one snack bar, parts for this search scanner.”

  “Confirm?” Petra displayed the new printing order.

  “Yes.”

  “Confirmed. Thank you, Nick.”

  “Thank you, Petra.” Nick turned back to Kathy, who had watched the entire proceedings. He was pretty sure she had helped Petra with the translation in a couple of spots, too.

  “Petra is a clock?” Kathy asked finally.

  Nick waved his hands around vaguely. “Yes.”

  “Petra is a very, very, very complicated clock.”

  “Yes, she is. She is, indeed.”