Astounding Science Fiction, October 1950 — page 27: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

REGULATIONS PROVIDE 25 around the galaxy faster than the ship itself could have done. Joe was made. That was the beginning. The infant FGA sponsored a program of approved service and repair stations at strategic points throughout the galaxy and Joe was auto- matically for it because by then he knew more than any other Earthman about foreign ships -and drives. It had been a reputation for Young Joe to maintain—and he’d maintained it. If only there were someone to turn it over to— As usual, the politicians came pounding , hard on the heels of the scientists, bent on regulating their betters. Some worlds were more prone to this tendency than others, but Earth was right up front in this respect. There had been a few unfortunate incidents in the meeting of alien cultures—but far fewer than even the most hopeful had sup- posed. An almost universal fact was that by the time a race had reached the stars it had begun to mature. Joe turned back to the desk on which lay the data on the strangers from Nerane IV. Their planet was one of the most non- terrestrian so far encountered. Little com- merce passed between its people and the rest of the galaxy, yet their ships occasion- ally called on exploratory or cultural missions, though none had been to Earth before. The creatures had a hard exoskeleton. Stiff, bony appendages supported them on a planet eight times the mass of Earth. They lived in a yellow-brown fog of nitrogen peroxide at a pressure of about one sixth Earth atmosphere. In an almost symbiotic relationship they lived with another species, a small, remotely monkeylike creature called mensa. These were controlled by telepathic forces and performed the physical work which the clumsy exoskeletons of the more intelligent creatures did not permit. Joe read through the data from the massive library his company had accumu- lated on a hundred thousand planets and cultures. He did not have the slightest con- ception of what kind of metabolism an atmosphere of nitrogen peroxide could sup- port—or even if it were necessary to the creatures’ metabolism. But, at any rate, it was reported that their ships were provided with such an atmosphere. Winfield called as he finished the file. “Perkins is in contact with them,” he said. “They were just about to give up and go away. He didn’t think it necessary to go aboard since they seemed to be doing all right for the time being. One of them is very Sick, they said. That’s one reason why they're in such a steam to get the ship repaired.” “All right. We still have no official clear- ance on them. Get them down. Use one of the pressure hangars, just in case. We wouldn’t want to smash them with our atmospheric pressure in case of accident. And I'd hate to have theirs get loose on the field.” “Think we ought to have quarters for the crew?” “Do you know how many there are?” “Just two, they say.” “Two? On a ship that size?” Joe recalled the photographs and plans of Neranian ships. ‘“IT'd say there ought to be a hundred of them at least. Something funny if only two are aboard. Anyway, we'd better get quarters ready. It might be necessary to evacuate the ship to work on it.” It was about a half hour later that the dark oval of the ship appeared over the field. The service ship in which Perkins and his crew rode followed at a little distance, talking the strangers down. It wasn’t without reason that Old Joe had picked a desert site for his operations. Some of the visitors were sloppy pilots near a. planet, and at other times ships came in almost completely out of control, crashing all over the landscape in a futile attempt to set down normally. But the Nerane ship was adequately controlled. Joe wouldn’t have called it a first-class landing, but it was good enough. He saw Perkins land a short distance away. Within minutes the ship was being towed toward the large, pressurized hangar where no damage would be done if the obnoxious atmosphere within the ship were to get free. Joe turned away. He would have liked to have gone out and handled the job himself, but there were too many other matters at hand. Too many executive matters. Joe gagged on that word. It made him think of plump, jolly men at luncheon clubs. Jt was six-thirty and the evening crews had come on, when he folded up his papers and decided to call it a day. Many of the customers insisted on continuous attention to their needs, so Joe had long ago gone on a round-the-clock basis. He wondered how they were coming on the Nerane ship. COMME NOOO! KS.€O)