"A gralnok." said Jahv. "Domesticated animal native to the Dorrian homeworld."
"A little Dorrian kid would take something this ugly to bed with them?" asked Davy.
Jahv nodded. "Anything else in here?"
"Just this." answered Keith, who'd been going through some drawers he'd found embedded in the wall he'd been leaning against. It looked like a metallic headband, and although it was quite ornate, it also clearly contained circuitry. "What is it?"
Jahv studied the device. "An encephalo-educator. Dorrian children wear these a few hours each day from the time they are three years old until they are ten. It teaches them language, math, history, science, all the basic skills."
"How do you know so much about Dorrian technology?" asked Davy.
"Botarans build a lot of it for them." replied Jahv.
There was a sudden THUNK on the roof of the shuttle. "Uh, ohhh." said Davy.
"I hope that was a tree branch." remarked Keith.
Then there was a low, growling noise. "And I hope that was your stomach." said Davy.
"It would've been if I hadn't figured out how to get a cheeseburger out of the food replicator." countered Keith.
"I still say what you people eat is — " started Jahv, but he was silenced by a wave of Niklas' hand. Niklas was pointing at the open doorway to the room they were presently in, and so scared he couldn't even speak.
Standing in the doorway was — something. It looked more or less humanoid, and about the same size as any of them. The light was so poor that they couldn't tell much more than that except that it clearly had very long hair and was crouched in a position as if to pounce. It was also what was growling.
"Oh, shit." muttered Keith.
The being sprang into the room and let loose a growling howl that nearly deafened the four boys. He went straight for Jahv, who was holding the only source of light in the room, which promptly shot out of his hand and skittered across the floor.
"He's attacking Jahv!" yelled Davy. "We gotta do something!"
"No, wait!" cried Niklas. "He's not after Jahv. Look!"
The new alien's eyes had followed the light, not Jahv. The alien released Jahv, and scampered across the floor and picked up the small hand light, inspecting it as an infant would a new toy. He was still growling, however.
"Is that a — what did you call them — Dorrian?" asked Keith.
Jahv was still checking himself to make sure he hadn't been hurt. "Yes, but Creator's name, I've never seen one in such sorry shape."
"Whataya expect?" remarked Davy. "He's a kid alone on a primitive planet."
Jahv nodded. "You're right, of course. But we need to try to communicate with him."
The alien had turned to face the others, and in the glow of the hand-light it was possible to get a look at his face.
"Is he a whole lot dirtier than we are, or is his face actually camouflage-patterned?" asked Niklas.
"Some of both, probably." replied Jahv. "Dorrian skin is naturally multi-colored. There's probably several shades of green and tan on him. And if you could see past the hair, you'd see he has long, pointed ears."
"It's the eyes that I'm seeing." gulped Davy. "Are those yellow eyes normal?"
Jahv nodded. "Yes."
"Like a wild animal." said Keith. "Real good. Our first encounter with alien life on another planet, and instead of 'Star Trek' we get 'Wild Kingdom'."
The alien continued to crouch and growl at the others.
"You think maybe he's upset because we're on his turf?" speculated Keith.
"What?" asked Jahv.
"This is HIS shuttle, after all." continued Keith. "Maybe he's mad we're in here."
Jahv raised an eyebrow. "That's possible. I hadn't thought of that."
"Okay, so what say we all back out of here, nice and slow, and see what he does?" suggested Davy.
"I have no problem with that." said Niklas.
"All right, let's do it." said Jahv. "Keith, bring the headband."
"Whataya want this thing for?" asked Keith.
"I think you would call it a 'hunch'." answered Jahv.
Keith shrugged, but kept the headband with him. The four youngsters very carefully backed out of the room, and out of the shuttle. The alien boy followed them all the way, never taking his eyes off of them, and continuing to snarl. But he stopped once they were all outside the shuttle, and stayed at the doorway.
"Maybe if we all sat down we'd look less threatening to him." offered Niklas. The others sat down in a crouched position similar to the newcomer, but looking less like they were ready to spring at someone.
Now it was possible, in daylight, to get a better look at the boy. To begin with, given that the youngster was wearing no clothes, it was obvious that he was a boy. And he was certainly far dirtier than any of Jahv's group. But not so much so that his natural camouflage coloring wasn't fairly obvious even through the dirt. His hair, a long and tangled mess, was also more than one color, streaked dark green and brown.
His eyes, although yellow, were more human-looking than Jahv's, and he had a full complement of five fingers per hand and five toes per foot. The only ornamentation anywhere on the boy was a small device on a chain around his neck. Jahv identified it immediately. "That's the homing device for the distress signal!"
"Are you saying George of the Jungle there set up the distress signal?" asked Keith, disbelieving.
"He probably had been trained to do so by his parents, and being very young when he did so and on his own ever since, lost whatever skills he had learned." said Jahv. "That's why I wanted the headband."
"You said that thing was some sort of educator device." remarked Davy. "But you can't expect to civilize him that quickly."
"Remember I said I had a hunch." said Jahv. "And it's a longshot. I'm going to try to teach him language, in the hope that he still has some semblance of civilized behavior left, and that if we can communicate with him, we can bring it to the surface."
"I don't think he's going to let you get close enough for that." said Niklas. "Besides, would that thing be able to teach English?"
"Hey guys, look." said Davy quietly. The alien boy was slowly coming closer. His angry expression had been replaced by one of curiosity.
"Now that we're out of the shuttle," said Jahv. "He wonders who we are."