Life on other planets -- Fiction; Science fiction; Slavery -- Fiction
But the planet had natives on it already. The natives were called
Alberts, and here is a picture of them. Aren't they funny-looking?
The Alberts were happy to help with the digging in exchange for some of
the good things the explorers talked about, because they didn't have
many good things. But the explorers built houses for them and gave them
food and taught them English, and the Alberts dug in the ground and
helped get the metal ready to ship back to the Confederation.
* * * * *
... The following list of Review Questions may be helpful to the
instructor:
1. Why is Fruyling's World called by that name? After whom was it named?
2. What is so valuable about Fruyling's World?
3. Who helps the explorers dig up the metal?
4. Why do they help?
19
For Cadnan, the time passed slowly.
Consciousness came back, along with a thudding ache in the head and a
growing hunger: but there were no leaves on the smooth metal of the
floor, and the demands of his body had to be ignored. His mind began to
drift: once he heard a voice, but when he told himself that the voice
was not real, it went away. He found his hands moving as if he were
pushing the buttons of his job. He stopped them and in a second they
were moving again.
Then the room itself began to shake.
Cadnan had no doubts of his sanity: this was different from the
imaginary voice. The room shook again and he wondered whether this were
some new sort of punishment. But it did not hurt him.
The rumbling sound of the bombardment came to him only dimly, and for
brief seconds. To Cadnan, it sounded like a great machine, and he
wondered about that, too, but he could find no answers.
The rumbling came again, and sounded nearer. Cadnan thought of machines
shaking his small room, perhaps making it hot as the machines made
metal hot. If that happened, he knew, he would die.
He called: "Dara." It was hard to hear his own voice. There was no
answer, and he had expected none: but he had had to call.
The rumbling came again. Surely, he told himself, this was a new
punishment, and it was death.
There was only one thing for him to do. He sat crosslegged on the
smooth floor as the rumble and the other sounds continued, and in
opposition to them he made his song, chanting in a loud and even voice.
He had learned that a song was to be made when facing death: he had
learned that in the birth huts, and he did not question it.
The song was necessary, and his voice, carrying over the sounds that
filtered through to him, was clear and strong.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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