The Star Beast Read Online Free PDF

Mr. Kiku knew that each contact with “Out There” was unique. The universe was limitless in its variety. To assume without knowledge, to reason by analogy, to take the unknown for granted, all meant to invite disaster.
    Mr. Kiku looked over his list to see whom he could send. Any of his career officers could act as a court of original and superior jurisdiction in any case involving extra-terrestrials, but who was on Earth and free? Hmm…
    Sergei Greenberg, that was the man. System Trade Intelligence could get along without a chief for a day or two. He flipped a switch. “Sergei?”
    “Yes, boss?”
    “Busy?”
    “Well, yes and no. I’m paring my nails and trying to figure a reason why the taxpayers should pay me more money.”
    “Should they, now? I’m sending a bluesheet down.” Mr. Kiku checked Greenberg’s name on the radiotype, dropped it in his outgoing basket, waited a few seconds until he saw Greenberg pick it out of his own incoming basket. “Read it.”
    Greenberg did so, then looked up. “Well, boss?”
    “Phone the local justice that we are assuming tentative jurisdiction, then buzz out and look into it.”
    “Thy wish is my command, O King. Even money the critter is terrestrial after all, two to one I can identify if it isn’t.”
    “No wager, not at those odds. You’re probably right. But it might be a ‘special situation’; we can’t take chances.”
    “I’ll keep the local yokels in line, boss. Where is this hamlet? Westville? Or whatever it is?”
    “How would I know? You have the sheet in front of you.”
    Greenberg glanced at it. “Hey! What do you know? It’s in the mountains…this may take two or three weeks, boss. Hot enough for you?”
    “Take more than three days and I’ll charge it off your annual leave.” Mr. Kiku switched off and turned to other matters. He disposed of a dozen calls, found the bottom of his incoming basket and lost it again, then noticed that it was time for the Rargyllian. Goose flesh crawled over him and he dug hastily into his desk for one of the special pills his doctor had warned him not to take too frequently. He had just gulped it when his secretary’s light started blinking.
    “Sir? Dr. Ftaeml is here.”
    “Show him in.” Mr. Kiku muttered in a language his ancestors had used in making magic—against snakes, for example. As the door dilated he hung on his face the expression suitable for receiving visitors.

III
“—An Improper Question”
    CHAPTER III
    “—An Improper Question”
    THE intervention by the Department of Spatial Affairs in the case of Lummox did not postpone the hearing; it speeded it up. Mr. Greenberg phoned the district judge, asked for the use of his courtroom, and asked him to have all parties and witnesses in court at ten o’clock the next morning—including, of course, the extra-terrestrial that was the center of the fuss. Judge O’Farrell questioned the last point.
    “This creature…you need him, too?”
    Greenberg said that he most decidedly wanted the e.-t. present, since his connection with the case was the reason for intervention. “Judge, we people in DepSpace don’t like to butt into your local affairs. After I’ve had a look at the creature and have asked half a dozen questions, I can probably bow out…which will suit us both. This alleged e.-t. is my only reason for coming out. So have the beastie present, will you?”
    “Eh, he’s rather too large to bring into the courtroom. I haven’t seen him for several years and I understand he has grown a bit…but he would have been too large to bring indoors even then. Couldn’t you look at him where he is?”
    “Possibly, though I admit to a prejudice for having everything pertinent to a hearing in one spot. Where is he?”
    “Penned up where he lives, with his owner. They have a suburban place a few miles out”
    Greenberg thought about it. Although a modest man, one who cared not where he ate or slept, when it came to DepSpace business he