"The general sent an urgent message. He asked us not to land on this or any other planet."
"He asked us?" The general was accustomed to commanding.
His face was illuminated with the weak radiance of his veins. "I didn't tell them we had landed and I don't think they observed it." He stopped to recall what she said and the effort was painful. "Oh yes, the general asked us. Below the cloud banks he discovered an alien civilization on the Saturn type planet and is negotiating with them. Naturally they'd regard it as a hostile act on the part of mankind if we occupied a planet in their system without first asking."
Jeriann touched the absorption capsules without feeling them. "Aliens!"
"You were right, though you had no right to be. Not that it would have made any difference what we thought. As long as the general was cruising around the planet we wouldn't have dared investigate."
It didn't pay to generalize on what they learned from one planet, in one system. When man had journeyed throughout the galaxy there would still be surprises waiting for him when he came to the other side. "Let the expedition worry about hostile acts," said Jeriann. "If the aliens break off negotiations, so much the better for us."
"You forget we didn't come solely for ourselves. We hoped to make ourselves useful to mankind. What kind of disservice is that, to embroil humanity in a war with the first aliens we meet?" His face was flaring and white and the smile gone.
"Don't," whispered Jeriann. "I'm afraid of lightning—yours most of all. I expect to hear thunder and be struck dead."
"I'm sorry," he said. "We have a right to think of ourselves but not exclusively of ourselves."
"I mean, do they care? If they live on that planet they can't want this. They couldn't survive under such different conditions. Astronomical observations must be difficult with so many clouds and without space travel are we sure the aliens even know about this world?"