"Wake up, you faker! Stop playing possum and stand up! You aren't fooling anyone!"
The Ghrynians got off the huddled little assassin and tried to stop Gorb. "Your pardon, but the dead require your respect," began one of the lizards mildly.
Gorb whirled angrily. "Maybe the dead do—but this character isn't dead!"
He knelt and said loudly in the Kallerian's dishlike ear, "You might as well quit it, Heraal. Listen to this, you shamming mountain of meat—your mother knits doilies for the Clan Verdrokh!"
The supposedly dead Kallerian emitted a twenty-cycle rumble that shook the floor, and clambered to his feet, pulling the sword out of his body and waving it in the air. Gorb leaped back nimbly, snatched up the Stortulian's fallen blaster, and trained it neatly on the big alien's throat before he could do any damage. The Kallerian grumbled and lowered his sword.
I felt groggy. I thought I knew plenty about non-terrestrial life-forms, but I was learning a few things today. "I don't understand. How—"
The police were blue with chagrin. "A thousand pardons, Earthman. There seems to have been some error."