"Ess?"
I tried waving my arms and wound up giving an impression of an atmospheric fighter dipping its wings. "Untie me, you Drac slime!" I was seated on the sand, my back against a rock.
The Drac smiled, exposing the upper and lower mandibles that looked human —except, that instead of separate teeth, they were solid. "Eh, ne, Irkmaan." It stood, walked over to me and checked my bonds.
"Untie me!"
The smile disappeared. 'Ne!" It pointed at me with a yellow finger. "Kos son va?"
"I don’t speak Drac, toad face. You speak Esper or English?"
The Drac delivered a very human-looking shrug, then pointed at its own chest. "Kos va son Jeriba Shigan." It pointed again at me. "Kos son va?"
"Davidge. My name is Willis E. Davidge."
"Ess?"
I tried my tongue on the unfamiliar syllables. "Kos va son Willis Davidge."
"Eh." Jeriba Shigan nodded, then motioned with its fingers. "Dasu, Davidge."
"Same to you, Jerry."
"Dasu, dasu!" The toad face began sounding a little impatient. I shrugged as best I could. The Drac bent over and grabbed the front of my jumpsuit with both hands and pulled me to my feet. "Dasu, dasu, kizlode!"
"All right! So dasu is get up. What’s a kizlode?"
Jerry laughed. "Gavey kiz?"
"Yeah, I gavey."
Jerry pointed at its head. "Lode." It pointed at my head. "Kizlode, gavey?"
I got it, then swung my arms around, catching Jerry upside its head with the metal rod. The Drac stumbled back against a rock, looking surprised. It raised a hand to its head and withdrew it covered with that pale pus that Dracs think is blood. It looked at me with murder in its eyes. "Gefh! Nu Gefh, Davidge!"
"Come and get it, Jerry, you kizlode sonofabitch!"
Jerry dived at me and I tried to catch it again with the rod, but the Drac caught my right wrist in both hands and, using the momentum of my swing, whirled me around, slamming my back against another rock. Just as I was getting back my breath, Jerry picked up a small boulder and came at me with every intention of turning my melon into pulp. With my back against the rock, I lifted a foot and kicked the Drac in the midsection, knocking it to the sand. I ran up, ready to stomp Jerry’s melon, but he pointed behind me. I turned and saw another tidal wave gathering steam, and heading our way. "Kid" Jerry got to its feet and scampered for the high ground with me following close behind. With the roar of the wave at our backs, we weaved among the black water and sand-ground black boulders until we reached Jerry’s ejection capsule. The Drac stopped, put its shoulder to the egg-shaped contraption, and began rolling it uphill. I could see Jerry’s point. The capsule contained all of the survival equipment and food either of us knew about. "Jerry!" I shouted above the rumble of the fast-approaching wave. "Pull out this damn rod and I’ll help!" The Drac frowned at me. "The rod, kizlode, pull it out!" I cocked my head toward my outstretched arm.
Jerry placed a rock beneath the capsule to keep it from rolling back, then quickly untied my wrists and pulled out the rod. Both of us put our shoulders to the capsule, and we quickly rolled it to higher ground. The wave hit and climbed rapidly up the slope until it came up to our chests. The capsule bobbed like a cork, and it was all we could do to keep control of the thing until the water receded, wedging the capsule between three big boulders. I stood there, puffing.
Jerry dropped to the sand, its back against one of the boulders, and watched the water rush back out to sea. "Magasiennal"
"You said it, brother." I sank down next to the Drac; we agreed by eye to a temporary truce, and promptly passed out.
My eyes opened on a sky boiling with blacks and greys. Letting my head loll over on my left shoulder, I checked out the Drac. It was still out. First, I thought that this would be the perfect time to get the drop on Jerry. Second, I thought about how silly our insignificant scrap seemed compared to the insanity of the sea that surrounded us. Why hadn’t the rescue team come? Did the Dracon fleet wipe us out? Why hadn’t the Dracs come to pick up Jerry? Did they wipe out each other? I didn’t even know where I was. An island. I had seen that much coming in, but where and in relation to what? Fyrine IV; the planet didn’t even rate a name, but was important enough to die over.
With an effort, I struggled to my feet. Jerry opened its eyes and quickly pushed itself to a defensive crouching position. I waved my hand and shook my head. "Ease off, Jerry. I’m just going to look around." I turned my back on it and trudged off between the boulders. I walked uphill for a few minutes until I reached level ground.
It was an island, all right, and not a very big one. By eyeball estimation, height from sea level was only eighty meters, while the island itself was about two kilometers long and less than half that wide. The wind whipping my jumpsuit against my body was at least drying it out, but as I looked around at the smooth-ground boulders on top of the rise, I realized that Jerry and I could expect bigger waves than the few puny ones we had seen.
A rock clattered behind me and I turned to see Jerry climbing up the slope. When it reached the top, the Drac looked around. I squatted next to one of the boulders and passed my hand over it to indicate the smoothness, then I pointed toward the sea. Jerry nodded. "Ae, gavey." It pointed downhill toward the capsule, then to where we stood. "Echey masu, nasesay."
I frowned, then pointed at the capsule. "Nasesay? The capsule?"
"Ae, capsule nasesay. Echey masu." Jerry pointed at its feet.
I shook my head. "Jerry, if you gavey how these rocks got smooth"—I pointed at one—"then you gavey that masuing the nasesay up here isn’t going to do a damned bit of good." I made a sweeping up and down movement with my hands. "Waves." I pointed at the sea below. "Waves, up here." I pointed to where we stood. "Waves, echey."
"Ae, gavey." Jerry looked around the top of the rise, then rubbed the side of its face. The Drac squatted next to some small rocks and began piling one on top of another. "Viga, Davidge."
I squatted next to it and watched while its nimble fingers constructed a circle of stones that quickly grew into a dollhouse-sized arena. Jerry stuck one of its fingers in the center of the circle. "Echey, nasesay."
The days on Fyrine IV seemed to be three times longer than any I had seen on any other habitable planet. I use the designation "habitable" with reservations. It took us most of the first day to painfully roll Jerry’s nasesay up to the top of the rise. The night was too black to work and was bone-cracking cold. We removed the couch from the capsule, which made just enough room for both of us to fit inside. The body heat warmed things up a bit; and we killed time between sleeping, nibbling on Jerry’s supply of ration bars (they taste a bit like fish mixed with cheddar cheese), and trying to come to some agreement about language.