Whispered Magics by Sherwood Smith

Teer and Noot,
here’s Kikinee, and Thisko, and Smelch. Inside is the Vmmm.”
    “The what?” Adam asked.
    “The Vmmm,” I said. “Every ship has one.”
    “May we look inside?” AyYesha asked.
    “Please do,” Thisko said, glad that things were starting out
like a proper trade ought to.
    The boys and girls swarmed inside the ship, curious about
everything, some using their arm-digits to touch things. AyYesha moved very
slowly, examining everything with close attention.
    “Wow, look at that computer,” Kenji exclaimed, and Laurie
expressed enthusiastic agreement, “I could use one of those!”
    “It smells so good in here,” NaTasha said to me.
    “That’s the Vmmm,” I told her. “They get CO 2 once a
month, and the rest of the time they spurt out pure oxygen. Unless they get
angry.”
    “You mean they fart good air?” Mick asked, making a hooting
noise. “Where’s this guy hiding?”
    “The Vmmm is fixing the energy compartment,” I said. “And zir
is not hiding, they just don’t come out into the light. It hurts them unless
they wear a coating of light-blocking alloy. But zir is listening. The Vmmm
always listen.”
    AyYesha turned from studying our piloting console. “You mean
they are telepathic?”
    We looked at one another. “The Vmmm seem to hear one another
no matter where they are,” Thisko said, waving two tentacles. “But I don’t know
if they hear us when we don’t speak.”
    “So, what shall we trade you for your sand?” Teer asked. “We
must get it loaded and converted.”
    “Your flight tech,” AyYesha said quickly.
    “This computer,” Kenji said almost as fast.
    Thisko and Teer said to the rest of us in our Universal Trade
Language, “Remember Class Five!”
    We weren’t even supposed to be talking to these beings, much
less trading for technology they didn’t have.
    “Don’t tell me,” Adam said. “You got these rules, right?”
    “How did you know?” I asked. “Have you heard of the
Interplanetary Trade School?”
    The two biggest, AyYesha and Adam, looked at each other.
    Behind, I heard the Vmmm humming.
    Kikinee whistled his ‘I hear trouble’ whistle.
    “No,” AyYesha said at last. “We haven’t. We didn’t even know
that other life exists. Some of our scientists don’t believe it.”
    “And won’t, even if we try to tell them,” Adam added. “Who
believes kids? They’ll just turn us over to a counselor.”
    “Or tell us to stop eating so much junk food,” Kenji added in
a sour voice.
    “Junk? Food?” Smelch’s mournful voice interrupted. “Do you
consume recyclables? Sounds very efficient.”
    “Nope,” NaTasha said, giggling. “Food that tastes good, but
doesn’t make you grow or anything. Parents hate it. Except for the kinds they
like to eat.”
    “Ah, like nid-nuts,” Teer said, and I clacked our mandibles in
agreement.
    “But if we show them some cool kind of new technology, like
how this ship works,” Mick said, waving his arms, “then they have to believe
us! And we can get to space sooner!”
    “Who says the government won’t just sit on it?” Adam said.
    “Capture this ship on your phone, and post on YouTube,” Kenji
said, turning to face him. “If we trade for their tech, then everyone can make
a space ship.”
    “And what then? Take our wars into space? Gangs staking claim
on the moon?” AyYesha said. “Look, guys, we got enough problems on our planet.
I think we’re going to have to solve them before we get into space, or we’ll
just have bigger problems and drag all these others into them.” She waved at
us. “I’m not sure I even want to put this on YouTube. I’m glad I don’t have my
phone.” She touched her brightly colored clothing that covered parts of her
skin, and left the rest bare.
    “Since we left our phones in our backpacks, it’s a waste of
time talking about it,” Adam said, waving his digits behind them at a square
domicile a distance away, as the rest of his friends bobbed their