69th Day, Year 135 of Helan Phorro Xamium

A most unforeseen major development occurred today. Most of the first half of the day was comparatively uneventful. Except for Tonglok Phorro and Guardian Tempun, who went outside to interact with examiners again, the rest of us spent the time inside the ship preforming our usual duties. Tonglok Phorro and Tempun came back in before sunset. Tonglok Phorro told us about how the creatures identify their kind as the 'Humans,' and that there are many variants of them on this planet, which they call 'Erth.' I do wonder what name Our Eldest will give this place when we return. Will we keep such names? Nonetheless, this is not the major development.

After the first sunset, I, Moloj Phorro and Champion Zalhang were on the navigational bridge. Moloj Phorro was working on the flight controls. Zalhang and I were discussing finding a way to go outside of the boundaries unnoticed to search for Junget Darruf. I happened to turn towards our broken communications station when I saw a human, standing there waving at me as it vocalized excitedly. I told the others to not make any sudden moves and no loud noises so to not startle it.

As I slowly approached, the very first thing I observed was that this one had absolutely no enviro-suit. Second thing I observed, from what Tonglok Phorro told me prior, looking at the facial hair patterns it appeared to be a male. On the face was a black frame with a pair of thin glass over the eyes. He wore brown footwear, long rough dark blue garments for the legs, and black short-sleeved garments for the torso with white symbols on it. These were all dirty from likely moving through soiled environments to get here. He also had a small light strapped to his head, which he turned off as I came closer. Its excited mannerisms petered off into clear signs of unease by the time I got close to properly study him. Zalhang soon spoke up about his concerns of a breach. I explained that finding a way to communicate with this human could tell us of its intentions. At this juncture, we heard this human say, “Breach.” All three of us focused our attention to the human and it said it again. I asked him to say it again, and he repeated the word.

It first came off like a simple form of mimicry when I said, “Maybe,” in response to Moloj Phorro’s question about if the human understood what we said and the human said, “Maybe.” He soon repeated the word, but this time gestured towards himself. I then wanted to try something. I pointed at the human and used our word for 'creature,' he said “creature.” I then pointed at the human and used their word 'human' in combination with 'creature,' so I said, “creature human.” He excitedly said, “creature human,” and repeated the words with much excitement and happiness. My assumptions were correct, in where this human learns from a combination of mimicry and visual points of reference. From here, after a little confusion on his part at first, I told him our names and the name of our people. I asked him for his and he said his name was Randee Willcox.

From that point, steadily, I and Moloj Phorro tried to get Randee to understand our question of how and where he entered our ship. Impatient, Zalhang insulted the human directly and then approached to ask the questions himself, not noticing Moloj Phorro’s tool container in his path. Zalhang stubbed his foot against the container and cursed aloud as he bent down to grab his foot. Apparently, Randee mistook this as a sort of sign of respect, so bowed to us as he cursed. He did this repeatedly as I and Moloj Phorro tried to clear the error, all while Zalhang was laughing.

Just then, the flight controls malfunctioned again, which drew everyone’s attention. Moloj Phorro quickly ran to it to try and stop further damage. I looked at Randee and he looked at me, before pointing at the controls asking something. Then he made a repeat gesticulation as if he was breaking something in half as he asked again. I came to grasp that he was asking if the controls were broken, which I confirmed. He then made a repeat gesticulation as if he was putting the broken pieces back together, then asked something else. He was likely asking if Moloj Phorro was trying to fix the controls, which I confirmed once again. Using a frantic combination of gestures and a very broken version of our language, using what he learned thus far, he said, “Me, go. Me, come. Fix. Fix.”

With that he quickly climbed down the opening in the communications station. I tried to call him back to continue our discussion but after a moment of hearing him scurry through the station, he was gone to much of Zalhang’s chagrin. Tonglok Phorro came in to check on the commotion. I ordered Zalhang to cease his irritated babble and call everyone into the central hub.

I told the crew what transpired before Zalhang voiced his concerns about the breach. It was then I declared my theory that we would not have to worry about our hosts discovering the breach like Randee. This for three reasons.

First, if our hosts did discover the same breach, they would have exploited this fact already.

Second, Randee is not allied with our hosts. Our hosts likely do not have an inkling of Randee’s presence. All this time we have been on this world, not once have our hosts offered any assistance to fix our ship. Clearly, they have a different goal in mind compared to Randee, which leads to my third and final reason.

If Randee tells our hosts about the breach, due to differing goals, his life will likely be in danger. Meaning, he must be from a different kingdom that wants to help. To further his own interests, he will have to stay quiet and keep such knowledge limited to his own people.

Whichever the case, the kingdom hosting our stay is not the only one interested in us.