My Friend is an Alien, стр. 6

Part 3

It had become clear that it simply wasn't safe for the young alien boy Jahv to go out in public. Disguises worked to a certain degree, but Jahv was simply too inexperienced with the culture and the way Earth-people acted to ever fit in. However, that didn't mean that he had to be out of touch with his new homeworld. Certainly he had friends like Niklas and Davy, who had rescued him from the nearby pond into which he'd fallen when he first arrived, and Keith and Martin, whom had met Jahv more recently, introduced to him by Davy. And, of course, there were other ways to study the world.

Everyone had pretty much agreed that the best way for someone who couldn't actually go "out there" and explore, would be to do so by computer. Unfortunately, the computer that Jahv had brought out of his seemingly bottomless backpack was totally incompatible with anything built on Earth. That meant having to somehow procure a computer for Jahv to use.

For a bunch of kids with no substantial sources of income, who couldn't very well explain to anyone what the computer was needed for, this would not be easy. Jahv was fairly well convinced that even if all Davy and the others could locate were various components and parts, even in poor condition, he could assemble them into something that would work with this world's computer systems. The technology was, by his standards, simplistic enough that even though it was of obvious «foreign» origin, he could work with it.

This resulted in the four boys, in their spare time, searching behind electronics stores, business dumpsters, and wherever else they could think of to look to see what they could come up with. What amazed all of them was what large businesses actually threw away. Within less than two weeks, they had salvaged a huge mess of assorted computer components, including a CD-Rom drive, cables, various plug-in boards, a couple of disc drives, «outdated» software, and various other items out of a wide range of dumpsters.

The real break had come when Niklas and Davy had been caught lugging a huge, intact monitor away from alongside somebody's trash can on a neighboring street. The owner had come out and asked what they wanted with it. They explained, more or less truthfully, that they were building their own computer system out of spare parts as a special project for when school started in the fall. The owner, himself a computer builder, had just upgraded to an even larger monitor, and not only let the boys take the monitor, but gave them $20 to help them. That went towards a brand-new keyboard for the computer, the one item they hadn't been able locate a decent enough specimen of for the project.

Jahv's dome-tent looked like an electronic junkpile for a while, as the young alien boy sought to make sense out of the technology. He grasped it readily enough, though, and roughly a week later had built his computer. The end result was a nightmarish miasma of components, including even a few from Jahv's own computer that he'd somehow managed to integrate into the final contraption, that looked to be one part Star Trek, two parts Radio Shack, and three parts of half-junked God-knows-what held together with the technological equivalent of adhesive tape and bubble gum.

Just turning the thing on resulted in a racket that sounded like a cross between a chipmunk and a lawn mower. But the silly thing worked. It not only worked, but it had enough memory capacity so that as soon as Jahv was able to get online, through of all things a satellite link he'd rigged up, he'd been able to download all the additional software he needed.

The thing was probably second only to computers one would find at NASA or the Pentagon. It wasn't just a computer, either. Thanks to the satellite link, Jahv was also able to use the device as a television set, and had also hooked a video game unit into it. Among their rummagings, Keith had come up with a broken down Playstation unit.

Jahv had quickly turned into an experienced hacker. If he'd been using an actual modem, half the business corporations on the planet probably would have tracked him down by now. He'd downloaded «beta» versions for video games the others hadn't even heard of, and had recently picked up designs for some of the planned aliens for "Star Wars Episode 2". This, of course, got him more than a few weird looks from the rest of the boys when he pointed at one particularly bizarre specimen of LucasFilm life and remarked, "Hey, I know this guy!"

On this particular day, Davy and Keith had headed out to Jahv's cloaked dome-tent. Martin had told Keith he'd join them later in the afternoon. Davy had found a discarded VCR and wondered if Jahv would be able to somehow hook it into the entire mess. Keith speculated that if they had found a microwave oven, Jahv would probably be able to hook THAT into the computer and program his meals in advance.

Not that Jahv needed such a device. One of his more wondrous machines was a food replicator that seemed to make meals out of thin air.

Jahv had been delighted to receive the VCR, but didn't plan to hook it up immediately. He was in the midst of testing a new program, but invited Davy and Keith in to spend some time and see what happened, anyway.

As usual, Jahv was stark naked when Davy and Keith arrived. Children on Jahv's homeworld didn't wear clothing except in special circumstances like space travel. Since it was yet another hot summer day, neither Davy nor Keith were wearing much, either. Keith was wearing denim shorts and sandals, and Davy had shown up wearing his usual coveralls, which he'd discarded once he'd entered the tent, so he was just wearing his boxer shorts.

Davy had come to regard Jahv as one of his best friends, and since he lived closest to the pond near where Jahv had pitched his tent, visited as often as possible. Keith, on the other hand, saw in Jahv something of a kindred spirit. Jahv had run away from home, literally light years, something Keith had considered doing more than once, and had nearly accomplished one time, if not on the light-years scale.

"So, what are you up to?" asked Davy, as the three boys gathered around the computer.

"I just recently found out that this planet has a huge radio telescope, aimed at the stars, picking up radio signals." said Jahv. "It's in a place called Arecibo, Puerto Rico." Jahv's mastery of language had come a long way. Even though he'd picked up on the language early on by a brief telepathic contact with Niklas, his pronunciation of names had taken longer.

"So what are you planning to do, bug it?" asked Keith.

"Something like that." replied Jahv.

Keith's eyes went wide. Sometimes, as interesting as he found Jahv, the alien made him a little nervous. For all his sophistication and technological know-how, Jahv was still a kid just like them, and even less learned in the ways of this particular world. Even electronically breaking into a huge facility like Arecibo seemed like asking for trouble.

"That's not gonna get you caught, is it?" asked Keith. None of them liked thinking about what might happen if Jahv's existence were ever discovered by grown-ups. Even the most understanding of their parents would have trouble with something like this.

"No." replied Jahv. "I'm just putting myself on the same reception frequency."

Moments later, streams of static burst forth from the computer's speaker.

"So much for that idea." remarked Keith.

"Actually, I think those are broadcasts from my homeworld!" said Jahv, amazed.

"What?" said Keith. "That was nothing but noise."

Davy was grinning. "You've never heard Jahv speak in his native language, have you?"

"What's that got to do with it?" asked Keith.