"Why Do They Want To Know?" by Ralph Sperry

CONTENTS SPRING (FOR GRANDPA) FAST FOOD WHY DO THEY WANT TO KNOW?
THE MONADNOCK FILE #1 - WHAT'S IN A NAME? CONSTRUCTION, RADIO TELESCOPE AUTHORS

So I can tell three shapes like that in red from five in blue. And I can tell three shapes are fewer than five and more than two. And when I get it right they give me food, and when I don't they don't. But when I'm not showing them I can do these things, they feed me anyway.

Of course I can do these things. Anyone can, so what's the point? Well, maybe not everyone can. Some of the others they caught and keep me with don't get it right that often. Still, they probably could if they could be told a reason they ought to. Well, maybe not the one named Dik. I don't know what part of the forest they found him in. He's pretty stupid.

Or maybe he's just not interested, like some of the others who don't do well. Maybe he's more not interested, though he seems pretty stupid in other ways. He doesn't wash off his fruit before eating, even after seeing the rest of us do that. What kind of troop is he from? He's not even very good at grooming. But maybe that's just because he's a stranger.

I know that in the forest there are others like me who aren't like my troop, just like I know that a shape with corners is like a shape that doesn't have corners. Both are shapes. It's just that one is one shape, and the other is another. So maybe Dik really isn't that stupid. Maybe he just comes from a part of the forest where things are different. My troop lives by the edge of the river, where the ground is pretty sandy, and you have to wash your fruit. But grooming is something else. Even if he comes from a part of the forest that doesn't have so many bugs, fur still gets dirty and matted and needs to be licked and clawed out, or you look unmateable.

Of course, the creatures that caught us and penned us together seem pretty stupid, too. You'd think they'd know enough not to put an unmated female with six of us guys. Uti is always harassing us with displays - well, except for Dik. But she really doesn't want any of us. She just figured out that, whenever she leads us on, the creatures give her extra food. But she has no idea why.

But the creatures come from someplace in the sky, and I know it's different there. But other creatures have come before and weren't as stupid as these - at least that's the way the stories about them go. The other creatures never tried to catch us and pen us up. They watched us do what we know how to do, and didn't try to make us do things that don't seem to have any point.

I know three fruits in a bunch are less than five, but that doesn't matter. Three fruits that are growing together are always bigger and riper than five. And I can count to six two times because that's how many claws I have on each of my two front paws. I can even count to six twice on my back paws. But counting only matters when fruit is scarce, and you have to share it with everyone else, or else they'll beat you up.

But the other creatures were different from these, or so the stories go. They came from the sky in a shape like a very round fruit, but these came down in something that looks like a very large bug. The others weren't much bigger than us and had fur the way we do, but black. These are much bigger with hardly any fur except on the top of their heads.

And these stand up on their two back legs all the time, and seem to get pretty excited when one of us does that, too. They also seem to get pretty excited when one of us has to use a rock to break open the shell of a nut. But why would anyone stand that way all the time, unless you're on alert, or trying to get a female's attention? And how do they think you'd eat a nut if you didn't break open its shell?

And then there's the sounds they make whenever they tell each other things. Some are so low you can only just hear them. And a lot of the time, these creatures can't hear the sounds we make, unless we make them slowly, and pretend to be very angry, which always gets Uti upset. And you really don't want to get a female like Uti upset. She'll beat you up. But if we're going to tell these creatures what they seem to want to know about us, then that's what we have to do. And Uti is starting to understand that. But so far, as hard as we've tried to make ourselves heard, it hasn't worked.

Everyone - even Uti - agrees that I'm the best one to try. I was raised by a storyteller to be a storyteller, too. So I was taught how to get angry without any reason, or happy, or anxious. That's what you have to know to tell stories like how our troop used to have a territory five claws of days away from the river, but then a female named Kit tried to challenge the leader, another female named Eesi, and led away some of the troop to the river. Storysounds have to have feelings.

But that's the thing with the sounds of these creatures. They don't seem to have any feelings. Of course, the sounds are so low they sound stupid, but maybe they really have feelings and I can't pick them out just yet. But I have been able to figure out some of the meanings of some of their sounds. "Okay, critters, time for more tests" means we have to sit in front of glowing things that change into pictures of two yellow shapes and four blue shapes and three red shapes, and, if we point to the bunches of shapes in order from fewest to most, we get a piece of fruit. But why?

"Critters" seems to be the sound they use for the name of our troop. Dik claims that's why he doesn't do what they want. He's not a part of our troop. I tried to let one of the creatures know that the name of our troop is Bok. But she - I think it's a female because she seems to control what the other four do - decided that was my name. It's really Lem, but I gave up trying to tell her.

"Youman" is the name of these creatures' troop, or something like that. There are several sounds they make that I can't make myself, or wouldn't dare, like the name of where they come from in the sky, a part called "Ert." They do this thing with their tongues against their front teeth - something I'd never do because it's so insulting. And then there are sounds like "cute," "great" and "crap" that sound like names, but don't seem to be used the way a name would be.

The female creature's name is "An," except she seems to have more than one name. "Doctor"'s another sometimes used by one of the males, if that's what he is. His name seems to be "Sargent," except that sometimes it seems to be "Clark." And he always seems to be anxious. But the smells of these creatures really don't make much sense, like having more than one name.

Then there's another "Doctor," also named "Mark," and sometimes "Levin." And then there's another male named "Ted," who's also named "Hired Gun." And then there's a male named "Andru," also "Pilot," also "Corelli." It took me one and a half paws of days to figure out they had all those names.

One of the sounds that Levin makes a lot is "not too different from Ert." But I don't know what that means because I can't tell how it feels. But whenever Sargent hears that sound, he replies with the sounds, "So is it safe enough? The settlers are getting antsy." And then An always makes the sound, "First we have to determine whether these critters are sentient or not."

I think An wants to understand who we are and what we're able to do. I think that's why she has us do these "tests" with shapes and colors. But she won't find out what she wants to understand because these "tests" have nothing to do with what we're able to do. And I kind of don't think Ted wants her to understand. Of all these creatures, he's the only one who harasses us with sounds so low they seem to be angry. He even kicked Dik the other day and made the sound he always makes to us all, "Stinkin' roadkill."

The stories tell that the other creatures who came from the sky did understand. And once they understood enough, they got back in their shape and went away. But they were different - I guess because they came from a different part of the sky. These, the ones from Ert - what if they won't go away until they find out what they want, which they won't the way things are going.

If only we could figure out why they want to find out about us. I think if we knew what these "tests" are supposed to do, we'd all do better with them. And maybe then these creatures would let us go, and we could get back to our troop.

I guess it's all up to me. I just wish I weren't getting so bored with these pointless "tests."

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