But they had agreed to negotiate a treaty of friendship with Earth and were sending an ambassador. That was good news, I thought.
We popped out of warp right on schedule and there was the giant hazy red sun that was Aldebaran, staring us right in the face. It seemed to fill the entire sky.
Our astrogator plotted a course rapidly for Aldebaran VII, which was then at perihelion and a good ways across the heavens from where we were. The Aldebaran system is a huge one--31 planets spread out over six or seven billion miles of space.
Most of them were dead worlds, though. It was only Aldebaran VII that had any sort of intelligent life, or so our survey teams reported.
It took three days more to get within hailing distance of the seventh planet. It spun beneath us, a pretty blue-green ball about the size of Earth.
We came within about a million miles and set up an orbit as per instructions. No sooner had we done that than we found ourselves surrounded by a flock of alien warships.
I went to the radio room and made contact.
"State name and object here," I was ordered in a crisp, business-like voice.
"I'm Johnny Martin, Captain of the Terran vessel 13-XV-1, with no hostile intent. We're here to pick up an ambassador from Aldebaran to Earth, along with his pet."
I heard some hasty conferring going on and then someone said, "Hold on, Terran ship. We'll check with the home planet."
Five tense minutes passed--minutes in which I half expected to be blown out of the sky by a sudden attack. You never can tell with aliens. They're likely to do almost anything; their psychologies are unpredictable in Terran terms--as, I guess, ours are in theirs.
But finally my receiver crackled and the alien voice said, "Everything is clear, 13-XV-1. Remain in orbit and ambassador will be transferred to your ship. Any suspicious move on your part will bring immediate attack by our defense fleet."
"Don't worry. I'm not going any place. I'll wait right here."
I watched in the viewscope as a small ship bellied upward from the blue-green world below and approached us. They matched velocities with us, airlock to airlock.
"Get that fluorine room ready," I ordered my men. "The Ambassador's coming aboard."
The two ships hung side by side in space. Of course, there was no apparent relative motion since we had the same velocity. It was possible to walk back and forth from their ship to ours.