****
"This list of substances that the Stone-Coats want is impossible!" complained White Cloud the next morning as the science and leadership teams met in the lab. "They want many tons of carbon, and that's not a problem. Dozens of the Stone-Coats are hard at work right now getting plenty of trees containing tons of carbon, but they aren't getting enough metals, metalloids and some other requested elements."
"What about that landfill I passed along the entrance road?" asked Running Bear.
"That's a good idea!" exclaimed White Cloud. "We have a several tons of recycle materials piling up there that probably contain many of the elements that the Stone-Coats want. That would get us started, but we'll need much more."
"There are plenty of other landfills and junkyards throughout the state," noted Chief Talking Bear. "We have men that can drive trash and dump trucks, but getting the trucks and scrap will require a lot of money. We can come up with a few thousand dollars at most."
"The Tribe never had much cash or credit," lamented Mouse.
"The Stone-Coats have diamond scales by the ton," pointed out Running Bear. "Even just the Bear Claw is worth many millions of dollars in terms of minerals."
"A scale would be much too big; a prune or fist-sized diamond would draw far too much attention," said Jack. "Feed the Claw some wood and tell it what we need. Maybe the Claw can provide us some much smaller stones that we could sell in the Albany area, then rent trucks and buy scrap there that can be driven to the Reservation."
Using their computer-link to Bear Claw they expressed their need for small diamonds to the Stone-Coats and placed several pounds of charcoal around the Claw. "Make sure that the diamonds are pure," Jack emphasized. "Any imbedded graphite electrical connections or logic gates might be detected and lead to unwanted inquiries."
Soon they had several pounds of raw diamonds that were pea-sized or smaller. A snowplow led convoy left the Reservation late in the morning, bound for the Albany area and a rich bounty of scrap materials. Jack, Mary and White Cloud led a team of truck drivers towards Albany while a truck-load of scrap from the local Tribe landfill headed back to Giant's Rest. An army of Tribe members with shovels manually cleared a path for the anticipated scrap trucks through Giants' Rest and halfway up the path to the Great Lodge, until huge boulders blocked them.
At the Great Lodge and all around the Mountain Chief Talking Bear managed the Tribe warriors that watched as dozens and then hundreds of Stone-Coats foraged for trees that they cut down with diamond teeth and then carried up the Mountain. Most closely resembled Hairless Bear, but some took other shapes, including a few that resembled great-tusked hairy elephants that could carry tree-trunks using their tusks and trunks, or giant crabs that carried trees in their claws and on their backs. The Mohawk were careful to keep out of their way, and the Stone-Coats ignored the humans, except for a few of the smaller Stone-Coats that stood and watched human activity instead of gathering food.
Chief Mike spent his time searching for his missing wife, mostly in Giants' Rest.
Inside the lab, Doc, Ed, Taking Owl, and Frank continued their efforts to communicate with and understand the Stone-Coats.
"No doubt about it," said Ed, "they are watching us as closely as we are watching them."
"Closer," said Frank. "They are definitely tapped into our Wi-Fi and from the usage stats I can see that they are surfing the internet big-time. They may be figuring us out but we can't hack into their side."
"Why not?" Ed asked. "If they are essentially walking computers that are connected somehow to your computer and to each other, shouldn't it be possible to hack your way into them?"
"Maybe in theory," said Frank. "But you can't readily hack into a system that you know nothing about. Their system architectures and communication protocols are totally unknown to us, and those dudes have probably been studying ours for years or maybe decades."
"Well we certainly don't have decades," said Doc. "At this rate they're going to deplete nearby forests and woodpiles within a few days. At that point yummy people and lodges might look more tempting to them."
"I worry that we have not shown them any of our strength," said Ed. "They might get over-confident. In human history there have been many instances when appeasement of potential adversaries has resulted in total capitulation or in unwanted conflict."
"And we still don't know what they know or don't know." added Doc. "They could greatly underestimate human military strength, if all they see is a few armed Mohawk tribesmen. A mere couple thousand actual military men with flame-throwers could probably stop them all in their tracks, and they could then easily be blown to bits using high explosives, or whatever. The military would gather the bits of them that are left and study them in top-secret labs to learn how they control minerals and so-forth."
"Do they appreciate what a terrific break the Tribe is giving them?" Ed wondered. "They could have been greeted by the US Army instead of the Tribe, and been blown to bits."
"Don't attribute such complex emotions to them," said Doc. "Something like 'appreciation' may be beyond them."
"Good point," said Talking Owl. "We sense only vague feelings from them and computer-like logic, and nothing in-between. They may not even be aware themselves of their own feelings, or they may think that those are insignificant. It must have been very difficult for them to learn to communicate with us."
"Or to figure out what an emotion tainted word like 'difficult' means," said Doc. "But neglecting emotions, what do they understand of the physical conditions they will face over the next centuries? Do they understand that climate change towards coldness is very local and according to models is likely to be relatively ephemeral? It won't last long enough here to form glaciers, and there probably won't be a solid return to widespread global glaciation for tens of thousands of years."
"Perhaps we should educate them," said Ed.
"That would have to be via our computer link with them," said Doc. "I've shouted things at them as they walk by and they completely ignore me. I suspect that they may be deaf, at least as far as sound carried in the air is concerned. That might make sense for beings that live mostly inside of rock and communicate electronically."
"They are deaf also to our more coherent psychic thoughts," noted Talking Owl. "Turtle Man would have appreciated the irony. For centuries we Mohawk have sought to better communicate with them psychically when they are actually deaf to our cogent telepathic thoughts."
"The Tribe should have sought out computer nerds like Frank instead of telepathic folks like me," said Ed.
"I have software on my computer that converts voices to digitized words," said Frank. "That could improve our communications with them."
"Turn it on and let's try it," said Talking Owl.
"Ha!" Frank exclaimed. "I see that it's already turned on! But I didn't turn it on!"
The team exchanged nervous glances.
"Crap!" Ed exclaimed. "The Stone-Coats turned it on! Does that mean what I think it means?"
"They may have already been eavesdropping on our verbal conversations here in the lab!" said Doc.
"Or maybe anywhere we have an activated computer with an internal transceiver that acts as a microphone," added Frank.
"That could be a good thing," said Ed. "The better they understand us, the better chance we have to work with them."
"Spoken like a wide-eyed, naive, the-cup-is-half-full liberal that doesn't believe in evil, but you could be right," said Doc.
"How do we know if they're listening to us?" Talking Owl wondered.
"Let's ask them!" said Doc. "Stone-Coats, please indicate on the screen if you can hear and understand our spoken words."
"WE HEAR YOU," came the immediate reply on the laptop screen.
"Do you understand us?" asked Ed.
"MUCH WE UNDERSTAND; SOME WE DO NOT."
"This is monumental! We should have all of the Tribe leadership here to help us talk with them," said Ed.
"And the clev
er Mohican too," said Doc. "I hope he gets back here very soon. In the meantime let's entertain them with some Global Warming basics."
****