“So when you talk sarcastically, they can’t understand you?”
“Sort of. Their speech might as well be written text, so when they hear sarcasm they aren’t even aware that there’s a hidden meaning to understand. So far, they’ve taken every message they’ve intercepted literally, and the Protectorate Maul has been able to catch them completely unaware on several occasions. We’ve even experimented with allowing the rebels to intercept us so we could bait them and the outcome has been favorable. Plus, according to a few interceptions of our own, it’s pissing the rebels off to no end,” Maz said. She tried and failed not to seem overeager—she hadn’t had a chance to discuss the intricacies of her project with anyone but Nines, and was glad for the chance to talk about her work. DuGalle nodded in apparent understanding.
“The beauty of it is that the only reason it works on the Grzzh rebels is that they’re fanatically against integrating with the Consortium, and we’re the only ones who could possibly explain to them how it works. Racism is literally losing a war for them.”
“So you say,” DuGalle said. There was something about the way his mouth was set that told Maz she was irritating the officer. He was a military man, after all, and she was treading in his territory without subjecting herself to the endemic risk—or maybe he was jealous that the embassy had found a simple way to help the Grrzh that didn’t involve building them a warship.
“Well, we’ll see,” Maz said. “The Protectorate Maul’s probably just scanned for the jump point we found. They’ll pop into the rebel base of operations while we’re out tonight. I’m willing to bet it’s unguarded while the rebels search for patrols, and the base will be dispatched by the time we get back. The embassy thinks there’s a chance that it’ll win us the war.”
“Wait, we’ve won already?” DuGalle asked.
“Like I said, I’m willing to wager. Why else would I take tonight off to get everyone together and celebrate?”
DuGalle keyed the pad for Maz’s front door and wordlessly followed her into the apartment hallway. The officer plainly had something to say, but he was holding back.
“What’s wrong, Simon?” Maz asked eventually.
“You just sent a loved one into a combat zone and you want to make bets?” His posture was stiff, his back and shoulders rigid as they walked.
“I meant that colloquially, but you know what? Sure. I’ll bet with you. I’ll bet that my months of research, my considerable efforts and sacrifice to get this program moving, and my very capable girlfriend have better odds than your uninformed skepticism.” Maz stopped walking, and DuGalle halted beside her. His face twitched with indignant guilt, and Maz smiled and reached for his hand. “I understand your doubts, but we’ve put more thought into this than you appreciate. Okay? Let’s have an enjoyable evening. We can get back to the military talk tomorrow.”
DuGalle sighed. “All right. I’m sorry. But this is playing with fire, Maz. I wouldn’t want to be in your shoes when it doesn’t work.”
“You know, that’s what my mom said about Nines and I when we started dating. Your concern is noted, big guy. But trust me—it’ll work.”
Grrzh Dreadnought Protectorate Maul, Outside Former Grrzh Rebel Base
“Dang, I can’t believe that worked as well as it did!” Nines said, as she swung her maintenance tug into one of the Protectorate Maul’s cavernous docking bays, an incapacitated rebel lifeboat gripped in her ship’s manipulator arms. The diminutive craft puttered to the refueling station the warship’s crew had converted for her, where it lowered the captive lifeboat to the hangar deck before dropping it the remaining two meters into the center of a waiting squad of Grrzh marines. Just beyond the translucent docking bay shield, the gargantuan metal shards of the Dyson Field slowly spun in the disturbance caused by the detonating rebel base of operations.
“Satisfied. It did seem to go well. Thank you for helping our crews with salvage and rescue,” Burg said through the tug’s comms.
“Eh, it’s the least I can do,” Nines said as she keyed in the tug’s docking sequence. Around her little ship, squadrons of one-man Grrzh craft landed and departed as automated refit drones swapped their combat kits for more appropriate cleanup apparatuses. One drone regarded Nines’s ship momentarily before it puttered away, unable to decipher the ship’s foreign construction.
Nines stepped out of the roaring hangar and into the shimmering olive green access hallway, where Burg waited. The hunched Grrzh diplomat tapped the fingers of her secondary arm-cluster together, while the primary cluster swept outward in a traditional Grrzh greeting, rotating her delicate wrists and fanning her fingers. Nines would have attempted returning the gesture, but Burg had informed her that her first few trials were almost offensively bad. Nines simply settled for a friendly wave before leaning one shoulder against the wall.
“What’s up? Why’d you call me in?” she asked. Her small glass handheld vibrated on her belt as the wing-like fixtures in Burg’s face began to oscillate, beating together to create the deep hum of Grrzh speech.
“Unsure,” the handheld interpreted, translating Burgh’s buzzing into an amiable but monotone female voice. “The bridge officers requested an opportunity to speak with you.”
“Uh-oh. Am I going alone?”
“Reassuring. No I shall accompany you. They might mean well but they are intimidating and I do not think that their capacity to understand your speech has improved since the last time you spoke to them. Helpful. If it is required I can translate for your benefit,” Burg said, the arch of her chitinous bulk lowering slightly. Nines suspected that Burg’s posture was a Grrzh sign of trust or comfort, but she wasn’t entirely sure—body language was more Maz’s cup of tea.
“Aw, thanks, Burg. That bridge gives me the creeps,” Nines said.
“Warm. It is my pleasure.” The two walked to a door for one of the ship trams, where Burg keyed in a transport request. As they waited, Burg’s second forearm cluster entwined its fingers together, one hand picking at the gaps in the chitin that separated her knuckles.
“Inquisitive,” the Grrzh hummed, “Where will you go now that the war is over.”
Nines blinked in surprise. “You know, I hadn’t thought that far ahead. I wasn’t really planning long-term as far as this program was concerned. I figure I’ll probably head back home to the station. Get a bowl from my favorite noodle joint, hug Maz so hard we both pass out, beg for my old job at Hull Maintenance. That kinda stuff.”
“Curious. You miss home.” The elevator arrived and both stepped in. Nines watched Burg tap in the bridge access code and tried her best not to memorize it for later, but failed. Old habits died hard.
“Well, yeah! Is that weird?” Nines asked.
“Expository. No I was simply confused by the degree of excitement you displayed when you first began this assignment and the excitement you display now as you are about to end it.”
“What, the Grrzh don’t get homesick?”
“Expository. Not particularly we do not place emphasis on home or family and instead emphasize the individual. Ruminating. I believe it may have something to do with our insecurity about evolving from insectoid races in a galaxy dominated by primate and reptilian types, but I am no historian.”
Nines smiled and propped herself against the elevator wall. “Man, I can’t imagine that. I grew up on the station, you know? The administrators named me after the bulkhead they found me in. Part of that was why I took the job, though. Maz has been everywhere and she has all these stories. I kinda wanted one of those stories for myself, but now I’ve got it, I’d like to hop back in my big metal bubble. It’s got all my favorite creature comforts and all the folks I love.”
There was a pause, even after her handheld finished translating Nines’ speech into Grrzh. After a few uncomfortable seconds, Burg spoke again. “Inquiring. Is the Consortium station truly the only place with people you care for.”
Nines cocked her head. “What do you—” she began, before the elevator ha
lted and the doors slid open. Nines winced as she stared into the imposing darkness of the Protectorate Maul’s unlit bridge. While Consortium and Grrzh engineers had collaborated together to build most of the dreadnaught, the bridge and the majority of the living quarters were solely Grrzh design.
Burg had explained once that the Grrzh military saw light as a distraction, and that even since their homeworld-bound days had kept strategic tents dark to prevent the intrusion of visual stimuli. This meant that even though every member of the bridge crew was plugged into the ship’s systems via virtual reality masks, the bridge was still almost entirely unlit but for a few digital consoles and the light from Nines’ elevator.
It also meant that Nines was expected to stand in the center of a dark, three-tiered room surrounded by a legion of masked bug-people. Her time on the station had pushed her far from anthropocentrism, but the sight still unsettled her. She jumped when she felt a hand on her shoulder, but when she realized it was Burg trying to comfort her she smiled back and patted her friend’s fingers.
“Formalpleasestepintothechamberandallowtheelevatordoorstoclose,” Nines’ handheld dirged.
“Oh! Sorry,” Nines said, and took a quick step inside the chamber. As soon as Burg stepped in behind her, the door slid shut with a sound like a sheathing sword and immersed the two in darkness.
Nines tried to find which of the Grrzh her handheld was translating, but behind their interface masks none of the bridge crew seemed to be looking in her direction. “Gratefulyourassistanceisgreatlyappreciatedwithoutyouthisdecisivevictorywouldnothavebeenpossible.”
“Yes, of course—” Nines continued to search the crowd for a sir or madam to address, but still found none. “—Your … Honor. It has been my pleasure to assist, and to grow more familiar with your culture. Ambassadress Burg has been a great help in this regard.”
“WarmitisgoodtohearthatwecouldbringourculturesclosertogetherindeedevenastheremainderoftherebelfleetfliesstraightintothejawsofyourConsortiumwarbaseourbondsgrowcloserinheartsandinblood.”
“I’m pleased to hear that we can continue to grow closer as a community—” Nines was cut off as Burg tightened her grip on her shoulder. Nines turned back and met Burg’s eyes, and the Grrzh shook her head frantically. “What? Did I miss something?” Nines asked.
“Alarmed. They have just informed you that the rebels have plotted a course toward your Consortium space station.”
“They’re what?” Nines shouted.
“Confusedisthisnotatacticalroutetheywillsurelybecrushedbyyoursuperiordefenses.”
“No, the station isn’t a military installation! It’s almost entirely a civilian population; a refit and refuel station at best! The security ships won’t be able to fend off an entire fleet!”
There was a pause.
“SuspiciousisthismoreofyourtonalduplicityIcannottell.”
“Tonal duplicity? You mean sarcasm?” Nines asked.
“NervousItakethatasano.”
Dyson Field Station Embassy
Maz and Simon stumbled through the Consortium embassy doors, leaning on one another for support.
“Oh my God, I’ve never seen someone dance that badly before,” Maz said, flattening the collar of her jacket.
“I wasn’t that bad!” DuGalle said.
“You made that Iliff girl cry!”
“She shouldn’t watch bar dance floors if she can’t take a little human mambo!”
“She was so innocent! So young! And you come along, rolling around like a creature made entirely out of shoulders and you expose her to a new world of darkness and uncertainty!”
“I don’t—whoa. This isn’t your apartment,” DuGalle said, looking up at the embassy ceiling’s wide blue archways. When the sprawling architecture began to unravel like a throbbing cobalt fractal, he wished he had not.
“Sounds like a certain shoulder golem’s optimistic about his chances. Why don’t you—” Maz blinked as she saw the empty digital terminals and processing equipment. “Oh, wow. It really isn’t. I must have punched in my elevator code for work instead of going home.”
“I told you that you needed a night out! You’re a workaholic!” DuGalle said, wedging his back against a desk. Something chirped in his breast pocket, and he swatted at his chest in an attempt to quiet it.
“I can’t be a workaholic if I’m drunk! That’s ex post facto on ’holism, I think …” Maz trailed off. A row away from her, a terminal had flickered to life. She moved closer and keyed up a pending alert. Security drones detected an intrusion signal lurking beyond the Dyson field. “Hey, DuGalle, did you—”
She turned to face DuGalle, who had finally managed to retrieve his chirping handheld from his breast pocket and answer it. To Maz’s horror, the security captain went white as a sheet.
“Grrzh rebel ships are waiting outside the Dyson field. Security ships are asking me what to do. Oh gods …”
Maz dug her wallet out of her jacket pockets and plucked two pills from a capsule in one of its compartments. She swallowed one and handed the second to DuGalle, who refused it and tapped an implant nodule behind his left ear. Maz counted to six and felt the effects of the alcohol wash away as her organs kicked into overdrive to metabolize it.
“They’re hailing us,” Maz said, tapping the blinking terminal. “We won’t be able to get a senior ambassador here for another fifteen minutes.”
“Stall them. I need to coordinate with the security attaché,” DuGalle said. Maz nodded and opened the frequency between the embassy and the Grrzh ship. A large Grrzh seated in a massive captain’s chair gesticulated wildly with both its arm-clusters.
“FuriousConsortiummixedracescumstandanddeliver,” the terminal translated in dull monotone. Maz recognized the figure onscreen as the Grrzh rebels’ ruthless Admiral Ferrnj.
Over Maz’s shoulder, DuGalle muttered to himself as he tapped at his handheld’s screen. “Why the hell are they here? We haven’t been a strategically significant target since the beginning of the war! They’re so far past their front line they might as well be—”
“Righteousyourdeceitfulopposite-speechhascostuseverything. DemandingwhereisthefleshycharlatancalledMaz.”
“Oh. Uh-oh,” Maz said.
“For a civilization that doesn’t understand sarcasm, they’re just as irritated by it as anyone else,” DuGalle said over her shoulder. Maz toggled the transmit setting.
“This is Maz, Dyson Station Embassy Journeyman Behaviorist. Why have you come to our station?” The Grrzh captain straightened visibly in his seat.
“Defiantwehavecometodiehonorablyonthespearsofthetruevictorsinthiswar.Bitterourownkindcouldonlydefeatuswiththeaidofyourtechnologyandmanipulation.”
“They what?” Maz said to herself. A second Grrzh ducked into frame.
“PlaintiveapologiessirbutthereareonlyahandfulofConsortiumfrigatespresent. Regretfulwewillnotbeabletoperishinbattleagainstafleetthisfeeble.” Admiral Ferrnj turned to his subordinate, his antennae lowered in surprise.
“Astonished,” he said, slower than Maz had heard any Grrzh speak. “Ohmygoodness.”
Grrzh Dreadnaught Protectorate Maul, Dyson Field
Nines tapped furiously at her cabin terminal, cycling through the ship’s communication arrays.
“Concerned. Is there anything I can do,” Burg asked behind her.
“Nope,” Nines said. She didn’t know too much about hyperluminal communication, but she didn’t think that there was any method available to the Protectorate Maul that could contact a far-off Consortium fleet without also letting the rebel fleet know they were coming. There were plenty of ways to mask a short-range transmission, but contacting anyone outside the Dyson Field was another matter entirely.
“Nervous. We have arrived at the station but four out of five of the security fleet have been damaged beyond combat capabilities all have retreated into the cover of the Dyson Field the remaining rebel ships have formed a holding pattern around the station.” Burg tapped at her own handheld, a gift Nines had prov
ided the ambassadress at the start of her journey.
“A holding pattern?” Nines asked.
“Apprehensive. Yes they seem to want to take the station or the personnel inside it hostage.”
Nines rubbed at her temples. “Can you send a field projection to my terminal?”
“Helpful. I assume that you are requesting my compliance rather than assessing my ability to—”
“Please, Burg. Now.”
“Concerned. You are upset.” Burg’s arm clusters fidgeted.
“Yes, Burg! I’m terrified! My home and my girlfriend are in mortal danger and I can’t do anything about it! Please, just send the projection!”
Burg tapped silently at her handheld and Nines’ terminal received a three-dimensional diagram of the rebel fleet’s positions. The security fleet, although hopelessly outmanned, still outgunned the rebel fleet and had inflicted significant losses. The five ellipsoid ships huddled behind the shattered metal of the Dyson field, cut off from the seven remaining knife-shaped Grrzh battlecruisers. The largest had connected itself to the Consortium station using what looked to Nines like a primitive boarding umbilical.
“It seems like their capital ship’s docked with the station,” Nines said.
“Informative. A last-ditch rebel tactic if any ships try to interfere while their shock troops storm the station they detonate the ship’s engines and claim as many civilian lives as possible,” Burg said. Nines said nothing as she rotated the image, trying to find something she hadn’t seen yet.
“Then we can’t discharge our weapons. All we can do is move and talk. What the hell can we—” Nines froze. “We get in close! We use the Maul’s stealth systems to get in there before they see us coming and shield the station from the blast!”
“Concerned. That does not sound like a safe plan we should wait for Consortium forces.”
“Wait? We can’t wait, we don’t even know if help is coming! Look, even with just civilian grade armor and shielding, the detonation would only make a divot in the station’s surface. Problem is, a divot in a station that size could still cost hundreds of civilian lives, if not thousands. But put some distance and a nearly indestructible military dreadnought between the station and the explosion—”
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