by John Shirley
“Ready and willing, Jiminy!” she said, regaining her seat. Even though she knew the game was rigged against her, she couldn’t help feeling a sense of elation. She had watched vids of all of the previous show episodes prior to embarking on the assignment. She was far better prepared than previous contestants, she felt sure. Her hunger for and grasp of esoteric knowledge of the people, places, and languages of the multiverse was vast and comprehensive. She also had a photographic memory courtesy of the implant her parents had given her for her third birthday.
“For your first clue to this world, the panelist will ask you to answer a question, Shalula. Are you ready?”
She nodded enthusiastically.
A voice did not so much speak as rearrange its secretions. Its supposed language sounded like phlegm being hacked up, rearranged, swallowed, and hacked up again. The very sound of it gave Shalula goosebumps she thought the studio audience probably could see clear to the back row. She was at a loss as to what tongue contained such fearsome noises. It had none of the common features that distinguished a tongue from a mere set of subvocalizations.
Watching the vids of the shows on which her fellow Corp members were contestants, Shalula had noticed that among the last set of questions, the clues were usually a bit indistinct in sound or image. Audience members were meant to think that the puzzle was simply extremely difficult but now Shalula wondered. Perhaps the clues were hard because they were not actually legitimate clues at all?
To test her theory, she scoured her throat to make similar sounds, as if she were about to vomit.
It took several moments, probably while Jiminy decided how to respond. She waited for him to say, “What was that you said?” or something of the sort but instead he said, “Our panelist says that was the correct answer. For the benefit of our audience, the panelist asked Shalula if she spoke the native language of Emeticus Trine and she replied that she did, a little. However, Shalula, that was a trick question as the planet in question here is not Emeticus Trine, though the panelist speaks the language. You must tell us which planet is the panelist’s home world. Do you need another clue?”
“Yes,” she said, and then added, “or should I say, ‘Hrrracccchacch?’ ”
“Heh heh. Very good. Here it is then, for the grand jackpot, tell us where you will find our next clue.”
A lacey tracery of interlocking outwardly expanding ripples of multicolored lights filled the interior of the sphere. At the center of each set of ripples a strong clear light pulsed. There was something familiar about the sequencing of the pulses—three short bursts, three long, then three short. Versed in ancient messaging modes as she was, Shalula, to her amazement, recognized that the light beams were signaling SOS, the once well known distress signal in a system of dots and dashes used by obsolete antique communications equipment. Who could be sending such a message except another communications expert? Like, for instance, the one who had preceded her on this show, and who was presently listed as AWOL from the GCS William Gates.
“Well, Shalula, do we have your answer?”
“Help,” she murmured, still considering the message.
“Does that mean you wish to ask the panelist a question?”
“Er—yes. Yes, it does Jiminy. Except my Emeticus Trine isn’t quite up to it, so I’d like to ask my question in Standard.”
“And your question is . . . ?”
“It is . . . it is . . . what does the dominant species on your planet look like?”
“I’m not sure that is the sort of question that is authorized, Shalula,” Jiminy told her cautiously.
“Oh, gee, Jiminy, nobody told me there were restrictions on what I could ask.”
Jiminy’s teeth looked bigger than ever as he smiled. “Gee, I’m sorry too, Shalula but that question is just too broad. We might as well let you ask what planet are you from?”
“Yes, well then, let me rephrase my question. We know your language is from Emeticus Trine but the planet we are speaking of is not Emeticus Trine. Are you yourself or your species dominating another planet?”
There were more gurgling hawking choking sounds. Shalula had identified them now that she read the feeling behind the noises rather than trying to make words of them. For the sounds represented to her as language were merely the pre-digestive utterances of a hungry slavering bestial being in search of a meal.
Jiminy looked extremely skittish. “I don’t think that question is quite authorized either.”
“Oh, but it should be, Jiminy. Because the answer to it holds the key to many of the riddles posed on and by this very show! I did recognize the light show from the last clue. It’s the transmission waves from this station bouncing off FLOG’s world below us and back out into space. And the rulers of this planet, FLOG’s Board of Directors, are dominated by the beings who make those horrible noises. I wonder if the audience can see the Emeticus Trinian as it really is. Because it is my contention that if they saw the true nature of this being, they would see it as one of the data-devouring demons of the Damaclesian Delta. No wonder no one guessed before. The demons are shapeshifters and can assume any form. In fact, Jiminy, I wonder if you yourself are what you seem to be?”
“Ladies and gentlemen of all species, we are going to cut to our commercial now. It seems our contestant is suffering from space sickness that is making her delusional.”
Shalula, still suspended inside the sphere, could see nothing outside except what Jiminy projected into her sphere. She could only hope her co-crew members were advancing on the stage.
“What better cover than a game show for a race that devours the data transmission and reception waves of living beings?” she continued. “Your so-called sponsors are these beings and you, Jiminy, are their leader! Not being content to manipulate from behind the scenes, you assumed the guise of a Nilurian amphibat and sought center stage yourself!”
Jiminy said nothing but through her earphones Shalula heard the scuffle of feet, the futile flap of wings, and the voices of her comrades barking orders.
A moment later her captain’s voice reached her. “We’re bringing you down now, Shalula.”
Her sphere was lowered to the stage and she stepped out. Jiminy was blurring around the edges.
“Aha!” she said. “I was right. For a data-devouring demon, being the host of a show such as this would allow you to satisfy your appetite before any of your fellows. If you had left it at that, Jiminy, or whatever your real name is, you would not have sparked a Galaxy Corps investigation. But six Galaxy Corps troops disappeared after playing your game. We want to know their fate and we want them or their remains returned at once.”
Havago’s special task force waved weapons at the blurry but still grinning host.
“Calm yourselves,” Jiminy said with a flutter of rapidly fading wings. They were morphing into a huge warty hump behind his head, which was also changing shape. The teeth now looked vaguely green and instead of being broad and square, were pointed. “We eat intellectual energy, not the beings that possess it. Your colleagues are all unharmed. We have simply given them the vacation we promised them, though we extended it somewhat. They are safe on one of our farms, hooked up to computers feeding them data indigestible to us in electronic form. They are more like cooks than meals to us. It takes very high-level intellects to absorb some of this material and some of what we are given even so is indigestible. This we recycle as questions for contestants.”
“Aha!” Shalula said. “That is how two of our people were able to get their mayday messages to me—one implanted a message within a frost flower holo and one in the pulsing of those lights.”
“But that’s cheating!” Jiminy said indignantly. “I’m afraid we can’t award you any prizes after all, Shalula.”
“No need,” she said grimly. “Breaking up your operation will be prize enough.”
Later, when the contestants, civilian and Galaxy Corpsmen alike, had been rescued, the off-duty members of the Havago’s crew sat around the recreat
ion lounge feeling at loose ends. Usually, this was the time when they could tune in for another game of Name That Planet! But now, of course, that was no longer possible. To her dismay, Shalula, who had been hailed as a heroine, now found herself the target of resentful glances. But as a second-voyage replicator technician was flipping frequencies, the ship’s intercom crackled to life.
“Lt. Makira, please report to the bridge. We have an incoming communication for you from Corps headquarters.”
Shalula arrived on the bridge to see the captain and other personnel standing at attention before the com screen. General Azimblii herself stood beside an amphibat much like the one Jiminy Jimson appeared to be. The amphibat also had large teeth and carried a briefcase. Shalula also snapped to attention in front of the general.
“At ease, Lt. Makira. This is Consul Flaabaat of Flaabaat, Flaabaat, and Smith Attorneys of Intergalactic Law, Incorporated. He is representing the being known to most of us as Jiminy Jimson and the FLOG corporation, who have brought a lawsuit against the corps.”
“I thought they would be incarcerated by now, General!” Shalula said indignantly. “Why are they suing us?”
“It’s complicated,” the general said, “But they have a great deal of power and money and the Galactic Congress has recently cut our own legal budget. Therefore, I hope you will consider FLOG’s proposition, which they wished Consul Flaabaat to present to you personally.”
“With respect, ma’am, I will not, even for the Corps, become one of FLOG’s data-feeding drones.”
Consul Flaabaat fluttered his wings in a soothing sort of way that indicated her assumption of his purpose was unwarranted. “Once your dramatic rescue of your colleagues (which, by the way, caused extreme public humiliation, harm, mental suffering, and constituted an invasion of privacy) was broadcast, beings throughout the cosmos realized what our sponsors required. All positions for data processors vacated by former contestants have been filled. We have quite a waiting list of applicants, in fact.”
“Then what?” Shalula asked.
“Well, our clients wish to invite you to appear as a hostess on another show they have in production. You see, the show on which you appeared garnered the highest ratings Name That Planet! ever enjoyed in its brief history. Viewers simply ate up—if you’ll pardon the expression—the drama of a game involving a live rescue. Our clients quickly realized that reality game shows are the wave of the future and you, you intrepid pioneer you, showed them the way. Therefore, they have agreed to drop their suit against Galaxy Corps if you will sign a contract to host the first six episodes of Save That Alien! So what will it be, Lt. Makira? Will you risk losing your commission in Galaxy Corps or go for the big rewards of hosting another popular FLOG TV production?”
Shalula said, in the appropriate communications mode for the situation, “I choose option number two, Consul Flaabaat.”
[Editor’s Note: A hendiatris is (a) three words used to express one idea. Other examples are “wine, women, and song” and William Shakespeare’s “Friends, Romans, countrymen . . . ”]
Be a bit patient with this story, sports fans. It’s clever scientific mystery will hold your attention, but the sports connection may be, at first, obscure. Once a certain gentleman from British Colombia enters the picture, some readers will, at least, have a good clue about what sport is involved . . . but even once you figure that out, there’s still mystery involved. And if it takes a little longer for the rest of you to figure it all out, just remember: In any sport, it may not all be in the numbers, but a great deal of the game is. And since numerals are the closest thing we have to a universal language, then how might others first try to communicate to us . . . ?
Distance
Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff
In the movies, you were slumped at your computer console, fast asleep, surrounded by empty Pepsi cans and candy wrappers, when the system pinged. You woke on a tide of adrenaline, flinging candy wrappers and crumpled cans to the lab floor and, after a moment of disorientation, realized WHAT THAT SOUND MEANT.
In reality, Dr. Santiago Rodriguez was standing in the middle of the lab stuffing his face with nachos when the Signal Detection System spoke—figuratively speaking. What the interface actually did was fire an alarm that played the five-note sequence from Close Encounters of the Third Kind, at Dr. Mukerjee’s whimsy.
When he’d first come to Project Quetzalcoatl, Santiago had jumped out of his skin every time the system pinged. Now, three years and many false alarms later, he didn’t even twitch. Now, he stood chewing like a contented cow, contemplating a response to the summons. Most likely it meant another bogey or that Kev and Roz would have to run diagnostics, which would mean pulling the Spectrum Analyzer and Signal Detection Subsystem offline for a day or two.
He was strolling over to the SDS console when Gita Mukerjee poked her head in the door. “Snag a tire, Sandy?” she asked, but her eyes were hopeful.
Santiago laughed, set aside the nachos, and dusted his hands off on his jeans. “Heck, no, Gita. I got me a live one this time.” He dropped into his chair and swiveled to the display.
“Any of those nachos left?”
“Uh, yeah . . . Kitchen.” His mind was already occupied with the data. He got a raw read on the left, a waterfall plot of the data on the right. He was still studying the waterfall plot of the side band when Gita returned from the kitchen with a small plate of nachos.
“What have we got?” she asked.
“Not sure. Come look at this.” He felt a peculiar wriggling in his stomach. Nachos were no longer of any interest. He was seeing pulses in the microwave window—pulses that were clearly patterned. They played in series, paused, then picked up again. There was very little drift. But the carrier wave was in the 1500 MHz range and looked familiar. In fact, Santiago could put his hands on any number of archived log entries that had recorded the same signal.
It didn’t look like a glitch. Those were generally more capricious. And the few hackers who’d tried to get bogeys into the system had been unable to get past the first Follow-Up Detection Device or couldn’t resist tapping out “ET phone home” in Morse code or something equally precious.
Santiago looked up at Gita. “What do you think, Dr. Mukerjee?”
“Well, Dr. Rodriguez, I think we need to call a powwow. This looks like a job for the FUDDs.”
The small conference room was dim and hushed. The handful of scientists sat, expectant, their eyes on the screen at the front of the room where Santiago Rodriguez stood next to the podium that held his laptop.
“The data signal is in the 2 GHz range,” Santiago told the gathering. “It’s regular and it repeats in cycles. It seems to be coming from the direction of the constellation Taurus.” He hesitated, allowing himself a bit of wonder at the words he would say next. “At a distance of 100 AU.”
He watched the others’ faces as they digested the information; saw that Gita Mukerjee, seated at the edge of the group, was doing the same.
Their Program Director, Dr. Kurt Costigyan, studied the screen intently, eyes roving over and over the figures there.
“That’s outside the heliosphere,” said one of the Techs, a lanky redhead named Kevin.
Santiago tapped the touch pad on the laptop and the projection on the screen beside him changed to a graphic representation of the signal’s source. He tapped a second time and a waterfall plot from the spectrum analysis opened on the right side of the screen.
“Oh, wow,” said Kevin.
“Here’s the carrier signal . . . ” Santiago switched the display again to show a second waterfall plot.
“I’ll be damned.” Kurt Costigyan sat back in the plastic conference chair. He was a big man; the chair squeaked loudly in protest. “That’s Pioneer 10.”
Santiago didn’t realize he’d leaned so heavily against the podium until it scraped away from him across the floor. He straightened. “That’s what we thought, but . . . ” He glanced over at Gita Mukerjee. “We don’t see how. She’
s so far out.”
“And she’s so dead,” said Kevin. “Those old power cells couldn’t possibly send from that distance. Even if she was turned in the right direction.”
“Couldn’t possibly?” asked Gita, gesturing at the screen.
“Okay, shouldn’t be able to.”
Kurt looked up at Santiago. “I didn’t know you were scheduled to ping Pioneer.”
“We weren’t.”
“Then why—?”
Santiago licked his lips. “We didn’t ping her—if this really is her—she pinged us.”
“With this . . . pattern?”
Santiago nodded, then clicked up another screen. This one came with a shower of noise that sounded like a Flamenco dance played at warp-speed. The graphical display showed the pulses as dashes and dots of white on black. The sequence was composed of multiple series of long and short pulses divided by mere seconds of silence.
“Oh, please tell me that’s not Morse code,” said Kurt.
“Not Morse code,” Santiago assured him. “If you listen real carefully, you might be able to catch the pattern, but I’m glad we’re not relying on our ears to decipher this. The spectrum analyzer pulled it apart pretty efficiently, and came up with this.” A key press brought up a window atop the display of dashes and dots. This one showed a series of eight numbers:
18.9, 27.44, 27.44, 27.44, 27.44, 103.6, 121.9, 99.1
Kurt’s eyes flickered between the exposed portion of the graphic and the numbers. “Okay, so it’s eighteen long pulses and nine short?”
“ ‘Long’ being purely arbitrary,” said Gita. “Those pulses can’t be more than . . . ”
“A quarter-second,” said Santiago. “Then there’s a half-second pause before the next set starts: twenty-seven long; forty-four short, and so on. Then, there’s a three second pause after the last repeat of 27.44. Then there’s about a nine second pause after the last number and the whole sequence starts up again with 18.9. It repeats twice per minute, roughly. It’s sending steadily—hasn’t stopped since we picked it up.”