Gibraltar Earth

by Michael McCollum

  The being’s body was thinner than that of a human, and looked more flexible. The six-fingered hands seemed patterned after a flower opening its petals to the sun. The feet were solid clubs of flesh without toes, making it look as though Butch was wearing moccasins. Except for an equipment belt that encircled his waist, the alien was unclothed. He was male, but not as obviously so as a human male would be if similarly attired.

  Moreover, while they watched Butch, he watched them back with an intensity that was hard to match. Except for an occasional blink, he did not move.

  Lisa was faster than Pavel in finding her voice. “What progress in communicating with him?”

  Bendagar reviewed their attempts during the return to Sol and since they had transferred the alien to PoleStar. He finished with, “He seems totally uninterested in our attempts at communication. Who knows? Maybe his people are telepathic.”

  “With those ears, he can obviously hear. How long do you work with him each day?”

  “At least two hours.”

  She nodded. “There’s your problem. The best way to establish communication with someone is to live with them. When can I move in?”

  This last caused Dr. Bendagar to sputter. “Move in where?”

  “With Butch, of course,” Lisa replied in a tone that made it seem the most obvious thing in the world.

  “You can’t go into that cage. It isn’t safe.”

  “Isn’t safe how?”

  “We haven’t absolutely eliminated the possibility of interspecies infections, for one thing. Why else do you think we keep this section under quarantine?”

  “Surely you must know the probability of us catching something from him is low or else you wouldn’t have brought him aboard this station.”

  “Low, but not yet zero. It will still take several months to be absolutely sure,” Bendagar insisted. “Until then, you will have to work through the glass like the rest of us.”

  Lisa let loose with a comment that she had not learned in linguistics class. “If I work through the glass, I will have about as much success as you have had. If this is to succeed, it must be a saturation learning experience for both of us.”

  The chief scientist hesitated and pondered his dilemma. He noted Dieter Pavel’s look and knew what the government man’s recommendation would be. He had made it clear enough in the office that afternoon that he wanted the alien speaking at the earliest possible moment. Then again, if this impetuous woman wanted to risk her life, who was he to stop her? Finally, he nodded. “Very well. I hope you realize that you are offering yourself up as a human guinea pig for the biologists’ studies.”

  “I realize that.”

  “What if he bites?” Pavel asked.

  Lisa turned to him and smiled. “Then I’ll bite him back. Seriously, I would not suggest this if it were not important. Two rational beings ought to be able to understand one another, but only if they can establish common ground of some kind. This is the only way I know to learn what I must to crack this being’s language – assuming, of course, that he has one. I certainly won’t succeed if I am limited to an hour a day of ‘Me Tarzan, You Jane’ through a centimeter of armor glass.”

  She turned to Bendagar. “How do I get inside?”

  “Do you mean now?”

  “Why not?”

  He sighed, recognizing her determination. “What will you need?”

  “A sleeping bag, my kit bag, and enough food to last me a week. Give me space rations. I will switch to real food once I am sure the smell will not upset our guest. Oh yes, and I want the camera turned off in the head whenever I need to use it.”

  “Very well.”

  “Now, how do I get inside?”

  Bendagar reached for his communicator. “Wait, I’ll call for some of the station maintenance people. They will unbolt this door for you.”

  #

  Sar-Say watched with apprehension as the barrier was removed and one of the bipeds floated into his cage. At first, he thought they were after more tissue samples. He prepared himself to be prodded and poked again. He was surprised when, after the others handed several bundles to the creature, they replaced the thick transparency that kept him prisoner.

  The newcomer was female, he observed, or at least of the subgroup of creatures he had tentatively identified as such. The cylindrical roll she carried had the looks of one of the null gravity beds they had provided to him for sleeping. In addition, the other packages were similar to the small rectangular packets from which Sar-Say had observed the guards eating on more than one occasion. It was then he realized that this creature intended to take up residence inside his cell. Evidently, then, this knowledge seeker would attempt to establish communication with him. It was a turn of events that he had been expecting.

  After stowing her gear on the far side of the compartment from where Sar-Say’s own sleeping mattress was hung, the female pulled herself to a point just beyond reach and lashed herself to a chair. She then leaned forward, showed her teeth in the ferocious gesture that Sar-Say had learned signified mirth among these beings, and spoke two syllables: “Leee ... Saa!”

  As she uttered the sound, she gestured in her own direction, then bared her teeth again and gestured toward Sar-Say. When he did not respond, she repeated the performance. He continued to watch her in silence as his brain worked overtime to resolve a dilemma he had been considering ever since his capture.

  It had taken Sar-Say several days to come to the realization that these people were ignorant of Civilization. The situation was not without precedent, of course. There were stations throughout the Broan dominion that swept the stars for telltale signs of a technologically advanced species. Once detected, a flotilla of warcraft would use dozens of refocused stargates to converge on that system. Usually a show of overwhelming force was sufficient to gain a species’ grudging acceptance of Broan domination. Sometimes actual fighting took place. In either event, the decision was never in doubt. A species either submitted to the overlords or else they were exterminated.

  However, this was the first time such outsiders had, in effect, discovered Civilization for themselves. The situation held great danger, but also, the prospect of great opportunity. Properly exploited, it would bring considerable profit to Sar-Say and all his line. Everything turned on what he told these beings of the situation out among the stars. To be caught in a lie would be disastrous. It would likely end his life and all possibility of personal profit. Yet, the whole truth would be equally disastrous. How much to tell these strange bipeds and how much to conceal? That was the dilemma.

  There had been no need to commit himself so long as his captors were content merely to watch him. With the arrival of this knowledge seeker, however, the time for contemplation had ended. Eventually he must acknowledge their attempts at communication. Once committed, he would have to tell them something of Civilization, and whatever that something was, it would have to be self-consistent. He had spent his time in captivity mapping out several versions of “the truth.” Each had its advantages and its risks.

  The problem was that any advanced species possessed computers – by definition! With computers comes information theory, and that leads to a scientific theory of language. Shortly after inventing the infernal machines, most species quickly developed software that could analyze an individual’s speech – say that of a prisoner – and determine from the content whether that individual told the truth. The method was not 100% accurate, of course; and it worked less well on aliens than on one’s own species. However, given a sufficiently large sample and the time to study the subject’s pronouncements, the internal inconsistencies would inevitably become apparent. No thinking being can remember everything when forced to substitute imagination for actual experience over a long period.

  Since Sar-Say expected his captors would use the technique on him, he dare not stray too far from the truth. In fact, the longer the bipeds studied him, the less he would be able to conceal. No, if he was going to lie, he would have to limi
t it to something simple, but vital. To escape detection, his secret must be small, and heavily swaddled in a wrapping of truth.

  Sar-Say reviewed one last time what he knew of these people, of their current state of knowledge, and what they were liable to learn about him in the future. He considered ... contemplated ... then made his decision. His twin hearts picked up their beat. For he was at a convergence of the star lanes. From this moment on, he would be committed. There would be no turning back.

  Sar-Say sat and watched the female go through her elaborate pantomime for perhaps the twelfth time. Again the two syllables “Leee ... Saaa” echoed through the compartment.

  Slowly, as though he was just beginning to understand, Sar-Say bent his own arm to touch his chest. He, too, bared his teeth, although that expression among his people was more an invitation to battle than a sign of mirth. Then he opened his mouth and let the sounds that he had practiced mentally a thousand times issue forth.

  “Sssarrr ... sssaayy...”

  His peripheral vision was quite good, better he judged than that of his captors. Thus, he was aware of a brief commotion beyond the glass, but not its significance. Had he been able to hear the oath that issued forth from Raoul Bendagar, he would not have understood it, although some of the emotional content might well have bridged the gap of interspecies ignorance.

  “Well I will be goddamned!” the chief scientist muttered in a low monotone. It was more of a prayer than a curse.

  Chapter Six

  Mikhail Vasloff strolled through the grand concourse of the headquarters of the Stellar Survey and gazed at the lighted displays of worlds the survey had discovered. Here an ice world lay beneath the blue-white actinic point of a B2 giant star; there an airless world orbited close to a red giant sun; beside it, twin suns hung high in the purple sky of a dusty, wind-swept desert planet. Everywhere he looked, Vasloff was reminded of the fact that the universe had little love for a race of vainglorious upstarts who styled themselves Homo sapiens. In all the endless light-years of blackness, there was but a single orb designed for human life. What a waste it was to send men and women in search of new homes for humanity when such were a logical absurdity.

  True, here and there the survey had stumbled across worlds that were marginally habitable. There was Lucifer, with its spouting volcanoes and boiling mud, where the domes floated amid columns of steam and the habitats had to be cooled if their occupants were not to be boiled alive in their beds. There was Malachi, with a pea soup atmosphere rich in oxygen. Fires there burned with the ferocity of explosions and an unprotected human was quickly poisoned by the very gas that made life possible. There was Persephone, locked in a permanent ice age, where the winter wind smelled of almonds due to a trace of cyanide in the air. There was Rio Verde, named by a practical joker, where there were neither rivers nor green —

  “Never mind,” Vasloff thought as he turned away from the prideful display dedicated to the latest in a long list of human arrogances. Everyone knew the list of worlds only slightly less deadly than most. So why couldn’t they see the waste of resources inherent in planting colonies on these slagheaps? What was the quirk in human beings that made them glamorize scratching out a living under conditions that would not be allowed in the most hellish prison? Whatever it was, Mikhail Vasloff had long ago set himself the task of combating this odd enthusiasm that resulted in Earth’s best and brightest risking their lives so far from home and to no good purpose.

  History, in Vasloff’s opinion, was a long contest between the despoilers and those who would conserve humanity’s limited resources, they who saw a wilderness as something to be tamed and others who enjoyed wildness for its intrinsic beauty. Vasloff was satisfied with the world that God had given man and saw no reason to go looking for a replacement. To his mind, there was something obscene about the risks the Stellar Survey was taking in their quest to find another Earth. Even the most rabid champion of interstellar expansion would admit (if pushed) that they did not know what they would find Out There. What if one of the starships brought home a plague, or worse? The survival of the race was too important to be risked for something as trivial as idle curiosity.

  He had begun his career as a political gadfly, one who lobbied parliament to end the huge subsidy given to explore the stars. Often his struggles had been in vain, although there had been an occasional small victory. Eventually, his efforts had brought him to the notice of a small coterie of wealthy people who thought as he did. With their aid, he had formed a grassroots political organization that he named Terra Nostra. It had grown into the largest and most influential of the anti-interstellar organizations.

  Terra Nostra was not affiliated with any particular religion, though it garnered much of its strength from the most fundamentalist denominations. Nor was it officially affiliated with the socially progressive political parties, though its views often found fertile ground among those who believed that resources spent exploring the stars could better be invested on Earth. Even people who were on opposite sides of most other issues found common ground in Vasloff’s organization when it came to opposing the huge drain on resources that was starflight.

  One place Mikhail Vasloff lacked supporters was the building in which he now found himself, this arrogant pyramid thrown up on the banks of Swan Lake. It felt strange to be striding across the vast expanse of marble with which these latter-day conquistadors had floored their monument to themselves. He was here at the invitation of the enemies that he had fought for so long, invited to give his views at a conference concerning the troubles encountered in implanting human beings on alien planets. In Vasloff’s opinion, the invitation was a grave tactical error on the part of his antagonists. Not only were they conferring the boon of legitimacy, they were giving him a platform from which to shout his heresies. A news media that would normally yawn at the latest Terra Nostra press release would take notice when the high priest of isolationist philosophy spoke in the very temple of expansionist power. That he had been invited at all was a testament to the growing influence of Terra Nostra.

  “Mr. Vasloff!”

  Vasloff turned to see a well-dressed young man striding across the marble floor in his direction. The man had light brown hair and a determined expression on his face. There were worry lines around his eyes and the way his mouth turned down at the corners told Vasloff that he was not happy.

  “Yes?”

  “Hello,” the young man said, “my name is Mark Rykand. I am a friend of Gunter Perlman. He suggested that you might be able to help me.”

  “How is Gunter?” Vasloff asked. “Still wasting his fortune on those expensive toys of his?”

  “You mean his yachts? Yeah, he is having a new 3-micron light sail built in time for the fall regatta.”

  “How did you find me, Mr. Rykand?”

  “Your office said that you were coming here today. I have been staying at a small villa on Lake Geneva, so I took a chance on intercepting you. I almost didn’t. I was in one of the side galleries looking at alien rocks.

  “What is your interest in me, Mr. Rykand?”

  Vasloff watched a hesitant look turn to one of determination. “I am afraid my problem can’t be put into a few words. Perhaps we can get together for dinner to discuss it.”

  “I am not in the habit of allowing myself to be picked up by strangers, even ones who claim a mutual friend, Mr. Rykand. A man in my position has to be careful. I am sure you understand. Perhaps if you come to my office when I am there next week¾”

  The answering smile was inappropriate on Rykand’s sad countenance and out of place for the situation. Normally when Vasloff brushed someone off, they stayed that way. “Would a substantial donation to Terra Nostra change your mind?”

  “How substantial?”

  “Fifty thousand credits.”

  Years of fund raising had honed Vasloff’s reflexes. His frown slipped effortlessly into a closed-lip smile as he extended his right hand to Rykand. “Why didn’t you say so? Where would you like t
o eat?”

  “Meersburg Yacht Club? It’s only five kilometers down the lake.”

  “Very well. My session ends with a reception at 18:00. It will be some time before I can break away. Shall we say 20:00 hours for dinner?”

  “Fine. I’ll be there.”

  #

  The Meersburg yacht club had served the sailors of Lake Constance for three centuries. Though its menu was international, its decor was local, with the waitresses just rude enough to maintain the Bavarian ambiance. Vasloff exited the autocab and strolled into the low building nestled among the vineyards just coming to ripeness. He found Mark Rykand in the bar, sipping a large stein of Beck's Dark Bitburger Premium Pilsner.

  Mark hopped off his barstool as he spotted his guest and came striding across the dimly lit room. “Good evening, Mr. Vasloff!”

  Vasloff smiled. With his thin face and shock of white hair, he knew that the expression made him look less formidable. That was one of the reasons why his official portraits showed him in somber pose. “Large contributors call me Mischa, Mr. Rykand.”

  “And I’m Mark.”

  “Very well, Mark. Which shall we do first? Eat or talk business?”

  “I imagine you’ve had a tiring day. Why don’t we eat first?”

  “An excellent suggestion!”

  The maitre’ de convoyed them to an out-of-the-way table as far from the small polka band as possible. After initial drinks and while they shared a plate of knackwurst as an appetizer, Mark asked, “How was the session?”

  Vasloff finished off his beer and leaned back. “Tiring, as you surmised. It is very difficult to maintain one’s equilibrium when confronted with a solid phalanx of nearsighted fools. Like most people, I think that if I could just state my position more clearly, others will see the logic of my arguments. Alas, such a result is far too utopian to ever be possible in the real world. May I inquire, Mark, whether you are a true believer?”