by Ben Jeapes
‘Excellent,’ Oomoing said. ‘I suggest we start by Sharing. I’m anxious to find out everything you know.’
‘I’m sorry, I was specifically told by Marshal of Space Barabadar not to Share.’ Stormer didn’t look all that sorry; he almost looked relieved.
‘I beg your pardon?’ Oomoing said.
‘I was specifically told—’
‘I insist on a Sharing!’ Oomoing was outraged. ‘How am I expected to do my job without proper background knowledge?’
‘I gather it’s a matter of clearance, Learned Mother.’
‘Clearance?’ The talons of her hunting arms slid out by reflex and Oomoing didn’t know whether to laugh or cuff him for his insolence. Doing the latter in front of Fleet would be bad military discipline. ‘Listen to yourself, Loyal Son. I’m cleared to be on a top-secret extraterrestrial base. I’m cleared to study their equipment and try to work out how they travelled faster than light, I’m authorized to study the creatures themselves, but I’m not cleared for the details?’
‘Precisely, Learned Mother,’ Stormer said, impassive.
Oomoing could see she wasn’t going to get anywhere. She began to compose a blistering complaint to deliver to Barabadar. In the meantime . . .
‘Then, let’s start with the extraterrestrials,’ she said.
‘Of course, Learned Mother. That’s why you’re here. The outlanders are this way.’
Stormer pulled himself back down the passage, followed by Oomoing, followed by Fleet. Oomoing, still not used to this way of travelling, found that the trick was to use her feeding arms for pulling on the line, and her hunting arms for the times she pulled too hard, or swung away from the line towards the walls. Every time they came to a junction or passed the entrance to a room or a chamber, she looked yearningly down it, wondering what marvels of extraterrestrial technology lay that way.
‘How much of the base have you explored?’ she said.
‘A fraction,’ Stormer said, without looking round. ‘It’s a maze and it’s big. We’ve sealed off this local area and repressurized it but we just didn’t have the gear to do a full job. But now we’ve got the supplies, we’ll be able to do it properly.’
Oomoing had already worked out that the plan had been for Stormer’s men to sneak up on the base in small, lightly armed spacecraft, and for a much larger ship – her ship – to bring supplies after the base was taken. No-one seemed to have expected that the supply ship would stop off at Habitat 1 and wait for her to wake. It seemed a bit of an oversight.
‘But you have troops exploring the rest of the place?’
‘Of course. I can show you a map of what we’ve found, if you like. Those outlanders dug in deep.’
That word again. Oomoing remembered her own reaction upon learning of the extraterrestrials’ existence. Stormer, a military male not given to scientific lines of thought, would have felt it all the more strongly. She felt the dislike, the loathing behind the word: to him, outlander was barely removed from Not Us, and it was probably only politeness in front of a female that kept him from using the ultimate term of contempt.
‘Thank you, I will want to see it,’ Oomoing said. ‘My brief is to assess the entire situation.’
‘Well, you can start here.’
They had stopped outside a doorway, and hanging by the doorway were two empty space suits. She could immediately tell which suit belonged to which extraterrestrial – a basic eye for shape told her that the wearer of one would have stood on two limbs and have two limbs free, while the other would have used all four for standing. Seeing the clothes that the creatures wore, but without the creatures inside them, somehow emphasized the sheer alienness of their species. She reached out a feeding arm and caressed the alien material, which wasn’t unlike her own suit.
‘Are you getting anything, Learned Mother?’ Stormer said.
‘You’re the expert spacer, Worthy Son,’ Oomoing said. ‘They probably tell you more than they tell me.’
Stormer shrugged, as if to say, whatever. ‘The tall one had this,’ he added. From a box he produced a narrow circle of plastic. ‘It was worn on one wrist.’
Oomoing took it in a feeding hand, turned it over and over. White, tough plastic; embedded in it was what looked like a headshot of its owner and a series of black and white parallel lines, probably some kind of computer code.
‘An identity tag?’ she said. Stormer’s people all carried something similar. It occurred to her that if they could only read that code . . .
‘Probably,’ Stormer agreed, sounding surprised that he and the Learned Mother could agree on something. ‘But press that red plastic square, there.’
Oomoing did, and a holo appeared next to the bracelet. It was a shapeless mass of colour that hung in mid air, the size of one feeding fist. It was a picture of something; but unlike a still photograph, which anyone could look at, it was attuned to the frequency of vision of an alien race. Eyes other than hers were meant to understand it.
‘And that’s all it does?’ she said. ‘No hidden keys, no access to computers, anything like that?’
‘As far as we can tell.’
‘I see.’ She put it in her pocket. ‘Well, looking at their discarded equipment is all very interesting but . . .’
‘Through here,’ Stormer said. He pulled himself through the door next to the suits. After a moment to collect her thoughts and control her excitement, Oomoing followed.
And she finally saw what she had crossed millions of miles of space to see.
‘They’re doing it again,’ Stormer said without a lot of interest. The two extraterrestrials were kept in a large, circular room; Stormer had chosen it simply as a secure place to put his captives, with no idea what the room was for. There was only the one entrance and two armed sentries waited by it. The two creatures lay still and motionless against the far wall in what Oomoing recognized as freefall hammocks; apart from them, and a cubicle containing a freefall chemical toilet, the room was bare, though it stank. This would be the smell of unwashed extraterrestrial; she wondered if they found it as unpleasant.
Oomoing feasted her eyes on the two forms in the hammocks. She was already familiar with their general appearance and the facts of the case from reports that had been beamed to her on the way here, but actually to see them . . .
‘Are they still keeping to the timetable?’ she said.
‘By and large. They do it less and less.’
The first time Long and Short, as she thought of them, had lapsed into this coma, there had been a major panic amongst Stormer’s men and frantic, long-range, time-delayed calls to her on the ship, asking her advice. A Kin deprived of resources would lapse into the Small Sleep, but these two had food, so what was happening? Were they dying?
The fuss had died down abruptly when someone actually approached the two, and suddenly they started moving again. When it happened again, half a day later, Oomoing had given orders that they were not to be disturbed. The creatures always got into their hammocks before passing out, so obviously they were expecting it. She surmised it was indeed like the Small Sleep, some kind of resource-conserving coma – just one which happened on a regular basis. Or maybe it was just a way of passing the time when nothing was happening. It clearly wasn’t life threatening, and that was the main thing.
‘How are they eating?’ she said.
‘They drink the water we provide,’ Stormer said. ‘And you remember what we decided were emergency rations from their canteen? The tall one fell on them when we produced them, but since then it’s gone off its appetite. The short one hasn’t touched a bite.’
‘That’s worrying.’ Oomoing gazed in concern at the unmoving form of Short in its hammock.
‘As the Learned Mother pleases,’ Stormer said, and Oomoing remembered that Short had apparently despatched five of his soldiers before being subdued.
‘Can I see this stuff you’ve been feeding Long? I mean, the tall one?’ she said. Stormer nodded at one of his men, who handed Oom
oing a slim, rectangular object wrapped in some kind of plastic.
She looked at it curiously, turning it over and over in her feeding hands. It was about the same size as two talons side by side and was covered in what she suspected was script. The plastic crinkled in her grip and a tab at either end practically begged, ‘pull me’.
So she did. The plastic peeled away and revealed a dark brown, waxy substance. It was divided into rows of three squares and without any difficulty she broke an entire row off. A strange odour, pungent but very rich, tickled her olfactory pores. Embedded in the broken edge she could see what looked like some kind of dried fruit.
‘Remind me why we decided these were emergency rations?’ she said.
‘They come out of a machine mounted on the wall,’ Stormer said. ‘If I’d built this place, I’d want emergency rations to be easily accessible to anyone who needed them. And smell it, Learned Mother! It’s bursting with energy.’
Oomoing sniffed the dark slab and had to agree. And yet – she looked back at Long – the extraterrestrial had gone off its feed. Maybe they didn’t need to eat that much. Or maybe they needed a more varied diet.
She could try and second-guess them for ever. It was time to start using Barabadar’s authority.
‘I want the tall one let out,’ she said.
‘I beg your pardon?’ Stormer said, so outraged he even forgot the ‘Learned Mother’.
‘It’s the safer one, isn’t it?’
‘Well, I, I mean . . . well, yes, the tall one hasn’t killed any of my people, if that’s what you mean,’ said Stormer.
‘Then I want it let out. Don’t worry –’ Oomoing held up all four hands to placate him – ‘we won’t give it free rein. I want to follow it, with an armed guard, of course, just to see where it goes and what it does. It might show us interesting things, and it probably has a better idea of how to look after its kind than we do. Now, please do it.’
‘An armed guard? I’ll follow it personally,’ Stormer muttered. ‘Well, as the Learned Mother pleases. We’d better revive them.’
‘How do you do that?’
‘Nothing simpler.’ Stormer kicked over to Long and slapped his hands together loudly. ‘Get moving! Come on! The Learned Mother has come halfway across the solar system to see you! On your feet!’
Long twitched, its eyes opened, and it recoiled at the sight of Stormer hanging over it. It may not have understood the words but it seemed to understand the gestures, and it slowly freed an arm and released the tabs that opened the hammock up. It came free and pushed itself gently off the wall. Even in free fall, Oomoing fancied she saw a measured caution about its movements.
Oomoing drank in the sight. The transmissions she had received on the way here still hadn’t done the creature justice. It was long and lanky – a thin torso, small head topped by a short, fuzzy mane of dark brown hair, four feeble limbs; all part of a stretched body much taller than the colonel or any other male, though only a head or so above Oomoing’s own height. Its skin was pale pink and looked clammy to the touch.
The eyes were recognizable – at least, Oomoing assumed that was what they were, though she had to remind herself to take nothing for granted. Still, they were in roughly the same place as a Kin’s own eyes, and as the eye had evolved independently on Homeworld in a multitude of species, she didn’t see why extraterrestrials shouldn’t have something similar. She wondered how much of the spectrum they could take in. Between them was something else sticking out from the face – she presumed it was some kind of extraterrestrial organ and reserved judgement for the time being on what it might be for. Long was wearing two garments – one covering the haunches, with its legs sticking out below, and one wrapped round its torso with its arms and head sticking out of their respective holes at the upper end of the body.
Its limbs were drawn up together and it was rubbing itself. There was a very thin pelt on the arms and the legs, and the hairs there – but not on the head, for some reason – were standing upright. Oomoing could understand perfectly: it was hardly wearing anything, and it was very cold in here.
‘The Learned Mother wants to see you, so move over here,’ Stormer shouted, but Oomoing was already moving towards it. She looked into Long’s eyes; each had a white background, a blue circle and a dark pupil within it. She wanted to feel the creature, see if the skin really was as clammy as it looked, learn the texture of that fuzz on the top of the head, so she reached out.
Long’s pupils dilated and with an incoherent shout – Where from? Which organ did it use for speech? – it leapt across the room. It came to a rest with its back against the wall, the other side of the chamber.
‘Stand to!’ Stormer shouted, though his guards at the entrance to the chamber already had their guns at the ready.
‘Don’t worry,’ Oomoing said. ‘It knows better than to argue.’ She looked at Long in fascination. That stance, that reaction reminded her of . . . yes, she had it. She studied Long with her stalker senses; amplified vision, smell, hearing. She could hear a fast-thumping heart beat. The smell of extraterrestrial was suddenly stronger. Its respiration was right up . . .
‘I think it’s frightened,’ she said. ‘Even terrified.’
‘Frightened?’ Stormer said scornfully. ‘You think it’s just an animal?’
‘I didn’t say that. Maybe its species kept the fear sense when they became sentient.’
Stormer plainly thought her on-the-fly theory was evolutionist nonsense, but he wasn’t going to say so. ‘What would it have to be frightened of, Learned Mother?’ he said. ‘We’re not going to eat it.’
‘Maybe it doesn’t know that.’ Oomoing decided to content herself with a visual inspection for the time being. ‘Anyway, this is all speculation. Colonel, if you want to supervize this procedure, I suggest you get your gun out. Fleet, you’ve got the camera?’ Fleet held up the device he had brought over from the ship. ‘Then let’s go. Are you recording? Good.’ She looked into the lens. ‘I am Oomoing of the Forensic Institute, present with me are Third Son of the Family Barabadar and . . .?’ She looked at Stormer.
‘Stormer, First Son of the Family Dadoi,’ Stormer said.
‘. . . and two other males acting as armed guards,’ said Oomoing. ‘I am about to release the tall extraterrestrial captured during the recent engagement . . .’
Joel studied the five XCs. The wall of the chamber was against his back and he was still poised for futile flight.
‘Idiot,’ he muttered to himself, but he hadn’t been able to help it. Those taloned hands reaching out to him; those beady, calculating eyes . . . He had long ago worked out that if the XCs wanted him dead then that was what he would be. But maybe this newcomer had just fancied a bite to eat, or it had been time to start the inevitable torture session that would lead to him spilling the beans on every aspect of Commonwealth technology that he knew about, or . . .
Well, he just didn’t know. He ran through what little he knew of XC culture for the thousandth time. The soldiers, the guards, the one who had until now seemed to be in charge would all be males. But this big newcomer, who seemed to be giving orders, would almost certainly be female. Maybe even a mother, which made her most senior of all. He didn’t really see having babies as being a sound basis for constitutional government, but it seemed to work for the XCs. So, she would be the one to make decisions. Perhaps he and Boon Round had been held pending the arrival of just this female. Maybe they were under sentence of death, and now was the time to carry it out.
But the XCs were standing back. Even the guards by the entrance had moved aside. One of the males had what looked like some kind of recording equipment held up to his face, and the female . . .
The female was actually gesturing at him, then at the door. He didn’t understand the chirps and tones and percussive blows that were XC conversation, but the gestures seemed clear. They wanted him to move, of his own volition.
‘Right . . .’ he said. He glanced at Boon Round in his hammock, then ba
ck at the door. Then he kicked off from the wall and over to the Rustie.
Boon Round hardly twitched. Joel was getting worried about his companion. All the electronic equipment on them had been confiscated, which meant no translator unit, which meant he and Boon Round couldn’t even exchange a few words. And he had seen how the loss of his pride had affected the Rustie; a shock no doubt exacerbated by the XCs’ choice of prison. They were in the Commune Place, where the pride would come to meet, to gather together, to rub bodies and smell scents and bond. Or, in human terms, just to hang. It meant so much more to the First Breed.
Nor did it help now that Boon Round was almost starved. Humans and First Breed could both drink water, but Rusties didn’t like chocolate bars and neither did Joel any more, after the first fifteen or so. He had had to start starving himself, or risk severely overtaxing the chemical toilet the XCs had thoughtfully provided.
So . . . He looked at the door again, then at the female in charge. Was that what was going through her mind? We don’t know how to look after you, so show us?
‘Only one way to find out,’ he said, and kicked off again.
Joel made his way through the dim passages of SkySpy with his retinue of XCs. They seemed to be giving him his head, so he would use the opportunity and see how far he was allowed to go.
Priorities were food and equipment. Anything else? He looked down at himself; grubby underwear and the need for a shower. OK, that was another objective. And if he was feeling naked, what must Boon Round be feeling? Yet another contributing factor to the Rustie’s decline would be the loss of his harness, his decorations – yet more ties with the pride. Well, he knew where they were – the last place Boon Round had left them.
Joel had his first destination.
He didn’t know how much of the base had been repressurized, so this was also an intelligence-gathering mission of his own. He pulled himself along, to a murmured narration from the female. He glanced back at the guards: they were plainly ill at ease, fingers itchy over their triggers, but they weren’t interfering.