by Drew Wagar
‘I don’t know,’ Derik growled. ‘But we’ll get some answers, even if I have to prise it out of that tin can with a hull welder.’
As they returned to the bay, Udian locked and sealed the airlock behind them, securing the docking area from the rest of the Catechism. Derik placed Rebecca’s unconscious body into the automated care facilities aboard the Spectre. It immediately activated and set to work. Coyote and Derik noted the diagnosis with dismay. Rebecca had two broken ribs, a fractured collarbone and a dislocated shoulder. By sheer luck she’d managed to avoid damage to any major arteries or a punctured lung, otherwise she might have already bled to death or suffocated.
It was all within the medi-comp’s ability to repair. Satisfied she was being cared for and after patching up their own wounds, the pair moved back down to the cargo bay where Udian was also undergoing ‘repairs’.
The big machine creature was immobile, a series of autonomous repair-bots working on his damaged third strut-leg. Coyote and Derik could see the plexi-glass tank in which the remains of his body resided had already been repaired. As they entered the bots finished the task of replacing the sliding metallic cover that protected his innards. It slid smoothly into place, obscuring the unearthly contents of the tank.
Udian’s ocular receptors flipped up and regarded them.
‘Am I to presume you’ve attended to our frail companion’s immediate needs?’ his deep voice intoned.
‘She’s going to make it…’ Coyote acknowledged.
‘No thanks to you,’ Derik growled.
Udian twisted slightly, in order to regard the lizard.
‘No thanks to me?’ he echoed. ‘I think you’ll find I saved her life on no less than three occasions within the last twenty minutes. And both of yours as well. Of course, effusive gratitude is unnecessary…’
‘Why was the Thargoid in the lab?’ Coyote demanded, ignoring Udian’s comments.
‘What purpose it had in mind, I cannot tell,’ Udian replied, easily. ‘Thargoid warriors are not known for their loquaciousness. There was no opportunity to interrogate it before the woman terminated it.’
Derik looked at Coyote and then strode forward. ‘Did you know it was in there before you went in?’
Udian looked down at the lizard. ‘There was always a danger the lab could have been breached. The sensors indicated it had not. I deemed it reasonable to proceed. I was wrong.’
‘What else are you going to be wrong about?’ Derik yelled.
‘I think it’s rather unreasonable of you to expect me to predict all dangers in advance,’ Udian replied calmly. ‘That would require a degree of clairvoyance somewhat beyond my capabilities…’
‘Listen, you piece of metal trash!’ Derik growled, punching the metal carapace impotently. The impact resulted in nothing but a dull thud echoing through the cargo bay. ‘I think you knew there was a ‘goid in there and I think you sent her in there in full knowledge of that fact!’
Udian straightened slightly.
‘And what would my motivation be for deliberately endangering one of our team for no reason?’
Coyote’s eyes narrowed and he tilted his head to one side as he regarded the metal machine.
‘I don’t know!’ Derik snapped, infuriated, futilely gesturing at Udian. ‘You tell me!’
‘I cannot,’ Udian replied. ‘Because there is no such reason. I was not aware of the Thargoid until it was too late. I thought the lab was safe enough.’
‘Safe enough!’ Derik’s teeth gleamed. ‘She almost got ripped apart by that…’
‘She had the advantage of her diminutive size and her shield generator, both of which served her well,’ Udian rattled off quickly. ‘I prevented the Thargoids from killing her. She survived their subsequent interception. We have the bio-packs. The mission remains viable. We can still proceed.’
Derik fumed on the spot for a moment. ‘This stinks, Udian. This stinks worse than Tibecia. I haven’t forgotten!’
He stomped out angrily, shaking his head. Udian watched him go without reacting.
Coyote raised his head once Derik had exited, waiting until the lizard was out of earshot.
‘You’re quite the hero…’ he said. Udian looked across at him, without responding.
‘…You rescue Rebecca, fight your way through a horde of Thargoid warriors and then hand our asses back to us too. Not bad for a day’s work.’
‘We’re supposed to be acting as a team,’ Udian replied, more cautiously. ‘This is the behaviour expected, as I understand it, from Derik and the woman. Loyalty, I believe it is called. I did what was necessary.’
‘You don’t seem fond of Rebecca,’ Coyote observed, noting Udian’s derogatory tone.
‘I am not fond of her at all,’ Udian replied. ‘So far she has been more of liability than an asset on this mission. Her attitude is cavalier and erratic, her skills of dubious value. Retrieving the bio-packs has been the first useful contribution she has made and even that required my intervention.’
‘She rescued me,’ Coyote countered.
‘Indeed. Perhaps you should pay more attention to ship maintenance in the future.’
‘There was nothing wrong with my ship… ’ Coyote fired back, before realising he was being distracted from his course of questioning.
‘I beg to differ,’ Udian replied smugly.
Damn, he can dissemble with the best…
Coyote smiled wryly. ‘One observation, if I may.’
Udian recoiled slightly. ‘As you wish.’
‘You mentioned Thargoids always attack on sight…’ Coyote mused.
‘I did.’
‘Interesting that Rebecca managed to get all the way into the lab, retrieve the samples and start heading back before the Thargoid attacked. Why was that, do you think?’
The big machine paused briefly before answering. Coyote raised his head, moving his eyes out of the shadow of his Sombrero.
‘Yes,’ Udian replied, his intonation flat and unrevealing. ‘That is interesting. I suggest you ask her.’
Jim glared at the huge bird in frustration. He’d given the two short phrases Rebecca had recorded from the Thargoids to the tall avian, hoping to quickly determine what they meant. Daddyhoggy had listened to them over and over again for a number of long minutes, before clearing a desk and writing them down on a large sheet of paper with a stylus clenched in his talons. After this he started lecturing on ancient modes of speech and how they were far more sophisticated than the standard common language now in use on the aligned worlds.
VULGATE! DUO, QUINDECIM, NOVEM!
RAGAZZA! DUX DUCIS, INCOLUMITAS!
‘I need a translation, not a lecture on the nominative and accusative modes of historical linguistics!’ Jim interrupted after a moment.
Daddyhoggy ruffled his feathers and turned a beady eye on Jim. ‘Your lack of patience does not become you. If you don’t understand the context and establish the tense with appropriate clarity, the meaning of the phrase will be lost. Act on a mis-translation and you will ensure that you act even more inappropriately than you already do.’
‘You know the language?’ Jim asked in surprise.
‘I know of the language,’ Daddyhoggy clarified. ‘All enlightened people do.’
Jim stared at him.
‘And?’
Daddyhoggy looked around. ‘Precisely what clarification are you seeking?’
‘Answer the frakkin question!’ Jim snapped in frustration.
Daddyhoggy straightened. ‘There is no need to resort to inappropriate profanity.’
‘Then just answer the question!’
‘I did,’ the bird replied, nonplussed.
‘No you didn’t!’
‘You asked whether I knew the language. I replied that knew of it.’
‘That’s not what I meant!’ Jim fumed.
The bird straightened and flapped its wings. ‘My impatient friend. I can hardly be expected to know what you meant. Clarity of communication is all. I
suggest you phrase your questions with a little more care.’
Jim clenched his fists and took a deep breath, gesturing to the paper. ‘Which language is represented by these words?’
‘An ancient one,’ Daddyhoggy announced sonorously. ‘Pre-dating the diaspora by many centuries. This is representative of a form of communication long lost. It comes from a time before much of what we currently accept as historical had even occurred. An old-Earth language.’
‘Old-Earth?’ Jim echoed. ‘One of the original languages prevalent during the colonisation?’
Daddyhoggy shook his head. ‘Something more antique. This language was already a distant memory by that point. A period before this part of the galaxy was visited. Before space flight was even a reality. Before the concept of the universe was even grasped. The language of an ancient empire on old-earth, even before industrialisation.’
‘But that’s thousands of years ago!’
‘Three to four thousand years ago, with apologies for a lamentable lack of accuracy,’ Daddyhoggy acknowledged. ‘We sometimes call it the mother-tongue. A formative root from which current languages can trace their ancestry. It is called Latin and it hails from a civilisation that was known as the Roman Empire. An early failed attempt to unify old-earth under a common law of state from its previous feudal existence. A time of reasonable enlightenment that finally crumpled under its own hubris.’
‘What would the Thargoids being doing using a language that pre-dates space travel?’
Daddyhoggy looked pained. ‘That is what we seek to determine. Speculating without facts is futile. Do not waste your energy asking questions that can not hope to be even approached at this stage.’
Jim impatiently tapped the words with his finger. ‘Can you just answer me a simple question?’
Daddyhoggy removed Jim’s hand from the paper with the tip of his wing. ‘As long as you’re not expecting me to reply with crass simplifications and erroneous brevity, I will do my best.’
Jim glared. ‘Is that a yes or a no?’
Daddyhoggy thought for a moment. ‘It is a yes.’
‘Good.’ Jim replied. ‘Here’s the question…’
‘Oh.’ Daddyhoggy sighed heavily. ‘I thought that was it.’
Jim pointed to the paper again and spoke with as much clarity as he could muster. ‘Can you read this?’
Daddyhoggy looked back at the paper, examining it closely once again.
‘No. I cannot.’
Coyote ducked back inside the Spectre, joining Derik at the medi-comp station in the rear living quarters of the new vessel.
‘How’s she doing?’ Coyote asked.
The big lizard was peering at the medi-comp readouts with apparent confusion. Rebecca’s unconscious body was laid out neatly on the bio-bed, her features now composed and serene. The equipment had cleaned her up and was apparently trying to heal the wound in her shoulder. It had stopped though, about two thirds of the way through its programme.
‘Come on you miserable piece of technical crapola!’ Derik hissed, prodding the controls with an outstretched claw.
‘That good…’ Coyote murmured. ‘Don’t tell me you broke it?’
Derik turned and glared. ‘You make it work then.’
Coyote chuckled and took a look at the medi-comp programme. It had stalled at the composite resonance scanning phase. He looked at the diagnostic.
Error. Resonance imaging reports no target found. Please specify target.
Coyote grinned.
‘You forgot to point it her,’ he said and began the sequence of refocusing the targeting scanners.
‘Oh really,’ Derik said, arms folded. ‘Silly me, why didn’t I think of that…’
Coyote shot him a look. The sequence initiated but the medi-comp didn’t restart. After a moment, it buzzed faintly.
Error. Resonance imaging reports no target found. Please specify target.
Coyote frowned.
‘You checked the diagnostics?’
The lizard eyeballed him by return and put on a dopey voice. ‘I’m just the stupid sunbasker remember? Me no understand clever human flashy lighty stuff…Yes, of course I checked the frakkin’ diagnostics!’
Coyote pulled up the diagnostic check anyway. Nothing was reporting an error. He activated the voice-comm circuit.
‘Resonance display, manual mode.’
The medi-comp’s monitors above them blazed into life. They could see a live scan of the bio-bed upon which Rebecca was still unconscious. Coyote and Derik stared at it.
It was empty.
They looked back at Rebecca, whole, alive; her chest rising and falling as her breath came in and out.
‘Visible light display,’ Coyote said. The viewer flickered and Rebecca’s body appeared, just as they could see it behind them.
Coyote and Derik exchanged a look.
‘Thermal Infra-red,’ Coyote said.
The image changed, Rebecca’s body became a glowing object, reflecting the parts of her body emitting the most heat.
‘Ultra-violet.’
Another image, with the emphasis on her exposed skin.
‘Resonance display,’ Coyote said.
The image faded, Rebecca’s body disappeared.
‘Scanner must be busted…’ Derik said. ‘Funny how the diagnostics check out though.’
Coyote shook his head and turned towards Rebecca. He slid his hand across her forehead, resting his palm on her cool skin.
‘Frak!’ Derik jumped back.
On the viewer both of them could clearly see Coyote’s hand, the bones, tendons and blood vessels, picked up by the scanner. Rebecca still wasn’t there.
Target acquired. Unable to apply selected operation to current target. Please reset.
Coyote pulled his hand back, the scanner went blank.
Target lost.
Derik pressed the cancel button. The viewer was blank again.
‘Ok, I’m officially freaked out now,’ he snapped. ‘What the frak does this mean? Is she some kind of ghost?’
He slowly reached out and gingerly prodded Rebecca’s arm. It felt reassuringly solid.
Coyote rubbed his beard. ‘It means the resonance scanner can’t see her. Why the hell that would be I can’t imagine. Maybe Udian would know.’
‘It’s not her shield thing is it?’ Derik said, his eye widening.
Coyote gestured to the side of the medi-comp. Rebecca’s strange little device was stored carefully on a shelf, it was clearly not active.
‘We’ll have to patch her up ourselves if the medi-comp won’t work. You any good as a medic?’
‘On humans?’ Derik hissed. ‘I know which bits to stab in a fight, that any good?’
Coyote rolled his eyes and set to work. His experience of triage in military engagements far from the luxury of falling back on medi-comp support served him well. Fortunately there were sufficient hand held med-tools to hand.
‘You were right about one thing…’ Coyote said softly, as he began to bind up Rebecca’s injuries with the dermal regenerators.
‘And what’s that?’
‘She is holding out on us…’
‘No frak,’ the lizard replied.
‘She’s going to need painkillers,’ Coyote instructed. ‘Standard pack, there, second shelf.’
Derik grabbed the packs and flung them to Coyote before clicking on the narrowband comm-link.
‘Udian?’
‘I’m busy,’ came the laconic response.
‘Get your metal ass up here. We’ve got a problem.’
‘Specify.’
‘This woman of ours is a frakkin’ ghost.’
There was a pause on the other end of the comm-link.
‘Have you been imbibing something narcotic?’ Udian replied.
‘I’m serious. Coyote’s sorting her out.’
‘Why aren’t you using the medi-comp?’
‘We would if we could, we aren’t stupid!’ Derik snapped back.
�
��Despite the copious evidence to the contrary…’ Udian intoned with a sigh.
‘Listen! The medi-comp won’t operate because it says she aint here,’ Derik snapped.
‘In what manner?’ Udian rumbled back.
Coyote leant forward into the comm-link’s range. ‘The resonance scan can’t see her but it works fine on us. The girl’s invisible.’
Again there was a pause.
‘Interesting. This may explain something. I will be there momentarily.’ Udian closed the connection from the other end.
Derik and Coyote exchanged a look before returning to the task in hand. Coyote had almost finished by the time a heavy series of thuds and the hiss of his mechanical actuators announced Udian’s arrival.
‘Show me,’ he said, without preamble.
Derik flipped on the medi-comp viewer, Udian examined it closely. It remained blank until Derik stuck his head in the way and gestured rudely at Udian.
‘Fascinating. Your puerile display notwithstanding,’ Udian said dryly. ‘It appears you have discovered her secret.’
‘What secret?’ Derik asked.
‘Whatever it was that caused Garew to add her to what I reluctantly refer to as our team,’ the machine replied.
‘You know what’s up with her?’ Coyote queried.
‘I have a suspicion. It may also explain why the Thargoids recognised her.’
‘What are you talking about?’ Derik ground out.
Udian sighed. ‘I’m assuming you’ve already forgotten how her ship was scanned by the Thargoids in our first altercation. How they diverted their attack?’
Coyote nodded. ‘I remember. They sacrificed themselves to punch a message out. Just sat there and let me destroy them.’
‘Indeed,’ Udian acknowledged. ‘This must be why.’
‘But what does it mean?’ Derik hissed angrily.
‘Resonance scanning works by determining quantum phase variations at the sub-atomic level. Simple technology,’ Udian began. ‘An anatomical image is derived by comparing the deltas between the states at various interlock frequencies and thus building up an image. If she is invisible to the scanner, it implies her sub-atomic constituents are in some unusual quantum state.’
Derik blinked and looked at Coyote.