by Rick Cook
So, the Council President thought. The pieces are all in place. Now let the game begin. The great game for the greatest stake of all.
PART III: CHUBAN
Heavy sand, Billy Toyoda thought approvingly. Really heavy sand.
He was floating disembodied in cyberspace admiring the structure spread out before him.
The aliens’ computer net was as complex as a Mandelbrot Set, with the same kinds of intricacies and unexpected excursions into near chaos. Overall there was a plan to it. It was elaborate arid subtle but Billy could definitely sense an ordered structure to it all.
Much of it Billy couldn’t interpret yet. But he could understand enough to know that this net tied together all the colonies in the system. Stretching off from the main structure were tenuous gray extensions, links that reached across interstellar space to tie into other Colonial civilizations through laser links. The signals were slow but the bandwidths were huge.
Probing gently, Billy Toyoda delicately tried to grasp the Tao of this alien cyberspace.
“Excuse me.”
Billy opened his eyes and the vision of the alien net faded away. In its place was the image of Dr. Sukihara Takiuji standing in the door of the computer room.
The computerman shook himself mentally and regarded the Japanese physicist.
“Please excuse the interruption, but you are in charge of the translation programs, I believe?”
“Sure. What do you want?”
“Can it be arranged so certain words are not translated correctly?”
Billy frowned. His interest in the doings on the ship outside of his computers was limited, but he did know that Dr. Takiuji was drawing up a list of forbidden topics for conversation with the aliens.
“You mean take them out of the tables so they won’t come across? Yeah, I guess so.”
“Not so they do not come across. So they are not translated meaningfully. I do not know, perhaps the word is translated differently each time.” He smiled. “It would be best if it were done so the speakers did not know what was happening.”
“That’ll screw up communication.”
“That is precisely the point.”
“Oh! You mean stuff about the drive? Yeah. Is that what the captain wants?”
“I am sure that it is,” Dr. Takiuji said.
“I am sorry,” Suki told the alien. “We are not allowed to discuss anything which might bear on the drive.”
The owl-like face remained impassive. “Of course not. However, there are other areas in which it would be mutually profitable to exchange information.”
“It is not an easy decision,” Suki said. “I must think on it.”
Derfuhrer was content with that. The creature had not refused outright and as long as communication remained open there was the possibility of learning what he wished to know. Besides, there was the other one, this “Aubrey.” He was coming along nicely.
Most of the Colonial leaders assigned the job of contacting the humans to their intelligence specialists and each of those specialists dealt with only one human on a regular basis.
Derfuhrer spent hours cultivating two humans personally.
In part that was a measure of the importance he attached to learning the secret of the drive and in part it was a mark of his confidence in his own abilities. Derfuhrer was a very convincing speaker and he knew it.
“Did you hear what Dr. Takiuji did with the computers?” Jenkins asked DeRosa. “He had Toyoda gimmick them so they wouldn’t give a straight translation of anything dealing with the drive.”
“Cute,” Iron Alice said. “But you don’t look so happy about it.”
“I’m not sure if I am or not. It’s useful security, but the Ship’s Council wasn’t consulted. I don’t think they’d like it at all.”
“You could take the matter up with them.”
Jenkins shook his head. “If I did that they would probably disapprove on general principles. I think I’ll let it ride.”
“What is this you do?” Derfuhrer asked Sukihara Takiuji.
“I play a game. Do you have games?”
There was a hesitation while the computers dealt with the concept.
“We have games. What is the purpose of this one?”
Suki made a deprecating gesture. “To pass time pleasantly. Perhaps to learn. It is called ‘go.’ It is very old.”
Derfuhrer had no time for games, but he had identified this human as one of the critical ones.
“Would it violate convention for you to teach me this game?”
“Not at all. Let me call up a board from the ship’s computer.” He made the adjustment and the nineteen by nineteen grid appeared on the screen.
“The game is played by the players alternately placing black and white stones on the intersections. Beyond that there are only four rules.”
“It seems simple,” Derfuhrer said dubiously.
“Perhaps not so simple,” Suki replied politely.
For the first game Suki spotted Derfuhrer fifteen stones, far in excess of the traditional nine. As the lines of stones grew, the alien quickly recognized that this was not a mere pastime. This was a battle game designed to develop and hone skills for conflict. He became absorbed in the flow of the play, dimly sensing the subtle logic that underlay the moves.
Even with a fifteen-stone handicap, Suki beat Derfuhrer easily.
“That was most interesting,” the alien said as the stones were counted and territories tallied. “Thank you.”
“It was an honor,” Suki replied.
“I wish to learn more of this game,” Derfuhrer said.
“I am sorry we do not have time for another game right now. But another time. Meanwhile there is some information in the ship’s library,” Suki said. “I could supply it to you.”
“I would be honored,” Derfuhrer said.
What is this creature offering me now? Derfuhrer thought after the screen went dark. Why is it giving me insights into its strategic thinking? An alliance? Possibly, but to what purpose? And against whom? It is imprudent to share matters of such import until the agreement is sealed and we have not yet agreed on terms.
Or are these beings just stupid? He nipped that thought off quickly. Beings who travel faster than light are not unintelligent. There had to be some deeper meaning here.
Derfuhrer was willing to wait to discover what it might be.
Steven Bustamonte held the capsule under his nose, exhaled and crushed it between his fingers. He inhaled sharply, filling his lungs to the very bottom with the sharp, sweet chemical reek. Then he collapsed backwards on his bunk and let the drug take him.
Goddamn those Owlies are good, Bustamonte thought as the waves of warmth spread through his veins and radiated out from the very center of his being, beating time with his own pulse. Goddamn good.
“You know,” Iron Alice said, “we’ve got another problem here.”
“What?” Jenkins asked, running his eyes down the oxygen/food production figures from hydroponics in another window on his screen.
“The crew. They were supposed to be kept busy rigging those scopes and running experiments. Now they’re just sitting on their asses. It’s not healthy.”
Jenkins turned his full attention to her. “Spacers are used to waiting.”
“I’m not so worried about the spacers,” DeRosa said. “But most of these people are scientists, technicians and construction workers. They’re not used to doing nothing and most of those scientists and techs haven’t been off Earth before.”
“There’s no point in rigging those arrays, not this close to a sun.”
“Maybe not, but it would be a good idea if they had something else to do to keep them occupied.”
“I’ll take it up with the Ship’s Council. It’ll give them something constructive to do.”
“Speaking of which, how is the Ship’s Council?”
Jenkins shrugged. “Not doing much of anything. Most of the members are too busy talking to the Owlies
and the rest of them are debating nitpicking procedural details.”
“Ain’t consensual management wonderful?” Iron Alice said cynically.
“Let’s just say dealing with them isn’t the best part of the job.”
The dice bounced high under half gravity and settled slowly to the groans of the losers and the applause of the winners. William Jewett turned over in his bunk and tried to concentrate on the book he was reading.
Not too long ago he would have been down there on the blanket yelling his lungs out with the rest of them. But he was married now and he needed all his pay.
The noise and the excitement was too much. Finally he set the book down and rolled out of his bunk.
“Hey, here comes fresh blood,” said one of the shooters, a burly crewman named Bustamonte.
“Not tonight,” Jewett said and made his way out the door to a chorus of good-natured catcalls.
Now what, he wondered as he made his way up the corridor. There just wasn’t a lot to do in the section of Spin that the vacuum jacks had claimed for their living quarters and from long tradition named the Construction Shack. There was some sappy historical drama on the tridee in the lounge—which was why his roommate had moved the craps game into their compartment. He wasn’t much of a reader under the best of circumstances and he’d already worked out in the gym twice today. In the old days he would have hit the bar and tried to find some female companionship, but that was out too.
God I miss you, Cherry!
There wasn’t even any point in writing her. He’d get back almost as fast as the letters would and besides, there wasn’t anything to tell her. The big instruments he and his fellows were supposed to rig and maintain were still stowed and the crews were down to half-days of make work every other day. The pay was the same, but even so . . .
Well, what about doing something that would be worth talking about? How about trying to talk to the Owlies?
The procedure had been explained to everyone on the ship. All you had to do was punch 683 from any comm screen and you’d have a private line to the aliens.
Well, there was a comm screen in a corner of the lounge.
He skirted the dozen or so people clustered around the tridee and pulled down the screen’s hush hood before he punched the number.
The screen dissolved into a kaleidoscope of colored sparks and then Jewett was looking at his first Owlie.
As usual, the view was face on. The fierce yellow eyes and hooked beak dominated the face from this view. The eyes fixed on him without blinking or wavering.
“Yes?” the computer synthesized voice sounded surprisingly human. Jewett almost lost his nerve and broke contact right there.
“Hi,” Jewett said lamely. “I’d like to talk to someone.”
Still the unblinking stare. “Have you spoken with us before?”
“No.”
“What is your special interest?”
“No special interest. I, uh, just wanted to talk to you guys. So I’d have something to tell my wife, you know.”
“What is your function?”
“My job? I’m a vacuum jack. Hey look, if this is any trouble . . .” But the alien was gone, replaced by a panoramic view of the inside of one of the colonies. To Jewett it looked like a jungle in a greenhouse.
“Hello.” The alien was back. Or rather an alien was back. Jewett wasn’t sure, but this one looked different.
“Hi,” Jewett responded. There was a long pause. “Uh, my name’s Bill Jewett. I just wanted to talk to an Owlie. I mean an alien.”
The unblinking eyes never left Jewett. “I am called Splicer. I work on an outside maintenance and repair crew,” the Owlie replied.
In point of fact, he did no such thing. But Splicer was a quick study and a very convincing liar.
Sukihara Takiuji and Derfuhrer studied the go board on the screen as they went over the results of their last game. “Here you see,” the Japanese physicist said as he flicked the cursor to a group of stones, “your play is very strong, but perhaps a little heavy. You enclose my stones firmly, but your shape is not good. Too compact.”
The cursor moved over the board, rearranging the stones. “Now if you had extended here instead of drawing back you would have made better shape.”
“I see,” Derfuhrer said. “Thank you.” He studied the configuration again.
“You were correct. This is not a simple game. But very interesting.”
“I am honored you find it so,” Suki told the alien. “You learn very quickly.” He didn’t tell Derfuhrer that he was already better than anyone on the Maxwell aside from himself. He only had to spot the Colonist five stones and Father Simon, the strongest human player, required a six-stone handicap to play evenly against him.
“Have we time to play again?” Derfuhrer asked.
“If you wish,” Dr. Takiuji told him.
William Jewett made his way across the metal plain with all the skill of an experienced vacuum jack. From where he stood with a toe hooked through a safety line, the Maxwell’s hull curved away from him before and behind and ran off straight to either side. Momentarily he felt like an ant on a stainless steel sewer pipe.
Goddamn, this thing’s big, he thought for the hundredth time.
As a vacuum jack Jewett had worked on some of the biggest manmade structures in the solar system, but the Maxwell and her sister starships were among the largest constructs in space. Only the L-5 colonies were larger, but they weren’t designed to go anywhere. The Maxwell was and that added to the air of unreality.
And so far from home, Jewett thought. So damn far. God, I miss you, Cherry. He tried to pick out the Sun from the star fields around him. He knew he was looking in the right direction, but he was a construction worker, not an astronomer and he could not make sense out of the myriad of lights before him.
Oh well, this would be his last one. With the money he’d make on this trip and his skills he’d be able to buy on to one of the colonies. Then he’d spend his days doing outside maintenance or something and come home to Cherry every night.
Not much help right now, though, he thought.
Automatically Jewett checked his safety line before starting out again. With an expert twitch, he shook out the line and then used his toes to propel himself forward toward the curve of the hull.
Splicer’s instructions had been specific, but he had been mysterious about their goal. Go to this place on the hull and turn on your short-range communicator to this frequency, the alien had told him in their last conversation. I think you will find something of interest. Jewett was bored enough to try it. Splicer was an odd sort, but he was a space worker and that gave him and Jewett a bond.
Normally the search would have been a lot more difficult. Jewett could only have gone out on his shift with his work party and would have been restricted to the area where he was working. But with no real work to be done, discipline and security were both lax. He had bluffed his way out the active lock with a lame story about taking a needed tool to a work group. He suspected the lock watch didn’t really believe him, but they were vacuum jacks too and sympathized with a jack’s need to get outside.
Jewett switched on his personal communicator, although there was no one else in sight on the vast pocked metal plain of the ship’s hull. He tuned his receiver as he had been instructed. Cautiously he swiveled his head, listening for a tone.
The personal communicator was a line-of-sight device using infrared radiation. The unit was designed to work with digitally encoded transmissions, eliminating the background noise produced by simple heat sources. However, it was possible to cut the encoder/decode circuits out of the loop and that was what Jewett had been told to do.
He had turned halfway around before he heard a low hum in his earphones, as if someone was sending a single tone on the communications channel. He picked his way carefully toward the sound, stopping every few feet to listen.
It took him a few minutes to find the source of the sound. The package was white,
whiter than the Maxwell’s skin and about the size of Jewett’s clenched fist, but otherwise unremarkable. Without the infrared beacon, Jewett would never have been able to find it.
As he picked it up, the vacuum jack saw there was no sign of a power source or an emitting element anywhere on the package. The wrappings themselves must emit, Jewett realized. They could soak up IR when the package was in sunlight and retransmit the energy on a single narrow frequency.
Jewett wasn’t enough of a technician to know how sophisticated that cloth was, but he had a practical spaceman’s appreciation of a clever engineering hack. He tucked the package into a leg pocket and turned to make his way back inside the Maxwell.
Back in his compartment, William Jewett hefted his present from the aliens. The package was heavy and it felt like there were several hard objects inside. The wrappings weren’t immediately obvious and he fumbled with them for a minute before they fell off and the contents went bouncing and clattering to the floor.
Jewett goggled and then dove for the floor, grabbing at the items with both hands. There were six of them, each a multi-sided prism about the length and diameter of the first joint of his thumb. One of them had a mashed corner where it had hit the floor, all of them were metallic and very heavy and there was no mistaking their color.
With shaking hands William Jewett shoved the prisms down into the bottom of his laundry bag. Then he tore out of the room, heading for the lounge and the hush-hooded communicators.
Harry Waddell was no more ambitious than any up-and-coming astrophysicist who had spent the last eight years knocking about between universities and observatories without a permanent appointment. Which is to say he would have cheerfully killed for tenure at a second-rate cow college.
“You mean you have a complete theory of stellar evolution?” he said incredulously. “No anomalies?”