by Rick Cook
“Shall we call for a higher seat on the Council?” asked the Master of Cities.
“No!” Derfuhrer snapped. “The Council is a powerless farce and illegitimate besides. We shall not beg for a higher seat. We shall not whimper and pule to be raised in their sight. Instead we shall pursue the true path. Let the Council do as it will. Soon it will do little enough.”
“What about the other humans?”
“They mend their ship and heal their internal hurts,” the Master of Skies said. “What their plans are we do not know.”
“Will they give over to the Colonial Council?”
The Master of Bounds gave a fizz of laughter. “Some on the Council still think so. But no, their stroke there has failed. Their agents are divided as the Council is divided and the Leader of the humans seems to use that skillfully.”
“We could always put an end to the others,” the Master of Cities suggested.
“No,” Derfurhrer said. “I know it would increase the value of the ones we hold, but there is still the possibility we can win the secret of the drive from the ones on the ship. As long as the surrender of the ship is not imminent it is not a wise move. Besides, it would not help our political position to move openly against the humans. We have made a spectacular leap from branch tip to branch tip. Now it is time to hug the trunk and wait.”
Once again, the conference room was packed. Jenkins deliberately had taken a seat halfway down the table. Aubrey used to insist on sitting at the head when he presided over a meeting. Unlike most of Aubrey’s meetings, this one was not being shown all over the ship. This group of a dozen or so people comprised the reconstituted alien study team.
Carlotti was still the leader, but many of the old faces were missing, either through capture or because they were tainted by their dealings with the Colonists.
Damn, I sure wish Sharon Dolan was here, the captain thought, and Father Simon, too. He shook the thought off and got down to business.
“Okay,” Jenkins said, not really calling the meeting to order. “What do we know so far?”
“Well,” Carlotti said carefully. “Since the attack we have obviously had to seriously rethink our view of the Colonists and Colonial civilization.” Someone down the table snorted. “It turns out that some things make much more sense in light of recent developments.”
“Meaning we’ve been conned,” Lewis put in.
“Meaning we were shown only part of a culture,” Carlotti said. “It’s not an unknown phenomenon when studying another culture. Anthropologists run into it all the time.”
“Save the theory for later,” Jenkins said. “Just give us the highlights.”
“Well, most of what we were told about the Colonists’ overall culture still appears to be true—or at least remains self-consistent. However it is obvious that they are nowhere near as peaceful as we had been led to believe.”
“We know they are warlike.”
“No,” Carlotti shook his head. “I don’t think warlike is precisely the right term.”
“Well, you can’t exactly call them peaceful!” Lewis said.
“No, but the reasons they gave us for avoiding open war are just as valid. Those habitats are too fragile and their economy is too finely balanced. If I may resurrect a term from the last century, I would say the Colonists exist in a state of perpetual cold war.
“One of the reasons the attack failed is that we weren’t subjected to just one attack, we were hit by five or six simultaneously. Most of them were launched prematurely and they got in each other’s way.”
Jenkins made a note on his comm pad. “There ought to be a way to use all that factionalism. Think about it and see what you can come up with.” He looked up.
“Now, how much danger are we in right now?”
“I’ll make a guess,” Barry Kirchoff said. “I’d say if they wanted to they could wipe us out in minutes. The only thing that would save us would be to jump instantly.”
“Probably correct,” Carlotti said. “But they won’t make the attempt for a variety of reasons. The main one is they want the secret of the star drive.”
“How close are they to getting that?” the captain asked.
“I’d say not very close at all,” Carlotti replied.
“I disagree,” Kirchoff put in. “Granted the mathematics and physics behind the drive are as screwy as everyone says they are, once you know it’s possible and you’ve seen it in operation, you can work out the basic principles in a matter of months.”
Carlotti shook his head. “We would have the basic secret in a few months. I am not convinced the Colonists can.”
“You’re saying their science isn’t as good as ours?” someone said skeptically.
He hesitated. “Properly speaking, I’m not sure they have science.”
Kirchoff gestured toward the star. “What do you call all that then, magic?”
“No, scholarship.”
“Eh?”
“I exaggerate, of course, but only slightly. The Colonists are heirs to an old, old culture. Our best estimates vary from fifty thousand to two-hundred-fifty-thousand years. In any event, very ancient. They have enormous libraries, but they do little or no original research. Judging by our contacts, they conceive of ‘science’ as a matter of going through their libraries and finding the appropriate information. Their store of information is huge, but their rate of addition is minuscule. Even their engineering seems to be mostly of the cookbook variety. Sophisticated, but not at all original.”
“Still, if they want something badly enough . . .”
He shrugged. “Oh, undoubtedly. But it will take them much longer than it would take us. They aren’t flexible, you see. Remember also that the basic principles underlying the Karpov Omo Hawking Effect are extremely subtle. Finally, the directions their mathematics and physics have taken do not lend themselves to an easy formulation of the underlying phenomena.
“I would say that even if they had, ah, obtained the services of Dr. Takiuji, it would take them several years to unravel the drive. As it is, even with the willing cooperation of their captives, it will take them much longer. A decade, perhaps two.”
“Are you suggesting we abandon the prisoners here?”
“That wouldn’t work, I’m afraid. I said their progress would be slow, but not nonexistent. Eventually they will solve the problem.”
“So we’re damned if we stay and damned a little slower if we run?” Jenkins asked.
“That is essentially my assessment, yes.”
“And if we get the prisoners back?”
A pause. “I think it would materially decrease their chances,” Carlotti said. “In fact, without the prisoners, there is a fair chance they would never get the drive. Well, perhaps not never, but it would take them much longer.”
The captain turned the situation over and decided he didn’t like it no matter what angle he viewed it from. Up and down the table the people were looking at him expectantly.
“All right,” he said at last. “We stay for the time being.”
As Jenkins glided back up the corridor toward the bridge, Billy Toyoda fell in with him.
“You know, Captain, I’ve been thinking about Aubrey.”
“Oh?” said Jenkins in a tone that didn’t encourage further comment. Typically the computerman ignored it.
“I don’t see how the Owlies suckered him like that.”
“I don’t either, Mr. Toyoda.”
“I mean all that shit about them being peace-loving. Hell, it was obvious that was a crock.”
“How obvious?”
“Real obvious. First off, peace-loving people don’t build goddamn fortresses around their systems. Hey, I mean security’s one thing, but those fuckers are goddamn paranoid and paranoids usually have real enemies somewhere.”
Jenkins kept moving and didn’t look at his unwanted companion. “Dr. Aubrey didn’t know about that.”
Billy sniffed, indicating his opinion of someone who took so little
interest in computers. “Yeah, but he was talking with them. The words should have clued him in.”
“What words?”
“Well, for example, did you notice that the main word for ‘stranger’ is the same as the word for ‘enemy’ or ‘spy’? And that they don’t have a simple word for ‘neutral’? They’ve got to use some big long phrase.”
Jenkins stopped and looked at Billy. “No, Mr. Toyoda, I had not noticed that. How did you come to see it?”
“By looking at the translation tables. Hey, someone must have studied them when you were optimizing them, right?”
“Mr. Toyoda,” Jenkins said slowly, “just what is a translation table?”
“That’s the list of our words cross-referenced against their words—or really the map of our meaning clusters onto their meaning clusters. You mean you never looked at it?”
“As far as I know, no one ever looked at it directly.”
“Oh shit man,” Billy cried, “you didn’t!”
“Why should we? I thought the computers took care of that part.”
“Because the damn things aren’t that good, not as they come out of the computer. Translation tables always got to be hand optimized or you lose all kinds of meaning.”
“Why the hell didn’t you tell me this before?”
“Oh man, I thought you knew.”
“Mr. Toyoda, I would appreciate it in the future if you would assume that we know a little less and tell us a little more. Now what else can you tell me about the Colonists’ language?”
“Not a lot,” said Billy, looking considerably chastened. “I didn’t study it systematic-like. I just spotted some things hanging out in cyberspace.”
“Well, study it ‘systematic-like’,” Jenkins snapped. “I want to know anything you can tell me about their language and what it indicates about their culture. If you need help I’ll see that you get it.”
“Yes, uh, sir. You think it will help?”
“Mr. Toyoda, at this point everything helps.” Even grasping at straws, he did not add.
Sharon Dolan was dreaming of Earth when the pounding on the bulkhead jarred her awake.
“Get up!” The guards roared down the corridor, slamming the walls with their truncheons as they went. “Everyone out-out-out.”
Groggily, Sharon pulled herself up and stumbled out into the corridor with the rest of the captives. The guards paced back and forth, brushing by the humans in the narrow space and counting as they went.
“This way, hurry,” the commander’s translator roared out. His own voice was so loud it hurt the humans’ eardrums in the confined space. With the guards pushing from behind, the prisoners were herded down a cramped, narrow corridor to an open air lock. The guards gestured with their weapons. “Inside.” One by one the humans filed through into what was obviously a second, smaller ship. They were forced back into a compartment barely big enough to contain a dozen or so acceleration couches.
“Strap in,” the guard commanded and then the door was shut and locked behind them.
Jenkins was on the bridge, staring at the stars and sucking on a bulb of coffee when his screen chimed.
He touched the stud and his communication officer’s face appeared, looking excited. “Sir, I’ve got the Council President. He wants to speak to you.”
“What in the . . .” The captain automatically checked the status display. The drive was hot, manned and ready to jump. Slightly mollified, Jenkins reached over and touched the stud. The screen lit with the familiar image and great staring yellow eyes. Jenkins, who still couldn’t tell one alien from another, nodded to the image. “Mr. President.”
“I have a proposition,” the alien said without preamble.
“Speak on.”
“I propose an agreement-of-convenience-between-lineages-with-only-slight-mutual-debt.”
It took Jenkins a second to decipher the phrase. He frowned and touched a screen button before he spoke.
“You want an alliance?” he asked. Then he looked down at the English retranslation that flashed on the bottom of the screen. “Alliance” had become “mutual-benefit-agreement-nature-unspecified”. He used the pointer to change the translation to the form the Council President had used and touched another screen button to send the sentence.
“I so propose.”
“Why?”
“The resultant of forces changes. The social orbits shift inauspiciously.”
Jenkins scowled at the screen. Billy Toyoda’s optimized translation tables might be more precise, but sometimes they got in the way of clear meaning.
“You mean the balance of power is shifting? In what way?”
“That is what I said. Derfuhrer’s vector lengthens. He perturbs other colonies into 246’s orbit. We wish to restore equilibrium.”
“How?”
“He uses his possession of humans to increase his virtual mass. This is inauspicious.”
As soon as I get the chance, I’m going to have Toyoda work on this damn thing again. Then he brushed the distraction away and thought hard.
“Such an agreement might prove beneficial,” he told the Council President. “I will consider it and then decide.”
“How long will it take you to consult your Council?” the Council President asked.
Jenkins punched up the retranslation of his sentence and saw “decide” had been translated as “consult with the elders of the inner grove.” Damn!
“Pardon. My translator erred. I alone will decide and I will inform you of my decision.”
The Council President’s nictating membranes flicked in surprise.
“I await your decision,” he said, making a gesture Jenkins had never seen before.
As soon as the screen blanked, Jenkins replayed the sequence and queried the translator on the gesture’s meaning.
exact meaning unknown/ the message came back, /probably acknowledgment of status between high-status equals/
Well, well, well Jenkins thought. Then he punched up his second-in-command.
“Al, get the alien team together right now. We need a meeting.”
“Screen’s fester.”
“Screen may also be less secure.”
“Well, what do you think?” the captain asked his hurriedly assembled team after playing them the recording of the Council President’s message.
“I think you’d better get that translator fixed,” Lewis said. There was a quick ripple of laughter.
“Right, but what about the offer?”
“I’d say he’s probably sincere,” Carlotti said. “If Derfuhrer was the one who pulled the actual raid on the ship, he’s probably upset this system’s applecart in high style. As the guy on top, the Council President has the most to lose so he’s the most eager to put Derfuhrer down.”
“We may assume it was Derfuhrer who ordered the attack,” Sukihara Takiuji said. “It is very much in his style and not, I think, the style of the others.”
Jenkins looked up and down the table. “Any contrary opinions?”
There were none.
“So you all think the Council President’s sincere in his offer?”
“Sincere is perhaps too strong a word,” Carlotti said. “I think the alien phrase expresses it nicely—the Council President wants,” he touched a stud on his electronic note pad, “an ‘agreement of convenience between lineages with only slight mutual debt’.”
“That’s not a phrase,” Billy Toyoda said. “That’s one word in their language.”
“Which is significant in itself,” Carlotti said. “The main thing is that we can trust the Council President to turn on us as soon as it’s to his advantage.”
“I rather expect that,” Jenkins said. “But in the meantime, I think we might be able to gain something from this.”
The Limbo System was covered by a net of sensors, but every net has holes. For the next few hours, this particular area of space would not be under hostile observation.
At precisely the right moment, the ship ejecte
d the smaller ship and did a spectacular burn to make a major course correction. Hidden in the flare of the larger ship’s rockets the smaller ship fired its own rockets and dropped swiftly away on a very different course.
Again, Jenkins faced the broad gray face and unblinking yellow eyes on the screen.
“I have decided to agree on an alliance,” he told the Council President—checking the screen to make sure the correct translation was rendered.
“I so agree,” the Council President replied.
“I further propose that it is to our mutual advantage to locate our missing people,” he told the alien.
“That is unnecessary.”
“You know where they are?” Jenkins demanded.
The Council President gestured in a way the humans interpreted as a shrug. “Not now. I know where they will be.”
“Where? And when will they be there?”
“On Hasta.” The computer scrambled for a minute and then identified “Hasta” as the outermost of the Mars-type planets. “Colony 246 has an old base there from when they tried to turn the whole planet into a Colony. It is Derfuhrer’s most secure dungeon. They will arrive in a few more days.”
“I found out something else interesting, too,” Jenkins told Carlotti later as he recounted the conversation. “The Council President says his people can mount a rescue in a few weeks.”
Instinctively, Carlotti looked out the great bridge windows toward the star. “A few weeks?”
Jenkins shrugged. “They have to modify ships to land on the planet. Most of theirs aren’t made for it.”
“So we let them make the rescue?” Iron Alice asked.
Jenkins scowled. “No good for two reasons. First, I don’t think we have that much time.”
“Second?”
“Would you trust the Council President with hostages?”