“They said nothing about our offer of the com unit,” noted Rankin.
Wenyuan scowled. “You heard what they want.”
“How did you take ‘of the Jiadur’—as a reference to their ship or their species?” Rankin asked Charan.
“Species,” Charan said. “But we can ask. Or can we?”
“FM’s no problem. But until they take the com unit, there’ll be no video. All our video downlinks are digital,” said Rankin. “We can always use the beacon frequencies again.”
Charan shook his head. “Let’s show them that we’re flexible. They chose this mode for some reason. And I want to know if their voice analyzer is as good as their voice synthesizer.”
“
What
do we answer them, not how, that’s my concern,” Wenyuan said. “Who are the Founders? Who is holding what in trust?”
“It almost sounds like something Joanna’s heavenly host might say—the Creator, the Founders, the meaning is close,” Rankin mused. “Earth held in trust—isn’t there something in Genesis?”
“I wouldn’t know. We’ll reply per mission protocol,” Charan replied. “We’ll try to get them to hold station with us. Am I ready here?” he asked Rankin, gesturing at the com controls.
Rankin nodded.
“No good reason to wait,” Charan said, positioning the headset mike. He closed his eyes briefly, took a deep breath, and began:
“This is Commander Tilak Charan of the starship
Pride of Earth
. We received the audio portion of your message clearly on this frequency. But we are not equipped to process your video signal or respond with our own. Please know that any information you sent in that manner was not received. We repeat our offer of a complete communications unit to facilitate the exchange of information between us.
“In your next transmission, we would like you to tell us the name of your vessel, the name by which you refer to your homeworld, and the name by which you yourself are known.”
“Why not where they’re from?” Wenyuan asked under his breath. “What name or coordinate system would they use to tell us?” Rankin said scornfully. “That’ll have to wait.”
Charan continued, “We are willing to arrange meetings between representatives of our two species. I myself will come to your ship if you will agree to reduce its velocity to one part in one hundred of the present magnitude.
“We await your reply.”
Rankin switched off the transmitter. “It’ll be two minutes at minimum, a minute’s lag either way.”
Wenyuan shook his head. “Much more. They will have to analyze the message and be certain they understand it, particularly phrases like ‘one part in a hundred.’ Then they will have to decide what they want to tell us. Please, Commander—do not base too many assumptions on their answers. They are as likely to tell us a self-serving lie as the truth.”
“It’s nice to be able to count on you for a refreshing breath of cynicism, Major,” Rankin said wryly.
“Expecting the best is a way to die young.” Wenyuan took note of Joanna’s appearance at the passway. “You have given up your foolishness at last?” he asked acidly. “Or do you worship the god of steel and the forge?”
Joanna pulled herself into the compartment and dangled lightly from a ceiling handhold. “That ship is only the vanguard of the heavenly host. The Gentle King has no wish to frighten us and sends this messenger in a form we can accept and with a voice we find familiar,” she said.
Wenyuan’s own misgivings had made him combative. “I have to admire a faith flexible enough to adapt to any set of facts.”
“He has spoken to me directly in many of the languages of men and in the language of heaven.”
“And what does he say?”
“The message is the same in all languages. To those who are One in the Spirit he says, Do not be afraid. The Redeemer is near.” Her voice had a tremor which could have been uncertainty or anticipation.
Rankin interrupted the debate. “Answer coming back!”
Commander Charan of the
Pride of Earth.
This one is Ryuka of the
Jiadur,
curator of the keep of Journa. No change in the
Jiadur’s
destiny is possible. What was planned must be
.
“How the hell are they generating that so fast?” fumed Rankin.
It is not necessary nor would it be fitting for the Commander Charan to risk the dangers of crossing between our two ships. What is a burden for you will be an honor for this one
.
“What danger is he talking about?” wondered Charan.
“Look! Something’s happening!”
Joanna’s exclamation drew their eyes upward toward the bridge window. On the top and bottom of the main hull, directly behind the five massive pistons of the pulse drive, were two arrowhead-shaped projections perhaps fifteen metres in length. To everyone’s eye, they had appeared to be an integral part of the vessel, one of the many spots where some unknown interior function had been allowed to dictate exterior form.
Now, one of the projections had separated from the main hull, revealing itself as an independent vehicle. Even as they watched, the tiny ship slowly rotated so the pointed end faced toward
Pride of Earth
. A yellow-white glow appeared as a halo around the blunt tail.
“There is your space fighter, Commander Charan,” Wenyuan said grimly.
“No,” said Charan. “The shape misleads you. The
Jiadur
could never land on Earth. Its crew would need a way around that limitation. I would wager you’re looking at a Journan shuttle—a ship designed for the 12 kps and below regime. And here it is being used as a transfer vehicle at more than half the speed of light. That’s the danger he meant. At this velocity, a grain of dust hardly large enough to irritate the eye would pack the power of a small atomic bomb. He must want this meeting very badly.”
“You can’t allow an alien aboard,” Wenyuan said sharply.
“Allow it? I intend to help it.”
“That is an unacceptable risk.”
“The time for objections was during intercept planning a year ago. Now we have a mission protocol to follow.”
“We are also expected to exercise judgment.” With each exchange, the tenor of each man’s voice became more belligerent.
“I heard no protest when I offered to go aboard the
Jiadur
.”
“The situations are not equivalent. Allowing it aboard could risk this ship.”
“Which is why mod E is not connected directly to either of the other habitable mods, and why the hatch to the drive core can only be locked from the drive core side—
outside
the mod. The visitor will be isolated.”
Wenyuan unstrapped his seat restraints. “I would like reassurance that those locks will function as required.”
“I’ll be happy to demonstrate them for you,” Charan said, pushing off toward the passway. Joanna moved aside to let them pass.
“Don’t follow,” Rankin said sharply as Joanna made a move in that direction. “That brew has been bubbling since we left Unity.” She hesitated, then pushed herself down toward the empty seat. “I’m afraid I am responsible for turning up the heat.”
Charan led as the two men moved from mod B into the drive core through one hatchway and a third of the way around its perimeter to a similar aperture.
“What would you consider proof?” asked Charan, stopping there.
“I was told repeatedly that you are the expert on the ship’s systems. If you are unable to open it from inside, I will be confident that no alien will be able to.”
Charan nodded deferentially and pulled himself through the hatchway, then rotated his body to face Wenyuan. “Then lock it.”
“As you will.” Wenyuan pressed a switch to the right of the opening and drifted back as the curved door slid sideways across the hatchway, then forward to seal the opening.
Charan went quickly to the terminal.
“Try now,” Wenyuan said through the intercom.
mp lockout
fool’s mate
done
“There is no way to unlock it,” Charan called back. “There is no access to the mechanism, no seams through which to attack the stays. There are no tools for cutting or prying. The lock draws its power directly from the drive core. Short of burning through both hulls, which there are also no tools for, the locks do their job quite thoroughly.”
“Still, I think I had better allow some time for your fertile mind to consider the problem,” Wenyuan replied. Charan could almost hear the gloating smile.
mp freezeout
fool’s mate
done
“The risks you propose to take are unacceptable,” Wenyuan continued. “We have already sent the crucial intelligence to our leaders. Now the first priority is survival.”
Charan floated by the terminal with crossed arms as though resting in an easy chair and laughed. “You’re afraid, Major. I hadn’t expected that of you.”
“I’m afraid that insults will not be sufficient to make me open this door.”
“I don’t want you to open it.”
“We cannot permit them aboard. I will not allow their shuttle to approach. We will keep our distance until and unless they agree to allow you aboard their ship. If they continue to refuse, I will take
Pride of Earth
back home as quickly as possible so that it can be armed before
Jiadur
arrives. Any risk that they may take over this ship is too great a risk.”
“This ship has already been taken, Major—by me. You invited me to try to unlock the hatch. I invite you to try the same.”
“I am not fool enough to be taken in by such a transparent trick.”
“You have already been taken in,” Charan said. He switched the bridge in on their conversation. “This is Charan in mod E. By the order of the Chairman of the Pangaean Consortium, I have placed this vessel under new mission protocols. As part of those protocols, all communications and certain ship functions are now controlled exclusively by me until this critical period is over.”
“This is the kind of high-handedness I expected from the Major, not you,” protested Rankin.
“Perhaps it will console you to know I merely anticipated his intent. The Major was prepared to run back to Earth without learning any more about the Journans than we know now.”
“When they receive our report of your ignominy, the people of Earth will see that for the falsehood it is,” Wenyuan said smoothly.
“Whether the Major is right or not, when this flashes on the NET it’s going to tear a rift right down the middle of the Consortium,” Rankin said angrily. “What was Rashuri thinking?”
“No one will know,” Charan said calmly. “Except for basic systems telemetry, all transmissions to Earth have been interrupted. We’ll evaluate our encounter with the Joumans as it progresses and make our report afterward.”
There was no answer. The others had fallen silent, each finding the thoughts they entertained beyond verbalizing. Charan found the silence awkward, a condemnation of a measure he had been reluctant to take. He wanted to tell them what he would do next, but he did not need their assistance and could not expect their approval. He yearned to shift the focus of then-hostility to Rashuri, who had written the script Charan was now playing out.
But he did none of those things. There was only one factor remaining on the right side of the equation, only one issue that mattered: a rendezvous with the approaching shuttle and its Journan pilot. With the weary reluctance of one who has gone too far down a wrong path to turn back, Tilak Charan turned to the task at hand.
Doppler radar gave the closing velocity of the Journan shuttle at a mere 25 kps. At that speed, it would cover barely two million kilometres a day, and take nearly ten days to crawl across to
Pride of Earth
.
Charan found that unacceptably slow, both from the standpoint of the risk to the Journan and for the amount of time it allowed Wenyuan to try turning the tables. In a ten-hour maneuver, Charan closed to within 800,000 kilometres of
Jiadur
, at which point the shuttle was just eight hours away physically and two and a half seconds away electronically.
While Charan was so engaged, Wenyuan made seven separate attempts to enter mod E or wrest back control of the ship. Rankin duly informed Charan of each attempt as it occurred, seeing his contribution as preventing not the attempts but any dangerous surprises that might result if one were successful.
But the mode of all Wenyuan’s efforts had been anticipated—protected against by Moraji and tested by a three-man tiger team during final checkout. Wenyuan’s only real option was to use his access to the drive core to disable the ship completely, but he gave it only the briefest passing consideration. He did not intend to die on a derelict; even admitting failure was more palatable than that alternative. And in time, admitting failure was the only choice left.
Charan was keeping the airwaves between
Pride of Earth
and the Journan shuttle busy with an improvised verbal version of one of the first lessons which had been prepared for use with the communications link: an introduction to basic chemistry.
The lesson presumed that the Joumans understood chemistry; what was needed was some way of intelligibly discussing it. Charan could not simply ask about biological requirements, for instance. There was no guarantee that the answer would be meaningful. What was needed were labels both could understand, beginning with the names of the elements. So Charan laboriously outlined the periodic chart from hydrogen to uranium, using a century-old concept of atomic structure, which though outdated had the virtue of simplicity.
Ryuka-voice—Charan thought it a seductive trap to think of the humanlike voice as the alien itself and so resisted—was patient and cooperative. It shared the Journan words for elements freely, evinced excitement when understanding of a troublesome idea was reached. The Joumans had obviously gleaned much from monitoring Earth’s radio and television signals, and that knowledge speeded the process.
Nevertheless, the shuttle was alongside before they were done. Charan realized suddenly that he was exhausted, not having slept since well before the first Journan message had been received forty hours ago. But he gave no thought to postponing what was at hand. He moved into the meeting chamber and activated its systems.