“Yes, sir!” Lieutenant Snipe saluted sharply and left the command center. He was ready to put some steel in the Omega Mob’s spines whether they needed it or not. He looked forward to making some examples. After the day he’d been through, he wouldn’t mind making examples of the whole company.
* * *
“We’re getting closer,” said Sushi, looking at the dial of his detector.
“This is fine to hear, Sushi,” said Flight Leftenant Qual. “Do you have a concept of how close the Hidden Ones may be?”
“Nothing precise,” said Sushi. “But the signal’s started to cover a wider angle, and that means we’re getting closer. How close depends on just how big an area the signal sources are coming from. If it’s a couple hundred feet across, we’re real close; if it’s a couple hundred miles, we’re still a long way away.”
Qual nodded, then asked, “And there is nothing to distinguish between those cases?”
Sushi looked up from his machine and said, “Nothing objective; the signal’s growing stronger, which could mean a closer distance. But I assume that people only a few feet away from one another have some way more effective than radio signals to communicate.”
“That is not an infallible assumption,” said Qual. “One could postulate a race that sees radio frequencies the way we do visible light, and uses them to communicate. After all, Garbo and I see deeper into the infrared than you do.”
“Yeah, and we humans can hear lower pitches than either of you,” said Sushi. “I know it’s possible, Qual, I’m just trying to keep the number of variables down to a bare minimum until something proves I need to look in other directions. Otherwise, we’ll be spending so much time on woo-woo ideas that the serious probabilities will get lost.”
“How could they get lost?” asked Qual. “They will still be there, even if we are looking at the boo-hoo ideas.”
Sushi grinned in spite of himself. “You know, Qual, sometimes I think you speak our language better than you let on.”
Qual returned the grin, showing a mouthful of predatory teeth. “I do not speak your language at all, Sushi; it is all done by the translator. Though I understand that the machine can learn from experience, so perhaps that is what you are hearing.”
“Guess that could make sense,” said Sushi. Then his brow wrinkled. “Say, that just gave me an idea. In fact, I feel like an idiot for not thinking of it earlier. If these signals we’re getting are some sort of messages, the translator ought to be able to make sense out of them. Maybe when we stop, I can borrow yours, and we can hook it up to the receiver …”
“That is a very interesting plan, Sushi,” said Qual. “Of course you can borrow it. Although it will leave me temporarily powerless to communicate, I think the risk of learning something useful is paramount here. Or, now that I think of it, Garbo has a translator as well. Perhaps it would be better to use hers, so I can stay advised of what occurs.”
“Sure, that ought to work just as well,” said Sushi. “We’ll give it a try when we stop again. It shouldn’t take long to set up.”
The search party set out again in the direction Sushi’s detector indicated the signal was coming from. But it was only a short time when Sushi stopped and said, “Hold on, guys. This thing’s going crazy.”
“Crazy? How?” asked Brick. “Has it stopped picking up the signal?”
“No, the directional indicator’s gone haywire,” said Sushi. “It says the signal’s coming from all directions. Wait a minute … That could only mean one thing. Except it doesn’t make any sense.”
“I see what you mean,” said Qual. “If the signal comes from all directions, it means we are in the place where the signal comes from. Yet there is nothing but the desert here.” He had taken a handheld spotlight off his belt and was shining its beam in all directions.
“Be damn,” said Double-X. “Maybe them Hidden Ones really are invisible.”
“I still don’t believe that,” said Sushi. “More likely, they’re hiding underground.”
“Then the signal would come from below us, would it not?” said Mahatma. “Does the detector indicate that?”
“No, it’s from all directions including straight up,” said Sushi. “Maybe it’s time to hook up a translator to the detector—”
“Hey, what’s that?” said Brick, pointing off into the desert.
Qual swung his spotlight beam back in the direction she was pointing, and the legionnaires saw the reflection of the beam from something metallic.
“We’d better go check it out,” said Sushi. “What are your orders, Flight Leftenant?”
“Wait, I can see it well,” said Garbo, the Gambolt. “It is a Legion hoverjeep!”
“It’s gotta be the captain’s jeep,” said Double-X. “What’s it doin’ this far out? That’s a hell of a hike for a guy without any supplies or protection.”
“That’s a good question,” said Sushi. “I expect we’re going to learn the answer to that, and to a lot of other questions, very soon now.”
“Yes, I think we are,” said Qual. “Here is the plan. Sushi and I will advance carefully and examine the jeep; the rest of you must take up positions whence you can observe and keep us covered in case of surprise; having the best night eyes, Garbo will command the covering party. Be certain to shout a warning if you see any movement other than ourselves. Is it understood?”
“Understood, Leftenant Qual,” murmured Garbo. She directed her group to fan out to positions with clear sight lines toward the hoverjeep, while Qual and Sushi carefully made their way forward. Stunners on the ready, they waited breathlessly to see what would happen next. Around them, the sounds of the desert filled the air.
* * *
The camp was full of activity as Lieutenant Snipe emerged from the CO’s office into the open area inside the perimeter—as active as he’d ever seen it. Brandy had the troops in their defensive emplacements, and everyone in sight was wearing a helmet and body armor. It made the lieutenant’s blood sing to see it.
A short distance away, Snipe spotted Lieutenant Armstrong scanning the sky with a pair of high-powered stereoculars. Snipe hurried over and stood next to Armstrong. “What can you see?” he said.
“The ship’s still below the horizon,” said Armstrong with a casual air that Snipe wished he could emulate. “So far, no sign of missiles or landing craft.”
“Keep a sharp eye out,” said Snipe, not bothering to keep an edge out of his voice. “I’ll need to know instantly if you spot any sign of activity.”
Lieutenant Armstrong took the ’ocs away from his eyes and fixed Snipe with a look that would have made an oyster flinch. “Sure, Lieutenant Snipe, just as soon as I see anything worth reporting. I hope you don’t mind if I use my judgment. It’ll be a few minutes before the ship clears the horizon, so if you need to do anything urgent—”
“Good, good, keep your eyes peeled,” said Snipe, oblivious to the chill in Armstrong’s voice. He turned and headed toward the perimeter to check out the defenses.
To Snipe’s surprise, there were only two legionnaires visible, sitting with their feet in the perimeter trench and quietly eating sandwiches, with their backs facing outward. One of them was looking at the centerfold of a men’s magazine, while the other was nodding his head in time to the music in the earphones he wore. “What are you doing?” Snipe shrieked, his voice going up an octave in pitch. “There’s an unidentified ship—probably an enemy—approaching the camp, and you’ve got nothing better to do than sit here reading a skin mag?”
“Chill, Lieutenant,” said the one wearing earphones—Snipe recognized him as the one named Street. “We on lunch break, is all.”
“Lunch break!” Snipe’s jaw dropped. “I never heard such bullshit! This is a war zone, legionnaire, and we’re under attack. Who told you to take a break?”
“Sergeant Brandy said it was OK,” said the other legionnaire. Snipe saw that his name tag read Gears.
“’Sides, ain’t no attack I can see,” said
Street. “Somebody starts attackin’, we be there.”
“And meanwhile you think you can go off and do as you please,” snarled Snipe. “The major will hear of this, you know. Consider yourselves both on report!”
“You can go get yourself some vacuum,” said Street. “I take my orders from Brandy.” He reached down, turned up the volume control on his headset, and proceeded to act as if Snipe did not exist.
Furious, the lieutenant turned around and began to search for the first sergeant. To his surprise, she was nowhere near the two errant soldiers. Finally spotting her unmistakable figure across the camp, he marched over to her, stiff as an overwound toy soldier.
Brandy was standing on the parapet of the trench on this side, looking out over the desert. “Sergeant!” Snipe strode right up to her and put his hands on his hips. “Sergeant, I need to talk to you.”
Brandy turned slowly and looked at him. “We’re in the middle of a situation right now, Lieutenant Snipe. Is this important, or can you wait until we get it sorted out?”
“A situation! I should say so,” said Snipe. “You’ve left the entire western perimeter undefended, except for a couple of men who say you told them to take a break!”
“That ship’s coming from the east, Lieutenant,” said Brandy. “If it’s going to land west of us, we’ll get plenty of notice. We don’t even know if it’s landing at all. If it does, I’ve got time to get those men back.”
“That’s not the point, Sergeant,” said Snipe. “Discipline must be maintained—”
“Sure, sure,” said Brandy, waving the lieutenant off with a huge hand. “You Headquarters types always think discipline’s the whole game. But this is Omega Company—”
“Yes, and your headline-hogging Captain Jester thinks he can throw away centuries of Legion tradition,” said Snipe. “Well, your little journey into unreality is over, Sergeant. We’re going to do things the Legion way from here on out. And you’re going to—”
“Here comes the ship,” a voice behind him called suddenly. It added, dryly, “Looks like she’s about to land.”
“Oh my God!” said Snipe, turning white as a sheet. He turned to Brandy, but she was already moving along the line, giving terse orders to her people. The whole line tensed, looking at the dot of light that was now visible to everybody in the camp. Lower it came, and lower still. Snipe watched in helpless fascination. It seemed to descend agonizingly slowly, but at last it touched down.
* * *
After a careful approach, Qual and Sushi reached the hoverjeep only to discover that it was unoccupied. That was a disappointment, though hardly a surprise. Inside the vehicle’s cab, the legionnaires found equipment belonging to both Phule and Beeker: notably, the captain’s Port-a-Brain computer, an item that could put a serious dent in the budgets of most planetary governments.
“That’s not something the captain would leave behind unless he was out of choices,” said Sushi. “And if Beeker were in any position to protest, he’d have made him take it along anyway. I wonder why he didn’t bring it back to camp with him.”
“If I am not mistaken, it is still turned on,” said Flight Leftenant Qual, pointing at the light glowing on the Port-a-Brain. “Captain Clown must have been in a great rush to leave the vehicle without closing down his brain.”
“You’re right,” said Sushi, suddenly excited. He leaned in and peered more closely at the device. He blew a film of dust off the front panel and looked more closely at the readouts. “Look at that. The modem’s operating. I wonder what it’s connected to.”
“No doubt to whatever the captain was accessing when he left it,” said Qual.
“Let me see that computer,” said Sushi suddenly. “It wouldn’t stay connected to the web that long; the connection will automatically time-out unless there’s activity on the user side. So either the captain left only a short while ago … But that’s impossible; he’s been in camp since before we left. So it’s still tuned in to whatever it was picking up when he left here. And my guess is that the something else is—”
“The signal you have been following to here!” Qual finished the sentence. His mouth fell open in a broad grin. “Great Gazma! The Hidden Ones attempt to communicate with the computer!”
Sushi grinned back at him. “It’s probably a pretty one-sided conversation, but yeah, I think that’s exactly what’s going on. I bet they’re sending different test signals, trying to get it to respond to them.”
Qual’s translator emitted a sound the legionnaires had learned to recognize as laughter. “Can they not tell the difference between a sophont and a machine?”
Sushi’s expression turned serious. “Funny you should ask. There’s a famous experiment some old Earth computer scientist invented. And if the Port-a-Brain has the Hidden Ones fooled into thinking it’s a sophont, it’s passed the Turing test. Which I guess it ought to, considering the price tag.”
“Your machines are designed differently from ours,” said Qual. “We know directly whether we are confronting a machine or an intelligent being. Confusion is not wanted.”
“I guess machine intelligence is so useful, we humans are willing to put up with a bit of confusion,” said Sushi. “Who needs stupid machines when we have so many stupid people? Besides, this Port-a-Brain may be smarter than all of us put together, but it doesn’t look like any living creature I’ve ever seen. The Hidden Ones must be very strange if they can’t tell it’s a machine they’re trying to talk to … Hey, wait a minute.”
“I suppose I can,” said Qual with a reptilian shrug. “But I think it would better utilize our time searching for the captain’s butler.”
Sushi laughed. “No, I mean I’ve got an idea what could have happened. Those strange signals we’ve been receiving—they’re all around us here, but we don’t see any sign of civilization, except for the hoverjeep and the things in it.”
“That is manifestly true,” said Qual. “It is a jigsaw.”
Sushi frowned, then shrugged and said, “I think maybe the Hidden Ones haven’t hidden on purpose. They’re just too small for us to notice. And that may prevent them from noticing us—or at least, from recognizing what we are—as much as it prevents us from seeing them.”
“Too small?” Qual turned and looked in all directions. “Even very small creatures would need machines and buildings, and we do not see those, either.”
“No,” admitted Sushi. “But I suddenly feel very confident in this idea. I think it’s time to try that experiment I’ve been talking about. Didn’t the captain and Beeker take along translators on their visit to your capital?”
“I think they did,” said Qual. “No doubt they would be in the baggage compartments.”
The baggage compartment was locked, but that deterred Sushi only a few moments. Sure enough, there were a pair of translators there, neatly packed in their neoplastic carrying cases. By the time Sushi got them out, Qual had signaled the rest of the squad to join them, and (at the Zenobian officer’s direction) they began looking around the area for signs of the jeep’s occupants.
“With two translators to play with, I’ve got another idea,” said Sushi. “If the Hidden Ones are trying to communicate with this Port-a-Brain, I want to see if there’s some way we can hook a translator into it.”
Brick, who’d helped Sushi unload the baggage compartment, said, “Sounds like your kind of fun. But why don’t you hook it up to your own gizmo first? I mean, the captain’s fancy computer’s got more brainpower than the Alliance Senate. If it hasn’t cracked the language on its own by now—how long’s it been working at it, a week?—maybe us sophonts deserve a shot at it.”
Sushi laughed. “Maybe you’re right,” he said. “I’ll give that a try first. If nothing else, I’ve been thinking about it long enough, so I have some idea where to start.” He set down the translators and headed back to retrieve his receiver and his tool kit.
* * *
Perhaps an hour later, Flight Leftenant Qual wandered over to the hover
jeep, where Sushi had set up a makeshift workbench on the tailgate. He took off his dark sunglasses and peered at the electronic tangle. “How functions it, young one?” asked the Zenobian.
Sushi leaned back and sighed. “These things were never meant to fit together,” he said. “If I had a parts shop handy, I could probably find something off the shelf to make the job easier. Out here in the field, I’ve got to kludge it up pretty much from scratch.”
“So this signifies it will not perform?” said Qual.
“Oh, I think I can make it work,” admitted Sushi. “I’ve probably voided the captain’s warranty on his computer, and it’ll never win any beauty contests. But I think he’d approve the project, just on general principles.”
“Since you’re doing it to save his butler, I guess he would,” said Brick. “He can buy another computer, but Beeker’s not going to be easy to replace.”
“I just hope Beeker’s still in condition to save,” said Sushi quietly. “He’s been out in the desert for a long time, and all the emergency rations are still in the jeep. Unless he’s got some other source of food and water …”
“If the Hidden Ones have seized him, they ought to nourish him,” said Qual.
“I hope so,” said Sushi. “Problem is, until we can communicate with them, we don’t know whether they even know where Beeker is. For all we know, he tried to get back to base with the captain and didn’t make it. He’s not a young man—”
“I do not think something has happened to Beeker,” said Qual. “Captain Clown would surely have talked about it.”
“You’d think so, wouldn’t you?” said Sushi. “But something must have happened to him on that trek back to the base. He’s not acting anything like himself. Brick, you said he acted like he couldn’t even see you when you talked to him.”
The Complete Phule’s Company Boxed Set Page 104
