“Hello, Kip,” Porblump answered properly. “My name is Porblump—”
“—the Chief Being for Displaying Beautiful Beasts. Hi! I can see you live right next to your call code. Hey, it’s great to talk to you in person! How’s the display going?”
Porblump was momentarily overwhelmed by such excessive good cheer. “The display is well in hand, generally, with one crucial exception.”
“Yeah, we’re working on this Vilzmix thing. Wow, is that an awesome beast! Lethal, but awesome! Man, have we got plans!”
“Design plans?”
“All kinds of plans. For instance, take a look at this sign.” The human did something with the gadget in its paw. The next moment, a stylized rendition of the word Vilzmix rotated on Porblump’s display, spewing beautiful whorls of ultraviolet in imitation of the creature’s tendrils.
Kip’s voice accompanied the image. “What you’re seeing is optimized for you, for the Porblump-type creature—”
“Not so,” buzzed HwoTzip. “This is a Sprighter Fly message.”
“Hey, I didn’t know you had a friend there. Hello, little friend! You’re demonstrating the coolness of this sign. We’re programming it to display the word Vilzmix in every language used by every creature who’s planning to attend the Sessions. We’ve got all the main players done now except for, I think, the IzzleBits, who are late, and the ZzzzBzzzz, who won’t confirm our translation.”
“Yes, this is quite wonderful,” Porblump interrupted, “but it doesn’t help contain the Vilzmix itself, will it?”
“You’re right about that, Chief. This is what you call an ‘extra.’ A little razzle-dazzle to really make the Vilzmix exhibit pop, right? And we’ve got these filters, we’re adding filters that will adhere to the enclosure walls–”
“The walls that aren’t yet built.”
“Yeah, those walls. When we get ’em in place, these filters will render the tendril display visually accessible to every member species, not just those who can natively see ultraviolet. We got the idea because Ying—you know Ying, from the forum? Anyway, Ying said, ‘If we’re doing all this work to house the Vilzmix, we might as well be able to see it when we’re done, right?’ So she and Mikhailov formed this subteam—”
“Yes, yes, quite impressive,” cried Porblump, almost distressed by the flood of enthusiasm. “If I could get back to the matter of the walls …”
“Well, hold onto your bonnet, because I’m about to up the coolness factor to ten.” The display reverted to an image of the human suspended within the collection of supporting struts. “You see these beams? Well, Durand said, why not make a statement? You know, like the Louvre or the Eiffel Tower? Sorry, that might not mean much to you, but basically, make it art for art’s sake. Something beautiful yet functional. Why go to all the trouble to build a brand new home for an awesomely amazing creature if it’s only the same old thing?”
Porblump realized the human was actually waiting for a response. “Because, without a proper structure, the Vilzmix will kill every attendee at the conference.”
“Yeah, well, that’s the functional side …”
“Human-Kip,” Porblump interrupted, pressed for time and too bothered to work out whether she addressed a male or female of the species, “the plain fact is this: Unless I can receive assurance within three moonstrobes—”
“Forty-eight hours,” HwoTzip hissed into her ear. “Humans measure units in hours.”
“Forty-eight hours,” Porblump corrected, “I will have no choice but to jettison the Vilzmix into the nearest nebula. Its current containment is disintegrating, and we can’t risk exposing any of our conference members to the uncontained radiation.”
The human went still. “Forty-eight hours, you said?”
“Yes. It’s on your progress indicator.”
“Yeah, but, forty-eight hours! Man, that came up quick, didn’t it?”
Porblump blinked. “I believe it came up precisely at the expected time. You have been following the enclosure’s progress, yes?”
“Yeah, it’s just …” The creature shook its head. “Whew! Forty-eight hours. Who knew?”
Porblump started to speak, then decided against it. She would have thought every being in the parsec understood the timeframe by now. Grargle proved to be cleverer than she had realized, for anticipating this weakness.
“Given the immediacy of the issue,” Porblump said carefully, “perhaps you had best leave off the matter of signs and filters and razzle-dazzle, and concentrate your efforts—”
“Yeah, I read you, Chief. No worries! I’m on this. I’ll catch up with you in a few, okay? Kip out.”
The image went dark. Porblump stared at the vacant screen.
HwoTzip twitched his wings. “We’re screwed, aren’t we?”
“Beautiful.”
Porblump had said it before, but she couldn’t stop repeating it.
The Vilzmix unfolded before them, its marvelous display highlighted by the complex geodesic structure that refracted its emissions in endless alluring counterpoint. The patterns themselves were more vivid than she’d ever seen them, thanks to the filter which optimized the wavelengths for every visual observer. Truly, it was an astounding achievement.
HwoTzip buzzed to her shoulder and settled. “I never would have thought they could do it. To build this, in only three moonstrobes …”
“I particularly like the sign,” Zalphin murmured beside them. Porblump and HwoTzip had invited it to view the completed exhibit with them. On the console beside them floated an image of Grargle’s reeking swamp, his greasy self-floating in the center.
“It’s a classy effort,” Porblump agreed. “I admit, I was concerned when I heard it described. But this is more than I could have dreamed!”
“But how?” HwoTzip fluttered restlessly. “How could the humans complete this so quickly? When we last spoke to Kip, I had thought it impossible.”
Grargle’s voice responded from the console. “The humans pulled, what I believe is called, an all-nighter.”
“All-nighter,” HwoTzip repeated. “Is that a formidable construction device?”
“Quite formidable.” Grargle gurgled with amusement. “Of all the human features we considered for this task—their empathy—”
“Compassion,” said Porblump.
“Creativity,” said Zalphin.
“Responsibility,” said HwoTzip.
“—this little quirk should prove supreme.” Grargle burbled happily. “Procrastination. The ultimate human trademark.”
Porblump admired the display. “I gladly forgive them this quirk, if it produces such wonders as these. What is the saying? All’s well that ends well?”
“And all’s well as ends better,” quoted Zalphin.
“Humans,” HwoTzip murmured. “Those exasperating humans.”
“Aren’t they amazing?” Porblump sighed.
In silence, the foursome contemplated the glorious display.
Overcommander Xcanda had screwed up. The how and why were still a mystery, but the result wasn’t. Xin’d written and signed the report that detailed every step of xen blunder in cool detail and sent it back to the Joint Exploratory Command headquarters marked Urgent. That was the agreed-upon protocol. The next step of the protocol dictated: Wait at safe distance for response.
Well, Xcanda had done that as well, even if it chafed xen shell. The massive protocol directory that made a significant chunk of their ship’s not-inconsiderable data banks was a step-by-step process of what the five species who made up the JEC had actually been able to agree on, and it was not to be deviated from. Xcanda had it on good authority that it had taken negotiators over thirty years to hammer it all out. It was an annoyance, but in some ways a relief. It meant that if one followed the JEC protocol and a problem occurred, it was a problem with the protocol, not with the executor.
Or at least that was how it should be in a just universe, may the light of all Ro burn it clean of darkness.
Shi
p at the fold point, one of the navigators informed Xcanda by ship transmission.
Message pod?
Xin sensed the hesitation in the answer, a split second longer than it should have taken. Was the navigator double checking that which they should have found certain? No, Overcommander. Diplomatic transport. Codes check. Previous call point Turabad Station.
It took Xcanda a moment to parse the shudder than ran down xen legs at this. The memory thread of Turabad Station led to Jahala IX, which lead to human ambassadorial program, which lead to incredibly annoying.
Overcommander? They request permission.
This was not outside of protocol. Xcanda only wished that it was. But xin was certain xin hadn’t blundered this badly. There was only one possible response, and the JEC protocols dictated that too: Permission granted. Prepare a full receiving line.
Hasan Al-Amir felt Kella’s breath against his neck. It wasn’t her fault; the ship was so small that every time they both occupied the same room—of which it had only three—they were practically in each other’s clothes. Worse, Kella had put on her full SEA Guard armor for the occasion, so her already large frame had gone past impressive and into the realm of frightening.
“Nervous?” she asked. She hadn’t pulled her helmet on yet, and the short, neat, salt-and-pepper braids of her hair stood out from her head. It made him miss his own hair, which had only just begun to grow back into a stiff black fuzz after the final rounds of augmentation.
His grip on the handhold—ships this small couldn’t produce artificial gravity and they hadn’t completely locked onto the Isxalit yet—was damp and his knuckles were white. He smiled at her and lied, “Not at all.” Of course not. What could he possibly have to be nervous about? This was his first mission out of training, and the assignment was a botched first contact.
She laughed, her teeth white against her so-dark-it-was-almost-black-skin, and information cascaded over his awareness. As was standard, he’d been given Kella’s full files, along with all of the Isxalit crew. Kella had acted as the bodyguard for six different ambassadors, all of them on their first few missions. That was why she’d jokingly referred to herself as “the nursemaid” when they met on Turabad Station. Kella knew he was lying because of her own experience. He knew that she knew he was lying because that was his job.
“Overcommander Xcanda will believe you,” Kella said. She even put the correct dry tsk of sound at the start of the Overcommander’s name, something most humans had a difficult time replicating and just allowed translation programs to manage.
There was a soft vibration which he felt in the handhold—the clamps of the Isxalit locking in. Gravity flowed over them like water and he suddenly felt his own weight press his feet down against the deck plates.
“Because Xurit can’t read out-species facial expressions,” Hasan said wryly. He knew the species like he’d lived among them all his life, thanks to the extensive memory input.
“Simpler than that,” Kella said as the airlock began its cycle. She tossed Hasan the small respirator he’d need to survive the atmosphere on the Xurit ship. “Xcanda needs this to not be xen fault.”
“That doesn’t make me feel any better.”
“It wasn’t meant to.”
And the airlock opened.
Xcanda looked over the receiving line, all of the named Xurit of the crew standing in good order. It was a pleasing sight, in xen opinion.
What stepped out of the message pod was far less pleasing. Two humans, the larger obviously a SEA Guard in full armor. The smaller was light brown and wore white robes with flared sleeves.
The ambassador approached and bowed, arms raised politely in an imitation of the proper Xurit greeting. Introductions were made, and Xcanda had xen translator note the names, since the bizarre sounds weren’t worth remembering.
“Do you have the full report for me?” the ambassador asked.
Xcanda gestured, and one of the menial crew came forward around the receiving line to offer a short, cloudy, gray data thread. The SEA Guard was the one who took it, power-armored hands moving as delicately as Xcanda’s own claws.
“There will be a transport ready to take you to the surface in twenty minutes,” Xcanda said, via the translator floating discreetly overhead. “You will land at the encounter site.”
The ambassador glanced at their bodyguard, though Xcanda could not guess the purpose in it. The bodyguard there, as they always had been. “That is most appreciated, Overcommander.”
“Swift resolution will be most appreciated of all,” Xcanda returned. “We have confidence in your efforts.” Xin actually didn’t have any confidence at all, but protocol required that as the response. It was probably, Xcanda could admit grudgingly, better than what xin might have said otherwise.
Hasan didn’t have a chance to take the data thread from Kella until they were both strapped into the transport and began the stomach-turning drop into the gravity well. He’d thought he’d have those twenty minutes to absorb things, but it had been entirely taken up by a series of exhaustive credential exchanges and then safety checks conducted by several of Xcanda’s unnamed underlings.
“You want it now?” Kella asked.
“Not really, but I need it,” he said. Every other download he’d ever done had been in the controlled environment of classroom, clinic, or meditation chamber. But he wouldn’t be any use at all if he set foot on the surface without it.
He bent his head forward so that Kella could slide the thread down the back of his robe, along his spine. The implants there sensed its presence, unzipping the synthetic skin along the ridge of bone, and absorbed the material through the aperture. It still felt very strange, like cold water running down his nerves.
The mass of data slammed into his consciousness, almost more than the neural processors could handle: recorded encounters ending with black and silver bloodshed, telemetry data, atmospheric data, samples of very interesting biologicals processed and flagged, and then the massive decoded language file. That was the most important, and he focused on that, shunting the less important details to the periphery of his attention.
Massive AI-augmented processing networks, like those onboard ships, usually made short work of decoding new languages from observation. All they required were enough recorded conversations and the machines could pick out grammatical structures—as long as they were present—match words to meaning, and the other tasks that had once required substantive effort from teams of biological translators. With that, he had a robust dictionary of the language he could speak if it was something a human tongue could manage—this was—or at the least, feed to his technical translator.
As Hasan finished absorbing the language—it made his mouth taste strange, something astringent on his tongue—he quickly reviewed the first contact logs. There’d been success with remote probes speaking to the local species, which were whip-thin and many-limbed.
Which brought him to the real first contact, species to species. He took a deep breath and sank into the recording from Xcanda’s perspective, the alienness of it grating at his perception. He swallowed the discomfort and unworthy feeling of revulsion, and accepted it, putting himself in the Overcommander’s place:
Stepping out of the transport where the probes had prepared the site and communicated arrival. Irritation from the respirator and thin-film protective outer suit. Finding the new species counterparts on the landing field inscrutable; fluid things that made no familiar gestures or sounds. Unsurprising.
Through the translator, reciting the greeting words that had been observed, and then rehearsed by the probes. This was standard protocol, required and annoying, but successful more often than not. Then the agreed-upon JEC greeting: “We are here in peace to welcome you to our society.”
A stir among the representatives across the field. Impossible to tell the source, or the meaning of the wavering about; the arms curving through the air. The translator begins to spit out a babble of “—changed—” “—out of str
eam—” “—does not trace—”
There is no procedure in the protocol for this precise situation. Move forward, repeat message. Note to check the translator for system flaws. Seven steps forward, the wild gesturing ends. Then the menial to the right sprouts an alloy projectile and silver blood mists the air.
Return fire—no, this is against protocol. Return to ship.
It was a mess, but Hasan felt a small bit of admiration for Overcommander Xcanda, for keeping mission and protocol foremost despite overwhelming emotion. He recalled some of his fellow humans he’d grown up with and doubted they’d have been able to do that much.
Though it was a question if any of them would have committed whatever misstep Xcanda had in the first place. He didn’t know, and couldn’t know. Humans were almost unique in the multitudinous species for their ability to grasp body language unlike their own, to want to empathize with beings completely alien to themselves. Why ambassadors were not standard parts of these missions, Hasan couldn’t guess, but he thought it must have something to do with internecine politics.
Kella nudged him lightly, and he carefully put all the if only away in a mental box. “If only” is a losing game, had been a favorite saying of one of his instructors. Hasan felt dizzy, turning his thoughts back outward; a low-grade headache throbbed from the back of his skull to the front, as the implants worked through the less essential data off to one side of his subconscious.
“Ready?” Kella asked. The set of her lips strongly implied a kiddo at the end of that statement.
“Of course,” Hasan lied. She knew it was a lie, and he knew that she knew.
The landing field gave him a moment of strange double vision because he’d seen and felt it already from a completely different perspective. Several of the new species—the fact what they called themselves translated to Tellers floated into his consciousness, supplied by the implants—gathered at the end of the field, as they had for Xcanda.
Humans Wanted Page 15
