by Mike Freeman
This was such a foreign concept to her self image that it had taken her several years to acknowledge it, never mind come to terms with it. She wasn't some silly young girl who didn't know anything. She wasn't a clueless and infatuated young woman. But she did look at someone like Bob Stone and think, there is a nice guy. And Stone could transform his entire looks, sure, but she wasn't even sure that she was that bothered at the moment. That would pass though, she thought, laughing as she thought of Stone’s ridiculous dome.
This mission felt wrong, like one drink too many. Novosa knew her melancholy was probably being magnified, perhaps hugely, by the tettraxigyiom contamination. But she still felt it. Knowing why she had toothache wouldn’t fix her toothache and knowing that she might feel downcast due to contamination didn't make her feel any better either.
She took a deep breath. It felt good to think about it and at least try and understand where she was up to. She'd been struggling to think straight for the last few hours, losing time and generally feeling dopey and hebetudinous.
She walked over the top of a low dune, perhaps a kilometer into the arid terrain. She spoke before she'd even properly registered the situation.
“Stephanie?”
Stephanie knelt beside something with only a tripod leg jutting out beside her leg. Stephanie turned quickly. She looked relieved.
“Oh, Saskia, thank goodness.”
Novosa felt strangely disoriented. She walked forward, around Stephanie, to reveal a surface comms kit with its collapsible disc unfurled and oriented skyward.
“What are you doing?”
“I found this.”
“You found it?”
“Yes, do you know what it is?”
Something felt wrong but Novosa didn't know what it was. Fucking tettraxigyiom contamination. Her mind was sluggish; befuddled like a village idiot's. Stephanie gazed up at her quizzically from her kneeling position.
“Maybe we've found something important. Do you think we should have John come out here?”
Novosa smiled. She crouched down to inspect the tripod. As she knelt down, Stephanie stood up. Novosa chatted as she inspected the equipment.
“What were the chances of you meeting your ex out here?”
Stephanie walked past the tripod and looked out across the dunes.
“I know. It's such a blessing.”
Novosa studied the tripod. It look like an Alliance relay for communicating with ships in orbit. She felt down the cable of the feed, presumably toward some kind of encryption assembly in the tripod's hollow leg.
“Do you think there's any chance for you two?”
Stephanie turned and walked slowly in the other direction, still gazing across the rolling dunes.
“I don't know. It's hard when there's so much history.”
Novosa frowned. She felt confused. There was no assembly on the end of the cable. She tried to recapture the thread of her thoughts. God her brain was fried.
“Ah, yeah, history.”
Stephanie walked forward to stand directly behind her.
“Do you know what it is?”
“Yes, but...”
Novosa realized that the assembly wasn't complete. It hadn't been finished. She felt rising alarm. What had been wrong clicked into focus. There was only one set of tracks down to the tripod.
“But?” Stephanie prompted.
Novosa’s gut constricted. Otva otva otva. She flicked on her all round view.
Stephanie stood over her with her arm raised, a filament blade fully extended from her right forearm, pointed straight at the back of her helmet.
Novosa fought panic as her adrenalin surged.
“I'm not sure, I need more time.”
100.
Weaver groaned inwardly as Kemensky’s complaining continued.
“I just don't understand why I can't do it as well as––”
Touvenay interjected.
“Kemensky even while God cursed you with a peevish and irritating voice he blessed you with a powerfully enigmatic silence. I suggest you play your strengths, God's will and my poor ears by shutting up.”
Kemensky visibly deflated.
“I want to be able to do what Fournier can.”
Weaver rolled her eyes.
“I want a pony.”
“I want a unicorn,” Touvenay said.
Karch gestured between them as she finished a snack.
“Great. Stick a horn on Weaver’s pony and we're golden.”
There was laughter. Kemensky skulked off to spend time with his ship. Touvenay came and sat next to Weaver. He gestured expansively.
“It's a treasure trove here. Undiscovered worlds.”
Weaver raised a questioning eyebrow.
“A Rosetta Stone?”
Touvenay’s eyes shone.
“Maybe. I've mapped a considerable amount of vocabulary as well as grammar rules for object actions. We're beginning to approach a critical mass. There is something interesting about the layout of the language.”
“Oh?”
“There are meta-markers used to denote lexicographical layout. Some are arranged horizontally and vertically, but many originate in the center and branch outward. Given the sheer quantity of pages laid out in this branching format––”
Weaver interrupted, trying to understand.
“In their navigation?”
“No, not only in the navigation but in their content. And utility determines layout. I wonder if they expect that the reader has a capability that makes that particular layout afford additional utility. I wondered, in other words, if they could process information concurrently.”
“Read multiple things at the same time?”
“Precisely, and perhaps also write them.”
Weaver smiled, fascinated.
“And how is the translation? Are you having a break? Or a breakthrough?”
Touvenay waved his hand at his screens. They displayed an accelerated form of Tetris with the alien symbols. Occasionally entire blocks would align, highlight, then disappear.
“I hope both. A new set of mappings are about to be generated. I'd prefer to study them in orbit but this environment is sufficient for now. And it has the benefit of being closer to the action, so to speak.”
Weaver could sense something in Touvenay’s demeanor.
“You think we're about to get something?”
He paused, a smile playing across his lips.
“Definitely, though it's a mish mash of miscellany. It could be universal truths or salagaster soup. We should get translations of many of the index pages that you revealed. I'm fascinated to see what concepts we don't understand. There are worlds of language out there. And language shapes what we can think and how we think about it.”
“Change your language and you change your thoughts?”
Touvenay smiled.
“Exactly.”
“So why languages, André?”
Touvenay leaned back, smiling wistfully as he gazed through the stacks.
“My love affair with languages began, as all blossoming love affairs do, in the spring. My inspiration came from my language teacher, the estimable Professor Brechtla. He was a fascinating character, or at least, he was fascinating to me and to his research assistant Francesca. He had the most terrible lisp. He could not pronounce ‘th’; it always came out as ‘f’, especially when he was emotional. What I didn't realize was that my dear Professor Brechtla was equally, if not even more infatuated with me. He adored my silly, strident search for definitive answers, my love of paper books, my proclivity for the poetry of Graves and my loathing of over-eating. He cultivated me as Erytheia would tend a nightblooming cereus in the garden of Hesperides.”
“He thought you were gay?”
Touvenay nodded.
“Gay as a goose. And given his Kheironic wisdom, I thought I must be too. I readied myself for my inevitable deflowering.”
“And...?”
“His love for me ended, as all forl
orn partings do, in the autumn, when he found me frolicking with his fun, flirty and unambiguously female assistant Francesca, who was fondling my febrile fuck fang. He shouted, inconsolably, 'that Francesca, is feft!'”
Weaver collapsed with laughter as Touvenay continued, his eyes twinkling.
“My own love affair with languages blossomed. I found that one language was not enough and I resolved to sample them all. I became...” – Touvenay eyed her with a deadpan expression – “a language gigolo.”
There was a ping from the screens and Touvenay's face lit up.
“The Rosetta Stone is unlocked!”
101.
Havoc concentrated as Stone spoke in a low voice, sounding strangely remote.
“Something is wrong.”
Havoc frowned.
“Wrong?”
“Yeah. With our setup.”
“People-wise?”
“Exactly. Tyburn won’t let me lift any of the reactors into orbit.”
“He won’t let you?”
“He says we’re not ready to do it yet; he wants to take five.”
“Is five full capacity?”
“Right.”
“Well that kind of makes sense, doesn’t it?”
“Yeah but he won’t let me load them.”
Havoc paused.
“Which makes no sense at all.”
“He says he wants to do it in one go, for security.”
“Odd.”
“Right. And get this. Tyburn disappeared for a couple of hours. I came up early and he wasn't around.”
As an experienced mission lead, Havoc didn’t find this particularly significant.
“There could be a lot of reasons for that.”
“Yeah, but when I came up Ekker got flustered and he lied about where Tyburn was. I walked away to find Tyburn and then Ekker started spouting crap. He said something quick and stupid and obviously a lie.”
“Did you ask him why?”
“He said operational security and then told me... well, I stopped asking.”
“Good for you. So when are you meant to have five reactors ready to go?”
“In two hours time. Number four is on its way up now.”
Havoc visualized the alien artifact slowly rising the four kilometers to the surface.
“So we’ve got plenty of time. You’re doing great, Stone. I have the next alien conference coming up and as soon as we're done up here, I'll call you and we’ll get you out of there. Ok?”
“Ok. Have you seen Saskia?”
“No. She’s replacing the outer markers. The Gathering blew some out accidentally on purpose, if you know what I mean.”
“I just––”
“Let her work Stone.”
“Yeah.”
“We’ll have you and the reactors into orbit in no time.”
“Great.”
“And Stone. Remember the fish.”
102.
The United Systems doctor stood above the patient, proffering a needle. The spy lay on an inclined bench in their United Systems air tent. The tent was hidden in a dip amongst the rolling dunes while their shuttle and platforms emitted heavy jamming. The doctor sighed. The patient was proving rather more recalcitrant than he’d hoped.
“I'm not telling you again, you are not putting me out.”
“I'm a doctor, not a––”
The patient interrupted his ethical protestations before he could even begin them.
“Spare me.”
The doctor felt morally offended and something of a hypocrite at the same time. He tried again.
“It's not safe to proceed without sedation. We need to access your brain at a deep level.”
“I don't care. Local anesthetic which I'll vene myself. For everything else I want a sensor in the feed. And I'll be conscious the whole time.”
The doctor looked at the intelligence liaison officer. He lifted his hands to indicate helplessness.
“I'm sensing a lack of patient doctor trust.”
The patient exhaled in exasperation. The intelligence liaison looked at the patient.
“Look, you want to do this procedure.”
“And you want me to provide you with the intelligence, so can we just get on with it.”
The doctor shrugged and looked at the liaison. The liaison shook his head to tell the doctor 'no', do not inject the spy with pain inducing chemicals, brought in case they thought they could get the spy to beg to be made unconscious. The liaison had obviously decided it wasn't going to work. The doctor agreed.
He initiated the worthless procedure, injecting and circulating chemicals into the spy's system while talking about what he was doing. It helped relax him. Emphasize the positive, he thought, even if there isn't any. Best not to promise the world, though.
“In this environment, with the limited resources available, what we’re looking to do is stabilize you. Ninety five percent of the damage that would have occurred will now be prevented.”
The spy grimaced and braced against the bench. Substances of varying colors ran into and out of their brain. There would be a lot of discomfort. More convincing that way, the doctor thought.
For fifteen minutes the spy twisted, grimaced and braced themselves against the bench in basic battlefield conditions.
The doctor nodded, satisfied.
“Ok. I'll patch up the entry points. With cosmetics and stitching it'll be as good as new.”
The spy relaxed, noticeably, once the procedure was done. The placebo effect always made patients so much more pliable, the doctor thought.
The liaison stepped forward.
“The data?”
The spy held out their hand. The liaison touched it and established point comms. The spy stared straight ahead as the transfer took place.
“They're getting close to me. I want locations for emergency lift out.”
The liaison nodded.
“We don't want anyone taking the alien out. Don't let them remove it.”
The spy looked up at the liaison as the liaison leaned over them.
“We want it.”
103.
Weaver stood with Touvenay beneath his three screens as his translation cascaded across them. Words gushed forth, line upon line, blocks of text swirling around images, animations and rotating perspectives. They might have been standing under a waterfall. Words washed over them, sank away, surged again and consumed them.
Touvenay’s eyes were bright.
“The dam is burst.”
The translation processes in Touvenay’s mind highlighted sections of the screens as they searched, segmented, sorted, sifted, weighed, gathered, collated, compared, summarized and reported. And still the content streamed out, unending, a geyser of black gold.
Weaver turned to Touvenay as the others gathered around them.
“This is only from what we had?”
“Indeed.”
Weaver could scarcely believe it.
“Goodness.”
Touvenay spun to face everyone as his continuously iterating processes updated their results on the screens behind him.
“Ladies and Gentleman. Welcome to André's Emporium of Wonder and Delight. The boutique is open. What information, pray tell, can I fetch for my fine customers today?”
Darkwood smiled.
“The name of this planet?”
Touvenay was ebullient as he sifted thousands of pieces of information.
“Would be... several contenders... most likely, using completely arbitrary phonetics until we have more information... Khwm Kheråxng.”
“And the name of the people who inhabit this ship?”
“Aulusthran. Possibly the Torquemada. The Galdos. There are others. Most likely Aulusthran.”
Weaver felt the building sense of collective excitement as everyone tapped into Touvenay’s database, absorbed the translation rulesets and started navigating the information on their own.
“Was the planet built or converted?” Darkwood sai
d.
Weaver raced to see if they had the information – if they could even formulate an answer yet.
“It was...”
“Grown?” Weaver and Touvenay said together.
They looked at each other wide eyed. There was laughter.
Darkwood beamed delightedly at Touvenay.
“We can actually search for specific things now. This is wonderful. Well done to you.”
Weaver nodded.
“Yes, well done, André.”
“Thank you.”
Abruptly, Weaver frowned.
“Wait a minute. Didn't the prisoner say it was Aulusthran?”
Kemensky nodded.
“Yes. Why?”
Weaver bit her lip, thinking it through.
“Why would it be imprisoned on its own ship?”
104.
Novosa woke with a start under a dark and cloudless umber sky. The wind sweeping over the dunes blasted into her. She lay face down on the ground with her head and neck exposed to the elements. Most of her helmet was missing and her suit had sealed around the base of her neck. Her face was freezing and raw.
She tried to think. It wasn't easy – she was swimming in hytelline.
She had an awful wheezing sensation and panicked. She shouldn't be able to breathe in the atmo. As she inhaled she realized what had happened. Her body had switched to her personal rebreather, which was being topped up by her suit supply. Fortunately, she had no shortage of gas so her oxygen supply wasn’t an issue.
She transmitted a distress signal with a location pulse and was immediately greeted with a failure alert in her mind’s eye. Not a failure to get through but a failure to transmit. She tried again. Same result.
Her head and neck were shredded down one side. It dawned on her that her comstrip had been hacked out. Not only that but her suit’s comms panel and executive were trashed. Stephanie had also stabbed her in the head at least twice but in the bloody mess had failed to strike a killing blow. Novosa thought Stephanie had probably looked away when she delivered the fatal thrust.
