Across the Sea of Suns

I’ve noticed.

Damnably low-grade process though, with that skimpy energy budget the deck’s stacked against the whole biosphere

God’s ingenious

Well he had longer to work on this one.

Five-billion-year-old biosphere makes you wonder what could happen

You two might talk to Bob over there about the exploration if you’ve the time—

Sure come on soul mate

Damn that sniffo’s some stuff isn’t it? Whattad I say?

Just let me do the talking

Nigel, Nigel, lemme tell you, I figure you can do somethin’, man I was so

mad

I felt like runnin’ over a toad with a power mower—

Ted’s more the man to complain to, precious little I can do

Sure but the right word in, y’know

Can’t promise anything but if it’s a friendly ear you’re after

C’mon you could have his job anytime we’d all vote for you.

Nonsense, step over this way the noise is dreadful now what was the—

He values the cascade of impressions more than anything. He drifts down carved rock corridors, in and out of rooms, never lingering long—

—yes, I know him, he’s from GHQ, works with Ted, kind of nice but homely as hell—

—uh-huh, ugliness like that is nature’s contraceptive, I figure. Forget it. You got anybody else in mind, though, the night is young even if I’m not—

—She came over to me and positively whispered all of it to me in one gush which was a kind of tribute when you think about it, coming from a woman who obviously hasn’t found much in the world it was necessary to whisper about—

—Evolution goes all sorts of ways, that’s why I don’t think we’ll puzzle out the radio sources just by peeking at the basic biochem, not when we got such lousy resolution through all that damned dust. I mean, all kinds of things are selected for, right? You and me are myopic because the nearsighted males couldn’t hunt so good, so they stayed home while the bruisers went out running down meat. Just hanging around the caves and painting the walls and gettin’ a little on the side in the heat of the day. Never mind all that strong pair-bonding stuff they always tell you; fact is, you never know who the father is and that’s why a male strategy of spreading it around as much as you can pays off. So it gets selected for. Hell, it feels good—that’s the sure sign; evolution doesn’t read our rule books, she’s got her own—

—think you’ve had enough? That rum isn’t rum, it’s spidmeer and you’re starting to look like a lobster—

—we need more recon down there skip this biochem piffle—

—yeah, right, way I see it is, we got a surplus a genius an a shortage of guts aroun’ ’ere—

—an oxidation-reduction cycle,’s what it is, down there in that dust they’re playin’ the same ol’ game we are, only not so profitable. Higher up the chain from those dust eaters there’s gotta be starch production using that crummy low-cal sunlight. Leaves oxy as leftovers, an’ that’s what the EMs gotta breathe, but damned if I know how anything could live off that—

—I don’t see why she has to bite my head off just over a spilled

sample

container—

—You get us contaminated with those Isis spores I’ll vac you so fast—

—well I

didn’t

why should I look I don’t. think you can say that just like

that

—

—Could be wrong but

some

body left off the seals.

—then don’t look at me when you—

—call this a multifass well, this may shape you up for a vote but nobody’s talking about what I want

—part of it’s to find out what the goddamn issue is if you’d just listen fer once—

—I was saying, when the smaller animals breathe they have this little sac, kind of an air trap, and it filters the dust out of the air before they hit the inward stroke to suck in a lungful—

—Real slow, about two breaths a minute, I’ve seen it

—No bigger’n your finger, intricate li’l things, damn fine design for eatin’ up those dust-huggin’ fellas. Then the ones fat as your hand, they’re lunchin’ off the finger-sized guys

—Him? Just a passing thing, yer ol’ hump ‘n’ hustle is all—

—Come on Elinor no civilized woman ever regrets a pleasure and this is going to be—

—so while you guys are grandstanding it with the survey, somebody’s taking out the garbage, getting meals, agronomists and skiffers, all scutwork, so at least we’d like to be in on what’s comin’ out instead of flashin’ on it in the weeklies you squirt Earthside—

—I still say you stack up your shipcred, you can get your tail upholstered the way he did, just give the usual squeeze to Dexter in medmon, they’ll slip you in, won’t be more than a hairline scar nobody’ll notice in the dark

He eased over into the group around Ted Landon and waited until a break came. It still all came through to him as overlapping voices, so even his own sounded involuntary, part of a stream.

—Ted, we’ve got to go down there and have a look.

—Hold your horses, gosh, this isn’t the best place to go over the technical details, Nigel; if you came to the briefings you’d be more up to speed—

—They take too long, never understood why you call them briefings, but I do run through the tapes.

—Glad to hear that, and of course we are doing a study of all the ramifications, looking for a safe way to do it.

—Seems a trifle obvious, actually.

—Well, some are advocating an active recon mode— you know, where we use remote radar sensing to interrogate the internal biochem of the EMs for—

—Sounds bloody awful.

—Ah, there’s the alternative, a passive mode which I incidentally favor, which is to station servo’d eyes in well-sheltered spots, and watch the EMs if they pass nearby. We’ve had good staff review of that proposal.

—Mere eyes? Use walkers. We’ll need mobility.

—In the long run, sure. We’ve got walkers in the ready equipment. Lord, were prepared for anything Earthside could anticipate. There’re even submersibles in storage, in case Isis was an all-ocean planet.

Bob appeared at Ted’s elbow and nodded vigorously.

—Walkers? Ah like that bettern sittin’ still.

—Ted, I should think it’s technically feasible to make a radio-reflecting blanket. One we could throw over a standard walker.

—What about it, Bob?

—Sure. You thinkin’ to calibrate them till they reflect the EMs’s own signals back?

—Dead on. But scatter their pulses to the side, the same way ordinary rocks do.

—Bettuh than hunckerin’ down, waitin’ for EMs to come strollin’ by.

—Perhaps program the blanket in some way, make its reflectivity change with time? That way the EMs won’t register a same-shaped object following them about.

—Mebbe possible. Have to look at the specs.

—Grand. I’ll pitch in whatever talents I have.

—Whoa there, Nigel. That’s Bob’s section. I can’t—

—Fine then. Bob, I’m on for the first go.

—Jess a minit now—

—My idea, lads. I should get some fraction of the action, as the slang puts it.

—I dunno about ground team. I mean, assumin’ the approach works. Dunno if you’re up to physical specs, Nigel.

—Undoubtedly. But most of those walkers are servo’d, true?

—Sure. Havta be. Can’t afford to put a big team on the ground. Ted’s Operations study showed—