Speaker’s head bobs, and his mandibles clatter together.
“Bring it to you? No. No, that is not what we meant. That is not on offer. We will give what help we can, but only within reason. We will offer advice. We will offer guidance. We will not go to war for you.”
I glance over at Nasha. Her eyes have narrowed again.
“Right,” she says. “Advice. Guidance. That sounds very helpful.”
“Yes,” Speaker says. “It will be.”
“Two years of eavesdropping on Mickey and Berto, and you didn’t pick up sarcasm, huh?”
Speaker’s head swings over to me, then back to Nasha.
“Sarcasm?”
“Not important,” I say. “The point is, we need more than advice and guidance, and I would think the fact that you killed six individuals would entitle us to more than that.”
Speaker scoots back a meter or so, and his head dips almost to the floor.
“You wish to negotiate,” he says. “This is fair. What do you feel you deserve from us?”
“More than advice,” I say. “Material support.”
I should have known what would happen now, but I still can’t suppress a groan when Speaker says, “We need to consider,” and scuttles away.
“SO,” NASHA SAYS. “Have you given much thought to how smart these things are?”
I turn to look at her. She’s sitting beside me now, back against the rough stone wall, draining the last of her water.
“The creepers, you mean?”
I can’t see her expression, but I can hear the eye roll in her voice when she responds. “Yeah, Mickey. The creepers.”
I shrug. “Hard to say, isn’t it? They don’t seem to have much of a material culture, do they? No cars or planes or houses, unless you count this place as a house. No weapons, so far as we’ve seen. No factories or obvious tech other than what’s in their bodies.”
“Right. On the other hand, they’ve been able to put together something that can speak our language at least as well as Gomez does in just a couple of years. What have we accomplished in the same amount of time? We don’t even know if they have a language. Also, it took them, what, a couple of weeks to figure out how to use the comm gear they took out of Six to get inside your head? What did we learn from the creeper we took apart? Anything at all?”
“In all fairness, the creeper we took apart was already half-exploded when we got ahold of it. Six, on the other hand, was apparently one hundred percent intact and kicking when he got vivisected.”
“Sure,” she says. “Still, though—if we had captured a totally intact creeper, do you really think we could have done to them what they did to us? Do you think we would have been able to reverse engineer a totally alien communication system, decipher the signals it was producing, and figure out how to use it to manipulate the brains of the creepers on the other end?”
“When you put it that way, it seems pretty unlikely, huh?”
Nasha laughs. “Unlikely? Give us six weeks with a totally intact creeper and I’d be willing to bet Bio would still be trying to figure out which end eats and which end shits.”
“Okay,” I say. “Granted. They’re better with electronics than we are, and maybe with biology too. What’s your point?”
“Electronics? Biology? What about linguistics? Do you hear the way that thing talks? They’re smarter than we are, Mickey. Much smarter.”
I shake my head. “Lots of animals can do things we can’t do. Bees can communicate the precise location of a food source two klicks away with a five-second dance. Doesn’t mean they’re smarter than we are. It just means they have a different skill set.”
She turns to look at me. “Since when do you know so much about bees?”
I grin behind my rebreather. “You’d be surprised what I know. Anyway, it doesn’t matter, does it? It’s not like we’re planning on playing chess with these things.”
“I don’t know,” she says. “We’re outnumbered on this planet by a whole hell of a lot. They can definitely outproduce us. If they can outthink us too…”
“We’re screwed?”
“Maybe,” Nasha says. “Or maybe we’re just gonna really need to make some friends. I think I might try being a little nicer when Speaker comes back next time.”
“HUH,” NASHA SAYS when the giant creeper’s coils lift and Speaker emerges again. “That one was quick. Wonder what that means.”
She’s right. It’s only been about ten minutes since he disappeared. We get to our feet as he approaches.
“So,” Speaker says. “We have considered, and we agree to your request. We will not go to war for you, but we will provide material support.”
“We’re not asking for war,” I say. “We don’t want to fight your friends. We don’t want to fight anyone. We just want our property back before it kills someone.”
Speaker’s head sways from side to side. “I can see that you do not know our friends.”
“What kind of support?” Nasha asks. “What are you offering us?”
“Diplomatic and logistical support,” Speaker says. “Not fighting support.”
“Not enough,” Nasha says. “It sounds like your friends are not actually your friends. Sounds like they’re your enemies, in fact. If this comes to fighting, we want you to be with us.”
“No,” Speaker says. “Understand, please: This is a final offer. If it comes to fighting, we would rather fight you than our friends to the south. We only suspect that you have the ability to do us serious harm. We know from hard experience that they do.”
“Clarify,” I say. “What, exactly, is on offer?”
“I am,” Speaker says. “I am on offer. When you go to face our friends to the south, I will go with you. This is the most we can give.”
Nasha looks over at me. I shrug. “Better than nothing, right? At least we’ll be able to talk to them.”
“Sure we can’t get the big guy?” Nasha says, and waves toward the giant creeper.
“Very sure,” Speaker says. “Are we agreed?”
Nasha sighs. “Yeah, I guess we are. Welcome aboard.”
011
<Black Hornet>: Mickey?
<Mickey7>: I’m right beside you, Nasha. Why are you texting?
<Black Hornet>: Can Speaker see this?
I GLANCE BEHIND us. Speaker trundles along a half dozen or so meters back, legs rippling in a viscerally disturbing way as he moves. We’re crossing a steep, sunny, fern-covered hillside, still at least an hour’s walk out from the perimeter.
<Mickey7>: I don’t think so, but I guess I’m not sure. Depends on how thoroughly they’ve penetrated our communication protocols.
<Black Hornet>: Is there any way to find out?
<Mickey7>: Maybe. Let me try an old ComSec trick.
<Mickey7>: Hey, Speaker, are you seeing this?
<Speaker1>: Yes, I am.
<Mickey7>: There ya go.
Nasha bumps me with her shoulder. “Nobody likes a smart-ass, Mickey.”
I grin behind my rebreather. “Found out what you needed to know, didn’t I?”
She glances back. “Speaker? Any way you could give us a little privacy?”
“Privacy?” Speaker says. “I do not know this word.”
“I need to say things to Mickey that I do not necessarily want you to overhear. Understand?”
“These things you wish to say—they are secrets?”
“Sure,” Nasha says. “Private secrets.”
“You wish to tell these secrets to Mickey, but not to me?”
“Yeah,” Nasha says. “That’s the gist of it.”
His mandibles spread wide, then snap together. “Allies do not keep secrets from one another, Nasha.”
She stops and turns to face him, arms folded across her chest. “Look, we’re not talking about military intel here, okay? I just have some things that I need to discuss with Mickey before we get to the dome. These things do not involve you. That’s what private means—things that involve us, but don’t involve you.”