Bickel followed the play of lights across his board as the message was gulped by the receivers, fed through the comparison blocks, refined to a single playback (with probable accuracy quotient logged beside each character), and finally was slowed to make it intelligible for human ears.
Sure as hell took 'em long enough, Bickel thought. He read the time log, subtracted the distance lag. Almost seven hours. He thought then of the first ships using single-channel radio, punching their messages across the solar system with only a few watts - but the error-uncertainty factor built up with distance and cumulative adverse interference. The Tin Egg's system had been engineered for computer-monitored automatic reports over stellar distances to tell watchers as yet unborn back on Earth how things fared with their star probe.
The message-ready chime sounded. Bickel keyed the vocoder. The voice of Morgan Hempstead, United Moonbase director, rolled out of the speakers, recognizable and still with its iced iron overtones preserved by the AAT's comparators.
"To UMB ship Earthling from Project Control. This is Morgan Hempstead. We hope you understand our distress and concern. Every decision from this point must have a prime motive of preserving the lives of yourselves and the colonists."
So much for the record, Flattery thought. There are seven nations and four races represented in the hyb Tanks - but all just as expendable as the ones who went before us.
"We have several prime questions," Hempstead said.
I've a few questions of my own, Bickel thought.
"Why was Project Control not alerted when the first Organic Mental Core failed?" Hempstead asked.
Bickel mentally logged the question. He knew the answer, but it was nothing he would ever transmit. Hempstead knew it as well as he did. The Tin Egg had momentum as an idea that had survived six failures. Nothing short of another ultimate failure would stop it. Nothing short of desperate emergency could make them risk aborting the mission by calling for help.
"Doppler reference indicates you'll be out of the solar system in approximately three hundred and sixteen days at present stabilized speed," Hempstead said. "Time to Tau Ceti: four hundred-plus years."
As he listened, Bickel pictured the man behind the voice: flintlike face with gray hair and gray-blue eyes - that aura of momentous decision even in his smallest gesture. The psych boys had called him "Big Daddy" behind his back, but they had jumped when he commanded. Now, Bickel focused on the fact that they never again expected to see Hempstead, yet the man still could reach into their midst with his decisions.
"First analysis indicates these possibilities," Hempstead went on. "You could turn back to orbit around UMB until the problem is solved and new Organic Mental Cores installed. That would return us to the old problem of sterile control under less than ideal conditions. It also would remove the ship from the situation of probable cause in the OMC breakdowns, perhaps making solution impossible."
"He always was a long-winded bore," Timberlake said.
"Second possibility," Hempstead said, "would be for you to convert to a closed ecology and continue at present speed, enlisting replacements from your hybernation tanks or breeding and raising your own crew complement. You would, of course, face high probability of genetic damage through the necessity of staying outside your core-shield areas long enough to build quarters for prolonged occupation. However, food would be your major problem unless you adopted a more closely integrated recycling system."
"Closely integrated recycling," Flattery said. "He means cannibalism. It was discussed."
Bickel turned to stare at Flattery. The idea of cannibalism was repellent, but that was not what had caught Bickel's attention. "It was discussed." That simple statement contained volumes of unanswered questions and hidden implications.
"Third possibility," Hempstead was saying, "would be to build the necessary consciousness into your robo-pilot, using the ship computer as a basis. Our computations indicate you have sufficient materials, including neuron packages intended for colony robots in your stores. This is theoretically feasible."
"Theoretically feasible!" Timberlake sneered. "Does he think we've never heard about all the failures in -"
"Shhhh," Flattery hissed.
"Project Council suggests you continue present course and speed," Hempstead said, "as long as you are within the solar system. If a solution has not been reached by then, present opinion is that you will be ordered to turn back." There followed a long silence, then: "....nless you have alternative suggestions."
"You will be ordered to turn back," Flattery thought. He turned to see how those key words sat with Bickel. They were aimed at Bickel, contrived for him, fitted specially to trigger his deepest motives.
Bickel lay in thoughtful silence staring up at the speech microscope display above the vocoder, checking the accuracy of message reception.
"At this time," Hempstead said, "Project Control requires a detailed report on condition of all ship systems with special reference to hybernating colonists. It is recognized that prolonging the voyage increases probability of hybernation failure. We recognize that you must replace crew losses from the tanks. Suggestions on replacements will be made upon request. We share your grief at the unfortunate accidents among you, but the Project must continue."
"Detailed report on all ship systems," Timberlake said. "He's out of his mind."
How cold was Hempstead's commiseration, Flattery thought. The phrasing betrayed the care with which it had been composed. Just enough grief, not too much.
The vocoder emitted a filter-dulled crackling, then: "This is Morgan Hempstead closing transmission. Acknowledge and answer our questions immediately. UMB out."
"They left too much unsaid," Bickel said. He sensed the "deletions for reasons of policy" all through the message. The thin political line they walked had been betrayed most in what was not said.
"Build consciousness into our computer," Timberlake growled. "How stupid can they get?" He glanced at Bickel. "You were on one of the original attempts at UMB, John. You get the honor of telling 'Big Daddy' where he can shove that idea."
"That attempt flopped and badly," Bickel agreed. "But it's still the only real course open to us."
Timberlake raged on as though he hadn't heard: "There were people on the UMB fiasco who make us look like a pack of amateurs."
Flattery had heart, though, and he hid a knowing smile by turning away and speaking mildly: "We all read the report, Tim."
"The only part worth reading was their summation." Timberlake pitched his voice in a sneering falsetto: "'Impossible of achievement at present level of technology.'"
"That was an excuse, not a summation," Bickel said. And he thought back to UMB's fruitless search for the Artificial Consciousness Factor. There had always been that sterile wall between his part of the group and the station personnel, but the triple-glass walls had never hidden the smell of failure. It had been all around the project from the beginning. They had been lost in tangles of pseudoneuron fiber, in winking lights and the snap of relays, the hiss of tape reels and the bitter ozone smell of burnt insulation from overloaded circuits. They had looked for a mechanical way to do what the least among them could do within his own flesh - be conscious. And they had failed.
Over them all had hung the unspoken fear, the knowledge of what had happened to the one project that reportedly had achieved success - and its own doom - back on the surface of Earth.
Timberlake cleared his throat, lifted a hand out of his couch cocoon, studied his fingernails. "Well, how're we going to answer their damn questions? They must be living in a dream world back there, expecting us to produce a detailed report on ship systems without the help of an OMC."