“I don’t have to do anything,” Norquist-Ng snapped back. “Ours is one ship among hundreds, maybe thousands. Of all people, Ausfaller, I would expect you to know to be wary.” He paused, rubbing his chin thoughtfully. “Maybe Nessus is right about Endurance coming home.”
“You can’t mean that!” Sigmund said.
“I will not gamble the safety of this crew, much less the safety of this world, on vague recollections of prehistoric ship designs. Captain…”
“I understand, Minister.” Julia did not meet Sigmund’s anguished gaze.
To have come this far. To have come so close. Alice’s heart sank.
“But hopping around like we’ve had to do uses a lot of fuel,” Julia continued. “Minister, we will redirect our efforts to refueling for the long return flight. Maintaining a safe distance from the alien ships as we must, collecting deuterium may take us a while. Will there be anything else, Minister, or may we get started?”
“Proceed, Captain. We’re done.” The connection broke.
Alice could not look away from the darkened comm console. So close …
Julia crossed the bridge to rest a hand on Alice’s shoulder. “I can stall for a few days. See what you can find.”
IT ALL CAME DOWN to Pak crypto software.
Because loath as Alice was to admit it, Norquist-Ng might be right. After two centuries, who was to say that Sigmund could recognize an Earth warship? Maybe another species had independently come to use the same basic shape. Maybe the flying crowbars were Earth ships of ancient design, but long ago sold to … whomever.
Maybe if Nessus would stop that infernal humming, half a dozen melodies at the same finagling time, she could think straight.
The Pak were whizzes at crypto. Alice suspected the best Pak algorithms never made it into the Library — clans battled clans, after all — but the Library offered plenty of the underlying math. Not even Norquist-Ng knew she had brought Pak algorithms, from the stash Sigmund called their “Secret Santa.”
But not even superior crypto technique would be enough. Suppose ARM ships were out there. What languages would their crews speak? You can hardly decrypt what you can’t even understand in plaintext.
Nessus knew human languages, and not only New Terra’s English. With but one set of vocal cords, no human could manage any Puppeteer language.
And so, Nessus had spoken Interworld back in the day he and Sigmund first met on Earth. And Nessus must have mastered a more recent dialect — and likely also Kzinti-speak, the so-called Hero’s Tongue — when he recruited on Earth for the disastrous Ringworld expedition.
Nessus, characteristically, refused to share his expertise.
His refusal wouldn’t have mattered if Endurance carried a Puppeteer translator. The Puppeteers had effective translation software — and it was among the most controlled of their technologies. Natural-language processing was too close to AI, was the official story, and Puppeteers saw no reason to risk building their own successors. Still, of necessity, scout ships had carried translators — and no ship that New Terra, upon gaining its independence, had been allowed to retain had had translation software. No record had ever been found on New Terra of the alien languages known to General Products’ trade representatives.
Sigmund, despite his best efforts, had never succeeded in stealing the information.
Jeeves knew English as it had been spoken when the ramscoop Long Pass set out from Sol system — more than a half millennium ago. Alice had taught the AI the Spanglish of her era in the Belt. Sigmund had taught Jeeves his more recent — but still, very dated — Interworld.
How much had Earth languages drifted in the meanwhile?
Jeeves had caught a few drops from the unending message streams. Just possibly, he had decrypted a tiny fraction of what he had intercepted. Nothing in any way enlightening. Nothing that seemed critical. No video: it would be too easy if they could see that humans were nearby. Despite Jeeves’s best efforts, all Alice had to go on were isolated words and the occasional short phrase scattered across intership text messages.
As likely, the purported decryptions were spurious.
A few days, Julia had said. Alice struggled not to despair. What could they hope to accomplish in a few days?
She had to focus their efforts. Somehow.
Recurring among the supposedly decrypted words was — Jeeves had reasoned from the logic of syntax — a person’s name. By terrestrial standards, a very common name. Nonetheless: a familiar name. Alice chuckled to herself. For all she knew, Wu meant snacks in Kzinti-speak.
She had nothing better on which to roll the dice.
“Jeeves,” Alice said. “Devote ten percent of your effort to messages to and from the signal source Koala.”
12
“You understand my requirements?” Horatius asked. The melody was not really a question.
“Yes, Hindmost,” Achilles sang. The title stuck in his throats.
“Very well,” the response finally came. The light-speed delay between Hearth and Nature Preserve One accounted for a few seconds of the gap. Most was just another of the Hindmost’s habitual, aggravating pauses. “I shall await your report on the matter.”
Protocol demanded that the Hindmost terminate the link. Jaws clenched, Achilles waited. And waited.
“Thank you,” Horatius offered at last. The status light blinked off and his image froze.
“I shall await your report on the matter,” Achilles mimicked. He had far more important matters with which to concern himself than minutiae of agricultural production. The Hindmost should, too.
Hindmost! Achilles grimaced at the static image still projected nearby. Tawny of hide (with unfortunate white markings more stripelike than proper patches), broad through the withers, and strikingly tall, Horatius had the potential to look worthy of the office. But that straggly, too lustrous mane? It needed to be toned down and tamed. The abundance of dark green jade among the curls and braids was acceptable as Conservative Party colors, but could not Horatius have found a green sash that better matched the gemstones?
“Image off.” Achilles rose from his nest of soft cushions, brushed his hide, straightened his own sash of office, and adjusted several circlets of orange garnets in his coiffure. He knew how to present himself.
Guards waited outside his private chambers; when Achilles threw open the doors they came stiffly to attention. Aides, assistants, adjutants, and their various flunkies stopped whatever they were doing to tend to his needs.
His chief deputy cantered over to him: loyal, trustworthy, none-to-bright Vesta. “Excellency, the farm administrator is here for his appointment.”
Subtle harmonics reinterpreted the verb’s explicit tense. The administrator had, it would seem, been kept waiting for a considerable time.
Too bad. He still waited to reclaim the position that was rightfully his. That a pretentious simpleton like Horatius should be Hindmost was almost too much to bear. Someday, Achilles promised himself, he would make Ol’t’ro realize that a change was necessary. A restoration.
Until that happy day, he had Nature Preserve One to rule.
“Very well,” Achilles announced. “You may notify the visitor that I am coming.”
He set out for the door, letting Vesta, a secretary, and his guards scamper to form ranks around him. Together, hooves clattering on the marble tiles, Vesta crooning into his communicator, they filed from the room. The remaining assistants, factotums, and minions went back to work.