“That’s a pretty substantial lapse in observation,” Meyer said. “I don’t suppose you have any evidence of this aside from your word on it.”
Holloway pointed past Isabel. “Mr. Sullivan over there heard her say it,” he said. “To be clear, Isabel did figure it out eventually. It just took a few days.”
“Because you told her otherwise,” Meyer said.
“Yes,” Holloway said. “I didn’t intend to mislead Isabel; it was just my own assumption. It was innocent. But I did end up misleading her.”
“No one’s blaming you for intentionally causing damage to Dr. Wangai’s professional standing,” Meyer assured him. “But, Mr. Holloway, is there possibly another way you misled Dr. Wangai? Not by what you told her, but by what you didn’t tell her?”
Holloway looked uncomfortable. “Yes,” he said, finally. “I suppose I did. And up here now, I’m quite embarrassed about it. I wish I didn’t have to admit to it.”
“You do have to admit to it, Mr. Holloway,” said Judge Soltan.
“I know,” Holloway said. “Of course. I think it would be easier to explain, however, if I could use the monitor Isabel set up to give you her briefing. Would that be all right?”
“How long will this take?” Soltan asked.
“I will be as brief as I possibly can,” Holloway said. “Trust me, I want to get this over as quickly as you do.”
“All right,” Soltan said.
Holloway pointed to the defense table. “There’s data that I need on the infopanel.”
“You may leave the witness stand, but you are still providing testimony and must tell the truth,” Soltan said.
“I understand,” Holloway said. He stood up, exited the stand, and walked over to the defense table, where his infopanel lay. He ignored it and went to Isabel, who couldn’t stand to look at him.
“Isabel,” he said.
“Please don’t talk to the other expert at this time, Mr. Holloway,” Soltan said.
“I’m sorry, Your Honor,” Holloway said. “But I don’t need the data on my infopanel. I need the data on hers.”
“I don’t understand,” Soltan said.
“Nor do I,” Meyer said.
“The data in Isabel’s infopanel is secure video, taken with cameras and recorders designed for scientific and legal verifiability,” Holloway said. “I am well aware that my own truth on the stand has been challenged, not the least by Isabel here. I want to be sure everyone can believe what I’m going to say, and that I haven’t tampered with the evidence I’m going to show you.”
Soltan nodded. “Dr. Wangai, please give Mr. Holloway your infopanel,” she said.
Isabel handed over the machine.
“Thank you,” Holloway said. “Are all your video records accessible?”
“I’m signed in,” Isabel said, tightly. She was avoiding saying any more to Holloway than she absolutely needed to.
“Did you change the file names of the videos?” Holloway asked.
“No,” Isabel said.
“Okay,” Holloway said. “Thanks.” Isabel didn’t respond. Holloway glanced over to Sullivan, whose own expression didn’t appear to be particularly friendly. He too had figured out the show trial nature of the inquiry.
Holloway tapped the infopanel and opened a pipe between it and the monitor. The monitor flicked on and awaited input.
“We’ve already established that Dr. Wangai, despite her considerable competence and talent as a scientist, does sometimes allow her assumptions to overrule her skills as an observer and her knowledge of this planet’s faunasphere,” Holloway said. His voice had become animated and precise; it was the voice Holloway used as a trial lawyer. Both Soltan and Meyer jumped a little at the change in tone. Holloway noted that but didn’t let the notation show on his face. “Taking my word for the fuzzys being gendered is the obvious example. But there’s another one that she missed.”
Holloway tapped the panel again, and a video played out on it: an image of Papa, Mama, and Grandpa Fuzzy sitting together in a semicircle, eating bindi fruit.
“As we all know, one of the major signifiers for sapience is the capacity for speech. Per the Cheng ruling, this means ‘meaningful communication that conveys more than the immediate and presently imminent.’ To date, three species are known to communicate at a level that satisfies Cheng: humans, Urai, and Negad. It is what each of these species have in common.
“But there is another thing that humans, Urai, and Negad also share in common: Their speech is vocalized, and the vocalization for each falls within a range that is perceivable by the human ear. In fact, it’s the humans who have the greatest range of frequencies in their speech, while the Negad have the least. The point is, we can hear when humans, Urai, and Negad are speaking.”
Holloway paused the video. “A couple of weeks ago I was visiting the new camp ZaraCorp is building to exploit the sunstone seam I discovered. While I was there, I was shown these large speakers posted around the fence line. They were blasting sound at an incredibly high decibel level in order to scare away the zararaptors and other large predators of the jungle—but while I could feel the speakers pounding away, I couldn’t hear them, because they were emitting their sound at twenty-five kilohertz. That’s higher than human hearing can register.”
“I’m waiting to hear relevance, Mr. Holloway,” Soltan said.
“Exactly,” Holloway said. “You’re waiting to hear relevance, but you can’t, because you’re listening too low. We all have been. The loudspeakers on the fence line work because the predators of Zara Twenty-three hear higher frequencies than we do. And they hear higher frequencies not for some random reason, but because it makes evolutionary sense for them to do so. Say, because their prey and other small animals make sounds in that range.”
Holloway reset the video and popped up a settings overlay on top of it. “One of the nice things about the research-level camera Dr. Wangai used to record the fuzzys is that unlike most commercial cameras, it records data humans don’t perceive on their own,” he said. “For example, in addition to recording the visible color spectrum, it records into the infrared and ultraviolet frequencies. You have to use filters to see these data, of course, but the data are there. It also records sounds above and below human hearing. You have to use filters for them, too.”
Holloway flipped through the overlay’s menus and reset the video’s audio filters to bring sounds above human hearing range into audibility. He started the video again.
It was the same image of Papa, Mama, and Grandpa Fuzzy sitting in a semicircle. Only now it sounded as if they were talking to each other.
“Look,” Holloway said, quietly, and pointed. “Look how they wait their turn to speak. Look how they respond to whatever the other is saying.” He turned up the volume of the monitor; the chittering between the fuzzys got louder. “You can hear the structure of the language.”
After a few more moments Holloway paused the video, closed it, and pulled up another one, this one of Grandpa Fuzzy and Pinto. Now beside the head-smacking was a constant stream of noise from Grandpa, interrupted occasionally by a squeak from Pinto. The squeak sounded, of all things, petulant.
Pause, close, open another video. In this one Mama Fuzzy was grooming Baby Fuzzy. The noises coming from Mama Fuzzy in this one were different from the noises in the other videos: softer, more sibilant.