"Oh, no offense received," said Qual, calmly. "In fact, I will tell you as much as I am permitted. The sklem-the meaning of the name is of course obvious-is in essence merely a triaxial projector of nonrandomized heebijeebis. As you can undoubtedly see, it is of considerably higher power than such units produced for the consumer market."
"Right," said Sushi, little wiser than before. He thought he grasped at least one point, though. "So this is basically the latest milspec version of one of your standard bits of hardware."
"Outstanding, Rawfish!" said Qual, slapping Sushi on the lower back. "Your intellectual capacity is, as usual, of the highest grade."
"Er,.thanks, Qual," said Sushi. He didn't think he knew much more than before he'd asked, but maybe if he mulled over Qual's answer he'd come up with something. Meanwhile. .. "I've got a favor to ask you guys;" he said.
"We're still trying to figure out how to adjust these translators to give the best results so you guys can understand us and vice versa."
"That is hardly mandatory," said Qual. "Misunderstanding is a fact of life. If you were a Zenobian, you would accept it as it is."
"Maybe," said Sushi. "But as it happens, I'm a human, and an inquisitive one at that. So I can't help tinkering with stuff that doesn't work quite the way it ought to. Here's what I'd like to do." He pulled a small rectangular black object out of his pocket. "This is a minirecorder I'd like you guys to turn on while you're talking about things. It'll give us a good sample of your normal conversation, with three or four of you talking at once, and then we can analyze it for common patterns. Is that OK?" Qual looked at the minirecorder with lidded eyes, then turned to his crew and spoke a few sentences. They replied, and a brief conversation ensued.
"We will do it," said Qual. "But only if you show me how to turn it off. I hope you understand me, Rawfish, my friend-sometimes we need to talk about things we do not want others to hear." Sushi nodded. "Sure, I know what you mean. Even friends need privacy once in a while. See this red switch? Slide it to the left-toward this red LED-and it's off, back to the right, and it's on." Qual took the device and slid the switch back and forth, then asked, "There should also. be some way we can resolve what it has recorded, and remove it if by mischance we have forgotten it was working while we talked."
"Yeah," said Sushi. "This is the playback switch, and this is the erase button. Let me show you..." A few minutes later, with Qual and his crew satisfied they knew the workings of the recorder, Sushi said his good-byes to the Zenobians and walked back to report to Rev. Rev and Do- Wop looked up at him as he entered the room. "They took it," he said.
"Good," said Rev. "Were them boys suspicious?"
"Maybe a little, but I showed them how it worked," said Sushi. "That seemed to satisfy them."
"Good," said Rev again. "I hope you didn't show them how everything worked."
"No way," said Sushi. "Unless they're experts in Terran milspec hardware, they'll never figure out that it's a transmitter as well as a recorder-and that you can't turn the transmitter off. You should be getting their signals now." Sushi and Rev smiled at each other. They turned to the receiver Sushi had rigged up on a bench in Rev's office.
Sure enough, a little light was blinking, showing that the unit was receiving. Attached to it was another small box, automatically recording every word the Zenobians said within range of the recorder Sushi had given to Qual. Now all they had to do was wait...
"You won what?" For once, Lola's openmouthed surprise at Ernie was not for his having done something stupid. Just the fact that he hadn't done anything stupid-at least, not anything she knew about yet-was sufficient cause for surprise, as far as she was concerned.
"I won the casino," Ernie repeated, smirking. "Er-at least, a big share of the stock. The old man told me my share is worth maybe fifty million smeltonians."
"I still don't believe it," said Lola. "They wouldn't offer that big a prize. Even if the odds are close to impossible, the risk of losing is too big..."
"Hey, you come down to the office with me and talk to the casino guys," said Ernie. "That's what I came to get you for, anyway. They' want me to sign papers, do all sorts of other stuff. I may be dumb, but I ain't dumb enough to sign somethin' I don't understand. That's what you're for."
"To sign something you don't understand?" Lola raised an eyebrow. "That applies to just about anything more complicated than a bar chit, and I'm sure not signing any of those for you. Well, if Phule's lawyers are as good as the rest of his staff, I doubt anybody could understand the papers they're going to want us to sign. We'll probably have to find a lawyer of our own to tell us what we're getting into--and I don't know who the legal heavies are on Lorelei. But give me a couple of minutes to fix my face, and we'll go see what they're trying to put over on us." It took Lola more like half an hour. She changed into a dark designer suit that stamped her as a no-nonsense professional who insisted on getting the absolutely best quality without worrying about her purchases going out of fashion within three weeks. Lola had picked it up last year from an acquaintance who fenced for a haute couture shoplifting ring, and considered it worth every penny it had cost-a serious outlay of money even after the five-finger discount. Her makeup took longer-she wiped it off and started over twice before she nodded and turned away from the mirror. In the end, she looked about five years older than her usual style-and ten times more formidable.
Nobody was likely to underestimate her, not now.
It took her another fifteen minutes of browbeating to get Ernie to change into something that might induce the Fat Chance Casino's legal staff to take him seriously. Then they boarded the local hoverbus and headed back to the casino. The Lorelei buses catered mainly to casino workers, and the vehicle was nearly empty, this being the middle of a shift.
"What's our plan?" asked Ernie, keeping his voice low just in case the driver was spying for the Fat Chance.
"I don't really have one yet," said Lola, shrugging.
"Find out what they're offering, and figure out how much more we can get by being a pain in their butts. That's what negotiating's all about."
"Well, they gotta make good on their promise, right?" said Ernie. "They say I own a hunk of the casino..."
"And if you believe that, I've got a couple of nice planets for sale, cheap," said Lola. "The best thing we can do is go in there expecting the worst, and let them surprise us by doing better. And if we can keep them from figuring out where we're coming from, maybe we can even fool them into offering us something they didn't plan on."
Ernie nodded. "I got it," he said. "We play the dumbs, and wait for them to screw up."
"Uh... not quite," said Lola. "Your job is to sit there looking as if you're in charge, but let me do all the real talking. Just pretend I'm your lawyer, and you don't make my move involving money or your rights without my sayso. And I don't commit you to anything until I think we've got the best deal they're going to give us. Got it?"
"Sure," said Ernie. "Just what I said before:-we play the dumbs and wait for them to screw up."
Lola sighed. "OK, have it your way," she said. "Just let me do all the talking." The hoverbus changed lanes and came to a stop. Across the street was the Fat Chance. Smiling bravely, Lola took Ernie's arm and steered him out to the sidewalk. This isn't going to be easy, she thought to herself. Then again, the alternatives all looked a lot worse...