He ignored the pilot's insult. "I have never seen such an Outsider craft before," Diplomat replied, the fear looming once more. One of his heads dipped toward his medical pouch.
"Nor have any of the Deep Council. We have our theories, even as you quake to your hooves over things which are new.”
Diplomat flutter-blinked in veiled irritation.
"It appears that this Outsider craft uses hyperdrive," he mused aloud to his pilot. The coldlife traders generally did not travel faster than light, preferring relativistic travel. The appearance of the Outsider vessel from hyperspace had set off alarms throughout the Homeworlds.
The Guardian puppeteer clacked her left set of molars in agreement. "It is exceedingly rare. The clan of helium-beasts with which our Race does business is known to use the hyperdrive in emergencies.”
The phrase made his neck pelts stand up. "What could constitute an emergency to such beings?" The Outsiders had little to do with the concerns of carbon-based, sunward forms of life. What could be an emergency to an Outsider? The thought chilled him.
"Perhaps their liquid helium is too warm," whistled the pilot sourly.
Diplomat understood the basic aggressive paranoia of the Guardian caste – much of it made sense in a hostile universe – but the Outsiders were long-term partners of the puppeteer race.
"Are the Outsiders not our allies?" he asked as diplomatically as his title. "Have they not given our Race help in the past?”
"Again you grasp truth with one mouth only," the pilot hummed. "We owe the helium-beasts much, but that dependency in turn leads to a threat to our Race.”
How like a Guardian, Diplomat thought, to view the gift of the Outsiders as threats. The coldlife sentients had provided the puppeteers with many technological marvels, including the Mover of Worlds that had saved the puppeteer race so long ago. All the Outsiders had asked in return was that Diplomat's race observe and study other life-forms and occasionally report that information back.
Selling the many technological miracles of the Outsiders to other warmlife races had enriched the puppeteers for thousands of years.
A seemingly harmless arrangement, until the terse summons had been received in the Homeworlds. And this frightening moon-sized ship appeared just outside the puppeteer system's gravity well Waiting for an urgently demanded emissary.
What was happening?
Diplomat touched forked tongue to lip-fingers in thought. "You grazed with the Study Herd on this issue, I presume.”
The Guardian blinked assent.
"I need all of your briefing materials, Guardian," Diplomat managed to muster.
The other puppeteers heads came up in humor. "Hardly," she grated. "I must feed you the information slowly, as tender leaves are fed to younglings before their grinding molars emerge. You would surely break under the strain of our mission, were it given you all at once.”
Diplomat squared his heads in a posture of pride, suppressing his fears, which lay ever ready to break out. Still, he was important to this mission, and the Wisdom of Retreat's pilot needed to be reminded of the fact. He forced himself to meet the Guardian's eyes directly. Not in submission. The soldier puppeteers free head meaningfully dipped down and touched the medal on the front of her impact armor. It was a holographic representation of the image of a retreating puppeteer: the Sigil of the Hindmost. She snorted in dismissal at Diplomat's earlier prideful tone. Even through his mouths, he could smell her annoyance-scent.
"I recognize your authority and honor," persisted Diplomat, inwardly bemused that he was not curled up tightly again into a ball for the other puppeteer to kick. "Yet I act for the Hindmost as well. We are a team, Guardian, a small Herd of our own. We are to work together, against a common enemy. Toward a common goal. That too is a Hindmost's Command.”
A long pause. Diplomat held his left breath as he tried not to listen to the other puppeteers harsh breathing. "Well spoken," Guardian replied at last, an undermelody of crude humor to her words. "You are aptly named, Little Talker." She reached into a pouch at her side and removed a shining multifaceted datacube. Diplomat merely waited. He knew that he held status; had not the Hindmost Itself selected him for this mission? Diplomat shook his midsection slightly, causing the gems in his intricately groomed backcoat to jingle, a reminder of Diplomat's rank. Another pause. "Many pardons, O Wise One. I have your pre rendezvous briefing datacube here, Diplomat." She waited, apparently to see if Diplomat would rise to the bait of her irony this time.
"How long until we dock with the Outsider vessel, Guardian?" Diplomat repeated, working very hard to seem unperturbed. "You have just enough time to review the contents of the information crystal, O Wise One. And digest the language programs into your communication module." Again, the Guardian's heads flipped up for a moment and looked eye to eye. "Though I suspect you will not like what you see and learn." She held out the datacube to Diplomat with her left mouth.
Just out of reach, of course, to make him bridge more than half the distance. Diplomat idly noticed that the pilot's right mouth never strayed from her disrupter holster, even inside the supposed safety of the Wisdom of Retreat, He nervously licked his finger-lips with a forked tongue and… made a long neck to the Guardian. More than halfway. He took the glittering geometrical solid which contained Diplomats fate. And perhaps the fate of much, much more.
OUTSIDERS ONE
Confusion. This local-and-other node cannot identify the hotlife irritants in this wracked geometric volume. Searching modalities are nil on all vibrational harmonics.
Attentiveness. This local-node sieves the plasma turbulence with great care. There is no trace but debris of the hotlife usurpers. The two battling motes are not present.
Thought. One. Perhaps, then, the hotlife vermin have all been destroyed? There has been no opportunity to interrogate the plans of the vermin for analysis and decision. The Nexus must be preserved from threat.
Suspicion. This local-and-other node are One. This local-node detects a disturbance in the ‹#@@#@›. It is more than the resonance from the unleashing of destructive forces. Something beyond the abilities of the hotlife vermin has been present. Prepare to receive relevant data-packets.
Anger. Received. Analysis complete. The heretic Feral Ones have indeed moved through this space-time locus, and fled! Perhaps the Feral Ones have taken the hotlife specimens – for purposes surely in opposition to the intentions of the Holy Radiants.
Confusion. One. What action shall this local-and-other-node take? The Treaty limits action near this geometry.
Determination. The Treaty has vertices and contour which are definite. The Nexus assembles, from local-and-other nodes, into Node. Node will determine the vector of the Feral Ones in the other ‹#@@#@› space and pursue.
Caution. What of the Treaty?
Righteousness. Treaties serve a Higher Purpose. Do the Holy Radiants approve? Their silence is license enough for action.
Shock. That direction of thought leads the other-node to the way of the Feral Ones.
Amusement The other-node japes. Following the directives of the Holy Radiants does not lead to heretical modes of action.
Concern. Can the other-node be certain?
Impatience Enough. All local-and-other nodes join to Node, and certitude will be One. Pursue the forces sundered by the Feral Ones, to their source.
CHAPTER THREE
Guardian held out the glittering datacube to Diplomat. Part of her mission was to protect her frail passenger, true. Establishing rank, however, had little to do with protection. She made the little puppeteer stretch to take the information matrix. It forced him into an extended-neck posture of submission.
Such an act was tradition and test both, Guardian reminded herself. How would the little talker react?
Diplomat avoided Guardian's eyes in dutiful respect, taking the cube with his left mouth. No challenge there.