Here We Stand, page 68




Marc edged around the frame of the hatch, rifle first, then lowered it slowly.
Nir-Tenbiku was sitting in the pilot’s seat, wearing a similar pressure suit to the one Gan-Pamas had died in, and looking calmly dignified with his visible hands clasped in his lap. Like his dead buddy, he was tiny, about four feet six. That didn’t make him any less dangerous, but Marc still felt like a dick for treating such a small bloke as a threat.
“Good afternoon, Primary.” Keep it simple. Short sentences. No jargon. “Were you planning to land at the probe’s position?”
“Good afternoon, General.” That had to be a translation glitch. “Yes, the course is laid in.”
“We have to give you coordinates for a different landing zone.”
“Are you able to exchange data with this vessel?”
“Aren’t you in control of this ship, Primary?”
“No. I’m not a trained pilot. The system’s automated.”
Nir-Tenbiku seemed to have his eyes fixed on the Marquis. Marc had no idea whatsoever about Jattan body language and there was no recognisable expression on Nir-Tenbiku’s eel-like face to guide him. The guy could have been offering his surrender or getting ready to detonate the ship. All the signs Marc had learned to read over a lifetime just weren’t there.
“Was that the prenu?” Nir-Tenbiku asked. “The sensors detected it but I only caught a glimpse through the windscreen.”
“Yes. That was the frigate.”
“Did you think I was armed?”
“I can’t rule it out. It’s my job to take maximum precautions.” He could see lights changing on the floating display. He pointed. “What does that show?”
“That’s the position of the other ship.”
“Make sure they understand they have to stay back.”
“I have. You really would open fire if the ship came closer, I assume.”
“Captain Ingram means exactly what she says.” Marc still couldn’t work out if the ship was holding position or not. He needed grids and numbers to work that out. “Your navigation system should be receiving a signal now with your new landing co-ordinates. You can begin your descent.”
“Your teeriks seem to have given you a great deal of information about our systems, General.”
General. Marc was never going to hear the end of that. “They like things done right,” he said. Another floating display changed its appearance. “Is that the new course coming in?”
“Yes.” Nir-Tenbiku turned towards the windscreen. Marc would never have accepted a transmission from Sol if he’d been Nir-Tenbiku. But the Jattan didn’t know about the AI’s hacking habits. “Please secure yourself in the seat.”
It was like sitting in a kid’s chair. Marc squeezed in and ended up wedged so tightly that a seat belt was probably redundant. Nir-Tenbiku made gestures at the controls and the patrol vessel rolled ninety degrees, spinning the visible stars and bringing Opis’s disc into view. Marc added it to the list of experiences that he wished he could have told John and Greg about. Here he was, trusting his safety to an alien rebel leader he’d only just met and who had to rely on autopilot to land safely, and who seemed to have a lot of basic things in common with humans, despite being a short-arse bipedal eel with multiple vestigial arms. It was just another regular day in Nomad. It was scary, it was cool, and it made him feel alive again. He was getting that buzz more often lately.
The descent was brief, but the silence between them was getting awkward. Nir-Tenbiku finally broke it.
“How did you acquire teeriks?” he asked. “Did your people have previous experience of handling them?”
It was an odd way to put it, but so was calling Marc a general. “No,” Marc said, still practicing good OPSEC and not volunteering too much. “But we help each other out.”
“And you’ve had no problems with them?”
Now there was a loaded and very specific question. Maybe Nir-Tenbiku meant labour disputes, or just that he thought they were a bit uppity for servants, which was understandable given what Lirrel had been like. But maybe Lirrel had the same medication problem as Fred’s commune. Did the Jattans know teeriks were given drugs? Marc almost asked by way of conversation, but decided to leave it to Ingram.
“We get on fine,” Marc said, wondering what was going on with Fred. “Except for Lirrel, obviously. I had to shoot him when he killed Dr Curtis. Sorry about that.”
“Well, if they get out of hand, you have no choice.”
Bloody hell. Jattan toffs really did believe in putting the working classes in their place. Marc struggled to think of a diplomatic response.
“How long had Lirrel been working for you?”
“One Opis year.” That sounded like the AI translation converting Jattan units to human ones the same way it converted distances. “He was very useful, but his temperament grew worse.”
Nir-Tenbiku sounded like he was talking about a dog, not even a servant. It was probably the translation’s limits again.
“We named the frigate after our comrade who was killed, by the way,” Marc said. “Curtis. The teeriks asked for that. They liked her.”
“Yes, I’ve heard they can get very attached to their owners.”
Marc’s natural response would have killed Ingram’s diplomacy stone dead, so he said nothing and sat back to keep an eye on the floating displays. He was getting the general idea of them, although nowhere near enough to glean any intel. His helmet was transmitting everything he looked at, though, so Cosqui could analyse it with Solomon. Opis was dead ahead, gradually filling his field of view with oceans and plains and forests, erasing the void. Plenty could still go wrong before the ship touched down, but Marc allowed himself a little optimism. It had gone better than he expected.
He still hated space. But today he’d realised how badly he didn’t want to die, something he hadn’t felt for a long time, and Opis somehow looked a little more like home. He could only hope that it would still be in one piece tomorrow.
13
I know what you did, Solomon. You’re no better than the Kugin.
Hredt, rehearsing a difficult conversation.
Nomad Base, Opis: November 10, OC.
Gan-Pamas had been wrong about humans. They weren’t as big as Kugin. They were actually bigger.
They weren’t as heavily-built, but most of them looked taller, and a number of them were waiting and watching when Nir-Tenbiku emerged from the ship into uncomfortably bright sun. Seeing them in the flesh was sobering. They reminded him of obercu, long-limbed with heads set on narrow necks, but he doubted they were docile herbivores. The creatures with them, the small four-legged ones covered in hair, stood beside them and shouted the same word over and over.
One was silent, though, a creature with a glossy black and white coat, and fixed its gaze on him. It lay crouched as if it was going to spring. One of the humans turned to speak to the quadrupeds and they stopped shouting immediately, but the black and white one didn’t take his eyes off Nir-Tenbiku.
Everything was disorienting — light, smells, vibrations, noises, even the slightly lower gravity that was enough to make him misjudge his steps. He was also too far away from the base to echolocate anything. It left him blind, squinting against the bright sun until he put on his visor to shield his eyes. It looked like an odd accessory now he’d changed into his formal clothes, but the humans probably didn’t notice.
“This way, Primary.” Marc pointed him towards an open vehicle, a small square thing with no roof. Nir-Tenbiku was fascinated by how much deeper and more varied in tone Marc’s real voice was without his helmet muting it. He could now hear both the translation and the human’s own voice. “Don’t worry about the dogs. They’re trained to warn us about intruders.”
The word dogs wasn’t translated. “They seem angry.”
“No, it’s just their way of telling us they’ve seen you.” Marc stopped as if something had occurred to him, but he didn’t explain. “See that grey building over there? That’s where we’re going.”
Nir-Tenbiku had to concentrate on every step. He was lifting his feet too high. He couldn’t be seen to trip up. He was the rightful Primary of Jatt and he had to maintain his dignity, especially when wearing his state regalia. His nation’s pride was at stake.
As he followed Marc, he saw a mechanical waiting nearby, the one built to resemble the dogs. It trotted over to the vehicle and jumped onto the back as if it intended to accompany them.
“Your mechanicals,” Nir-Tenbiku said to Marc. “It seems you can live alongside them.”
“You mean the robot with four legs? That’s not a mechanical. It’s our emanation. He just uses the bot frame to get around.” The word bot wasn’t translated. “But we do use ordinary mechanicals. You’ll see them everywhere here.”
Nir-Tenbiku wasn’t sure he understood. “So you have emanations as well.”
“We call them AIs.” The translation just rendered it the way he said it. Nir-Tenbiku heard the word in both streams of language. “That’s short for artificial intelligence. But he’s completely independent, not software. He thinks and feels like us and does what he wants. He’s called Solomon.”
Human technology sounded intriguing and a little dangerous as well. Nir-Tenbiku noted it as something to discuss in future talks if he emerged from this meeting in Ingram’s good graces. He followed Marc’s gesture to sit in the front seat and did his best to disguise his unease at having a mechanical right behind him, close enough to kill him. The reassurance that the intelligence within it was effectively human didn’t override his mistrust.
“Good afternoon, Primary,” the emanation said in passable Jattan. It made Nir-Tenbiku jump. “I’m here to assist Captain Ingram. There’s no need to worry about me.”
It must have heard the conversation. Nir-Tenbiku turned to look over his shoulder. The mechanical’s small head was a lens on a long, flexible neck, and it looked uncomfortably like a weapon.
“You’ve learned our language,” Nir-Tenbiku said.
“In a way. I have another artificial intelligence that does the translation work for me. It’s not sentient, but it’s very efficient.”
So their emanations had emanations of their own. This was impressive. No other civilisation in the known sectors had created anything like that, and if all human technology was that advanced, it might provide an edge against the Protectorate. Nir-Tenbiku had followed Gan-Pamas’s advice to forge links with the humans mostly out of blind trust, but now he was beginning to see what might have convinced his friend that contact was worthwhile.
“So mechanicals really are dangerous where you come from,” Marc said, driving towards the base. “The teeriks said so, but I wasn’t sure if it was true. We call them bots, by the way.”
“Yes, they form their own communities and dislike contact with outsiders,” Nir-Tenbiku said. “I know little about the technology, but once they were modified to work in self-directing groups, they evolved organised social behaviour, and they decided they disliked organics.”
Marc made a hah sound that didn’t get translated. “What about the ones who do the cleaning, then?”
“Oh, they don’t carry out tasks like that. They mine, build, tend crop facilities, and work in environments too hazardous for people. All the tasks that don’t bring them into contact with us.”
Marc’s expression changed slightly. The thin strips of hair above his eyes rose and fell. But he didn’t pass comment. Nir-Tenbiku asked no more questions and took in as much as he could on the short drive. There were few humans visible within the base, but all were carrying a variety of objects that were clearly weapons, and large cannon-like devices stood at road junctions. Beyond the central area of domed and flat-roofed buildings, he could see avenues lined with smaller structures that weren’t quite identical but seemed to have a common style. He was struck by how complete and well-ordered the base seemed, as if it had been carefully assembled elsewhere and placed in the middle of the Opis wilderness like an island. Nothing seemed unfinished or in progress. It breathed permanence.
The vehicle came to a halt next to a row of poles adorned with brightly-coloured flags. Outside the building a human was waiting, hands clasped behind their back, and Nir-Tenbiku knew right away that it was Captain Bridget Ingram. He knew nothing about the status signs of humans, but he recognised someone who believed in their own authority.
It was a quality he’d seen in every species, even animals. He was especially taken by what he assumed was her uniform, very different from the black, looser-fitting, functional clothing worn by the troops he’d seen on landing. Her jacket was dark blue, precisely tailored, and decorated with gold, and she wore a cap with similar embellishment. It was a statement, not clothing to work in, almost Jattan in its splendid formality. He was glad he’d changed into his own regalia before leaving his ship.
He could have been completely wrong, of course. It might simply have been the fashion for human females, because he could see the differences between males and females now that he had Ingram to use as a guide. But he was sure he was looking at a uniform of someone with high rank. He was surprised by how much he already found to relate to in this species. They seemed to value ritual and honour, both signs of personal and collective discipline, and that was something he could use to forge an alliance.
“That’s Captain Ingram,” Marc said, confirming his guess. “Back home, she’s in the history books for winning battles. And destroying enemy cities.”
Nir-Tenbiku wasn’t sure if Marc had given him a warning or a reassurance, but Ingram was probably doing the same as he was — keeping an open but cautious mind, checking each other out in the hope of finding mutual advantage. He climbed out of the vehicle and steadied himself to negotiate the low steps in front of the doors.
“Primary Nir-Tenbiku, welcome to Nomad Base,” Ingram said. A Kugin commander would probably have shot him now for intruding like this. “Come this way. Let’s talk.”
Again he heard human speech and the Jattan voice almost simultaneously, the latter apparently coming from the small metal object pinned discreetly to her collar, but he was already getting better at concentrating solely on the Jattan part. Human speech was starting to sound like music in the background, devoid of verbal meaning, and he could filter it out.
“Thank you for agreeing to see me, Captain.”
“I’d offer you refreshment, Primary, but I don’t know if our beverages would be safe for you to drink.” Ingram opened the door to lead him into the building. Solomon the emanation followed them. “We can give you purified water, though. That’s probably safe.”
The venue was a sparsely-furnished room with screens drawn across the windows, making the shaded interior a welcome refuge from the daylight outside. It contained two seats with two small tables beside them, one with a container of water next to some unidentifiable devices. When Ingram touched one of the objects, a smoke-like stream of water vapour rose silently into the air. Nir-Tenbiku could feel the moisture right away.
“Is this comfortable for you, Primary?” Ingram asked. “I know you prefer low light and higher humidity.”
He couldn’t interpret her expression, but that gesture alone told him she wasn’t hostile, at least not yet. No enemy, not even an honourable one, would miss a chance to put pressure on him by making him physically uncomfortable during a sensitive negotiation. It added to the picture he was forming of a culture not completely alien to his own.
“Thank you, Captain,” he said. “That’s very thoughtful.”
“Please, sit down.”
Cudik would have said this was psychological warfare, softening up Nir-Tenbiku for some downfall, but he was the one seeking the softening and he was sure Ingram knew that. She poured water into a cup and placed it on the table within his reach. Solomon had taken up position behind him by the door, watching him as carefully as that black and white dog.
“If I sound abrupt,” Ingram said, “it’s because I’m still simplifying my language to avoid mistranslation. It’s not discourtesy. The emanation’s still learning Jattan and might not understand some terms well enough. I’m sure we’d both have a better conversation if we could speak directly, but for the time being, avoiding misunderstandings will have to be enough.”
“I understand, Captain. We should be pleasantly surprised at our ability to have any meaningful conversation at all.”
Ingram showed her teeth and creased her face. The expression seemed to correlate with approval if Marc was anything to judge by. Nir-Tenbiku made a note to watch out for it.
“I try to remind myself how rare it is to meet another intelligent species,” she said. “And yes, it’s remarkable we have enough in common to be able to discuss anything. So why have you come to see me?”
Nir-Tenbiku was relieved that the language limitations gave him an excuse to get straight to the point without seeming rude.
“I’d like to establish a friendly relationship with humans, or at least reach an agreement that you won’t side with our enemies,” he said. “We’ve already had an unfortunate and unintended conflict. I hope you believe me when I say we would not have behaved that way under normal circumstances.”
Ingram looked at him, suddenly expressionless. “We don’t know enough about local politics yet to understand the issues, let alone take sides. We just want to be left alone.”
“But what we do in this sector regarding our claim on Jatt will have some impact on you, and your presence will change the balance of power here and affect us,” Nir-Tenbiku said. “We should at least discuss what we can do to minimise friction.”