The Ship Who Won (2 page)

to wait for the full analysis-"

'That would have taken hours," Keff interjected. "Our

social interaction was happening in realtime."

"Well, you certainly made an impression."

"Did you understand the Beasts Blatisant? How'd the

IT program go?" asked Simeon, changing;the subject.

IT stood for Intentional Translator, the universal

simultaneous language translation program that Keff had

started before he graduated from school. IT was in a

constant state of being perfected, adding referents and

standards from each new alien language recorded by

Central Worlds exploration teams. The brawn had more

faith in his invention than his brain partner, who never

relied on IT more than necessary. Carialle teased Keff

mightily over the mistakes the IT made, but all the

chaffing was affectionately meant. Brain and brawn had

been together fourteen years out of a twenty-five-year

mission, and were close and caring friends. For all the

badinage she tossed his way, Carialle never let anyone else

take the mickey out other partner within her hearing.

Now she sniffed. "Still flawed, since IT uses only the

symbology of alien life-forms already discpvered. Even

with the addition of the Blaize Modification for sign language, I think that it still fails to anticipate. I mean, who

the hell knows what referents and standards new alien

races will use?"

"Sustained use of a symbol in context suggests that it has

meaning," Keff argued. 'That's the basis of the program."

"How do you tell the difference between a repeated

movement with meaning and one without?" Carialle

asked, reviving the old argument. "Supposing a jellyfish's

wiggle is sometimes for propulsion and sometimes for dis-semination of information? Listen, Simeon, you be the

judge."

"All right," the station manager said, amused.

"What if members of a new race have mouths and talk,

but impart any information of real importance in some

other way? Say, with a couple of sharp poots out the

sphincter?"

"It was the berries," Keff said. 'Their diet caused the

repeating, er, repeats."

"Maybe that. . . habit. . . had some relevance in the

beginning of their civilization," Carialle said with acer-bity. "However, Simeon, once Keff got the translator

working on their verbal language, we found that at first

they just parroted back to him anything he said, like a

primitive AI pattern, gradually forming sentences, using

words of their own and anything they heard him say. It

seemed useful at first. We thought they'd leam Standard

at light-speed, long before Keff could pick up on the

intricacies of their language, but that wasn't what

happened."

'They parroted the language right, but they didn't really

understand what I was saying," Keff said, alternating his

narrative automatically with Carialle's. "No true comprehension."

"In the meantime, the flatulence was bothering him, not

only because it seemed to be ubiquitous, but because it

seemed to be controllable."

"I didn't know if it was supposed to annoy me, or if it

meant something. Then we started studying them more

closely."

The video cut from one scene to another of the skinny,

hairy aliens diving for ichthyoids and eels, which they captured with their middle pair of limbs. More footage

showed them eating voraciously; teaching their young to

hunt; questing for smaller food animals and tiiding from

larger and more dangerous beasties. Not much of the land

was dry, and what vegetation grew there was sought after

by all the hungry species.

Early tapes showed that, at first, the Beasts seemed to

be afraid of Keff, behaving as if they thought he was going

to attack them. Over the course of a few days, as he

seemed to be neither aggressive nor helpless, they

investigated him further. When they dined, he ate a meal

from his own supplies beside them.

'Then, keeping my distance, I started asking them

questions, putting a clear rising interrogative into my

tone of voice that I had heard their young use when asking for instruction. That seemed to please them, even

though they were puzzled why an obviously mature

being needed what seemed to be survival information.

Interspecies communication and cooperation was

unknown to them." Keff watched as Carialle skipped

through the data to another event. 'This was the pot-latch. Before it really got started, the Beasts ate kilos of

those bean-berries."

"Keff had decided then that they couldn't be too intelligent, doing something like that to themselves. Eating

foods that caused them obvious distress for pure ceremony's sake seemed downright dumb."

"I was disappointed. Then the IT started kicking back

patterns to me on the Beasts' noises. Then I felt downright

dumb." Keff had the good grace to grin at himself.

"And what happened, ah, in the end?" Simeon asked.

Keff grinned sheepishly. "Oh, Carialle was right, of

course. The red berries were the key to their formal communication. I had to give points for repetition of, er, body

language. So, I programmed the IT to pick up what the

Blatisants meant, not just what they said, taking in all

movement or sounds to analyze for meaning. It didn't

always work right..."

"Hah!" Carialle interrupted, in triumph. "He admits it!"

"... but soon, I was getting the sense of what they were

really communicating. The verbal was little more than protective coloration. The Blatisants do have a natural gift for

mimicry. The IT worked fine-well, mostly. The systems

just going to require more testing, that's all."

"It always requires more testing," CariaUe remarked in a

THE SHIP WHO WON 11

long-suffering voice. "One day we're going to miss something we really need."

Keff was unperturbed. "Maybe IT needs an AI element

to test each set of physical movements or gestures for

meaning on the spot and relay it to the running glossary.

I'm going to use IT on humans next, see if I can refine the

quirks that way when I already know what a being is communicating."

"If it works," Simeon said, with rising interest, "and you

can read body language, it'll put you far beyond any means

of translation that's ever been done. They'll call you a

mind-reader. Softshells so seldom say what they mean-but they do express it through their attitudes and gestures.

I can think of a thousand practical uses for IT right here in

Central Worlds."

"As for the Blatisants, there's no reason not to recommend further investigation to award them ISS status, since

it's clear they are sentient and have an ongoing civilization,

however primitive," Keff said. "And that's what I'm going

to tell the Central Committee in my report. Iricon Ill's got

to go on the list."

T wish I could be a mouse in the wall," Simeon said,

chuckling with mischievous glee, "when an evaluation

team has to talk with your Beasts. The whole party's going

to sound like a raft of untuned engines. I know CenCom's

going to be happy to hear about another race ofsentients."

"I know," Keff said, a little sadly, "but it's not the race,

you know." To Keff and Carialle, the designation meant

that most elusive of holy grails, an alien race culturally and

technologically advanced enough to meet humanity on its

own terms, having independently achieved computer science and space travel.

"If anyone's going to find the race, it's likely to be you

two," Simeon said with open sincerity.

Carialle closed the last kilometers to the docking bay and

shut off her engines as the magnetic grapples pulled her

close, and the vacuum seal snugged around the atrlock.

"Home again," she sighed.

The lights on the board started flashing as Simeon

sent a burst requesting decontamination for the CK-963.

Keff pushed back from the monitor panels and went

back to his cabin to make certain everything personal

was locked down before the decontam crew came on

board.

"We're empty on everything, Simeon," Carialle said.

"Protein vats are at the low ebb, my nutrients are redlining,

fuel cells down. Fill 'er up."

"We're a bit short on some supplies at the moment,"

Simeon said, "but I'll give you what I can." There was a

brief pause, and his voice returned. "I've checked for mail.

Keff has two parcels. The manifests are for circuits, and for

a 'Rotoflex.'What's that?"

"Hah!" said Keff, pleased. "Exercise equipment. A

Rotoflex helps build chest and back muscles without strain

on the intercostals." He flattened his hands over his ribs

and breathed deeply to demonstrate.

"All we need is more clang-and-bump deadware on my

deck," Carialle said with the noise that served her for a

sigh.

"Where's your shipment, Carialle?" Keff asked innocently. "I thought you were sending for a body from

Moto-Prosthetics."

"Well, you thought wrong," Carialle said, exasperated

that he was bringing up their old argument. "I'm happy in

my skin, thank you."

"You'd love being mobile, lady fair," Keff said. "All the

things you miss staying in one place! You can't imagine.

Tell her, Simeon."

"She travels more than I do. Sir Galahad. Forget it."

"Anyone else have messages for us?" Carialle asked.

THE SHIP WHO WON 13

"Not that I have on record, but I'll put out a query to

show you're in dock."

Keff picked his sodden tunic off the console and stood

up. ,

"I'd better go and let the medicals have their poke at

me," he said. "Will you take care of the rest of the computer debriefing, my lady Cari, or do you want me to stay

and make sure they don't poke in anywhere you don't want

them?"

"Nay, good sir knight," Carialle responded, still playing

the game. "You have coursed long and far, and deserve

reward."

'The only rewards I want," Keff said wistfully, "are a

beer that hasn't been frozen for a year, and a little compan-ionship-not that you aren't the perfect companion, lady

fair"-he kissed his hand to the titanium column-"but as

the prophet said, let there be spaces in your togethemess.

If you'll excuse me?"

"Well, don't space yourself too far," Carialle said. Keff

grinned. Carialle followed him on her internal cameras to

his cabin, where, in deference to those spaces he mentioned, she stopped. She heard the sonic-shower turn on

and off, and the hiss of his closet door. He came out of the

cabin pulling on a new, dry tunic, his curly hair tousled.

Ta-ta," Keff said. "I go to confess all and slay a beer or

two."

Before the airlock sealed, Carialle had opened up her

public memory banks to Simeon, transferring full copies of

their datafiles on the Iricon mission. Xeno were on line in

seconds, asking her for in-depth, eyewitness commentary

on their exploration. Keff, in Medical, was probably

answering some of the same questions. Xeno liked subjective accounts as well as mechanical recordings.

At the same time Carialle carried on her conversation

with Simeon, she oversaw the decontam crew and loading

14 Anne McCaffrey

staff, and relaxed a little herself after what had been an

arduous journey. A few days here, and she'd feel ready to

go out and knit the galactic spiral into a sweater.

Keffs medical examination, under the capable stetho-scope of Dr. Chaundra, took less than fifteen minutes, but

the interview with Xeno went on for hours. By the time he

had recited from memory everything he thought or

observed about the Beasts Blatisant he was wrung out and

dry.

"You know, Keff," Darvi, the xenologist, said, shutting

down his clipboard terminal on the Beast Blatisant file, "if

I didn't know you personally, I'd have to think you were a

little nuts, giving alien races silly names like that. Beasts

Blatisant. Sea Nymphs. Losels-that was the last one I

remember."

"Don't you ever play Myths and Legends, Darvi?" Keff

asked, eyes innocent.

"Not in years. It's a kid game, isn't it?"

"No! Nothing wrong with my mind, nyuk-nyuk," Keff

said, rubbing knuckles on his own pate and pulling a face.

The xenologist looked worried for a moment, then relaxed

as he realized Keff was teasing him. "Seriously, its

self-defense against boredom. After fourteen years of this

job, one gets fardling tired of referring to a species as 'the

indigenous race' or 'the inhabitants of Zoocon I.' I'm not

an AI drone, and neither is Carialle."

"Well, the names are still silly."

"Humankind is a silly race," Keff said lightly. "I'm just

indulging in innocent fun."

He didn't want to get into what he and Carialle considered

the serious aspects of the game, the points of honor, the

satisfaction of laying successes at the feet of his lady fair. It

wasn't as if he and Carialle couldn't tell the difference

between play and reality. The game had permeated their life