“These aren’t our partners,” Hans said. “They’re just some other poor sons of bitches lost out here.”
More faces. Dark interiors with brightly lighted figures. They began to see the overall shape of the beings: round bodies with four thick stubby legs, elongated horse-like heads on long necks, a pair of slender limbs rising from the “shoulders” and tipped with four-fingered hands. They wore harness-like outfits more useful for carrying things than as concealment.
“Centaurs,” Jennifer said.
“They look more like dinosaurs to me,” Giacomo said. “Sauropods.”
“Tweak it again,” Hans ordered.
Giacomo and Jennifer worked together to interpolate more detail. For a moment, the picture fuzzed into grayness, and then it stood out in artificial clarity, all shapes reduced to plastic simplifications. “I’ll enhance shadows, since the light source seems to be from this angle,” Giacomo said, pointing his finger in toward the picture experimentally.
Hans’ scowl did not change.
Giacomo poked the unseen menu and keyboard and spoke short verbal commands, all interpreted by his wand.
The image’s contrast became more dramatic, shadows more pronounced, and the scene suddenly took on depth. Five of the sauropod beings floated in an ill-defined interior, joined in a five-pointed star, heads toward the middle, linked by hand-like appendages.
“Group portrait,” Martin said.
“Next picture, and tweak it the same,” Hans said.
More figures appeared, arrayed with machines as difficult to riddle as the interiors of the
Hakim leaned closer to the picture and said, “I can make out a familiar constellation. Familiar to the search team, at least… We have called it the Orchid. It has been with us for a year now. It looks a little different, however… The brightest star, there…” He gestured to Giacomo, who surrendered control of the image to him. Hakim brought up a crystalline starfield, live, and rotated it until he found the constellation he wanted. Then he flash-compared the blurred chart with the fresh image, adjusted for scale, and the corresponding stars jumped in and out, the brightest jumping the farthest.
“Time has passed,” Hakim said, “but these are the same stars. Notice that stars in the distant background do not jump.”
“I noticed,” Hans said. “How long has it been?”
Hakim worked his momerath quickly. “If estimates of proper motion are correct, this image would have to be one, perhaps two thousand years old.”
“They’ve been out here two thousand years?” Harpal asked, whistling.
The next few images showed the spacecraft itself from several angles: three spheres linked by necks.
“It’s like our ship,” Jennifer said.
Harpal whistled again. “It’s a Ship of the Law, all right.”
More pictures: cabin interiors, what might have been a social or even a mating ritual, sauropods holding up pale ovoids for examination, breaking the ovoids and appearing to consume the contents, beings in repose or dead, twenty blocks of what was probably text, then a series of ten individual portraits.
The next ten images were simple charts of a stellar system. Hakim compared these charts with the charts they had made of Leviathan. The numbers and orbits of the planets were very similar, though not exact. “Puzzling,” Hakim said. “There is strong similarity, but…”
“Maybe the system has changed,” Martin suggested.
“Not natural changes. Twelve planets are shown in these charts, but we have detected only ten. The largest planet is not shown in the earlier charts. Where could it have come from?”
“You’re saying they didn’t visit Leviathan? This is another system?” Hans asked.
Hakim frowned. “I do not know what to say. The resemblance is too close to be coincidence… these six similar planets, congruent masses, orbits, diameters…”
“Forget it for now,” Hans said.
The next forty images showed planets and planetary surfaces, details too muddied to be very useful. Hints of mountains or large structures with regular, smooth surfaces; a lake or body of water; dramatic cloud formations over a flat-topped mesa, sauropods in suits exploring a broad field.
The last image was startling in its directness.
Three sauropods in suits on a planetary surface confronted a being of another kind entirely; three times more massive than they, barrel-bodied, standing on two massive legs like an elephant’s, with a long, flat head topped by a row of what might have been eyes, nine of them.
They were exchanging ovoids. One sauropod appeared to be kneeling before the larger being; offering up an ovoid.
“What in the hell happened?” Hans asked, frowning, fixed on the final image. “They’ve picked a mighty poor choice of pictures to tell a story.”
“Perhaps the sequence is incomplete,” Hakim said. “What could be left after such a time?”
“Are we going to change course and find out?” Giacomo asked.
“Hell, no,” Hans said immediately. “They’re dead. This isn’t a distress call, that’s clear; they must have known they were dying.”
Silence settled. Then, very distinctly, the ship’s voice spoke—the first time they had heard it since a year before the Skirmish, before Martin served as Pan.
“There will be an expedition to examine this ship,” it said in a rich contralto. “It would be best if members of the crew accompany the expedition.”
Hans’ face reddened as much with surprise as anger. “We don’t have the fuel to waste!”
“There is sufficient fuel,” the ship’s voice said. “A vessel will be manufactured. It can carry three people, or none, depending on your decision.”
“You can make another ship now?” Hakim asked in a small voice.
“Why do it at all?” Hans said. “The ship is dead—it must be! Two thousand years!”
“It is a Ship of the Law,” the ship’s voice answered. “The transmitted information is likely to be much less than what is stored aboard the ship itself. It is required for all Ships of the Law to rendezvous and exchange information, if such a rendezvous is possible.”
Hans lifted his eyes, then his hands, giving up. “Who wants to go?” he asked.
“We can draw lots,” Hakim said.
“No—we won’t draw lots,” Hans said. “Martin, I assume you’d like to go?”
“I don’t know,” Martin said.
“I’d like you to go. Take Hakim and Giacomo with you.”
Jennifer’s breath hitched.
“How long a voyage?” Giacomo asked.
“Your time, one month,” the ship’s voice said. “Time for this ship, four months. There will be super acceleration and deceleration.”
“A lot of fuel,” Hans said under his breath.
Giacomo touched Jennifer’s hand. “Nothing like a side trip,” she said. “Makes the heart grow fonder.”
Giacomo did not look at all convinced.
“If people go, it will use more fuel,” Martin said. He wondered if Hans wanted him out of the way.
“That is correct,” the ship’s voice said. “But it is not a major consideration. You will learn much that cannot be learned by sending an uncrewed vessel. Your observations will be valuable.”
“There it is,” Hans said. He wrapped his arm around Martin. “It’ll cheer you up,” he said.
“How?” Martin asked. “Visiting a derelict…”
“Get your goddamned glum face off this barge,” Hans said.
