the xenocs. They seemed to glide along effortlessly through the topmost fringe, with the lower half of their bodies immersed in the brown fronds, their limbs wriggling gently to control their motion. It was a wonderfully graceful action resulting from what was essentially a mad combination of the smooth flick of a dolphin flipper and a human hand slapping at grab hoops.
Joshua admired it with mild envy, at the same time wondering just how long evolution would take to produce that kind of arrangement. It was almost a case of symbiosis, which meant the fronds of vegetation would have to be
He couldn’t doubt these xenocs were intelligent beyond any Tyrathca vassal class the Confederation had encountered. They wore electronic systems like clothes. The upper half of their bodies were covered in a garment that combined a string vest with bandolier straps to which various modules were clipped, interspersed with tools and small canisters. They also went in for exoaugmentation; lenses jutted out of eye sockets, while plenty of them had replaced upper-limb hands with cybernetic claws.
Joshua switched his sensor focus around them until he found one whose electronics seemed slightly better quality than the others. Their styling was more slimline, with elegant key pads and displays. Some of the modules were actually embossed with marmoreal patterns. A fast spectrographic scan said the metal was iron. Curious choice, he thought.
“I am Captain Joshua Calvert, and I apologize to Quantook-LOU,” he said. The communication block relayed his words into the hooting whistles of Tyrathca-style speech, which he could just make out through the muffling of the SII suit’s silicon. “We assumed the Tyrathca occupied this place.”
The creature his sensors were focused on opened its gnarled beak and chittered loudly. “Do you wish to leave now you have found it is otherwise?”
“Not at all. We are delighted to have gained the knowledge of your existence. Could you tell me what you call yourselves?”
“My race is the Mosdva. For all of Tyrathca history we were their subjects. Their history has ended. Mastrit-PJ is our star now.”
“Way to go,” Monica said over the general communication band.
“Let’s not jump to conclusions,” Syrinx admonished. “They’re clearly from the same evolutionary chain.”
“Relevant observations only,” Joshua told them. “I mean, do we even need to carry on? We can be diplomatic here for a couple of hours, then fly off to the nearest probable Tyrathca colony star to get what we need.”
“They have the same language and origin planet,” Parker said. “It’s highly probable they share the same stellar almanac. We need to know a lot more before we even consider moving on.”
“Okay.” Joshua datavised his communication block back to its translation function. “You have achieved much here. My race has never built any structure on such a scale as Tojolt-HI.”
“But you have built a most interesting ship.”
“Thank you.” He took a processor block from his belt slowly and carefully. It was one that he’d found in
One of the other Mosdva slithered forwards through the foliage and gingerly took the block before hurrying back to Quantook-LOU. The distributor of resources examined it before putting it in a pouch near the bottom of his torso garment.
“I thank you, Captain Joshua Calvert. In return, I would show you this section of Anthi-CL, of which you have expressed such interest.”
“Was that cynicism?” Joshua asked his people.
“I don’t think so,” Oski said. “The Tyrathca language as we know it doesn’t have the carrier mechanism for that kind of nuance. It can’t, because they don’t have cynicism.”
“Might be a good idea to keep the analysis program watching for those kind of patterns emerging.”
“I’ll second that,” Samuel said. “They’ve been bombarding us with sensor probes from the second that hatch opened. They’re clearly looking for an advantage. This kind of mercantile behaviour is thankfully easy to appreciate. It almost makes them human.”
“Wonderful. Sixteen thousand light years, and all we get to meet is the local equivalent of the Kulu Traders Association.”
“Joshua, your first priority is to understand exactly what position Quantook-LOU has within their social structure,” Parker said. “Once that is known, we’ll be able to proceed quickly to a resolution. Their culture is plainly developed along different lines from the Tyrathca, though I’m happy to say the basics of trade apparently remain a fundamental.”
“Yes, thank you, Mr Director.” And I wonder if
“Accompany us, then. I will enlighten you.”
The whole Mosdva group turned, virtually in unison, and began their sliding glide along the vegetation. Joshua, who considered himself highly proficient in freefall conditions, was fascinated by the manoeuvre. There was a lot of torque and inertia involved with such a move; their mid-limbs must apply a lot of pressure to the fronds. And the fronds themselves must be stronger than they looked; try tugging a terrestrial palm like that and you’d rip it in half.
He cancelled the tak pad application on his boot soles and kicked off after them. Ultimately, he cheated, using the cold gas jets of his armour’s manoeuvring pack as well as climbing a frond like a rope. When he reached the upper fringes, the fronds now did their best to impede his progress; where they parted for any Mosdva, they formed elastic nets for him. The best method, he found, was to stay above their tips altogether, and reach down as necessary to swing yourself along. Gauntlet tactile sensors reported the vegetation was spongy, but with a solid spine.
Out of the four of them, he was the most agile, though he struggled to keep up with Quantook-LOU. And the serjeant’s motions were plain painful to watch; Ione had not ventured into Tranquillity’s zero-gee sections very often.
The Mosdva had slowed to observe the progress of the humans, allowing them to catch up.
“You do not fly as fast as your ship, Captain Joshua Calvert,” Quantook-LOU said.
“Our species lives on planets. We’re accustomed to high-gravity environments.”
“We know of planets. The Mosdva have many stories of Mastrit-PJ’s worlds before the expansion devoured them all. But there are no pictures on file in Tojolt-HI, not after such a time. They are as legend, now.”
“I have many pictures of planets in my ship. I would welcome exchanging them for any pictures you do have of Mastrit-PJ’s history.”
“A good first exchange. We are fortunate to have made contact with you, Captain Joshua Calvert.”
Joshua had been hanging on to a frond tip as he waited for the serjeant to catch up; now he realized the plant was wriggling slightly. There certainly wasn’t enough of a breeze to do that.
“The fronds stir the air for us,” Quantook-LOU explained when he mentioned it. All plants on Tojolt-HI flexed gently; that was why they’d originally been selected, and careful breeding had enhanced the trait. Air had to be moved in freefall, or stagnant pockets of gas would build up, unpleasant and potentially lethal for animals and plants alike. The Mosdva still had mechanical fans and ducts, but they were very much secondary systems.
“Not quite up to Edenist levels,” Sarha said.
“They’re edging towards biological solutions,” Ruben replied. “Leaving the mechanical behind.”
“You can’t use wholly biological systems here, not in this environment, it’s too hostile.”
“And there is precious little sign of genetic engineering techniques being employed,” Samuel said. “Quantook-LOU told us the plants were bred. Cross-pollination is almost a lost art in human society, Adamist and Edenist alike. We shall have to be more careful here than we originally expected, both in what we say and what we exchange with them. This society is static, and it survives perfectly by being so. To introduce change, even in the form of concepts, could be disastrous to it.”
