for no other reason than to support my intended action of placing all three of the ships involved in indefinite quarantine. The reasons must be credible; otherwise our authorities might think that we have been so affected by the situation that we must be considered psychologically suspect, in which case they will send another ship anyway. But other than telling them to stay away from us, what can I say? Have you a suggestion, Doctor? I hope.”
“I have, friend Fletcher,” Prilicla replied, thinking how good it felt to be in possession of a clear mind in a rested body. “But it may involve a small personal risk for you.”
“If the risk is warranted,” said the captain impatiently, “the size is unimportant. Go on.”
Prilicla went on. “Until I know the exact nature of the threat, infection, or whatever that seems to have been picked up by Terragar, I have asked that Rhabwar remain separated from the medical team. That stricture still holds, but I may have been a little overcautious because none of the team suffered any detectable ill effects as a result of our brief visit to the ship, nor myself from my examination of the damaged life-form found on board. I feel sure that, provided the normal safety precautions are taken and we subject ourselves to external sterilization procedures before and after the visit, we could conduct a forensic examination of the wreck in safety. Whatever the damage inflicted by the alien
hip, or by that life-form found on board, it must have left some evidence of the kind of weapon used — enough, perhaps, to complete your report. And the quality of the information could well be better than that supplied by a semiconscious casualty in intense pain. Do you have any comments, friend Fletcher?”
The captain nodded and showed its teeth. “Three of them,” it said. “The first is that you should rest and clear your body and mind more often. The second and third are, how soon can we meet, and where?”
Less than an hour later Prilicla was watching the captain’s Earth-human hands beside his as they began the reexamination of the strange life-form, and suddenly he remembered his odd waking dream. He was about to mention it, then had second thoughts. The captain was not the sort of person with whom one discussed one’s dreams.
CHAPTER 9
Murchison reported that the condition of the three casualties remained stable, and asked permission to go along to assist with the forensic examination. It had insisted that as an other-species pathologist its field covered all forms of intelligent life, and not just the organic variety. Prilicla had heard few lamer excuses for satisfying professional curiosity, which in Murchi-son’s case was every bit as intense as that of the captain and himself, but he had agreed. Murchison was his principal assistant and the person most likely to inherit thesenior medical officer’s position on Rhabwar — and besides, he was curious to see how it dealt with a totally new situation.
That was why most of the talking was being done into the recorder by Captain Fletcher, with Murchison making an occasional interjection, while Prilicla spent long periods saying nothing at all. Following a meticulous examination with the special scanner provided by Lieutenant Chen — a scanner normally used to detect obscure symptoms deep inside ailing machinery — the captain straightened up, placed the instrument gently on the deck, and spoke with feelings of excitement and enthusiasm.
“This creature, entity, artifact, or whatever,” it said, “displays a degree of design and structural sophistication well beyond
the Federation’s present capabilities — if it was, in fact, built by anyone or anything but itself. The internal circuitry and actuator mechanisms are so incredibly fine and intricate that at first I couldn’t recognize them for what they are. This thing wasn’t just put together by watchmakers but by the mechanical equivalent of a microsurgery team. I’ve traced several of the peripheral nerve networks to a processing area in the central body which seems to house the brain and heart equivalents. I can’t be sure of this because that location has been damaged and the contents fused by the heat and radiation discharge that destroyed the creature. The sensory circuits underlying the surface in the same area have also been burned out, probably by the same agency, which may or may not have been a wide-focus heat weapon of some kind. “But there is clear evidence throughout the whole body,” it went on, “of a highly developed self-repair capability of apparently indefinite duration. Until it sustained that blast injury, this thing would have been capable of regeneration and growth. Any organism that can do that is technically alive.”
Prilicla had a question but Murchison asked it for him. Quickly it said, “Are you sure that your subject isn’t alive now?” “Don’t worry, ma’am,” the captain replied. “How sure would you be if your subject’s brain and heart had been burned to a crisp? Besides, its muscles — I mean its actuator linkages— are designed for light, precise work and are not all that robust. Physically it would not represent a serious threat' — it smiled— “except possibly to Dr. Prilicla.”
Murchison returned the other’s smile, because practically everything larger than an Earth kitten was a serious threat to Prilicla.
Something else is worrying me,” Murchison said, “I watched your internal scanner examination, Captain, and saw that the subject’s body is solidly packed with circuitry, metal musculature, and sensory receptors. But why is it that particular shape?”
Fletcher remained silent, radiating the confusion and impatience characteristic of a mind that had been expecting a different question.
“Robotics isn’t my specialty,” Murchison went on, “but isn’t it usual for one to be mechanically more functional? I mean, shouldn’t it basically be a box with locomotor appendages simpler and more versatile than the six limbs we are seeing here; with a variety of specialized manipulators sprouting out of the body without regard to aesthetic balance; and with all-around visual sensors instead of just two in the head section? If this thing had been normally organic we would classify it as a CHLI. Rather than adopting a functional robotic shape, it seems clear that this body configuration is decidedly organimorphic. My question is, why would a non-organic intelligence copy itself on a CHLI?”
“Sorry, ma’am,” the captain replied, looking and feeling apologetic. “I have no answers, just a wild guess.”
Murchison nodded and said, “Which is?”
The captain hesitated, then said, “This isn’t my field, either. But think about the evolution of an organic life- form as opposed to that of an intelligent machine. Ignoring the religious perspective, the first begins as an accidental grouping of simple, cellular forms which takes several millions of years of environmental adaptation with other competing species to become the dominant intelligence. The second doesn’t do anything like that because, no matter how long it is given, a simple tool like a monkey wrench can never evolve through the intermediate stage of a lawn mower to become a superintelligent computer, at least, not without outside help. That simple tool has to be created by someone in the first place, and at some later stage the creator has to provide the machine with self-awareness and intelligence. Only then would there be the possibility of further self-evolution.
“I’m speculating, of course,” the captain went on, “but a further possibility is that the beings who first bestowed on their machines the gift of self-aware, intelligent life are a permanent part of their racial memory — or inherited design — and that they made, or in gratitude made the choice to remain, in their CHLI creators’ image.”
“In your opinion, friend Fletcher,” Prilicla asked, “would this entity have been capable of disabling a starship?”
“No, Doctor,” the captain replied firmly. “At least, not directly. Although composed of metal with plastic- insulated circuitry, the appendages were designed for precise and delicate work rather than hard labor or fighting, although there would have been nothing to stop it using those digits, as we DBDGs have been known to do, to operate a variety of destructive weapons. I’ll be looking for anything like that when I’m searching the ship. All the evidence points to our robot friend being dead on arrival, and the type of heat and blast injuries it sustained were too unfocused to be caused by a Corps hand-weapon.
“And now,” it went on, looking at the opened seams in the hull plating of the ship all around them, “I have to examine the body of a larger, metal cadaver, one that is more familiar to me.”
Prilicla used his antigravity belt to move outside and fly forward to the control deck while Murchison stayed with the captain, both to satisfy its curiosity and to help move aside troublesome debris. There was minimal risk
