Drednanth: A Tale of the Final Fall of Man (26 page)

“But it showed up some time after AstroCorps Rep and Rec left?” Waffa asked.

“Impossible to say,” Decay replied. “At the moment all we know is that they mothballed the wreck, and the shouter’s here. There might have been a whole fleet and for whatever reason they just agreed to leave this one behind. We’ll have to consult the logs, and hopefully talk to our noisy friend before we know anything.”

“
This
was why we took the original detour,” Z-Lin reiterated, “to answer your point about taking the back-roads and missing Þursheim. Getting to the
Boonie
and linking up with a fully-stocked AstroCorps Rep and Rec crew would have been invaluable. We could tell them where the rest of the
Boonie
was, and they could fix our ship and tell us the news. All at the ‘cost’ of a – I’m just going to say it – a decent shortcut in our route.”

“Did we even get Jauren Silva on our charts in the end?” Sally enquired a little challengingly.

“Well, no,” Z-Lin admitted, “but since you blew the rest of the
Boonie
to kingdom come with Godfire, it doesn’t really matter.”

“We’re not going to tell the Corps guys about the Artist and the underspace drive anyway, are we?” Janus said. “We don’t want them investigating, tabling, opening a file … right?” he waved towards Thord, this time feeling a little safer involving her in the debate. “Curiosity, caution, digging in chasms, all that?”

“Fair,” Z-Lin admitted. “And all a moot point anyway, since we seem to have missed the repair crew and instead we have a dumbler-folk squatter in the derelict.”

“Which is exciting, even though a new fabrication plant would have been neat too,” Waffa said.

“No argument from me,” Z-Lin said, and stood up. “But since this is what we’ve got, what say we go and make contact?”

Z-LIN

They relocated to the bridge
en masse
. Everybody wanted to witness the potentially-historical communication, and even though Z-Lin knew from experience that it was usually a bit of an over-technical anticlimax she didn’t have the heart to try sending anyone to their posts.

“Take us in, Mister Pendraegg,” she said. “And Sally, let’s have battle stations, just in case.”

“Commander,” Sally responded in her best I’d-already-done-that-but-let’s-keep-it-official voice.

“Decay, once we get close enough you can hit him with a Rosetta underlay,” Clue went on. “Let’s see who’s got the best translator system.”

The Rosetta was a scientifically-arrived-at series of basic alphanumeric and electronic building blocks that any reasonably intuitive computing or communications system ought to be able to turn into a translation matrix. Actual raw computing power did the rest, at least on the AstroCorps end. It had worked so far.

“How many, ah,
Sevens
have you met, Commander?” Maladin asked politely in the silence while the
Tramp
eased closer to the still-invisible wreck of the
Boonie
and the Rosetta was beamed out, buffered and – it was to be hoped – absorbed by the alien spacecraft’s communications system.

“This will be my fourth,” Z-Lin said, “if you only count brand-new dumbler-folk. I’ve also had some run-ins that were classified as
near
-first contacts, since they were with groups of the species who had never encountered us ‘aliens’ before. I met with agents of the Boze, members of the Adderback Confederacy, and a few random They Stand Aside. But they were all already known Seveners, even if the term doesn’t really apply since they had no intention of joining the Six Species.”

“The Adderbacks were taking a good swing at
destroying
the Six Species until they realised there was more than just the one Chrysanthemum-full of us,” Sally said fondly. “And that we had Godfire.”

“Well you’ve got me beat,” Waffa said. “The only new sentients I’ve met-and-greeted with were the Twistlocks.”

“Oh right,” Clue muttered, “I wasn’t even counting them. This’ll be my fifth then.”

“Third for me,” Sally contributed. “The Twists, and I was on the ship that first met the Biograbe – back in my service days.”

“Nine,” Decay said modestly. “But most of them were boring.”

“Give me boring any day of the week,” Clue asserted. “The Boze were annoying, and the Adderbacks gave the Fergies a run for their money in the creepy fucker department.”

“What about the new contacts?” Maladin asked. “Anyone we would have heard of?”

“Only the Noro Metak,” Clue said, “they were the only ones who were relative-capable, but they had a pretty rich local cluster so they just took our comms-dampening technology, thanked us kindly, and closed their borders. They’ve got a little goodwill ambassador exchange thing going on, one- or two-person buccaneer crews that travel around.”

“There was a Noro Metak bucky on Seven Widdershins,” Zeegon remarked. “She was in the lockup for drunk and disorderly.”

“Completely unsurprising,” Z-Lin said. “Our first meeting with the Noro Metak convinced me that their goodwill ambassador institution was actually a state-sanctioned exile program for pathological disturbers of the peace,” she noticed the Bonshooni were still looking on in interest, so she concluded, “the other two species were planetbound. Astragoyen, named for their planet, and The One People, named for the fact that they had no idea there were any others to choose from,” she glanced at Thord. “What about you?” she asked.

“The Drednanth has made contact with many species,” Thord replied, “but I personally, in this lifetime as aki’Drednanth, have met no beings but Molren, Blaren, Bonshooni, Fergunak, humans and my fellow aki’Drednanth,” she waved a gauntlet. “Until now,” she added.

“We’re getting a pingback,” Decay said. “Analogous Rosetta-like counter-underlay. We can work with this,” he gave an appreciative little chuckle as he unpacked the data. “They still think prime numbers are a thing,” he murmured. “That’s adorable.”

The
Boonie
crept into view as they approached, and soon it was visible in the viewsceeens. There wasn’t much to see, just a thick horseshoe of buckled metal and crete, plates and pylons. Clearly, the departure of the Artist had bitten a massive chunk out of the manufactory and only the outlying extremities were left. And they had suffered some pretty catastrophic damage in the accompanying explosions and venting of atmosphere.

The alien ship was at first difficult to pick out from the manufactory wreckage, and not just because it was more than a little beaten up itself. It was a hodgepodge of chambers and cables and panels – some of them a kind of primitive foil-sheathed plating, others obviously scavenged from the hull of the
Boonie
, further blurring the distinction between the two – with three enormous booster rockets and their fuel tanks making up the bulk of the vessel.

“Are they … are those staged solid-state combustion rockets?” Z-Lin marvelled.

“Looks like it,” Decay said.

“Where’s the nearest planet?”

“Not close enough for this guy to get here on burners,” Decay said, “unless he’s immortal. And the nearest planet is Þursheim,” he tapped at his console. “There’s a huge metadata subscript here,” he went on, “it looks like languages and cultural background, coordinates and biological data … it’s still unpacking. But we’ve got some sort of audio protocol up and running. Ready when you are, Commander.”

Z-Lin cleared her throat. “This is Commander Z-Lin Clue of the starship designated
AstroCorps Transpersion Modular Payload 400
,” she recited dutifully, “usually shortened to
Astro Tramp 400
. We are a deep-space exploration and transportation vessel and we come in peace on behalf of AstroCorps and the Six Species. Greetings.”

There was a tense silence as Decay worked. Finally, a short-burst sound transmission returned from the alien craft.

“This [treasured technology] is mine.”

Ah
, Z-Lin nodded to herself. “Since our people have already picked the wreck over, as you could tell from the safety tags if you knew what to look for,” she said, “you’re welcome to what’s left. That’s why it
was
left. I mean, if you like hull plates and junk, this wreck is just perfect…” she paused and looked across at Decay, who suspended the packaging of her communication with a tap of a finger. “Hold on,” she murmured, “does his ship even
have
proper armour?” The Blaran shook his head. “Oh,” she blinked, and then twirled a finger for him to resume the package. “You don’t have metaflux. How did you get so far out … ? Never mind. Well, I guess I can see why you’d be impressed, then. Um, okay, help yourself to hull plating. I see you already are. We’ll send you an instruction manual on its correct installation and use.”

After another extended wait, the answer came through in recognisable tones of suspicion and disbelief. “Really?”

“You want to get full use out of the stuff, yeah? We’ll also throw in a little nuclear transpersion primer, because you’re not going to get those hull plates to work properly for you unless you have the power. Unfortunately we can’t give you a reactor, but this is going to revolutionise your space program. Which, um, so. About that. Where
is
your space program?”

“An object fell to [our planetary gravity well],” the alien said eventually. “It was destroyed in [re-entry]. We found its origin, the [missing signifier object], and through this we [I was assigned through primacy] came here,” the transmission ended, but Decay was already decoding a second package. “The object came to us through [missing signifier object] in space, I ventured [like the glorious heroes of old] through the [missing signifier object], and this is what I found. This [treasured technology].”

“Any chance of clearing up what a ‘missing signifier object’ is?” Clue asked quietly.

“No frame of reference,” Decay replied, “although I’m afraid I might have an … oh wait, there’s one more.”

“I came to this place,” the alien went on, “but then the [missing signifier object] [evaporated / became nothing], and I was left here.”

“Oh shit,” Z-Lin muttered.

“I guess we have the same basic thought at this point,” Decay remarked.

“A stray piece of the
Boonie
drifted off, some scrap of underspace tech,” Z-Lin said. “It somehow fell
through
and ended up burning up in their atmosphere, they put this guy in the nearest rocket and fired him up after it, and he came through the same … blob … and emerged
here
.”

“Then the blob dissolved when we closed the door,” Decay said, “leaving him stranded.”

“That’s pretty heavy on the conjecture,” Janya remarked. “We didn’t see any ‘blobs’ that acted as wormholes.”

“The Artist had a whole mess of different experiments going on in the part of the
Boonie
he managed to steal,” Z-Lin said. “This sort of usage was his end-game, or at least part of it. And it’s about the only thing that explains the presence of a ship this primitive, this far from anywhere,” she waved a hand. “And you have to admit – any other explanation, this close to
Boonie’s Last Stand
, would be pushing the bounds of coincidence.”

“This is true,” Janya admitted.

“I’m sending some rough descriptive cues,” Decay said, “based on the information we gathered from our own experiences. We’re still not quite compatible for more complex media, but if this guy came through an underspace darkerness blob, chances are he’ll be able to confirm it based on this.”

It didn’t take long. “That is [missing signifier object],” the alien said. “That is [missing signifier object], that is [missing signifier object].”

“Okay, got it,” Z-Lin said, sighed, and ran her fingers through her hair in frustration. “Alright. Okay. How long have you been here?”

“My people are coming,” the unhelpful and slightly disturbing answer came back a few moments later. “We have [contingency plans].”

“Right … and how far…” she turned to Decay again. “Do we know how far they have to come, assuming they have to fly the long way?”

“His stellar coordinates are logged onto every single broadcast he’s making,” Decay replied, “in that metadata subscript – you might also want to tell him
that’s
a terrible idea – so let’s see. His home planet seems to be about … six weeks away, at maximum relative. At subluminal, forget it. He’s done well to survive, but…”

“Has our shouter actually identified himself yet?” Clue asked. Decay shook his head, and Z-Lin gestured for him to prepare another package. “What’s your name, friend?”

Decay laughed as the response transmission came through. “I am Rakmanmorion,” the alien proclaimed, “Conqueror of Space.”

Z-Lin kept a straight face. “And we’re the first people you’ve seen?” she asked, wondering if Rakmanmorion would even understand the point of the question. “There was nobody else here when you arrived? This … how long have you been here?” she repeated the question.

“[Probably eighteen] [time units],” Rakmanmorion, Conqueror of Space replied, and Clue kicked herself mentally. Of course the translators would have enormous trouble with precisely that sort of question, at least until both systems could break each other down to their component infinitesimalities and then build back up to comparative timeframes. “I have been alone here all this time,” Rakmanmorion went on far more helpfully than Z-Lin deserved, “except the [
Boonie’s Last Stand
’s computer] was talking to my [computer] and so I deduced with my [area of brain] and [genital aspect] that this was abandoned [treasured technology] and therefore mine for the taking.”

“Did he say ‘genital aspect’?” Zeegon murmured.

“No, the computer did,” Z-Lin replied quietly. “Probably struggling with a colloquialism of some sort. Think ‘gut feeling’ and just follow the gut through to its inevitable outlet,” she turned to Decay. “What’s
our
computer getting from the
Boonie
’s logs? What have AstroCorps Rep and Rec left here anyway?”