Apes and Angels Read online

  “What were they arguing about?” Kosoff asked.

  “Oh, my man was doing a routine questionnaire about the man’s duties, and he took offense, thought he was being accused of loafing on duty.”

  “That’s strange,” Chang murmured.

  And Brad found himself wondering if Kosoff set up the confrontation just to keep Littlejohn from getting to this meeting. You’re getting paranoid, he told himself. But the disappointment on Kosoff’s face told him that he might be right.

  “Very well,” Kosoff said. “We’re all here.” Turning to Brad, he asked, “And just how do you intend to test the data about the octopods’ noises?”

  “We say hello to them, in their own language.”

  Chang’s eyes widened.

  Kosoff’s face froze for an instant, then he snapped, “Absolutely not!”

  “That would be a contact,” said Chang.

  Littlejohn pointed out, “But we’ve already contacted them, haven’t we? We’ve sent the probes to study them.”

  “That’s not contact,” Kosoff argued.

  Brad said, “Emcee says it is.”

  “The master computer?”

  “Ask him.”

  Clearly unhappy, Kosoff nevertheless called to the wall screen, “Master computer, please.”

  Emcee’s placidly smiling face took form on the screen. “How may I help you?”

  Before Brad could speak, Kosoff asked, “Do the probes we inserted among the octopods on Alpha constitute a contact between our two species?”

  “In the strictest sense of the word, yes, we have made a form of contact with the alien species.”

  Chang said, “But the probes have been completely passive.” Then, realizing that that was not entirely true, she added, “Except for the neutrino scans, of course. And I don’t see how those animals could detect neutrino scans.”

  Emcee replied, “The octopods have given no indication of being aware of the scans. But they were certainly curious about the probes when we first inserted them among them.”

  “That doesn’t constitute contact,” Kosoff said firmly.

  “I’m afraid that it does,” Emcee contradicted. “Mission guidelines define various levels of contact. Passive contact, such as the probes represent, is contact nonetheless. If the octopods are intelligent, they must realize that those probes are foreign objects.”

  “They talked to them,” Brad said.

  “When they first encountered them,” said Kosoff. “They’ve ignored them ever since, except to avoid their communications bursts when they send data to us.”

  Littlejohn suggested, “Perhaps they’ve accepted them as visitors.”

  “Nonsense,” Kosoff retorted.

  “I know how we can test whether they’re intelligent or not,” said Brad. Before anyone could interrupt him, he went on, “We say hello to them. Use the probes to broadcast the sound cluster we’ve identified as their phrase for greeting.”

  Chang said, “We don’t know for certain that it’s their phrase for greeting. It could be a million other things.”

  “But we could find out,” Brad insisted, “by trying to talk to them.”

  Shaking her head almost violently, Chang said, “We’ve got to study them for a much longer time. Build up a vocabulary, correlate the sounds they make with their actions, their brain activity.”

  “We’ve been doing that for six months now,” Brad said. “How much do you need before you test the data you’ve collected?”

  Littlejohn said, “Dr. Chang, I understand that you’ve only put three of your people into studying the octopods’ language.”

  “That’s all the manpower I can spare,” Chang replied, almost defensively. “Most of our effort is dedicated to the bipeds on planet Gamma.”

  “So it could take years before you’re ready to speak to the octopods.”

  Surprisingly, Kosoff said, “We don’t have years.”

  They all turned squarely toward him.

  Looking unhappy, troubled, Kosoff said, “This mission is supposed to study the Mithra system for five years, then return to Earth. We’ve already spent more than six months here.”

  “We’re making excellent progress on the Gamma aliens,” Chang said.

  “Yes, but we don’t really know yet whether the octopods are intelligent, do we?” said Brad.

  “What difference?” Chang replied. “We can drop the shielding generators into their ocean and protect them from the death wave. Later expeditions can determine if they’re intelligent.”

  “No,” said Kosoff. “It’s our mission to make that determination. I think the impetuous Dr. MacDaniels is right. We need to test whether or not we really can converse with those creatures.”

  RESPONSIBILITY

  Surprised at Kosoff’s sudden change of attitude, Brad blurted, “You agree?”

  With a grim smile, Kosoff replied, “I’m not the ogre that you think I am.”

  “I never…”

  Chang interrupted, “I protest. We don’t have enough hard evidence that the octopods actually have a language.”

  Waving one hand in the air, Kosoff said, “MacDaniels’ idea of trying to speak to them has some merit. We can determine very quickly whether they actually have a language or if they’re merely making hoots and whistles, like chimpanzees.”

  “The chimps have language,” Chang said. “It’s primitive, but it is a working language.”

  Kosoff asked Emcee’s image, “What possible damage could be caused by speaking to them?”

  “We have insufficient data for a firm answer,” the computer’s avatar replied. “At worst, it might shatter their worldview, cause psychological damage such as that caused by the Spanish conquistadors’ sudden appearance among the Aztecs and Incas of the Americas.”

  With an impatient humph, Kosoff said, “We’re not going to be looting their temples for gold or carrying off their women, for god’s sake.”

  Littlejohn spoke up. “They accepted the probes easily enough. Perhaps they’d welcome an attempt to converse.”

  “Or perhaps they’ll be terrified,” Chang countered.

  “I’m going to convene the executive committee and put it to them,” said Kosoff. “If they agree, we’ll try to speak to the octopods.”

  “Not the World Council, back on Earth?” Chang asked, her voice hollow with awe. “The World Council has the ultimate authority—”

  “No,” Kosoff said firmly. “This is our responsibility.”

  Brad realized he was nodding vigorously. “We’ll put our data to the test.”

  Littlejohn said softly, “Every experiment is a step into the unknown.”

  “A risk,” said Chang, clearly unhappy.

  “A risk I’m willing to take,” Kosoff said.

  * * *

  As he and Littlejohn strode down the passageway from Kosoff’s office, Brad felt almost like dancing.

  “He changed his mind!” Brad marveled. “He accepted my idea.”

  “Yes,” said Littlejohn. “He accepted your idea. If anything goes wrong, it will be on your head.”

  Smiling down on the diminutive Aborigine, Brad said, “What could go wrong?”

  “That’s what your General Custer said when he ordered the Seventh Cavalry to attack at the Little Bighorn.”

  Brad laughed.

  Very seriously, Littlejohn explained, “Kosoff has performed a neat little bit of mental jujitsu on you, Brad. If this attempt at contact works well, he’ll take the credit for it. As far as the World Council back on Earth is concerned, it will be Adrian Kosoff who made the first meaningful contact with an alien race, not you.”

  “And if it doesn’t work out?”

  “It will be on your head. You insisted on the experiment. You’ll be responsible, if it fails.”

  CONTACT

  The entire scientific staff seemed to learn of the decision within a microsecond. An attempt to contact an alien species. The first time it’s ever been tried. History in the making.
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br />   Suddenly Brad was an important person. The beanpole had convinced Kosoff to make the attempt. Skyhook had battled the linguistics department chairman and won.

  That evening Felicia asked, “What do you want to do about dinner?”

  Staring intently at the sitting room’s wall screen, covered with lists of protocol requirements, Brad answered absently, “Whatever.”

  “I think it’s best to eat here,” Felicia said.

  “Yeah.”

  “You’ve become an overnight sensation, you know.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  Felicia smiled patiently and headed for the kitchen, knowing that Brad was totally immersed in the coming attempt to contact the octopods. She thought that she should be just as excited as he was, but instead she felt nothing but apprehension. No, she realized: what she felt was dread.

  * * *

  Brad sat tense as a drawn bowstring in front of the set of display screens. The command post for the contact attempt had been set up in one of the ship’s smaller conference rooms, just off the communications center. One wall screen had been digitally divided into half a dozen displays.

  Each display showed different views of the same group of twenty-two octopods swimming leisurely in Alpha’s planet-wide sea, with half a dozen of the expedition’s probes cruising on either flank of their formation.

  It’s their world, Brad said to himself. They’ve lived in this sea for god knows how many millennia. And now we’ve invaded their world. He realized that, in a sense, Kosoff and the mission protocol rules had been right. We’re going to change their world forever.

  Elizabeth Chang looked cool and unruffled as she took her chair at Brad’s right. But Brad noticed that she was rubbing her right hand along her thigh. Nervous? Why not. The head of the communications team, a large roundish Hispanic with a thick drooping moustache, sat at Brad’s left. He seemed more concerned with the countdown clock ticking away at the left of the screens than anything else.

  “Remember,” he said to Brad in a low, rumbling voice, “there’s a three-minute lag in two-way communications between here and there. Any action you want to take will require one point six minutes to reach the probes.”

  Nodding, Brad muttered, “Yo comprendo.”

  “Santa Maria,” muttered the comm chief.

  Only half a dozen other people had been allowed into the command post. Still the little room felt crowded, hot, stuffy. Kosoff sat in the next row, behind Brad and Chang. Captain Desai sat next to him. Littlejohn had been placed behind Kosoff. Brad had insisted that Felicia be allowed in; they had placed her in the back row.

  “Five seconds,” the comm chief muttered. “Four … three…”

  Brad could feel his pulse throbbing in his ears.

  “… two … one…”

  “Hello,” the central screen’s synthesized voice said. In the upper right corner of the set of displays, a burst of chittering sound screeched in the octopods’ language. The screen showed a spiked curve.

  Nothing changed.

  “Give it three minutes to get their response back here,” said the comm chief.

  Brad sat there, staring at the central screen, counting his thundering pulse beats. The command post was absolutely quiet. No one stirred. Brad felt perspiration beading his upper lip.

  Suddenly the screens erupted in chatter. “Hello!” the central screen announced, translating the octopods’ clicks and squeaks into standard English. “Hello…” Undecipherable twitters and chirps. “Deep … [more chatter] no food…”

  “They’re talking!”

  More beeps and squeals. The octopods clustered around each of the probes, twittering and waving their tentacles vigorously.

  Chang said excitedly, “I think they’re asking the probes to hunt with them!”

  Brad pressed the key that sent the “hello” signal again.

  “Is all this chatter being recorded?” someone asked. It sounded like Kosoff, but Brad was too fascinated with the views on the screens to turn and check.

  “Automatically,” said the communications chief.

  “We’ve done it!” Littlejohn’s voice, triumphant. “We’ve made contact with an intelligent alien species!”

  A hand clasped Brad’s shoulder. Turning, he saw it was Kosoff. “Congratulations, son. You’ve made history today.”

  Before Brad could reply, Kosoff turned to the comm chief. “I’ve got to report this back to Earth. Please set up an FTL link for me.”

  And the octopods chattered on, seemingly just as excited as the humans.

  WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE?

  “This changes everything,” said Elizabeth Chang.

  She was standing in Kosoff’s sitting room, with Brad, Felicia, and a dozen others—including the burly comm chief—quaffing champagne from Kosoff’s private supply.

  A victory party. A celebration.

  Kosoff’s quarters were larger than the normal accommodations for less prestigious personnel. The sitting room was absolutely spacious, and Brad presumed there was more than just a bedroom down the hallway that led to the kitchen/dining area.

  As Littlejohn had predicted, Kosoff himself was receiving most of the congratulations from Captain Desai and the members of the scientific staff who were present.

  Brad didn’t care. He had been proven right. The octopods were chattering away with the probes in Alpha’s ocean. Contact, even if most of their chatter was incomprehensible.

  Kosoff himself stood in one corner of the warmly carpeted room, champagne flute in hand, a broad smile on his bearded pirate’s face. Chang was beside him, Desai on his other side. Most of the people were focused on him.

  Brad and Felicia stood across the room, by the wall screen that showed the octopods swimming alongside the probes, still chattering. The aliens looked almost playful to Brad, swimming around the probes, touching them lightly with their tentacles, chirping away at them.

  He tried to imagine what was going through their minds. Here they’ve had these foreign objects plowing through the ocean alongside them for months, silent, totally passive. Then all at once they say hello.

  The octopods shower them with greetings. Questions too, most likely. And the probes answer with the few words they know. To the octopods, the probes must seem like retarded children or mental defectives. Hardly the most flattering way to make contact.

  “Where do we go from here?” Brad asked Felicia.

  She was beaming. “Don’t be such a worrywart, Brad. Enjoy your success. You can get back to work tomorrow.”

  He nodded, but said, “And do what?”

  As if he heard Brad, Kosoff said, loudly enough for his deep voice to carry across the crowded room, “Now we have to throw every resource we have into translating the octopods’ language. We have an alien species to understand, to learn about, to join with.”

  Chang nodded reluctantly. “But we don’t have the resources—”

  Kosoff cut her off. “Elizabeth, I want you to turn your entire staff to studying the octopods’ language. We’ve got to follow up this breakthrough!”

  “But the bipeds on Gamma,” she objected, almost whining.

  Kosoff blinked at her. “We’ll continue studying them, of course. It should be easier to make meaningful contact with them, certainly.”

  “I don’t have the manpower to do both at the same time.”

  “Then we’ll have to draft more people to do the work. Raid the other departments.”

  “Really?”

  “Really,” said Kosoff. Glancing around the room, his eyes lit on Brad. His smile turning slightly crafty, Kosoff called, “Brad! Come over here, will you?”

  Brad put his glass of lime juice down on the coffee table, then took Felicia’s hand and walked through the crowd.

  Kosoff reached up to put a hand on Brad’s shoulder. “How would you like to study the bipeds on Gamma?”

  Feeling wary, Brad temporized, “I’m an anthropologist, sir.”

  “That might be just what we need.” B
eckoning to Littlejohn, standing in the crowd, Kosoff said, “James, why don’t we put the entire anthropology team to studying the bipeds? They’re rather humanoid, after all.”

  Looking somewhere between surprised and suspicious, Littlejohn made his way through the crowd toward Kosoff. The room went absolutely silent. Brad could feel icicles suddenly dangling from the ceiling.

  “Well?” Kosoff asked the Aborigine. “Wouldn’t your team like to focus their attention on the Gamma bipeds?”

  Littlejohn pursed his lips thoughtfully, then said, “We’d have to suspend our existing studies. I don’t have the manpower for both.”

  With a laugh, Kosoff answered, “I don’t think anyone of the scientific staff would mind if you suspended your studies of them. Most of us don’t really like being your guinea pigs.”

  Littlejohn forced a smile. “Perhaps we should discuss this tomorrow.”

  “You’re entirely right. Forgive me. I forgot that this is supposed to be a party, not a planning session.”

  Brad could feel the tension in the room ease a notch.

  On an impulse he turned to Desai. “Captain, Felicia and I want to get married. Could you perform the ceremony for us?”

  Desai blinked his dark, long-lashed eyes, glanced questioningly at Kosoff, then turned back to Brad. “I have never performed a marriage ceremony. It is very rare, you know.”

  “But you could do it, couldn’t you?” Brad pushed. “It’s within your authority as captain of this ship, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, I believe so.”

  “We want to be married,” Brad repeated.

  Focusing on Felicia, Desai asked, “You too?”

  “Me too,” she replied softly.

  Kosoff broke into a big grin and said, “I’ll give away the bride.”

  Felicia and Brad burst into laughter.

  And Kosoff’s face burned deep red.

  WEDDING DAY

  Felicia rose early, kissed a groggy Brad lightly, then dressed and left for her own quarters. She spent the morning with nearly a dozen other young women, dressing and gossiping and making ready for the wedding ceremony.

  In the week that had passed since the contact with the octopods, Brad realized that he didn’t have any really close friends. He’d always been something of a loner, and outside of his fellow anthropologists, he barely knew any of the other men among the scientific staff.