~ No, but we might have a ship in distress in there. I can’t just sit here doing nothing. Have you attempted to contact the entity?
~ No. I sent back a pro forma to its initial Hello, but… wait a moment. Look at the signal it sent (signal enclosed).
~ There. You see? I told you! That was probably an Elench-sourced handshake burst.
~ Meatshit. Yes, I see. Well, maybe your pal did find the damn thing first, but if it did, it probably did exactly what you’re proposing to do. And it’s gone. Disappeared. You seeing where this is leading?
~ I intend to be careful.
~ Uh-huh. Was your comrade vessel notoriously careless?
~ Indeed not.
~ Well then.
~ I appreciate your concern. Was there any sign of contention in the volume when you got here? Emergency or distress signals? Voyage Event Record Ejectiles?
~ There was this, here (material analysis/location enclosed), but if you want to mention any of this stuff on record you’d better make it look like you just stumbled across the debris, all right?
~ Thank you. Yes, of course… Looks like one of our little-drones was caught up in something. Hmm. Sort of… smells subsidiary somehow, don’t you think?
~ Possibly. I know what you mean. It’s untidy.
~ Back on record?
~ Okay.
~ I hereby give notice I intend to attempt to contact the entity.
~ I beg you not to. Let me make a request that you be allowed to take part in the Culture investigation when it takes place. I’m sure there is every chance you will be welcome to share in the relevant data.
~ I’m sorry, I have my own reasons for considering the matter urgent.
~ Off record again?
~ All right.
~ My records show you to be – to all intents and purposes – identical to the Peace Makes Plenty.
~ Yes. Go on?
~ Don’t you see? Look, if this thing jeopardised your comrade with no more fuss than an escaped little-drone, what’s it going to be able to do now that it’s had a chance to pick over the structure and mind-set of your sister craft for at least sixty-six days?
~ I have the benefit of being forewarned. And the entity may not have been able entirely to take over the Peace Makes Plenty yet. The ship might be inside there, under siege. Perhaps all the entity’s intellectual energies are being absorbed in the maintenance of that blockade. That being the case my intervention may lift the siege and free my comrade.
~ Cousin, this is self-delusion. We have already dealt with the issue of the minimal extra safeguarding provided by you having been alerted to the entity’s potential danger; the Peace Makes Plenty could hardly have been less prepared. I appreciate your feelings towards your fellow craft and Fleet-mate, but it rends the bounds of possibility to believe that something capable of perpetuating E-grid links in both directions is going to be substantially troubled by craft with the capabilities of ourselves. The Excession has not troubled me but then I did not trouble it; we exchanged greetings, no more. What you propose might be construed as interference, or even as a hostile act. I have accepted a duty to observe and won’t be able to help you if you get into trouble. Please, please reconsider.
~ I take your point. I still intend to attempt communication with the entity but I shall not recommend that a drone approach be made. I have to put all this to my humans, of course, but they usually concur.
– Naturally. I urge you to argue strongly against sending any object towards the Excession, should your human crew suggest this.
~ I’ll see which way they jump. This could take a while; they like arguing.
~ Don’t be in any rush on my account.
II
The Torturer class Rapid Offensive Unit Killing Time swung out of the darkness between the stars and braked hard, scrubbing velocity off in a wild, extravagant flare of energies which briefly left a livid line of disturbance across the surface of the energy grid. It came to a local-relative stop a light month out from the cold, dark, slowly tumbling body that was the ship store Pittance, some way beyond the outside edge of the tiny world’s spherical cloud of defence/attack mechanisms. It flashed a Permission-To-Approach signal at the rock.
The reply took longer than it would have expected.
tightbeam, M16, tra. @n4.28. 882.1398]
xPittance Store
oROU Killing Time
(Permission withheld.) What is your business here?
oo
[tightbeam, M16, tra. @n4.28.882.1399]
xROU Killing Time
oPittance Store
Just stopping by to make sure you’re all right. What’s the problem? (PTA burst.)
oo
(Permission withheld.) Who sent you?
oo
What makes you think I had to be sent? (PTA burst.)
(Permission withheld.) I am a restricted entity. I have no duty or obligation to permit any other craft to approach my vicinity. Traditionally Stores are only approached on a need-to basis. What is your need?
oo
There is some activity in the volume which includes your current location. People are concerned. A neighbourly check-up seemed timely. (PTA burst.)
oo
(Permission withheld.) Such concern would be better expressed by leaving me alone. Your visit might even attract attention, all of which I find intrinsically unwelcome. Please leave immediately, and kindly create less of a display on departure than you made on your arrival.
oo
I consider it my duty to assess your current state of integrity. I regret to say I have not been reassured by your recalcitrant attitude. You will do me the minimally polite honour of allowing me to interface with your independent external event-monitoring systems. (PTA burst.)
oo
(Permission withheld.) No! I shall not! I am perfectly able to take care of myself and there is nothing of interest contained within my associated independent security systems. Any attempt to access them without my permission will be treated as an act of aggression. This is your last chance to quit my jurisdiction before I emit a protest-registering signal concerning your unreasonable and boorish behaviour.
oo
I have already composed my own report detailing your bizarre and uncooperative attitude and copying this signal exchange. I shall release the compac immediately if a satisfactory reply is not received to this message. (PTA burst.)
…
Acknowledge signal.
…
Acknowledge signal!
I repeat: I have already composed my own report detailing your bizarre and uncooperative attitude. I shall release the compac immediately if a satisfactory reply is not received to this message. I shall not warn you again. (PTA burst.)
oo
(Permission granted.) Purely in the interests of a quiet life, only on condition that my associate security monitoring systems remain untouched, and under protest.
oo
Thank you; of course.
Under way. Heaving to at 2km from your rotational envelope in thirty minutes.
~ Thanks to your delaying tactics, Commander, it probably already suspects something and may well have signalled back to whoever sent it already. Think yourself lucky we have as much as half an hour to prepare; it is being cautious.
They had re-sealed the airlocks from the accommodation section and pumped in some real atmosphere. Commander Risingmoon Parchseason IV of the Farsight tribe had been able to shed his space suit some days earlier. The gravity was still far too mild but it was better than floating. The Commander clicked his beak at the image on the screen presented by the mobile command centre they’d set up in what had been the humans’ pool/growing unit. A lieutenant at the Commander’s side spoke quietly but urgently to the twenty other Affronters distributed throughout the base’s caverns, letting them know what was going on.
The Commander looked back impatiently, waiting for the servant who’d been sent to fetch his suit the instant the Culture warship had appeared on the other craft’s sensors. On secondary screens, he could see suited Affronter technicians, their machines and some slaved drones working on the exteriors of the stored ships. They had about half of them ready to get out and go; a decent fleet, but they needed the rest, and preferably all at once, and as a complete surprise to the Culture and everybody else.
‘Can’t you destroy it?’ the Commander asked the traitor Culture vessel. He glanced at the status of the nearest Affront vessels. Far too far away. They had avoided approaching Pittance in case they could be monitored by other Culture craft.
The Attitude Adjuster didn’t like vocalising; it preferred to print out its side of a conversation:
~ If it gets to within a few minutes, yes, perhaps. It might have been relatively easy, if I could have caught it completely unawares. However, I doubt that was ever very likely given that it must have been suspicious to come here in the first place and is almost certainly completely out of the question now.
‘What about the ships we’ve cleared?’
~ Commander, they haven’t been woken up yet. Until I’ve done that they’re useless. And if we wake half of them now they’ll have too long to think, too much time to do their own checking around before we need them for the main action. Our project must all happen in a rush, in a state of perceived chaos, panic and urgency, or it cannot happen effectively at all.