“Yes, sir. Countermand detonation. Board, secure crew, and seize.”
From the auxiliary screen, the hard-eyed attentive face looked out alertly. “You’re making a mistake, Colonel. For less than this, I’ve had guys like you put on the Bemus asteroid census for years.”
“You have six minutes and forty seconds until detonation.”
“You wouldn’t dare detonate.”
“Detonation is fully automatic unless countermanded, first by my verbal order, second by action of the missile-officer in immediate command. Countermanding takes time. But there is no question of not daring to detonate. Everything so far has been pure routine, and detonation will be the same.”
“You’d be hung from the rafters.”
“Visual records will show the menacing attitude of both the Star Chaser and the Krojac Empire, if these are actually the ships’ names. Granting this and other circumstances, I am fully justified in regarding either or both ships as planetary raiders or worse. Detonation will blow your ship into vaporized fragments. If there is an armored central citadel capable of surviving the initial explosion—and it is very doubtful that anyone inside will be alive after detonation—that citadel itself will be destroyed at once by concentrated missile and fusion attack. You have five minutes and fifty-six seconds until detonation.”
“And suppose I decide to ignore this whole silly business?”
“You will be destroyed.”
There was a silence that lasted several seconds as the hard blue eyes looked steadily at Doyle and Doyle looked steadily back.
Then Nels Krojac laughed. His image vanished from the screen, and after a moment the braid-encrusted captain reappeared.
“Mr. Krojac orders me to yield this ship for your inspection, to provide you with any necessary papers or information, and to satisfy any reasonable demand on your part to convince you that we are not planetary raiders. The ship is not surrendered, however; Mr. Krojac is not to be disturbed; and the operation of his business offices is to be disturbed as little as possible, on pain of punitive legal measures.”
“I won’t accept restraints on examining the ship.”
The captain blinked. “Then I’m not authorized to proceed.”
Doyle touched a stud on the console.
“Gunnery officer.”
“Sir?”
“Count off the minutes and half-minutes till detonation of that larger ship.”
“Yes, sir. Just a moment, sir. Five minutes until detonation.”
The captain of the Krojac Empire said nothing, but the sweat rolled down his face as he stared at Doyle.
The gunnery officer spoke:
“Four minutes and thirty seconds until detonation.”
The Krojac Empire’s captain thrust out his jaw.
“Four minutes until detonation.
“Three minutes and thirty seconds until detonation.
“Three minutes until detonation.
“Two minutes and thirty seconds until detonation.
“Two minutes until detonation.
“One minute and thirty seconds until detonation.
“One minute until detonation.”
Doyle watched the second hand sweep for the last time around the dial. It was now clearly apparent that the Krojac Empire was no raider. When the hand reached “30,” Doyle would, therefore, countermand detonation and order a boarding.
At “45” the Krojac Empire’s captain moistened his lips. Suddenly he blurted, “I surrender this ship!”
Doyle touched a stud on the console.
“Vulcan.”
“Yes, sir?”
“Countermand detonation.”
“Yes, sir. Detonation countermanded, sir.”
“Board that larger ship with a fully-armed search party, determine the identity of the ship with certainty, and examine the ship throughout for any sign that it is a planetary raider.”
“Yes, sir. Board, determine identity, and search to see if the ship is a planetary raider.”
“The captain has surrendered the ship, and you can make any temporary arrangements with him that seem suitable.”
“Yes, sir.”
On the auxiliary screen, the hard features of Nels Krojac reappeared, to study Doyle coldly. Doyle broke the connection, and glanced at the main screen. The armed transport had disappeared from direct view, but a green symbol showed its approximate location.
“Minotaur.”
“Sir?”
“What’s your position?”
“We’re at twenty thousand seven hundred feet above the planet, sir, dropping toward the PDA classification-unit base. No trouble so far, sir.”
“Good. Let me know when you’re set up.”
“Yes, sir.”
Doyle touched another stud on the console.
A voice said promptly, “Communications, sir.”
“Get the PDA classification-unit on the screen.”
“Yes, sir.”
Lindell appeared on the screen. “You got here just in time, Colonel. The work gangs are moving their machinery into place right now.”
“You mean there’s been no change in Krojac’s schedule?”
“Not by a hair.”
“I see,” said Doyle. “Well, I’ll put troops down to stop them.”
“Fine. That’s a relief.”
“Have you had any word on your language-computer?”
Lindell beamed. “Yes. The LC-10,000 will be here tomorrow. So the situation is well in hand. This is really the ultimate linguistics computer, and it will extract the linguistics elements from the welter of noise that has my experts baffled. Our trouble, you see, is that the Marcats produce much sound that is . . . ah . . . somewhat at a tangent to what we’re interested in. Their art form of vocal singing, for instance, runs largely in the range of 2,000 to 50,000 cycles. Since an acute human ear can detect loud sounds of roughly 30 to 20,000 cycles, you can see that we have some cause for confusion.”
“I can see you have considerable cause for discomfort. But what’s confusing about it? Would aliens speak the same way we do?”
Lindell changed expression. “This is quite a technical matter, Colonel.”
Doyle was unconvinced, but nodded. “Incidentally, could you send me the survey and evaluation reports on this planet?”
“I’m afraid they’re highly technical, and—”
“I’m not talking about the linguistics reports. I’m talking about general reports on how the Marcats live, their planetary distribution, numbers, characteristics, habits, size, weight, and so on. Remember, you’ve expressed the opinion that we may wind up in a war here.”
Lindell’s face cleared. “You don’t want the linguistics reports?”
“I’m perfectly content to leave that to you.”
“All right. I’ll see that you get copies of the rest.”
The Minotaur shortly set down on the planet, and Doyle had troops sent out at once to stop the work crews. A savage argument followed, in which the earth-moving machines were stopped only when the troops opened fire.
Then the reports on the planet began to come in.
Doyle gradually built up a mental picture of big-browed tigerlike creatures that roamed the planet like lords of creation, lived in dens or burrows lined with dried grass, could be found in nearly any type of terrain on the planet, and everywhere were left strictly unmolested by the monster carnivores that roamed the globe. Pictures showed grown tigerlike Marcats upright on their hind legs, strolling casually along over rolling fields and hills, obviously deep in conversation, as younger Marcats gamboled and played around them on all fours, bounded up trees, and chased rabbit-like creatures that went twenty feet at a bound. Meanwhile huge beasts with teeth like broadswords slunk out of sight, or bolted for the horizon at top speed.
After watching enough of these scenes, Doyle gradually came to the conclusion that Lindell was right. The Marcats were intelligent, did talk, and were more formidable than their teeth and claws suggested. Though how, remained a good question.
One visual record particularly impressed Doyle. It showed a creature like Tyrannosaurus rex that blundered out into the path of a strolling Marcat. The Marcat gave it one hard look, the big carnivore collapsed and lay motionless, apparently dead. Now, did the creature suffer a heart attack at the mere sight of the Marcat, or what did happen? But the closest examination of the scene showed Doyle nothing whatever to answer the question.
Other scenes showed savage fights, between the Marcats themselves; in these fights no Marcat dropped from a hard look. The fight was with fang and claw, and the scene was thick with blood and flying tufts of fur. But then, human beings used weapons against alien attackers that they hesitated to use on each other.
As Doyle wrestled with the problem, to wind up in the same frame of mind as Lindell, word came that the LC-10,000 had arrived, and would carry out its test shortly.
Doyle went down on the planet, found himself deafened by music like harmonizing bandsaws, while a group of angry Marcats glared at the earth-moving machines, and Al Lindell earnestly assured him that the Marcats did talk. Then the burly man with jutting cigar angrily carried over a tripod with cone on top, putting it down so hard that the tripod’s pointed feet sank out of sight in the ground.
“There, Colonel. Now, take these earphones, listen to them yourself, and see if you think they talk!”
Doyle looked around, to see coming up the hill behind him a huge glittering ovoid covered with outthrust hornlike devices, and drifting along on antigravs beside a tall individual wearing thick glasses, a long laboratory coat, and the dignity of a high priest.
Doyle winced as the Marcats hit another jarring note, then he put on the earphones, and swung the wide end of the cone toward the coveralled humans. He heard a blast of sizzling profanity, turned the device toward some Marcats, who were obviously deep in conversation, and then stood paralyzed at the sounds that came through the earphones. They were complex sounds, but certain dominant notes stood out: