Even though he should have known about such a development if anyone did, Hunt was too taken aback for the moment to wonder about it. As months passed after the sole reply to the first message transmitted from Giordano Bruno at the time of the S/iapieron’s departure, he had grown increasingly suspicious that the whole thing had been a hoax-that somebody with access to the UNSA communications net had somehow arranged a message to be relayed back from some piece of UNSA hardware located out
in space in the right direction. He was open-minded enough to admit that with an advanced alien civilization anything could be possible, but a hoax had seemed the most likely explanation for the fourteen-hour turn-around time. If Caldwell were right, it made so much nonsense of that conviction.
“You’re certain they’re genuine?” he asked dubiously when he had recovered from the initial shock. “It couldn’t all be a sick joke by a freak somewhere?”
CaIdwell shook his head. “We have enough data now to pinpoint the source interferometrically. It’s way out past Pluto, and UNSA does not have anything anywhere near it. Besides, we’ve checked every bit of traffic through all our hardware, and it’s clean. The signals are genuine.”
Hunt raised his eyebrows and exhaled a long breath. Okay, so he’d been wrong on that one. He shifted his gaze from Caldwell to the notes and papers lying along the middle of the table in front of him, and frowned as another thought occurred to him. Like the original message from Farside, the reply from the Giants’ Star had been composed in the ancient Ganymean language and communications codes from the time of the Shapieron. After the ship’s departure, the reply had been translated by Don Maddson, head of the Linguistics section lower down in the building, who had made a study of Ganymean during the aliens’ stay. That had required considerable effort, short though the reply had been, and Hunt knew of no one else anywhere who could have handled the more recent signals that Caldwell was talking about. As a rule Hunt didn’t have much time for protocol and formality, but if Maddson was in on this, he sure-as-hell should have known about it too. “So who did the translating?” he asked suspiciously. “Linguistics?”
“There wasn’t any need,” Lyn said simply. “The signals are coming through in standard datacomm codes. They’re in English.”
Hunt slumped back in his chair and just stared. Ironically that said definitely that it was no hoax; who in their right mind would forge messages from aliens in English? And then it came to him. “Of course!” he exclaimed. “They must have intercepted the S/iapieron somehow. Well, that’s good to-” He broke off in surprise as he saw Caidwell shaking his head.
“From the content of the dialogue over the last few weeks, we’re pretty certain that’s not the case,” Caldwell said. He looked
at Hunt gravely. “So if they haven’t talked to the Ganymeans who were here, and they know our communications codes and our language, what does that say to you?”
Hunt looked around and saw that the others were watching him expectantly. So he thought about it. And after a few seconds his eyes widened slowly, and his mouth fell open in undisguised disbelief. “Je-sus!” he breathed softly.
“That’s right,” Norman Pacey said. “This whole planet must be under some kind of surveillance . . . and has been for a long time.” For the moment Hunt was too flabbergasted to offer any reply. Little wonder the whole business had been hushed up.
“That supposition was backed up by the first of the new signals that came in at Bruno,” Caidwell resumed. “It said in no uncertain terms that nothing whatsoever relating to the contact was to be communicated via lasers, comsats, datalinks, or any kind of electronic media. The scientists up at Bruno who received the message went along with that directive, and told me about it by sending a courier down from Luna. I passed the word up through Navcomms to UNSA Corporate in the same way and told the Bruno guys to carry on handling things locally until somebody got back to them.”