As attentive readers will have anticipated, once we were released into the light of day, we were thoroughly astonished to learn the nature of our captors.
“I don’t understand it,” said Phule, pointing to the robotlike being standing next to Sushi. “If this creature is what captured us, why didn’t we ever see it?”
Sushi shrugged. “I wasn’t here, Captain, but I don’t think it existed in this form before we started talking to it.
“It didn’t exist?” said Beeker. “How, then, Mr. Sushi, did it manage to take us captive?”
“I said, `in this form,’ Beeker,” said Sushi. “The creatures that captured you are nanotech intelligences: tiny machines that can combine into various larger units to accomplish specific tasks. Until we started talking to them, they didn’t have any reason to make themselves visible to us.”
“This explains much,” said Flight Leftenant Qual. “Not only why our instruments could not detect them but why they thought that your machines were the intelligent creatures, and you some sort of captive animal companions.”
Phule’s jaw dropped so far it looked for a moment as if it had been dislocated. “What?” he blurted out. “They think that Beeker and I are…pets?”
Sushi managed to keep from grinning. “Yeah, that’s about as close as I can describe what seems to be their basic assumption. As far as I can tell, when they saw you two leaving the hoverjeep, they thought you were running away, and so they captured you and took care of you until they could find out what your master-the jeep or the computer-wanted done with you. Apparently, Sir, they have a hard time imagining intelligent animal life…”