White, James – Sector General 05 – Sector General

required an enormous amount of prior design work, plan­ning and tooling long

before the first simple parts and subas-semblies could become three-dimensional

metal on someone^s workbench. The number of detail and assembly drawings,

wir­ing diagrams, and so on for even a small spaceship was mind-staggering, and

the purpose of all this paperwork was simply to instruct beings of average

intelligence how to manufacture and fit together the pieces of the jigsaw

without knowing, or perhaps even caring, anything about the completed picture.

If normal Earth-human, Tralthan, Illensan, and Melfan prac­tice was observed—and

the engineers of those races and many others insisted that there was no easier

way—then those drawings and the components they described must include

instruc­tions, identifying symbols, to guide the builders in the correct placing

of these parts within the jigsaw.

Possibly there were extraterrestrial species which used more exotic methods of

identifying components before assembly, such as tagging each part with an

olfactory or tactile coding system, but this, considering the tremendous size of

the coil ship and the number of parts to be identified and joined, would

represent a totally unnecessary complication unless there were physiological

reasons for doing things the hard way.

The cadaver had possessed eyes which operated within the normal visible

spectrum, and Captain Fletcher was sure that the alien shipbuilders would do

things the easy way by marking the surface of the components with identifying

symbols which could be read at a glance. Following a detailed examination of a

damaged suspended animation cylinder and the remains of its supporting

framework, Fletcher found that the system of identification used was groups of

symbols vibro-etched into the metal, and that adjoining components bore the same

type and sequence of symbols except for the final letter or number. “Clearly

they think, and put their spaceships together, much the same as we do,” Conway

concluded.

“I see,” the Colonel said. He sat forward in his chair. “But decoding those

symbols and fitting the parts .together will take a lot of time.”

“Or a lot of extra help,” Conway said. Skempton sat back, shaking his head.

Thornnastor was silent also, but the slow, impatient thumping of its massive

feet in­dicated that it was not likely to remain so for long. It was O’Mara who

spoke first.

“What assistance will you need, Doctor?” Conway looked gratefully at the Chief

Psychologist for get­ting straight to the point as well as for the implied

support. But he knew that O’Mara would withdraw that support without hesitation

if he had the slightest doubt about Conway’s ability to handle the problem. If

Conway was to be confirmed in this assignment, he would have to convince O’Mara

that he knew exactly what he was doing. He cleared his throat.

“First,” he said, “we should initiate an immediate search for the vessel’s home

world so that we can learn as much as possible about this entity’s culture,

environment, and food re­quirements, as well as having somewhere to put it when

the rescue is complete. It is almost certain that the disaster caused a large

deviation in the coilship’s course, and it is possible that the vessel suffered

a guidance malfunction not associated with the accident which fragmented it, and

it has already overshot the target world. This would complicate the search and

increase the number of units conducting it.”

Before the Colonel could react, Conway went on quickly, “I also need a search of

the Federation Archives. For many centuries before the Federation came into

being there were species who possessed the startravel capability and did a lot

of independent exploration. There is a slight chance that one of them may have

encountered or heard reports of an entity re­sembling an intelligent Midgard

Serpent—”

He broke off, then for Thornnastor’s benefit he explained that the Midgard

Serpent was a creature of Earth-human my­thology, an enormous snake which was

supposed to have en­circled the planet with its tail in its mouth. Thornnastor

thanked him and expressed its relief that the being was mythological.

“Until now,” the Colonel said sourly.

“Second,” Conway went on, “comes the problem of rapid retrieval and placement of

the scattered suspended animation cylinders. Many more scoutships will be

required, supported by all of the available specialists in e-t languages and