“We’re getting there, Doctor,” Haslam said excitedly; then, in a tone almost of apology it went on. “Names and places of origin help, but they aren’t enough for the computer to begin structuring the language. We still need verbs and related actions.”
Unlike its outsize parent in Sector General, Rhabwar’s translation computer did not carry a record of all of the intelligence-bearing clicks, moans, hisses, and chirps that were used as speech by the members of the Galactic Federation, a vast store of data which enabled it to compare the input of the new languages that were discovered from time to time and produce a translation. But the ambulance ship had proved on several previous occasions that it could do the same job, with a little on-site help.
“Friend Fletcher,” he said, pointing at the material in the other’s transparent satchel, “I need a short piece of fine cable that can be pulled apart easily, and a short length of piping. Do you have one that is thin-walled and breaks without shattering into pieces?”
He felt the captain’s puzzlement dissolve in a flood of comprehension. It produced the cable, wrapped it around his hand and pulled it apart, then he produced—not a pipe, but a length of thin sleeving—and snapped it in two before handing the four pieces to him. It said, “Yes and no, Doctor. This breaks without splintering, but it needs an Earth-human’s muscles to do it.”
Prilicla indicated a section of undamaged piping through one of the transparent access hatches, then pointed back the way they had come towards the other survivor’s position. Holding a piece of the broken pipe in each hand, he brought them slowly together at the faces of the original fracture and did the same with the severed wiring. He repeated the movements several time before speaking.
“Wire, pipes,” he said, pointing at the captain and himself. “We join wires and pipes. We fix wires and pipes. We repair”— he made a wide gesture that included the ship all around them— “everything.”
Through its robot crew member’s sensors, the first survivor already knew that they repaired things, although it had not known the word for what they had been doing. He waited, straining to detect the first feelings of comprehension that would tell him that it understood the other, more important message that he was trying to send. And when the crew robot spoke again, he knew that it did.
“Pil-ik-la, Flet-cha,” it said. “Fix Jasam.”
The captain gave a loud, barking laugh of sheer relief, which it cut short abruptly in case it might have been mistaken for a threatening sound by the survivor. On Rhabwar, Haslam sounded equally pleased.
“That’s it!” said the lieutenant. “We have a translation. Just talk to it naturally and mime only if you think it might not understand a new action. The conversation will be a bit stilted until you build up a vocabulary, but the computer is happy. I’m relaying the translation through your headsets. Nice work. Any other instructions?”
Prilicla’s body was shaking with a slow, even tremor of pleasure and relief that was tempered slightly by the remembered emotional radiation from the second survivor, Jasam, which indicated that clinically it was in very bad shape.
“Stand by, friend Haslam,” he said. “I need you to project more pictures. Edit the previous run to show only the recovery of space-wreck casualties, then add something on their transfer to and treatment on Rhabwar. Be brief regarding the treatment, too much detail on surgical procedures might give the impression that we go in for physical torture. Concentrate on the before-and-after aspects, the badly injured casualties, and then showing them cured. Run them as soon as you can.”
Turning towards the inner door and the robot hovering in front of it, he brought the two pieces of pipe together slowly and said, “I fix slowly,” and repeated the action and words several times; then he moved them quickly into contact and said, “I fix quickly.” Then he pointed back the way they had come and added, “I fix Jasam quickly,” emphasizing the last word.
He felt understanding and agreement coloring the ever-present deep concern, and said, “Keet, the word for that is ‘yes.”