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“And I greet you,” Pesskrag answered. “This is such an exciting time in which to have come out of the egg!” She used an emphatic cough. “And I owe you an apology, Senior Researcher. I did not believe what you told me about the Big Uglies’ relentless drive. I was mistaken. They must be all you claimed, and more.”
A server came up and gave them both printouts of choices, adding, “We also have a special on zisuili ribs in a sauce of peffeg and other southern spices. You will enjoy it if you care for something that makes your tongue sit up and take notice.”
“That will do very well,” Ttomalss said. Pesskrag made the affirmative gesture. Ttomalss just wanted to get the server out from under his scales. Sometimes such individuals made too much of themselves. This male, mercifully, gathered up the printouts and went away.
Pesskrag kept on gushing about the Tosevites: “They went from experiment to theory to engineering in the flick of a nictitating membrane. We would never have been so impetuous-never, I tell you.”
“We are going to have to be,” Ttomalss said. “The military advantage this gives them is truly appalling. Until our signals reach Tosev 3, we are at their mercy. They have years to organize defenses against us and prepare their own surprise attack. Rabotev 2 and Halless 1 would never know what hit them. Even Home is vulnerable, though less so than it was before the Admiral Peary arrived.”
“These are truths, Senior Researcher. I cannot deny it,” Pesskrag said. “But this news holds other truths, too. These ships open much of this arm of the galaxy to colonization.”
“At the moment, they open it to Tosevite colonization,” Ttomalss said. “How long will we need to get such ships of our own?”
The physicist’s eye turrets swung up toward the ceiling as she calculated. Her tongue flicked in and out. After a bit, she said, “Now that we know it can be done, I would estimate somewhere between fifty and a hundred years.”
A pained hiss escaped Ttomalss. That wasn’t far from what he’d thought himself. He’d hoped Pesskrag would tell him he was wrong. “Not sooner?” he said. “This is a very long time for the Big Uglies to have the capability while we do not.”
“If we have to do the research and the engineering, that is my best guess,” Pesskrag said. “I know the Big Uglies did it faster, but we are not Big Uglies.”
“Truth-a truth that delights me most of the time. Here, though, it could spell the end of us.” Ttomalss paused. “Wait. You say if we do these things, it will take about this long. What else can we do?”
Before Pesskrag could answer, the server brought their meals. He had not been lying; the sauce that coated Ttomalss’ zisuili ribs stung his tongue. He drank water to help quench the fire, then ate some more. The midday meal was not a gourmet’s delight, but it was good enough of its kind. That sufficed; his mind wasn’t fully on it anyhow.
After stripping the meat from a large rib with teeth and tongue, Pesskrag said, “We could save a lot of time by buying a ship from the Big Uglies, or at least acquiring some of the engineering know-how from them. Copying is faster than creating.”
Ttomalss stared at her. That was also a truth, and a profound one. The Tosevites had caught up with the Race by imitating-stealing-technology from the conquest fleet. Of course, then the Big Uglies had proceeded to jump past their former mentors. Could the Race return the favor, or would the Empire live forever in the Tosevites’ rapidly spreading shadow?
“There is one obvious problem,” Ttomalss said. Pesskrag started eating another rib, but gestured for him to go on. He did: “It is not in the Big Uglies’ interest to sell us this technology. The longer they have it and we do not, the greater their advantage.”
“I cannot disagree with you,” Pesskrag said. “But some individual Tosevites are bound to be corrupt. We can afford enormous rewards for information. And if we cannot openly buy these secrets, perhaps we can steal them.”
“Perhaps we can,” Ttomalss said. “You may well be right. We have to try.”
“I still marvel that the Big Uglies made these experiments in the first place,” Pesskrag said. “We had a hundred thousand years in which to try them, and we never did. We were convinced we knew everything worth knowing, and content with what we had.”
“Big Uglies are never content. Never,” Ttomalss said. “Discontent is their salient characteristic.”
“This has proved to be to their advantage,” Pesskrag observed.
“I do not deny it. I could not, could I?” Ttomalss replied. “Do you truly understand how they have done what they have done?”
“If I truly understood it, I would be able to duplicate it myself,” the physicist said. “I cannot do that, Senior Researcher. At present, anyone who tells you he or she fully understands how the Big Uglies did this is either an optimist or a liar. I think my colleagues and I do begin to grasp the theory behind what they have done. Begin to, I stress.” She used an emphatic cough. “I remain convinced that this is a useful first step.”
“No doubt,” Ttomalss said.
Pesskrag finished the second rib and began on a third. Ttomalss wished his appetite were as good. A Tosevite proverb floated through his mind: the condemned male ate a hearty meal. He wasn’t condemned himself, but all the Race might be.
He started to say something, then had to lean back in a hurry as Pesskrag used the new rib like a lecturer’s pointer and almost got sauce on his snout. “Oh, excuse me,” the female said, “but I just thought of something else. Before long, I fear charlatans and maniacs will start crawling out from under every flat stone. They will all be shouting that they know how to travel faster than light. They will show us how if we transfer some large sum to their credit balance, or if we name them prime minister, or if the Emperor balances an egg on the end of his snout.”
“An egg?” Ttomalss said, confused.
“These males and females will be addled. Just about all of them will either be addled or frauds,” Pesskrag explained. “But we will have to investigate at least some of their claims, for fear of missing something profoundly important.”
“I see.” Ttomalss made the affirmative gesture. “I think I see, anyhow. There will also be some who travel on the opposite side of the road. Did you see Professor Kralk’s memorandum, in which she states that the Big Uglies must be frauds, because faster-than-light travel is an obvious impossibility?”
“Oh, yes, I saw it. It would be pathetic if it were not so sad,” Pesskrag said. “Kralk asserts this even though the signals from Tosev 3 are confirming in detail what the Big Uglies aboard the Commodore Perry said they would say.” Pesskrag sighed. “It is too bad. Kralk was a sound female when she was younger. To be unwilling to change theory without justification is the mark of a scientist. To be unwilling to change theory even when there is abundant justification is the mark of someone whose thought processes have ossified.”
They went their separate ways then, Pesskrag back to the laboratory to go on chasing the Big Uglies and Ttomalss back to the hotel to report to Atvar on what he had learned from the physicist. A young male wearing a wig of a greenish yellow like no Tosevite’s real hair tried to sell him ginger. He snarled his rejection so fiercely, he frightened the petty crimin
al.
Can we change? he wondered. Or have all our processes become ossified? We are going to find out. That is certain.
He didn’t talk to Atvar inside the hotel. Again, they feared the wild Big Uglies might be able to listen to what they said. They went over to the park where Sam Yeager liked to visit in the early morning or the late afternoon. They sat in the sunshine, not in the shade, also for fear the American ambassador might have planted little electronic hearing diaphragms wherever he went.
That was probably close to a delusion of persecution. Considering what had just happened to the Race, though, was any worry about the Big Uglies’ abilities really delusional? Ttomalss feared it wasn’t.
He told Atvar what Pesskrag had told him. The fleetlord hissed in dismay. “We cannot afford to wait so long. The Tosevites will not wait for us.”
“The other alternative, as Pesskrag suggested, involves bribery and espionage,” Ttomalss said. “It may well prove quicker, as she said. But it is far less certain.”
“Nothing is certain any more,” Atvar said sadly. “Nothing.”
Ttomalss understood how he felt. The Empire was built on certainty and stability. It had been, for as long as it existed. Now all of that was likely to fly away like a swarm of startled evening sevod. “We should never have sent the conquest fleet to Tosev 3,” the psychologist said.
“This same thought has occurred to me,” Atvar answered. “But who knows whether things would have turned out better or worse? If we had waited longer, the Big Uglies might have come upon us and caught us unawares. That would have been even worse than this. I will tell you what we should have done.”
“What is that?” Ttomalss asked. “As far as I can see, all of our choices were bad.”
“What we should have done, when our probe showed Tosev 3 to be inhabited, was send the conquest fleet at once. The Big Uglies really were primitives and savages then. We could have easily subdued them, and we would not have had to worry about any of this.”
