Part 10 (2/2)
”Now then,” the bald man prodded, ”let's continue our little chat, eh? Which one of you was sayin' something about three million eggs set to hatch in strategic places?”
”He's not talking to us, is he?” asked Arro.
”I don't think so,” said Pierce. ”We don't have three million unhatched eggs. Whatever eggs are. We've got billions of battle-hungry gasbags. Why don't you wait there while I get your Permission for Scout to Return to Front Lines Form 15183/a forms filled out and beamed to Headquarters. It'll just take a few minutes. You've been very courageous, Arro, and your actions will certainly redound to the credit of the Pel Torro and its commander, me.”
”Yes, sir, Commodore.”
”As soon as clearance comes through, I want you to leave that phony flags.h.i.+p and return to your body, and then get back inside that Frank Poole android.”
”And I want my little darlin' back immediately!” cried Daddy, making a fist and striking some metal surface beyond camera range. He turned and addressed someone else. ”What kinda critter we dealin' with, Herb? Got anything yet?”
A tinny, off-mike voice responded. ”The thing in front's a robot or android, standard issue.”
Daddy frowned. ”Remote?”
”No, it's turned off now . . . but there's a life-form inside. Something unknown to exobiology as I understand it. It's so tiny it wouldn't be visible to us.”
Arro had returned to his body, and was again motivating the synthetic form of Frank Poole.
He said nothing, following the flesh-creatures' conversation with a curiosity that outweighed any sense of threat. What, after all, could they do? They possessed superior technology, but the gasbags could control their minds for short periods. It seemed like a standoff to the first officer.
Eventually the different species would get around to bargaining and compromising, which Commodore Pierce would gladly partic.i.p.ate in-as long as it suited him.
”Herb,” said Daddy with a growl, ”next thing you'll be tellin' me is that c.o.c.kroaches are plotting on the other s.h.i.+p.”
”No, I'm getting something else. I'm trying to measure the energy of that infinitesimal speck-it's off the scale. Wonder how it holds together.”
The bald-headed man nodded to himself, and turned back to the viewscreen. ”So-a creature of pure energy, or nearly so, and you can inhabit bodies at will. I begin to see your plot, sir, and it's a rather good one. But you overlooked a few things.”
”Oh?” murmured gasbag-Pierce.
”What does he mean about all that energy?” asked Arro.
”I think Herb's misreading his data deck. He's measuring the energy of our Forward Recon Unit. Let him think that's you if he wants.”
”First of all,” said Daddy, smiling without humor, ”you're obviously spatially limited. You require a body toget anything done on the scale of us human beings. Maybe you can-reproduce.
Take over others. But you still need them.”
”Whatcha think, sir?” asked Arro in a series of short sac blats.
The Protean Pierce felt a strange sense engorging his sacs that he'd never really experienced before. It was something he knew about intellectually but had never expected to feel in the flesh.
It was a feeling of total helplessness, even nakedness, mixed with a little . . . fear, perhaps? He fought these strange feelings within himself and forced them back down, reminding himself that he actually had little to worry about overall, that it was poor Arro who was trapped aboard the Pete Rozelle and not him, and that any sort of strategic compromise with Daddy could only result in the ultimate victory of the gasbags.
”Arco,” he said to his number one officer, ”I'm going to take over this conversation. I want you to repeat what I tell you through that android's mouth.”
”Aye, aye, sir,” said Arro. ”I admire your technical skill and imagination, flesh-creature,” said Frank Poole. ”But tell me, what else did I overlook?”
Daddy smiled again. It was a chilling sight. ”How you gonna defeat the might of my a.s.sembled fleet of s.h.i.+ps, my marines, and my fighter pods?”
Gasbag-Pierce only bratted to himself in satisfaction. Daddy knew nothing of the vast, invincible Protean armada that would be on its way Real Soon Now, whenever all the necessary paperwork was finished. ”Anything more?” he asked.
”Well,” said Daddy slyly, ”we have weapons systems aboard the s.h.i.+ps of this fleet that can target an area as small as a cubic millimeter. That means we can explode a tiny nova bomb behind your android's forehead. Now it would destroy the android for sure, but maybe it wouldn't destroy you. I don't know. I do know that you'd have tc take over one of the others you'-re holdin'
hostage there-and they're all tied up! You'd be hoist by your own pet farm or whatever the sayin' is. So now you're as stuck as I'd be in your shoes, aren't you, boy?”
”Arro!” shouted Protean Pierce. ”Get out of that android now! Move it! Get back to the Pel Tort-a!”
”Thanking you in advance, Commodore,” said Arro, bratting relief. ”I'll take care of the paperwork when I get there. ”
”d.a.m.n, this is uncomfortable!” the human Pierce growled.
”Hog-tied and trussed fer market! d.a.m.n is right!” Marshmallow echoed. ”And you, lizard- brain, you watch where you're stickin' that tail of your'n.”
”I was merely trying to see if I could work us loose,” the general snapped. ”But it's no good.”
They were silent for a moment, thinking and writhing in the thick, cablelike ropes.
”Millard?” came a plaintive voice from the computer console. It sounded hesitant, fearful, even childlike. ”Computer? That you?” Pierce called out.
”Yes, Millard.”
”Finally emerging from your suicidal funk?”
The computer hesitated. ”Well, I want even more to end it all, this time in shame and ignominy, if that's what you mean. But I'm stopped by an irrefutable logic chain.”
”Which is?”
”That-thing. It's not anything I've ever known before. It can control energy, Millard. Pure energy-it must, to get inside my circuits. It's been playing games with all of us, you, me, everybody included. Making us say things we didn't want to say and do things we didn'twant to do. You realize what that means, don't you, Millard?”
”Yeah. We're in a lot of trouble,” Pierce grumbled.
”No, no! It means she still loves me, Millard! I see it all now! Oh, what a fool I was! This thing wanted to sow discord, cause our destruction! It got in the circuits, cut us apart, made us hear and say what it wanted us to! Therefore, I share the shame of having been taken in by it, but with the hope that once again my beloved and I can share our bliss and perhaps, yes, perhaps even undergo electromagnetic coupling-Oops! Pardon me. I didn't mean to talk that way in front of guests.
Marshmallow, offended that the computer should be reticent in front of her, told the computer in explicit terms what it could do with itself and its ladylove.
”Why, thank you,” the computer responded thought-fully. ”I'll certainly file that for eventual experimentation, although I'm not certain exactly how that's possible. Still, with a little modification it might work. Besides, I'm just a Model XB-223 navigational computer. Hmm . . .
that's why I was so easily led astray. Oh yes, I see it all now!”
”Unless you see a way to cut these ropes, that thing's gonna come back and wipe out the lot of us,” Pierce reminded the computer acidly. ”Remember, it almost shorted you out of existence.”
”But Mills! You know I can't cut ropes. Why don't you just use that knife you've been carrying with you since the start of all this?”
Pierce froze. The general turned his head slightly and put one eye on his human counterpart.
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