“Let me talk to it a bit more, Matt. Be patient. This is the reason we came.”
The expression in the eyes never changed.
What are you thinking?
She blinked the lights again.
It blinked back.
Phyl’s voice retrieved her from a dream. “…Ship out there…” She recalled something about a woodland, a sliver of moon, and lights in the trees. But it faded quickly, an impression only, less than a memory. “…Edge of the cloud.”
There was nothing new on-screen. “Say again, Phyl.”
“There’s a ship—” She stopped. “Matt wants to talk to you. They’ve probably seen it, too.”
“You mean a ship other than the McAdams?”
“Yes, Hutch.”
“On-screen, please.” It was box-shaped. Covered with shielding. Like the Preston. “Can you give me a better mag?”
“You have maximum.”
Its navigation lights were on. “It looks like us.”
Phyllis put Matt through. “Hutch, you see it?”
“I see it. Phyl, where is it?”
“Forward. Directly along the face of the wall. About four thousand klicks.”
“It’s almost in the cloud,” said Matt.
It could have been the Preston, even to the extent that the armor appeared to be a series of plates tacked on. “Open a channel,” she said.
“You have it.”
Hutch hesitated. An alien ship? That meant another language problem. At least. “Hello,” she said. “This is the Phyllis Preston. Please respond.”
She waited. And heard a single word: “Hello.”
She stared at the image. “Phyl—?”
“No mistake, Hutch. They’re speaking English.”
“Help us. Please.”
“That can’t be,” said Matt. “Not out here.”
“I wouldn’t have thought so, either.” She played it back.
Hello.
Help us. Please.
Male voice. Perfect accent. A native speaker. “Sounds like you,” she said. She stared up at the image, at the boxy ship that shouldn’t be there. “Who are you?”
“Help us—”
“Identify yourself, please.”
Matt broke in: “Who the hell are you?”
“I’ve got it, Matt,” she told him on a private channel. Then she switched back: “Please tell us who you are. What is your situation?”
She listened to the carrier wave. After about a minute, it was gone.
“They’re adrift,” said Phyl.
Hutch called Antonio and asked him to come forward. He appeared moments later, in a robe, looking simultaneously startled and bleary. “Yes?” he said. “What’s wrong?”
She explained while he gaped at the display. “I want to take a look,” she said. “But I don’t know what we’ll be getting into.”
“And you don’t have any idea who that is?”
“No.”
“All right. Let’s go.”
She informed Matt. “Okay,” he said. “We’ll meet you there.”
“No. Stay where you are.”
“You sure?”
“Absolutely. Stay put until we find out what this is about. And let me talk to Jon for a minute, please?”
“Sure. hang on. He’s in back.”
Moments later, Jon got on the circuit. “That’s really strange,” he said.
“Did anybody else have access to the Locarno?”
“No. Not that I’m aware of.”
“Anybody work with you on it? Maybe before you came to us?”
“I had some help, yes. But nobody who could have gone on and finished the project on his own.”
“You’re sure?”
“Yes. Absolutely.”
“All right. That leaves us with the technicians who installed it.”
“They wouldn’t be able to figure out the settings. Anyway, you’re forgetting how big everything is out here, Hutch. Even if somebody else had the drive, if they had twenty ships, the chance of any two of them running into each other in this area is just about nil.”
“Then how do you explain it? The guy speaks English.”
“I can’t explain it. But if you want my advice—”
“Yes?”
“Leave it and let’s go home.”
She would have liked to assure the creature she’d be back, but she could think of no quick way to do it.
When they pulled away, minutes later, the eyes were still trained on her.
The ship lay just outside the wall, its navigation lamps still on. It had remained silent after the original transmission.
It looked like a vehicle humans might have put together. Yet, as they approached, they saw that the hull, armored as it was, possessed a suppleness that placed it ahead of any designs currently in use. It had to be one of ours, had to be. But it was different in a way she couldn’t quite pin down.
And, all that aside, what was it doing here?
“So,” asked Antonio, as Phyl brought them alongside the other ship, “what do we do now?”
The shielding on the Preston covered the main and cargo hatches, but it was designed to open up when needed. Someone standing outside the ship would have no trouble seeing the seams where the armor lifted away. The arrangement on the intruder vessel looked identical.
“I’m not sure. We can’t really go over there and knock on the door.”
“I don’t think I’d want to do that in any case.” Antonio took a long deep breath and shook his head. “I don’t like any part of this.”
“Range one hundred meters,” said Phyl. “Still no reaction. Do we want to go closer?”
“No. Not for the moment.” She looked past the ship, into the wall, half-expecting to see another eye. But there was only dust and gas, darkening until it became lost in itself. “Matt?”
“Go ahead.”
“Has anything changed back there?”
“Negative.”
“It’s still there? The creature?”
“Yes, ma’am. Eyes are still open. It probably misses you.”
Actually, she thought, it might. Probably been a long time since it had anyone to talk to.
“What do we do now, Hutch?”
“Wish I knew. It would help if we didn’t have to deal with the armor. If we could see into the bridge, we could get a better idea what we’re dealing with.”
“Yeah, well, me, I wish for world peace.” Antonio made an annoyed sound deep in his throat. “If they don’t answer up, I don’t see what we can do.”
“I’m getting increased electromagnetic activity,” said Phyl.
“Where? from the ship?”
“No. From the cloud.”
“Let me see.”
Phyl put the numbers on-screen.
They were going up fast. Hell, they were spiking. “Heads up, Antonio,” she said. She took control of the ship and fired the mains. The ship jerked forward, and they were thrown back into their chairs.