"That's a lot better," said Brandy, bringing up the clipboard and checking off the legionnaire's name. "Dukes?" The rest of the roll call went so smoothly that even Thumper was impressed. What was it about the obstacle course that had such influence over Omega Company?
Whatever it was, he was about to find out...
Qual and his squad of Zenobians were out in the central compound of Zenobia Base again, busy at work as Sushi walked up to them. "Hey, what's new, Qual?" he said, waving to the Zenobian Flight Leftenant.
Qual looked up from the piece of equipment he and his crew were working on. It was apparently called the Sklern. At least, that was what Qual had told Sushi it was. But after hearing Qual explain how no two Zenobians spoke their language in exactly the same way, Sushi wasn't sure he could assume that the words Qual told him for local objects had any universal validity for other Zenobians. The explanation still didn't quite make sense to him. But today, he had other things to think about, in particular Rev's quest for the mysterious 'L'VlZ.
"Oh ho, welcome, Rawfish!" said Qual. "All goes rippingly with us today, our alignments are exemplary!"
"Uh... triff," said Sushi. Then, recognizing an apparent opening, he went on, "Really interesting machine you guys have here. What does it do?"
Qual's face assumed what Sushi took to be a serious expression. "Much of what it does is organized," the Zenobian officer said.
It took Sushi a moment to make the mental connection between the translator's wording and Qual's probable meaning. "Oh, I didn't mean to pry into military secrets," he said. "Just curious about the apparatus, y'know."
"Oh, no offense received," said Qual, calmly. "In fact, I will tell you as much as I am permitted. The sklem-the meaning of the name is of course obvious-is in essence merely a triaxial projector of nonrandomized heebijeebis. As you can undoubtedly see, it is of considerably higher power than such units produced for the consumer market."
"Right," said Sushi, little wiser than before. He thought he grasped at least one point, though. "So this is basically the latest milspec version of one of your standard bits of hardware."
"Outstanding, Rawfish!" said Qual, slapping Sushi on the lower back. "Your intellectual capacity is, as usual, of the highest grade."
"Er,.thanks, Qual," said Sushi. He didn't think he knew much more than before he'd asked, but maybe if he mulled over Qual's answer he'd come up with something. Meanwhile. .. "I've got a favor to ask you guys;" he said.
"We're still trying to figure out how to adjust these translators to give the best results so you guys can understand us and vice versa."
"That is hardly mandatory," said Qual. "Misunderstanding is a fact of life. If you were a Zenobian, you would accept it as it is."
"Maybe," said Sushi. "But as it happens, I'm a human, and an inquisitive one at that. So I can't help tinkering with stuff that doesn't work quite the way it ought to. Here's what I'd like to do." He pulled a small rectangular black object out of his pocket. "This is a minirecorder I'd like you guys to turn on while you're talking about things. It'll give us a good sample of your normal conversation, with three or four of you talking at once, and then we can analyze it for common patterns. Is that OK?" Qual looked at the minirecorder with lidded eyes, then turned to his crew and spoke a few sentences. They replied, and a brief conversation ensued.
"We will do it," said Qual. "But only if you show me how to turn it off. I hope you understand me, Rawfish, my friend-sometimes we need to talk about things we do not want others to hear." Sushi nodded. "Sure, I know what you mean. Even friends need privacy once in a while. See this red switch? Slide it to the left-toward this red LED-and it's off, back to the right, and it's on." Qual took the device and slid the switch back and forth, then asked, "There should also. be some way we can resolve what it has recorded, and remove it if by mischance we have forgotten it was working while we talked."
"Yeah," said Sushi. "This is the playback switch, and this is the erase button. Let me show you..." A few minutes later, with Qual and his crew satisfied they knew the workings of the recorder, Sushi said his good-byes to the Zenobians and walked back to report to Rev. Rev and Do- Wop looked up at him as he entered the room. "They took it," he said.
"Good," said Rev. "Were them boys suspicious?"
"Maybe a little, but I showed them how it worked," said Sushi. "That seemed to satisfy them."
"Good," said Rev again. "I hope you didn't show them how everything worked."
"No way," said Sushi. "Unless they're experts in Terran milspec hardware, they'll never figure out that it's a transmitter as well as a recorder-and that you can't turn the transmitter off. You should be getting their signals now." Sushi and Rev smiled at each other. They turned to the receiver Sushi had rigged up on a bench in Rev's office.
Sure enough, a little light was blinking, showing that the unit was receiving. Attached to it was another small box, automatically recording every word the Zenobians said within range of the recorder Sushi had given to Qual. Now all they had to do was wait...
"You won what?" For once, Lola's openmouthed surprise at Ernie was not for his having done something stupid. Just the fact that he hadn't done anything stupid-at least, not anything she knew about yet-was sufficient cause for surprise, as far as she was concerned.
"I won the casino," Ernie repeated, smirking. "Er-at least, a big share of the stock. The old man told me my share is worth maybe fifty million smeltonians."
"I still don't believe it," said Lola. "They wouldn't offer that big a prize. Even if the odds are close to impossible, the risk of losing is too big..."
"Hey, you come down to the office with me and talk to the casino guys," said Ernie. "That's what I came to get you for, anyway. They' want me to sign papers, do all sorts of other stuff. I may be dumb, but I ain't dumb enough to sign somethin' I don't understand. That's what you're for."
"To sign something you don't understand?" Lola raised an eyebrow. "That applies to just about anything more complicated than a bar chit, and I'm sure not signing any of those for you. Well, if Phule's lawyers are as good as the rest of his staff, I doubt anybody could understand the papers they're going to want us to sign. We'll probably have to find a lawyer of our own to tell us what we're getting into--and I don't know who the legal heavies are on Lorelei. But give me a couple of minutes to fix my face, and we'll go see what they're trying to put over on us." It took Lola more like half an hour. She changed into a dark designer suit that stamped her as a no-nonsense professional who insisted on getting the absolutely best quality without worrying about her purchases going out of fashion within three weeks. Lola had picked it up last year from an acquaintance who fenced for a haute couture shoplifting ring, and considered it worth every penny it had cost-a serious outlay of money even after the five-finger discount. Her makeup took longer-she wiped it off and started over twice before she nodded and turned away from the mirror. In the end, she looked about five years older than her usual style-and ten times more formidable.
Nobody was likely to underestimate her, not now.
It took her another fifteen minutes of browbeating to get Ernie to change into something that might induce the Fat Chance Casino's legal staff to take him seriously. Then they boarded the local hoverbus and headed back to the casino. The Lorelei buses catered mainly to casino workers, and the vehicle was nearly empty, this being the middle of a shift.