For millennia, Anidel sang to the offworlders, the squales had been exploring their world, seeking to quench their bottomless thirst for knowledge. Using living probes adapted from existing life forms, they had explored the depths of their native sea and the seemingly endless reaches of the sky.
But then they had found the sky was not endless after all. Over centuries, they had evolved their aerial probes to rise higher and higher, to survive ever greater cold and ever thinner air. They gained an understanding of the vast, frigid emptiness between bodies in space, but this did not terrify them any more than the emptiness of the air in comparison to the water. After all, their own World Between was as good as vacuum to the creatures of the World Below, the dynamo layer. That was a realm even the squales had not developed the means to reach, for it was impossible for their biotechnology to function there. The void of space seemed far more attainable in comparison.
And so they had studied and learned for centuries. They had derived the laws of gravity by watching the motions of the planets. They had studied the stars, learning much from them about the nature of light. Ultimately they had become aware of the invisible forms of light and developed instruments to study them. A living nervous system was a ready-made radio antenna.
Thousands of years ago, before humans or even Vulcans had ventured into space, the squales had sent forth the first capsule like this. But outside Droplet’s magnetic field, away from the Song of Life, the squales had been disoriented and impaired. The unfamiliar field of the system’s star and the emissions of the exotic elements in the debris disk had caused them discomfort. They had decided they could learn enough about the emptiness through astronomical observation, and had turned their attention back to exploring the profundities of their ocean and improving their biotechnology.
But now, Melo said, the arrival of visitors from space had inspired his pod and others in related disciplines to revive their ancient space program, recreating the design from their extraordinary racial memory. As an echolocating species, they perceived three-dimensional shapes in terms of sound patterns, and could literally speak the form of an object in detail. And they had an eidetic recall for sound patterns, keeping the “blueprints” alive in oral memory. Anidel’s team had needed to fill in certain details degraded over time, but it hadn’t proven too difficult to deduce what was needed.
The key difference, Anidel sang, came from a study of Titan’s field-neutralizing probes. Their design had given the squales some ideas for how to use the capsule’s nervous system to generate a field that would compensate for the effects of extra-Dropletian travel on squale neurology. They had wasted no time incorporating these insights into the design of this capsule, which would be over ten meters high when fully grown in a week or so. “Our thanks to you,”Anidel sang, “for giving us the final key we need to bring this ancient dream again to life.”
Once they surfaced again, it was some time before Vale could speak. “I owe you an apology, Aili. And them. This is…Tell Anidel I am truly humbled. I think maybe we’re the ones who have the most to learn here.”
“She understands,” Aili told her. “They pick up languages very fast.”
“Okay, okay. Don’t rub it in.”
Riker chuckled. “To be fair, it’s only the equivalent of a Mercury capsule,” he said. “They’re a long way from warp drive.”
“Technologically. Not conceptually. Hell, Will, we’ve seen living creatures with warp capability. If it hadn’t been for their dependence on the Song, they might’ve been the ones visiting our planet, a few thousand years ago.”
“Isn’t that a reason to leave them alone, then?” Riker asked. “Let them develop their own technology in their own direction, instead of using ours?”
Vale glared. “I hate it when you play devil’s advocate.” Taking a slow breath, she went on. “Of course that’s what we should do. Hell, something tells me they wouldn’t tolerate anything else. But that doesn’t mean we can’t… keep them in the loop. We could recommend that the Federation open diplomatic relations. Just the occasional visit. With slipstream drive, that should be more feasible in a few years. And not just for the squales’ benefit. We could learn a lot from them about biotechnology, medicine…”
“Hmm, something tells me they wouldn’t take too well to the Federation’s policy against genetic engineering.”
“It never hurts to have a contrasting opinion. And like the Denobulans and Choblik, they seem to have adjusted to their enhancements pretty well.”
Riker studied her. “You’ve really come around, haven’t you?”
“Well, I didn’t have the chance for as much close contact with them as you did. They are an impressive bunch of people.” She lowered her head. “Especially for not blaming us for what happened.”
“Hey. Don’t blame yourself, Christine. You made a mistake, but you went above and beyond to fix it. The squales see that, and so do I.” He clapped her shoulder. “You did a fine job, Commander.”
“Thank you, sir.” She frowned. “Although wouldn’t ‘below and beyond’ be more accurate here…?”
EPILOGUE
HVOV MEMORIAL HOSPITAL, PLANET LUMBU
Nurse Mawson was glad to see things getting back to normal at the hospital. Not only was Administrator Ruddle due back from her rest cure soon, but the city was growing calmer with the war fears dying down. The Cafmor had done a fine job in the last round of debates, restating her position in the finest, most elegant traditional forms and thereby undermining the Kumpen challenge to her victory. Many Kumpen were crying foul, insisting that she had been coached, but the Cafmor had proven a subtler point: by making the same argument in traditional rhetorical structure that she had in more informal words, she had implicitly demonstrated that the form was irrelevant, undermining the Regent’s position enough that a majority of voters in both countries had declared the Cafmor victorious. So Lirht was safe now, and so was Kump, for what would the Lirhten want with that arid, mountainous waste anyway? All they had there were dilithium crystals, and what good were those?