“Is there s symbol for slave or servant?” asked Gorski. “Maybe we can tell them we are slaves that have broken away from their masters.”
I liked that idea. Marvin selected appropriate symbols and we fired them off. The Worms declared us liars and villains from time to time, but with less frequency and repetition. Maybe they were beginning to believe us.
“Now,” I said, “now is the moment to ask. Send them the symbol for hunting together-that fat sliced grub thing, along with machine and destruction. Intermix that with we are not machines off and on.”
We all waited tensely for their reply. A full minute passed.
“Anything?” I finally asked.
“No response.”
“Keep sending. But slowly, as if it is important and we want to make sure they got it, not as a frightened plea.”
After another minute, a response finally came in. “They are sending hunting partner, and a tunnel mouth,” Marvin said.
I grunted, not sure what to make of that. “Is that a yes or a no?”
“We don’t have much time left, sir,” Gorski said.
“I know Captain, I can read the clock,” I snapped back. I rubbed my face. “So, what does it mean? Do they want to hunt inside one of their mounds? On Helios?”
“Does the tunnel mouth mean one of their mounds?” Gorski asked. “Or does it mean entry or exit?”
“The symbol indicates leaving or arriving at a destination,” Marvin said.
I nodded suddenly. “I think I have it,” I said. “They want us to leave. That is about the only way to prove we aren’t Macros. What do lone Macros generally do when they are wounded? They fight to the death. They only retreat if they are risking a large fleet. Singly they are always willing to die like ants protecting the nest, without worry or fear for their lives. If we turn around, that would indicate we are not Macros.”
“Worth a try,” Major Welter said. He rubbed his hands together and lifted them to his control board like an orchestra conductor ready to conduct.
“All right,” I said. I turned to Welter, who had been standing for the last twenty minutes with his arms crossed and looking positively bored. “Start it up. Turn our nose around and head slowly for the ring.”
Major Welter did as I asked, but instead of a graceful maneuver, he caused the ship to whirl around in a sickening spin. Fortunately, it was over with quickly. “Sorry,” he said. He gently worked the controls and we nosed toward the ring.
“Now,” I told Marvin, “transmit hunters-machine-destroy. Then send that me-Worm thing and the exit symbol. We’ll tell them we are allies against the Macros, and we are agreeing to leave.”
“Done.”
“Anything else from them?” I asked.
“No.”
I hissed in vexation. This was a golden opportunity. I didn’t have the feeling we’d forged an alliance, but rather we’d been told to get out and had finally agreed.
“Let’s make them do something,” I said. “Welter, slow it down to a crawl, but keep moving. Marvin, is there a symbol for their fleet?”
“They refer to themselves as the raging Worm warrior.”
“Right,” I said. “Send them the Worm warrior and a symbol for stop. We want them to halt their attack approach and we’ll leave.”
“Symbols sent.”
“Response?”
“None.”
A long minute went by. The Worm ships were still approaching, and we were crawling out of their system.
“Sir,” Gorski said. “We have to get underway now. At their speed, they will be able to come through the ring after us, overtake us and engage us in battle if we don’t get moving.”
“Right,” I said. “Major Welter, slow it down even more.”
“But sir…” Gorski began.
I put my hand up into his face. He shut up. “Marvin,” I said, “rapidly send warrior-stop, warrior-stop, warrior-stop.”
“Done.”
We waited for thirty seconds, then thirty more. Gorski licked his lips and tapped madly at his tablet. I could tell he was sweating it. “I should prepare my missiles tubes, just in case,” he said.
“Good idea,” I said. “Open them now, Captain.”
“But wouldn’t that be interpreted-”
“Yes,” I said, “exactly. It will be interpreted as a threat. If we are going to do what they want, they have to reciprocate. Otherwise, this isn’t an alliance.”
“Opening the missile ports, sir,” Gorski said unhappily.
“Repeat our message three more times, Marvin.”
“Done.”
Another span of time went by. No one talked, but the tension was thick in the room. “Order everyone to put on their battle suits,” I said quietly.
Everyone jumped into action. It was as if they had been waiting for this order-and they probably had. I was already wearing mine, but most of the bridge crew was not. They were cumbersome, especially when tapping at fragile screens. More than one of us had cracked a tablet screen with an exoskeletal, enhanced-strength fingertip.
“Incoming message: the red sun,” Marvin said.
“What’s the meaning?” I asked.
“It is generally a positive symbol of agreement or good fortune,” Marvin said.
“They are slowing down, sir,” Gorski said.
Everyone breathed a sigh of relief. “Send them hunter-machine-destroy again,” I said. “Gorski, close the missile ports. Welter, get us the hell out of here!”
The ship rocked with applied power before I’d finished my sentence. People cursed all around me, caught by surprise with their battle suits half on. They swayed and reached for balance. A few of them had to pick themselves up, including Major Sarin. I moved to help her up, but caught Sandra’s stern eye. I stopped and turned back to the control boards, pretending I hadn’t noticed Jasmine as she fell over and then picked herself up.
Within a few minutes we were through the ring and flying across the Alpha Centauri system bound for home.
46
We took our time crossing the Alpha Centauri system. For the first time in a long while, we had the chance to survey a planetary system without any enemy ships poised to strike. I was still anxious to get home, but I didn’t want to squander this opportunity. I had the factory bricks build passive sensory satellites and we dropped them off behind us. I dropped them off in orbits all around the system. The last time a fleet had come to Earth, they’d done it through the other ring, the one on Venus that led to the blue giant system. But for all I knew, they had another large fleet past Eden. After learning of what we’d done, we had to expect a major reprisal. It was only a matter of time.
I thought about planting a minefield of our own at the ring between Helios and Alpha Centauri, but decided against it. We’d just made our first steps toward understanding with the Worms. All the biotic species had to work together, in my estimation, to defeat the Macros. How would it look if we blew up a few of their ships when they got around to nosing their way into this neutral system?
On a relatively peaceful mission, we cruised across the vast tri-star system and catalogued what we found there. The two G-class yellow suns known as Alpha and Beta Centauri were both lovely stars. Alone somewhere else in space, either of these twins could probably have grown a nice family of planets, maybe even worlds with life. But because there were two large stars, plus the smaller red dwarf Proxima Centauri, no large chunk of real estate had survived. There were swirls of dust and plenty of asteroids floating around, but nothing that could support an atmosphere, much less life.
The star system was effectively a desert, but deserts still had their strategic uses. We would militarize it. It would form a buffer between us and the Worms. I was glad, in a way, to have the system between us and Helios. It represented more travel time between our world and alien strongholds. I realized now that having the rings in the Solar System placed at a fair distance from Earth was helpful. If we had a ring sitting in orbit over our world, we would be much less likely to survive. Aliens could pop in at any moment to ravage our world without warning. This way we could hold this territory and fight over Alpha Centauri, rather than war close to home where billions might die.