Tau Ceti (an Ell Donsaii story #6) (29 page)

“Okaay.”

“Then we could talk about
exactly what it is that
we need your help with?”

“Sure.”
Piscova signed off, wondering exactly w
hat she would be doing for them…

***

In Ell’s ear
,
Allan said, “Presidential science advisor Fladwami is returning your call.”

Ell put up a finger asking Emma to wait a moment,
“Put him on. Dr. Fladwami?”

“Yes Ms. Donsaii?’

“I
was calling
back as you requested regarding CO
2
emissions. We
,
here
at Quantum Tech
,
think we may have a partial solution.”

“That’s great! We’re having a conference on greenhouse gas emission reduction next week with a lot of the big players in the auto and
energy industries represented. Do you think you could come to D.C. and make a presentation
regarding your ideas
at the conference?”

After a pause Ell said, “Sure… I’ll probably have Dr. Emmerit make the presentation though. It’s mostly his idea.”

“You’ll be there
too
though
, right?”

“I can be.”

“We’d really appreciate it.”

Ell
disconnected
,
bemused to realize that Fladwami had never asked what the tech
actually
was.
For a moment she wondered if she should give him some warning, but eventually shrugged and turned back to
Emma
.

***

Piscova looked askance at her new AI headband. It
s high end design
didn’t exactly fit her eclectic image. However, the actual computer they’d given her for the AI to reside in shocked her. It wasn’t high end, it was
very
high end. She couldn’t figure out why she would need such an AI
for translation,
but she wouldn’t look a gift horse in the mouth. The young man who’d been fitting her said, “Is it OK?”

Kira
shook herself, “Sure, what next?”

“I’m to take you to see Ell.”

Surprised by
his
casual reference to
Ms.
Donsaii by her first name, Piscova said, “OK.”

When they arrived in
a
conference room Donsaii looked up saying, “Oh, Hi Dr. Piscova. Come in!”

“Thank you.” She raised an eyebrow, “D
o I finally get to find out what this is about?”

“Yes Ma’am. First I’d like to introduce you to the team you’re joining.” She was introduced to an astronomer from UNC and a biologist from NC State as well as some employees of “Quantum Tech,” apparently a subsidiary of D5R. “As to what this is about, currently we’re observing some intelligent aliens on the third planet of the star Tau Ceti. We can hear them communicating
acoustically
,
but we aren’t
having
much
luck understanding
the sounds.
”

Piscova laughed, “Sure you are.
” She looked around at them.
“
No, really, what’s this about?” She leaned back, expecting the others to be
disappointed
that she
hadn’t
fall
en
for their little joke. Instead, they all stared at her seriously.

“Allan,” Donsaii said, “brighten the display so we can see the
Teecees
.”

The screens on the wall of the conference room brightened up and
Kira saw some very strange beings there. The images looked like low light photography, devoid of color information. The creatures looked somewhat like perched birds, wings up top, large clawed feet under, bizarre tiny heads turned back over one wing, and, front limbs that l
ooked like a cross between bird
s
’
feet and human hands. Her eyes narrowed, they didn’t seem to be breathing.

Donsaii then said, “Now please
play
a recording of the
Teecees
communication with one another.”

The screen jumped to a day lit picture of the creatures about a fire on which they were roasting something on a stick. Noise issued from the speakers, consisting of high pitched tweedling.
Piscova stared for a moment then looked around at the group, “I’m not sure if this is some kind of joke
,
but these supposed aliens aren’t breathing. If you aren’t breathing, it’s pretty hard to stay alive, much less speak.”

Wheat, the biologist from NC State said, “That’s a quick pick up.” He grinned, “Actually, the first time I saw video from TC3, I thought it was a trailer from a new movie, so I’m familiar with how you feel. However, I’ve watched a number of, well
we
call them dissections, but actually they
were
just the
Teecees
‘cleaning’ their catch prior to cooking it. But
,
anyway
,
I think I’ve come to understand how their respiratory system works.”

Glancing
at Piscova
again
,
he
then
looked around at the others
, “This is new to the rest of the group too.” Addressing the group as a whole he said. “At first I was puzzled about the mechanics of their respiratory process. We pull air into our lungs with our diaphragms. The diaphragm is essentially a large muscular sheet that pulls downward, sucking air into the chest cavity and lungs. When it does so
,
it pushes the
contents of the abdomen downward, thus when you take a deep breath, your
stomach
moves
outward. But the
Teecees
seem to have ribs around their entire body cavity so their abdomen can’t expand to accept the displacement of volume from their chest.” He looked around to be sure everyone seemed to be tracking what he’d said. “
I’ve told you that I thought they pull air in through that hole at the base of the neck and exhaust it through the vent on the
lower
chest.
And, as Dr. Piscova notes, the way they talk makes it seem like that airflow is pretty continuous.
From one of the dissections yesterday
,
I now believe that they have two lungs, like we do
, but
with a ‘diaphragm’ between them
, rather than below both of them like ours
is
. Instead of pushing the abdominal contents down like our diaphragm does, theirs pulls air into the left lung while squeezing the right lung and pulls air into the right lung while squeezing the left lung. Thus airflow into the intake and out the vent is almost continuou
s. S
omething akin to vocal c
ords in the vent
makes the
continuous sound
of their speech
.”
He looked around again, “I
think i
t’s
very
elegant and efficient.”

Kira looked around at the group. They all appeared to be taking this completely seriously. Stifling a hysterical laugh she turned back to look at the screens where the “
Teecees
” were gesticulating. She closed her eyes briefly, but when she opened them everything had stayed the same. “Really?
!
” she asked.

They all
nodded
solemnly
.

***

Dex and Syrdian
broke out of the forest into an enormous
meadow. It sloped down on one side to the stream they’
d been paralleling as they hiked
these
higher altitudes. Like the meadow they’d started
their climb from,
it had some large rocks protruding from it near the upper end.
“This looks like a good place to hunt.” Syrdian said, then
hies wings sagged
remembering
that hie couldn’t hunt a meadow since hie couldn’t fly. Hie lifted hies wing to look at the sutured lacerations. “Dex, I think the
wounds in my wing are healing.
Do you think I could try flying?”

Dex looked at Syrdian with some surprise.
Why would hie think that I’d know?
Hie stepped over closer and peered at the wounds, then gently tugged on them.
The
sutures were a little loose but the wound edges
did seem
to be stuck to one another by themselves now. “Does it hurt when I pull on the wound?” Hie tugged again.

“It aches a little.”

Dex tilted hies head,
“I think you should wait until it doesn’t hurt, you don’t want to rip them open again.”

To Dex’s surprise, Syrdian dipped hies head in acceptance, “OK.”

“I think I should look for a place for us to live near here.
A permanent camp for the summer
,
I mean.
Could you see if you can catch a swimmer from the stream? I’m
starving.
”

“Great idea!” Syrdian said with enthusiasm because hie desperately wanted to contribute and
so far
catching swimmers had been the one thing hie knew more about than Dex.

Dex beat into the air, surprised at how much harder it had gotten
to fly
as they climbed the mountain. No wonder the tribe preferred to fly a long distance to the south rather than a short distance up the mountain for the summer.
Spending the summer flying in this
thin
air was going to be trying.

Wistfully, Syrdian watched Dex fly away. Syrdian felt
melancholy
, both for
hies lost
ability to fly, though hie could see that it was a struggle at this altitude
, b
ut also for Dex. Dex
,
whom Syrdian had never given a second thought to in days gone by
. Dex
,
who
daily
seemed to surprise Syrdian with new capabilities.

Syrdian found himrself admiring Dex
;
not only for hies ability to adapt to a situation which would have led to Syrdian’s death if Dex hadn’t been there, but also
because
Dex was a handsome dalin. Why hadn’t
Syrdian
ever seen it before…?
Just because his rank had been low?!
Syrdian turned to the stream, happy to note that it had several large pools visible along the side of the meadow.

Dex flew a large circle around the enormous clearing, hoping that hie might see a cave of some sort
. The only rocks hie saw were the ones in the clearing and the ones bordering the stream.
Hie
thought ab
out making another, even larger
circle
,
but
with breath whistling through himr
,
decided to
stop and
look
more carefully at the rock outcropping in the meadow first.
Hie
circled it as
hie
came in to land.
As hie looked at it hie got the impression that
one
huge rock had rolled down from the rocky areas that could be seen high on the mountain above.  It had then broken into two huge cracked rocks
that had
settled into the dirt of the meadow. The larger split separating them
was a little wider than Dex’s wingspan. Dex walked around the rocks hoping for an unseen recess that could act as a cave but nothing like that appeared
. Maybe they could build a roof over the big split and make their own cave?
Hie turned to walk down to the stream
,
hoping that Syrdian had a swimmer for dinner.

Approaching the stream
,
hie saw Syrdian sitting on a large rock overhanging a pool with a fiberlin string in hies hand. “Any luck?”

Syrdian’s head turned to put fore eyes on Dex. Hie whispered, “Yes, but speak quietly and I may have another. Dex curiously walked out onto the rock but Syrdian hissed, “Don’t show yourself over the edge, it’ll spook the swimmer.”

Dex stopped
, watching curiously. The fiberlin held loosely in Syrdian’s hand started to move, the kinks
in it
from being wound on a stick pull
ed
slowly straight. Suddenly Syrdian straightened from hies crouch
,
raising an arm over hies head and jerking the fiberlin straight. A moderately large swimmer flew up out of the water and Syrdian kept rapidly pulling it up
,
hand over hand with the fiberlin. It flew up onto the rock and Syrdian pinned it with a foot, then reached down with hies knife
to stab
into the brain at the base of the neck.