The Mote in God's Eye

Through the camera eye mounted on Whitbread’s helmet Blaine could see the alien seated in the pilot’s chair, its image seemng to grow as the middie rushed toward it. Blaine turned to Renner. “Did you see what it did?”

“Yah. Sir. The alien was— Captain, I’d swear it was trying to take the gig’s controls apart.”

“So would I.” They watched in frustration as Whitbread piloted the gig toward MacArthur. Blaine couldn’t blame the boy for not looking around at his passenger while trying to steer the boat, but… best leave him alone. They waited while the cables were made fast to the gig and it was winched down into MacArthur.

“Captain!” It was Staley, midshipman of the watch, but Rod could see it too. Several screens and a couple of minor batteries were trained on the gig, but the heavy stuff was all aimed at the alien ship; and it had come to life.

A streamer of blue light glowed at the stem of the alien craft. The color of Cherenkov radiation, it flowed parallel to the slender silver spine at the tail. Suddenly there was a line of intense white light beside it.

“Yon ship’s under way, Captain,” Sinclair reported.

“God damn it to hell!” His own screens showed the same thing, also that the ship’s batteries were tracking the alien craft.

“Permission to fire?” the gunnery officer asked.

“No!” But what was the thing up to? Rod wondered. Time enough when Whitbread got aboard, he supposed. The alien ship couldn’t escape. And neither would the alien.

“Kelley!”

“Sir!”

“Squad to the air lock. Escort Whitbread and that thing to the reception room. Politely, Gunner. Politely, but make sure it doesn’t go anywhere else.”

“Aye aye, Captain.”

“Number One?” Blaine called.

“Yes, sir,” Cargill answered.

“You were monitoring Whitbread’s helmet camera the entire time he was in that ship?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Any chance there was another alien aboard?”

“No, sir. There wasn’t room. Right, Sandy?”

“Aye, Captain,” Sinclair answered. Blaine had activated a com circuit to both the after bridge and the engine room. “Not if that beastie were to carry fuel too. And we saw nae doors.”

“There wasn’t any air-lock door either, until it opened,” Rod reminded him. “Was there anything that might have been a bathroom?”

“Captain, did we nae see the w.c.? I took the object on port side near the air lock to be such.”

“Yeah. Then that thing’s on autopilot, would you both agree? But we didn’t see him program it.”

“We saw him practically rebuild the controls, Captain,” Cargill said. “My Lord! Do you think that’s how they control…”

“Seems verra inefficient, but the beastie did nae else that could hae been the programming of an autopilot,” Sinclair mused. “And ‘twas bloody quick about it, sir. Captain, do ye think it built an autopilot?”

There was a glare on one of Rod’s screens. “Catch that? A blue flare in the alien ship’s air lock. Now what was that for?”

“To kill yon vermin?” Sinclair asked.

“Hardly. The vacuum would have done,” Cargill answered.

Whitbread came onto the bridge and stood stiffly in front of Blaine’s command chair. “Reporting to Captain, sir.”

“Well done, Mr. Whitbread,” Rod said. “Uh—have you any ideas about those two vermin he brought abroad? Such as why they’re here?”

“No, sir—courtesy? We might want to dissect one?”

“Possibly. If we knew what they were. Now take a look at that.” Blaine pointed at his screens.

The alien ship was turning, the white light of its drive drawing an arc on the sky. It seemed to be heading back to the Trojan points.

And Jonathon Whitbread was the only man alive who had ever been inside. As Blaine released the crew from action stations, the red-haired midshipman was probably thinking that the ordeal was over.

15. Work

The Engineer’s mouth was wide and lipless, turned up at the corners. It looked like a half-smile of gentle happiness, but it was not. It was a permanent fixture of her cartoon face.

Nonetheless, the Engineer was happy.

Her joy had grown and grown. Coming through the Langston Field had been a new experience, like penetrating a black bubble of retarded time. Even without instruments, that told her something about the Field. She was more eager than ever to see that generator.