Undaunted

5

“ Do not shoot us,” came over the guard link in a half-computer, half-not-human voice. The English words were stripped of all grammar and declension. Stripped of everything but the plaintive cry for nonviolence.

“Please do not shoot us,” it repeated.

“Why not?” Kris demanded in plain English.

“Why not what?” shot back at her before she could add, You shot at our messenger pod.

Kris bit her tongue to slow herself down. A good thing, because she swallowed the first three snapbacks that reached her lips. “Why not us shoot you?” she finally said. That should eliminate all ambiguity.

“We not shoot you. We not shoot, others shoot us,” was so lacking in emotion that Kris had a hard time keeping feelings out of her own reply. She paused so long, trying to figure just what to say that the other side added, “We not shoot you.”

“You shot our messenger pod,” Kris snapped.

“Yes, we did.”

That hung in the bridge air for a moment. Kris turned to her team. Jack and Colonel Cortez frowned in puzzlement. Penny looked up from her board where the Iteeche ship still was not in her targeting crosshairs. “At least they’re honest,” she said.

“But what good would it do to deny shooting the pod when the wreckage hasn’t even cooled?” Kris said.

“I’ve known some folks who could tell such a barefaced lie,” Abby said, entering the bridge in a businesslike shipsuit.

“Nelly, are you using their words for our replies?”

“I’m not using anybody’s words. They’re talking English. I’m talking English. Didn’t Grampa Ray say that the Iteeche demanded that we always talk to them in their language, even when we thought they were hearing our English just fine?”

That was one for the human side, but it just meant that any mistranslation would be their fault. If a war started over this confab, that it was their fault wouldn’t warm Kris’s heart.

“Okay, then I’m going to keep this as simple as I can,” Kris said, facing the screen front on. “Why did you shoot our messenger pod? Please give us a reason.”

“Sent,” Nelly said.

“Time the response,” Kris ordered. A count started in the lower edge of the central screen. It got past three minutes before a reply came back.

“I am sorry the pod was shot. It was necessary.” The voice this time was less artificial. Now it sounded more like a man talking. Apparently, this meeting had caught someone less than fully prepared.

Kris wasn’t at all satisfied with that reply. She thought for a moment, then said, “Why was it necessary to shoot the pod and you be sorry about it?” The others nodded.

“I like the last part,” Penny said. “In the negotiations, the Iteeche never seemed emotional about anything. This has to be the first Iteeche ever to say he was sorry.”

“Send it, Nelly,” and she did.

The reply clock was up to five minutes before the Iteeche said anything. And what it said sent jaws dropping.

“Do you have aboard a Longknife, spawn of the chosen Ray Longknife?”

“That changes the topic,” Kris muttered, not sure she liked this sudden twist.

“You did kind of announce yourself,” Jack pointed out, “Princess Longknife and all.”

“I did, didn’t I.”

“Might as well admit it,” Captain Drago said.

“Oh no I don’t. Abby, is this guy a friend of yours? He’s changing the topic on me. Just like you do anytime I try to have a polite conversation with you.”

“Don’t blame me, honey child. This fellow picked up all his bad habits a long way from my momma.”

“Why did you shoot our messenger pod?” Kris repeated. “Nelly, send that back.”

“Done, ma’am.”

The reply clock had hardly reset itself before “Is there a Longknife, spawn of the chosen Ray Longknife aboard? I must talk to her.”

“Interesting conversation we have here,” Jack said. “Kind of like most talk-talks with a certain princess I know. You say one thing. She talks about what she wants. Be interesting to see who gives way this time.”

Kris didn’t intend to be the one. “You fired on and destroyed our pod. You say you are sorry you did. Why?”

“Why” was hardly out of her mouth before the Iteeche stormed back—this time in Iteeche. Nelly quickly translated “I do not explain myself or my actions to any scum-eating monkey. I will speak with chosen Kristine Longknife, a spawn of Chooser Ray Longknife, or this conversation is over.”

Nelly cut in fast. “Kris, the ‘I’ he chose is very close to Imperial. Someone is suddenly using precise grammar.”

So much for talking to the scum-eating monkeys in their own jabber, Kris thought. “Then translate this into as high and fancy as you can. ‘You are talking to Princess Kristine Anne Longknife, great-granddaughter of King Ray Longknife.’ ” Kris was about to add king of 150 plants but thought better of letting an Iteeche in on the present fragmented state of humanity. “You fired on the messenger pod I ordered dispatched to my king. Explain yourself.”

“I adjusted the declensions, but I am sending just about what you said, Kris.”

“Good, Nelly,” Kris snapped.

“I’ve fought in a couple of wars,” Colonel Cortez said, hand over his mouth. “Never actually been around when one was being started, though.”

“I don’t know why anyone would come across all this space to talk to one of these damn Longknifes,” Abby grumbled.

“Step on my toes, you better expect to get kicked in the shins,” Kris growled.

“Well, at least he’s thinking about what to say back,” Penny said, her fingers ready to change where her lasers were pointed.

The reply timer stretched, two, three, four minutes.

“You sure do know how to close down a conversation.” Captain Drago sighed as he tried to get more comfortable in his command chair. “Anyone else hungry?”

“Starving,” Chief Beni replied immediately.

The captain tapped his commlink. “Cookie, please pass some midrats around. And don’t ignore the bridge too long.”

“No problem, Captain, I’m hungry, too,” said the cook.

The reply counter passed five minutes.

“That Death Sphere doing anything, hostile or otherwise?” Captain Drago asked.

“It’s not so much as twitching,” Chief Beni reported. “Same acceleration. Same jamming. Nothing to show anyone’s there.”

“Let me know if anything changes.”

“I will,” Nelly said pointedly.

Nelly, feel free To HAVE The WASP ZIG, ZAG, AND pin-wheel well Before any HUMAN eye NOTICES a TWITCH FROM The ITEECHE warship.

So you TRUST Me To DODGE, JUST NOT SHOOT, the computer spat back in Kris’s head.

Nelly, I Don’T TRUST anyone BUT Me To SHOOT.

BUT you EXPECT Me To TRUST you.

Nelly had a point, but Kris chose to ignore it. EVERYONE else Does. Why NOT you?

Nelly said nothing back, but Kris could hear more than the usual hum in her head as her computer went about its business. Nelly was thinking a lot.

The reply clock was still counting up when Cookie brought a tray with several kinds of fresh-baked bread, butter, and steaming coffee onto the bridge. Kris had intended to relieve Penny on weapons so she could get something. However, the smell brought on some serious grumbling from her own stomach. So Kris postponed her good intentions until she’d had at least one piece of the cranberry-oat bread.

Thus Kris had her mouth full when Nelly announced, “I’ve got a message from the Iteeche. It requires translation.”

“So translate it,” Kris muttered through her stuffed mouth.

“It’s High Iteeche, Imperial court member, make that high, very high Imperial court official to, ah, oh right, an equal. Yes, that’s equal to equal. No insult here. This is pure head-high muckety-muck to equal mandarin.”

Kris swallowed. “What’s he say?”

“Give me a second. This is not easy. But here is what I have so far. ‘Hail, Honored Princess Kristine Longknife, chosen of the choosers . . .’ ”

“We’ve heard that all before.”

“Yes, but he or she has to say it back in all the right declensions and fancy talk. Let me get on with it. I am also working on the rest of the message. Give a girl a break.”

The last was pure human twelve-year-old.

“Okay, but hurry,” Kris said in straight Longknife short-tempered.

“Where was I,” Nelly said, sounding hurried. “‘Hail, Princess-Nose-in-my Face, with all kinds of whipped cream on top.’ Shows what he knows about you.”

“Tell us the message!” didn’t come just from Kris. Drago, Jack, and Cortez had also run out of patience.

“Okay, okay, this is new, ‘Greetings from Ron’sum’ Pin’sum’We qu Chap’sum’We. Chosen of the choosers and speaker for the bah ba-bah ba-bah, I think the Iteeche have a new emperor. Honored and exalted I bear words to he who is now honored and exalted among men as King Raymond Longknife,’ and it goes on like that, which shows how much they really learned about him.”

“There’s got to be a message in there somewhere, Nelly,” Kris snapped. “I’m sure you’ve translated it for yourself.” If Nelly no longer responded to orders, maybe her vanity could be tickled.

“Of course there is a message. He wants to come over and talk to you.”

“Why?”

“He didn’t say.”

“Kris, I wouldn’t suggest you answer this flowery message with a curt demand,” Penny got in quickly.

“I know. I know,” Kris said, wondering if she could eat the entire loaf of cranberry-oat bread. It was good! However, Kris suspected a bit of worried eating might be viewed as very noblesse not obliged and be grounds for mutiny for most of the bridge crew.

“I guess I’m gonna have to invite him over for tea and crumpets,” Kris grouched.

“My goodness,” Abby said, hand up to cover a wide-gapping mouth. “Methinks our stubborn princess has met her match. I, for one, want to meet this guy, gal, or fish, whatever.”

Kris ignored the joke. “Give me reasons he wants to come over here.”

“To slit all our throats,” Colonel Cortez said.

“He could have blown us out of space,” Penny countered. “Us and those two Greenfeld cruisers. He didn’t even fire a shot.”

“Give the boy one point for politeness,” Abby said. “Course, that don’t mean he won’t go rude on us once he’s aboard.”

“Accepted,” Kris said. “Give me a nice reason he wants to come over.”

“It’s hard to play poker when you aren’t eye to eye,” Captain Drago said. “And this is a very-high-stakes game.”

“Agreed,” Kris said, finding that she was already busy figuring out how to manage the first human-Iteeche meeting in eighty years. And do it with what she had available on one small explorer ship. That Iteeche was back to using high mandarin. Now was no time to appear a poor, working relation.

“Penny, Jack, Captain, Colonel, am I giving in too easily on this? Every time I’ve followed my agenda, he’s replied from his agenda. I don’t see any value in repeating what he’s ignored. Still, do I want to get eyeball-to-eyeball with this dude?”

“He is offering to come to you,” Captain Drago said. “We’ve only got his ship and our ship. Not many options for neutral territory. He’s offering to meet you on your ship. That looks like a major concession.”

“Assuming he doesn’t blow it up,” Colonel Cortez added.

“He’s had plenty of chances and hasn’t,” Penny noted.

“He also says he wants to talk to you,” Jack said. “Once he’s in front of you, if he doesn’t address what you want him to, you’ve got some call on him to answer you or leave. He asked for the meeting. You’re granting it.”

“We agree it’s safe to have a meeting?” Kris asked. She got nods from most. The colonel frowned but said nothing.

“So, we are going to have a meeting,” Kris said. “How fancy do we go? How fancy can we go?”

“We are just an exploration ship,” Captain Drago said.

“Now dealing with a Lord of Lords,” Penny added.

Kris made up her mind. “But we got a princess. Abby, lay out dress whites. Jack, Penny, Colonel, you go full dress.”

“Swords?” the colonel asked.

“Swords and sidearms. Captain Drago, you and your crew get into the most colorful nonregulation set of threads you have. Purple velvet jacket, gold trim.”

“And jet-black bell-bottom trousers. Got you, Your Highness, straight out of Gilbert and Sullivan, I think.”

“Am I in uniform?” Abby asked.

“No, you are a lady-in-waiting. Formal ball gown. Ah, have you got one to fit Cara? We might as well put that twelve-year-old to work.”

“I have a ball gown for her, one that matches mine.”

“What better shows this is not a military mission than to bring along our junior spawn, I mean kid,” Kris said, trying to pull her head out of Iteeche speak for a moment.

“She’ll love it,” Sulwan said. It amazed Kris the number of grins that sprouted around the bridge. That kid had her hooks everywhere!

“Professor mFumbo, do you and a couple of your boffins have full bib and tucker?” Kris asked.

“I wondered why we packed all that extra weight. Yes, and several of the distaff executives brought their ball gowns. How many can I invite?”

“Ten—no, twenty. Equal male and female.”

“Done. Oh, Your Highness, what about Judge Francine? She and her bailiff do look impressive in their judicial robes, and she would feel most left out if not included.”

Kris pulled at her ear for a moment, trying to picture the scene if she threw a full bash. A grin grew on her face. “Why not. All the reports say the Iteeche love ceremony. Let’s give this Ron-what’s-his-name Chap-something-or-other a show. Nelly, inform Ron that we will be glad to welcome him aboard, with any of his honorable retainers, in three hours. If they don’t remember from negotiations how long an hour is, teach him.”

“Doing so, Kris, in the most proper of Iteeche,” Nelly replied.