“Ariane…” Zane murmured, and I wasn’t sure if it was in warning or concern.
“Fine,” Justine said. “I suppose that should work both ways.”
I didn’t understand exactly what that meant, but I didn’t like the eager, speculative gleam in her eyes.
I watched as she tapped on her phone for a few seconds. Then she spun it to face me.
“Here,” Justine said.
The screen was black with a white triangle—the traditional “play” symbol. With a sense that I was stepping out into water that was likely way over my head, I touched the play symbol and immediately pulled my hand back.
At first, there was nothing. Faint static and some small rustling noises in the background made a little sound-measuring needle flutter, but barely.
“I don’t hear anything,” Zane said, frowning. “What—”
Cold. Pain. Alone. Alone. Help. Damage.
Cold. Pain. Alone. Alone. Help. Damage.
The needle never moved, but the words somehow broke through the static in my head that was a permanent part of my existence, all the human thoughts being broadcast around me. Except they weren’t words so much as sensations screaming in my head and sending waves of chills across my skin.
“Shut it off!” I said, clapping my hands over my ears, an instinctive and completely illogical response to something that was likely a frequency my brain was detecting rather than my auditory nerves.
Justine gave a triumphant grin. “They weren’t sure it would work. It’s new technology, a broad spectrum recording, but—”
Zane reached over and slapped at the phone, cutting the sounds off instantly. “Are you okay?” he asked me, his eyes wide.
I had to wait a few extra seconds for my teeth to stop chattering. “It’s…Something’s wrong.” I shook my head and wrapped my arms around my middle. “A distress call, maybe, I don’t know.” I’d never felt anything like that inside my own mind before, like a finger rising up out of nowhere to poke at the gray matter around it.
Zane stared at me, and I winced a little on the inside. I was, once more, just a little too alien.
Justine cleared her throat. “If I may continue?” Without waiting for us to respond, she said, “We would like you to interact with the artifacts and to look at the accumulation of reports on the incident and of the various tests run on the tech. See if you can think of something we haven’t.”
That’s what she’d meant by documents, not sheaves of paper on which my relatives had jotted down interstellar directions or something. So, no written language, or at least not one the humans could perceive as such. I’d been right about that.
“Or see if something speaks to me, you mean,” I said. “You want to see if the wreckage responds to me. If I can hear it, then maybe it can hear me.”
“That is one of our interests, yes,” she agreed, but there was the lingering feeling of words unspoken hanging in the air.
A new weapon or a better engine, most likely. That’s what they were hoping for out of this mess, I could almost guarantee it.
“And what are your other interests?” I prompted. Because so far, this was exactly what she’d asked me to do before breaking out the recording from hell.
“Our primary interest in your assistance is in communication,” she said.
“You want to talk to them?” Zane sounded alarmed. “Are you sure that’s a good idea? I’m thinking they might be kind of pissed.” He slid me a questioning glance.
I nodded. That was my take as well. And part of me wanted to see it—Dr. Jacobs sucked up screaming into a vortex of light to a ship where he’d be punished for all that he’d done.
I smiled grimly at the mental image of the good doctor trapped in a giant maze, where one lever would bring the alien equivalent of cheese; and the other, death by some vaporizing ray.
Yeah. I could live with that.
“We want to be able to talk to them,” Justine said. “Learn from them. Offer an exchange of information and culture in what could be a major turning point in human history.” She sounded almost excited for a moment. Then her gaze dropped to her hands. “And, of course, we’ll want to explain our efforts to preserve their culture and species in the best way we knew how,” she said primly, tipping her head toward me.
I couldn’t help it; I laughed. “That’s your story? That’s the rationale for why I exist?”
She nodded. “Yes. And we hope it will be yours as well.”
“Oh.” It clicked finally. Duh, Ariane. I couldn’t believe I’d been this slow to catch on. “You want me to be your mouthpiece, to stand in front of them and speak in official bullet points.”
Zane looked horrified. “You want to just offer her up? You don’t know them. You don’t know what their reaction might be to—”
“We want her to communicate with them,” Justine corrected. “If they return. It’s been three years since the last incident. They were within a hundred miles of Ariane and the others and never attempted to make contact.”