The Consuming Fire (The Interdependency #2)(60)

“You’re cataloging every man-made object in the area anyway,” Marce said. “All I’m asking is that if you find one that even vaguely resembles the one the Dalasyslans talk about, you tell me about it. It’s been over a thousand years since we’ve seen evidence of human civilization outside the Interdependency. I think that’s worth checking into.”

Laure nodded. “We’ll look into it. Don’t expect miracles. And don’t bother me about it.”

“Fair enough,” Marce said.

“On another note entirely, I know you brought one of the Dalasyslans over for a tour.”

“Chuch, their captain, yes,” Marce said. “Thank you for the permission.”

“I thought we worried about infecting them with our germs.”

“He was in his own suit, and it was sterilized before he came on board.”

“He has an eight-hundred-year-old space suit.”

“Actually he claims it’s from that newer arrival.”

“Is it?”

“No,” Marce said. “It’s standard-issue Interdependency from just pre-collapse.”

“And how did he enjoy his trip?”

“It tired him out because he wasn’t used to full gravity. We had him in a chair for a lot of the visit. He said it was interesting to see a ship that had all of its insides actually in its insides. He would still be questioning your engineering staff if we hadn’t reminded him he was about to run out of his oxygen.”

“And he was able to understand what they were saying.”

“Yes, Captain. Most of it. Probably more than me. They really are exceptionally intelligent. They would have to be to have survived this long out here.”

“Everyone keeps telling me that,” Laure said. “They still look like little goblins to me.”

“She’s not wrong,” Roynold told Marce later, as they ate. “They creep me the hell out, that’s for sure.”

“You don’t like people anyway,” Marce reminded her. “You said so yourself.”

“Right, but this is more so.”

“That’s prejudiced.”

“I’m aware of that,” Roynold said. “So I’m doing them the favor of staying away.”

“What about the other thing we were talking about?” Marce asked her.

“About the idea of another Flow stream opening up here from somewhere else?” Roynold shrugged. “It’s entirely possible. The Interdependency has more Flow streams in it by an order of magnitude than anywhere else in local space because of a quirk in the multidimensional topography, but there’s nothing that says they’re only confined to our local space, or that Flow streams can’t emerge in Interdependency space from elsewhere. That’s how humans originally got here.”

“I’m asking if you’re seeing any evidence of it.”

“Not yet, but that could change,” Roynold said. “I’ve got the probe we brought looking at the local topography and I’m feeding it into our latest models, but aside from our current streams I’m not seeing anything yet. I’ll know more the more data I get. This is what I’m doing while you are out gallivanting.”

“I don’t gallivant,” said Marce.

“Call it what you want. You’re not doing much Flow physics research, is what I’m saying. It’s all me so far. I’m going to want that noted when it comes time to publish, by the way.”

“That seems fair.”

“This is how I can tell you’re not in academia anymore. If you were still a professor you’d be screaming to be the primary author.”

“How much more data will we need before we potentially see evidence of other streams into here?”

“It’s hard to say, and a lot will depend on how old the streams in and out are. This aspect isn’t entirely surprising. Our model doesn’t do very well predicting individual streams more than about two decades out on either side of the timeline. Even that massive stream shift we’re predicting comes with a margin of a couple thousand years on either side.”

“That still bothers me,” Marce said.

“We won’t be around for it, so I don’t lose any sleep over it.”

“That’s an interesting life philosophy.”

“Not really,” Roynold said. “Look, if you find that ship, see if you can discover exactly where it came from and exactly when it arrived in local space. If we have all that data, we can work backward and maybe construct a model.”

“If we know where it comes from, then we don’t need to construct a model,” Marce pointed out. “We already know where it comes from.”

“If we have a model, then we can predict if that particular Flow stream is coming back anytime soon.”

“Does it matter?” Marce said. “The Flow stream out of here is collapsing in two months. It won’t do us any good.”

“Not us, dimwit,” Roynold said. “The goblin people.”

“The Dalasyslans?”

“Yes, them. Maybe they would like a way out of a life of endless desperate scavenging. Unless you think you can get their ship up and running before the Flow stream back to the Interdependency collapses.”