“Are you willing to invade the Dreamsea protected area?” he said, without looking up.

A high-pitched whistle of horror came from Shikari, and S’greela chittered in disapproval.

“That is an unthinkable notion,” said Angel. “Unthinkable, we would hope, even for a human.”

“How about for observation only? Suppose it was guaranteed that no Shellback would be harmed — or even touched?”

“We would not trust such a guarantee. Suppose that the Simulacrum attacked you? We feel sure that you would insist on returning that attack. The Shellbacks might be harmed.”

I was not thinking of myself. Not even of any one of us.”

“Who, then?” S’greela waved her jointed arms all around them. “We cannot communicate with the Shellbacks, to seek their assistance. They may be intelligent, but we four are the only useful intelligences on the planet.”

“I don’t want intelligence. According to our briefings, the Simmie will be wary of anything mat shows signs of intelligence.” Chan turned to Shikari. “You told me that your individual components have two million neurons each, enough to eat, drink, mate and cluster. Suppose you made a small assembly of them. Could as few as ten or twenty components cluster?”

“It is possible. But it is never done. Why would we choose to do so? Such a tiny aggregate could not be intelligent.”

“That’s fine. Could such a small group take direction from the rest of you?”

“Primitive direction. Simple commands, no more.”

“But it could at least collect information?”

“Within limits.” A wave traveled across the Tinker’s upper body, a shrug of dismissal. “But what purpose would that serve? A small group could never integrate its information with anything else. We would not know how to interpret such data. It would be isolated and useless point inputs.”

“Maybe you couldn’t integrate it. Nor could I. But we have a superb integrator, right here.” Chan nodded at Angel. “Shikari, all you would need to do is form a number of very small assemblies and direct them to explore the region near the Simmie’s hideout. There would be no chance that they could harm the Simmie, or the Shellbacks. Could you do that?”

“Certainly. But to what end?”

“We need to know how it occupies its time, what it does during the days and nights. We have to understand it. Then we can lure it out, away from the Shellbacks’ protected area around Dreamsea.’

“But we have no idea what would be attractive to a Simulacrum,” protested S’greela. “Even when we know its habits, we will not know that.”

“You will not, and I will not.” Chan turned to the silent Angel. “But you will. Given enough information about the Simmie, its appearance and its structure and its habits, you can go into your emulator mode. You can mimic the thought patterns of the Simmie.”

“No. What you say is partially true. Given enough time and enough information, we can usually duplicate some of the thought patterns of another being within our own mental processes. But not always. As you know, we have been completely unsuccessful in replicating any element of human aggression.”

“Forget humans. Maybe we’re unique. What about the Simmie?”

“We do not have enough information. There has been no opportunity for interaction. Our limited observations — ”

“ — are going to be enough.” Chan interrupted Angel for the first time ever, and marvelled at his own nerve. “They have to be. Angel, I’m not asking for perfection. All I need is a good working imitation, something that we can use to guess how a Simmie may react in a given situation.”

“You suggest a knowingly imperfect thought simulation? One moment, if you please.” Angel’s fronds dropped, as communication halted between the Singer and the Chassel-Rose.

“Possibly,” it said at last. “Necessity is the mother of invention. I have within me a large general data bank regarding the Simulacrum, and perhaps a gross model of its mental processes can be achieved; perhaps enough to compare the relative probabilities of different courses of action, without assigning absolute values to any. But that process would take me a long time to accomplish, even with Shikari’s sub-group inputs on Simulacrum habits and environment.”

“How long?” Chan was not even going to mention his other worry: How to model the behavior of the team itself?

Angel drifted into another brooding silence. “If we can be left undisturbed, perhaps three days. And during that same period of time we can develop the mechanism to accept direct inputs from Tinker small sub-assemblies. To achieve that, Shikari and I must first become closely connected.”

Chan turned to the Tinker. “Can you? Can you set up connection with Angel?”

“The pleasure will be ours. No experience is more rewarding than close connection, and this one will be particularly intriguing.”

Shikari began to drift slowly toward Angel. In front of Chan, the Tinker paused. “May we begin at once, Chan? Or do you first prefer to tell us about the rest of your plan?”

Chapter 26

The Simulacra used in pursuit team training were modeled on Livia Morgan’s design, as re-interpreted through the work of Phoebe Willard. But they had been designed and built by the Margrave of Fujitsu. Inevitably, he had woven into their mental make-up some of his own aesthetics.

The habitat and lifestyle of the Simmie Artefact on Barchan suggested the Margrave’s sensibilities and appreciation of beauty. The Simmie had chosen a relatively exposed position on the shore of Dreamsea, a place where it could obtain the best views of Barchan’s long winter sunsets. Every evening Eta Cass-A shone golden-red through the dusty atmosphere, and the later setting of Eta Cass-B threw patterns of amber, garnet, and jet across the dark basaltic rocks.

According to Angel’s interpretation of data from the Tinker sub-assemblies who flew their sorties of the Dreamsea shore, the Simmie moved little from its preferred hiding place. It rested, half-hidden by a shallow ledge of rock that jutted out over Dreamsea’s bitter water, and gazed out across the tideless shore.

The attack plan would be Chan’s. It had to be. He was still skeptical of his abilities, but the others gave him no choice. They admitted human superiority in just one area; fighting.

But on every other issue, each one was more than ready to give him advice.

“It will be watchful, and suspicious, without a doubt,” said Angel, while the others gathered round and listened closely. Angel had been experimenting with more runs of Simmie thought processes, and was now convinced that the emulation was as good as it could be without actual contact. “However, its penchant for destruction is undetermined. The Simulacrum certainly does not destroy every life form that it encounters. It did injure a few Shellbacks, when it was first placed on Barchan and was establishing itself here; but we judge those to have been accidents. The Simulacrum shows little curiosity in small living things, and no fear of them. Shikari’s component flights near its hideout caused no action, and stirred no apparent interest. We do not believe that it will move from its hideout, solely to make an unprovoked attack.”

“For food, then?” S’greela had folded and re-folded her flexible body to form a compact mass. The Pipe-Rilla appeared as an isolated head, poking out from the dark surrounding mound of Tinker components.

“It does not need to move for food. Its requirements are few, and there is ample sustenance close to where it is living.”

“Are these things important?” said Shikari dreamily. As usual when it was clustered around one of the others, the Tinker was almost dormant. Scarcely a component was moving.

“We don’t know what’s important,” said Chan. “All I know is, you won’t let me attack the Simmie where it is.