Samuel Delany: Babel-17

He nodded. It was easier to lie with a gesture than a word.

"Good. Now, General Forester, what's Babel-17?"

He looked around for the bartender, but a glow brought his eyes back to her face—the glow was simply her smile, but from the corner of his eye he had actually mistaken it for a light. "Here," she said, pushing her second drink, untouched, to him. "I won't finish this."

He took it, sipped. "The Invasion, Miss Wong, . . . it's got to be involved with the Invasion."

She leaned on one arm, listening with narrowing eyes.

"It started with a series of accidents—well, at first they seemed like accidents. Now we're sure it's sabotage. They've occurred all over the Alliance regularly since December' 68. Some on warships, some in Space Navy Yards, usually involving the failure of some important equipment. Twice, explosions have caused the death of important officials. Several times these 'accidents' have happened in industrial plants producing essential war products."

"What connects all these 'accidents,' other than that they touched on the war? With our economy working this way, it would be difficult for any major industrial accident not to affect the war."

"The thing that connects them all, Miss Wong, is Babel-17."

He watched her finish her drink and set the glass precisely on the wet circle.

"Just before, during, and immediately after each accident, the area is flooded with radio exchanges back and forth from indefinite sources; most of them only have a carrying power of a couple of hundred yards. But there are occasional bursts through hyperstatic channels that blanket a few lightyears. We have transcribed the stuff during the last three 'accidents' and given it the working title Babel-17. Now. Does that tell you anything you can use?"

"Yes. There's a good chance you're receiving radio instructions for the sabotage back and forth between whatever is directing the 'accidents'—"

“—But we can't find a thing!" Exasperation struck. 'There's nothing but that blasted gobbledy-gook, piping away at double speed! Finally someone noticed certain repetitions in the pattern that suggested a code. Cryptography seemed to think it was a good lead but couldn't crack it for a month; so they called you."

As he talked, he watched her think. Now she said, “General Forester, I'd like the original monitors of these radio exchanges, plus a thorough report, second by second if it's available, of those accidents timed to the tapes."

"I don't know if—"

"If you don't have such a report, make one during the next accident' that occurs. If this radio garbage is a conversation, I have to be able to follow what's being talked about. You may not have noticed, but, in the copy Cryptography gave me, there was no distinction as to which voice was which. In short, what I'm working with now is a transcription of a highly technical exchange run together without punctuation, or even word breaks,"

"I can probably get you everything you want except the original recordings—"

"You have to. I must make my own transcription, carefully, and on my own equipment."

"We'll make a new one to your specifications." She shook her head. "I have to do it myself, or I can't promise a thing. There's the whole problem of phonemic and allophonic distinctions. Your people didn't even realize it was a language, so it didn't occur to them—"

Now he interrupted her. "What sort of distinctions?"

"You know the way some Orientals confuse the sounds of R and L when they speak a Western language? That's because R and L in many Eastern languages are allophones, that is, considered the same sound, written and even heard the same—just like the th at the beginning of they and at the beginning of theater."

"What's different about the sound of theater and fAey?"

"Say them again and listen. One's voiced and the other's unvoiced. They're as distinct as V and F; only they're allophones in English and you're used to hearing them as if they were the same phoneme."

"Oh."

"But you see the problem a 'foreigner' has transcribing a language he doesn't speak; he may come out with too many distinctions of sound, or not enough."

"How do you propose to do it?"

"By what I know about the sound systems of a lot of other languages and by feel."

"The 'knack' again?"

She smiled. "I suppose."

She waited for him to grant approval. What wouldn't he have granted her? For a moment he had been distracted by her voice through subtleties of sound. "Of course, Miss Wong," he said, "you're our expert. Come to Cryptography tomorrow and you can have access to whatever you need."

"Thank you. General Forester. I'll bring my official report in then."

He stood in the static beam of her smile. I must go now, he thought desperately. Oh, let me say something to her. "Fine, Miss Wong. I'll speak to you then." Something more, something—

He wrenched his body away (I must turn from her) say one thing more, thank you, be you, love you. He walked to the door, his thoughts quieting: who is she? Oh, the things that should have been said. I have been brusque, military, efficient. But the luxuriance of thought and word I would have given her. The door stayed open and evening brushed blue fingers on his eyes.

My god, he thought, as coolness struck his face, all that inside me and she doesn't know! I didn't communicate a thing! Somewhere in the depths the words, not a thing, you're still safe. But stronger on the surface was the outrage at his own silence. Didn't communicate a thing at all—

Rydra stood up, her hands on the edge of the counter, looking at the mirror. The bartender came to remove the glasses at her fingertips. As he reached for them, he frowned.

"Miss Wong?"

Her face was fixed.

"Miss Wong, are you—"

Her knuckles were white and as the bartender watched, the whiteness crept along her hands till they looked like shaking wax.

"Is there something wrong. Miss Wong?"

She snapped her face toward him. "You noticed?" Her voice was a hoarse whisper, harsh, sarcastic, strained. She whirled from the bar and started toward the door, stopped once to cough, then hurried on.

"MOCKY, HELP ME"

"Rydra?" Dr. Markus T'mwarba pushed himself from the pillow in the darkness. Her face sprung in smoky light above the bed. "Where are you?"

"Downstairs, Mocky— Please, I've got to talk to you."

Her agitated features moved right, left, trying to avoid his look. He squinched his eyes against the glare, then opened them slowly. "Come on up."

Her face disappeared.

He waved his hand across the control board and soft light filled the sumptuous bedroom. He shoved back the gold quilt, stood on the fur rug, took a black silk robe from a gnarled bronze column, and as he swung it across his back the automatic contour wires wrapped the panels across his chest and straightened the shoulders. He brushed the induction bank in the rococo frame again, and aluminum flaps fell back on the sideboard. A steaming carafe and liquor decanters rolled forward.

Another gesture started bubble chairs inflating from the floor. As Dr. T'mwarba turned to the entrance cabinet, it creaked, mica wings slid out, and Rydra caught her breath.

"Coffee?" He pushed the carafe and the force-field caught it and carried it gently toward her. "What've you been doing?"

"Mocky, it . . . I . . . ?"

"Drink your coffee."

She poured a cup, lifted it halfway to her mouth. "No sedatives?"

"Creme de cacao or creme de cafe?" He held up two small glasses. "Unless you think alcohol is cheating, too. Oh, and there's some franks and beans left over from dinner. I had company."

She shook her head. "Just cacao." The tiny glass followed the coffee across the beam. "I've had a perfectly dreadful day."