Flinx Transcendent_ A Pip & Flinx Adventure - Alan Dean Foster [152]
“I don't know about this, Flinx.” Tse-Mallory was clearly unhappy as he studied the configuration. “The design and layout is noticeably different from the operator's pulpit inside the Krang on Booster.”
Gazing speculatively at the beckoning rostrum, Flinx found himself nodding in agreement. “It's different from the one I utilized when I was on this artifact previously, too. But it has to be a communicator-contact.” He gestured in its direction. “The composition of the platform, the general size and shape—everything beneath the multiple domes is exactly the same.”
“Perhaps this arrangement is designed to allow even better communications and more control.” Truzenzuzex sounded hopeful as his antennae waved in the dais's direction.
Clarity stood close to Flinx. “Or maybe it requires more experience and skill to operate.” She looked up at him. “We can keep looking for a platform like the ones you've used before.”
He considered the options. Yes, they could keep looking. Yes, he would feel more comfortable placing himself beneath the twin transparent domes with which he was familiar. But in more than a day of probing they had encountered nothing else even remotely like a contact platform. Here right in front of them, almost as if it had been dropped there in response to their wishes, was something sufficiently similar to be worth a try. Maybe Truzenzuzex was right, and its apparent greater complexity would allow for cleaner communications and improved control. Certainly the atypical layout of the chamber hinted at something out of the ordinary.
That's me, he taunted himself in an effort to stiffen his resolve. Something out of the ordinary. If one proceeded from that premise, he was in exactly the right place.
“I'm going to give it a go,” he told Clarity and the others. “If it doesn't work, we'll keep looking. If it does, that doesn't necessarily mean I can contact anything from here. This room might be nothing more than an elaborate Tar-Aiym classroom, or kitchen.”
“It could also be a suicide chamber, or a specialized niche for performing some kind of religious self-immolation,” Clarity counseled him.
“That's my girl,” he shot back, “always encouraging.”
“Clarity's my name and Clarity's my game,” she countered in all seriousness. “I just don't want to see you end up dead because you chose to try activating a different piece of Tar-Aiym instrumentation without thinking it through as thoroughly as possible.”
“Then we're in complete agreement.” He found Tse-Mallory staring back at him. “Sir?”
The sociologist-soldier did not hesitate. “If you think there are sufficient similarities to the apparatus you have already operated, then I have to agree with Tru.” Raising an arm, he gestured toward the platform. “Greater schematic complexity implies a higher, not a lesser, level of importance. If you can't activate it and it looks like it's giving you trouble, Tru and I will be standing by to pull you out.”
Left unsaid were the potential adverse side effects, mental as well as physical, that he might suffer from such an abrupt and violent disconnect from the alien instrumentation. He did not raise the possibilities for discussion, nor did the two scientists, or Clarity, or Sylzenzuzex. There was no need to hold forth on an uncomfortable possibility of which everyone was already aware.
He conferred a kiss on Clarity, said nothing, found himself pulled back for a second, longer embrace. Thoroughly familiar with the peculiar courtship rituals of humankind due to the length of time he had spent among the species, Truzenzuzex paid no attention to the seemingly interminable physical give and take. In contrast to her jaded Eighth, Sylzenzuzex looked on in unabashed fascination. She was captivated by the intricacies of