Star Wars_ Coruscant Nights II Streets of Shadows - Michael Reaves [36]
The Sullustan could barely keep from recoiling every time he saw it. The Cephalon’s skin was the mottled flat gray of long-dead flesh, its shape an undulating oblate globe, festooned apparently at random with tentacles, antennae, feelers, and chelae. It had no eyes or other sensory organs that Den could see. According to I-Five, it perceived its external environment by means of electroceptive matrices, whatever those were. Its mouth was a baleen plate that sieved extremophile microorganisms from the dense, primarily methane atmosphere that sustained it.
The Cephalon was surely one of the most bizarre species in the entire galaxy. Its inner thoughts were as unknowable as nearly everything else about it. Working with a Force-sensitive Inquisitor, Imperial scientists had managed to identify nine distinct emotional states, of which only three bore even a faint resemblance to the sentiments that most humanoids experienced. There might be more, but it was rumored that the Inquisitor himself had gone mad from trying to wrap his own mind around the varying states of the Cephalon’s four-dimensional consciousness.
There’s a comforting image with which to open a negotiation, Den thought. Aloud, he began, “We, uh, we have two sentients on the UML who, uh, need …”
—Elaboration is/was/will be unnecessary. This was another eerie thing about the Cephalon. Since it could “observe” happenings in time as clearly as Den could see objects in three dimensions, it always knew what he was about to say. The Cephalon was not omniscient—it couldn’t conceptualize every incident in the fourth dimension any more than most beings could see everything in all three spatial directions from any single vantage point. But it seemed to know enough about the immediate future to be able to make predictions with unsettling accuracy.
—Sentients are/have been/shall be non-united. Point-pattern at now contingent modalities nonviable. As yet point-pattern in noncollapsed state, it told them.
—Probability matrices undefined. I/we apperceive discontinuity. Suggest cautious/passive/observational mode.
This was one of the biggest problems in attempted communication with a nonlinear being, as far as Den was concerned. The translation did its best to keep up with the Cephalon’s erratic and seemingly irrational changes between tenses and personae, as well as struggling to fit its static perception of the time-stream into terms of past, present, and future. The result was often a translation that usually seemed right on the verge of making sense. The Sullustan sometimes felt that he actually might be able to understand it, if he only had an extra lobe or two with which to process the mishmash. Usually, however, it was as far over his head as a skyhook penthouse.
Which was the case this time. At wit’s end in time as well as space, he glanced helplessly at Laranth. “Any idea what all this probability poodoo is about?”
She shook her head. “I have the impression it’s indecisive. Basically, it’s advising us to wait and see.” She turned to exit the habitat chamber.
He gaped at her retreating back. “That’s it? We come all this way …?”
“It was three blocks, Den.”
“That’s not the point. The Cephalon’s supposed to give us tips on the best UML routes, the right officers to bribe, that sort of stuff. He—excuse me, it—is our go- to guy in the prognostication department. I could get better advice from a Mon Cal kismet biscuit.”
Laranth did not reply. Den sighed and started to follow, when from the corner of his eye he caught a glimpse of more words forming on the monitors. Scowling, he turned back. You’d think the thing could at least afford a vocabulator, he thought as he read the creature’s latest words.
—Vulnerability apperceived in alternate probability. Extreme discontinuity in Force convergent. Prioritize discreet vigilance anent