Synthesis - James Swallow [22]
Sethe shot Zurin a look. “Ensign, prepare a phased-array probe.” He approached the block of alien systemry, watching the dull pattern of firelight inside. “If we can make a process gate here—”
“That’s a foolish thing to do,” brayed the Pak’shree. “More study is required to confirm that I am right and you are wrong.”
The Cygnian drew himself up to his full height, attempting to look the bulky arthropod in the eyes. He tapped the gold pips on his collar. “Do you know what these mean?”
“It’s your rank, Lieutenant,” Chaka said brightly, as if she were explaining something to a rather dull child.
“And do you know what it means?” he repeated, his face gaining a little yellow and his tone rising. “It means I am in charge!”
“Of course you are,” she responded soothingly. “But you are being rather impulsive. It’s very male.”
Zurin sighed. That was a poor choice of reply, the Cardassian told himself. Over the months he had been serving aboard the Titan, he had grown to disregard the slightly condescending manner Chaka showed toward any beings who weren’t female. He didn’t take it personally; on the Pak’shree homeworld, the natives were born sexless, then became male after puberty before finally evolving into a final, female form for the remainder of their life-cycle. Masculine-phase Pak’shree were characterized by instinctual behavior patterns that largely revolved around procreating as much as possible. Consequently, a lifetime of living with those kinds of males made it difficult for Chaka to shrug off an almost cellular level of sexism; she simply found it hard to conceive that males of any species could contribute anything intellectual to a situation.
Zurin was firmly convinced that the only reason Chaka was polite to him was that she had difficulty telling the difference between the sexes of some humanoid species and for most of the voyage had thought he was a woman.
“What,” demanded Sethe, ice forming on the words, “does my gender have to do with anything?”
“Oh, nothing, I’m sure,” she replied blithely. “Sir. It’s just that I thought you might benefit from a more enlightened female viewpoint.”
Sethe’s eye twitched. “What are you implying?”
“Isn’t that the way things are on your homeworld?” said Chaka, turning her tentacle manipulators to work one of the consoles.
“I left my homeworld to get away from ‘enlightened female viewpoints,’ ” the Cygnian grumbled.
From what Zurin knew of the planet Cygnet XIV, the world had been an early member of the Federation, noted for its excellence in computer sciences and a strict matriarchy for more than nine centuries. He was no stranger to matriarchs himself. Back on Cardassia Prime, he had grown up under the stern but fair gaze of his great-grandmother Junol, who had run the affairs of the Dakal clan with an iron grip until they had lost her during the Dominion War. But on Cygnet, males were in the minority, and any one of them who wished to progress in that society would have found it a hard road to follow. Sethe had almost certainly been shaped by that experience. Zurin recalled a human expression he had heard Lieutenant Radowski use: The man has a chip on his shoulder.
Chaka was speaking again, doubtless saying something that would irritate Sethe even further, but all at once, Zurin’s attention was snared by something on the console in front of him. The comparative analysis cycle he set running had ended, and the data was surprising. “I think…” he began. “I think you’re both wrong.”
The Cygnian and the Pak’shree turned to him. “Is that so?” demanded the lieutenant.
Zurin’s gray face bobbed in a nod. “This device isn’t duotronic-based, and it’s not bubble-memory technology, either.” He held up a padd, showing them a complex energy-transfer waveform, the decay pattern of old data trails through the alien device’s circuitry. “It’s a tachyon-phase processor.”
“Unlikely,” chuffed Chaka.
“I’m compelled to agree,” said Sethe. “That’s highly theoretical, and compared with the level of technology exhibited in other systems aboard the wreck,