The Engineer Reconditioned Read Online Free PDF

gesture? Would it even recognise what was in these containers?
    "Let's do it," she said, her words disturbing the air in front of her face and letting some of the heat in. She started to sweat.
    "The creature is aware of our presence," said Judd. The Golem was linked in to Box and to the control room where Abaron sat biting his nails. Box had arbitrarily decided not to speak to them while they were in the isolation chamber as this might confuse the creature.
    "There," Judd pointed to where three triangular tentacles broke the surface and zeroed in on Chapra. The fronts of these tentacles were equilateral triangles about ten centimetres on the side. Contained in these triangles was an organic complexity that had something of a lamprey's mouth, the underside of a starfish, and a computer interface plug.
    "It is physically motionless now, though Abaron informs me that there is huge sensorium activity."
    "Fine," said Chapra. She walked to the end of the jetty, lowered the case to the floor, then walked back to stand beside Judd. There was something strange ... something made her shiver.
    "We are being ultrasound scanned," the Golem observed.
    Chapra nodded. That was what she was feeling. Her partial catadaption made her more sensitive to some things. She thought about some of the structures they had studied in the creature's head. There had been much they had been unable to fathom, but now they at least knew it used ultrasound. Just by looking at a human's hands, eyes, and the structure of the brain it is not possible to know all of what a human is capable.
    "Something like a dolphin," said Judd. "There are also complex pheromones present in the air."
    "It's talking to us," said Chapra.
    "It is scanning the case," said Judd.
    Before Chapra could think of any reply to that the creature propelled itself to the edge of the jetty. A tentacle poised above the case, came down, pulled the lid to one of the containers, hovered above it. Something like a butterfly's tongue flickered from the end of the tentacle. There was a pause, then the creature sampled the other cases so fast its movements were a blur. The hand came out then snatched the case into the water, gone.
    "Well, thank you, too," said Chapra, but she was euphoric.
    Back in the control room Abaron watched, fascinated as the creature coiled around its strange device and worked upon it in some strange manner. It opened the pots one at a time and fed tastes of the various compounds into it with its tentacles. It reached inside with its long fingers and shifted things, reached deep inside with dabs of the compounds. This was causing reactions inside the device and turning the surrounding water cloudy. Abaron could see it was growing rapidly. When it reached twenty centimetres across, the creature snared more crustaceans, feeding itself on their flesh and their shells into the device, which continued to grow. After one sleep period it lay a metre across, and was like some enormous seashell bearing the shape of a wormcast. Its outer surface was red and rough, but what he could see of the interior was iridescent white, smooth, with the tube ends turned out like lips. Movement was visible far inside, which under scan seemed the interplay of complex mechanisms, or the internal function of a living creature. The line was blurred.
    "Have we any idea at all what that is?" asked Abaron.
    "Could be anything. It might use it to prepare its food, make drugs, or it might even serve no purpose at all. Imagine an alien watching a human paint a picture ... "
    "I think it serves a function."
    "It's a step or two beyond complete analysis," said Box in an unusual interruption. "But there are nanomechanical structures in there and as a consequence we must limit scan." Chapra said, her voice flat, "Then its function could be anything, and might even be everything."
    "What do you mean?" asked Abaron.
    "Nanomechanical — it's likely it can make whatever it wants from the molecular level up. I would