The reverberations of the bell announcing lunch were just quieting as Sir Colmer wheeled around the corner of the narrow hallway of the CHRISTOS and passed through the doorway to the mess hall. Prompt to the summons as he had been, he found himself queuing up behind Street and Eldon who were already loading their plates at the buffet Mendel had set out. A welcome new selection of cold meats and salad greens, noticeably diminished in quantity, graced the table. Arlyis, accompanied by Sister Seika appeared shortly after, both engaged in enthusiastic conversation. A week of research had yielded an amazing amount of information about the Wavies, and both were currently very happy in their work.

"Just imagine. If Logan's hobby had been Lepidoptera or stamp collecting instead of a fascination with musical forms. Why, we would never have made the progress we have."

"It was you," noted Sister Seika, "that put the translator software together."

"Oh, I may have done the modifications to the Rosetta program, but setting up to look for musical structures like codas and motifs, that's what gave us our start. Wavies are so responsive! All Wile and Logan do is present a color, element, or a concept, and they fall all over themselves to try to define it with us. Strangely, they have real problems with identifying compound structures and mechanical concepts. "

Sister Seika frowned. "Why would that be? They seem like advanced organisms."

They 'see' vibrations and energies, not so much forms and contours. We are already finalizing a translator program. Mark my words, Sister, Bishop Wile will have us in meaningful communication by week's end."

Just then Monsignor Ammens strode in. The mathematician, catching the end of their conversation, snorted. "End of the week? Our fearless prelate, Joshua, will be initiating a conversation this evening, just as soon as Mr. Eldon...," at this point the volume of the Mathematician's tenor bloomed to take in a larger audience, "finishes hooking up the translator!" He grabbed a plate and inspected the buffet offerings.

"Ah! Something new, I see."

He poked a fork at the sad remains of what had been a mound of sliced lean beef, and shot a cold stare at Street and Eldon, now seated and wolfing down cold cuts.

"How is it that our military crew members always seem to be the first to know of any dietary changes aboard this ship? Are menus routed directly to their cabin?"

Eldon looked up from his plate, swallowed and said, "Only if they include food, yer worship."

After a week of the standard shipboard fare, as good as it was, any simple change of diet was widely appreciated. Logan soon joined his friend Ernst Ammens and a healthy buzz of general conversation filled the mess.

Colmer, having arrived first, was at table with Street and Eldon, but glanced frequently toward where Arlyis and Sister Seika sat. Joshua, a little later than was his habit, ducked to enter the mess. A message from Alcomer, had required his presence on the bridge.

"Pope John," Joshua waved, "wanted a first hand update. Oh, and he wishes to commend you all on your work. He reassures me that the team composition will not change. I know some here are under considerable pressure to return to their primary duties, but you may safely ignore any of that."

At least, mused Joshua, one benefit of a benevolent Theocracy. Rank did not, in the modern church, pigeon-hole people. Which gave everyone more incentive to develop multiple talents, with the expectation that they would be used. Pope John could expect, even demand, that his flock use their abilities to the best advantage of the colony, or the churches mission, as he saw fit. So a Bishop might be drafted to duty here, as Wile had been, and the assignment respected. In the end, everyone contributed more that way, and drew meaningful satisfaction from their diverse interests, knowing they supported a greater, and unified purpose.

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Mr. Eldon, having wolfed his fill, approached Joshua, a bit red faced. "Regardless of what Monsignor Ammens thinks, yer honor, we will have the rig all ready for ya this afternoon. See if we don't"

****

Joshua stood at the translator ordering his thoughts. The thing was just an audio pickup linked into the ship's computer through an auxiliary terminal, which was in turn connected to a quantum caster / receiver tinkered up by Tech Private Eldon, Father Logan and Arlyis from the scientific instrumentation the researchers had brought aboard. It was tuned to the energy bands used by the Wavies and according to the display, was 'on'. He checked his list of prompts, provided by Bishop Wile, one last time and spoke.

"I listen for one who speaks, are you hearing me?" There was a pause, and the translator recreated his words and cast them out toward the group of lights glittering along the separate set of rigged sails that now floated at some distance from the CHRISTOS. Then, a translated reply came from the speaker of the terminal.

"I/We content to listen to the (singer/speaker) of (man/carbon)."

"Do you live in this place?"

"(I/We) (live/nest) this (space/moment.)"

"Do you speak for your kind?"

"I am speaker for the (Queen/Nest)."

"You Speak For Your Queen?"

"(Queen/Nest) another moment away."

Joshua frowned at his notes,trying to gather in something from the translation. "I would be...content to speak to the Queen."

"Queen another moment. Still/Hard point no move here."

"Where is your Queen?"

"Point/move *****moment/reference no."

"You don't know?"

"Know."

"You can't tell me?"

"Point (no reference) other."

"Where?" Joshua felt the sense of dialog slipping away.

"(No reference)"

Joshua sighed. "Speaker pauses, will speak again."

"Content."

Joshua turned from the translator and spoke to Bishop Wile. "Amazing. Beyond belief, Benn. Under any other circumstances, this would call for a week of celebration. There are only a handful of sentient races in the universe, and no inter-dimensional ones I've ever heard of. Incredible, and an astonishing breakthrough. Did you make anything of that?"

Bishop Wile colored under the praise and pulled at his ear. "I believe it was saying that the queen wasn't around. They are a hive society, best Sister Seika can determine so far. The queen term is a rough approximation Logan and I settled on. 'Mother' or 'leader' was discussed as other possibilities. I think it was trying to say it didn't have a frame of reference to describe where the queen was, and that the queen couldn't come here. Their terms for time and place are blended. I think they struggle with the concept of a three-dimensional frame of reference, and the whole idea of time."

Joshua thought for a moment."We really have to be able to break through that. Diocullis found a containment device on St. Croix. Do you think that hard still point business might refer to the queen being unable to move? To being trapped, caged?"

Bishop Wile shrugged. "One guess is as good as another. It's a big universe after all."

"From what we know, the earth transceiver broadcast defined a point in space, yes? And we know what the coordinates of the transmitter information were. We have the recordings of the SONG WEAVER and the coordinate position where they were made. We know our current location, and we have the recordings we first took when entering the Draco. The time, date and coordinates, yes?"

"All of that is on board, yes," agreed Wile.

"So that's three points and an origin. Can you run a program together using abstracts from these recordings and see if you can get them to understand that we are defining an area of space, give them a reference we can both interpret?."

Bishop Wile looked startled for a second. "Why, yes that just might work. Ammens would be the man to work out the math for it, and I can get Arlyis to do the programming."

"Why don't you do that? Work with them to define a mapping system. Then see if we can determine where this queen is. I have a bad feeling that our Mr. St Croix and this queen/mother just might be at the same," - he referred to his notes, "point / moment. I think I would be 'content' with that."