C-3PO tipped his head slightly. “Why, no, Captain Solo. To do that, I’d have to understand what they’re saying.”
Han groaned. “What’s wrong with the Imperial blink code those dartships were using?”
“Unfortunately, their pressure suits don’t seem to be equipped with strobes,” C-3PO explained. “But I am making progress with their dance-language. For instance, I’ve established that they’re repeating the same message time after time.”
“Exactly the same message?” Leia asked.
“Of course,” C-3PO said. “Otherwise, I would have said similar-“
“Long or short?”
“That’s quite impossible to say,” C-3PO said. “Until I can establish the average number of units it requires to express one concept-“
“How long does it take to repeat the message?” Leia peered out at the bulging hatch, studying its membranous segments. “Seconds? Minutes?”
“Three point five-four seconds, on average,” C-3PO said. “But without a context, that datum is entirely worthless.”
“Not entirely worthless.” Leia returned to the copilot’s seat. “Edge us ahead, Han. I want to see something.”
As Han complied, Leia stared out at the bulging hatch, looking for any flaw in her thinking. The insects suddenly arranged themselves in the center of the membrane, then started to scuttle toward the edge and ooze green gel again.
“Keep going,” Leia said. “I know what they’ve been saying.”
“That’s quite unlikely!” C-3PO objected. “Even I don’t have enough data to establish a grammar-much less attempt an accurate translation.”
Instead of arguing, Leia reached for the glide switches
that controlled the Falcon’s shields. Han eyed her hand warily, but continued forward. When the hatch began to bow inward, Leia lowered the shields, and a moment later the flexible membrane was sucked tight against the Falcon by the external vacuum.
Han let out a breath, then said to Leia, “Good call.”
“Yes, Princess Leia, it was quite an extraordinary translation.” C-3PO sounded crushed. “In how many forms of communication did you say you are fluent?”
FIVE
Luke felt as though he had swallowed a jug of minnows. Ben had turned an alarming hue of green. Mara, who could normally whirl-dance for hours in weak gravity, held her jaws clamped tight against the possibility of an embarrassing eruption. The Skywalkers were hardly micro-g novices, but their stomachs were rebelling at the utter strangeness of the asteroid colony - at the sticky gold wax that lined the corridors, at the constant thrum of insect sounds, at the endless parade of six-limbed, meter-high workers scurrying past on the walls and ceiling.
Saba, however, seemed entirely comfortable. She was moving along in front, trotting along a wall on all fours, her head swinging from side to side and her long tongue licking the sweet air. Luke suspected that the heat and mugginess reminded her of Barab I, but maybe she just liked the way her hands and feet squished into the corridor’s wax lining. Barabels, he had noticed, took pleasure in the oddest things.
They came to a cockeyed intersection, and Luke stopped to listen to a strange pulsing sound that was rumbling out of a crooked side tunnel. It was muted, eerie, and rasping, but there was a definite melody and rhythm.
“Music,” he said.
“If you’re from Tatooine, maybe,” Mara said. “The rest of us would call that a rancor belch.”
“This one likez it,” Saba said. “It makez her tail shake.”
“I’ve seen squeaky thrust impellers make your tail shake,” Mara said. She pointed at the floor, where a steady flow of booted feet had worn the wax down to the stone. “But it is popular. Let’s check it out.”
They started up the passage, and Ben asked, “Is this where Jaina is?”
“No,” Luke said. Ben had been repeating the same question since they had emerged from hyperspace. “I told you, she’s not in the asteroid colony. “
“Then where is she?”
“We don’t know.” Luke looked over his shoulder at Ben. “That’s what we’re trying to find out.”
Ben considered this a moment, then said, “If you don’t know where she’s at, then maybe she is here, and maybe you just don’t know it.”
This sent Saba into a fit of sissing. “He has you there, Master Skywalker.”
Ben retreated behind his mother, and Luke found himself worrying about the boy’s strange fear of Saba. They had made a point of exposing him to friends of many species early in his life, and only Saba still seemed to frighten him.