The characters in this story and the concept of the SeaQuest belong to Amblin and Steven Spielberg, except for Ari, who belongs to herself, although she allows me to write her adventures down. There is no intent to benefit monetarily, although any and all comments are welcomed and appreciated. ---ki
Signs of Intelligence
by katirene (XMP)
The scientist slowly paced through the halls of his research facility. He was the premier researcher in this field, despite his relative youth, but that was due to good fortune, not design.
Due to a childhood mishap, he'd been separated from his family, and had almost gotten himself killed. An alien had rescued him from death, and nursed him to health. Too young to know his way back home, he'd stayed with the being, despite the differences between them, and had come to love it. In time, he had found others of his kind again, and shared what he had learned with them. But he found he had too much affection for the one who had saved him to remain away for long.
His was an ancient race, which had been studying these aliens for millenia, trying to determine whether they were truely an intelligent species, or merely clever like some look-alike cousins. Many of his people claimed the latter, but he thought that they were wrong. He paused to peer through one of the many windows set in the hallway walls, allowing him to view them engaging in a variety of activities.
They were a fascinating race of beings. Various skin tones, bristle colour, sizes. And they seemed so busy, if only he could figure out the reason for their actions. It had been they who had constructed this research lab for him, bringing him here in the hopes of pleasing him when it was finished. They's even persuaded his pet, the first one, to join them. He'd tried to argue that they had to be intelligent to have done all that. But his opponents had pointed to corals and shellfish and certain species that glued the cast-offs of others into dwelling places.
He entered the observation area of the main part of the vessel. Looking around, he found the one who'd saved him, so long ago. He called out. "Well, Bridger, old boy. How are you doing today, Hmmm?" The meanings of his statements sounded in the language of the creatures, sounding monotonic and inadequate, rather ugly in fact, although they were capable of creating sounds of beauty. Stretching the corners of his sadly inadequate snout, Bridger hurried up to him, scratching his melon in the way he'd trained him.
Bridger was fairly smart for his kind. No one knew just how long these beings lived, but Darwin suspected that this one was quite old. In the cycles since he'd been rescued, he'd seen the creatures bristles change colour, become more dolphin-like. The visible skin had sagged and wrinkled up, the way all of their skins did if they remained in the true world for too long, but his eyes remained bright and youthful, almost seal-like in their intensity.
After a few seconds, Bridger answered in that adorable, yearling speech pattern used by the translater. "Bridger fine? Darwin fine? Darwin swim good?" How could anyone hear that and not fall in love with them?
Darwin had tried to argue that the use of whatever translater they had was another sign of intelligence. But the counter argument had come swiftly. The adversaries had pointed to the remora that suck the scum from the backs of sharks and the fish that lure prey into the anemone maw, all for a share in the kill. This was probably another species from the desert places that had been pressed into doing this. Perhaps one of the flying kind, they made enough different sounds. If so, it's name was Vocoder.
"Oh, yes. I've been out and about today. Found a good site for hunting, the fish here are delicious. Perhaps you'd like come out swimming with me?"
"Bridger not swim now. Maybe later." Darwin nodded his understanding. They had such a such an imperfect grasp of time sense. He looked around the area, which the Vocoder translated as "bridge". Surely a mistake. It looked nothing like any bridge, natural or otherwise, that he'd ever seen.
He spied a young male in a seat above, one half of a courting couple of these creatures. Darwin had learned much of their mating rites from observing the two of them, and he had hopes that he could breed them together. The female of the pair, called Ari, seemed an unusually intelligent example of the species, almost capable of intelligent communications. And Miguel was fairly intuitive, as well. Any young that they produced would be ideal for his research purposes. And to be able to train one up from infancy, that would yield the definative answer to the question.
But so far, they had refused to co-operate with his plans, despite their obvious infatuation with one another.
Darwin commented, "Well, I'm glad to see Ari isn't here. Perhaps I can persuade her to come out with me."
"Ari not here, leave. Maybe asleep." At this intelligence, he looked at male again and sighed. "Well, since Miguel is here, that probably is all she's doing." For some reason, this simple statement set the others off in a gale of what seemed to Darwin to be the truest sign of intelligence, laughter. It sounded a little strange, not very delphine and it did take some getting used to, but that's what it seemed to be. The object of the comment changed colour.
But the detractors among his kind pointed to other dry world creatures who made similar noises for no reason whatsoever.
One of those on the bridge, another young male often in the company of the courting couple made a totally obscure and incomprehensible reply to Darwin's statement, "Darwin number Miguel." He snorted. Why would he want to do that? Although, some of his people did suggest ways of tagging them, in order to more easily tell them apart. He snorted with disgust at the thought. Those were the ones who claimed that all these humans looked alike.
But Darwin didn't correct the male. He was another in whom he had high hopes, possessing an almost dolphin-like awareness in some ways. Perhaps it would be better to breed the female with this one?
At the companion's comment, the courting male's colour change became even more pronounced. He'd observed this phenomenon before and wondered as to it's use. Was is a defense mechanism, to make the creature seem even more dangerous? Or did it serve some other function. At times, it even appeared to be related to mating practices, but that wouldn't apply in this situation.
"Well, I think I'll shove off and find out if Ari is available. I look forward to our swim later, ok Bridger?" Bridger patted his head again. "Bridger swim later," he promised. " 'WUK' now."
As Darwin dove down and off the bridge, he mused on the meaning to the word "WUK". The closest the Vocoder could come to it was "boring/unfun/not-interesting things forced to do". He sighed unhappily. No dolphin would ever do anything of that sort willingly, and not for the amount of time that these creatures devoted to it. And that was the biggest argument AGAINST their true intelligence that he knew.