When Dev and his companions reached the point where the ship responded to a query about when it would be able to respond to a query by saying it could not respond to that query—at the present time—they gave up. Nor were the A'jeii or Vantolos or any of their former captors forthcoming. They had all retired—or been forcibly retired—to their own quarters.

Unable to find out what was happening, Dev and his companions had returned to their own rooms. Busy with their own tasks, the horde of mechanicals that had boarded the vessel went about their business indifferent to whatever the humans might choose to do. Presently, he lay on his bed in his quarters looking on as two dozen small robots wandered about; poking, prodding, and connecting themselves to pods and apertures he had not even known existed. Some walked on two legs or four, others traveled on tracks, and a few utilized the same unknown, near magical suspension technology that had been displayed by their far larger and more intimidating counterpart. Each was as beautifully machined as a jewel. None of them appeared to be armed or capable of delivering anything more dangerous than a stern pinch.

This was a great relief, because in their inspection and inscrutable modification of his living quarters one of the intruders would occasionally crawl or climb or drift over his recumbent form. Mostly they ignored him, intent on fulfilling their programming. Occasionally one would pause, coming to a stop on the bed or sometimes on his chest, to examine him out of monocular, dual, or multiple lenses, or perhaps to observe him by means other than ocular. At such moments he would fight to remain as motionless as possible. In the course of each brief confrontation he would smile, not knowing if the meaning behind his expression was recognized but seeing no harm in hoping that it was.

Insofar as he could tell, given his less than rudimentary knowledge of alien robotic engineering, there were no organics among their number. Only a bustling bevy of automatons. He could speak English, Hindi, Bengali, Urdu, and some German and French, but the notion that ancient Hebrew might one day prove useful had remained forever outside his purview. Hopefully the Zimmers were having better luck acquiring information from the ship’s new mechanical masters. But as Jakob had told him before he and Chiasa had retired to their own cabin, “Just because I can maybe ask them questions doesn’t mean I will get any answers. They very likely will respond as uninformatively as the ship.”