Re-taking the base on planet Camelot was no mean feat. We had lost a hundred men and women in the battle to secure the outpost, and the outlook was grim. I was alive, but I wasn’t sure how long this was going to last me. Sharon, Douglas and I were assigned “spider hunt” for the third watch. Grimly we stalked the corridors, always wondering weather each breath would be our last. We opened the door to the war room, as we always did, without exposing ourselves to the inside. Then, weapons first, we turned to face… Nothing. Douglas' rifle started to jitter.

"You okay Doug?"

"I'm fine. It's… It's just the shakes. That's all." Douglas wasn't a soldier. He wore the insignia, he carried the rifle, but he wasn't a soldier. At night, I could hear the screams through the wall. He did not sleep well.

The room was unoccupied. I had always assumed that the war room would be a place the spiders would go for first, but then, nothing they did ever made sense. Not wanting to chance it, we searched the room from top to bottom, leaving no chair unturned. In the corner, a large pile of blankets suddenly became animated.

“Don’t shoot! I’m on your side!”

We spun, weapons trained on the pile of blankets, which, apparently, contained an occupant. The voice continued.

“I should say I’m not on the side of the people who want to blow you up. I don’t know if you could call me an ally… yet.”

“What are you talking about?” I asked.

“I will now let you know that I am armed. I need to give you some time to let that sink in. I will also tell you that I am armed with a spider weapon, capable of firing a spread that would destroy all of you with one shot. If you fire upon me, you will all die with me. I will show you I’m not bluffing in order to further increase my chances of survival.” The weapon was now visible, sliding out from under the blankets. It was indeed a spider rifle, capable of destroying anything within 25 degrees and 15 feet of its muzzle. “I have about one minuite before I must remove my covering to improve my chances of survival. I should let you know before that time that I am in fact a spider, as this too will increase my chances of survival. If you were shocked by that fact, it might cause you to fire.”

“You can’t be a spider. Spiders don’t talk.” I was shaking badly. If spiders could talk, that could mean any number of advantages had been gained over us. They could be inhabiting cloned spies, as humans did in the Martian wars, or worse.

“Most spiders can’t. But I’ve decoded your language. Now I must remove my covering.” He was a spider. His eyes were luminous globes that bulged out of his head, his skin was covered with fine green hair, and his neck was short, ending in a bulbous body surrounded with mammalian limbs. His mouth was a small gathering of bony plates, like a beak inside a beak. We all pulled back a few paces each. “Now you might think that we are at an impasse. You have weapons, I have a weapon, and both of us are at strategically neutral positions. Even now you’re trying to find a way to decide that it isn’t, but you can’t. Now consider this. If I drop my weapon, you would be able to fire and kill me. But then you would lose the information I carry and the hope of peace that I am trying to deliver. Also, if I make this show of faith, it is doubtful that you would be willing to destroy me. It will be approximately thirty seconds before I can drop the weapon without decreacing my chances of survival, provided we keep talking. The talking is very good for relaxing tensions, don’t you think?”

“I’m scared as hell.” I don’t know why I said that. I felt childish as soon as the words were out of my mouth. Again the spider spoke.

“I am not surprised. Your visage is fearful to me as well. Perhaps if we weren’t so monstrous in appearance to each other, this war would never have happened.” He dropped the gun. “Now then, if you would be so kind as to find me some quarters, or at least lead me to some form of interrogation, I would be happy to help you bring this war to an end.”

“Shut up and get your… hands… in the air.” The spider raised four of his limbs.

“Well, I didn’t plan on politeness. You’ll find it’s very hard to offend someone who has nothing to lose.” He cooperated perfectly as we lead him to the compound’s one holding cell, which was there only to hold humans. Spiders had never surrendered before. He walked into the cell and turned around.

“May I lower my appendages now?”

“Yes.” I was amazed at the spider’s mannerisms. Spiders never, ever spoke. They didn’t surrender; they didn’t negotiate. They just killed. If captured, spiders could commit suicide by swallowing a tablet kept in one of their internal pouches.

“Oh, thank you. I was getting tired. May I inquire as to how long it will be before I can meet with a command individual?”

“I’m afraid not. I don’t even know when that would be. Jesus! Who the hell are you?”  

“I’m a mathematician.”

“Oh, great.” I left the spider to his thoughts. Sharon and Douglas turned to face me as soon as the door to the cell’s anteroom closed behind us.

“What the hell was that? I’ve been in combat on twelve systems, and I’ve never, ever been in this situation,” Sharon hissed.

“You don’t need to whisper, Sharon,” Said Douglas, “Our octopodic friend in there doesn’t seem to care what we think. God, he doesn't seem evil, does he?” Doug gave us a nervous grin.

“We’ve got to get back to the general.” Sharon and Douglas nodded in agreement. We walked the corridors for some time until we approached the command base established, for tactical reasons, in the women’s lavatory. The general’s desk was next to a sink, but his attitude somehow made it seem like he was in a corner office on the two hundredth floor of the Gates tower on Io.

I approached him first. “Report!” He said briskly.

“Floors two through five secured, sir. And… we’ve captured a spider.”

“Bullshit!”

“No sir! Prisoner found on floor five room twenty-two. Currently located in cell 1.”

“I don’t take kindly to people who lie to their superior officers, boy.”

“I’m not lying, sir.”

The general insisted on seeing this himself. We led him out of the command base and down the hall to the cell block of one. The door slid open at his command and then I saw something I never thought I’d see. General Anderson was surprised. The spider looked up, seemingly impassively, and said in a cool voice, “Are you a command individual?”

“You might say that. What do you want here? I know you could suicide at any time.”

“Actually that’s not true. Only soldiers are equipped with suicide capsules. I’m just a civilian.”

“A civilian? What do you do?”

“I’m a mathematician. I am in your custody due to a calculated effort on my part to end the war. As of yet I am the only one of my people who understands your communication, which defies most people’s understanding. I suspect some of my people will be executed for letting me fall into your hands. But I must not dwell on such matters. I’m here to save lives.”

“Are you now. Your kind has no mercy."

"Not when we are terrified, we don't. You drastically underestimate your monstrous appearance. I am a man of science, so I have no fear of your kind. But think of what you look like to one of our soldiers. Those beady eyes, that enourmous height… Your very form is that of nightmares to us. Surely you've had nightmares about our kind. Fear can make anyone kill. This is a war driven by fear. If I can stop the fear, I can stop the war. I want you to imagine what it would be like without the war. No battles, no killing. Peace. You could go to bed safe every night. And your days would be filled with the conquests of humanities glory years. Think of that."

"How do I know this isn't a trick?"

"You don't. But you do know that my appearance is unique. My kind does not come gift wrapped to your door very often. I think you'll agree that you'd be better off getting your information from me than getting none at all. The information I can give you is guaranteed to be more useful than none at all. Even if I do everything in my power to mislead you, you'll be better off for it in the long run, especially since you're not about to trust me. Is that not so?"

"Damn, you spiders are clever buggers."

"Many of my erstwhile companions would not agree." The spider stared up at us impassively. He turned to Sharon next. "My proposal is not unreasonable, is it? All I ask is that you use my knowledge of my own people's language to initiate a somewhat… more civilized contact. When we first met, we killed each other."

"You slaughtered our people! Everyone on Epsilon Eridanni five was dead within the hour!"

"Men and spiders both! You humans must really be as eager to hate as mine. I suppose your legends of the encounter tell of a war party that landed, obliterated your people and left." Again we were subjected to that impassive stare that could have hidden any emotion… or none at all. This time, though, we returned the stare.

"We do. There were stories. A ship escaped at the last moment. It was heavily armed; a warship."

"It is, on a very black level, hilarious. Our legends of the encounter are almost exactly the same. Yours was just a medical ship, wasn't it?" Doug was shaking again. He whimpered something unintelligible. "Is he alright?" I didn't know. Douglas' eyes rolled back in his head and he fell to the ground.

Just before he lost consciousness, I heard him whisper, "My God… The stupid bastards." Then he fainted dead away.

"Is he all right?" The alien reguarded him with what we could only assume to be concern.

"He's fine. I think he always suspected something like this. Do you have a name? I don't want to keep calling you 'the spider' if at all possible."

"I'm asking the questions here," boomed the general. I demured instantly, as any officer would. Most officers wouldn't have spoken up in the first place, but these were very, very unusual times. "Your people were not the agressers? Do you have proof?"

"I have no proof other than the data I carry. If I tell you how to translate our communications, you'll be able to see for yourselves how similar our cultures really are. But there is one more problem."

"What is that? It sounds like we've got us a won war on our hands."

"That's the problem, general. You want to win the war. I want to stop it. I want the killing to end, not increase. The only way that is going to happen is if the general population can translate my people's words. And that, General, is the problem."

"There's a security risk there, too. If the general population has the languages, what's to stop someone from sending a translation over to the other side?"

"I have underestimated human stubbornness. If both sides have the translation key, the war will end in a matter of months. If the military has this knowledge, the war will be over in a year, and ten billion of my people will be dead. It is also very likely that they will be in a bad situation afterwards. Another war will follow in a matter of decades. It will be worse than this one, because my people will be angry instead of afraid. I tell you now, if you insist on keeping this a secret, you will watch your grandchildren killed in a war just like this one. You cannot let that blood be on your hands." The conversation between the general and the spider went on until everyone but the general was convinced of his cause. Douglas was awake for most of it. Towards the end of the conversation, I was looking at Douglas with growing alarm. His expression seemed to ice over with a cold rage I had never seen in him. He had never, ever been angry. Frightened, scared, but never angry. But this was beyond angry. His eyes were squinting, his jaw set, and his shoulders were knotted. He wasn't shaking, either. He just stood there, rock steady. I started to back away from him and his silent fury. He held out a hand, and ever so gently squeezed mine.

"Stay with me… I musn't…" He couldn't say anymore. He was back in that personal firestorm of his. I stayed with him as the general described yet another time the rules of war. The spider was parrying with some logical devices that made the general's arguments seem childish, but we all knew the general would not be convinced. Then the spider changed tactics. Suddenly, his voice dripped with acid tones as he luridly described future scenarios where humanity was crushed and obliterated by his people on a righteous crusade against the tyranny of humanity. He told the general of the sleepless nights he would suffer as he waited for the spider armies to claim him in his bed. I didn't realize it until much later, but the spider had no emotional atatchment to these words. He was using them as a ploy to get the general to agree with him.

The general, for the first time since I met him, was visibly shaken. He looked down at his feet. “You have given me…” His voice lost its stability, the never shifting rock of his voice wavering like a leaf of an aspen. “… a lot to think about. I’ll speak with you again later. What is your name, anyway?”

“Greemer. I’m not sure if my other names could be considered analagous to your last and middle names. General, I want you to help me stop the war. It can be done. All it takes is courage. Not that courage a soldier feels because his body dumps steroids into his blood, but the bravery that built the base on Venus, the kind of courage that put your people into the stars. Think about it. If I paint a grim picture it is because it is the truth. There can be no lasting peace if it is not mutual.”

We were assigned guard duties of the prisoner and the launch pad, rotating duties. The general called me into his office some days later. I entered and noted that even in his new location, with all that civility and somberness to surround him, he looked less secure than he had in the ladies room. He was losing sleep. His fiery eyes were watery and dark. His hair was dishevled, his hands twitched, and he stuttered.

“I told the command everything. They’re advising we turn him over to them.”

“With all due respect sir, we can’t do that.”

“History is a fickle judge, mister Harrison. I don’t know what they’ll say about me a hundred years from now. Maybe I’ll be a hero, maybe school children will be taught to revile me, but… But there’s something else you should know.” His depression seemed to lift like a cloud passing. If anything, he looked positively impish. “Douglas broke into the cell and freed the prisoner. He wouldn’t have been able to get in, but I gave him some… unnoticed assistance. And, if you can make it to the launch pad in time, you might be able to go with him.”

“What?”

“I’ll be fine. I’ll say Douglas kidnapped you and the spider and broke out without my assistance. I’ll probably get demoted, but they can’t courtmarshal me for incompetance!”

“Good luck sir.”

“You too.” I ran.

“Hey! Dave! Nice to have you on board!” Douglas grabbed me by the arm and hoisted me aboard as the boosters kicked in. We were moving very quickly by the time we cleared the compound. We were persued, which was not unexpected. Greemer leaned toward Douglas in the pilot’s seat and said with what could have been alarm, “They’re gaining on us!”

“Don’t worry, Greemer. I’ve left behind a some rad mines. High frequency radiation will be given off by these mines,” he indicated a small device he held in his left hand. “which will disable the navigation and sensors of the ships.”

“My English isn’t perfect. Mines?”

“In Earth’s ancient past, people buried explosives in the ground. They killed those who stepped on them, sometimes decades after the end of a war.”

“That’s awful!”

“That’s war.”

Then the flashes started. On the radar screen, where the points representing the other ships were, flashes were appearing and sustaining themselves for long durations, like fireflies.

“The pulses also give of streams of plasma. Our radar can’t find them, but theirs can’t find us, either.”

“What do we do now?”

Douglas wasn’t the same person he had been since I had met him. He was self assured, confident. He grinned. “We’re going to alpha centauri to visit a certain university.” He laughed insanely. ACU, the last of the schools to give up the anti-war movement. ACU, the last true liberal bulwark of human space. ACU, the only place our news would be appreciated.

We encountered other ships, but none of them were a match for our craft. It wasn’t that we weren’t outgunned, it was the psychology of the thing. They hesitated to fire on a human vessel, and found their radar down. They waited for signs of hostility, then found them in the logs after weeks of rewiring and repairs. Humans hadn’t killed their own kind for hundreds of years. Finally, we arrived at ACU with a message that got us talking to a fairly high level official almost immediately.

“I hope this isn’t another ‘spider on line one’ prank. This is a very serious…” The administrator’s voice trailed off as Greemer entered his field of view.

“I will transmit the ‘spider’ language base to you soon. Are you ready?”

“Yes.”

“Will you use these words for peace?”

“You know that we will.”

Satisfied, we moved on to the halfway point between ACU and our next target. Douglas set the controls to station keeping and stood up. It was the first time I’d ever seen him happy. He walked over to his bunk and fell asleep instantly. Greemer spoke to me then.

“We are keeping our position so that the transmissions can reach into the networks. In approximately twelve hours, we will move on to our next target. One of your networks, MCNN, will be the next to receive the message.” I nodded.

“Sounds reasonable. If we moved directly, the scientists at ACU could be silenced.”

“You understand me so quickly. Our species are more similar than I could have hoped. I only hope that this is the end of this war. I want to go home one day. I will never be able to go home if the war doesn’t end.” I had to guess at his emotions: you can’t read an alien’s expression.

An hour later, Greemer woke Douglas. He protested only long enough to remember his position. He strode to the pilot’s seat and sat. “Why did you wake me so soon, Greemer? What’s the rush?”

“I’d rather not say just yet. Can we see if our announcement has had an impact yet?”

“Doubtful. ACU will still be decoding messages. The news media will be the fast movers. That’s why we’re going to Earth.”

Greemer inclined his head to Douglas. “I thought MCNN was based on Mars. Is this a change in course?”

“It wouldn’t affect timing, but I just used Earth in place of Mars because they’re in the Sol system. Why are you so interested in time all of a sudden?”

“Call it morbid curiosity.”

“Morbid, eh?” I could almost see the gears working in Douglas’ head. Greemer’s up to something…

Once in orbit, we beamed the whole language tape directly into the complex via e-mail. Then, Douglas turned the ship for deep space and activated the FTL drive. We found a wide space between the stars and waited. Greemer started pacing. He looked at the news reports, mumbled in spider talk, then walked to the back of the ship. He had repeated this ritual about fifty times when the news started mentioning the language some twelve hours later.

Douglas turned in his chair to face the spider suddenly. “Now that the waiting is over, tell me why time’s so important. It’s not morbid curiosity. You’re worried. Why?”

“I will tell you now, as my gambit appears to have been successful. About an hour ago my government, along with all associated news media, received the nucleus of the human language in an easy to read format. If I had failed, the war would have ended anyway. Less satisfactory, but better than my people losing. I’m not a traitor.”

“You gave the code to your side first?”

“Yes.”

“That’s awful!”

“That’s war.”

And it was. It was.