The Braided World (2 page)

Even from a distance, the planet looked like Earth: a dot of rare blue, embraced by a gauze of clouds. The ship could detect oceans, polar caps, magnetic fields, and an atmosphere with nitrogen, oxygen, water, and carbon dioxide. A close match to Earth, complete with stabilizing moon and ideal relation to its G5 star. But poisoning the crew's excitement was the growing sense that the planet was not—well,
probable.
Radio signals revealed that its inhabitants spoke a language suited to human articulation.
Improbable
, the biologists said. Then, upon closer approach, using laser imaging, the most startling view of all…

In her quarters aboard the
Restoration
, Bailey Shaw was enduring yet another sleepless night, a circumstance she blamed partly on old age and partly on the rough voyage. She rubbed at her sore eyes, myopic despite the ship's surgeon's offering a little corrective. At seventy-eight, Bailey was about done with self-improvement.

Her gaze went again and again to the view screen, displaying Earth's cousin, so far the only other water planet in the known universe. It was a world of scattered islands,
with one forested landmass cinched in narrowly at the equator. Only this middle region gave evidence of civilization, one with limited radio technology and primitive dwellings clustered along a great river system. She blanked the screen, having seen enough, for now. It would all become clear on the ground mission, the expedition that would have been led by Captain Darrow, except that he was dying. Damn him anyway.

When the door chimed, she jumped. If they were disturbing her this late, there must be news. She swiveled her chair around, preparing herself.

On voice command, the door opened, revealing Ensign Petty looking about sixteen years old. She couldn't remember hiring any sixteen-year-olds. Besides, they'd been in transit for three years, so he must be at least twenty. He stood stiffly, like a walk-on character in a cheap opera. “Ma'am,” the youngster mumbled.

Bailey rose. “Go ahead, Petty I'm not so frail that bad news will kill me outright.”

He managed a miserable smile. Then, remembering what he came for, he sobered. “Mrs. Shaw, the captain is dead.”

She thought he'd practiced that line on his way down from the medical suite. Like saying
The king is dead, Your Highness.
And not too far off, either. Captain Charlton Darrow was a formidable leader, the man she'd handpicked for the job of commanding a crew of forty for the six-year round trip, plus ground mission. Now what would they do?

The ensign looked like he might break down. “I'm sorry.”

Oh, not as sorry as I am
, she thought. The captain had been among the first to sicken, but Bailey had hoped he would pull through. After killing ten crew, the disease had run its course, knocked out by a drug they'd designed to stop viral replication. But it was too late to save Darrow. The irony was that, despite all their attempts at antisepsis, the virus had hitched a ride in the cleansing baths in which
they stored their surgical tools. The damn thing had hidden there during the trip out, having gone into a kind of sporulation, toughening an unusual outer envelope around itself. It was disheartening to think how smart microbes were, little specks of living matter that never went to university.

She gave instructions, and Petry went off to prepare for the meeting.

The meeting at which she must appoint a new captain.

Pulling out a fresh uniform, she buttoned the green jumpsuit.
Not
her best color—but the uniform reflected the quasi-military organization aboard the craft and made packing easier, God knew. They needed a chain of command, being thirty light-years from home—as the crow flies. Using the stellar-mass Kardashev tunnel, the trip was a good deal shorter, or she wouldn't be the only elder on the mission.

Bailey headed down the corridor to the science deck, passing a few crew members, who, by their expressions, had heard the news.
Now what are we going to do?
seemed to be everyone's reactions, including hers.

By contract, Bailey reserved the right to choose the ship's leader. Because it was her mission. She had paid for every bolt, bucket of paint, and frozen dinner on board. One billion alone for the opto-crystalline tronic cubes. So yes, this mission was hers. Also hers was the duty to keep the faith, to bolster the crew's enthusiasm for the mission: pursuing an alien message, alien claims. And just how
could
DNA code be reanimated? Even supposing the lost codes of Earth were salvaged from the Dark Cloud, it was still only information, not life.

The crew could afford to be skeptical. Being young, they hadn't seen as much sorrow as she had: the loved ones dead, whole cities perishing. Perhaps they felt they could skip faith. And its corollary, penance.

She didn't blame crew members for their doubts. The brief, alien message held no proofs, only a claim:
Come find what you have lost. Salvagedfrom the dark structure, your genetic heritage is sequestered here.
Even if it was a ruse, curiosity
alone would argue for a mission. And then, what if it was true?

People dithered about the Message for a hundred years. Before that, they weren't listening to space, being rather more preoccupied with reclaiming civilized life after the near extinction caused by the Dark Cloud. Once they
were
listening, they began analyzing the planet of origination; its presence could be discerned by the wobble of the parent star. The planet's edge-on alignment to Earth allowed astronomers to determine its atmospheric composition by identifying which wavelengths of starlight were dimmed by the atmosphere. The reason Bailey Shaw slapped her money down on the table was that the planet matched Earth. In such things as astronomical setting, mass, radius, and atmosphere, it was a perfect match. She had looked up at her staff—more accustomed to planning concerts and benefits than space voyages—and asked,
How much would it cost to go?

It wasn't such a surprising move on her part. She would never sing again. Despite having a voice like the very angels, even now, in her eighth decade … So she was
looking
for something to do. And here it was.

The trouble began when they arrived in orbit and grabbed a close resolution of that boat traffic along the rivers. The readouts from three hundred kilometers overhead were blurred, but unmistakable. Those beings using boats on the rivers were human. As the science team fell into denial and the crew whispered apprehensively, Bailey had stormed around the ship, claiming victory. It's all here, she'd proclaimed, just as the Message promised.

And the sweetest utterance of all: I told you so.

Well, on this mission there were good days and bad. The present one, as Bailey stood in front of the doors to the conference deck, was definitely one of the latter. But she called up a confident smile. Anton Prados and Nick Venning stood as she entered the room, but she waved them back into their seats.

They looked uncomfortable, these two young men who'd shared quarters all the trip out, who'd been classmates at officer candidate school—who now were competitors. It was appalling to think of appointing one of these twenty-four-year-olds to captain a ship worth billions and to preside over an alien contact. But what choice did she have?

“Anton,” Bailey said. “Nick.” She found a seat and let the pause lengthen.

“I'm sorry, ma'am,” Anton said.

No need to say what about.

Nick said, “He rallied for a bit yesterday. It's an ugly shock.”

They were a study in opposites. Anton Prados was slim and black-haired, a handsome dark Russian look. A little serious. Young.

Nick Venning was a little shorter, more stocky, sandy-haired. Good with the crew. Quick-witted. Young.

They kept looking at the door, expecting to see Phillip Strahan join them. He wouldn't be. Strahan was a systems engineer, and would be staying on board to keep the ship and its science deck operational. Bailey had decided against appointing Strahan around midnight, before turning her attention to the remaining choices.

She voiced the wall screen forward, choosing a real-time view of the planet, now displaying the hemispheric ocean. If there was a highly advanced civilization here, perhaps it was underwater. But no, ground radar surveys found nothing that looked artificial. Yet, having captured one of the four orbiting satellites broadcasting the Message to Earth, they'd found the engineering so highly advanced it was incomprehensible. Furthermore, the satellite was composed of a material the science team called transuranic—something about its atomic number being, well,
astronomically
high. The thing was built to last forever, although it could be destroyed—as evidenced by the debris of one former satellite that had perhaps succumbed to meteor bombardment.

But where were the beings who'd created these things?

And if they had abandoned this planet, how long had they been gone? The materials of the satellite couldn't be dated by conventional means, since they didn't decay.

Bailey found herself asking the young men, “Do you think we've come here for nothing?”

Nick leaned forward. “That's what we'll go down to see.”

“And you, Anton, what do you think?”

“If it's there, we'll find it.”
It
referring to the code, to the vanished life of Earth.

Nick hastened to add, “Even if we have to run that ocean through a sieve.”

The competition was heating up, the last thing she wanted. Especially since she'd already made up her mind.

“Bailey,” Anton said. “May I say something?”

“No fair,” Nick said, half joking. “No speeches.”

He waved Nick off, looking at Bailey. Getting her permission, he said, “I never looked for this post, Bailey. Never thought in a million years that I'd be considered to captain the
Restoration.
I don't know why Commander Strahan isn't in here, but I assume you've given him the job. I figure that's fair. You don't need to explain. Maybe you shouldn't explain why you didn't pick us.” He smiled. “For our morale.”

Nick looked at Bailey, in surprise. “Commander Strahan doesn't have the time in service that either one of us do. He might be older, but that doesn't make him a better officer.” He shifted uneasily in his chair.

Bailey held up her hands. “Don't jump to conclusions.” She knew whom she would pick, but she dreaded making it final. Either one of them could take command. They'd been trained for command, an eventual one. They'd both served under an excellent officer, none better. Along with the entire crew, they had been studying the native language for two years, on the approach to Neshar, after the language program had cracked the translation and assembled a decent lexicon. They were both fluent. As model officers and
good crewmates, they had dispatched themselves with equal ability. She liked them both.

But Anton was her favorite. He was not as decisive as Nick, nor as popular, though the crew liked him well enough. He kept himself the slightest bit apart. Of course, he was born to privilege, and it did show. She couldn't hold that against him, because in her classical singing career she had moved in wealthy circles. So, as for Anton's aristocratic bearing, Bailey thought she understood him. Nick, on the other hand, came from a humble background. He was book-smart if not wise, perhaps even impulsive. This quality made it easier for Nick to make a decision. So far, they'd all been good ones, but she'd only been watching him for three years.

She had to admit her choice wasn't entirely logical. The whole mission, for God's sake, was flying in the face of the
facts
, in favor of intuition.

“I've decided on Anton,” she said. She let that hang in the air.

Anton swallowed, looking stuck to his chair.

Nick closed his eyes. When he opened them, he turned to Anton and offered his hand. “Congratulations, Anton.” He smiled. “Captain.”

“My God, Nick,” Anton said. He took the hand. “Thank you.” Turning to Bailey, he began, “But Strahan—”

She held him off. “Commander Strahan is needed up here for the engineering side of things. He was never in the equation.” The other likely candidate, Lieutenant Brigid Dahlstrom, had succumbed to the virus two weeks ago.

Nick said, “Can I ask what you based your decision on?”

Bailey was grateful for the excuse that Anton had unwittingly provided. She said, “Perhaps
for the sake of morale
, I won't justify myself. Except to say this: Nick, you're the only anthropologist who isn't in the medical suite. You'll be on the ground mission, if the captain agrees.” Anton looked as though he
should
be in the medical suite.

She went on, “You'll be busy, Nick. Whoever is down
there, whatever the nature of that culture, you'll be doing the analysis, making the interpretations. You'll be busy” Anton's specialty was astrophysics, a discipline not especially needed at this juncture. He could be spared to lead the most important endeavor in the history of the world.

Anton turned to Bailey His dark eyes wavered. She wanted to comfort him, to tell him he was ready, although it wouldn't do to treat him like a grandson with a scraped knee. And she wasn't altogether sure he
was
ready, but the choices were few and time was wasting.

Nick clapped a hand on his friend's shoulder. “You'll do just fine, Anton. I'll be there to help you. OK?”

He got a smile in return. “I think I'm going to need it. Thanks.”

Bailey rose. “This was a tough call, tough on all of us. Now, let's get some sleep, if we can.” Before she turned to go, she paused long enough to say: “So, Anton, who's down there, then?” She tilted her head toward the wall screen, wondering what the
Restorations
new captain thought the mission was facing.

Anton's color had returned, and as he stood, he looked every bit a captain. “Humans,” he said. “Strangers.”

The concise summary gave her pause. This expedition would soon learn how human, how strange. She was more than ready to get on with it. To do, at the end of her life, one good thing. After a lifetime of self-indulgence, it was a nice plan.