The Well of Stars (19 page)
Authors: Robert Reed
The skimmer began to slow, seats reversed, and the passengers yanked into the deep foam. The gees weren’t difficult for Pamir, but his companion had only the ancient protein-spawning repair genes. Her back and legs were bruised, and without autodoc help, the purple blotches would remain visible and sore for days.
The landscape slowed to a crawl, and at a seemingly random spot, the ship quit moving beneath them.
“We walk,” he announced.
She donned her lifesuit without complaint or questions.
“It’s not far,” he promised.
But she hadn’t asked, and she didn’t seem to care now.
They were parked on a narrow path set in the midst of an enormous, silent, and utterly motionless forest. Shields and exploding bits of grit colored the sky. Vast dishes stood on both sides of them, rising high on elegant columns of diamond and optical cables. Hexagon-shaped dishes touched one another. No light fell beneath the telescopes, and the brutal cold only worsened in the smothering darkness.
“Follow my marker,” Pamir instructed.
The tall emissary walked stiffly, her eyes fixed on a tiny red light riding on the crest of his helmet.
“Keep close,” he advised.
But she didn’t have the strength to match the man’s pace. Age and the fresh bruises pulled her back, forcing her to call out, “I can’t see you now.”
“Stop walking,” Pamir advised.
She stopped and waited silently. Her breathing was a little quick, and her human heart raced to a normal degree. But as soon as her body recovered from its exertions, breath and the heart rate slowed again. Her own suit had several lights, but she didn’t use them. She
seemed utterly at ease in the blackness. Nothing could be visible to her eyes, and she was happy enough to smile.
seemed utterly at ease in the blackness. Nothing could be visible to her eyes, and she was happy enough to smile.
In the distance, the red beacon blinked back into view.
Pamir said, “Come on now.”
She held the line, every step accomplished with a blind faith that the hull was smooth and trustworthy. Only when she reached the beacon did she realize that it was higher than before, and the lifesuit beneath was as large her own. She hesitated. For an instant, her old-fashioned water-and-fat mind felt a perfectly ordinary confusion that was detected by an array of subcutaneous sensors.
“Who are you?” she asked.
The giant lifesuit turned slowly. A light came on inside the helmet, the golden face peering out through the faceplate, not quite smiling as the Master Captain said, “I need to ask you something, darling. Come with me.”
The emissary hesitated, then obeyed.
Sometime during the last few days, a fleck of ice had managed to fall through the lasers and shields, striking the hull with a flash and enough force to obliterate a hundred hectares of mirrors. The crater was shallow and white-gray, the hyperfiber able to realign its structure enough to recover most of its strength. Repair crews of robots and fef had been sent elsewhere. What were the odds that a second object would slip through the defenses and explode here? The odds were tiny, but no tinier than any other target zone, of course. What the Master wanted was open ground. What the psychobiologists found appealing was the dose of drama that came with this unexpected meeting. Put the emissary through humane amounts of abuse and worry, then throw her into a situation she could never have anticipated.
In the middle of the round clearing, black chairs had been set up.
Washen met the Master at the fringe, using the public channel to say, “Welcome, madam. And welcome to you, emissary.”
The creature gave a little nod.
“When did we talk last?” Washen inquired. “At the Master’s banquet, was it?”
“Yes.”
“I hope you’ve been enjoying your stay with us.”
A feeling of puzzlement ran through the emissary’s mind. But she had the poise to say, “I have enjoyed everything that I have seen.”
Her years had been spent inside a large apartment decorated with security enough for a prison cell. Except for a few carefully orchestrated trips, she had seen nothing, and not once, even in passing, had she asked for more freedom.
“What question may I answer?” the emissary wished to know.
Pointing with a long arm, the Master Captain said, “This way, please. If you would.”
The chairs were arranged in a widely spaced ring. When the emissary walked into the middle, the Submasters took their seats. Pamir was visible again, sitting on the Master’s left side. And Conrad filled the next chair, his single eye staring at the emissary as if he had never seen her before.
Washen was on the Master’s right. “Look up now,” she coaxed.
The sky was a splotch of deep indigo turning crimson at its margins.
“Of course we’re a little bit blind,” Washen confessed. “There’s a lot of noise and busy light to look past, and that keeps us from using these mirrors to their full potential. But still, we can piece together a few things.”
The sky changed. What lay beyond the shields burst into view, shifting from radio to the infrared range and back. The Satin Sack was a vast bubble of noise and tiny puddles of heat, elaborate structures and intricate details revealed suddenly. Ionized gas and ice looked like twisting threads, leading inevitably to clusters of warm water. One of the clusters was magnified, thousands of points appearing beside a standard scale. The
points were packed into a neat sphere barely one light-hour in diameter. Each was the size of a small moon, and with a reasoned tone, Washen said, “They’re children, of a kind. Buds, we’ve dubbed them.”
points were packed into a neat sphere barely one light-hour in diameter. Each was the size of a small moon, and with a reasoned tone, Washen said, “They’re children, of a kind. Buds, we’ve dubbed them.”
A quiet but intense voice said, “I would not know.”
“I believe you,” Washen said.
The image shifted again. Directly ahead of the ship lay the hole, the promised passageway, as cold and as empty as the rest of Sack was busy and bright.
“Our course,” Washen muttered.
The emissary gave a little nod.
“Still open and ready for us, it seems.”
“Seems?”
“To the limits of our eyes, it looks open. Yes.”
The emissary’s heart beat harder, and her breath sped up until it was audible—a nervous quick breathing that slurred her next words.
“I do not know … what you want …”
“Some weeks ago,” Washen explained, “we noticed a new phenomenon. Something odd or ordinary, but definitely an event that had to have been planned in advance.”
“Yes?”
“These threads here, these rivers of water and minerals … they seem to have been feeding the young polyponds, letting them acquire mass and raw materials.” She paused for a moment, then added, “Together, the rivers started to expand. You can’t see it yet, not with this resolution. But it’s obvious enough. The electromagnetic shackles have been relaxed. The ions are running away from each other, spreading out in all directions.”
The aging face nodded, nothing to say.
“Maybe the children have grown enough,” Washen allowed. “Maybe that’s as simple as any explanation needs to be.”
The view shifted suddenly, dramatically. Everyone stared at one of the nursery clusters, except this cluster
lay near the bottom of the Satin Sack. Two light-years distance, and the infrared signature was extraordinarily bright. Inside a narrow zone, each of the moon-sized children appeared as hot as plasma, portions of their watery bulk surging into space on a fountain that was not only hot but fiercely radioactive too.
lay near the bottom of the Satin Sack. Two light-years distance, and the infrared signature was extraordinarily bright. Inside a narrow zone, each of the moon-sized children appeared as hot as plasma, portions of their watery bulk surging into space on a fountain that was not only hot but fiercely radioactive too.
“The engines are crude but effective,” Washen relented. “Reaction-mass affairs powered by laser arrays driven by fusion reactors—systems we know something about.”
Silence.
“The most distant children are moving now,” she continued. “Of course, if they wish to come visit us … to come see the Great Ship at a closer vantage point … well, they would have to get an early leap on things. Which seems like a reasonable story to tell.”
“Yes, it does seem reasonable,” the emissary agreed.
“Except every child seems to be thinking the same way. The Sack is four light-years tall, and all of the buds on its margins are expending fabulous amounts of energy and their scarce water for no clear purpose other than to move toward us. They’ll have to destroy more than half of their mass just to make a close approach. And does that seem at all reasonable to you?”
Silence.
The Master Captain interrupted, saying, “We just want to know, dear. Do you have any idea what they’re trying to accomplish?”
Again, silence.
“And the Blue World,” said Pamir with a stern voice. “Your parent. She must have sprouted some kind of engine, too. Because after we passed by, she began flinging a huge hot jet of her own into space. She’s approaching us from behind, at a fantastic cost of mass and energy.” He sighed, then said, “At current rates, she’ll catch us just before we get clear of the Sack …”
His voice trailed away.
The other Submasters rose to their feet. But since none
of them were physically present—why accept all the risks of placing everyone on the exposed hull?—it was Pamir’s duty to walk across the face of the new crater, grabbing the emissary by her shoulder and tugging hard enough to make her lifesuit collapse at its knees.
of them were physically present—why accept all the risks of placing everyone on the exposed hull?—it was Pamir’s duty to walk across the face of the new crater, grabbing the emissary by her shoulder and tugging hard enough to make her lifesuit collapse at its knees.
Key enzymes had failed, bringing the hoary old Kreb’s cycle to a halt.
The emissary had died, while the sky above was filled with countless thousands of relentless, utterly determined giants.
The trickle crawls out from between two carved faces, and for a long little moment perches on the lamellated fringe of a pink granite beak, gathering itself, forming a bulb of clear cold water that borrows its color from the stone and its brilliance from the sky. It sparkles and shivers as its growing mass wrestles with the surface tension of its skin. Then a nearby voice speaks. The simple vibration is enough to shake the drop, causing it to flinch and break free and silently fall. The voice says, “We trust all the captains. Always, always.” The glistening drop plunges into a smooth and polished pocket at the base of the two stone Janusian faces, mixing with a thousand other drops. “But we trust her most,” says the voice. “Washen,” says a voice much like the first. “Though it’s good to have the Master Captain still at the helm,” says the first. “Of course we think that way” the second adds. Then after a lengthy pause, both voices declare, “Look into their one-faces. Nothing is more obvious than their best intentions.”
Janusians are born with just a single face, but upon maturation they find a worthy mate, and following a process older than their species, the tiny male lashes himself to his lover’s back with an array of elaborate and viciously hooked limbs. The hooks burrow deep, releasing anesthetics and sperm. The first merging takes several seasons. Immunologic systems adapt and marry. Two bodies link, blood vessels and limbs gradually joined. The position of the smaller head depends upon genetics and social conventions, but the male usually twists his head backward, watching for foes and missed opportunities. In ancient times, the two minds would remain separate and pragmatically unequal, the female ruling in every important circumstance. But then the Janusians embraced immortality. When two souls shared a single body and one set of circumstances, and did so for unbroken
aeons, they gradually and inexorably grew into a single entity. Simple habit accounted for the shared philosophy and a unified outlook, while nexuses and adventurous neurons built permanent neural bridges. When her face looked at the pool of blessing waters, both could enjoy her reflection. Then their shared body turned, and both looked at his smaller, equally pretty face, and together, the shared voices repeated, “We trust Washen. Her one-face knows what is best for the ship, and for us.”
aeons, they gradually and inexorably grew into a single entity. Simple habit accounted for the shared philosophy and a unified outlook, while nexuses and adventurous neurons built permanent neural bridges. When her face looked at the pool of blessing waters, both could enjoy her reflection. Then their shared body turned, and both looked at his smaller, equally pretty face, and together, the shared voices repeated, “We trust Washen. Her one-face knows what is best for the ship, and for us.”
Seepage fills the pool and gives birth to a thin and nameless stream that follows a narrow fissure—an elegant and perfectly straight seam cut in the floor of the worship park. Evaporation and thirsty creatures nearly drink it dry. But the last slow dampness reaches a tiny stream that eventually leaves the park, following a conduit cut through a thousand meters of cold granite and two meters of bracing hyperfiber. The conduit helps fill a little reservoir that is carefully poisoned with heavy metals. An AI shopkeeper sells the toxic water to the appropriate clients. Several local passenger species, one of them truly gigantic, will pay dearly for the leaden flavor of home to slake their thirsts. But they are rare clients, and there are issues of freshness. The shopkeeper purges the reservoir every eleven days, filtering out the useful metals while allowing the pure cheap water to run out the tap and across his diamond-tiled floor, then into the little river that slides past his shop.
He is a passionate machine and experienced in his trade, which is selling fluids of all kinds to all kinds. And with a machine’s endless energy, he will talk about any subject to any passerby.
“For one, I love this detour that our ship has taken,” he claims, speaking to a human woman, wearing a little crewman badge on her trousers. “No voyage is a voyage without a gale pushing you into unexpected seas. That’s what I believe.”
To a towering harum-scarum, he says, “I am so fond
of your species. And may I tell you, it was long ago when your sort should have been invited to sit among the captains!”
of your species. And may I tell you, it was long ago when your sort should have been invited to sit among the captains!”
Staring in either direction, he can see a full kilometer along the avenue, and with a glance, he recognizes most of the species. If traffic is slow, and if he sees a potential client approaching, he will step back into his shop and reconfigure his artificial body. There is no doubt that he is an AI. Pretend otherwise, and certain civil codes are tested, not to mention the social norms. But just as any shopkeeper knows the value of manners and a smiling expression, this machine knows how to make clients feel comfortable.
With a whiff of pheromones, he tells a paddywing, “Nectar like you haven’t had since you were green! Come try mine, please!”
To a passing Boil-dog, he sings, “Piss for a lover, I can make you!”
Dressed like a gillbaby, he claims, “I can freshen what you’re living inside, if you need. And at a fair price.”
After that sale, he spies a lone captain approaching. Again he steps inside his shop and steps out again, smiling with a decidedly human face. “Hello to you, honorable and noble sir. I hope the day smiles on you.”
The captain says, “And to you, sir,” while glancing at the apron of wet stone.
“A little something for the tongue, sir? A broth? A liquor? A sweet drink of your own invention, perhaps?”
“I cannot drink,” the captain confesses. “Sorry
.”
.”
The shopkeeper hadn’t noticed until now, but the captain is a projection. He is real in the way that moonlight is real, and he has been sent by one of the higher captains—
“Pamir,” the figure offers.
“I know you well, sir. I have followed your astonishing career with interest, and may I say—”
“No, please. don’t want to hear anything about me.”
The shopkeeper nods, then asks, “What may I say then?”
“You hear things, I would think.” The projection wants to know “What is the mood of the ship?”
“Confident,” the AI replies. “Excited. Eager to see what waits—”
“Bullshit.”
Unsure of a response, silence is best.
Then the projection adds, “But thank you for that lie. I know you meant well by it.”
Again, silence seems best.
“There is something I would like to buy. If I recall, you have an optical trap under your countertop.”
“No, I do not, sir.”
The projection smiles, waiting patiently.
The AI knows captains. If they think they are right, no argument works. The only hope is to show them the idiocy of their ways. With that in mind, the machine walks inside his shop—a spacious side cavern with a round wall covered with assorted taps and nipples and false penises and mouths as well as changeable ports that can be configured in an instant to fit the needs and preferences of any likely species. The counter itself is a tiny raised platform carved from slick onyx. Behind it is an assortment of invisible cubbyholes, all of which contain exactly what they are supposed to contain. But when the AI begins to say, “As you can see,” his odd guest points with a long hand, asking, “What about that?”
How odd. The machine hadn’t noticed that cubbyhole. Opening it with a touch, he is surprised and amazed and a little scared to find a small bottle filled with a grayish substance that has no weight whatsoever.
“Empty it into me,” Pamir says.
The shopkeeper complies immediately. An unknown quantity of raw data is absorbed by the tall bundle of shaped light.
“Now put it back again, please.”
The bottle records nothing but the opinions expressed by the shopkeeper. Passersby are not recalled—not their faces or voices, much less their names. The AI is a mirror,
of sorts. He is a template. To make a sale, he will put on any face or attitude, and both are cues to slippery moods of its clients.
of sorts. He is a template. To make a sale, he will put on any face or attitude, and both are cues to slippery moods of its clients.
“Thank you,” says the projection.
“You are welcome, I suppose. Sir.”
Together, they walk outside again.
“Perhaps I should ask—” the machine begins.
“You wouldn’t remember, even if I told you.”
Somehow, that seems like enough of an answer. The shopkeeper nods and looks down at the human shoes that he wears at this moment, glassy eyes watching the cool pure water slipping down into the passing river.
“How long have you had this shop?” the projection inquires.
“Since the first thousand years of the voyage, nearly.”
“And you drain this reservoir how often?”
“Every eleven days, ship-time.”
“But the stone isn’t worn,
” the rumbling low voice points out. “You see? If you’d been here for a thousand centuries, and if every eleven days you drained this one reservoir, not to mention your other stockpiles …”
” the rumbling low voice points out. “You see? If you’d been here for a thousand centuries, and if every eleven days you drained this one reservoir, not to mention your other stockpiles …”
“I do not understand” the machine confesses.
But he is alone suddenly and what he doesn’t understand is why he is speaking to himself.
The little river flows to the end of the avenue, dives through another long conduit, and after being heated to the brink of boiling, the water is shoved up into a mass of black mud and dirty bubbles of methane. Inside a diamond bubble, a thousand creatures sit in the soft scalding mud. For the last twenty thousand years, this is where they have lived. Every need flows to them. Every curiosity is answered by nexuses and glow-screens and other standard tools. Their species has no common name, just a set of numbers and letters designated by the captains who admitted them to the Great Ship. They are intensely social creatures, but only with their own kind. Paradise is a hot wet realm full of stink and sudden fires and the musical
roar of farts, great voices rising up through the steam, telling one another. “This herd did not pay for the wrong path. Steer toward our destination, as promised, or we demand our fees returned in full … !”
roar of farts, great voices rising up through the steam, telling one another. “This herd did not pay for the wrong path. Steer toward our destination, as promised, or we demand our fees returned in full … !”
The water is cleaned again and set free again, merging with another little river before a long, spiraling fall through a series of fresh caverns and long avenues. Each chamber differs in the native rock and the steepness of the slope, in its width and height and how the terrain has been shaped. Billions of years ago, unknown hands worked with rock and hyperfiber, fractals and the demands of engineering, contriving clifflike walls and granite shoulders and mock-faults and too many side caverns to count. Even ceilings refuse to be predictable: Hyper-fiber forms ribs or fat arches or interwoven domes, and, depending on the grade, they are as bright as mirrors or gray as cold smoke. Or there are stone ceilings braced with little spines of hyperfiber—pink granites or black basalts or bright green olivines, or cultured ruby or diamond or sapphires, singly or mixed into an elaborate but seemingly accidental stew of glittering faces. There are no artificial skies. The only lights are small and occasional, and simple, casting a feeble white glow over the river’s busy face. There is no soil on the shoreline and no intentional life anywhere. For the moment, this drainage is being held in reserve. Much of my interior is the same. For all the billions of passengers, there is little need to open up most of my emptiness. After more than a hundred thousand years, I remain mostly wilderness, a realm of untouched stone and empty spaces hovering on the brinks of Time.
The river steals up minerals from the surrounding stone, feeding a few patient microbes, while some presentient machines turn parasitic, milking power from the occasional light. Sometimes tourists wander in here and out again, leaving behind intense little colonies of life on their wastes and discarded meals. A tuft of gray-green marks a rotting sandwich. A bluish smear is all that remains
of an enormous fecal pile. Then there is the tourist who never left—a biped of some obscure species who wandered into this cavern alone, scaled the enormous clifflike wall, and at the worst possible moment lost his grip on his inadequate rope. The fall shattered both of his legs and both of his spines. The essential equipment that he carried with him was left high above, out of reach. Immortal but lacking a human’s relentless repair mechanisms, he had no choice but to remain where he lay Then starvation and thirst drove him into a deep coma, and what survives today sits in a little bowl just three meters above the waterline—a mummified body that has not moved in the last eighteen centuries.
of an enormous fecal pile. Then there is the tourist who never left—a biped of some obscure species who wandered into this cavern alone, scaled the enormous clifflike wall, and at the worst possible moment lost his grip on his inadequate rope. The fall shattered both of his legs and both of his spines. The essential equipment that he carried with him was left high above, out of reach. Immortal but lacking a human’s relentless repair mechanisms, he had no choice but to remain where he lay Then starvation and thirst drove him into a deep coma, and what survives today sits in a little bowl just three meters above the waterline—a mummified body that has not moved in the last eighteen centuries.
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