Pandora's Star

by Peter F. Hamilton

  Paula walked in to be greeted by the assistant, a young woman whose clothes were all chosen from the racks around the shop. For a moment Paula found herself studying the woman a little too closely, but what exactly did someone designed to be a shop assistant look like? Same as you, she told herself crossly, an ordinary person. There was no specific shop assistant caste anyway. All the fixed dominant gene would give her was a behavioural trait for public service. She could just as easily have been a cook or librarian or gardener. It was only after primary school, which took them up to age twelve, that people on Huxley’s Haven started to choose what sort of specialty they wanted to follow within their pre-determined sphere of interest.

  The assistant smiled faintly as she took in Paula’s clothes. ‘Can I help you, miss?’

  It took a second for Paula to realize that she still looked younger than the assistant, even in a formal suit. ‘I don’t need clothes, sorry, I’m looking for directions to the Denken house.’

  ‘Ah yes.’ The assistant was almost pleased at the question, as if it was what she expected an offworlder to ask. ‘It’s on Semley Avenue.’ She gave Paula a string of directions, and asked, ‘If you don’t mind me asking, why do you want to visit him?’

  ‘I need some advice.’

  ‘Really? I didn’t know Commonwealth citizens used our freethinkers.’

  ‘They don’t. I was born here.’ She grinned at the woman’s startled expression.

  Semley Avenue was still the same, a street of bungalows with tidy front gardens. The exception were the pines and conifers planted along the edge of the pavement, which had been tended properly over the intervening century and a half to grow into huge sturdy trees. Their strong scent mingled with the fresh breeze coming in off the sea, giving the avenue a restful quality. It put her in mind of a retirement village.

  The Denken house was the last bungalow before the avenue opened out into a swathe of parkland that ran along the top of the cliffs. It was bigger than all the others, in itself a bit of a novelty on a world where everyone earned the same salary no matter what their job. At some time someone had built a big brick annexe on the side, with a few simple high slit windows. It didn’t really match the rest of the bungalow’s chalet-style architecture.

  Paula walked up the little path to the front door, and rang the tarnished brass bell. The garden was subtly different to all the neighbours, who favoured rigid layouts of lawns, flower-beds with colourful annuals, and the occasional stone birdbath or sundial. This garden was lined with evergreen shrubs to provide a range of pastel colours, and the lawn hadn’t been mown for a week or more.

  Paula was just about to press the bell button again when a man’s voice said, ‘Coming, coming,’ somewhere inside the house. A moment later the door was opened by a tall man in his mid-thirties, with untidy shoulder-length brown hair that already had several grey strands appearing. He was wearing a much-creased turquoise-blue T-shirt and a pair of lemon-yellow shorts. ‘You’re early.’ He gave Paula a bleary look. ‘Oh, couldn’t your mother come?’

  ‘I don’t have a mother.’ She could see his ancestor’s face. His cheeks were rounder, and the hair was darker, but that nose was the same, as were his expressive green eyes. The slight bafflement at everyday life was identical, too.

  The man rubbed his face as if he’d just woken up, and looked closer. ‘My my, an offworlder. What are you doing here?’

  ‘Are you Denken?’

  ‘Leonard Denken. Yes?’

  ‘I’m Paula Myo, and technically I’m not an offworlder.’

  Leonard Denken frowned, then a startled expression appeared. He straightened up, suddenly wide awake. ‘Oh my, oh my, yes of course, the last stolen baby. My grandfather! No! It was my great-grandfather who advised you. My father always talked about that.’

  ‘I need some more advice.’

  Leonard gasped, then smiled broadly. ‘Come in, please, do come in. I’m sorry about the mess. My mind isn’t quite as tidy as people expect. The house reflects that. Matilda keeps threatening to tidy up, but I haven’t had a chance to compile an index, yet. One day. Yes, one day.’

  There were books piled up along both walls in the long hall, hardbacks and leather-bound tomes. Some of the stacks reached up to Paula’s shoulder, looking terribly unsafe. ‘I need to get myself some more bookshelves,’ Leonard said apologetically as he caught her looking round. ‘There are several carpenters in the street, but I just haven’t got round to asking them yet. I need wood, too.’

  He led her into the big annexe, which was a single room. ‘My father intended this to be our library,’ he said. ‘But I seem to have subverted that, a little.’

  Every wall was fronted by bookcases that reached from floor to ceiling, with every inch of space taken up. Leonard was now building new piles along the floor. It was only the back wall which had high slit windows, long since covered by shelving. The front had two large arched French doors which opened onto the bungalow’s main garden, and gave a superb view out over the cliffs and sea beyond. A big old desk had been set up in front of one, awash with magazines, papers, books, and cardboard files.

  ‘Please sit down.’ Leonard gestured to a spindly antique seat in front of the desk. ‘Matilda! Matilda, we have a guest. Would you like some tea? Or coffee? I’m afraid I don’t have any Commonwealth brands. I do have some passable sherry.’ He looked around as if he was in a strange room until he saw an old grandfather clock. ‘Or maybe it’s too early?’

  ‘Tea will be fine, thank you.’

  A girl came through the door.

  ‘This is Matilda,’ Leonard said. The adoration in his voice was almost embarrassing for an outsider. His face had taken on a dreamy quality as he smiled at her.

  Paula, who was used to the sequenced and modified women of the Commonwealth, was surprised by how beautiful Matilda was. She was in her early twenties, with delicate cheek bones that still managed to give her strong features, complemented by wide ice-blue eyes that allowed her an unnervingly piercing stare. Her hair was the fairest blond, and she’d let it grow very long. Right now it was gathered into a single braid that fell all the way along her spine to the top of her narrow hips. She was also tall, with long legs whose perfect shape was produced by muscles that any dancer would envy. Paula could see that easily; all Matilda wore was a small pair of red bikini bottoms and a cut-off white T-shirt. Her skin had a rich healthy tan.

  When Paula looked out of the open French doors again, she saw the towels on the garden where the two of them must have been sunbathing.

  ‘I’d like you to meet Paula Myo, our very distinguished guest from the Commonwealth,’ Leonard said.

  ‘Hi,’ Matilda said. ‘What can I get you?’

  ‘Just some tea, thank you,’ Paula said.

  ‘Sure.’ Her smile was guileless. Paula found herself smiling back.

  ‘Isn’t she lovely?’ Leonard asked when the girl had left. He was as shy and eager as a teenager who’d unexpectedly found himself dating the prom queen. ‘I’m going to ask her to marry me. I think. There’s nothing I want more, but . . . I’m a little bit older than her. Not that she’s ever said anything about that.’

  ‘Don’t wait too long,’ Paula said. ‘There’ll be another hundred men wanting to ask the same question if you don’t. And she’s where she wants to be. That ought to tell you something.’

  ‘Yes, oh yes, you’re quite right.’ He caught himself and sighed. ‘I’m sorry. I’m not supposed to be asking you for advice.’

  ‘It’s okay. I’ve had a lot more experience with these kinds of things. And I’m used to seeing age differences over a century or more. Love normally wins out.’

  ‘Yes, yes, of course. I must say this is something of a shock having you come to me. That’s why I’m not handling this well. Your letters to my great-grandfather are around here somewhere.’ He waved a hand at the library’s piles. ‘I read them when I took over from my father. You had just qualified to be some kind of detective in the Commonwealt
h govern-ment.’

  Paula had forgotten the letters she’d written. At first they’d been a welcome contact with the one person in the galaxy who seemed to understand her; then when her insecurities had slowly abated she wrote out of politeness. Eventually, of course, her job took up so much of her time . . . It was a very tired excuse. She should have realized Alexis would have kept the letters. It had been a very intense affair during the short time it lasted. ‘Yes, I qualified as an investigator. I’ve been successful, too. No false modesty.’

  He smiled in that proud way that stirred up a few too many old memories. ‘Of course you succeeded. You’d be the best they ever had. Not that they’d ever admit that.’

  ‘I have your great-grandfather to thank. He was the one who told me to go. He knew that I wouldn’t be happy here, not after being exposed to so much of the Commonwealth.’

  ‘I’d dispute that; but I’m not him, and you’ve obviously flourished. I have to ask, and I’m sorry if this is intrusive, but do you ever have any doubts about rejuvenation, you’ve obviously been through the process several times. I think you were a teenager when you left Huxley’s Haven.’

  ‘No, no doubts. Not ever. There is so much crime out there.’

  ‘And nobody else can do the job.’

  She pulled a face. He was very similar to Alexis. ‘A few might manage,’ she admitted.

  ‘I’m asking because rejuvenation is the one thing that is debated endlessly by my caste. We simply cannot decide if we should adopt it here.’

  ‘I’d say it was contrary to your whole ethos. This society was formed so people could live their lives and be content. A great deal of that contentment comes from a natural cycle which lies undisturbed, and was never sequenced in by the Foundation. They just gave you the ability to enjoy what was available within a relatively simple framework – at least compared to majority Commonwealth culture. There will always be a job for you whoever you are, a job, or purpose that you will enjoy, and you will be rewarded financially by it no more or no less than anyone else. If you introduce rejuvenation you will start to expand beyond the rate sustainable by your current economy. And your current technoeconomy is the only one suitable for fixed-trait castes. The best the Foundation could sequence in was behaviour suitable for a particular profession, along with a few extras like dexterity for doctors. But you simply can’t produce dedicated fusion techs or microbiologists. Those kinds of profession have too many requirements – there’s no single recognizable aptitude. To support a more modern economy you’d have to de-specialize the traits to the point where they’d effectively be dissolved. You’d wind up with normal humans living in an economy that was ideologically driven rather than needs related. There’d be nothing to stop them going and getting a better-paid job on another planet, especially after a couple of centuries of going in to work in the same office.’

  ‘Goodness me, and I thought freethinkers such as myself were the only ones who could put together solid logical arguments.’

  Matilda returned with a tray carrying mugs of tea. ‘Don’t let him distract you,’ she said as she gave Paula her mug. ‘He’s a very bad freethinker. He always asks questions, he never answers them.’

  ‘To think about things, I have to know about them first.’

  Matilda gave Paula a told-you-so shrug as she gave Leonard his mug.

  ‘What do you do?’ Paula asked.

  ‘I’m a nurse. I work at the maternity ward of the local hospital. I like children.’ She gave Leonard a meaningful glance. He blushed.

  Paula wanted to snap at him, for God’s sake ask her. There was way too much recycled history in this house. A static, timeless society was one thing, but you could take it to extremes. At the time, over a century and a half ago, she’d been younger than Matilda, while Alexis had been older than Leonard. It had broken Alexis’s heart having her leave, and he’d been the one who pushed her out knowing it was the only way for her to have a future. Although, if she could have been happy anywhere on Huxley’s Haven it would have been here with him. That was the trouble with freethinkers – they had overactive imaginations which made them uncertain. Maybe that’s why they’re always men. The Foundation just amplified their natural inability to make a commitment.

  Matilda looked from her lover to Paula. ‘I’m going to leave you two alone to talk. Let me know if you need anything else.’ She kissed Leonard on the forehead, and went back out into the garden. As she slipped out of her scraps of clothing to lie on the towel, Paula had a memory flash of Mellanie and Morton, a couple she could really do with forgetting about.

  ‘Aren’t you the perfect counter to your own argument, though?’ Leonard said.

  ‘Somebody recently claimed my Foundation trait was obsessive-compulsive disorder. He was an idiot, but he might have had a point. It is an excellent quality for a police officer to have. My type are probably the only kind who can adapt to the Commonwealth.’ She paused, troubled by where her thoughts were leading. ‘Freethinkers, as well, possibly.’

  Leonard held his mug in both hands, and peered at her over the rim. ‘We’re not quite as free as people think. If I had to define us it would be as psychiatrists for society. The Foundation considered us necessary to assist this world, address questions and problems beyond the norm. As a collective, we are effectively the politicians. Our council is supposed to provide alternatives which everyone else gets to vote on.’ His expression softened. ‘It’s a bit of a myth that everyone else is sequenced to do as we tell them. Though I have to admit, were it true, the possibilities for dictatorship are fabulous.’

  ‘I don’t think you’d make a very good dictator, Leonard.’

  ‘No, I suppose you’re right. It is an irony that we are known for our micro work rather than our macro. I really do get treated as the local psychiatrist, you know. Any slightly out of the ordinary problem, and this house is the first stop.’

  ‘I’m as guilty of that as all the others.’

  ‘I understand. So what did you come here for?’

  ‘You might need to prepare some options for this planet. Have you been following the news about the Dyson Pair and the Prime aliens who live there?’

  ‘Dear me, yes, it’s been in the newspapers, though I’m afraid we don’t have many column inches devoted to Commonwealth affairs; but I have received briefing papers from the Commonwealth office here in Fordsville. Are you connected with that?’

  ‘I used to be.’ She started to tell him what had happened.

  Two hours later, when she’d finished, Leonard’s face had taken on a somewhat daunted look. He pressed both hands to his temples and exhaled loudly. ‘Apart from me going up to this Rafael Columbia character and punching him soundly on the nose, I don’t see there is much I can do to help you. Have you really been working on the same case for over a hundred and thirty years?’

  ‘Yes. It’s not in my nature to quit.’

  ‘No. No, of course not. I’m sorry, I’m just not used to working with this sort of timescale. So what exactly do you want to do next?’

  ‘My instinct is to catch Johansson.’

  ‘Yes, I can see that. Well, of course I do have some discretionary power, it’s in the Foundation’s charter. I can have the Treasury pay you a monthly salary. It won’t be much, but it will leave you free to pursue this diabolical man without worrying about money.’

  Paula laughed somewhat unkindly. She was beginning to think she’d made a huge mistake coming here. But it was just an instinctive thing to do. He was a freethinker, and the last link she’d have with Alexis. She let her gaze wander round the library, wondering what she would have done with the bungalow if she had stayed; the paint, furniture, wallpaper that could be used to lift away the air of academic shabbiness. ‘Leonard, for a hundred and fifty years the Commonwealth has been paying me a good salary and even better expenses. I finished paying for my apartment a hundred and eight years ago. I eat most meals in the staff canteen. All I buy are six suits a year, and some casual clothes. Af
ter my R & R pension, all my money is paid into an SI-managed fund account. It adds up, even with inflation. I don’t need financing, but thank you for the offer.’

  ‘Then how am I going to help you?’

  ‘Freethinkers are supposed to be objective with the larger picture. I wanted your opinion on what I should be doing. Even though that comes perilously close to absolution.’

  ‘What’s religion . . . no, forget that. Are you saying I should tell you what to do next?’

  ‘Convince me, possibly. And yes, I appreciate you don’t do specifics.’

  ‘I’m not even sure I can handle an overview in your case. What options have you got? It is in your nature never to give up. You know Johansson belongs in custody. Use your talent, Paula, catch him.’

  ‘But should I?’ she murmured. Even saying it sent a cold shiver along her arms.

  ‘Why shouldn’t you?’

  ‘What if he is right? What if there is a Starflyer, a malicious alien that has been influencing human politicians?’

  ‘Dear me, is that likely? It does sound suspiciously like a conspiracy theory to me.’

  ‘I know. But there are an increasing number of inconsistencies in the case that I’m having difficulty with. Until now it did look like Johansson had very simple motivations, that the Guardians were formed first to help him steal the money from Las Vegas, then to cover up his subsequent lifestyle and allow him to live off the proceeds. But if he’s right, and the Starflyer did somehow push us into the flight to Dyson Alpha, it would explain a lot of things. For one, he has never wavered in projecting his belief in the Starflyer. The only other person I know who could maintain such a constant position after so much time is me.’

  ‘Ah, now I understand why you have come to me. This is a moral question. Should you drop your pursuit of Johansson, even though you know for certain he has committed crimes, and go after the Starflyer, whose existence as yet remains unproven.’