by Larry Niven
The square dance ended with cheers and a thunderous round of applause, and the hall emptied into the quad.
Mary Ann worked her way to him through the press, holding a foaming mug. She panted, face glowing and sticky with perspiration. “Cad, you’re such a stick. Why won’t you dance?”
“War wound. Both legs blown off. Medics screwed up, sewed two left feet on.”
She stuck her tongue out.
“Look on the bright side: somewhere out there is a guy with two right feet, killing ’em at the Waldorf.”
“You’re just ashamed of me. You don’t want anyone to see us together.”
Carlos nodded sagely. “It is true. Many times he has told of how he likes to hide you away in the dark, covering you with his own body if need be—”
“Carlos—”
Martinez took the hint. “I’ve got to get ready for the rapids.”
“Turning into a tradition, isn’t it?”
“Around here, anything that happens twice is a tradition.”
Carlos disappeared into the crowd.
The day just felt so damn good.
Contests and exhibitions had been running since breakfast. Cadmann had watched the archery and wrestling, cheering but not competing. Soon would begin the three-day boat race between the honeymooning couples. That he would enjoy! Then the dance contest . . . silliness, that was really all it was, but he had to admit that he was catching the bug.
True, he was pleasantly drunk. (Who had brewed the beer? If he could work out a private deal with that worthy—say, fresh melon cactus every month in exchange, for a keg?) He felt more comfortable around the camp than he had in months.
But something was pulling him back from wholehearted participation. A voice that was weakening by the minute. Or the mug. Whatever.
He politely squelched a burp.
Watching Mary Ann dance was good for him. He hadn’t had a chance to really compare her with the other women.
There was no question that they were a couple: she had fixed the judges, bribed his cornermen and KO’d him before he even knew the fight was on. But it warmed him to feel a healthy physical tug when a twirl or gust of wind raised her skirts. Her hard work up at Cadmann’s Bluff had trimmed away fat and added healthy muscle. The pregnancy didn’t show yet, but there was something special about her. She did glow . . .
She squashed her lips against his in a beery kiss. “Cad—when are you going to—” her face changed in the middle of the question, became more mischievous—“dance with me?”
Shoot the rapids with me?
The real question was behind the smile, behind the laugh. It lived in the way she leaned against him, letting him feel the muted fire in her belly.
What the hell. It’s just a formalization. Why not? But not now. Not on holotape, for God and the whole world to see.
“Later,” he promised. “You’ll see.”
The stands on the north edge of the quad displayed a mosaic of the Colony’s artistic craftsmanship. Cadmann was startled and gratified by the breadth and reach of the work on display. These people had not been chosen for artistic talent. They had hidden depths.
Here was a kinetic sculpture, a globe filled with clear fluid, holding iron flakes spiraling in a slow nebula of magnetic flux. There, a painting of Avalon’s twin moons setting over the bramble bushes. The artist had precisely captured the mauve sunset.
Mounted on a linen-covered table was a sculpture of woven, wired and glued bones. Hundreds of samlon and pterodon bones, sliver thin, formed and painted into a golden bull. As a sumi painting suggests flight or motion with the barest strokes, somehow the bull was challenging and frightened, bursting with animal power and aching vulnerability. The artist’s signature was simply “Sylvia.”
Cadmann glanced over his shoulder, suddenly wondering if anyone was watching him study the incredible piece, then forced himself to move on.
Next to it was a cameo of native obsidian, and several of Carlos’s scandalous thornwood carvings. They would have been right at home on the wall of a Nepalese temple, and Cadmann was suddenly glad that none of the children were old enough to point and ask embarrassing questions.
The crowd was flowing into the meeting hall. Food must be ready to serve. Cadmann followed the flow. He claimed two empty seats next to Terry’s wheelchair.
Mary Ann brought two plates piled with Bobbi’s samlon sushi, with a dab of the precious powdered wasabi horseradish shipped from Earth; fresh spinach pasta, fresh tomato marinara, whole-grain wheat bread. Most of the food was from the fields and the nets. Avalon was yielding up her harvest, making what reparations she could for the damage done to her newest, strangest children.
Terry ate quietly, slowly chewing each mouthful into liquid. Always thin, he seemed to have gained a few pounds since his injury, and it made his face less pinched and severe. “I approve,” he said neutrally.
It took a beat for Cadmann to realize Terry was talking to him. “Food’s pretty good,” he agreed.
“No. You and Mary Ann. Good match.” Terry took another careful mouthful. Cadmann noticed the streaks of gray hair coursing through the curly brown. “How are things up there on the mesa?”
“Nice. Quiet.” Cadmann glanced at Mary Ann. “Wait until Sylvia has the baby. Come on up for dinner.”
“I’d like that, if we can get this damned chair into a Skeeter.”
“Sure, we can do that. Or have Carlos make you a folding model.”
The projection equipment was wheeled out to the center of the floor. An enlarged holofield shimmered like a heat mirage: the faces and figures against the far wall were pale, wavering ghosts.
The lights dimmed. The holoimage hardened, and the speakers piped in sound.
A motorboat was being lowered down the ravine and into the river below the dam. The boat was a ten-foot black oval, tough synthetic elasticized skin stretched over a metal frame, two low seats and crescent steering wheel mounted in the front. The Skeeter-type engine aft looked too big for the boat. The plastic-sealed knob of a holotape recorder showed above the central mast.
It had reached the water. A second, identical boat dropped to join it.
Sylvia came to sit between Cadmann and Terry, and she smiled shyly as she lowered herself uncomfortably to her seat.
“You look ready,” Mary Ann said.
“You know it. Now Marnie’s saying next week! Cadmann, don’t ever get pregnant.” Her complexion was a little blotchy. She wheezed with relief as she settled herself, balancing a plate heaped with food in her hands.
“I’ll remember that,” he said. “Last time Mary Ann gets on top.”
“Hush.”
Someone yelled, “Ta-ta-ta-daah!” as Elliot Falkland and his fiancée, La Donna, dashed to the center of the floor amid a rowdy chorus of cheers. “Chunky!” Falkland was all grin and jug ears and peeling tan, with a body almost twice the size of La Donna’s. But the little woman was known as an indefatigable construction worker. Behind Cadmann, Andy guffawed something about La Donna “sweating that blubber off Elliot before they reach the ocean.”
Cadmann raised a cheer as Carlos and Bobbi joined the first couple. Carlos swept off a broad-brimmed hat in a low, gallant bow. Somehow, even dressed in denims, Bobbi managed a shy curtsey.
Carlos rushed over to Cadmann and Mary Ann. He wore a yellow safety vest, and skintight rubber pants. He carried a bedroll in his left hand. He and Bobbi would take the boat all the way to the ocean, camping along the way. Three days later they would be picked up by Skeeter, officially married.
Cadmann chortled to himself, guessing that Carlos would triple-check that the recording equipment was off before turning in for the evenings . . .
“Wish me luck, amigo. Falkland has more water experience than we do.”
“More than anyone but the samlon. He’s got flippers for feet.” Elliot Falkland and Jerry minded the catfish ponds downriver. Falkland also coordinated the underwater repair operations and had overseen the constru
ction of the dam. That was where he had come to know La Donna. “Anyway, it’s not when you get there, it’s how.”
“Loser paints the winner’s house.”
“I see your point. Kill him.”
“Señor Falkland sleeps with the fishes.”
“Good luck,” Terry and Sylvia chimed.
Carlos shook hands with the men, kissed the women, then hustled out to supervise the lowering of his boat.
Sudden envy stirred in Cadmann. A three-day trip down the river would be a nice honeymoon. But we had ours while we built the camp, and it was fine!
The holofield flickered to a different vantage point. An aerial view of the Skeeter pad swiftly expanded to take in the entire camp. Cadmann’s stomach lurched—the reaction he always had when in the air under another’s control.
The Skeeter zoomed and veered explosively, rose straight up, then dive bombed the Civic Center. There was clapping, cheering and groaning. The holofield was expanded to fill the room, the magnification bleaching a little of the color from the image.
The three-dimensional aerial panorama was stunning, especially when it veered east, across the Miskatonic. There, Camelot, their new community, was already blocked out.
Camelot wasn’t the cramped curlicue of the first year’s temporary dwellings. It would be Avalon’s first permanent city, and was designed as such. Now that the crops were established, there was time to work on a more leisurely layout. Camelot covered a square kilometer of homes, boulevards, parks and meditation groves, recreation centers . . .
Each plot of land was huge, larger than any of them could have afforded on Earth. Unbelievable wealth by any standard that they had left behind. And room for almost infinite expansion, as their worms and insects and terraforming lichens churned Avalon’s soil into something that the less hardy plants and animals could use. Mineral supplementation and acid balancing created an ideal medium for their crops. Huge homes, ranch houses. Mansions that would one day overlook gracious estates.
Room for a man to grow!
The boat engines were no longer ear-jarring burrs, and the Skeeter zipped off to follow the race. The camp cheered, bets flying and changing: Who would be the first through the rapids? They were twenty kilometers from the northern mountains, and it would be a while before the real action began, a few minutes before the boats worked their way through the dam locks.
In the meantime, the band had apparently rested long enough. Zack mopped his forehead with a bandanna and yelled, “All right—we’ve got enough time for a couple more turns around the floor. Let’s get it moving!”
He shouldered his fiddle. His fingers danced across the strings, producing sounds of surprising sweetness.
Hey there ladies, grab your man
Hold that lad as tight as you can—
Sylvia’s hand sneaked around behind Cadmann and tapped Mary Ann twice, sharply, and they exchanged a silent message.
It’s a conspiracy. I’m doomed . . .
Mary Ann stood, politely but firmly pulled his plate from his hand. Setting her heels into the composition floor, she dragged him to his feet.
Sylvia and Terry and the surrounding crowd howled at his obvious discomfort, and Cadmann let that bolster him.
“It’s been a long time,” he whispered, “and I am sore wounded.” He was relieved that others were moving out on the floor. They formed a square with Hendrick and Phyllis.
In a few moments, there were squares all over the hall, and Zack was calling and fiddling, the band was playing, and Cadmann’s considerations were lost in the urge to keep the rhythm and watch his feet.
Mary Ann was an excellent square dancer, and she pulled him along with her into the mood. Soon Cadmann was part of an interweaving pattern of human rectangles, do-si-do-ing and skip-stepping as their square broke and reformed, changed places and swiveled joyously around the floor. Sharp reminders from half-healed wounds eased as he warmed up. The seated observers whistled and clapped and stomped their feet.
Before he realized it, Cadmann was grinning and sweating and thoroughly convinced that he was keeping better time than anyone out there.
At the end of an hour the dance broke up with a spontaneous cheer and hugs all around, and Cadmann’s drunken whoop was as loud as any. What the hell—this is your family. You need them—at least Mary Ann does. And don’t be surprised that square dancing makes you feel like part of the community. Earth magic, that’s what it is. What it’s always been.
The holofield projector was wheeled back to the center of the quad. Once again the air shimmered, causing squeals of delight—Carlos’s boat had breached the rapids, and it was deliciously easy for Cadmann to lose himself in the illusion.
He was aboard their boat, hovering directly above Carlos’s shoulders as he spun the wheel, guiding the boat through the rushing water. The water was beginning to churn white, and there an outcropping of glistening wet rock scraped the side of the inflatable. The boat jumped, and beside him Bobbi screamed delightedly.
Elliot’s boat was right behind him, and with a jolt the holofield changed its perspective. La Donna was at the wheel, and the couple were whooping it up more than competing. As the boat hit each spill, they grabbed each other in mock fear, mugging ferociously for the cameras.
The water grew whiter, choppier, and the race was really on. The river was narrower and faster here, and the towering walls of the northern mountains rose up around them in jagged iron-gray sheets.
Elliot coaxed his engine to sharper life. With a sure hand La Donna wove them through the rocks. Every dip, every eddy was breathtakingly real, three times larger than life.
The water splashed up and licked at them, and Cadmann wiped at his face reflexively. Elliot’s boat shot a short falls, landed flat bellied, with a crash and a whoop from the hall.
The image switched back to Carlos, who was looking back over his shoulder at the approaching boat.
Cadmann’s palms were sweaty and shaking. It was almost impossible to resist the urge to roll up his sleeves and grab a pole: there was a rock spur! Ah, good. Bobbi, with movements as quick and light as the flicker of a whip, nudged their boat away from it.
Everyone was cheering now, and it grew riotous as the image switched from one perspective to the other; the gap between the boats narrowed, and the race finally became nose to nose. The river narrowed as it sluiced through a gap between two towering slabs of rock, and Carlos narrowly held his lead, Elliot coming up fast.
Then, as they came out of it, and the way widened again, Elliot rammed Carlos from the rear. La Donna squealed as their boat hit a rock and lurched in a drunken circle. Elliot cursed fluidly as Carlos’s craft shot past.
Elliot’s boat spun twice, dipped and swung perilously and then finally stabilized.
The hologram switched to Carlos’s craft and a triumphant Bobbi shaking her fist at Elliot as they widened the distance.
Carlos gunned the motor fully, and their boat rose in the water and shot north toward the ocean. Far behind them now, Elliot opened his throttle and skimmed along the surface, churning the water into white as he roared in pursuit.
Rock walls flashed by. Cadmann’s heart thundered as he remembered the sheer speed of the boats, their near-hydrofoil design that kept a minimum of prow in the water, minimizing drag.
Fast!
But then . . .
“Switch back!” someone yelled, and suddenly they were with Carlos’s boat, and it was in trouble. Something was terribly wrong, and the boat was spinning—
Another rock? But Carlos’s face was distorted, and he was grabbing for Bobbi, screaming something unintelligible. The boat seemed to be collapsing, the holoimage buckling and blurring. The last image that they had was of rocks and water and churning foam, and a brief glimpse of Bobbi tumbling through the foam toward the rocks, thrashing her hands frantically as she disappeared beneath the surface of the water.
♦ChaptEr 16♦
on the cliff
All men think all men mortal,
save themselves.
—Edmund Young, Night Thoughts
First there was a humming. Mama was a good distance from the water, and her mouth was full of blood and feathers. She looked for insects swarming. If she found the nest she would eat it whole . . .
But the swarm sound was louder now, and too uniform, and there were no dark clouds that could be insects. Something strange, in unfamiliar terrain. Mama made for the water, not yet fast but already wary.
The humming was louder as she reached the water.
It came around a bend upstream. She couldn’t see the intruder’s shape; it was too distant yet. But it moved on the water, not through it. Moved fast.
Finally. Mama’s eyes were above the water. The snorkel between her eyes drew air; her lungs heaved. There was rage in her, and something else: sphincter muscles relaxed back of her neck, speed began dripping into her blood, and her entire body began to fizz. The vulnerable snorkel withdrew into her head. She watched the intruder come—not quite toward her, she hadn’t been seen yet—then why was the intruder already fast?
But Mama was fast now, and she moved.
This was her territory now. She knew it that well, she had been here that long. Mine. She too was almost above the water as she reached the intruder. She struck from the side. For a bare instant she knew that she had won.
Skin with a thin taste, a taste like metal but not as strong, ruptured on impact and tore in her jaws. No meaty texture, no taste of blood. Not won: lost! Tricked! And where was her enemy?’
The metallic skin filled with water and began to sink. Confusing tastes drifted in its wake. Things thrashed the water in slow motion, beasts caught between fighters. She ignored them. Where was her rival?
Still fast, Mama streaked for her cave before she could be blind-sided. At the underwater mouth she turned. She couldn’t be attacked now except from the front.
Now there was time. Mama lifted her eyes above the water and watched two beasts thrashing. If meat were suddenly snatched beneath the surface, she would know that her enemy was below. But the prey were swept downstream, thrashing, trying to reach the river’s edge. They reached shore unmolested, and scrambled from the water unmolested.
