* * * *
T
he growth and mutations of Port Fireball had scarcely touched Headland Street. A few more houses stood along it, but they were generally of the same modest size and Early American style as the oldest. Below them, cliffs still fronted a strip of beach and Shelter Bay reached beyond to the ocean. Mainly, there were now whole flocks of seabirds and every tree had become tall. On this winter day, elms and maples lifted bare against a low, heavy overcast, while evergreens challenged its gloom. The waters glimmered like steel. Demeter’s weak tide sent wavelets rustling against the shore. Little other sound was to hear. The air had gone from cold to a damp almost-warmth that felt somehow expectant.
Guthrie’s footfalls rang loud on pavement. Nobody else was in sight; most people were at work, of which they had no dearth. In his body that suggested a knight armored, he stopped at Kyra Davis’ home, turned, and strode up the path. As he mounted the porch step, a man and a woman came out.
Guthrie stopped. “Hello,” he said in his archaic fashion. “Were you watching for me?”
“Yes,” Hugh Davis confessed awkwardly. “We should receive you, sir, and be sociable, but—” He ran fingers through his grizzled hair.
“But I’m going in anyway,” Guthrie finished for him, “and you’ve been caged too damn much. It’s okay, son, m’lady.”
“Besides, we thought you might want to talk in private, you and she. Seeing as how you’ve arrived like this.”
“What? Hold on,” Guthrie demanded. “Has she gotten worse?”
“No, not really,” Charissa Davis reassured him. “She’s wide awake, in fact, cheerful, eager for your visit.” Her smile faded. “But—we don’t know—”
“She’s sinking fast,” Hugh said. “Plain to see, she doesn’t have many days left.” Pain edged his voice. “And she may be unconscious in the last two or three. We shouldn’t waste time you can spend with her.”
Charissa caught her man’s arm. “Please, sir,” she begged Guthrie, “you spoke of our feeling caged, but please don’t think we’ve minded caring for her. It’s been—not just a privilege. Mostly a pleasure.”
Faceless, Guthrie made a chuckle serve for a smile. “All the same, good of you,” he said. “Nobody should die in any goddamn hospital. M-m, before you go, how’s the family?” Whenever he phoned Kyra, the greeting he exchanged with this couple had been brief.
Hugh brightened. “Everyone doing fine, sir.”
Charissa’s own smile kindled. “Mikey came with his mother, day before yesterday—”
“Michael Rudbeck,” Hugh explained. “Tessa and Jack’s boy.”
“Sure, I’ve met the young rascal,” Guthrie said. “How’d it go?”
Charissa laughed a little. “He and Kyra are in love. They practically ignored everyone else, chattering and joking the whole while.”
“Well, a great-grandson. Go ahead, brag about him. Grandparents are entitled, in a way that parents aren’t.”
Hugh went serious. “Uh, sir, Mother’s strength is very limited. If you want to talk with her, you’d better go straight in.”
“Right,” Guthrie agreed. “Run along, you two.”
“We’re going for a walk,” Charissa told him. They needed the outdoors more than most folk, and of late had seldom been able to seek it together. “We’ll return in an hour.”
“Hasta la vista.”
They left. Guthrie went inside. The living room through which he passed was clutterful of memorabilia, bound printouts, a child’s patched and scruffy teddy bear, models of sailships and spaceships, a bit of wreckage, a small meteoroid, a glittery rock from the single planet that B had kept, more and more. . . . Among the pictures on the wall were those of several men. Kyra had referred to them as her rogues’ gallery. Two remained alive.
Her bedroom was austere. On the multi, which was placed for her to readily see it, she could evoke anything in the databases, public or personal. At the moment it showed a blue and white house among birches, a lake behind, in the light summer night of Earth’s high North. Windows gave on her garden, bare under the darkling sky.
Guthrie trod to her where she lay. “Howdy, gorgeous,” he said.
She grinned from her pillow. “Hola, Tin Woodman.” He must amplify to hear her clearly. She touched her control bracelet. The bed elevated till she was half reclined. “Have a seat.”
He did, careful not to break the chair beneath his weight, and took her hand, flesh laid in metal and plastic. It was thin, nearly translucent. Her face bore the same pallor within the white mane, and was dominated by its bones, and the eyes had faded from hazel to gray. Yet she gazed steadily at him and said, “Gracias. That’s why I asked if you could come yourself this once. Your man-image in the phone is better looking, but you are real.”
“Sort of,” he replied, the least bit harshly.
Her grin widened. “That helps conversation. It’s less distracting. I don’t have to lust after you.”
Robot, he could show surprise by nothing but, “Hm?”
“Come on, you’re not stupid or naive, you must have smelled a hint or two. Ever since we first met—no, earlier than that, when I watched your broadcasts and grew up with your legend—I’ve wished I’d been born when you were, so I could’ve gotten you into the sack.”
He retreated behind a jape. “What an unregenerate hussy you are.”
She squeezed his machine hand—how feebly and shakily. “It’s been fun.”
Easing, he said, “I must admit to occasional thoughts about you. Of course, in my case they were kind of theoretical.”
Kyra let go. Her arm dropped to the coverlet. “Bueno, a foolishness of mine,” she sighed. “Unless I’d gotten there ahead of your wife, she’d’ve been too much competition. Even if I had, she prob’ly would . . . from what I’ve heard of her.”
“We might have had a wonderful romp, we two. But you never were one to settle down, Kyra, anywhere or with anybody.”
“Never really got the chance.”
“The hell you didn’t. How many proposals have you had in your life?”
“Proposals, or propositions?” Her smile softened. “Yes, plenty of offers,” she said gravely, “and some regrets. Bob above all— But you’re right, I think space was calling me before I was born, and no man was ever quite the one to ship with me for always.”
They were quiet a spell.
“How do you feel?” Guthrie asked.
Skeletal shoulders shrugged. “That nanostuff they’ve given me, it keeps me comfortable. When I think of some deaths I’ve watched, and most deaths in most of history, I know what luck is.”
“True. If you were in pain or out of your mind or whatever, I’d have somebody’s head. But how do you feel about—” Guthrie gestured around him.
“About ending here, not splashily among the stars? Straw-death, the vikings called it.” Kyra considered. “It isn’t bad. Hugh, Charissa, the youngsters, my friends, everybody’s so loving—and you, jefe—and the memories.”
Her voice died away, her eyelids drooped. Guthrie sat motionless and let her rest.
When she glanced at him again, he ventured: “Kyra?”
“Yes?”
“Would you like to hear from a couple of others?”
She had regained alertness. “Depends. I begrudge time I could spend with you, you know.”
“The downloads. Yours and Eiko Tamura’s.”
She caught a ragged breath. “Them? Can’t they . . . use the phone?”
“It isn’t the same for her. Or me.”
“Her?”
“She—they—more and more over the years, they’re becoming one.”
“I s’pose they would. . . .”
“And I—” His words stumbled. “We link now and then, she and I. Radionic, direct input, neural net to net. She, they do it between themselves all the time, of course; I’m separate; but they let me join in whenever it’s feasible, and . . . it’s richer than I can tell. If we did it today, sharing w
hat we know of you, we’d . . . understand you better than we can alone. What we said would mean more.”
She shook her head. “No,” she answered slowly, “I’m a stranger to them. I never did follow what was going on, their story, except in the most superficial way.”
When not in space, she had been abundantly engaged on Demeter. For her excursions into its nature, she was apt to choose the sea or those wildernesses where life was independently thrusting into the barrens. Her last years, entirely groundside, she had passed for the most part in compiling a database of memoirs and advice for spacers, otherwise among friends in town or on sunny Ogygia.
“You could have spoken with your download whenever you liked,” Guthrie reminded her.
“I know. But what for, what about? And after Eiko died, no, not with that one.”
“Don’t you want to, ever?”
Kyra stiffened, then leaned back. “Go ahead,” she yielded. “Maybe I can learn something yet.”
He went to the multi, which had complete capabilities. From his kit box he took a cable. Standing beside the outfit, he plugged himself in. “Bienvenidas,” he said aloud.
The picture from Russia disappeared. Gentle, pulsing colors flowed in the cylinder like clouds. A female voice came forth. “Hola, Kyra.”
“Saludos,” the old woman responded ironically. Her self-possession cracked. She trembled. “Eiko—is that you, Eiko?”
“A part of what was me is a part of what is us,” the other said low. “We were never this close, you and I, in our lives.” Anxiety: “Is something wrong, dear?”
“No. No. But I hadn’t realized—suddenly hearing you, Eiko—”
“A shock. Oh, I am sorry. Shall we go?”
Kyra winced. “Don’t. Por favor, stay. I’m sorry. That I didn’t ask to . . . meet you.” Tears coursed soundlessly down over her cheekbones. “I, I told myself you were too busy running the world—”
“Not that.”
“Being the world.”
“Nor that. Think of Anson. Take him away, and what is Demeter?”
“You’d manage jolly well without me,” Guthrie growled. “That better be true.”
“Hush,” the other admonished him. “Go on, Kyra.”
“Oh, it doesn’t. . . doesn’t matter,” the old woman faltered, “unless you feel hurt that I steered shy of you.”
“We wondered.”
Kyra reached hands toward the multi. They shook. “The—forgive me—the rest of the downloads who came to Centauri, they terminated. Once they’d finished their duties, th-they wanted an ending. I imagined you, Eiko— I’d gotten used to the idea of my half-self in there, but you, Eiko, you who loved the living world so much, now trapped—”
“It isn’t like that, Kyra, not like that at all,” went the answer, softly and urgently. “We live. Sunshine and rain, daylight and stars, a river, a flower, a bird aloft, life, everywhere life. And when we grow lonely for humanness, when we fear we may be losing it, there is Anson.”
“You make me want to keep going, you do,” said Guthrie. A man would have blinked away tears of his own.
“Did you really not know this, Kyra?”
“In a way,” the old woman admitted. “I hoped. But I suppose I—I dared not ask straight out.”
“And you did have your days full.”
“Brimful,” Guthrie said.
Kyra’s smile quivered. “At last I’ve dared. Gracias, gracias.”
“The thanks are to you, querida,” murmured the other.
“Did you come for this?”
“And to bid farewell.” A sigh as of wind in leaves. “If only it were summer. Anson would carry you into the garden for me.”
“That’s all right.” I remember many beautiful summers. Thank you for them.”
“Peace be upon you, Kyra.”
The colors vanished. After a moment, Guthrie unplugged and went back to the bedside.
Kyra breathed quickly, shallowly. “And gracias to you, jefe,” she whispered, “for that—and everything else—”
“Same to you,” he replied. “But it tired you empty, didn’t it?”
“ ‘Fraid so.” She lay back and closed her eyes.
His robot fingers took her wrist, touched the bracelet, lowered the bed. “Would you like some music, sweetheart?”
“Yes, that’d be good.”
“What?”
Kyra smiled, her eyes still shut. “Surprise me.”
He returned to the multi, summoned a list, scanned it, and chose. Dvorak’s Fourth Symphony gladdened the air. He sat down again and took her hand. She slept. He waited.
Hugh and Charissa entered. Guthrie hailed them in an undertone, released Kyra’s hand, and rose. He bent low above her, as if he had lips to kiss her brow, then said, “Adios” and departed into a day gone dark.
An hour later, Kyra woke, alone in the room. She raised herself to an elbow and looked out a window. Through the gray that filled it tumbled white flakes, they had already covered her garden, they were the first snow that ever fell in this land.
* * * *
60
In my DNA I am largely human, and therefore it is I who compose this message. You have misunderstood; your concern for your species on Earth is unfounded. They are prosperous, free to lead lives serene or frenetic as they individually wish, subject to reasonable restraints much less than what their primitive ancestors knew. A detailed account follows. If their numbers continue to diminish, be aware that their heritage is preserved in the communion of intelligence of which I am an avatar who now returns to its wholeness.
* * * *
A
far, Zamok Sabyel’ shone against night, silvery sunlit, intricate and exquisite. From the facets of its hub radiated spokes, a spiderwork of cables and tubeways between them, out to the rim, which sparkled with a thousand lights and lighted ports. Four long, dark wings, solar collectors, stretched beyond, scything across Milky Way and stars as the jewel spun. Among the constellations lustered blue Demeter, sixty degrees ahead in the same great path.
When you approached, its size and might overtowered you: a hundred kilometers’ breadth, monstrously armed with missiles and ray projectors, attended by two score guardian robotic vessels. Those defenses were against flying stones, but could as easily destroy ships.
Erling Davis directed his onward without fear. Today he, his associates, and his technicians were envoys, their persons inviolate. For all that, wonder touched him. Until now he had only known this strongholdby images, only dealt with it infrequently by communicator beam. Few Demetrians had ever walked yonder halls.
He mustered necessary arrogance, conversed with Station Control, brought his vessel into the hub and docked her. Maybe an ambassador shouldn’t be his own pilot, but he was who he was; besides, he and Guthrie thought it would gain him respect, and who could foremeasure the quantum by which that might move Lunarian minds?
When his party passed through locks to the interior, they found an honor guard waiting, tall men in form-fitting black and red, armed with shock pistols. The leader gave dignified salutation and conducted them to a fahrweg reserved for them. It went down a spoke to the rim and let them out near the apartments they would occupy. The leader told them that if they desired any information or whatever else the quarters could not supply, they had but to phone a number he gave them. No doubt they wished to rest and refresh themselves undisturbed. Three hours hence they would go to a reception and supper—except for Captain Davis, whom the Lady Commander invited to join her at that time. The leader touched his brow and led his men away.
Davis was a little disappointed in the accommodations. He had expected something more exotic. Well, maybe his hosts wanted their guests to feel at home. Certainly they had provided every comfort and convenience; and after the long, hard boost from Odysseus, Lunar weight was a blessing. For a while the Demetrians mingled and talked, then Davis withdrew to his billet. There he showered, flopped out on the bed, surveyed what the entertainment dat
abase had to offer, and ran an old production of The Girls From Aegea. Lunarian arts were interesting, often weirdly beautiful, but too alien to relax him.
In due course he dressed. The uniform of his recent naval service would have been appropriate, but MacCannon’s Kids had been irregulars— however crewmanlike their discipline—identified simply by a brassard. Davis donned current high style on Demeter: headband around shoulder-length red hair, fringed buckskin tunic, linen trousers dyed weld-and-woad green, moccasins, sheath knife. Usually he wore a coverall, if he wore anything other than body paint. However, this evenwatch he represented his world.
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