Bowl of Heaven

by Gregory Benford; Larry Niven

  Memor gave an assenting wave of feather-fan. “True enough. Word leaks out, I see. They have made the case against their kind quite well.”

  Sarko peered into Memor’s face. “You do fathom that the best way to save your career is to agree that they must be exterminated.”

  “Oh, quite.”

  “So you will? Please.”

  “I think we play with fires we do not know here, and should be careful.” Memor had planned that sentence; might as well try it out on a friend.

  “That will not go well with the Profounds, old friend.”

  A slow side glance. “Friend, I can count on your support?”

  A humble bow. “I have little power, alas.”

  “Use what you have. I have survived the Citadel of Remembrance, though not without scorn.”

  “May you do so well here!” Sarko said, her expression returning to her usual happy state, with blue eye-feathers furling.

  Memor followed Sarko’s guidance through the formal labyrinth, enjoying her quick, birdlike movements. Sarko was a quick but not deep intelligence, open to larger mental vistas but preferring the light joys of the social give-and-take.

  As an Ecosystem Savant approached, Sarko fell back. “Would you have sustenance?” came the customary offer.

  “Not before any other,” Memor made the usual counter. The Ecosystem Savant ruffled colors of routine admiration and the introductions were complete.

  At this formal moment, a Packmistress entered, seated herself, and nodded to all with a fluttering plumage neck-arc of authority. “We will commence.” A flutter of acceptance ran round the moist chamber.

  The first item was an anticlimax. An ecosystem engineer presented the latest problem. In Zone 28-94-4578, water temples controlled flow to terraces, preventing Folk tribes upstream from using it all, and so avoided impoverishing those below. Yet rainfall had slackened, despite the best Eco management. To prevent the highlands from withholding water without conflict demanded social cement. These Moist Temples used customary subak rituals to link the communities with full mingling ceremony and mandatory cross-breeding. Otherwise, they would be snatching at one another’s feathers. Absent such community, crops would fail. Ancient forests would be overrun with loggers, potters, shepherds, and thieves, seeking what they could wrench forth. This evolving crisis challenged lands larger than whole planets.

  The biology of all lands shifted in time, of course—nature’s restless seekings making species that, in the evolutionary sense, pass by each other on their way to somewhere else. Adapt, evolve, or die—the eternal rule. But drought hastened nature here.

  Memor watched as several Profounds tossed the problem among themselves. Much verbal artistry could not conceal the hard choices. There seemed no merciful solution. Accordingly, the Packmistress let each side play out, stating cases, pleading for more aid.

  Then the Packmistress showed a crescent display of resolute judgment—a bad sign. She said, “No extensions for longevity throughout the threatened domain. No appeals, no exceptions.”

  There it was. A hush fell upon the chamber. Memor could hear the gentle splashing of the calming waters on the walls. The Packmistress had condemned millions to their natural extinction. They could not claim special aging preventives.

  The Packmistress ordered a recess for contemplation. Sarko immediately appeared at Memor’s flank. “Perhaps such stern justice will be of help.”

  “Or set the tone,” Memor said dryly.

  “I have been circulating.…” Sarko always opened with a teasing promise, fluttering side feathers near her eyes. “Some say you know the most of these aliens, so should lead the hunt.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes, those who spoke at all seemed quite friendly to your cause.”

  “I do not seek to lead a hunt.”

  Feathers ringing Sarko’s neck fluttered. “But you fathom these strange—”

  “Has it occurred to you that I could fail?”

  “Ah, no. You have such a sterling record—”

  “This is the first alien invasion in countless twelve-cubed Cycles. We are inexperienced. As well, no one has ever dealt with such evil little creatures.”

  Sarko’s elegant head jerked, weaved. Feathers fanned the astonished violet-rimmed eyes. “But you! Everyone says—”

  “Everyone hasn’t walked in my path. I do not wish to exchange one route to death for another. This hunt could fail, the aliens could do much damage—and there will be victims among us, then.”

  Sarko’s joyful face collapsed. “Surely you can’t—”

  The summoning chimes sounded, reverberating in the high chamber. Memor drew in the soft air, but tasted a bitter hint—her own bile?

  Back in chambers, more Eco deliberations droned by. Movements of the Folk were not following the Design. Memor let her Undermind rove as she half listened.

  All life was properly in movement, on the grand plains of the Bowl World. But the bigger, lower-grade-intelligence Folk, who lived as primitives and augmented their diet browsing shrubs and trees, were to move on—to give grazers a chance to live on the grasses that followed the loss of shrubs. These primitives were not crop-raising Folk, and should remain in their wild condition.

  So populations had to be forced to move, and not set up camps and villages. The Packmistress made quick work of this matter, directing Suborns to destroy the primitive camps and force the subFolk to move on. They had their role in the Design, and should be reminded of it.

  She reminded them all that the Originals had learned the Great Truth that governed all: that given vast new lands, the Folk then quickly invade these spaces, wreak destruction, and when resources grow short, fight with neighbors for more. Under the first rush of exploding populations in the Original Times, wildland had to pay or perish, to persist. Poachers and loggers turned lands into battlefields.

  Only after much strife that threatened the Bowl itself did the Codes come, managed by the Savants. There was no alternative to a constant, assuring order. Another revelation was that death did not permit one to stay out of the Cycle. In some Bowl societies, the Folk tried to deny their own role, and so put their dead into coffins and mausoleums, burned themselves in pyres, even suspend themselves in cold for future resurrection. All were a wrongness, for the Bowl needed these bodies.

  “Mites and worms should have us,” the Packmistress said. “This is the Cycle and it must be obeyed. Such is the Design. The Code does not protect lands and seas from the Folk, but rather for the Folk—by taking the long view. The Code teaches humility, because it engages us with Nature in the eternal dance with all other species.”

  Memor bowed her head at this obvious platitude and wondered how it would affect her—well, trial was not quite right, but the stern faces of those around her did not bode well.

  At this moment Sarko piped forth, “I suppose the message here is, just remember that you can never predict the behavior of a system more complex than you. And if you want a project to stay on track after you’re gone, you don’t give control to anything that’s guaranteed to develop its own agenda.”

  Ah, Memor thought. Sarko was drawing fire to defuse the tension in the room. And it worked. Those clustered around made derisive noises, though some just fluttered their feather-fans. “Surely that is too simple,” an elderly Savant hooted. Others just laughed.

  The Packmistress allowed a flicker of irritation to ripple through her feathered corona. “For we—Savants, Profounds, all those in the tier below Astronomers—corruption of purpose means simple bribery, graft, or nepotism. But for lower Folk who enjoy their lives in the unchanging state our Bowl ensures, corruption has an entirely different meaning. It is the failure to share any largesse you have received with those with whom you have formed ties of dependence.”

  Sarko said, “Surely that is predictable, my—”

  “Our view of corruption makes sense in a culture of laws and impersonal institutions,” the Packmistress rolled right over Sarko. “But
theirs is a small world whose defining feature is the web of indebtedness, of obligations that ensure the social order. So to them, not to give a job to a cousin is corrupt, even if others are better qualified. Not to do deals with tribesFolk because better terms may be found elsewhere is also corrupt. Reducing corruption of this sort demands—” The Packmistress let her voice fall to a grave tone. “—resolve.”

  A sobered silence from those who saw what was going on.

  “It is useful to recall the full brunt of our measures,” she began, displaying a somber arc-pattern of grays and pale blues. “I remind us all that while such social dissension occurs on occasion, there is a rogue element afoot, and not far from these territories where the water temples are failing to make a benign equilibrium.”

  With this she cast a significant long look at Memor. “Witness, I bid you, the current state of those we have condemned for committing offenses of this type.” With a great sway of her body, she signaled the attendants. The dome over their heads surged with popping energy, and a wide image played upon it. Memor shivered with fear when she recognized the context.

  The greatest preventive the Astronomers had, used against only those whose actions threatened the Bowl’s environment and fate, was the Perpetual Hell. Mention of its very existence could silence a crowd.

  Those who violated the Code could face having their very minds mapped, and their bodies then executed. They would then awake suspended in a virtual, mental Hell from which none escaped. Ever.

  Memor had gone through the mandatory sampling of a mere single Hell, and would never forget it. And now here it came again, splashed across the ceiling.

  A glowering sky, shot with red and amber. Beneath lay a vast swamp flooded with fuming lava, the stench—the Packmistress had ordered the full sensorium to come into play across the chamber—so strong, it now crawled into her nostrils and stung throughout her head.

  “Attend!” the Packmistress commanded. Heads had already averted the images, eyes snatched away.

  Memor looked up against her will. Rooted in this acrid slime were … the doomed Folk. They writhed and screamed in tiny shrill voices. Fires danced upon them as they twisted. A din of shrieking pain played across the bodies. They could not wrench free of the fires and so endured it like trees whipped by winds of agony. Eyes pleaded with them all—for those in this place knew they were watched; it was part of the torture—begging for release from agonies she could see but do nothing about. Rocks fell from the smoldering sky and smashed the fevered mud.

  The first time she had to watch this, the intent was to educate her, and the lesson never left her mind for long. Now the Packmistress meant to instill discipline. Memor trembled, for the message was clearly focused on her.

  At a nod, the image and scents fled. Sighs and worried murmurs laced the air as the Packmistress settled herself, looking satisfied.

  All waited and the Packmistress let tension build. She’s toying with me, Memor thought. At last the Packmistress said slowly, “The Bureau of the Adopted had as its Research Minister a Profound of the most high stratum. He will present their views now, and our guest, Memor, will answer. Attend—these are the firm results of our global staff, an analysis of the nature of these … aliens.”

  Memor watched as the Profound—a male, of course, since males push at the boundaries, as a rightful, youthful function—gave a rather hurried talk. He swept his great head about to stress his points, feathers ruffling constantly at his neck for emphasis. Masculine energy surged through his sentences.

  “These are clever creatures, a form we never saw evolve in the Bowl.” The Profound tipped his head at his audience, mirth playing in his eyes. “This may come from their tempting role as game—” This brought a storm of laughter, obviously a release from the tension of watching the Hell. “—but we can deduce aspects of their evolution from their surprising intelligence.”

  Memor knew where this was going. She was not so far from the male phase; she could still anticipate the channels of their thoughts; after all, that was a core female talent. Evolutionary theory would predict a clear pattern in the aliens, and males loved the mechanisms of theory. Selection pressure on some world had favored the climbers of trees, and then had somehow shifted, so the climbers came down to the ground. There they learned to hunt. As strategies go, hunting in groups compelled social communication, to find prey and coordinate attacks. That drove speech and language. In turn, intelligence acted on social cues so that group survival became enhanced, in conflict with other hunting groups of the same species. That drove cooperation. Particularly, selection would favor both the charismatic minds that could lead, and the analytical ones, which would see deeper. The social pyramid would have a bulge in the middle, of the variously competent.

  “But this is a commonplace,” Memor injected, a calculated move whose risk made her heart pound. She tasted in her breath the tang of her own sour apprehension. “We can all see where the argument goes. We ourselves evolved in something like this manner, in the Home.”

  Invoking the Home was a bold move, but she had to make it. Memor made a fan display of rattling colors. “But these creatures are tiny! They would lack the advantage of size, and so should not be very successful.”

  The Profound gave a jut of his head and a jaunty spray of derisive colors. “Size can become an instability, as surely even nonspecialists must know.” This dig provoked a titter among some. “It is simple to grow large and dumb, yet remain secure. We—the Folk—found a balance. We became smart and yet our size let us develop the civilized arts. Our societies matured. We learned to sustain, the greatest of virtues. We learned to Adopt other species through modification of their genes, our great skill—though, of course, even the Adopted at times need recalibration.”

  Memor rose to her full height to challenge this. Rising was a risk, for it could offend. But her life was at stake here. Plainly, the Packmistress had chosen to subject them to the Perpetual Hell to make this point without speaking of it. “You speak of strategies we do not in fact know at all. Adopting is our method here, yes. But, I might remind the Profound, we do not know how we evolved!”

  Memor had not expected this sally to deflect the Profound’s argument, and it did not. He said, “Standard theory declares that this skill, plus our extraordinary social coherence, was decisive. I am not surprised you do not know this, for you are untutored in the evolutionary arts.”

  “Do you know what sort of world we came from?”

  “Of course. The best parts of it were much like our Bowl.”

  “You like mean the Great Plain, the Knothole, the Zone of Reflectance, or—what?”

  He shot back, “That is a specialist question, beyond the concerns of—”

  “You do not know, do you?”

  “I did not say that. I think it beside my point.”

  “Let us note the Profound did not answer the question.”

  “Halt!” the Packmistress ordered. “We are getting away from the reason for your appearance here, Memor, and I note you are using this diversion to delay our proper considerations.”

  Memor saw she had gone too far and so made the ritual bow with coronations of dutiful apology—three fan-trills and a rainbow display of self-dismay. The attendees nodded in approval and a few even sent quick fan-toasts at Memor’s performance of a difficult salute. That seemed to calm everyone, but Memor knew it was mere polite manners.

  The Profound said slowly, voice filled with deep sour notes, “Memor here has allowed to escape the only of these aliens our Security had captured! They are far away from the other primates, who escaped immediately when they entered.”

  “How did that occur?” a senior figure asked.

  “Inexcusable oversight. I might add that the commanders responsible have been recycled.”

  “That seems brutal,” a voice at the back called. “We are unaccustomed to invasion, and do not have anyone living who has experience.”

  The Profound said slowly, “As well it might,
but word of recyclings spreads, and aids in discipline.”

  Silence. A senior member said, “We still cannot find those, the ones who got away at the air lock?”

  “No, and that is the salient threat. These primates are vicious—they have killed some of us!—and at a demonstrably lower stage of evolution. But they are infernally hard to find, catch, and kill.”

  “We have none in captivity?” The senior figure rustled head feathers in surprise.

  “Exactly so—” The Packmistress’s head swiveled. “—due to Memor. The only dead primate we have found, left behind by his companions as they fled, apparently died from a large predator—which the other primates then killed. All this occurred during their escape from Memor.” She ended with a long stare at Memor, aided by fan stirring of rebuke at her shoulders.

  Memor disliked such smug orations but kept still.

  The entire body turned and looked at Memor. She decided the best tactic was to stare right back.

  The Profound did not hesitate. “There is a further issue. These are not truly rational minds. They cannot view the Underminds and so do not know themselves.”

  Gasps, frowns. Memor started to object to this intrusion into her own area. “Ah, I—”

  The Profound waved her off. “For these primates, there is always a silent partner riding along in the same mind. It can get in touch with their Foreselves. Yes—we do owe this discovery to Memor, I’ll grant. But! Their Underminds can speak to them only through dreams during sleep. Memor showed that they have ideas that come to them out of ‘nowhere.’ Not words or exact thoughts, just images and sensations.”

  “Surely these cannot be significant ideas?” a senior asked. “They are unmotivated.”

  The Profound shook his head sadly, a theatrical move that made Memor grind her teeth. “Alas, I must report to you—again, due to Memor’s work—that this primate ‘silent partner’ is the wellspring of their primitive creativity.”