Foreigner

by Robert J. Sawyer

  But if the material had been fluid before it had congealed—the melting-wax analogy still seemed appropriate—it was completely dry now. There was no tackiness to it at all, no sense that it had ever been anything but solid.

  The stuff had to be leaking out of the ship, so the blue material surely only formed a thin veneer over the rock. Except for the orange dust that had marched outside, nothing had left the ship, and even if the material comprising the blue coating was only eggshell-thin, there still was much more of it than the total volume of all the dust grains.

  Novato lowered herself farther down the climbing ropes, moving with difficulty over the part where the ropes had become mired in the blue material. She was at eye level with one of the spikes that anchored the ropes to the cliff face. But this spike was now completely surrounded by blue stuff. Proof, she thought, that the blueness had originally been liquid: it had flowed right around the spike, which was buried in the rock except for its flared head.

  Here, at the spike hole, it should be easy to see how thick the blue coating was. Novato was wearing a tool belt, held up by her tail. She used the splayed end of a hammer to grab the spike’s crown. She bent her legs up and planted her feet flat against the vertical cliff face, then used the strength of flexing her knees to lever the hammer.

  It took several yanks, then suddenly the spike popped free, Novato flying away from the cliff like a rappeller. She dropped her hammer and the spike, and they skittered down to the beach far below. The climbing web, no longer anchored by the spike, billowed away from the cliff. Novato held on tightly, twisting and turning with the ropes. At last she regained control and maneuvered over to the spike hole. It was hard to get a good view inside; whenever she brought her face close, the shadow of her head put the hole in darkness. But at last she managed it.

  It was blue all the way down.

  It was just barely possible that the spike had been loose enough in its hole to allow the liquid blueness to trickle in and harden there, but in a flash of insight Novato realized that that was not what had happened at all. She would confirm it later by digging into the sandstone right at the edge of the blueness, but even now she knew what was going on.

  The blueness wasn’t a stain, wasn’t a congealed liquid that had dripped off the spaceship.

  No, the blueness was the cliff itself. Somehow the entire cliff face was slowly turning into the same incredibly strong material from which the ancient spaceship was made.

  By the time Toroca and Babnol returned to the Dasheter, the body of the one Other that Keenir and Spalton had brought back had already been laid out on Toroca’s dissection table. During the various voyages of the Geological Survey, Toroca had collected many biological specimens, and in this room—a cabin converted to a laboratory—he often dissected animals. It was here that he’d examined the body of a diver, the Antarctic swimming creature built on the wingfinger body plan that had first suggested to him the idea of evolution.

  In the center of the room was a worktable, its top made of two wide wooden boards that gently sloped toward each other. The boards didn’t join in the middle, though. Rather, there was a small gap to allow body fluids to drain into a ceramic trough underneath.

  Toroca had intended to let each person have a look at the body, this likely being their one chance to see an Other up close. He was surprised at the vehemence of the response, though. Individuals were emerging from his lab with claws extended, and one—old Biltog, the Dasheter’s longest-serving mate—came out with a distinct bobbing motion to his steps. Over the protests of those who hadn’t yet seen the corpse, Toroca barred further access to the room. Anything that aroused even a hint of territoriality could not be permitted. Toroca had always been haunted by the story of the Galadoreter, the ill-fated vessel that had blown back to shore near Parnood, its decks littered with the rotting corpses of its crew, many of them still locked in the death struggles that had killed them all.

  It was well into the evening, but this was even-night, the night that Toroca and half the crew were supposed to be awake while the others slept—another precaution against triggering the territorial reflex—so he decided to begin his dissection by lamplight.

  The Other’s shoulder bones and several of its vertebrae had already been exposed by Keenir’s jaws. Toroca picked up a scalpel, but hesitated before making an incision. He’d dissected hundreds of animals before but although he’d studied Quintaglio anatomy, he’d never carved into the body of a person. And even though its skin was yellow instead of green, this clearly had been a person; the copper jewelry it wore reflected the flickering lamplight.

  When a Quintaglio died, a series of rites were performed, including a service at the Hall of Worship, five days of mourning, and the laying of the body at a prescribed funereal site so that it could be reclaimed by nature.

  But this Other was being denied whatever customs his people had concerning death. Indeed, assuming they’d made good their escape, the Others wouldn’t even be sure for some time that this one was dead, and only eventually would conclude that his disappearance must be proof of his demise.

  Toroca didn’t feel right about treating this body as a mere specimen. He put his scalpel down and made a brief trip to his cabin to fetch his book of Lubalite prayer. Finding an appropriate passage, he spoke softly over the body:

  “I mourn the death even of one unknown, for the chance to make that stranger a friend has come and passed. In heaven perhaps our paths will cross, and although we were not acquainted in life, perhaps there we will hunt side by side. Your journey will be a safe one, stranger, for we are both formed from the hands of God.”

  Toroca was silent for a moment afterward, then picked up his scalpel and went to work.

  The Other’s skeleton was similar to a Quintaglio’s. Its arm articulated with its shoulder the same way a Quintaglio’s did, and the vertebrae had similar processes on the superior surface for anchoring the back muscles. Toroca rolled the body on its side and carved into the upper chest. Most carnivorous reptiles had two types of ribs: large ones projecting off the vertebrae and a secondary set along the belly, attached to the back ribs by ligaments. The Other had such chest riblets; indeed, by pressing his fingers into the skin, Toroca was able to count the same number of vertebrae, back ribs, and chest ribs as one would find in a Quintaglio.

  Before examining the lower body, Toroca spent some time on the head. Here, there were some subtle differences in structure. The neck muscles weren’t as strong as in a Quintaglio. That made sense, since the jaws were much less pronounced, meaning the neck had a smaller weight to support. And the eyes had a scleral ring of bone, something that blackdeaths and other carnivorous reptiles had, but Quintaglios lacked. Also, the Other’s snout had several hornlets and bony knobs, making it look more like a blackdeath’s head than the smooth head of a Quintaglio.

  Toroca repositioned the corpse so that he could work on the lower abdomen. The riblets would have made a simple ventral incision difficult, but, as in Quintaglios, there was a gap between the front and rear rib sets, covered only with skin, muscle, and ligaments. Toroca made a long vertical slice there, and then intersected it with a deep horizontal cut. He peeled back the four resulting flaps of skin, exposing the belly cavity.

  There was something hard and blue-green inside.

  A gizzard stone? Surely not in a carnivore! And surely not so big!

  And then he realized what it was. In shape and size it was just like those of a Quintaglio, but the odd color had prevented Toroca from immediately recognizing it.

  An egg.

  An unlaid, unhatched egg.

  But this Other had appeared to be male; it had a dewlap sack. Had it been eating eggs?

  Toroca tilted the creature onto its side and examined the flaps covering the genitals. No doubt—this was a female. Perhaps both sexes had dewlaps. Amazing.

  He gently repositioned the corpse and reached into the opening he’d made in its belly. His hands were slick with bodily fluids so he was c
areful not to lose his grip as he pulled out the egg. Along its major axis, the orb was just a bit longer than Toroca’s handspan.

  There was another egg behind it.

  Toroca carefully set the first egg on the floor, lest the rocking of the ship knock it from his dissecting table. He got the second one out as well.

  There was a third egg behind the second. He removed that one, too. Behind it were shards of a fourth egg, and an interior pocket smeared with yellow egg-fluid: that egg had been smashed inside the body, probably when Keenir had propelled the Other to the ground.

  There were no signs of additional eggs.

  Quintaglios normally laid clutches of eight. Assuming this Other wasn’t anomalous, these people only had four eggs to a clutch.

  The three intact eggs were fully formed, with tough, soft shells, as if they’d been ready to be laid. Indeed, Toroca wondered whether the Other they’d encountered had been walking the beach looking for a suitable spot to deposit her eggs. If that was the case, then the eggs were probably still alive. He’d heard stories of eggs being rescued from the body of a dying female.

  Toroca hurried off to find leather blankets to wrap the eggs in.

  Chapter 6

  “The talking cure is not always pleasant,” said Nav-Mokleb, leaning back on her tail. She was standing about fifteen paces downwind of Afsan’s rock. “You will have to bare your innermost thoughts to me. Further, the cure takes a great deal of time. We must meet for a daytenth every other day for a protracted period—perhaps as long as a kiloday.”

  “Five hundred sessions!” said Afsan. “Five hundred daytenths.” And then, as was his wont, he extended the mathematics: “That would mean the aggregate of our sessions would total fifty days.”

  “Yes.”

  “Mokleb, I don’t have fifty days to spare. I’m old.”

  “To invoke math, as you are so famous for doing, you are not old. If you survive an average span, your life is a little less than half over.” Mokleb let out a long, hissing sigh. “Look, this is an unusual case for me. Normally, patients seek me out on their own. They believe in my techniques and are eager to be cured. You, however, are here because the Emperor and your physician recommended it. I see that you are skeptical, and reluctant to undertake the process.”

  “Skepticism is the mark of a good scientist,” replied Afsan. “As for reluctance, as I said, I don’t have fifty days to spare.”

  “The Emperor asked me to take you on as a patient,” said Mokleb, “and I am a loyal subject of Dy-Dybo. But if you are reluctant now, it will only get worse as our explorations take longer. You must be committed to this process, or it cannot work.”

  “Then it will not work,” said Afsan.

  Mokleb shrugged. “The loss is yours. I sleep well at night, Afsan, and I can see. I don’t expect you to envy me for that, but I had been led to believe that you desired those same things yourself. I see that I was mistaken. My apologies for taking up some of your precious time.”

  Mokleb began walking away. Insects buzzed. She passed three Rockscape boulders before Afsan spoke. “Wait,” he said. And then, a moment later, “Come back.”

  Mokleb walked back toward Afsan’s rock.

  “I’m sorry,” Afsan said. “I understand you are trying to help me. Please—I do want to be cured.”

  “Good,” said Mokleb. “That brings us to the question of compensation for my labors.”

  “I have an unlimited imperial endowment,” said Afsan. “Please talk with Dee-Laree at the palace; he’ll make sure you are well looked after.”

  “I will speak to Dee-Laree,” said Mokleb. “But simply having a third party provide me with recompense is insufficient. We are about to embark on a long and difficult road, Afsan. There must be a contract directly between us. Normally, I wouldn’t say this to a patient, but I’m sure you would figure this out for yourself—and I know that the moment I leave, you will send an assistant to the library and have him or her bring back my writings and read them to you anyway.” She paused. “I have found that, as therapy progresses, patients begin to skip appointments. They wish to avoid facing difficult questions. Therefore, I will charge you a personal fee for every session, to be paid whether you attend or not, said fee to be dear enough to make you reluctant to waste it.”

  “A fee! On top of what the palace will give you?”

  “Yes. You’ve already made clear how valuable your time is to you, Afsan. Mine is equally valuable to me, and I won’t be trifled with.”

  “But a fee! Doctors don’t trade directly with patients, Mokleb. Surely you already receive a stipend.”

  “That’s irrelevant. You must be committed to the therapy, and a fee helps ensure that. Plus, there’s another reason to charge you a fee. Again, I wouldn’t normally mention it, but you will be savvy enough to see it, anyway. During the course of the therapy, you will have many different reactions to me. At times, those reactions will be ones of aggression and hate. Paying me a fee will help assuage your guilt over having those feelings. You must have no humiliating debt of gratitude to me for tolerating such outbursts; rather, you must feel that you have bought the right to make them.”

  Afsan was silent for a time. Then: “Although Dybo looks after my needs, Mokleb, I personally own little. My endowment is mostly to finance research. I have no precious stones, no percentage interest in any ship or caravan, and only a few trading markers. How would I pay you?”

  “What do you own that you value most?”

  “I have few possessions. My greatest prize, I suppose, was the far-seer that Novato gave me. But that is in the custody of my son, Toroca.”

  “What else do you treasure?”

  Afsan’s tail, hanging off the back of the rock he was straddling, waggled back and forth. “Well, to my astonishment, my old teaching master, Tak-Saleed, left me a complete set of his Treatise on the Planets, the most famous of his works.”

  “What good are books to a blind person?” asked Mokleb.

  “Oh, occasionally I have a student read passages from them to me. But simply owning them, running my fingers over the kurpa leather binding, smelling the musty pages—that gives me pleasure.”

  “How many volumes are there?”

  “Eighteen. Three per planet, other than the Face of God.”

  “Excellent,” said Mokleb. “And how many times does eighteen go into five hundred?”

  Afsan tipped his head. “A little less than twenty-eight: 27.778, to be precise.”

  “Very good. You will pay me in advance. Today, you will surrender the first volume of the treatise. After every twenty eight sessions, you will surrender another volume. If you are still being treated after five hundred sessions, we will renegotiate the contract. Agreed?”

  “I cherish those books,” Afsan said softly.

  “Agreed?” said Mokleb harshly.

  Afsan tipped his head down, blind eyes looking at the ground. “Agreed,” he said at last.

  Novato mentally whipped herself with her tail for not having come up with the idea. After all, it was a logical extension of her own invention, the far-seer. The far-seer used lenses to make distant objects appear close, and this device, the small-seer, used lenses to make tiny objects visible. The small-seer’s inventor, Bor-Vanbelk of Pack Brampto in Arj’toolar, had discovered amazing things. Tiny lifeforms in a drop of water! Little disks within blood. Minuscule chambers in the leaf of a plant!

  Novato, balancing again on the side of the cliff, clinging with one hand to the rope web, was using a small-seer to examine the spreading blueness.

  Here, right at its very edge, she could see shifting patterns of dust. Even through the lenses, the grains were all but invisible. But unlike the random jostling in a drop of water, these motes moved in regular patterns, back and forth, up and down. It was as though Novato were watching a dance from the back of an impossibly high amphitheater, the individual dancers virtually impossible to discern but the mathematical precision of their movements still a thing of b
eauty.

  Dancers, thought Novato. Dancers smaller than the eye could see.

  But they weren’t just dancing. They were working, like ants building an anthill, moving with determined insectile exactness.

  Part of her said the little things must be alive, and part said that that was ridiculous, that nothing so ancient could be living. But if they were not lifeforms, then what could they be?

  Whatever they were, they were making phenomenal progress. Already, almost the entire cliff face was blue.

  If further contact was to be made with the Others, Toroca would have to go ashore—and he would have to do so alone. The Dasheter had sailed south and was now approaching the archipelago from a different direction so that the ship’s arrival would not immediately be associated with the death on the westernmost island. The ship stayed below the horizon, the islands out of sight.

  This part of the world never knew real darkness. By day, the sun blazed overhead. True, for a good part of the day, the sun was eclipsed by the Face of God (although they were far enough north of the equator that the sun’s path behind the Face was a chord much shorter than the Face’s diameter). But even when the sun was eclipsed, and the Face was completely unilluminated, the purple sky grew no darker than it did at twilight. And at midnight, when the sun shone down on the other side of the world, the Face was full, covering a quarter of the sky, lighting up the waves in shades of yellow and orange.

  Because of this, there was no time at which the Dasheter could sneak in to let Toroca off. Toroca, therefore, was going to swim to shore. He’d removed his sash; it would have interfered with swimming. But he was not completely naked: around his waist he wore a swimmer’s belt, with waterproof pouches made from lizard bladders in which he carried supplies.