Manekato raised a hand to quiet him. "I am aware of the dangers of anthropomorphism. You think I have found a pet, here in this dismal place – that I am seeking intelligence where all I see is a reflection of my own self."
Babo rubbed her back affectionately. "Well, isn't that true?"
"Perhaps. But I strive to discount it. And meanwhile I have come to the belief that Nemoto and her kind may be – not merely intelligent – but self-aware."
Babo laughed. "Come now, Mane. Let us show her a mirror, and together we will watch her seek the hominid behind the glass."
"I already tried that test," Manekato said. "She was very insulted."
"If she is too proud to be tested, why does she follow you around?"
"For protection," Manekato said promptly. "You saw how Without-Name treated her when she first found her. Nemoto shows great fear of her."
Babo grunted. He crouched down before the hominid, Nemoto; his huge body was like a wall before her slim frame.
Nemoto returned his gaze calmly.
"...Intelligent, Mane? But the size of the cranium, the limited expanse of the frontal lobes – the dullness of those eyes. I do not get a sense of a person looking back out at me."
Manekato snapped, "And you can assess a creature's intelligence merely by looking at it?" She said, "Nemoto."
The hominid looked up at her.
"You remember what I told you of the Mapping." Manekato strove to slow down her speech, and to pronounce each word of Nemoto's limited language clearly and distinctly.
Nemoto was frowning, concentrating hard. "I remember. You defined a mathematical function to map the components of your body to material of the Moon." Her words, like her actions, were slow, drawn-out. "The domain of this function was yourselves and your equipment, the range a subset of the Moon. When you had defined the Mapping..."
"Yes?"
Nemoto struggled, but failed-to find the words. "I have much to learn."
Babo grunted. "It is impressive that she knows there are limits to her knowledge. Perhaps that indicates some degree of self-awareness after all."
Manekato said, "Then I am winning the argument."
Babo grumbled good-naturedly. "Just remember we are here to study the Moon, and those who sent it spinning between the universes – not to converse with these brutish hominids, who were certainly not responsible."
Manekato studied Nemoto. The little creature was watching her with empty, serious eyes. "Come," said Manekato, and she held out her hand.
Nemoto took it with some reluctance.
Babo turned back to the refinement of his Mapping.
Manekato led Nemoto across the Mapped-in floor of the compound. They passed between structures that had been conjured out of Adjusted Space to shelter the people. Rounded yellow forms, to Mane's taste over-ornate, they made the compound look like a plate set before a giant, loaded with exotic shapes – and with insect-like humans, Workers and hominids scuttling across it.
"You must not let my brother upset you," Manekato said evenly, striving to express herself correctly in the narrow confines of Nemoto's limited tongue.
"He has no imagination," said Nemoto.
Manekato barked laughter, and Nemoto flinched. "I'll tell him you said that!... But he means you no harm."
"Unlike Without-Name, who does mean harm, and who has far too much imagination."
"That is insightful, and neatly phrased." She snapped her fingers and a Worker came scuttling. "Well done, Nemoto. You deserve a banana."
Nemoto regarded the yellow fruit proffered by the Worker with loathing.
Manekato shrugged. She popped the banana into her mouth and swallowed it whole, skin and all.
Nemoto said cautiously, "I think your world has no Moon – none but this unwanted arrival."
Manekato, interested, said, "And what of it?"
"Our scientists have speculated how the destiny of my world might have differed if it had been born without a Moon."
"Really?" Manekato wondered briefly if "scientists" was correctly translated.
Nemoto took a deep breath. "Our Moon was born in a giant impact, in the final stage of the violent formation of the Solar System. The effects on Earth were profound..."
Manekato was fascinated by all this – not so much by the content, which seemed trivially obvious, but by the fact that Nemoto was able to spin together such a coherent statement at all – even if it was delivered in a maddeningly slow drawl. But Nemoto seemed desperate to retain Manekato's attention, to win her understanding – and perhaps her approval.
"And what difference would all this make to the evolution of life?"
Nemoto said, "You come from a world that spins fast. There must be winds there persistent, strong. Perhaps you were once bipeds, but now you walk on all fours; probably I could not stand upright on your world. Your trees must hug the ground. And so on. Your air, derived from a primordial atmosphere never stripped off by impact, is thicker than mine, richer in carbon dioxide, probably richer in oxygen. You think fast, move fast, fuelled by the oxygen-rich air." She hesitated. "And perhaps you die fast. Mane, I can expect to live for seventy years – years measured on your Earth, or mine. And you?"
"Twenty-five," Manekato breathed. "Or less." She was stunned by Nemoto's sudden acuity – but then the hominid had been observing her for days now, learning about Manekato as Manekato had learned about her; she had simply saved up her conclusions – as a good scientist should.
"The evolution of life must have been quite different," Nemoto said now. "With lower tides your oceans must be less enriched of silt washed down from the continents. And there must be less global ocean movement. I would expect a significantly different biota.
"As for humans, I believe that our evolutionary paths diverged at the stage we call the 'Australopithecine', Manekato. But the environment was different on our worlds, evoking a different adaptation. I would hazard that hunting is not a viable strategy for hominids on your world. Probably your short days were simply not long enough. You call yourself "Farmers". Perhaps your world encouraged the early development of agriculture."
" 'Australopithecines'. I don't know that word."
"The hominids called Nutcrackers and Elves here seem to be surviving specimens. From that root stock your kind took one path; mine took another."
"But, Nemoto – why do such divergent worlds have people at all? Why would hominid forms evolve on world after world –"
"Your kind did not originate on your Earth," Nemoto said bluntly. "Your scientists must have deduced that much."
Manekato bristled. She tried to put aside her annoyance at being patronized by this monkey-thing. "You are right. That much is evident. People share the same biochemical substrate as other living things, but are linked to no animal alive or of the past by any clear evolutionary path."
"But on my Earth there is a clear evolutionary path to be traced from humans back into the past."
"So you are saying my line originated on your Earth? And how did my Australopithecine grandmothers get delivered to 'my Earth'?"
Nemoto shrugged. "Perhaps by this Red Moon, and its blue-ring scoops."
It was a startling vision – especially coming from the mouth of this small brained biped – but it had a certain cogency. Manekato was aware her mouth was dangling open; she shut it with a snap of her great teeth. "Who would have devised such a mechanism? And why?"
Nemoto's face pulled tight in the grimace Manekato had come to recognize as a smile. "The Hams have a legend of the Old Ones, who built the world. I am hoping you will find them."
Manekato glared at Nemoto: she was profoundly impressed by Nemoto's acuity, yet she was embarrassed at her own condescension towards the hominid. It was not a comfortable mixture. "We will talk of this further."
"We must," said Nemoto.
Reid Malenfant
Malenfant counted them. Sixteen, seventeen, eighteen Runners: eighteen powerful, languid bodies relaxing on the barren ground. The band see
med to be settling here for the night. The three of them – Julia, Malenfant, Hugh McCann – hunkered down in the dirt. The grass beneath Malenfant's scuffed boots was sparse, and the Mars-red dust of the world showed through, crimson-bright where it caught the light of the setting sun.
This swathe of scrubby grassland was at the western border of the coastal forest strip NASA cartographers had christened the Beltway. Further west of this point, beyond a range of eroded mountains, there was only the arid, baked interior of the great continent, hundreds of miles of red desert, an Australia in the sky. No doubt it was stocked with its own unique ecology exquisitely evolved to maximize the use of the available resources, Malenfant thought sourly, but it was an unremittingly hostile place for a middle-aged American – and of no interest to him whatsoever, unless it held Emma in its barren heart.
McCann moved closer to Malenfant, his buckskin clothes creaking softly. "How strange these pongids are," he said. "How very obviously ante-human. See the way they have made their crude camp. They have built a fire, you see, probably from a hot coal carried for tens of miles by some horny-handed wretch. They even have a rudimentary sense of the hearth and home: look at that big buck voiding his bowels, off beyond the group – what an immense straining – everything these fellows do is mighty!
"But that is about the extent of their humanity. They have no tools, save the pebbles they pluck from the ground to be shaped; they carry nothing for sentiment – nothing at all, so their nakedness is deeper than ever yours or mine could be. And though they gather in little clusters, of mothers with infants, a few younger siblings, there is no community there.
"If you look into the eyes of a Runner, Malenfant, you see a bright primal presence, you see cleverness – but you do not see a mind. There is only the now, and that is all there will ever be. Whatever dim spark of awareness resides behind those deceptive eyes is trapped forever in a cage of inarticulacy... One must pity them, even as one admires them for their animal grace."
Malenfant grimaced. "Another lecture, Hugh?"
McCann sighed. "I have been effectively alone here too long, my reflections on the strange lost creatures who inhabit this place rattling around in my head. Would I were as conservative with my words as dear Julia, who, like the rest of her kind, speaks only when necessary!"
Or maybe, Malenfant thought, she just hasn't got much to say to you, or me. He'd observed the Hams chattering among themselves, when they thought no human was watching them. For all his bush craft, McCann's understanding of the creatures around him was obviously shallow.
Without a word, Julia stood up and began to walk across the sparse scrub towards the Running-folk. McCann and Malenfant stayed crouched in the dirt.
The Runners turned to watch her approach. They were silent, still, like wary prey animals.
Julia got as far as the Runners' fire. She hunkered down there, making sure she didn't sit close to the meat. The Runners were still wary – one burly man bared his teeth at Julia, which she calmly ignored – but they didn't try to drive her away.
After a time an infant came up to her, bright eyes over a lithe little body. Julia reached out her massive hand, but its mother instantly snatched the child back.
Malenfant suppressed a sigh. Sometimes Julia would win the Runners' confidence quickly; other times it took longer. Tonight it looked as if Julia would have to spend the night in the Runners' rough camp before they could make any further progress.
As the days had worn on, Malenfant had lost count of the number of Runner groups they had tracked down. Julia was always given the lead, hoping to establish a basis of trust, and then Malenfant and McCann would follow up. Malenfant would produce his precious South African air force lens, his one indubitable trace of Emma, hoping for some spark of recognition in those bright animal eyes.
It hadn't worked so far, and Malenfant, despite his own grim determination, was gradually losing hope. But he didn't have any better ideas.
As Julia sat quietly with the Runners, the light leaked out of the sky. The predators began to call, their eerie howls carrying far on the still evening air.
Briskly, without speaking, Malenfant and McCann built a fire. They used dry grass for tinder, and had brought bundles of wood from the Beltway for fuel.
Malenfant's supper was a few mouthfuls of raw fish. The Runners used their fires primarily for warmth, not cooking. If McCann or Malenfant were to throw this tough, salty fish onto the fire, the smell of burned flesh would spook the Runners and quickly drive them away.
After that it was foot-maintenance time. Malenfant eased off his boots and inspected the latest damage. There was a kind of flea that laid eggs under your toenail, and naturally it was Malenfant who was infected. When the critters started to grow in the soft flesh under there, feeding off his damn toe cheese, McCann said Julia would dig them out with her stone knives. Malenfant backed off from that, sterilized his pocket knife in the fire, and did it himself. But, Christ, it hurt, unreasonably so, and it made a bloody mess of his toes; for the next few days he had had a lot of trouble walking.
When he was done with his feet, Malenfant started making pemmican. It was one of his long-term projects. You took congealed fat from cooked fish, and softened it in your hands. Then you used one of Julia's stone knives to grate the cooked flesh into powdery pieces and mixed it with the fat. You added some salt and berries and maybe a little grated nutmeg from McCann's pack, and then pulled the mess apart into lumps the size of a golf ball. You rolled the balls into cocktail-sausage shapes, and put them in the sun, to set hard.
He had already done the same with a haunch of antelope. It was simple stuff, dredged up from his memories of his astronaut survival training. But the treatment ought to make these bits of fish and meat last months.
McCann sat and watched him. He was nursing a wooden bowl filled with a tea made of crushed green needles from a spruce tree. Malenfant had been skeptical of what he saw as an English affectation, but the tea was oddly refreshing; Malenfant suspected the needles were full of Vitamin C. But the tea was strongly flavored and full of sharp bits of needle (which he had learned to strain out through a sock).
McCann said, "Malenfant, you are a man of silence and unswerving intent. Your preparations are admirable and thorough. But to enter the desert is foolhardy, no matter how many pemmican cakes you make. Even if you could find your way through the mountains, there is only aridity beyond."
Malenfant growled, "We have this conversation roughly once a day, Hugh. We must have found all the Runner groups who work this area, and have come up blank. On the other hand, we know a lot of them work deeper into the desert." He squinted, peering into the harsh flat light of the arid western lands. "There could be dozens more tribes out there. We have to go find them."
McCann pulled a face and sipped his tea. "And seek out traces of your Emma."
Malenfant kept kneading his pemmican. "You've come this far, and I'm grateful. But if you don't want to follow me any further that's okay by me."
McCann smiled, tired. "I suppose I have attached myself to you – become a squire to your chessboard knight. On this desolate Red Moon we are all lost, you see, Malenfant – not just your Emma. And we all seek purpose."
Malenfant grunted, uncomfortable. "I'm grateful for your company. But why the hell you're doing it is your business, not mine. I never cared much for psychoanalysis."
McCann frowned at the term, but seemed to puzzle out its meaning. "You always look outward, don't you? – but perhaps it would serve you to look inward, from time to time."
"What is that supposed to mean?"
"For a man with such a powerful drive – a drive to a goal for which he is clearly prepared to give his life – you seem little interested in the origin of that drive." McCann raised a finger. "I predict you will puzzle it out in the end – though it may require you to find Emma herself before you do so."
They would take turns to stand watch: McCann first, then Malenfant.
Malenfant cleaned his t
eeth with a bit of twig. Then he settled down for his first sleep.
The nights here were always cold. Malenfant zipped up his jumpsuit, placed a bag of underwear under his hips to soften the hardness of the ground, and pulled a couple of layers of chute cloth over his body. He set his head on the pack in which he carried the remnant of his NASA coverall, his real-world underwear and the rest of his few luxuries, and he put spare underwear under his hip for a mattress. Though he had gotten used to his suit of deerskin – it had softened with use, and after the first few days he suspected it stank more of him than its original owner – he clung to the few items he had salvaged from the ludicrous wreck of his mission as a kind of message to himself, a reminder that he hadn't been born in these circumstances, and maybe he wouldn't have to die in them either.
As usual he had trouble settling.
"I don't like to complain," he said at length.
"Of course not."
"This ground is like rock. I can't turn over without dislocating a hip."
"Then don't turn over."
So it went.
After three hours it was Malenfant's turn to stand watch. McCann shook Malenfant awake, pitching him into a cold, star-littered night. Malenfant shook out his blanket and went to take a leak. Sign of age, Malenfant.
Beyond the circle of light from their hearth, the desert was deep and dark, its emptiness broken only by the ragged glow of the Runners' fire.
Sometimes it scared him to think of what a wilderness it was that had claimed him. There were no cop cars cruising through that darkness, no watching choppers or surveillance satellites, nobody out there to help him – no law operating save the savagely impartial rule of nature.
And yet every day he was struck by the strange orderliness of the place. Decaying animal corpses did not litter the ground, save for a handful of bleached bones here and there; it was rare to walk into so much as a heap of dung. There was death here, yes, there was blood and pain – but it was as if every creature, including the hominids, was a cog in some vaster machine, that served to sustain all their lives. And every creature, presumably unconsciously, accepted its place and the sacrifices that came with it.
Manifold: Origin Page 32
