Heaven's River

by Dennis E. Taylor

  Tina had mentioned cold segments that was interesting.

  “Tina, have you ever been in a cold segment?”

  “No, but my dad lived in one for a while. It snowed sometimes, and there was ice on some of the streams. I’ve never seen snow or ice. Hard water, right? Weird. Different fish, too, and some other plants and animals that are different.” She thought for a moment. “Da used to tell stories of segments that had other oddities as well. There was supposed to be one that was mostly water, with only islands sticking up here and there. Another one was dry, and the river actually disappeared under the land. I don't know how much to believe, and how much was da trying to scare us when we were juniors.”

  “I don't think your da was making it up,” Ralph volunteered. “I’ve heard of segments with different climates. They always have different plant and animal life, whether the plants and animals came first, or the different climates came first, I don't know.”

  I started to wish I’d paid more attention to Bridget's conversations with Quinlans and the theories she discussed. This had the feel of a discussion of evolution, based on the mistaken idea that Heaven's River was a natural environment. And deism was replacing history, in regard to the Administrator. Top that off with the back-to-nature movement and the possible loss of sapience, and the Quinlans were in peril of ceasing to exist as an intelligent species, possibly within as little as a few more generations. Was it time for The Bob to get involved? Did I dare start stirring the pot again? And was a good idea while I was still in country and vulnerable? I could just blow up the Manny and returned to virt if I got in trouble, but Bender didn't have that option.

  I’d finally managed to get everyone together for a meeting. Hugh was parked in Will’s beanbag chair, but the rest of the expedition members were present in floating video windows. I’d just finished describing the latest conversation with fellow deckhands and passengers.

  “I think you're correct, Bob. It's going that way. Although, maybe not as quickly as you fear.” Bridget crossed her arms, a distinctly worried expression on her face, which clashed with her mildly reassuring phrasing.

  “I don't know if it matters,” Hugh replied. “How long it'll take, I mean. The takeaway is that it will happen if nothing changes. I don't think we can refuse to deal with this.”

  I gazed at him, head cocked. I still haven't had a chance to bring up the whole question of the Administrator's true status and Hughes true motivations. How would he play this?

  “And how would you suggest we do that,” Will asked.

  “Contact the administrator. Talk to them. They may not realize what's happening.”

  “Maybe once Bender is safe,” I said. “Not until. That's not negotiable. And anyway, what makes you think they don't know?”

  Hugh’s brow knit together as he glanced at me. “Seriously? You think they'd want that?”

  “Depends on what the Administrator's motivations are. Maybe they'd consider a non-sentient but living Quinlan race better than a sentient but always on the edge of extinction version. Like a perverse instantiation, you know now.”

  Now Hugh was all but glaring at me. His eyes narrowed. At that moment, I think we understood each other. I might have just blown any element of surprise, but on the other hand, it might force a reaction of some kind. It seemed a worthwhile trade-off.

  “Certainly, there's no reason not to try,” Bill spoken into the silence. “Once Bender safe, as you say. We to start broadcasting radio from all our drones, or send in a spider to dance in front of the camera. Either they'll investigate and open a dialogue, or they'll blow up our devices. We’ll know better once they've set the tone.”

  “And what they do blow up a roamer or whatever device?” Bridget said, voice tense. “Do we just walk away? Do we just let an entire intelligent species go? Can we ethically do that?”

  “Starfleet would.”

  I glared at Garfield. “They’re not really a moral standard hold up right now, Gar.

  “Uh, I meant, Star Trek’s Starfleet. Not the current crop of idiots we’re dealing with.”

  “Oh.” I nodded. “True. But even then, original Bob always thought that was a bunch of dreck.”

  “Focus, please,” Bridget cut in. “This isn’t a Comic-Con. We’re discussing the fate of an actual intelligent species.”

  Bill smirked at her. “Okay, look. We won't invade or anything, but we won't just go away either. We’ll just keep poking until we can get a statement from the Administrator. If they tell us they have everything under control and we should go away, do we really have a right to butt in?”

  I rubbed the bridge of my nose and sighed loudly. “It always comes down to this, doesn't it? Edge cases. Grey areas. I agree with Bill. At least on the basics. We can't decide now, and we can't decide until we contact the Administrator.” I glared at Hugh. “Which we won't do until Bender is out of danger.”

  I re-entered my Manny on the Clipper, just as the crew was starting to stir for the morning shift. Ralph assigned a deckhand named Gil and me to gathering breakfast, and I happily dove into the water with a small net. There was never a lack of any of the Quinlans’ several favorite prey species. Careful balancing of the ecosystem by the Administrator? Or just a case of too few predators? I mused over the question as I gathered breakfast. I pooted onto the deck just seconds before Gil, but I noticed that his bag was fuller. Most likely he intended to eat the overage. Gil was known for his appetite.

  The captain grabbed a few fish for himself, than the rest of us sat around the fish bowl. I ate the minimum that I could get away with without arousing suspicion, interspersing my meal with a lot of conversation. Tina and her friends were more than willing to talk about their views on the world. Well, Tina mostly. The others nodded a lot.

  During a lull in the conversation, Ralph looked up and said, “Well, that's weird.”

  I followed his pointing finger to see a small bird-equivalent perched on top of a pallet of crates.

  “That’s a furl. They’re forest birds. What’s it doing out here on the river?”

  “Lost?” I ventured.

  Ralph shook his head. “I don't…”

  At that moment the bird, seemingly embarrassed by all the attention flew off. He shook his head again and conversation drifted to other topics.

  I would've dismissed the matter as inconsequential, except that I'd seen that species of bird around on the boat a couple of times. I’d just assumed it was looking for food scraps, but Ralph's bemusement had me paranoid. I scraped a few bits of fish from my current helping and set them aside. When we were done with breakfast and the captain had started ramping up his morning delivery of abuse, I took a moment and place the food scraps on top of the crate where the bird had perched.

  Life on the Quinlan boat was very much a panic and boredom thing. When in port we worked until we dropped, whereas while en route tasks tended to be routine and easy, if somewhat dull. This left me multiple opportunities to keep my eye on the food offering.

  The furl buzzed the boat twice more, but showed no interest in the scraps. A couple of acrils, though, though descended on it with cries of noisy delight. So maybe furl were herbivores? I might be overgeneralizing from Terran examples, but birds tended to be opportunistic feeders. Even hummingbirds ate insects, when available. I sighed silently and grabbed the net to retrieve the afternoon meal. I felt a little silly, getting bent out of shape over a bird. Ralph had been convincing, but still.

  Mealtime conversations were always free-wheeling, but hadn’t been nearly as interesting since Teresa and I had parted ways. I often found my mind drifting while the others argued the fine points of Quinlan life. Bridget would probably be very interested, and in fact might be replaying the sessions as fast as they could be transferred across the SCUT connection.

  I snapped back to attention though when Gil said “Hey Sam, your pet is back.”

  Sure enough, a furl was hopping around on the pile of crates.

  I scraped off a bit of fis
h and tossed it in the right direction. The furl froze for a moment, then went back to hopping around completely ignoring the offering. In fact, it appeared to be… reading labels? That couldn't be right.

  I turned back to my companions, but kept one eye on the animal. It eventually left the pallet and flew over to another stack and repeated the performance. And the more I watched it, the more convinced I became that it was looking at the shipping information on the crates.

  I contacted Hugh on the intercom.

  “Hey Hugh.”

  “What’s up, Bob?”

  “Do we know if the Administrator's technology level is advanced enough to include small drone-like units?”

  “Unlikely. No SURGE drive.”

  “What about something that emulates a bird.”

  “Uh… ornithopter kind of thing? Yeah, I don't see why not. The Boogens were masterpieces of miniaturization, you’d said so yourself.”

  “Yeah. Uh, you're on a boat, right? Have you seen any small birds hanging around.”

  “Lots of acrils. Rats with wings, they are, but nothing else.”

  “Let me know if you spot any furls, okay?”

  “Will do.”

  Hugh sounded a little puzzled as he signed off. Although weather that was because of the request or the fact that I haven't confronted him on the AI issue was anyone's guess. Meanwhile, the furl had finished investigating a third stack and was back to the miscellaneous pile, which included my crate. Paranoia was no longer a valid explanation.

  As soon as we settled down for the night. I went back to virt and called Bill. He showed up in a video window right away.

  “What’s up, Bob?”

  I explained about the furl's behavior, then asked him about Quinlan drones.

  “I agree with Hugh about the lack of SURGE being a limiting factor, but there is no reason why the Administrator couldn't have security devices that mimic birds. Even in original Bob's day, they had mechanical devices that could emulate bird flight. And the Administrator has had generations to work on it, and no real alternative.”

  “But why the Clipper? I've been careful to avoid any connection with previous me. The backpack’s put away, Bender is not visible, I looked different… what could've tipped it off?”

  “You don't know that it has been tipped off, Bob. Think of how the CDC would track down disease spread. Lots of detective work, mapping of contacts, logical extrapolation, and so on. They can't find Bob with a bulky backpack anywhere, so it's logical to assume you've either gone into hiding, or found a different way to get around. They know where you left the infrastructure, because they have a failed use of Natasha's card. From there, it’s just a case of working outward, and given Quinlan limitations and the geography of Heaven's River, they can concentrate mostly on east and west.”

  I nodded, thinking it through. “And river travel is the obvious method. No doubt, they’re watching for Quinlan swimming in a directed manner as well. They can’t know for sure that I won't risk submerging Bender.”

  “Which is probably splitting their efforts,” Bill replied. “Good for us, but shipping the matrix is an obvious ploy, if you think of it. They could board and inspect every crate of every ship in two segments, but I imagine they simply don't have the personnel for that.”

  “So maybe they'll be looking for anything even the slightest bit odd, like the lack of detail on my shipping label, and may be the shipping guy remembered me wanting to travel with my crate.”

  “Uh-huh. They'll be watching for anything even a little off. Even if it doesn't pan out, it applies pressure.”

  “Yeah, you're right. And they'll keep adding tactics for as long as they aren't successful.” I shook my head at Bill and sighed deeply. “Looks like I'm right back in the fertilizer.”

  We coasted up to the dock in the town of Six Hills. No one knew why was called Six Hills, you could only get Four Hills from the surrounding territory, and only that if you were generous with the interpretation of the word ‘hill’. By this point though, I just rolled my eyes at Quinlan naming conventions. Maybe there was a subtle sort of irony involved, like naming a large man Tiny. If so, I hadn’t caught on yet.

  There were cops waiting on the dock as we pulled up, which was perplexing to everyone except me. As soon as the gangplank was down, the gendarmerie marched up straight to the postal pile and grabbed the crate with just my name on the label, which wasn't actually my crate as I'd swapped labels with another crate the night before. And rearranged the stack, just in case their instructions were very specific. I felt a bit bad that someone in Little Creek wasn't going to get their shipment, but there wasn't much in the way of alternatives.

  The cop read the label then said loudly, “Which of you is Sam?”

  I raised my hand and stepped forward.

  “You're going to have to come with us.”

  I feigned surprise and displeasure. My acting was reinforced by the very real surprise and displeasure expressed by the captain and crew. I was a hard worker, and therefore popular.

  “Sorry folks, but we need to have a talk with this person at the station. I'm sure you'll be able to find a new crew member quickly.”

  Uh-oh. I'd been expecting something like the scenario with Snidely. Open the box, nothing there, sorry to bother you, etc.

  “Excuse me,” I said. “How long exactly is this interview supposed to take?”

  “Could be a couple of days, Sam. Officials will be coming in from another city.”

  “But…”

  Ohhhh, this was un-good. If it'd just been overnight, worst case, the captain probably would've waited wouldn't. We didn’t have a deadline for anything that was on board at the moment, and the cargo we were contracted to pick up was all non-perishable. But the captain would wait days. Especially some unknown number of days. Time was money for a riverboat.

  The captain came over to me. “I’ll be sorry to see the last of you, Sam. You're an exceptionally good worker. And not much of a complainer. Here’s what I owe you up to this point.”

  He handed me some coins, which I pocketed. The subtext was crystal clear: the Clipper would be leaving as soon as they got their cargo squared away.

  The cop was polite and waited until I said my goodbyes and grabbed my backpack, and then led me off the dock and into town. Behind us, another cop carried the shipping crate.

  “What’s going on, what are you looking for?” I asked.

  He gazed at me for a moment, maybe trying to decide how much to tell me. “I don't have much of anything for you, Sam. We were given the name of the boat, the name on the label to look for, and orders to take both you and the box to the station, pending a visit. I don't even know who is coming.” He leaned in close. “But the scuttlebutt is that it's Crew.”

  “Crew? Aren’t they a myth?”

  The cop smiled at my apparent naivety. “I know a lot of people think that, Sam, but law enforcement has to work with them occasionally. We know they’re real. Some of them have weapons.” He mimed holding a gun and firing it. “They can put you to sleep from a distance. I've seen them.”

  Ohhhh boy. So, I was to be held for some number of days until Crew could come and examined me. This was well past un-good, heading for double-plus.

  21. Earth Abides

  Bill

  September 2334

  Virt, Earth

  A ping to Charles, and received an invitation a drop in. I was surprised by his VR. It appeared to be the hotel suite that original Bob was staying in on the day he died. I couldn't keep a perplexed expression off my face.

  Charles laughed. “I know, Bill. It's been called everything from morbid to macabre, but it grounds me somehow. Reminds me where we all came from, you know?”

  “Yeah, okay. At least you're still trying. Most VRs I visit these days are just Bob-1’s default library theme.” I invoked La-Z-Boy, sat, and accepted a coffee from Jeeves.

  “So, to what do I owe the pleasure?” Charles asked.

  I replied with a he
lpless shrug. “I've been popping around everywhere, evaluating damage from the Starfleet attack. I guess it's wanted to take a break in a location that I already know isn’t affected.”

  Charles nodded slowly. “I'm still not sure if we were just lucky, or if they left us alone out of some kind of respect.” He gestured to his picture window, where Earth hung in the heavens. “Or maybe were just irrelevant.”

  I was sure Charles was just trolling me. No Bob would think that about the Earth Rehabilitation Project. Of course, there was some question about whether Starfleet could be considered Bobs anymore.

  “Charles, you've been one of the more prolific cloners. Do you have any kind of feeling about whether Starfleet's last common ancestor was of your line?”

  Charles shook his head. “I can't contact all my clones, but none of those who I've talked to can identify a candidate. I'm going 15, 16 generations down.”

  “The ones you can’t contact are…”

  “Out of range. Either temporarily until they build a station, or indefinitely because they are bothering.”

  I sighed and tasted my coffee while I consider the possibilities. Pretty much everyone in the first couple of generations says the same. We all have descendants who've gone dark in that way, so it's not specifically a drift thing. Something in original Bob, may be a tendency to run away, I don't know.”

  “I think you're overanalyzing it, Bill. Drift is drift. You're going to get convergent evolution as well. Same end behavior from different lines.”

  “I suppose.” To change the subject, I gestured at the image of Earth. “How’s it going?”

  “Pretty good. We've halted the Ice Age, and the glaciers are starting to retreat. We’re taking it really slow, of course - we don't want to overdo it with the warming. We’ve already shut down three mirrors. Current estimates are that we’ll be back to an inter-glacial in another hundred years.”

  “That's fast, geologically speaking. Any luck with DNA sampling?”