A Larger Universe

by James L Gillaspy

  When they were done, Tommy had everyone organizing the warehouse while he went to Moder's farm to turn on the extra equipment he had installed. If something went wrong, he wanted the lords' anger to fall on him, not on those he had lured into helping him. Not that I could do anything, he thought, about either the luring or the consequences if something goes wrong.

  He hadn't seen radio transmission or receiving equipment on this ship, and he was about to turn some on, even if it was low powered. He had no idea what the consequences would be. Even with the short range his transmitters would have in this warren of passageways, he couldn't predict the repercussions. He was ready with a plausible explanation for what he was doing, as long as he didn't shut down the whole starship. The airlines on earth had rules concerning computer equipment and cell phones operation on takeoff and landing. Whatever their reason, maybe it also applied here.

  He decided to stop fretting and started the wireless access point attached to the network. When he heard no sudden noises, he opened one of the two laptops he had brought with him and displayed a duplicate of the main monitor control screen. Using the laptop keyboard, he adjusted the water flow, slightly, through one of the pumps and then returned it to its original setting. He then waited for someone in authority to tell him to stop doing what he was doing.

  When no one had come to arrest him after an hour, he used the laptop to wirelessly access Tillie's farm through the network and perform the same small changes to a pump there, and waited again.

  The day was almost over when he took the second laptop to Moder to give a demonstration. Moder’s eyes widened, betraying his fascination with his new ability to monitor the tanks from outside the control room. Tommy didn't tell him he could monitor and control the tanks in Tillie's farm, too. He also didn't share that information with Tillie the next day when he gave each of the other hydroponics masters his own laptop and turned on the wireless access point in his section. And he didn't share with anyone that the wireless-capable handheld he had programmed could control the hydroponics farms from anywhere a wireless connection was available. For now, he had access to the network in parts of five decks and, sometimes, a small area in the levels just above and below the hydroponics control rooms. The coverage had to be improved.

  # # #

  The next day was a rest day, and Tommy decided to skip services and make the trek to one of the observation rooms. He hadn't looked outside the ship in months. Even if all he saw was blackness, somewhere out there his home and family waited.

  This time, traffic rushed in both directions in the usually deserted radial tunnel. People on foot, pulling carts piled high with unidentifiable objects, and small trucks, battery powered he supposed, filled with canisters and boxes, traveled on the left side of the tunnel toward the center of the ship. On the other side of the tunnel, empty carts and trucks moved toward the hull.

  He joined the line of empties, and had to hurry to keep up. He fell back until he was even with a farmer pulling an empty cart at a near run. "What's going on? I thought no one worked on a rest day," he panted.

  "Emergency cargo loading. If that happens on a rest day, everyone works until the job is done." He looked at Tommy's artisan clothes. "Even an artisan should have an assigned duty. Where should you be?"

  "I'm not sure," Tommy said, and dropped behind to cut off the conversation.

  Near the stairwell to the observation room, a large cargo elevator lifted boxes and canisters to the level of the tunnel floor. A mixed crew of artisans and farmers then quickly loaded the waiting carts and trucks. He moved through the stairwell door before someone could put him to work.

  In the observation room, he turned off the lights and moved close to the window. Outside, the disk-shaped landers moved toward and away from some area of the ship below his view. In the distance he saw a blue and white ball, approximately five times the size of a full moon and lit by an orange star.

  He watched for a while and almost fell asleep in front of the window. That made him feel guilty. Perhaps I shouldn't be goofing off when everyone else is working. He moved to turn on the light when the sound of a gong and a single word in the lords' language came from a speaker somewhere in the chamber: "Recall!"

  The landers that had been moving toward the planet slowed and turned back toward the ship. A stream of landers soon followed. Occasionally, he heard a faint clank he assumed must be a lander docking. Mostly, he heard nothing as the disks flew toward his face and, at the last moment, turned aside and vanished.

  Soon after the last disk disappeared from view, the clanking sounds ended. The stars wheeled outside the window, steadied, and several more minutes passed. Tommy waited for some other announcement to be made over the speaker, but heard nothing. As he waited, an impossible motion caught his eye. In the distance, partially eclipsing the planet, a gray sphere materialized where empty space had been before. Irregularities in its face reflected the sun, shining from a point above Tommy's perspective, as the sphere spun. A twinkling of lights flashed in four rows across the middle of the sphere, then across the middle of the sphere again, and then again. A few seconds passed, and he saw a swarm of tiny toothpicks coming toward him. As the sphere continued to spin, the flickering row of lights twinkled again, and again, and again.

  The toothpicks in the first swarm grew.

  A second swarm of toothpicks appeared.

  He backed from the window as the first toothpicks, now the size of gigantic logs, approached the ship at tremendous speed.

  The window went completely black.

  Tommy turned on the light and looked at himself in the mirror. He saw a chalk white face over clothes soaked with sweat.

  That was another ship! A ship attacking this ship! And this ship did nothing in return except run!

  # # #

  Valin shook him awake the next morning. "Lord Ull wants to see you. Now!"

  Did the wireless transmitters interfere with something after all? Is that why this ship did nothing to defend itself?

  He put both feet into the same pant leg, stood up, and sprawled to the floor.

  "Why? Why does she want to see me?" was all he could think to say as he started over with his pants. "Can I leave Potter here in the room?" He had been taking Potter each day to the deck where he was working. Somehow, he didn't think that would work with Lord Ull.

  "I don’t know why she wants to see you, and you worry too much over that silly cat. Yes, he will be all right here. Leave the door closed. Hurry! A lord shouldn't be kept waiting."

  As they rushed to the central shaft, Tommy realized he had never heard one of the lords described. "What does she look like?" Tommy asked breathlessly. "Is she tall, short, big, little? What color is her hair?"

  "These are not appropriate questions to ask concerning a lord. A lord is a lord, and in any case, you'll soon know."

  "Well, how should I act toward her? You've never told me anything! Are you going to help me with this or just throw me in on my own? You said lords kill people! What should I do when I see her? What should I say? Why haven't you ever told me these things?"

  There was a nervous edge to Valin’s voice. "We have little time for this now, but I'll tell you what I can. This is completely without precedent, at least in my memory. The lords communicate through artisans and farmers of the guildmaster level and with priests. You are neither. I am as surprised by this as you are." They reached the bank of elevators. "When you are in a lord's presence, keep your head down. Do not look directly at her. Do not speak unless she asks you a question, then only to give her a direct answer. Always tell her the truth. To lie is to risk your life."

  The ride up was the longest Tommy had ever taken. The deck markers flickered by, one after another. A question from Valin interrupted his count at forty. "Where were you, yesterday? I searched for you for a work assignment."

  "I went to one of the observation windows and didn't make it back for several hours. What work assignment?"

  "We had to get cargo loaded a
nd put away. Your strength would have been helpful, and, in any case, everyone works in such a situation."

  "I watched some of that through the window. The ship left in a hurry after another ship appeared. What was that about?"

  "The lords didn't share that information with me." Valin smiled tightly. "Perhaps Lord Ull will explain the situation to you when we see her, if you ask politely. Or more likely after you've become fertilizer in the Commons, I'll receive the same fate for allowing your silly questions."

  Tommy crossed his arms in front of his chest. "I can't control being curious."

  "Be curious. Just control your mouth in a lord's presence."

  The two men who met them when the elevator door slid aside wore blue instead of green tunics and armbands, but otherwise were much like the first warriors he had seen.

  The man on the left grunted, "Follow me." When they complied, the other man fell in behind.

  As they followed the warrior down the corridor, the warrior's hem bouncing around his knees made Tommy want to giggle. I wonder what he's wearing under that tunic, Tommy thought. He pressed his hand firmly against his mouth. Not a question to ask right now.

  Valin leaned over to his ear and whispered, "Remember to be quiet!"

  Tommy glanced behind him, then at the warrior ahead. Both ignored him and Valin, though he was certain that could change instantly.

  "I think they just do as they're told," Tommy said, "And they were told to escort us to Lord Ull. They aren't interested in what I might say."

  "Perhaps, but you take too many chances," Valin grumbled. "Life was much easier before I was given you to oversee."

  The lead warrior stopped at a large hatch marked with a symbol Tommy had never seen before: a thick, upside-down V in white crossed with a wavy, irregular, blue line extending over both legs. Unlike on the doors to storerooms below the Commons, no words explained the symbol or what lay beyond. On the door's face held a silver plate like that on the door to the room in which he had first been held captive. One of the warriors placed his hand on the plate. A doorbell, he thought, as the door opened outward, or maybe a doorknob, depending on who you are.

  As he followed the lead warrior through the hatch, he first heard the sound of falling water, and then a puff of humid air brought the smell of an indoor pool like that at the YMCA near his home on Earth. When the warrior moved aside enough for him to see, he realized why. The chamber's dominant feature was a pond, much bigger than the Olympic sized pool at the Y. A rocky cliff bordered the pond against the left wall, and a stream of water fell from near the high ceiling into a dark pool surrounded by floating greenery. Tommy searched for an outlet to the pond without success. The water must be circulated from beneath, like in a Koi pond, a gigantic Koi pond. Are the lords fish? The edges of the lake were irregular, with dusky inlets extending under overhanging trees and faint trails leading from the bank to almost hidden walls. A trough, to the right of the waterfall, also carried water from the top of the cliff to the pool, down a double S shaped curve. More water splashed down a trough on the front of a low hill directly across from the entrance.

  Periodic waves moved out from the base of the waterfall, lifting the lilies surrounding the plunge pool. One of the waves turned into a roiling silver line, beginning near the waterfall and ending when a long, grey shape catapulted from the water and landed on its hind feet, drenching them.

  Tommy jumped back, trying to escape through the entrance. Before he could, Valin, who had prostrated himself on the wet floor, pulled him to his knees. "Get down," Valin hissed.

  The creature gave an undulating whistle, its transparent inner eyelids snapping shut and then open again, and bent over to examine Tommy. "So this is the boy from Earth," she said in the lords' language. "Are you sure he is human?" After whistling again, she said, "Stand up, let me see you. Show me how well you speak our language."

  Valin's face twisted into an expression of utter misery.

  Tommy stood, carefully, as his feet almost slipped out from under him. Valin needn't have worried. The shock of meeting an animal that could speak had made him dumb. He kept his head down, but even as the beast was turning him, he tried to see what it was. The creature had the appearance of a slender bear, more than seven feet in height, covered with sparse fur, except for a thicker ruff circling the neck. Its torso seemed long for its arms and legs, and a thick tail snaked back to the water's edge. Tommy risked tilting his head a bit to see its head. It had a long snout below black eyes, a high brow and a domed skull that seemed completely out of place. When the creature reached out, roughly, to turn him, he saw that its fingers were webbed for a third of their length. A pair of tight shorts held up by straps crossing over its narrow shoulders made it look like a cartoon animal, one of the weasels in The Wind in the Willows.

  This strange creature had to be a lord. It had to be Lord Ull. This 'toon had ordered his capture and might have him killed on a whim. Except Tommy wasn't a cartoon character. He wouldn't bounce back to life.

  His vision fizzed at the edges. The fizz became a drifting snow that spiraled until he looked down a tunnel. All he saw was Lord Ull's webbed feet and the sharp claws at the end of her toes. His thoughts slowed. He had another migraine. He needed to be able to think. He needed to use the sprayer he carried in his pocket.

  Lord Ull was speaking. "Without consulting with me, you have completed repairing the dead hydroponics farms." Tommy saw Valin drop lower through the fuzz at the edge of his vision. "How many computers were brought from Earth?" When Tommy didn't answer, Lord Ull struck him on the side of the head.

  The blow resulted in nausea rather than pain. The room spun. He took a deep breath. "Over a thousand."

  "We have many dead computers on this ship. The artisans will provide you with a list. After you receive the list, I will inform you of the order of their replacement. I will also ensure you have access to all sections and the cooperation of every guild and craft. My desire is that every part of this ship, once again, be fully functional."

  Tommy decided some response was required and managed to say, "Yes, Lord Ull." The nausea was getting worse. He wondered what would happen if he threw up on Lord Ull's feet.

  "These computers create radio signals." Her words were not a question.

  Tommy body became rigid. Here it comes. She knows something is wrong.

  "Will the radio signals always be on the frequencies we have detected and of no greater power?"

  She doesn't know! She doesn't understand! "Yes, Lord Ull. The frequencies will always be the same, for each new computer."

  "The frequencies are not of those we use. If it were otherwise..." She broke off. "That is enough. Go back to work. I will check on your progress."

  Valin grabbed the back of Tommy's shirt and pulled him to the rear, out of the chamber. As soon as the portal had closed in front of them, Tommy pulled the migraine sprayer from his pocket and tore off the wrapper. The spray exploded up his nostril, and, by the time they were on the elevator, his vision had cleared.

  Ull

  As Ull swam in slow, joyless circles around her pond, she considered her options. After Valin had reported problems with translating the computer books, her proposal to the ship's council had been simple but controversial. At least two humans knowledgeable about the latest Earth computers would be taken to provide assistance. These humans would be confined and closely watched, and their cooperation forced. Feral adult humans were never allowed the freedom of the ship. Valin would evaluate which feral human was most helpful. The others would be disposed of. When the remaining human was no longer useful, it too would be disposed of. The council had agreed after much argument. The failure of the pumps beneath Nore's pond had emphasized the need to act.

  However, it had originally been her idea to obtain the computers she had seen in the television programs. The other members of the council had been doubtful, even scornful, that anything created by humans could be of use to The People. The People had traded humans' primitive mach
inery to other, even more primitive, cultures for generations, but nothing mechanical, beyond hoe and plow, had ever been used on The People's Hand. Without the fish kill in Nore's pond, her arguments would have been political suicide. Since the revolt three hundred years before, Feral adult humans were brought on board for immunizing the tame humans with their latest diseases, then returned. They were just too dangerous.

  The broadcast from Earth had provided another alternative. The boy in the transmission seemed to know much about Earth's computers. The others were honoring him for that knowledge, and he was scarcely more than an infant. With no guarantee that even one of the adults they planned to take would be beneficial or even cooperative, this Tommy had seemed a lower risk, so, without further discussion with the council, she had authorized the mission to take the child. Now, she had begun to wonder if she had made a mistake.

  This feral human kit had grown more than a hand in height and width at the shoulders. He looked more like a miniature human warrior than an artisan, and he was loose on the ship.

  Miniature warrior.

  That was especially troubling, but the stories about him must be no more than exaggerated rumors. Only a true warrior could have done the physical deeds attributed to him: lifting the corner of the stable, capturing a giant bird, and pulling a jammed hatch off its hinges.

  Instead of spending all of his time helping with the translations, the feral installed the computers himself and recruited discontented artisan apprentices to help. She could not deny that this accomplished exactly what she wanted, but the others on the council would find it unsettling. She found it unsettling. The People had lived in the waters of this ship for more than a hundred generations, and no feral human could swim in its currents.