The Starfarers Quartet Omnibus

by Vonda N. McIntyre

  “I found their statue,” she said.

  “What statue?” Androgeos asked.

  “The statue!” Europa exclaimed in dismay.

  “The one of the meerkat. In the museum.”

  Europa sat up straighter. Startled, the lookout meerkat shrieked. All the meerkats dropped down and ran away, disappearing against the dry ground.

  “But how could you?” Europa said, stricken. “You didn’t land — you couldn’t!”

  “I’m afraid we did,” J.D. said.

  “My beautiful museum,” Europa said, her voice a sigh. “I worked so hard on it for you.”

  “I’m sorry,” J.D. said.

  Distressed, Europa sat on the warm boulder with her hands clasped between her knees, kneading wrinkles into the fabric of her skirt.

  “What is it about you Earth humans?” Androgeos said angrily. “You could have joined us a thousand years ago. Instead, no sooner do you gain access to knowledge, than you destroy it. You raze the library at Alexandria. You burn books, you suppress research, and now — !”

  J.D. could not stand it; she could not bear to apologize again.

  “That isn’t fair!” J.D. said. “We didn’t know the museum would destroy itself if we tried to look at it! We had no way to know! Why didn’t you tell us what would happen? Why didn’t you leave a message?”

  “We fell silent,” Europa said. “We withdrew our welcome.”

  “The warlike ones never take the hint,” Androgeos said ominously. “They have to be shocked into sense.”

  “If you’d just left it alone!” Europa said. “It would have been waiting for you when you came back.”

  “Not for me!” J.D. cried. “It doesn’t make any difference to me if it destroyed itself, or if it’s still there in five hundred years!”

  She turned away, distressed by the accusation, distressed by her own reaction. The destruction of the library at Alexandria had always seemed to J.D. to be one of the great tragedies of human history. To be accused of being the cause of an equivalent disaster was too much to bear, and too close to the truth.

  Europa touched J.D.’s shoulder. Her hand was delicate, long-fingered, strong, the nails opalescent.

  “Back on Earth,” she said. “How long do you live, back on Earth?”

  J.D. collected herself, pretended she was all right, and answered.

  “Not much more than a hundred years.”

  “Hardly any different from our birthplace,” Androgeos said. “Why so little improvement?”

  “You could keep the body going indefinitely. But if you keep renewing neural tissue, eventually the connections in your memory get fuzzy. After a while... you aren’t you anymore.” She could not keep her thoughts away from Feral, from the destroyed museum, from Stephen Thomas changing as she watched. She caught her breath, trying so hard not to cry that her throat hurt. Seeking calm, she stared at the ground. A minuscule plant grew from a crack in the rock, dusty green with deep-purple flowers, like pinpoint violets.

  “You didn’t visit the worlds, did you?” Europa asked “Tau Ceti II, Tau Ceti III? The living ones? You would have mentioned it if you did. Wouldn’t you?”

  J.D. shook her head, then jerked up to look at Europa in horror.

  “You don’t mean — you can’t be saying the worlds would have destroyed themselves, too!” Even though she had first suggested it, she could not believe it might actually be true.

  “It’s our defense,” Europa said. “Not to let them fall into warlike hands.”

  “We didn’t land,” J.D. said.

  “I’m so glad,” Europa said. “That makes things better. The planets will still be there when Earth humans come back. I can build you another museum, but five hundred years isn’t nearly enough to reconstruct the ecosystem. And they never come out the same. Tau Ceti II is so pretty, and Tau Ceti III is severe, and exciting...” She stopped. “But you won’t get to see them.”

  “No.”

  “I’m sorry you have to return to Earth.”

  “I am, too,” J.D. said, at a loss. “Please, come and talk to my colleagues before we go. Don’t make them leave without even meeting you.”

  Androgeos glanced at her, sidelong, suspicious. “It would not be to your advantage to kidnap us.”

  “I’ve got no intention of kidnapping you!” J.D. exclaimed, shocked and embarrassed and insulted. “I’m trying to show you some hospitality.”

  Androgeos and Europa gazed at her, and she had no idea what they might be thinking.

  “If you don’t want to come inside the explorer,” she said, “at least invite my friends out. If you’re afraid—”

  “We’re not afraid of you, J.D.,” Europa said.

  “All right. But you asked questions my colleagues will have to answer.”

  The two alien humans hesitated, and then Europa rose.

  “We’ll meet your colleagues,” she said.

  They climbed down the scree and walked back toward the Chi, Europa and Androgeos flanking J.D. The alien humans were of a height, and J.D. was a head taller.

  “You’re so fair!” Europa said. “I can see your blood right through your skin!” She reached up and laid her fingertips against J.D.’s skin. J.D. was still flushed with the embarrassment of Androgeos’ accusation. Europa felt the heat. She pulled back, startled.

  “I knew there were colorless people, of course,” she said. “But you’re the first I’ve ever met.”

  It’s no easier for the alien humans, meeting us for the first time, J.D. thought, than it is for me, meeting them.

  “We come in lots of colors,” she said. “Even colorless.”

  o0o

  The Chi cycled open with a faint sigh of the locking mechanism. The meerkat troop, which had been slinking around and sniffing at the spacecraft’s legs, stood up as one. A high, shrill cry: they all scampered off.

  “Why meerkats?” J.D. said. “They aren’t from Greece.”

  “Neither are we,” Androgeos said. “We were civilized when the Greeks were still barbarians, when there were no Greeks. Our ancestors were the Pharaohs. We like to have reminders of our mother continent around us.”

  Europa laughed. “Andro, you’re so pompous. We have meerkats because the people who rescued us rescued them, too, and other creatures. And because they’re fun to watch and soft to pet.”

  “Because they’re cute,” J.D. said.

  “Yes.”

  “Tell me about the people who rescued you.”

  Europa glanced away. “I can’t do that.”

  The door opened. Victoria stepped down. Satoshi and Stephen Thomas and Zev followed her.

  J.D. made the introductions. The alien humans greeted her teammates civilly, coolly. Androgeos turned all his attention and arrogance on Victoria.

  “You can answer questions your colleague did not understand,” he said.

  “I can answer questions in my area of expertise,” Victoria said, “and J.D. can answer questions in the areas of hers. I have questions for you, too.” She paused. “Want to trade?”

  J.D. caught a quick flash of anger before Androgeos repressed it. Stephen Thomas looked at Androgeos, narrowing his eyes. J.D. wondered what he perceived, what he thought of the alien humans.

  Whatever Stephen Thomas thought, J.D. knew she did not trust Androgeos. She had not decided for certain about Europa, though she liked Europa better. She assumed they would back each other up. Europa might tease Androgeos, her — colleague? Lover? Son? All three? Or none? But they must, after all these centuries of waiting, have the same goals.

  “I can’t explain our transition algorithm in words of one syllable,” Victoria was saying to Androgeos. “Or in words at all. We need a graphics display.”

  J.D. had worried about how to tell Victoria of her suspicions without communicating through Arachne or the Chi. The alien humans could, no doubt, pick up transmitted information if they cared to. Now J.D. saw she did not need to voice her warning. Victoria was holding back her explana
tion, for the Chi could create displays out here as easily as inside.

  “How many of you are there?” Satoshi asked Europa.

  “Just one,” she said. “Just me. I never thought it would be much fun to have a younger twin.”

  “Sorry,” Satoshi said. “I meant how many humans did the other people rescue? Were they all from Crete, from the same time and place? Are they here, on your ship? Even if it was only a few, there must be a sizable human population away from Earth.”

  “Not that many,” she said. “We don’t have a world of our own, you see.”

  “What about Tau Ceti’s worlds?”

  “But,” she said, as if explaining to a very young child, “those were made for you.”

  “‘Made’?”

  “They were lifeless, waterless.”

  “And you made them habitable? In three thousand years?” Satoshi sounded incredulous.

  “Not I,” Europa said. “And not in four thousand years. Your neighbors placed them and seeded them for you, as a gift. Eons ago. Before there were human beings.”

  “That’s remarkably magnanimous,” Satoshi said.

  Europa smiled. “Earth had life. Sentience always evolves. It just needs time. Someday human beings will terraform some other lifeless world for some other people. For beings who have not yet come into existence.”

  Satoshi fell silent.

  Stephen Thomas crossed the landing stone, headed for the meadow.

  “Where are you going?” Androgeos spoke sharply.

  “To take a look at your plants,” Stephen Thomas said. “To take a few samples.”

  “You wouldn’t find them interesting. The species originated on Earth.”

  “They’re interesting, believe me.” Stephen Thomas started away again.

  “No,” Europa said, with a firmness J.D. had not previously heard in her voice, but did not find surprising.

  Stephen Thomas stopped short.

  “I’m sorry,” Europa said. “That isn’t possible.”

  J.D. winced for Stephen Thomas, feeling the blow as if it had been directed at her. Stephen Thomas stood on the sterile landing stone, looking around him at a world full of, if not precisely alien life forms, species that had been cut off from Earth for three and a half millennia, plants, and microbes, and animals, that must have been engineered for the environment.

  “Europa —” Stephen Thomas said.

  She circled him and approached Zev.

  “You are wonderful,” she said, awed. “What are you?”

  “I’m Zev,” he said. “Can we go swimming?”

  “I thought you’d been watching us,” J.D. said. “Don’t you know about the divers?”

  “We’re not omniscient, J.D.,” Europa said. “We’re not omnipotent. What’s a diver?”

  Zev told her about the divers, the orcas.

  “An ichthyocentaur, that’s what you are!” Europa said. “I never expected to see one. But you have no scales on your legs.”

  “I’m not a fish!” Zev said, offended. “I have no scales anywhere.” This was obvious. Zev was wearing nothing but a pair of Stephen Thomas’s shorts. The fabric was a shade of green that did not compliment his skin tones. J.D. could not imagine the color complimenting anyone, including Stephen Thomas.

  J.D. tried to keep track of several conversations at once. To her astonishment, Victoria had persuaded Androgeos that the transition algorithm could only be displayed by Arachne, back on board Starfarer.

  J.D. regretted the dissembling, but approved. She had arrived to meet the alien humans in a state of deliberate, willful naiveté, and it had been a mistake.

  I won’t do that again, she promised Victoria silently, though she still refrained from sending her teammate a message. I promise I won’t do that again

  Chapter 12

  The landing stone became a white expanse, then an irregular patch in a green meadow, then a decorative gleam against the natural landscape. It disappeared within the flowing pattern of forests and streams, lakes and marshes and island-studded seas.

  The Chi rose. A herd of aurochs galloped across the meadow, tossing their horns.

  The Chi rose, and the landscape vanished beneath sweeping white scarves of cloud.

  The horizon curved quickly, steeply. The blue of the shallow seas overwhelmed the green of the land. The Chi sped away from the small blue planet, the miniature replica of Earth.

  Despite the promise Androgeos and Europa had made, to visit Starfarer, J.D. expected their world, their ship, to accelerate and vanish, taking the alien humans along with it.

  “They’re following us,” Victoria said. She sounded as surprised as J.D. felt.

  The streamlined white blob of the alien humans’ short-range spacecraft followed them out of the atmosphere.

  J.D. let out her breath. “I didn’t dare to believe them,” she said.

  “What have they got to gain by lying?” Satoshi said.

  “What did they have to gain by talking to us at all?” J.D. asked. “If it’s true that we’ve caused them nothing but trouble with our missile, why didn’t they just whiz around us and disappear again?”

  “I wish you wouldn’t refer to that bomb as if it were our fault,” Victoria said.

  “I have to, Victoria,” J.D. said. She met Victoria’s sharp glance. “I’m sorry. We are responsible for it, we, us, human beings. All of us. People who will, or won’t, prove we’re worth asking to join civilization. The people who fired the missile, the people who were the target. Maybe Europa is right. Maybe we ought to go back to Earth for five hundred years.”

  “You’re speaking like a guilty child,” Victoria said, “and I disagree, I deny, that we deserve to be punished!”

  o0o

  In the amphitheater, Infinity and Esther and Kolya and the rest of the faculty and staff of Starfarer watched the transmission from the Chi. Infinity found it comforting that so many of his colleagues had, independently, decided to come to Starfarer’s heart. Together, as a community, they watched the landing, the first meeting of humans and alien people.

  By the time the Chi lifted off from the alien humans’ spaceship, Infinity was numb with shock. The landing amazed and delighted him; the existence of the alien humans astonished him; Androgeos and Europa first exasperated and then affronted him. They had tremendous power, and they used it the way people always used power. Or misused it.

  He leaned forward and rested his forehead on his arms. drained.

  “Quite a story for Feral to cover,” he muttered.

  “Where is Feral?” Kolya asked. “I thought he would be here, but — Oh, bojemoi...”

  The disbelief, the pain, in Kolya’s voice, jolted Infinity upright.

  “What — ?” He automatically reached out to Arachne for information...

  ...and discovered the news of Feral’s death.

  “I was wrong,” Infinity said, out loud, but more to himself than to Esther or Kolya. “I was wrong. Losing one person is just as bad.”

  “Look at strand three,” Esther said.

  As Arachne reached its full strength, regaining all its communications capabilities, a parallel message strand began to carry the recording Stephen Thomas had made of the antibody trace. It spun through the web, requiring no explanation. Infinity watched the evidence J.D. and Stephen Thomas had uncovered, disgusted, appalled, but not surprised. If he had learned one thing in his life, it was that people in authority would behave badly whenever they had the chance.

  All around Infinity, other people were discovering the same information. Like whispers, messages vibrated through Arachne’s shiny new web, messages echoed by voices in the amphitheater.

  “It was Chancellor Blades...”

  “Blades crashed the web...”

  “Blades caused Feral’s death...”

  “Blades...”

  “Blades...”

  “Blades...”

  All around Infinity, people cried or cursed, or held each other, or simply stood, stunned, or mi
lled around in confusion and anger and disbelief.

  A crowd began to form, cohesive, wrathful.

  “This is going to turn into a mob,” Kolya said. “We’ve got to —”

  Iphigenie DuPre strode into the amphitheater. At the top of the stairs, she looked down over the crowd.

  “Listen to me!” she cried. “Listen to me!” Her angry voice sliced through the buzz of incredulity and outrage.

  “Any of us could have died,” Iphigenie said.

  She had torn herself free of indecision. She was magnetic, arousing, driven by her fury and her grief.

  “It was deliberate murder! It was aimed at me — and instead it killed Feral. An innocent, a guest, a friend! He died trying to help us! He died because he tried to help us.”

  She paused, gazing at her colleagues, letting what had happened sink in.

  “We can’t let Blades do this again! Will you come with me, will you help me stop him?”

  She led her colleagues in a stream, out of the amphitheater.

  Infinity found himself being pulled along, following Esther. Outside the amphitheater, when the crush eased a little, Kolya caught up to him and grabbed him by the shoulder.

  “What are you doing? Infinity! Esther! Where are you going?”

  “I’m going with Iphigenie,” Esther said. “We’ve been jerked around enough.”

  “And then what?”

  Infinity stopped. Esther did not hesitate.

  “I... I don’t know,” Infinity said. “Maybe there’s an explanation. Maybe it was an accident —”

  “Feral’s death? Perhaps it was an accident. But the crash of the web caused it. And the crash was deliberate.”

  Infinity hurried after Esther. He did not know what else to do. He caught up to her. Kolya strode along beside them.

  “What do you do here,” Kolya asked, “when someone commits a criminal act?”

  “I don’t know,” Infinity said again.

  Esther had never lived on Starfarer till now. Though Kolya had lived on the starship since its beginning, he had avoided Starfarer’s endless organizational meetings. But Infinity had attended most of them.