Dragon's Egg

by Robert L. Forward

  Soother was barely conscious when the banks of X-ray arcs were struck. The violet-white radiation beamed unmercifully down upon her weakened body. The pain and shock knocked her out and she flowed. The doctors were watching closely, and the arcs were extinguished just as the blisters started.

  The troop commander and Soother’s-First stood by, looking with distaste and horror on the flattened sac of blistered skin that lay in front of them. The scientists and doctors hovered around, their tendrils constantly touching the now sleeping body.

  “She still lives,” one of the doctors said. “But her body functions are very unusual. Her fluid pumps are not beating as they do when a cheela is struck in the brain-knot and knocked unconscious; instead they are moving very slowly. It is a state that the humans call sleep.”

  Soother’s-First moved toward the body and confirmed their diagnosis. “It is indeed fortunate for you that she is still alive,” he said. “Continue your work.”

  “There is nothing left for us to do,” one of the scientists said. “It is now up to her body. All we can do is make sure that she is not disturbed. We can only wait and watch.”

  For two dozen turns, nothing much happened, except that the blistered topside started slowly to heal itself. As the healing progressed, Soother’s-First noticed that the muscle tone of the skin, which had been poor at the end of the starvation period, now became almost nonexistent. The skin under the healing blisters seemed to be almost transparent. Then after another dozen turns, a small, twelve-pointed crown started to lift up under the center of the sac of skin.

  “It looks as if the transformation is working,” one of the scientists reported. “The root spike must now be complete, and that is the start of the cantilever structure that will hold the skin up to the sky.”

  Inside Soother, the hormones and enzymes were busy. The animal muscle was attacked and dissolved, but the enzymes were careful to take their dissolution process just so far. The stringlike molecules in the muscle tissue were carefully teased apart into separate strands, but the strands were carefully maintained as long fibers. The longer they were, the stronger would be the resulting dragon crystal. The fibers floated through the juices where they were picked up by the enzymes building the engineering marvel that would lift the huge body up off the surface of Egg against the fierce gravity, the stiff structures of the plant body being capable of doing something that the more flexible tissues of the animal body could never do. Carefully the enzymes worked the long fibers into the crystal, embedding them firmly into the clear crystal-Hum, to make a composite material that was many times stronger than the crystallium itself. Things went well for a while, and the cantilever structure grew, slowly lifting the thinned sack of skin off the ground. However, long before the twelve-pointed structure was really finished, the muscle tissue ran low. The growth slowed, and every strand that floated nearby was eagerly salvaged by the enzymes that struggled to make do with inadequate building materials. Finally the last portions of the spikes were being made almost entirely of inadequate clear crystallium.

  Soother had waited too long for her transformation. The ancient Swift-Killer had been a well-exercised troop commander, and even in her starved state she had had plenty of muscle tissue; but Soother had been an administrator too long, and had not gone into her ordeal with sufficient reserves.

  Soother’s-First was awed by the huge plant that began to tower over him. Even the scientists were greatly pleased with the result. As the turns passed, the skin folds lifted off the crust, and the doctors could already tell from the wastes emitted from the still partially functioning animal orifices that new nourishment was being generated by the plant portion of the body. Everything looked good. Soother’s-First even began to think about leaving the Sky-Talk compound to visit with Soother’s-Pride to work out the details of their temporary joint rule for the next dozen greats of turns until his mother was rejuvenated.

  Then it happened. The tip of one of the weakened spikes broke as it attempted to tighten the skin. Soother’s-First was horrified to see a jagged point of dragon crystal sticking up out of the torn fold of skin. The skin held for a while, and the scientists attempted to build a mound up against the side of the body to support the damaged section. But before the support could be arranged, an adjoining spike gave way under the unequal tension, and in a rapid series of sharp cracks and loud crashes, the remainder of the twelve-pointed skeleton broke and fell to the crust.

  For a few moments, they all stood in horror as the thin skin oozed the last of its juices out of jagged holes onto the crust. Then Soother’s-First turned to the troop commander.

  “I am Soother-of-All-Clans,” he said. His eyes took in the horrified group of scientists and doctors.

  “They failed,” he said. “Do as my mother commanded!”

  The troop commander hesitated. “But they did their best!” he protested. “There must have been something wrong with Soother’s body for the failure to have occurred like that. It is not proper for you to punish them.”

  “Do not lecture to me about what is proper, for I am Soother-of-All-Clans,” he replied angrily. “Obey me at once, or you will no longer be troop commander.”

  The troop commander felt an angry muttering among his warriors. Although they were well-trained troopers and obedient to duty, it would take all of his prestige to get them to carry out the order. Then suddenly the troop commander realized the strength of his position. His troopers were more loyal to him personally than to Soother’s-First. They would not have backed him against the legendary Soother herself, but he had no question as to their choice now.

  “Who is Leader of All Clans, Old One?” he said quietly, and not a tread moved in the complex as the ancient challenge rang out through the crust.

  “What is this nonsense!” Soother’s-First demanded angrily. “The leadership challenge was outlawed by Soother long ago.” His eyes swept over the large body of troopers and found a burly squad leader.

  “You,” he ordered. “You are now commander of this troop. Take command and take this traitor into custody!”

  The squad leader hesitated. Then with the repressed violence of someone who has seen her whole clan-oriented life disrupted by Soother, who kept track of her eggs like a perverted Old One, she vibrated a harsh reply back through the crust, “I take orders from my commander, not from you—you clanless mother-lover!”

  The vehemence of the reply startled Soother’s-First. He looked through the mass of trooper eyes, looking for support, but found none.

  The troop commander, now confident of his backing, repeated the challenge. “Who is Leader of All Clans, Old One?”

  Soother’s-First did not reply, knowing that he had no chance against this battle-hardened warrior. He attempted to flow off to the west. The troop commander watched for a moment, then accepted a dragon tooth from the nearest trooper. After a very short chase, a well-aimed thrust to the brain-knot ended the short rule of Soother’s-First.

  The troop commander found a very strong popular support for his actions, and soon the much larger group of “Clannists” had overcome the numerically smaller group of “Mothers” and by popular acclaim, the troop commander became the new Leader of All Clans.

  TIME: 14:28:53 GMT MONDAY 20 JUNE 2050

  Seiko was watching the image of the decorated cheela on the screen. Soother’s-Worry was in the midst of one of his confused sentences when suddenly there was a large crowd of cheela surrounding him. She caught a glimpse of glittering knives of dragon crystal as the computer-fed display stopped. Almost instantly the screen flashed on again. There was no trace of Soother’s-Worry, and the very plain topside of a cheela again was centered on her screen, the dozen eye-stubs waving smoothly as the intelligent-looking eyes stared intently at the optical pickup.

  “I am Leonardo, the Chief Scientist of the Sky Talk science complex,” the image said. “I have been appointed the new Keeper of the Comm by the Leader of All Clans.”

  Not a flicker of surprise crosse
d Seiko’s stolid face. One minute ago, the ruler of this world had been called Soother-of-All-Clans. Now they were back to the old title of Leader. Well, they were probably going through their equivalent of the consolidation of China by Ch’in or of Europe by Napoleon, and one would have to expect rapid changes for a while until they had left their semibarbaric state and had settled down to a method for transition of rule by peaceful means.

  “Welcome, Leonardo,” Seiko said, slightly amused. The name was probably inherited with the job as Chief Scientist. Right now the cheela were in awe of the accomplishments of the humans and often took names from the encyclopedia the humans were sending down. Within half a day, they would have surpassed the humans in knowledge and technology. She doubted that she would meet any Leonardos or Einsteins on her next shift.

  “We are about through with the HoloMem crystal GAM to GRE and we will have to take a short break while we load in the next one,” Seiko said.

  “Good,” said the computer-slowed image of Leonardo. “That will give us a chance to install the new radiation to taste converters.”

  TIME: 20:29:59 GMT MONDAY 20 JUNE 2050

  Super-Fluid was dejected. This turn was to have been one of the greatest moments of his career, and it had been blasted by his meeting with the Council for the Programmed Education of the Slow Ones. The Council had decided that the humans would not be told about Super-Fluid’s new theory of gravity. Instead, the humans would have to rediscover it for themselves.

  Super-Fluid had wanted to have his new theory appreciated and used by the humans. After all, they had given so much to the cheela. Yet he recognized that the only reason that the cheela were still developing on their own was that the extensive knowledge of the humans had been transmitted down to them so slowly that the faster-thinking cheela had usually figured out things by themselves, long before the detailed human explanation had finally trickled in.

  The Council had decreed that his new discoveries on antigravity would have to be sent up to the humans in a coded form. The detailed information on his theory would be in the hands of the humans, but they would not be able to read it until they knew the crypto-keyword that would decipher the gibberish that they had received. The crypto-keyword for the antigravity section was the complete nonlinear formula that Super-Fluid had laboriously developed only after many turns of deep thought.

  “It isn’t fair,” Super-Fluid thought. “Before they can find out what I did, one of the humans will have had to think the same thoughts that I did, and that person will get the credit!”

  Yet he knew that, although the human might receive some limited notoriety for breaking the cryptocode to the antigravity section, it would give no real consolation to the person who, after all, had come in second best.

  “They are so brave—so noble—those Slow Ones,” thought Super-Fluid, as he approached the construction site for the antigravity machine.

  Helium-Two, Project Manager of the Negative Gravity Test Project, watched the wrinkled figure of the elderly scientist approach. According to reports, the Aged One still had enough juice left in him to take an interest in his earlier scientific exploits, even though he had served a full stint at the hatching pens. He had been expecting a wrinkled, but still perky Aged One; but what was coming toward him was the sorriest, most dejected cheela he had ever seen since he had been hatched. There must be something wrong.

  Then, as Helium-Two watched, the cheela in the distance noticed his presence. Shivering himself all over, Super-Fluid suddenly changed character and moved surely toward him, even though he was partially off in the hard direction.

  “I presume you are Helium-Two,” the Aged One said with a firm tread. “Thank you for arranging to have me present during the demonstration.”

  “I knew that you would want to see it,” Helium-Two said. “Please follow me.”

  The two cheela moved in single file across the dense crystal crust of the neutron star. Helium-Two pushed hard, as if he were leaning into a heavy wind. His opalescent, ellipsoidal body flattened out to force an opening between the trillion gauss magnetic field lines. He deferentially held the gap open with a trailing cluster of reinforced manipulator arms that allowed the elder scientist to flow after him with minimum effort. They paused to look around; as they did so, they felt the magnetic field close in on them again, their bodies pinned onto the field lines like beads on a wire.

  “How do you like it, Super-Fluid?” Helium-Two asked. “Big, isn’t it?”

  “I don’t see much of anything except those large pumps over there and some ridges in the crust.”

  “We had to put most of the antigravity machine underground because of the high pressures. Underneath those ridges are the largest high pressure vessels ever made by cheela. They are formed of strong pipes wrapped around and around in the shape of a ring wrapped with wire. You can see one ring under that ridge and the top of the other ring over there. They are set up at an angle to each other so that the place of maximum interaction is just above the surface in the middle.”

  “I didn’t visualize anything like this when I was working on the theory,” Super-Fluid said, as his dozen eyes took in the vista.

  “You are lucky. Very few theoretical scientists ever see their mathematical equations turned into working hardware in their lifetime, especially when the theoretical work involves such a fundamental change in our understanding of nature such as does the Super-Fluid-Einstein theory of gravitation. Einstein himself was one of the few. He lived to see his E=mc2 prediction bring about control of nuclear energy. Einstein was lucky because it turned out to be easy for the humans to get a nuclear chain reaction going—they just have to bring two pieces of uranium or plutonium near each other. You are fortunate in that it is easy for us to get the very high mass-densities and velocities that are needed to make the Super-Fluid effect work.”

  “I wish you wouldn’t use that term,” Super-Fluid said. “The correct term is the gravimotive effect. People keep referring to the effect by my name—and I appreciate the honor, but I am thinking of the poor students in the future. They are going to have a hard time remembering that the Super-Fluid effect is the gravimotive effect and does not have anything to do with superconductivity.”

  The two started back toward the bunker as Super-Fluid went on, “I have always been proud of the unusual name that the Old Ones chose for me when I was a hatchling. Like you, I was hatched during the generation when the humans were beaming down the SUPERCONDUCTIVITY section of their encyclopedia. The theories of superconductivity revolutionized our understanding of the interior of our home star. It made quite an impression on everyone to learn that we are floating on a crystalline crust over a liquid core of superfluid neutrons.”

  “All right—the gravimotive effect,” Helium-Two said. “Anyway, the gravitational engineers did a good job on the design. The antigravity machine is a lot more efficient and compact than I thought it would be when I took on the job of managing the design and construction contract.”

  Helium-Two went around the bunker to the entrance in the rear. “Come inside, then we will give the machine its first try. We will only take it to half-power in this first trial. We won’t try to make the gravity force go negative, but there should be plenty of interesting effects when we get to zero gravity.”

  The project manager and the scientist went into the low bunker. They raised some of their eyes up on short conical stubs and looked out over the top. Helium-Two spent the next few moments going over the checklist with the gravitational engineers.

  “It is a big moment for them, too,” Helium-Two thought. “They have been studying and training for many turns, and this is the first time they will be able to see the theories they studied work.”

  Everything was soon ready and Helium-Two signaled for the power to be applied. Super-Fluid could feel the vibrations from the great pumps as they started to move their massive loads of ultra-dense liquid. The fluid moved around in the pipes at a constantly increasing velocity. The acceleration suppli
ed by the pumps was so great that the velocity of the dense fluid would begin to approach the speed of light in a millisecond. However, that would be more than time enough for the fast-living cheela to carry out a leisurely experiment.

  Super-Fluid could almost visualize the Einstein gravity fields generated by the motion of the liquid and was not surprised to see the crust in the center of the machine lift up and flow out from the center. Soon there was a great cavity almost a centimeter deep, as the Einstein fields took hold and started to nullify the neutron star’s 67-billion-gee gravitational field.

  “So far it has all been Einstein antigravity fields,” Helium-Two whispered to him. “Very shortly the hyper-nonlinear portion of your theory should take over and we should get the contraction of the Einstein fields into a region at the center.”

  They watched tensely as the crust started to flow back to fill in the depression—more slowly this time—while the whine of the pumps moved to higher and higher pitch. Soon the crust was nearly what it had been before, but now above the crust at the center of the machine was a distortion in the atmosphere.

  “Why can we see the region?” Helium-Two asked. “It can’t be a distortion in space-time caused by strong gravity fields. The gravity is less there than it is here.”

  “No,” Super-Fluid said, awed in spite of himself. “The explanation is much more pragmatic than that. The low-gravity region is visible because it doesn’t have any atmosphere. The atmosphere has all flowed to the outside edges. That is an oval-shaped chunk of outer space hanging in front of you, and what you are seeing is the difference in the index of refraction of vacuum and the atmosphere.”