Titan

by John Varley

  "Me, too," Gaby said. 'But it wasn't a repeat. It was all new things."

  "Did you always know who you were? That was the worst part for me, remembering and then forgetting. I don't know how many times that happened."

  "Yeah, I always knew who I was. But I got to be pretty tired of being me, if that makes any sense. The possibilities were so limited. "

  "What do you mean by that?" Gaby moved her hands indecisively, trying to pull something out of the air. She gave up and twisted in Ciroccol' arms to look intently into her eyes for a long moment. Then she rested her

  head between Cirocco's breasts. Cirocco found it disturbing, but the warmth and companionship of their closeness was too good to give up. She looked down at Gaby's bald head and had to fight an urge to kiss it.

  "I was in there for twenty or thirty years," Gaby said quietly. "And don't try to tell me that's impossible. I've got a pretty good idea that nothing like that amount of time passed in the rest of the universe. I'm not crazy."

  "I didn't say you were." Cirocco rubbed her shoulders when Gaby began to tremble, and it subsided.

  "Well, I shouldn't have said I'm not crazy, either. I never had to have somebody baby me so I wouldn't cry before. I'm sorry."

  "I don't mind," Cirocco murmured, and she really did not. She found it surprisingly easy to whisper assurances in the other woman's ear. "Gaby, there's no way either one of us could have come through that without some twitches. I cried for hours. I threw up. I may do it again, and if I can't help myself, I'd like for you to take care of me."

  "I will, don't worry about that." She seemed to relax a little more.

  "Real time isn't important," Gaby said at last. "It's internal time that matters. And by that clock, I was in there for many years. I went up to heaven on a Mdam staircase of glass, and as sure as I'm sitting here I can see every step in my mind, and I can feel the clouds whipping by and hear my feet squeak on the glass. And it was Hollywood heaven, with red carpet for the last three or four kilometers, and golden gates like skyscrapers, and people with wings. And I didn't believe in it, you understand, and yet I did. I knew I was dreaming, I knew it was ridiculous, and finally I wouldn't have any more to do with it and it went away. "

  She yawned, and laughed quietly. "Why am I telling you all this?"

  "Maybe to get rid of it. Does it make you feel better?"

  "Some. "

  She was quiet for a while after that and eirocco thought she had gone to sleep, but it was not so. She stirred, and nuzzled deeper into Ciroccols chest.

  "I had time to take a good look at myself," she said, slurring her words. "I didn't like it. I got to wondering what I was doing with myself. It never bothered me before."

  "What's wrong with the way you were?" Cirocco asked. "I kind of liked you."

  "You did? I don't see how. Sure, I didn't cause a lot of trouble to anybody, I could take care of myself. But what else? What good?"

  "You were very good at your job, That's all I really demanded of you. You're the very best there is, or you wouldn't have been picked for this mission."

  Gaby sighed. "Somehow, that doesn't impress me. I mean, to get that good I sacrficed just about everything that makes a human being. Like I said, I did some real soul-searching."

  "What did you decide?"

  "For one thing, I'm through with astronomy."

  "Gaby ? "

  "It's the truth. And what the hell? We'll never get out of here, and there's no stars to look at. I'd have needed to find something else to do anyway. And it's not that sudden. I had a long, long time to change my mind. You know, I don't have one lover in the whole world? Not even one friend."

  "I'm your friend."

  "No. Not the way I'm talking about. People respected me for my work, men desired me for my body. But I never made any friends, even as a kid. Not the kind you can open your heart to."

  "It's not that hard."

  "I hope not. Because I'm going to be a different person. I'm going to tell people about the real me. This is the first time I can do it, because it's the first time I've really known myself. And I'm going to love. I'm going to care about people. And it looks like you're it." She raised her head and smiled at Cirocco.

  "What do you mean?" Cirocco asked, frowning slightly.

  "It's a funny feeling, and I knew it as soon as I saw you." She rested her head again. "I think I love you."

  Cirocco could not say anything for a time, then forced a laugh. "Hey, honey, you're still in that Hollywood heaven. There's no such thing as love at first sight. It takes time. Gaby? "

  She tried several times to talk to her, but she was either asleep or faking it very well. She let her head fall back wearily.

  "Oh, my God."

  CHAPTER SIX

  The smart thing would have been to post watches. Cirocco wondered as she struggled to wakefulness why she had so seldom managed to do the smart thing since she got to Themis. They would have to adjust to the strange timelessness. They couldn't go on walking until they dropped.

  Gaby was sleeping with her thumb in her mouth. Cirocco tried to get up without disturbing her, but it wasn't possible. She moaned, then opened her eyes.

  "Are you as hungry as I am?" she yawned. "That's hard to say."

  "You think it's the berries? Maybe they're no good." "Impossible to tell so soon. But take a look over there. That might be breakfast."

  Gaby looked where Cirocco pointed. There was an animal down by the stream, drinking. As they watched, it raised its head and looked at them from no more than twenty meters away. Cirocco tensed, ready for anything. It blinked, and lowered its head.

  "A six-legged kangaroo, " Gaby said. 'With no ears." It was a fair description. The animal was covered with short fur and had two large hind legs, though not as large as a kangaroo's. The four front legs were smaller. The fur was light green and yellow. It was not taking any special care to protect itself.

  "I'd like to get a look at its teeth. It might tell us something." "The smart thing is probably to get the hell out of here," Gaby

  said. She sighed, and looked around on the ground. She got up before Cirocco could stop her, and was walking toward the creature.

  "Gaby stop it," Cirocco hissed, trying not to alert the animal. She saw now that Gaby had a rock in her hand.

  The creature looked up again. It had a face that would have been hilarious in other circumstances. The head was round, with no visible ears or nose- just two big soft eyes. But the mouth looked as if the creature was chewing on a bass bar- morjica. It stretched twice as wide as the rest of the head, giving the animal a foolish grin.

  it lifted all four front feet from the ground and bounded three meters in the air. Gaby jumped just about as high in surprise, and had time to twist wildly in the air before coming down on her buttocks. Cirocco reached her and tried to take the rock away.

  "Come on, Gaby, we don't need meat that badly."

  "Be quiet," Gaby said through clenched teeth. "I'm doing this for you, too." She wrenched her arm away and ran forward.

  The thing had taken two leaps, but each had been good for eight or nine meters. Now it stood quietly, forelegs touching the ground, head lowered. It was eating the grass.

  It looked up placidly as Gaby stopped two meters away. It seemed to have no fear of her, and resumed cropping as Cirocco came up behind Gaby.

  "Do you think we should-"

  "Hush!" Gaby hesitated only a moment longer, then stepped up to the beast. She raised her arm and brought the rock down hard on the top of its head, then jumped away.

  The beast made a coughing noise, staggered, and fell on its side. It kicked once, and was still.

  They watched it for a while, then Gaby walked over and prod- ded it with a toe. Nothing happened, so she went down on one knee beside it. it was no larger than a small deer. Cirocco squatted, elbows on her knees, trying not to feel disgusted by it. Gaby seemed short of breath.

  "Do you think it's dead?" she asked.

  "Looks like it. Ki
nd of anti-climactic, don't you think?"

  "It's okay with me."

  Gaby wiped a hand across her forehead, then smacked the rock repeatedly into the creature's head until red blood flowed. Cirroco winced. Gaby dropped the rock and wiped her hands on her thighs.

  "That's that. You know, if you could gather up some of that dry underbrush I think I might be able to make a fire. "

  "How're you going to do that?"

  "Never mind. just get the wood."

  Ciracco had half an armload of it before she stopped to wonder when Gaby started giving the orders.

  "Well, the theory was good," Gaby said, gloomily.

  Cirocco tore again at the stringy red meat that clung so tenaciously to the bone.

  Gaby had sweated for an hour with a piece of her spacesuit and a rack she had hoped was flint but which proved not to be. They had a pile of dry wood, a fine moss-like substance, and splinters carefully shaved from tree branches with the sharp edge of Cirocco's helmet. They had all the essential ingredients of fire except the spark.

  In that hour Cirocco's opinion of Gaby's kill had undergone a revolution. By the time she had it skinned and Gaby had given up on the fire she knew she would cat it raw and be thankful for it.

  "That thing didn't have any predators," Cirocco said, around a mouthful. The meat was better than she had expected, but could have used some salt.

  "It sure didn't act like it," Gaby agreed. She squatted on the other side of the carcass and her eyes roamed the ground over Cirocco's shoulder. Cirocco was doing the same thing.

  "That could mean no predators big enough to bother us." Dinner was a drawn-out affair because of all the chewing necessary. They spent the time examining the carcass. The animal didn't seem too remarkable to Cirocco's untrained eyes. She wished Calvin was there to tell her if she was wrong. The meat, skin, bones and fur were of the usual colors and textures, and even smelled right. There were organs she couldn't identify.

  "The skin ought to be good for something," Gaby pointed out. "We could make clothes out of it."

  Cirocco wrinkled her nose, "If,you want to wear it, go ahead. It's probably going to stink pretty soon. And it's warm enough so far without clothes."

  It didn't seem right to leave the biggest part of the animal behind, but they decided they had to. They both kept a leg bone for use as a weapon, and Cirocco hacked off a large chunk of meat while Gaby cut strips of skin to tie the spacesuit parts together. She made a crude belt for herself and tied her things to it. Then they started downstream again.

  They saw more of the kangaroo creatures, both singly and in groups of three or six. There were other, smaller animals that moved up and down the tree trunks almost too fast to see, and still more that stayed close to the water's edge. None of them were hard to approach. The tree animals, when they held still long enough to examine, didn't seem to have heads. They were blue balls of short fur with six clawed feet sticking out around the edges, and they moved in any direction with equal case. The mouth was on the underside, centered in a star of legs.

  The countryside began to change. Not only did they see more animals, but there were more varieties of plant life. They plodded on through light that was turned pale green by the forest canopy, one hundred thousand steps to the twenty-four-hour day.

  Unfortunately, they soon lost count. The huge, simplified trees gave way to a hundred different species, and a thousand kinds of flowering shrubs, trailing vines, and parasitic growths. The only things that remained constant were the stream that was their only guide, and the tendency of Thernis trees to be gigantic. Any one of them would have rated a plaque and a tourist turn-out in Sequoia National Park.

  It was no longer quiet, either. During their first day of travel Cirocco and Gaby had only the sounds of their own footsteps and the clatter of their salvaged suits to keep them company.

  Now the forest twittered and barked and yammered at them. The meat tasted better than ever when they stopped for a rest.

  Cirocco wolfed it down, sitting back to back with Gaby beside the gnarled trunk of a tree that was warmer than any tree should have been, with soft bark and roots that knotted into burls big- ger than houses. Its upper branches were lost in the incredible tangle overhead.

  "Ill bet there's more life in those trees than there is on the ground," Cirocco said.

  "Look up there," Gaby said. "I'd say somebody wove those vines together. You can see water leaking out the bottom."

  "We ought to talk about that. What about intelligent life in here? How would we recognize it? That's one of the reasons I tried to stop you from killing this animal."

  Gaby munched thoughtfully. "Should I have tried to talk to it first?"

  "I know, I know. I was more afraid it would turn around and bite your legs off. But now that we know how unaggressive it is, maybe we ought to do just that. Try to talk to one.",

  "How stupid, you mean. That thing didn't have half the brain of a cow. You could see that in its eyes."

  "You're probably right"

  "No, you're right. I mean, I'm right, but you're right that we should be more careful. I'd hate to cat something I ought to he talking to. Hey, what was that?"

  It wasn't a noise, but the realization that noise had ceased. Only the splash of water and the high hiss of leaves disturbed the silence. Then, building so quietly and so slowly that they had been bearing it for minutes before they could identify it, came a vast moan.

  God might moan like that, if He had lost everything He had ever loved, and if He had a throat like an organ pipe a thousand kilometers long. It continued to build on a note that somehow managed to rise without ever straying from the uttermost lower limits of human hearing. They felt it in their bowels and behind their eyeballs.

  It already seemed to fill the universe, and yet still it got louder. It was joined by the sound of a string section: cellos and electronic basses. Treading lightly on top of this massive tonal floor were supersonic hissing overtones. The ensemble grew louder when it was not possible that it could grow louder.

  Cirocco thought her skull would shatter. She was dimly aware of Gaby hugging her. They stared slack-jawed as they were showered by dead leaves from the vault overhead. Tiny animals fell, twisting and bouncing. The ground began to throb in sympathy. It yearned to fly apart and hurl itself into the air. A dust- devil skittered indecisively, then dashed itself to pieces on the bones of the tree where they huddled. They were lashed with debris.

  There was crashing above them, and a wind began to reach down to the forest floor. A massive branch embedded itself in the middle of the stream. By then the forest was swaying and creaking, protesting: gunshots, and nails wrenched from dry wood.

  The violence reached a plateau and stayed at that level. The winds seemed to be about sixty kilometers per hour. Higher up it sounded much worse. They stayed low in the protection of the tree roots and watched the storm rage around them. Cirocco had to shout to be heard above the bass moaning.

  "What do you suppose could cause it to come up so fast?"

  "I have no idea," Gaby yelled back. "Local heating or cooling, a big change in the air pressure. I don't know what would cause that, though. "

  "I think the worst is over. Hey, your teeth are chattering."

  "I'm not scared anymore. I'm cold."

  Cirocco was feeling it, too. The temperature was plunging. in just a few minutes it had gone from balmy to chilly, and now she judged it was getting down around zero. With the wind coming at sixty klicks, it was no laughing matter. They huddled togeth- er, but she could feel the heat being sucked from her back.

  "We've got to get to some kind of shelter," she yelled.

  "Yeah, but what?"

  Neither of them wanted to move from what little shelter they had. They tried covering each other with dirt and dead leaves, but the wind blew it away.

  When they were sure they would freeze to death, the wind stopped. it did not diminish; it stopped dead, and Cirocco's cars popped so hard it hurt. She could not hea
r until she forced a yawn.

  "Wow. I've heard of pressure changes, but nothing like that." - The forest was quiet again. Then Cirocco found that if she listened carefully she could hear the dying ghost of whatever had made the moaning sound. It made her shiver in a way that had nothing to do with the cold. She had never thought of herself as imaginative, but the moan had sounded so human, though on such a mighty scale. It made her want to lie down and die.

  "Don't go to sleep, Rocky. We've got something else."

  "What now?" She opened her eyes and saw a fine white powder drifting through the air. It sparkled in the pale light.

  "I'd call it snow." They went as fast as they could to keep their feet from getting numb, and Cirocco knew it was only the still air that saved them. It was cold; even the ground was cold for a change. Ciroc- co felt drugged. It could not be possible. She was a spaceship captain; how had she ended up trudging through a snowstorm in her bare skin?

  But the snow was transitory. At one point it was a few centimeters deep on the ground, but then the heat began to well up from below and it melted quickly. Soon the air was getting warmer. When they felt it was safe, they found a place on the warm ground and went to sleep.

  The haunch of meat did not smell too good when they awoke, and neither did Gaby's hide belt. They threw it all away and washed in the stream, then Gaby killed another of the animals they had begun to call smilers. It was as easy as it had been the last time.

  They felt much better after breakfast, which they supplemented with some of the less exotic fruits they found in great profusion. Cirocco liked one that looked like a lumpy pear but had meat like a melm. It tasted like sharp cheddar cheese.

  She felt as if she could march all day, but it turned out that they could not. The stream, their guide for the whole journey so far, vanished in a large hole at the base of a hill.

  The two of them stood on the edge of the hole ;and looked down. It gurgled like the drain of a bathtub, but at long intervals made a sucking sound followed by a deep belch. Cirocco didn't like it, and edged away.