by Nancy Kress
* * *
He found himself back on his bunk when he came to—God, he was tired of coming to, conscious-un-conscious-un-conscious-un, he was starting to feel like a holo persona. A medical patch adorned his arm. Lyle Kaufman sat beside the bunk, studying Capelo’s flimsies.
“Don’t worry yourself about my privacy,” Capelo said. “I’m just Solar Alliance property, like this ship.”
Kaufman said, “You did it,” and at his tone, reverent as one should be in the face of cosmic beauty, Capelo’s mood abruptly changed. He sat up and swung his feet to the floor, and found he could do so easily. Whatever the patch was delivering into his bloodstream, it was terrific.
“I did it, Lyle. Or, rather—” he hated to say this, and his old irritation returned, making him feel more like himself, “—we did it. The … the Faller and I.”
“Tell me.”
“You don’t have the math,” Capelo said brutally.
“I know. I probably don’t even have all the non-mathematical fundamental concepts. But try, Tom. Please.”
Capelo studied Kaufman. “You’re not asking as a soldier, are you?”
“Later I’ll ask like that. Everyone will. But now I just want to know.”
Capelo hadn’t realized this streak of humility lay in the man. It didn’t make him like Kaufman any better, but it made it acceptable to tell him the theory. He explained it as well as he could in layman’s terms. Kaufman interrupted with questions, but the questions were intelligent enough that they didn’t annoy Capelo too much.
When he’d done, Kaufman sat quietly, his hands on his knees. Finally he said, “The destruction of the fabric of spacetime? If two artifacts are activated at setting prime thirteen in the same star system?”
“Is that the only part you focus on?” The man was a soldier after all, with a soldier’s tunnel vision.
“It’s a not unimportant point,” Kaufman said acerbically. “Why would the makers of the artifacts have permitted such a thing?”
“I have no idea.”
“It doesn’t make sense. Surely they would have built in safeguards against tearing spacetime.”
“Yes … no,” Capelo said. He was losing the thread here. “Maybe … maybe they couldn’t control their own technology any better than we can control ours. Maybe that’s what happened to them.”
Kaufman was silent.
“I suppose this is all being recorded.”
“Everything you’ve done in the last fifty-six hours has been recorded, copied, downloaded, and encrypted. Surely you already knew that.”
“I guess,” Capelo said, without interest. Fifty-six hours? “What day is it?”
“Very early Friday morning. Oh three hundred hours.”
“Where are my children?”
“I imagine they’re asleep.”
“Did Rosalind win her chess game against Gruber?”
“I don’t know,” Kaufman said, and from the way he looked at Capelo, Capelo realized that he’d been jumping topics randomly.
“Are we nearing the space tunnel?”
“Yes. Tom, you need sleep. The doctor stabilized you—you were dehydrated, with low blood sugar and abnormal heart rhythm—but you still need sleep. I’m going to put another patch on you. A sedative.”
“Don’t tell Grafton,” Capelo said, which made no sense, even to him.
“Lie back down. There. But before you sleep … I’d like to ask one more thing. A favor.”
“What?”
Kaufman’s speech turned almost formal. “With your permission, I’d like to comlink Ann Sikorski what you’ve found. Once we go through the space tunnel, no further communication will be possible. I’d like her to know what you’ve found, while that’s still possible.”
“Why?” Capelo said sleepily. The patch was already hitting him.
“So she’ll at least know that the reason we took the artifact off World was worth doing so.”
“The natives still on your conscience, Lyle? Throw ’em out. But, yes, go ahead and comlink Ann.”
“Thank you.”
“And in return I want to ask one thing, too,” Capelo said. The torpor was coming up on him fast, but this was important. “Tell me the truth, if you’re capable of it. What happened to the Faller when the nerve gas immobilized the rest of us?”
“He died.”
That fine alien physicist mind, that motherfucking bastard killer. “Good,” Capelo said, and there was no time before he slid into sleep to examine how deeply he might or might not have meant it.
TWENTY-EIGHT
GOFKIT SHAMLOE
There were some tall upright sticks in front of Gofkit Shamloe. Enli had never seen such a thing. The sticks were very close together, too close to fly wind toys from, and pointed on the top. A tight row of them blocked her view of Ano’s house and then curved around the cookfires to one side.
“What’s that?” she exclaimed to Pek Sikorski. “That was never there before.”
“It’s a fence,” Pek Sikorski said, and Enli saw that it was. A fence like the low ones used to keep frebs from eating the tender new shoots of fakimib, and always removed once the fakimib grew tough stems. A freb fence grown tall and pointed, around Gofkit Shamloe. To keep out people.
Enli, Pek Sikorski, and Pek Gruber stood on the road beside their bicycles, staring at the unfinished fence, Essa and Serlit behind them. The adults were dusty and hot. The two youngsters hadn’t seemed to mind the heat, or anything else, as they rode along, giggling. Essa would go on giggling if not stopped, but for Serlit, naturally graver, the laughter was a temporary intoxicant due to Essa’s presence.
Enli finally said, “Stay here, please, until I’ve gone to Ano’s house. Until I see…” See what? If Ano and the children were all right. If Calin had come back to Gofkit Shamloe and told everyone that it was Terrans who had destroyed shared reality. Calin, the only other Worlder beside Enli who knew that piece of reality. If he had told, Pek Sikorski and Pek Gruber, and maybe Enli as well, might not be welcome here. What if while Enli had been on the road to Gofkit Shamloe, sunflashers had told all of World what Terrans had done? Where could Pek Sikorski and Pek Gruber go?
At least the fence would hide the Terrans from Gofkit Shamloe until Enli saw whatever reality possessed it now.
She rounded the last of the tall upright logs. Her breath rose in her throat, bristled her neckfur. Ano …
Gofkit Shamloe looked unchanged.
No, not completely unchanged. The green, with its hearths for shared cookfires, was deserted, but one would expect that in mid-afternoon. The flowerbeds looked as well-tended as before, a colorful refreshment of trifalitib, allabenirib, mittib. But one house was missing, that of Gostir Pek Nafirif and his family. Where the house had stood was a pile of cold ashes.
Behind the village, its fields stretched to the horizon, gently undulating. Although she strained her eyes, Enli couldn’t see anyone working them. But the hills might hide the workers, or the tall larfruit overshadow them, or everyone might be working in the casir grove in the other direction …
“May your flowers bloom forever,” Enli called, but not very loudly. Afraid, she realized, of any answer, or no answer.
From the other side of the village, where the ground dipped toward the wooded riverbank, came shouting. It drew closer. Enli took a step forward, stopped, waited.
Two men rose slowly above the gentle ridge, their backs to her, dragging something. They shouted to people below, who shouted back. The men kept pulling and shouting, and a large log, most of a tree, scraped up the bank. When enough of it had passed the top of the rise so that the whole thing would not topple back down into the river, the two men stopped dragging and turned, wiping their skull ridges. One of them was Calin.
He saw Enli and stopped dead. The other man saw her, too, and rushed forward. “Enli Pek Brimmidin!” It was Ano’s husband, Sparil Pek Trestin. “You’re back with us! Back from the household of Voratur and the Terrans!” He embraced her and
then stepped back, his thin honest face shining with pleasure and sweat.
“Ano…” Enli got out.
“The soil is rich. She will be so happy to see you! She was afraid—so happy to see you!”
“And your children…”
A shadow passed over Sparil’s face, but before he could answer a small shape hurled itself at Enli. “Enli! Enli!”
“Fentil! By the First Flower, how you’ve grown!”
Her nephew drew himself up proudly to his full height. His neckfur, as golden as Enli’s brother’s had been, rippled with health. He smiled even as he spoke. “I’ve been helping haul logs!”
“And a big help he is,” his father said, but the shadow was still there in Sparil’s voice. Was it for her? Had Calin told? “Ano is at harvest. They’ll come back soon.”
Now Calin came forward. He spoke formally. “May your blossoms perfume the world of your ancestors, Enli.”
“May your garden bloom forever, Calin.” Her eyes questioned him. He saw it, and looked away.
Fentil said eagerly, “You must stay now and not go away again, Enli.”
She would have to do it sometime. It might as well be now. “I have visitors with me.”
Sparil said, “Are they good workers? We need good workers?”
“Yes.” Were the Terrans good workers? Pek Gruber, whom she still could not bring herself to call by his childname, was at least very strong. “There are two youngsters and … and two Terrans.”
“Terrans?” said Afri Pek Buctor; she and a man Enli didn’t recognize had climbed up from the riverbank. “Are they good workers? We cannot have anyone here who does not work hard, now that reality has shifted so much. You should know that.”
So Calin had not told. And Afri Pek Buctor was still a scold. Something broke in Enli, and she suddenly felt close to tears.
“There, Enli, you’re tired and hungry,” Sparil said kindly, “and so are your friends, I’m sure. Bring them here. O, but … what do Terrans eat?”
“They’ll manage,” Enli said, not up to explaining the foods Terrans could eat, those they could not, those they could but got no good from, those they carried with them along with seeds that grew at an astonishing rate … She hated to cry. With a huge effort, she made herself stop.
“I’ll get food!” Fentil said, and was off running toward Ano’s house. “And water!”
“Where are your friends?” Sparil said. “O, my manners—this is Morfib Pek Chandor, Afri’s new mate.”
Enli murmured a flower greeting. She had a sudden incongruous hope that Essa would not laugh; “Morfib” was a funny name. If wild Essa giggled, Afri would be affronted.
“Let’s go get your friends,” Sparil said gently, and took Enli’s hand. Calin walked away, toward his house.
Afri said disapprovingly, “I have never seen a Terran before, Enli. Is it true they have neckfur on their heads? Are they very ugly?”
* * *
Enli sat with Sparil, Essa, Serlit, and the Terrans on the thick log. Pek Gruber had made himself instantly accepted by dragging it, unassisted, the rest of the way to the new fence. Fentil capered on the green with the few children who had already returned from harvest. The children darted shy looks at the Terrans and giggled among themselves.
So unchanged. So much the shared reality Enli remembered. And so different.
Essa said to Serlit, “Come on! Let’s play with them!”
Serlit, more polite, looked at Enli. Had she then become his mother, until his mother returned from sunflashing? Apparently she had.
“Yes, go play.” Essa bounded off, Serlit following more slowly. When they were gone, Enli said to Sparil, “Tell me what has happened in Gofkit Shamloe since … since shared reality went away.” He was the right person to ask, not Ano. Sparil would tell it honestly and austerely. Ano would add too many details, too much feeling. Enli had had enough feeling.
Sparil looked uncomfortable. But it wouldn’t occur to him not to share reality, no matter how much his skull ridges wrinkled. Pek Sikorski and Pek Gruber twisted their bodies on the rough log to listen.
“At first,” Sparil finally began, “we all stayed inside our houses. Everyone was afraid. And no one spoke much because … because we didn’t know how, without shared reality. People … thought different things. The only one who spoke much was Ano.”
Despite herself, Enli smiled. Nothing could shut up Ano.
“We got hungry,” Sparil said simply, “so people came out. But some … were not right in their brains. They just sat and rocked back and forth. Others were not wrong in their brains, but they wouldn’t go to the fields to harvest. They were too afraid. They ate, but they wouldn’t work, and other people got angry.”
Afri, for one, Ano guessed. No wonder Sparil was anxious that Enli’s visitors be good workers.
“One day we went to the fields, except for a few people, and some unreal people came. They were taking things, burning things, killing things. Gostir Pek Nafirif and his family were in their hut.” His kind, plain face sagged under his agitated skull ridges. “We had the farewell burning for them all, and then Calin said we should build the fence.”
Calin. With effort, Enli kept her skull ridges smooth.
“Two other families left,” Sparil continued, “Udi Pek Giffiliir and Laril Pek Broffir. They went to other relatives. And some other people came, who live now in those houses. Plus Morfib Pek Chandor, who mated with Afri.”
There was that name again. Enli must warn Essa not to laugh.
“That’s all,” Sparil said. But Enli knew that it wasn’t. There was a piece of reality Sparil wasn’t sharing.
“Sparil—”
He said quickly, “O, and Pek Gruber, you and your mate can have Laril Pek Broffir’s house. It’s still empty. Are those youngsters, ah, yours?”
Pek Sikorski smiled at the mannerly absurdity. Enli realized that it was the first time she’d seen her smile since shared reality went away. Pek Sikorski said, “No, Pek Trestin. Essa is in Enli’s care. Serlit is only with us until his mother comes for him. She’s a sunflasher. May I ask, if the petals unfold for your answer…”
Sparil looked slightly bewildered. Pek Sikorski had learned her World in the Household of Voratur, richer and more formal than Gofkit Shamloe. Her elaborate speech scared Sparil a little. But when the silence had stretched on, he seemed to realize what he was supposed to say. “You may ask,”
“Has Gofkit Shamloe received any messages from your sunflasher about how shared reality went away?”
“Our sunflasher left the village,” Sparil said. “He was Gostir Pek Nafirif.”
So no message could reach Gofkit Shamloe, and the chain would be broken. If Ivi Pek Harrilin had sent Pek Sikorski’s explanation sunflashing from the capital, it might not have gotten very far at all. World would not hear about the object that had perfumed the air with shared reality and then rose away into the sky. The villages would have to cope with unshared reality on their own, as Gofkit Shamloe was trying to do.
“Look,” Pek Sikorski said suddenly, and slowly raised her arm to point at her own face. A lifegiver had perched there, one of the tiny flyers that carried life from blossom to blossom. Sacred to the First Flower, they were revered all over the World. They alit on people’s arms, legs, bodies. But never, until shared reality went away, on their heads.
Pek Gruber said in Terran, “You were right. They are sensitive to the altered brain electricity.”
“Sparil,” Enli said, because it had to be said, “there is a piece of reality you are not sharing with me.”
His skull ridges darkened to a dull red. “Enli…”
“Please.”
Pek Sikorski rose, “We need to control Essa. Come, Dieter.” He looked at her blankly. Finally Pek Sikorski said in Terran, “Private family matters!”
“Oh,” Pek Gruber said, getting to his feet.
Eyen Pek Sikorski did not understand all of World. Family matters were village matters. But Enli let the
Terrans go. “Sparil?”
“It’s Obora,” he blurted. “You know how noisy and wild she’s always been, Enli, getting into everything…” He looked bewildered by this oldest daughter, as well he might, so different from obedient Fentil and placid baby Usi. So different from Sparil himself.
“I know,” Enli said. “What has Obora done?”
“She struck Solor Pek Ramul, and he fell into the fire.”
Enli gasped. Solor Pek Ramul was the village’s ancient piper. He had played music for dancing on the green every evening for as long as Enli could remember. Doddering, sometimes unclear in his mind, he nonetheless played music so sweet it was like the scent of flowers. To strike him, to knock him into the fire …
She managed to get out, “Did Pek Ramul join his ancestors?”
“No. In fact, he was only burned a little, on one arm. Calin was there and dragged him right out and threw water on him.”
Calin again. “Why did Obora strike him?”
“She wanted him to pipe some song he didn’t want to pipe. They didn’t … share reality about the song. She didn’t mean to hurt him, Enli. You know how Obora is. She lost her temper and lashed out, but she caught Pek Ramul off balance, and he’s so old … her soul wilts over what she did. But some people in the village don’t … don’t share that reality.”
“Has … has Obora been declared unreal?” If she had, she was now dead.
“That’s just it!” Sparil cried. “No one knows what to do! How can you declare someone unreal when there is no shared reality? No one can agree what to do!”
Relief flooded Enli. Obora was still alive, not dead with her body imprisoned in chemicals to prevent its decay and her joyous return to her ancestors. Still alive.
“Where is she now?”
“With Ano at the harvest. No one knows what to do. But tonight everyone will gather on the green to … to talk about the reality.”
Which always before had needed no talk, had been shared without dissension.
Suddenly Sparil cried, “Everything is different, and no one knows what to do!”
Enli didn’t answer. She didn’t know, either.
