by Ben Bova
Deirdre had wormed her feet back into the deck loops, but she still hung on to one of the handgrips on her console as Faraday arrowed down, down, deeper into the dark and hotter depths. Beyond the shaking that rattled the bridge she could feel the vessel tossing up and down, like a raft in heavy surf, lurching and yawing. There’s a rhythm to it, she realized as she tried to fight down the pain that burned inside her. It must be the rhythm of the leviathan’s flippers, like the oars of an ancient galley.
“Only minor problems so far,” Dorn said. “Structural integrity is still sound. Temperature within acceptable limits. Life-support systems performing nominally.” Still, his voice sounded strained to Deirdre.
“My back pain is worse,” said Yeager. “And I’m getting seasick.”
Deirdre nodded in sympathy. She felt it, too. Nausea. And pain. The tightness in her chest was a hot burning knot that was growing worse each minute. It’s the pressure, she told herself. How much can I stand?
She glanced across toward Andy. He was rubbing the bridge of his nose again. His headache must be getting worse, she thought. We’re all suffering from the pressure buildup. But the expression on Andy’s face was far from misery. He was smiling faintly, that absurd lopsided smile of his.
“How far down is this critter taking us?” Yeager demanded.
“As far as it wants to,” Corvus snapped.
Dorn said, “We’re approaching one thousand kilometers’ depth. That’s the vessel’s nominal limit. If we exceed design limits we’ll have to disengage and return to a safer depth.”
Corvus shot him an annoyed look. To Yeager, he said, “Max, that design limit isn’t absolute, is it? You built a safety factor into it, didn’t you?”
“Yeah,” Yeager said, halfheartedly.
“How deep can we really go?”
Yeager growled, “How high is up?”
“Fifteen hundred klicks?” Corvus demanded. “Can we go that deep?”
Yeager shook his head.
Deirdre thought, Andy’s changed. He was crushed when his DBS equipment didn’t work, but now he’s taken charge. He’s determined to communicate with the leviathans, one way or another.
The pounding was getting worse. The bridge was rattling so hard now that the displays on Deirdre’s console screens were blurring. Are the electronics failing or is it just my eyesight? she wondered.
She called to Dorn, “Are your screens blurry?”
The cyborg turned his head toward her, its human side set in a grim rictus that almost matched the metal half. “You’re having a problem with your vision?”
Squinting at the fuzzy screens, Deirdre said, “I … I don’t know if it’s me or the displays.”
“The system monitors show no indications of failure,” said Dorn.
“It must be my eyesight, then,” Deirdre replied.
“Vibration’s getting worse,” Yeager said, pointing a shaking finger at the monitor screens.
“Everything is still within design limits,” Dorn insisted. Then he added, “Barely.”
“The equipment’s within design limits,” Yeager countered. “But we’re not.”
* * *
Leviathan swam deeper, seeking the Kin but being careful not to dive too swiftly. Leviathan thought that the alien was probably fragile, so it had to descend slowly, gently. After all, the alien is a creature of the cold abyss above, Leviathan reasoned. This region is foreign to it.
What if it can’t live in the warm domain of the Symmetry? Leviathan wondered. It doesn’t belong in our region. It isn’t part of the Symmetry, it’s an alien.
Then a new thought: Does the alien have a Symmetry of its own? It must have! It comes from the cold abyss above; there must be an alien Symmetry up there somewhere, a region where the alien lives with its own kind.
This was something to think about: another Symmetry. An alien Symmetry. Why would the alien leave its own place and invade ours?
Leviathan had no answer. It hoped that the Elders would know—or at least learn what the answer might be.
We must bring the alien to the Elders. Leviathan confirmed its earlier decision. The Elders must see this creature, signal with it, learn from it.
Fighting down its inner impatience, Leviathan swam still deeper, cautiously moving slowly, gently, so that the alien would not be harmed. Or frightened.
* * *
“Andy, are you all right?” Yeager asked.
“Yeah, yeah, I’m okay,” Corvus replied as he swayed in the foot loops, his eyes closed, both hands massaging his forehead.
“You don’t look so good,” said Yeager.
“I’ve got the mother of all sinus headaches, that’s all.”
Yeager nodded, then clasped Dorn’s metal shoulder. “The crew’s going to hit failure mode before the equipment does, pal.”
Dorn said nothing; the cyborg didn’t take his eyes from the screens of his control console.
“Did you hear me, robot?” Yeager snapped. “We can’t go much deeper. We’re all gonna crack up!”
Deirdre saw the fear in Yeager’s face and understood what he was trying to do. Max is scared, she realized. He wants to turn back but he’s too timid to say it, so he’s blaming it on our physical condition.
Corvus said tightly, “I can take it. I’m not going to crack.”
“Not till your head explodes,” Yeager growled. He turned toward Deirdre. “Dee, how are you?”
The pain in her chest was like a knife twisting inside her, but Deirdre said, “I’m okay.” She was surprised at what an effort it took to gasp out the two words.
Corvus slid over to her. Bobbing in the liquid before her he asked in a near whisper, “Are you really okay, Dee?”
“Yes,” she said tightly.
“If it’s too much for you we can go back up.”
“And leave the leviathan?” Deirdre asked. “Quit the mission?”
Andy’s gentle blue eyes looked sad, but he said, “There’ll be other missions, Dee. You’re more important than anything else.”
“But Andy,” she said, panting from the pain, “we’ve come … all this way…”
Corvus turned toward Dorn. “Take us up.”
The cyborg looked over his shoulder at Corvus.
“Up! Disengage and get us the hell out of here!”
“Are you certain—”
Hunched over from the pain in her chest, Deirdre caught a glimmer from her sensor screens.
“Look!” she gasped. “More of them!”
OBSERVATION BLISTER
“I thought I’d find you here.”
Grant Archer turned and saw Zareb Muzorewa stepping into the glassteel bubble of station Gold’s observation blister.
“Hello, Zeb,” Archer said softly.
The transparent compartment was flooded with light from Jupiter. The planet was so large that it encompassed their view, a mammoth swath of gleaming colors spreading as far as their eyes could see, many-hued clouds racing along in turbulent ribbons, a wide circular storm system spiraling far off to their right.
“Come to see it for yourself, have you?” Muzorewa stood several centimeters taller than Archer, a broad-shouldered, muscular figure next to the compactly built station director.
“This is as close as I can get.”
Muzorewa nodded. “We’ve been closer.”
“And we’ve got the scars to prove it,” Archer said, tapping his thigh.
Muzorewa took in a deep breath. “Well, you’ve done it. You’ve proved that they’re intelligent. The data from the capsule shows that the leviathans can communicate.”
“I haven’t done it,” Archer said. “I just helped to set things up so that they could do it.”
“You’ll get a Nobel out of this.”
“Not me. Them.”
That brought a smile to Muzorewa’s deeply black face. Archer smiled back at the scientist, both men basking in the glow from the giant planet.
“Well,” Muzorewa said, “at least you’ll be named chairman of the
IAA governing council.”
“God forbid!” Archer blurted, shaking his head. “What would I want that for? Go back Earthside to sit at a desk and spend my life in conference rooms? No thanks. I’ll stay right here.”
“But everyone thinks—”
“Zeb, I was never interested in the IAA position, no matter what others may have said. Why would I leave here, just when things are getting really interesting?”
Muzorewa fell silent for several moments. Then, his eyes on the swirling splendor of the giant world, he murmured, “I wonder what they’re seeing now, at this moment. What are they doing right this instant?”
THE KIN
“More of them!” Deirdre repeated.
Andy Corvus gaped at the screens of her console. Wordlessly, Dorn put the sensor views on his control console’s screens.
“Look … at … that,” Yeager breathed, drawing out each word.
The screens were filled with leviathans; the huge, massive creatures were surrounding Faraday, gliding up on all sides. Deirdre stared at them, feeling like a little child in the midst of fairy-tale giants. They were truly enormous, their immense bodies decked with rows of eyes that all seemed to be looking straight at her. Bright splashes of color flashed across their flanks: vivid blues and greens, hot reds and oranges, brilliant whites.
“God almighty,” Corvus whispered.
Unbidden, the words of an old poem rang in Deirdre’s mind: “And we are here as on a darkling plain … where ignorant armies clash by night.”
As they stared at the leviathans they barely noticed that the vessel’s shaking, jarring ride had smoothed. Faraday was still riding up and down, still shuddering, but the vibrations were much gentler now, almost pleasant.
“There’s dozens of ’em,” Yeager said, his voice filled with awe.
“More like a hundred,” said Corvus, staring at the screens. “Look at the size of them!”
Checking the data bars on her screens, Deirdre saw that even the smallest of the leviathans was more than ten times bigger than their vessel.
“They’re talking to each other,” she said as the gigantic creatures flashed multicolored signals to each other. The images changed so rapidly that she could make no sense of them.
“Maybe they’re talking to us,” said Corvus.
Yeager shook his head. “How can we make sense out of it?”
“The computer will slow down the imagery,” said Dorn. “Perhaps enough for us to understand them.”
“Should we signal back to them?” Deirdre asked.
“Replay their images,” Corvus said. “Show them that we’re receiving their messages, even though we don’t understand them.”
* * *
Leviathan signed that it had brought the alien for the Elders to see. And explain, if they could.
Its message flashed inward through the Kin to the core where the Elders dwelled. Leviathan saw that the alien was flashing, too, repeating its own message, but much slower. Mimicry again. Is that all it can do? It’s so weak, Leviathan thought. Weak and slow.
Dozens of the Kin gathered closer to Leviathan, flashing a myriad of questions. Where did the alien come from? Why is it attached to you? Is it feeding on you? Does it hurt? What does it want? Why is it here?
Leviathan signaled back to them as much as it knew, but that merely raised the Kin’s curiosity.
At last the Elders’ response came flashing through the Kin to the periphery where Leviathan waited, with the alien still attached to it. The other members of the Kin saw the message and made way for Leviathan to take the alien inward, to the waiting Elders.
* * *
“We’re a lot deeper than we ought to be,” Yeager said, pointing to the graphs on Dorn’s screens. It showed that Faraday was nearly fourteen hundred kilometers below the ocean’s surface.
“Well, this is where the leviathans are,” said Corvus, “and we came here to contact them.”
“Should we detach the probe?” Deirdre asked, leaving unsaid “So we can get away quickly if we have to?”
Dorn flicked his eyes up and down the system status screens. “We’ve trimmed out at neutral buoyancy for this depth. The compression support arms are handling the stresses and all systems are functioning close to normal.”
“So far,” Yeager muttered.
“So far,” Dorn agreed.
“What about life support?” Deirdre asked.
“No apparent problems,” Dorn said, his eyes on the screens. The curves on the life-support displays were near their redlines. Before anyone could respond, he asked, “How do you feel?”
“Rotten,” Yeager snapped.
“I’m okay,” Corvus said quickly. Then he turned to Deirdre, “Dee, what about you?”
In the excitement of being surrounded by the leviathans Deirdre had forgotten the pain in her chest. It was still there, worse than ever. But I can deal with it, she told herself.
With a brief little nod, she said, “I’ll be all right.”
“Very well, then,” Dorn said. “The question remains, should we detach the probe or not?”
“Wait a sec,” Yeager protested. “What about you, pal? How do you feel?”
The cyborg hesitated, as if thinking over the question. Then, “Stiff. Sluggish. This pressure is degrading the performance of my prosthetics.”
“But not enough for us to leave,” Corvus prompted.
Dorn made a weary smile with the human side of his face. “No, Andy. It’s not bad enough to force us to leave.”
Corvus said, “I’ve been thinking. If we detach from the beast, then we’ll have to move on our own power.”
Yeager said, “That’s what the fusion propulsion system is for.”
“Yeah, but if we activate the fusion drive we’ll be squirting out hot steam. Our friends out there might not like that.”
Dorn nodded slowly. “They would not understand that we eject the steam to propel ourselves.”
“Would they think we’re deliberately trying to hurt them?” Deirdre wondered aloud.
Suddenly the bridge seemed to wrench sideways. All four of them lurched and grabbed for supports.
“Doesn’t matter now,” Yeager said, wedging his hands against the overhead once more. “The big guy’s towing us again.”
THE ELDERS
Through the herd of leviathans they moved, towed by the one that had brought them down to this depth. Deirdre watched in silence as they glided through the massive formation of the majestic creatures. They seemed to move away from Faraday, making an avenue for their vessel and the enormous animal that was towing it. The ride was fairly smooth, nothing like the shaking, violent dive earlier.
Deirdre’s chest still hurt, but the pain seemed no worse than before. I can stand it, she told herself as she stared at the screens’ displays. I can put up with it.
“Where’s he taking us?” Yeager asked.
“Deeper into the herd,” said Corvus.
“Into the center of their formation,” Dorn added.
“Why?” Yeager demanded. “What’s he up to?”
* * *
With the fragile alien in tow, Leviathan moved slowly, carefully, through the Kin. Ahead, at the core of their formation, waited the Elders.
There were five of them. Always five. When the Eldest had left the Kin to sacrifice itself to the waiting darters, another member of the Kin became an Elder. There had to be five. Why, Leviathan did not know. But it had been so for longer than the memory of the eldest among them.
The Elders hovered around Leviathan and the strange hard-shelled creature in its tow.
Here is the alien, Leviathan signed to them.
In unison, all five of the Elders signaled, Your replicant told us that you had gone back to find it.
It appears to be intelligent, Leviathan flashed. It is slow, but it is capable of mimicry. Perhaps it can communicate with us, tell us of its world.
For long moments the Elders remained dark. Then the new Eldest asked, Why i
s it attached to you?
Leviathan replied, It is small and weak. We allowed it to attach itself so that we could bring it to you.
It could not find us on its own? asked another of the Elders.
Perhaps it could, but towing it seemed better, more certain.
Again the Elders went dark. Without waiting for them to ask, Leviathan showed them how the alien helped fight off the darters when it was budding.
Instead of showing gratitude, one of the Elders signaled hotly, It interfered with the Symmetry!
It saved our life, Leviathan flashed back. It allowed us and our replicant to add to the Kin.
Darters are a part of the Symmetry, signed the disgruntled Elder. For all of existence we of the Kin have lived with the darters.
And died with the darters, Leviathan shot back.
Thus it has always been. Thus it must always be. That is the Symmetry.
Why must it always be? Leviathan demanded. Perhaps the alien is showing us a better way.
Destroying the Symmetry is a better way? the Elder signaled in glaring blue.
The darters are changing their ways, Leviathan pointed out. They are coming against us in larger numbers than ever. They cut us off from a stream of food. We should change our ways to meet this new challenge.
The Eldest lit up in solemn green: It is the alien that poses a challenge to us. Why is it here? What does it want of us? How will it affect the Symmetry?
* * *
Andy Corvus pinched two fingers over the bridge of his nose as he studied the slowed-down replay of the leviathans’ colorful displays.
“Even in slow motion I can’t make much sense of it,” he admitted. Pointing to his screen, he continued, “I mean, that circle there has got to represent us. See, it’s attached to one of the beasts, just like we are.”
Deirdre nodded. She too had put the computer’s slowed imagery on the central screen of her console. “And those look like those shark things.”
Nodding back at her, Corvus said, “I think he’s telling those others about how we fought off the sharks when he was attacked.”
