The Abyss

by Orson Scott Card

  FEL BETTER

  SOM LITE BELOW

  "What kind of light?" Lindsey turned to Monk. "What is he talking about? There's no light down there."

  LIGHT EVYWHER

  BEAWTIFULLL

  "He's hallucinating badly," said Monk.

  But he wasn't hallucinating. He was moving into the nimbus of light around and above the city of the builders. It was still too far below for him to see shapes or details. But it was vast, and after so much darkness it was a relief to see light again, colors, moving in a dance that he didn't understand, yet it made sense to him. He knew it had to be them, the NTIs. He knew he was seeing their home.

  The light from his flare was dully reflected by the cliff wall, except now in one spot below him, where it reflected much more brightly. Big Geek. Like Little Geek, it had also imploded, its lights were also out, but the metal was still shiny enough to give him a faint beacon.

  Bud began to deliberately brush against the wall, trying to slow his descent. He grabbed with his hand, each contact, each friction taking just a little more from his velocity. He brought himself to a stop at the shelf where Big Geek rested. He was there. Below him the wall of the canyon wasn't sheer now. It sloped outward, toward the city of light. He was near the bottom of the Cayman Trench.

  And his mind was just a little clearer now, clearer than it had been for some time. The hallucinations were gone. He was still groggy, sluggish, but he saw only things that he knew were real. They kept moving closer and farther away, jiggling, but they were actually there. Maybe it was because he wasn't descending, wasn't having to adjust constantly to new increases in pressure. Maybe his body was adapting.

  He reached for the keyboard on his wrist.

  AT GEEK

  Monk took the microphone. "OK, Bud, we'll go step by step. Remove the detonator housing by unscrewing it counterclockwise."

  Bud's flare went out. It was the last one. He discarded it and pulled out a cyalume stick, broke it. It gave off a dull yellowish-green light, nowhere near as much as the flare, but it was enough. He found the housing in the base of the cone, where he had seen the SEALs working on the videotape Hippy took through the maintenance-room window. Bud's hands were clumsy and stiff, but they obeyed him. He let the housing drop; it dangled from two wires. These two wires were very important, Bud remembered that.

  UNSCREWD

  "Great," said Monk. "All right, Bud, you have to cut the ground wire, not the lead wire. It's the blue wire with the white stripe, not - I repeat, not - the black wire with the yellow stripe."

  CUT ING NNOW

  The two wires looked big as sewer pipes, but miles away, very far, down there near his hands, which were very very small. The trouble with these wires was that in the yellow-green cyalume light, they looked exactly identical. The white was as yellow as the yellow, the blue as black as the black. Identical twin wires, and cutting one would save the NTI city while cutting the other would destroy it. How could he possibly do this? How was he going to choose?

  One of the wires looked right to him. Not blue and white, particularly; there was no visual difference. He just knew which one it was. The question was, could he trust his own intuition?

  No, that wasn't the question. The question was, did he have anything else to rely on?

  Up in Deepcore, everyone froze. Waiting. "Would we see the flash?" Lindsey asked.

  "Through three miles of water?" said Monk. "I don't know."

  He cut.

  STIL HERE

  They laughed, cheered.

  Catfish brought them back to reality. "Quiet, quiet! Save your air, goddammit."

  Monk was talking to Bud again. "Bud, give me a reading off your liquid-oxygen gauge."

  10 MINUTS WORTH

  Hippy knew what it meant. "It took him thirty minutes just to get down there - "

  Lindsey went just a little crazy. "What? Ten minutes' worth?" How could he possibly get back? Gravity working against him, no ROV pulling him. It didn't matter. He was going to come - she willed him to come. "You drop your weights and you start back now, do you hear me? Bud? Bud, your gauge could be wrong. Drop your weights and start back now."

  NO

  "No! No, don't tell me no."

  THINK ILL STAY

  A WHILE

  "You come back here, do you hear me? Drop your weights, you can breathe shallow, goddammit Bud!" He had to try to come back. For her - the way she had come back for him.

  He heard her. He understood. He understood that her voice was the sweetest sound in the world, and he knew that he wouldn't cause her any more sorrow if he could help it, but there was no way he could go up. He was spent. It was over. Why should he run out of air struggling to rise up through the sea? Why should he die in frustration and fear, when he could stay here and look out over a sight no human being had ever seen before or would again, probably.

  BEAUTIFUL HERE

  Lindsey wasn't taking it, though. She shouted at him, railed at him. "You dragged me out of that bottomless pit, now you come back here."

  But you don't understand, Lins. I can't do it. You can't tell me to do that, because I just can't.

  She knew that. Knew also that it wasn't fair, it wasn't right. Her voice lost its sternness, broke. "Don't leave me here." And, at least, a prayer. "God, Virgil, please."

  He couldn't leave her like that. Not without a word.

  DONT CRY BABY

  KNEW THIS WAS

  ONE WAY TICKET

  BUT YOU KNOW

  I HAD TO COME

  She did cry, though.

  LOVE YOU WIFE

  She knew it was his last word to her. Knew that it meant he understood. That she was his wife, truly now, as she had never been before. There was only one thing left for her to say, and it wasn't until the words passed her lips that she realized she had never known what they meant before, had never felt them flow through her like blood the way they did right now.

  "Love you."

  There was no reply.

  Chapter 15

  Alive

  All the time that Bud came down the canyon, they were watching him. Their tendrils were inside his brain, scanning his memories, interpreting his thoughts, hearing all he heard, feeling all he felt.

  Why is he coming down to us?

  He comes because he's afraid. He fears that the warhead will explode. He fears that it will destroy our city. He fears that we'll be angry and punish his people.

  Then is he a fool? We can destroy this warhead for ourselves.

  He doesn't know that.

  We would never harm his people.

  Not intentionally - but we have harmed them. They're on the verge of war out on the surface of this world, in part because of us. He thinks we're also on the verge of destruction here, because of him. He's risking all he is and all he has in order to come undo the terrible thing that Coffey meant to do to us. Who is the nobler creature, then? Him or us? What do we put at risk, if we save them?

  We can't save them. Killing is in their hearts, even the best of them.

  So is fear and yet they overcome it. You say that fear has brought him down to us. There were also fears that made him hate to come. Fear of personal death, which is more terrible to them than it is to us. His fear of breathing liquid, which is worse in him than any other human that we've seen. His fear of losing her - a fear that we ourselves have tasted. You asked why he's coming down to us. I think I understand. He saw two possible worlds. One, a world in which he remained alive, but in which a terrible crime would be committed against us, a crime that he might have prevented. The other, a world in which there remained the possibility of peace between us and his people, but in which he himself was dead.

  This is too simple an explanation.

  Is it? Then let me show you another, even simpler. I also see two worlds ahead of us. One in which we refuse to change our own behavior, and so we stand by and let these humans destroy each other, forcing us to leave this world behind, dead, when we could have prevented it,
when its death is partly our fault. The other is a world in which we change to become a little more like them, in order to have the power to change them to become a little more like us; that's the world that remains alive, with us and these humans sharing it, at peace with each other, at peace within ourselves. I choose the second one. I choose to change ourselves a little in order to save us all.

  What sort of change do you propose?

  We've seen how fear controls them. How fear of each other, which we inadvertently helped to cause, is leading them to devastating war. Why not, then, let them see how irresistibly powerful we are, compared to them? Why not let them fear our power so much that when we tell them to destroy their nuclear weapons, they'll do it?

  Fear us? But we would never harm them!

  Wouldn't we? Haven't you nearly decided to stand back and let them destroy this world?

  They would be the ones destroying each other, not us causing harm.

  Bud Brigman believes this warhead will destroy us. But by your reasoning, it would be Coffey destroying us, not him. Yet he has chosen to act as if Coffey were part of himself, to take responsibility for Coffey's actions, to die in order to undo the harm that Coffey caused. We can't pretend to be innocent if we stand by and let them destroy each other - especially since we're partly to blame for their crisis.

  No! Your madness is confusing you, and you are confusing us! You're speaking as if these humans were as important to us as we are to each other, as if they were our equals, when plainly they aren't! They're killers!

  Didn't you mean to kill me?

  They're strangers! Monstrous, terrible strangers that we can't speak to because they don't even know they're being spoken to. They can never understand us and we can never understand them. They don't matter to us! Why should we change ourselves, betray our nature for them?

  This is the most important thing the humans have taught me. The thing they're teaching us right now. You see, they are all strangers to each other. They live out their entire lives, never truly understanding one another, only making guesses, making mistakes, distorting, deceiving, misunderstanding each other. And yet, though they're permanently strangers, they choose sometimes to trust each other, care for each other so completely that they gladly die to let the other live - that they gladly change themselves to make the other person happy. They're so used to this great leap of trust and love that Bud Brigman has extended that same trust to us even though he doesn't know us, doesn't understand us, even though we're strangers to him. All I ask is that we treat them as Bud Brigman is treating us. He barely comprehends us, yet values our lives enough to die trying to save us. We understand far more about them, and we don't even have to die to save them. We only have to change a little bit, and then when their nuclear weapons are gone, we benefit as much as they do, because we can remain in peace on this planet.

  You make it sound as if you think they're better than we are.

  In some ways they are. In some ways they're much worse.

  Humans and builders, we're different from each other. But we must still value each other, in spite of the differences. Because of them.

  This is hard. This is very hard. We've never thought like this before - we can't find this in any of our memories, even the oldest ones from the first of all worlds.

  Then watch Bud Brigman and Lindsey Brigman. They're as separate from each other, as strange to each other, as we are from humans, as humans are from us. See how they do what I think that we should do.

  Somewhere during Bud's journey down the cliff, as the city watched and listened, a mind that was made up of ten thousand other minds made a decision. The builders began to act.

  By the time Bud reached the ledge near the bottom of the cliff, instead of his being helpless, his brain destroyed, their tendrils had reached into his brain, into his body, and changed him, restored him, made it possible for him to live in a place where a human could not live.

  They showed him which wire to cut and made him sure of his choice. They filled him with peace at the thought of staying to see the city of strangers. And finally, as the last of the oxygen began to bleed out of his breathing fluid, a builder was sent to him.

  He sat on the ledge, leaning against the wall of the cliff. He had seen the city of light, and he had saved it. There was more that he would have wished to do with his life, but if it had to end now, this was enough. It was worth living. Lindsey loved him. He had accomplished everything that really mattered to him. Now he was tired, and the breathing fluid was no longer replenishing; the liquid oxygen was gone. He closed his eyes.

  Closed his eyes and saw his brother, standing on the shore. Rushing into the water to save him. Don't come. Don't save me. I'd rather have you live than me.

  But Junior answered him and said, I couldn't live and be the one who stood on the shore and watched you die.

  Yeah, that's right, Junior. Me neither. I couldn't live and be that guy. So it looks like we both bought it in the ocean, liquid in our lungs, splashing around trying to be heroes. Not a bad way to go.

  But speaking of being dead, Junior, isn't this taking kind of a long time? I'm out of oxygen. Shouldn't I be gone by now? Or is this life after death, sitting around forever wondering what happens next, only nothing ever does?

  He saw light. Moving, getting brighter. He opened his eyes. Turned his head to face it.

  It was an angel, coming toward him in the water, just like Jammer said. Bright, glowing, light shifting inside it; two wings arching from its back, sweeping down behind it.

  As it came closer, though, he saw that they weren't wings and it wasn't an angel. Where the body of it should have been, it wasn't human, not even close. What seemed to be wings was a veil, a delicate mantle that billowed as it moved through the water. No, it was the rhythmic undulation of the mantle that was propelling it. Its body and limbs were transparent, like a figure of blown glass. Its face was inhuman, but not repellent. He looked into its eyes and realized that it was beautiful.

  Bud wasn't afraid. He knew he was seeing an NTI - not something it made, not an artifact or vehicle, but one of the people of the abyss. He knew that he was safe now that it was here.

  Bud reached out his hand in greeting.

  The NTI reached out an arm to him. The slender blown-glass fingers grasped his bulky glove. The fingers were solid and strong, belying the delicacy of their appearance. But instead of being afraid, instead of feeling imprisoned by the creature's hold on him, Bud felt protected, cared for. He wanted very much to go with this creature, to see everything that it might show him. He didn't wonder anymore why he wasn't dead yet; he knew that the coming of this creature - this person - meant that his life wasn't over yet, and he was glad of the delay.

  The NTI pulled him up from the ledge, and then, like Peter Pan taking Wendy on her maiden flight, the NTI drew him through the water, carrying him swiftly over the last sweeping downslopes of the canyon wall. They cruised over rocks and cliffs, toward the glow he had seen at the bottom.

  Suddenly the darkness exploded with light as they cleared the last cliff and saw the whole city open up beneath and before them. It was one vast, symmetrical structure, radiating outward from the center, as if it were one living body, one huge machine. Light swept along slender threads that must have been twenty yards thick, yet still looked graceful and delicate. They seemed like highways, but the only travelers were pulses of color. He saw huge spires rising upward in graceful spirals, with arches and webbing and tissue stretched across ribs, like microscopic photographs of delicate internal organs. None of the structures made sense - where were the highways, the shopping districts, the suburbs, the parks? This city wasn't built for any purpose Bud could understand. But he knew, without comprehension, that it was perfect for its purpose, that not a spire, not a channel, not a ridge or arch or bend was out of place.

  They swept toward the center, descending as they went, and now Bud could see thousands of creatures moving through the city. They didn't follow the channels or ridg
es - when they all could fly through the dense water at the bottom of the sea, why would they need roads? There were many like the one who was leading Bud; there were also other shapes, dozens of them, all going about their business with purpose and intelligence. Many of them stopped and touched each other as they passed not like ants, with their chaotic dance of indecision, constantly touching antennae to discover where they were and what they ought to do, but rather like a city of people who all knew each other so well that they must greet with brief but real affection everyone they pass.

  The NTI led him toward one of the spires. As they sank down toward its base, he realized how tall it was, hundreds of feet high. The closer they got to it, the more detail he could see. Each feature - a rib, an arch, a sweep of wall - was really composed of hundreds of smaller structures that echoed the shapes and patterns of the spire as a whole, and each of those smaller structures was composed of others, smaller still, so that he believed that the entire thing was grown, not built, taking its shape naturally from the myriad forms within it. Even the buildings are alive, he thought. The whole city is alive.

  They approached one of the large openings. It was not an archway; it opened in so smooth and gradual a curve that it was impossible to tell the moment when you stopped being outside and started being inside its yawning mouth. Instead of slowing as they came near, the NTI accelerated, as if they had been caught in a current, like blood cells being swept through the veins toward the heart. Inside, they rushed through a curving, three-dimensional maze of tunnels, not dark and forbidding, but full of light and life, a safe place, a place of memory.