The Year's Best Science Fiction: Twenty-Fourth Annual Collection

by Gardner Dozois

  The problem was that if the fires came, the heat would turn catastrophic. The worst fires to date were in the south, not far from the polar zone. Epiphyte forests were being consumed in an instant. The normally inflammable cuticle boiled away soon after that. Then the deep living wood caught fire and burned off, allowing drowned, half-rotted islands free to spring to the surface, bringing up fresh methane that only caused the fires to grow larger. After that, the soggiest, most rotten wood was soon baked to a crisp and set on fire, and despite an army of mockmen and brave firefighters, that circular zone of total destruction was spreading outwards, eating a kilometer with every cycle, engulfing abandoned villages and useless farms in a roaring, irresistible maelstrom.

  Yet Jopale’s friends put on hopeful, brave faces. “We’ll get the upper hand soon,” they claimed, sounding as if they were fighting on the front lines. “And we’ll beat the next twenty blazes, too. You just wait and see.”

  But nothing happened quickly in the world. Cycle after cycle, the southern fire continued to spread, and new ones exploded to life in other distant places. The steady, irresistible disaster gave everyone time enough to doubt his most cherished beliefs. That’s when people found themselves admitting to their very lousy prospects, particularly in conversation with their oldest friends.

  “I keep telling people that I’m staying,” announced one of Jopale’s neighbors. A bachelor like Jopale, bright and well read, he admitted, “I’m always saying that the fires will be put out, or they’ll miss us. But when it comes down to it, do you know what I’ll do? Run. Run east to the Ocean, just like you’re running west. If I can slip past the provincial guards and disappear into the chaos…”

  “Maybe,” Jopale replied, unsure what that would accomplish.

  But the fellow had written himself into an interesting story. “All those last islands that merged with the Continent? Well, I’ve heard their citizens are burying explosives inside the old fault lines. And when the time comes, they’ll set off the biggest blasts in history.”

  Again, Jopale said, “Maybe.”

  He didn’t want to attack the man’s dream. But doubt must have crept into his face, because his friend bristled, asking, “What’s wrong?”

  Jopale was no expert. But in every account he had read, those giant fires were accompanied by fabulously strong winds. The winds blew toward the flames, feeding them the oxygen critical to their survival. You could shatter the old fractures from end to end, chiseling the islands free of the doomed Continent; but those enormous masses of wood and scared humanity would still have to move into the open water, pressing against that roaring gale.

  “Well then,” the friend responded. “They’ll think of that. Probably they’ll blow their way free long before the fire comes.”

  And release any methane trapped under their feet, starting their own deadly blaze. But this time, Jopale found the tact to say, “That’s reasonable, sure.” Then he added, “I don’t know much about technical matters.”

  “Keep that in mind, Jopale.” Shaking a finger, the old friend said, “You don’t know much about anything.”

  True enough.

  Jopale’s relatives surprised him with their calm, stubborn dismissal of his New Isles plan. Uncles and older cousins thought he was a fool for surrendering to popular despair. Poisons and fires would kill distant strangers and burn up portions of the world. But not their good ground, no. They couldn’t imagine their lucky island being changed in any lasting fashion. At the very worst, forests and farms would burn up, which would bring a famine that would quickly silence the extra mouths in the world. But that would be a blessing and a grand opportunity, they maintained. To his considerable astonishment, Jopale learned that his family had been preparing for years: Secret lockers were stuffed full of dried scramblers and wooden tubs jammed with pickled fruit, plus enough roach cakes and syrup to keep the most useful mockmen alive. There would be a few hard years, they agreed. Only the prepared would survive to the end. But that’s what they intended to do. Survive at all costs. Then life would settle back into its comfortable, profitable, and entirely natural routine.

  “Stay with us,” they pleaded, but not too hard. Perhaps they’d decided that Jopale was one of those extra mouths.

  One old aunt assured him, “You will go insane in the darkness. Starlight has that effect on people, you know.”

  That wasn’t true. Humans were adaptable, and besides, the New Isles were lit up with blue-white lights very much like sunshine. Yet his response was deflected with a cold pleasure. “You will go insane,” his aunt repeated. “Don’t for two moments think otherwise, my boy.”

  Then a pair of young cousins—a twin brother and sister—explained what was plainly obvious to them. “When the time comes,” they said, “the Spirit of Man will rise from the Ocean’s center to save all of the good people.”

  It was an old faith, half-remembered and twisted to fit the times.

  “Only true believers will be spared,” they promised. “How about you, Jopale? Will you join us with the reborn?”

  “Never,” he responded, amazed by his sudden anger. His cousins were probably no more mistaken about the future than those with well-stocked bunkers. But he found himself panting, telling them, “That’s a stupid creed, and you can’t make me buy into it.”

  “Then you will die horribly,” they told him, speaking with one voice. “And that’s precisely what you deserve, Jopale.”

  But people rarely got what they deserved; wasn’t that the central lesson of the modern world?

  With his critical possessions packed and his precious tickets and papers in easy reach, Jopale walked to the nearest worm station, accompanied by his only remaining mockman. No well-wishers were waiting to send him off. Thank goodness. He and a few other travelers stood on the open platform, looking off to the east. The huge gray worm appeared on schedule, sliding in on the side trail and stopping before them, deep wet breaths making the entire station shake. Travelers formed a line, ready to prove themselves to the waiting soldiers. Then a single voice called out, “Jopale.” It was a woman’s voice, vaguely familiar. Jopale looked over his shoulder. He had grown up with this woman—a natural beauty who hadn’t spoken ten words to him in the last ten years—but there she stood, dressed to travel and smiling only at him.

  Jopale assumed she was heading west, perhaps even to the New Isles.

  But no, she explained that she didn’t have any ticket. She’d heard about his plans and simply come here to speak with him now.

  “Please,” she implored, touching her wide mouth, then running a hand across her long, elegant scalp.

  He stepped out of line.

  “This is difficult,” she admitted. Then with a deep, soul-wrenching sigh, she added, “I wish I’d done what you’ve done.”

  But she hadn’t, of course.

  “If I stay here, I’ll die here,” she told him and every other person in earshot. “But I’ll ask you, Jopale: Is there any way I could travel with you?”

  There wasn’t. No. “All the berths on the New Isles are taken by now. I’m quite sure. And I’m bringing only what I’m allowed to bring. Even with these little bags here, I’m pressing against my limits.”

  The woman wrapped her arms around her perfect chest, shivering as if chilled. Then quietly, through a clenched mouth, she said, “But there is away.”

  “What?”

  Standing beside Jopale was his red-haired mockman. The beautiful woman glanced up at the gigantic creature. Then with a stiff, somewhat angry voice, she said, “Leave it behind. Take me instead.”

  Did Jopale hear that correctly?

  “I’ll ride inside the worm’s stomach with the mockmen,” she promised. “And I’ll carry your luggage for you, too.”

  “No,” he said.

  “I’ll even eat mockman rations—“

  “No.”

  The woman began to cry, tears rolling down her lovely, pain-wracked face. “I’ll do whatever you wish, Jopale. I’ll
even relinquish my legal rights, and you can beat me if I’m slow—“

  “Stop it,” he cried out.

  “Please, Jopale! Please?”

  Then a soldier stepped up, asking to see their papers. What could Jopale do? He was startled, off-balance. This unexpected idea hadn’t had time enough to take root in his head. The woman could never survive the life she was begging for. Besides, he had never lived without a mockman on his right side. And if he ever needed new money, this was a valuable creature on any market.

  Jopale’s only rational choice was to turn away from the woman, saying nothing else. He silently handed his identification to the armed man and then his precious ticket to an elderly fellow wearing the gray uniform of a worm caretaker.

  “Master Brace” was written over the chest pocket.

  “All the way to the Port of Krauss, sir?” asked the old fellow.

  “Yes, I am.”

  Offering a wink and jolly laugh, Brace said, “Well, sir. You and I should get to know each other by the end of the line, sir. I should think.”

  * * * *

  “IT IS COMING”

  The sky was cloudless and absolutely dark, save for a single point of soft yellow light—one of the Four Sisters slowly dancing about the hidden sun. The distant stars were too faint to be seen through the thick window—a few hundred specks that only scientists had bothered to name and map. Stars meant very little to Jopale. What captured his mind was soft country beneath: The Tanglelands. Relentless pressures had crumbled this wood, exposing every old seam and any line of weakness. Long ridges and single hills had been erected through a series of unending quakes. As a result, the trail was far from a straight line, and the climb as well as fatigue kept slowing the worm’s progress. But there were no fresh breaks or blockages on the trail, at least so far. The waking passengers seemed thrilled to be alive, or at least they pretended to share a renewed confidence. And of course everyone wanted at least a glimpse of the tall saprophytes that grew beside the trail, watching the exotic forest passing by for a moment or two, then returning to their blankets and more familiar distractions.

  Jopale had never seen country like this, save in picture books.

  He mentioned his interest to Do-ane, and she responded as he hoped. “I’ve seen the Tanglelands,” she admitted. “Several times now. But I still think they’re lovely. Just wonderful.”

  The girl had a buoyant, joyful attitude when she wanted to.

  Jopale stood beside her, watching the pale, many-hued light pouring out of the dense foliage. Sometimes he asked about a particularly bright or massive tree. Do-ane would warn that she didn’t know her fungi as well as she would like. But every time, she named the species. Then when the rest of the passengers had settled on the stomach’s floor, leaving them alone, she quietly asked her new student, “Do you know why this country is so rich?”

  “The old islands are broken into hundreds of pieces,” he offered. “Plenty of fresh surfaces ready to rot away.”

  “That’s part of it,” she allowed. “But as much as anything, it’s because of the moisture. Three large islands were compressed and splintered to make the Tanglelands, and each one had tremendous reserves of fresh water underground. Which the saprophytes need as much as they need food, of course.”

  He nodded amiably.

  “And besides, rain likes hilly country,” she continued. “Given its choice, a storm will drop its wealth on broken ground.”

  “How about your Good Mountain? Is it very wet… ?”

  She shook her head. “Not particularly. That country is very flat and very boring. And beneath the surface, the wood is exceptionally dry.”

  “Why?”

  “Because the island on the surface can’t reach the Ocean any more.” Do-ane put one tiny hand beneath the other, as an illustration. “I think I mentioned: There’s a second island resting under it, thick and solid, blocking almost every root.”

  “That’s your Mountain? The underneath island?”

  She hesitated, making some kind of delicate calculation. Then she looked out the window again, saying, “No,” in the tone people use when they want to say a good deal more.

  Jopale waited. Then he said, “Tell me more.”

  She squinted, saying nothing.

  “About your undersea mountain,” he coaxed. “What do you do down there?”

  “Research,” she allowed.

  “In biology?” he asked. And when she didn’t respond, he offered a mild lie. “I was once an avid biology student. Some years ago now.”

  Do-ane glanced at the passengers. Rit was sleeping. None of the others were paying attention to the two of them. Yet the young woman whispered so softly that Jopale could barely hear her words. “No,” she said. “It’s not really biology that I’m studying, no.”

  “Not really?” he pushed.

  She wasn’t supposed to speak, but she also wanted to explain herself. With a slender smile, she said, “I can’t.”

  “I don’t mean to interrogate,” he lied.

  The young woman’s life was wrapped around her work. It showed in her face, her manners. In her anxious, joyful silence.

  “Forget it,” he muttered. An enormous fungus stood beside the trail—a pillar topped with fruiting bodies that bled a bright purple light. It was a common species whose name he had already forgotten. Staring at that apparition of rot and death, Jopale remarked with the coldest possible voice, “It’s not as if the world is going to end soon.”

  “But it won’t end,” Do-ane said.

  He gave a little sniff, and that’s when he discovered that he was crying. It was the sort of manipulative gesture Jopale might have attempted and would have failed at. But his tears were as honest as anything he had ever done, a fabulous pain hiding inside him, any excuse good enough to make it surge into public view.

  “This disaster has happened before,” the young woman promised.

  “So I’ve heard.”

  “But it’s true. A new continent always grows on the sunlit face of the world. The water below is always choked of its free oxygen. Old wood compresses and shatters, and the methane rises up through the fissures and holes.”

  “What about wildfires?” he asked.

  “There have been big fires before.” She smiled to herself, betraying a deep fascination, as if describing an enjoyable novel full of fictional tragedies. Then she added, “These world-consuming fires have come seventeen other times.”

  Not sixteen times, or fifty thousand.

  Jopale invested several long minutes contemplating her precision. Then he asked, “How do you know that? An exact number?”

  “I can’t,” she said.

  “You can’t tell me?”

  “No.”

  He stared at her face, letting his own anger bubble up. “This place where you’re going,” he started to ask. “This peculiar mountain… ?”

  “Yes?”

  “Your colleagues, those scientists who discovered the feature… I don’t think they used the old word ‘mountain’ because it reaches in any particular direction. Toward the sky or toward the world’s core, either.”

  Do-ane avoided his weepy eyes.

  “My guess? The object was named for its composition. That’s another quality inherent in the word. The mythical mountain is supposed to be harder and far more enduring than any wood. Am I right?”

  The young woman was standing on her stocking feet, staring through the window again. The Tanglelands were beginning to thin out and turn flat, stretches of empty dead ground between the occasional giant fungi. Now the brightest stars were visible through the window, twinkling and jumping as the worm slid along. Do-ane was standing close enough to Jopale to touch him, and she was taking quick shallow breaths, her face growing brighter even as the empty land around them turned blacker.

  Jopale held his breath.

  Then very quietly, his companion said, “The great fire,” and touched the plastic of the window with the tips of two fingers.
r />   Do-ane announced, “It is coming…!”

  * * * *

  THE HEART OF THINGS

  When a worm like theirs was a baby, it was abused in the most awful ways—or so it might seem to somebody who didn’t concern himself with the rough necessities of the world. Stolen from its mother, the newborn creature was cut through in several places and the wounds were kept open until they became permanent holes, ready for the first in a series of increasingly large sphincters. Then its diet was strictly controlled while professional handlers assessed its tendencies and potential uses. Intelligent and mild-tempered worms were given over to passenger duties. Many of the candidates didn’t survive the conditioning of their digestive tracts or the additional surgeries. Among the alterations, inflatable bladders were inserted into the region directly behind the head, producing a series of permanent cavities where individual caretakers could live, each fitting with a rubber doorway leading into a narrow, astonishingly dry esophagus.