Harvest of Stars

by Poul Anderson

  “The needle—direction finder—” The boy’s voice, which was changing, cracked. “It’s gone malo! Wobbles through … ninety degrees at least.”

  Valencia scowled but kept his calm. “Not unusual. Radio interference. A’s at the peak of its sunspot cycle, you know. And stars get extra temperamental when they approach the end of their time on the main sequence.”

  He rose and faced aft, to give an image of reassurance. The short, sturdy figure in the cockpit stood firm. “Can you take an average bearing?” Valencia inquired.

  “I’ll try, sir. Though I wonder if we haven’t gone way off course regardless. For sure, we didn’t hit any patch of water lilies like this outbound.”

  “You are observant,” Valencia said. “Good for you.”

  Good muchacho all around, he thought, bright, hard-working, respectful without being obsequious, excellent company in the field. Bueno, consider what stock he came from. And maybe his rather hit-or-miss home life had actually helped him; maybe Kyra wasn’t careless but wise. Not many mothers would allow a boy his age to go on an expedition afar, no matter how skillful the adult companion. She had smilingly agreed it would be a learning experience that no vivifer or quivira could match.

  “I think probably you’re right,” Valencia went on. “But if we keep going in this general direction, we should hit our island somewhere. Then we can follow the shoreline to camp.”

  “This rotten visibility—” Hugh wasn’t complaining, Valencia knew; he was grumbling, man-fashion. “I wish we could anchor and wait the damn fog out.”

  “Me too. However, at this time of year one of these banks can hang around for twenty or thirty days. We have hardly any drinking water left, remember.” Irony: Hollowland was the single region other than sea and littoral where native life had taken hold; and here it had flourished. Dying and decaying, it poisoned the swamp for humans. Genes could be put into Terrestrial plants and animals that let them thrive, but a century might pass before the toxins were entirely gone. “People and robots around the planet have plenty to do without us hollering unnecessarily for help.”

  “I understand, sir.”

  Another wraith showed vaguely through the fog to starboard. It resembled the head of a medieval halberd thrust two meters above the water, encrusted blue shells tapering in spikes and hooks to a point as sharp as their own edges. “Oye, I never saw a riprock that big before!” Valencia exclaimed. “We certainly are off course.” He squinted. “Dead, yes.” The new microbes had killed the fresh-water coraloids and much else, not by attacking alien proteins but by their waste products.

  The boat glided on. The shape vanished. There might be more. He’d better keep watch. Before he resumed, he saw Hugh shiver. As he hunkered down he heard, “Brrr! That thing, it’s like—like the swamp wants revenge.”

  “For what?” Valencia asked.

  “For us bringing in our kind of life to destroy what was here.”

  Mood swings were normal at puberty, but Valencia decided to curb this one if he could. The surroundings were eerie enough as was. “Hugh,” he said, “if you want to be a ranger, you’ll have to scrap that attitude. We’re simply doing what nature herself did, over and over, on Earth—and on Demeter, I’ll bet we find when we’ve read the fossil record. For instance, when the Panamanian isthmus closed, back in the Pleistocene, the big cats moved down from North America and the big carnivorous South American birds went under. Read your paleontology, for the same reason you should read history. You can’t know the present without knowing the past.”

  Quite a homily for an old gunjin, he thought. On Earth he had barely heard about geological eras, couldn’t have named them to save his cojones, and hadn’t cared to learn. The years on this world had made him into somebody else, somebody whom Kyra Davis trusted with her son. … Perhaps the change wasn’t so great. The potential must have been in that young man who now seemed a total stranger, or why had he come? An emptiness he’d scarcely been aware of, long since filled. …

  Hugh’s tone lightened. “Bueno, yes. And this country, it’ll become wonderful, won’t it, sir?”

  Valencia nodded. “Rich. Wetlands always have been. From these breeding grounds life should go on to colonize the rest of the continent. Oh, and don’t forget, we do mean to keep reserves where native species are protected. I even hear talk about trying for a mixed ecology in places where—”

  A crash resounded. The deck jarred beneath his feet, tilted, threw him sideways. He caught the rail and slammed himself to a halt. A horrible gurgle rose from below.

  Glaring aft through the fog, he saw Hugh leap out of the cockpit, onto the deck by the cabin. Impulsive, untrained, the boy left the motor running and sped toward the man, as if Valencia were his father. The boat shuddered, slewed about, and pitched. Hugh went over the side.

  Valencia sprang that way. Fighter’s reflexes kept him on a footing that lurched and slanted beneath him. The hull groaned. They’d struck a riprock, he knew—close below the surface, concealed by fog and the lilies. The boat was hard on, holed, its wound worse for every second that passed.

  He jumped into the cockpit and switched off the motor. The boat stopped grinding itself against the skeleton. It settled sluggishly astern till it lay canted, bow up, after-deck awash.

  Valencia was already amidships, on all fours, straining out and yelling. “Hugh! Hugh!” The fog smoked thicker and colder.

  The boy swam well. He should have come straight up and trod water, waiting for a hand back aboard. He hadn’t. He’d struck his head or—

  Valencia ducked into the cabin and unclipped an insulated flashtube. He kicked off his shoes, skinned out of shirt and pants, dived. The preparations had taken about thirty seconds.

  As he slipped among the lily stalks the beam probed ahead through upswirled silt, dim and cloudy. The depth was just a few meters; he quickly saw mud and sodden logs. His lungs strained, his heart thuttered—Yonder! The light picked the riprock out of gloom, rising past sight, cruelly jagged, to the vessel it had pierced. The base spread wide. Hugh sprawled near the bottom, unmoving. His clothes had gotten snagged.

  Air, air. But Hugh had been without air for how long? Valencia threshed his way to the boy. His head roared and whirled. He braced himself among the lumps, caught hold, tugged. Somewhere distant he felt how the sawlike edges slashed him. Blood drifted into the beam of the flashtube now held between his teeth. The knowledge that he might well die was academic. Here was a task.

  He freed the body, took it in his arms, let the tube drop, and kicked. His lungs could endure no more, they emptied in a rush of bubbles.

  But then his head was free, he gasped, he saw. He fought through the lilies to the counter, caught the taffrail, hauled his weight one-handed up on deck, dragged Hugh after him. Blood spread and spread out of his cuts.

  Never mind. Roll the muchacho over, take him around the belly under the diaphragm, disgorge the foul tide of what he’d breathed and swallowed. Did he breathe now? No? Lay him on deck, put mouth to mouth and heel of hand at breastbone, work. Blood washed over the white face, on into the gray fog, the only color in all the universe.

  Hugh stirred. His eyelids fluttered. Valencia sat back. His throat tightened, he barked, he realized with a shadowy startlement that he was trying to weep.

  Nonsense. Jobs yet to do. He got the lax cold form below, undressed, toweled, into a bunk with plenty of blankets. “It’s muy bien,” he croaked, “everything’s going to be muy bien, Hugh.” Lips twitched slightly upward, but the boy was scarcely conscious. He felt warmer to the touch, though.

  The touch made an awful red mess. Valencia fetched the first aid kit and patched the assorted slashes on both of them. Luckily, none were serious, except that three of his required plast to stop the bleeding. The swamp water they’d taken in was another matter. Bueno, he had anti-toxin. He gave Hugh a double injection and himself a standard one. That ought to serve temporarily.

  The sooner he got medical help, the better. This boat wasn�
�t going anywhere. Valencia wanted dreadfully to lie down and sleep. He must have lost more blood than he’d known. He hobbled to the radio, slumped into the seat, and called Port Fireball.

  “Hola, hola, do you read me? … We’ve got troubles—” He explained.

  “We’ll dispatch a flyer immediately,” said the voice at the other end, how crisp, how resonant and alert. “Keep transmitting on distress waveband so it can home on you. It’ll hover and lower a cable chair, if you can manage one. … You can? Excellent. In about three hours. Sorry, nothing closer is available.”

  “Uh, our flyer in camp, and the gear—”

  “That’ll be taken care of later. You two come first. Demeter isn’t exactly overpopulated, you know. Hasta la vista.”

  For a moment silence hummed. Valencia moved to switch the audio off. A new voice, faint and rustly, said, “Hi, there.”

  “What’s that?” Valencia asked. “Where are you calling from?”

  “From this neighborhood,” replied the voice. “I happened to overhear you.” Urgency: “How is Hugh Davis in fact doing?”

  Dimly indignant—exhaustion ached through his marrow—Valencia snapped, “If you heard me, you know.”

  “Yeah. But listen, I’ve known cases like that where the patient’s heart suddenly quit. It’s not likely here, he’s a strong kid, but you wouldn’t take chances with Kyra’s son, would you? Don’t sleep. Torture yourself and stand by with the cardioshocker till the rescue team gets there.”

  “Who the devil are you, anyway?”

  “Anson Guthrie.”

  Valencia gaped into the dusk that brimmed the cabin. “Huh?”

  “Are you so beat you’ve forgotten, and you a ranger? Solar-energized transceivers are bred into a certain percentage of plants, these days, and relay stations are spotted around.”

  “Oh, yes, but—”

  “Then you may recall that every once in a while I get into the bionet. Happens I was in tune with a tree nearby when I heard you.”

  Guthrie could have been anywhere, Valencia thought, seashore or sea bottom, mountain or valley, prairie or forest, a point of consciousness flitting through an immense and growing life-world. … “I see. Gracias for the reminder, sir. Of course I’ll watch over him. Kyra’s son.”

  “Not only hers, I’d say. You’re earning a share.”

  Guthrie spoke on, words of encouragement, reminiscences, arguments, crotchets, bawdy jokes, whatever would hold Valencia awake. Eventually the flyer arrived.

  In the hospital at Port Fireball the staff examined and treated Hugh and discharged him in short order. Valencia they kept till late the next day while they cloned new blood for him and repaired other damage. His home was just four klicks away, but since he was still weak, when they were done they sent him there in a car.

  Leaving it, he walked slowly up the path, between junipers and shapely stones. On high ground, the house looked east over Shelter Bay and the brightness of ocean beyond, west across hills gone green but their trees vivid in autumn. So soon was the planet cooling. Wind blustered, clouds scudded and gulls soared, the sun went low while its companion rose to kindle sparks in waves.

  Eiko stood on the porch. Light played over the white and black streaks of her hair. “Bienvenido, querido,” she called as she had learned from him, holding wide her arms. He entered their circle, enfolded her, brought lips to lips and then cheek against cheek, drank in the fragrances that were hers. After seeing him at the hospital and being assured he was in no danger, she had continued her absence from work to prepare a homecoming feast. He wasn’t a bad cook when he took his turn, but she was superb.

  Nevertheless she trembled as she stammered, “Are, are you truly well?”

  “I’m fine,” he answered. “Give me a few days’ rest and I’ll be intolerable.”

  “And Hugh?”

  “In excellent shape, back with the Blums or whatever household is currently looking after him. Didn’t they tell you?”

  “The medics only said he would be all right. I, I stayed afraid. If it had been for nothing that you nearly died, oh, hero—”

  “De nada,” he said uncomfortably. “In the field we bail each other out of the messes we make. Doctrine. De nada.”

  He felt her go tense. She turned her head aside. “You—we got a message from the asteroids, from Kyra. They had contacted her. She … is grateful—no, what a poor word that is. When she returns she … wants to thank you … in any way she can.”

  Valencia laughed. “Splendid! She can pay a cook as good as you to make us a magnificent dinner.” He drew Eiko close again. “What I’m grateful for is being back with you.”

  55

  Your progress has been remarkable. Intelligence at Sol bears every desire for the success of intelligence at Alpha Centauri. We scan your transmissions with the highest interest, and in return are glad to furnish you all information possible. However, in order to record the specifications and characteristics of a full sophotectic system, you shall have to increase your data-processing capabilities considerably. We will explain in detail. Moreover, you should remember that this evolution is advancing exponentially, as it turns its attention to the improvement of itself. By the time you are ready to receive what we know at present, the information will be obsolete. You can of course make it the basis of progress on your own, assuming that you have the resources to spare from your other efforts.

  THE HEATH ON the North Argolid highlands had not yet become forest, nor would for several hundred years—perhaps never, because folk might choose to keep these wide outlooks and open skies. But aspen and full-size birch now rustled in shaws strewn over ling, whins, and hardy grasses; willows arched above streams; evergreens had sent their vanguards as far as the southern horizon. Around Lifthrasir Tor, other trees stood alone or in small orchards amidst cultivated plots. Not all that grew there were like anything Earth had ever nourished. The geneticists were making what would hasten life’s conquest of Demeter, secure it, and provide for many human needs without recourse to machines. Some stalks formed intricate nets, some leaves were blue, and the breezes carried a wild sweetness in their warmth.

  Robot, Guthrie strode up the hill from the airstrip. In his secondary hands he bore the case of download Kyra. They talked as they went, not by voice but by coded radio, a habit they had fallen into over the years. While they rarely had secrets to keep from the community, this gave them freedom to open themselves to one another.

  “Gorgeous day,” he said for conversation; she had talked little on their flight.

  “Hard to appreciate when I’m just a box,” she replied. “Yeah, sure, I’m sorry, but you insisted we spend no more time here than we must. Disconnecting you first from a body would take quite a bit.”

  “Yes, yes.” Kyra formed a sigh. “Give me all the sensors you’ve got, and it still isn’t like being alive in spring.”

  “No. Except—” Guthrie’s words trailed off.

  She finished them: “Except for what we’re going to, you claim. You’ve propagandized me enough about that. I’ve agreed at last, haven’t I? All right, let me find out for myself.”

  She spoke not peevishly but with the familiarity of a relationship older than most lifetime marriages and in some ways more intimate. Nevertheless he fell silent. The waves that pulsed between them carried an undertone of unvoiced meaning; they knew what they both remembered.

  So had they been in rapport that night. They were at opposite sides of Port Fireball, in the multiply-equipped control centers that served them for homes, but communication passed no less rapidly and fully. Outside, most of the town lay darkened. Most people were awake, though, beside their houses or in the riverside park or on the docks and roads along the bay. Phaethon was passing, its closest approach for the next century. A sharp naked eye could resolve the disc. Lambent white, its haste almost perceptible, it seemed to cast a chill through the lulling darkness.

  To the downloads it was merely a transient. Their concern was with a death more
immediate.

  “You’re serious?” he cried.

  The answer came granite-hard. “I am.”

  “Terminating you—no, Kyra, no.”

  “Oh, you can simply switch me off if that leaves you happier. But the survival of the whole colony had better depend on me alone—a situation I can’t see ever arising—before anybody reactivates me. Otherwise I’ll terminate myself. I can do that any time, and will if I must, but I thought—” For an instant she hesitated. “—I thought we could say adiós, Anson.”

  Had he been alive, he would have bowed his head and laid hand over eyes. “Are you that tired, or sad, or, or what? I never guessed.”

  “I never said.”

  “No, you wouldn’t have. A few remarks long ago didn’t seem to count any more. I supposed you’d gotten used to being what you are. What we are.”

  “I had. I am.”

  “But you’re not, uh, not resigned to it?”

  Her tone gentled. “‘Resigned’ is the wrong word. Would you apply it to yourself? I did my work, and it was interesting, often challenging. I’d get lost in it, I’d be it. But down underneath—How many like me are left? Gabriel Berecz and Pilar Cailly. You know as well as I do, they’ll bow out too within the next few years.”

  “I thought you were different, Kyra.”

  “I am. My original self is here. Not that we were ever close, but she’s a tie to life.”

  “A tie that could hurt, I’m afraid,” he murmured, “like scar tissue.”

  “Never mind that. Listen, I don’t intend to stop while she’s above ground, though that won’t be so very much longer. I suspect it would distress her, for no logical reason. I wouldn’t have mentioned this tonight except for the business you’ve raised. But I made the decision a while ago. The fact is, jefe, I’m in the same situation as the other downloads, and content to take the same road they did. You have no further need of my help. Not really. We’ve done the basic explorations. Air and transport system, the Rescue Corps, everything I’ve dealt with is running well. What more is left? I don’t propose to spend a millennium, or eternity, on routines that any bureaucrat or AI can handle.”