The Ware Tetralogy

by Rudy Rucker

  The King looked questioningly at Onar and Onar said, “We don’t really have a choice, do we?”

  “I suppose not,” said the King. “But please, Yoke, don’t you or Cobb tell this to any of your loonie friends. The secret is that we’ve contacted an alien intelligence. A being named Shimmer. She’s living deep below the ocean here, in what’s known as the Tonga Trench. She knows you. She had an encounter with you and your parents just a little over three months ago, at the Willy Taze isopod you mentioned. November sixth, 2053. Your parents tried to kill her.”

  Shimmer! Yoke’s stomach flip-flopped. She’d had a feeling this was coming. “She wants to get even?”

  “Why would Shimmer be into that kind of kilp, honey?” said Vaana soothingly. She was standing behind the King’s couch. “Shimmer’s way too big for that. I bet she just wants to see you, Yoke. She probably digs your mind. When Shimmer was here talking to Bou-Bou she acted nice as pie.”

  Yoke felt frightened and angry. So Onar had been lying to her all along. She gave him a rough shove. “You deliberately lured me here! You don’t like me for myself one bit. You fetched me like some bauble for your precious King. And I’m so stupid, I came for free.”

  “That’s not the whole truth, Yoke,” protested Onar. “I’m very attracted to you.”

  “And you killed Mr. Olou on purpose, didn’t you!” Yoke’s words popped out fast, and she saw something on their faces. She was getting in deeper every second.

  “I think everyone could use some dinner,” put in Vaana. “The table’s set.”

  The King smiled and got nimbly to his feet, making a polite gesture for Yoke to follow him into the dining room, which was the next dome farther along. Following behind the big man, Yoke could make out his underwear through the thin fabric of his trousers. Purplish bikini briefs worn very low down on the crack.

  “It’s nice to finally meet you in person,” said Onar to Vaana, as if trying to steer the conversation back to a normal mode. “How do you come to know HRH?”

  “Well, my family nest was down in the flats of Oakland,” said the womanly green moldie. “I got it together and landed a phat job in the wetware engineering labs at Stanford U. I met Bou-Bou when he was taking Wet E 202. I helped him invent a new kind of coconut for his class project. Less grease and mo’ protein. Ought to been a miracle for the Tongan diet.”

  “Except the Tongans won’t eat my new coconuts or even feed them to their pigs,” said the King over his shoulder. “The flesh is a ghastly greenish hue. Wet E was never my thing. Here we are then, the royal dining room. Our main course will be Tongan lobster in a coconut cream sauce over steamed taro root. Nontweaked coconut, of course. I think we have some local melon as well. A glass of champagne, Yoke?”

  “All right. Why not?”

  The three humans sat down at the dining table and Vaana discreetly withdrew. A kind-faced Tongan woman named Kika served them their food. Yoke and Onar were very hungry, and the King ate with a ready appetite as well. The first course of the meal was a green melon with tiny orange balls on it which were, the King informed them, the fruiting body of a special kind of Tongan seaweed. The second course was a curried pork broth.

  “What was it like, Yoke?” Onar asked presently. “When all the moldies at Taze’s isopod turned into aliens that day?”

  “It was wavy,” said Yoke. With the food and the champagne she was feeling a little more relaxed. “They were so interesting, so wise. Shimmer especially. Shimmer comes from a place where they have two-dimensional time. The extra time dimension is like possibility, of worlds that could be. That’s why my parents couldn’t shoot Shimmer. Even though the time in our part of the cosmos is only one-dimensional, Shimmer can see the ghosts of all the future maybes and she can actualize the right one. She’s always where the bullet isn’t.” Kika removed the soup plates and began bringing in the lobster. Yoke was, on the whole, glad to be eating this meal. “But now you two answer some questions. Shimmer’s the one who’s siphoning off Cappy Jane’s bandwidth, right?”

  “Very clever, Yoke,” said Onar. “Yes, the King gave Shimmer permission to gather and process data through Cappy Jane, so there’s been a lot of traffic between those two. Cappy Jane’s been winnowing out certain kinds of space signals that Shimmer’s interested in. Not that Cappy Jane realizes who she’s working for. Shimmer and the King have her convinced that Shimmer’s a human scientist doing a study of high-energy cosmic rays.”

  “The Tongan Extragalactic Signal Survey,” said the King, smiling.

  “Moldies are even more leery of aliens than the humans,” said Onar. “With good reason. Their computational architecture is very susceptible to invasion. If Cappy Jane knew this stuff was for Shimmer, she probably wouldn’t help us no matter how much we pay her.”

  “Vaana knows about Shimmer,” said Yoke. “And she’s not objecting.”

  “Yes,” said the King. “But Vaana expects to share in the benefits of helping Shimmer. Now that you know, Yoke, that makes five humans and four moldies who are in on the secret. You, Onar, me, Oofa, Kennit, Vaana, Tashtego, Daggoo, and Turklee. Nine in all. And as soon as we get something from Shimmer, I’ll have to tell a few more of my people. Secrets don’t last on Tonga for very long. That’s why we have to move forward so rapidly.”

  “Mr. Olou didn’t know,” said Yoke. “And instead of telling him the truth, Onar killed him.”

  “Mr. Olou was unreliable,” said the King. “A loose cannon. He did know that some source in the Tonga Trench has been using up a large amount of the Cappy Jane bandwidth. He was very persistent in repeatedly bringing this problem to Meta West’s attention. Too much so, and against my express wishes. Fortunately, I had a prior relationship with Onar, and I made sure that he was the anteater whom Meta West sent down here to deal with Mr. Olou’s problem. I thought it would be a good idea to have Onar intimidate Mr. Olou within the framework of Olou’s highly idiosyncratic visualization system.”

  “So what was in that pale vine signal?” asked Yoke.

  “That was a red herring,” laughed Onar. “I didn’t really unpack the vine signal at all. Wouldn’t know how to. What I did in cyberspace with you and Olou was just theater. The jellyfish thing, that was something I brought along stored in that inlaid coffin like a jack-in-the-box. I copied it off some phreaks who were using it to protect their clubhouse. I’d never tested it before, you understand, and I had no idea it would be lethal. The idea was just to frighten Olou and to impress you, Yoke. I was reckless and negligent, yes. But please don’t think I’m a mind-assassin.”

  “So it really was you who killed Olou?”

  “Don’t blame me,” said Onar. “It was the phreaks who made that stinging jellyfish.” He gave a sudden giggle. “It talked Olou’s ear off. More than his ear.” He gave himself a playful slap on the cheek. “Sober up, Onar. It’s not my fault at all. How was I to know that Olou had a weak heart? And he shouldn’t have kept complaining about those extra signals.”

  “But what’s in the signals?” demanded Yoke. “Can’t anyone tell me?”

  “Shimmer’s been using Cappy Jane to download the personality waves of more aliens from her home world,” said the King. “Isn’t it obvious? Shimmer’s specified a certain class of gamma ray burst events for Cappy Jane to record, preprocess, and transmit. And these signals are of course alien personality waves. Apparently Shimmer’s been able to decrypt five or six of her fellows by now. That’s what she wants to discuss with you, Yoke. Champagne?”

  “Indubitably,” said Onar, holding out his and Yoke’s glasses. “Let’s drink to the noble Shimmer! Oofa can take Yoke down into the trench to meet her tomorrow.”

  “We’re supposed to be sitting here planning to help aliens invade the Earth?” said Yoke. “You two are xoxxed! Where’s your sense of self-preservation?”

  “It’s what’s happening, baby,” said Onar. “There’s no stopping Shimmer. If you want to blame someone, blame Gurdle-7 or Willy Taze. They’re the ones who
decrypted Shimmer’s signal in the first place. But now she’s here, and we’re going to have to live with her, at least for a while. It’s a new stage in history. Hop aboard or get plowed under.”

  “Shimmer’s got good things for us,” said the King. “She’s promised to give us realware.”

  “What’s that?” asked Yoke.

  “It’s some kind of magic or super science that Shimmer has,” said Onar. “Direct matter control. We don’t know much more than that. I think maybe when you dive down to see Shimmer tomorrow she’s going to give it to you. She trusts you or something. You’re up for this, right?”

  Yoke sat quiet for a minute, thinking. She’d loved talking with the aliens that time on the Moon; she’d been sad and angry when her parents attacked them. Onar was probably right about there being no way to stop Shimmer now. And Yoke knew that even if she wanted to try and stop Shimmer, the only thing to do was to go farther in. “Okay,” said Yoke slowly. “But I’m only diving if I’m safe inside of Cobb. And before we dive, I’m going to tell him every detail about what we’re doing.”

  She held up her hand to stave off Onar and the King’s protests. “I think I know why you don’t want Cobb to know. He’s a grandstander, a loudmouth. You’re afraid he’ll whip up a movement against the aliens. You’re afraid everyone will react like Darla—like Darla would if she were still around.” Her voice faltered as she thought of her dead mother. She caught her breath and pressed on. “But remember that Cobb Anderson is an explorer. A radical. The total opposite of those right-wing, moldie-hating Heritagists. If Cobb had a closed mind he wouldn’t have built the boppers in the first place. Cobb loves change. And who knows, maybe his death experiences taught him something about the kind of world where Shimmer comes from.”

  “I could have you both silenced,” mused the King. “Thanks to the ID viruses, it’s like you’re not even here.”

  “You wouldn’t dare,” said Yoke, deepening her voice and sounding more confident than she felt. “Shimmer would never forgive you. Don’t you think she’s already thought through the consequences of your talking to me? It’s like we’re dustboarding down an extreme slope, Bou-Bou. If you waver now, you’ll fall. The only way to do this is straight and fast.”

  “Well said, Yoke!” Onar held up his glass. “A toast to Lady Yoke Starr-Mydol!” And the King toasted along.

  “I expected as much from you, Yoke,” said the King presently. “You have spirit. Yes, you’re the one to bring back the realware. And that’s the real reason I had Eleani put out the ID virus on you. Because if and when the news of the realware gets out, everyone’s going to want to find the person who has it.”

  Yoke and Onar rode back across the lagoon in a wooden boat propelled by the yellow slug moldie, whose name turned out to be Topo. Topo fastened himself to the underside of the boat and beat the water like a long-tailed eel.

  It was a clear, balmy night, with a caressing breeze of sweet fresh air flowing in from the sea. The full moon shone high overhead. Onar pointed out the pinprick of light that was Cappy Jane. Topo’s underwater undulations left a glowing trail, and when Yoke let her hand dip into the smooth black water, it made a phosphorescent wake of tiny green sparkles.

  “It’s wonderful to share this with you, Yoke,” said Onar, pulling his arm tight around her. “I love to see you smile.”

  “Liar,” said Yoke, leaning against him. “I’m just a pawn in your scheme.”

  “Compared to Shimmer, we’re plankton,” said Onar, looking out over the lagoon. “The best we can do is glimmer in her wave. I won’t lie to you again, Yoke. I care much more for you than I expected. You’re so fresh and kind and good.”

  Onar kissed her then, and the boat ride turned fully as romantic as Yoke had hoped: the tropical lagoon, the champagne in her veins, and her arms around this handsome, raffish, not-quite-trustworthy man. When they got back to the guest house, Yoke made a snap decision that it would be a good idea to sleep with Onar after all.

  But Onar turned out to be a poor lover, certainly the worst of Yoke’s few partners thus far. Onar stinted on the foreplay, made a long messy fuss of his prophylactic preparations, and was up for at most sixty seconds of actual coitus. As a final turn-off, Onar said something British when he came, something like “Cor blimey,” or “Top drawer,” or “Bit of all right”—Yoke’s outraged brain disdained to retain the phrase.

  In the night, Yoke had a nightmare about her dead mother Darla, a dream of Darla desperately firing her needier gun at an endless attack wave of softly smiling jellyfish. She woke up in a sweat, feeling cramped in Onar’s bed. She washed her face in the grungy guest house bathroom, then went into her own room to fall back asleep.

  February 21

  In the morning, Saturday, Yoke woke to the sound of a rooster crowing right outside her window. The first thing she thought about was Darla. And Phil’s father. They’d been eaten by something from a higher dimension. And all of a sudden Yoke could remember what the cyberspace jellyfish thing had said when it came at her yesterday. “You love Onar,” it had been saying. “Do what Onar says.” The jellyfish had been quite thoroughly under Onar’s control. Mr. Olou’s death had been no accident. Onar was a killer. And now she was supposed to let Onar take her to meet Shimmer? What about Shimmer and the four-dimensional things that had eaten Darla and Phil’s father? Was there a connection?

  Oh, this was creepy. Yoke pushed on to other thoughts. The fat, polite King in his soap-bubble castle. The romantic ride across lagoon. The unpleasant, selfish groping in Onar’s bed. Too bad she hadn’t come here with Phil Gottner instead. That Kevvie didn’t deserve to keep a boy like Phil. He was the cutest thing she had met on Earth so far. Phil would be perfect, if only he could learn to take hold of life and do something.

  Before even getting out of bed, Yoke put on her uvvy, wincing a bit. Her neck was still tender from the jellyfish blast at the Foreign Ministry. She called for Cobb. His signal was faint and weird, so Yoke sent him an extra hard mind jolt. There was a thud right outside her window and then Cobb’s face appeared out there.

  “What? I was lying on the roof.”

  “Shhh! Come in here.”

  Cobb slithered through Yoke’s window to perch on the foot of her sagging bed. He was nothing like so pink and shiny as usual. And he reeked of decay.

  “I’m really spun,” said Cobb, sounding satisfied. “Two of the moldies at the Happy Club turned me on to this stuff called ‘betty.’ I rubbed it onto myself and whoah, Nellie. It’s the first time I’ve found a way to use this body to catch a lift. ‘Fine, fine betty,’ my new friends call it. Tashtego and Daggoo. They work for Sea Cuke Divers. Tashtego’s a moldie fakaleiti. I think maybe I had sex with him? Or no, wait, that was another moldie I did it with. A green one. Her name was V-something. She rubbed even more betty on me. Are we diving today?”

  “Are you going to be okay, Cobb? You look way kilpy.” Cobb’s normally clean outlines were wavering and irregular, with small ripples darting about upon the surface of his skin. His rosy flesh was shot through with lines of gray.

  “A shower would help,” said Cobb. “I could open my pores and let the water flush out the toxins. But—not yet.” He slumped against the wall. “I have too much slack. It feels good to be lifted.” He held his hands up in front of his face, slowly moving them as if watching their motion trails.

  “I’m not sure we should dive at all,” mused Yoke. “There’s more to it than you realize. Stop looking at your hands and pay attention! The biggest news is that there’s an alien named Shimmer living down in the Tonga Trench. The King says Shimmer wants me to come see her. She’s been decrypting more aliens out of signals from this Tongan Meta West Link satellite called Cappy Jane. Yesterday Onar killed a Tongan man who’d been trying to stop Shimmer from using Cappy Jane. For some reason Onar and the King don’t want you in on this, Cobb. The King’s a cheeseball by the way; his girlfriend is a moldie named Vaana.”

  Cobb stopped wiggling his fingers a
nd looked past them at Yoke. “Killed?” said Cobb, not sounding so happy anymore. His motionless gray-streaked hands were in supplicating claw positions. “Vaana?”

  “You better take that shower, Cobb. You want me to help you?”

  “Help,” said Cobb, and suddenly slipped off the bed onto the floor. He was more than lifted, he was poisoned.

  Yoke dragged the stinking heavy moldie down the hall to the guest house bathroom. Another guest, a German woman, was just vacating it. She gave Yoke a disgusted look as she stepped over the inert Cobb. But she didn’t bother to ask any questions. It was a very cheap guest house.

  Yoke wrestled Cobb into the concrete shower stall and turned the controls on all the way, which produced a limp drizzle. The water didn’t seem to be penetrating Cobb fast enough, so Yoke got into the shower and started kneading him with her feet. The shower wasn’t exactly hot, but it wasn’t freezing cold either. Out of reflex, Yoke picked up a stray sliver of soap and started washing herself, all the while jouncing around on the soft moldie flesh of Cobb. As she washed she thought about making love to Onar—which made her wash herself the more thoroughly. Triple ugh for Onar. Three ughs and you’re out.

  There was a shuddering beneath her feet. Yoke turned her attention back down to Cobb. Thanks to her trampling, the water was squeegeeing in and out of his flesh. The water coming out of Cobb was dark as if with dust or pollen. His eyes were open, glassily staring up at Yoke’s body. She flipped him over with a deft motion of her feet and continued to tread on him.

  The bathroom door swung open and in walked Onar, nude, with a morning erection.

  “Cheerio, Yoke,” he said. “Care if I join you? Missed you in bed this morning.”

  “It’s pretty full in here,” said Yoke. “Someone poisoned Cobb.”