The sky there was low, and the clouds were definitely mean. Theory searched around for some sign of where he might look for Constants, and was about to give up when he came upon a single drop of fresh blood. It must be from the boy’s neck.
Theory spiraled out from the blood spoor until he encountered another drop, and continued with this until he could pick out a line. It was leaking information, of course, and not really blood, but, even if the blood was made of a different substance, you could bleed to death in the virtuality just as you could in actuality. The trail led through a gully between piles of rubble, and into what seemed, from a distance, to be the remains of a town of some sort.
A main road led into the town, and Theory followed it in. He passed a faded sign that read:
WINDOWS
That was, perhaps, the name of this desolate place.
As Theory passed the sign, the vibration of his walking cause it to disintegrate and crumble before him. He wondered how this place had gotten to Triton, for it must exist in Triton’s local grist, since the remainder of the merci was jammed. But it was not really a surprise to find such a thing in Shepardsville; old web sites migrated about the virtuality and clung like tattered plastic to whatever outcroppings they could lodge upon.
The town had seemed simple from the outside, but after Theory entered, he was soon lost within a maze of structures that seemed to have no logic to their arrangement. The blood spoor of his child led inevitably onward through the labyrinthine streets, and Theory followed it.
On a long street paved with hard-packed dirt, Constants stepped forth from the shadows, pulling the boy along with her into the middle of the street. Theory stopped short and regarded her.
“Just you?” she said.
“Only me,” Theory answered.
Somewhere a clock chimed thirteen times.
“If you kill him, I will shoot you,” said Theory.
“Yes. Do you have any suggestions as to how to resolve our differences?”
Theory dangled both hands straight down at his sides.
“Draw,” he said.
“You know I’m faster,” Constants said. “I’m the fastest that’s ever been. That’s why they chose me for this mission.”
“You’re a traitor to free converts everywhere,” Theory replied. “They did right to wash you out of OCS.”
“Maybe if they hadn’t,” said Constants, “I wouldn’t be killing you today.”
“Ready?”
“You know I’m faster, Theory.”
“We’ll see.”
“It’s illogical. You can’t win.”
“This isn’t the future,” he said, “and you can’t know that.”
“It’s inevitable.”
“Let the boy go, and draw.”
Constants laughed. It sounded like glass breaking. She thrust the boy aside, and he fell into the shadow of the ruins. She looked down at the scythe, and it became a revolver. She holstered it at her side.
“Good-bye, Theory,” she said.
“Good-bye, Constants.”
With a blur of motion, her hand moved toward the revolver; Theory reached for his own.
Theory knew he was beaten halfway through the motion, but something kept him moving. Desperation. Conviction. Something without any strict logic to it.
There was a blur of motion through the still air.
Constants gasped and looked down at her stomach.
The curve of a harvest scythe protruded from her belly. She raised her head and gazed into the shadows of the ruins.
The boy stepped into the light. He was holding two more scythes in his hands. “You taught me this,” he said without a shred of emotion in his voice. “Mother.”
He sounds like sand blowing in the desert, Theory thought. Sand blowing at night.
“You little shit!” screamed Constants, and she reached for her gun.
Theory cut her down with a single shot to the head. She fell into the dust of the street and bled a pool that was as black as her exterior. The boy stood over her, the scythes still in his hands. Theory came to stand beside his son.
“I’ll never harm you, boy,” Theory said.
The boy looked up at him with his crazy, algebraic eyes. He said nothing, but dropped his weapons.
“Maybe you’d better keep those,” Theory said.
“I’ve got lots more,” the boy said. “Inside me.”
They stood together and watched the last of Constants’s blood soak into the ground.
Fifteen
from
First Constitutional Congress of
the Cloudships of the Outer System
April 2, 3013 (e-standard)
a transcript
C. al-Farghani: Thank you, most gracious Chairman and assembled worthies. I would like neither to deny nor affirm this preamble, but to call your attention to the greater matter which is before us—namely, continued exploration and elaboration of the cosmos. While I agree that we may believe whatever we want to, to waste resources in the defense of misguided thought seems to me a foolhardy venture. Let us form this government, or not, and just leave. We have been to the Centauris. We are going to Barnard’s Star. We are ships, and ships are explorers. To turn inward and gaze at our navels—or, more precisely, the navels of those who could not hope to share our sense of adventure and wonder—is to abandon that which brought us to where we are today. If this Amés wants the solar system, I say: Let him have it. There are a hundred million stars in our galaxy alone waiting for us. What is the use of getting ourselves killed over one average sun? To leave would not be a sign of cowardice, but an expression of our true purpose. Cowardice can mean nothing to creatures such as we have become. We are above the petty squabbles of our ancestors, and the fact that the vestigial remains of our origins still exist in some twisted form in this solar system can ultimately mean nothing to us. Did we join in the fights of one ape band with another on Earth? Of course not! Were we cowards to turn away, and let the two sides fight it out? In no way. We are in an analogous situation. I, for one, feel only the vaguest kinship with those who do not know the pleasures and wonders of the stars, or who would deny them to us out of some latent animal perversity. We are ships! Let us sail away. Thank you, kind Chairman, and honorable colleagues.
C. Mencken: Thank you for seeing in me attributes to which even my wife will not attest, Cloudship al-Farghani. Chair recognizes Cloudship . . . uh, excuse me a moment. Yes? . . . All right. Chair recognizes Cloudship Austen—J. Austen.
C. Austen: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Before we become so enamored of ourselves that this caucus descends into a love fest, I might ask you to consider, ladies and gentlemen, where the money comes from, money that allows us to fund our wondrous adventures and fanatical quests? I am not, of course, referring to anyone in particular. I myself have an obsession or two, and adventures are fun to go on, as long as one can be back for a good meal in the evening. And by a meal, I am talking about the energy that makes us go. Do we obtain our energy directly from the sun? No—it is delivered to us through the Met in forms that we can use. A few cloudships can exist for a short time on the solar collection we do in the Centauris. Can you imagine the infrastructure we need to support all of us? We would not do it in under a hundred years. Hear me again: We could not build it! The Met collects, refines, and delivers our food to us in a form that is, to us, easily digestible. I call it food, because that is what it is. And if someone, anyone, threatened to cut off that energy, that person is threatening to starve us, either to our deaths, or into submission. Even if we take the position that cloudships are somehow better than everyone else—which I do not—it is still incumbent upon us to organize a means to always be assured of eating. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is what this resolution, the preamble of which we are debating, does. It feeds us—and in the best
way possible, and with the least amount of work on our part to obtain our meat and bread. The threat that we face from the inner system is very real, and this, I truly believe, is the only sensible solution. Thank you.
C. Mencken: Thank you, Cloudship Austen, now will—
C. Huxley: Mr. Chairman, point of order.
C. Mencken: What is it, Cloudship Huxley?
C. Huxley: Are we debating a declaration of war or a resolution for the adoption of a new constitution? I heard no specific reference to any hostilities in that preamble.
Chamber Left: Get real, Huxley!
Chamber Right: It’s not a constitution; it’s a Tacitus stink bomb!
C. Mencken: This chamber will come to order or I will have the troublemakers condemned and hung. Or vice versa. But I mean it!
C. Huxley: But does my point stand, Mr. Chairman?
C. Mencken: Just a moment, just a moment. Order, I say! All right then. Yes, you make a good point. Speakers will confine themselves to the resolution before us and cease speculation on the current state of affairs between potential friends or enemies. Your committee wrote it broad, Lebedev. Keep it broad. Chair recognizes Cloudship—
C. Beatrice: Mr. Chairman, I strongly disagree with Cloudship Huxley.
C. Mencken: But I’ve already ruled on that.
C. Beatrice: Without debate.
C. Mencken: But I . . . oh, all right, never mind. What was it you wanted to say?
C. Beatrice: Only that by adopting this resolution we are, in effect, declaring war, as any fool can see. Amés will certainly see it. I believe that before we vote on any portion of this revolution we should consider what form this war might take and whether or not we have any chance of winning it.
Chamber Right: Hear, hear!
C. Mencken: Oh, very well. Very well. Fine, then. Chair will now hear arguments on Cloudship Huxley’s point of order and upon Cloudship Beatrice’s addendum to it.
C. Turing: Point of order!
C. Mencken: I don’t get that recursive, Turing. We shall do as I have said. Cloudship Beatrice, do you have anything further . . .
C. Beatrice: My only question is this: If we take on Amés, who is going to do it? That is: Us and what army?
C. Lebedev: I believe I can provide an answer for a portion of that question, Mr. Chairman.
C. Mencken: Chair recognizes Cloudship Lebedev.
C. Lebedev: The Met has a force of several thousand ships, all told. They are not anywhere equivalent in inertial mass to us. It is true that they have certain strategic advantages in areas, but—
C. Beatrice: Are you suggesting . . . do I understand this correctly . . . that we fight directly? Are you insane? We could get killed!
C. Lebedev: Some of us will get killed. It is inevitable. We are not playing games, here. This is a life-and-death question. Amés is bringing the war to us.
C. Beatrice: But he’s only at Pluto. You can’t believe he would challenge us directly.
C. Mencken: Cloudships, please. Order—
Sixteen
“Director,” said C. “I have a great deal else of your business to concern me.”
“Add it to your checklist, C.”
“Very well.”
Amés returned to his desk and sat down. “And now,” he said. “It is time for your dividend.”
C said nothing. He remained standing before the desk, betraying no emotion. This did not mean that he felt nothing inside. On the contrary. The calmer C appeared, the more he was filled with turmoil.
“I am ready, Director,” he said. “If you are.”
Amés opened a drawer in the desk and took out a finely carved mahogany box. Inside of the box was C’s lover. Or an algorithmic copy. For C, the difference was of no import.
“You may touch it,” Amés said. C reached over and did so. Instantly, he was inside the memory box.
“Lace,” he said. “I am here.”
A woman sat in a rocking chair by a window. There was the afternoon sun streaming through the glass. Dust motes danced in the air. It was Earth, a long, long time ago. Her hair was long and as fine as silk. Her skin was freckled. She wore a calico dress and a simple strand of pearls about her neck. Her eyes were the same green as C’s own, and as empty as the sea.
“Who are you?”
“My name is Clare,” he said. “We’ve met, but you won’t remember me.”
The woman nodded to him, attempted to smile, but then a look of sorrow passed over her face and she turned back to the window. “There’s ice tea in the refrigerator,” she said. “Pardon me, but you must help yourself. I’m waiting for someone.”
C went into the kitchen and cracked ice into a glass from the plastic tray in the refrigerator. One of the cube spaces of the tray was split and he saw that she had not filled that one with water. For some reason, this made him unutterably sad. He poured tea over the ice, then went to sit with Lace by the window. He pulled over another chair—his old straight-backed desk chair—and settled into it. He sat beside her and sipped his tea.
“He won’t come,” said the woman. “He never comes.”
“Who?” C asked.
“I . . . I don’t know his name,” she said. “He left such a long time ago. Do you know him?”
“Yes,” C replied. “I met him once, in a foreign land.”
“Oh!” she said, and squeezed his arm. It was all C could do not to reach over and pull her into his arms.
“He said for me to tell you that he was making his way back,” said C. “But he might be some time in the coming.”
“You spoke to him,” she said. “You heard his voice!”
“He spoke only of you.”
“Ah,” she said, “if only I could believe you. Did he give you some sort of token? A sign?”
“He gave me none,” said C. “Only to say to you that you must wear the sheepskin coat when winter comes. The one he gave you.”
“Yes,” she said. “You did. You did speak with him.”
“I spoke with him. In another time.”
She took her hand from C’s arm. She pulled her shawl about her shoulders and began to rock. The sound of the rocker drowned out her sobs, but he knew she was softly crying.
“When will he come?” she said.
“After the winter,” C replied.
She stopped her rocking. “Then I must wait?”
“A little longer. A little longer, dear Lace.”
“Lace,” she said. “My name is Lace.”
“Lace Criur is your name,” C said.
She began to move the chair again. “Pleased to meet you,” she said. She rocked, and C finished his tea. The sun set in the west, and a crescent moon rose in the sky. Venus burned near the moon’s arms. It was a long, long time ago, when you couldn’t go to either place.
“I have to be moving along now,” C told her. “But I promise to return.”
“You have to be going?” she said. “Who are you?”
He set the tea glass on a side table. When he returned, he knew he would find it back in the cabinet, washed.
“Oh,” he said, “nobody in particular.”
She turned from him and gazed back out the window. She pulled the shawl more tightly about her shoulders.
“When will he come?” she asked.
C left through the arches of San Souci and went out to face the Mercurian night. He thought to go to his office, but instead found himself wandering the corridors of the lower levels of Bach. He kept to the shadows out of habit, and you might not have even noticed a man passing you if you had not been looking directly at him. Or perhaps you could not look directly at him. If you tried, you might find something uncertain in your gaze.
He was puzzling over a cipher in his mind. It was a task he had set himself two years before. He had chanced upon somet
hing that looked very like a secret code one day in his relative youth when he had cracked open a pecan. Instead of nut meat inside, a slip of paper had fallen out, as if the pecan were a fortune cookie. Like a good operative, he had memorized the message and then eaten it.
It had said, simply, “Clue in Clare.”
It had been a pecan Lace had handed him to open, but there was no way, of course, she could have put the message in there. No one could have put it there.
It was impossible.
The impossible is inconceivable.
C wandered on into the darker and darker reaches. There was so much to think about, all at once. He was not a man given to despair. If that had been the case, he should have fallen into oblivion centuries ago. He was not a man given to despair, but he was confused. This was not often the case. There were hidden variables he was dealing with here. Wheels within wheels. It was either that, or he was going mad. He did not discount that possibility.
Sometimes he missed talking with dear old mad Tod. Now there was a true lunatic for you.
Perfect for this mad war, this mad time.
He was glad the old booger had escaped.
And, in that moment, C hit upon the missing piece to his puzzle. He stopped walking, looked around. He was standing a hundred feet from his office. It was enough to make you believe in predestination. Pure coincidence, though.
“I have to find this Leo Sherman,” C said, to no one in particular.
And then, he thought: I’ll get to the bottom of this.
Everything is pure coincidence, but it all has a twisted sort of logic. It is a matter of finding the right key. And, then, everything becomes music.
PART FOUR
HOW THE SKY CAN BURN
* * *
One
It was a good thing Leo knew when the transmitter pod would brake, because if he hadn’t they would all have been caught by surprise and pasted into the outer wall of the pod. As it was, they got ready and found a particularly thick part of the fiber to put behind them. Outside, a receiving tube would suck them in, according to Leo, and they would slow down as they slid down its length to docking.
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