The Year's Best SF 13 # 1995

by Gardner Dozois (ed)

  I changed topics, Ula-fashion. “When we met you warned me not to get too close to her. And not to be too honest.”

  “I remember.”

  “How do you know? Who else has been here?”

  No answer.

  “She’s had another tutor, hasn’t she?”

  “Never.”

  “Then how can you know?”

  “Twice,” Provo told me, “my daughter has taken lovers. Two different crew members from separate freighters. Dullards, both of them. With each there was a period of bliss. They stayed behind and helped Ula with her work, then something would go wrong. I don’t know any details. I refuse to spy on my own daughter. But with the man, her first lover … he expressed an interest in leaving, I believe … in returning to his vocation.…”

  “What happened?”

  “Ula pierced the wall of the tent. A year’s work was destroyed in a few minutes.” The man sighed, betraying a huge fatigue. “She told me that it was an accident, that she intended just to scare him—”

  “She murdered him?” I managed.

  And Provo laughed with relief. “No, no. No, the dullard was able to climb into an emergency suit in time, saving himself.”

  “What about the other lover?”

  “The woman?” A strong shrug of the shoulders, then he said, “A fire. Another accident. I know less, but I surmise they had had a spat of some kind. A ridiculous, wasteful fit of anger. Although Ula claimed not to have started the blaze. She acted thoroughly innocent, and astonishingly unrepentant.”

  I swallowed, then whispered, “Your daughter is disturbed.”

  Provo said, “And didn’t I warn you? Did you not understand me?” The soft face was perspiring despite the chill air. A cloud of mosquitoes drifted between us, hunting suitable game. “How much forewarning did you require, Mr. Locum?”

  I said nothing.

  “And you’ve done so well, too. Better than I had hoped possible, I should tell you.”

  I opened my mouth, and I said nothing.

  “She told me … yesterday, I think … how important you are to her education—”

  “The poison,” I interrupted.

  Provo quit speaking.

  “There’s a residue here. In the soil.” I showed him a molecule displayed on my portable reader. “It’s a synthetic alkaloid. Very messy, very tough. And very, very intentional, I think.” A moment’s pause, then I asked him, “Has it occurred to you that she was trying to murder you?”

  “Naturally,” he responded, in an instant.

  “And?”

  “And she didn’t try. No.”

  “How can you feel sure?”

  “You claim that my daughter is bright. Is talented. If she wanted to kill me, even if she was an idiot, don’t you think that right now I would be dead?”

  Probably true, I thought.

  “Two people alone on an empty world. Nothing would be simpler than the perfect murder, Mr. Locum.”

  “Then what did she want?” I gestured at the little lake. “What was this about?”

  Provo appeared disgusted, impatient.

  He told me, “I might have hoped that you could explain it to me.”

  I imagined Ula on the bottom of a freezing sea, risking death in some bid to understand … what? And three times she had endangered others … which left another dozen creations that she had killed … and was she alone in each of them when they died…?

  “Discover her purpose, Mr. Locum, and perhaps I’ll give you a bonus. If that’s permissible.”

  I said nothing.

  “You have been following my suggestions, haven’t you? You aren’t becoming too entangled with her, are you?”

  I looked at Provo.

  And he read my face, shaking his head with heavy sadness, saying, “Oh, my, Mr. Locum. Oh, my.”

  * * *

  A purpose.

  The possibility gnawed at me. I assumed some kind of madness lay over whatever her rationale, and I wished for a degree in psychiatry, or maybe some life experience with insanity. Anything would help. Riding the mag-rail back into our cavern, replaying the last few months in my mind, I heard part of me begging for me to flee, to turn now and take refuge where I could, then stow away on the first freighter to pass—

  —which was impossible, I realized in the same instant. Not to mention dangerous. Acting normal was important, I told myself. Then aloud, I said, “Just keep her happy.”

  I have never been more terrified of a human being.

  Yet Ula seemed oblivious. She greeted me with a kiss and demanded more, and I failed her, nervousness and a sudden fatigue leaving me soft. But she explained it away as stress and unimportant, cuddling up next to me on the shady jungle floor. She said, “Let’s sleep,” and I managed to close my eyes and drift into a broken dreamy sleep, jerking awake to find myself alone.

  Where had the girl gone?

  I called her on our com-line, hearing her voice and my voice dry and clumsy, asking her, “Where are you?”

  “Mutating treefrogs, darling.”

  Which put her inside her home. Out of my way. I moved to the closest workstation, asking its reader to show me the original schematics and everything that we had done to date; and I opened up my jersey—I was still wearing my heavy, cold-weather jersey—drops of salty water splattering on the reader. I was hunting for anything odd or obviously dangerous. A flaw in the ice roof? None that I could find. A subtle poison in our young trees? None that showed in the genetic diagrams. But just to be sure, I tested myself. Nothing wrong in my blood, I learned. What else? There was one oddity, something that I might have noticed before but missed. The trees had quirks in their chemistry. Nothing deadly. Just curious. I was studying a series of sugars, wondering when Ula had slipped them into the tailoring process, and why; and just then, as if selecting the perfect moment, she said, “Darling,” with a clear close voice. Then, “What are you doing?”

  I straightened my back, and I turned.

  Ula was standing behind me, the smile bright and certain. And strange. She said, “Hello?” and then, “What are you doing, darling?”

  I blanked the reader.

  Then with the stiffest possible voice, I told her, “Nothing. Just checking details.”

  She approached, taking me around my waist.

  I hugged her, wondering what to do.

  Then she released me, pulling back her hair while asking, “What did you and my father decide?”

  Swallowing was impossible, my throat full of dust.

  “I forgot to ask before. Do we get a second reactor?”

  I managed to shake my head. No.

  “An unnecessary expense,” she said, perfectly mimicking her father’s voice. She couldn’t have acted more normal, walking around me while asking, “Has the nap helped?”

  I watched her undress as she moved.

  “Feel like fun?”

  Why was I afraid? There weren’t any flaws in our work, I knew, and as long as she was with me, nude and in my grasp, what could she do to me? Nothing, and I became a little confident. At least confident enough to accomplish the task at hand, the event feeling robotic and false, and entirely safe.

  Afterward she said, “That was the best,” and I knew—knew without doubt—that Ula was lying. “The best ever,” she told me, kissing my nose and mouth and upturned throat. “We’ll never have a more perfect moment. Can I ask you something?”

  “What…?”

  She said, “It’s something that I’ve considered. For a long while, I’ve been wondering—”

  “What?”

  “About the future.” She straddled me, pressure on my stomach. The grin was sly and expectant. “When Father dies, I inherit this world. All of it and his money too, and his robots. Everything.”

  A slight nod, and I said, “Yes?”

  “What will I do with it?”

  I had no idea.

  “What if I bought an artificial sun? Not fancy. And brought it here and put it in or
bit. I’ve estimated how long it would take to melt this sea, if I hurried things along by seeding the ice with little reactors—”

  “Decades,” I interrupted.

  “Two or three, I think. And then I could terraform an entire world.” She paused, tilting her head and her eyes lifting. “Of course all of this would be destroyed. Which is sad.” She sighed, shrugging her shoulders. “How many people have my kind of wealth, Hann? In the entire Realm, how many?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “And who already own a world too. How many?”

  “Very few.”

  “And who have an interest in terraforming, of course.” She giggled and said, “I could be one of a kind. It’s possible.”

  It was.

  “What I want to ask,” she said, “is this. Would you, Hann Locum, like to help me? To remake all of this ice and rock with me?”

  I opened my mouth, then hesitated.

  “Because I don’t deserve all the fun for myself,” she explained, climbing off me. “Wouldn’t that be something? You might be the first NT terraformer with your own world. Wouldn’t that make you the envy of your peers?”

  “Undoubtedly,” I whispered.

  Ula walked to her clothes, beginning to dress. “Are you interested?”

  I said, “Yes. Sure.” True or not, I wanted to make agreeable sounds. Then I made myself add, “But your father’s in good health. It could be a long time before—”

  “Oh, yeah.” A glib shrug of her shoulders; a vague little-girl smile. “I hope it’s years and years away. I do.”

  I watched the girl’s face, unable to pierce it. I couldn’t guess what she was really thinking, not even when she removed the odd control from one of her deep pockets. A simple device, homemade and held in her right hand; and now she winked at me, saying, “I know.”

  Know?

  “What both of you talked about today. Of course I know.”

  The pressure on my chest grew a thousandfold.

  “The mosquitoes? Some aren’t. They’re electronic packages dressed up as mosquitoes, and I always hear what Father says—”

  Shit.

  “—and have for years. Always.”

  I sat upright, hands digging into the damp black soil.

  She laughed and warned me, “You’re not the first person to hear his confession. I am sorry. He has this guilt, and he salves it by telling people who can’t threaten him. I suppose he wanted you to feel sorry for him, and to admire him—”

  “What do you remember?”

  “Of my parents? Nothing.” She shook her head. “Everything.” A nod and the head titled, and she told me, “I do have one clear image. I don’t know if it’s memory or if it’s a dream, or what. But I’m a child inside a smelly freighter, huddled in a corner, watching Provo Lei strangle my real mother. He doesn’t know I’m there, of course.” A pause. “If he had known, do you suppose he would have strangled me too? To save himself, perhaps?”

  “I’m sorry,” I muttered.

  And she laughed, the sound shrill. Complex. “Why? He’s a very good father, considering. I love him, and I can’t blame him for anything.” A pause, then with a caring voice she told me, “I love him quite a lot more than I love you, Hann.”

  I moved, the ground under my butt creaking; and I had to say, “But you poisoned him anyway.”

  Ula waved her control with a flourish, telling me, “I poisoned everything. All I wanted was for Father to watch.” A shrug. “I tried to make him understand … to comprehend … but I don’t think he could ever appreciate what I was trying to tell him. Never.”

  I swallowed, then asked, “What were you telling him?”

  Her eyes grew huge, then a finger was wagged at me. “No. No, you don’t.” She took a small step backward, shaking her head. “I think it’s just a little too soon for that. Dear.”

  I waited.

  Then she waved the control again, saying, “Look up, Hann. Will you? Now?”

  “Up?” I whispered.

  “This direction.” She pointed at the canopy. “This is up.”

  My gaze lifted, the solid green ceiling of leaves glowing, branches like veins running through the green; and she must have activated the control, a distinct click followed by her calm voice saying, “I left out parts of the schematics, Hann. Intentionally. Before you were even hired, you should know.”

  There was a distant rumbling noise.

  The ground moved, tall trees swaying for an instant; then came a flash of light with instant thunder, a bolt of electricity leaping down the long cavern, the force of it swatting me down against the forest floor, heat against my face and chest, every hair on my body lifting for a terrible long instant.

  Then it was gone again.

  Everything was.

  The lights had failed, a perfect seamless night engulfing the world; and twice I heard a laugh, close and then distant.

  Then nothing.

  And I screamed, the loudest sound I could muster lost in the leaves and against the tree trunks, fading into echoes and vanishing, as if it had never existed at all.

  * * *

  My jersey … where was my jersey…?

  I made myself stand and think, perfectly alert, trying to remember where it had lain and counting steps in my mind … one step, and two, and three. Then I knelt and found nothing in reach, nothing but the rich new soil, and for a terrified instant I wondered if Ula had stolen my clothes, leaving me naked as well as blind.

  But another step and grope gave me my boots, then the jersey. I dressed and found my various equipment in the pockets and pouches. The portable reader had been cooked by the lightning, but the glowglobes were eager. I ignited one of them and released it; it hovered over me, moving with a faint dry hum as it emitted a yellowish light.

  I walked to the closest mag-rail.

  Inoperative.

  Nearby were a pair of robots standing like statues.

  Dead.

  I started to jog uphill, moving fast. Where was Ula? Had she gone somewhere, or was she nearby, watching me?

  It was fifteen kilometers to the waterfall, the exit. The trees seemed larger in the very weak light, the open jungle floor feeling rather like a place of worship. A cathedral. Then came a wall of vines and thorny brush—our earliest plantings—and I burrowed into them, pushing despite the stabs at my skin, breaking into an open unfinished glade and pausing. Something was wrong, I thought. Against my face was cold air, bitter and sudden. Of course the field generators were down. And the refrigeration elements. What remained was the passive emergency system, heat rising into high ducts while others released cubic kilometers of stored air from below.

  How long would the process take?

  I couldn’t remember, could scarcely think about anything. My jersey automatically warmed me, and I helped keep warm by running fast, pulling ahead of my glowglobe, my frantic shadow gigantic and ethereal.

  In my head, in simple terms, I handled the mathematics.

  Calories; volume; turbulence; time.

  Halfway to the waterfall, feeling the distance and the grade, I had a terrible sudden premonition.

  Slowing, I said, “Where are you?”

  Then I screamed, “Ula! Ula!”

  In the chill air my voice carried, and when it died there was a new sound, clear and strong and very distant. A howl; a wild inhuman moan. I took a weak step sideways and faltered. Somehow I felt as if I should know the source … and I remembered Ula’s eight-legged predator, swift and smart and possibly on the hunt now. She had made it…!

  There was a motion, a single swirling something coming out of the gloom at me. I grunted and twisted, falling down, and a leaf landed at my feet. Brown and cold. Partly cooked by the lightning, I realized. It crumbled when my hand closed around it. Then came the howl again, seemingly closer, and again I was running, sprinting uphill, into another band of prickly underbrush and starting to sob with the authority of a beaten child.

  The ambient temperature was plumm
eting.

  My breath showed in my glowglobe’s yellow light, lifting and thinning and mixing with more falling leaves. The forest was slipping into dormancy. A piece of me was thankful, confident that it at least would survive whatever happened; and most of me was furious with Ula—a simple, visceral fury—as I imagined my escape and the filing of criminal complaints. Attempted murder. Malicious endangerment. And straight murder charges on Provo, me as witness for the prosecution and their lives here finished. Extinguished. Lost.

  “I’m going to escape,” I muttered at the shadows. “Ula? Are you listening? Ula?”

  I pulled gloves from a pocket, covering my cold hands and them knitting into my sleeves. Then I unrolled my jersey’s simple hood, tying it flush against my head, enjoying the heat of the fabric. Leaves were falling in a steady brown blizzard. They covered the freezing earth, crunching with each footfall, and sometimes in the crunches I thought I heard someone or something else moving. Pausing, I would listen. Wait. The predator? Or Ula? But the next howl seemed distant and perhaps confused, and it had to be the girl whom I heard. Who wouldn’t be fooled with my stop and then go and stop again tricks.

  The cavern’s upper end was bitter cold. One of our emergency ducts had opened up beside the entranceway, robbing the heat from the water and ground and trees. Already the pond was freezing, the ice clear and hard, very nearly flawless. I ran on its shore, squinting into the gloom, believing that at least the cliché, the falls, would have stopped flowing when the power failed. Not in an instant, no. But its reservoir was relatively small—Ula had shown me her plans—and for a glorious instant I was absolutely convinced that my escape was imminent.

  What was that? From the gloom came an apparent wall of marble, white and thick and built where the cliché had been. Frozen … the waterfall had frozen clear through…!

  I moaned, screamed, and slowed.

  Beside the pond was one of the useless robots. I moved to it, my breath freezing against the ceramic skin, and with a few desperate tugs I managed to pry free one of its hands. The hand was meant for cutting, for chopping, and I held it like an axe, growling at my audience. “What did you think? That I’d just give up now?”

  No answer. The only sounds were the falling of leaves and the occasional creaking pop as sap froze inside the sleeping trees.