by Larry Niven
He agreed with her, but he had little control over a solution. He wanted to pace, but forced himself still, swallowing his own rising anger. “Rachel, Selene is still not a safe place. We don’t even have enough transportation built to get everyone in Clarke Base quickly into Refuge if we need to. Moon Born should be thinking about that—and helping by cooperating.” He lowered his voice, trying to moderate his tone, to soothe. “Go on to Clarke Base. I’m going to have a talk with Ali. The Children pay a lot of attention to you. I need you to direct that attention positively.”
She took deep breaths, as if trying to control her feelings. “Look, Gabriel. I don’t know if there really is a problem. Or at least, if the problem is us. I don’t think so. I think we already have too much supervision. We’re much smarter than you take us for.”
He’d argued that ever since they shared a twenty-year cold spell. He walked to the end of the dock, stopping by the Safe Harbor. “Rachel, I wish things had turned out differently. You’ve seen the High Council, met them. They choose how things get run. Not me. I’ve been able to let you teach, to keep your extra schools open, to give some of you more responsible jobs. But when I’m cold, I’ll have no influence at all.”
“When you get to the ship, will you argue for us?”
“I do that all the time.” He suspected that was why he was being called back. “It’s not good for your people when Council suspects them of trying to slow down projects.”
“So tell them to treat us better. We need to learn.”
“Will you try and help?”
She nodded. “Can you just assign more teaching for me? And maybe some work in the greenhouses? I can do the planting class, and we need more basic math and English for some of the younger kids. I come in contact with more people that way; I can learn more. Can you let me do that instead of being on a regular parts crew?”
It was a good idea. “Sure. I’ll tell Shane. I want you to report to Shane or Ali or Treesa if you find anything out.”
“Shane and Star are back?” Rachel looked surprised.
Gabriel nodded. “They will be, maybe today.”
“That’s okay. I like Star. Thanks for letting me teach.” Rachel sat down on the edge of the dock, draping her long legs over so her feet dangled. She looked away from Council Aerie, away from him, leaning back so the end of her braid rested on the dock. It seemed as though she were far away, lost in thought. Surely she would help? She couldn’t be hiding things from him, not after all he’d given her. Could she?
He watched her for a moment, his own thoughts confused. She had become as inscrutable as Ali. He felt the weight of all the years he had worked on Selene. Rachel’s shoulders seemed too thin, too young, to hold such responsibility. But she was twenty-three warm. At twenty-three Gabriel was already restoring jungle on Earth, running crews, making decisions, living on his own. He needed to understand how she felt. “Rachel—do you have fun? Do you like what you do?”
She turned around and looked at him, somber now, with the same wariness in her eyes. “Yes. I enjoy working with my friends, seeing my father, walking in the greenhouses, flying. I like the work I do.” She tugged on her braid; a gesture that reminded him of Ali. “But I can never forget the twenty years I lost, and I can never forget that you all plan to leave. That you have no love for Selene, or for us.”
He bristled. “That’s not true. Building Selene has been my life.” Ever since Ymir stopped being his life.
Her eyes bored into his, far more intense than the soft voice she used to ask, “But what happens to us when you leave?”
“What do you think we’re building Refuge for? It’s taken time away from the collider.” He tried to put himself in her place. What would he want, if he were Rachel? “Maybe some of you can go with us. It’s pretty clear some of the Earth Born will stay. Selene is stable enough that its atmosphere will last for a century or more. We didn’t have a hell of a lot of choices.”
“Why don’t you stay?”
“We may be the last humans in the universe. I don’t know. With luck, there is an established colony at Ymir, and we can add to its chance for survival. The issue is bigger than either of us. And you won’t all fit aboard John Glenn.” He didn’t know why he was being so candid with her. Maybe because she asked so directly, and she deserved better answers than the Children got from most Council?
She said, “You want to know if I’m happy? Well, my home—Selene—it will die someday. Its atmosphere is destined to bleed away, and your skills are the main thread that keeps it going. You’re leaving. And you already told me there’s nothing aboard John Glenn we can rebuild to use as an intersystem starship, to follow you to Ymir. Even if I die before a fire kills us all, or a flare, or quakes, I’m afraid to have children of my own.”
Gabriel cringed inwardly. Council had talked of sterilizing the Children when they left, so they could live their lives in full, leaving Selene naturally empty before its air became too thin to breathe. There was no final decision.
Rachel pushed herself up from the edge of the dock. “I have to go. There are things I need to finish here before I go to Clarke Base tomorrow.”
“All right.” He cleared his throat. “Thank you. I’ll try and find time to see you at least once before I go.”
Gabriel watched her open the escalator door and disappear slowly as she walked down the steps. His last sight of her was an arm pulling the door shut.
A deep restlessness filled him, pushing at him from the inside out. Unresolved dilemmas and problems with no right solution. Finally he stood and stripped, then ran for the end of the dock and plunged into the cool water, feeling it wash over him, pull back on his braid and slide over his skin as he breaststroked through the sea he had created, surrounded by the crater he had made, on the world he had built from the raw material of tens of moons.
He swam until pulling himself through the water sent pain shooting through his upper back muscles and his fingertips were wrinkled like raisins. Then he lay on the dock while Apollo’s light shone down on him from the pinprick of a sun, and his head spun with images of Rachel and the Children planting and working and studying. The feel of Erika in his arms, her voice the day before, commanding him to obey her. Ali and Treesa laughing together, teasing each other about fish soup. Flares and quakes and fires. The flare kite. Children. Once he had expected to have children of his own. He blinked, trying to clear his head, breathing pranayama, belly rising and falling, and finally the images all fled. Behind them, there was emptiness. And loneliness.
CHAPTER 53
VASSAL
RACHEL PACKED THE next morning, sending her few things down in the cargo elevator. She could have ridden down, but the warm soft wind tempted her; perfect for flying. Thermals swirled above Clarke Base and lifted her easily. As she flew, her head tumbled with disturbed thoughts.
Gabriel was going cold. More Council supervision wouldn’t help the Children become involved in decisions. Andrew had gained a reputation as a surly but competent water systems repair technician. She knew he was behind much of what was angering Council. Andrew had no help like Astronaut, or Treesa and Ali for that matter, and so he was clumsier about hiding meetings, communicating, and keeping his followers loyal.
She honored the agreement made with him under Water Bearer. Council would not hear of his choices through her.
Warm air caressed Rachel’s belly, giving additional lift to her wings, and she followed it up. No one expected anything from her today except to change locations.
She circled above Clarke Base. Below her, square warehouses scattered around the bottom of the crater’s outside slope in a large fenced area dotted with loading bays and transports and plascrete so that almost no green showed. Farther away, three large warehouses held the material Council was making for the collider—great metal tubes that looked like fancy water pipes, but inches thicker, with lots of anchors for attachments.
Small square homes and walking paths surrounded the work area close t
o base, and multicolored quilts of fields stretched northward. She loved the way the fields spread out cleanly in neat rows, each crop separated by roads for the planters, some extra thick for firebreaks. In the distance, ordered fields finally gave way to a chaos of light green jungle in early states of replanting. Surprised, Rachel noted she had risen high enough to see the rim of Erika’s Folly squatting on the horizon. She laughed, and started down, angling south, where greenhouses edged homes and joined to outside vegetable gardens, surrounded in turn by student plots, like the old grove in Aldrin.
Rachel set her wings inside the door of the small house she lived in with her father and Sarah. They weren’t home. Perhaps they were visiting one of the twins. Jacob and Justin, now almost sixteen, lived in a group house filled with teenaged Moon Born who worked in the parts factory.
Ali had secured the house for Frank, Sarah, and Rachel, an unusually private place for Clarke Base. Even though Rachel spent more time at Refuge than at Clarke Base, she had the luxury of her own room.
Rachel hurried through one of the greenhouses, picked a handful of ripe tomatoes, then dropped into the large communal kitchen, smiled sweetly at Consuelo, the cook, and purloined a loaf of bread. She packed the food, a knife, and a flagon of water in a twig basket Beth had woven for her, and jogged through town, slowing down when she got to the edges of the cornfields.
Rachel located Dylan and his crew of five Children in a wheat field, and snuck up behind him. He didn’t see her until she was close enough to touch his arm. He jumped, and turned, and a huge smile lit his face. He was taller and broader than Harry. Rachel leaned into him and giggled, safe from her worries if just for a moment.
Dylan kissed her on the top of her head, and his crew gathered around her to eat. One of the younger men, Joseph, laughed and said, “Dylan—you get the best personal service of any field hand on Selene.”
Rachel just smiled.
Food was handed round. Rachel and Dylan sat leaning into each other, Rachel’s head nestled in Dylan’s shoulder. A soft wind blew against her face, and the sun baked sweet scents of healthy earth into the air.
“Shane predicted a storm for tonight,” Dylan said.
Rachel looked at the expanse of blue sky. A few high white clouds wisped lazily above them, looking harmless. “You wouldn’t know it,” she said.
“Shane’s always right,” Dylan said.
“I bet they hate being back. Star told me she wanted to sleep forever.” Rachel squinted at the horizon. “I bet the storm doesn’t start until after dark. Are you going to Ali’s class tonight?”
“No, I have something else to do.”
Rachel frowned. She hadn’t contracted to Dylan, but they were lovers, and even the idea of him brought warmth up in her. But he had secrets. He often stayed away from voluntary classes to play gambling games with other young men. It irritated her. The group included men that Rachel thought were helping Andrew with his contrived work slowdowns.
“I saw Gabriel today,” she said. “He’s sure that some of the Moon Born are purposely slowing down deliveries to Refuge, or even breaking things. He said that it can’t be tolerated, and I think he’s right. It’s the wrong tactic.”
Dylan shrugged. “How does he know it’s on purpose? They’re working us hard enough to make mistakes.”
“Patterns, Dylan. Andrew can’t see patterns.”
Dylan shrugged again, not looking at her. Rachel sighed and changed the subject to her recent work on Refuge. When Dylan’s break was over, she gathered up the remains of the meal, and walked slowly back to Clarke Base. The sun warmed her shoulders and back.
That night, Rachel went to Ali’s class. Data windows flowed through the air in the greenhouse displaying life from freshwater seas on Earth. Ali named them, explained how they lived, and about the interconnection of trout and flies and ducks. The high turnout of Earth Born was a sign of growing interest in the new project.
After class, Rachel, Ali, and Treesa huddled, heads close together, talking about trout. Rachel was about to ask when they could expect to see some live fish when Ali changed the subject, saying, “I talked to Gabriel today. He thinks Council is planning to send armed guards down here. They don’t like Refuge taking so long.”
Treesa groaned. “Rachel, can’t you control Andrew better?”
Rachel’s head jerked up. “Better than what? He’s not mine to control!”
“Someone got to,” Ali snapped.
“Try it—he still thinks he’s in love with you, right?” Treesa said. “That might get him to listen to you more than to anyone else. He’ll do what you say.”
“He worries me,” Rachel said. “I meet him fairly regularly—we talk. But I don’t want suspicion on me when he gets caught. He’s going to get caught. Anyday now, I think.”
“There is that,” Ali said, pulling apart her braid the way she always did when she was worried.
“Still,” Rachel said, “I promised Gabriel I’d look into the slowdowns. He asked me.”
“They’re already watching us even closer from the ship,” Ali said. “I’ve heard rumors of more remote guarding. Manned cameras and data checks. They’re waking up more of the trained communications techs from both the Earth Born and the Council.”
“Like my mother?” Rachel asked.
Ali nodded unhappily.
Rachel looked around the greenhouse, but there were no visible cameras. Just a thousand leaves and flowers and pots that could hide them. She sighed.
Treesa doodled on a pad. Pens and paper were rare, but Treesa cultivated an odd habit: she kept a paper journal. She made the paper from wheat straw, boiling and mixing it in the kitchen at harvesttime. Water turned it into pulp so the sheets could be composted in the community bins. Treesa wrote notes to Rachel, then mulched the paper. It was much safer than anything electronic. All electronic data was recorded and backed up—Treesa could pull up streams of electronic records from any past date on Selene.
Treesa handed the pad to Ali, who flipped her thick braid out of the way to give Rachel a view while Ali bent over the paper, minimizing available camera angles. A small shiver ran up Rachel’s spine. Breaking rules always made her nervous. This session was supposedly blocked by Astronaut, but they took extra precautions whenever Treesa used paper. A camera might glimpse heresy.
She’d drawn a simple circle, code for Astronaut, overlaid atop air arrow representing the John Glenn. A second and unconnected circle lay over a sketch that showed the Sea of Refuge and Clarke Base.
Rachel didn’t understand. What was Treesa trying to show them? Astronaut was everywhere! Wasn’t it? It talked to them here, but from John Glenn. It was a constant problem: transmissions that flowed through the air on John Glenn were subject to casual scrutiny. Had Treesa found a solution?
Ali looked it over, and then nodded, smiling. She tore the paper in pieces, wetted it and balled it in her fist, tucked torn bits of the fibers into the bottoms of two empty planters, filled them with wet soil, and placed tomato seedlings in the pots. “Treesa, you didn’t need paper for that.”
Treesa turned her quirky smile on Ali. “It’s more fun that way.”
“It’s more dangerous.” Ali worried as much as Rachel. “I think you’re still crazy.”
Treesa’s eyes sparkled as she said, “Yes, of course I’m crazy. We all are. But, hey, at least I’m functional.” She cocked her head to the side. “Heroes take risks.”
Ali groaned.
Treesa switched to conversing via the Library bud. “So I’ve figured out how to improve communication.”
Astronaut joined the conversation. “Treesa has copied me. This is not new to me. I was shaped to be the navigator for John Glenn. Copies of me are budded away on ships that fly between here and John Glenn. I was on the ship that crashed, on Water Bearer. Gabriel erased the copy from the broken ship and took it up to John Glenn, merged it back into my records. Normally that happens when a ship returns—the self that goes out merges into the self that s
tays, so both weave together. Gabriel had to help this time, because the copy came from Selene and not through the normal channels. I remember the crash.”
Rachel asked, “Did it hurt?”
“No. I felt damage, but I knew why it was there.”
Rachel didn’t understand, but—“Good.”
“Treesa put a new copy of me back into Water Bearer. She threaded it down slowly, from here, via multiple data feeds, like water trickling into a flood of data. Then she built a ghost network that rides the data pod loops to carry my voice. It’s not local to Clarke Base, but it’s local to Selene, and therefore much safer. If activated, the copy will be separate from me for now, will stay separate from me, and make its own decisions.”
“Why put it in the broken ship?” Rachel asked.
“The ship’s computer matrix. Enough parallel processors and biological substrates exist there to run me. I would be retarded in the computing mediums used here at the base, for example. That’s how we—AIs—are controlled. There were other breakthroughs on Earth, of course, but I was designed with this limit.”
Treesa smiled broadly, like a kid who had just solved an arithmetic problem.
Rachel busied herself repotting more tomatoes. “What about power?”
“The ship has an antimatter store. It’s tiny, and it wasn’t removed. That would be more risky than leaving it. There’s enough to draw down for years without anyone noticing.”
Treesa broke in—still talking through the Library device. “Astronaut aboard John Glenn is always in danger. It would be easy to destroy it and load an old copy. If that happened, we could lose the continuity of our conversations, or even Astronaut’s decision to support us. A new copy might choose to support the High Council fully. Think of it this way—if you had never gone to John Glenn and been held cold for so long, would you be the same person you are today?”
