by Arthur C.
Several minutes later she announced "It's coming" and the three women pressed against the right side of the vehicle. In the far distance another tube approached on the opposite side of the track. Within instants it was upon them and the humans had no more than a second to stare across at the occupants of the vehicle heading for the Engineering Module.
"Wow!" said Katie as the tube rushed past.
"There were two different types," said Simone.
"Eight or ten creatures altogether."
"One set was pink, the other gold. Both mostly spherical."
"And those long stringy tentacles, like gossamer. How big would you guess they were, Mother?"
"Five, maybe six meters in diameter," Nicole said. "Much bigger than we are."
"Wow!" said Katie again. "That was really something." There was excitement in her eyes. The girl loved the feeling of adrenaline rushing through her system.
I too have never stopped being amazed, Nicole thought. Not once during these thirteen months. But is this all there is? Were we brought all the way here from Earth just to be tested? And titillated by the existence of creatures from other worlds? Or is there some other, deeper purpose?
There was a momentary silence in the speeding vehicle. Nicole, who was sitting in the middle, drew her daughters closer to her. "You know I love you, don't you?" she said.
"Yes, Mother," Simone replied. "And we love you too."
2
The reunion party was a success. Benjy embraced his beloved Simone the moment she walked into the apartment. Katie had Patrick pinned to the floor no more than a minute later.
"See," she said, "I can still beat you."
"But not by much," Patrick replied. "I'm getting stronger. You'd better watch out."
Nicole hugged both Richard and Michael before little Ellie ran over and leapt into her arms. It was evening, two hours after dinner on the twenty-four-hour clock used by the family, and Ellie had been almost ready for bed when her mother and sisters had arrived. The little girl walked down the hall to her room after proudly showing Nicole that she could now read cat, dog, and boy.
The adults let Patrick stay awake until he was exhausted. Michael carried him to bed and Nicole tucked him in. "I'm glad you're back, Mommy," he said. "I missed you very much."
"And I missed you too," Nicole answered. "I don't think I'll be going away for so long again."
"I hope not," the six-year-old said. "I like having you here."
Everyone but Nicole was asleep by one o'clock in the morning. Nicole was not tired. After all, she had just finished sleeping for five weeks. After lying restlessly beside Richard in bed for thirty minutes, she decided to take a walk.
Although their apartment itself had no windows, the small atrium just off the entrance hall had an exterior window that offered a breathtaking view of the other two vertices of the Node. Nicole walked into the atrium, put on her space suit, and stood in front of the outer door. It did not open. She smiled to herself. Maybe Katie's right. Maybe we are just prisoners here. It had been clear very early in their stay that the outside door was locked intermittently; the Eagle had explained that it was "necessary" to keep them from seeing things they "couldn't understand."
Nicole gazed out the window. At that moment a shuttle vehicle, similar in shape to the one that had brought them to the Node thirteen months before, was approaching the Habitation Module transportation center. What land of wonderful creatures do you contain? Nicole thought. And are they as astounded as we were when we first arrived?
Nicole would never forget those first views of the Node. All of the family had thought, after they had left the way station, that they would reach their next destination within several hours. They had been wrong. Their separation from the illuminated Rama craft had grown slowly until after six hours they could no longer see Rama at all on their left. The lights of the way station behind them were becoming faint. They were all tired. Eventually the entire family had fallen asleep.
It had been Katie who had awakened them. "I see where we're going," she had shouted triumphantly, her excitement unrestrained. She had pointed out the front shuttle window, a little to the right, where one strong and growing light was dividing itself into three. For the next four hours the image of the Node grew and grew. From that distance it had been an awesome sight, an equilateral triangle with three glowing, transparent spheres at its vertices. And what a scale! Even their experience with Rama had not prepared them for the majesty of this incredible engineering creation. Each of the three sides, actually long transportation corridors connecting the three spherical modules, was over a hundred and fifty kilometers in length. The spheres at each vertex were twenty-five kilometers in diameter. Even from a great distance the humans could discern activity on many of the separate levels inside the modules.
"What is going to happen now?" Patrick had anxiously asked Nicole as the shuttle had altered its path and started heading toward one of the vertices of the triangle.
Nicole had picked Patrick up and held him in her arms. "I don't know, darling," she had said softly to her son. "We have to wait and see."
Benjy had been completely awestruck. He had stared for hours at the great illuminated triangle in space. Simone had often stood beside him, holding his hand. While the shuttle was making its final approach to one of the spheres, she had felt his muscles tense. "Don't worry, Benjy," Simone had said reassuringly, "everything will be all right."
Their shuttle had entered a narrow corridor cut into the sphere and then docked in a berth at the edge of the transportation center. The family had cautiously left the craft, carrying with them their bags and Richard's computer. Then the shuttle had immediately departed, unnerving even the adults by its swift disappearance. Less than a minute later they heard the first disembodied voice.
"Welcome," it had said in an unmodulated tone. "You have arrived at the Habitation Module. Proceed straight ahead and stand in front of the gray wall."
"Where is that voice coming from?" Katie had asked. Her voice contained the fright they all were feeling.
"Everywhere," Richard had answered. "It's above us, around us, even below us." They all scanned the walls and ceiling.
"But how does it know English?" Simone had inquired. "Are there other people here?"
Richard laughed nervously. "Unlikely," he replied.
"Probably this place has been in contact with Rama in some way and has a master language algorithm. I wonder—"
"Please move forward," the voice had interrupted. "You are in a transportation complex. The vehicle that will take you to your section of the module is waiting on a lower level."
It had taken them several minutes to reach the gray wail. The children had never been in unconfined weightlessness before. Katie and Patrick jumped off the platform and did flips and rolls in the air. Benjy, watching their fun, tried to copy their antics. Unfortunately, he was not able to figure out how to use the ceiling and walls to return to the platform. He was completely disoriented by the time Simone rescued him.
When the entire family and its baggage were properly positioned in front of the wall, a wide door opened and they entered a small room. Special tight-fitting suits, helmets, and slippers were neatly arranged on a bench. "The transportation center and most of the common areas here at the Node," the voice said in its absolute monotone, "do not have an atmosphere that is suitable for your species. You will need to wear this clothing unless you are inside your apartment."
When they were all dressed, a door on the opposite side of the room opened and they entered the main hall of the Habitation Module transportation center. The station was identical to the one they would later encounter at the Engineering Module. Nicole and her family descended two levels, as directed by the voice, and then proceeded around the circular periphery to where their "bus" was waiting. The closed vehicle was comfortable and well lit, but they were unable to see out during the hour and a half that it traveled through a maze of passageways. At length the bus halted and it
s top lifted off.
"Take the hall to your left," another, similar voice had directed as soon as all eight of them were standing on the metallic floor. "The hall splits into two pathways after four hundred meters. Take the path to your right and stop in front of the third square marker on the left. That is the door to your apartment."
Patrick had sprinted off down one of the halls. "That is the wrong hall," the voice had announced without inflection. "Return to the dock and take the next hall on your left."
There was nothing for them to see on the walk from the dock to their apartment. In the succeeding months, they would make the walk many times, either going to the exercise room or, occasionally, for tests over in the Engineering Module, and they would still never see anything except walls and ceilings and the square markers they would come to recognize as doors. The place was obviously carefully monitored. Nicole and Richard both felt certain, from the very beginning, that some, perhaps many, of the apartments in their area were occupied by someone or something, but they never ever saw any of the Others in the corridors.
After finding and entering the specified door to their apartment, Nicole and her family removed their special clothing in the atrium and stored it in the cabinets created for that purpose. The children took turns looking out the window at the other two spherical modules while they waited for the inner door to open. A few minutes later they saw the interior of their new home for the very first time.
They were all overwhelmed. Compared to the relatively primitive conditions in which they had been living in Rama, the family's apartment at the Node was paradise. Each of the children had his or her own room. Michael had a suite for himself at one end of the unit; Richard and Nicole's master bedroom, complete even with a king-sized bed, was at the opposite end of the apartment, just off the entrance hall. There were four bathrooms altogether, plus a kitchen, a dining room, and even a playroom for the children. The furniture in each room was surprisingly appropriate and tastefully designed. The apartment contained over four hundred square meters of living space.
Even the adults were stunned. "How in the world could they have done this?" Nicole had asked Richard that first night, out of earshot of the overjoyed children.
Richard had cast a bewildered glance around them. "I can only surmise," he had replied, "that somehow all our actions in Rama were monitored and telemetered here to the Node. They must also have had access to our data bases and extracted the way we live from that set of information." Richard grinned. "And of course, even way out here, if they have sensitive receivers, they could be picking up television signals from Earth. Isn't it embarrassing to think that we are represented by such—"
"Welcome," another identical voice had interrupted Richard's thought. Again the sound seemed to be coming from all directions. "We hope everything in your apartment is satisfactory. If it is not, please tell us. We cannot possibly respond to everything that all of you say at all times. Therefore, a simple communication regimen has been established. On your kitchen counter is a white button. We will assume that everything said by an individual after pushing the white button is directed at us. When you are finished with your communication, push the white button again. In that way—"
"I have one question first," Katie had then interrupted. She had run into the kitchen to push the button. "Just who are you, anyway?"
A tiny delay of maybe one second had preceded the answer. "We are the collective intelligence that governs the Node. We are here to assist you, to make you more comfortable, and to supply you with the essentials for living. We will also, from time to time, ask you to perform certain tasks that will help us to understand you better…"
Nicole could no longer see the shuttle she had been watching out the window. Actually, she had been so deeply immersed in her memory of their arrival at the Node that she had temporarily forgotten the newcomers. Now, as she returned to the present, in her mind's eye she imagined an assemblage of strange creatures disembarking on a platform and being startled upon hearing a voice address them in their native language. The experience of wonder must be universal, she thought. Belonging to all conscious chemicals.
Her eyes lifted from the near field and focused on the Administration Module in the distance. What goes on over there? Nicole wondered. We hapless creatures move back and forth between Habitation and Engineering. All our activities appear to be logically orchestrated. But by whom? And for what? Why has someone brought all these beings to this artificial world?
Nicole had no answer to these infinite questions. As usual, they gave her a powerful sense of her own insignificance. Her immediate impulse was to go back inside and hug one of her children. She laughed at herself. Both pictures are true indications of our position in the cosmos, she thought. We are both desperately important to our children and absolutely nothing in the grand scheme of things. It takes enormous wisdom to see that there is no inconsistency in those two points of view.
3
Breakfast was a celebration. They ordered a feast from the exceptional cooks who prepared their food. The designers of their apartment had considerately provided them with a variety of ovens and a full refrigerator, in case they wanted to prepare their own meals from the raw materials. However, the alien (or robot) cooks were so good, and so quickly trained, that Nicole and her family almost never prepared the meals themselves—they just pushed the white button and ordered.
"I want pancakes this morning," Katie announced in the kitchen.
"Me too, me too," her sidekick Patrick added.
"What kind of pancakes?" the voice intoned. "We have four different types in our memory. There is buckwheat, buttermilk—"
"Buttermilk," interrupted Katie. "Three altogether," She glanced at her little brother. "Better make it four."
"With butter and maple syrup," Patrick shouted.
"Four pancakes with butter and maple syrup," said the voice. "Will that be all?"
"One apple juice and one orange juice as well," Katie said after a brief consultation with Patrick.
"Six minutes and eighteen seconds," the voice said.
When the food was ready, the family gathered at the round table in the kitchen. The youngest children explained to Nicole what they had been doing during her absence. Patrick was especially proud of his new personal record in the fifty-meter dash over in the exercise room. Benjy laboriously counted to ten and everyone applauded. They had just finished breakfast and were cleaning the dishes off the table when the doorbell rang.
The adults looked at each other and Richard walked over to the control console, where he turned on the video monitor. The Eagle was standing outside their door.
"I hope it's not another test," said Patrick spontaneously.
"No … no, I doubt it," Nicole replied, moving toward the entryway. "He's probably here to give us the results of the last experiments."
Nicole took a deep breath before she opened the door. No matter how many times she encountered the Eagle, her adrenaline level always increased in his presence. Why was that? Was it his awesome knowledge that frightened her? Or his power over them? Or just the bewildering fact of his existence?
The Eagle greeted her with what she had come to recognize as a smile. "May I come in?" he said pleasantly. "I would like to talk to you, your husband, and Mr. O'Toole."
Nicole stared at him (or it, her mind instantly flashed), as she always did. He was tall, maybe two and a quarter meters, and- shaped like a human being from the neck down. His arms and torso, however, were covered with small, tightly woven charcoal gray feathers—except for the four fingers on each hand, which were creamy white and featherless, Below his waist, the surface of the Eagle's body was flesh-colored, but it was obvious from the sheen of his outer layer that no attempt had been made to duplicate real human skin. There was no hair below his waist and neither visible joints nor genitalia. His feet had no toes. When the Eagle walked, wrinkles developed around the knee area, but they disappeared when he was standing still.
The Eagle's
face was mesmerizing. His head had two large, powder blue eyes on either side of a protruding grayish beak. When he talked the beak opened and his perfect English came from some kind of electronic voice box at the back of the throat. The feathers on the top of his head were white and contrasted sharply with the dark gray of his face, neck, and back. The feathering on his face was quite sparse and scattered.
"May I come in?" the Eagle repeated politely when Nicole did not move for several seconds.
"Of course … of course," she replied, moving away from the door. "I'm sorry … I just hadn't seen you for so long."
"Good morning, Mr. Wakefield, Mr. O'Toole. Hello, children," the Eagle said as he strode into the living room.
Patrick and Benjy both backed away from him. Of all the children, only Katie and little Ellie did not seem to be afraid.
"Good morning," Richard replied. "And what can we do for you today?" he inquired. The Eagle never made social calls. There was always some purpose for his visits.
"As I told your wife at the door," the Eagle replied, "I need to talk to all three of you adults. Can Simone take care of the other children while we chat for an hour or so?"
Nicole had already started herding the children back into the playroom when the Eagle stopped her. "That won't be necessary," he said. "They can use the whole apartment. The four of us are going to the conference room across the hall."
Uh-oh, Nicole thought immediately. This is something big. We've never left the children alone in the apartment before.
She was suddenly very concerned about their safety. "Excuse me, Mr. Eagle," she said. "Will the children be all right here? I mean, they're not going to have any special visitors or anything like that…"
"No, Mrs. Wakefield," the Eagle responded matter-of-factly. "I give you my word that nothing will interfere with your children."
